WWF Royal Rumble 1990

WWF Royal Rumble 1990

Venue: Orlando, Florida

Date: 21/01/90

Attendance: 16,000

Commentators: Tony Schiavone & Jesse Ventura

The second annual Royal Rumble pay-per-view event took place in Orlando, Florida and helped set the scene for Wrestlemania VI. Tony Schiavone was on pay-per-view commentary duties for the second and last time in the WWF alongside Jesse "The Body" Ventura who himself would leave the Federation in 1990.

 

Ronnie Garvin manages to reverse Greg Valentine's figure four leg lock

Review

The Bushwackers defeated The Fabulous Rougeau Brothers in an extended version of the usual Bushwacker match which in fairness was ever so slightly better than normal, but still bad. Luke pinned Jacques after the Battering Ram, which by the way is one of the worst finishers of all time... Whatever match went on next couldn't lose, right? Wrong. The match between Brutus Beefcake and The Genius was dreadful and went to a double disqualification just to make matters worse. With the referee down Beefcake decided to give The Genius a haircut and despite facing the aisle somehow failed to see Mr Perfect running down and climbing in the ring to attack him. Perfect's chair assisted assault on "The Barber" at least set up their clash at Wrestlemania and prevented this match from being a complete waste of time...

 

Randy Savage nails Jake Roberts who is being held by Ted Dibiase

The Greg Valentine/Ronnie Garvin feud came to a head in a near 17-minute Submission Match won by Garvin with a Scorpion Deathlock/Sharpshooter (or "Reverse Figure Four" according to Tony Schiavone). This was a good, stiff grudge match that felt like it came straight out of Jim Crockett Promotions. On the flip side it was a bit sluggish in places and the repeated pin fall attempts made the participants look a bit stupid... Hacksaw Jim Duggan beat The Big Boss Man by disqualification in an acceptable brawl albeit with a cheap finish. Boss Man was much leaner at this point in his career and his performances were getting better and better. He was about to split from Slick and Akeem to become a popular babyface, while Duggan continued to be a one dimensional brawler yet still very popular himself. Boss Man nailed Duggan with his knight stick to signal the end of this one...

 

The Ultimate Warrior is about to level Haku

After an uninspiring undercard the Royal Rumble match itself was thankfully very good. In the most notable happenings... After managing to purchase the number thirty slot in the previous year's event, Ted Dibiase this time drew number one. That's karma I supposed. Dibiase saw off a couple of guys before Jake Roberts made his way down to a great ovation to face his arch enemy. Dibiase applied the Million Dollar Dream on the outside of the ring only for Roberts to counter it by ramming Dibiase (and himself) into the ringpost. Amazingly, this would also be their finish for their upcoming Wrestlemania grudge match... Randy Savage surprisingly didn't enjoy a long stay in the match as he was eliminated by Dusty Rhodes, with whom he was feuding... Rowdy Roddy Piper eliminated Bad News Brown only for Brown to then eliminate Piper and spark a brawl between the two in the aisle way...

 

Hulk Hogan and The Ultimate Warrior face off for the first time

Demolition and the Colossal Connection clashed ahead of their Wrestlemania title match... The Ultimate Warrior brought the house down by eliminating the Royal Rumble's first marathon man, Ted Dibiase... Hulk Hogan entered the match to a huge pop and it wasn't long before he and the Warrior were alone standing face-to-face in the ring. This was their first confrontation and it was wisely kept to a minimum leaving the fans wanting more. After a Hogan/Warrior stalemate, The Barbarian and Rick Rude attempted to dump Hogan but Warrior came to his aid. The heels then turned their attention to Warrior and had in him trouble before Hogan attempted to eliminate them both from behind but actually ended up only eliminating Warrior... In the end Hogan overcame Rick Rude and lastly Mr Perfect to win the match and send the fans home happy. Royal Rumble 1990 drew a disappointing 260,000 buys on pay-per-view.

