WWWF All-Star Wrestling (8.5.1978) Review

-Originally aired August 5, 1978.

-Your host is Vince McMahon.

SPRIOS ARION vs. FRANK WILLIAMS
-Crowd actually swarms the ring to get autographs from Frank Williams during the intro. Those fans are probably retired now thanks to Ebay auctions.

-Arion stomps and chokes away at Williams. Williams fights back with a hammerlock. Arion fights back and goes for a neckbreaker, but Williams actually blocks it by grabbing the ropes and Arion lands flat on his back. Hard rights and turnbuckle shots as Williams has the best week of his life. Handful of tights puts a stop to it, and a backbreaker finishes for Arion. Actually kind of exciting for a moment there.

YUKON LUMBERJACKS (Tag Team Champions, with Captain Lou Albano) vs. JIM RAY & CARLOS CRUZ
-Lumberjacks double-team Cruz and whip him into his own corner, and the jobbers surprise Eric by just lighting into him once he’s in that corner. Ray cracks Vince up with his unique brand of hulking up when he gets in the ring, as he just…vibrates and looks like he’s trying to charge an invisible battery.

-Eric tags in and clamps on a nerve hold, then snapmares him. Everybody tags, but Cruz runs into a boot by Pierre. Double-teaming in the corner by the Lumberjacks, as they work together on a stomachbreaker. The Double-Ax (both guys do Polish hammers, essentially) finishes.

-Ringside interview with Dino Bravo. Dino mentions that he’s already won championships in the NWA, but he wants to keep winning titles in the WWWF because it’s the #1 area in the world for wrestling. He also says that to succeed in wrestling, you have to put out. I hope he’s training at the Terry Garvin School of Self-Defense for his next match, then. Bravo goes on to assure us that he jogs seven miles a day, and that he is quite supple.

LUKE GRAHAM (with The Grand Wizard) vs. MIKE MILTON
-Milton is billed from Ohio and he looks so much like Frank Williams that I feel like there’s a connection there. Graham uses his weapon, with Wizard providing an assist by snatching it from his tights and tucking it back in his tights as needed so the referee won’t find anything during a search. Shot to the throat ends it.

DINO BRAVO vs. BARON MIKEL SCICLUNA
-Bravo with a side headlock to start. Baron slips free and boots away, then applies a nerve hold. Dino with a chinlock as I begin to worry I might get whiplash from merely watching this frenzied action. Pair of dropkicks by Dino sends the Baron over the top rope, and Dino gets the win after the fastest ten-count ever, as even the referee didn’t want this match to keep going longer than it absolutely had to.

VICTOR RIVERA vs. LOUIS LUGO
-Rivera was last seen here as a babyface, but he’s “a changed man” according to Vince. Rivera rips at the face and chokes away. Rivera sends Lugo over the top rope and posts him. Back in, a suplex finishes with ease, and Rivera dumps Lugo over the top rope again.

-Vince is with Gorilla Monsoon. Gorilla suspects that Rivera has struck up a friendship with Fred Blassie.

4.0

The final score: review Poor

The 411

Frank Williams gets Match of the Week honors. I mean, really...