Chris Flackett
The NWA and Jim Crockett Promotions in 1987: after a hot summer for the Alliance with the Great American Bash tour doing strong attendance numbers, Jim Crockett Jr. was optimistic that their first ever Pay-Per-View, Starrcade ’87: Chi-Town Heat, would capitalise on their summer’s success and would legitimise their place as serious competition to the runaway train of sucess that was the WWF.
It didn’t quite happen.
The story of Starrcade ’87 is well known in wrestling circles, of course, but it bears repeating, if only as a cautionary tale for promoters who overestimate their product and underestimate the lengths WWE will go to so as to strike a blow against their competitors.
Starrcade ’87 is the end result of Jim Crockett Jr’s hubris, ultimately. He decided to run the show in Chicago, traditionally a WWF town rather than an NWA one. Starrcade had traditionally run from Greensboro, key Crockett territory, and it was felt that Crockett was trying to prove that he was as big as Vince and the WWF by running the show in Chicago, at the cost of upsetting all the fans in the South that had supported Crockett for so long. The Chicago fans weren’t even particularly impressed, seeing that Starrcade was taking place in the local college arena rather than the city’s main arena. It only made the NWA appear secondary to the WWF.
Not only that, but Vince McMahon decided to hurt the show by running his own PPV, the inaugural Survivor Series, on the same day. If that wasn’t enough of a blow to Crockett, Vince instructed cable providers that they would not have access to WrestleMania IV if they ran Starrcade. As a consequence of Vince’s aggressive manoeuvring, Starrcade ’87 would receive a decent amount of buys, but would not be anywhere near the success it could have been.
Now, with the scene set, it’s November 26th, 1987; we’re in the UIC Pavillion, Chicago, Illinois; it’s Starrcade ’87: Chi-Town Heat—let’s go down to the ring and into the action!
The Opening
We get the classic Turner Home Entertainment logo, and we go straight into a cool video package, where each match is featured by utilising clips of each wrestler in bone-breaking action before displaying stills of the grapplers next to the Starrcade ’87 logo, all soundtracked by a kind of synthy funk-rock instrumental that couldn’t scream ‘the eighties’ any louder if it tried.
Jim Ross and Tony Schiavone are your commentators, sitting at a desk, complete with a grey Starrcade star, that is strangely reminiscent of the desks the likes of Schiavone, Mike Tenay and ‘The Brain’ would start PPVs from in the late-nineties. Good Ol’ J.R. pumps us up by shouting out the five title matches on the card tonight, and we’re straight down to ringside for the first match.
Eddie Gilbert, Rick Steiner & Larry Zbyszko (w/ Baby Doll) vs. Sting, Michael ‘PS’ Hayes & ‘Gorgeous’ Jimmy Garvin (w/ Precious)
Jim Crockett Promotions had bought out Bill Watts’ UWF earlier in the year, and this opening contest is a showcase of that particular company’s younger talent (and Zbyszko, who was born old, I imagine). The heels are already in the ring, meaning we get the odd sight of Sting coming out with the proto-Freebirds to ‘Badstreet USA’. And while the WWF had the edge on production, putting out a clearer, brighter-looking product (although still not as bright as it would be the following year—look at the difference in quality of image between WrestleMania III and WrestleMania IV), Crockett was trying here, with the entrance music rocking and pumping out at good volume, and the entranceway being doused liberally in coloured lights and fog to make the entrance feel big and sporting, like a boxing match—a literal big fight feel, and certainly grittier, less polished than the WWF.
This is a fun little opener that moves at a good speed, and even Zybyszko’s rest holds are short and kept to a minimum. Sting is noticeably over with the crowd, who come alive every time he’s in the ring. I’m not saying you can see his future stardom in this match, but you can tell even here that he had something, and it’s only four months after this that Sting and Flair would hook up in the main event of the first Clash of the Champions. He’s energetic throughout, hitting a nice dive onto his former UWF tag team champion partner Rick Steiner on the outside, and hitting the soon-to-be-famous Stinger Splash on Steiner in the corner.
Hayes is popular, if not as popular as Sting, moonwalking around the ring and getting some near-falls in the closing stretch. Garvin does the Ricky-Morton-in-Peril spot, Gilbert bumps around well for everyone, and Zybysko is inoffensive. Even Steiner, who arguably is used the least here, looks built and manages to get some hard clubbing blows on Sting in the opening, and turns a bear hug on Hayes into tasty-looking belly to belly suplex. Whatever you may think of Crockett purchasing the UWF and what he did with the talent, you have to admit he struck gold with Sting and Steiner.
