93 WWF UK tour & a portion of prawn crackers

[Kaz Hayashi]

It's been years, hello.

I love 93 to 96 WWF. I don't care how shit it was, it was was mint.

No matter how insanely stupid, or how horrendous and deranged it may have been, those 3 years are still my go to on the network. I can't get enough of that time frame, It's an addiction.

I wanted to quickly share a random anecdote of my love for 93. It's on the back of listening to the most recent SCG uploads regarding that time frame, and I sent a similar anecdote to @Liam O'Rourke as it really strengthened the following memory.

I was treated to my first ever WWF event on December 4th, at Whitly Bay Ice Rink (North East, near Newcastle). It was a couple of weeks after my 9 birthday, and my Dad took both me and my younger brother.

The card was a mix of amazing to complete arse, and I've given each match a star rating, because Dave couldn't be arsed for some reason, but i assume he'd have said something like this...

Results

1) Adam Bomb defeated Virgil (1.5 stars, should be 1/2 a star but I loved Adam Bomb and hated Virgil, squash Match, a bit shite)

2)    Tatanka defeated Diesel by countout (1.5 star, Deisel Power was only 3 months in and running on fumes at this point. Titanka kicked his arse all tour, however, Diesel went on a winning streak after this, until he fought & lost to Titanka in Feb, and then Deisel went another big win streak and got his own back again the daft Native American in april 94).

3) Smoking Gunns (Billy Gunn and Bart Gunn) defeated The Red Knight and The Black Knight (1/2 star, fuck off)

4) 1-2-3 Kid defeated Rick Martel (3.75 star, really good match, Kid with his high flying antics, crowd loved him, Martel with his technical prowess and got under criwds skin, spot on).

5) WWF Intercontinental Title Match

Razor Ramon (c) defeated Irwin R. Schyster (2.5 star, crowd were ravenous for Razor and hated IRRRRWIIIIN, which was chanted through this chin lock fest. Razor did his best, but the taxman was very sweaty and performed exactly how you'd expect).

6) Randy Savage defeated Shawn Michaels (4 stars, absolutely incredible. Both were on truly top form, Savage was stupidly over and HBK got heel boos of the night. Shawn went to the guard rails and chased a kid who was honking a horn, took it off him and stamped on it in the ring, which lead to 1000 more horns going fucking mental for the remainder. Shawn went for another horn, but Savage chased him and stopped him destroying more irritating noise vessels, yeah cheers Randy. Lots of top rope to outside axe handles, lots of reversals, back and fourth spots, both were truly brilliant, and deserved a full programme in my opinion).

7) WWF World Heavyweight Title Match

The Undertaker defeated Yokozuna (c) by disqualification (3 star, just for the sheer atmosphere if nothing else. The match was exactly how you'd expect, slow, ploddy, but seeing Yoko as the champ and Takers original lights out entrance, the spectacle was better than the match, but it was fine after having HBK vs Savage and was a great go home vibe).

Notes:

1)1On the way in to the venue, a group were handing out dirtsheets titled "wrestling news". Now, I didn't know what a dirtsheet was, but I ababsolutely wanted one. I also decided I wanted to mimick these cool as fuck wrestling news wizard dorks, so took the sheet home, photocopied 50 sheets of it on my dads fax machine, took them to school and handed them out to my class mates. The teacher confiscated a sheet, and called my dad due to the nature of the content, which covered the Sid/Arn scissor stabbing. Pic of it below, had it for 31 years.

2) before the first match, an announcement came over the tannoy from Fink, apologising (in finks voice) that "Unfortunately, Bret Hart was not able to make the trip, and is back home in Canada, nursing a baaaad cooold, we all wish him a speedy recovery". no mention of which match Bret was due to wrestle in, but one of the cool adult wizard dorks was stood next to my dad and said "Bret was due to wrestle Yoko or Shawn". To which my dad pretended to be interested but gave no fucks. My dad gave no shits about wrestling but popped big for Paul Bearer and did impressions of him for the next 20 years, and joined in with the IIIRRRRWWIIINNN chants. Security confiscated his camera early in to the event, but I got 1 pic of 123 kid battering Martel. I picked up an event program and dome hitman shades, still have both.

3) on way home, my dad decided to pop in to his favourite Chinese takeaway, the good old Red Double Happiness. The owner Ken had a great exchange with my dad in his broken English...

Ken: "Hello Fox family, where you been?"

Dad: "I've just taken the lads to see the American wrestling Ken"

Ken: "HULK HOGAN"

Dad: "He wasn't there"

Ken: "How much for wrestling?"

Dad: "Well with the tickets, sunglasses and program it's come to £100"

Ken: "100 POUNDS... YOU THICK IN HEAD? NO HULK HOGAN???"

and he gave us an extra free bag of prawn crackers because he felt sorry for us.

So there you go, the above is why 1993 WWF is the best and nobody can argue otherwise. 

To make this somewhat worth posting, did any of you go to the 93 UK tour?

[HarmonicGenerator]

Welcome back @Kaz Hayashi! Brilliant post.

