Starrcade '87

Legacy Review

Starrcade '87: Chi-Town Heat

November 26, 1987 from the UIC Pavillion in Chicago, IL

 

Commentary: Jim Ross and Tony Schiavone

 

This is the first Starrcade to not take place in either Jim Crockett Promotions' home arena in Greenbsoro, NC or their adopted second home of the Omni in Atlanta. Not only that, Chicago is a very odd choice. It's well outside JCP's usual territorial boundaries, even with all the acquisitions they've made the past couple of years. My guess is they were trying to continue to push into was was perceived as WWF territory. Speaking of acquisitions, this show takes place about 6 months after possibly the biggest one JCP made- the purchase of the UWF (formerly Mid-South and not to be confused with the later Herb Abrams disaster UWF) from Bill Watts after their disastrously failed attempt to go national. Given that, holding this show in the New Orleans Superdome might have made much more sense if it would work with the Saints' schedule. But, that also would have been at odds with the way JCP was treating their latest purchase. Over the second half of '87 they ran a JCP vs UWF "invasion" angle, and much like the later WCW Invasion after WWF's purchase of WCW, they took every opportunity to bury most everything related to the UWF. That would be one of several business mistakes that would lead to this being the final Starrcade under the JCP banner. Their sale to Turner to create WCW happened just before the '88 edition of Starrcade.

 

To make matters worse for JCP, this was the first Starrcade they offered on PPV rather than just closed circuit TV, and knowing that WWF purposely counter-programmed the first Survivor Series to run at the exact same time to eat into JCP's buyrate. WWF went so far as to threaten to withhold Wrestlemania 4 from any cable operators that chose Starrcade over Survivor Series, and the threats worked as most cable outlets went with the WWF show on their single available PPV channel. Because of that this is not only the last fully JCP run Starrcade, it's the last one that will be on Thanksgiving. Starting with the '88 show they'd concede the date to Survivor Series and move Starrcade to mid/late December. With just seven matches and running only two and a half hours this is also the shortest Starrcade to date.

 

One plus of JCP's UWF purchase, and one of the few they treated correctly, was lead play by play announcer Jim Ross, making his Starrcade debut tonight. Tom Miller is up from Greensboro to continue his tradition as Starrcade ring announcer, though this will be his last Starrcade as he was very much a JCP territory guy and didn't make it to the Turner era. They also continue to gradually upgrade the entrance stage into something more flashy.

 

