WWWF All-Star Wrestling Review 11-04-78

Hold the phone!!! Where’s the Stache??? Say it ain’t so Larry!!!

WWWF ALL-STAR WRESTLING 11-04-78

All-Star Wrestling is taped from the Fieldhouse in Hamburg, Pennsylvania.
Taping date is November 1, 1978.

“Living Legend” BRUNO SAMMARTINO joins Vince McMahon at the announcer’s table this week for the action. Love that fake Fro. #FakeFroBruno

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MATCH #1: SPECIAL DELIVERY JONES VS. “UNPREDICTABLE” JOHNNY RODZ

Referee here is Mario Savoldi. Rodz gets control of the match early and he maintains that control for several minutes, mainly using a chinlock to keep SD on the mat. Jones makes an ill-fated attempt at a comeback for a moment before Rodz takes right back over with a sloppy backdrop and a big elbow drop gets Johnny a 2 count. SD counters a second backdrop attempted with a sunset flip for a near fall. That only pisses Rodz off as he starts dropping stomps off the middle rope to the head of Jones. Johnny continues to dominate as he smashes Jones on the mat. Rodz with a pair of basement dropkicks! DAMN. Rodz tries a third dropkick but SD moves and Johnny lands into the ropes for a nice bump. 

Jones jumps up to make a comeback but the bell sounds IMMEDIATELY and Jones isn’t even given any time to amount any type of a comeback.

Official result is a 10:00 Draw

Notes: Well that took up a quarter of the show. This felt like complete filler, and for good reason with two lower card guys competing against one another. Both guys knew how to work, ESPECIALLY RODZ so it wasn’t bad story telling, just boring. It would have been a little better if they had saved some time for SD to at least get in some comeback offense before time expired. This was just Rodz beating SD’s ass for 9:30 of a ten minute bout.[spacer height=”20px”]

MATCH #2: DINO BRAVO & DOMINIC DENUCCI VS. JOSE ESTRADA & DAVEY O’HANNON

[spacer height=”20px”]Referee is Dick Woehrle. DeNucci & O’Hannon to start. Dominic sporting a singlet this week. Davey applauds his efforts for holding his own against Dominic, so DeNucci slaps him across the nose. LOL. O’Hannon complains to referee Woehrle and asks Dick to check his nose. While O’Hannon complains Dominic comes over and pops him in the nose again. LOL. Dominic outwrestles O’Hannon with some basic offense. Davey finally catches DeNucci with a knee to the head and brings him back to the heel corner where he and Estrada double team and work over Dominic. Estrada distracts Woehrle and causes him to miss DeNucci making the tag to Dino Bravo. DeNucci is forced to continue as the legal man. Dominic does his best to fight his way out of the heel corner with little success.

DeNucci finally slides around O’Hannon and gets the tag to Bravo. Hot tag to Dino and business picks up. HUGE backdrop on Davey sends O’Hannon into the ropes. Estrada comes into the ring and Dino works him over as well. Bravo and DeNucci Irish whip the heels into each other. Dino covers Estrada but Jose is the illegal man. Dino goes to work on Davey O’Hannon and hits a big legdrop, but Estrada breaks up a cover. DeNucci tags back in and takes on both Estrada and O’Hannon at the same time. DeNucci backdrops Estrada. Tag back to Dino who lands a nice DROPKICK, the Airplane Spin, and it’s over in 7:38.

Winners are Bravo & DeNucci

Notes: Both Estrada and O’Hannon were very handy heels and it was good to see them working the tag team format, distracting the ref to allow double teaming and causing Woehrle to miss a tag.[spacer height=”20px”]

RINGSIDE INTERVIEW WITH FRED BLASSIE, SPIROS ARION, VICTOR RIVERA

[spacer height=”20px”]Blassie starts right off making fun of the ringside fans. Calling his favorite fat fan an eater of garbage. He then turns his attention to a guy with coke bottle glasses and a big nose before getting to the subject at hand. He refers to Arion & Rivera  as the next Tag Team Champions. On paper I could buy that, but having to watch them in the ring circa 1978 week after week, I’m not so sure. Blassie says you spell charm M-O-N-E-Y. Rivera speaks next. He’s on board with the “next tag team champions” thing. Vince brings up Rivera being a former champion with Dominic DeNucci. Rivera actually left the territory during that title run. Rivera speaks Spanish. No idea.

Arion is next. He asks Vince if he’s ever seen a better team. Vince nods his head yes. Arion replies “don’t lie”. lol. Arion says they made New York. Their history speaks for itself. It’s rough when Arion is the more understandable speaker of a team.

Blassie is still pissed off that Backlund chose Arnold Skaaland over Blassie as manager. He rambles about a 1902 road map as time runs out.[spacer height=”20px”]

MATCH #3: TONY GAREA & LARRY ZBYSZKO VS. VICTOR RIVERA & SPIROS ARION (w/FRED BLASSIE)

I smell some short matches coming. We’re 2/3 of the way through this episode and the third match is JUST STARTING.

