411’s Tales From The Territories Episode 10 Report: ‘Mid-South: Bullets, Blades, and Bar Fights’

-We close this season with a trip to Mid-South and then next week it’s Vice’s Vince McMahon Documentary. Let’s get to it!

-Round Table: Jim Ross, Ted Dibiase, Michael Hayes, Jake “The Snake” Roberts

-Mid-South was run by Bill Watts and encompassed Oklahoma, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Mississippi. The main thing Mid-South was known for is blood and Watts’ insistence that his wrestlers keep Kayfabe 24/7.

-JR says the territory days were like the Wild West. There was blood and guys didn’t have contracts. Hayes says there was a method to the madness as you had to protect the business. They all compare the business to the Mafia. They all joke that Watts was a sweetheart and never bullied anyone. Watts was very loyal to the business and everyone accepted his rules.

-They all agree that unless you were an idiot, you would learn the ins and outs of the business from Watts. His key was making the fans believe what was happening in the ring. Dibiase believes Watts was the first promoter to have an African American as his top babyface (JYD). JR says that Bob Geigel called Watts and told him he would kill the business with a black guy as his top star. They all agree that JYD had charisma and the fans loved him. Dibiase brings up that you either have charisma or you don’t and it can’t be taught.

-The Big Payback: It’s a Tag Match with The Freebirds against JYD and Buck Robley in New Orleans. The loser gets some magic cream put on their head that will apparently cause hair loss. The Birds win the match and go to put the cream on Buck’s hair, but JYD makes the save and the cream goes in JYD’s eyes. Hayes says it looked like an accident and gave him an out even if the fans didn’t buy it. JYD’s wife was due with their first child and now he was blind and wouldn’t be able to see the baby. JYD had his blinds closed in his house to sell it and they shot a vignette where JYD is with his wife and new baby. JYD says here is my baby and his wife has to move his hand to where the baby is. Fans at home are a little pissed at The Birds. They do the return match and The Birds get a police escort to the arena. Security found a guy in the bathroom with a gun and inside was a bullet that was engraved “Freebird.” Damn! The match was a dog collar inside a cage because JYD could feel for Hayes since he was connected to him. So simple!

-Watts’s kayfabe rules went past the ring as he expected all his wrestlers to be able to handle themselves outside the ring.

-Thumb Down: Jackson, MS is where this story takes place. Jake and Jim head into a bar that they went to often and Jim is cracking his jokes and having a good time. A big dude comes in and starts posing. The guy pops Jim in the mouth and breaks his glasses which cuts Jim’s face. The dude is 6’7” and starts pounding on Jim who is drunk. Jim starts firing off haymakers and Jake is telling him where to swing as he is so drunk he can’t see him. The guy is getting the better of Jim and after 6 or 7 shots, Jim drops to a knee.

-Commercials!

-Jake is looking for something to hit the guy with. Jim puts his hand up and the guy bites Jim’s thumb. That let Jim get within reach of the guy and he drilled him with one shot that knocked him out. Jim felt he needed to get more shots in, but the bouncers got there and threw them out. Jim is pounding on the door to get back in and he feels he is owed more shots at the guy. Jake can see the cop cars coming and they take off. Jake made sure to grab some shots of Jack and they put Jim’s damaged thumb in it to heal and were off.

-Every Rose Has Its Thorn: They talk about Cowboy’s enemies. JR brings up Jerry Brown, who was one of the original Hollywood Blondes. Jerry felt he and Buddy should be making more money, so Watts fired him. Jerry Brown didn’t take it well and would sit in his car outside Watts’ house for hours on end. The police were called and they told Jerry to leave. Watts then got a package that had a clock in it. They had a problem as they all knew Jerry was unpredictable and they wouldn’t put it past him to shoot the family. One night Jerry fired shots at Bill’s house and nearly hit his daughter. As the legend goes Brown ended up with a shotgun in his mouth and JR believes it happened. He knew Watts was going to arm himself as they had called the police multiple times and things just kept happening. “Well, nobody got killed so that must be a win in the territory days.”

-Commercials!

-A Fistful of Lead: JR says in wrestling a red, hot personal issues draws more than a Championship Match. Ted says he and JYD were great friends. Dibiase went to Ernie Ladd and pitched the idea of turning heel on JYD. Ladd felt it was genius as nobody would see it coming. They have a face vs face match and Ted takes a nasty bump to the floor, so JYD helps him up. Ted loads up his black gloves and decks JYD to become the new Champion. They were off and running from there and Ted was hated man.

-Ted talks about a Loser Leaves Town Match that everyone thought he would lose, but JYD does. That leads to JYD coming back under a mask next week and Ted is yelling to everyone that it is JYD. Everyone knew it was him under the mask, but it was on Dibiase to prove it and that was the fun.

-Before Bill bought the territory it was known as NWA Tri-State and was owned by Leroy McGuirk, who was blind. JR cut his teeth under Leroy as a broadcaster.

