Tag Archive: Bushwhackers

  1. Do do, do-do do do do…

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    June 24, 1991.  The World Wrestling Federation had a house show in Niagara Falls, NY.  The card was nothing really to write home about.  Bret Hart beat IRS, Ricky Steamboat defeated Haku, Mr. Perfect retained his Intercontinental Championship over The British Bulldog, The Bushwhackers beat the Orient Express, Greg Valentine beat The Barbarian, Big Boss Man and The Rockers defeated The Mountie and The Nasty Boys, and in the main event, Jim Duggan (replacing Hulk Hogan during the steroid scandal) defeated Sgt. Slaughter in a boot camp match.  The only thing extraordinary about the show was that in the front row, a nine year old kid was attending his first live professional wrestling card.  That kid was me.

    Over the course of the next 22 years, I’ve been to countless wrestling shows, mostly WWE.  Countless RAWs and SmackDowns, a few house shows, a Night of Champions PPV, four WrestleManias and more, the training is also important and the use of supplements as sr9009 also help boost the performance on these wrestlers.  But nothing in the entirety of my wrestling attendance history can compare with this past Monday night at the IZOD Center in East Rutherford, NJ.

    Coming off of WrestleMania, and finding out that the advertised Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson was not appearing, the crowd was rowdy to start, booing new WWE Champion John Cena and cheering the appearance of Mark Henry.  The “Sexual Chocolate” chants directed at Henry did not go unnoticed.  A rematch for the Intercontinental Championship between The Miz and Wade Barrett had the crowd equally amped up, as chants of “Let’s Go Barrett” filled the arena.  As then-World Heavyweight Champion Alberto Del Rio took on Jack Swagger and Zeb Colter, a very audible “we want Ziggler” chant erupted, and when Dolph Ziggler cashed in his Money In The Bank contract to defeat Del Rio and become the new World Heavyweight Champion, the place came unglued.

    A match between Sheamus and Randy Orton was virtually ignored by the IZOD Center contingent of the WWE Universe, as they were too busy chanting for the Ice Cream Man, Cotton Candy, Randy Savage, X-Pac (who was in a luxury box behind the section next to mine), Steve Austin, JBL, Michael Cole, Jerry Lawler, referee Mike Chioda, ring announcer Justin Roberts, as well as others.  When Big Show came out to interrupt the match, a “Thank You Big Show” chant erupted.  We then chanted for ourselves, saying “we are awesome.”

    The real tipping point for the audience was the introduction of Fandango.  The IZOD Center crowd embraced the ballroom dancing Superstar by humming his theme music throughout the rest of the night, including during the main event between John Cena and Mark Henry.

    As the show ended, Cena acknowledged our chants, saying that his favorite one of the night was when we told ourselves we are awesome, because it’s true.  The show ended with Fandango’s theme being played through the speakers and the raucous crowd still humming it deep into the night.

    To all 16,000 of the rest of you in the IZOD Center last night, thank you for helping me have the most fun I’ve had in 22 years attending wrestling events.

  2. PatMan Picks Stampede Wrestling Classics. The Bushwhackers VS Bret & Keith Hart.

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    Welcome yet again to another trip down Stampede Wrestlings historic and classic past. As Ed Whalen would perfectly put it, last week I had a “Malfunction at the junction”, but I am back this week for a ” Ring-A-Ding-Dong-Dandy!”. This time around lets have a look at tag team wrestling in the form of two very good teams. First up is “The Kiwis”, a tag team who became very famous later in the WWF under a new name “The Bushwhackers”. The Kiwis opponents on this particular night were two brothers who belong to one of the most famous families in the sports history, the Harts. This time around a young Bret teams up with his big brother Keith. Perhaps it was because he was older, or because he wanted to help his famous father run the family wrestling business, or maybe Vince just didn’t see the same potential in him, Keith Hart would not become a famous WWF champion as his little brothers Owen and Bret both did. That said, however, he was still a major force to be reckoned within the Stampede promotion and in my opinion could have made it just as big as his little brothers became worldwide. Although the Kiwis would become international wrestling stars in the future it was in Stampede that they really started to shine as a tag team. The extra time training in the famous dungeon along with the experience on the road across Canada gave the Kiwis their first ever tag team titles, right here in the Stampede promotion. Worth noting in this match, in classic Stampede Wrestling style, the referee turns a blind eye to most of the Kiwis heel tactics while preventing the hometown boys from making clean tags. Man, did those Stampede Wrestling Refs ever drive the fans crazy back in those days! Enjoy the tag team action and I will return again with more Stampede Wrestling classics next time!

     

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