Rasslin 114: The Poffo's ICW 1980 (Wee Willie Takes a Macho Elbow, Landel & Gang Debut!)

Interactive Transcript

spk_0 Hello again everybody, my intro for Dave Brown right along my side.

spk_0 I got a word about ready to go with more big action.

spk_0 Thank you very much and welcome to Georgia Championship Wrestling.

spk_0 I'm Gordon Suley.

spk_0 Welcome to the Appointment Hour and Store for us.

spk_0 Hello everyone and welcome to Championship Wrestling.

spk_0 I bring side to the Event of the Basketball Club.

spk_0 With wrestling's only living legend, Bruno Samartino.

spk_0 Welcome this week's edition of Bits Outresting Television.

spk_0 Back your host, Boy Cheers, another outstanding card.

spk_0 Hey guys and welcome back to the Regional Wrestling Podcast where we talk the territories

spk_0 I am Ray Russell in this week and to be a fun ride guys back in time.

spk_0 To the late 70s, early 80s as we continue on our voyage back to Angelo Pafos.

spk_0 I see W. I can't wait to get there.

spk_0 In order to continue that discussion, we've got to bring the man himself back onto the

spk_0 program, the man doing well, I won't say all the research but I'll give 99% of the credit.

spk_0 Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome back the one and only Mr. Steve Crawford.

spk_0 Hey, as always, it's my pleasure to be here doing my favorite thing in the world talking

spk_0 about I see W. wrestling man.

spk_0 Favorite thing in the world?

spk_0 Wow, that's a lot Steve.

spk_0 Well, you know, I'm a man of few interests.

spk_0 What can I say?

spk_0 If you were going to pick a wrestling promotion to have fun with, it would certainly have

spk_0 to be I.C.W. and you get that from the beginning of the intro to the TV shows, right?

spk_0 Like everything that you could ever ask for in the world of wrestling wrapped all into

spk_0 one 60 second music video there at the beginning of the program.

spk_0 Oh, yeah.

spk_0 You know, what the intro, a lot of times, was actually the best thing about the hour long

spk_0 program.

spk_0 But yeah, whoever edited that intro, it was fantastic.

spk_0 I don't know that there was ever a better intro to a like if you just wanted to hook somebody,

spk_0 the battle royals, the chaos, the people getting their heads split open, the wrestling bear,

spk_0 you know, people in bumblebee costumes and coming out of boxes and midgets dressed up as

spk_0 God knows what I mean, it was total chaos.

spk_0 It was amazing.

spk_0 It was it was pro wrestling entertainment at its finest.

spk_0 Well, and you know, that was before the era when people were tracking down copyrights

spk_0 so they've got that team from the midnight express chase by Georgia and LaRoder.

spk_0 So that was a cool song to play over, you know, all those wild images that were going

spk_0 on.

spk_0 So yeah, that's fun stuff.

spk_0 Well, last time out, guys, if you want to go back to episode one of the project that

spk_0 is episode 108 of regional wrestling, Steve really did a great job breaking down the

spk_0 early inception of the ICW and incomes, the all-star crew from Knoxville, they kind of

spk_0 merged together and Angelo Poffo as well on his way.

spk_0 We talked a lot about the frugality stories.

spk_0 I'm sure more will come along.

spk_0 I've already gotten a couple sent to me.

spk_0 I just need to kind of clean them up a little bit before we discuss those.

spk_0 We've got we've got some more coming in the future.

spk_0 I've also been working on back details.

spk_0 Steve, I sent you a few little blurbs on some of the announcers yesterday.

spk_0

spk_0 Yeah, I sent you a Edgar Wallis.

spk_0 I had to confirm that he was the, I didn't think the announcer was the same guy as who I

spk_0 had looked up, but sure enough, they're all the same human beings.

spk_0 So looking forward to getting there at some point as well.

spk_0 But last episode, why don't you give everybody just a really quick overview of maybe some

spk_0 of the things we tackled?

spk_0 Well, you know, we talked about how they started and kind of Georgetown Kentucky.

spk_0 It's just this weird little weekly small town promotion.

spk_0 They were working with Dale man, who's you know, infamous or famous in Kentucky wrestling

spk_0 circles for a number of reasons.

spk_0 You may or may not have murdered a few people.

spk_0 May or may not.

spk_0 You think things happen.

spk_0 Things all like allegedly allegedly.

spk_0 Somehow the two alpha males, Dale man and Randy Savage did not become best friends.

spk_0 And so the proffos said, hey, we can build our own ring.

spk_0 We'll just get the dimensions off of Dale's ring maker own.

spk_0 So they did that.

spk_0 And then, you know, luckily for them, the best thing in the world that could happen was

spk_0 the split Knoxville and they were able to, you know, immediately start, you know, the

spk_0 pop-offs started working at Knoxville.

spk_0 The Knoxville talent started working with the pop-offs.

spk_0 So you had, you know, the foundation just really, you know, good talent as we talked about.

spk_0 I mean, people who would go on to do, you know, exceptional things in the world of wrestling.

spk_0 And they were all right here in this weird little tiny outlaw promotion in Kentucky.

spk_0 It's fascinating.

spk_0 You talk about getting the dimensions from Dale man's ring.

spk_0 And we did discuss that on the last episode.

spk_0 And somehow I have these visions of Randy Savage with a handsaw cutting the two by force.

spk_0 They are telling them on it, Lanny.

spk_0 Hold the other side.

spk_0 You know, it's amazing.

spk_0 What people will do to, you know, make things work and they built their own ring.

spk_0 And off to the races we were, we told some fun little tidbits about, you know, people

spk_0 sharing rooms.

spk_0 And I had to ask Bob Rupin the recent wrestling stoop episode to reconfirm those stories.

spk_0 And he was like, oh, yeah, I was never part of that.

spk_0 But I was totally aware of it.

spk_0 And I guess how do they make them all fit?

spk_0 A lot of people were asking me online after you told that story, Steve.

spk_0 And I guess Bob said they would take the mattress off the bed for guys to sleep on the mattress.

spk_0 Four guys to sleep on the box springs.

spk_0 Angela Poffo was big to sleep underneath the sink.

spk_0 That was his favorite place to sleep.

spk_0 The promote.

spk_0 Oh my God.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 Well, crazy, crazy stuff.

spk_0 Yeah, you know, and when you look back on that promotion, I mean poor Bob Rupin is just

spk_0 not fit in with what they're doing.

spk_0 They're just taking a limpian who had done everything he had done in Florida and whatnot

spk_0 and just kind of drop him even Bob Orton really, but Bob Rupin, I mean, just his personality

spk_0 alone just drop him right into this ICW world, just unbelievable.

spk_0 Yeah, he was, he was definitely the odd man out.

spk_0 You could, you could tell his, his heart really wasn't into what was going on there.

spk_0 You know, he had, he had known what it took to be successful in a, in a big league promotion.

spk_0 And he knew pretty quickly that wasn't going to be it.

spk_0 Yeah, you're, you're riding high, you're booking San Francisco, you're selling out, nearly

spk_0 selling out the cow palace with Kevin Sullivan.

spk_0 And then, you know, a few mistakes later in poop.

spk_0 Here you are working across the ring from Wee Willie, but that is what it's right.

spk_0 Yeah, you're doing some spot show and some potent Kentucky town for, you know, that the

spk_0 $200 a week guarantee or whatever it was.

spk_0 You know, Bob told a story one time and, you know, because I don't know if we're going

spk_0 to touch on it as we go through here, because I don't know if it had happened at this

spk_0 point, but I guess they do an injury angle at some point with Bob or his leg or arm or

spk_0 something was in a cast and he drives about six hours from wherever he's staying all

spk_0 the way to the spot show.

spk_0 And he gets there and Angela's like, no, no, that angle has an air here yet in this city.

spk_0 You can't be here.

spk_0 And he just sends Bob back on his way six hours back to the other side of the state.

spk_0 I go, fuck that.

spk_0 Man, I mean, fuck.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 Yeah, 12 hour, that's brutal.

spk_0 That's a brutal day right there.

spk_0 That's, and you don't get a penny for it, right?

spk_0 No gas money, no trans.

spk_0 This is a.

spk_0 Yeah, I know with the tapes run.

spk_0 Well, I've been putting together a lot of stories.

spk_0 So we've got a lot of great angles and stories coming in the future episodes, but I'm

spk_0 going to see what Steve has in store for us this week.

spk_0 We talked a lot about 1979 getting things off the ground, Steve, but I'll let you take

spk_0 it away and kind of move into 1980 as things begin to come together.

spk_0 1980.

spk_0 Do you remember 1980?

spk_0 I remember 1980.

spk_0 I was born in 1980, Steve.

spk_0 I was born in 1965.

spk_0 I was, I was watching ICW wrestling in 1980.

spk_0 I love it.

spk_0 Just, just a few things I said, you know, we set at the top of the first show.

spk_0 We really wanted to give credit, we're credits due.

spk_0 And we mentioned a lot of the, you know, different sources.

spk_0 One of the things I didn't mention.

spk_0 So we talked about cocoa, we're coming into wrestling and it really not related specifically

spk_0 to ICW, how he started working with Stan Frazier.