"Hot Stuff" Eddie Gilbert, Larry Zbyszko & Rick Steiner (w/Baby Doll) and "Gorgeous" Jimmy Garvin, Michael PS Hayes & Sting (w/Precious) 15:00 time limit draw- Gilbert, Steiner, Hayes and Sting all came into JCP from the UWF purchase. Zbyskzo is an exception, having signed with JCP earlier in the year after a main event level run in the AWA. He'd continue to bounce between the two until the AWA's death. There's actually a carry on story from the UWF days here. Sting co-held the UWF tag team titles with both Gilbert and Steiner as a sort of loose stable, Gilbert tutoring the two young wrestlers, but shortly before the sell to JCP Gilbert and Steiner turned on Sting. They'll be far from the last guys to turn on Sting in his career. Sting had been scheduled to win the UWF TV title as part of his rise upward, but after the buyout JCP brass rightly saw in Sting the young potential top babyface they'd been looking for since Magnum TA's injury and decided to bring him along a little more slowly. Garvin and Hayes had been teaming for a few weeks but hadn't officially dubbed themselves the latest and final version of the Fabulous Freebirds just yet. They are coming out to Badstreet USA, still some of the best entrance music ever. The ring skirts say "TWN" which honestly I have no idea what the reference is to. "The Wrestling Network" maybe? I think that was a startup Crockett and the NWA were trying to do. I'm assuming it's a local ring, as it's set up differently from regular NWA rings with white ropes and buckle pads. Sting gets a pretty decent reaction in Chicago despite the fact he's just getting going. There's a *ton* of empty seats opposite hard camera as the show starts, not a great sign for JCP's expansion, though it does fill in more as the show goes on. It takes a while for everyone to clear the ring, so Steiner, being a Steiner, says the hell with it and jumps Sting to get things going. Sting ducks a charge and Steiner flies out to the (still unpadded) floor. Sting hits a plancha! I assume he did. He literally flew over the cameraman and we barely saw it. Coming back in Sting hits a missile dropkick, and his teammates give the other heels dropkicks as things already break down. All the heels are whipped into each other and they clear the ring to recover. Gilbert takes a crazy bump on the floor off a Garvin punch. Back in the faces take turns on Steiner until Garvin backdrops him into his corner and he tags out to Zbyszko. Speaking of locals, I'm almost positive the guy reffing this match is one of the local refs from WWF's The Wrestling Classic PPV from here in '85 that did so awfully. Hayes literally holds Zbyszko by the nose to punch him, then gives us a bit of a moonwalk. Gilbert tags in and also can't get anything going. He backs into his own corner and calls a TO. Sting tags in looking for revenge on Gilbert. He hits Gilbert with a slightly awkward clothesline. Gilbert counters an arm wringer into a slam and tags out. Steiner walks into a Sting armdrag. Garvin sunset flip on Steiner for 2. Baby Doll holds Garvin's foot in the heel corner so Zbyszko can hit his back kick. That puts Garvin in peril as the heels get their first offense of the match. Gilbert atomic drop on Garvin. Backbreaker from Gilbert, but the local ref is busy checking out Baby Doll and is way late to the count. Who the hell trained these Chicago refs? Are they boxing refs trying to do wrestling? Steiner big powerslam on Garvin for 2. He hooks on a bear hug. Garvin dodges in the corner and Steiner crashes, but Zbyszko cuts the tag off. He hooks Garvin in an abdominal stretch as we get to 5 minutes left. Garvin hiptosses free and tags out to Sting. He cleans house, again slightly awkwardly showing his inexperience. Zbyszko goes to the old eye rake to cut his momentum off. Gilbert tosses Sting over the top rope to the floor. Back in Gilbert hits a suplex for 2. Sting blocks a Zbyszko suplex and hits his own. 3 minutes left as Steiner cuts a tag off. He gets Sting in a sleeper. Sting runs him face first into the top turnbuckle! Very well done on both sides there. Again the tag is cut off. Sting reverses a corner whip and Zbyszko Bret bumps in the corner. 2 minutes left as Sting barely crawls over to tag Hayes. Full hot tag run from Hayes. DONNYBROOK! Hayes hits a bulldog on Zbyszko. The local ref counts 3, but Zbyszko had his leg draped over the bottom rope and it's waved off. Hayes sleeper on Zbyszko. Gilbert comes off the top rope to break that up as we get the 1 minute left call. Steiner bear hug on Hayes. Belly to belly suplex! That gets a 2 count at 30 seconds left. Hayes small package on Gilbert for 2. Hayes tries a sunset flip but the bell rings for the time limit during the count. Acceptable draw. Everyone was working hard but there were a few clear stally spots. Sting had some good flash, but he also clearly still has a lot of learning to do. But on the other side, Steiner is already looking like a near polished and very good package. As polished as a Steiner ever is. **1/2

 

We go to another JCP newcomer from the UWF purchase, Missy Hyatt, who'll be backstage tonight. Or IS backstage, this is the only time she'll be on in this show. The "W" in the NWA logo behind her looks like it belongs in a modern women's sports league logo. 

 

