Remembering Saturday Night's When It Was THE MAIN EVENT

One of the things that is missing in wrestling today is the big event feel that we had back in the 1980’s there are lots of reasons it is gone. It begins with the amount of television time dedicated to wrestling today. When I was a kid wrestling consisted of basically two hours a week that both happened on a Saturday. It was WWE Superstars in the afternoon and at 7pm we had WWE Wrestling on CHCH a local broadcaster here in Hamilton that would feature one of the matches from Maple Leaf Gardens or Copps Coliseum.

Every once in awhile there was a special Saturday that I could stay up late and watch this show called Saturday Night’s Main Event. It was used by NBC as a fill in instead of airing a re-run of Saturday Night Live every couple of months. It began back in May of 1985 and ran through 1992. It also produced The Main Event which was broadcast a couple of times on Friday that served as the lead up to both Wrestle Mania 4 and 5. Wrestling in prime time on broadcast television not cable was unheard of and really had not happened since the 1950’s.

What made Saturday Night’s Main Event so great was it featured matches that we had never seen and often feature World Title matches that back in those days were rarely if every on T.V. You needed to go to your local house show if you wanted to see Hulk Hogan as the WWE Champion. Any time he appeared on T.V it was a massively big deal. This is a big change from modern times, where the Champion can be seen every Monday and most of the time is wrestling in a match but is definitely featured on the show.

There was not the access of information like today either so even if these matches had happened at house shows most of the time if we saw a match on Saturday Night’s Main Event it was something that for the majority of the audience was a fresh and new match they had never seen. It had some strange matches like the time Randy “Macho Man” Savage would defend his intercontinental title against Jake “The Snake” Roberts. Both at the time were considered heels and it made for something unique and bizarre for that time in wrestling. In reality it was the WWE floating the idea of making Jake “the Snake” Roberts a good guy. WWE would go back to this feud with Savage as a face and Roberts as a heel years later.

It was a show that in the early years was built around Hulk Hogan and he would have his title defenses against the guys he current would have feuds with or be the starts to feuds for him. Matches against guys like Volkoff, Hercules, Mr. Wonderful, Sika and insert the next bad guy for Hulk Hogan to defeat here. The show as time moved on became a vehicle to set up things for big pay-per-view events or closed circuit events prior to the days of PPV.

It set up Bundy against Hogan in Wrestlemania 2 as Bundy came out and with the help of Don Muraco laid waste to the Champion. Wrestlemania 3 was built on having Hogan and Andre in a Battle Royal and having the Giant easily eliminate Hogan. The Main Event shows I mentioned earlier saw Hogan lose to Andre in the re-match of their Wrestlemania 3 match as their were two refs (The Hebner Brothers) that looked like twins and the evil thinner one counted Hogan out after he had clearly kicked out. Andre would surrender the title to Ted Dibiase how back in December the year prior had tried to buy the WWF Title from Hogan unsuccessfully. This was his plan B to have Andre win the belt for him and give him the title. It would be ruled that you could not in fact buy the title (News to fans these days with replica belts) and Jack Tunney created the tournament that would headline Wrestlemania 4. The next year the show would feature the break-up of the Mega-Powers leading to the Savage vs. Hogan Wrestlemania 5 main event.

To my knowledge it has yet to appear on the WWE Network of yet. If I am guessing it is because some deal would need to be worked out with NBC perhaps. It may just be content they are holding back that they have the full rights too. When it does pop up and if you’re younger and going back to check it out I am not sure if you’ll understand just how big every match on those shows felt in the present time period they occurred. It was something that once Monday Night Raw came around took away from what was unique and special about the show. It was rare back in those days to see any featured performers face off in a match against on another. It was mostly Randy Savage against some generic jobber. Some of the job guys in WWE stood out but for the most part it was some star you knew against so guy you had never heard of. The result was obvious but it was still entertaining. Saturday Night’s Main Event sometimes it would be obvious too but not as much when you had top guys squaring off with perhaps the exception of Hogan. He was always going to win and it is why Andre winning the Belt on that Main Event show, was more or as shocking back than for fans, as it was to see the Streak of the Undertaker being beaten in modern times was.

The WWE attempted to recreate the magic in 2005 and bring back Saturday Night’s Main Event but it just wasn’t the same as we get to see these types of matches every week on Raw. To an extent it is the same issue the WWE has trying to make pay-per-views seem special when they really can’t avoid having wrestlers in feuds interacting with each other in a physical way before the big money matches.

I miss what it felt like to get ready for a Saturday Night’s Main Event. Staying up way past my bedtime eating things that no one should be at that late hour it made it feel special. It was a unique piece of my childhood that I will never forget.

NXT is supposed to be this window to the future for the WWE and it is in some senses. In others it is a throwback to the old 80’s style of pro wrestling with just one hour of T.V a week and the ability to keep guys away from each other prior to a big match. Great example comes from this past NXT with Tyler Breeze being on commentary during Adrian Neville’s match with RVD. They also have started having big shows every few months that are treated as Special Events. They have a feel much like a cross between a traditional pay-per-view and a Saturday Night’s Main Event. It goes two hours which is 30 minutes longer than the old Saturday Night’s Main Events and has no commercials. It does however fall just about hour shy of the traditional WWE pay-per-view.

It is the closest thing I will get to do short of  remembering fondly my childhood memories until the WWE Network gets to Canada and they get Saturday Night’s Main Event on the WWE Network.

