Year in Review
Throughout the 1980s, the Crockett Family and their associates proved that all of that good pro wrestling – even rasslin’ – could be done at a major league level. They assembled a core group of 20-25 singles and tag wrestlers utilized and positioned so well that they could get away with mixing and matching most pairings on live events and it’d probably work.
A mix of creative principles around human emotion, straight-up logic, and just letting quick-witted personalities be themselves made for a compelling and believable run of greatness that with the benefit of hindsight might be one of the greatest single-product years in professional wrestling history. Correspondingly, they both helped catapult wrestling into the future while also nearly setting everything back by ensuring nobody was going to match up to any of this for a long time.
What follows is a deep dive into Jim Crockett Promotions in 1986 based on a complete watch via the WWE Network and some other places too: the company, timeline, wrestlers, standout stuff, and what this entire year of production made a fellow think and feel.
How We Got Here
Ric Flair, Tully Blanchard, Arn Anderson, Ole Anderson, and manager J.J. Dillon officially-ish came together as the Four Horsemen, providing a bad guy glue that could play off nearly any wrestler up and down the card in singles or tags: rising star Magnum T.A., the dominant Road Warriors, the fan favorite Rock & Roll Express, and of course “The American” Dream” Dusty Rhodes.
Rhodes defeated Ric Flair at Starrcade ’85: The Gathering in a Steel Cage Match for the NWA World Title… until he didn’t, a bait-and-switch announced after the show. Elsewhere, The Rock & Roll Express won the World Tag Titles from The Russians while “Boogie Woogie Man” Jimmy Valiant teamed up with Ron Garvin in drag to beat the Midnight Express.
Magnum T.A. ascended to wrestling greatness as well when he won the U.S. Heavyweight Title and made his arch-nemesis Tully scream “I quit!” by not a simple wrestling hold – but by shoving a splintered piece of wooden chair into his eye. In theory, he had conquered Ric Flair’s #2 and was set as his next challenger and generally the guy who might be able to fend off these Horsemen assholes once and for all.
But first… let’s take A Step Back and talk through the wrestling, the wrestlers, the promos, the stories, and the platform. Then we’ll talk about what actually happened.
The Wrestling
JCP’s roster in 1986 continued to play around with in-ring wrestling psychology and perfecting the finer points of it : pacing a match, a comeback, babyface vs. heel, working shtick, cutoffs, payoffs, broadways, bladejobs, blah blah blah. It’s just more fun to watch. Everybody put more effort into their finishes too, with a complexity that you Just Don’t See These Days. The art is not just in the twists and turns, but the ability and timing of these hairy old men to pull them off and flip the crowd out.
If watching ALL the JCP aired on TV, you are going to see so many squash matches. And while some are outrageous bores, others are the most effective amazing squash matches you will ever see. There are a lot of close-up camera shots on torture and guys trying new moves out just because. The performances and ass-kickings of Ole and Arn Anderson, Tully Blanchard, The Midnight Express, The Road Warriors, and Ron Garvin especially stand out.
The Pavlovian approach to squash after squash of pasty schlubs weekly absolutely works – there is a vibe that anybody can compete with anybody and it goes a long way in keeping things feeling relevant and/or awesome. Even Krusher Khruschev seems like a real badass until Dusty gets a hold of him.
The Wrestlers
JCP in the 80s was usually more about great performances over matches – just watching Tully Blanchard do his thing in multiple scenarios is incredible, even if the actual scenario itself doesn’t always hit. Something as simple as “Ric Flair and Tully Blanchard stare in disbelief at Dusty Rhodes” is worth seeking out just to see the masters at work.
JCP’s crowds in Georgia and the Carolinas were another member of the roster themselves, red hot for anybody resembling a star. ALL the babyfaces are Hulk Hogan here. I am not going to say these folks thought it was real or fake, but the company was booked well enough to make them tick either way. Lots of popping, shrieking, and reacting to finishing stretches like the loser may straight up die.
The Promos
One promo will usually address like five different rivalries or potential rivalries, all the exposition of current WWE but none of the scripting. When one guy rambles on about literally everything else going on the company it feels completely normal and actually helps build up future feuds too. If there’s a gimmick match the wrestler’s will sometimes explain in painstaking detail how it works, and it is more often helpful than off-putting.
In the lead-up to Starrcade they go into promo overdrive and there is an overwhelming amount of gold from all the usual suspects and others too, classic promo after classic promo and classic line after classic line.
