Not a rant, just a runt.
You can tell that even the guys producing the World Class shows are getting antsy now, because Michael Hayes led off this week’s episode by noting that we’re “finally” getting to the Flair-Von Erich cage match on Christmas night of 1982, which changes the course of wrestling forever. And not that I don’t appreciate some backstory, but really let’s just hurry up and get there so the awesome can begin. The show currently airing is December 2, so we’re still three episodes away, which is why I’ve stopped recapping for the time being. Really, the good stuff starts at that point. This week’s show was pretty good, as they all seem to be, with The Spoiler doing a double countout against Jose Lothario (who was looking old even in 1982), Magic Dragon & Kabuki & Checkmate over Bugsy & Brian Adias & Al Madril (Adias/Adidas is one of those guys, like Mike Rotundo, who had his name spelled multiple ways, sometimes changing within the same show! I think the official way is “Adias”, but I could never figure it out for sure), and finally King Kong Bundy over Kevin Von Erich. But really the centerpieces this week were an interview between Fritz Von Erich and Ric Flair about the upcoming cage match, and an interview with the referees about a special fan vote to nominate the special guest referee for the match, with the winner being…Michael PS Hayes. Dun dun dun! And now all the pieces are falling into place. Honestly, these are the shows where you HAVE to start watching, especially if you don’t know what happens in the title match (although really there can’t be anyone left who doesn’t, can there?) I almost did recap this week’s show, just so I could do a running joke about The Spoiler’s name, but this is good enough, I figure.
Also this afternoon, I subjected myself to another round of Pedro Morales matches, and after what feels like a million of them I still don’t get the big deal with the guy. Basically he takes punishment from the heel, slugs back, and gets the pin, and there’s very little variation in his offense. I’m not seeing the charisma he must have had to draw the reactions he did. Must be an ethnic thing, I dunno. The Hall of Fame tribute show was a pretty bad one, featuring the boring Ivan Koloff title change and then the IC title win over Don Muraco, which hasn’t aged very well but featured a hot finish with Pedro getting brass knux away from Muraco and winning the title. There’s also a terrible match against Randy Savage from 1986 on the channel right now, where Pedro wins by countout and I just DON’T GET IT. There’s rarely been someone portrayed as such a huge star (outside of say, Dusty Rhodes, but at least with him I “get it”) where I just don’t see anything from him in the ring or on the mic that would justify the extended push they got for years on end.
