The Best of Wrestlers Slaughtering Jobbers

THE BEST OF WRESTLERS SLAUGHTERING JOBBERS:
* Okay, so there’s a long, proud history of wrestlers taking liberties with job guys who piss them off for some reason, so I figured I’d find a handful of them. I can only imagine at the backstories to some of this- wrestlers being giant liars and all, it’s tricky to find out just WHY some of these dudes apparently had to die, but boy you can tell when it happens.

KOKO WARE vs. THE MASKED PATRIOT:
(Memphis, 1985)
* An infamous one where Koko just trucks a guy. Koko’s short, squat and muscular in red tights with white trunks over them, and the jobber is some pasty white guy in a blue singlet and a red mask & trunks, with white boots. Well I guess he has the colors, but he’s too cheap to buy stars for his gear?

The jobber gets a bit jumpy to start, just wrenching on a lockup, but Koko starts throwing safe overhands to his back, but putting a FLOURISH into it, then hits an absolute motherfucker of a clothesline that flat-backs the guy but good. You can see he doesn’t tuck his head on for the bump at all, so the stiff 1980s ring just puts his lights out. Koko throws another overhand but can’t lift the dead-weight of the jobber, so he starts throwing punches and kicks as the guy only kinda revives and sits up while stiff kicks are thrown by a FURIOUS Koko. One soccer punt hits him square in the back as even the commentators go “Ooh- he is REALLY working on the Patriot”, and Koko deadlifts him up for the Ghostbuster (Brainbuster) then viciously slaps him in the face while the guy’s getting pinned (1:03). Holy Jesus.

Someone in the YouTube comments suggests the guy was recognized as an outlaw show wrestler and THAT’S why Koko obliterated him. Or that aggressive lockup and chest-slap early just lit Koko’s fire, I dunno. He obviously did SOMETHING to make guys mad.

Rating: 1/2* (you gotta give guy ratings for a jobber match to a beating this, um, credible-looking)

When “I don’t wanna look bad in my hometown” goes wrong.

THE SKYSCRAPERS (Dan Spivey & Sid Vicious, w/ Theodore R. Long) vs. MIKE BLACKWELL & AVALANCHE:
(WCW, 8/5/89)
* Another infamous one, this features the chubby jobber Avalanche (in a black singlet that doesn’t cover NEARLY enough up) teaming with local boy Mike Blackwell, in black tights and a leather jacket, who apparently did not want to be jobbed out in front of his friends or family. So he agreed to take the loss to the monster duo the Skyscrapers, but didn’t want to look bad, meaning… well, just watch.

The Skyscrapers jump into the fray immediately, throwing worked shots to the back- Avalanche gets dumped but Blackwell keeps throwing shots to Dan’s stomach instead of selling (he’s leaning down as if to “sell” but keeps fighting back), and Dan just hoists him up in a bearhug and drops him face-first. Blackwell’s up IMMEDIATELY looking like nothing happened, and Dan whips him into Sid so hard that SID falls over. Blackwell’s shaking it off and both Scrapers work him over, Dan blank-faced as he suplexes the guy, releasing him at the top so Blackwell takes the bump ugly, right on his ass. Blackwell still won’t sell beyond “shakes his head like it surprised him”, doing the same sell for a big boot AND a clothesline, popping right back to his feet after each bump. The Assisted Powerbomb hits and the fucker is STILL KICKING HIS LEGS as he’s pinned at (0:52). From an assisted powerbomb!

Sid & Dan, now just livid, dump both jobbers and tell Avalanche to get out of the way (Dan clearly tells him something while giving him the courtesy dump) while they teach Blackwell a lesson on the outside (Long: “Kick his ass!”)- Sid goes from safe punches to legit shots to the ribs, then holds Blackwell by the hair so Dan can deliberately measure him and just BLAST him with a left hand. According to Dan and Jim Cornette “the back wasn’t very comfortable for him either”. The dude just went into business for himself and refused to sell at all, still trying to work punches and comebacks and not staying down for a single move. Given that these are Monster Heels and he’s a jobber, it was ludicrous and Dan, who was very high on the list of wrestlers to be fucked with, was unamused.

Rating: 1/4* (less than a minute and the jobber won’t even do anything to sell the offense)

YOKOZUNA (w/ Mr. Fuji) vs. CASEY CLERIC:
(Early 1993)
* This isn’t the most terrifying Banzai Drop match (where the guy is shown begging the ref to get Yoko off of him- you can find the bump on YouTube), but man, this looks vicious. Cleric is a generic-looking guy with a hairy chest and pits, in a black singlet. Yoko’s just gearing up for the World Title match against Bret Hart.

Cleric charges in but runs straight into a clothesline. Yoko slams him with a belly-to-belly, legdrop, ass slam in the corner and Banzai Drop in succession, but KICKS HIS LEGS OUT on the landing so it looks like an absolute deathblow (1:48). He’s actually got his hand on the top rope so he’s probably braced slightly, but goddamn. And after Fuji cuts a promo Yoko DOES IT AGAIN!! And continues to sit on Cleric for a good 45 seconds. Probably looks worse than it is (Yoko was considered a very good, safe worker by everyone), but holy hell.

