Thursday, June 18, 2009

WWF at the Maple Leaf Gardens- 02/15/1987

1) SD Jones v. Ron Bass- 2
2) Sika v. Moondog Spot- 2
3) Corporal Kircshner v. Johnny K-9- 3
4) Adrian Adonis v. Roddy Piper- 4
5) Pedro Morales v. Paul Orndorff- 2
6) Harley Race v. Junkyard Dog- 4
7) Randy Savage v. Ricky Steamboat (IC Title Match)- 6
8) Hart Foundation v. Killer Bees (non Title)- 4

Okay, opening match was dreadful. Jones has some charisma and the crowd was behind him during his two brief bouts of control. Bass was a shell of his former self in Florida; if the Florida version of Ron Bass fought the WWF version of Ron Bass, he'd handily kick his ass. Both guy's body slams were really sloppy, dropping each other on their tailbone, could really have caused some injury. The match dragged at ten minutes, pace slower than my current 800 page novel, Mr. Norrell and Johnathan Strange by Susanna Clarke. Bass won with a sloppy back elbow he supposedly stole from Blackjack Mulligan. He'd be best served to return it.

Mean while, hours before his match, in a sweaty locker room, pro wrestler Sika reads a few chapters of "How to Kill a Crowd for Dummies!" Standing front facelock pulled this match into a black hole of suck-dom. Crowd was dying a slow, poison tipped Shakespeare death. Spot threw some gnarly punches, but didn't add up to much.

Cpl was sweating like he was tripping on X; Slick came out and cut a good promo, guy really had character. K-9, who recently was convicted on major drug charges, was reading from the Zybyzsko playbook of stalling. Neither guy had much to do in the ring, so i guess it was just as good a use of time. The Corp. (as Monsoon called him) still looked seriously untrained, his punches and kneedrops backyard at best, and his suplex completely unfinished. This went on way too long.

Adonis bumped like a fiend for Hot Rod here. Match had a better story and pace than their famous Mania encounter. Piper took some spray from the atomizer in the eyes and wandered into the crowd. No body plays desperate comeback like Roddy could, just a move of his right knee forward, clawing his way back into the ring would get a pop. They played up a few false finishes, but went with a DQ to keep the program hot for Mania. Jimmy Hart looked like the biker from a Village People tribute band that plays gay clubs exclusively.

Orndorff may as well have worn a postman's uniform to ringside because this was so completely mailed in. Morales, at least, was getting older and couldn't do much; even his famed left hand had lost most of it's sizzle. All in all, this was a pretty poor match. Orndorff swarmed Pedro with kicks and stomps ontop of the ring announcers table for most of it, not letting him get anything off. Would have hated working with him here.

I think Chris Farley was heavily influenced by the King Harley Race with his over the top comedy, evidence is watching Race do nasty comedy bumps out of the ring, hanged upside down and falling every which way for Dog in this brief match. He looked more like the Court Jester than the King. Dog was even laughing after each spot. These guys were just fucking around in front of the Canucks here. Same finish as Mania would have, Race catches him off guard in belly to belly.

Really psyched to see this match right before their famous Mania bout. Match was wholly different, Good back and forth armdrags etc, start then Savage starts long methodical dissection of Dragon. Ricky is so awesome at selling (like that hasn't been said a million times) the agony he puts on his face is as realistic as anything in the cartoon world of wrestling. Savage keeps dumping him outside but his comeback is red hot. Savage blades deep and then just kills himself on crazy bumps, like slingshot in the corner, looks like he's trapped in Venom's web laying up there all mangled. Finish was really great too, Steamboat goes for this spot where he tries every kind of pinfall he can think of but Savage reverses (w/ some tights action) and gets the duke. This so blew away anything else on this show, hence the high score.

Main event was okay but felt like a half effort. Bees could really move, good tags, timely tags actually, their tights were like the ass end of a bee like they were slowly trying to transform them. Anvil actually was really on, came away with some good power stuff to stop Bee's momentum while Bret came in for his token beatdown. They did the double mask gimmick where no one, especially the ref can tell who's legal except Monsoon who calls out Brunzell right away. Faces get the win to send the crowd home happy, except they couldn't have been too pleased after a very poorly performed show.

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