Portland Wrestling
1980
VOLUME 11

The current Portland wrestling champions are as follows as of 8/30/1980:
NWA World Champion: Harley Race (11/7/1979)
PNW Heavyweight Champion: Buddy Rose (8/16/1980)
PNW Tag Team Champions: Roddy Piper & Mike Popovich (8/28/1980)

Your host is Frank Bonnema.

From 8/30/80. Even though he’s on crutches and has been brutally attacked by Buddy Rose, Dutch Savage is being a *man* about it and still promotes a muscular dystrophy benefit on Labor Day. He thanks friends and family for supporting him through this tough time, but one day Dutch will have his revenge on Buddy Rose. Great promo.

So Ed Wiskowski did lose to Roddy Piper last Wednesday night in a “Loser Leaves Town” match, but he will finish out his bookings through the end of the week. Wiskowski accepts his defeat graciously. Now that promoters know that he’s leaving Portland, Wiskowski is in high demand all over the country. Over to Buddy Rose. He’s wearing a silly cowboy hat calling him “JR” Buddy Rose referencing the TV show Dallas. He challenges Roddy Piper to a “loser leaves town” match. Don Owen has already voiced how sick of these matches he is. Piper isn’t here this week due to blood poisoning and Rose sees this as a great opportunity for him to put Piper out of the Pacific Northwest. What a lovely guy.

• Mike Popovich vs. Ed Wiskowski – (Portland Wrestling, 8/30/80)
  

This is the last show we will see of Ed Wiskowski on the 1980 recaps. I’m not sure where he goes, but he does return to Portland in December. Maybe he went south to San Francisco for a few months. Is Mike Popovich supposed to be keeping the little teenie boppers around now that Martel is gone? Most of the match is Wiskowski failing to garner any real offense. He spends a lot of time in a headlock. However, Wiskowski suckers Popovich into a three-point stance move and knees him in the face as he comes forward. Poor Popovich can’t even take a basic back bump after a clothesline. He won’t go down to a running bulldog either. Popovich applies a FULL NELSON on Wiskowski and picks up the win to mercifully end this match. (9:07) Considering the limitations of Popovich, Wiskowski did as good a job as anybody could making this guy look tough – Popovich just wouldn’t take the bumps right.

Buddy Rose (wearing the wig mask) says he wants to challenge Roddy Piper and Rick Martel’s replacement Mike Popovich for the PNW tag belts this week. Rip Oliver says a few words and looks forward to making money with the Rose Army.

• 12-man $2000 Battle Royal – (Portland Wrestling, 8/30/80)
  

The contestants are Stan Stasiak, Mike Popovich, Eric Embry, Ed Wiskowski, Rocky Dellaserra, Rip Oliver, Jonathan Boyd, Ricky Hunter, Chris Colt, Joe Lightfoot, Fidel Cortez, and Buddy Rose. The announcer made this very easy for me to list everybody. As far as notable eliminations, Stasiak takes Buddy Rose with him over the top rope. Our final four comes down to Mike Popovich, Rip Oliver, Jonathan Boyd, and Fidel Cortez. After Popovich gets knocked to the floor, Boyd gets thrown out by Oliver and Cortez. Popovich then comes in behind both heels and instead of throwing them out at the same time which would have been a cool finish, he just slumps over into the ropes. I don’t get this guy. Popovich ignores Cortez and throws Oliver out. As Cortez takes Popovich over to the ropes, Boyd grabs Cortez and pulls him over the top rope to the floor to help Popovich win the battle royal. (7:40) Check out the crowd coming up to the ring to shake his hand. That’s so cool. *½

To wrap up the show, Fidel Cortez goes over to Frank Bonnema crying he wants Jonathan Boyd for sticking his nose in the match. Buddy Rose tells Cortez that he’s here to protect him and that’s all. Jonathan Boyd comes over and accepts the challenge against Buddy’s wishes. Boyd then tells Rose that his days are numbered because he’s going to start watching Roddy Piper’s back.

From 9/6/80. Frank Bonnema announces that Roddy Piper defeated Buddy Rose for the PNW heavyweight title on Thursday night in Salem. Rose wants a rematch for the title next Saturday night and a loser leaves town match ASAP.

