Picked this one up in the bargain bin and if you can find it for $5, I will say that Disc 2 is arguably the greatest thing the guys that select the matches for these things has EVER done. Seriously you think it can't get better than the previous match...and it does. Of course Disc 3 isn't as good but there are some serious cruiserweight gems in there.
So if you're home alone this weekend while Mr. Princess and the kid are on their annual fishing excursion, find this for $5 and watch it while you catch up on work.
But naturally I have a question about this from the "program" portion of the set and it concerns Dusty Rhodes. Generally I'm a fan of Big Dust but I am curious of how others think of him. Is Dusty's reputation of being a visionary with occasional flaws one of fact or fiction? I know he had a role in a LOT of shit but has his role in that past success become greater through these various DVDs and WWE productions?
So if you're home alone this weekend while Mr. Princess and the kid are on their annual fishing excursion, find this for $5 and watch it while you catch up on work.
But naturally I have a question about this from the "program" portion of the set and it concerns Dusty Rhodes. Generally I'm a fan of Big Dust but I am curious of how others think of him. Is Dusty's reputation of being a visionary with occasional flaws one of fact or fiction? I know he had a role in a LOT of shit but has his role in that past success become greater through these various DVDs and WWE productions?
I think a more accurate description of Dusty is "A visionary with MANY flaws". He was a good booker who developed many great concepts and ideas but the problem was he had to be at the center of almost EVERY ONE.
ReplyDeletegood matches but majorly flawed documentary filled with WWE revisionist history
ReplyDeleteI'm watching this Midnights/R&R match and wondering if the Midnights ever had a televised match with the Steiners. They were around during the same era. It would seem only natural for one encounter to have happened.
ReplyDeleteMy take on Dusty is that for a while (early and mid 80s), he was on fire, in regards to behind the scenes creativity. Starrcade, Wargames, and much of that great mid-80s JCP run had his fingerprints all over it. Unfortunately, when he ran out of those good ideas (87-88ish), almost all he had was a lot of garbage. That's the way it goes with a lot of creative wrestling minds, but with Dusty, it was taken to an extreme, both ways.
ReplyDeleteSo I see him as being both a talented visionary and pretty bad, largely depending on what period you look at. A little like Vince McMahon, now that I think about it.
Having a quick look around, it doesn't appear so. I think they were both face teams for most of the time they were in the same company, so that would have played a part. This is the closest I could find, Eaton vs. Scott.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IHOGNzc1O4Q
Dusty doesn't get near enough credit for being a genius and a huge talent in the ring. His biggest problem was having flair try and sabotage him at every turn as a booker.
ReplyDeleteI don't know which angles Dusty "forced himself into." People say it time and time again, really just citing the Nikita/Magnum angle. Truth is, when Magnum TA came in, he teamed with Dusty and got the rub off of Dusty. The Magnum/Tully angle came out of the Dusty/Tully program. Yeah, he aligned himself with Sting to fight the Road Warriors, but what angle was Sting in? The breakup of Hot Stuff Inc? Please.
ReplyDeleteThe Midnights dropped the U.S. Tag titles to the Steiners in June '90, so yes, it did happen and on TV.
ReplyDeleteRe: Dusty. He was a GREAT booker in 1985 up through probably the end of '86. He booked Flair well, he pushed the Four Horsemen, he gave Jim Cornette and the Midnights their first national exposure, he knew how to get heat on the heels, and he made Big Bubba into a star. At some point, like almost all bookers, Dusty burned himself out and started to decline. He missed the boat on giving Big Bubba a major push (seriously: Dusty vs. Bubba headlined a Crockett show in the Boston Garden, the WWF's own backyard, and almost sold the place out. The feud was THAT hot and it should have headlined Starrcade for the World title). Also very good in Florida in the early '80s before the Sullivan stuff just completely overtook the program.
