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Rugged Ron


Hey Scott,

Why was Ron Garvin a ring announcer/referee in 1989?

Man's gotta have some kind of backup plan if his wrestling career ended early.

Real answer:  It was just an angle so that Garvin could torment Greg Valentine while "suspended" and keep that dull midcard feud going.  I think Garvin was injured and they wanted to keep him on TV.  The matches were actually pretty good because they weren't afraid to wallop the shit out of each other, at least.  

Comments

  1. Seriously horrible feud though.. I remember it sucking it's uncles dick, but watching PTW on Classics has proven it was even worse than memory served..

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  2. A few months ago on Classics, PTW pretty much revolved around the Hammer/Garvin and Taylor/Brawler feuds. The only reason I got through them was Heenan and Gorilla.

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  3. Best thing about Garvin was his shoot interview a few years ago where his voice sounded exactly like a Muppet. None in particular, just Muppet-y.

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  4. I thought it was a creative midcard feud, if nothing else.

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  5. I thought Garvin was incredibly cool back in the day... I guess because his win over Flair was the first NWA title change I saw and his spiky blonde hair seemed cool to me at the time. I remember this feud as when the Hammer was wearing that shin guard and using the figure four as a finisher and IIRC Garvin eventually countered by claiming Valentine hurt him with the move and wore one of his own... good times for my like 8 year old self... I'm guessing I wouldn't find it so enthralling today...

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  6. Their submission match at the 1990 Royal Rumble was really good.

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  7. lol...they were trying to pin each other

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  8. They were probably loopy from beating the holy shit out of one another.


    LOVE that match.

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  9. I love, love, love me some Garvin-Valentine. Fun matches.

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  10. The angles surrounding that feud were silly but the matches they had were enjoyable. The matches worked because they felt like NWA matches transplanted to WWF although the angles surrounding feud were totally 1980s WWF



    It would be amazing if there was a midcard feud today where the wrestlers just decide to get stiff with each other, regardless of whatever else was going on with that feud.

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  11. Sucking it's uncles dick? Legit LOL for that one.

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  12. I love that match more and more every time I watch it. Garvin is OVER by the end of that match, too.

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  13. Excessively detailed background: Garvin was scheduled to run this angle almost exactly against Tully Blanchard in Crockett, right down to becoming a referee after dropping a LLT match. Then came the hasty heel turn and Garvin quitting and it never came up. Some months into the WWF Garvin asked what any plans for him were, and he was told basically "more of the same if you're not released, unless you can think of something." Garvin had the angle in his pocket, and saw a sort of kindred spirit in Greg Valentine, who also wasn't going anywhere in the mid-card and was absolutely cool with working a feud involving two guys pounding the snot out of each other, and pitched it.


    I really hated the feud at the time and Garvin too--too much Apter mag Kool-Aid thinking he was a failure as NWA Champion so therefore he sucked. Looking back, the Valentine matches in general are very good and the submission match is borderline great, and really out of the box by 1990 WWF standards. Garvin's NWA work is of course beyond reproach. The sad part is that may not even be his peak, as he was already in his 40's or close to it and was a major star in Knoxville in the '70s.

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  14. Oh, no shit. Can you imagine this crazy bastard running roughshod through Crockettland?

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