Mid-Atlantic Championship Wrestling
Date: February 15, 1986
Location: WPCQ Studios, Charlotte, North Carolina
Commentators: Bob Caudle, Johnny Weaver

This is another territory that I’ve touched on before and we’ll be taking another look at it here now. I only have one episode at the moment but if this goes well I’ll see if I can find some more. This isn’t the main WCW show but rather a territory still, although I’d bet pretty strongly that you’ll see a lot of the same people. Let’s get to it.

I’m a little sketchy on the time period because this show should be called World Championship Wrestling. This doesn’t look like the Atlanta studios though. The opening sequence says Mid-Atlantic too.

Upon further investigation (and by that I mean I did the World Championship Wrestling show from this date already), this is the B show and would be the forerunner to WCW Pro. I think I’ve got this now.

Caudle says we have new world tag champions but with him are the former champions, the Rock N Roll Express. They say they’re coming for Cornette and their titles.

Manny Fernandez vs. Mike Semani

No idea if I spelled that last name right. Manny takes him down immediately and does kind of a reverse leapfrog out of the corner and the Flying Burrito (that’s the real name. It’s a flying forearm) gets the pin.

Ron Bass says he thinks he’s stronger than Barbarian. If he wins whatever challenge that follows, he’ll get $10,000.

Arn Anderson, the TV Champion, rants about how Dusty Rhodes has apparently been stealing money from him.

Rock N Roll Express vs. ???/???

Two unnamed jobbers here. Robert starts with the one in green and after some armdrags it’s time for Ricky. Double dropkick to the second one and we’re done in 30 seconds. Replay shows that Robert’s literally missed by 10 inches.

We get a clip of Nikita saving Ivan Koloff from getting pinned by Magnum’s belly to belly. Baron Von Raschke came in for a 3-1 beatdown. Dusty tried to make the save but got beaten down as well. Baby Doll, Dusty’s chick, tried to help also but it only got Dusty beaten down even worse until the Road Warriors and Rock N Roll made the save.

Black Bart vs. Ron Rossi

Bart is a big evil cowboy and he wins with a middle rope double legdrop in about 20 seconds. This would be the case a lot.

Midnight Express vs. Rocky King/Ben Alexander

This would be Condrey and Eaton. The Rock N Roll Express comes out to watch and the place erupts. The jobbers are Rocky King and Ben Alexander. Not that it matters but I try to be informative. Top rope splash by Eaton, 45 seconds. That’s a long match for this show.

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House show ads. Anderson isn’t worried about defending the title in a cage against Dusty.

Cornette says that the Midnights are ready for Rhodes and Magnum in South Carolina.

Dusty says he and Magnum want to take out the Russians.

Magnum says pretty much the same thing.

Nelson Royal/Sam Houston vs. Jim Jeffers/Tony Zane

Everything breaks down to start and we finally get it does to Houston and Zane. Houston is Mid-Atlantic Heavyweight Champion. Off to Royal who puts a knee in Zane’s ribs and it’s off to Jeffers. Royal dropkicks him down and it’s off to Houston for some abuse. Royal takes him down with a headlock takeover and Houston hits an atomic drop. This is going a lot longer than I thought it would. Royal uses a spinning toe hold to get the submission.

Rating: D. This was long and not that good. When I say long I mean about four minutes but for this show that’s a marathon. This could have been accomplished in about 45 seconds but I guess they had to fill in the time somehow. I don’t remember much about Royal but Houston would go to WWF soon and wouldn’t mean anything.

The Midnights say they’re awesome and any team can come after them that wants to.

Paul Jones and Barbarian say they’re sick of Jones being called a weasel. Bass’ challenge is accepted.

Ron Bass vs. George South

Bass throws him around and easily breaks any hold that South tries. Claw ends this quick.

More house show ads. Baby Doll says Arn has no chance against Dusty in a Texas Death Match. For the South Carolina show, the Midnights need to be ready for America’s Team.

Baby Doll is in the arena now and says Dusty is on a movie set in Arizona with Willie Nelson.

