Portland Wrestling
1977-1979
VOLUME 6

The current Portland wrestling champions are as follows as of 2/18/78:
NWA World Champion: Harley Race (2/6/1977)
PNW Heavyweight Champion: Ed Wiskowski (11/12/1977)
PNW Tag Team Champions: Buddy Rose & Ed Wiskowski (12/7/1977)

Your host is Frank Bonnema.

• 2/3 Falls: PNW Tag Team Champions Buddy Rose & Ed Wiskowski vs. Jerry Oates & Skip Young – (Portland Wrestling, 2/18/78)
  

FIRST FALL: Skip Young just keeps on changing partners around here. Jimmy Snuka is still around doing more singles stuff or tags with Jesse Ventura while Gino Hernandez is about to head back to Texas. Anyways, Skip joins Buddy Rose in the ring to start. Once he gets Rose over to his corner, Jerry Oates tags into the match and works a headlock on first Rose and then Wiskowski. This is the first we’ve seen of Jerry Oates in the Portland area. He’s best known for his work down in Central States Wrestling teaming with Ted Oates in the 1970s. He is a former Central States heavyweight champion, North American heavyweight champion, and a future Pacific Northwest heavyweight champion here in a few months. It’s not really a spoiler since we don’t seem to have any footage of that period. Back to the match. Skip tags in and works a headlock as well. He shows off his vertical leaping ability with a HIGH dropkick to Rose. Awesome. They play around with the headlock some more. Wiskowski finally creates an opening by kneeing Young in the ribs. He and Rose hammer the ribs a little bit, but Skip manages to hot tag Oates. As Oates climbs the ropes to take Wiskowski over for a headlock, Wiskowski counters with a back suplex. He drops a knee on the head of Oates for the three-count to secure the first fall for the tag champs at 8:32.

SECOND FALL: Wiskowski and Rose take control of Oates and dominate him with a front headlock. Oates eventually counters the hold on Rose with a suplex. Wiskowski manages to cut off the hot tag though and tries to get the quick pinfall on Oates. Rose comes back in and Oates does what he can to combat against that guy. Hot tag to Skip, Rose is completely terrified of him. Big back drop sets up a jumping headbutt by Young. Before Rose can fall over, Young holds him up and gives him another headbutt. Tag to Oates, he slams Rose close to Wiskowski. Oates covers Rose and Wiskowski leaps over the top rope to miss a knee drop. Seizing the moment, Oates applies his finisher the SPINNING TOEHOLD for the submission win at 14:36 total.

THIRD FALL: Oates goes right back to work on the leg of Wiskowski. He’s in the wrong corner though as Rose punches him away a few times. Tag to Skip, he hits a weak backbreaker on Rose. He actually starts doing some heel stuff like choking and raking the back. SKIP IS MAD. Oates tags in and lands an atomic drop, but Rose collapses over by Wiskowski for a tag. He gives Oates a running turnbuckle smash and drops a knee on the forehead for two. Back to Skip, he runs his shoulder into Rose’s knee over in the corner. That begins the punishment of Skip’s injured shoulder putting over Rose as “The Crippler”. This continues until Young is showing no signs of fighting back and the ref calls for the bell. Of course, that doesn’t stop Wiskowski and Rose from being total dicks about it. (20:50 total) So Wiskowski and Rose retain the titles since the ref Sandy Barr believes Skip Young’s arm is broken. This pretty much ends the Portland run for Skip Young. He’ll be heading out to Oklahoma real soon and the Leroy McGuirk territory for a few months before spending the rest of 1978 in the Mid-Atlantic area. ***

From February 1978. This Tuesday night in Portland, Jesse Ventura takes on Buddy Rose in a match where Ed Wiskowski will be the special guest referee. WHAT IS JESSE THINKING? Besides pinfall and submission, you can also win by sending your opponent to the floor. At least with Wiskowski in the ring, Jesse can keep an eye on him. All he’ll be doing is watching Jesse annihilate his partner. Jesse says he put up $5000 to get Rose to fight against Buddy’s $1000. Ventura is certain just one match with Rose and he’ll take out BOTH Rose and Wiskowski. Well, that would be interesting.

More from the winter of 1978. Buddy Rose tells us that he’s $5000 richer because Jesse Ventura is an idiot. He did in fact beat Jesse Ventura for the money. As for the champ Ed Wiskowski, he’s got some complaints about the Portland area. He feels threatened by the powers that be around here. They don’t want him getting too strong beating everybody. When he was the special referee during the Rose/Ventura match, he got punched in the face by Jesse Ventura and nobody got fined for that. Wiskowski says the people may not like him, but they must respect him. As they both start to walk away, Rose tells the camera that Ventura is very close to “the precipice of extinction”.

