Megabucks Presents: GWF Supercard (1992)

Note: This is the Megabucks Sez edition of something I wrote about 20+ years ago. Notes from present-day me, as always, will be in bold italics. Also, 2002 was a different time, so please excuse some jokes. I’ll probably call myself out on them too.

With GWF content seemingly on the BOD shelf for now, figured I’d go back to when I attempted to review something from the company’s post-Jump the Shark phase. This too originally appeared on The Heel’s Daily Diatribes website.

This show is in the Daily Diatribes Videos Inc. collection. If you are interested in it or any other wrestling videos, come visit the tape list here! (OR DON’T. Because it no longer exists.)

Today I will be doing my first review of a television show from the Global Wrestling Federation, the last of the wrestling programs from the Dallas Sportatorium to be regularly aired on ESPN. (It would last another year or so in Dallas syndication and on channels such as SportsChannel America. They tried to improve mostly with old WCCW stars like the Freebirds and Chris Adams, but it was too little, too late. But…the Sportatorium would go out on a number of other companies, such as an attempt at a JCP revival and the Continental Wrestling Alliance, which actually got on pay per view with the infamous Bodyguards vs. Bandits show!) It is also perhaps one of the biggest “riches to rags” stories in wrestling of the early 1990s. You see, although I was pretty much still a mark 11 years ago (yikes, make it 34 years ago!), I started to build my appreciation for good, nonsense-free matches. So having the likes of Eddie Gilbert, the Patriot, Scott Anthony, Cactus Jack, Lightning Kid, and Jerry Lynn on weekdays at 4 pm was kind of a nice break from the WWF and WCW. It started out swell, but as the year passed, talent losses and money issues took their toll on this once-promising federation, and that brought us things such as…

– The first-ever bungee cord match (and it is on another show in the collection, so a review isn’t unfeasible [keep waiting…]), preceded by “Maniac” Mike Davis’ “space launch,” where he found his new best friend, his “moon rock.”

– Commentator David Webb gets hit with a microphone by the “Ragin’ Tex-Mex T-Rex” Manny Fernandez, and wakes up thinking he’s Elvis Presley.

– “Hollywood” John Tatum and Jack Victory feuding over their past partnership. Perhaps John thought Jack didn’t carry his end in their tag team in the UWF, you guess? Oh, you thought I meant, “wrestling partnership”? No, this was over profits made by Tatum and Victory’s pizza delivery service!

– Manuel Villalobos, having gone to the poor house, needs to win the TV title to make a living. Hey, didn’t they do that in WCW with Chavo Guerrero Jr. and the cruiserweight title? My memories of 2000 WCW are either hazy or being suppressed, so I wouldn’t know off the top of my head.

And so on and so forth. And that brings us to the point we shall visit now.

We start with the rather cool “pillars” opening, the theme music of which I liked.

We are coming from the World Famous Sportatorium in Downtown Dallas, and your host is Doyle King, who is interviewing Tribal Nation. For those of you who thought Tatanka sent images of Native Americans back 50 years, these two punctuate their comments with tomahawk chops and Indian war whoops, complete with the mouth slapping. (The Heel: I have “reservations” about this team, HAW HAW!) Aside from that, they promise bad things later on for “Harleywood” John Tatum and Rod Price. (No truth to the rumor that someone from up high wants to see Tribal Nation return. They might even fund a new Sportatorium if they do! For the rest of us, like I said, both 1992 AND 2002 were a different time. That includes your inset, Heel…)

Opening Match: Mad Dog Billy vs. Crusher – And this, ladies and gentlemen, is the reason why I chose this seemingly inconsequential episode for my first GWF review. This had to be some kind of amateur night, as both men are these old, heavy-set, unathletic excuses for wrestlers. Not only that, but “Mad Dog” and “Crusher”?!!? Those are, like, Names One and Two in the Book of Cliched Wrestling Nicknames! (Revisited numerous times in reviews of cartoons from the ’60s and back with wrestlers…#ReadToonedIn…) Stevie Ray is doing color with Doyle. Speaking of which, if Mad Dog and Crusher were “fruit booties,” they’d probably be overripe, mealy apples. Anyway, there’s a match here, or something resembling one, so on to that. Nothing notable happens, then Billy does a low shoulder block (Described by Doyle as “flying nearly six feet!”) and pretty much bounces off of Crusher’s midsection. Gut-gut-gut-gut-wrench suplex gets 2 for Crusher. Even Stevie and Doyle are making fun of the two wrestlers’ girths as the match goes on. Basically Crusher no-sells all of Mad Dog’s offense before getting the win with a piledriver. Can I go –2 for 1 here?

