WWF @ Hamilton, Ontario
Copps Coliseum
March 13, 1988
Summer is upon us once again, and with that, we’ve started making our yearly trips out to Pinawa, which is where we were over the long weekend, beginning last Thursday. And you know what that means – lots of free time in the late evenings for me to watch a shit ton of old wrestling. I’ve absolutely come to treasure my time out there and a big part of the joy is the chance to catch up on actual relaxing – reading, movies, and of course lots of wrestling. So I have a few reviews that I’ll be getting around to. Also this weekend was the latest AEW card – Fyter Fest – which I watched last night. I can’t wait until their weekly TV gets started.
I have a growing pile of random events that I’ve been accumulating and need to start checking out. I was in the mood for some simple and straightforward wrestling, and this card certainly fit the bill. A really awesome longtime collector has started recreating old cards that were never released in full, piecing together the best quality sources available to make these cards as complete as possible. I have a bunch of his stuff, and all of it looks really unique and interesting, including this recorded house show from Hamilton, Ontario in March of 1988.
In addition to the WWF’s regular tapings in classic cities like New York, Boston, and Toronto, they would also semi-regularly record house shows in other major cities like Houston, LA, Washington, and most interestingly – Hamilton. They certainly had a lot of television content to fill back in the 80s, and the majority of these recordings ended up being aired on Prime Time and in international markets. I’m endlessly fascinated by these production details, and love the fact that this collector took the time to recreate this card from all the scattered available sources.
The Copps Coliseum is a fascinating and fantastic venue. It looked amazing when it was all brightly lit for Royal Rumble 88, and two months later, it’s packed again for this house show. Over the weekend I finished reading an awesome book – The Down Goes Brown History of the NHL by Sean McIndoe – and it was interesting to learn how many times Hamilton has been denied an NHL franchise. The Copps Coliseum was built specifically for an NHL team, but thanks to the territorial rights of Toronto and Buffalo, were denied every time, despite having an arena, ownership, and a fanbase all in place. A team in Hamilton seemed like a surefire bet, but the NHL made a sharp left turn and granted a team to Ottawa instead, despite that city not even having an NHL calibre rink ready.
Really unique and interesting commentary duo for most of these matches – Craig DeGeorge and Nick Bockwinkel. I forgot Bockwinkel even worked for the WWF in the 80s! Talk about an underrated talent – Bockwinkel’s commentary was awesome. His delivery was so smooth and so smart. He explained all these details like strategy, how holds work, what wrestlers were thinking, why they acted and dressed the way they did. I can’t believe he was never given a shot to handle some A shows. From what I was reading he was brought in primarily as a road agent.
1) SD Jones pinned Johnny V with a headbutt
One of the problems with running three cities a night is that the cards were padded with garbage like this. But the money was pouring in so who am I to criticize. Perhaps a bigger question is why this kind of crap was broadcast on Prime Time Wrestling? I suppose they didn’t want to give away much in the way of marquee matches on free TV at this point, so they would tape this junk and broadcast it to fill time. This was as basic as it gets, but surprisingly the fans are behind SDJ. Or maybe they just really hate Johnny V? Hilariously SD Jones picks up a win! Who would have thought!
2) Nikolai Volkoff & Boris Zhukov defeated B. Brian Blair & Jim Brunzell when Volkoff pinned Brunzell at 11:15 after a double axe handle from the middle rope as Brunzell had a sleeper applied on Zhukov
Man did the Killer Bees ever drop deep down the standings by the beginning of 88. Who did they piss off? It’s strange considering the Bees were survivors back in November at the inaugural Survivor Series, yet don’t do much other than lose throughout 88 until breaking up towards the end of the year. Blair and Brunzell were talented workers, but the team never really rose above mid-card status. But it’s insane that they lose to the bumbling and inept Russians. I enjoyed this wacky mess, and was outright surprised when the Bolsheviks won seriously.
3) Dino Bravo (w/ Frenchy Martin) pinned Koko B. Ware at 7:47 with the side suplex
I love the fact that they put over Bravo supposedly beating the world bench press record in this very building. Royal Rumble 88 was hardly ever mentioned over the years, other than in passing, so it’s always interesting to catch these tidbits. Man Bockwinkel is great on commentary, even keeping me interested in a Dino Bravo match. Koko is a really highly underrated worker, as he had spectacular timing and always kept the fans into his matches even when it was obvious he was going to get squashed. I also got a chuckle out of Koko entering to Piledriver still, and laughed even harder when Bravo used a piledriver on him, a fact not lost on the commentators.