The final two in the Royal Rumble: Hulk Hogan and Mr Perfect

Overall

After the first two Royal Rumbles were won by Hacksaw Jim Duggan and Big John Studd respectively I believe it was the right decision to have the WWF's top star win the 1990 match to legitimise the event as an important one. Considering the star power in the Rumble match, Hogan's victory only reaffirmed his status as number one in the fans' minds which would only make Warrior's upcoming victory at Wrestlemania look even more impressive. The rumble match also did a great job of furthering other feuds leading into Wrestlemania such as Dibiase/Roberts, Rhodes/Savage, Colossal Connection/Demolition and not forgetting Perfect/Beefcake from the undercard. If you've never seen this event then the Garvin/Valentine bout and the Royal Rumble match are worth your time, the rest is not.

Results

1 The Bushwackers def The Fabulous Rougeaus by pinfall (13:35) *

2 Brutus Beefcake fought The Genius to a double disqualification (11:07) 1/2

3 Ronnie Garvin def Greg Valentine in a submission match (16:55) **3/4

4 Jim Duggan def The Big Boss Man by disqualification (10:26) *3/4

5 Hulk Hogan won the Royal Rumble match (58:46) ***1/2

Rating

9.50/25 = 38% Rating

Star Rating Guide

*****   Excellent/World Class

****     Very Good

***        Good

**           OK/Acceptable

*             Poor

DUD       Abysmal

SQ          Squash (Less than 1 min)

WWF Survivor Series 1989

WWF Survivor Series 1989

Venue: Rosemont, Illinois

Date: 23/11/89

Attendance: 15,294

Commentators: Gorilla Monsoon & Jesse Ventura

The third annual Survivor Series saw teams cut from five members to four and the addition of team names. Could the 1989 edition live up to the high standards of the previous events?

Review

The Dream Team (Dusty Rhodes, Brutus Beefcake, Tito Santana & The Red Rooster) vs The Enforcers (The Big Boss Man, The Honky Tonk Man, Rick Martel & Bad News Brown)

Eliminations: Martel pinned Santana; Bad News Brown was counted out; Beefcake pinned Honky; Beefcake pinned Martel; Boss Man pinned Rooster; Rhodes pinned Boss Man. Rhodes and Beefcake were the survivors.

Notes

The Big Boss Man and Dusty Rhodes were feuding at this time as were Tito Santana and Rick Martel following their split back at Wrestlemania... Martel got the better of Santana again by eliminating him from the match first... Boss Man accidentally nailed Bad News Brown (who was replacing the injured Akeem) causing Brown to walk out on his team. Brown did the exact same thing last year you might remember... Brutus Beefcake scored big wins over The Honky Tonk Man and Rick Martel... Rhodes pinned Boss Man to win the match for his team but Boss Man got his heat back by handcuffing Rhodes and giving him a few shots with the knight stick... Good opening match which the crowd appreciated.

The 4x4's (Hacksaw Jim Duggan, Bret Hart, Ronnie Garvin & Hercules) vs The King's Court (Randy Savage, Greg Valentine, Earthquake & Dino Bravo)

Eliminations: Earthquake pinned Hercules; Duggan pinned Valentine; Bravo pinned Garvin; Savage pinned Hart; Duggan was counted out. Savage, Earthquake and Bravo were the survivors.

Here's the original King's Court team with Barry Windham included

Notes

Following Summerslam Randy Savage defeated King Hacksaw Jim Duggan to become the Macho King so this was a continuation of that feud. Ronnie Garvin and Greg Valentine were still embroiled in a feud, and this was the second half assed attempt to give Bret Hart a run as a singles wrestler. He would be back with Neidhart within a couple of months. Hercules is now just a mid-card jobber. Barry Windham was supposed to be on the King's Court team but left the company prior to the event. Windham was billed as the Widowmaker during his short WWF stint in 1989. Hart and Savages had some great exchanges. A feud between these two would surely have got Hart over as a solo act not to mention the great matches they would have produced. Duggan is left alone to face three guys and yet lots of illegal double teaming goes unpunished by the referee. Keep that in mind for the next match. Duggan eventually is counted out to protect him from a loss in the ring… Passable contest.

