The Wrestling Observer Yearbook '97: The Last Time WWF Was Number Two

by Dave Meltzer

  Brown starting working with Russell, whose legacy in Memphis wrestling dates to the 50s, on WHBQ, Ch. 13, where he served as the weatherman on the news. In the late 70s, the television wrestling show moved from Ch. 13 to Ch. 5 with Russell as host, and a short time later, strings were pulled to lure Brown from Ch. 13 to Ch. 5 to be both the weatherman and wrestling announcer. Brown became the singular host of the show in 1989 when Russell moved on to WCW.

  Apparently there was some sort of a remark from Burton, who has heat with just about everyone in the Memphis territory except owner Jerry Lawler, that led to Brown abruptly calling it quits. Several other wrestlers have either quit or threatened to quit or are looking to quit for similar reasons.

  The feeling was that after investing nearly 30 years of Saturday mornings, the combination of heat with Burton and it just being time to take his Saturday mornings back led to his leaving. Apparently Lawler spoke to Brown after his quitting, under the impression Brown would finish up on the 1/25 show, saying not to mention that he was leaving or say goodbye to avoid a maudlin feeling to the show. Brown told Lawler it wouldn’t be a problem because he had no intention of doing the show. Lawler and others in USWA attempted to contact Russell about doing the show, but he had prior commitments so Lawler and Cory Maclin hosted the show.

  During the show, there was no mention of Brown made whatsoever. Previously when Brown would miss a week due to vacation, it would always be acknowledged at the beginning of the show that he was on vacation and would be back next week. Russell, who hasn’t done the show in months, was contacted about coming back but there is no word whether he’ll do so or not at press time although it is believed he won’t come back full-time.

  FEBRUARY 10

  Add long-time general manager Randy Hales and announcer Cory Maclin to the list of those who have left over problems with new general manager Larry Burton. Maclin left because he wanted a raise since his position with Brown leaving would be upgraded from second banana to regular host, and was turned down by Burton. Burton’s ideas of changing the way things have been done and attempts to upgrade but also his knack for getting under people’s skin and not showing them respect they believe they are deserved has led to the mass exodus.

  With both announcers, Maclin and Dave Brown having left, and Lance Russell, who has been asked to return, still on vacation in Florida over the weekend, they called up local sports talk radio hosts John Rainey and another guy who I believe is named Brad Shapiro to do the show. The two have experience as Rainey did an angle some time back with Downtown Bruno and even did some matches with him, and also has done radio play-by-play of the Memphis matches. At the beginning of the show, the two said that Dave and Cory weren’t available, giving the impression that the two were on vacation. The previous week when Brown wasn’t on, his name was never mentioned.

  This is the second time Hales has quit the promotion in recent months and this time appears to be for good as he’s said to be frustrated at being 35-years-old and having spent his life working long weeks and traveling 100,000 miles a year in his car to cities and having nothing to show for it. There is a lot of bitterness among those who left that Jerry Lawler turned his back on several people who kept the promotion going when all the other regionals folded.

  FEBRUARY 17

  Lance Russell returned as announcer on the 2/8 television show which also featured an appearance by Brian Pillman. Russell has agreed to do the show every week until the end of the month and will do it fairly often after that point but refused to commit to a weekly regular deal because he’s largely retired and spends a lot of time vacationing. Pillman showed up and played total heel, including one reference to Russell having Alzheimer’s and claiming his personal friend Dr. Jack Kevorkian can take care of Russell’s problems. On the show, Russell acknowledged Dave Brown’s leaving saying that Brown had done the show for 30 years and it appeared almost that he and Jerry Lawler were trying to convince Brown to change his mind and return.

