First wrestling memory

ShawnRaven · 23-05-2008 12:13am

Cartoon_Head wrote: »

1992 of course.

The Hogan bit at the end was interesting because of the boos he got - he looked like a real bad loser and Sid really played the crowd well for a change! I remember Hogan looked genuinely worried at the reaction to the finish.

What a lot of people don't remember is the fact that on the TV programming after that, the audio was edited so that it sounded like Flair was booed when he won, and Hogan was cheered when he pulled Sid out.

The SNME that took place the following month is a prime example of this.
VR!

SlickRic · 23-05-2008 12:14am

Bret v Owen WM10

Bret was (i repeat, WAS) my hero. Owen's win hurt.

i remember King repeatedly telling everyone about the sharpshooter being Owen's move and i just remember it pi$$ing me off no end as a naive 9yr old

fatal · 23-05-2008 1:39am

Watching WCW on saturday afternoons on ITV are probably my earliest wrestling memories.The first time I saw wrestling I was hooked.A couple of years later "WWF superstars" was shown on saturday evenings on sky one.
I couldn't to watch WCW "nitro" ,gladiators and WWF "superstars" every saturday.Hence why saturday's used to be my favourite day.
I was a huge fan of guys like Hogan,sting,warrior,doink the clown,the nasty boys,flair,ahmed johson,smoking guns,nation of domination,big bossman etc etc etc and i've got some wonderful memories of them.

edit:After reading vince's first post,I also remember watching japanese wrestling on eurosport.Very entertaining stuff indeed!

chopperbyrne · 23-05-2008 8:02am

Cartoon_Head wrote: »

My favorite memory though, if there is such a thing, was listening to the whole of the 1991 Royal Rumble where Flair won the title in the Rumble match. It was scrambled on Cablelink as it was known at the time but the audio still came through and since Monsoon and Heenan did possibly the best commentary job of any PPV I have seen before or since I could almost visualise what was going on in the ring. I was a huge Flair fan back then - even though nobody in my class at school seemed to realise who he was since they only knew of WWF.

I did that too!

greatgoal · 23-05-2008 8:36am

nice1franko wrote: »

Watching a Big Daddy and Giant Haystacks fight

http://popandcrisps.wordpress.com/2008/05/22/big-daddy-and-giant-haystacks/

now the ages are showing,jackie pallo v mick mc manus in the mid 60s,i also remember johnny kwango v les kellett.

ShawnRaven · 23-05-2008 9:26am

Hah PW Forum war! The New Blood vs The Old Codgers

VR!

Vince135792003 · 23-05-2008 9:38am

greatgoal wrote: »

now the ages are showing,jackie pallo v mick mc manus in the mid 60s,i also remember johnny kwango v les kellett.

It's amazing to think that up to 14 million people used to watch it in the UK at it's peak each Saturday. Of course it was a different era with less pass times but that's still a heck of a number.

Apparently it was Greg Dyke the former director general of the BBC who pulled the plug on it when he held that position in ITV at the time.

nhughes100 · 23-05-2008 9:48am

Another one showing my age but British wrestling on Saturday mornings ITV is my first memory. God it was awful but very occassionally they would show an american wrestling special - It was like taking drugs, all hell broke lose - why can't they do that on British wrestling I asked. Anyway I was there for the start of Sky TV so watching WMIII live was my first American event.

+1 for the brilliant Brain and Gorilla commentaries. I don't think there's ever been a commentator to match Heenan's quick wit.

Vince135792003 · 23-05-2008 9:56am

nhughes100 wrote: »

I don't think there's ever been a commentator to match Heenan's quick wit.

Jessie Ventura was great too. Different to Heenan but equally as good in my opinion.

ShawnRaven · 23-05-2008 11:13am

Ventura was awesome because when you were a young mark kid, Jesse always called it as he saw it, and you hated him so much because he was ragging on the faces, yet he was pretty much speaking the truth. His commentary during the Megapowers feud was awesome, siding with Savage (and rightfully so), while laying into Hogan at every given opportunity.

Ah... good times.
VR!

ShawnRaven · 23-05-2008 11:16am

nhughes100 wrote: »

Anyway I was there for the start of Sky TV so watching WMIII live was my first American event.

Funnily enough, that would be the only event they would show live until Sky Movies showed Mania VI as a special event. All others in between would be shown the following Monday at 8pm. I remember they made a total botch of Mania V with ads and the matches were all in the wrong order too. Survivor Series 87 was also riddled with ads too.

VR!

chopperbyrne · 23-05-2008 11:21am

validreasoning! wrote: »

Ventura was awesome because when you were a young mark kid, Jesse always called it as he saw it, and you hated him so much because he was ragging on the faces, yet he was pretty much speaking the truth. His commentary during the Megapowers feud was awesome, siding with Savage (and rightfully so), while laying into Hogan at every given opportunity.

