Very few men define the term “tag team specialist†like Bobby Eaton. However, there is much more to his career than simply the Midnight Express.
43. BOBBY EATON
Hometown – Huntsville, Alabama
Aliases – Earl Robert Eaton; Beautiful Bobby Eaton
Debut – May, 1976
Titles Held – WCW World Tag Team (with Arn Anderson); WCW Television; NWA United States Tag Team (3x – with Stan Lane); NWA Georgia Television; IWC Tag Team (with Dennis Condrey); NWA World Tag Team (2x – 1 with Dennis Condrey, 1 with Stan Lane); NWA Mid-Atlantic Tag Team (with Ricky Nelson); AWA Southern Tag Team (4x – 2 with Sweet Brown Sugar, 2 with Duke Myers); CWA World Heavyweight; NWA Mid-America Heavyweight (11x); NWA Mid-America Tag Team (6x – 1 with Lanny Poffo, 3 with George Gulas, 1 with Mexican Angel, 1 with Great Togo); NWA Six-Man Tag Team (4x – 1 with George Gulas and Jerry Barber, 1 with Gulas and Arvil Hutto, 1 with Gulas and Mexican Angel, 1 with Secret Weapon and Tojo Yamamoto); NWA Mid-America Television; Mid-South Tag Team (2x – with Dennis Condrey); NWA Bluegrass Tag Team (with Dennis Condrey); NWA Rocky Top Tag Team (with Dennis Condrey); SMW Beat the Champ Television; NWA American Tag Team (with Dennis Condrey)
Other Accomplishments – generally considered one of the nicest guys in wrestling; trained by Tojo Yamamoto
Bobby Eaton got his start in the wrestling business at an early age. At the age of 13, he was already helping to set up the ring for wrestling shows in his hometown. It didn’t take long for him to begin training under Memphis legend Tojo Yamamoto.
In 1976 Eaton debuted for NWA Mid-America – the Memphis wrestling company run by Nick Gulas. Eaton soon began catching Gulas’s eye, and he found himself on the way up the card.
Eaton’s first major feud was against the Hollywood Blonds – Jerry Brown and pre-Freebird Buddy Roberts. The angle saw Eaton recruiting different partners (including Yamamoto) to battle the Blonds, although they were never able to take the Mid-America Tag Team titles from them. In September of 1977 the Blonds lost the belts to Norvell Austin and Pat Barrett and left the promotion, going their separate ways. Eaton was given credit for running them out of Memphis.
Eaton got his first taste of gold in January of 1978 when he and Leapin’ Lanny Poffo (better known as the WWF’s Genius) defeated Gypsy Joe and Leroy Rochester to capture the Mid-America tag team titles. They held them for about a month before losing them to Gypsy Joe and his new partner Dutch Mantell.
By December, Eaton had allied with promoter Nick Gulas’s son George to form a team known as the Jet Set. They captured the tag team titles from Gypsy Joe and Tojo Yamamoto on December 16, and lost them to Terry Gordy and Michael Hayes on January 7.
Eaton wasn’t giving up that easily. With new partner Mexican Angel, they defeated Hayes and Gordy in February to regain the titles. Their reign was brief as the future Freebirds regained the belts later that month.
Eaton soon found himself in a feud with Chris Colt that centered around the Mid-America Heavyweight title Eaton had won in February. In April, Colt captured the title. The war became so heated that Colt found himself suspended for hitting Eaton with a piledriver on the concrete floor.
September saw the Jet Set winning the tag titles for the second time by defeating Yamamoto and the Great Togo. They held the titles until November, when they split up (when Eaton became a heel by joining Tojo Yamamoto’s stable) and the belts were vacated.
In October Eaton became a double champion as he defeated Dutch Mantell to regain the Mid-America Heavyweight belt. His reign lasted nearly a month until old foe Chris Colt captured it. In December, Eaton decisively regained the belt and found himself moved to the upper-midcard and main event level.
Interestingly enough, during this time period Eaton competed often against Dennis Condrey.
In January, the Jet Set was reborn as Eaton saved Gulas from a beatdown from the Blond Bombers (Larry Latham (better known as Moondog Spot) and Wayne Farris (WWF’s Honky Tonk Man). In January of 1980 the Jet Set began their third title reign after defeating the Bombers. They would hold the belts for about three weeks before the Bombers recaptured them.
February 17 saw Gorgeous George Jr. defeating Eaton for the heavyweight belt. Eaton quickly recaptured it and just as quickly lost it to Tojo Yamamoto.
Eaton had one final tag team reign in June as he teamed with Great Togo to take the belts from Rocky Brewer and George Gulas. It would be old foes the Blond Bombers who dethroned them in July.
On July 23rd, Eaton regained the heavyweight title. He would be the final champion under Gulas.
In October, Gulas’s promotion (which had been struggling for some time against Jerry Jarrett’s upstart company) finally shut down and Eaton headed to Georgia.
