Brody and Friends talk about the AWA (Brody has no friends)

[strummer]

Oh man I remember finding those AWA Remco figures in the basement/downstairs of an old fashioned toy store I grew up near and begged my mother to buy them.

Truth be told I much preferred them and the WCW Golub figures to the Hasbro wwf ones.

LJN was still the ultimate though

 

[BruiserBrody]

This week's AWA Unleashed on Rivalries was again "ok". The show wanting to be an hour, while trying to cover 40 years of info at once is hurting it.
Think of it compared to a Conrad show, where they will spend 90 mins talking about 1 2-3 hour show. By doing a quick countdown list, both Karch and Schire have to condense their thoughts into a 60 second sound byte.

 

[Cackling Co Pilot Kamala]

AWA Unleashed! Ep. 9- ”Jumping” Jim Brunzell - AWA Unleashed

Time for an hour plus of fun filled stories as Mick Karch and George Schire catch up with their friend and one half of the famous High Flyers, "Jumping" Jim Brunzell. Did he ever wish he could have turned heel and feud with Greg Gagne? He talks old schoo...

pca.st

Hope this surely exciting Jim Brunzell interview gets the show back on track, @BruiserBrody

 

[BruiserBrody]

AWA Unleashed on Youtube is definitely the way to enjoy this show vs audio.

- Brunzell puts over Verne for being so rich and self made successful, which is nice to hear compared to all the shit Gagne gets.
- Brunzell does say Verne was the "buck stops here" hardass boss. When Steve Regal told Verne he was going to JCP, Verne told him "You need me more than I need you", which soured Regal on Verne severely.
- I'd love to get my hands on the Apter mags that covered Brunzell and Bockwinkel teaming in the AJPW Real World Tag League
- They show pics from the 70s where Groovy Greg actually had show muscles.
- Jumpin' Jim says Ted Dibiase was supposed to be spoofing Jim Crockett, with Virgil (Runnels) as his lackey.
- Greg Gagne worked a indy date 10 years ago at 57 years old(!?!?!?) I don't think I knew of this.... Greg got potatoed right away and his eye split open. Greg was being inducted into the Ohio Wrestling HOF at the event, (Wrestlingdata has 1991 as his last match)
- Brunzell quit when he was 50.
- Neidhart was impossible to work with because he was a big ape loaded with drugs.
- Jimmy tells of trying to work an hour draw with Iron Sheik in JCP. George Scott gave him the angle of having stole Sheik's (loaded) boot but he was still unable to over come the heel. Brunzell told Scott he was an awful booker and was fired.
- Bob Orton Jr was the best technician Brunzell worked with.
- Tito Santana was the best Hispanic wrestler Brunzell worked with. Santana started as a kid traveling from Texas to Wisconsin to pick fruit in summer. Both of Tito's kids graduated from Ivy League Schools.
- OMG!!! 48 min mark!!!! Brunzell tells a story about how the boys were drinking in a hotel bar. Larry Henning sticks his head in Ray Stevens room and sees Ray giving a ring rat an airplane spin. The Rat lets out a stream of piss and hits Larry in the face! Ray laughed so hard that he dropped the girl on her head.
- Brunzell accidentally broke Sheik Adnan's leg at a show in LaCrosse, WI.
- Jimmy talks about modern wrestling and what trash Orange Cassidy is in particular.

Kayfabe, Lies and Alibis: Jim Brunzell Shoot Interview – CXF | Culture Crossfire | culturecrossfire.com

 

[snuffbox]

No memories of the Bock/Brunzell team in the Apter mags but I remember the leg breaking in La Crosse getting mentioned.

 

[BruiserBrody]

No memories of the Bock/Brunzell team in the Apter mags but I remember the leg breaking in La Crosse getting mentioned.

Off hand I don't recall anything with Adnan having a broken leg. I'll have to pin down a date. Wrestlingdata doesn't have any Adnan vs Brunzell LaCrosse matches that I saw.
I recall him doing the arm in a cast gimmick.
----
Adnan says he broke Verne's ribs by accident during one of Verne's comeback matches. Verne was annoyed but the locker room loved it (according to Adnan's version)
--

A few random AWA TV segments from 1990/91 that I am still hoping to find on YT someday:
Tommy Jammer(IIRC) and Baron VR vs The Texas Hangman... The Hangman loads up his mask and KO's Baron with a headbutt. Jammer must fight alone!
I also recall a segment where Baron VR tries to play up having a big time new partner returning to fight ______. He then brings in Buck Zumhofe (yes, ugh). Buck does the whole Boom box and jump suit gimmick in the 90s like it's still 1978. I want to see it not only because it stuck with me all these years, but also it could be some quality cringe entertainment.

