Southwest Championship Wrestling


Southwest Championship Wrestling was a professional wrestling promotion that was owned by Joe Blanchard and based in San Antonio, Texas, from 1978 to 1985, when it was purchased by Texas All-Star Wrestling and absorbed into that company.

History

Venues

Its television matches were usually taped at The Junction, a small boxing venue in San Antonio, although occasional matches from cards at San Antonio's HemisFair Arena were also seen.

Television

Starting on December 5, 1982, Southwest Championship Wrestling became the first weekly wrestling program on the USA Cable Network, airing Sundays at 11:00 a.m. Eastern Time. As a result of the new national exposure, SWCW staged a one-night tournament in Houston, Texas, to determine an "Undisputed World Heavyweight Champion." Adrian Adonis was the winner of this tournament, and as a result he was presented with the oldest existing championship belt by Lou Thesz as well as a brand new belt. The 75-year old belt is now on display at the George Tragos/Lou Thesz Professional Wrestling Hall of Fame in Waterloo, Iowa
However, because of a particularly bloody match between Tully Blanchard and "Bruiser" Bob Sweetan, the inability of the promotion to keep paying USA the $7,000 per week to keep the time slot, and a monetary offer made to the cable channel by WWF owner Vince McMahon to replace Southwest Championship Wrestling with his own programming, In addition, Barry Diller, who as head of Paramount Pictures was also at the time the main shareholder in the USA Network, had by August 1983 secured a deal to make the USA Network a source for Madison Square Garden Network programming and wanted to focus more on having the network being tied to sporting organizations which could air events in New York City's Madison Square Garden. USA canceled the program and turned the time slot over to WWF All American Wrestling. Adonis' "undisputed championship" simply faded from SCW storylines within a few months and was abandoned in September 1983, and in April 1985, the promotion was sold to Texas All-Star Wrestling.

Working alliance

Southwest Championship Wrestling had many working alliances with other wrestling promotions such as the American Wrestling Association when its world champion Nick Bockwinkel defended his title at SWC cards. Southwest Championship Wrestling also had talent exchange deals with World Class Championship Wrestling in Dallas and the World Wrestling Council in Puerto Rico.

Rights of Footage

In 2010, JADAT Sports Inc. bought all the footage of SCW and Texas All Star from Ronnie Martinez. They have released a DVD "Best of the 80s Volume I", which contains mostly SCW footage. The Southwest Championship Wrestling tape library is one of the few classic wrestling tape libraries not owned by World Wrestling Entertainment. in 2021 JADAT Sports Inc. appointed Stream Go Media LLC as the exclusive distribution agents for both SCW and Texas All-Star Wrestling. Footage from both SCW and Texas All-Star Wrestling both appear on the streaming service "Wrestling Legends Network" built and operated by Stream Go Media, LLC launched on May 25, 2021, on the Roku platform and on www.WrestlingLegendsNetwork.tv.

Championships

For most of the promotion's existence, the World Heavyweight Champion of the American Wrestling Association was recognized as SCW's top champion as well.
TitleFinal champion
SCW Southwest Brass Knuckles ChampionshipTony Atlas
SCW Southwest Heavyweight ChampionshipKevin Sullivan
SCW Southwest Junior Heavyweight ChampionshipRon Sexton
SCW Southwest Tag Team ChampionshipThe Maoris
SCW World Heavyweight ChampionshipScott Casey
SCW World Tag Team ChampionshipThe Sheepherders

Alumni

Commentators

  • Gene Kelly
  • Gene Goodsen
  • Steve Stack
  • Rapido Rodriguez