Clash of the Champions
Clash of the Champions is an American series of professional wrestling television specials that were produced by World Championship Wrestling and Jim Crockett Promotions in conjunction with the National Wrestling Alliance. The specials were supercards comprising pay-per-view caliber matches, similar to the World Wrestling Federation's Saturday Night's Main Event series. The Clash of the Champions shows were famous for typically not airing commercials during matches even though many of these matches lasted 20 minutes or more.
The first Clash of the Champions was held on March 27, 1988, by JCP and was entitled NWA: Clash of the Champions. Subsequent events had different subtitles, for example, Clash of the Champions II: Miami Mayhem, up until Clash of the Champions XVI: Fall Brawl 1991, which was the last event with a subtitle. JCP was sold to Ted Turner and renamed WCW in 1988, and WCW continued to air the events until 1997. The rights to Clash of the Champions now belong to WWE, which acquired WCW in 2001.
History
Throughout 1987 and 1988, a bitter event scheduling war broke out between rival wrestling promoters Vince McMahon and Jim Crockett, Jr. On Thanksgiving night 1987, McMahon's World Wrestling Federation aired Survivor Series against Starrcade from Crockett and the National Wrestling Alliance, two pay-per-view events on the same day. At that time, many cable companies could only offer one live PPV event at a time, and furthermore were presented with an edict from the WWF saying that any cable company that chose to carry Starrcade would be barred from carrying any future WWF events. Hence, the WWF PPV was cleared 10-1 over Starrcade.Following this incident, McMahon was warned by the PPV industry not to schedule PPV events simultaneously with the NWA again. However, he was still not willing to fully cooperate with Crockett, and on January 24, 1988, another scheduling conflict took place between the WWF and NWA. The NWA presented the Bunkhouse Stampede on PPV, while on the same night, the WWF aired the first Royal Rumble for free on the USA Network.
In 1988, with the WWF's WrestleMania IV around the corner, Crockett decided to give McMahon a taste of his own medicine. He aired his own supercard, Clash of the Champions for free on TBS on March 27, 1988 - the same night as WrestleMania. The first Clash was of PPV caliber and made Sting a star after he wrestled NWA World Champion Ric Flair to a 45-minute draw. WCW would repeat the practice again the following year with a Clash coinciding with the WWF's WrestleMania V. Although the main event of NWA Champion Ricky Steamboat defeating Flair in a best of three falls match was widely considered the best wrestling match that took place among the two promotions on that day, ratings and attendance for the event fell well below expectations due to the event not being advertised and the practice of conflicting major events would cease until the Monday Night War began in 1995.
Clash events continued on a sporadic basis over the next nine years, quickly changing focus to become a free marketing vehicle for NWA/WCW PPV events, similar to the WWF's Saturday Night's Main Event. WCW aired the 35th and last Clash of the Champions on August 21, 1997. In 1997 the determination was made to discontinue air Clash of the Champions due to the start of Thunder.
WWE, the owner of the WCW properties since 2001, resurrected the name under the WWE Clash of Champions pay-per-view starting in 2016.
Following a 25-year hiatus, the variant of the Clash event was resurrected by All Elite Wrestling as the Battle of the Belts in 2022 and airs on TBS' sister channel, TNT on a quarterly basis.
Dates and venues
Results
National Wrestling Alliance (Jim Crockett Promotions)
Clash of the Champions I
Clash of the Champions took place on March 27, 1988, at the Greensboro Coliseum in Greensboro, North Carolina. There were 6,000 people in attendance and the show drew a 5.6 rating on TBS. This was aired head-to-head with WWF's WrestleMania IV. In a "College Rules" match, Mike Rotunda won with a cradle for the one-count pin 1:10 into the second round.In a match for the United States Tag Team Championship, The Fantastics' Tommy Rogers originally pinned The Midnight Express's Bobby Eaton to win the titles but the decision was reversed because Rogers' partner, Bobby Fulton, had thrown referee Randy Anderson over the top rope before the pinfall was made. The Road Warriors and Dusty Rhodes defeated The Powers of Pain and Ivan Koloff when The Barbarian accidentally hit his partner, The Warlord, with a diving headbutt. Animal wore a goalie mask during the match to protect his injured face.
Lex Luger and Barry Windham defeated Arn Anderson and Tully Blanchard for the World Tag Team Championship, when interference by the champions' manager J. J. Dillon backfired; Dillon held a chair on the apron, but Lex Luger whipped Arn Anderson into the chair.
In the main event, Sting challenged Ric Flair for the NWA World Heavyweight Championship. Flair's manager, J. J. Dillon, was suspended in a cage above the ring. As no wrestler scored a decision before the time limit expired, the decision was left to the judges appointed for this occasion: wrestling official Gary Juster awarded the match to Sting, while Penthouse model Patty Mullen decided in favour of Flair. Wrestling official Sandy Scott ruled the match a draw. No decision was announced for the remaining two judges, actors Jason Hervey and Ken Osmond, resulting in the match being ruled a draw and Flair retaining the title.