 

[Cackling Co Pilot Kamala]

Are you thinking of Tommy Jammer? No way Tommy Dreamer showed up in the last years of AWA without me knowing.

 

[BruiserBrody]

Are you thinking of Tommy Jammer? No way Tommy Dreamer showed up in the last years of AWA without me knowing.

Typo. Damn it.

How about F'N REPO MAN????

AWA Results: 1990 | crazymax.org

crazymax.org

Jan. 22, Verne Gagne promoted a guaranteed show paid for by Treasure Island Casino in Red Wing, Minn. Attendance was free and the show, which was heavily advertised in the local papers in the preceding week, was used to draw new customers to the highly competitive casino industry in Minnesota. An estimated 700 were allowed to enter the facility before they closed the doors, turning away hundreds, many of whom went next door to gamble.

1/22/94 – Steve “The Viking” Berg beat Randy Gust, “Mean” Mike Enos beat Baron Von Raschke, Larry Zbyszko beat Repoman, and Jim Brunzell & B. Brian Blair beat The Texas Hangmen in the four-match, one hour card.

Last month at the same location in front of around 400, Baron Von Raschke (virtually immobile) beat “Hater” Jamie Magnum, Jerry Lynn beat J.B. Trask, Destruction Crew (Enos & Bloom) beat Erik Watts & Chad Fortune, and Santana beat Zbyszko via DQ when Zbyszko hit Bockwinkel.

Verne also gave us Techno Team 2000 vs The Beverly Bros. A God promoter.

 

[snuffbox]

Off hand I don't recall anything with Adnan having a broken leg. I'll have to pin down a date. Wrestlingdata doesn't have any Adnan vs Brunzell LaCrosse matches that I saw.
I recall him doing the arm in a cast gimmick.
----
Adnan says he broke Verne's ribs by accident during one of Verne's comeback matches. Verne was annoyed but the locker room loved it (according to Adnan's version)
--

A few random AWA TV segments from 1990/91 that I am still hoping to find on YT someday:
Tommy Jammer(IIRC) and Baron VR vs The Texas Hangman... The Hangman loads up his mask and KO's Baron with a headbutt. Jammer must fight alone!
I also recall a segment where Baron VR tries to play up having a big time new partner returning to fight ______. He then brings in Buck Zumhofe (yes, ugh). Buck does the whole Boom box and jump suit gimmick in the 90s like it's still 1978. I want to see it not only because it stuck with me all these years, but also it could be some quality cringe entertainment.

While the data sites are excellent resources, they don't include everything. It wasn't necessarily a singles match; may have been a postmatch thing, etc. And, being in an Apter mag, it might've been entirely fiction.

But, while searching for anything about the broken leg, I did finally find a date for the fabled AWA card at my high school.

 

[Cackling Co Pilot Kamala]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1500360433798111234

 

[BruiserBrody]

Highlights:

- The guys talk about Bull Bullinski, one of my all time favorite names. I do also love the gimmick of a trucker who wanted to kick ass to make money while out of work.
- Karch says the massive Olympian Chris Taylor got a cut while wrestling, resulting in a staph infection. Mick claims Chris dropped from 450 to 180 in the months before his death. That is the opposite of what his book "A Gentle Giant" said about his last days. In the book it says Taylor's illnesses made his large frame become more obviously sloppy fat and not a muscular girth.
- JT Southern worked a submission hold in a battle royal and Verne was so pissed he promised to fire him on the spot. The may well be true as the AWA results show Southern in a battle royal in mid Nov 88, he works the Thanksgiving shows 2 weeks later and is gone. Oddly, he wins his last 2 matches....
- LOL Silo Sam gets his moment of infamy as Karch makes fun of this goof.
- Pedro Morales came in, billed as a former WWWF world champ, and failed to get over despite feuds with Ray Stevens, Super Destroyer (Don Jardine) and Angelo Mosca, people Pedro had feuded with elsewhere.
- ROCKY MOUNTAIN THUNDER!!! Nuff said there.
- The explain why Jerry Lawler was a bad fit for the AWA title picture in 1988. (He was over in Memphis, but it didn't translate nationally).
- Schire explains why the Otto Wanz AWA title win was good in at least one way (It taught the fans that anyone could beat anyone). Bobby Heenan was miffed that Verne and Nick did not warn him about the finish.
- Mick surprises me by calling "Dizzy" Ed Boulder under rated.
- Ole Anderson broke in under Verne and was given Crusher and Bruiser as gimmick relatives, but he was allowed to go south and never came back home to be a major star for Gagne.