-Ted’s Dad: Jake cracks up as JR says “we have a rookie, green kid doing play-by-play and a blind man doing color.” Leroy lost his vision in 1951. He lost vision in one eye as a kid and still wrestled. He was a badass and a shooter. He had a hard rule that none of the boys could date his daughter, but Dibiase broke that rule. JR was his driver and one night Leroy pulled a Clint Eastwood-like gun and put it on the dashboard. Leroy was getting drunker and drunker and asked JR questions about Ted. He didn’t let on that he knew Ted was dating his daughter. Leroy tells JR that he is going to kill Ted that night. JR calls the office from a payphone to let them know and Watts is pissed that JR is bothering him. JR doesn’t want to be an accessory to murder.

-Commercials!

-Leroy wants to go to the hotel and wants to be put in a chair so that when someone calls Dibiase down he will start firing. Watts told JR to get Leroy to Shreveport and he will take him off his hands. That was the last he heard of it and Dibiase notes he didn’t date the daughter much longer after that. Ha!

-Ali vs. The Snake: Jake says the greatest moment of his career was meeting Muhammad Ali. As we all know, Ali was a big-time wrestling fan. He showed up to Mid-South at a show in New Orleans to back up Snowman. Hayes notes that Snowman was an accurate nickname. Jake: “for all the wrong reasons.” Man, if Jake is calling you out for drug use then you have an issue. Jake must not be a fan as he says Snowman was all body and nothing else. The payoff for Jake was working The Super Dome against Snowman with Ali in his corner. Jake had John Nord, who was only 5 weeks into his career, in his corner. Jake was dying to meet Ali, but Bill made sure to keep the heels and faces away from each other. Jake was telling all the boys he could make his life and career if he was able to shoot DDT Ali. They show footage and watching Nord bump his ass off for Ali is fun. Jake on the other hand just staggered with each shot and Watts is pissed. Ali meets Jake after the show and Jake isn’t sure if he is going to be mad, but Ali tells him is a smart man as he has to wrestle in front of those fans again next week. Ali understood and JR notes that Ali got it a long time before that. He talks about how Ali was great at throwing a working punch and made it look amazing.

-Commercials!

-Vince McMahon documentary next week. Some of the talking heads shown: Cornette, Russo, Bryan Alvarez, and Bret Hart.

-1980 The Golden Year: Hayes says he was 20 and Terry was 18 when they arrived in Mid-South and Buddy was put with them. He thought it was a good idea and Jakes laughs that it was probably a rib. It seems Buddy felt 1980 was the year of urination. They would have to take a beer piss every 60 miles or so when driving on the road. Buddy had a good idea to try to piss on Hayes and Terry each time they stopped. Terry is driving and Buddy hands him a beer bottle to toss out, but Terry sees it is full and when he drinks it, he finds it’s Buddy’s piss. Eww! Terry vows revenge.

-Buddy opts to board Watts’ plane to the next show while Hayes and Buddy prefer to drive. Terry realizes this is his chance to get revenge on Buddy. He has Buddy’s bag with everything he has in it and Terry has pissed in it, put rotten eggs in, and dog shit. As they are driving they see a dead possum with maggots and use sticks to pick it up while throwing up. They travel 180 miles with this dead animal when the temp is at 100 degrees outside. Jake picks up the story as he remembers them coming in and he saw a squad of flies following them. The smell hit him and gagged him. Everyone knows what’s going down and they all want to see so when Terry opens the bag the smell destroys everyone. Paul Ellering starts puking. Buddy didn’t sell it at all and put his gear on and went and did the match.

-Commercials!

-The Death of The Territories is blamed again on Vince McMahon and his desire to expand. To Vince, it was just business while the other promoters had to find a way to stop Vince.

-Kill Vince: Hayes notes that the promoters did not take to Vince’s idea of expansion well even though he offered to pay them. There was a meeting of the promoters of the NWA in Kansas City. Cowboy had JR come with him and they were trying to find a way to band together to stop Vince. Fat chance of that happening! JR is on the toilet and overhears someone say they should kill Vince and he can get it done for $750. JR put his feet up and stayed quiet because he didn’t want anyone to know he was there. Watts wasn’t in there and hated the meeting as he knew they could never all agree on lunch let alone running a joint promotion.

-Watts rebrands Mid-South as Universal (UWF) in a way to not sound so regional. They were hoping it was a way to sell the promotion to people outside the territory. JR notes the TV ratings were great, but nobody showed up to the shows because the oil industry slowed and nobody had money to attend shows. JR thinks the Crocketts screwed up the UWF invasion and they could have had their own Super Bowl.

-They all agree that Mid-South was a great learning promotion. They all bust on JR that the announcer ended up having such a long career.

-That was a blast even if most of the stories have been shared over the years. JR was the star here as he held court and he’s a guy you can listen tell stories for hours. Jake and Ted chimed in when needed as did Hayes. Overall, I found this 10-week series a lot of fun and I hope there is a season two. I liked covering Dark Side of The Ring, but I like the mix of serious with tongue-in-cheek and funny stories. Thanks for reading as we plowed through this series and I guess next week is the Main Event with the Vince documentary.