The Hulkamaniacs (Hulk Hogan, Jake Roberts & Demolition) vs The Million Dollar Team (Ted Dibiase, Zeus & The Powers of Pain)

Eliminations: Zeus was disqualified; Warlord pinned Ax; Barbarian pinned Smash; The Powers of Pain were disqualified; Dibiase pinned Roberts; Hogan pinned Dibiase. Hogan was the survivor.

Notes

Hogan was still feuding with Zeus here ahead of the No Holds Barred pay-per-view which would contain the movie and then a steel cage final battle between Hogan & Brutus Beefcake and Zeus & Randy Savage. Dibiase resumes his feud with Jake Roberts who had recently returned from injury. Demolition and the Powers of Pain were still feuding over a year after their issue began... Zeus was disqualified in the opening minutes for relentlessly choking Hogan and shoving down the referee. It kept him looking like a monster and prevented him from having to take a loss before No Holds Barred... The Powers of Pain defeated both members of Demolition yet it would be Andre the Giant and Haku who were about to (temporarily) relieve Ax and Smash of the championship... The Powers of Pain were both disqualified for continuously double teaming Hogan which begged the question why these rules were not enforced in the previous match. No consistency! It did make it look like the referee was favouring Hogan... Dibiase eliminated Roberts with a bit of help from Virgil before Hogan made his comeback to defeat Dibiase and win the match... After the match Zeus and Savage attacked Hogan and Beefcake in the locker room to set the stage for No Holds Barred… The match was fine for what it was but while the Zeus' disqualification made sense in hindsight, the double disqualification of the Powers of Pain was too much. Quite why Hogan or Roberts couldn't have beaten one of them is beyond me.

 

Hogan bodyslams Zeus to the delight of his teammates

 

Roddy's Rowdies (Rowdy Roddy Piper, Jimmy Snuka & The Bushwackers) vs Rude's Brood (Ravishing Rick Rude, Mr Perfect & The Fabulous Rougeau Brothers)

Eliminations: Snuka pinned Jacques; Piper pinned Raymond; Perfect pinned Butch; Rude pinned Luke; Piper and Rude were counted out; Perfect pinned Snuka. Perfect was the survivor.

Notes

Piper and Rude were feuding after Piper had a hand in Rude losing the Intercontinental Title to the Ultimate Warrior at Summerslam... The first half of this bout was comedy (not the good kind) with the Bushwackers leading the way with lots of biting and stomping around the ring... The Rougeaus both went down without much of a fight before Perfect and Rude restored parity by eliminating the Bushwackers... Snuka took a beating setting up for a hot tag to Piper so we could get a big showdown between Piper and Rude, except it didn't even last a minute as both men got counted out. What a joke... It came down to Perfect and Snuka and it was a decent wrestling contest where Perfect went over clean to remain undefeated… Once again overall the match was okay.

 

Mr Perfect and Rick Rude have Jimmy Snuka in trouble

The Warriors (The Ultimate Warrior, Jim Neidhart & The Rockers) vs The Heenan Family (Andre the Giant, Haku, Arn Anderson & Bobby Heenan)

Eliminations: Andre was counted out; Haku pinned Neidhart; Heenan pinned Jannetty; Michaels pinned Haku; Anderson pinned Michaels; Warrior pinned Anderson; Warrior pinned Heenan. Warrior was the survivor.

Notes

There was a real mid card feel to the main event not helped by the fact that Andre didn't like or respect the Warrior and refused to work with him, therefore we got Andre being eliminated in the first minute of the bout by count out. This left Haku, Arn Anderon and Bobby Heenan as Tully Blanchard was fired before the event for failing a drug test. Anderson would also leave following the event. The outcome was never in doubt here... Haku beat Neidhart who, as good as he was as part of a tag team was never going to get over as a singles wrestler... Heenan got a cheap pin fall over Jannetty after Haku had done the hard work... Shawn Michaels got a big win over Haku but then went down clean to Anderson... Warrior was left alone but he easily despatched Anderson and then Heenan for an anticlimactic finish… This match, while still decent, should have been moved to the middle of the show especially knowing that Blanchard was gone and that Andre wouldn't work with Warrior.

