AWA Super Sunday

Legacy Review

AWA Super Sunday

April 24, 1983 from the St. Paul Civic Center in St. Paul, MN

 

Commentary: Ron Trongard

 

This should have been Hulk Hogan's grand coronation as the face of the AWA. It turned into the night the AWA blew their biggest chance to stand against the WWF and NWA in the coming war for the nationalization of wrestling, though it took them years to realize it.

There's no opening, the Network copy jumps right into intros for the first match. Mean Gene Okerlund is handling the ring announcing duties as well as postmatch interviews with the winners.

 

Brad Rheingans def Rocky Stone in 7:00- Rheingans is a local boy and two time Olympian so the crowd is on his side. He's most "known" (relative term) for a decent stint in New Japan in the early '90s teaming up with Vader and other gaijins against the home Japanese talent. Code of Honor handshake to start. The crowd gets mad at Stone for going for quick rope breaks. On a speed run Rheingans leapfrogs, catches and slams Stone, and gets an armdrag. He leaps over a Stone backdrop attempt and grabs another armdrag. Lots of arm work, which will be a theme throughout the night. Rheingans tries to leapfrog again but Stone runs his head right into his gut while he's in midair. Stone works a chinlock for a while. Kneedrop for 2. Stone cuts off a comeback with an eye rake and tosses Rheingans to the apron. Stone runs him back and forth across the apron for buckle shots. Rheingans shoulderblocks back in and hits a backdrop. A gutwrench suplex gets the pin. Meh. *1/4

 

"Rock N Roll" Buck Zumhofe def Steve Regal in 8:37- Once again, this is not Steven "William" Regal the pride of Blackpool, it's the American Steve Regal that also wrestled in a couple of early Starrcades. He and Zumhofe are in the early part of a feud that would last for a couple of years. Zumhofe's gimmick is a babyface blend of the Honky Tonk Man and Disco Inferno with maybe a bit of Jimmy Valiant mixed in. He carries around a giant '80s boombox. Also, before we start I'll get out of the way right now that Zumhofe is currently serving 25 years in prison following a 2014 arrest on sexual misconduct charges that involved his daughter. He also served time for similar crimes in the late '80s. So if you want to skip this one, go right ahead. They start with Regal outwrestling Zumhofe and Zomhofe outpunching Regal. Regal pushes Zumhofe into a monkey flip, but Zumhofe lands on his feet and hits a dropkick. Body slam exchange. It's 1983 so that's still a relatively high impact move believe it or not. Regal gets a cheap shot on a rope break. He runs Zumhofe into the buckles and does some heel 101 hair pulling shenanigans. Zumhofe tackles Regal to try to come back. Regal kills it with a knee to the gut. Regal elbow off the second rope for 2. Zumhofe crawls around the ring on his ass like a dog trying to clean itself off after taking a shit to try to get out of a chinlock. Buckle shot exchange. Zumhofe goes into full comeback mode and dropkicks Regal to the floor. Regal gets a knee up in the corner. Zumhofe reverses a corner whip, slams Regal, and hits a Vader bomb for 3. *1/2

 

Jerry "The King" Lawler def John Tolos in 7:53- Lawler's national profile is still pretty high as this is soon after his famous Andy Kaufman worked shoot feud. Okerlund even mentions the episode of David Letterman Lawler was on is going to be repeated on NBC this weekend. Tolos was a regular in the territories for over two decades, but might be best known for his WWF stint as one of the shortest running managers there, Coach. Really the only reason anyone would remember Coach at all was he was Mr. Perfect's manager for his classic IC title match with Bret Hart at Summerslam '91. Tolos attacks Lawler from behind after instructions and the match starts with no bell. Tolos is the bell. He picks apart Lawler's arm. After a lot of thinking and teasing Lawler finally punches out. Lots of standoffs. Lawler cranks a headlock with the crowd counting along to like 25 cranks. Tolos is wobblelegged and Lawler drops him down with a punch. Lawler sunset flip for 2. Collision and both guys are down. A Tolos punch sends Lawler over the top to the floor. There's a bit of confusion as Okerlund rings the bell thinking it's a DQ for the dumb over the top rope throw rule, but the ref waves it off and lets the match continue. THE STRAP IS DOWN! Lawler pounds away. Fist drop off the second rope for 2. Tolos dodges and Lawler posts his shoulder. Tolos tries a kneedrop off the second rope but Lawler dodges, hits the piledriver, and good night. Trongard says the piledriver is a controversial, dangerous move that should be banned. Give Vince about 20 years. **

