Bought the Rowdy Roddy Piper dvd the other day and it got me to thinking. How come Vince never ran a Piper vs Macho man program. The timing would have been perfect for Wrestlemania VI, (would have been better then Piper/Brown and the mixed tag that Savage was in.) Can you imagine the crazed promos and wild brawls between those two?
Mike
Frankly I'm shocked they never crossed paths in the 80s, either. The period leading up to Wrestlemania III when Piper was a giant babyface and Savage was a crazed heel would have been a natural to book them in IC title matches on the house show circuit. In fact, they barely interacted in WCW, either, aside from Savage costing Piper the World title against Hogan when he turned nWo. They probably could have made a few bucks even in that late stage of their careers, too, but there was nothing to come out of that either. Maybe they just didn't want to work together? I got nothing.
As much as I love both guys, I don't think it would've turned out so well for Savage, career wise. Piper was notorious for not wanting to job and for being particular about what he did and didn't do in the ring and in angles, whereas Savage tended to kinda go with the flow, at least a little bit. I get the feeling Piper would never lose unless it was in extremely mitigating circumstances, and Savage would basically come out of it looking like Piper had gotten the better of him.
ReplyDeleteIt was actually a case of Vince McMahon saving humanity. The promos and matches would have been so awesome, the universe would have folded in on its self.
ReplyDeleteThey were in a six man elimination tag about a month before Mania 3. It was at MSG and it's on one of the Best of the WWF tapes, Volume 11 I think. It was Savage/Harley Race/Adonis vs. Piper/JYD/Steamboat in Piper's farewell match at MSG. It came down to Savage vs. Piper and it was an awesome match. I gave it an A and Meltzer gave it four stars. If that's any indication of what those two could do together, I'd love to see them fight back in the 80s.
ReplyDeleteI think timing had a lot to do with it. They did have at least one taped singles match in 1990 prior to Wrestlemania 6 that is on Youtube. But it seems like at the best time for them to have an extended feud with each other, one of the men were "retired." After Wrestlemania 3 would have been perfect but Piper "retired" after that. Then during most of the time they were on commentary together Savage was "retired." The timing just wasn't right for them to feud with each other.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=61rLJVNW12w
ReplyDeleteThis is exactly what I was thinking. It's probably the same reason we never got Hogan-Piper one on one. It's kinda silly on Piper's part though, he could've made a real killing working a singles program with the Mega-Powers.
ReplyDeleteI'd like to blame Dusty Rhodes for this. If he wasn't around in 1990, Savage definitely would have gone on to feud with Piper after the Royal Rumble and it would have been awesome.
ReplyDeleteI like to think the main problem behind Savage and Piper not feuding was that the amount of cocaine needed to fuel their promos against each other would have been insane!
ReplyDeleteMaybe Savage didn't trust Roddy not to mess with Liz during the match- Piper is a notorious improviser (ask Mr T) and we know how touchy Savage was about Liz (he got mad at HTM for "gesturing" towards her). Could also be that Piper didn't want to script a whole match.
ReplyDeleteI suspect that they probably could have scraped enough up.
ReplyDeleteFlair's book describing the spittoon full of cocaine that Piper was given in Japan was just mind blowing if you have an idea of the amount of cocaine that people generally do at a time. And made me a little bit jealous.
ReplyDeleteIt was also released on the Top 50 Superstars released a couple of years ago.
ReplyDeleteI love that match...especially the DUELING AIRPLANE SPINS~!
ReplyDeleteI thought that was the Dominican Republic? (Jack Veneno, right?) I really doubt that that would have happened in Japan.
ReplyDeleteThe problem with Piper was that he was the one face who acted like he was smarter than all the heels, and so he'd gobble up all their offense and reverse all their shit, getting himself over while the heels always looked hapless and stupid against him. Like others have said, Savage would probably spend all their matches getting his ass kicked. However, the promos alone would rule the world.
ReplyDeletenot jobbing to Hogan was the right decision, though. it would have not been very unlikely that he would have ended up like Orndorff etc. after that program would have been over.
ReplyDeleteCoked-up Roddy versus Coked-out Savage trying to one up each other on the microphone? That's why they didn't meet—the universe couldn't handle that kind of awesome.
ReplyDeleteGreat American Bash 98 - Piper vs. Savage was the MAIN EVENT. D'oh!
ReplyDeleteActually Sting vs. Giant for the tag belts was the main event. Piper/Savage fought Hogan/Bret and then Piper and Savage had like a 5 minute match. Savage tapped out twice that night too. Not exactly what I'd call a long program or anything.
ReplyDeletetouche or something
ReplyDeleteDon't worry, I think I was one of the few masochists who bought that show. About the only good thing on that show was the last match in the Booker T/Benoit series.
ReplyDelete