The Stories
It also helped that the guys doing these stories were just flat-out some of the greatest pro wrestlers ever putting on some of the greatest week-to-week TV wrestling ever. This is a product trying to sell live events and monthly big shows in their favorite towns like their livelihoods depended on it, and it shows.
They ran around 1-2 “big” angles a month which ranged from logical to incredible, and everybody employed by JCP seemed to be under an agreement to make their brawls as real and ugly as possible – a snug punch to the head that knocks your brain around or getting your face rubbed in the concrete of a locker room floor are simply badges of honor, brother.
Rivalries typically flowed logically from one to the next, whether it was a babyface going after a Horseman’s title or a tag team positioning themselves for a bigger spot. When acts are feuding, it doesn’t become an enclosed bubble nobody can touch – guys stick around and feuds last throughout the year and beyond, clear battle lines drawn between good guys and bad. Tensions would then flare up when it made sense, giving the booker a lot more avenues to play with.
For example, Dusty and Tully had a series of matches in 1985 before Dusty challenged Flair again. When Dusty moves on from Flair at the end of 1985, he hooks up with Baby Doll and re-ignites his feud with Tully that would last on-and-off through the next Starrcade.
All this led to conclusions that ranged from clever to absolute wrestling boner killers. Look no further than the end of Starrcade 1985, where Dusty won the NWA World Title on-screen only to have to give it back due to interference. Or the end of Starrcade 1986, where Ric Flair and Nikita Koloff fought to a double DQ. By trying to keep their guys hot, Jim Crockett Promotions sometimes just pissed everybody off.
Week-to-week there really is not much better or more exciting in wrestling than following JCP, but they definitely had a way of delivering on the angles and the build-up but not the ACTUAL final matches.
The Platform
The talent helps, but studio wrestling is a special thing – both for what it actually is and what it can get away with. It is an infomercial, packed with promos and squashes to get people to buy a ticket to something else. In some ways, this is the ultimate pro wrestling atmosphere: bright blue ring, flags from multiple countries hanging from the ceiling, and a host’s podium in front of the classic WCW globe backdrop.
Dusty never wrestled on this show while Flair did a few times, and any time Flair laces up in the studio it is gold – four-star matches with names ranging from Ricky Morton to Mike Jackson, and awesome squash tag matches with his Horsemen brothers.
A young and mustachioed Tony Schiavone and Jim Crockett Jr.’s brother David play your unassuming hosts, Tony the straight man who keeps things on track and David the excited fanboy pretending he keeps things on track. Jim Cornette occasionally joins to rile things up as co-host too.
The crowd is at most a hundred deep, some recurring including a group of Horsemen bros in suits. Anything above a whisper usually gets picked up, so you’re hearing everything from audible anger at rule-breaking spots to audible horror when Ron Garvin chops a layer of skin off a man’s chest. Any weird moment of silence or dead spot is usually broken up by somebody calling out, a Southern belle calling for someone to break an arm or a cheesy 80s chant like “Ole is a wimp!”
The crowd also becomes a part of the promos sometimes, adding to the organic (thank you Stone Cold) feel of the program when a guy can’t help but respond to what everybody heard.
Rather than a glitzy arena event, it feels like somebody set a ring up and now everybody who’s around wants to fight. These are two-hour-long shows filled with nothing but promos and squash matches, but they get away with it because everything flows logically and you shouldn’t expect anything else. If something big happens in the arenas, they’ll usually show it too. The best of both worlds!
Things are Bad Sometimes
But it can be boring. Really boring. The Saturday show is an hour-and-a-half without commercials. I didn’t mention the bad squashes either. There are tons of bad squashes, some that go over 10 whole minutes. Nobody needs to see even one Wahoo McDaniel squash match, and there are TONS of them.
There is a reason the masses took more easily to the WWF’s fast-paced product – sweaty Ron Garvin cranking some guys’ neck while David Crockett yells like a self-assured dork isn’t going to be for everybody.
Baby Doll goes from Tully’s girl to Dusty’s to Cornette’s enemy to Warlord’s manager to Flair’s girl to manager of The Midnight Express and nothing really takes, starting with the fact that her name is BABY DOLL and the brass in charge of JCP are absolute creeps about it – super excited that a GIRL is here at the wrestling.