The end is a little disappointing, with a Hayes sunset flip on ‘Hot Stuff’ looking like it would cinch victory, only for the time limit to expire. Still, this was a fun little match, and the crowd was enthusiastic. Sometimes that’s all you need for an opener.
Winners: N/A (15-minute time limit draw)
Backstage, Missy Hyatt hypes up the backstage atmosphere and pushes the main event, and almost forgets what she’s saying at the end. Must have been all that excitement backstage…
UWF World Heavyweight Champion ‘Dr Death’ Steve Williams vs. Western States Heritage Champion Barry Windham
You can see how much the UWF was thought of by Crockett, even though he bought them: their world title match was placed second on the bill and given just under seven minutes. Not long after this, the UWF World Heavyweight Championship title would be retired while Williams was in Japan (the Western States Heritage title, or at least this version of it, would be retired in 1989).
This is a very strange match, in that both guys are meant to be friends, so that when an opportunity opens for one of them to go for the kill, they back off—at least at first. Mat wrestling makes up the bulk of the match, and I’ve seen reviews really criticise this, not forgetting the fans audibly chanting ‘boring’ during the match, but I actually enjoyed the actual wrestling part of things—it was the nonsense that went with it that drags the match way down. See, Dr Death goes to leapfrog Windham, only to catch his little ‘Dr Deaths’ on Big Barry’s head. Williams really sells the accidental nut shot for what must be 30 seconds but feels like an hour, but Barry won’t take advantage, much to the crowd’s annoyance. Windham then misses a charge and goes hurtling over the ropes and into a table in an admittedly cool spot. Williams, though, is not so kind and rolls Windham up as he slips back in the ring for the decisive three-count.
I could live with that if they ever paid it off, like with a Williams heel turn that wasn’t The Varsity Club and a Windham return victory, but they never did. In any case, the mat wrestling I actually enjoyed, and there was potential here, but I’d love to meet whoever booked this and ask them what they were smoking when they laid this one out.
Winner: ‘Dr Death’ Steve Williams
Skywalker Match: The Midnight Express (w/ Jim Cornette & Big Bubba Rogers) vs. The Rock ‘n’ Roll Express
A Skywalker match, for those who don’t know, is not a duel with light sabres (although watch Tony Khan introduce that one day), but is a scaffold match, just by a different name. I don’t tend to like these matches, mainly because, with the narrowness of the scaffold itself, there’s not a lot wrestlers can do without the risk of unintentionally falling off. This one, however, is one of the better ones I’ve seen, just because the chemistry between these two teams was always insane.
Robert Gibson found himself alone on the scaffold with The Express to start, as Bubba attacked Ricky in the ring. This worked to Morton’s advantage, however, as he stole Cornette’s tennis racket and, climbing to the top, set about Eaton and Sweet Stan as if it was Wimbledon.
With the scaffold limiting action, the racket shots became a big part of things, and both Gibson and Eaton were split open. Lane decided to begin climbing down the scaffold (surely that’s self-defeating in a match like this?), so Morton followed and eventually knocked Stan to the mat. Moments later, after Morton literally spanked Eaton(!) with the racket, the RNR boys sent Eaton to the mat also. Eaton noticeably hung from the underside of the scaffold first, so it wasn’t as big a drop. Clever lad. Afterwards, Bubba scaled the scaffold, only for Ricky Morton to hit him in the nuts and clamber away. I’m noticing a theme with this show…
Your mileage will vary on a match like this, but this is probably one of only a couple of scaffold matches I actually like, mainly because these two teams could always put on an entertaining contest, and also because it didn’t outstay its welcome. Maybe that’s damning with faint praise, but with a scaffold match, I’ll take it.
Winners: The Rock ‘n’ Roll Express
Backstage, Michael Hayes, Jimmy Garvin and Precious talk to Bob Caudle about the other matches on the card and how they’ll be coming for the tag titles. I say Hayes and Precious spoke, but Garvin, rambling at hyper-speed, kept on…and on…and on, with Hayes standing like a spare part at an orgy. It’s unintentionally one of the funniest promos I’ve ever heard. I don’t know if it was nerves or something recreational, but it was hilarious.
‘Dr Death’ then tells Bob Caudle that Barry Windham gave him a hell of a match, but the UWF title is like the Super Bowl, so he will go 210% to protect his belt as he is a wrestling machine. This, sadly, was anything but hilarious…
TV Title Unification Match: Nikita Koloff vs. Terry Taylor (w/ ‘Hot Stuff’ Eddie Gilbert)
This was to unify the UWF and NWA TV titles, which begs the question of why they didn’t do the same with the Heavyweight titles. At the very least, we might have got a great match out of Flair and ‘Dr Death’.
