We heard your pleas, and finally, finally we are giving you what you’ve all been demanding since we started this column – a Bill Kamaier squash!
What’s that? You don’t remember Bill Kazmaier? By golly this behemoth was not only the world’s strongest man, but also a competitor in WCW during the early 1990s. Was he any good? Let’s find out together!
Today he will be wrestling Rip Rogers, who was a common face around the same time in WCW. Fun fact: he’s also the same guy that greenlit yours truly to manage Mark Henry and take a chokeslam from the Big Show in my last ever match. One day I REALLY need to apologize to Rip for that as I was clueless and it wound up being something of a disaster. Not sure when I will run into him again, so I will just say “SORRY RIP” rightchere and hope he sees it.
Back to our match, here’s Rip in his fantastic pink coattails deciding to play tough guy with Kaz. It goes about as well as you’d expect, with the big guy shoving him down in two seconds flat.
Seeing that shoves have no effect, Rip changes things up and goes with some kicks to the gut instead. They have minimal effect, but that’s a step up from no effect so it’s progress. Rogers goes for a side headlock and Kaz quite literally throws him about ten feet in the air. Have I mentioned yet that Bill is kinda sorta strong?
Rip then decides an entirely new tactic is needed, so he climbs the top rope and flies off at his foe. Kaz catches him with absolutely no effort and applies a bear hug. As he is doing so, we get an inset promo from Nikita Koloff and he teases a match. In what universe did THAT happen? I kinda gotta see it because that sounds like a hoss battle for the ages.
Kaz shows off his agility, springboarding over the top to get back in the ring. Ok ok, he’s now a million times better than every other World’s Strongest Man wrestler just for that tiny act alone. He then whips Rip into the ropes and catches him coming off with a powerslam for the pin. But I should note that if you watch closely, Rip’s foot was under the bottom rope when the ref started counting. Rematch anyone?