[air_raid]

Superb, what I neglect to mention whenever I mention my trip to Telford in March 94 is that I picked up the most recent version of the exact same Wrestling News - it'll still be in my mum's loft somewhere.

@Kaz Hayashi Would you mind if I copied your post into the December '93 post for House Show Happenings? I love personal reports, even when they aren't mine!

https://ukff.com/topic/142250-house-showtv-tapings-random-happenings/?do=findComment&comment=3462416

Bret definitely wasnt at home with a cold, he was wrestling Double J in Hawaii.

Edited May 13 by air_raid
shaka brah

[Keith Houchen]

KAZ!!!

[Kaz Hayashi]

9 minutes ago, air_raid said:

Superb, what I neglect to mention whenever I mention my trip to Telford in March 94 is that I picked up the most recent version of the exact same Wrestling News - it'll still be in my mum's loft somewhere.

@Kaz Hayashi Would you mind if I copied your post into the December '93 post for House Show Happenings? I love personal reports, even when they aren't mine!

https://ukff.com/topic/142250-house-showtv-tapings-random-happenings/?do=findComment&comment=3462416

 

Yeah of course mate 

[simonworden]

Wonderful write up of a memory from a long time ago. Really enjoy reading things like this (and your house show happenings AirRaid).

[Chili]

Hello Kaz good to hear from you.

[Merzbow]

2 hours ago, Kaz Hayashi said:

We need some more Sids in here!

[Abe_Knuckleball_Schwartz]

Great post, I am guessing Barry Horowitz was the Red Knight

[air_raid]

6 minutes ago, Abe_Knuckleball_Schwartz said:

Great post, I am guessing Barry Horowitz was the Red Knight

Give the man a goldfish.

[AshC]

Went to the Cardiff leg, my first WWF show.  Sat in the balcony.  Same card but in a different order, we had Kid vs Martel as the opener and it was ace. A photo of it made the next day's Western Mail/South Wales Echo and I still have the cutting, along with a copy of that same issue of 'Wrestling News'! A little over six months later and I saw Hogan on the front of Issue 2 of Power Slam and that was my forage into the behind-the-scenes aspect of the business properly underway. But will always have a place in my heart for that December 93 dirtsheet. Onita in the Rumble would've been a trip, haha! Thanks for posting this.

[Kaz Hayashi]

6 minutes ago, AshC said:

Went to the Cardiff leg, my first WWF show.  Sat in the balcony.  Same card but in a different order, we had Kid vs Martel as the opener and it was ace. A photo of it made the next day's Western Mail/South Wales Echo and I still have the cutting, along with a copy of that same issue of 'Wrestling News'! A little over six months later and I saw Hogan on the front of Issue 2 of Power Slam and that was my forage into the behind-the-scenes aspect of the business properly underway. But will always have a place in my heart for that December 93 dirtsheet. Onita in the Rumble would've been a trip, haha! Thanks for posting this.

You're the only other person I've interacted with in recent years who remembers the dirt sheet (other than the kids who saw me get in to bother at school). Yeah, it's a weirdly special item.

[AshC]

I believe it's comfortably nestled in my big, glossy programme with Undertaker on the cover!

I remember being a bit stressed that night that Crush would show up and attack Randy Savage.

Razor came out in Savage's match to fuck with Shawn, but, for a second, I thought it was Crush.

I should add that I was a big Kona Crush fan, so the turn angle must have affected me, haha!

 

[wandshogun09]

I saw exactly the same card with the exact same results at the NEC in Birmingham in early Dec 93 as well. I’d have been 8 years old at the time. 

You’ve got a much more detailed memory of the actual matches than me and reading your post brings back a lot of memories. Shame really that I got to see Randy Savage vs Shawn Michaels in the flesh and I barely remember any of it. Only thing I recall being different on the Brum show was the order of the matches. I know Kid vs Model was the opener at the NEC. The rest is a bit of a blur. I do remember Fink announcing that Mr Perfect was unable to make the card due to illness or travel issues or something. He was gonna wrestle Diesel so Tatanka stepped in as replacement. I never did get to see Perfect wrestle. Shite. 

[Kaz Hayashi]

5 hours ago, wandshogun09 said:

I saw exactly the same card with the exact same results at the NEC in Birmingham in early Dec 93 as well. I’d have been 8 years old at the time. 

You’ve got a much more detailed memory of the actual matches than me and reading your post brings back a lot of memories. Shame really that I got to see Randy Savage vs Shawn Michaels in the flesh and I barely remember any of it. Only thing I recall being different on the Brum show was the order of the matches. I know Kid vs Model was the opener at the NEC. The rest is a bit of a blur. I do remember Fink announcing that Mr Perfect was unable to make the card due to illness or travel issues or something. He was gonna wrestle Diesel so Tatanka stepped in as replacement. I never did get to see Perfect wrestle. Shite. 

That's interesting that Perfect had a sick note at your show, where it was Bret at ours. Its also bollocks because Bret wasn't I'll, he was doing house shows in USA at the same time. It would surprise me if Fink announced in another town "Unfortunately, Lex Luger, can't be with us this evening, due to a baaaad cold".