The Name on the Marquee: Mid-South Wrestling (7.17.1982)

-Originally aired July 10, 1982.

-Your hosts are Boyd Pierce, wearing an ensemble that I can only describe as “Brother Disco,” & Bill Watts.

BUCK ROBLEY vs. THE GRAPPLER
-They trade holds while Bill Watts does a little kayfabe-splaining to help us understand why the matches at house shows go so much longer than the matches on TV. You don’t have time for “strategy” with a ten minute time limit!

-Shoulderblock and a knee. Watts uses hockey terminology, referring to the shoulderblock as a “check.” Grappler slams Robley and drops elbows & knees on him. Grappler goes to a chinlock, then gives Robley a backbreaker for two. Robley with elbows and a sleeper, but Grappler makes the ropes and manages to do it in such a way that Robley stunguns himself. Grappler loads up the boot, but the referee catches him in the act and stops him. Robley immediately gives Grappler two good shots with his plaster cast in full view of the referee and gets the three count. Nothing about that makes me want to cheer Buck Robley.

TED DIBIASE (North American Champion) vs. BUDDY LANDELL
-They trade arm work until DiBiase trips Buddy and takes him down. Buddy gets armdragged as Bill Watts tells the story of learning what DiBiase had done from an irate Dick Murdoch, who suspects that DiBiase’s father’s early death means DiBiase didn’t quite get ALL the discipline he needed as a teenager.

-Landell shows up DiBiase a few times and cradles him for two. Landell is looking ripped AF this week, too. DiBiase gets good and mad, attacking Landell with elbows and knees. Buddy slugs back and hiptosses him. Dropkick sends DiBiase to the floor and Watts flips out because it’s the first time he’s ever seen DiBiase bail and stall. Landell slingshots him back in and whips him into the corner, but DiBiase gives him one good punch with the glove, and a powerslam could finish, but DiBiase’s a bastard, so he gives Landell another shot with the glove and then applies the figure four to force a submission. Good storytelling all around here.

IRON MIKE SHARPE vs. BILL ASH
-Knowledge bomb from Bill Watts: Bill Ash’s father Noel is considered the premier designer of boots for pro wrestlers.

-Waistlock by Ash is fought off by Sharpe while Bill Watts’ Kayfabe Korner covers “why the commentators don’t tell the referees what happened when the guys cheat.” They have no official jurisdiction in Mid-South, and besides, collegiate wrestling is getting a lot of heat right now because the referees are considered over-restrictive, so there’s a delicate balance to be struck with regards to how to handle cheating.

-Sharpe works the arm. Ash fights back with punches, but Sharpe gets fired up and Ash takes the damndest turnbuckle shot I’ve ever seen, just going flying from the impact, and Sharpe puts him away with a body vice.

KILLER KHAN & ONE MAN GANG (with Skandar Akbar) vs. COCO SAMOA & VINNIE ROMEO
-Khan wears out Romeo with a front facelock. OMG hammers him and Khan chokes him out. Romeo throws punches and Khan sells them like a character in Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out, with the same goofy expression frozen on his face until another punch is thrown. Samoa tags in and throws all kinds of punches and chops, which Khan just shrugs off. Dropkick finally works, taking him off his feet. Samoa tries to follow with a bodypress, but Khan just chops him down, and a knee drop the second rope finishes.

MISSISSIPPI TITLE: MR. OLYMPIA (Champion) vs. BOB ROOP
-They criss-cross until Olympia hooks Roop in a backslide for two. Roop applies a wristlock and elbows him down. Roop starts working the leg, but Olympia stops him with one good kick. GREAT spot sees Roop try to sucker Olympia into chasing him around the ring, but Olympia instead just lets him run for a bit and then dashes back into the ring to plancha him.

-Back in, Roop takes him down with a high knee for two. Chinlock by Roop and they slug it out while Bill Watts notes that Roop humiliated Paul Orndorff so badly that Orndorff left Mid-South to go wrestle easier competition on other TV shows. Man, we’re two years away from Vince supposedly doing away with the old way of the territories cooperating and helping each other out, but here in 1982, Bill Watts week after week operates with a clear agenda of “Georgia can eat shit and die.”

-Olympia throws forearms and applies a sleeper, but Roop shocks everyone by revealing he’s discovered a reversal for the sleeper too, turning it into a backbreaker. And then he applies his own sleeper. Olympia climbs the turnbuckles and flips himself over to reverse once again to his own sleeper, and Roop fades away. I gotta disagree with Bill Watts on that one. The backbreaker should have been the finish, because then Roop would have one hell of a character to work with, the guy who cracks everyone’s finishers, and he’d look like the smartest heel in wrestling. Oh, by the way, before Bill forgets, he also wants to make it clear that Mid-South Wrestling is better than that shitty wrestling on CBN, HBO and USA Network, too. So there.

HACKSAW JIM DUGGAN vs. MIKE BOND
-Elbows and forearm smashes by Duggan. Neckbreaker by Bond, who just flops over like a dead fish when Duggan spins him around for the bump. Watts notes that Duggan was best-known in his pro football days for this type of tackle called the spear, which is completely lethal but is now illegal in the NFL. Holy crap, how did Bill Watts not put 2+2 together for that move? Backbreaker by Duggan gets the three-count.

JUNKYARD DOG & ERNIE LADD vs. HANGMAN HARRIS & THE ASSASSIN
-DiBiase comes to the ring with a pen and a tablet to take detailed notes, and then probably write some column about it like a loser.

-Dog takes on Assassin and scares him out of the ring by going after the mask. Harris gets beaten on by both guys, but Assassin loads up his mask and sneaks in to knock out Dog. Dog ends up on the floor while Ernie Ladd tries to fight off both opponents. Referee gets bumped and we have bedlam and pandemonium. DiBiase attacks JYD with a chair, but Ernie Ladd knocks him out of the ring. Grappler runs to the ring wearing an Assassin mask. In the chaos, the referee recovers, JYD thumps the Grappler, and the referee counts the pin and gives the faces the win. That wasn’t even a match, it was like they started at the finish, but that was just a great finish, with all kinds of hell breaking loose and be not even being able to type it all up.

8.5

The final score: review Very Good

The 411

This continues to be the best use of an hour of TV time that I could ever ask for.