Great American Bash '88 (PPV)

Legacy Review

Great American Bash '88 (PPV)

July 10, 1988 from the Baltimore Arena in Baltimore, MD

Commentary: Jim Ross and Tony Schiavone

This is Jim Crockett Promotions' and the NWA's second attempt in '88 to expand their PPV calendar as part of their national expansion, again using an established tour as the basis. This one would end up a little better than the last one.

NWA World Tag Team Championship: Arn Anderson & Tully Blanchard (c) (w/JJ Dillon) and Nikita Koloff & Sting go to a 20:00 time limit draw- Koloff's hair is borderline out of control. Tony: "You know it's going to be a good night when the fans literally explode." LITERALLY. Quick, but legit post-bell, jump by the faces for a quick start and early bedlam. Koloff and Arn fight outside. Sting gets a small package on Tully but the ref's distracted. A Sting dropkick sends Arn outside. TOPE SUICIDA! Sting grounds Arn with an armbar, then tags in Koloff to ground things even more. Sting and Koloff are actually a very inspired tag team mix. Sting can hit his big stuff, Koloff comes in and puts a hold on for a few minutes so everyone can rest up, Sting comes back in for more high spots, rinse and repeat. Arn dodges a corner charge but Koloff stops himself before hitting the buckles and kills Arn with a Sickle. Arn catches a charging Sting with a knee. He goes up top, Sting tries to give him the Flair throw, but Arn eye gouges out. Sleeper! Sting runs Arn face first into the top buckle to get out. Sting flips out of a double team and dropkicks both heels. Koloff takes things down again with Tully. Tully's shoulder gets posted and worked on. He tries to tag out in the wrong corner, and the faces drag him away from other tag attempts. While Arn is jawing with the ref Sting and Koloff switch without a tag. Arn and Dillon are irate, shocked and appalled at such cheating! Lots more arm work but they also keep the parts moving so things stay interesting and don't bog down. Finally Tully physically drags Koloff across the ring and *just* gets his fingertips over to tag Arn. Arn and Koloff do a small reset with a lockup sequence. While in a Koloff full nelson Arn manages to lean over and get a tag. Koloff with a Cactus Clothesline on Tully! He suplexes Tully back in and covers but Dillon pulls him off. Koloff goes on the attack but Dillon dodges and Koloff Sickles the post. The Horsemen go to work. Koloff tries hulking up but Arn kills it with a DDT. Koloff just kicks out at 2. More arm work at the 3 minutes left call. Arn goes for a Vader Bomb but Koloff gets his knees up. Hot tag! Sting with a press slam. 2 minutes left. Sting sleeper on Arn with one minute left. Arn manages to work his way out, blind tags Tully. Tully tries a sunset flip off the top rope but Sting blocks it. Koloff Sickle on Arn. Stinger Splash! Scorpion Death Lock on Tully! The bell rings! Sting and Koloff think they won, take the belts and put them on. Dillon has a discussion with the ref. It's officially announced as a time limit draw. Tully held on and didn't submit. Absolutely fantastic. There was a little draw stalling but nothing that held the match down any. ***3/4

NWA United States Tag Team Championship: The Midnight Express (w/Jim Cornette) def The Fantastics (c) in 16:23- The Fantastics took the titles from the Express in May on weekly TV. If the Fantastics win they can give Cornette 10 lashes with a leather strap. Cornette is going to spend the match suspended above the ring in a cage *and* in a straitjacket. Why not put him in the Pandorica while you're at it? Cornette needs a hug before the jacket is put on. Then he complains the sleeves are too long. Fantastic. And this exchange with the ref while he's being tied up: "I'm gonna appeal to your baser instincts. Can you be bribed? 5000? (ref says not for 10,000) What about 15? What is this crackpot? He's an honest man!". Cornette was something special in his heyday. Too bad about today, but that's neither here nor there right now. Cornette screams for his mommy as the cage gets raised. According to JR he's scared of heights and claustrophobic.

