Kayfabe! – Supercard: Jim Duggan Re-Experiences Royal Rumble ’88

Kayfabe!
SuperCard – Jim Duggan remembers Royal Rumble 1988

This is more or less divided up into two sections, the backstory, and the event itself. Now, I’ve never seen any other shoot interviews from Hacksaw, so, I don’t know if he’s already talked about a lot of this stuff at length before, but, I found the backstory portion of the interview to be great. As usual, KC’s research as far as dates, arenas, opponents, etc. is dead on. It starts way back in 1979, when Jim first started working for Vince Sr. When he was going by the name “Big” Jim Duggan, and wearing a golden robe to the ring. He wound up being used as a jobber and eventually left for Hawaii. Then, we jump ahead to his return in 1987. Jim fills in the gaps, talking about wrestling in Pensacola, Texas, and Mid-South. He says that Watts and Vince Jr. are actually very much alike, in the ways that they ran their businesses.

Jim is also pretty funny. When he talks about doing the run-in at Wrestlemania III, someone asked him how the crowd was, and he replied that he didn’t have his glasses on, so, he only saw the first three rows, but they were full. Jim knew how well he was getting over when the WWF ran the Market Square Arena in Indianapolis, and the crowd was going crazy during his match. Then, Hogan simply had to put his hand to his ear and the crowd was ten times louder. He tells a joke about someone asking his wife if she was nervous about him going back to the WWE, and working around all those young divas, and his wife only replied “No.” He also joked that he beat Stunning Steve Austin so bad that he had to shave his head and change his name, so ought to be getting a kickback from Austin. Jim talks about WWF TV, and cutting local promos for the house shows, and George Steele was the agent for these, and would always critique the guys. Jim told him that his whole promo was “Mine!” so he didn’t have room to talk. Duggan tells a hilarious story about an Owen Hart rib. He was in his hotel and called the front desk to ask if a gym was close by. The guy at the desk told him to look it up in the phone book, he was tired of babysitting wrestlers. The phone rang again, and a different clerk tells him that it was another wrestler who was just on the phone, Jim asked which one, and when the clerk asked Owen his name, Owen replied “Jim Powers.”

Jim does a rather in-depth retelling of the incident with the Iron Sheik. They got pulled over because a New Jersey State Trooper saw Duggan drinking a beer while driving (Jim claims that he didn’t know this was illegal, because New Orleans actually has drive-thru daiquiri places, he just knew drunk driving was bad). His father was also chief of police, so he waved to the cop as they passed him. The trooper pulled them over and Duggan got charged for the drinking and having a few joins, while Sheik had three grams of cocaine. They still made the show, and, in the days without internet, TMZ, Twitter, etc. they figured maybe nobody would find out. The next morning it was everywhere! Vince called him, and told him to turn in his plane tickets and go home. He wound up being brought back a couple of months later, but he thinks that was the reason why he never got the big push again.

The portion talking about the actual event is still good, but, it’s a step down from the backstory discussion. Jim doesn’t really have much to say about the idea behind the concept or running the show opposite the Bunkhouse Stampede, because he was never in the office. Sean goes over the matches, and the names, and Jim gives his take on them, with nobody getting buried. “Dangerous” Danny Davis gets some props, because he worked up from the bottom by driving the ring truck, refereeing, and working under a hood, and finally got himself a break. He thinks that One Man Gang ought to be in the Hall of Fame (Note from Mike: I agree, one of the most underrated big men from that era). People always think that he and Butch Reed had heat because they both used “Hacksaw,” but they were actually good friends. He puts over Bruiser Brody for teaching him that the result didn’t matter, as long as he kept his heat, so, he could go out and get beat by IRS, but afterwards, he hit him with the board, push the ref, flip over a table, and the whole crowd would be with him yelling “Hoooooo!” and nobody would care, or remember, that he lost. Jim says that the Dino Bravo trying to set a weightlifting record on the show was totally legit. And that the Rumble match was easy to work, because with so much going on, guys could take it easy, but, it was challenging to keep track of the elimination spots, and especially hard for OMG, because he had a lot to keep track of. Jim is proud to go down in history as being the first winner of the Royal Rumble, and people remind him to this day, at Indy shows and conventions.

8.5

The final score: review Very Good

The 411

Another good edition of Supercard. The discussion about the actual Royal Rumble event itself is a step down from the backstory portion, but even that is still good. Duggan's humor and stories make this a very entertaining way to spend a couple of hours.