Tribute to WWE Hall of Famer Pedro Morales

Wrestling Magazine Cover of the Week

Inside Wrestling 

March 1976

WWF Tag Team Champions - 1980

August 9th 1980

Bob Backlund and Pedro Morales defeated the The Wild Samoans at Shea Stadium in New York City to win the WWF Tag Team titles.  They won a best 2 out of 3 falls match by winning the first 2 falls.  However, Bob Backlund was the reigning WWF Heavyweight champion and thus is was ruled he could not hold 2 titles at the same time.  He and Pedro vacated the belts the day.   One month later the Wild Samoans would regain the belts by winning a tournament to fill the vacated belts.

Tag Team Thursday

NWA World Wide Wrestling

1979

Paul Jones and Baron Von Raschke

vs

Steve Regal and Pedro Morales

Match of the Night (George "The Animal" Steele)

Because I am enjoying his recently published book about his life in wrestling, here is Jim Myers a.k.a. George "The Animal" Steele as the #1 contender for the WWWF Heavyweight Title.

June 30th 1973

Madison Square Garden

WWWF Heavyweight Title

Pedro Morales

(Champion)

vs

George "The Animal" Steele

WWWF Title

Today in 1971 WWWF United States Heavyweight Champion Pedro Morales pinned WWWF World Heavyweight Champion Ivan Koloff to win the title. Koloff had Morales in a waistlock, with Morales kicking off the top turnbuckle and falling on top of Koloff with both of their shoulders down.

The referee began counting, with Morales lifting a shoulder after the two-count. Bruno Sammartino, whom Koloff had defeated three weeks earlier for the title, came out and congratulated Morales after the match. As a result of his winning the World title, Morales' United States title was vacated.

Here is film of the match with the announcer and crowd noise dub in many years later.