  MARCH 24

  Business is way down across the board and there is a lot of talk about impending doom, particularly since the 3/12 show in Memphis drew something like 250 fans and a $1,300 house with the loser leaves town match. The main on that show was Lawler vs. Reggie B. Fine and if Lawler won, he’d get five minutes with Queen Nikki (who is apparently the girlfriend of area indie wrestler Crazy Luke Graham Jr., who I believe is no relation to the original). Lawler won, but Reginald piledrove him and Nikki started on him for a few minutes. Lawler made his comeback, and finished doing the Tommy Dreamer piledriver spot where the dress falls down. Nikki got into it later with ref Downtown Bruno and they are now feuding.

  APRIL 21

  All kinds of behind-the-scenes turmoil. Mike Samples quit as booker and the new booker will be Dutch Mantel. Larry Burton, who has been running the company for the past several months, at press time was expected to be leaving and moving back home to California as well. Samples and Jerry Lawler had a disagreement when Samples wanted to stop booking Bill Dundee, feeling that at the age of 57, it was time for Dundee to get out of the ring. Lawler overruled him and put Dundee back on the cards feeling they needed to use more talent known in the area rather than fill the slots with young wrestles.

  JUNE 2

  Update on the business situation here. The situation doesn’t appear to be as bleak as some have made it out to be. In regard to the reports of them losing television in Nashville and Louisville, that doesn’t appear to be the case. In the case of Nashville, the television situation is going to stay the same (on both local Ch. 30 and Ch. 58). In Louisville, they are dropping the station they were on because the company felt it couldn’t afford the $1,000 per week fee, and are moving to a new station. They haven’t run Memphis in several weeks, but the plan as we can tell is that they will go back to Memphis in a few more weeks, although most likely not run the city on a weekly basis as in the past, and they may move to a new location since they were only doing 200 to 300 fans for night shows at the Big One Flea Market.

  JULY 7

  Christine Jarrett, Jerry’s mother, was fired by the promotion. She’s worked the box office in Louisville literally since the beginning of time. That fed all kinds of rumors that Jerry Jarrett would come back to run opposition, but Jarrett really doesn’t follow wrestling very closely anymore and has his own land development business to run.

  JULY 21

  Lots of news both in and out of the ring here. The promotion has reorganized and there has been a lot said and speculated about it. Exactly who owns the group isn’t clear but the new President of the promotion is Michael Selnick of Cleveland. The wrestlers were brought to a meeting on 7/10 and told that new money would be put into the company, that they would be expanding operations and that Jerry Lawler would no longer be running things.

  Although it has been reported that Lawler has no more ownership in the company, I’ve been told that isn’t the case, although Lawler is not going to be involved in day-to-day running operations because of his commitments particularly in the WWF. Lawler’s title is Vice President in charge of Public Relations.

  They are going to change the way they do business hoping to expand syndication in getting on new cable stations that are opening up and desperate for programming, but without paying for programming which killed Paul Alperstein’s AWF when he tried to do something similar. They are also talking about expanding into new markets, with both New Orleans and St. Louis having been discussed and with the former more likely than the latter because it already has a TV clearance.

  Dutch Mantel was officially announced as booker. The wrestlers were told it would no longer be a nickel-and-dime promotion with the influx of new capital. There were several new officers announced, but only one with any previous background in pro wrestling, being long-time Texas referee and Japanese booker James Beard.

  SEPTEMBER 8

  The final live television show on WMC-TV took place on 8/30 after a 21-year-run (actually more than 30 years since the show was on WHBQ in
Memphis live on Saturday mornings for many years before going to Ch. 5). The show is moving to a one hour (it had been 90 minutes) taped version which will air at midnight on Saturdays and be replayed on Sunday afternoons. Tony Friedman and Bill Behrens handled the announcing since Michael St. John wasn’t there. Lance Russell did a telephone interview late in the show thanking fans for their cards and flowers and sounded great and said that he hoped he could return to the show at some point. They also did a video montage showing clips of among others, Lou Thesz, Tommy Gilbert, Eddie Gilbert, Jeff Jarrett, Miss Texas, Andy Kaufman, Bill Dundee and Jimmy Hart. They dropped balloons from the ceiling as the show went off the air. Dundee returned as referee for the Dutch Mantel vs. Tommy Dreamer main event the next day in Memphis.