spk_0 And that came from a brand new book from Kurt Nielsen.

spk_0 And it's called Howdy Neighbor Stan Frazier and his appetite for life.

spk_0 So it's a sort of book.

spk_0 If you think you'll like it, you'll like it.

spk_0 If you're interested in the crazy life of Stan Frazier, it wouldn't be.

spk_0 It's a very well written book and I have to give credit props for that.

spk_0 I don't have Matt Cardin for super good guy.

spk_0 And then a lot of the Izzy's Lapwoods quotes that we're going to use today are from an interview.

spk_0 He did with the late Scott Bowden several years ago.

spk_0 So unfortunately, both those gentlemen have passed on, but they're quotes, their memories remain.

spk_0 Wanted to kind of talk about Rapp Arena at the start of this program because that was a constant theme

spk_0 during the run of ICW.

spk_0 One of their big thorns on their side, I guess, was they couldn't get regular bookings in Rapp Arena.

spk_0 And they felt like Jared was shutting them out because Jared would run a monthly show.

spk_0 And for people who don't know, Rapp Arena is the major arena in Lexington, Kentucky,

spk_0 which was their home base for ICW.

spk_0 So ICW couldn't get into the major arena in the town where they were based out of.

spk_0 And so a lot of these quotes are from an article that Scott bounded years ago.

spk_0 But in February of 1980, Jared has a show at Rapp.

spk_0 The ICW guys show up outside to start kind of trouble and trying to get some publicity.

spk_0 And Savage tells Jimmy Hart that he's going to take Lawler out tonight.

spk_0 It Hart says, Lawler won't be here because he hasn't broken leg.

spk_0 So that's why I know the timeline because that's when Lawler broke his leg playing football.

spk_0 Right from Jerry Pell, and then Savage says, OK, tonight I'm taking out Bill Dundee.

spk_0 And one of the shows later that year, Steve Cooper was actually arrested for disorderly conduct.

spk_0 So they would come back for months.

spk_0 I don't think this helped them in their goals, but you're so great.

spk_0 Yeah, Dave Brown, I didn't quite know what to expect from Randy.

spk_0 So first night in Madam, I'd taken the night off from the evening newscast

spk_0 to ride to Rapparina in Lexington with Glantz and his wife Audrey and my wife Margaret.

spk_0 But as soon as we got there, there's this guy in the parking lot yelling at us.

spk_0 Lance says to me, that's Randy Poffo.

spk_0 Russell recalled, who could miss him?

spk_0 I hear that.

spk_0

spk_0 I can't do more.

spk_0

spk_0 Uh-huh.

spk_0 In that rast before some Savage, and I'm thinking, uh-oh, he finally caught up with us.

spk_0 We had secured their time slot in Lexington and Randy was really unhappy with all of us.

spk_0 Dave Brown, I remember thinking we haven't even gotten to see wrestling or Kentucky basketball game.

spk_0 And we're going to die right here at the parking lot of Rapparina.

spk_0 Then Lance goes back, we actually got back into the van and drove down into the underground parking facility at Rob.

spk_0 I was legitimately scared of him because we had an effect, put his family's promotion out of business.

spk_0 This is Lance remembering years, years later.

spk_0 So it's not like you put them out of business at this time.

spk_0 At the end of the night, the cops had already rested some of the ICW wrestlers who shut up with Savage.

spk_0 So the police warned him not to not to even cough near us.

spk_0 Savage City was going to wait for us on the bluegrass parkway.

spk_0 We walked back in the dressing room and every wrestler had made the trip from Memphis was carrying a piece.

spk_0 He's referring to it as a gun.

spk_0 Dave and I appeared to be the only ones without a gun.

spk_0 I was thinking, are you kidding me?

spk_0 So I'm thinking that Savage is going to try to jump us on the bluegrass parkway.

spk_0 But big old sony King said, let me lead the way.

spk_0 Sonny was as tough outside the ring as he was inside it.

spk_0 Needless to say, we had no problems.

spk_0 There's a quote from Jerry Jarrett.

spk_0 He said Randy's crew did show up at Rapparina arena in Lexington, which only made them look bad to the fans coming into our arena.

spk_0 I had no idea if their threats to jump into the ring and our matches were fantasy thoughts of reality.

spk_0 They did not make that mistake.

spk_0 And then Cornette talking about it years later.

spk_0 Lexington was where all the ICW guys lived in Jarrett, Jarrett ran Rapparina there once a month.

spk_0 Rapparina called Christine Jarrett and said they got in word that some of the ICW wrestlers had bought ringside tickets.

spk_0 So they had extra security.

spk_0 They wouldn't let them in the building for two or three shows.

spk_0 The ICW guys would meet the Jarrett guys in the parking lot.

spk_0 Then Rapparina started lending the Jarrett wrestlers park inside the building.

spk_0 All the guys brought their guns.

spk_0 The boat, the boys believed probably rightly so.

spk_0 Most of the guys working ICW were there impaired or crazy or both.

spk_0 It was a constant harassment when ICW had to close up all of those promos worked in a way, but they made money for Jarrett instead of the Poffos.

spk_0 And then easy slapwoods kind of puts the cherry on the top here.

spk_0 We said those were crazy times.

spk_0 They wanted to solve the go to the Jarrett show in Lexington.

spk_0 I wouldn't go.

spk_0 It's funny and retro stuff that but it really wasn't funny at all.

spk_0 The boys only wanted to work.

spk_0 We weren't interested in that stuff.

spk_0 It really got out of hand.

spk_0 And so a lot of people is the story.

spk_0 Is he kind of the voice of Reese?

spk_0 Is he slaughtful?

spk_0 Your voice of reason for the ICW approach.

spk_0 What you wouldn't pick him out of a lineup to be the voice of reason, but he seemed to be pretty sound outside of that whole, you know, riot that he incited there in the

spk_0 not the territory, but no, it's crazy.

spk_0 Look at that.

spk_0 Can you imagine two middle aged guys with their wives going out for a night, you know, a good time, if you will, or whatever.

spk_0 Lansing Dave, poor Lansing Dave.

spk_0 And Randy said, I don't see any of the wrestlers.

spk_0 So I guess we'll just pick on the um.

spk_0 Like poor Lansing Dave.

spk_0 Well, you know, and I think Lance was really proud.

spk_0 I think he had helped get the, you know, they had like a prime TV station and timing in that Lexington market, which allowed them to run, you know, major shows.

spk_0 And you know, Rupert is a huge arena.

spk_0 It's, you know, usually used like basketball and concerts and things like that.

spk_0 So they would just load those shows with with the top talent that they could bring in.

spk_0 So he's going in there kind of showing off with all this pride.

spk_0 Then you have to meet this kind of lunatic.

spk_0 Trying to enjoy your evening.

spk_0 Well, it's amazing that Randy was able to channel his saloonacy, you know, for all those years working for Vince McMahon, because I'm not saying he wasn't off the hinges a few times, obviously.

spk_0 But it's amazing that he was able to make that work for as many years as he did.

spk_0 Once he finally got that big break because man, this, this is a, some crazy stuff.

spk_0 When you think about it, rowing up the troops and, you know, some of these guys clearly were off their rockers in period or crazy or both.

spk_0 Indeed.

spk_0 And so it's just an amazing period of time.

spk_0 Imagine, you know, this wasn't going on in some of the other territory, just like, yeah, you're coming to dorset.

spk_0 You know, huh?

spk_0 Well, you know, with Vince's personality, you probably enjoyed like out, out there savage was he probably got a kick in.

spk_0 Oh, pal.

spk_0 That's great.

spk_0 But it's, it's not.

spk_0 I've just, you know, all these guys pecking guns and all this crazy nonsense going on in this one particular town because, you know, Angela Poffo put a stake in it.

spk_0 He put his flag down and said, this is our city Lexington, but here it's running the Rappereena.

spk_0 Okay.

spk_0 Here you go.

spk_0 In January of 1990, they debuted in Manchester, Kentucky, which was one of the more interesting venues that they would work George Wengeroff kind of sets the stage.

spk_0 When you come into Manchester, there's a sign that says, welcome to Manchester and it's full of bullet holes.

spk_0 And it says they used to run Manchester, Kentucky because they didn't have a building this fanning earning couch.

spk_0 He actually put up one of those pole barns in his backyard.

spk_0 They could see like 400 to 500 people.

spk_0 They later called it Ernie Couches Entertainment Center.

spk_0 So this guy who's just big wrestling fan basically says, how can you get an image is here? He says there's no place to have him.

spk_0 He builds a barn in his backyard.

spk_0 Something to have wrestling.

spk_0 You can have it now, boy.

spk_0 There you go.

spk_0 Rip Rogers.

spk_0 The most exciting venue was Ernie Couches Entertainment Center.

spk_0 He built an arena on his property and it held 500 people on Super Bowl Sunday.

spk_0 They were lined up around the building and we turned 300 people away.

spk_0 Ernie was always there.

spk_0 He really wasn't smart to the business.

spk_0 He always had a gun.

spk_0 It was like he was threatening to shoot the heels all of the time.

spk_0 I love him.

