NWA Central States TV – March 17, 1984 – A Good Lesson In Bad Chemistry

NWA Central States TV
Date: March 17, 1984
Location: Memorial Hall, Kansas City, Kansas
Commentators: Kevin Walters, Bill Morris

This is one of the NWA’s big territories from back in the day, but at this point it’s fallen on some hard times due to Vince’s nationwide plans. Harley Race was the big star but I think he’s moved into a management role by this point. I have no real idea what to expect here so I don’t have much else to say. Let’s get to it.

The show is called All Star Wrestling. Ok then. I’m sticking with Central States TV.

The announcers run down the card tonight. I only know a handful of these names.

Tommy Rogers vs. Scott Ferris

I’m assuming that’s the same Rogers from the Fantastics. He has a beard so it’s kind of hard to tell. Ferris is from Oregon and is the heel here. Very basic match here and the camera angle is taking some getting used to. It’s between the top and middle rope for the most part. Ferris is the bigger guy and the veteran here. He likes to drop knees it seems. Time for a bearhug because it’s the 80s. A belly to belly gets two. Scott works on the back but Rogers makes a very weak comeback. He walks into a hot shot though and a splash ends this with Ferris getting the very slow pin.

Rating: D. By today’s standards this was pretty boring and I don’t think it was all that great back then either. Ferris is a guy I’ve never really heard of but then again this is a territory so that has to be expected with a lot of them. This was really just a somewhat longer than usual squash, but Rogers would get a lot better.

Frank Leopard vs. One Man Gang

Gang is pretty new here and this is from a different area. Gordon Solie is on commentary. This is total dominance and for some reason we’re talking about Dusty Rhodes. I’d assume this is from Florida. It’s mentioned that Gang and Ron Bass are US Tag Champions so that puts this somewhere from late December of 83 to mid January of 84 in Florida. A splash ends this total squash.

Gorgeous Jimmy Garvin says he’s coming to St. Louis. He talks about an upcoming match with Chris Adams.

Tiger Mask vs. TG Stone

This is joined in progress. Stone gets knocked backwards and rolled up for two. Stone stomps away and is definitely the heel here. Tiger tries to use speed but Stone is an evil cheater who does bad things. Off to a chinlock and Stone pounds away. Most of this is just Stone pounding away on Tiger Mask. I’m assuming this is Tiger Mask I. That chinlockery continues, this time with a knee in the back.

A backdrop and a kneedrop combine to get one. Tiger Mask gets up and Hulks Up. Things get a little sloppy now as it seems like they go into a totally different match. Tiger gets up and things kind of stumble around into Stone taking him down. The masked one comes back and hits a backdrop and middle rope punch for two. A cross body gets two. Some punches and elbow drops get the same. A dropkick puts Stone down and it’s a time limit draw.

Rating: F. This was more about these two just not clicking at all. Tiger Mask is very good but he had nothing to work with here. Like I said, there’s only so much you can do in territories like these. You have guys like Stone who isn’t anything of note but he filled in a spot on a card. Bad chemistry abounded here.

Video on Bruce Reed, who is far more famous as Butch Reed. It’s a music video and all it really says is that Reed is awesome and strong. There are a LOT of shoulder blocks in this. This goes on WAY too long, as in like 5 minutes.

Chris Adams offers a rebuttal to Garvin. He’s British and from World Class where he had a long feud with Jimmy Garvin. They both had women involved. He also had two big contributions to American wrestling: he was the first big named guy to use a superkick, and he trained Steve Austin.

Wahoo McDaniel says he’s ready for his match with Harley Race for the Missouri Heavyweight Title, which was a big time title in those days.

Grapplers vs. Ted Oates

This is No DQ. The Grapplers are masked guys and Oates’ partner, Ron Richie, isn’t here yet so we’re starting with a handicap match. We’ll say that’s Grappler #1 to start. Oates fights them both off and the Grapplers regroup. We’ll say that’s #2 in there now. You really can’t tell them apart so there’s no point in trying to tell which is which. Oates hammers him down so it’s off to #1. The Grapplers run again as this has been one sided so far.

The Grapplers switch but the referee (the same one in all of the matches so far) catches him because of something about their boots. So the Grapplers tag and #1, the one that tried to cheat, comes in anyway. Oates nips up but finally gets in trouble due to the numbers advantage. The Grapplers start double teaming and here’s Bulldog Bob Brown to be Oates’ partner.

Brown tries to come in but gets shoved out for fear of a stern lecture I suppose. The Grapplers work over the leg with a spinning toe hold. Oates has finally seen Brown but #2 comes in and tries the same hold for awhile. Oates gets in a knee lift to #1 and makes the tag. Brown cleans house and wins very quickly with a belly to back suplex.

Rating: C-. Pretty basic tag match here once it got to the end. I’m not sure what the point of it was but I can’t hold that against it as I don’t know what the story was to it. Not a bad match or anything and the idea of having Oates desperately needing a tag worked well enough. Not bad and definitely the match of the show.

Brown and Oates take the Grappler down and try to find out if his boot is loaded. The other Grappler comes back and the boot goes upside Oates’ head to bust him open.

Post break Oates and Brown say they won.

Overall Rating: D. Like I said in the rating for the previous match, I’d have probably liked this a lot better if I had known some of the stories going into it. The stuff with the promos was good and I’d like of like to see some of those matches. The best way to describe this show is that the stuff that was good was good and the stuff that was bad was bad. Not the worst I’ve ever seen but it wasn’t anything great.

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