Down With The Brown: Best Of The WWF Vol. 7 (1986)

Thirteen is the first great film I have seen this year. Granted, I don’t go to the movie theater much these days, but this was one of the most powerful, haunting films I’ve seen in quite some time. Not for all tastes for sure, but it’s one you’re not going to forget easily.

Okay, I’ve been getting requests lately to keep doing Coliseum reviews, so I’m obliging to the masses for the time being until someone tells me otherwise. Besides, the WWF period between 1985-1988 is when I grew up, so it’s great for nostalgia purposes.

Today we’re looking at the Best of the WWF Vol. 7. To me, the first 5 volumes were the best only because those were the ones I could find at the local video store. 6 & 7 I could find occasionally, but never anything above 8 (aside from Vol. 18 for some weird reason.) This one’s one of my faves as it features one of my all-time favorite tag matches as well as some other goodies. Let’s do this thing:

Match #1

Terry Funk vs. Pedro Morales

Boy, this would have been a dream match once upon a time. Both men former World champions, and both men who SHOULD be past their prime. Pedro would retire a year or so later. Funk kept going, hell, he STILL wrestles once in a while. We’re in the Boston Garden for this one, and as things start, Funk slaps Pedro in the face. He scampers away as Pedro’s ready to fight. Tie-up and Pedro returns the favor, slapping him in the face about five times. Another tie-up and Funk launches Pedro onto the announce table. While Funk gloats, a piece of trash pops him in the face from the crowd, and Funk goes AFTER THE GUY. He points out the offender to the cops, though I don’t see how he could know especially when he’s not looking at the right side of the crowd.

Pedro may legit be hurt as he’s STILL selling the table bump despite the minute or two of extracurricular activity. Funk pounds away and Pedro just slumps to the canvas. Funk steps on Morales’ face. Funk punches Morales and he again falls on the announce table. And Funk starts taunting Monsoon, taking a swipe at him, knocking his headset off. Monsoon looks a tad less than pleased by it, and he threatens payback if “he gets close enough.” Morales collapses on the mat and Funk grinds a foreign object in Pedro’s face, then chokes him out with the tape on his wrist.

Morales gets tired of selling and he chokes Funk out with his own tape. Hard left sends Funk to the floor. Funk eats the wooden steps and he crawls under them to escape. With Funk on the steps, Pedro climbs to the top and threatens to jump but thinks better. Funk goes into the turnbuckle and he falls off the apron. More lefts puts Funk nearly unconscious and he ends up back on the floor again. Pedro goes after Jimmy Hart giving Funk a chance to rest, and more importantly a chair, but the ref takes it away before he can use it. Funk gets further destroyed by Pedro, going so far as pulling his tight down. In a great bit of storytelling, numerous amounts of trash begin to accumulate in the ring, (especially after Funk gets pelted earlier) and as the ref goes to clean them out, Funk grabs Hart’s megaphone, whacks Pedro in the face and he gets the pin.
Pretty fun brawl, much better than it had a right to be. Though really, Funk never had a bad match in his 1985 WWF tenure, you could always tell he was having a good time.

Match #2

Hulk Hogan vs. “Macho Man” Randy Savage

This is the MSG rematch from January 1986 after Savage had beaten Hogan by countout. Seriously, Savage had an incredibly hot MSG period as every match he had from 12/85-8/86 were damn near classics between his Hogan and Santana series. Savage jumps Hogan at the bell and we’re off. He drops an axehandle and rips Hogan’s shirt off of him. He beats Hogan with his own title belt and Savage still has his shades and robe on. He hits Hogan from the top rope with the belt and the ring is getting littered with garbage. MAJOR heat at this point. Elizabeth gets on the apron to try to calm Savage down and Hogan Hulks up. Hogan steals Savage’s shades then beats him up while wearing them. He chokes Savage out with his headband and an atomic drop sends him flying. Savage gets sent to the floor.

Savage gets launched facefirst into the steel post and Savage proceeds to do one of the more obvious bladejobs as he slashes right on camera. Savage hits an artery as he’s a mess in seconds. Hogan pounds at the wound and he’s gushing. Hell, he’s glowing red at this point and the blood starting to get on Hogan. Elizabeth distracts Hogan and Savage tosses him. He hits the double axehandle to the floor. Back in and he hits a second one. He goes for the big elbow and he hits it. Hogan Hulks up again, and to make things worse, he does it at the one count. Clothesline in the corner, and this match seems to be getting rushed, hopefully to get Savage stitched up, because the blood keeps flowing. Savage keeps trying to bail but Hogan won’t let him. The two fight on the floor and Hogan tries to post him again, but Elizabeth blocks him. That lets Savage push Hogan into the post and get the countout win. Good. If you’re gonna lose a ton of blood, they better at least let you win. Hogan destroys Savage some more after the bell. The jobber patrol comes out to break it up. Savage gets a cheap shot in and he bails. Intense stuff, and further proof that Savage was one of Hogan’s better opponents. At least in the WWF days.