I know this gets guys like Russo in trouble, but Dusty was never afraid to be bold and try new things in his booking. His biggest weakness, especially in Crockett but also in Florida, was a seeming inability/refusal to blow the big angles off. He sometimes had that Eric Bischoff "if it ain't broke don't fix it" mentality that led to things like Flair vs. Dusty go on, and on, and on, and on.
There isn't any denying that Dusty hitched himself to most babyface's wagons and not always to their benefit. Manny Fernandez was over like crazy upon debuting in JCP and got booked into a hot angle where he became the "first man ever" to confront Wahoo McDaniel and get him to beg/back off. Then he and Dusty won the Tag Titles and the belts were almost completely forgotten about, despite JCP being a tag team territory. Manny went from being a possible Magnum TA-level star to being pals with Jimmy Valiant and then a flunky for Paul Jones' Island of Misfit Wrestlers.
ReplyDeleteThank you Pete, just scanned that Scott-Eaton match and it's a legit ***1/2 stars at worse. Have to re-watch to get the full impact.
ReplyDeleteNot coming to Flair's defense but could you list some examples? I seem to recall Dusty making Flair look bad in ALL their encounters so I don't see your point.
ReplyDeletewhich I think is (or unfortunately: was) one Vince McMahons (plus guys like Patterson at his side) biggest qualities. even if the feud weren't totally ended they managed to create this "this match is THE showdown" atmosphere more the once (good example: Hogan vs. Savage. their rivalry obiviously continued after WrestleMania V, still that match didn't feel like just another match in their ongoing feud but was sort of an end).
ReplyDeleteOn one of the DVDs WWE released about WCW (might have been this one) had a 6 man tag match from 1985 with Manny and he was drawing insane face heat. How he ended up a heel in Paul Jones stable a year or two later baffled me.
ReplyDeleteDude invented War Games. Nuff said.
ReplyDeleteThe Midnights dropped the belts in East Rutherford on August 1990.
ReplyDeletewithout arguing Flair or not, Dusty's biggest problem as a booker was carrying angles out too long. He waited to long for blowoffs. The biggest example is the Road Warriors. The fans were waiting so long for them to finally get the belts that it passed a certain point and the fans just gave up. Then he did a ill-advised heel turn and the Roadies were never the same the rest of their careers. Sure they were over in WWF or even during JCP, post heel turn, but the aura was killed by the dusty finishes and the Luger style choking when trying to get those world tag belts. I think Dusty was a big influence on Bischoff in that respect. Bischoff refused to blow off the NWO because it was still pulling in merchandising, even as the writing was on the wall, and instead of getting big bucks for a Goldberg/Hogan blowoff or something like that, it ended up dying with a whimper with DDP winning the belt, Hogan turning face, and the 14 later incarnations of the NWO filled with JJ and the Harris Brother and the like.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the correction on Midnights-Steiners. A match to track down, that's for sure.
ReplyDeleteWasn't this one. At least not unless it's an easter egg.
ReplyDeleteThe six-man on this disc is Luger-Windham-Sting vs. Flair, Arn and Tully from 1988..
And yes it completely did not suck in any way at all.
I dont think it was so much that Bischoff refused to blow off the NWO, but it was the fact that they watered it down with jobbers and then split it into two NWO factions. It just wasnt the special thing it started out as.
ReplyDeleteThe NWO didnt need to come to an end but Bischoff and co made plenty of wrong turns that wound up leading to a dead end. Booked correctly, there were still lots of possibilities to keep them fresh and relevant. Before they added the 9 million members though.
Its funny to hear complaints about programs in the past running too long when most of us complain about the same guys fighting each other on multiple PPVs nowadays.
It was on the second Flair set (Definitive Flair), and it's a good definition of nuclear heat.
ReplyDeleteHorsemen DVD I think.
ReplyDeleteFlair was constantly refusing to drop the title to Luger.
ReplyDeleteWasn't that due to Flair keeping his promise to Sting? Well I guess I can't defend Starrcade 88. Luger definitely should have won it there.