Ah... good times.
VR!

Venturas commentary made matches seem better than they were.

People always go on about how great the Savage and Steamboat match was, but I've seen it dozens of times and it is a good match, but not as great as people say it was.

I'm convinced many people only have that opinion because about fifteen or sixteen minutes in Jesse says "This is the best pro wrestling match I've ever seen." and it just stuck in peoples minds.

ShawnRaven · 23-05-2008 11:36am

Here's the thing about Wrestlemania III, right...

It's remembered for two things. The second is the Savage v Steamboat match, because it upstaged every match on that card, and you can't deny that. You can say you don't like it because you don't like that style of Pro-Wrestling, which is fine, but it blew every other match on that card out of the water (unless you're Bret Hart, in which case you'll be a firm believe of your own hype and say that the midcard six man tag was the best out of the entire card), but the crowd reaction after the end of both matches tells that story anyway.

The first thing Mania III will be remembered for is the Hogan/Andre slam, it was a horrible match but that was the slam heard around the world at the time, and it's still shown on highlights packages to this day.

But Savage v Steamboat, in my opinion, was probably one of the greatest matches of the 80's, and one that brought back prestige back to the IC title as a direct result. After Savage literally stole it from Santana 14 months earlier. And it's pretty much known that Vince McMahon used every opportunity to humiliate and de-push Steamboat that he could find, because he upstaged the main event.

VR!

chopperbyrne · 23-05-2008 11:41am

I'm not suggesting that it wasn't the best match on the card, but I just don't think it's as good as it's regarded.

ShawnRaven · 23-05-2008 11:43am

I'll be honest with you, you're not the first person i've heard/read say/type that. It's down to personal preference really, but what has to be taken into consideration is that a lot of matches in WWE at the time were punck/kick, slam, clothesline, finisher, 123. That match took made that formula look like the joke that it was, and which, in my opinion, has made it so memorable to the point that it's still talked about 21 years later.

VR!

chopperbyrne · 23-05-2008 11:47am

Oh it definitely kickstarted the kind of wrestling we see today and both Savage and Steamboat deserve recognition for that, but it was very choreographed.

Possible Savage did the same thing for that match he did with Flair years later, made him practice the match repeatedly.

nhughes100 · 23-05-2008 12:45pm

It was a classic build up to the Savage/Steamboat match, the type you don't really get any more thanks to PPV's every month etc. Both guys style matched perfectly, add in having George Steele on the outside, the numerous pinning attempts, the crowd reaction - not to mention the ref sounding like he made a 3 count on more then one occassion and it was completely above standerd given the kick punch clothes line finisher matches as is correctly pointed out above that were par for the day.

ShawnRaven · 23-05-2008 1:31pm

chopperbyrne wrote: »

Oh it definitely kickstarted the kind of wrestling we see today and both Savage and Steamboat deserve recognition for that, but it was very choreographed.

Possible Savage did the same thing for that match he did with Flair years later, made him practice the match repeatedly.

Savage apparently did that with everyone he worked a program with, he did it with Hogan (according to him on the Warrior DVD anyway), and he did it with Warrior.

Personally i don't see any problem with it. The whole thing is a work anyway, so if it's gonna be done to perfection, then i've no problem with it. Of course, i'm a huge mark for Savage and always was.

VR!

ShawnRaven · 23-05-2008 1:36pm

nhughes100 wrote: »

It was a classic build up to the Savage/Steamboat match, the type you don't really get any more thanks to PPV's every month etc. Both guys style matched perfectly, add in having George Steele on the outside, the numerous pinning attempts, the crowd reaction - not to mention the ref sounding like he made a 3 count on more then one occassion and it was completely above standerd given the kick punch clothes line finisher matches as is correctly pointed out above that were par for the day.

The amount of near-falls like that today would be booed out of the building. Thats how big a deal it was in 87. I'd have to agree with you on the buildup, thats why SNME was such a big deal in the 80s and early 90s. It doesn't mean squat nowadays as it's pretty much a glorified RAW now.

Times like this i wish Vince would go through some of the WWE library so he can remember the days when wrestling was watchable, and maybe produce a better show than he is doing these days.

VR!

D-FENS · 23-05-2008 2:06pm

Earliest memory of WWF was ironically on the old English wrestling on ITV – they had a special “American Edition” for the 4th of July in ’86, and it was hosted by Lord Alfred Hayes of all people (I remember not having a clue who he was), I can’t really remember the matches, but I know Hogan, Savage and Greg Valentine were involved. Ì actually didn’t really know who Hogan was either, I remembered seeing him in the A Team about a year earlier, but thought he was just a character for that show.