spk_0 Then I found a quote from somebody who regularly attended those shows.

spk_0 And he posted his screen name with CB CSPO.

spk_0 This is from wrestling classics and they have 2021.

spk_0 I was lucky enough to watch ICD every wrestling live every Sunday at Ernie Couches Entertainment Center in Manchester, Kentucky.

spk_0 It was a small building in a small town.

spk_0 They also ran Combs, Kentucky at 12 o'clock.

spk_0 Then Manchester at 4 p.m.

spk_0 In another town at 8 p.m.

spk_0 They ran every small town in Kentucky.

spk_0 So they're running three shows on triple header triple header Jerry Lollady doing double header softball games.

spk_0 These guys are not fucking around.

spk_0 We're almost they made for three three towns in one day.

spk_0 What do you think?

spk_0 50 60 bucks.

spk_0 I'm guessing.

spk_0 Wow.

spk_0 OK.

spk_0 That's what I thought.

spk_0 I want to look at Ernie.

spk_0 It was Ernie Couch getting a cut.

spk_0 You think it all?

spk_0 I'm thinking 50 60 bucks all together.

spk_0 You know, three.

spk_0 OK.

spk_0 That's a person.

spk_0 That's a little high steep, but that's OK.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 Ernie may have got some like the popcorn money.

spk_0 I don't know.

spk_0 I tell you what we'll do, Ernie.

spk_0 You build us a barn.

spk_0 We'll show up and then we'll let you watch for free.

spk_0 We won't charge you for the ticket.

spk_0 There you go.

spk_0 You'll get a ring side seat every time.

spk_0 Every way you pick the seat.

spk_0 Yeah, you can be our fat guy.

spk_0 And Rip Rogers kind of talked about, you know,

spk_0 just the shows in that area.

spk_0 About 20 shows a month we ran off the Lexington TV market.

spk_0 We just flooded that area.

spk_0 We would bring the circus to the small town

spk_0 and the audience would have the time of their life.

spk_0 So, you know, again, it's just the running high schools,

spk_0 armories, pole barns, just wherever they can, you know,

spk_0 put on a show.

spk_0 Pride yards.

spk_0 Yeah, exactly.

spk_0 Yeah, it's going to like backyard wrestling before

spk_0 backyard wrestling wasn't it?

spk_0 So to fit the ring, they were going to get it in.

spk_0 That's true.

spk_0 Couple of new guys that joined the ICW crew in January of 1980

spk_0 was Jeff Sourd and Big Boy Williams who would stick around

spk_0 for quite a while.

spk_0 Williams would be in and out.

spk_0 So I think it would be two.

spk_0 And they had an app for the Ronnie Garvin Wrestling School.

spk_0 No, thank you.

spk_0 And one thing, and one thing you did not want to do

spk_0 was go to the Ronnie Garvin Wrestling School.

spk_0 And one poor person that did was named Bill Martin.

spk_0 What kind of get into this?

spk_0 Paul Pilmarin.

spk_0 What rip Rogers?

spk_0 When ICW had its beginner class,

spk_0 Garvin was in their sugaring guys, you know, putting the

spk_0 sugar on them.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 Guys were painting their pants and pooping their pants.

spk_0 Lanyan George were scared to death.

spk_0 The Fred Garvin was going to kill them.

spk_0 And here's a quote from Lanyan 2018.

spk_0 I just ran into Bill Martin.

spk_0 He gives me credit.

spk_0 His friend, Rick Cook was watching and he watched me panic.

spk_0 I said, let him go for Christ's sake.

spk_0 You're going to kill him.

spk_0 His eyes were bulging and I thought he was going to have

spk_0 any aneurysm or something.

spk_0 I thought I was witnessing a murder.

spk_0 So I had to jump in.

spk_0 Bill Martin said, thanks for saving my life that day.

spk_0 Unbelievable.

spk_0 Well, we see what Ronnie Garvin would do on TBS to those, you know,

spk_0 the job guys and things.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 And the further down the totem pole they were, you know,

spk_0 the guys that weren't necessarily trained too well, Ronnie would, you know,

spk_0 go go extra stiff on them, but he didn't really care who you were.

spk_0 He would go in there and stretch for anybody that's curious.

spk_0 You can go watch any Ron Garvin squash.

spk_0 You're pretty much going to see him twist guys into pretzels.

spk_0 And that's him being kind.

spk_0 I can only imagine what he did when the cameras weren't rolling.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 I mean, Ronnie Garvin was not a man to be taken lightly.

spk_0 That's for sure.

spk_0 But this time Steve Cooper was working his savages manager.

spk_0 It was, you know, sometimes I would kind of switch and Izzy would be his

spk_0 manager.

spk_0 I'm not sure how those decisions were made, probably just whoever was around.

spk_0 Lany and George Wanger off of the US tag team champions.

spk_0 So they would defend those belts on a lot of the cards.

spk_0 And then sometimes it was Steve Cooper and sometimes other people would work

spk_0 under a mask as quote to Tennessee stud.

spk_0 And it was just, it was just a job guy, right?

spk_0 So they're, they're making fun of the fullers by having somebody work as the

spk_0 Tennessee stud and just being like this.

spk_0 We couldn't not get a job guy.

spk_0 I see that we got to love it.

spk_0 There is some, I did find some matches from 1980 on YouTube, which is like,

spk_0 there are some matches from 1979 with it got like directors commentary over them.

spk_0 So they're very hard to kind of watch in the flow of the match.

spk_0 1980, there's a time limit draw between Bob Roops and Terry Gibbs and

spk_0 David Savage and Rogers.

spk_0 I think there were probably about 15 people in the studio audience that day.

spk_0 Now, where they all confirmed real human beings or were some of those painted on.

spk_0 That's, that's the question.

spk_0 You know, from the reactions, it's hard to get a bit of a weekend at

spk_0 Bernie's thing.

spk_0 The way the audience reacted.

spk_0 Pull the, pull the ropes, Lany, pull the ropes.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 Woo boy.

spk_0 Is he did some commentary with, with John Beck, you're putting over the heels.

spk_0 Most of the matches, the heels were actually selling for the baby faces.

spk_0 Just a fun little match.

spk_0 And this boy, Bob Warton had kind of semi bleach blonde hair, which was interesting.

spk_0 It's kind of looked like, you know, the guy with dark hair who goes to the

spk_0 Walmart and buys a kit to bleach his hair and it just looks weird and frizzy.

spk_0 I'm sure that's exactly what happened was, you know, that's right.

spk_0 And he thought it was a good idea.

spk_0 Bob Warton just goes on down to the local five and dime and grabs some, some

spk_0 peroxide or something because you know, he wasn't going to the hairdresser, right?

spk_0 They, they weren't getting paid enough to afford a hairdresser.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 One of the things interesting is they would refer to savages belt as the

spk_0 international belt instead of the world title a lot during this time.

spk_0 So at some point, it transitioned from being the international to be the world title.

spk_0 Ordin, you know, it was a good back and forth match wing, Gordon, Bob

spk_0 Ordin and Garvin, Ordin, had some with a pile driver, he had some with a chain,

spk_0 but Garvin still, you know, makes his own comeback.

spk_0 So it's like, you know, the don't say die baby face that's going to come back for

spk_0 anything.

spk_0 And there was an interesting squash match, the miser versus somebody named Jimmy

spk_0 Dean, who I guess also wrestled as fireball Woody.

spk_0 So you can look up fireball Woody on Facebook and he's out there and he's

spk_0 proud of that squash match.

spk_0 Let me tell you this.

spk_0 And he's looking for more.

spk_0 He's looking for more of his matches too, fireball Woody there on Facebook.

spk_0 I noticed he's more of his old timey stuff there.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 They had their first show in Illinois in March, the mid in Illinois.

spk_0 So they're getting out of Kentucky a little bit.

spk_0 Spreading out.

spk_0 And there was an article in March in the Lexington Harold.

spk_0 It was it was like on a Thursday morning, they were taping four,

spk_0 four one hour shows that day.

spk_0 So, you know, if you're old as I am, I remember when world class championship

spk_0 wrestling, not world class, when world championship wrestling, WCW started

spk_0 doing multiple tapings on the same day.

spk_0 It was just, it was just the worst thing in the world of the diehard fans

spk_0 because they were exposing title changes and all these different things

spk_0 throughout the day.

spk_0 But I see W was ahead of their time again.

spk_0 I imagine that.

spk_0 For so many.

spk_0 And here's a quote from John back.

spk_0 And I think it shows you just how passionate he was about his job here.

spk_0 They know how to get me involved in their battles.

spk_0 I can always leave.

spk_0 They take their promotional announcements at our cable station.

spk_0 And one day asked me if I would come with them to Lexington to do their

spk_0 bouts. And here I am.

spk_0 Money will cost people to do many things.

spk_0 So basically, I'm here for a check and I'll stick around for a little while.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 I'm not necessarily a fan of this shit here, but as long as they keep paying me,

spk_0 as long as the check clear is all be here.

spk_0 And I think that passion really came across as is an influencer.

spk_0 He was he would wind up getting replaced.

spk_0 I would imagine.

spk_0 He was he was no Gordon solely or Lance was there.