He didn’t stay gone long. Eaton soon returned to Memphis, this time to Jarrett’s CWA where he was again placed in the tag team division. Interestingly, one of his common opponents during this time was Stan Lane.
In March of 1982, Eaton and Sweet Brown Sugar (better known as Koko B. Ware) with manager Jimmy Hart won a tournament to crown new AWA Southern Tag Team champions as the New Wave. They held the belt for nearly a month before Bill Dundee and Steve Keirn defeated them.
In May Eaton once again won the Mid-America title (now being associated with the CWA). He held it for a week, and was defeated by King Cobra.
In July of 1982 Eaton defeated Dutch Mantell to begin his seventh Mid-America Heavyweight title reign. However, Bill Dundee soon captured the belt from him.
The New Wave wasn’t finished, however. In August they defeated Dream Machine and Jim Mitchell to regain the gold. They held the belts two weeks before they fell to Steve Keirn and Terry Taylor.
In December Eaton won the belts again with new partner Duke Myers. However, the belts soon went back to the dominant tag team in the promotion – the Fabulous Ones (Stan Lane and Steve Keirn).
Eaton regained the title from Jacques Rougeau on January 10 although it was soon vacated. Eaton would re-win the title in February, this time defeating Sweet Brown Sugar in a tournament final.
Eaton’s changing attitudes caused the New Wave to split as the former partners began battling over the title. Sugar won the belt on the 25th of February and Eaton immediately challenged him to a rematch on the 28th.
This time the match was a Loser Leaves Town match. Eaton won and Sugar was forced to leave town, although a masked man named Stagger Lee (Sugar under the mask) soon began attacking Eaton. Lee won the belt on March seventh to end Eaton’s tenth title reign.
Eaton soon joined forces with the Moondogs as they battled Jerry Lawler and the Fabulous Ones. During one match the Moondogs hit Eaton with a bone which wound up costing them the match. The Moondogs and Hart attacked Eaton after the match and he was saved by Stagger Lee.
Soon thereafter, Eaton left the CWA and headed to Bill Watts’s Mid-South Wrestling. There he was teamed with Dennis Condrey as the Midnight Express. To complement Condrey’s “Loverboy†nickname, Eaton was given the nickname “Beautiful.†The two were then given Jim Cornette as a manager.
The Midnight Express soon began feuding with tag team champions Magnum TA and Mr. Wrestling II. The Express were hated and even went so far as to tar and feather Magnum on television. On March 13, 1984 the Express won the tag team titles when Mr. Wrestling attacked Magnum during the title match.
But a new threat was on the horizon. The newest foes for the Express turned out to be Ricky Morton and Robert Gibson, the Rock ‘N Roll Express. In May, Morton and Gibson won the titles. Eaton and Condrey regained them later that month and held them until September when Morton and Gibson won them again.
After the final loss, the Midnights left the promotion and headed to Fritz Von Erich’s World Class Championship Wrestling. Here their main foes were Tommy Rogers and Bobby Fulton – the Fantastics.
The Express captured the American Tag Team titles in January of 1985 and held them until March when the belts were held up following a rematch which had seen Jim Cornette getting involved. The Fantastics regained the belts in May at the second David Von Erich Memorial Parade of Champions.
The next stop for the Express was Jim Crockett’s NWA promotion, where the Rock N Roll Express were already waiting. Eaton and Gibson dethroned Gibson and Morton in February of 1986 to win the NWA World Tag Team titles. Gibson and Morton took them back in August.
1987 saw a massive change for the Midnight Express. Dennis Condrey left the company and was replaced in the Midnights with Sweet Stan Lane.
It didn’t take long for the new Midnights to win gold. In May, the Midnight Express defeated Ron Garvin and Barry Windham in a tournament to crown new NWA United States Tag Team champions. They held these belts for nearly a year. In April of 1988 old foes the Fantastics took the gold away and the Midnights reclaimed the belts in July.
The Midnights were forced to give up the belts in September. They defeated Arn Anderson and Tully Blanchard to win the NWA World Tag Team titles. This time they lost the gold to the Road Warriors (Hawk and Animal) on October 29. The battle turned the Warriors heel and turned the Midnights into babyfaces.
In late 1988, Cornette’s worst nightmare came true as his nemesis Paul E. Dangerously (Paul Heyman) debuted a new team – the Original Midnight Express, composed of former members Dennis Condrey and Randy Rose.
The two teams battled throughout the rest of the year with Cornette’s team coming out on top during a match at Starrcade. However, problems soon arose again with Condrey and he left the company. Dangerously’s team replaced him with Jack Victory.
The blowoff match happened at February’s Chi-Town Rumble as Cornette’s team defeated Rose and Victory in a Loser Leaves the NWA match.
The next feud the Midnights had was an unexpected one. Johnny Ace and Shane Douglas were teaming as the Dynamic Dudes. The Dudes came to Cornette and told him how they had idolized the Midnights before asking him to manage them as well. Against the protests of Lane and Eaton, he did so.
