By Brian Hoops, PWTorch.com Nostalgia Specialist

Over the last several weeks, we have looked back at nostalgic Wrestlemania events. 20 years ago, the WWF was in a heated competition for national expansion with the NWA and Jim Crockett Promotions. On March 27, 1988; the WWF promoted their 4th Wrestlemania event, however the NWA promoted their 1st supercard on superstation TBS head to head with Wrestlemania. The NWA called this event “The Clash of the Champions” and this event would become a fixture on TBS until WCW’s demise in 2001.

On Thanksgiving evening, 1987; the NWA promoted Starrcade 1987; however Vince McMahon promoted the first ever Survivor Series that same evening in direct competition with the NWA. In January, 1988; the NWA was again promoting another PPV; called the Bunkhouse Stampede and McMahon again promoted a wrestling card in direct competition to the NWA. Due to fallout from PPV companies from the Survivor Series, McMahon promoted this event live on the USA Network for free. The event was built around an over the top battle royal and was called The Royal Rumble. McMahon’s actions significantly hurt the NWA and they badly needed all the PPV they could generate to compete with McMahon. Jim Crockett was nearly bankrupt by March of 1988 and Ted Turner would soon step in the picture and purchase Jim Crockett Promotions and rename the promotion World Championship Wrestling. Crockett and Turner were not willing to give into McMahon and concede the coveted top spot in wrestling; so they promoted a supercard called the Clash of the Champions head to head with Wrestlemania on TBS for free. McMahon of course cried foul, but he had set the precedent earlier with his Survivor Series and Royal Rumble events.

Jim Ross, Tony Schiavone and Bob Caudle are the broadcast team.

1. In a match for the NWA World TV Title, Mike Rotunda defeated Jimmy Garvin in 6:10 in an “amateur” rules match to retain the title. The match was contested under amateur rules and Garvin was pinned with a one count. Kevin Sullivan tried to attack Precious and when Garvin went to protect her, Rotunda cradled Garvin for the pin. Match was meant to further the Garvin-Rotunda –Precious feud.

2. The Midnight Express; Bobby Eaton and Stan Lane with Jim Cornette defeated The Fantastics; Bobby Fulton and Tommy Rogers in 10:15 by disqualification to retain the NWA U.S. Tag Team Titles. Wild brawl to start the match. When they finally got in the ring, The Fantastics used great double teaming to take control of the match. Eaton regained control with a powerslam and a bulldog on the table outside the ring. They did the Dusty finish where Bobby Fulton threw ref Randy Anderson over the top rope and then pinned Eaton with substitute ref Tommy Young making the pinfall. However, Anderson overturned the title change and disqualified the Fantastics.

3. In a Texas barb wire match, the Road Warriors and Dusty Rhodes defeated the Barbarian, the Warlord and Ivan Koloff in 3:39. This was a decent brawl inside the ring as no one took many bumps into the barb wire. Animal pinned the Warlord for the finish. Koloff brought his chain into the ring after the match to regain their heel heat, until Hawk got the chain away and cleared the ring.

4. In a match for the NWA World Tag Team titles, Barry Windham and Lex Luger defeated champions Tully Blanchard and Arn Anderson to win the belts in 9:35. Luger and Windham teamed together to go after the Horsemen and their belts and had tremendous crowd support as this was at the pinnacle of the Horsemen era. Windham was in selling most of the match until he made the hot tag to Luger. Finish came when JJ Dillion held a chair up in the corner as Anderson attempted to whip Luger into the chair, only Luger reversed the whip and threw Anderson into the chair and pinned Anderson for the win. Huge crowd reaction for the title change. A very good match.

5. In the main event, Sting and Ric Flair wrestled to a 45 minute time limit draw. This match was for Flair’s NWA World Heavyweight Title. This was the match that put Sting on the map as he was languishing as a mid-card babyface, until Ric Flair wrestled him to a draw on national, prime time television and elevated Sting into an up and coming star. Ross made a special mention that there is a 45 minute time limit due to TV restrictions. The NWA also had three judges at ringside for this match, in case it ended in a time limit draw. Plenty of foreshadowing of the finish of this match. They kept it very basic and at a slow pace early in the match since they were going 45 minutes. Story of the match was Flair was the veteran who controlled the match but couldn’t put the young challenger away as Sting was too strong. This formula worked well as Flair looked good on offense and it allowed Sting to make several comebacks during the match before the veteran Flair would use his experience to stop Sting’s offense. A very exciting last five minutes of this match made it a great match as they traded several near falls. The crowd was on their feet and into everything Sting and Flair did.

Summary: This was a very good card, highlighted by a great tag team title match and an awesome main event. This show, from a wrestling stand point, blew away the WWF Wrestlemania PPV event it went head to head with. This show is a must see from a nostalgia standpoint, being the first ever Clash of the Champions event; and also has two very good matches.

I hope you enjoyed this week’s look at wrestling nostalgia. Feel free to contact me if you have any comments or questions at bhoops@iw.net

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