UWF Heavyweight Championship: "Dr. Death" Steve Williams (c) def NWA Western States Heritage Champion Barry Windham in 7:02- At this point the UWF title was worth about the same as a bucket of warm spit and wouldn't be around much longer. After spending the first part of the year having an incredible feud with Flair over the NWA World title Windham's been dropped down to this. The Western States title JCP created during the summer that Windham was the inaugural champion of was no consolation as it would never be worth more than a bucket of cold spit. Doc Death wasn't at all happy with how this all went, but fortunately it wouldn't hurt his long term relationship with the promotion. Williams comes out in an OU football jersey. I'm sure JR has to contain himself from gushing. This is face vs face so they high ten even before Miller starts his intros. Another Code of Honor handshake after the bell. They go right into a criss cross and Williams gets a hiptoss, then lifts Windham up in a press and literally does a couple of reps. That lets Windham escape and roll Williams up for 2. There it is, JR says OU is the "#1 college football team in America". A quick fact check I can't resist shows that OU was indeed #1 in the polls at the time, but would end up losing the Orange Bowl and national championship to Miami in a very rare straight 1 vs 2 matchup in a bowl game for the time. Anyway, we get a nice short mat wrestling sequence and another stalemate.Windham grabs an arm and gets an armdrag. They have another mat exchange as the Chicago crowd gets awful restless at the respectful grappling. They go out to the floor and tease slugging it out, but instead agree to get back in the ring and continue the respectful wrestling. Chicago boos that decision. Some things haven't changed. Williams gets the first hard takedown of the match, almost a suplex. Windham muscles Williams up for a gutwrench suplex. Williams grabs a headlock. Windham tries to suplex out but Williams holds onto the hold. Armdrag from Williams and Windham still can't get free. Some more "boring" chants echo around the arena, followed by some more boos at another stalemate reset. After a couple of awkward counters Windham doesn't duck down when Williams tries to leapfrog and literally headbutts Williams' testicles! That wakes the crowd up, big reaction for that. But Windham, being the good guy, refuses to press the advantage and lets Williams recover as best he can. The crowd HATES that. Williams taking forever to get going while literally holding his balls doesn't help any. Finally Windham gets a headlock takedown. Headscissors counter from Williams but Windham quickly escapes. Williams is still favoring his nads. He ducks a crossbody and Windham FLIES over the top rope out to the floor! He's sure as hell trying, I'll give him that. As soon as he gets back in Williams does not give the same space Windham gave him, grabs an Oklahoma roll and gets the pin to retain! No reaction at all from the crowd at first, then they boo Williams or the match in general. These are two guys I really like, but they approached this match all wrong from a conceptual standpoint and it never worked. Especially in front of a Chicago crowd that's never afraid to show how they really feel. The UWF title would be mercifully euthanized before the end of the year. *

 

Scaffold Match: The Rock 'N' Roll Express def NWA United States Tag Team Champions The Midnight Express (w/Jim Cornette & Big Bubba Rogers) in 9:35- We finally get a Midnights/RNR Express match on a Starrcade....and it's a scaffold match. Freaking typical. THIS is why JCP went out of business. Not really but I'm bitter. JCP's first ever scaffold match between the Eaton/Condrey Midnights and the Road Warriors at last year's Starrcade was a huge draw, so here we are again. Once again, the rules are to win you have to knock your opponents off the scaffold. In theory incredibly dangerous, but in practice they usually find the safest way possible to get down. Though Cornette did destroy his knee in last year's match after Rogers didn't catch him coming down as planned. Needless to say the Midnights' US tag titles are not on the line in a match like this. The RNR Express don't get nearly as big a pop as they would in the south. Not a lot of heel stalling before everyone climbs up, I appreciate that. But as Gibson climbs Rogers takes Morton out with what will be the Boss Man Slam! That makes it a two on one advantage for the Midnights up on the scaffold. Gibson takes a shot on the scaffold and I'm pretty sure starts bleeding. Cornette tries to climb but Morton hits him with his own tennis racket! Not sure what good Cornette would have done up there anyway. Morton goes up with the racket and uses the weapon on both Midnights. Eaton has the usual handful of powder and throws it into both RNR's faces. What he can keep a hold of at least. We quickly see the downside of all this, as the structure isn't wide or stable enough for them to really do anything. The only scaffold structure I've seen worse was built by Glory's brain sucked army. Buffy reference, for those in the dark on that. Eaton has a hard time just walking across to Morton without wobbling. I think one of the pipes came off the support structure where Lane and Gibson are. This thing is nowhere near up to OSHA standard. Gibson does take advantage and use the loose pipe as a weapon. Lane is the first one to start working his way down to the underside. Eaton and Gibson get all the value out of the racket as they possibly can. Eaton actually manages to do a decent flop on the scaffold off a racket shot. Lane grabs the monkey bars underside of the scaffold and Morton kicks him off to the mat. He's out. Eaton takes more racket shots up top. He manages to work around to the scaffold underside right in the middle of it, then takes his drop to give the RNR Express the win. Rogers climbs up onto the scaffold, takes the racket, tosses it away, then takes his hat and jacket off. Morton goes over to meet him. Morton gives Rogers the Marty McFly "WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?" point and low blows him! The RNR Express escape back to the ground while Rogers is down. Morton then celebrates by putting Rogers' hat and jacket on. Like always, when you've seen one scaffold match you've seen them all. That was one of them. Total waste of what could have been a sensational normal RNR/Midnight match on a major show too. *1/2

 

The ring crew comes out and takes down the scaffold so there'll be room for the cage later on tonight. Commentary vamps while that's going on and we get a mini intermission. We go to the back to Bob Caudle with the not yet Freebirds plus Precious. Garvin filibusters the entire interview without letting Hayes get a word in despite Hayes looking like he desperately wants to let loose, which has to be Garvin having a laugh with his real life buddy. Doc Death then comes in and shows that talking is not exactly the best part of his game. 

