[1993-02-20-WCW-Saturday Night] Up Close w/ Barry Windham

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

Gordon Solie interviews Windham, who shows up outside on a Harley. Awesome! Solie talks about Flair returning to WCW, but Windham has no desire to talk about it. He'd rather talk about Muta. Windham was never a great promo, but this is one of the better ones I've ever seen from him. He points out that it's been years since he's had a shot at the NWA title, and he's trained his entire career to win it.

[benj]

Great idea for an interview, No Fear T-Shirt! fuck yeah 93.

 

Hey another Up Close segment making the title seem as the most important thing in the world.

[shoe]

A really cool segment. Windham's "Lone Wolf" gimmick is so cool.

[El-P]

Windham is great. This is what lacks from wrestling : serious stuff. No-Fear T-shirt, Harley, no-selling Flair returning, all about the NWA title, talking about history and the fact Windham is looking for this title since he was in Florida (basically). I love these segments.

[Kevin Ridge]

Is Solie just randomly walking the streets hoping to bump into a wrestler to do an interview? Some of the cars in the background are going fast. Barry don't want to talk about Flair. He is more focused on Muta and the NWA World Title.

[PeteF3]

Windham blows off the mention of Ric Flair, who gets hyped and shown on-screen. That's as much Flair hype as they could probably legally get away with at this point (the WWF was late in faxing over his official release, then after getting prodded, they faxed a release but "accidentally" forgot to get it notarized, and the mess wasn't cleared up until days before the PPV). The ending to Starrcade is mentioned--Windham points out that Muta never pinned him and that the NWA World title is a bigger goal than the BattleBowl ring.

[WingedEagle]

Solie wants to talk about Flair, but Windham is focused on Muta and his title shot resulting from winning Battle Bowl. Windham is such an asset here, just doing an interview on the road setting up what's basically a cold challenger. Shame we're just about done with Windham as a player.

[soup23]

Great promo by Windham who has been super for the year so far. Him on a Harley felt like a huge bad ass and hit the right tone for his persona.

[garretta]

I wondered why Barry would no-sell Flair's return to the degree that he did, but if Flair was still technically with the WWF when the interview was taped, there was nothing else he could do. Of course, it also adds to the idea that he's supremely focused on Muta and the NWA title and won't let Gordon or anyone else distract him from his goal.

 

I was surprised that Barry brushed Chono aside in much the same way. He was someone the WCW fans knew from his battles with Rude, so it couldn't have hurt to give him his due as a former champion.

 

It was great to see Gordon again. Just once, I would have liked to hear Gordon and Lance call a pay-per-view match together. Let Tony and Jesse do the hotline for one stinkin' match; it wouldn't have killed them. For that matter, I'd have liked to hear either Gordon or Lance with Jesse, even if it was only occasionally.

 

I liked the quote from the NASCAR guy about taking things to the ragged edge. It was most likely an actual quote; Gordon was an announcer for auto racing tracks in Florida while he was working for Eddie Graham, at least in the beginning.

 

This was JR's last Saturday night show; I fast-forwarded into the Steamboat-Pillman match to find out for sure. I seem to recall reading that he was still around for occasional syndicated matches into early March, but I could certainly be wrong about that.