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UWF Crockett Question

I am asking you this and essentially the site this because I have not seen a response in other Ask like columns:
I have been watching UWF stuff online and I noticed Big Bubba (Ray Traylor) came into the UWF and won their title on April 19, 1987.  With that being said Watts sold the UWF to Crockett on April 9, 1987.  Did Crockett send Big Bubba to UWF to win the title so that a Crockett guy would have the belt?
I also noticed around that time Magnum TA showing up around that time, too, was that a Crockett decision?

Yup, Crockett bought the UWF and absolutely wanted to populate the show with his own guys.  There were big plans for Bubba and it was a pretty darn good way to give him main event experience.  That being said, the whole UWF experiment turned pretty quickly into the same thing as all his other acquisitions did, with Crockett short-sightedly stripping the promotion of all the usable talent (Sting, Steiner, Gilbert, Williams) and then sending his job guys down there to replace them.  Is it any wonder the UWF died so quickly afterwards?  

Comments

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  2. Just wanted to add that One Man Gang was leaving the UWF at the time so they needed a new champion anyway. Real shame that they couldn't put the belt on Gilbert or Sting and then have them build up the promotion more.

    I do however remember being really excited to see Sting and a few of the other UWF guys that I could only read about in the wrestling magazines, so I'm halfway glad that the UWF died as it helped BOTH federations with an influx of new talent.

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  3. IIRC, they were both still heels at the time?  What was the keyfabe rationale for that match taking place?

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  4. I know after the title change, Skandar Akbar switched allegiances to Big Bubba stating the OMG got lazy & wouldn't last as champion so he recruited Bubba to take him out, or something to that effect.

    That was a cool aspect of Bill Watts UWF, there were many heel vs heel programs. Eddie Gilbert vs John Tatum for Missy Hyatt was a good one, and the Freebirds were always fighting Devastation Inc.

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  5. I am the one who asked the question and Bubba looked like he went down there as a face and the crowd was behind him when he won.  It was the week later that 
    Skandar Akbar switched allegiances, that pretty much made it a heel turn, but it was done as a back stage thing.   

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  6. Eddie Gilbert was *really* small; great as a secondary guy, but I don't think he was the guy to lead the promotion.  Sting was already being looked on as Crockett's next horse, so I think they wanted him in JCP as quickly as possible.

    To your point, though: Dr. Death, Sting, One Man Gang, the Freebirds, the Fantastics, the Lightning Express, Chris Adams, Shane Douglas, Ted DiBiase, Rick Steiner, the Wild Samoans.  Jeez, Watts put a HELL of a roster together; I miss the territories and, as you note, the excitement about seeing a guy that you only read about in PWI.  Wendell Cooley, for example, was one of my territory faves based purely on stories about him from the Apter mags.  I never actually saw him wrestle!

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  7. Wildcat Wendell was OK, kind of a James Storm type of character/worker.  Nothing exciting but he was great for the Continental promotion as the local hero type.  

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  8. Wikipedia has Gilbert at 5'10 and 222, that isn't really that small. Smaller than the average wrestler in the 80s but he was on par with Steamboat and Savage, frame wise.

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  9.  Yeah, but that was his "billed" height and weight.  Gilbert was probably about 5'8 and around 210.  Check out this pic of him with Sting, Steiner and JR from the UWF.  JR, who I've met, is around 6'0 even.  Perspective changes, but Gilbert is at least three inches shorter: http://www.jrsbarbq.com/files/images/JR46.jpg.

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  10.  Savage (before he roided to the gills) and Steamboat were both a good bit bigger than Gilbert -- Steamboat was a bit of an anomaly -- Before he came to the WWF for his first run he was yoked and then he got progressively leaner and more natural looking (sort of like Angle in reverse)...

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