Terry Funk vs Tully Blanchard (WCW, 5-22-1994)

WCW Slamboree, Philadelphia, PA

This is a Legends Match at Slamboree ’94, with Funk and Blanchard both Legends who aren’t part of the regular WCW roster. Funk would be again, for a couple of stints, in fact, but not Tully.

Tully Blanchard has the Journey ripoff music that Chris Jericho used early in WCW. He gets a nice reception in Philadelphia, a lot of people holding up the four fingers of the Horsemen, which Tully does, too.

Terry Funk’s out with the branding iron and the cowboy hat and the full get-up. In recent times, Funk has made another name for himself in the budding days of ECW in Philadelphia, so they’re up for him. The dummy WCW production team shows an ECW sign, in fact.

Gordon Solie and Bobby Heenan are on the commentary as the crowd chants “ECW” and Funk goes out to the front row to fuck around with Hat Guy and some other weirdoes.

“He’s an unusual character,” Solie says of Funk. “A lot of people say his elevator doesn’t stop at every floor. He’s hardcore.”

Funk calls at Blanchard from the floor, and throws some clothing at him, so Tully hops down and just starts RIPPING into Funk with shots, and Funk is happy to fire back! Both guys just slugging the shit out of each other to start this match.

The match goes into the ring. Funk is prone and Blanchard drops a knee on his back. Blanchard with a vertical suplex, Funk bails out of the ring. Two crutches get chucked into the ring by Funk, and the referee gets them back out of there. Funk lifts Blanchard up for an atomic drop, and hits it on the floor.

Funk wanders away as Blanchard comes up with his fists cocked, dazed. Back into the ring. Funk hits a reverse neckbreaker. Two count. Funk dumps Blanchard out onto the entrance ramp. Chop from Funk as the fight goes out there now. Funk screaming at Blanchard. “You son of a bitch!”

Blanchard gets knocked off the ramp to the floor, and Funk has a bit of wood now, Nick Patrick wants to take it away, but Funk holds onto it and bops Blanchard over the head.

Funk takes that paneling back into the ring and sets it up leaning on the bottom rope, and piledrives Blanchard through it! Heenan can’t help but get a tremendous kick out of Terry Funk’s nonsense. Nick Patrick really giving Funk the business, and Funk doesn’t give a shit.

Back out to the ramp, and Funk hits a DDT as Heenan talks about the differences between the wildman Terry and the “passive” Dory Funk Jr. Nick Patrick giving both guys guff about getting this thing under control, and he starts a count.

Funk headbutts Blanchard. “We want blood” chant. Funk doing nothing but encouraging these Philly nutjobs. Back into the ring and Terry hits another piledriver. The crowd wants the Funk moonsault, and fuck it, Funk’s gonna go for it. He goes up, launches himself, and misses!

Blanchard gets an opening there and just LACES Funk with chops. Funk fires back with wild left hands. Blanchard with knees to the stomach in the corner. Blanchard goes for a whip to the corner, they reverse it around a couple times, and Blanchard gets whipped into Nick Patrick, who goes down.

So Funk goes and gets a red folding chair. He sets it up seated in the corner. Blanchard’s cut. Funk puts Blanchard up top for a superplex onto an open chair, it would appear, or maybe another piledriver. Yeah, it’s another piledriver. They sort of lazily half-ass execute that and don’t really go through with it. Rightly so if you’re Tully.

Tully stomping at Funk, Patrick involved again, so Tully kicks him. The fight is back on the ramp now, and Funk has the branding iron, which he swings at Tully’s midsection, landing a shot. Funk hits him again and Blanchard goes to tackle Funk. Funk bending it over the head and neck of Blanchard, and the bell sounds. Nick Patrick’s done with this madness.

But they’re not stopping. Funk swings and misses at Blanchard, then the fight finally stops. Funk crawls out into the crowd again, nobody knows what the hell he’s doing. But he’s over with the ECW fans, takes Hat Guy’s hat, and then elbowdrops the hat at ringside and headbutts it a bunch.

Meanwhile, it’s announced as a double disqualification. Funk wanders around and Heenan gets nervous at ringside.

Rating: 4/5. This was really the last time Blanchard was ever seen in the ring on a major wrestling show, unless you want to count a few ECW matches in ’95 and he had a NJPW match with Tatsumi Fujinami that year, too. But for a major event, a pay-per-view, even a true big TV show, this was it for Tully. It’s a goddamn shame the way he got basically blackballed out of major wrestling in ’89, because even by ’94 he was still a hell of a wrestler and had a hell of a match here with Funk, who stuck around a bit in WCW as part of the Stud Stable, which was a really good short run for him and everyone else involved.