At the November 1989 Clash of the Champions, the two teams faced off with Cornette in a neutral corner to force him to make his choice. In the end, Cornette blasted Douglas with his tennis racket and the Midnights not only won the match but also returned to more familiar heel territory.
In May of 1990, the Midnights defeated Brian Pillman and Tom Zenk to win the NWA United States Tag Team titles for the third time. They held the belts until August, when they were defeated by the Steiner Brothers.
In November, the Midnights split up again with Cornette and Lane leaving the company.
May of 1991 saw Eaton, who’d been reestablishing himself as a singles competitor, defeat Arn Anderson to win the WCW World Television title. June 3rd saw him lose the belt to up and comer Steve Austin.
June 14th saw Eaton face World champion Ric Flair in a two-out-of-three falls match. Although Eaton won the first fall, Flair won the match with the two remaining.
Eaton went on to feud with Alexandra York (Terri Runnells) and her York Foundation until November of 1991. At the November Clash of the Champions, Lex Luger attacked Sting from behind until he was run off by several faces. Eaton urged Sting to get his knee checked out and told him he’d have plenty of time to get back to defend his United States title against Paul E Dangerously’s Ravishing Rick Rude. Sting did so and Dangerously revealed that if Sting didn’t make it back that Rude would win the belt.
Sting lost the match to Rude and on the next WCW Saturday Night the Dangerous Alliance was born consisting of Dangerously, Eaton, Rude, Madusa, Arn Anderson, Larry Zbyszko, and Steve Austin.
Eaton and Anderson soon became the Alliance’s premier tag team and they defeated Ricky Steamboat and Dustin Rhodes on January 16 to win the World Tag Team titles. They held the belts until May, when they lost them to the Steiner Brothers.
Shortly thereafter, at May 17’s Wrestle War, the Alliance faced Sting, Dustin Rhodes, Barry Windham, Nikita Koloff, and Ricky Steamboat in a War Games match. Zbyszko hit Eaton in the arm with a metal rod and Sting forced him to submit with an armbar. The Alliance soon collapsed and Dangerously left the company. Soon Eaton was released to cut costs.
Eaton contacted Jim Cornette and was welcomed into Smoky Mountain Wrestling. Eaton soon allied with the Heavenly Bodies (Jimmy Del Ray and Dr. Tom Pritchard) as one of the company’s top heels. He won gold on March 1, 1993 when he defeated Tim Horner to win the Beat the Champ Television title. He held the belt until April 19 when he was defeated by Brian Lee.
But back at WCW, things were changing. Bill Watts left the company and was replaced by Eric Bischoff. One of the first things Bischoff did was to rehire Eaton. Eaton found himself paired with Chris Benoit, although the two served mainly as an enhancement team.
Eaton also made a few appearances for ECW during this timeframe as part of a talent exchange agreement between ECW and WCW. This is notable because of Eaton’s appearance at 1994’s When Worlds Collide, where he teamed with Sabu to defeat Terry Funk and Arn Anderson.
Back in WCW, Eaton was beginning to team with Steve Keirn under the name of Bad Attitude. Again, Bad Attitude didn’t have much success and it faded away by January of 1995.
1995 saw Eaton being repackaged. Now known as Earl Robert Eaton, he began teaming with Lord Steven Regal as the Blue Bloods following Regal’s split with former manager Sir William (Bill Dundee). Squire David Taylor also soon joined the duo as did a new butler named Jeeves.
The Blue Bloods immediately began feuding with a team that stood against everything they stood for – the Nasty Boys. They also battled Harlem Heat and the Stud Stable (Bunkhouse Buck and Dick Slater) but were never able to win the titles.
In early 1996 Eaton left the group following problems with Taylor. After a short feud, Eaton was sent to Saturday Night, where he would defeat wrestlers who were farther down the rankings than he was and help to enhance wrestlers who were getting a push.
Later Eaton became a trainer at the WCW Power Plant and also began working backstage as a road agent. He was released toward the end of 2000.
Eaton still wrestles part-time, usually tagging with Dennis Condrey or Stan Lane under the Midnight Express name. In 2003, he made one TNA appearance where he lost to Kid Kash.
In September of 2006 Eaton was hospitalized following a suspected heart attack. Eaton issued a statement following his release that he had been diagnosed with high blood pressure and a hint of diabetes but that he did not suffer a heart attack.
Why is Eaton on this list? Apart from being a genuinely nice guy (when Bill Dundee found out that his daughter was dating Eaton and breaking his rule against dating wrestlers he was booking, Dundee said it was OK for her to go out with Eaton – the two are now married and have three children), Eaton was a key part of one of the most renowned tag teams of the 1980’s. Apart from that, he had successful runs as a singles wrestler before joining the Midnight Express, and was still valued in WCW enough to keep him working four years after his last push to help to enhance others, as well as to help with training in the Power Plant.
Even today, over two decades after he debuted, Eaton is still competing and still respected among wrestlers for his skilled wrestling style. Bobby Eaton has definitely earned his place on this list of the top 100 wrestlers of the modern era.
The entire Top 100 Wrestlers feature can be found here.
