You're All Right, You Put up a Good Clean Fight, I'm Afraid You'll Lose Tonight to The King

Jerry Lawler/Tommy Rich/Jerry Oates v. Rip Rogers/Bob Roop/Ted Oates GCW 10/31/84 - GREAT

Truly enjoyable workrate TV six man tag. Just a menagerie of random awesome 80's wrestlers (plus the Oateses) moving at a fast pace. We get to see Lawler work against both Rip Rogers and Bob Roop, neither guy got any sort of Memphis run, but both matchups are really fun. Rogers is exactly how you remember him, athletic wild bumper who had a great pace. Roop didn't do as much of his awesome tricky mat wrestling in this context, but he threw some nice punches and he and Lawler had a great standoff. Tommy Rich worked face in peril and threw nifty elbows, the Oates's were perfectly fine, and the match breaks down entertainingly at the end. The kind of match you didn't know you really wanted to see.

Jerry Lawler v. Chris Benoit 1994 - FUN

This is sort of dream match (well pre 2007), the best US based worker of the 1980s v. one of the best of the 90s. However it was pretty much Lawler plugging Benoit into Lawler's touring heel match. Lawler's touring heel match is a pretty great match, but in the role of heel Lawler opponent, Benoit doesn't have the charisma of Eric Embry or Tito Santana and it comes off flat. I imagine this would have been better as heel Benoit v. face Lawler. This had some stuff I liked, Lawler selling the diving headbutt like Fred Sanford coming home to Elizabeth was pretty great, but this was overall sort of a disappointment. Post match Benoit double nogging knocks Lawler and his valet, and it is hard enough to watch Benoit matches without him manhandling women. The rating is FUN, because it had too much good stuff to be SKIPPABLE, not because I had particularly fun time watching it.

Jerry Lawler/Bill Dundee v. Billy Joe Travis/Bulldog Rains MPPW 7/26/98 - FUN

Only about five minutes and it needed another two minutes or so to push over the to the GREAT category, but man alive what we got of this match was pretty awesome. Bulldog Rains is a perfectly serviceable bald goateed guy with big arms and a gut, but holy shit did Billy Joe Travis look amazing when he was in the ring. Travis and Dundee just unload on each other with Travis's uppercuts vs. Superstars short hooks, BJ also takes one of his in the lights high backdrops. Memphis studio wrestling at its most energetic, Lawler looked good, although this style was always more suited to Dundee who shined. Mainly though this match made me want to do a BJ Travis Complete and Accurate.


COMPLETE AND ACCURATE KING