Match #3
Arnold Skaaland vs. Capt. Lou Albano

It’s manager vs. manager here. Most of Albano’s matches had a simple formula. He beats up opponent with a foreign object for a while, face gets object, Albano blades like a mofo, he runs off. Let’s see how close the formula this match is.

Uh, it’s exact.

Albano, to make matters worse, has the blade on his thumb and he jabs himself in full few of everybody. He blades numerous times. He runs off. The end.

Match #4

Haystacks Calhoun & Tony Garea vs. Mr. Fuji & Prof. Toru Tanaka (2 of 3)

Why did Fuji always get top billing when he always seemed to be the weak link of his team? Calhoun of course was the original wrestling behemoth, weighing almost 600 lbs. (Though considering Yokozuna really DID weigh that much, Calhoun looks a tad smaller.) Tanaka tosses salt in the corner to rid the ring of evil spirits and an elderly lady brushes it away with her program, telling Tanaka to kiss her ass in the process. Every time he tries to throw salt, she brushes it away. Since it’s the ‘70’s and not now, Tanaka doesn’t proceed to thrust kick her in the face or anything.

We cut ahead as Garea gets Tanaka in a headlock. The two trade armdrags which Garea wins, and the crowd is WAY too excited about it. Those were the days. Garea gets tied up in the corner, literally, as Fuji chokes him with the tag rope. Garea gets back into it with some shots that Fuji totally oversells.

Jump ahead to a Garea backdrop on Fuji who tags Tanaka in. Tanaka controls until Haystacks finally tags in with the dreaded “shove my crotch in your face” hold. Calhoun sits on both heels while Garea stands on all three of them. Garea tags back in and gets bashed by the Professor. Two shoulderblocks by Garea gets two. Tanaka blindsides Garea with a thrust kick and the heels win the first fall.

Clip ahead into fall two as Garea controls with a front facelock. Clip some more to Fuji controlling on Garea. The heels control until Haystacks has enough and he interferes. The heels double team Haystacks throwing salt in his eyes. And the heels gets DQ’d.

Off to fall three as Garea pounds away on Tanaka. Garea tags Calhoun who splashes Tanaka for the academic pin. Eh. Not the most thrilling match in the world. Seemed to be the 70’s equivalent of the Colossal Connection. One big guy and another bland guy with the big guy wrestling 3% of the time.

Match #5

Ken Patera vs. Tony Atlas

This is from 1980’s Showdown in Shea, one of the largest WWF shows of its time. Vince McMahon serves as ring announcer for this one. Patera was the I-C champ at the time. Boy, the color scheme is straight out of an Atari 2600 game. Green grass, blue ring apron, purple ring. Atlas dominates from the outset, ultimately press slamming Patera with near ease. Patera bails, but not for long as he gets a quick kneelift to gain control. Clothesline and elbowdrop gets two. Atlas kicks out with such force, Patera’s leg hits the top rope. Atlas crushes Patera with three headbutts. Splash gets two. More headbutts send Patera on dream street as his eyes roll back in his head. Patera bails again.

He suckers Atlas and clotheslines him on the top rope. He hits some kick or something off the top rope but it looks awkward. Patera press slams Atlas sending him to the other side of the ring. He locks on the swinging neckbreaker, a move that legitimately looks really painful. Atlas makes the ropes so Patera stomps him in the corner. Atlas Hulks up, headbutting him to turn the tide. Big rights send Patera down. Suplex gets two. He locks on a sleeper, but Patera escapes, clotheslining him on the ropes to escape. That gets a two count. Atlas gets a bodypress for two. Patera punches Atlas so hard he falls out of the ring. And the two men trade shots outside the ring. Atlas gets back in the ring, but Patera doesn’t in time and he gets counted out. Lame ending but a pretty good match. Atlas grabs the mike and wants to forget about titles: “I just wanna whip your butt!” Which was pretty strong words for 1980 WWF.

