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Ric Flair Reaches The End of the Road?
Assuming that reports are true that Ric
Flair’s in-ring wrestling career will reach its end on Sunday with a
match against Shawn Michaels at WrestleMania 24, I have to admit
that I’m feeling a bit nostalgic this week. I’ve been a fan of the
Nature Boy since he entered Mid-Atlantic Championship Wrestling way
back in May of 1974. Well, maybe a “Ric Flair Fanatic” would
describe me better. One example, if you’re traveling through the
Commonwealth of Virginia and see a car with a license plate RFLAIR,
that would be me. Please honk if you see me on the road, but excuse
me if I don’t acknowledge you immediately—as I may be listening to
1970s Ric Flair audio clips on my iPod that I have plugged into my
car’s cigarette lighter. Okay, “Obsessed With Ric Flair” might
describe me better yet!
So many years, so many Ric Flair
memories. I must say, when Ric first came into Jim Crockett
Promotions, I didn’t take him real seriously. He was young, pudgy
and his jive talkin’ with a hint of a northern accent didn’t do a
lot for me. However, teaming with my hero Rip Hawk, and becoming one
half of the Mid-Atlantic Tag Team Champions in July of 1974, gave
him some credibility. Even so, I still remember laughing with some
of my buddies at the start of high school for me in September of
1974 about Ric taking on Paul Jones in a singles match at the
Richmond Coliseum…no way did I think Ric could stand up to “Number
One.” Well…think again.
Perhaps my favorite year in wrestling
was 1975, and it was a monumental year for Ric. No longer using his
familial ties with “uncle” Rip Hawk and “cousins” Gene and Ole
Anderson as a springboard, Flair became a legitimate singles threat
in the territory. He won the Mid-Atlantic TV Title in February, and
held it through to August when he lost it to Paul Jones at the
Richmond Arena. Just over a month later in the Hampton Coliseum,
Flair did what I thought couldn’t be done…he beat Wahoo McDaniel for
the Mid-Atlantic Heavyweight Championship, and at the same time
keeping his blond locks from being shaved off in that Hampton ring.
It was at that moment that I knew Ric was the real deal.
A mere two weeks after his greatest
wrestling triumph, Ric was stopped dead in his tracks---almost
literally. The October 4, 1975 plane crash in Wilmington, NC had
Mid-Atlantic fans holding their collective breaths as to whether the
wrestlers in that catastrophic event would ever come back to the
ring. Some didn’t. Not only did Ric come back, within two months he
was on Mid-Atlantic television just as brash and cocky as ever! A
few pounds lighter upon his return, but otherwise apparently none
the worse for wear. Two months later, amazingly, he was back in the
ring. I was astonished…not only had the Nature Boy conquered the
legend Wahoo McDaniel, but he had stared down death, and was back in
the ring doing his thing in a scant four months. This guy was now
somebody truly special in my eyes!
The rest of the 1970s saw Ric in major
feuds with the best the Mid Atlantic area had to offer. Flair
battled Wahoo throughout the year of 1976 over the Mid-Atlantic
Heavyweight Title. Battling Wahoo toe to toe for a whole year had to
soften even the most fervent Ric Flair cynics! Even when Ric lost
the Mid-Atlantic Title to Wahoo in the Richmond Coliseum in December
of 1976, it didn’t take the luster off Ric’s performance in one of
the hardest hitting programs in Mid-Atlantic history.
We in Richmond were fortunate to see
Ric’s first United States Heavyweight Championship victory, a win
over the aging veteran Bobo Brazil in July of 1977 at the Coliseum.
Earlier that year, the long running feud between Ric and Ricky
Steamboat began…what memorable battles those two had for many years!
Ric’s last full Mid-Atlantic year as a
bad guy was 1978, and I’ll always remember the brawls between the
Nature Boy and Blackjack Mulligan that year. Some of the crowds in
Richmond for those matches were as crazy as I’d ever seen. And, for
Richmond, that’s saying something!
I was shocked when Ric Flair turned
into a good guy in the middle of 1979! To see Ric and Ricky
Steamboat as tag team partners…unbelievable! I don’t think there was
ever a bigger wrestling crowd at the Richmond Coliseum than for the
first match where Flair and Steamboat teamed up, in July of 1979.