spk_0 No sir unbelievable.

spk_0 So how shows Lanny's working a lot with with rip rogers and Savage and either tag

spk_0 teams or single matches.

spk_0 So, you know, it seemed like, you know, one of the problems, of course,

spk_0 the top guys were the top guys forever.

spk_0 You know, three years later, Ranny and rip rogers are feuding, right?

spk_0 And Savage and Garvin are feuding.

spk_0 So that's that's one of the things that they never could get any other real

spk_0 main event talent into the promotion.

spk_0 No, once the guys that had been black balls started getting booked away again,

spk_0 they were pretty screwed.

spk_0 I mean, Ronnie Garvin stuck around longer than the rest of them because he had a,

spk_0 you know, piece of the pie still and whatnot.

spk_0 But you know, once, once Rupin, Orton, leave in 1981, it really just comes down

spk_0 to like you said, the same guys every, every night.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 Yeah, it's a, it got, it got stale.

spk_0 Well, that's for sure.

spk_0 Uh, I saw some April promos.

spk_0 Uh, Savage could have promoed about a hair versus tear match between rip rogers

spk_0 and bare man rip Tyler.

spk_0 So I'm guessing rip Tyler needed to pay a outstanding bill or.

spk_0 I wonder if there was a payoff.

spk_0 Hopefully somebody did get their hair.

spk_0 Can we know it wasn't the ripper?

spk_0 We know it wasn't the ripper.

spk_0 Uh, Ronnie Garvin gave this very passionate promo about Terry Gibbs and so

spk_0 many of them injured in a figure four like like a lot.

spk_0 Unfortunately, the more passionate Ronnie got, the harder he was to understand

spk_0 with his French Canadian accent.

spk_0 So it almost worked against him in a way.

spk_0 He was almost better off just being like matter of fact.

spk_0 Right.

spk_0 Then the, the screaming yelling because first the fans aren't responding

spk_0 anyway.

spk_0 And secondly, it's difficult to understand.

spk_0 You know, let me, let me stop you just real quick.

spk_0 You talk about those four hour TV tapings real quick and like 15 people in the crowd.

spk_0 Now we've seen 20,000 people in the WF, you know, tapings when they would do three or four.

spk_0 And you can tell when you get to the end of the tapings, the fans aren't reacting

spk_0 like they were for the first hour as they would say for the third hour.

spk_0 Can you imagine in your fourth hour of ICW having these 15 people and what

spk_0 that sounded or did not sound like unbelievable?

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 What you want to talk about an endurance contest that would have been, that would have been

spk_0 a lot of morning.

spk_0 That's for sure.

spk_0 So by May all star wrestling is pretty much done in Knoxville.

spk_0 I think ICW would go back to Knoxville, but it would be under their banner.

spk_0 It would be under the all star wrestling banner anymore.

spk_0 So it's basically, you know, the split worked for nobody.

spk_0 The fullers had to leave Knoxville.

spk_0 And the split crew with Garvern and Rupert and Orton and everybody involved.

spk_0 They had to leave as well.

spk_0 So basically nobody benefited from that deal.

spk_0 No, yeah.

spk_0 Fuller winds up what's selling the croquet at the end of 1979.

spk_0 Croquet finds a couple suckers and Mulligan flair to take it from him.

spk_0 Right.

spk_0 No, it was Barnett or Barnett, Barnett bought it, I believe.

spk_0 If I remember or took it over, I believe.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 And he sells it to Mulligan and flair.

spk_0 And then eventually crocket just kind of takes it over from them by the end of 1981,

spk_0 going into 82.

spk_0 So it just never really worked out after the demise.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 And I think so much of the exposing of the business back when that really mattered got

spk_0 into the newspapers and people, oh, this is all the work and it's all BS and didn't help anybody.

spk_0 So on May 20th, they actually actually did get into Rupert.

spk_0 They're up.

spk_0 I said, Rupert.

spk_0 Rupert.

spk_0 Arena.

spk_0 Gotcha.

spk_0 I don't think Bob has his own arena named after him, but he's a good man.

spk_0 I think maybe he should.

spk_0 But this is the card that is the level which we claim for years that actually sold out

spk_0 the building and drew like 10,000 people.

spk_0 And I think is the slap with the only person in the world that believes that.

spk_0 And Angela would later say to the newspaper that they drew 2500 and a $10,000 gate,

spk_0 which, which is respectable, but I don't think that would pay the bills for an eye at Rupert.

spk_0 Yeah, I was going to say I wonder how much it cost to rent the arena alone.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 And of course, half of the advertised card was a $30,000 challenge to Lawler, Dundee and Jimmy

spk_0 Valley.

spk_0 Half of the advertised card were matches that we're not going to happen.

spk_0 Right.

spk_0 If you visually looked at the card that challenge took up like half.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 If you go back and look at those posters, this is insane.

spk_0 They spend more time promoting matches that won't happen.

spk_0 And then at the bottom, it's like plus Rip Rogers versus Lani Poffo, right?

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 Plus the guys will actually be there.

spk_0 Right.

spk_0 June, June, they debuted in Cape Gerardo, Missouri, which is a town they would run actually through,

spk_0 you know, 1985, 1985.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 Right up to the point where Savage left to go to WWF at the time.

spk_0 My understanding with Cape Gerardo and I believe there was one other city too was that at some

spk_0 point, Angelo suckered the people of Cape Gerardo, the local TV station to do some kind of a

spk_0 contract.

spk_0 And then he became even though they had merged kind of with Jared or whatever you want to call it,

spk_0 dissolved into Jared, he was forced to continue to run shows there based on the contract that he

spk_0 had.

spk_0 That's why if you go back and look at results for Cape Gerardo, yeah, Loller would pop up

spk_0 every once in a blue moon, but there were cards that were basically ICW slash Jared promotion

spk_0 cards, but it was Jerry saying, you go down there, that's your thing.

spk_0 You go fucking figure it out.

spk_0 And then there would be like four matches on the card with a bunch of masks guys with

spk_0 real names.

spk_0 You never heard tell of.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 Jared gave Angelo the Memphis tape to run.

spk_0 And then they would put cut ins with interviews and that's where you see a lot of the early interviews

spk_0 with Liz, Mr. Elizabeth doing little promos and things.

spk_0 So she's doing advertising those type of cards at that time.

spk_0 All right.

spk_0 July and July on TV Jeff Sword turned heel and that will kind of lead to then starting the devil's

spk_0 duo later in the year.

spk_0 And I had to say that, you know, the devil's duo were a really good presentation.

spk_0 You know, they were certainly not top guys and were never really pushed hard any place

spk_0 else.

spk_0 Right.

spk_0 They did come back to Memphis in like the early 90s after Memphis was pretty much just,

spk_0 you know, an IC love W level promotion.

spk_0 You know, it was just kind of just existing and they had a run there.

spk_0 But, you know, when they matched him with Izzy and they all had the long beards and the robes,

spk_0 they were a very good looking heel team at that time.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 There's a few pictures of them out there, but you know, those guys would travel together forever

spk_0 talking about Doug Vines and Jeff Sword.

spk_0 You'd see him do jobs for Vince all the way into the early 90s, you know, on the same TV

spk_0 taping.

spk_0 So those guys, I know they were in mid-Atlantic at the same time.

spk_0 They did like a two week deal in Los Angeles before they realized that they were getting

spk_0 less there than they were getting for Angelo, I think.

spk_0 I don't really know how that was, but yeah, so everywhere they seemed to go to, they

spk_0 worked really well together.

spk_0 I thought I really enjoyed them as a heel team.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 Yeah, I did too.

spk_0 I, when they lost that team, I think they lost something.

spk_0 They also did the deal where Angelo did sit up throughout an entire one hour TV taping.

spk_0 So they were, you know, working off of his world record, 6,000 and 33 set ups.

spk_0 You know, here Angelo is, gosh, how old is he?

spk_0 At least 50, right?

spk_0 At least I was.

spk_0 Yeah, yeah, he's up there.

spk_0 He's in his 50s and they have the little like screen and screen box and he's doing sit-ups

spk_0 for it.

spk_0 He's got to give him some respect for the game.

spk_0 It's not like your world champion Bob Backland and his prime doing the Harvard step test

spk_0 or whatever that was called up and down for the duration of the program.

spk_0 This is the promoter, the miser, if you will, sitting here doing sit-ups, promoting

spk_0 something that he had, you know, set a record on maybe three decades prior or whatever

spk_0 the case was, but it's fun to see that, you know, they just come up with anything.

spk_0 I just woke up that day and decided this, I guess.

spk_0 Yeah, I think he said that he had to, you know, have certain feeling in his body like

spk_0 and he was like, okay, this day I can do this.

spk_0 I see it as he had to come up.

spk_0 Must've fucked in a real bed that night, Steve.

spk_0 He wasn't looking at plumbing when he woke up on the board.

spk_0 Oh, that's a nice fixture they have here.

spk_0 I wonder how much content they took with them.

spk_0 Yes.

spk_0 So in August they debuted in Charleston, West Virginia, which would be another town

spk_0 that they would go to for years.

