OOld Tyme Rasslin Revue for WWF Royal Rumble 1988
 

Emanating from the Copps Coliseum in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada

Your commentators are Vince McMahon and Jesse “the Body” Ventura

- For the uninformed, this initial edition of the Royal Rumble actually aired on the USA network. Vince decided to have a three hour special to compete against an NWA PPV airing the same night,

because he’s a shrewd businessman like that. To help draw people away from the NWA event, they decided to create a brand new event, called the Royal Rumble. The match is the brainchild of Pat Patterson, who felt the idea of a battle royal could be improved upon. And thus history was made and one of the most popular gimmick matches began.

Before the match, Rude fluffs his hair in front of Steamboat; I guess to indicate that, yes, he is indeed ravishing. Rude hammers away on Steamboat, but Steamboat fires back. Rude attempts to launch Steamboat to the floor, but he skins the cat and then dumps Rude outside. Back inside, Rude asks for a test of strength. Steamboat obliges, but Rude sends him to his knees. Steamboat gets back up and puts Rude in a hammerlock. As Steamboat works Rude’s arm, we’re treated to the taunts of a fat female Canuck, who has her own megaphone. I’d like to see her try and bring that to a live event these days. Rude tries to mount a comeback, but Steamboat drops him again with an armdrag. Rude goes back on offense with a boot to the midsection. It doesn’t last long before Steamboat is able to go back to work on Rude’s arm. After knocking Steamboat down, Rude tries to pose, but his arm is too hurt. This pleases the megaphone lady. A botched criss-cross sequence ends with Rude somewhat hitting Steamboat with a knee to the midsection. On the floor, Rude works over Steamboat. Rude suplexes Steamboat back inside and gets 2. Now Rude wears down Steamboat with a rear chinlock. Steamboat is able to stand and drops Rude off his back. He then goes for a big splash, but Rude gets his knees up. An atomic drop by Rude gets 2. Steamboat recovers and rams Rude’s head into the turnbuckle ten times. The two exchange numerous pinfalls in a nice sequence. Steamboat blocks a suplex and delivers one of his own. Steamboat goes for a high crossbody, but Rude pulls the referee in front of him. Rude gets Steamboat up on his shoulder for a submission move. The referee wakes up and calls for the bell. But I never heard Steamboat give up. What’s this? The referee has dq’ed Rude and Steamboat wins the match! Justice has been served.

Bottom Line: I would have expected more here, but I think Rude was too new to have a good match. Too many times throughout the match, he wasted time by trying to get himself over as a heel. Each man had a lengthy resthold period, which would have been forgivable had either one factored into the finish. Things were picking up in the closing minutes, but that DQ finish sucked the life out of it. * ¾

Mean Gene oversees the festivities, while Jesse Ventura is there as a spotter. The crowd does not give their countryman a very warm reception. Bravo asks the audience for complete silence, but doesn’t get it. He begins with a warm-up weight of 415 lbs. He does that with ease and moves up to 505. This is scintillating! We move on to 555. If this were taking place today, he probably would have torn his pec before getting to the record. Next up is 595. The suspense is killing me! Both Jesse and Bravo are getting annoyed with the crowd’s boos. The pace “quickens” as we move up to 655. Bravo struggles, but manages to do it. The moment finally arrives as Bravo goes to break the record by doing 715. Before he does it, he gets up and leaves because he doesn’t like the crowd noise. Frenchy Martin convinces him to come back and he presses the weight…with a little assistance from Jesse. Mean Gene acts like he’s done it, but Vince McMahon argues otherwise.

Wow, what a waste of time that was. If it progressed a feud, that would have been one thing. But this seemingly was done just to add heat to Bravo, which by the sound of the crowd, wasn’t necessary. This was a double failure as Mean Gene didn’t properly get over the fact that Jesse cheated to help him do it.

Yes, you read that right, women’s tag titles. How sad is it that there are barely enough male tag teams to warrant a division today and twenty years ago they actually had one for women as well.

Fall #1: The Angels hit a pair of dropkicks to kick things off. Both teams get some quick offense in, but neither can gain an advantage. Judy Martin gets caught in the face corner and then the Red Angel (the announcers don’t know their actual names) puts her in an abdominal stretch. Now the Angels get both Girls in figure four leglocks. Leilani Kai continues to get her leg worked over by the Angels. Kai finally tags out and Jimmy Hart begins to massage her leg. Things just got a little skeevy in here. Martin pulls the Red Angel out of the corner and she lands on her head. Martin then flips the Red Angel over her head and to the mat. She covers and gets the 3 count.