TV Title: Arn Anderson vs. Italian Stallion

The fans chant for Dusty which gets on Arn’s nerves. A quick rollup gets two for Stallion and he grabs an armbar. Arn finally wakes up and pounds on his back before sending Stallion to the floor. Now Arn hooks the arm as is his custom. The fans keep chanting Dusty as Arn stays on the arm. Arn literally works on it with basically the same hold for five minutes. He wraps it around the post a few times and Stallion makes his comeback. He charges into a hot shot and the gordbuster ends this.

Rating: D-. This is a good example of a match that is long but not good. The match runs almost ten minutes but like I said, almost seven or eight of that is a boring arm hold. When it doesn’t even play into the finish, that doesn’t make things interesting. It makes them long and uninteresting, which isn’t good. Really boring match.

Houston, Royal and Fernandez say they’ve got Magnum’s back against the Russians.

Overall Rating: D. I wasn’t that interested in this. You can tell that it’s the B show here as there’s not much of interest going on here. The main focus is on the two tag team feuds and Flair is nowhere in sight. It’s not the worst show I’ve ever seen but there’s nothing of note going on here. I might take a look at one more episode of this but if it’s not any better I won’t be doing more than that.

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Mid-Atlantic Championship Wrestling
Date: May 12, 1982
Location: Techwood Studios, Charlotte, North Carolina
Commentators: Bob Caudle, David Crockett

So this is Mid-Atlantic and this is the only show I’m doing of it. This would be the grandfather of WCW in a long story that I don’t want to get into again. Anyway this is pre-Starrcade so it’s a pure territory show. Let’s get to it.

The opening theme is mainly a map of the territory and bad music.

Caudle and Crockett open the show, talking about a tag team title tournament. The finalists are Ole Anderson/Stan Hansen vs. Don Muraco/Wahoo McDaniel which is going to be a best of seven series.

Sandy Scott, a former Stampede heel referee, is now a representative of the NWA. Jack Brisco is here having just beaten Rodney (yes Rodney) Piper for the Mid-Atlantic Title. He says he was here to win titles but Piper comes up with a trashcan. Brisco is garbage and a trashcan Indian. Brisco pulls out a sucker and puts it in Piper’s pocket. A jobber is there and Piper beats him up for fun.

Since the interview area is mere feet from the ring, Horner (the jobber) and Piper get in there along with Ivan Koloff. Brisco comes out to even the odds. Muraco is here and it’s a wild brawl as we go to a break. Scott, the NWA representative says that for the next 30 days there will be NO Disqualifications. Also if they go to a time limit there will be a two minute rest and then a battle to the finish. Muraco calls out Koloff, having more energy than I’ve ever heard from him.

Ron Richie vs. Jim Dalton

No clue who either of these people are but one looks familiar. There’s a very tiny crowd here which is weird to see. It’s weird hearing the crowd this silent but there can’t be more than 100 people there, which is capacity. We’re talking about the opening segment so I have no idea what the point of this match is. Come to think of it I have no idea who is who.

THERE WE GO! Dalton is in blue. That helps a lot and I think he’s the heel. There are a lot of nerve/rest holds in this one. Decent dropkick from Richie to give him a break. They speed things up a bit and a powerslam out of nowhere gets the pin for Richie. That was really, really bad.

Rating: D-. From a technical standpoint it’s ok but at the same time there was just nothing worth paying attention to at all here. The commentators were at the level of Tony Schiavone with talking about stuff not related to the match. I still have no idea why this match happened or who I was supposed to like.

Sgt. Slaughter, the US Champion, says he’s still the champion. He wants Wahoo and Muraco in these matches with No DQ. I think he’s heel here but I’m really not sure.

Killer Khan vs. Vinnie Valentino

Khan was an old school monster that feuded with Hogan and Andre in WWF. Valentino is a jobber. You do the math. Arm bar goes on for awhile, Valentino gets some jobber offense in, Khan massacres him, big knee drop ends it. No rating.