spk_0 So again, I mean, they're having some success this year and kind of spurting out the

spk_0 promotion and not just being, you know, these tiny little towns in Kentucky every night.

spk_0 Barrio and Terry Gibbs said, well, we've done this and they left IcyW in August, you

spk_0 know, very famously got involved with the WWF scandals year later.

spk_0 And Terry had just kind of a quiet career didn't do a whole lot.

spk_0 You know, Terry winds up.

spk_0 Yeah, he's just kind of a journeyman after this float around.

spk_0 I, you know, he goes through Florida, he's from the Tampa area, I believe.

spk_0 And he'll work some in Puerto Rico in the next couple of years.

spk_0 And he'll wind up working for Vince from like 85 through the beginning of 88 ish just

spk_0 under.

spk_0 And enhancement work, but he'll, you know, he'll have steady work at least through really

spk_0 into 88.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 Yeah, yeah.

spk_0 He stick around a long time.

spk_0 It's kind of peculiar though, what where Barrio goes.

spk_0 His brother Bob Orton still here for another, nearly another year.

spk_0 So for Barrio to just pack up and leave, I wonder if that was an angel of thing.

spk_0 If that was a get the fuck out of my locker room, kind of deal.

spk_0 I don't know what the hell.

spk_0 It's just kind of odd to see Barrio leave, leave town.

spk_0 Yeah, maybe he wanted to eat food on a daily basis.

spk_0 I don't know.

spk_0 People get really in the strange about stuff like that.

spk_0 Yeah, like, so August they have a tournament for the TV title.

spk_0 And Bob Rup, Wednesday, he beats Savage in the final.

spk_0 So that's the way Savage can do a job and still hold onto the main championship in the

spk_0 promotion.

spk_0 And as separate, I can let Monster Savage knock down Garvin with a cast and took his

spk_0 southeast title from him.

spk_0 And that was kind of a strange thing.

spk_0 Garvin would defend that southeast title for years.

spk_0 It was the title that he took from Knoxville and kept with him.

spk_0 So you've got, you know, just another bell for, you know, when you got 10 guys in

spk_0 the company, I don't know how many belts you really need.

spk_0 Absolutely.

spk_0 They had a lot.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 And then Rup was feuding with Bob Orton Jr. at the house shows and those were probably really

spk_0 good matches.

spk_0 I imagine.

spk_0 Relive the glory days of Memphis wrestling with the Retro Wrestling Review USWA podcast.

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spk_0 Listen, if you know what's good for it.

spk_0 So let's September, we have the debut of Body Land Down.

spk_0 This is where Body Land Down starts his wrestling career and doesn't stay here particularly

spk_0 long, but he likes to eat too.

spk_0 He likes to eat, but he'll be making good money a few years from now.

spk_0 And he was trained.

spk_0 Yeah, he was trained by the great Malinka.

spk_0 I think he had to sell his car or something to get the money to get trained to be a wrestler.

spk_0 I know he slept in a storefront during that period.

spk_0 Yeah, yeah, we'll talk about that a little later.

spk_0 It was lean times for Woodrow and I see W.

spk_0 The garbage savaged you again.

spk_0 They're working that around through all the house shows.

spk_0 Wanny was no longer really in the world title picture a lot after this.

spk_0 He would occasionally have those title matches, but it wasn't the big push match always

spk_0 seemed to be garbage and savaged.

spk_0 I think even Angelo with this point realized who was the star son and who was the other one.

spk_0 Right.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 September, one of the funnier things that are out there and you can find this very easily

spk_0 on YouTube is Savage and Orton cut a promo challenging pant Patterson and Ray Stevens

spk_0 because for some ungodly reason, you know, the I.C.W. type was being of course played in

spk_0 San Francisco.

spk_0 Everybody trying to take over San Francisco.

spk_0 Yes.

spk_0 Savage, me and the cowboy do everything together.

spk_0 We train together.

spk_0 We even.

spk_0 Then he goes on to he just he just leaves you the imagination.

spk_0 All the things that he and the cowboy do together.

spk_0 Alrighty.

spk_0 It's it's it's it's quite a little promo.

spk_0 And then we get one of the famous exposés that happened at this time.

spk_0 So that this was Ronnie Garvin specialty.

spk_0 He would always come out and expose something that we weren't supposed to know as fans.

spk_0 And he had this grainy studio footage from quote Omaha Nebraska.

spk_0 And I have no idea where this was tape, but it was like a TV studio wrestling.

spk_0 And and Lanny and Randy were out there.

spk_0 And he exposes that Landy and Randy or brothers.

spk_0 And as as he's ending this expo to say Savage jumps over the announcement table to tackle Garvin

spk_0 and they get into it.

spk_0 So it's just it's funny because when they say, Oh, we've got this footage from Omaha, Nebraska.

spk_0 It looks like something from the 1950s, because they're kind of trying to use this camera technique

spk_0 to make it look like really gritty old.

spk_0 You know, which is funny because it's years ahead of its time as far as you know,

spk_0 they don't have the software to make this happen.

spk_0 And even if they did, Angela shirt certainly wasn't going to spring for it.

spk_0 So it's it's funny to see what they went to to try to make this look realistic, you know.

spk_0 Yes, yes.

spk_0 And they they're showing the debut in Louisville during this time frame.

spk_0 So again, there's another market where they're going directly against it.

spk_0 Omaha's decades back on their, you know, acknowledge it by the way.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 The famous late 1970s Omaha wrestling that we've all heard.

spk_0 Of course.

spk_0 No, October, Wharton wins the TV title from Rube.

spk_0 I've read that it happened in Louisville, Kentucky, but I don't have anything that shows that card taking place on the results.

spk_0 So I don't know if that was a real switch or a phantom switch.

spk_0 Peasant Bentley was injured in storyline by Wharton from a pile driver.

spk_0 And he starts a few for the TV title.

spk_0 And then Rube was quote, injured.

spk_0 And he just decided, hey, I think I'm injured in real life.

spk_0 Yes.

spk_0 And a few months off.

spk_0 Now Bob has told that story.

spk_0 He felt he had been ripped off enough by Angela at this point that he went and bought himself the necessities to create a plaster cast.

spk_0 Anytime he needed it to kind of wander into an ICW program.

spk_0 So he would basically drive so far to the arenas to the TV studio, whatever the case may be.

spk_0 And then he would stop on the side of the rotor, whatever and kind of create the cast, put it on the leg.

spk_0 I believe it was the leg.

spk_0 And then show up.

spk_0 Oh, here's my injury.

spk_0 See, it's real.

spk_0 That's pretty wild when you're in your...

spk_0 That's dedication, right?

spk_0 I mean, that is not about working a gimmick.

spk_0 Yeah, that's...

spk_0 That's you are really, really not happy in your job.

spk_0 We're putting on a fake cast to say, oh, hey, I can't work.

spk_0 I've still got a broken ankle or a leg or whatever it is.

spk_0 I'd rather not be paid than wrestle for you.

spk_0 That's right.

spk_0 It's just not worth it.

spk_0 November, Tom Hagey, who was wrestling his gym pride, let the promotion.

spk_0 And we had mentioned that Savage had used the name gym pride when he was working with Damor Rillo.

spk_0 And I think it was like 1975-ish.

spk_0 And then the challenge to Dundee and Tokyo and Girat, which had been $30,000,

spk_0 increases to $100,000.

spk_0 In place.

spk_0 And he comes out and he's got this briefcase and it's just full of rolled up bills

spk_0 and Steve Cooper's standing in behind him like he's some sort of security

spk_0 over all this money that they have in the briefcase.

spk_0 And of course, the reason that the challenge went up so dramatically

spk_0 is there about to debut in Memphis.

spk_0 And we'll talk about that here coming up in a moment.

spk_0 But I do have some quotes from Buddy Landel from a shoot interview.

spk_0 It was dark days.

spk_0 There wasn't much money.

spk_0 They had me living with a midget.

spk_0 His name was We Willy and he hated me.

spk_0 He hated me with a P-purple passion.

spk_0 He had a one bedroom studio apartment.

spk_0 He was just forever being cruel to me.

spk_0 I thought it was this hobby just to be mean to me.

spk_0 Wow.

spk_0 So Landel's into the new into the business and he's getting rid by a midget every day.

spk_0 This is a carny wrestling, man.

spk_0 I mean, you're moving in with a midget to break into the business.

spk_0 Only in pro wrestling or the carnival circuit.

spk_0 I'm only there.

spk_0 Before they had me living with a midget, Randy had a gym.

spk_0 It was a store front and then these big picture windows.

spk_0 Me and this female wrestler named Dona Day would sleep in the big store for a window.

spk_0 I'm 17 years old and I'm making 300 a week in 1979.

spk_0 I never went without a meal.

spk_0 You have to sacrifice all the creature comforts in the world.

spk_0 I just constantly learn from the veterans.

spk_0 I really got to be around some of the best talent in the business.

spk_0 So it's, you know, I don't know if he was really making 300 a week.

spk_0 That sounds high, but.

spk_0 Yeah, especially in a midget.

spk_0 He's okay.

spk_0 Right, but he was saying this late in his life and at least he had the perspective that hey, this got me into the business.

spk_0 I am working with veterans.

