Mid-South Wrestling – January 13, 1984: Magnum Gets Tarred And Feathered
Mid-South Championship Wrestling
Date: January 13, 1984
Location: Irish McNeil Boys Club, Shreveport, Louisiana
Commentators: Jim Ross, Bill Watts
What is with all this 1984 I’m watching lately? Anyway, this is Mid-South which is one of the major territories I haven’t touched on yet. It was based around Oklahoma, east Texas and Louisiana and was run by Cowboy Bill Watts. They’re known for having great in ring stuff but being light on angles, so if that’s your style this might be what you’re looking for. I haven’t seen much of their stuff either so let’s get to it.
JR and Billy welcome us to the card. Last week the Russians ran their mouths and challenged whoever wanted some to come fight them. They wanted JYD and Magnum (probably the biggest stars in the company) but they weren’t ready to wrestle. Terry Taylor came out and yelled at Crusher Darsow, the Russian sympathizer. Volkoff jumped Taylor and this became a match. Taylor won with a sunset flip in like 30 seconds.
Terry Taylor vs. Doug Vines
This is Taylor’s second match in the territory so he’s brand new. Terry hits a monkey flip, a dropkick and an armdrag to set up an armbar. Small package wins it quick.
The Russians run in but JYD and Duggan make the save.
Junkyard Dog/Jim Duggan vs. Larry Higgens/Jeff Sword
JYD is the North American Champion, which is the top title in Mid-South. Dog starts with let’s say Higgens. A headbutt puts Jeff down and he runs away from a scream by Duggan. Duggan knocks him into the corner and Sword comes in. JYD hits Sword in the head a bit and Duggan slams him. The referee is Karl Fergie who had a match on a show I recently did. I love little things like that. Three Point Headbutt from Duggan gets the pin. Total squash.
The Russians attack post match but the power of AMERICA cleans house.
Paul Garner/Don Ralston vs. Magnum TA/Mr. Wrestling II
Magnum and Wrestling are tag champions. Magnum and Garner start us off…..and here’s Jim Cornette. He gets in the ring and makes fun of the champs as the Midnight Express runs in through the crowd and knocks out Wrestling with a blackjack. The Express lay out Magnum as Cornette pours some liquid on his back. They pull out a pillow and tar and feather Magnum. Ok that’s AWESOME. I remember hearing about this in Cornette’s shoot and it resulted in the Express almost being killed on multiple instances. This was a comedy spot in Memphis but here, it’s DEAD serious.
Midnight Express vs. Lanny Poffo/George Weingroff
Dig that From Lexington, Kentucky! This is Eaton and Condrey. Condrey and Poffo start us off. Eaton has brown hair here which is so strange to see. Poffo throws them both around to start and Condrey is in trouble. Back to Eaton who has a little bit better luck. We get into a much more standard Express match with the double teaming blocking a tag. The Express destroys Weingroff for awhile and a double team move (elbow/belly to back drop combination) gets the pin.
Rating: D+. Not much here but it was a squash so what were you expecting? The Express at least had a little change of pace in their squashes as they started off slow because they were adjusting to their opponents. It’s not much but at least it breaks the formula that you always get in these things.
Wrestling II and Magnum say they’ll pluck the Express.
Jim Neidhart vs. Tom Lentz
Neidhart goes right after Lentz and the dominance begins. A Samoan drop ends this quick.
Steve Williams vs. Crusher Darsow
I think this is the main event. Watts sums up the match very quickly: Williams hates Russians. Watts, ever the AMERICAN rants about how the Russians winning means annihilation. Crusher hooks a quick chinlock and holds onto that for a good while. Doc finally gets up and hits a bunch of three point stance shoulders. Volkoff comes out and slips something to Darsow. A shot to the head with it gets the pin.
Rating: F. What a boring match. We had a four minute long match here and about two and a half of that was the chinlock. Who goes to a chinlock that early in the match anyway? Doc was a lot more interesting when he was running over people rather than laying on the mat. Darsow would go on to become Smash in Demolition.
Butch Reed vs. Rick Rood
Yes, that Rood. He’s VERY young here and looks nothing like himself. Reed is a former champion here so what do you expect out of this? Reed throws him around a lot but Rood makes a comeback with very little time left in the show. Butch takes him down again and we hear about a new team coming called the Rock N Roll Express. Reed hooks a facelock with about two minutes to go in the show. He finally wins with a delayed gorilla press.
Rating: D. It’s always cool to see someone like Rude out there where you have no idea what’s coming from him in the next few years. Reed was a guy that had everything going for him and then more or less disappeared after Doom broke up. The match was just a squash but Rude would get a push soon after this I think.
Overall Rating: C. I liked this show. It flew by which is good and there was a big angle going on in it. The Express had been here only a short time but they’ve now established themselves as monster heels. This was a good show and I’m looking forward to seeing more from this company.
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I spent Sunday nights during the 1980’s at the Tulsa Civic Center, enjoying what I still feel was, for perhaps a 2 to 3 year span, the greatest professional wrestling ever presented. Lots of things have been said about Cowboy Bill Watts: he was a racist, a bully, a cheapskate who ran the boys ragged and kept the glory for himself. However, those were qualities found in pretty much every successful rasslin’ promoter for the first 80 years or so of the sports’ existence.
As far as the racism allegations, I’m not too sure. Yes, he was a redneck, but what other promoter then or now built their organization around a black man, even putting the top title around the waist of Junkyard Dog when it wasn’t even necessary. Plus I’ll never forget the way he presented Hacksaw Butch Reed: not as a dancin’, hard-headed, loveable idiot but as a smart, ruthless athlete whose color was inconsequential.
Also, with the exceptions of Lance Russell and Gordon Solie, pro wrestling commentators were all cut from the same cloth: dense apes in ugly suits who only seemed to get excited when a babyface began his standard comeback. So when Jim Ross showed up, smart and fast talking and knowledgable, I felt an odd pride in my home promotion. Every Sunday evening, from about the 5th row ringside, I got to see the greatest all around pros in the U.S. (Dibiase, Jake Roberts, Cornette with the Midnights, Dr. Death, both Hacksaws, the Fabulous Freebirds, Eddie Gilbert, Dick Slater, Buzz Sawyer, Magnum TA, Dick Murdoch, often Ric Flair for NWA title defenses, and so many more). Watts of course was fervently anti-WWF, and presented a totally alternate universe from what Vince was then giving us. Smart, exciting booking, plenty of blood but never over the top…the Mid-South/UWF was the perfect antidote for Vince’s hijinks. I still miss it.
I’ve liked the stuff I’ve seen from it and you can’t argue with their roster’s success.