ReplyDeleteRegardless of how any of you feel about his booking or his in-ring ability (personally, I think he was a great albeit flawed booker), I think we can all agree that Dusty should definitely be doing commentary on either RAW or Smackdown every week.
ReplyDeleteDusty in his sleep is a more entertaining commentator than Michael Cole, Booker T and Jerry Lawler put together.
well I'm not arguing to kill the NWO at Starcade 96 or something. Or even Starcade 97, although I think having Nash and Hall boot Hogan after a CLEAN loss to Sting would have made for some good TV and lots of angles and matchups that could have been spun off of that. I'm arguing that after Starcade 98 and the fingerpoke of doom, the logical conclusion was for Goldberg to run roughshod through the NWO. He could even start with the B Team. Heck, have Bigelow as the "hired gun" for the NWO to still get a match out of that program. Eventually Goldberg beats Hall, then Nash, leaving a battle against Hogan, who is champ by this point. Now of course Goldberg should beat Hogan, win the belt, and then Nash and Hall turf Hogan out of the NWO, leading to a a Hogan swan song face run. The problem with all that is of course Hogan probably refusing to job to Goldberg a 2nd time without getting his win back. But you could even have Hogan win at GAB under totally screwy BS. Maybe he only agreed to the match if it was a no DQ and then the entire NWO takes out Goldberg for the Hogan win. Then at BAB, Goldberg gets a one on one match, NWO barred from ringside (they always had some GM/President story going, so figure out how to do it from that storyline). Goldberg wins, becomes the face of WCW as the champ, hogan gets beat down, turns face. He works tags against Nash and Hall with Sting, Bret, DDP, even Goldberg. Lots of possibilities. Either way at Starcade 99, you have a match between Hogan and a partner vs. Hall and Nash for the right to kill the NWO or retire Hogan. Hogan's team wins, the NWO dies. You've now had 3 1/2 years of merchandise sales, countless twists and turns, created the new star for the next millenium, turned Hogan face in a much better manner than a half ass 4 way with DDP winning the belt, and given the NWO a full year's worth of proper blowoff.
ReplyDeleteThe "Dusty Finish" was a necessity -- Hogan would kill the big, fat super villain of the month and where would that leave said super villain after the blowoff? Dusty needed that finish to keep everybody strong -- The biggest problem was, in my opinion, that Dusty was still booking for the territories while being on national TV -- My memory might be a bit selective but I don't remember the WWF as having too many strong finishes until they figured out they could make a shit-ton of money by blowing angles off at PPV's (hell, Hogan never beat Piper cleanly) -- We don't really know what happened then -- Seems to me that Dusty and Flair needed eachother...
ReplyDeleteWho was Luger going to defend against? And make money?
ReplyDeleteDusty vs. Big Bubba for the World Title... NO. HELL NO.
ReplyDeleteThat's okay as a TV or probably even U.S. Title match... but NEVER as a World Title match.
The U.S. tag title replaced the National tag title, which had been the top tag title in Georgia Championship Wrestling.
ReplyDeleteEssentially, the U.S. heavyweight & U.S. tag titles were the top belts for NWA World Championship Wrestling, which was both the TBS show and the super-regional promotion that was formed by 1985/86 from Crockett's Mid-Atlantic, what was left of Georgia, and the other JCP acquisitions. The history of WCW definitely does not begin when Turner Broadcasting bought out Jim Crockett.
The Western States Heritage title was from the brief WCW/UWF period, before they simply dropped the UWF.
ReplyDeleteI think Dusty had the mind and the clout to handle booking responsibilities...
ReplyDeleteProblem was, he couldn't resist putting himself in the limelight, and he just couldn't part ways with the "Dusty Finish".
Look no further than LOD vs. Horsemen from Starrcade 1987. Killed all Chicago heat that night, a point brought up by Scott in his last book.