House Show/TV tapings random happenings

[The Reverend]

50 minutes ago, air_raid said:

I'd be tempted but not sure it would be worth it since its a bit of a niche interest within a niche interest and I imagine it costs a bit to get a book published. And I haven't really got the time to do it properly - I scribble these down in bits and pieces on iphone Notes whenever I have two minutes free at a time.

@air_raid- sent you a PM. 

[NavigatorFan]

I absolutely love reading these, especially as they are month by month as I struggle reading for too long off of a screen. I would be all over a book though. 

Keep up the good work 👍

[air_raid]

April 1992

Half the month is a massive European tour so I'm going to cover that separately.

Macho Man Randy Savage, as new WWF Champion, is of course beating Ric Flair in rematches dark at Toledo and Kalamazoo TVs via intercepted brass knucks. Flair and Mr Perfect argue afterwards, that’s going nowhere though for now. They do various DQ finishes in St Louis (4000), at the Rosemont (3600) and in Portland ME (2500) and at Niagara Falls and Syracuse TVs, but 30th in Vegas (<2500) there’s a nice clean pinfall. Domestic business is worrying.

The returned Ultimate Warrior is of course the other main event. His short-lived run with Sid Justice takes place in Baltimore (3000) and at Boston Garden (3500) with two Dusty finishes before Sid walks out ; in Rochester, New Haven and dark at TVs Warrior wrestles Papa Shango in matches that go twice as long as with Sid. Thankfully Warriors loop has good support from the fresh Bret Hart vs Shawn Michaels run for the Intercontinental title and Legion of Doom crushing the Beverly Brothers.

Cards are getting cancelled due to poor advances. The numbers don’t lie ; the WWF without Hogan is not the same product. Even shows without Hogan main eventing drew better before he left because more people were watching the TV. European business is incredible considering they can sell out 10,000 seat buildings two nights in a row with two rosters, it’s no wonder they’ll milk that cash cow for all it’s worth with another tour later in the year, plus SummerSlam.

Feuds…
New Intercontinental Champ the Hitman is defending vs Shawn Michaels. I’m all about the different finishes here ; at early months TVs and in Syracuse they’re using the HBK count-out finish, with Syracuse being the one that made it to more than one Coliseum release. Overseas, it’s Bret by count-out as Shawn pushes him in just before the 10 but misses himself. On the domestic houses and in Niagara Falls, it’s Hart by schoolboy after Shawn collides with Sherri which I’m sure will also be a Coliseum finish at a later date.

Sids departure causes a shuffle. Undertakers supposed to work Papa Shango but he gets switched to Warrior so Taker inherits Berzerker. Davey Boy Smith is just starting a run with Repo Man when he gets hurt and will be out 5-6 weeks ; Hacksaw Duggan picks up for him. Texas Tornado has returned and picks up a win against Skinner in St Louis but isn’t making all his dates - Kerry is a troubled man by now. Money Inc are losing their defences to the Natural Disasters by count-out, LOD are splattering the Beverly Brothers, they haven’t settled yet on Koko full time so Owen Hart & Jim Powers are doing jobs for the Nasty Boys. El Matador is back in his natural spot, doing jobs for The Model. It’s otherwise Sgt Slaughter vs The Mountie!, Tatanka vs Col Mustafa and Crush vs Kato which all work out well for the goodies. Virgil was going to be losing to Berzerker but instead picks up welcome wins from Skinner.

Only a couple of subs/one offs ; Right before the shuffle Taker and Virgil swap opponents one night at the Rosemont - good for Taker as he’ll end up working Berzerker anyway, Virg gives a rare win this month to Papa Shango. Great bit of happenstance for Jim Brunzell - 30th in Vegas he’s in for KVE but Kerry’s original opponent (Skinner) has been shuffled, so Jim gets a win over Bob Bradley! Bradley also jobs for Chris Walker this month.

As for Europe :

On Macho Mans side of the tour, he's successfully defending the belt against The Mountie! in Milan, Brighton, at Wembley Arena (1st night), Frankfurt, Dortmund, Birmingham (1st night) and Glasgow (2nd night), exceptions are in Munich and Sheffield for TV where he's pinning Shawn Michaels.

The Undertaker vs Sid Justice is the main event of the other roster, wrestling usually to a double count-out in Rotterdam, Brussels, Kiel, Wembley (2nd night), Belfast, Dublin, Glasgow (1st night), Birmingham (2nd night) and Sheffield Sid wins by count-out when parts of the rosters combine.

Bret Hart is defending the Intercontinental title on Savage's crew in count-out wins over Shawn except in Munich its the allegedly retired Dino Bravo, in Sheffield its The Model, which you know if you bought the UK Rampage tape. LOD wrestle the Nasty Boys every night except in Munich its a six man with British Bulldog and Mountie added, in Sheffield they work Col Mustafa & Bravo. Seriously.

Davey Boy has an excellent series of pinfall wins over Ric Flair up until Munich where he also wins a battle royal, thereafter he moves to the Sid/Taker crew along with Repo Man who's his opponent as Flair's been sent on the SWS run, and thats every night until IRS in Sheffield. Hacksaw Duggan works Dino on Randys cards up until Munich were he beats Mustafa then thereafter loses to Papa Shango every night until Sheffield, then its Repo for him. El Matador beats Repo Man every night, drops one pin to Shango in Munich, then is saddled with Bravo for the rest of the tour. Everywhere but Munich and Sheffield, Sgt Slaughter is beating Mustafa. In Munich he loses to Repo.