 

Bobby Heenan is about realise he's alone with Warrior

Overall

The 80's and early 90's WWF PPVs with fewer matches tend to get higher ratings as there were usually less lousy filler matches shoved in. All matches here were above average to good so the overall rating looks good. However there was nothing really standout or historically significant on this card. A definite step down in quality from the first two Survivor Series events but still an entertaining show. Survivor Series 1989 drew 385,000 buys on pay-per-view.

Results

1 Dusty Rhodes, Brutus Beefcake, Tito Santana & The Red Rooster def The Big Boss Man, The Honky Tonk Man, Bad News Brown & Rick Martel (22:02) **3/4

2 Earthquake, Dino Bravo, Randy Savage & Greg Valentine def Hercules, Bret Hart, Jim Duggan & Ronnie Garvin (23:25) **

3 Hulk Hogan, Jake Roberts & Demolition def Ted Dibiase, Zeus & The Powers of Pain (27:32) **1/4

4 Mr Perfect, Rick Rude & The Fabulous Rougeaus def Rowdy Roddy Piper, Jimmy Snuka & The Bushwackers (21:27) **1/4

5 The Ultimate Warrior, Jim Neidhart & The Rockers def Andre the Giant, Arn Anderson, Haku & Bobby Heenan (20:28) **1/2

Rating

11.75/25 = 47% Rating

Star Rating Guide

*****    Excellent/World Class

****       Very Good

***         Good

**           OK/Acceptable

*              Poor

DUD       Abysmal

SQ          Squash (Less than 1 min)

WWF Summerslam 1989

 

WWF Summerslam 1989

Venue: East Rutherford, New Jersey

Date: 28/08/89

Attendance: 20,000

Commentators: Tony Schiavone & Jesse Ventura

In a bid to further the hype for WWF financed movie No Holds Barred starring Hulk Hogan and Tiny Lister, Lister's character Zeus was brought into the World Wrestling Federation to be a short term monster heel and face Hogan in a "real life confrontation". Meanwhile Randy Savage who had lost the WWF Heavyweight Championship to Hogan at Wrestlemania and had spent the summer unsuccessfully trying to regain the title, teamed up with Zeus to attempt to take out 'The Hulkster' once and for all. Hogan's best friend Brutus Beefcake, who was also targeted by Zeus, would team with Hogan to face Zeus and Savage in the big main event at Summerslam. This was the first of two WWF pay-per-views that featured Tony Schiavone as lead announcer.

Review

Recently crowned tag team champions The Brain Busters (Arn Anderson & Tully Blanchard) defeated The Hart Foundation in a quality non-title opening bout. The Harts were dominant for most of the contest, so much so that the Busters looked almost inferior to their opponents. Although Anderson and Blanchard went over in the end they should have been afforded more offense in order to legitimise their status as champions... Dusty Rhodes beat The Honky Tonk Man in a slow and boring contest. Rhodes took the win after Jimmy Hart accidently crashed a guitar over Honky's head. The real highlight though was Honky's post match interview where the effects of the guitar shot caused him to believe he was Elvis Presley...

 

Mr Perfect lands a standing dropkick on The Red Rooster.

Mr Perfect continued his unbeaten streak as he made short work of The Red Rooster (Terry Taylor). Taylor actually suffered a knee injury during the bout so perhaps the match was shorter than intended but as that wasn't obvious to those watching Rooster just came across as a jobber here... Next up was a very good six-man tag team match where Rick Martel and The Fabulous Rougeau Brothers defeated Tito Santana and The Rockers. Santana was desperate for revenge after Martel turned his back on him at Wrestlemania but Martel played the cowardly heel brilliantly, only entering the fray when his former partner was in trouble. Martel scored the win for his team pinning Marty Jannetty amidst the confusion at the end of the bout...