For the next two years, Ric had memorable battles against bad guys
such as Buddy Rogers, Jimmy Snuka, Greg Valentine and Roddy Piper.
But I have to say, I liked Ric better as a bad guy!
I can remember how proud I was when Ric
was announced as the NWA World’s Heavyweight Champion in September
of 1981. It was like our hometown hero had made it to the very top
of the professional wrestling mountain! His NWA Title victory over
Dusty Rhodes came out of nowhere for me. But the more I thought
about it, I was depressed that we wouldn’t be seeing as much of Ric
in the Mid-Atlantic area anymore! We now had to share him with the
rest of the wrestling world.
It was always great when Ric came back
to the Mid-Atlantic area during his first NWA Title reign, always
putting over our territory and making it clear he was always one of
“us.” Whether Ric was a good guy, bad guy or “tweener,” he was
cheered as the returning Champion coming back home, until his first
reign ended in the middle of 1983.
Starrcade 1983 was then on the horizon,
and really did usher in a new era in professional wrestling. Ric’s
victory over Harley Race to regain the NWA World’s Title in
Greensboro, NC that night was another source of pride for
Mid-Atlantic fans…our guy had brought the belt back home! But the
landscape of profession wrestling was about to change radically.
Ric’s second NWA Title reign took him
through to a time period where the Mid-Atlantic area ceased to be a
separate entity, and was eventually swallowed up as just a part of
the National Wrestling Alliance. By later into 1985/early 1986,
there really wasn’t a true “Mid-Atlantic area” in my mind anymore.
While I continued to follow wrestling closely, it just was never
quite the same to me. But I still watched Ric religiously! And Ric
Flair undoubtedly had some of his finest moments in the mid and late
1980s. I was often there in the Richmond Coliseum when Jim Crockett
Promotions still came to town, though their visits were scaled down
as they attempted to go national.
When I think mid and late 1980s, I
think Four Horsemen! I think back fondly to Ric’s battles with Dusty
Rhodes, Magnum TA, Nikita Koloff, the Road Warriors and Ronnie
Garvin during that time frame. Those times were a boom period for
Jim Crockett Promotions, but the boom very soon turned to bust later
in the 1980s. When Jim Crockett sold out to Ted Turner, I remember
the weekly TV shows giving way to the Clash of Champions on TBS, and
Pay Per Views. And I remember a seemingly never-ending series of
matches between Ric and Lex Luger at the Richmond Coliseum! But even
in the midst of the turmoil of the changeover to Turner, Ric had a
fabulous year in the ring in 1989. His matches that year with Ricky
Steamboat and Terry Funk were historic on a number of levels.
While the primary focus of the
Mid-Atlantic Gateway are the 1970s and 1980s, a couple of
memories hit me from 1990 and 1991. Certainly a low point was when
Ric was unmasked as the Black Scorpion in December of 1990.
Definitely an angle to forget! And then to hear the rumors that Ric
was leaving WCW in the middle of 1991…that was the lowest point!
That possibility even possessed me to call the WCW Hotline for the
only time, to get up to date news on the status of the Nature Boy.
To learn that Ric had left WCW was devastating, and to see him
several months later in the WWF, World Title belt in hand, was
surreal! Leave it to the Nature Boy, the “dirtiest player in the
game,” to pull the ultimate fast one!
In one of my many Ric Flair audio tapes
from the 1970s, Ric said he wouldn’t retire until “the ripe old age
of about 85.” For a while there, I thought the Nature Boy might be
true to his word! But currently at age 59, Ric has more than put his
time in within the confines of the squared circle. And if Sunday
night does prove to be the end of the road for Ric Flair, what a
road and wild ride it’s been!
I’ll be keeping my memories of Ric
Flair in the ring alive as I hit the road, listening to Ric’s
“blasts from the past” audio on the trusty iPod. Honk if you see
RFLAIR on a road near you….and we’ll share a Woooooooooo and a Four
Horsemen sign together!
Yep, some roads will never end.
David Chappell
March 2008
Photograph by Peggy Lathan
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