 

Unification Match: NWA World Television Champion Nikita Koloff def UWF Television Champion Terry Taylor (w/Eddie Gilbert) in 18:55- Koloff dropped the US title to Four Horseman Lex Luger during the '87 Great American Bash tour (sadly as of this writing no GAB shows from '87 have been released on the WWE Vault yet), but right after in August took the TV title from fellow Horseman Tully Blanchard. Taylor was a UWF guy already somewhat familiar to JCP audiences, having dipped his toes in the territory while he was a regular in Georgia before JCP bought *them* out. He's the heel here as he's formed a "UWF guys" alliance with Gilbert. They go nose to nose after intros with their belts still on before handing them over. Koloff shows his obvious power advantage on the initial lockups. They go nose to nose again and shove a bunch. Nikita breaks clean in the corner. Taylor manages an armdrag, but that only pisses Koloff off and Taylor quickly backs off. Taylor tries to trap Koloff in the corner but also eventually breaks clean. Next time in the corner Taylor tries a punch but Koloff blocks it. Again Taylor backs the hell up. Taylor grabs an arm wringer. Koloff looks more annoyed than anything. He easily reverses and gets Taylor down in an ARMBAR. Taylor tries to escape over the top rope but Koloff pulls him right back over. Koloff wins a buckle shot war. He grabs the arm again and no sells Taylor's punches. Taylor reverses a hammerlock but quickly takes a back elbow, and Koloff's in control on the arm again. Taylor finally takes a rope break to get free and goes to the floor to kill the momentum. More jawing and shoving back in and Koloff slaps. Backdrop from Koloff for 2. Taylor again bails to the floor. Koloff has enough of the stalling and pulls Taylor back in by the hair. Taylor gets a knee up in the corner and tries for an illegal leverage pin but can't keep Koloff down. Right back to Koloff working the arm. Again Taylor takes a rope break. Finally he goes to the eye poke to get Koloff on the defensive. Snap mare but Koloff dodges an elbow drop and Taylor's right back in the armbar. Koloff continues to no sell what little offense Taylor manages to muster. The Hammer puts Taylor down. Koloff loads up for the Sickle to finish it. Taylor dodges and Koloff crashes into the corner! That finally changes things. Taylor takes Koloff to the floor and gives him a guardrail shot. Chop on the floor. He runs Koloff's shoulder into the post. Koloff's arm is snapped over the top rope as Taylor clearly has a target. Gilbert gets involved, giving Koloff's arm a shot on the apron. Taylor kneedrop onto the bad arm. Another one to the jaw and a slow cover for 2. Koloff tries to hit a back elbow but that hurts him more than Taylor. Taylor tries a sunset flip but Koloff blocks it. Suplex fight that Koloff wins. Taylor is still up first, but Koloff starts to hulk up. He pounds on Taylor in the corner. Taylor counters mounted punches with an inverted atomic drop for 2. He argues with ref Earl Hebner and Koloff rolls him up for 2. Koloff backdrops out of a piledriver attempt. He hits punches and Taylor runs on the floor. He catches Koloff coming back in, then Gilbert hits Koloff in the leg with a chair (off camera) as he's coming back in. So much for all the arm work. Taylor figure four! Gilbert helps and Taylor gets a near fall. Hebner eventually catches them and breaks the hold. Gilbert tries to choke Koloff. Taylor and Gilbert collide! Sickle! Koloff gets the pin! It took a bit to get going, but once it did it was pretty decent. **3/4 

 

Like before with the Georgia buyout, Taylor would bypass going fully full time with JCP and depart the promotion. He'd spend the first half of '88 in WCCW, then in the summer he signed with WWF and was soon saddled with one of the absolute worst gimmicks anyone's ever seen, especially for a worker as good as Taylor was. 