Fall #2: The Girls continue to work over the Red Angel as the second fall begins. Kai misses a big splash, which allows the Red Angel to tag out. The Pink Angel goes to work on Kai and hits a crossbody. All four ladies are in there now and miscommunication leads to the Girls clotheslining each other. The Red Angel catches Martin in a sunset flip and pins her for 3.

Fall #3: The Angels double-team Kai, but then the Red Angel gets caught in the heel corner. The Red Angel avoids a prolonged attack by hitting Martin with an enziguri. Martin nails the Pink Angel with a slingshot. The Pink Angel has now become the face-in-peril, but it doesn’t last long. The Red Angel gets tagged in and now she gets worked over by the Girls. The Red Angels fights back and drops Kai on her ass a couple of times. Lucky for her, she’s got a lot of cushioning to protect those blows. The Angels get several nearfalls on Martin in their corner. The Red Angel misses a senton splash and Martin gets a 2 count from it. As Kai comes in to argue with the referee, the Angels hit tandem top rope dropkicks on Martin. The Pink Angel covers and scores the pinfall. New champs! Big pop from the crowd for that win.

BL: I wouldn’t normally say this, but in this case, I believe the 2 out of 3 falls stipulation hurt this match. The Angels had some pretty impressive moves, especially for the time period, but those moves weren’t held together with any kind of narrative. It was just this fast collection of moves that at times was difficult to follow. The match ends up being more of a novelty than a true mat classic. ** ½

This would be the signing for their Wrestlemania III rematch that would take place about a week or so after this event. Could you imagine waiting nearly a year for a championship rematch in today’s wrestling environment? Naturally a 30 second process takes forever here as Andre stalls before sitting down to sign. As Hogan signs, the Million Dollar Man (who recently paid Andre to win the belt for him) tells him that he’s signing his career away. Andre stalls some more by carefully reading the contract. He finally signs and then rams Hogan’s head into the table. A contract signing ending in violence? Well, this is highly unusual!

About the only difference between this match and the one we know today is that there were only twenty participants in this one. #1 is Bret Hart and #2 is Tito Santana; a fine pair to kick things off. Bret starts off by beating down Santana in the corner. Santana comes back and delivers some rights of his own. As Bret goes to eliminate Santana, Butch Reed comes out at #3. He naturally goes after Santana. Get it, naturally? Santana retaliates with a double noggin knocker on the heels. Things get worse for Santana as #4 is Jim “the Anvil” Neidhart. They triple team Santana, but do not eliminate him before Jake “the Snake” Roberts comes in at #5. He comes up behind Reed and eliminates him. Jake attacks the Hart Foundation and soon Santana helps him. Harley Race is #6, as the Harts go back on offense. Everybody dukes it out with nothing special happening until Jumping Jim Brunzell arrives at #7. We’ve paired off now with Brunzell battling Race, Santana hammering Bret, and Jake and Neidhart going at it. #8 is Sam Houston and he goes after Neidhart. The Harts team up and toss Santana out of the ring. Dangerous Danny Davis is the #9 entrant and he immediately brawls with Houston. Jake has Race teetering on the ropes. The ring is starting to fill up as Boris Zhukov enters at #10. #11 is…is…well, both Don Muraco and Nikoli Volkoff come down to the ring. The referees let Muraco in and hold back Nikoli. As he argues with the refs, his partner, Zhukov is eliminated. It’s time for #12 and now they let Nikoli enter. They could have played that better and had it where Nikoli just missed out on saving his partner. Meanwhile, Muraco throws Race out of the ring. As Race argues with the refs, Hacksaw Jim Duggan comes out at #13. Those two exchange shots before Race eventually runs away. Jake teases about his fourth or fifth DDT of the match, but still doesn’t hit it. Outlaw Ron Bass is #14 and the ring is still pretty crowded. Nikoli picks up Brunzell and dumps him to the floor. And what poor timing it is as B. Brian Blair now enters at #15. It’s your typical run of the mill brawling from everyone when Hillbilly Jim comes out at #16. He makes an immediate impact by eliminating Neidhart. #17 is that record-breaker Dino Bravo. Bass gets Houston up on his shoulders and then tosses him to the floor. Charging out at #18 is the Ultimate Warrior. Soon after, Muraco grabs Bret and throws him out. Good showing by Bret going about 25 mins. in this initial Rumble. #19 is OMG! I’m not surprised; it’s just the One Man Gang. He grabs Blair and quickly disposes of him. Now the Gang eliminates Jake. The field is complete as Junkyard Dog comes out at #20. Duggan ducks a clothesline and flips Nikoli out of the ring. The Gang continues to dominate as he now gets rid of Hillbilly. Duggan charges and clotheslines Davis out of the ring, much to the delight of the crowd. Bravo and the Gang team up to toss out the Warrior. They’re dropping like flies now. As JYD attacks the Gang, Bass comes from behind and throws him out. That’s followed by Muraco clotheslining him out of the ring. That means the inaugural Final Four are: One Man Gang, Don Muraco, Hacksaw Jim Duggan and Dino Bravo. Muraco holds his own against the heels until he dropkicks Frenchy Martin. That allows Bravo to attack him. He then holds Muraco and allows the Gang to clothesline him to the floor. Duggan’s divide and conquer only works briefly. The heels try the same move they just did on Muraco, but this time Duggan moves and the Gang accidentally eliminates Bravo. The Gang charges at Duggan, but Duggan drops down and the Gang falls out and to the floor. Hacksaw is going to Wrestlemania!! Oh wait, nevermind. Actually, Duggan did have a chance of winning the title because he was part of the tournament. Who knew they inadvertently had the “winner gets a title shot as Wrestlemania” stipulation in since the beginning.