spk_0 I am learning.

spk_0 And, you know, really, it's just a few short years from this and he's getting big pushes in different places.

spk_0 But he was an atro.

spk_0 He was good.

spk_0 What he did.

spk_0 November 27th, I see W decides to show up in Memphis.

spk_0 And they book the cook convention center.

spk_0 And they have this very standard ICW car.

spk_0 There's nothing unique.

spk_0 It's Garvin versus Savage on top, Root versus Orton.

spk_0 Leap and Laney and George wine graph against the devil's duo has a lot of versus the quote mighty Yankee.

spk_0 And rip Rogers versus Rick McCord.

spk_0 And of course, you have the $100,000 challenge to the Jared Peru, which they had done on television for the Memphis.

spk_0 And I don't know if it was this show or the next show that is they did two shows pretty quickly in Memphis at this time.

spk_0 And I'm guessing he must have rented like got a better rate for renting two shows.

spk_0 One of these shows they they show the part of a match on television.

spk_0 And I swear to God, all you could see was the front row.

spk_0 It was all dark in the front row was not even filled up.

spk_0 Wow.

spk_0 It looked like there were maybe seven to ten people in that building from what they showed on television.

spk_0 That had to be so deflating for these guys who are going out there and putting on you know these are you look at the undercard has like pezz-waltly and rip Rogers nice solid Matt Rick McCord even some nice solid matches for your you know your opener or what have you and

spk_0 I just can't imagine being you know talent like a rooper in Orton who had been in Florida and done all these things and even Randy Savage is deserves more than ten people in the crowd.

spk_0 Of course you're coming into Memphis and you're screwing with Jerry Jared and the crew I get that but it's just dumb founding.

spk_0 None of those guys had any history of meaning anything in the city of Memphis.

spk_0 Right.

spk_0 You know they they had done well in other places but nobody had been a regular on a Memphis card.

spk_0 I mean a few of them had been made a shot or two you know right.

spk_0 So they come in there and you've got this very low budget television and you've got names that mean nothing to the city of Memphis.

spk_0 And this was before cable took over and people still really viewed you know law learned in Dundee are the biggest stars in wrestling right.

spk_0 That's the way it was viewed back then.

spk_0 I'd love to see that taping in because I remember just you know I'm 14 15 years old watching the time.

spk_0 And I'm like oh my god what a train wreck.

spk_0 So here is Izzy slapwoods talking about going into Memphis years later in his interview with with Bowden.

spk_0 Angelo thought that Jared was giving us a hard time keeping us out of rep or in it.

spk_0 Angelo said we're going to go into the cook convention center of Memphis.

spk_0 All of us said Angelo let's wait it's too soon.

spk_0 We had only been on Memphis TV for a few weeks.

spk_0 Back then the rule of thumb was you let your TV run for 12 or 13 weeks before you did a house show in a major city.

spk_0 We needed to get the boys over especially in the case of Memphis where Jared's group was over big time.

spk_0 We begged Angelo away.

spk_0 We went to Memphis. God knows how much he's money he spent on that building.

spk_0 Maybe 200 people showed up. Possibly less.

spk_0 Needless to say Angelo wasn't very happy.

spk_0 I can see that you never did well in Memphis.

spk_0 And I can guarantee you it was less.

spk_0 There were probably more people selling popcorn than they were sitting in the seats.

spk_0 It sounds like.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 So again it's just kind of dumb founding that I mean the cook convention center is a big building.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 And that's what you run whenever they couldn't run the Colosseum.

spk_0 Right.

spk_0 So you know that was just a huge leap of faith to say you know we've got this little promotion.

spk_0 And we've never done anything in this city and we're going to go straight to the cook convention center.

spk_0 Not real smart.

spk_0 Well I mean in Ernie County's world if you build it they will come but it didn't work here in Memphis.

spk_0 Right.

spk_0 So here's here's some quotes on the grandstand challenges one of one of them's from from your show with Bob Rube.

spk_0 There was a variety of reasons for doing it one of my reasons was to embarrass sticks later.

spk_0 Also you add what looks like a match to your card.

spk_0 So he's kind of defending doing that in a certain way.

spk_0 But but I think easy kind of nails it.

spk_0 I thought it was unnecessary.

spk_0 It was bad for the business.

spk_0 We were good enough it was something a second rate promotion would do.

spk_0 We had the talent I would take the guys working in ICW at that time against any promotion in the country.

spk_0 And no promotion could even come close to the talent we had.

spk_0 Well now I don't know if I agree with that in terms of talent but he's he's right it made them look like a second rate promotion.

spk_0 Absolutely.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 It made them look like we are minor league we know we're minor league.

spk_0 We want a major league person to give us credibility.

spk_0 And we know it's not going to happen but we're trying to get this rub through embarrassing you.

spk_0 Alright some of the things that happened in December.

spk_0 There were some really low budget props.

spk_0 I think we may mention that.

spk_0 I see that.

spk_0 So so here's a low budget prop you get a t shirt that says Brad on it.

spk_0 And rip Rogers if he loses a match on television has to wear a shirt that says Brad on it.

spk_0 And landing interferes in one of the matches and poor rip Rogers has to wear a shirt that says Brad.

spk_0 Brad so that was that was how he is humiliating the heel was making him wear that t shirt.

spk_0 So whoo.

spk_0 That must have been big in Angelo's youth.

spk_0 Yeah remember when they called his friends.

spk_0 And then we have then we have the we will a angle the infamous we will angle when he wasn't the torturing poor buddy and Dell.

spk_0 You know he'd been part of the crew pretty much from the beginning.

spk_0 And he's garbage doing some things with we will and they're doing some things to humiliate savage.

spk_0 And that was the kind of the weird psychology of the Garvin Savage feud.

spk_0 Savage is the world champion and but he's always angry with Garvin because Garvin's always outsmarting him.

spk_0 But Garvin's never the world champion.

spk_0 Right.

spk_0 So they use Willie is some part of angle to get Savage beat on TV or humiliate savage.

spk_0 But at the end Savage hits his top rope elbow.

spk_0 To on we will and it looks like he is killed we will.

spk_0 Right and and later this will actually be like an article in like the local paper like what happened to we will.

spk_0 Yes, I actually have that article here in my notes.

spk_0 I grabbed it yesterday, honestly.

spk_0 So is he is he is said late years later we will.

spk_0 I needed to go into surgery promotions didn't offer help insurance or anything like that.

spk_0 They're going to help him with his medical deal bills.

spk_0 They did the thing where Randy came off the top rope.

spk_0 Then they had a collection to help him with his medical bills.

spk_0 So so that was you know pretty clever way to get some simply on wood.

spk_0 Will and and have people try to help them out.

spk_0 Oh, they ruined it for me because all I you know I'm envisioning just the storytelling here from the paper.

spk_0 The way they break it down is you know it's like Garvin's in a match.

spk_0 I believe with Doug Vines.

spk_0 I don't I think it was vines.

spk_0 And they they spilled of the floor and we will he is acting as the manager for running.

spk_0 In this match in the ways described as we will he's out there in a top hat I guess.

spk_0 And so all you can see from the camera angle is just this top hat over the ring apron there.

spk_0 But so he climbs up into the ring for some reason while the other two are out of the ring and incomes Randy Savage attacks.

spk_0 We will he and drops I guess one of the more legit stiff elbows.

spk_0 We got to make him believe you're in the hospital for the reason.

spk_0 So I guess you just all of his weight Randy Savage comes crashing down.

spk_0 And I'm sure it hurt inside poor we will he there.

spk_0 Poor we will.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 Well thanks for the specifics that I didn't remember our head and seeing that angle recently.

spk_0 December the kind of the last piece of the puzzle for the first generation vice.

spk_0 W talent comes in under the name of George Gray or Crusher Brumfield or later known as one man gang.

spk_0 And then what Hakeem I guess we're here.

spk_0 I came.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 I'm a dream man.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 Can't be about I keep.

spk_0 So he had debuted in November 30th in Manchester.

spk_0 Manchester seemed like like a town they would do a lot of experimental stuff in.

spk_0 You know,

spk_0 experimenting.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 Yeah, they would they would run like they would have different people in the car there or or have different types of matches.

spk_0 I think you know it was just like okay.

spk_0 We can do anything in this place.

spk_0 But he had started is George the Giant and the way he got into the promotion was Jay Eagle.

spk_0 Out of South Carolina was one of the guys who had worked underneath it.

spk_0 As enhancement talent some of the IZW shows and he would bring people with him to work underneath.

spk_0 And George was not even scheduled to work at the show.

spk_0 But Savage looked at him and he found out they'd been working.

spk_0 and outlaw shows in South Carolina and he gave him a job.

spk_0 And, you know, he stood out there because there weren't giants in ICW.

spk_0 No, I mean, like six ten or something like that. He's a big dude.

spk_0 But I'm top of the five pounds.

spk_0 Right, right. So, you know, it's not like, you know, like the WWF got to be where you've got

spk_0 ten guys that look like giants and it's how does anybody stand out.

spk_0 So, yeah, just due to his size alone, he was an imposing figure.

spk_0 He certainly wasn't going to come in and work underneath. That's for sure.