 

NWA World Tag Team Championship: Arn Anderson & Tully Blanchard (c) (w/JJ Dillon) def The Road Warriors (w/Paul Ellering) by DQ in 14:13- The last three matches are all Four Horsemen matches. After dancing around each other for a while and working with other partners within the Horsemen the legendary Arn & Blanchard team solidified as a permanent thing during the summer and they defeated the RNR Express for the tag titles in September. Despite being with the company full time for nearly two years now the Roadies had not been able to capture the World tag titles, and had been chasing the Horsemen team since they won the titles. Now they get one more shot in their hometown in front of a crowd rabid to see them win. Nothing can go wrong, right? Naturally the Roadies get a massive ovation in their hometown. They were easily the most popular hometown Chicago wrestlers before CM Punk came along. Arn starts off with Hawk. Arn tries to do some trash talking. Hawk grabs him by the throat! That'll stop that. Arn catches Hawk with a knee and climbs up top. Hawk picks him up and press slams him back down! Arn rolls all the way to the floor to recover. Back in Arn tries a headlock that Hawk easily powers out of. Again Arn bails to the floor, giving Ellering some what for while he's out there. That leads to Dillon and Ellering getting too close to each other and the wrestlers go out to break it up. Blanchard tags in for a try. Hawk easily powers him out of a lockup, fakes him out with a boot and drops him with a clothesline. Blanchard tries to bail but Animal presses him back in the ring! Blanchard rolls out again and takes a long walk. Hawk chases him down and throws him back in. Dropkick from Hawk for 2. Animal tags in and Blanchard does what Arn tried earlier, a quick knee and going up top. Blanchard gets a little farther, successfully launching, but right into an Animal powerslam. Arn saves a pin and tags in. You can almost literally see the gears in his brain turning trying to figure out how to handle what he's up against. Arn tries a floatover in the corner but gets murdered by an Animal clothesline. Blanchard runs in and gets dropped again. Again the champs have regroup and go down to about Plan E on the gameplan. Arn runs into a Hawk bear hug, but the Horsemen quickly double team Hawk to counter. It doesn't last long as Hawk plants them both with a double clothesline and covers Blanchard for 2. Hawk presses Blanchard into an Animal bear hug! With some fantastic bridges. Animal then turns it into an inverted atomic drop. Blanchard gets mad and fires off some open hand chops. Animal counters with his own that are more effective and hits a dropkick. Arn tags in and they go speed. Arn has a weird bit where he seems to hit the ropes wrong and goes out to the floor, but it turns out it was just a lure to get Animal to chase. Arn catches him coming back in and tries a piledriver. Animal backdrops out and gives Arn another press slam. Hawk then presses Blanchard again. Arn clips Hawk's knee while he has Blanchard up! They went to the presses one too many time. Blanchard is quickly ALL OVER Hawk's knee. Got the opening and wasted no time taking advantage of it. Arn posts Hawk's knee. Blanchard chairshot onto Hawk's knee on the floor. Back in Arn hits a DDT for 2. Blanchard tries for a figure four but Hawk pulls him down into what looks like was supposed to be a small package but they can't quite pull it off. Arn does a classic spinning toe hold but Hawk pushes him into the corner. Arn does a great job grabbing Hawk's foot to just barely cut the tag off. This time Blanchard gets a figure four on. Arn tries to provide extra leverage but Young sees and calls it a tag, breaking the hold. Arn tries for a leverage pin but works around into crotching himself on Hawk's legs. Tag to Animal! A side note, Hawk's normally criticized for never selling, but he's sold the hurt knee great this whole time here. Animal hits a dropkick on Arn. Blanchard goes down, but then he trips Animal from the floor! Everything breaks down and Blanchard possibly deliberately knocks ref Tommy Young out of the ring. Animal backdrops Arn over the top rope down to the floor, right next to where Young landed. Double clothesline on Blanchard. The Roadies set up Arn in the ring. Doomsday Device! Backup ref Hebner counts 3! The Road Warriors FINALLY win the tag titles in their hometown! BUT WAIT! Young is back in the ring and he raises Arn's hand! He saw the over the top rope throw and is DQ'ing the Roadies for it. Weak. Ass. Sauce. The Roadies refuse to listen and walk out with the belts, but it is indeed a Horsemen retention by DQ. During replays we hear some "bullshit" chants. This is a textbook example of overthinking what should have been incredibly simple. Sometimes the easiest decision is also the correct one, and it should have been here. Crazily it'll still be nearly a year before the Roadies finally get a hold of the tag titles. The match was going great before that horrible finish and even worse booking decision. ***1/2

 

Mini intermission #2 as the cage is set up. Some guy I don't remember at all named Jack Gregory is in the back with Magnum TA, still needing a cane but looking well recovered from the car accident that ended his career. After that Caudle is with Nikita Koloff. He might as well throw that UWF TV title belt in a trash can, it's not worth any more than that. JJ Dillon then comes in and after celebrating the fact the tag titles are still with the Horsemen he admits he's nervous about the next match, as much as he believes in Luger, because he's 0 for about 800 in his career against Dusty Rhodes. 

