• Look Back In History
• Pmessages
• Quiz
• Stump The Staff
• Top Fifty
• Close

Joe Babinsack Talks Demolition Tag Team

Posted: Sep 27th 2009 By: CMBurnham

Ringside: With Demolition

Kayfabe Commentaries

www.kayfabecommentaries.com

$20.00

Reviewed by Joe Babinsack

?Here comes the Ax
And here comes the Smasher
The Demolition
Walkin' disaster?

I always remember the song coming across as ?Here comes the Axer, here comes the Smasher? but what do I know?

Well, one thing I know after watching another excellent Kayfabe Commentaries DVD, is that most of the Wikipedia sites got it all wrong about Demolition. Sure. It?s easy to call Demolition a rip-off of the Road Warriors, but unless Bill Eadie ? the Masked Superstar to us hardcore types, Demolition Ax to you mainstream types, and Demolition Axis for a time for you indy followers ? unless ? of the original team wants to give complete credit to Randy Colley, then there?s a lot of misinformation going on around the internet.

Imagine that!

Colley, for those who need to know, was one of the Moondogs (Rex), was the original Smash, was called Deadeye Dick in WCW, and of course, was the masked Assassin #3.

Well, according to Eadie, Colley was the one who came up with the Demolition concept. Now, it?s not exactly unreasonable to figure out that Demolition was a knock-off, of sorts, of the Road Warriors, but the realities of the comparisons end at ?two teams with paint, black leather and an aggressively popular approach.?

Thing is, and Eadie and the more well known Smash (who we know as Barry Darsow, and likely his incarnations as Crusher Darsow, Krusher Khruschev, Blacktop Bully (for his infamous taped watch with Dustin Rhodes,) and of course, one of the all time early 1990?s WWF great characters, The REPO MAN!!!) were rather dramatically different from the Road Warriors (Animal and Hawk) in so many ways.

Demolition was experienced, large but not quite overly muscled, and ? experienced.

You weren?t going to see a classic wrestling tag team match with the Warriors, more likely an all-out assault, with some classic spots and some general destruction of reputations of their opponents.

With Demolition, you were going to see some ?snug? wrestling, displays of psychology, some great understanding of their roles and an overall well-rounded, well-oiled machine (to throw a nod at Eadie?s yet another alter-ego.)

But it was Colley who came up with the concept, and Colley who was rather completely miscast in the role. Coming off a long run in the Northeast and the WWF as a Moondog, with wild white hair and a not-so-impressive physique, he was readily identifiable by the regulars, and well, there?s not much of a run involved when the catcalls and casual fans would rather you be what they want you to be.

So Colley graciously passed on the gimmick, became a Conquistador and later a Desperado, but never fully reclaimed his spot as one of the all-time notable tag team specialists.

Was that what we can call Demolition?

Certainly.

While hindsight and wrestling insight readily connects the dots between tough heels transitioning to babyface status without much of an effort, the foundation of the team was their combination of no-nonsense aggression and a wholly identifiable and impressive command of the ring.

Eadie and Darsow gladly intermingle stories and anecdotes while applying their paint.

It?s a visual that may not sound impressive on paper, but in application, it?s rather cool. It?s a glimpse, literally and figuratively, into the backstage antics and dedication of the men. Sure, watching guys put on face-paint is rather strange, and stranger still, the concept that face paint made certain tag teams look incredibly tough (while face paint on, say Adrian Street or Adrian Adonis was another story!) There is a notion of exposing things that well fits today?s mentalities.

Stranger still is the concept of having the guys watch video of their matches, comment upon them, but realizing that with copyright and other legalities, they aren?t going to be able to show that stuff.

Kayfabe Commentaries has more than a few products that run with this concept. It?s interesting.

But more interesting is Demolition?s role in the mid/late 1980?s.

These are guys that crashed onto the screen, with an aggressiveness barnstormed by the Road Warriors, but with a mentality forged by the experience of Ax and the athleticism of fellow big man, Smash. These guys could match up with the power and presence of Ken Patera and Billy Jack Haynes. They could wrestle to highlight the high-flying of the Killer Bees, or the wrestling talent of the Rougeaus, or the total package of the British Bulldogs at their prime.

With Mr. Fuji as their manager, they had that streak of sadistic intent, and with Mr. Fuji as their manager, they have plenty of prank stories, and a surprising respect for the old prankster, and in explaining why they never were at the receiving end of a rather dementedly active locker room.

More than anything, they were the dominant team of the late 80?s.

While the Road Warriors bounced around promotions and shifted from face to heels in spite of their popularity, Demolition was establishing itself as a strong, solid, for the long term team. While the Warriors dealt with the Freebirds and other oddly matched teams in the AWA and WCW, Demolition was dueling with the Bulldogs, Strike Force (Rick Martel and Tito Santana,) the Brain Busters and the Hart Foundation, at a time when the WWF was hip-deep in tag team talent.

Even more impressive was the feud with the Powers of Pain (Warlord and Barbarian,) themselves compared and called Road Warrior clones. Well, Barbarian was far more impressive than Warlord, but then again, Warlord took heavily muscled to much higher heights.

(And Eadie/Darsow say he looks just as big today???)

Losing Fuji as their manager seems to be a regret, but as faces, and with the same aggressive style, Demolition crushed the opposition. Well, they out-wrestled, stiffly, and with power moves and wrestling style, their opponents, to be honest.

That finisher, where Ax does the backbreaker and Smash dives with the elbow, was always the favorite finisher in those early video games.

And then there was Royal Rumble 1989, where Demolition was #1 and #2, and they stomped on each other for two minutes until they could stomp on Andre the Giant.

The Giant and Haku, as the Colossal Connection, were a strong feud, as went their matches with other big guys, the Twin Towers (Akeem the former One Man Gang and the late Big Bossman.)

One cannot overlook their reign of 478 days, finally ended by the Brain Busters.

One cannot overlook the addition of the late Brian Adams, as Crush.

One cannot overlook the impressive debut of the Road Warriors, finally renamed as the Legion of Doom and WWF talent. That, strangely enough, ironically or coincidentally, was the last gasp of the Crush/Smash team in the WWF.

The later points weren?t quite touched upon by the DVD, but remain historically important.

Filling in the gaps is what the guys on the DVD do. Lead by Sean Oliver, who has a penchant for getting good stories out of the subjects, the DVD never gets boring, and toes the line between a solid mainstream approach and a hardcore mentality.

Kind of like how the face painting goes ? enough to allow you to get a solid glimpse of the backstage stories, but not enough to make you turn away, not wanting to ruin you appreciation of the sport.

Today, that?s a hard line to toe.

Which is why, likely, that products like the interviews by Kayfabe Commentaries and MWF and other distributors are becoming more relevant than the current wrestling scene.

Tags: Smash, The Masked Superstar, Randy Colley, Moondog Rex, Deadeye Dick, WCW, Barry Darsow, Krusher Darsow, Krusher Kruschev, The Blacktop Bully, Repo Man, WWF, Ken Patera, Billy Jack Haynes, AWA, Andre the Giant, Akeem, One Man Gang, Big Bossman