Questions about Territories and World Titles

[MrElijah]

A few things that I have been wondering about lately:
-How many territories recognized both the AWA and NWA World Titles? This is due to seeing a vid of Houston Wrestling promoting a match between AWA World Champ Nick Bockwinkel vs. NWA US Champion(JCP) Wahoo McDaniels.

-Did either belt hold any weight in Mexico?

-Was anyone from Mexico ever considered?

-Did either belt hold any weight in the UK/Europe?

[Joe Neglia]

Jan 31, 2019 17:44:05 GMT -5 MrElijah said:

A few things that I have been wondering about lately:
-How many territories recognized both the AWA and NWA World Titles? This is due to seeing a vid of Houston Wrestling promoting a match between AWA World Champ Nick Bockwinkel vs. NWA US Champion(JCP) Wahoo McDaniels.

McDaniel, no 's'. Houston Wrestling, much like St. Louis, was a bit of an anomaly in the territories, as it didn't keep its own dedicated roster but rather booked top guys from other territories to fill cards. Depending on the time period, there was a lot of cooperation between Verne and Crockett, so having their champs on the same card was somewhat common. Now, with that said, you have to remember that - much like Vince Sr - when Verne left the NWA, he didn't really "leave" the NWA. The split was done to get the feds off the NWA's back. When they did happen to be on the same card, they did just as they had when the NWA and WWF had champ vs. champ matches - the NWA titles was the NWA World Heavyweight Championship while the AWA strap was the AWA Heavyweight Championship, no "World." That changed a little in the mid-80s as Verne didn't give a crap anymore and some of the cross-promoting in there, he made sure the AWA title was referred to was World as well.

-Did either belt hold any weight in Mexico?

EMLL was an NWA member from 1953-1986. It very much carried weight there up until then. Afterward, not so much. Best I can tell, Gory Guererro, patriarch of the Guererro family, was the first NWA title defense in Mexico, in 1954. There was an official NWA Mexico promotion that ran very briefly about 10 years ago.

-Was anyone from Mexico ever considered?

Doubtful. The NWA was never going to allow a masked wrestler as the champ, and slim pickings for NWA Champ material without the masked luchadors. Also, most of the NWA were racist as f*** and would never have allowed it for any other reason, either.

-Did either belt hold any weight in the UK/Europe?

Not a whole lot. When the NWA came to be, the title matches were mostly held in the Midwest and the international aspect that had played a big part in the prior years came to an end. This lasted throughout the '40s and by the mid-'50s, they were slowly dipping their toes into Mexico and Canada after years of building up the traveling champ system nationwide. By the mid-70s, they were solidly touring Japan and New Zealand/Australia, as well as some of the Caribbean islands, but I'm not aware of any Europe-based title defenses up through at least the end of the Crockett years. I could be wrong on that though.

As far as the AWA, it was somehow worth enough for Otto Wanz to pay money to rent it for a run in his own promotion with it, but beyond that? Dunno.

[OVO 40 hunched over like he 80]

Was it worth it to get into business with Verne? He stole from his partners and was a pain to deal with.

[Cranjis McBasketball]

There is a book out now called Death of the Territories. Not done yet but it covers a lot of these kinds of things.

[Ultimo Gallos]

Tim Hornbaker's NWA book covers some of this stuff. Word of warning while the book is good it is very dry and bland.

[Futureraven: Beelzebruv]

Jan 31, 2019 17:44:05 GMT -5 MrElijah said:

-Did either belt hold any weight in the UK/Europe?

Nah, we had our own wrestling and due to the logistics they were entirely seperate.

By the time British Wresltling left TV, Vince was already making inroads so the WWF WAS wrestling.

There was a British NWA Affiliate, NWA Hammerlock, most British talent came through there at some point but this was still pretty much in the doldrums of the British scene.

Although there was an English NWA World Champion, Gary Steele. Who won it from Naoya Ogawa and lost it back a week later in 1999.

[salz4life]

Feb 1, 2019 0:48:55 GMT -5 OVO 40 hunched over like he 80 said:

Was it worth it to get into business with Verne? He stole from his partners and was a pain to deal with.

I can't wait to get into the AWA stuff with the Lapsed Fan. I'm going through the Wrestlemania episodes now.

[OVO 40 hunched over like he 80]

Feb 1, 2019 13:05:40 GMT -5 salz4life said:

Feb 1, 2019 0:48:55 GMT -5 OVO 40 hunched over like he 80 said:

Was it worth it to get into business with Verne? He stole from his partners and was a pain to deal with.

I can't wait to get into the AWA stuff with the Lapsed Fan. I'm going through the Wrestlemania episodes now.

30 years, a farm boy, born and raised in Minnesota.

He’s also a thief.