Memphis Wrestling (2.20.1982) Review

-Originally aired February 20, 1982.

-Your hosts are Lance Russell & Dave Brown.

STAN LANE vs. SPEED (with Jimmy Hart)
-In the past month, Stan Lane found evidence that Jimmy Hart was skimming money from his men’s earnings and turned babyface as a result.

-Lane wrings the arm but gets taken down with a drop toehold. Lane gets back to his feet and throws a dropkick, then locks on an armbar. They exchange holds, but Lane simply throws a punch to put a stop to that. Speed gets aggressive too, but Lane backdrops him and applies a figure four, and Speed hangs on until the Assassins make it to the ring for a surprise attack.

ROY ROGERS & JOE STARK vs. BEAUTIFUL BOBBY EATON & SWEET BROWN SUGAR (with Jimmy Hart)
-Rogers armdrags Sugar around. Eaton tags in and gets his arm wound. Starks tags in and stays on the arm. Sugar tags back in and makes easy work of Stark, but he manages to tag Rogers back in and life starts to suck for Sugar again.

-Eaton tags in and clamps on a front facelock. Meanwhile, Kenny Shane heads to ringside and chats with Jimmy Hart about something while the commentators discuss rumors that they’re going to set up a “co-manager” business deal like Jimmy had with Chic Donovan. Is there a reason that they kept wanting to do this with Jimmy?

-Stark works Sugar’s legs over, and Rogers tags in to do the same. Stark keeps cutting off Sugar’s attempted tags before Eaton just suddenly remembers “Wait, I’m a heel” and charges in there to kick the shit out of Rogers.

-Heels work over Rogers for a spell as this match is going shockingly long, and it’s actually been almost all-action, it’s not a telegraphed draw or anything.

-Heels cut off a hot tag and Starks takes a page from their playbook, coming in and taking a free shot anyway, but Rogers continues getting worked over as we hit the 10-minute mark!

-Sugar keeps working over Rogers as the Gibson Brothers suddenly hit the ring and beat the hell out of Eaton and Sugar, clearing them from the building. Why the HELL would you make a match go 11 minutes if that’s your finish? I was kind of excited to see how this was going to turn out too, it was a great match until the cheap attack.

MIDNIGHT EXPRESS (with Norvell Austin) vs. RICK MCCORD & CHIEF THUNDERCLOUD
-So again they do the thing where the Midnights decide who’s going to wrestle and who’s going to sit this out, but Norvell Austin is definitely the Demolition Ax of this group and it’s just as ridiculous here to listen to the commentators speculate about who it will be.

-Thundercloud clamps a chinlock on Condrey. Condrey gets out and makes the tag. Rose and Thundercloud have a little trouble getting on the same page. McCord tags in and things go a little more smoothly from there, with Rose tying him up in a front facelock and turning it into a backdrop, and then turning that into a wristlock in a nice succession of moves. Camera gets a shot of Dave Brown calling the match, and he’s reclining in his chair like he’s watching the match in his living room, and I love that.

-Thundercloud tags back in, and Condrey finishes him with ease, powerslamming him and getting the pin.

EXPIRATION OF TIME, NON-TITLE: STEVE KIERN & SUPERSTAR BILL DUNDEE (Southern Tag Team Champions) vs. KENNY SHANE & ROOSTER COGMAN
-We have 20 minutes of show left.

FALL ONE: Keirn takes down Rooster, who is somehow #1, not the only wrestler in history to go by “Rooster” and #2, not the most famous wrestler in history to go by “Rooster.” Would you have taken that bet in 1982?

-Shane tags in and that doesn’t go well. Dundee tags in and manages to fend off both opponents before making a, uh, hot tag to Keirn, even though he was never really in trouble. Champs ram their opponents together and shockingly, that doesn’t lead to a fall.

-Rooster and Shane go to the floor to regroup. Dundee knocks the Rooster around. Sleeper is applied on Rooster while Keirn blocks Shane from breaking the hold, but Tojo heads into the ring with a kendo stick and attacks Dundee for a DQ to end fall one.

-FALL TWO: Backbreaker by Dundee to start off as Jimmy Hart suddenly shows up at ringside and announces that he’s signed some new First Family members. He calls Kenny Shane away from the apron for an emergency meeting to tell him about the new developments while Rooster just keeps getting his ass kicked.

-Shane tags in and takes a beating until going for Dundee’s eyes. Jimmy Hart takes some cheap shots, and Lance just sounds so ANNOYED with him for it, like he’s Jimmy’s supervisor and they just talked about this shit yesterday. Everybody tags and Keirn KOs the Rooster with a forearm and gets the three-count.

5.5

The final score: review Not So Good

The 411

Weird booking this week. But we got one pretty good match out of it.