May 1988: A Tournament of Champions
May 16, 1988
WWF
Even with Hogan gone, crowds have been really good lately. So good, in fact, that managers might be back to work on house shows soon.
Speaking of Hogan, his wife recently gave birth to a baby girl named Brooke. [1]
Ricky Steamboat is now being billed as the “Undisputed WWF Champion”. The word “Heavyweight” will no longer be used when talking about the title.
A tournament to crown the new challenger to the WWF Title will be announced on the next taping of Superstars. It’s suspected this will incorporate a storyline involving Steamboat and DiBiase, but not much is known as of yet.
The new show in August is reportedly going to be called “Summer Slam” … [2]
NWA
Some more information has come to light about why Crockett released Sting … Apparently, Sting went for a ride on his 3-wheeler all-terrain vehicle at his home, deliberately defying doctor’s orders not to partake in any activities like that while his injury healed. Sting turned the vehicle too quickly, causing it to roll over on him, and while it didn’t cause anything life-threatening, it did fracture two of (Sting’s) fingers and re-injured his shoulder. When Crockett and Dusty got word of the accident, they were both furious about it, and fired Sting over the phone when he called about his situation.
Jim “Venom” Hellwig, Sting’s closest friend backstage, was said to be furious about Sting being fired, and threatened to quit. Dusty, Arn and Flair convinced him to stay by offering him a bonus for his match at the Great American Bash on 7/10 against Jim Duggan. Duggan is extremely popular with the crowd, so they couldn’t afford to lose one-half of that match.
No word yet on where Sting will be headed …
WCW
Jerry Lawler defeated Manny Fernandez in a tournament final at the show on 5/11 to win the newly created WCW Heavyweight Championship. Kerry Von Erich, who lost to Fernandez in the semifinal, ran out to cause the distraction, costing Manny the match … A tag team match of Lawler & Kerry vs. Fernandez & Eddie Gilbert will air on the first episode of WCW World of Wrestling (the new name for the weekly WCW TV show).
STAMPEDE
Owen Hart’s last Stampede match occurred on 5/14, where he lost a rematch against Makhan Singh for the North American Title. Singh ended Owen’s year-plus long reign as North American champion on 5/6 … Owen is definitely headed to WWF next month, but there’s no other word on that situation right now.
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May 21, 1988
(The WWF logo appears over a background of clouds)
GENE OKERLUND, VOICE-OVER: The WWF…what the world is watching!
(The camera shows the inside of the arena, the audience, the ringside area, and eventually settles on Vince McMahon and Jesse Ventura at the announce table)
VINCE MCMAHON: Emanating live from Duluth, Minnesota, the home of rock-and-roll legend Bob Dylan, it’s the Superstars of Wrestling! Hello, everyone, I’m Vince McMahon, alongside Jesse “the Body” Ventura, and we have some great action for you tonight!
JESSE VENTURA: Bob Dylan? That’s very fitting, McMahon, because sitting next to you, I definitely can smell something “blowing in the wind!” [3]
MCMAHON: Pay no mind to the man next to me, ladies and gentlemen, because we also have a huge announcement from WWF President Jack Tunney himself! Let’s get down to business!
(The intro credits for Superstars of Wrestling roll)
MCMAHON: Welcome, everyone! We have lots of action for you here tonight, as we will see the Intercontinental Champion, “the Hitman” Bret Hart, live and in action tonight, as well as “Ravishing” Rick Rude. In addition, “the Million Dollar Man” Ted DiBiase will be taking on one-half of Strike Force, the young Canadian, Rick Martel. And tonight, yes, the man himself, WWF Champion “the Dragon” Ricky Steamboat will be in action! But first, we have a special announcement…Jesse, what do you suppose this is about?
VENTURA: Well, McMahon, Tunney’s like a groundhog: he only appears once or twice a year, and when he does, it’s usually something important. But if I had to speculate about it, I’d say Tunney is gonna say that Steamboat has finally come to his senses, that he’s decided to accept the Million Dollar Man’s offer after all, and that he will announce Ted DiBiase as the brand-new World Wrestling Federation Champion, tonight!
MCMAHON: Personally, I think there’s very little chance of that happening. Ladies and gentlemen, without further ado, World Wrestling Federation President Jack Tunney!
(The camera cuts to an obviously pre-recorded promo from Tunney, who is seated at a table in an office with black-and-white pictures of wrestlers on the walls behind him)
JACK TUNNEY: Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. As president of the World Wrestling Federation, it is my duty to organize the most entertaining events and matches for the WWF fans to see. With this in mind, I have two announcements that concern upcoming happenings this summer. My first announcement concerns the WWF’s newest pay-per-view event. On August 28th, the World Wrestling Federation will hold an event which I am dubbing Summer Slam. I encourage all of our fans to call their local cable provider and order this sure-to-be-exciting show. My second announcement concerns the state of the Undisputed WWF Championship. Starting next week, a tournament will be held featuring eight of the top superstars in this company to determine the next challenger to the World Wrestling Federation Champion, “the Dragon” Ricky Steamboat. [4] The first-round matches will be as follows: Jake “the Snake” Roberts will take on the “Million Dollar Man” Ted DiBiase. Don Muraco will face Greg Valentine. “The Macho Man” Randy Savage will face off against “Ravishing” Rick Rude. And finally, the Junkyard Dog will go one-on-one with the One Man Gang. The four winners of these matches will then advance to the second round, and the winners of those matches will face one another in the final match, which will take place on an upcoming Friday Night’s Main Event. The winner of that match will receive an Undisputed WWF Championship match against Ricky “the Dragon” Steamboat at Summer Slam. The first two matches will happen next week. Good luck to all the superstars involved, and may the best competitor win. Now, on with the show.