 

[snuffbox]

I wish I had been born earlier. It would've been fun to see the Bull Bullinski & Andre the Giant tag team.

 

[BruiserBrody]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1506845136738652166

Road Warriors slip away from the Las Vegas AWA tapings to drink hot sauce and steal cars.

 

[BruiserBrody]

Apparently the AWA job crew ran indy shows from at least the early 70s onward. In 81/82 they actually had TV slots in Green Bay and other AWA towns.
The clip is worth it just to hear not- Mel Phillips have the worst cadence possible.

 

[BruiserBrody]

Finishing up this week's Between the Sheets podcast from March 84. Meltz says Jerry Blackwell and Patera are going to drop the belts to the Blackjacks as Blackwell is set to move on to Georgia.
Assuming Meltz got accurate info, this would change a bunch of stuff in the near future for the AWA, but I question a lot of it.
- Blackwell going to Ole makes sense as Jerry would leave the AWA to start his own promotion in 1986/87.
- Mulligan had came in as a heel in Jan or so but they ran an angle to turn him face and reunite w/Lanza.
Check out some of these tag bouts!~!:
2/5/84 – Denver, CO @ the Auditorium Arena
Blackjack Lanza & Blackjack Mulligan defeated Nick Bockwinkel & Harley Race
2/27/84 – Phoenix, AZ @ the Veteran’s Memorial Coliseum
Blackjack Mulligan & Blackjack Lanza defeated AWA Tag Team Champions Ken Patera & Jerry Blackwell via DQ
3/1/84 – Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada @ the Arena
Blackjack Mulligan & Blackjack Lanza defeated Harley Race & Ken Patera
3/3/84 – Milwaukee, WI @ the Auditorium
Blackjack Lanza & Blackjack Mulligan defeated Stan Hansen & Nick Bockwinkel
5/13/84 – St. Paul, MN @ the Civic Center
Blackjack Mulligan & Blackjack Lanza no contest Abdullah The Butcher & Jerry Blackwell
Mulligan started no showing in late May but made some shots into early June, including TV squashes before jumping to Florida in early June.

Blackwell and Patera lose the belts to Crusher and Baron May 6th. I assume either babyface team still jobs to the Road Warriors regardless come Aug. Dave may have just been guessing on the Blackjacks tag title win since their reunion was a big angle, so it would make sense to make them champs(?)

Blackwell did his famous battle royal face turn soon after. I wonder if Verne promised to do the turn to keep Blackwell?? Or Meltz got bad intel.

 

[Valeyard]

Blackwell is the most underrated big man ever. I owe his feud with Brody a debt for being a key force in my interest in non-WWF stuff.

 

[Cackling Co Pilot Kamala]

AWA Unleashed!- Episode 14- ”Polish” Joe Cuipik- Part 1 - AWA Unleashed

This week we get some real good behind the scenes stories with former AWA Cameraman/Producer "Polish" Joe Cuipik. In this first of a two part interview he talks with Mick Karch, George Schire and Chris Tubbs about getting into the business with no exper...

pca.st

@BruiserBrody does George Steele’s elephant trunk arm dance in jubilation

 

[Mickey Massuco]

Blackwell is the most underrated big man ever. I owe his feud with Brody a debt for being a key force in my interest in non-WWF stuff.

The aforementioned AWA review show had featured Blackwell episodes filled with his greatest hits and biggest squashes.

 

[BruiserBrody]

https://podbay.fm/p/the-lapsed-fan-wrestling-podcast/e/1643186583

I generally do not like TLF and their LOLing at themselves and shitting on my wrasslin', but Wrestling for a Cure is chocked full of lay ups for them to amuse themselves with. I guess I haven't checked out their podcast stream since December.