 

NWA Women's World Tag Team Championship: The Texas Cowgirls (c) def Judy Martin and Velvet McIntyre in 13:46- The Cowgirls are Wendi Richter and Joyce Grable and they're the heels in this one. Everyone in this match would go on to work in the Rock N Wrestling era women's division in the WWF to one degree or another. McIntyre and Richter start. Grable cheap shots McIntyre from behind and Richter throws her outside. When McIntyre gets on the apron Richter shoulderblocks her off. She tries it again, but McIntyre dodges and Richter crashes to the floor! No pads out there either, it's the early '80s. Back in Richter tries a tiltawhirl but McIntyre blocks and falls on her for 2. This is already the best thing on the show. Grable comes in and bitches with the ref about rope breaks. The faces work Grable's arm. Martin with a slam and kneedrop on Richter. Now the faces pick apart Richter's arm. Arm work is definitely the theme of this show so far. The Cowgirls work the ref and take the upper hand back. McIntyre is whipped into Richter's knee and flipped around by her hair, a mandatory spot in '80s women's wrestling. McIntyre gets a couple of punches in and tags. Martin *pops* Richter with an elbow to the jaw as she's coming off the ropes. Big gasp from the crowd on that. Diving clothesline from Martin. Grable breaks the pin up. Martin's had enough of Grable's lip and pops her on the apron. A headbutt in the gut from Richter sends Martin into the heel corner. They tie Martin up in the tree of woe! The Cowgirls work her over while McIntyre occupies the ref with her protests. They continue to work the ref for double teams and chokes. Martin ducks a clothesline, hits one, and tags. McIntyre cleans house. Flying headscissors! DONNYBROOK! The faces try to battering ram the heels into each other. The heels push out, but the faces counter the counter and the heels still run into each other. Double cover for 2. They do a run where everyone misses big splashes. The crowd boos hard for that. Grable hits McIntyre from behind while she's hitting the ropes and Richter puts her in a Canadian backbreaker. Cowgirls double team backbreaker. Power bomb! That gets the win and retention for the Cowgirls, relatively clean too. Not too shabby. The end run could have used a bit more polish, but it's a fun match. **3/4

 

Wahoo McDaniel def Dizzy Ed Boulder in 7:06- It's hard to tell behind the bleach blonde hair and mustache, but Boulder is in fact the future Brutus "The Barber" Beefcake, AKA Brother Bruti AKA The Zodiac AKA The Man with No Name AKA The Booty Man AKA The Man with No Face AKA The Disciple AKA you get the idea. Boulder's clearly the heel but he offers a sincere handshake to McDaniel, who accepts. Jerry Lawler joins Trongard on commentary. After some mic issues they agree to use the same headset. So much for personal space. Nothing interesting happening in the ring while that's going on as Beefcake was just this side of godawful at this point and McDaniel wasn't much interested in making it work so there's a lot of arm flailing around out there. Boulder drops some knees and does an arrogant cover. McDaniel chops the bejeesus out of him (possibly some teaching the kid stiffness in there) and hits a suplex for 2, the first proper suplex of the entire show. McDaniel does do a nice upside down bump in the corner. After some around the world buckle shots for Boulder a wild chop finishes it. 1/4*

 

