Friday, January 02, 2009

An Afternoon of Classic Wrestling

ESPN Classic will air a marathon of AWA Championship Wrestling beginning this afternoon at 1 p.m. Central Time and concluding at 6 p.m. Central Time, for a grand total of five straight episodes.

I'm not sure exactly what time frame the episodes will be from, although as of late they have been airing events from 1990 during their weekday showcase each evening at 11 p.m. Central on the station. Those particular shows have featured then-AWA World Champion Larry Zbyszko, Nikita Koloff, The Trooper (later known as "The Patriot"), Yukon John (John Nord who went on to WWE as "The Bezerker"), Mike Enos, Wayne Bloom and more including a young announcer named Eric Bischoff.

The airing of the classic shows have certainly been a throwback. While many will laugh at things such as the "Team Challenge Series," some of the footage from the mid-1980's was quite entertaining as it featured Nick Bockwinkle, Curt Hennig, Shawn Michaels, Marty Jannetty and many others who certainly carried the AWA torch at the time.