Mid-South Wrestling (10.12.1985) Review

-Originally aired October 12, 1985.

-Your hosts are Boyd Pierce and Bill Watts, with Hacksaw Jim Duggan hanging out at the commentary table at the start of the show.

-BREAKING: The Barbarian has mysteriously disappeared from the Mid-South area, and Oliver Humperdink is accusing Hacksaw Jim of “an incident in a parking lot” that may have compelled Barbarian to leave.

-Also, Ric Flair is freaking out because the Mid-South roster is almost nothing but #1 contenders at this point, with Duggan, Reed, Murdoch, DiBiase, Slater, Jake, Dylan, Rumer, Scout, The Inanimate Carbon Rod, and Wendell Cooley all having legit claims to a title match. With that, we go to pre-recorded words from Ric Flair, who reiterates that he will never defend his title against anyone in Mid-South except for whoever holds the North American Title. He’s not going to humor a dozen guys demanding matches at the same time.

-Bill Watts says that’s a load of crap because he doesn’t dictate who his challengers are! Bill Watts and Jim Crockett are in charge of that, dad gummit! We go to some video that possibly explains why Flair is suddenly demanding this, a house show in Alexandria, LA, with Flair defending the title against Duggan. At the 25-minute mark, Flair locks on the figure four. Duggan reverses it, so Flair decides to turn it into a brawl on the floor, which is a stupid mistake because Duggan is a brawler. Duggan busts Flair open with a shot to the post.

-Back in the ring, Duggan tries to finish with the spear, but Flair pulls the referee into harm’s way, getting himself disqualified.

BUZZ SAWYER vs. MIKE NICHOLS
-Sawyer refuses to put his chain away, demanding Nichols grab the other end of it and have a chain match. Nichols doesn’t have the guts, so Sawyer puts the chain away and beats the hell out of Nichols. Powerslam off the top rope gets three for Sawyer. And since Nichols is too beaten to fight back, Sawyer grabs his chain again, but the referee threatens to reverse the decision if anything happens.

-And now in the interest of equal time, we finally get our Wendell Cooley music video. He’s a cowboy, but nowhere near as shirtless as the other babyfaces in Mid-South.

AL PEREZ & WILDCAT WENDELL COOLEY vs. GYPSY JOE & BRODY CHASE
-Cooley tosses Joe around. Everybody tags and Perez backdrops Chase. Slingshot by Chase, and Chase has never done the bump before and he has a ROUGH landing in the corner, with even Bill Watts noting how nasty the bump looked. German suplex gives Perez the win.

-Breaking news: We’ve identified the mysterious woman who hangs out with Dick Slater. Her name is Dark Journey.

-And that leads us to a Dark Journey music video, and it’s a 2 1/2-minute forerunner to TikTok and Instagram thirst trap accounts, as the whole video is just Journey dancing and shooting sultry looks at the camera in a small room while Joel Watts rotates through every individual filter and effect on his keyboard one-by-one.

DICK SLATER (with Dark Journey) vs. STEVE CONSTANCE
-And we go to ringside, where Dark Journey is suddenly unrecognizable because she’s wearing a Dolly Parton blonde wig. On the other side of the ring, Watts gives Constance props for sticking with wrestling. He originally came into Mid-South with a partner named Tim Ashley, but Tim Ashley got a concussion and decided to just quit the wrestling business altogether. The thing about Bill’s tone of voice is I can’t tell if he’s thinking “Yeah, wrestling’s not for everyone” or “Pfft, candy ass.”

-Slater seems to be sucking wind as he suplexes Constance and follows with a neckbreaker. Sleeper puts Constance out cold. Watts says people take moves like the sleeper lightly, but “some talk show host ended up with 21 stitches” because of a sleeper, so it can really do some damage. We of course don’t mention the wrestler who did it.

HUMUNGOUS & THE NIGHTMARE (with Oliver Humperdink) vs. DON TURNER & TONY FAUCK
-Well, that’s a hell of a name to go through life with. There’s some effort to de-Moondog the Nightmare here, as he suddenly has neatly combed brown hair and short black tights with a weightlifting belt.

-Backdrop by Nightmare as Watts reiterates that we don’t know where Barbarian went and Jake doesn’t have any comment on the matter. All we know is that Nightmare probably just got an extra three months of work because of his disappearing act.

-Humperdink appears to load the mask with something before Humungous tags in. A single headbutt by Humungous wipes out Fauck, and he does a really, really gory bladejob to ell it. Shinni no make puts Fauck away.

-Fauck.

TED DIBIASE (with Steve Williams) vs. NICK PATRICK
-Yep! Same guy.

– DiBiase shoulderblocks Patrick down. Slam and a stomp by DiBiase. Patrick comes to life with a series of slams and lefts, but he puts his head down for a backdrop and DiBiase kicks him away. Elbow off the second rope by DiBiase. Suplex looks like it could finish, but DiBiase pulls Patrick up at two, then pays for it, missing a corner charge. Patrick tries to capitalize with a side headlock, but DiBiase suplexes out and clamps on the figure four.

-And Patrick makes the ropes! Holy hell, that’s a compliment from DiBiase. So DiBiase keeps trying to put Patrick away as Bob Sweetan heads to ringside and attacks Steve Williams. With Williams dazed on the floor, Sweetan heads into the ring to attack DiBiase. Patrick gets DQed, but he instantly offers backup and helps Sweetan put a beating on DiBiase, and the heels scurry out of there. Behold our new badass up-and-comer, Nick Patrick.

HACKSAW JIM DUGGAN & JAKE “The Snake” ROBERTS vs. DUTCH MANTELL & EL CORSARIO
-Words of wisdom from Bill Watts: “Don’t bring something to a fight that’s not chocolate, because you might eat it.” (…in bed.)

-Duggan slams and rams Corsario. Jake tags in and goes for the mask. Corsario squirms out of the ring and sneaks back around to chop Jake down. Dutch Mantell is our first wrestler of the hour to ask no quarter and give none, as he tags in and hammers on Jake. Corsario tags back in and eats a kneelift, and it’s hot tag Duggan. And Duggan is WALKING TALL. Dutch grabs the bullwhip and tries to use it as a weapon, but a slick finish sees Duggan grab the end of the whip for a tug of war with Dutch. Jake slides back in the ring right as Duggan jerks Dutch toward him, and Jake steps over and grabs onto Dutch to DDT him for a three-count.

6.2

The final score: review Average

The 411

Good show, but kind of a placeholder feel to it.