Tatanka vs Skinner and Mountie vs Virgil complete Sheffield, its Money Inc vs Bushwhackers, Owen Hart vs Skinner, Big Boss Man vs Berzerker, Texas Tornado vs The Model and Tatanka vs Kato elsewhere on the tour.

Departure - a series of jobs to Virgil in Europe are the last paydays for the Warlord.

TV notables ; In Syracuse they film the angle where Nailz attacks Big Boss Man, writing him off until July, but based on his inactivity on the road for near two months, I think Ray was actually hurt already. Crush films his TV debut against Kato, but there’s still no Cranium Crunch. Happy days : Kamala is back!! Owen & Koko film squashes early month in non-matching attire, referred to as High Energy on comms added on but not by Fink on the night. By month end they’ve got the matching clobber. They film a load of Pipers Pit segments but none of them make air. No idea if this is because they were intended as just treats for the live crowds or because they sucked.

Final editorial - as good as Brunzell and Powers both look when they’re used (Powers does get the occasional TV win, still) it’s a crying shame the tag team division has degraded from the point there’s always about 8 decent teams contesting stories in the late 80s, to 4/5 maximum in 1992, because they’d have done great together. Or earlier still, I’d have been very interested to see Killer Stallions vs Power & Glory.

 

Munich here if interested 

 

Edited July 3, 2022 by air_raid

[BomberPat]

World of Sporters Alan Kilby and Danny Boy Collins got a dark match on that Sheffield show - it may well be that there were plenty more examples that have been lost to time (or at least, to Cagematch), but it looks like the only show on that tour where the local lads got a call.

[Magnum Milano]

Just now, BomberPat said:

World of Sporters Alan Kilby and Danny Boy Collins got a dark match on that Sheffield show - it may well be that there were plenty more examples that have been lost to time (or at least, to Cagematch), but it looks like the only show on that tour where the local lads got a call.

Definitely no British lads on the Birmingham show the night before. The Sheffield show aired on Sky, so probably just a case of a "dark match" to check levels and everything before they went live.

[JNLister]

3 hours ago, Magnum Milano said:

Definitely no British lads on the Birmingham show the night before. The Sheffield show aired on Sky, so probably just a case of a "dark match" to check levels and everything before they went live.

The UK presence in 89 and 91 was because they brought the US guys over on a visa for running a sports tournament. Part of the rules was that to make it fair, you had to let British people in the "tournament". Later on the Home Office changed the rules and said wrestlers could come under an entertainment visa, which is when they stopped using the British guys regularly.

Not sure exactly when the change was. Regal-Maxine at Battle Royal at the Albert Hall was a tryout for Regal, though they may have also been using that and Collins-Kilby as a way to have a dark match for production purposes rather than for visa reasons.

[Loki]

Surprised the WWE never signed Del Wilkes up full-time, what little I've seen of The Patriot he looked like their kind of wrestler.

[Loki]

Fell asleep reading this thread, and then had a dream about how @air_raidand I were writing this book about the WWE house shows but the details didn't line up with what you see in Young Rock and we kept getting hassled by Macho Man and André.

[gmoney]

19 hours ago, air_raid said:

April 1992

Davey Boy Smith is just starting a run with Repo Man when he gets hurt and will be out 5-6 weeks ;

 

Always worth posting this. 

[BomberPat]

16 hours ago, JNLister said:

The UK presence in 89 and 91 was because they brought the US guys over on a visa for running a sports tournament. Part of the rules was that to make it fair, you had to let British people in the "tournament". Later on the Home Office changed the rules and said wrestlers could come under an entertainment visa, which is when they stopped using the British guys regularly.

This is excellent knowledge, thank you!

It's like how BBC radio used to require a certain percentage of any musical act to be British to get live performances aired, so you ended up with American bands working with British session musicians or big incongruous string sections to hit the quota. John Peel allegedly got around it with Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band by convincing his bosses that they were a magic and variety act rather than a band, so didn't fall under the same rules.

[Vamp]

Don't the French still have rules about what percentage of music on the radio has to be sung in French? 

 

[air_raid]

On 5/27/2022 at 9:55 AM, Loki said:

Fell asleep reading this thread, and then had a dream about how @air_raidand I were writing this book about the WWE house shows but the details didn't line up with what you see in Young Rock and we kept getting hassled by Macho Man and André.

Wouldn’t be the first time I’ve been harassed by someone from the business about factual inaccuracies. Of a sort.

[SpykeDudlei1]

18 hours ago, air_raid said:

Wouldn’t be the first time I’ve been harassed by someone from the business about factual inaccuracies. Of a sort.

[TildeGuy~!]

When often on Instagram, Random videos of Roman Reigns will pop up from house shows having a back and forth with children throughout a match, he’s really great. 

[Keith Houchen]

11 minutes ago, TildeGuy~! said:

having a back and forth with children

He’s AEW bound now!!