HOLD THE PHONE. WHAT IN THE???? LARRY ZBYSZKO SHAVED HIS STACHE!!! WHAT???? NOOOOO!!!! SAY IT AIN’T SO LARRY!!!

I blame Tony Garea. DAMN that Tony Garea!!!

I hope this is better than the interview. Larry & Rivera will start. Big backdrop by Larry and a series of nice armdrags sends Victor to the outside. Victor returns to the ring and takes control, bringing Larry to the heel corner where Arion tags in and pounds Larry on the mat. For some reason Arion drags Larry to the FACE corner, and even Bruno is confused why he would do that. Needless to say, Garea tags in and the faces whip the heels into each other.

Garea and Arion are now the legal men. Garea with a dropkick sends Arion OVER THE TOP ROPE to the floor. Nice. Rivera comes running in and eats an armdrag, and Victor too is dropkicked to the floor.

The heels regroup and Spiros returns to the ring and takes over on Garea, Rivera tags in and the heels double team Tony. Victor works a chinlock which eventually leads to all four men in the ring and referee Mario Savoldi throws the match out as all four men brawl around the ring after 5:09.

The faces run the heels off, but we wind up with no winner.

Official Results is a Double DQ

Notes: That was WAY better than I expected. Even more odd, the guy I expected to pick up the pace (Zbyszko) didn’t do anything beyond the first minute of the match. This was another instance where Arion may not have been great on offense, but he sold well and showed his aggressive side in the ring. Rivera also came to work. I haven’t been inspired by any of Victor’s offense since his return here in 1978, but he was a bumping machine here for Larry and Tony. Hell, even Garea was decent here. It was short, which may have been why it didn’t have time to slow down, but I enjoyed the match. The finish, not so much.[spacer height=”20px”]

MATCH #4: CRUSHER BLACKWELL (w/THE GRAND WIZARD) VS. STEVE KING

I like the Crusher in orange. Blackwell scoops up the Wizard like a baby and helps him out of the ring. You just KNOW the Wiz was into that sort of thing.

Blackwell is all over King right away. Beating him down and SMASHING him with an Avalanche splash in the corner. Crusher throws King across the ring with a slam. Falling headbutt on Steve. Scoops King up HIGH in the air for a backbreaker. Crusher applies a HALF CRAB for the submission. Wow, nice. Blackwell gets the submission win in 1:52.

Winner is The Crusher

Notes: First off, that splash in the corner was AWESOME. Second, normally I may question the idea of a guy who weighs 400+ pounds using a Boston Crab as a finisher, but Blackwell applied it so perfectly and made it look so real that I really liked it and I thought it added yet another dimension to the Crusher’s arsenal. I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again… I wish they would have done more with Blackwell during this run.[spacer height=”20px”]

MATCH #5: CHIEF JAY STRONGBOW VS. TONY RUSSO

Strongbow slides through Russo’s legs and catches him with a chop early on. They go at it again and Strongbow begins bouncing off several ropes to confuse Russo, before sliding through his legs again for another chop. Tony hooks a front facelock, but Strongbow picks him up in the air and throws him across the ring onto his stomach. Russo finally thinks he has control as he grabs a headlock, but the two men wing up in a crisscross spot and AGAIN Jay slides through Russo’s legs for ANOTHER CHOP.

Russo FINALLY gets the better of Strongbow and stomps on his head. Russo chokes Jay across the ropes and Strongbow has to rolls to the floor to collect himself. Jay tries to climb back inside but Russo meets him with a knee to the head. Strongbow finally finds his way back into the ring and starts NO SELLING Russo. Jay begins to dance, he’s on the WAR PATH. Chop. Kneelift. Double Chop. It’s over in 5:25.

Winner is the Chief

Notes: Strongbow did as much as he could with as little as he could. It shows here. He found a way to work the same spot into the match three times in a row by changing it up a little. Then the finish, a little “war dance” and some awful chops and the fans ate it up. They shouldn’t call it HULKING UP, they should call it CHIEFING UP. Brother.[spacer height=”20px”]

Closing Thoughts: This wasn’t a bad show. Garea & Zbyszko vs. Rivera & Arion was solid for the time they got, but the non-finish sucked. Not that I expected a definitive finish for a match of that stature on TV. I almost wish Arion and Rivera would have got a run as tag champs… ALMOST. I feel like it SOUNDS like a good idea, but I don’t know if they would have kept up the hard work to keep things entertaining here in 1978 – going into ’79.

Blackwell continues to impress, even in a 2 minute squash. We haven’t seen much of Chief Jay in singles, if at all, up to this point so it was cool in the fact that at least we got to see it. Bravo & DeNucci over O’Hannon and Rivera was decent for a squash with the heels getting a little time to make it feel like a real match, even if we weren’t fooled. Rodz vs. SD ate up 1/4 of the show, and as much as I like Rodz I could have done without this match. Still though, the biggest bummer about this show is Larry Zbyszko ditched his mustache. Booo!

Everyone reading the Retro Rasslin’ Review can Tweet Larry right now #BringBackTheStache at https://twitter.com/livinglegendlz