  SEPTEMBER 8

  There is some serious discontent among members of the current ownership group since lots of money is being spent on things like a new set, but no real money is coming in. Nothing at this point has happened but some sort of a shake-up is expected and many of the stockholders are tense. USWA survived for years under Jerry Jarrett basically by never spending any money while everyone else went out of business. Many of the wrestlers already believe there is an ownership change and the rumor is flying around everywhere.

  SEPTEMBER 15

  There continues to be all sorts of chaos behind the scenes. Although it has been reported that the USWA has been sold to a Texas group, we’re again told by people in the company that the same three person ownership group from Cleveland is still in control. The only person from Texas in a management position is James Beard, who along with Bert Prentice is in charge of booking and promoting spot shows, and his hiring came at the recommendation of Bruce Prichard of the WWF.

  There is in-fighting among that ownership group because very little money is coming in after a lot of money was spent on cosmetic changes to give the promotion and the television show a more modern look, and General Manager Larry Burton was again talking about leaving this week.

  I believe they went eight days without running any house shows, and with nobody under a guaranteed contract except the people sent here by the WWF, the wrestlers have to survive on their either $40 or $100 (depending on the wrestler) per shot, which doesn’t add up to much when you multiply $100 times zero shows.

  In addition, the company has eliminated the babyfaces picking up extra money working the gimmick table, as it has wanted to take over concessions in a more professional manner, but as of yet that really hasn’t started happening either.

  SEPTEMBER 22

  Mark Selker, one of the three Cleveland-based part-owners of the USWA filed a lawsuit on 9/11 against Jerry Lawler and Larry Burton, the latter of whom controls the other 50% of the ownership, charging fraud in the sale of the company. Lawler was served with the lawsuit papers by an armed guard at the television tapings two days later.

  Selker sent a memo to the wrestlers at the 9/14 house show in Memphis stating that this wasn’t a USWA Inc. card and he wasn’t responsible for paying them. The show went on as scheduled before a crowd of 207 fans with Larry Burton agreeing to pay the wrestlers. A subsequent show was scheduled for 9/16 in Louisville headlined by Lawler vs. Tommy Dreamer with Burton saying he’d pay the wrestlers for both that show and a casino show later in the week, which, if canceled, would violate an important company contract for a regular guaranteed money casino date.

  Lawler was scheduled to fly into Louisville for that show after doing voice-overs for Raw the day before. Earlier on 9/16, Eugene Selker, the father and attorney for Mark Selker, attempted and was turned down in Federal Court in Cleveland in an attempt to get a temporary restraining order to keep Lawler and Burton from doing any business within the company until the resolution of the lawsuit.

  Selker attempted to cancel the Louisville show and every other show on the books has already been canceled. At this point, television is still scheduled to be taped on 9/20 in Memphis but there is discontent at WMC-TV in Memphis and with poor ratings in the movie to midnight combined with all the problems such as an armed guard coming to television and serving Lawler which nearly turned into a physical altercation, police being involved as a shoot on recent television shows and the latest problems, it wouldn’t shock people to see the station finally wash its hands of its long-time powerhouse wrestling show.

  The lawsuit against Lawler and Burton alleges mail fraud, theft by fraud, fraudulent business practices and fraud as it relates to the sale of the company. The claim in the suit is that Lawler and Burton doctored the books to inflate the value of the company, syndication profits and potential were inflated, expenses were understated and the defendants withheld important information from them including the knowledge of the expected time slot move on WMC. There have been rumors of criminal charges being filed as well but at press time that hadn’t happened.

  Lawler claimed that it was just a case of people buying a business, then losing money in the business and then suing the previous owners. Both Lawler and Burton claimed that the Selkers had done this same scenario with two previous businesses in an attempt to gain complete control of the company and remove Burton from the company.