The Slammys

“Highlights” of the Slammys but first some never-before-seen man on the street interviews. Okerlund talks to people who seem to have no idea what the WWF is, much less who Okerlund is. Okerlund tries to hit on a cute woman with little success. A guy dressed as a pimp wants nothing to do with Gene. Finally Gene finds a guy who seems just a TAD too excited to see Gene. Then Okerlund busts out the words “jabroni” and “kayfabe” about three seconds apart, which of course meant nothing to 98% of the audience at the time. We finish with a guy who seems to be a tad drunk, as he keeps screaming “We’re gonna do it!” Funny in a “This really shouldn’t be funny” kind of way.

On to the show:

-Jesse Ventura interviews Gene Okerlund who seems to be sweating. Okerlund claims it’s because he just ran 71/2 miles. Jesse: “You couldn’t even drive 71/2 miles.”

-Gorilla Monsoon comes out with his fly open. Naturally, the overacting kills it from being funny.

-Nikolai Volkoff wins Most Ignominious. He’s very happy, despite not knowing what it means. But you see, when none of the audience knows what it means, it’s kinda hard to give Volkoff grief about not knowing either. Iron Sheik does a pratfall for good measure.

-Roddy Piper wins Best Personality to a rather interesting mixed cheers and boos ratio as the face turn was slowly creeping in. Piper’s award breaks in his hands. Piper delivers his trademark: “MTV is Music To Vomit by.” And then he really gets controversial by remarking “I DO play Sun City.” A dated comment and a lot of you guys have no idea what he means, but it’s about as heel of a statement as you could make in 1986. He proceeds to destroy the podium with the award and he walks off. GREAT stuff.

Match #6

The British Bulldogs vs. The Hart Foundation

Oh. Yeah. There’s a butchered Bulldogs/Harts on the Best of Vol. 3. Thankfully, this one airs pretty much in its entirety. Okerlund calls this a “blood” feud making hints at the relationships the four men have. Dynamite slingshots Bret chestfirst into the corner to start things. Clip to Bret getting back in the ring and Dynamite and Bret trade hammerlocks. Dynamite tosses Bret to a large pop. Bret says “Screw this” and he leaves. Jimmy Hart begs him to come back but not before he tags out to Neidhart. BTW, not that anyone cares, I MUCH preferred the Harts in their blue and black attire over their pink and black. Just looked cooler. Davey tags in too and he gets slammed. Davey returns the favor and the crowd is REALLY into this. One dropkick later and Anvil bails too.

Bret back in and he takes control with forearms. Davey escapes by jumping on Bret’s shoulders and executing a victory roll for two. Irish whip in and Bret delivers a knee that Davey almost does a 480, much less a 360 flip. Elbowdrop and ledgdrop and the Harts take control. Anvil tags in and does more damage to Davey Boy. Bret tags in with a standing dropkick to Smith’s face. More damage from the Harts leading to a Anvil bearhug. Davey punches away and crawls between Anvil’s legs to escape and he makes the hot tag to Dynamite.

Dynamite smashes both Harts together. Dynamite yanks Bret up by the hair in a particularly violent matter. In fact, Dynamite spends too much time with Bret and he pays for it. Neidhart Irish whips Kid who gets kicked in the back by Bret. Neidhart distracts the ref some more and Bret drops a second rope elbow. Anvil tosses Dynamite and Bret continues the assault, slamming him on the concrete. See, THIS is how wrestling should be done. Little instances like that. Dynamite insults Bret by pulling on his hair. Bret goes to every length to get payback. Davey Boy comes over to stop the onslaught and to check on his partner. Resthold time. Clipping ahead to the end of the resthold. (THAT’S how you clip a match.) Bret drives Dynamite’s face to the mat twice. That’s followed by a particularly nasty legdrop. Dynamite does his Bret Hart impression, as he smashes sternum first into the turnbuckle. Second turnbuckle elbowdrop gets two. Backbreaker gets two. Neidhart tags in and delivers axehandle shots. The typical front facelock where the face tags without the ref seeing sequence plays out with a nice twist. Instead of the heel distracting the ref, Bret just cheapshots Smith instead. Davey Boy responds by chasing Bret around the ring.

Bret tags back in and ties Dynamite in the ropes, getting more shots in. Bret tries a backbreaker but Dynamite tries to cartwheel out, but he screws it up and falls on his head, and Bret drops an elbow before anyone can notice. THAT’S how you fix a messed up spot. Even Monsoon nicely covers for it. Bret tries an uppercut but Dynamite hooks it into a backslide for two. Bret ties up Dynamite for more punishment, this time delivering his patented “crotching the top rope” spot, and he bites it HARD.