Earliest memory of WWF programming is of course “Superstars” when it started on Sky around the start of ‘87 – Andre’s heel turn, Piper feuding with Adrian Adonis, and The Harts winning the tag belts from The Bulldogs, I remember being disgusted by that as a kid, over a year before I’d learnt to appreciate Bret (Until his face turn at WM 4 really).
Oh yeah, and I remember being scared of Kamala and Sika…

Minto · 23-05-2008 2:07pm

My first wrestling memory is watching a PPV in a friends house one afternoon, many moons ago. I think it would have been a Saturday Night's Main Event now that I think of it. After we watched it, we had toasted cheese sandwiches and played with his wrestling figures. They were the ****ty hasbro ones that didn't move and the ring had two american flags on opposite ring posts. I don't really remember much about the matches, I kinda remember seeing Slaughter and Bossman, don't think they wrestled each other though.

My next wrestling memory was catching WCW a few years later and thinking I don't like any of these characters. They just didn't capture my imagination like Austin did in WWF at that time. I've been WWF/E since then!

D-FENS · 23-05-2008 2:18pm

Minto wrote: »

Saturday Night's Main Event now that I think of it. After we watched it, we had toasted cheese sandwiches and played with his wrestling figures. They were the ****ty hasbro ones that didn't move and the ring had two american flags on opposite ring posts.

Je$us, you've just stirred a memory or two - Where they the ones that were a good inch or so taller than the modern day ones but not quite as big as say, Action Man, just made out of solid plastic all the way through? I still have a Bret Hart one of them somewhere, the paint is completely gone from him

And does anyone the smaller "Thumb Wrestlers" that had a big hole in the back of them (No, I don't mean their anus

) and were almost in a sitting stance, you were supposed to put your thumb in them and wrestle your friends (Which was as crap as it sounds, but they were actually quite flexible for doing moves), I remember having a good few of them - Hogan, Savage (Complete with the Shades), Hillbilly Jim, JYD, Orndorf, Iron Sheik (Complete with curly boots), Volkoff (Complete with Russian Hat) and Piper (Complete with kilt and "HotRod" Tshirt)

How simpler life was then…

Minto · 23-05-2008 2:22pm

D-FENS wrote: »

Je$us, you've just stirred a memory or two - Where they the ones that were a good inch or so taller than the modern day ones but not quite as big as say, Action Man, just made out of solid plastic all the way through? I still have a Bret Hart one of them somewhere, the paint is completely gone from him

I thought they were about the 6 inch mark, but I could be wrong. And if I'm not mistaken, aren't the modern day ones about 6 inches too?

DaveyGem · 23-05-2008 2:22pm

Probably the arrival of Kane, i was amazed so I was

D-FENS · 23-05-2008 2:28pm

Minto wrote: »

I thought they were about the 6 inch mark, but I could be wrong. And if I'm not mistaken, aren't the modern day ones about 6 inches too?

Maybe they looked bigger because i was smaller!
But i do think they were a bit bigger than the modern ones, they were certainly heavier, just big solid lumps of rubber

ShawnRaven · 23-05-2008 3:24pm

D-FENS wrote: »

over a year before I’d learnt to appreciate Bret (Until his face turn at WM 4 really).

Well to be honest, he hadn't fully turned face. He and Neidhart would still be heels for another three months until a week before Wrestlefest, which was July 1988. When they fell out with Jimmy Hart, and Hart gave his 10% commission to the Rougeaus, which started that feud going. Bret did get a brief singles run, but he was jobbing to Bad News Allen the whole time, so they ended up putting him back together with Neidhart against Demolition at Summerslam that year, which they would lose as Hart had also sided with Demolition temporarily for that PPV and there was a lot of outside interference.

It was definitely the teaser for the face turn, and the Harts were so over that it was inevitable.
VR!

Vince135792003 · 23-05-2008 6:44pm

D-FENS wrote: »

Je$us, you've just stirred a memory or two - Where they the ones that were a good inch or so taller than the modern day ones but not quite as big as say, Action Man, just made out of solid plastic all the way through? I still have a Bret Hart one of them somewhere, the paint is completely gone from him

I had 2 Hacksaw Jim Duggan ones. I only ever wanted a Hogan 1 though!

super_furry · 23-05-2008 6:45pm

Watching Coco B-Ware. I would have been about six or seven and he was by far my favourite because the first time I saw him, his parrot crapped on his shoulder.

ShawnRaven · 24-05-2008 10:39am

super_furry wrote: »

Watching Coco B-Ware. I would have been about six or seven and he was by far my favourite because the first time I saw him, his parrot crapped on his shoulder.

Ah good ol' Koko B. Pinned. Feeling hungry now, any one care for some fried parrot?

(I'm so going to hell for that one!)
VR!

HorseRadish · 25-05-2008 9:07pm

I remember watching a WWF video where Ultimate Warrior put the referee on the top turnbuckle when he kept telling the Warrior to break it up. Cant remember who his opponent was. The first big ppv I watched was Wrestlemania 6 (booing Hogan in the main event was a fond memory)

First wrestling memory

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