Another promo from Buddy Rose and Ed Wiskowski from 1978. Apparently, Jesse Ventura and Jimmy Snuka desire another PNW tag team titles match on March 7 in Portland. Wiskowski tells these two guys that if they really want a shot at the tag belts, they should ask Skip Young what happens to guys who want tag title shots against them. They get their shoulders dislocated! Rose says Ventura and Snuka have big arms, but small ankles. He’s thinking about maybe snapping an ankle or two on March 7. These two are just such good dick heels. And yes, I realize how weird that reads.

Here is a third consecutive promo from Ed Wiskowski and Buddy Rose. There’s talk of a cage match with Rose, but I’m not sure who he’s supposed to be facing. They bring up Jesse Ventura and Jimmy Snuka’s challenge over the tag belts. Once again, Ed Wiskowski brings up the injury of Skip Young to let all challengers know what can happen to them if they step in the ring with the tag champs.

• Buddy Rose vs. Jimmy Snuka – (Portland Wrestling, 3/4/78)
  

Ed Wiskowski comes out and plays some head games with Snuka, but ref Sandy Barr makes him leave. Rose backpedals and stalls getting the crowd to go absolutely nuts. Some ladies are threatening to take a swing at him. Rose is just such a fantastic heel. He’s such a whiny heel and looks like Louie Anderson, but he’s also a tough guy as well. Once they finally hook up, Snuka shocks him with a Brisco armdrag into an armbar. Frank Bonnema LOVES it. Anyways, they work off an armbar for a few minutes. Once Rose misses a corner charge and runs his shoulder into the post, Snuka looks to put him away as he heads up top only to be slammed down. Rose tries the same and gets slammed down as well. Snuka hits a couple headbutts and a piledriver, but only gets two. He misses a diving move off the ropes. Rose starts attacking the back with a backdrop and an atomic drop, but SNUKA WILL NOT DIE. They are close to reaching the time limit. Snuka surprises Rose with a sunset flip. He goes for the FULL NELSON, but Rose falls into the ropes. Snuka continues to try for the pinfall as we reach the time limit draw. (12:00) Ed Wiskowski heads down, but Jimmy Snuka is too hot to handle right now. I doubt they try anything. Jesse Ventura runs down and joins Snuka just in case. Wiskowski and Rose head into the ring and act like we’re about to have an impromptu tag match. Jesse even takes off his shirt. However, Wiskowski and Rose slink out before anything can go down. ***

From August 1978. Just a quick clip of the announcement of Lonnie “Moondog” Mayne passing away after an automobile accident at the young age of 33. This TV announcer discusses changes in schedules and whatnot. At the time, he was the NWA U.S. champion down in San Francisco and the NWA Americas champ in Los Angeles – the top championships in those areas. Besides the sad news of Mayne’s death, Buddy Rose was chosen as the number one contender to the NWA U.S. title would face Dean Ho to decide the new champion. When that match ends in a draw, a one night ten-man tournament was started where Dean Ho and Buddy Rose ended up in the finals anyways. Rose would win the match and would finally secure the U.S. title. He would hold onto the championship until early 1979 when he would be suspended from the territory. But back onto Mayne, I really enjoyed him from the few matches I’ve seen and how charismatic. Not exactly a master of workrate, but he was still a very entertaining character.

On 3/13/1979, Portland boys Buddy Rose and Ed Wiskowski plan to head to Texas to defend their NWA world tag belts they hold in San Francisco. Whoa, so much going on there. This is about as close to the end of that championship as you can get. Those tag belts would be retired in April of 1979. Talk turns to Roddy Piper and Killer Tim Brooks, which is the first we’ve heard of either of these two in these Portland recaps. They put over Piper and Brooks as being able to handle “Rock Star” Adrian Adonis while they’re gone. Wiskowski doesn’t understand why Portland needs to bring women onto the show when they have somebody as pretty as he is on the program. Of course, they can’t help but make a “women belong in the kitchen” comment. OF COURSE.

More from March 31, 1979. Just to give you all a taste of what is to come, the Rose Army has arrived and here they are in all their glory. Buddy Rose, Ed Wiskowski, Roddy Piper, and Killer Tim Brooks carry so much gold, they have to carry it all around in a wheelbarrow. The Rose Army is feeling so good, they make an open challenge to any other four guys who want to face them in an elimination match. They will show us all what power means in Portland wrestling. Piper wants some fresh meat to beat. Oh boy. Adrian Adonis, Ron Starr, and Dutch Savage get called out. AWESOME. With this much confidence being displayed, something bad is bound to happen to these guys.

Until next time, so long for now.