spk_0 No, no. And that's really, you know, he was still like living at home with his mom and been out

spk_0 at high school for a year or two and started an ICW wrestling. He does tell a funny story and this,

spk_0 when he left ICW wrestling, he had absolutely no money. He was going to Mid-South and he was

spk_0 sleeping in his car somewhere. And the cops tell him, hey, you can't sleep in your car here.

spk_0 And he's like, well, I don't have any money to buy a hotel room.

spk_0 Somehow they got a home of Grizzly Smith and he'd put him up somewhere for the night or something.

spk_0 But poor George couldn't get more.

spk_0 He didn't even have nothing to get to the city with with his next town.

spk_0 He'd do okay moving forward, though. He'd do okay.

spk_0 He'd do okay. Here's a show. This is just kind of a typical

spk_0 part that they're running at this time. This was Christmas night at Louisville, the Commonwealth

spk_0 Convention Center. And from what we've heard, they never drew well in Louisville.

spk_0 McHorred versus the Miser, Rip Rogers versus Buddy Landell, Orton versus Pizz Wattley.

spk_0 If Wattley wins, he gets a TV title match. So that's an easy way to put Pizz over and not lose the belt.

spk_0

spk_0 Leap and Laney and George Winegraf against the Devil's Duo, which as I always said, was a pretty

spk_0 impressive heel team for the time and place and Savage versus Garvin. And of course,

spk_0 because that's Louisville, they're advertising the $100,000 challenge.

spk_0 That's kind of some of the major things that happen in the year for ICW.

spk_0 But there were things happening outside of ICW that were interesting as well.

spk_0 Do tell.

spk_0 So have you ever been to Milwaukee? I've never been to Milwaukee, but I saw this poster online

spk_0 just the other day. Yeah. It's an I stand. I let a lot of beer drinking in it.

spk_0 But there was a guy named Al King Kong Patterson, who promoted a show in Milwaukee

spk_0 that made ICW look like the Boston Gardens. You were going to talk about low budget television.

spk_0 But he starts getting the ICW people on some of his cards. I just want to read this whole card.

spk_0 Oh my gosh. Yes.

spk_0 So there was my God. I'm looking at some of the names.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 September 6, 1980, Milwaukee Auditorium.

spk_0 Opener the Italian bomber versus Johnny Valens. Vales. You guess.

spk_0 Bad brain Lucas versus quote the Mexican champion.

spk_0 No, just the Mexican champion.

spk_0 Yes. Indian Pete versus Doran, I'm mixing. That's my Indian Pete. He's an Indian name

spk_0 Pete by the way. Doran, I'm Nixon. Maybe my new favorite wrestling name of all time.

spk_0 That's a good one. Jeff May versus Randy Atlas.

spk_0 Randy Alice is not a bad name. It reminds me of somebody. And then Bob Orton, Jr. versus

spk_0 Ron Garvin, King Kong Patterson versus Randy Savage. And then a quote 20 man battle royal.

spk_0 Well, there's a lot of guys on the cards. So I'm scared to think of who else filled out that

spk_0 battle royal. There's actually a match of Savage and King Kong Patterson on YouTube.

spk_0 Oh my gosh. And King Kong Patterson. Wow. You think Savage can have a match with anybody? No.

spk_0 There are limits to human ability. I need to go find this. I can't believe it's on tape.

spk_0 I gotta go check it. Yeah. It is out there and it is. Boy, it's ugly. So Rip Rogers,

spk_0 Randy worked for Al King Kong Patterson in Milwaukee. Al didn't have enough money to pay him.

spk_0 Oh boy. So Garvin went up and got the cage. The ICW still caged that we had for years.

spk_0 It was Al King Kong Patterson's cage. We were operating on a shoestring. So basically,

spk_0 you know, can't pay us. We're just going to take your cage here. You're not going to do a damn thing

spk_0 about it. You imagine standing up to Savage and Garvin saying, sorry, can't pay you.

spk_0 Can't pay you that 20 bucks, but you can take this, you know, however many hundred dollars of

spk_0 steel here that we had put together. Okay. Well, I mean, there you go. That's how they,

spk_0 it's just like the box. You know, everything came out of the box and ICW was the same bot.

spk_0 They just recycled that bot. They kept it over in the corner and they just

spk_0 allowed use it whenever they needed it. Yeah. Then December 14th, our Savage and Garvin appeared

spk_0 in Kenosha, Wisconsin for Al King Kong Patterson. So I think we're back several times.

spk_0 Well, they want to see what else they could take Steve. What do you think we can take this time?

spk_0 Not any belts. We need new title belts. Yeah. And then there was some appearances in

spk_0 Maulden, Missouri for Henry Rogers, who we often enjoy talking about. December 16th, I wish I had

spk_0 a time machine and get go back. Oh my god. Because I was 45 minutes away. It had no idea

spk_0 these things were happening. Awesome. So rip Rogers, big way waves, Bob and Junior and Peswaltly

spk_0 appeared were him on December 16th. From what I've heard the Puffos used Henry Rogers,

spk_0 wrestling license and Missouri. So that was probably, you know, a trail. And then January 3rd,

spk_0 Savage, Rick McCord, Debbie comes and Dona Day worked in Maulden. So 81, but it's, you know,

spk_0 it's hard to picture Bob Orton because I've seen the Maulden results. Like I've seen years

spk_0 with the Maulden results. And you know, the Black Panther and the Yadda Yadda and all this stuff.

spk_0 And Bob Orton, it just like I wouldn't even have believed it if I'd sought in the print. I would

spk_0 have thought, oh, they're pretending some guys Bob Orton here because here it is, man. It's crazy.

spk_0 Well, we're we're recently did say that they had a guarantee. You didn't say what the guarantee

spk_0 you will. I guarantee you'll have a match. So somebody had a listing of times that Savage appeared in

spk_0 Wisconsin, September, October, December, 1980. And even in 81 January, and then there's a June shot

spk_0 to do the 1981. So it's really weird. You're running your own promotion. And then you're driving

spk_0 all the way to frickin Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I mean, I can't imagine they were flying them up there.

spk_0 Very very very strange. Yeah, it's very peculiar. Maybe they were trying to test the water

spk_0 so you think they could kind of take over Milwaukee up there. I don't know because that's

spk_0 verna country. So right? Yeah. Yeah. But like I say, boy, it was it was a rough product. Take a

spk_0 look at that sometime. If you think you've seen some low budget wrestling. So we wanted to again

spk_0 kind of talk about, you know, one of the main problems with ICW is the opening montage of the show

spk_0 was was fantastic. We talked about that. Right. You've got mud pits. You've got a wrestling bear.

spk_0 You've got fireballs. You got savage. We're in a snake. You got pistol pes jumping through

spk_0 ropes under you know, doing a dive before dives were really good thing. So you know, the intro was

spk_0 it's fantastic. But the first time I met Rupert Rogers, he said we didn't know anything about

spk_0 television production. And the endouncers acted like they were talking about a chess match.

spk_0 They had so little emotion into what was happening on the screen. It was like, oh, savage has a

spk_0 chainsaw. And it looks like he's going to saw a fronny guy runs on arm. That that that might be a

spk_0 legal. There's a lot of blood in the rig. That's depending on yeah, depending on yeah.

spk_0 On the baby face side, we've mentioned Garvin was difficult to understand. Lanny would sound like a

spk_0 frustrated community college English professor, you know, making literary references. And you know,

spk_0 that's another thing. But you talk about a shoestring budget like Rupert Rogers was saying, you

spk_0 know, when they would go to the arena footage, a lot of times Lanny would be doing the voice over

spk_0 Rupert. So you'd do commentary when you could clearly tell it's Lanny because when he's cut in

spk_0 a promo, it's the same voice. And here's Lanny talking about a match involving Lanny, right? So

spk_0 it's just really right. Yeah, he could not cut up a I fired up baby face promo. He just he

spk_0 just didn't have it in him. Well, he found the genius character though. He got that. He nailed that.

spk_0 That was good stuff. He the interpoit. Yeah, came at it's end point. But you know, that's one of

spk_0 the reasons why I think that the promotion never connected outside, you know, you look at Memphis

spk_0 and you look at the studio reaction and you look at the announcers and how they put things over.

spk_0 And you know, you compare that to 15 people who look like they're at a funeral watching,

spk_0 watching Squashmatch, just I see W and TV. Yeah. And it just just doesn't translate.

spk_0 I did list here's, you know, some of the places that they work. Yeah. As I said, they started to

spk_0 branch out. They they were in K even rock Illinois for one show. So they go into the Southern

spk_0 Illinois. They didn't show the work. There's hypes. They did everything. Okay. Yeah, they went to

spk_0 Warner Robbins, Georgia. And I'm sure they're probably the military base on the 4th of July.

spk_0 So they probably somebody probably had a connection to get a wrestling show into there. Johnson Cindy

spk_0 Tancy Bristol Virginia. So so they're in Illinois, Virginia, Missouri. This is this is when they

spk_0 start really spreading out through that that mid America States area where they were at.