Kelly Kiniski (likely playing a relative of Gene) and Mike Davis (no clue) are here. Kelly has a Canada jacket on so yeah I think I’m right. He mentions his dad and says he’s Canada’s greatest athlete so yep I was right. He’s ready for King Kong Mosca. Davis runs down Piper a bit also, saying Brisco is going to kill him.

King Parsons vs. Tony Russo

Earl Hebner is referee here and looks just like he does now, 29 years later. Parsons would become a much bigger deal in WCCW. Russo is a fat man but he’s short. Think Kevin Sullivan but with a bigger gut and black hair. Full nelson by Parsons gets him nowhere. Hip toss out of the corner sets up a dropkick as this is likely going to be another squash. Parsons throws some off punches and here comes Russo. This is one of the sloppiest matches I’ve ever seen. Parsons gets a monkey flip and some other basic moves before a headbutt ends it.

Rating: F. This was awful as both guys looked terrible and none of their shots were hitting at all. Parsons looked lost out there and Russo didn’t help anything. Terrible match indeed.

King Kong Mosca, a monster, says he loves the No DQ rule.

In the same shot Piper comes up and goes off on Brisco saying he’s got a counter to the Figure Four. This is another classic Piper rant and we get the “you don’t throw rocks at a guy with a machine gun” line, which is far more famous when he said it in WWF.

Ole Anderson comes up after Piper leaves and says he and his partner are winning the tag title series.

King Kong Mosca vs. Kelly Kiniski

Paul Jones comes out early in the match and joins commentary. Kiniski works on the arm of the monster. We spend very little time talking about the match itself as Jones is talking about the new rules as well. Mosca gets a knee to the ribs and controls with a front facelock. Kiniski fights back but misses a dropkick to put himself right back down again.

Mosca yells at Jones after drilling Kiniski. This is more or less about Jones rather than the match at hand. We hit the chinlock now and this is going on a good bit too long now. Kinishi gets a slam out of nowhere for two. This is going on way too long here and it’s boring now. Kiniski goes into the corner but the referee breaks it up. A big forearm of all things ends it for Mosca.

Rating: D-. This was one of the weakest matches I’ve seen in a long time. It ran about seven minutes when it should have been about two. There was nothing special at all about this as Mosca was lumbering all over the place. Cut this in half and make it a squash and it works ok at best.

Jim Dalton and Steve Syberg (I think that’s his name) like the new rules. You think that’s a theme or something tonight?

Private Nelson/Private Kernoodle vs. Johnny Weaver/Jake Roberts

The former here are known as Sgt. Slaughter’s Privates. I can’t make this stuff up people. Kernoodle would be a tag partner of Sarge while Nelson would eventually embrace his Soviet roots and become Boris Zhukov. Roberts you know and Weaver is credited with inventing the sleeper. I think the military dudes are heels here but they’re kind of inept.

Weaver vs. Kernoodle at the moment with Weaver destroying him seemingly with ease. Atomic drop gets two. Nelson comes in and goes after Weaver’s arm. Back to Kernoodle now as the beating is on. The referee rubs Nelson’s head for no apparent reason. Yes the one on top of his neck you sick freaks.

Hey let’s talk about the no DQ and Piper some more! We haven’t done that in 19 seconds so we need to do it now! Back to the arm now and it’s all Privates here. After about four minutes of arm work we get the hot tag off to Jake who cleans house. DDT, called a Brainbuster here, gets two on Nelson. The running knee sends him out to the floor and we’re almost out of time. And yep there’s the bell as we’re out of time. This will continue next week apparently.

Rating: C. Match was ok at best but they had more of a formula and they set it up a bit better. The Privates were ok as a weak heel team and we got a decent match out of it. Roberts as this young was kind of interesting to see even though he wasn’t in there much at all. This was to play up the must be a winner thing that was part of the rule change.

Weaver and Roberts say they’ll be back next week with no time limit to end the show.

Overall Rating: D+. This was a pretty weak show by modern standards but overall it wasn’t too bad. They definitely had a theme going here and the Piper vs. Brisco feud is actually kind of interesting. They would trade the title a few more times over the summer before Piper turned face. Anyway this was an ok show but nothing great. Kind of fun from a history standpoint though.