Roddy Piper remarks that Buddy Rose plays with inflatable dolls. He thinks all these women are chasing him because it can’t be for his body. The other day when Rose went to put on his underwear, the Fruit of the Loom guy fell over laughing. Piper then claims he was using psychological warfare against Buddy Rose when he wouldn’t accept those hair matches back earlier in the year. Once he went through the Sheepherders and shaved their heads, he knew by that point Rose was shaking in his boots and could easily be beaten. As for the title match and a loser leaves town match, Rose will get his loser leaves town match when Piper says it will happen. This town just ain’t big enough for the two of them.

Dutch Savage gets on the mic hyping the week’s activities by pointing his finger at Buddy Rose and saying what’s going to happen to him. Savage vows revenge on Rose and in the same breath says he’ll be praying for Rose’s well-being.

Weird interview from Jonathan Boyd. He says he’s never needed an army and then says he might start one with Mike Popovich and Roddy Piper. Anyways, he’s coming for the Rose Army.

We skip ahead to finish of the main event: Rip Oliver and Buddy Rose against Roddy Piper and Mike Popovich in a non-title bout. Piper gets pinned by Rose with some leverage assistance from Oliver. Afterwards, they go up to Frank Bonnema where Piper comes up behind Rose and puts him out with the SLEEPERHOLD and takes off the WIG MASK~! The crowd goes NUTS. Rose freaks out when he knows the people have seen his brown hair and puts a towel on his head. The mask is staying off. Piper then grants Buddy Rose the title match for next week. Bonnema puts this moment over as one of the wildest things he’s seen since he began wrestling commentary in 1966. After Piper leaves, Rose declares that he will do whatever it takes to get Piper to agree to a loser leaves town match.

From 9/13/80. Buddy Rose is now proud to show off his short brown hair. The ladies are after him more than ever! A lot has happened since Rose lost his hair and he runs down the details. Everybody thought he was leaving Portland when he faced Rick Martel, but he didn’t lose to Martel and he won’t lose to Piper either. Rose is the one wrestler who can’t be beaten in the big matches. ROSE WILL BE IN PORTLAND FOREVER~!

• PNW Heavyweight Championship: Roddy Piper (c) vs. Buddy Rose – (Portland Wrestling, 9/13/80)
  

FIRST FALL: Incredible heat for this one as everybody is solidly behind Piper. Don Owen says he’s against the loser leaves town match that’s coming, but Piper demanded this match and it’s going to happen. Piper escapes a neck vice and starts throwing those right hands. Some pretty decent jabs from Piper. SLEEPERHOLD is applied and despite Rose’s best efforts to back Piper into the corner, he goes down and his arm drops three times for Piper to secure the first fall at 4:55.

SECOND FALL: Rose has busted open Piper by sending him into the ringpost. While he’s working the cut, Rose wipes the blood on the ref’s red shirt. Rose gets several nearfalls, but Piper makes a valiant comeback only for Rose to cut him off. Knee drop by Rose gets two. Piper counters a slam and hits Rose with an O’Connor roll for the pinfall to win two straight falls. (8:02 total) Afterwards, Rose attacks Piper with a chair. Piper takes the chair away from Rose and controls the ring. There’s a huge pull-apart brawl to end the segment. **½

They head up to Frank Bonnema. Since Buddy Rose has lost two straight falls to Roddy Piper, he doesn’t want the loser leaves town match now. While Joe Lightfoot and somebody else holds back Piper, Don Owen tells Rose it’s going to happen. If anybody interferes in this match, whoever they come out to help will be disqualified. Piper wants two referees to make sure that nothing funny happens. Don Owen likes that idea. As the good guys leave, Rip Oliver and Fidel Cortez try to boost Buddy’s confidence. If Buddy wins though, the Rose Army will rule the northwest. Piper comes over to run the Rose Army away while Joe Lightfoot tries to keep him calm. Good luck, pal. Piper declares that when he gets through with Buddy Rose, he won’t be allowed in Portland anymore.

Final Thoughts: Well, Roddy Piper pulling off the wig mask is huge. Some good promos here, but nothing too great match-wise. The build to the Roddy Piper and Buddy Rose “loser leaves town” match is really fun. If you want to see how green Mike Popovich is, this is a good place to start. I wonder how long he was even trained before they threw him out there. Either way, Portland does seem to love the guy.

Next time we visit Portland, I know who we won’t get to see and that’s Roddy Piper. :( The Rose Army will begin their RULE of the Northwest as we wrap up September 1980. Who is left to be any kind of competition for them? Joe Lightfoot? Old Man Dutch Savage? Jonathan Boyd? MIKE POPOVICH? Nah. Until next time, so long for now.