Jesse "The Body" Ventura, Ken Patera and Blackjack Lanza (w/Bobby Heenan) def AWA World Tag Team Champions The High Flyers and Rick Martel in 17:03- The High Flyers are future WWF Killer Bee Jim Brunzell and Verne Gagne's son Greg. They've been AWA tag champs nearly two years at this point. By the following year Martel would be AWA world champion. Martel and Patera start. Quick armdrags by Martel. A Brunzell armbar keeps Patera from tagging. Atomic drop from Brunzell. The faces work Ventura's arm. Ventura lifts Gagne into a fireman's carry and carries him into the heel corner. Gagne fights off Lanza and tags. The heels are selling like crazy. The Flyers bounce on the ropes while Ventura is reaching for a tag, causing him to fall into the ring! Nice. Patera tosses Brunzell around. Ventura hooks in a bear hug. Brunzell bell rings out and tags. Donnybrook! The match had been threatening to break down since the opening bell and it finally does. Lanza and Patera are run into each other while Ventura is posted. Gagne hooks a sleeper on Patera. Ventura hits him to release the hold. Lanza with a backdrop as Gagne goes in peril. He goes for the claw (or "brain buster" according to Trongard) and Gagne gets to the ropes. Ventura runs Gagne into the corner. Phantom tag to Martel while the heels have the ref distracted. Gagne reverses a whip and Lanza does a Bret bump. Real hot tag to Martel! Lanza dodges a dropkick and Patera follows up with a quick elbow drop for 2. Suplex. Brunzell breaks the pin up. Martel gets choked in the heel corner. He counters a backdrop and tags. Brunzell with a hiptoss and dropkick on Lanza. Figure four! Or "Indian Death Lock" per Trongard. He had his own names for a lot of holds. Everyone back in the pool! Heenan gets on the apron and you can see him taking something out of his pocket. After things calm down Brunzell goes for the figure four again on Patera and everyone runs in again as the ref might as well give up and go home. In the confusion Brunzell goes down and Patera pins him. Trongard doesn't know what's happening and thinks the heels have been DQ'd until Okerlund announces them as the winners. The faces protest, saying Brunzell was hit by a foreign object and run the heels off. Heenan takes his shots. The slow mo replay shows more clearly Patera taking the international knucks from Heenan, stowing them in his tights, and hitting Brunzell with them while others were partially blocking the camera. That one is more on the camera crew and production staff than the wrestlers. Not much action to write home about, but it had good grudge match heat. **1/4

 

To lead into the world title match- Nick Bockwinkel was in his third reign as champion and had held the title the vast majority of the time since 1975, cementing him as the company's biggest star following Verne Gagne's retirement. Hulk Hogan, after working as a top heel during his initial WWF run and becoming a huge star in New Japan through his matches with guys like Tatsumi Fujimani and the god of Japanese wrestling Antonio Inoki, went to the AWA soon after filming his role in Rocky III. He was turned face not long after and quickly became the most popular wrestler in the company. This match is supposed to be the culmination of a long title chase that had already featured multiple screwy finishes.

 

AWA World Heavyweight Championship: Nick Bockwinkel (c) (w/Bobby Heenan) and Hulk Hogan go to a Dusty Finish in 18:12- There's a great all-arena shot for Hogan's entrance with the crowd going nuts. Hogan steps in the ring and gets right in Bockwinkel's face. His shirt says "We want the belt!" on the front and "Now or never" on the back. Well.....Lord James Blears is the special guest ref. As soon as the bell rings Bockwinkel pulls a Jay White and rolls out of the ring, then gets back in, teases forever, and rolls out again. After he gets back in again there's a cautious hand lockup. Hogan pulls and Bockwinkel goes down. Trongard says Bockwinkel's fee was so high for this show and to get in the ring with Hogan again the promoter had to raise the ticket prices. Now that's heel work. And a hell of a cover to jack up ticket prices. Hogan easily wins a full lockup. Bockwinkel runs into Hogan full speed and goes down. After a second time he rolls out and gets consoled by Heenan. Bockwinkel with rapid fire knees while Hogan's against the ropes. Hogan counters a backdrop and returns the knee favor while Bockwinkel's in the ropes. Hogan double stomp and backbreaker. Bockwinkel gets more knees to the gut and covers. Hogan's kickout sends him to the apron. Hogan backdrops out of a piledriver. Bockwinkel with crawling headbutts while both guys are down. Hogan gets a knee up in the corner, hits a clothesline and elbow drop for 2. Bockwinkel dodges a legdrop. Both guys are slow moving like they've gone 45 minutes already or something. After a slugfest Hogan hits a powerslam for 2. Running elbow and elbow drop for 2. Bockwinkel dodges in the corner and locks on a sleeper. Hogan flips him over and Bockwinkel falls on the ref. He puts the sleeper back on. Hogan backs into the corner, squashing Blears in the process. The crowd boos, almost sensing a screwjob on the horizon. Back to the sleeper. Hogan flips Bockwinkel over the top rope to the floor. When he gets back on the apron Hogan suplexes him back in. Legdrop! Hogan gets the pin! The crowd goes INSANE. BUT WAIT! The AWA president at ringside confers with Blears. Blears confers with Okerlund. Okerlund announces that, in the determination of the AWA president, Hogan threw Bockwinkel over the top rope and is therefore disqualified. Bockwinkel is still the champion. All the air goes out of the arena. Big "BULLSHIT" chant. And this is polite near Canadian Minnesotans getting pushed to the point they're chanting bullshit, that should really tell you something. The ring is pelted with popcorn and drinks. Hogan takes Bockwinkel and Heenan out, refuses to give the belt back to the gaggle of refs now in the ring, and leaves. Screwjob aside the match was still not that great, mostly because they were moving in slow motion almost the whole time. *1/2