Condo on the Moon is on Twitter and Facebook and check out our weekly podcasts Every Friday! You can find us now at Condoonthemoon.com

Top Ten Foreign Bad Guys Of All Time In WWE

In honor of the WWE finally sort of getting the Rusev gimmick right it got me thinking of all the bad foreign heels that caused fans to chant U.S.A. It was some of the cheapest heat you can get in wrestling but it works there is no denying it So in WWE what foreign acts got you mad as heck?


10. Dino Bravo: He was brought in as the French Canadian strong man who replaced Brutus Beefcake in the “Dream Team” after that he would move on to singles career with a new manager Frenchy Martin. He would try to set the bench press record on what would turn out to be the first ever Royal Rumble in Hamilton, Ontario my hometown. Jessie Ventura assisted and the record lift would be disputed. 

 9. Sika: You might know his son Roman Reigns. But old school wrestling fans remember the Wild Samoans and were a three-time tag-team Champion. He also had a run leading up to a match with Hulk Hogan on Saturday Night’s Main Event. He was known at the time for eating live animals. This was a real old school crazy savage gimmick that in 2014 would never pass the politically correct test.

8. Muhammad Hassan: Technically speaking Hassan was an American and should not be on such a list. However in the post 9/11 world this was a gimmick that perhaps touched way to close to home on many levels. Hassan was a Muslim American that claimed he was mistreated by America in a post 9/11 world. It was a very edgy gimmick when it started but by the end of it became a comic foil for an aging Hulk Hogan. This was an angle that really was one of the more edgy things WWE did since the Slaughter angle during the Iraq war.

7. Mr Fuji: He managed a host of both people from outside of the U.S as well as American’s as well. Fuji was also a foreign bad guy himself in the ring in his younger days. He was always the man with the cane and Master Fuji loved to watch his men’s opposition suffer. Outside of his character in WWE he was known as being one of the bigger backstage jokesters.

6. The Mountie: We could have gone with both Jacques and Raymond as the Rougeau brothers. But honestly The Mountie was that campy 80’s heel long after that had gone out of fashion. It would lead to former a tag-team called the Quebecers as well managed by Johnny Polo who later would be known to the world as Raven. The most famous Mountie Moments were him losing the I-C Title to Roddy Piper for his only title run in WWE. He also lost a jailhouse match to the Big Boss Man in which the loser would have to spend the night in jail. He lost and the fun of what happened after showed how funny Jacques could be. Jacques also was the first trainer for one Kevin Steen who is on his way to WWE soon.

5. Yokozuna: A former WWE Champion and one of the biggest men to ever be in a WWE Ring. He never said much and had mangers like Fuji who during this run forgot how to speak English and Jim Cornette to back up the massive man. He really didn’t need the help. He was used in the angle to try and get Lex Luger over by having him slam him on a U.S Warship on July the fourth. It didn’t work and WWE decided to keep the belt on Yokozuna even with the plan originally being him losing at Summerslam that year. He also was a winner of the Royal Rumble and holds a rare win over Hulk Hogan in WWE.

4. Sergeant Slaughter Iraqi Sympathizer: WWE had an idea to cash in on the tension between Iraq and world as a whole in the 90’s. They just never expected things in real life to escalate as fast as they did. Sergeant Slaughter turned his back on America calling the nation weak and he now followed a new leader Saddam Hassan. He would beat the Warrior with some help from Randy Savage and become the WWF World Champion. Around the same time the real war with U.S and Iraq had broken out in real life. It caused the WWF to change plans for Wrestlemania. Slaughter was getting legit death threats and that is not a work it was very much real. Hogan would save America and win the title at Wrestlmania and feud would go on to Summerslam and go far to long as the War ended before this feud leading to some awkwardness and a low point for WWF.

3. Bret Hart: Yes for most of his career he was a beloved baby face. It did for a period of time become very clear that he was from Canada. He became a Canadian Hero and one of the most hated people in the U.S. It was one of the most interesting times in wrestling where a wrestler being heel or face was literally based on what country the show was in.

2. Nikolai Volkoff: He was the tag-team partner of the Iron Sheik and his singing of the Russian National Anthem is one of the most memorable gimmicks in the history of wrestling. If Rusev could get over half as well as Volkoff WWE should be thrilled. He didn’t have a hot blonde with him he had the legendary Classy Freddie Blassie as his manger. He would later be paired with the doctor of style Slick.

1. Iron Sheik: Ask him on twitter he will tell you he is a legend. I am not going to argue with him so he will want to make me humble. He truly is the classic 80’s foreign heel. He said every single time what he thought of the U.S and more importantly for me Canada. He was the heel champion that launched Hulk-a-Mania. He has become a social media icon in modern times and started to reclaim his fame with appearance on the Howard Stern Show. But perhaps his best moment was winning the Gimmick Battle Royal based on the simple face he could not take the bump to go out of the ring. Fans loved the result though and booed Slaughter for putting him in the Cobra Clutch.

So how did we do? There is a long list of guys you could include. One name I considered was Andre the Giant but it was never really played up the fact he was from France as much as the fact he turned his back on the fans. Killer Kahn, Orient Express, Akeem the African Dream, Kamala we could go on for days. Hope you enjoyed the list.


Condo on the Moon is on Twitter and Facebook and check out our weekly podcasts Every Friday! You can find us now at Condoonthemoon.com