Post by "Nature Boy" Ric Moranis on Apr 26, 2008 14:06:13 GMT -5
I had to look these up (for the dates), but these were the ones I was at as a little kid...
4/20/86 Greensboro, NC (Greensboro Coliseum)
Dusty Rhodes & Rock & Roll Express beat Ric Flair & Tully Blanchard & Arn Anderson
(...the Ric Flair/Ricky Morton WTBS/JCP angle got me into wrestling in NC...pretty sure this was the match where they did the hot TV angle backstage where Flair grinded Morton's face into the concrete in the locker room, destroying Morton's nose and face, because Flair was mad about losing to some upstart pretty boy. Great angle.)
4/30/86 Raleigh, NC (Dorton Arena)
NWA Champion Ric Flair beat Ricky Morton
5/3/86 Greensboro, NC (Greensboro Coliseum)
Ricky Morton drew NWA Champion Ric Flair
6/1/86 Greensboro, NC (Greensboro Coliseum)
Ric Flair & Tully Blanchard beat Rock & Roll Express
7/26/86 Greensboro, NC (Greensboro Coliseum/"Great American Bash" tour)
Dusty Rhodes beat Ric Flair to win NWA title
(cage match...GREAT CARD...Andersons vs. Rock & Roll Express, Magnum TA over Nikita in match 4 or 5 of the Best of 7 series for the US Title, Tully vs. Ron Garvin in a "taped fists" match, Wahoo vs. Jimmy Garvin, and Paul Jones beating Jimmy Valiant in a Hair vs. Hair. To this day, it's probably the best wrestling show I've ever seen)
1988 Crockett Cup, Final Night, Greensboro, NC
Nikita Koloff beat NWA World Champion Ric Flair by DQ.
(...finding out in the arena that my favorite wrestler at the time, Barry Windham...had already turned "bad" and joined the Four Horseman before I saw it on TV kind of made me lose interest in the NWA as a kid.)
1990 Wrestle War, Greensboro, NC
NWA World Champion Ric Flair beat Lex Luger by countout/Arn & Ole run-in.
^
After that stupid-ass Dusty finish (Ole Anderson was booking) for no reason, my parents told me that they weren't going to pay money to take me to see wrestling. They always told me it was "fake" as a kid, so I knew it was, but that was a shit show...and everybody leaving the arena was pissed off...not because Flair won, but because it sucked. Leaving the arena, it felt like you were trying to find your car in the parking lot with 10,000 other mad people that had all just set $20 of their own money on fire. And apparently, those parent/child discussions and people being pissed off at live shows were happening all over the territory since the NWA/UWF merger in '87 (w/Dusty and/or Ole booking), and that effectively slowly killed wrestling in the Carolinas...which sucked, because that territory was awesome, and I'm glad I grew up there.
And, I was supposed to go to WCW Fall Brawl '97 in Winston-Salem with my high school buddies, but I got hurt playing football the Friday before...and I guess I didn't miss anything, because Curt Hennig joined the NWO by crushing Flair's head in the cage door in War Games. I heard enough complaining from my friends that went (about how shitty that show was), and decided I wasn't going to pay money/parking/concessions for stuff I can see on TV or PPV.
But Flair drew me into wrestling as a heel, and to this day, he's my all-time fave. I'm gonna miss him. There will be another Hogan, but there will never be another Ric Flair.
4/20/86 Greensboro, NC (Greensboro Coliseum)
Dusty Rhodes & Rock & Roll Express beat Ric Flair & Tully Blanchard & Arn Anderson
(...the Ric Flair/Ricky Morton WTBS/JCP angle got me into wrestling in NC...pretty sure this was the match where they did the hot TV angle backstage where Flair grinded Morton's face into the concrete in the locker room, destroying Morton's nose and face, because Flair was mad about losing to some upstart pretty boy. Great angle.)
4/30/86 Raleigh, NC (Dorton Arena)
NWA Champion Ric Flair beat Ricky Morton
5/3/86 Greensboro, NC (Greensboro Coliseum)
Ricky Morton drew NWA Champion Ric Flair
6/1/86 Greensboro, NC (Greensboro Coliseum)
Ric Flair & Tully Blanchard beat Rock & Roll Express
7/26/86 Greensboro, NC (Greensboro Coliseum/"Great American Bash" tour)
Dusty Rhodes beat Ric Flair to win NWA title
(cage match...GREAT CARD...Andersons vs. Rock & Roll Express, Magnum TA over Nikita in match 4 or 5 of the Best of 7 series for the US Title, Tully vs. Ron Garvin in a "taped fists" match, Wahoo vs. Jimmy Garvin, and Paul Jones beating Jimmy Valiant in a Hair vs. Hair. To this day, it's probably the best wrestling show I've ever seen)
1988 Crockett Cup, Final Night, Greensboro, NC
Nikita Koloff beat NWA World Champion Ric Flair by DQ.
(...finding out in the arena that my favorite wrestler at the time, Barry Windham...had already turned "bad" and joined the Four Horseman before I saw it on TV kind of made me lose interest in the NWA as a kid.)
1990 Wrestle War, Greensboro, NC
NWA World Champion Ric Flair beat Lex Luger by countout/Arn & Ole run-in.
^
After that stupid-ass Dusty finish (Ole Anderson was booking) for no reason, my parents told me that they weren't going to pay money to take me to see wrestling. They always told me it was "fake" as a kid, so I knew it was, but that was a shit show...and everybody leaving the arena was pissed off...not because Flair won, but because it sucked. Leaving the arena, it felt like you were trying to find your car in the parking lot with 10,000 other mad people that had all just set $20 of their own money on fire. And apparently, those parent/child discussions and people being pissed off at live shows were happening all over the territory since the NWA/UWF merger in '87 (w/Dusty and/or Ole booking), and that effectively slowly killed wrestling in the Carolinas...which sucked, because that territory was awesome, and I'm glad I grew up there.
And, I was supposed to go to WCW Fall Brawl '97 in Winston-Salem with my high school buddies, but I got hurt playing football the Friday before...and I guess I didn't miss anything, because Curt Hennig joined the NWO by crushing Flair's head in the cage door in War Games. I heard enough complaining from my friends that went (about how shitty that show was), and decided I wasn't going to pay money/parking/concessions for stuff I can see on TV or PPV.
But Flair drew me into wrestling as a heel, and to this day, he's my all-time fave. I'm gonna miss him. There will be another Hogan, but there will never be another Ric Flair.