-opening to WWF Superstars of Wrestling, aired on May 21st, 1988
WWF Championship Match Tournament bracket
1st Round: Ted DiBiase vs. Jake Roberts
1st Round: Greg Valentine vs. Don Muraco
1st Round: Randy Savage vs. Rick Rude
1st Round: Junkyard Dog vs. One Man Gang
Semifinal: TBD
Semifinal: TBD
Final: TBD
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May 30, 1988
WWF
The WWF … (has) already sold most of its ads for the whole year, and they’re getting worried about what’s going to happen now. An ad they ran in Electronic Media magazine recently stated they were in the top 5 Nielsen-rated shows every week for four straight weeks, which only Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy can also claim. That’s actually only still a slight lie – there was one week where they were #6.
Hulk Hogan is reportedly spending time with his family after the birth of his first child – a baby girl named Brooke, as we stated last week. Still no word on when he’ll be returning.
Just to let you know the type of person Ricky Steamboat is: back in April, you may remember a story I wrote about visiting Steamboat’s gym in Charlotte to buy some t-shirts. And lo and behold, the guy at the desk tells us he just closed up before we got there. Well, guess what I got in the mail last week? That’s right: a couple of Steamboat gym t-shirts. [5]
Terry Taylor may be getting a gimmick when he debuts soon, but there’s no word on what it might be.
Owen Hart will be making his debut soon as a babyface. Early word is they will be associating him with Bret, and maybe Neidhart, in some shape or form. [6]
Wrestlers are now working 10 days on, 3 days off.
Not much word yet about the tournament to crown a new challenger to the WWF Title, but the early favorites to win are Savage and DiBiase …
Steve Blackman, a WWF jobber, recently got a win over Sam Houston on one of the matches taped for Superstars. Steamboat is reportedly friends with him backstage and is lobbying for Vince to use him on TV.
NWA
Big Bubba Rogers has quit in a dispute over pay … With Sting’s departure and now this, this writer expects Crockett to start trying to push some of the Mid-South guys they haven’t been using much.
AWA
I survived an AWA ESPN taping. Just barely. There is no question in my mind that the AWA is the worst promotion of any significant proportion after viewing “The Night of Wrestling Hell”, the 5/14 taping at the Showboat Training Center before 400 fans. A whole group of us decided to go at the last minute, mainly to see Riki Choshu’s first wrestling appearance in the U.S. in nearly six years. Actually, it was just an excuse to write off Choshu’s honeymoon in Las Vegas, and he wrestled with about as much effort as someone who was on their honeymoon. And he was still better than just about everybody on the card … Four of the advertised five matches didn’t take place, and there were six no-shows. [7]
The Nasty Boys have been fired.
It stinks that the AWA are billing Choshu as “Shoshi”. But then again, I half-expected Verne to misspell his name as “Cho Shoe”.
Dallas Paige (sp) is still one of the most over guys on the roster, and one of the best promos. Too bad he’s head and shoulders below Jesse Ventura …
I will say one positive thing about (Madusa) Miceli: she has a lot of charisma and gets a lot of reaction from everything she does, even though most of the time she doesn’t have a clue what she’s doing. She has potential to be an awesome valet, though.
WCW
Reports on the 5/11 show where Jerry Lawler won the title have been promising. 6,200 fans attended, and the gate drew almost $90,000. It doesn’t seem like much, but it’s phenomenal for an upstart company.
STAMPEDE
Lots of Stampede fans are really worried about the future of the company now that Owen is headed to the WWF, but they’ve always done okay whenever he headed to Japan to tour. He was always very over with the live crowd, but he wasn’t a huge draw.
They’re setting up a Chris Benoit/Johnny Smith feud over the Continental Title. Benoit will be gone by July for a New Japan tour.
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[1] Hulk Hogan’s daughter is born in early May 1988, as OTL, but whether or not she’ll get involved in the business remains to be seen…
[2] IOTL, of course, it was named Summerslam (one word).
[3] Again, Ventura thumbing his nose at the boss without getting in trouble for it, as he did best at this time!
[4] I know what some of you out there are saying: “But Vince McMahon hates tournaments!” He agrees to this one for numerous reasons. First off, the primary reason McMahon soured so much on tournaments IOTL in the first place was because of the lukewarm reception of Wrestlemania IV, which featured a huge tournament for the WWF Title (which never happens ITTL); second, it’s at the center of a storyline that he really likes. There’s another reason, too, but I won’t spoil it here…
[5] This sounds like something I’d make up for the narrative, but no—all of it is as OTL. Nice guy, that Steamboat!
[6] They didn’t do this IOTL, of course, opting to give Owen a bumbling superhero gimmick called “The Blue Blazer” (which I’m actually very glad they went with instead of their other name, “The Cheetah Kid”), and opting not to mention Owen’s real name or any connection whatsoever with his brother Bret. Here, since Bret and the Hart Foundation are a much bigger deal, Vince makes the choice to debut Owen under his real name, smelling the chance to make more money.
[7] This all comes nearly word-for-word from the OTL 5/23 Wrestling Observer Newsletter, except the attendance number is quite a bit worse than OTL.
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I'm back, folks! I hope you're all ready for a flurry of new updates in the near future!
As the WWF rolls toward a new PPV and a new challenger for Steamboat, Owen Hart is looking towards his future in the WWF, and Sting and Big "Not the Boss Man" Bubba Rogers are forcing JCP to look toward the future as well. Also, the AWA are suffering; how much longer can Verne Gagne hold on?
Coming soon: the beginnings of the #1 contender's tournament for the WWF Championship, and the NWA is under new ownership...
