This Week In WWE Vintage Collection History: Islands In The Sun
By Aaron Wood Jul 15, 2012 - 2:19 PM
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COLLECTION #215 Gene
introduced the show, making good on his tease from last week, not
that this week's "Best In The World" series action would
feature superstars who hails, or at the very least have ancestral
ties to, the Island nations such as Samoa or Fiji. Despite their
smaller populations, they have provided numerous superstars thanks to
their family trees. And we'd be starting off with a member of the
Anoa'i family in Rikishi, as he teamed up with Scotty 2 Hotty as they
challenged The Basham Brothers for the WWE Tag Team Titles on the
February 5th 2004 edition of Smackdown.
After
the break, we took a trip to Fiji as we were going to take a look up
Superfly Jimmy Snuka, as Gene spoke about him, noting his legendary
splash off the top of the cage, although he would end up in a feud
with Roddy Piper and Cowboy Bob Orton. And it would be the latter he
faced here in Madison Square Garden. the on-screen graphic said
February 19th 1985, but it was the day before on February 18th, which
was the night of "The War To Settle The Score", which was a
Hogan vs. Roddy Piper match that aired live on MTV in a match that
directly set up the first Wrestlemania. This match, like the rest of
the card, didn't air on MTV, but did end up on Prime Time Wrestling,
in this case the episode that aired on March 19th.
It
was back to Samoa for our next pair of superstars, mainly because
Samoa was in their name, as it was Afa and Sika, The Wild Samoans.
gene said they were one of the most outrageous and charismatic duos
in WWE history, winning the Tag Titles three times, seeing them
inducted into the Hall Of Fame in 2007. And it was back to MSG as
the Samoans got a shot at the Tag Titles against the champions of
Dick Murdoch and Adrian Adonis, a match that would see Captain Lou
Albano as guest referee. This match took place on August 25th 1984,
and aired on the Tuesday Night Titans episode of October 16th.
We
came back form break to the RAW of July 29th 2002, which emanated
from Greensboro, North Carolina, as we saw The Rock backstage as he
cut a promo on his first time ever match against The Nature Boy and
Ric Flair. We jumped to Rock's entrance for that match as Okerlund
said that the Undisputed Champion, Rock (Grandson of High Chief Peter
Miavia) strutted into Flair's own backyard in a non-title match. But
just who would pick up the win?
As
it goes, we didn't get any of the post-match stuff, cutting away when
the pair hugged. gene said that today's episode showed that some
wrestling biggest stars can come from the smallest of places,
although while he said the series wasn't even half over (so I guess
we are going for the full 8 episodes), he didn't give a tease as to
where we'd be heading next week.
Epilogue It's
kind of amazing, but none of the featured wrestlers on this week's
show were around for much longer at those particular times. Rikishi
& Scotty held onto the WWE Tag Titles for a couple of months
before losing them to Charlie Haas & Rico. However, in July of
2004, as he refused management's request to lose some weight, Rikishi
was released.
Snuka,
as well as Orton, would play their parts as corner men in the main
event of the first Wrestlemania, and while he would appear in the
"Hulk Hogan's Rock 'n' Wrestling" cartoon, he left the WWE
in the summer of 85, due to drug problems, showing up in the AWA the
following year after an (ultimately failed) stint in rehab. funnily
enough, Mick Foley, in his stand up set tells stories about Jimmy
Snuka from that time.
For
The Wild Samoans, their WWE careers were on the wane by this point,
having had their 3 title runs by this match's occurring. And indeed,
they left the WWE very early in 1985, only having one house show
match on record for that year at the beginning of January. As it
goes, Sika himself would return to the company a couple of years
later.
As
for The Rock, he was set to face Brock Lesnar at Summerslam, although
in the interim, he defended the Undisputed title at the Global
Warning event in Australia against Lesnar and HHH, with Rock pinning
Hunter to win, and then the pair teaming up to contain Lesnar after
the match. But Lesnar wouldn't be stopped at Summerslam, winning the
Undisputed Title. Rock then left the WWE for the rest of the year as
we began filming on The Scorpion King.