Terry Taylor doesn’t get enough credit for his time as a performer, and that is a real shame. Case in point: this is a solid match that no one ever really talks about. It tells a good story, where Taylor is unable to match Nikita’s power, so he has to rely on cheap shots and interference from Eddie Gilbert to make any kind of impact. Nikita mainly shrugs this off until he misses the Sickle finisher, at which point Taylor gets to throw Nikita into the guard rail and twist his arm around the ring post. But he still can’t get the job done.
Gilbert and Taylor make a great heel pairing, and they almost pull off the victory too, with Gilbert hitting Nikita in the leg with a chair, before Taylor locks in a figure four, ‘Hot Stuff’ pulling Taylor’s arms for extra leverage. The ref breaks up the hold when he notices, but Taylor distracts him so that Gilbert can sneak a choke in. Nikita pulls Eddie up to the apron, Terry charges but hits Gilbert instead and, with the crowd on his feet, hits the Sickle to get the decisive 1-2-3 as the crowd goes batshit. That pop is insane—Nikita was really over with the Chicago crowd here, deservedly so, after such a wonderfully intense performance. It’s an exhilarating end to a highly entertaining contest.
Winner: Nikita Koloff
NWA World Heavyweight Tag Team Champions Arn Anderson & Tully Blanchard (w/ J.J. Dillon) vs. The Road Warriors (w/ Paul Ellering
This, on paper, had the makings of being the match of the night. The Road Warriors, the most over team on the NWA roster, in the home town of Chicago, wrestling for the tag titles that they’d never held, against the biggest heels in the company in members of The Four Horsemen, a team everyone wanted to see dethroned. It should have been an easy victory. Instead…
It’s not a bad match, and it tells a pretty good story. Tully and Arn try everything to get around Animal and Hawk’s strength and power, from using their speed to avoid moves to taking it to the mat, and to engaging in dastardly deeds such as clipping Hawk’s knee when he has Tully up for a press slam, with Tully smashing said knee outside the ring with a steel chair afterwards.
Up to that point, The Road Warriors were dominant, as you might expect, throwing Tully and Arn around with ease, the Horsemen duo bouncing around well for the home team. But after Hawk’s knee was clipped, it was all Horsemen, with the pair demonstrating strong limbwork so as to disable Hawk from being able to stand and throw them around. It didn’t last, with Animal getting the hot tag and all four men going hell for leather in the ring.
So far so good, even if it felt we hadn’t really moved into next gear. But then came a moment of ridiculous booking from the late Dusty Rhodes, a decision so bad that fans still criticise him for this day.
Tully is being chased around ringside, and as he runs back into the ring, he knocks referee Tommy Young over the ropes to the floor. Earl Hebner runs down, just as Animal backdrops Arn over the top rope. One Doomsday Device later, and The Road Warriors are the new champions, to a hell of a pop from their home crowd…until Tommy Young gets back in the ring and disqualifies the Roadies for having dumped Arn over the top rope—completely neglecting the fact that Tully had already knocked Young out of the ring in the first place, something that should have disqualified the Horsemen instead.
If they’d done that first and DQ’d The Horsemen, then, if they really didn’t want to put the belts on the Road Warriors, that would have at least given the Chicago team a home victory. But to tease the crowd that ‘their’ team had won the gold, only to have the belts snatched away by a ridiculous piece of booking, was a slap in the face and damaged relations between Crockett/WCW and Chicago for several years. A shame, as, with an extra five minutes and a proper ending, this could have been something special.
*
Meanwhile, backstage, to pass time as the cage is put up, Magnum T.A. tells Jack Gregory he’s shocked about The Road Warriors losing (not as shocked as that Chicago crowd), and puts over Ronnie Garvin and Dusty Rhodes (of course). Bob Caudle then has the pleasure of an intense Nikita Koloff—stating that being the only TV champion makes his heart ‘feel good’ and J.J. Dillon says that he and Lex Luger have the perfect plan. Shame that Luger was wrestling the booker…
Cage Match: NWA United States Champion ‘The Total Package’ Lex Luger (w/J.J. Dillon) vs. ‘The American Dream’ Dusty Rhodes
The extra stipulation here is that if Dusty loses, he will be unable to wrestle for 90 days. Which isn’t great for the wallet, I know, but isn’t the worst stipulation for ‘The Dream’. It’s not like it was a Loser Leaves Town bout. He’d already done the whole ‘Midnight Rider’ thing, so they weren’t giving much for the fans to get invested in. They never did explain why it needed to be a cage match either—the cynic in me assumes Dusty wanted to steal some limelight away from Flair’s main event steel cage encounter.
