Prime Time Wrestling 4/4/88
– Just to clarify for the sake of consistency, there was an episode of PTW on 3/29/88 which was treated as a “Best of Tuesday Night Titans” episode. The episode was taped prior to WrestleMania IV, and hosted by former TNT alumni Vince McMahon and “Lord” Alfred Hayes. It featured clips and whatnot from the old TNT show as a filler episode of Prime Time. Now that we’re over a week removed from the PPV, we’re back to the normal format with Gorilla and Bobby hosting as we prepare for the “Macho Era”, dig it?
– Gorilla and Bobby open up the show by making references to their time in Atlantic City, Gorilla puts over the “new champion”, never making mention of any details from the PPV or even naming who the new champion was. Monsoon then throws us to a promo with the “new champion”, but instead we get treated to the last few minutes of the DiBiase vs. Savage main event from WrestleMania. Following the footage, Heenan and Gorilla bicker about how the finish of the match played out with both Andre and the Hulkster getting involved. But we have a new champion, “Macho Man” Randy Savage, and tough nuts to Mr. Money Bags and the Jolly Green Giant.
Match #1: Koko B. Ware v. Dino Bravo (w/ Frenchy Martin). From Copps Coliseum in Hamilton, Ontario 3/13/88. Commentators are Craig DeGeorge & Nick Bockwinkel. Bravo has fun overpowering Koko on an early lock up, but once they turned to actual wrestling, Koko cleared the ring of Bravo. Dino teases leaving, and I wish he had. Bravo shits around outside the ring for almost 2 minutes before getting back in. Ware goes back on the offense until Dino counters a monkey flip with an inverted atomic drop. Dino sends Koko outside where he rams him into the security rail, and then Frenchy takes some cheap shots on the Birdman. Back in the ring, Bravo applies a chinlock. Excitement ensues. Ware finally fights his way out of the chinlock and hits a reverse body block from the second rope, but Frenchy gets the referee’s attention and Koko only gets a two count. Dino tries a piledriver, but Koko counters with a backdrop, and then a pair of dropkicks gets a 2 count. Ware misses a charge in the corner, and Bravo capitalizes with his patented Side Suplex for the finish in 7:46. Koko was Okok, see what I did there? Bravo was the usual shits, an atomic drop, a chinlock, and his finisher. 1/2* all for Koko, who tried, God bless him.
The match was so exciting that we’re treated to a replay of the entire finish, complete with Frenchy Martin coming in to congratulate by grabbing Dino’s tits from behind. Seriously, check it out, or maybe don’t.
– Special Interview conducted by Craig DeGeorge from the Bristol, TN, “Wrestling Challenge” TV Taping on 3/8/88. DeGeorge interviews “The Rock” Don Muraco and his manager “Superstar” Billy Graham. The Superstar puts over Muraco’s physique and then plays up how Don was the only man to check on him and help him in his recovery. Muraco takes over on the promo, says how Graham’s inspiration is his motivation. Muraco tries to cut a Graham, promo, it’s passable but obviously forced. No real point to this interview. Vince loved him some Superstar Graham, and the jacked-up roid monsters that followed.
Match #2: Bad News Brown v. Brady Boone. From the Municipal Auditorium in Nashville, TN, at the SNME Tapings from 3/7/88. Inserted audio commentary from Gorilla and Bobby on this one. It’s tit for tat early, Brown getting in some shots, and Boone retaliating. Brady ducks a charge and backdrops Brown to the outside. Boone jerks the top rope to bring Bad News back in “the hard way”, and somehow Brady manages to lose his balance and fall backwards onto his ass. Damn, Boone is the shits. Seriously, for an athlete, he’s the clumsiest damn guy I’ve ever seen. BNB takes back over and beats the crap out of Boone. Brown hits a running powerslam for two. BNB misses a fist drop off the second rope and Boone gets one final chance at some offense. Brady hits a flying back elbow for a one count, Brown won’t even give him two. Boone does a back flip off the top rope and lands on his feet, then he WALKS into a boot to the chest and takes a back bump like he’s just been shot. Ghetto Blaster ends this crap after 5:56. I seriously didn’t realize how shitty Boone was until I started doing these Prime Time Reviews. Anyway, Brown slaps him around after the match and tosses him out of the ring. 1/4* for the attempt, but nothing in this match was good and the crowd was nonexistent for this one.