4) WWF Women’s Tag Team Champion Noriyo Tateno (w/ WWF Women’s Champion Itsuki Yamazaki) pinned Leilani Kai (w/ Jimmy Hart & Judy Martin) at 13:12 after Kai collided with Hart on the ring apron
Gorilla Monsoon and Bobby Heenan provide new commentary for this match, which is too bad because I was enjoying Bockwinkel so much. But Heenan’s hilarious as always, making remarks about Leilani Kai being a centerfold and dodging Gorilla’s questions after declaring his knowledge of where exactly in Hawaii Kai is from. It’s interesting that the Jumping Bomb Angels and Glamour Girls wrestled two months earlier in Hamilton at the Rumble, a fact discussed briefly by Monsoon and Heenan, with Monsoon thinking it was an SNME, but the Brain correcting him that it was the Royal Rumble. This was a lengthy match, with a lot of good mat work. I keep hearing great things about Japanese women’s wrestling from the 80s and 90s, I really should track some of it down. I really enjoyed this scientific match and loved seeing Tateno pick up the win. Too bad Moolah fucked over this whole division and we never got the Angels-Girls match that was rumored for Wrestlemania V.
5) Brutus Beefcake defeated Greg Valentine (w/ Jimmy Hart) via disqualification at 9:03 when Valentine used Hart’s megaphone as a weapon as Beefcake had Hart in a bearhug
This match was broadcast on an international version of Wrestling Challenge and as such has the worst quality of all the matches. It’s hilarious that Beefcake and Valentine were still feuding a year later. But as Beefcake talked about in his book, they were best buddies and loved working and hanging out together. This match is all house show nonsense and stalling for the first part before Valentine goes to work on Beefcake. I laughed my ass off as Valentine mocked Beefcake’s strut and mannerisms and even made the scissors motion. The fans were red hot for Beefer and this unsurprisingly ends in a DQ when Jimmy Hart interferes.
6) Don Muraco & George Steele defeated Butch Reed & the One Man Gang at 17:52 when Muraco pinned Reed after Reed & Gang failed a double clothesline on Muraco when Steele pulled Gang out of the ring and Reed ran into the ropes
What a weird fucking match! Muraco has been feuding with Gang and Reed since fall 87, when he saved Superstar Billy Graham from getting annihilated, leading to The Rock’s good guy turn and being featured in the Survivor Series main event. The crowd is really behind Muraco, but wow was he ever on the juice hard at this point. He was a shell of his former self in the ring, just a musclebound slug. And of course George Steele is just fucking awful and useless. However, I found myself enjoying this piece of shit match just because of the zany antics and combination. Workrate is non-existent, and after an eternity of stalling and antics, the majority of the match is Reed and Gang slowly working over Muraco while Steele acts like a clown. Things break down and Muraco powerslams Reed by surprise after interference from Steele. This was steaming hot shit, but was oddly fun to watch.
7) Hulk Hogan & Bam Bam Bigelow (w/ Sir Oliver Humperdink) defeated Ted Dibiase & Virgil (w/ Andre the Giant) at 10:06 when Bigelow pinned Virgil with a splash after Hogan hit the legdrop on Virgil
Now this is why the Copps Coliseum was packed! This is taken from a Hulk Hogan DVD set released a few years back. The crowd was molten hot for the Hulkster and Bigelow! Just a month prior to this Hamilton card, I saw my second WWF event at the Winnipeg Arena, which was main evented by Bigelow-Dibiase. They started booking these main event tag matches in the fallout of The Main Event. It’s all action to start and Hogan and Bigelow clear the ring. Interference from Andre the Giant leads to Dibiase and Virgil getting the heat on the Hulkster. The sight of Virgil beating down Hogan, mocking his poses, and going for covers is surreal! Hogan manages to fight back and make the huge tag to Bigelow and it’s all out mayhem! Hogan and Bigelow clean house, with Hogan dropping the leg on Virgil, then putting over Bigelow by tagging him in for the finish. Hogan and Bigelow clean house and Andre is threatening to take off his jacket to fight Hogan while the fans are losing their minds. Hogan’s ready to fight, but the Giant retreats and Hogan and Bigelow pose to conclude the show. This main event was a SCORCHER! So much fun and action packed. Loved this shit.
the RepoDan Wrestling Institution 