Davey tags in and he dropkicks Neidhart before he can interfere. He smashes Hart into Neidhart for good measure. Bret gets smashed sternum first into the turnbuckle for two. Davey press slams Bret for two. Neidhart interferes to give Bret the advantage. Bret holds Davey for a Neidhart axehandle then takes over without tagging. Monsoon’s furious at this point. The Harts bust out a TOP ROPE Hart Attack which pretty much rips Davey’s head off, but while the ref tries to get Neidhart out of the ring, Dynamite hits a top rope headbutt on Bret. Dynamite rolls Davey out and he pins Bret.

AWESOME match. I don’t do this too often, go back through the archives if you don’t believe me, you aren’t gonna see this rating too much. ****. One of the BEST WWF tag matches you’re gonna see. And the insane crowd reaction afterwards only further makes my point.

Match #7

The Rougeaus vs. The Moondogs

This is from the WWF Australia tour, the tours that dared to call S.D. Jones and Paul Roma “Main Eventers.” This is what I believe to be the WWF debut of the Rougeaus. Rex doesn’t even have his ring attire on for some reason, making him look like a fatter Matt Borne. Raymond gets Rex’s feet caught in the top rope and the ref struggles to get him out. Atomic drop gets two. Nice sequence as Jacques tags in, dropkicks Rex in the back of the head leading to a Raymond slam and a Jacques splash to finish it. Rex tags Spot and he wants no part of it.

Spot gets rolled up for two. Spot gets a side headlock but his success is short lived as Jacques hiptosses him and gets pounded by both brothers, finishing as they make a wish on Spot’s leg.
Clip ahead to the Moondogs gaining control as Rex rams Raymond to the corner, but he blind charges to the buckle and Jacques gets the hot tag. He destroys both Dogs with forearms and dropkicks. Spot gets a shot to the ribs to end it. The Dogs try a double clothesline but Jacques ducks it, Raymond trips Spot and Jacques bodypresses Rex for the pin. Good debut for the Rougeaus. The fans seemed pretty impressed.

Match #8

Valentine / Beefcake vs. Sheik / Volkoff

How the hell did THIS happen? Since when did heels face off in the WWF? The Dream Team are the champs here and seem to be playing the faces as well as they double team the Sheik to start. Beefcake seems to have difficulty applying an armbar. Sheik gets atomic dropped and Beefcake doesn’t seem to know what else to do so Sheik just tags Volkoff. Volkoff applies a headlock but Sheik gets in the way. Valentine tries a top rope elbow but apparently Volkoff doesn’t know this because he walks too far away for Valentine to hit it. So he gives up on the idea.

Blind charge goes nowhere for Volkoff and Valentine tags in. More armlock action. Volkoff eats a Valentine elbow but tries a backdrop and Volkoff kicks him in the chest. Sheik comes back in and chops him down for two. Abdominal stretch by Sheik performed wrong as always. Sheik busts out a dropkick, I’ve NEVER seen the Sheik do that. Volkoff back in but Valentine fights him off and Beefcake tags in. All four men end up in the ring but the ref manages to separate everybody. Volkoff gets Beefcake in a bearhug. He escapes but he can’t escape Sheik’s camel clutch so Valentine makes the save. He tags back in and he suplexes Sheik and he gives the sign for the figure-four. So Volkoff clobbers him. Again all four men in and the ref throws the match out. Thank God. This was a freakin’ cluster. *. Not a good idea as nobody seemed to really know what they were doing in this one. And the Dream Team seemed really uncomfortable playing face.

End of tape.

Much like a great episode of SNL, the good far outweighs the bad, and the bad tends to come at the end. One outstanding match (Bulldogs/Harts), two really good matches (Hogan/Savage, Funk/Morales) and the rest (aside from the heels/heels match) is all pretty good. Even the Slammys stuff is kept to a relative minimum. This tape is a fine indicator of the direction the WWF was heading after a blockbuster 1985. Heel Piper was out, Heel Savage was in. Sheik & Volkoff out, Bulldogs in. Most of the major stars were making way for the new crop of talent, something that is SORELY lacking in today’s talent where we’re lucky if TWO guys break out in a year. An enjoyable tape, one of the better “Best ofs” in my opinion. Definite recommendation.

Thumbs up, very much recommended, B+.

-Sydney Brown