– Post WrestleMania IV Report with Gene Okerlund: Demolition defeated Strike Force for the WWF Tag Team Titles, highlights are shown. Gene also touches on Andre the Giant aiding DiBiase in a win over Hacksaw Duggan in the opening round of the title tournament. We hear from Jim Duggan after seeing a clip from the match. Hacksaw wants him a piece of Andre for costing him a shot at the gold, as the post Mania feuds start to brew. Back in the studio, Gorilla and Bobby discuss the Duggan/Andre issues. Heenan of course has his own version of how things went down.
Match #3: “Outlaw” Ron Bass v. Rick Hunter. From Viking Hall in Bristol, TN, “Wrestling Challenge” TV Tapings 3/8/88. Gorilla & Bobby on inserted commentary again. Hunter is a long time journeyman wrestler from the west coast and he’s showing his age here. Bass also worked on the west coast in the late 1970’s as Sam Oliver Bass, or “S.O.B.”, pretty fun fact, huh? Hunter executes a very sloppy Jack Brisco style sunset flip out of the corner, and then nearly botches an inside cradle. Bass comes back with the same move over and over. He keeps whipping Rick off the ropes and hitting a forearm to the head. Outlaw changes it up a little with a clothesline and an elbow off the ropes, but it’s basically the same move like six times. And then the pedigree like piledriver ends it in 2:30. 1/4* just because, seeing Bass hit the same move that many times made me laugh.
– ANGLE TIME. Ron Bass is given about 3 seconds to celebrate before The Junkyard Dog is introduced for his “match”. Even though there’s no jobber in the ring, the Dog’s music isn’t playing, and this is taking place like literally 5 seconds after the previous match, somehow the JYD is introduced for his match. But why? Well, you’ll see why. As the Dog makes it to ringside, he’s stopped in his tracks by the bully Outlaw. JYD tries to kindly step around Bass, but the Outlaw keeps blocking the JYD’s way. What a heel! The two men exchange words, and the Dog finally steps around Bass. But the Outlaw isn’t finished. Bass grabs his whip “Miss Betsy” and starts to choke the JYD from behind right in the aisle. Bass drags JYD by the throat all the way up the aisle back towards the entrance, JYD is frothing at the mouth as he’s choked out as we cut away.
Match #4: Noriyo Tateno (w/ Itsuki Yamazaki) v. Leilani Kai (w/ Judy Martin and Jimmy Hart). From Copps Coliseum in Hamilton, Ontario 3/13/88. For some reason we get Gorilla and Bobby inserted audio over this match, even though Craig DeGeorge & Nick Bockwinkel were there. Guess I shouldn’t complain though. Judy Martin is hobbling very noticeably at ringside, not sure what’s supposed to be wrong with her leg. The match actually starts off with the heels in full force, but Tateno actually leaves the ring to retrieve Yamazaki from the locker room to watch her back. These two teams had an awesome match against each other back at the Royal Rumble in January in this very arena. It’s back and forth from the start, Tateno with some nice stiff looking shots and submission spots, and Kai gets in her shots too. Kai starts to work the leg of Tateno, but it’s Noriyo who takes over on the leg of Leilani. Kai finally escapes a leglock and takes Tateno down. Kai then distracts the ref while Judy Martin chokes Tateno with a tag rope she removed from the corner buckle. Kai takes control of the match, letting Martin get her cheap shots in, with Yamazaki edging her way over to make the save each time before being caught by the referee. From there, the two girls trade shots, Tateno hits a pair of flying clotheslines and a double underhook suplex for two. Kai comes back with sort of a Northern Lights suplex for two. Tateno comes back with a Fisherman’s Suplex, but Judy Martin has the referee distracted to prevent the count. Tateno hits a clothesline off the second rope, but Jimmy Hart puts Leilani’s leg on the ropes to stop the count. Hart then grabs Tateno’s leg to help Kai take over control once more. Yamazaki has enough and starts chasing Hart around ringside. Hart jumps up onto the apron to escape, but Kai runs right into Jimmy. Hart bumps off the apron and Kai goes down. Tateno makes the cover for the win in 13:10. The finishing sequence sounds pretty exciting when writing it, but outside of the first couple of minutes and the last couple of minutes this was pretty bad. I expected much better, but the middle of this match was worked in 1980’s American Ladies Wrestling format, and that’s never a good thing. One * at the very best, disappointing.
Back in the studio, the very first words after the match…
Gorilla: Wasn’t That Exciting?
Heenan: No.