Rating: 1/4* (basic monster squash with nothing given to the jobber at all, but Yoko’s offense looks terrific)

PERRY SATURN (w/ Terri Runnels) vs. MIKE BELL:
(WWF Metal, May 17th 2001)
* Another infamous one I missed as it happened, since RAW rarely aired squashes and I didn’t have the secondary show. Saturn’s in black tights but has a ridiculous fuzzy pink jacket and fuzzy white hat on, just kinda throwing all all the extraneous shit a lot of wrestlers were at the time in attempts to stand out (in this case, he’s openly aping Superstar Billy Graham). Bell is a standard issue jobber, albeit a bit more stockily built than most, in a black singlet with “MB” (for “Mad Dog”- his nickname) on it. He’s most notable for this match and an appearance in his brother’s documentary “Bigger, Stronger, Faster” where he’s using steroids and attempting to make it as a pro wrestler when everyone, from his wife to his brother, knows his dream is never gonna happen.

Things start well enough, doing a good chain-wrestling sequence into two Internationals, but shit goes downhill when Bell does a big hiptoss, but then throws what looks like an armdrag, but with his LEFT limb, sending Saturn going over him awkwardly and landing on the side of his neck. And you know that’s bad because Saturn IMMEDIATELY leaps to his feet and throws shoot punches and kicks rather than selling it, screams various nasty things I can’t make out, then VICIOUSLY dumps him, not even trying to guide the landing so Bell lands vertically on the floor, folding like an accordion. Saturn then rams him into the steps, deliberately making it so Bell’s neck/head hit instead of the flat of his back. Saturn appears to have it out of his system now, and tree-of-woes the guy while Terri comes over (probably like “WTF?”) for their air-kisses. She can be heard going “You’re going too far!” or “You’re going to kill him!” on-camera as Bell rolls back in. Brainbuster gets two and Saturn locks on a resthold so the commentary can discuss more angles of the day (the real purpose to extended D-show squashes like this). Bell gets rammed into the corner, but ducks a clothesline only to eat a superkick, and the Three-Toed Moss-Covered Family Gredunza (spinning fisherman’s suplex) finishes at (3:17).

So from the looks of things, Saturn just got pissed at the messed up move, probably expecting a standard right-handed armdrag or hiptoss (I don’t think wrestlers are supposed to just switch hands like that), and was so furious he just lit the jobber up (when asked about it, he just said “Drugs” apparently). Not the first time I’ve seen a wrestler explode from a screwed-up move (you can see Akira Hokuto do this in early ’90s joshi sometimes), but certainly not as public or as big as this, even on a low-end show. The vertical dump is definitely NOT how you’re supposed to do that move, as Bell had zero room to take the bump properly, then Saturn made sure the shove into the steps hurt. At least after that they got back into “working”. The blowback from this one was bad enough that Saturn was brutally punished in a match with Faarooq & Bradshaw, who stiffed the hell out of him, then he was given the “Goofy Brain-Dead Idiot” gimmick with Moppy, etc.

Rating: 1/2* (ugly, brutal squash- after the botch it’s largely indistinguishable from a normal squash save for Saturn’s unprofessional brutality, which could easily be mistaken for standard wrestling if you weren’t looking for it. I mean Rick Steiner just wrestled like that all the time normally)

THE STEINER BROTHERS (Rick & Scott Steiner) vs. GLENN RUTH & DALE WOLF:
(WWF Wrestling Challenge, March 1993)
* You could pick nearly any Steiners squash and watch them abuse jobbers, but this is a WWF one notable for the future Thrasher, Glenn Ruth, as one of the dweebs. Scott’s in a yellow/black singlet, and Rick’s in a mostly pink multicolored one. Ruth’s in the most hilariously bad tiny trunks- multicolored in that ’80s way but mostly pastel squares- he’s a bit tall & lanky, without much definition. Wolfe is hilariously dumpy, pasty and short, in a blue singlet.

Scott handles Ruth to start, the jobber repeatedly stalling and complaining of tights-pulling, so you know this match is a backdrop for Monsoon & Heenan to hype WrestleMania. So they screw around and Ruth shoves him like he don’t wanna live no more, so Scott headlocks him and hits a fucking DRAGON SUPLEX, flipping Ruth right on his head. Hebner just casually walks over to ask Ruth if he’s alive and Scott tosses him to Wolfe for the tag. Wolfe appears hesitant to lock up (GEE WONDER WHY?) and gets backdropped. Over to Rick, who gets eyepoked and slugged, but Wolfe turns around to talk shit to Scottie and turns around into the Steinerline. Well he earned that one. Rick belly-to-bellies him off the second rope in a big bump, Heenan going “I like ’em! Imagine doing that to a midget?” (Monsoon: “WHAT?” “Never mind”). Back to Ruth, who gets slaughtered with the tilt-a-whirl slam and Steiner Bulldog at (3:28).

Rating: 3/4* (spectacular for a squash, as the goobers just take all sorts of violence while the Steiners force tags just to beat up the other guy)