Continental Championship Wrestling 1986

Welcome again to another month looking back at professional wrestling from the state of Alabama. This time around we look at Continental Championship Wrestling (CCW) in the year 1986. We'll touch on Kevin Sullivan's run in the area, Wendell Cooley, the great battles between Jerry Stubbs & Brad Armstrong over the Continental Title, and a good year for tag team wrestling in the area.

A quick review of 1985 saw the name of the promotion change from Southeastern Wrestling to Continental during the summer of '85, the television show went from a weekly studio taped show to a weekly then every other week arena show, a change of TV announcers as Charlie Platt was replaced by the "Dean" himself Gordon Solie. The promotion also made a return to the roots of the Fuller family in promoting as Continental began running shows in East Tennessee as well as Alabama, East Mississippi, and Northwest Florida. Ron Fuller became the lead bad guy figure as a manager in 1985 as he formed his Stud Stable. Robert Fuller joined his brother in really a shocking turn and being a heel bad guy for perhaps the first time in his career, joining cousin Jimmy Golden in the Stable. Bob Armstrong was forced to leave CCW and in his place a masked man bearing great resemblance to Armstrong came into the territory known as the Bullet. The masked Nightmares became the unmasked Nightmares thanks to the Rich Cousins. Nightmares may have lost the masks, but started wearing painted stars over their eyes and rainbow colored hair. Former NWA World Champion Tommy Rich had a short run as Continental Champion. And by the end of 1985 my favorite performer to work in the area from 1985 - 1989 had established himself, Dr. Tom Prichard. All in all a pretty good year for Alabama wrestling.

Now on to 1986.

January - June

United States Jr. Heavyweight action in the first half of the year can pretty much be summed up with three men, Tim Horner, Tom Prichard, and Roy Lee Welch. As the year began Prichard and Horner were locked in a battle for the title. As fans know, both these men were and are very good workers in the ring so their matches were always exciting. With both men being young and athletic, this was a departure from the Jr. title picture over the last year or so when Bill Ash was the dominant figure in the division with a very methodical mat style of wrestling.  More...