Finally the match gets going. Fulton and Eaton start. Fulton slides under the legs but stops and tries for a roll up. Multiple flying headscissors from Fulton, almost .5 hurricanranas. Fulton and Lane do a quick test of strength, and Fulton uses an arm as a step to work around Lane's back for a takedown. Lane responds with karate kicks that send Fulton tumbling outside. Lane gets posted and eats a baseball slide kick. Eaton plants Rogers on the top and tries for a superplex, but Rogers slips out and gets a roll up for just 1. JR mentions the MD Athletic Commission is here and we see the officials' table on camera. Planting seeds for later in the show. The faces get a sneaky tag. Eaton tries a backdrop on Rogers, but Fulton is hiding behind Eaton to block it. Double backdrop on Eaton! Mid-match donnybrook! Lane accidentally backdrops Eaton. The Express go out to regroup while the Fantastics strut. Rogers flips out of a Lane backdrop attempt and rolls him up, but Lane tagged Eaton as he was going down and Eaton plants Rogers with a bulldog. Rogers goes face in peril. Lane kills him with a clothesline and mocks the Fantastics' strut. Eaton hits a big neckbreaker and covers but Rogers' foot is on the rope. A Lane kick in the back of Rogers' head send him into an Eaton backbreaker. Tiltawhirl backbreaker for 2. Alabama Jam! Lane sets Rogers up with a Russian leg sweep and the Express go for the rocket launcher, but Rogers gets his knees up and gets the hot tag. The Express shut Fulton down with double teams and he gets slammed on the concrete. A Rogers crossbody gets Tommy Young and he's down. Eaton gets out a chain, wraps it around his wrist, waffles Fulton, and covers for the 3. The Express retake the titles! Bit of a pop for the win too. After Cornette gets out of the cage the Fantastics attack him and try to give him the 10 lashes anyway but the Express save him. There's a lot of cool stuff in here and overall it was a good match, but it was also slightly off in that way that's hard to put your finger on. Not either team's A game. Fortunately they killed it in their match in Greensboro later in the tour. ***

Tower of Doom Match: The Road Warriors, "Gorgeous" Jimmy Garvin, Ron Garvin and "Dr. Death" Steve Williams (w/Paul Ellering) def NWA World Television Champion Mike Rotunda, Kevin Sullivan, Al Perez, Ivan Koloff and The Russian Assassin (w/Gary Hart and Paul Jones) in 19:55- This is supposed to be the final blowoff of the long running Jimmy Garvin vs the Varsity Club/Sullivan messing with Precious feud with a lot of extra parts added. The Tower of Doom was spawned from the success of War Games, trying to come up with another match involving big cages. This is the same triple decker structure of smaller cages on top of each other that WCW would wheel out again from time to time, most notably at Uncensored '96 and a Nitro during the awful days of WCW 2000. Two guys start in the top (small) cage, then every two minutes each team sends another man in, and at the same time the refs unlock the trap doors, allowing wrestlers to descend a level. The goal is for every member of the team to leave the structure through the door at ring level. Precious is in the ring and is the "keeper of the key" for the exit door. She's dressed in all black, making her allegiance murky, or at least in theory. Tommy Young is up top controlling the top trap door and he does not look the least bit comfortable being up there. Ron Garvin and Koloff start and try to brawl in the tiny cage but have no space, and it doesn't help that the whole structure wobbles dangerously every time someone so much as nudges the sides in the top cage. They're so far up in the lights, how can the crowd even see them? When the horn sounds the end of the first two minute period Ron Garvin goes down to the middle cage by himself. It's a hell of a drop. He has to try to grab the wall with his feet and gradually work his way down. When the new wrestlers come in up top they look to be worried about keeping their balance more than anything else. Williams is in a 2 on 1 spot in the top cage, and gets run into the cage so hard the whole thing almost collapses. They won't try that again. At the next horn Williams and Koloff go to the middle. Ron Garvin goes to the bottom all alone and Precious lets him out. JR: "The floor is steel! The walls are steel! It's flesh on steel!" Bless him for trying. The horn sounds again. Animal and Perez go to the middle. JR continues in mega overdrive this is so awesome overselling mode. He knows it sucks. Another horn and the last guys enter the match up top. Perez and Animal go to the bottom and leave. So, what's the point of Precious exactly? On the next couple of horns Assassin, Koloff, Hawk and Williams all get down and leave. Again, Precious is doing nothing but opening the door for everyone. It's down to Jimmy Garvin vs Sullivan and Rotunda in the middle ring. At the next horn Rotunda gets down and out while Sullivan and Garvin prevent each other from escaping. A big brawl erupts on the floor. At the next horn the last two guys finally get down to the ring. Precious opens the door but for some reason Sullivan tries to attack her anyway. Garvin fights him off, hits a brain buster, and goes for the door. Precious opens it. As Garvin is exiting Sullivan jumps him from behind and pushes him out. The faces win the match, but Sullivan locks the door back up so he's alone with Precious. Garvin has to climb all the way to the top and go down again to save her. Hawk goes with him. Precious fights off Sullivan's half assed attempts at assault before he takes a piece of tape and starts choking her. Damn, now that's something that you'll never ever see again. Hawk gets down first and makes the save. Garvin gets Precious out and they leave together, all questions apparently settled. Well, they got a good crowd reaction, and there's a good number of people out there that like this feud so fair dos to them. This match, however, was absolute trash. Ill conceived, poorly thought out, horribly executed, and a giant waste of time. They could have (should have) gotten the exact same end result with a simple Garvin vs Sullivan match with Precious in the middle or on a pole or something. I have no choice. This match earned it. MINUS FIVE STARS