Clash of the Champions II: Miami Mayhem
Clash of the Champions II took place on June 8, 1988, at the James L. Knight Center in Miami, Florida. There were 2,400 people in attendance and the show drew a 4.8 rating on TBS. Throughout the show, wrestlers were being interviewed as they arrived to the building, most notably, Lex Luger who was attacked by The Four Horsemen and was busted open after being slammed head first into the trunk of his limo. This would also be an important factor in the conclusion of Luger's match against Ric Flair at the 1988 Great American Bash. Kevin Sullivan was locked in a cage at ringside during the third match but stole the key from the Garvins’ valet Precious. Steve Williams ran in after the match to save the Garvins from a 3 on 2 beat down. Al Perez was disqualified when Larry Zbyszko interfered in the match attacking Nikita Koloff. The referee is knocked out near the end of the main event, prompting Flair and Barry Windham to interfere, resulting in a double disqualification.Clash of the Champions III: Fall Brawl
Clash of the Champions III took place on September 7, 1988, at the Albany Civic Center in Albany, Georgia. There were 3,700 people in attendance and the show drew a 5.4 rating on TBS. Fall Brawl would later become a regular PPV event for WCW. After the match Steve Williams ran to the ring to congratulate Brad Armstrong. Armstrong replaced Tim Horner, who left the company in August. Despite the match not being announced as a no-DQ match, Kevin Sullivan is not disqualified when Al Perez interferes in the match. Dusty Rhodes won the match by pinning Gary Hart and not the legal opponent Kevin Sullivan. The bout was originally scheduled as Rhodes and Dick Murdoch vs Al Perez and Ron Garvin. Garvin left the company in August and the bout was changed. Ivan Koloff had manager Paul Jones and The Russian Assassin at ringside. After accidentally costing Koloff the match Paul Jones and the Russian Assassin attacked Koloff soon joined by a second masked Russian Assassin turning Koloff face. Barry Windham was disqualified after hitting Sting with a chair. The referee didn't actually see the chair shot but is informed of it by San Francisco 49er John Ayers who came to ringside.National Wrestling Alliance (World Championship Wrestling)
Clash of the Champions IV: Season's Beatings
Clash of the Champions IV took place on December 7, 1988, at the UTC Arena in Chattanooga, Tennessee. This was the first Clash of the Champions following the sale of Jim Crockett Promotions to Turner Broadcasting and the subsequent company name change to World Championship Wrestling. There were 8,000 people in attendance and the show drew a 4.5 rating on TBS. This show set up Starrcade '88. It was on this show that TBS/WCW experimented with a top down camera angle, which did not catch on. This is comparable to the "refer-eye" camera from Halloween Havoc '91. This was the finals of the tournament to crown new United States Tag Team champions; the titles were vacated when the Midnight Express won the NWA World Tag Team titles in September. Ron Simmons and Eddie Gilbert had originally lost to the Sheepherders in the semi-finals but the decision was reversed when the Sheepherders signed with the World Wrestling Federation to become the Bushwhackers. Both losing finalists would later win the title with other partners Ivan Koloff pinned Paul Jones after hitting him with Jones’ own illegal object. Koloff had one arm tied behind his back during the entire match. The Russian Assassins attacked Koloff after the match only for the Junkyard Dog to make the save. Dusty Rhodes was disqualified for hitting Road Warrior Animal with a chair. Both Hawk and Sting had already interfered in the match. The Road Warriors chose Genichiro Tenryu to be the 3rd champion on the December 10th edition of NWA World Championship Wrestling.Clash of the Champions V: St. Valentine's Massacre
Clash of the Champions V took place on February 15, 1989, at the Cleveland Convention Center in Cleveland, Ohio. There were 5,000 people in attendance and the show drew a 4.6 rating on TBS. This show was warm up show for the Chi-Town Rumble PPV only 5 days later. Steven Casey was billed as "undefeated" coming into this match. The masked Blackmailer was Jack Victory who did double duty on the night Mike Rotunda replaced Kevin Sullivan in the match, Sullivan and Williams originally won the US titles. The main event match was declared a double disqualification when Sting, Junkyard Dog and Michael Hayes stormed the ring. Sting, JYD and Hayes were originally slated to face the Road Warriors and Tenryu but were locked in by Kevin Sullivan before the match. A Ric Flair scheduled interview resulted in a Ricky Steamboat confrontation and an unscheduled in-ring, and out-of-ring, brawl, resulting in Flair losing all his clothes except his socks and trunks. The ring announcer for the night was former IWA and WWF Play-by-Play announcer Jack Reynolds. Ricky Steamboat and Ric Flair had an in-ring contract signing for their match at Chi-Town Rumble.There is a very entertaining review of this Clash Of The Champions on an episode of the We Can't Wrestle Podcast.