 

Santana executes a sunset flip out of the corner on former partner Martel.

Ravishing Rick Rude managed to surpass his herculean efforts at Wrestlemania to pull an even better match out of the bag with The Ultimate Warrior for the Intercontinental Title. It must be said that Warrior and Rude always worked well together but this was probably their best encounter. Warrior regained the title he lost in Atlantic City thanks in part to a distraction from Rowdy Roddy Piper which allowed Rude to avoid taking a clean loss and moved him seamlessly onto his next feud... Hacksaw Jim Duggan and Demolition beat Andre the Giant and The Twin Towers in a six man tag that was light years in quality behind the one earlier on the card. Duggan once again cheated to win in a typical for the time big man brawl... The Hercules/Greg Valentine match existed only to further the feud between Valentine and Ronnie Garvin, who was guest ring announcer. Garvin insulted Valentine at length on the house mic before the bout. Valentine pinned Hercules in short order only for Garvin to announce Hercules as the winner. Valentine nailed Garvin for his trouble before Garvin climbed back into the ring and hit "The Hammer" with a terrible looking punch made worse by Valentine's sell, or lack there of...

 

Andre crushes Axe as Akeem looks on. Notice how Bobby Heenan is still distraught
following Rude's IC Title loss. Selling is important for managers too you know.

Ted Dibiase squared off with Jimmy Snuka in a nothing match which Dibiase won by count out. The action was lacklustre and the finish was lousy. Dibiase's comments towards Snuka in his pre-match interview bordered on being racist as did Jesse Ventura's commentary during the match. WWE must have thought the same as Dibiase's comments have been edited out of the DVD release of this event, although Ventura's remain... In the main event Hulk Hogan and Brutus Beefcake beat Randy Savage and Zeus in an enjoyable tag bout. Zeus (actor Tiny Lister) was brought in to be a monster heel who was impervious to pain. His ability to perform in the ring was limited to say the least so Savage had to work extra hard to compensate for him but what he did do was acceptable. Hogan pinned Zeus after nailing him with a loaded purse, which had previously been used in the match by Savage. After the match Beefcake and Miss Elizabeth chopped off Sensational Sherri's long hair (which I suspect was extensions) with a pair of shears.

 

Zeus and the Macho Man before the main event

Overall

Summerslam 1989 can be considered a good show thanks to three very good matches and a decent main event. Unfortunately the show's overall rating is dragged down by the remaining five bouts which were poor and nothing more than filler in truth. The best matches were also the ones that mattered most and that made this show worthwhile. Summerslam 1989 drew 625,000 buys on pay-per-view, an excellent number.

 

Hogan, Beefcake and Miss Elizabeth celebrate victory

 

Results

1 The Brain Busters def The Hart Foundation by pinfall (16:23) ***3/4

2 Dusty Rhodes pinned The Honky Tonk Man (9:36) 3/4

3 Mr Perfect pinned The Red Rooster (3:21) *

4 The Fabulous Rougeaus & Rick Martel def The Rockers & Tito Santana by pinfall (14:58) ***1/2

5 The Ultimate Warrior pinned Rick Rude (c) to win the Intercontinental Title (16:02) ***3/4

6 Demolition & Jim Duggan def The Twin Towers & Andre the Giant by pinfall (7:23) *

7 Greg Valentine pinned Hercules (3:08) 1/2

8 Ted Dibiase def Jimmy Snuka by count out (6:27) *1/4

9 Hulk Hogan & Brutus Beefcake def Randy Savage & Zeus by pinfall (15:04) ***

Rating

18.50/45 = 41.11% Rating

Star Rating Guide

*****   Excellent/World Class

****     Very Good

***        Good

**           OK/Acceptable

*             Poor

DUD       Abysmal

SQ          Squash (Less than 1 min)