Of all the Von Erich vs. Flair matches so far, this one can be categorized as the Classic Great Flair match. That’s not to take away anything from Kerry’s performance here, which we’ll get to, but this is about as textbook Flair as you can get. It’s a 60 minute broadway for the NWA World Championship, and it’s wrestled far closer to that style than the much quicker TV bouts down in Texas.

All the classic Flair tropes are here, from allowing the early shine for the babyface. Those short knees to the gut and other various tricks and cheats to move into more of a heat. And even some great structural ideas like early injuries that pay off down the line. Flair’s point of attacks in this match aren’t necessarily focused, but they do seem to build with time. Initially it’s avoiding a tackle that sends Kerry into the corner shoulder first, later on it’s Flair going after the midsection, and then of course, a section working over the leg for the Figure Four. In this kind of setting, Flair really feels comfortable finding this opportunities to wear the bigger, stronger man down. 

But Kerry really does feel great in this too. Yes, he’s working a pretty comfortable and familiar formula with Flair here, but his actual performance within those parameters more than earns him praise. For one, he feels credible and legitimate working with Flair down in the mat in the early goings. When the match slows down and one or the other slaps an extended hold on, Kerry’s far more adept than say his brother David at building tension and suspense around the kind of problem/solution wrestling that makes longer bouts like this work. And once again, I find Kerry’s selling rather impressive when it’s called upon him. I wouldn’t say any of his selling is especially “long-term” and while I wish there was a little more focus towards the stretch, Flair’s strategy shifts enough that I can forgive when one body part recovers over the extended runtime.

To Kerry’s credit too, there’s a lot of great small ideas he brings to this title match that really help elevate it. It’s a great twist, for example, when it’s Kerry who has the chance to initiate leg work on floor in this bout. He’s pretty vicious about it too–ramming the knee into the ringpost, punching at the knees when Flair is standing. Perhaps the peak of this leg work from Kerry for me is when he gets Flair in the figure four twice, and just as he’s gesturing for a third, decides to slap the Iron Claw onto the bad knee instead. Brilliant stuff.

As with many broadways though, this does tend to drift a little in those closing moments. The last ten minutes of footage or so do come across a little aimless, that is until Kerry gets the climactic Iron Claw on Flair’s head, at which point most fans can tell where this is going. As far as my own ratings go too, I always struggle with things like these where we’re missing a good 15 minutes of footage (a full fourth of this hour!) to commercial breaks. Just keep that in mind when you count the asterisks below. The 45 minutes we do have though are all generally quite strong.

Pretty much classic Flair all around, but also a really great Kerry performance to supplement it as well.

Rating: ****

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