  The Selkers idea is to shut the company down temporarily except for continuing to produce television, but the question is with the company shut down, who would stay in the area to work television. This has, among the wrestlers, put Burton in the babyface role since he’s the one who is now paying them. Eugene Selker, the attorney listed as filing the lawsuit, was the same attorney who wrote the contract in the initial sale of the company, a point Lawler and Burton have been quick to point out.

  It has been expected that if/when this ownership group bails out, and them doing so wasn’t unexpected, that the WWF would attempt to take over the territory and use it as a grooming ground for inexperienced wrestlers they have under contract, but control the booking of that talent which they didn’t do in previous incarnations of attempting to use USWA to train wrestlers. At this point, until everything it settled, the WWF isn’t expected to send any new talent to Memphis.

  SEPTEMBER 29

  The prospective legal fight over the future of the USWA got messier during the week, resulting in no television show taped on 9/20 in Memphis.

  As the week went on, the scorecard stood as follows. The 50% ownership group, an investment group headed by Mark Selker, had filed suit in Federal Court in Cleveland against the other 50% owner, Larry Burton, along with former owner Jerry Lawler, who had sold them their shares for $1 million, claiming fraud. They had claimed they had such a strong open-and-shut case that during the week they would get a temporary restraining order to keep Burton and Lawler from doing any business within the company. However, a Cleveland judge turned down their request. There was also talk they’d have criminal charges for fraud pressed against Lawler and Burton, but by the end of the week, no such charges were filed.

  Lawler was publicly claiming he was going to file a countersuit because the Selkers had stopped paying him on his $125,000 per year salaried front office position within the company he was contracted to when he sold them his stock, that he and Burton would attempt to get the other case moved to Memphis, and that they would attempt to disqualify Eugene Selker, father of Mark, from being the attorney in the case because of the conflict of interest since he was both the attorney who drew up the papers for the sale of the company and the attorney who filed the lawsuit papers.

  Mark Selker attempted and failed to get a USWA house show on 9/16 in Louisville canceled, headlined by Lawler vs. Tommy Dreamer, which drew a $4,000 house, about double what the company usually draws in that city. However, several other spot shows during the week were canceled, as was the television taping. The belief at press time is that Lawler and Burton would continue to run shows in Nashville and Louisville every week and there are no plans announced for a return date in Memphis.

  During the week there had been talk that Lawler and Burton would bring in a crew of wrestlers for the scheduled Saturday morning taping at W
MC-TV studios in Memphis for airing at midnight, and that James Beard, a representative of the Selkers, would also bring in a crew of Dallas-based wrestlers and nobody knew which group of wrestlers would end up appearing on the show. As late as the day before, it was believed that a wrestling show would be taped and a show had been scripted out.

  As it turned out, the Selkers managed to lock up the company’s editing equipment, making it impossible for a show to be taped, and the program that aired on WMC-TV had Beard in a studio doing lead-ins for random clips from USWA’s past that had nothing to do with today’s storylines. About the only comment, other than it being a totally dead show with no plugs or mentions about any future house show dates or talk of current angles, is that it appeared from the clips to be kissing up to Jerry Jarrett. They aired clips of Jarrett’s mother Christine, who was fired by the Burton group, being honored and of Jerry Jarrett accepting an award for his late partner Tojo Yamamoto, along with favorable clips of Jeff Jarrett as a babyface.

  It was a seven-hour deposition that the Selkers had with Jarrett just prior to filing the suit that gave them the information about how much Lawler had purchased the other 50% of the company for and how much money the company had taken in when Jarrett was co-owner, and the huge profit Lawler had made in selling the company. Burton and his booker, Dutch Mantel, were going to attempt this week to get their own restraining order so they could stop the video equipment from being locked up so they could tape a television show this weekend. If that restraining order fails to come through, it is expected that the show this weekend would be another old-time highlight show with Beard in the studio.