#111 – Smoky Mountain Wrestling TV, April 10, 1993
On this week’s bonus episode we dive into uncharted territories and talk about some Smoky Mountain Wrestling, including a RUSSIAN ROULETTE MATCH, a CHAIN MATCH, and some crazy three team street fight that includes Arn Anderson and the Rock N Roll Express. Please visit flairchop.com for more information on our new book, THE OSWP 500, our box sets, and other great ways to help support the show.
Thank you for doing this episode. I found the episode and am watching it now.
One of you(I think Dre)remarked on a lot of the hardcore aspects of the show and I immediately thought of this…
I my area of the country neither SMW or ECW aired. I knew that Ecw was supposed to be wild and crazy, but remembered looking at the early (1995) RF Video ads and thinking “It seems like SMW is the crazy promotion”.
All of the major SMW shows had crazy gimmick matches. Its strange, they were drawing relatively BIG crowds too. I think they drew 5000 fans a few times which is much more than ECW would do for years.
Looking back though, it was way too southern-themed to enjoy national exposure.
Thank you guys.
Hey guys,
Thanks so much for the bonus episode! I have a stack of 1994 Smokey Mountain TV sitting at my house that I am now a lot more excited to dive into.
Jimmy Golden is best known as Bunkhouse Buck in WCW, managed by none other than Colonel Robert Parker (Rob Fuller). He is second best known as playing “Jack Swagger’s Daddy” on Smackdown, and getting annihilated by the Big Show. Also, I was suprised that noone mentioned that The Dirty White Boy gained “fame” as TL Hopper in the WWF. Unless you said it and I missed it.
Very interesting to hear about a Heavenly Bodies tag team that did not include one of my quiet favorites growing up, Jigelow Jimmy Del Ray.
What little I recall of SMW seems to be confirmed here. I recall it being littered with Bullet Bob, Tracey Smothers, and Dirty White Boy Tony Anthony.
I also remember it being the launching pad for guys like Brian Lee, Chris Candido, Tammy Sytch/Fytch/whatever it actually is, Al Snow, Kane, Adam Bomb, etc.
I definitely had never heard of the Nazi group run by a wheelchair man. Google tells me his name in Ron Wright, not Ron White. Ron White is one of the redneck comedy guys that isn’t a Cable Guy or Jeff Foxworthy.
Great show as always boys, keep it up!
My Quick 1-2-3:
1. “The Dark Side” – The Midnight Express
2. “Blackpool, England” – William/Steven Regal
3. “Waxahachie, Texas” – Trevor Murdoch
Three ain’t enough man I need five
4. “Nesquehoning, Pennsylvania” – Gene Snitsky
5. “Cocoa Beach, Florida” – Rick The Model Martel
What a great episode, never watched SMW but I always love Jim Cornette and ave started to watch some of the SMW stuff available.
I remember Tracy Smothers as Freddy Joe Floyd in the WWE, He was a giant suck Fest. Also The Dirty White boy became TL Hopper in the WWE, THe wrestling Plumber He was an even suckier suckfest.
Paul White had to be a shitty manager, not only did he fly the Nazi Flag but he let his guys go to the top rope during a Chain match……Let us never speak of him again.
Dre, be as inaccurate as you want I have wikipedia open as I listen its all good
Be as inaccurate as you want Dre, but Jesse Ventura was billed from San Diego, California and Superstar Graham from Paradise Valley, Arizona. You were right with Hogan and Sting though. 50% accuracy ain’t bad!
A bonus episode! You guys are awesome.
When I next go to the casino (which will also be the first time). Im definotely heading straight to the Roo-Lay wheel. So much classier than plain old roulette.
As for SMW,I only got to see it through tape trading so it had a mysterious air to it. I always thought it was ironic that the lead tag team were called the Heavenly Bodies when they both looked like your out of shape uncle
My out of shape uncle (when he had a mustache) looked like Rick Steiner, albeit an out of shape Rick Steiner.
Another great show, guys. I used to watch SMW back in the 90s on our local access channel in GA (same one that showed ECW and USWA) late at night.
Want to let you know, Dre, that I too have had the misfortune of being “caught” looking at wrestling in public (it was on my work laptop). Was reading a wrestling newsboard, and some guy in his signature a photo of Val Venis pulling his towel off. One of my co-workers, an older gentleman, looked at me and said, “what in god’s name are you looking at… better yet, I don’t need to know”.
As an aside, I did once catch a guy in a bar watching hard-core porn on a laptop.
Slightly late comment.
My favourite home town was from an old WCW PPV on VCR that I used to own. Sid Vicious was announced as hailing from “anywhere he damn pleases”.
You can have lots of fun imagining the conversation that lead up to that!
Hey guys, the Tank Abbott comment you read in the feedback portion was mine, I think – and I didn’t necessarily mean for it to come off as angry or downright negative as it must have read. Sorry about that. I actually like the show a lot! Even with less than 100% accuracy, you manage to be pretty damn entertaining and I’ve listened to every episode from the Havoc #97 one until this one (soon I’ll be up-to-date, finally), so you must be doing a whole lot of things right. I love that (unlike me, apparently) you’re so positive most of the time and focus on nostalgia and fun instead of ripping into whatever company you’re reviewing. So much of wrestling podcasts and wrestling writing is way too critical – you gentlemen are a very nice exception.
Special thanks for taking some time to talk about Mark Curtis in this episode! He’s easily my favourite referee not just because Mick Foley paints him as an awesome dude in “Have a nice day” but mostly because he really adds a lot to the matches he officiates. I’m not really familiar with SMW and his work there, but Wikipedia tells me that Curtis aka Brian Hildebrand was not only working as a referee but also as head of marketing and sound director.
If WWE ever decides to do a “Best of Smokey Mountain” set, I’d probably buy it just to see the original Heavenly Bodies. Like perhaps some others, I’m mostly familiar with the version consisting of Tom Pritchard and Gigolo Jimmy Del Ray (who was beyond awesome as Jimmy Graffiti on Nitro, by the way) but I’m a fan of Stan Lane’s and of course Jim Cornette is always entertaining, so I bet there was a lot of fun to be had.
Also, since Dre had no memory whatsoever of Jimmy Golden or his camera punching and tag team title winning antics as Bunkhouse Buck in WCW (he briefly held the belts with Dick Slater in 95), here’s a fun fact about him: According to her imdb profile, Katie Holmes (of having been married to Tom Cruise-fame) is Jimmy Golden’s niece. Inside my head, the child that was intimidated and disgusted by Bunkhouse Buck and the teenager who was deeply infatuated with Katie’s character on Dawson’s Creek can’t quite accept this bizarre connection, but here we are…
Sorry about the novel-sized comment – keep up the good work! I’ll be catching up with the new shows soon and hope to give my two cents about them in a more timely manner.
Brain Clark was Nightstalker, Brain Adams was Crush
they did become Kronic later