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The Name on the Marquee: Smoky Mountain Wrestling (9.9.1995)

May 12, 2018 | Posted by Adam Nedeff
Jim Cornette Smoky Mountain Wrestling
4.4
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The Name on the Marquee: Smoky Mountain Wrestling (9.9.1995)  

-Cold open: At a house show in Barbourville, KY, General Cornette announces that he’s court martialing Buddy Landell and kicking him out of the Militia.

-Originally aired September 9, 1995.

-Your host his Chip Kessler.

-We go to more house show action, the closing moments of a ten-man elimination tag match, with the winner getting $5,000. We’re down to Boo Bradley and Terry Gordy. Cornette trips Boo, Gordy drops a big elbow for three, and Gordy’s $5,000 richer. They put a beating on Boo after the match, but Brad Armstrong comes to the rescue. Cornette blinds Armstrong with some sort of sinister powder, and Gordy powerbombs Armstrong twice. He pins Armstrong and Cornette counts the pin, declaring Terry Gordy the SMW Champion.

-Terry Gordy issues the formal challenge for a title challenge. Armstrong calls bullshit on Gordy declaring a victory but accepts the challenge.

-We revisit the chaotic Thugs/Heavenly Bodies match from last week. Tonight’s match in Johnson City should be a heck of a battle!

-We recap the whole Buddy Landell saga, starting with his five-star promo owning up to his alcohol problem. Next, a montage of highlights from the Shawn Michaels/Buddy Landell match, set to “Going the Distance” from the Rocky soundtrack. And then for padding, we watch just the finish over again, plus the post-match argument between Buddy and Jim Cornette. We jump ahead to Cornette screwing up the SMW Title match and causing Brad Armstrong to win the belt, plus all the most-match shenanigans and Cornette’s declaration that Landell is being demoted.

-Next, we’re off to house show highlights of Bob and Brad Armstrong against Landell and Tommy Rich. Brad applies a sleeper on Landell when Cornette runs in with an ether-soaked rag and tries to smother him, but Armstrong catches him, grabs the rag, chases Cornette out of the ring, and smothers Landell with the rag to put him to sleep and get a three-count. Cornette lays the blame squarely on Landell for screwing up, and Landell has finally had enough and takes on Cornette, Punisher, Rich, and Gordy all at once, and holding his own very successfully until Punisher breaks out a blackjack and opens Buddy up with it, and now it’s a 4-on-1 attack. Buddy is bleeding (although the Heavenly Bodies have set the bar so high for blood in this territory that by comparison, Buddy just looks like a cat scratched him).

-Cornette lashes out at the drunk junkie Buddy Landell for being jealous of former world champion Tommy Rich, who DIDN’T screw up his career opportunities.

-Chip Kessler talks to Buddy Landell, who says he’s ten years younger than Tommy Rich(!) and he’s his own one-man Militia. I went ahead and looked it up and I’m honestly surprised to learn that Tommy is even five years older than Buddy.

4.4
The final score: review Poor
The 411
It's neat to see a whole story re-told like this on the one hand, but on the other, it's such a red flag that things are wrong with the company that it's hard to enjoy it.
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