In any case, considering the stipulations and the feud, this was a strangely heatless encounter. An old-school NWA cage match usually meant two men (sometimes four) who wanted to absolutely tear the flesh off each other—think Magnum and Tully. This was polite by comparison, with the cage only coming into play a couple of times—Dusty bled, naturally. But large parts were dedicated to the oft-lethal arm bars, both from Dusty and Luger. Lex did attempt the Torture Rack but couldn’t pull it off, dropping Dusty into the ropes as a consequence.
In the end, while the ref was down, the villainous Dillon threw a steel chair over the cage into the ring, but Dusty got to Luger first and dropped him with a DDT onto the chair for the 1-2-3 to, admittedly, a big pop from the Chicago audience. A big criticism of this match is that Dusty booked himself over the guy Crockett was grooming to be the next big thing. I don’t mind that so much, in that Luger was clearly not ready yet to be in a position where he could lead a big upper-card match. More concerning was Dusty booking himself a championship he didn’t need when the Road Warriors, in the perfect place at the perfect time, were booked to lose. And it was to the company’s detriment.
A highly skippable match.
Cage Match: NWA World Heavyweight Champion ‘Rugged Ronnie Garvin vs. ‘Nature Boy’ Ric Flair
It’s a bold move to have your biggest star be the challenger in the main event on your first-ever PPV, when no one bought into the champion or doubted that Flair would win. Two months before this, Crockett put the NWA World Heavyweight Championship around the waist of ‘Rugged’ Ronnie Garvin, a hard-hitting, popular wrestler, but not someone who had ever been considered a legitimate main eventer, never mind a world champion. The fans didn’t buy him as the top dog, and could tell he was only given the title to set up a title change back to Flair at Starrcade. It was arguably cynical booking, for an event that was full of cynical booking, and the fans saw through it and rejected it (it’s quite a thing hearing Garvin being booed throughout the match and having chants of ‘Ronnie sucks!’ shouted at him).
But, with all that said, I actually enjoy this match and think it deserves a lot more respect than it gets. I’m not trying to claim it as some kind of lost classic, but it’s a hard-hitting slugfest that’s perfectly paced and has a genuinely exciting final stretch. It also seems a little more in-tune with modern times than you’d imagine, keeping in mind the strikefests of the likes of a Minoru Suzuki or Eddie Kingston.
The opening moments bear this out, as Garvin and Flair slap the absolute tar out of each other—in fact, Garvin goes in harder than Flair and some of his shots genuinely made me wince. Here is the heat that was needed in the previous match. Flair, being ‘The Dirtiest Player in the Game’, only finds his advantage after he’s able to low-blow Garvin’s ‘Genitals of Stone’. Ric then slows the pace down, working methodically over Garvin’s leg before locking in the figure four. Garvin eventually manages to turn it around and makes a comeback by blocking a throw into the cage, and grinding Flair’s forehead into the steel mesh instead, giving Flair colour. A figure four attempt of Garvin’s own only results in a rope break, though.
The pace begins to quicken as we enter the final stretch, and Garvin nails a couple of leg snaps, followed by an exchange of blistering shots and some more bumps into the cage. Garvin piles on the pressure with near-falls from a flying crossbody and a backslide. Flair gets crotched after being knocked from the top rope, and a sunset flip from the top gets a close two, as does the knockout punch. The crowd are wild for the near falls.
Finally, Garvin leaps, but his faith is not rewarded, as Flair falls backwards and Garvin bashes his head into the metal bar in the middle of the cage wall, giving Flair the 1-2-3 and another reign with the Big Gold Belt, to a massive pop from the crowd. Despite that, and perhaps realising he wasn’t meant to be being cheered, Flair hightails it with the belt pretty quickly, and that’s that.
A really good match that I hope is re-evaluated in the future, it’s not up there with the classic battles against Steamboat and Dusty, but Flair and Garvin did well and ended the night on a high note. Respect.
Final Thoughts
Starrcade ’87 is not a good show, ultimately. Considering that this was the NWA’s first PPV, plus the fact that Vince was running Survivor Series on the same night, you would expect Crockett to go all guns blazing. Instead, this show feels incredibly flat, even compared to the three Starrcades prior to this. Whereas they had felt like big shows, this doesn’t. Something in the presentation and the atmosphere doesn’t sell the importance of the event.
The booking didn’t help, of course. No disrespect to these performers, but when Nikita Koloff and Terry Taylor are putting on the second-best match of the night, something isn’t quite right somewhere. But outside of their match, the decent opener and the exciting main event, there really isn’t much to recommend Starrcade ’87 outside of historical interest. Not too long after this, Crockett would sell JCP to Ted Turner, and while hindsight is 20/20, watching this show, the writing was clearly on the wall.