I may mention that the pain of this “experience” was dulled somewhat by me taking breaks to watch WWF Metal is Wildside as I did this review Saturday night. After getting over the trauma of seeing that Onyx is not much bigger than Crash Holly, I also caught a pretty good Hurricane vs. A.J. Styles match, which was highlighted by the return of the VER-TUH-BREA-KUH! (Or is it the “Hurribreaker” now?) (Urban America TV was on our cable for awhile, and I was big on NWA Wildside, which they aired in the wee hours on Saturdays)

2) Booker T. vs. Alex Porteau – This is the period in which Booker was managed by Sebastian, basically a heel version of Jamison who was under the wing of former WCCW and NWA manager Gary Hart. Yes, they created a bush league imitation of a bush league WWF gimmick. The storyline was that the Ebony Experience (Harlem Heat’s GWF identity) needed money to take care of their hospitalized mother, so they had no choice but to turn to Hart and Sebastian, even though they don’t believe in their “cheat to win” philosophy. Collar and elbow, then Booker hits the side headlock. In a cute spot, Porteau straddles the top rope to break the hold, then Booker just lets go and drops him. Then Porteau comes back with a headlock of his own. Booker breaks out with a hiptoss and hits a dropkick. After this we are back to dueling headlocks. A criss-cross leads to Booker thwarting a monkey flip attempt with a simple stomp. Then he goes for a little variation with an armbar. Alex fights out, and cute spot #2 comes when he headbutts to escape and then sells his own head. With some decent wrestling in between, we return to the headlocks once more. The end comes when Booker either blows a move or hits Iceman Parsons’ butt-butt (which is called a “reverse headbutt” by Doyle, is he saying something about Booker’s looks there? Or, “Tell me he did not just say that!”). Camera cuts to the crowd for whatever reason, then Booker misses a dropkick and Porteau gets the pin? Well that came out of nowhere. I wonder, was this one of ESPN’s infamous foreign object edits or did they edit out another blown spot? Aside from the Headlock Fu, there was a little potential here.

3) Calvin Knapp vs. Steven Dane – Take a drink every time Doyle starts a segment by saying, “From the Global Wrestling Federation.” This is a light heavyweight match, apparently (despite Knapp’s pumped-uppedness) and Alex Porteau is accordingly doing color, ranting on and on that he is still the light heavyweight champion despite being stripped, and “that’s the bottom line.” He also chides Doyle with a “What?” or two. Hmmmmm…between that and being a paranoid (ex-)champion, can we theorize that it was “The Pug” who inspired Steve Austin? Anyhow, Knapp picks up the headlocking where Booker and Alex left off. After a crossbody, Knapp “hits” a dropkick that can be ranked as 0.6 on the Watts scale. So he goes back to the considerably easier headlock yet again. Was this the first move Chris Adams taught people at the GWF wrestling school or what? Doyle explains that there is a light heavyweight tournament going on across the country. I guess the GWF didn’t have enough money to book it in Rio de Janiero, eh? Dane and Knapp reverse armbars, and then Porteau runs in but messes up by missing Knapp’s leg. So he just runs in to double team him with Dane for the DQ finish. As a LH match, Pillman vs. Liger this was definitely not.