 

Steel Cage Match for the NWA United States Heavyweight Championship: "The American Dream" Dusty Rhodes def "The Total Package" Lex Luger (c) (w/JJ Dillon) in 16:23- As I mentioned, Luger defeated Koloff for this title during the GAB tour as part of his continued rapid rise up. Like Sting, JCP saw huge things in him. Luger's definitely gotten some pointers from Flair on his robe game. An added stipulation for this match is if Dusty loses he'll be suspended for 90 days, which is somehow portrayed as career threatening. JCP legend Johnny Weaver is on the floor to act as the "keymaster" for the key to the cage, making sure no other Horsement get involved. Luger is announced as from Chicago but still gets booed going against Dusty. Cautious start with a rough but clean corner break off the first lockup. Luger then hits the first shots and tries to give Dusty a cage shot. Dusty blocks it and hits an elbow. Luger decides to flex a bit for mind games. Dusty responds with some strutting and even tries his own flex. Dusty fires away with jabs and puts Luger down with a bionic elbow. Atomic drop for Luger. Dusty gets the Weaverlock (a sleeper bequeathed to Dusty by Weaver for this match) on but Luger quickly escapes. Luger cranks a headlock for a bit. Speed run and the Weaverlock is on again. Again Luger quickly gets free using the ropes. Luger snap mares Dusty over but badly misses an elbow drop. Dusty works that arm for a while as things kind of grind to a halt for a bit. Luger gets a flurry but Dusty dodges a corner charge and gets back on the arm. Eventually Luger catches Dusty with a knee to the gut or possibly lower while Dusty was wrapping his arm around the top rope. Dusty takes the first cage shot. He's bleeding and Luger attacks the cut. Another cage shot and cover for 2. Another snap mare and this time the big elbow drop hits for 2. Luger starts working on Dusty's back, setting up for the Torture Rack. Dusty fires back with a crazy one foot dropkick. That was not pretty. Luger gets Dusty up for a backdrop and calls for the Rack. He gets Dusty up but can't balance him and Dusty ends up sitting on the top rope. Now Luger starts working on the arm. Pure inexperience here, not picking out just one body part. He gets extra rope leverage for a simple armbar. When Dusty tries to fire back up Luger hair pulls him back down. Dusty fires back up for real in the corner and puts Luger down with a punch combo and elbow. He hits a kind of DDT I think? Dunno what that was supposed to be. Cover for 2. Dusty ducks a clothesline and gets the Weaverlock on! He hops on Luger's back! Not even Luger can hold that weight. Dillon takes Weaver out on the floor and gets the key! But he can't hold onto it or drops it and loses it or something and can't get the door open. He settles for throwing a chair over the top of the cage into the ring, which just barely makes it over. Luger took Hebner out at some point in there too. Before Luger can pick the chair up Dusty DDTs him onto it! Cover and Dusty gets the pin to win the title! Hoist on his own petard. 0 for 801. Crazily enough it's Dusty's first ever US title win, finally giving him the JCP triple crown (World, US, TV), or grand slam if you count the tag titles. Kind of an ugly finish sequence there, and the whole match didn't have a whole lot going for it either. Luger hadn't put it all together just yet, that'll happen next year when he starts working with Flair regularly after his face turn, and Dusty was quickly becoming more and more limited in the ring. *1/2

 

To set up the main event- Ric Flair had grown tired of defending the World title every Starrcade and wanted to win it back this year. Head booker Dusty and other JCP brass agreed, thinking it would be a good counter to whatever WWF threw at them with Survivor Series. But then came the hard question, who does Flair drop the title to and win it back from? No name immediately came to mind, and no one stood out enough to make a strong case for. Eventually a compromise choice was reached in a "he happened to walk by the room while discussions were happening" kind of way: Ron Garvin. Now Garvin had some really good matches with Flair in the past and was a perfectly fine wrestler, but he was not main event material, especially in a day and age when very few guys reached that level. But having no real alternatives the plan was set, and Garvin upset Flair for the title on weekly TV in Detroit in September, ending Flair's (officially) fourth reign at 412 days. Putting the title on Garvin was another decision generally blamed for JCP's sharp downturn in business. The simple fact is that while he was liked and respected by both fans and peers, no one took him seriously as a world champion.