Bobby said it so quickly and nonchalantly, the delivery was great.
Match #5: Andre the Giant v. Brian Costello. From Winston-Salem, NC 3/9/88 “Superstars” Tapings in the Coliseum. This is straight from Superstars with Vince McMahon and Jesse Ventura on commentary. Bruno Sammartino is now gone from the WWF and will vehemently attack them for the next 25 years. Andre attacks Costello before the bell, headbutts the shit out of him and flings him to the floor like a big turd. So I guess no match. “Hacksaw” Jim Duggan is out just seconds later with his 2×4. This is supposed to be Hacksaw confronting Andre after the Mania IV screw job, but it was taped weeks ahead of time. Duggan challenges Andre to a one-on-one match. Andre laughs, flings sweat from his forehead onto Duggan and then starts to choke Hacksaw out. Duggan drops his board as he’s being choked down by the Giant. Duggan tries to fight back but gets a bloody mouth for his trouble. Finally, Hacksaw feels around and grabs his board, clocking Andre in the head with it to get the release. Andre tumbles backward, knocked out cold from the 2×4 shot. Andre lays there dead afterwards as a bloody faced Hacksaw celebrates with his 2×4. No match, but with the angle this is the best thing on the show.
– Bobby and Gorilla have a lengthy conversation about Duggan waking the sleeping giant, or is it putting to sleep an awaken giant? We go back to the footage after the commercial break with Andre finally coming around in the ring. Several officials are checking on Andre when he snaps and starts attacking everyone in sight, even shoving a camera man off the apron. The Giant is PISSED OFF and starts making his way to the locker room to go after Duggan.
Match #6: George “The Animal” Steele v. Boris Zhukov (w/ Nikolai Volkoff and Slick). From Viking Hall in Bristol, TN, “Wrestling Challenge” TV Tapings 3/8/88. This is the “feature” match, but I’ll use that term loosely. Bruce Prichard and Alfred Hayes on inserted audio commentary for this one. Nikolai wants to sing the Russian anthem before the match, but the Animal attacks and clears the ring of the Bolsheviks and Slick. Nikolai is up on the apron from the start of the match. Steele works over Zhukov. Slick hits the Animal with his cane, but George no sells it. God, what an easy job to be Steele. George starts biting Zhukov and Slick hits him with the cane again, and this time the Animal sells it for whatever reason. Boris grabs the ref’s attention and Slick cracks Steele in the face with the cane. And then Slick chokes Steele over the bottom rope. At this point, Slick his garnered far more offense than Zhukov. After choking Steele, Boris tries his first move of the match, a clotheslines, but Animal bites Zhukov’s arm and takes back over. George takes Boris to the corner, and Nikolai jumps in to interfere, causing a DQ in 2:30. WTF? The Bolsheviks and Slick attack Steele after the bell and toss him outside. The Animal grabs chairs and starts flinging them in the ring, then chases all three heels to the back with a plastic chair. That’s scary. George then returns to the ring to eat a turnbuckle pad. How the hell can you call this a MATCH, much less a “feature” match. I don’t even understand the point of this. 1/4* for the Slickster on offense.
– Bobby and Gorilla close the show, reminding us of some of the latest happenings between WrestleMania and this show. Bobby also reminds everyone that he won at WrestleMania. That wraps things up here.
Final Thoughts: Quite easily one of the least eventful episodes of Prime Time Wrestling that I can recall seeing. They’re in a position where they are beginning a “new season”, with new feuds, new champions, and this show was very much filler as they work towards new sets of TV Tapings and angles. I did like them getting the jump on Duggan vs. Andre, because without that, this show would have been completely brutal. JYD vs. Bass still shocks me that they even wasted time on giving guys so far down the totem pole an angle, but it’s better than nothing. The ladies match was a huge disappointment and a far cry from the tag team matches the girls had. Bravo continues to get the unwarranted push for being juiced up, and the Steele vs. Zhukov match was so short and odd it was more pointless than it even looks on paper. The studio banter was on par with a usual episode, Gorilla and Bobby are never “bad”, but nothing really stood out this week. They spent a lot of time hyping the WrestleMania IV double cassette set, but that’s expected.
Match of the Night: I guess you’d call it Andre vs. Costello, but obviously there was no match. The angle with Duggan was better than anything else on this episode by a long shot. Unless you were there in that time period, you probably can’t appreciate how huge it was when Duggan KO’d the Giant. I don’t know that I’d want to sit through anything else on this show again.