4) Stevie Ray vs. Angel of Death – The second Harlem Heat Before They Were Stars match today, and just as Booker T showed some potential, Stevie showed his lack of potential against Black Scorpion #1293. I think there was one thing resembling a wrestling move in this whole match (a reverse chinlock by AOD), the rest is pretty much just punching and weak brawling. Gary Hart is on color during this match, where he argues with Doyle about whether the Ebony Experience should listen to Sebastian. When Doyle brings up Booker commenting that he doesn’t like his advice and cheating, Gary says that he need only “just say no.” So he agrees that they shouldn’t be managed by them? Outside, Angel hits his hand against the post when attempting the Titanium Claw. Oh yeah, that’s right, AOD’s gimmick here was that he went overseas to have a titanium tendon implanted in his hand so that his clawhold would surpass even the Von Erich Iron Claw. Maybe by the same scientists that built a Greg Valentine cyborg to trick Bob Backlund, as reported in your favorite magazine and mine, Inside Wrestling. And anyway, shouldn’t titanium stand up better to a steel ringpost? While I ponder this, back in the ring Stevie mounts his comeback by punching AOD like a little kid would punch at an older sibling who teases him by stealing his toys. They do a double clothesline spot, but it looks like they just bumped into each other. After a ref bump, Angel gets his TRUMPET OF DOOM (BTW, the other part of Angel’s gimmick was that he played Taps for his opponent before the match) and hits Stevie with it, which we don’t see thanks to the ESPN Crowd Shot. This gets the pin, after which AOD leaves the ring to his uncharacteristic, Muzak-like theme. I can name this match in three notes: B, A, and D.

5) Tribal Nation vs. Rod Price (GWF champion) and John Tatum – John Hawk is doing color commentary, and I still can’t reconcile this blond, clean-shaven, soft-spoken Texan with Bradshaw. (JBL to you younger readers…) Rod actually has a belt other than a tag team one to represent his title. If I remember Brandon Baxter’s story, after Eddie Gilbert took the North American title belt with him, they had to use the tag title, then Killer Tim Brooks loaned the GWF one of his old belts. That got stolen, though, so they were back to the tag ones, duct taping the words “tag team.”

(In fact, here’s an article from when the belt was found, in 2013)

Match starts off as Nicona of the Nation runs Tatum and Price off with hiptosses. The heels bail, and get in a shouting match with a high school marching band in the crowd who rallies Tribal Nation by playing the stereotypical Native American song. (You know, the one Bobby Heenan used to use when saying hello to Tatanka: “Hey-how-are-ya, hey-how-are-ya!”) (The Heel: As long as it doesn’t shriek, “TATANKA! BUFFALO!” over and over, I can deal.) Apparently, this match is based around a series of haircuts, one to Brave Sky, and an earlier incident in which the Nation “scalped” Gary Hart of his toupee. (Yes, yet Another Stupid Global Gimmick, Gary decided to dishonor the stipulation of a hair vs. hair match between Kerry Von Erich and One Man Gang from about 10 years ago by pretending he grew his hair back)

Back in the ring, Tatum tries his luck but gets thwarted by Brave Sky, sending him back outside where he does his classic pouty crying face. (The Heel: Missy Hyatt noted in her book that Tatum was an okayish wrestler who stayed active for so long due to GREAT facial expressions. Is that verily correct? Refresh my memory.) (I believe so….it was hard to remember because it was probably caught in between Missy’s numerous kiss and tells about who she slept with…) Back in again, Tatum is caught in an armbar and tries to escape with a hairpull, but the cruel hand of irony comes into play since he can’t do it because of his and Price’s haircut. Eventually, Price and Tatum cheat Brave Sky into Blatantly Offensive Ethnic Stereotype in Peril role. Funny moment comes when Tatum is again distracted by the band, and every time they hit a note, he stops and makes fists as if he was in one of those countless numbers of cartoons involving a character who can’t sleep because of loud music. After a body block, Brave Sky finally makes the hot tag, and Nicona is a Teepee on Fire (2002…) during which he performs a 0.8 Watts dropkick. Pier six erupts, then Nicona misses a monkey flip and Price gets the Flair pin, except he just kind of lays on Nicona’s legs and puts his feet on the ropes (for rollups, that would be 0.9 on the SummerSlam ’97 Austin scale, BTW). Match sucked, but John Tatum is quite funny.

Post-match, Hart, Price, and Tatum complain about the band distracting them. Then my tape runs out there.

The Deal: Well, I warned you, much of the GWF wasn’t pretty after mid-1992, and this would be more than sufficient proof of that. Not even the stuff that was so bad it’s funny was in abundance (with the exception of Sebastian, perhaps), so not even a guilty pleasure for you here.