Randy Savage v Bruno Sammartino (WWF, 1/3/87)
Hard to ask for much more out of the Macho Man v the Living Legend for six minutes in 1987. Bruno's stomps and forearm strikes just drip with energy and Savage's bumping and stooging is electric so obviously this worked a treat. Savage tries to hide behind Elizabeth at the start until Bruno grabs him by the hair and rams him head-first into the buckles so for the next couple minutes Savage tries to hightail it out of there. Each attempt is unsuccessful as Bruno will not RELENT and Savage almost gets his trunks yanked off and of course the crowd eats it up completely. The Boston Garden still loves Bruno and it's not difficult to understand why he was a megastar in the Northeast for like 15 years. Eventually Savage uses Liz as enough of a distraction to knee Bruno in the kidneys and Lord Al on commentary is convinced Elizabeth is shown too much sympathy from the public. She's in on the whole thing and knows what she's doing, by god. Savage is frantic energy, hitting axe handles off the top to the floor and Bruno's old legend who is now an old man selling is great. He's never beaten but at any moment he might just be broken. Savage wellying Bruno in the back with a chair not being called by Marella is interesting and Bruno was well within his rights to be apoplectic afterwards at losing by count out. Maybe Monsoon was right about his adopted son's incompetence all along.
Hulk Hogan v Paul Orndorff (Cage Match) (WWF Saturday Night's Main Event, 1/3/87)
Really fun WWF-style cage match. It started great with Hogan ripping the shirt off as he climbs over the cage into the ring only to be jumped by Orndorff. There are obviously allowances you have to afford the wrestlers when it comes to these escape the cage rules, but I thought they mostly worked around the inherent limitations well and if nothing else they used them to their advantage by cutting a quick pace. Orndorff had Hogan rocked from the start, whipping him with the title belt and immediately trying to escape out the door. Makes sense because why wouldn't you walk out the door as soon as you could? Hogan cut him off a couple times so Orndorff must've figured that wasn't for working and instead tried climbing up and over in the opposite corner. Seems sensible enough. Hogan regrouping and dragging Orndorff back in, slamming his head off the cage repeatedly while he was upside down, was a great transition spot and Jesse's call is perfect - "Hogan would've lost the title if Mr. Wonderful was bald!" Hogan even uses his own discarded bandana to choke Orndorff, much to Jesse's disgust. If the match ended after the stereo escapes it would've been a nice cage match sprint, but the restart allowed it to build some more and gave Orndorff a chance to run up some proper heat on Hogan. Orndorff's falling elbows and stomps are always exceptional and that was no different here. There was also a cool double head knock into the cage that served as a reset of sorts, which was a neat choice structurally. Orndorff even gets a bit of colour on network TV and then post-match Heenan takes three absolutely world class bumps. I'm a fan of Orndorff so I kind of like how he never lost this feud decisively, only being defeated in the end by not escaping a cage quick enough and even then with the argument that he should've been declared the winner before it got to that point. I don't actually remember what he ends up doing the rest of the year and by early '88 he's gone from the company entirely. It was a hell of a four-year run, though.
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