NWA United States Heavyweight Championship: Barry Windham (c) (w/JJ Dillon) def Dusty Rhodes in 15:55- Dusty's trying to get back a title he never officially lost. He was stripped in April for attacking NWA officials, and Windham won the subsequent tournament for the vacant title to give all the Horsemen gold. Dusty gets an armdrag out of the lockup and cocks the elbow but Windham backs off. Criss cross. Windham drops an elbow on Dusty. Dusty counters with a press slam and a DDT. Then he goes up top and comes off with a high crossbody for 2! Get the spatulas out to get Windham off the mat. Windham rolls out and takes a walk. Back in, Dusty no sells punches and floats around boxing style and hits a few of his own. Dillon gets on the apron and gets clocked as well. Windham kicks Dusty out of the ring and follows. Guardrail shot. Windham goes for a piledriver on the floor but Dusty backdrops out. Windham comes back in the ring with punches, but Dusty flips him back outside and slams him on the floor. Dillon distracts and Windham ambushes. He calls for the claw and puts it on. Couple of near falls. Dusty tries to boogie up but Windham tightens up and he goes down again. Dusty backs into the corner, climbs to the second rope, cocks the elbow.....and collapses again. Finally on the third try he elbows out. He goes for the figure four but Windham reaches out (loooooooong arms) and hooks the claw on again. Dusty backs onto the second rope again. This time Windham lets go and sets up a superplex. Dusty pushes out and on the way down Windham takes out Tommy Young. Dusty hits the big elbow drop but there's no ref. Ron Garvin randomly runs in. He pops Dusty with a Hand of Stone! Dillon gets Young back in. Windham puts the claw on an already unconscious Dusty and gets the pin. OK match that had to paper over the fact Dusty was severely breaking down physically. The Garvin turn was randomly out of left field, but completely shocking. **1/4

In the back, Dillon presents Garvin with a briefcase full of cold hard cash in exchange for his soul. I guess when you get used to the money a world champion makes you have to supplement your income somehow.

NWA World Heavyweight Championship: Ric Flair (c) (w/JJ Dillon) def Lex Luger in 23:13- Flair's main mission in '88, while holding the title the whole year, was to help develop Luger and Sting into stars. Bit of a pop for Flair from another non-normal Crockett city crowd. Flair gives us a WOOOOO and we're off. Luger throws Flair around a bit and no sells chops. Press slam. Flair rolls out and flops over the barricade! He calls Young over, has some words, they push each other, and Flair chases him back in the ring. A test of strength leads to another press slam. Bear hug. Flair rubs his arm into Luger's eyes and Luger backs into the ropes. Luger whips Flair, who grabs the top rope to stop and flops out between the ropes onto the apron. Luger suplexes him back in and gets a 2 count. Huge elbow drop for another 2. Flair begs off. He suckers Luger outside and gives him an eye rake, chop, and barricade shots. Flair gets rolling and cocky. Luger ducks a chop while running and hits a huge flying clothesline for a long 2. Flair goes up top. Luger shakes the rope and Flair drops down, gets crotched, and falls into the ring. Flair dodges a dropkick. Flair Flop! Luger sunset flip for 2. Flair gets a shot in on Luger's knee and goes to work. Figure four! Luger reverses out pretty quickly. Luger clotheslines Flair over the top and out but his knee is too hurt to follow up. Chops in the corner and Luger hulks up (he's even wearing yellow trunks tonight). Another press slam but Luger's knee buckles again. Flair throw! Flair flip! Flair dives onto Luger and they both fall into the ropes and are supposed to both go over the top, but they get caught up and take forever to maneuver themselves over. Luger's posted. Flair gets a chair, and while Young is stopping him Dillon posts Luger again. Luger's bleeding. The MD Athletic Commission official walks to ringside to look at it. Luger powerslam. He gets Flair up in the Torture Rack. Young is with the MD official. The bell rings. Luger thinks he's won and so does the crowd, HUGE pop. Sting and other faces run in to celebrate with Luger. Young confers with Gary Capetta. Due to a "severe laceration" (which wasn't even close, like maybe .2 Muta) the state athletic commission official has stopped the match and awarded it to Flair. "Bullshit" chant from the crowd. Kinda funny to hear JR run Maryland down. "Well, in a lot of other states they would have let that go but Maryland is so strict...." Run of the mill Flair vs big strong boi match with Flair taking the still learning Luger to main event school, and an atrocious finish. ***1/2

OVERALL SHOW THOUGHTS- Started great, fell off a cliff hard, then tried to rebound but couldn't quite recover. This was the last major Jim Crockett Promotions show before selling to Ted Turner.

OVERALL SHOW GRADE: C