 

Steel Cage Match for the NWA World Heavyweight Championship: "Nature Boy" Ric Flair def Ron Garvin (c) in 17:25- Flair's got a weird synth version of his regular music rather than the normal full orchestra version. Glad that didn't last. Love the white robe though. Despite Flair being the clear heel and all the other Horsemen being heavily booed the crowd is much more 50/50 for this match, maybe even 60/40 Flair. Flair's serious as the challenger, not a lot of shenanigans before the first lockup. He does give Garvin a small "WOOOOOOO" on the corner break. After a couple of chop exchanges Garvin absolutely pummels Flair with open hand chops and hiptosses him. Again Garvin wins a chop battle. One part of the crowd loudly starts a "Garvin sucks" chant that a good portion of the crowd picks up. Shoulderblock from Garvin. More chops. Flair Flop! Backdrop and Flair begs off. Garvin says no and cranks an arm into an armbar. Mounted punches from Garvin. Another backdrop. Garvin Stomp! All around the world. Garvin straight up slaps Flair's face in the corner trying to get him to fight back. It works and they get into a full on slugfest. Garvin's chops win again. Flair low blow! That'll turn things around. And we're also in the cage so no DQ. Follow up to the same area with an inverted atomic drop. Snap mare/kneedrop combo for 2. Flair grabs Garvin's knee and gives it a shot, starting up with that. Chop in the corner then another shot to the knee. Kneebreaker! Into the figure four! Flair crawls over and gets extra rope leverage, getting a couple of near falls. Garvin then manages to reverse it. They end up in the ropes and Young breaks the hold. Garvin is very wobblelegged trying to stand and Flair is right back on the knee. Garvin just barely blocks a cage shot. Garvin reverses a whip and Flair flies into the cage! Another cage shot for Flair! Cheese grater spot! Flair is, naturally, bleeding. Another cage shot. Garvin bites the cut! Flair climbs up the cage trying to get some space. Garvin grabs his leg and follows him. Flair takes shots on the top of the cage and flops back down to the ring. Garvin sets up on the top rope, but Flair very deliberately Flair Flops away from him. It was a sunset flip off the top rope that won Garvin the title back in September. More big open hand chops from Garvin. Flair hits an elbow that puts Garvin back down. Flair goes up top and gets slammed off. Garvin puts on a figure four! That gets a couple of near falls. Flair grabs a rope and Young breaks the hold. That's questionable in this match, if rope breaks should count but whatever. Garvin continues to punish the knee. Another corner chop exchange. Garvin blocks another cage shot and gives Flair another one. Garvin goes up top and hits a crossbody for 2. Backslide from Garvin for 2. Another cheese grater spot for Flair and more chops. Again Flair tries to escape up top and takes more top of the cage shots. Garvin hits a headbutt and Flair falls crotch first on the top rope! Garvin goes for the top rope sunset flip! Flair blocks it, pins Garvin down and grabs the top rope for extra leverage. Garvin still kicks out, then cradles Flair for 2. Flair counters more mounted punches by backing Garvin into the opposite corner, sort of squashing Young in the process. Garvin hits the Hand of Stone punch! Young is OK and counts. Flair kicks out! Flair grabs a charging Garvin, hot shots him into the cage support post, and covers to get the pin and win the title back! The win gets a pretty nice pop in Chicago too. That was.....fine. No more. A letdown for a peak Flair main event for sure. It just never came together fully. Back at the Superstars on the Superstation special in the spring of '86 these two had a phenomenal match, where Flair let Garvin lead with his style and Flair adapted perfectly. This time, Garvin seemed to try to work more Flair's style and it doesn't work as well. ***1/4

 

OVERALL SHOW THOUGHTS- Not the best Starrcade to close out the "territory era" of them, but not a completely terrible one either. There's a few good matches, but nothing that's going to make any "best of Starrcade" lists. It's also let down by some terrible booking calls, which stand out even more on such a small card. The Chicago crowd was hot all night as Chicago crowds are, but also never really fully into it as they weren't as invested in this promotion. The experiment coming here really didn't work from a business or show perspective.

OVERALL SHOW GRADE: C

 

v2.0 posted 7/28/26