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Best of Memphis in the 80s Part 10
Rock N Roll Express vs. Lanny Poffo & Randy Savage (7/9/84)
Pretty solid way to kick off the second half of the disc. Their first match was really fun. Morton and Savage start the match. Savage attacks and runs him into the corner right away, but a huge right hand puts a stop to everything. Morton gets a fist up for the ax handle, then tags Gibson in, who immediately does a sunset flip. In comes Lanny. Lots of stalling from the Poffos. Dropkick from Morton. Savage comes in, throws Morton to the floor, and does an ax handle as Lanny prances on the apron. Lanny just moves so...strangely. Not even effeminately or anything like that. He moves like he's made of rubber. Morton has settled into FIP mode. Savage tries to piledrive Morton through the table again. It was reversed and Savage bounced off the table because Memphis gets their tables from Japan. Hot tag to Gibson. Angelo takes his boot off and starts pounding Gibson, causing a DQ. Morton went after him and Randy went insane over it.
Tommy Rich vs. Masao Ito (7/9/84)
Ito is a generic evil Japanese brute in America kind of deal. Nerve holds and chops. A lot of them. Nothing of note. Jimmy Hart kept interfering and Rich kept kicking out. Tojo then gives Rich salt to throw, and Rich gets the win after using it.
Jerry Lawler vs. King Kong Bundy $10,000 Challenge (7/16/84)
Bundy hits the avalanche in the corner before the bell even rings. I assume the challenge is $10K if King can slam him. He continues to squash King around the ring. King goes face first into the ring post. Bear hug. Bundy misses an elbow drop. King gets Bundy to chase him around the ring. Bundy finally gets a hold of him, but he's tired. He misses a splash. The strap comes down and King fires off some punches. Rick Rude jumped on the apron and also got decked. Bundy got an international object from Jimmy Hart and hit King with it to score a win.
Randy Savage vs. Rick Rude (9/3/84)
Savage cuts a promo before the match, but it's too hard to make out what he was saying. Regardless, he's in CWA and is now a face. Or at least getting face reactions and facing heels. He chases Rude and Hart out of he ring. Rude also does some promo work that is hard to hear. A lot of stalling and avoiding. Savage chases Jimmy well into the crowd. The ref is terrible. He checks Rude for weapons and somehow misses the weapon in the knee pad that Rude then puts in his tights. They have a pose off before finally locking up. Savage gets a top wrist lock and a long airplane spin. Rude throws Savage over the top while Hart has the ref distracted. Savage also went into the ring post. Snake eyes. Lariatooo. Rude randomly rubs the ref's bald head. Savage fires up with 10 count head smash in the corner. He throws Rude to the floor and nails the ax handle. Cross body in the ring. King Kong Bundy comes out and hits Savage with a chain or something. The ref was out with Jimmy Hart I think. Rude wins.
Jerry Lawler/Randy Savage vs. King Kong Bundy/Rick Rude (9/10/84)
Former bitter rivals turned partners. King and Rude start the match. Savage gets a hold of Rude from the apron. He tags out to Bundy. Bundy was massive here. I think he was bigger than his WWF run. He runs into Rude on accident. King and Savage are just too fast for Bundy. Rude and Savage have another pose off. No offense from the heels. Just continually being shown up. Rude finally gets an eye rake on King. He then attempts a piledriver that Savage breaks up. These heels are bumbling idiots. Airplane spin. He should have tried it on Bundy. Bundy gets some offense on King. Spinning neck breaker from Rude. Not quite a Rude Awakening. Piledriver on King. King fires up on Bundy. Savage starts swinging at everyone and hits the ref as well. They all start brawling on the floor, with the steps and chairs being used, but the match is thrown out.
Jerry Lawler/Randy Savage vs. King Kong Bundy/Rick Rude No DQ (9/17/84)
This had a promo before it with Savage walking around with signs and confetti. No stalling for this one. Right into the action. Rude is thrown over the top and hit with a chair. Ax handle to the floor. Inverted atomic drop on King. Just brawling around. Bundy puts the table on King and stands on it. Piledriver on Rude. Bundy splashes the ref to break the pin. A second ref is brought out and Jimmy Hart prevents him from counting, but the original ref counts a fall for Rude on the other side of the ring.
Dutch Mantell vs. Eddie Gilbert (9/17/84)
Dutch gets Eddie to the mat and locks on a side headlock. Mid ring collision sends Eddie to the floor. Dutch suplexes him back in. Back to the headlock. Eddie gets up and they throw some punches, ending with a near back drop drivaaaah. Dutch gets his leg wrapped around the ring post. Eddie then uses a chair and the ropes to continue to work the leg. Figure four. Dutch gets pissed and knocks Eddie to the floor, then slams his face into the table a few times. Eddie gets a roll up with his feet on the ropes. Eddie won a title because every damn match on this set is a title match, apparently. King has won or lost a title in every singles match on this set. The ref was told of Eddie using the ropes, so the match was restarted. Dutch quickly won with a roll up. Eddie delivered a DDT after the match.
Dirty White Boys vs. Randy Savage/Mark Batten (10/13/84)
Finally, a studio match. I prefer the studio stuff. The wrestling is tighter and faster paced in the studio. Batten starts out. Tony Anthony would be doing the Dirty White Boy gimmick 10 years later in the USWA. It's kind of the reverse Road Warriors, where Animal started out as The Road Warrior, then Hawk joined the team. I don't know who Batten is. He gets his ass kicked for most of the match. Hot tag to Savage. Maybe it wasn't a tag, since Batten was pinned moments later to lose the first fall. Batten continues to get his ass kicked in the second fall. DWBs are disqualified in the second fall for hitting Savage with a chair. Savage would then get tied up in the ropes and beaten until Some dudes tried to save him, only to be thrown out of the ring. Eddie Marlin came out to stop it and they didn't listen to him. There was a promo with Savage for the upcoming match. Jimmy Valiant is his street brother and they are going to rip eye balls out.
BONUS: Breakup of New Fabulous Ones
Eddie is in a rocking chair at I assume a grandma's house, talking about how he's hurt and angry. He got sick of Tommy Rich taking all the credit for their team. Eddie was hurt that Rich picked Tojo instead of him to manage him for Rich's International Championship match. Once Rich won a singles title, he had no plans to go after the tag titles again and instead went for another singles title. Eddie let King Kong Bundy use a chain against Rich. He's never going to be Rich's partner ever again.
We then get a promo with Jackie Fargo and Tommy Rich. Fargo will be Rich's partner for I think an upcoming tournament. Some weird undertones with Fargo calling himself Big Daddy and calling Rich Baby, while saying he'd never leave him. Maybe they were overtones.
Another Rich promo. Eddie had busted Rich open.
We're then shown two fans presenting a tag team of the year award to Gilbert and Rich. The voting went on for the whole year, even if the team isn't together right now. Eddie accepts the award and takes the chance to shit all over Tommy for being too much of a big shot to even come to TV anymore now that he's International Champion. As it turned out, he WAS there and knocked the shit out of Eddie. Eddie got to say some words after the break, still covered in blood. He feels like maybe he has done something wrong and maybe he was jealous. He asks for Tommy to come out to apologize. Tommy came out and they hugged. As they were walking to the back, Eddie attacked. SWERVE!
Coming up: More Savage, the return of Adrian Street, a new version of the Sheepherders, Bruiser Brody, and The Freebirds.