As always there's two sides to the story. One side says Gagne was using the promise of being champion as a lure to keep Hogan in the company without intending to ever actually put the belt on him. The other side says Hogan didn't want to give up time in New Japan (an argument somewhat countered by Hogan's WWF signing), and being AWA champion would mean having to work with their partner All Japan, breaking the all important loyalty bonds in Japan. Whatever middle the truth lies in, the end result is indisputable: soon after this Hogan left the company to return to the WWF, was instantly made the champion, became the face of the WWF's national expansion boom of the '80s and the biggest star the sport ever saw until at least Attitude Era Steve Austin. AWA got nothing.

Verne Gagne and Mad Dog Vachon def Sheik Adnan El-Kaissey and Jerry Blackwell in 12:23- This is getting the main event slot because Gagne is coming out of retirement for one night only. Or, put more cynically, Gagne booked himself in the main event. Take your pick. Sheik Adnan is the same guy as General Adnan during Sgt. Slaughter's Iraqi sympathizer heel run. Gagne's big goal here is to hurt the heel team so bad they can't challenge his son and Brunzell for the tag titles. Yeah. The faces charge the ring before intros and the heels bail. So does Okerlund, gently easing himself over the top rope. After everything calms down Blackwell charges in and Gagne chops him down. Both the heels have wrapped up casts on one arm. The first five or so minutes of the match is the faces easily staying on top. Blears joins commentary for a quick interview and basically says he did what his boss told him to do. I can sympathize with that. Adnan turns things around by hitting Vachon with his cast and Vachon falls to the floor. He grabs the bell and whacks Adnan with it. Then he throws a mic stand, but Adnan catches it and hits him with it. Vachon is busted open. A chair gets in the ring and Gagne hits everyone with it. It's total chaos, and not the good kind of chaos. Match is a complete mess. Adnan and Vachon get in a slugfest. Blackwell powerslams Vachon and Gagne breaks the pin up. Then he breaks up an Adnan abdominal stretch. Vachon ducks a punch and tags. Gagne dropkicks. Another Blackwell powerslam on Gagne for 2. Gagne dodges a splash and an avalanche. He hooks in a sleeper. Vachon cuts Adnan off and uses Adnan's cast to hit Blackwell. Gagne rips Adnan's cast off and Blackwell takes a chairshot to the head from Vachon on the floor. The faces pick apart Adnan's exposed hurt arm, with Gagne kicking it coming off the second rope to get the pin. Ugly as hell. Also the faces cheated way, way more than the heels. 3/4*

OVERALL SHOW THOUGTS: It's 1983 AWA so you can excuse the very 1970s (or even earlier) wrestling style. No one touched the NWA, specifically Jim Crockett's Mid-Atlantic, when it came to in-ring innovation in the early-mid '80s, at least until Randy Savage hit the WWF. The Hogan title screwjob is a historical curio that should be checked out at least once for anyone interested in wrestling history, a mistake the AWA never recovered from.

OVERALL SHOW GRADE: D-