spk_0 People bitch and complained about that schedule that Bill Watts had in Bob Roof really shits

spk_0 all over the Amarillo schedule. He said that was for him. That was worse than the the Mid South

spk_0 sketch like the the driving. I mean, you know, the trips up and down the road. But this doesn't

spk_0 look fun. And you're making a whole lot less money here in ICW than you were for Bill Watts or

spk_0 for the or the FUNX. Now, now these are some serious long road trips. And a lot of these are my

spk_0 interstate road trips. They're, you know, you're you're going through, you know, a lot of small towns.

spk_0 Yeah, the mountains. Yeah. Yeah. This is this is slow moving. This is yeah, I don't envy them.

spk_0 So who do you think had the most of main events for ICW in 1980? Let me think about it for a minute.

spk_0 I think you're right. Randy Savage, I have 150 that I found. I'm sure there's an war.

spk_0 Ronnie Garvin was next. Lanny right behind. Bob Morton, Jr. had a lot. 89 rip Rodgers,

spk_0 Pezwatt Lee, George Winegrov, Bob Roof had 45 and then it goes down from there. But so those

spk_0 your your key kind of headline guys. George Winegrov, for more main events than Bob Roof,

spk_0 I'm going to have to get Bob shit for that one. Oh, yeah. Well, you know, but he was tied to Lanny.

spk_0 That's true. And they were they were doing a lot of those tag team main events. I don't think George

spk_0 was in a lot of single main events. But yeah. So to talk about the crew a little bit like I said,

spk_0 Crusher Brewfield, George Gray was kind of the last piece. Yeah. Here's a quote on Cornette on

spk_0 the crew. Lanny was a heck of a worker back then. Savage was incredible in the ring.

spk_0 Bob Morton, Jr. One of the best workers in the business. Ronnie Garvin, they got him over in

spk_0 Knoxville and he did the brawling shit and the crazy angles. People thought he was nuts and a bad

spk_0 ass. Andre, the giant came in and sold for him. Ronnie Garvin kicked the shit out of Andre in Knoxville.

spk_0 When he turned baby face, he was a top guy. Roof was a shooter. He had he'd been everywhere.

spk_0 He had those guys plus rip rogers. All those guys were in great shape. Rrip was a good young talent.

spk_0 The rest of the card fell off band. Doug Binds and Jeff Sward were a solid tag team with

spk_0 their manager manager, Izzy Slappowitz. The devil's duo, Izzy was fun. So it's it's kind of

spk_0 neat that the Cornette puts over Izzy who was, you know, such a weird unique character. Right.

spk_0 Absolutely. Cornette, George Gray was Crusher Brewfield. He reminded everybody of Crusher Blackwell.

spk_0 You can tell he was going to be a star. One of the big boy he was. I love his real name.

spk_0 Ralph Derry Berry. Derry Berry. What a name. He would come in and out of ICW. He'd started

spk_0 with the Colkins in 78 and he worked in Memphis in 1984 as the animal. Okay. So he was he was doing

spk_0 the makeup gimmick back in Memphis at that time. And I think we talked about Tony Peters before.

spk_0 He only worked in the East Tennessee. He was working. Yeah. Yeah. And he worked underneath

spk_0 for Crockett in 1981. So that was his last time of being in the sort of big position was

spk_0 was the All-Star crew. So last time we talked about how cheap the Puffalo family was.

spk_0 Now we'll get into some of the other sides of Lanyard Angelo today. So Lanyard said,

spk_0 I didn't create the moonsault. I stole the moonsault from the Tiger Mass versus Dynamite Kid

spk_0 Match. I wasn't an innovator and I also wasn't a perfectionist. My moonsault wasn't as good as

spk_0 Tiger Mass because a lot of people, you know, give him a lot of credit for being one of the early

spk_0 people to use the moonsault. He's just, I just stole it from the center. He's still the first

spk_0 guy I ever saw do a springboard though. Yeah. Yeah. Lanyard had some interesting gifts. That's for sure.

spk_0 George Winegriffe. Lanyard wasn't as intense. He really didn't give a shit. He was pushed into

spk_0 the business by his brother and his father. They just dominated his life. And you'll kind of see

spk_0 that theme from other people that like Lanyard almost just didn't even want this life.

spk_0 But he didn't have a choice. Yeah. Like this is what we do. And so you're going to do it. Yeah.

spk_0 Bob Roup, Lanyard didn't have that star factor that Ranyard did. Ranyard was hardcore. What you saw

spk_0 with Ranyard is what you got. Tim Tyler, the, the announcer. When I first got a chance to talk to

spk_0 Lanyard's mother, she said, Lanyard is the quiet one in the family. And Ranyard is just nuts.

spk_0 That's the term she used. So if it is mom's like this dude's out of here. George Gray and

spk_0 Rip Rogers put over Lanyard's punches. George Gray, Lanyard probably had one of the best punches

spk_0 in professional wrestling. And Rip always says Lanyard had the best working punch in the business.

spk_0 That's weird when I think of work punches. I can't even picture Lanyard's punch. So now I'm

spk_0 going to have to pay attention to that next time I watch a match. Yeah. And the thing was,

spk_0 you know, if it was so great, it wasn't so like it was so great. Right.

spk_0 So something was missing there since normal people, if you're going to say who are the best

spk_0 punches in the business, Lanyard's name's not going to come up a lot. Yeah. Tim Tyler, Lanyard just

spk_0 did what he was told. Angelo never said much. Angelo to me was just a financial man. Lanyard,

spk_0 I thought my father should have hung it up years before he did, but he loved it so much. I didn't

spk_0 have the heart to tell him. George Wungroff, I love George Wungroff's quotes because he just

spk_0 gets it right to the point. Angelo was so routine. He did the same damn thing in every match.

spk_0 And our friend Bob, Angelo didn't have to work very hard to find the

spk_0 hide the fact that he was a jerk. So again, Bob happened to be the general consensus. I mean,

spk_0 even the people that affectionately love Angelo for whatever the reason may be still, you know,

spk_0 even without calling him a jerk, just basically discussing him. It sounds like he could be,

spk_0 you know, kind of a jerk, but it's, you know, going back to Lanyard really quickly there,

spk_0 and basic conversation with Bob Ruped throughout several different episodes. You get the feeling

spk_0 that I don't want to say Lanyard didn't want to be part of the wrestling business, but that Lanyard

spk_0 was just kind of there. It was Angelo and Randy who not only ran things, but, you know, had that

spk_0 out of drive or, you know, that, you know, that they get upset, they get paranoid, etc, etc.

spk_0 And Lanyard just kind of over here because every time Bob starts to talk about the family,

spk_0 he goes, well, probably not Lanyard. Lanyard, you know, it's like, so he kept

spk_0 just getting Lanyard out of it. Right. Right. Yeah, it's like one father and somewhere exactly

spk_0 alike in the other son was just like, I got him put up with this. I'm going to stand over here

spk_0 and write my poetry. Yes. Let me reference Walter Midi in my interview. That'll sell some tickets.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 Into the year, of course, sandwiches and world champion Lanyard and George are the tag team champs.

spk_0 Horton is the TV champ. Ronnie Garvin is the Southeast champ. I mean, that's some really good

spk_0 talent, right? Yeah. I mean, that's that's some really good talent. So you've got some good people

spk_0 at the top. And from what I have heard, 80 and 81 may have been their best years. Certainly,

spk_0 81, a lot of the guys start to leave. In the beginning of 2003, everything will really start

spk_0 falling apart. But we'll get to that. Yeah. But I think this is probably a good plan to end up

spk_0 this week. And we're going to get heavily more into talking about different perspectives about

spk_0 Randy Savage next week because we got to talk more about Randy's say. I love it. It's

spk_0 here. I've been taken on the announcers and the referees and some of the interesting stories

spk_0 that go along with those. Like I said, I found some, you know, I just sent you a couple of little clips

spk_0 from some newspapers on Edgar Wallace, who is the the black, the African American announcer there.

spk_0 And Tim Tyler did an interview with the genius cast, Lany Poffo. So he actually has an interview

spk_0 out there if you guys can find it on the old Lany Poffo podcast. It didn't last too long, but

spk_0 Tim Tyler was actually a guest on there. So that's kind of very cool. Very cool. So yeah,

spk_0 we got things. And I did take some notes on some of the fans writing down their accounts of some

spk_0 of the angles that took place. And if you guys haven't heard of the ICW angles, boy, you ain't heard

spk_0 nothing yet. So we got plenty to jump into and hey, we haven't even gotten to Radomias. So we've

spk_0 got a lot to do. Oh, yes. So much, so much more fun stuff to get into. That's for sure.

spk_0 Well, Steve, I appreciate you doing this with me. I couldn't have more of a fun time with somebody

spk_0 talking ICW than you. I don't believe so I'm looking forward to seeing what 1981 brings us

spk_0 the next time around. It's going to be a fun ride. That's for sure. We're going to have a sugar

spk_0 hold in 1991. Oh, my, here we go. I'm on my buy. All right, guys, we'll be back soon.

spk_0 More regional wrestling on the way more ICW around the corner.

Rasslin 114: The Poffo's ICW 1980 (Wee Willie Takes a Macho Elbow, Landel & Gang Debut!)

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