BL: Given all the other Rumble matches since then, this one is far from one of the best. Still, it was inventive enough from the beginning that it was able to endure and become a classic tradition. I would have preferred more eliminations throughout the match, but they were still ironing out the kinks here. Having Duggan win wouldn’t have been my first suggestion, but since a win here really meant nothing, I won’t let bother me too much. ***

- Craig DeGeorge gets an interview with Hulk Hogan, who huffs and puffs and throws a lot of idle threats at Andre and Dibiase. I really don’t think we needed to have this to know that Hogan can’t wait to meet Andre again.

Fall #1: Unbelievably, the Rumble was not the final match on this show. Toma starts things off with Jim Powers. Toma offers a handshake, but Powers gives him an atomic drop instead. In a surreal moment, Vince chastises Jesse Ventura because he felt the bench press segment was boring. Wow, if only Vince had that judgment in entertainment today. Haku and Paul Roma are in now and they do a couple criss-cross sequences with neither looking very clean. One ended with a botched armdrag and the other a sloppy crossbody. Powers gets caught in the heel corner and becomes the first Ricky Morton of the match. Powers boots a charging Haku, but can’t tag his partner. After a double clothesline, both men tag out. Roma hits a weak dropkick on Haku and gets 2. Haku recovers and tosses Roma to the floor. It appears as if Roma injured his knee when he hit the floor. He’s too hurt to get back in, so he’s counted out.

- At this point they returned from a commercial break and announced that Roma was in the back getting checked on by trainers. So they actually stop the match and have Craig DeGeorge interview Andre and Dibiase. They actually have the Islanders still in the ring as they cut their promos. I can’t say I’ve ever seen this before.

Fall #2: The Stallions are back out and Roma has to unfortunately start the match, despite noticeably limping. He manages to get away from Haku and tags Powers. Powers takes it to Haku and gets several nearfalls. The Islanders recover and wear down Powers. They get a number of nearfalls, but can’t quite put him away. Powers avoids a somersault splash, but can’t tag his partner; but then again, why would he? Now Haku misses a dropkick and Powers does tag Roma, which gets no reaction from the crowd. I guess they’re giving him no chance in this match. Roma fires away on Haku, but all it takes is one kick to the leg and he goes down. After Toma splashes the leg, he puts Roma in a half crab and gets him to quickly submit. The Islanders win it in two straight.

BL: I’m not sure if this was a legit injury or not. If it wasn’t, this was a pretty crappy way to end the show. If it was, why have him come back out for fall #2 and risk further injury? I don’t wish ill will on anyone, but if it was a legit injury, you almost have to feel karma played a role here, given the sloppy work Roma displayed before the injury. The match seemed like it wasn’t going to be anything special to begin and then just went in the toilet for that second fall. *

Final Thoughts: It’s a good thing this was televised, because I would have felt bad if people would have had to pay to watch this. There was a lot of skippable fluff on the show and none of the wrestling was extremely noteworthy. Clearly, the appeal here is the first ever Royal Rumble. As I stated earlier, it’s not necessarily a great Rumble, but should be seen for historical purposes. Now that this show is readily available on DVD, I recommend everyone go and check it out to see how this great tradition got started.

Next time, we return back to the normal order and continue our long look into the PPVs of yesteryear.

Until then, thanks for stopping by the OOld Tyme Rasslin Revue.