Wrestling for a Cure: AWA Benefit Show 8/26/1985 – CXF | Culture Crossfire | culturecrossfire.com

https://podbay.fm/p/the-lapsed-fan-wrestling-podcast/e/1643748226

@Irish King Kamala NEW ENGLAND MAN IIRC

 

[Cackling Co Pilot Kamala]

Yep. Eddie Andelman is a New England sports talk radio legend and father of creator of The Phantom Gourmet (cc @Laz )

 

[Big Papa Paegan]

...fucking Andelmans...

 

[BruiserBrody]

6/29/86 – Denver, CO @ the McNichols Arena
Nick Bockwinkel defeated Stan Hansen via forfeit to win AWA title
Battle Royal
Verne Gagne & Greg Gagne & Jimmy Snuka defeated Nord The Barbarian & Boris Zhukov & Sheik Adnan
AWA Tag Team Champions Buddy Rose & Doug Somers defeated Midnight Rockers
Sherri Martel defeated Candi Devine

I'm not sure I've ever noticed that Verne's last ever match (even after he "retired" at Wrestlerock in April) was the same night as Hansen refusing to drop the belt.

--
I'm intrigued as to why when most of the AWA's home markets were tanking to 2000 or less a show, Salt Lake City was still drawing 10k+? Good local promoter and lack of JCP/WWF saturation?

 

[snuffbox]

Yeah, I don't know anything about the promoter (John Olsen), but I think the lack of saturation was a big reason for that. Not just WWF or Crockett, either, I don't think Utah had much pro wrestling of any kind for years.

 

[Super Leather]

Seems like Utah, Nevada, and Idaho were never part of the pro wrestling territory map back in the day. Always wondered if there was even much of a market for wrestling in any of those states in the pre-WWF expansion era.

 

[Valeyard]

Idaho deserves nothing as a general rule, but Utah and Nevada kind of surprise me. I mean I don't know that Utah would be thriving or anything but that's a starved place, I would think, even if the Mormon fun police made the shows less than they could be.

But is there a reason Nevada didn't get attention?

 

[Super Leather]

They had the annual NWA meetings in Las Vegas, so it's not like Nevada was unfamiliar ground to any of the promoters. Perhaps they only saw Las Vegas and Reno as tourist destinations without a local population capable of supporting wrestling on TV and in whatever arenas existed in those cities at the time.

Somebody with an account over at Wrestling Classics should ask someone there; I imagine one of the old-timer posters might know.

 

[BruiserBrody]

They had the annual NWA meetings in Las Vegas, so it's not like Nevada was unfamiliar ground to any of the promoters. Perhaps they only saw Las Vegas and Reno as tourist destinations without a local population capable of supporting wrestling on TV and in whatever arenas existed in those cities at the time.

Somebody with an account over at Wrestling Classics should ask someone there; I imagine one of the old-timer posters might know.

I'll try and dig around this weekend. Since LV is sort of close to San Diego, MAYBE Shire stretched down to do spot shows? Not sure how far from San Fran he stretched. I know eventually he was using Owens guys, which would indicate more Northern shows.

With Texas having like 5 promotions at times, I'm not sure any stretched out that far West.

There were likely some pop up promotions that came and went.

 

[Cackling Co Pilot Kamala]

Verne Gagne had the AWA World Title for damn near 13 YEARS (collectively). Eat your heart out, Bruno.

It’s nice to own the company, I guess.

 

[BruiserBrody]

Hennig locking up Mitch Snow's gym bag after shitting in it hits differently in 2022.

 

[JHawk]

6/29/86 – Denver, CO @ the McNichols Arena
Nick Bockwinkel defeated Stan Hansen via forfeit to win AWA title
Battle Royal
Verne Gagne & Greg Gagne & Jimmy Snuka defeated Nord The Barbarian & Boris Zhukov & Sheik Adnan
AWA Tag Team Champions Buddy Rose & Doug Somers defeated Midnight Rockers
Sherri Martel defeated Candi Devine

I'm not sure I've ever noticed that Verne's last ever match (even after he "retired" at Wrestlerock in April) was the same night as Hansen refusing to drop the belt.

--
I'm intrigued as to why when most of the AWA's home markets were tanking to 2000 or less a show, Salt Lake City was still drawing 10k+? Good local promoter and lack of JCP/WWF saturation?

Amazingly enough, Verne's match is on Youtube