Greg Valentine & The Honky Tonk Man vs. Hulk Hogan & Tugboat

[5.0] "18/9/90 WWF. Hogan's promo gone full on corny at this stage. The match itself isn't the worst and a bonus that we didn't get the hulking up and a few boos for Hogan. Always strange to see Valentine with black hair, why couldn't he be in the R&B with blonde hair. The angle at the end was ruined by the follow up promo. 4.5*"

[5.0] "This was not as bad a match as the consensus score would indicate. But it's also not a good match. The crowd really does not like Rhythm & Blues, and Hogan is still mega over at this point, with his new buddy Tugboat getting a warm reception as well. I can see the appeal of Tugboat, as a huge strong-fat guy wearing a childish sailor's Halloween costume. It's silly but played straight and I couldn't help but chuckle at it. But in the ring, Tugboat was just not that good for his spot. Honky and Valentine do most of the bumping here though, and for what it's worth, Hogan's simple yet powerful offense worked in this match. Rhythm & Blues seemed overmatched from the start, and the tag team psychology was standard stuff, yet it was executed well (evidenced by the positive crowd reaction). Tugboat does a decent job selling that he's in peril from the heelish, and cooperative, efforts of HTM & Valentine, but with Hogan waiting for the tag, you never quite worry that the result is in doubt. Hogan with the hot tag gets the crowd behind him and the match should have ended cleanly there if not for the DQ. Not sure why Rhythm & Blues were protected here, but I did love to see Earthquake/John Tenta, a personal favorite of mine. Tenta should have been in the Tugboat spot, as Hogan's partner to turn on him, since he is a much better worker. All in all, I enjoyed the match and post-match segment for what it was: an almost satisfactory performance by Cagematch rating standards."

[5.0] "Hulk Hogan and [insert new friend's name] face some Heels whose manager employes more Heels so the Babyfaces have the numbers disadvantage. You have seen it all before, but at least the execution is passable. A pretty standard tag team match, where nothing really bad happens and everything is done by the book. It can be said that everybody is going through the motions and it would not be wrong."

[2.0] "Yeah...no thank you. I wasn't looking forward to this and I was proven right. The Tugboat push is interesting to look back on; I think they really failed with that character and what they seemed like they were lining up to do."

[2.0] "Bruce Prichard said the original plan for Wrestlemania & was Tugboat turning on America instead of Sgt. Slaughter and becoming Sheik Tugboat, which would have been utterly ridiculous, even for the '80s. I guess they were trying to start the Mega-Powers storyline over again with a less talented performer. This match was all kinds of bad."

[2.0] "This was a very rough match. I have a soft spot for Rhythm and Blues and Tugboat, so I was hoping to enjoy this, but it was rough. Tugboat sold his ass off, but everyone knew we were just killing time for Hogan, who had finally found a way to get his comeback without having to put the other team over first."

[3.0] "This wasn't a terrible match or anything, but it's increasingly clear how stale Hogan was at this point. He might not be WWF champion, but he's still front and center of WWF programming. Both Valentine and Honky were safe hands, but should have been left in the 80s. Don't even get me started on Tugboat. I imagine if you started watching WWF in the golden era of 87-89, growing up a few years and seeing Hogan teaming up with a fat sailor must have made a few fans realise that wrestling can be incredibly lame. This one is thrown out when Earthquake and friends rush in. Tugboat ends up taking an impressive tumble over the top off a guitar shot. I just didn't care about this one."

[1.0] "This one dragged significantly and felt like there was a lot more time wasting than there should have been. The Hogan/Tugboat team is probably one of the most uneven I've ever seen, its matches are just Hogan leaving Tugboat to the wolves and getting his SuperHogan hot tag again. There is some set up to Hogan/Earthquake here, but there's also a dumb DQ finish that protects Rhythm and Blues to some extent, because you gotts keep an ageing Greg Valentine look strong! A bore of a match."

[4.0] "Yes this was all Hogan and to a lesser degree Tugboat, not an actual match, but it still had the crowd going pretty wild and was mindless fun. **1/4"

[2.0] "Gee. Did anybody back in 1990 give the heels a chance? So weird that even though the mega buddies won, they did so by DQ. You DON'T need to protect Honky and Valentine at this point in their WWF careers."

[3.0] "Not the worst in-ring action I've seen, but it was still bad. Face's domination, very boring domination of heels over Fred, Hulk-up, domination of faces again and dq finish. Weakly. Greg's selling was the best part (he is as beautiful as ever)."

[2.0] "Absolutely awful match, Tugboat looked like a bitch until he had to use a guitar to clean house at the end. Honky with the weak ass guitar shot for the DQ finish. Awful"

[1.0] "Yeah, this was pretty awful. A way too long of an extended squash that did nothing but made everyone look like a geek except for Hogan. [1/2*]"

[2.0] "This was a nothing match with a nothing finish, existing only as a glorified ad for the upcoming Survivor Series PPV. Everytime Hogan was in the ring, he dominated easily and when Tugboat was in, the heels just beat the living shit out of him like a big jabroni to set up multiple Hogan hot tags. It was not very good and made Tugboat look like a big geek next to the almighty Hulkster. [1/2*]"

[0.0] "Hahaha, what a stupid match. Tugboat's partnership with Hogan is just silly, amazing that they originally wanted him to main event Wrestlemania VII against the Hulkster. Valentine and HTM are not remotely threatening. Hogan feebly stands behind the referee doing nothing as HTM slowly slaps Tugboat with a guitar for the DQ. Nothing to see here."