There is plenty of time-killing and clunkiness from guys who don’t belong either too. A Flair or Dusty promo doesn’t save everything.
What Happened in 1986
The first few months of the year set up the Dusty/Tully/Baby Doll story that Dusty seemed more enamored with than anybody else, and puts Ron Garvin in the Four Horsemen’s crosshairs when Ronnie knocks Flair out, a scenario they’d come back to a few times. The Magnum T.A./Nikita Koloff feud also kicks off when the young Russian Nightmare says he wants the U.S. Title.
They are also spent on the first Crockett Cup, a one-night 24-team tournament with $1M on the line. This gives the core roster stuff to talk about and build character without actually giving anything away besides $1M. The Road Warriors win, a show of dominance among all the others. It’s a great top-to-bottom show with a bit of filler but great cameos, no less than five classic tags, and one of the better Dusty vs. Flair matches. WWE Network uploaded the entire thing in June 2019 when they still did Hidden Gems.
The Four Horsemen are the constants, Ric Flair always there to defend the championship or talk all the greatest shit. Tully Blanchard is right there with him as a top guy, a tremendous complement for Dusty when Flair/Dusty gets stale. Arn Anderson keeps TV interesting during one of his many TV Title runs, while Ole Anderson is sporadic for the first half of the year with an injury before resuming his team with Arn in June and being the surliest bastard known to man. J.J. Dillon moves everything along too, his role as the Horsemen and especially Tully’s manager the story device that helps things make sense when there are stipulations or money on the line.
The Magnum/Nikita feud positions both as the next big things, leading to a Best of 7 Series over the U.S. Title during the Summer. Magnum also gets to team and hang out with Dusty Rhodes as “America’s Team.” This is of course counter to Nikita and Ivan Koloff’s Russian Team. America’s Team also feuds with The Midnight Express throughout the Spring and Summer, first under masks as The James Boys and then with Baby Doll at their side punching out Jim Cornette every night. Big Bubba Rogers also makes his debut as the bodyguard of Jim Cornette, introduced with a great angle where Dusty breaks a chair over his head and he doesn’t budge.
The Bunkhouse Match gimmick debuts at Great American Bash in July, a tour that blows off the first half of the year with 14 shows in a row, Flair defending the title every single night. The always-credible Wahoo McDaniel gets called out by newcomer Gorgeous Jimmy Garvin, and when they aren’t having Strap Matches the Chief keeps Tully busy in the Summer too. Nikita goes on to win the the Best of 7 Series while Blue Collar Ron Garvin moves on from dressing in drag at Starrcade to play a variety of roles: Flair challenger, tag team guy, Cornette killer.
Jimmy Valiant gets turned on by both “Ragin’ Bull” Manny Fernandez and Pistol Pez Whatley throughout the year, both recruited with cash to Paul Jones’ Army. Manny eventually forms a tag team with Rick Rude that seems primed for success. Dick Murdoch returns in the Fall as a babyface while Starrcade 1986 begins to heat up, and Gorgeous Jimmy keeps Magnum T.A. busy before they can fire up the Magnum/Flair angle.
But Magnum T.A. has a car accident in October, paralyzing him and ended his career. Magnum vs. Flair was the obvious Starrcade main event, so JCP quickly turned Nikita Koloff babyface by having him save Dusty from a beatdown, apologize to Magnum, and pledge his allegiance to the United States.
Starrcade ’86: The Sky Walkers tried to close the year and bridge to the next, a show that reaped the rewards of all the good booking that preceded it but didn’t necessarily deliver. Flair vs. Nikita was a wildcard that made perfect sense despite tragedy, but it was just an OK match that went to a double DQ. Tully cheated to win and beat Dusty Rhodes in a match that didn’t end their feud for a second.
I loved how both the Steel Cage and Scaffold tag matches came together – Road Warriors, Midnights, Rock & Rolls, Andersons – greatest tag team division there ever was. The Rock & Roll Express get a huge pop when they beat The Andersons for the Tag Team Titles and Jim Cornette blows both his knees out when the Warriors throw him off a Scaffold. Also, Jimmy Valiant turns Paul Jones into a bald-headed geek.
As 1986 comes to a close JCP heads to the Rosemont Horizon for the fist time, teases trouble with The Andersons, and starts talking Crockett Cup again. As usual though, they just kind of sat back and reaped the rewards of a consistent wrestling product. 1987 would bring a ton of changes, but for now things were… normal.
