gallery 5.6
 
 
AWA BATTLE ROYAL
 
On February 7,1989 in St. Paul, Minnesota, Tom Zenk narrowly lost to Larry Zbyszko in an 18-man battle royal to determine the new AWA heavyweight title (vacated by Jerry Lawler).
 
includes extracts from a  report by Bob Smith, PWI, June 1989
 
 

 "I came real close to getting rid of him [Zbyszko] in that battle royal [for the World title], but once that belt got in his hands, he was gonna do everything possible to keep it, and that includes cheating." 
 

 
Battle Royal participants in alphabetical order - 
Wayne "The Train" Bloom
Col.DeBeers
Paul Diamond
Derek Dukes
"Mean" Mike Enos
"RagingBull" Manny Fernandez
Greg Gagne
Mike George
Tommy Jammer
Chief  Wahoo McDaniel
Ken Patera
Steve Ray
Ricky Rice
Akio Sato
Sgt. Slaughter
Pat Tanaka
Larry Zbyszko
Tom Zenk
 
 
"In typical Zbyszko fashion, he decided not to get involved in the action at all once the opening bell sounded.... He simply stayed out of everybody's way". 
 
 
 
 
 "Hey, with all those feuds going, why get involved?" laughed Zbyszko after the match. "I decided to just step aside and let those other bums rip each other apart. It was a major key in this victory, just like it was in Chicago." 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
"All of the feuding contenders were eventually eliminated, as well as other stars such as Greg Gagne, Ken Patera, Mike George and Akio Sato. In the end, Zbyszko stared across the ring at Tom Zenk, who was also making a return to the AWA with this bout". 
 
"Zbyszko vs. Zenk: The man who remained standing would be crowned the new AWA champion." 
 
 
This match concludes next week.
 
 

Page 1 | Page 2 | Page 3 | Page 4 | Page 5 of this week's gallery

Back to Main Gallery
 
 
Back to the A-Zenk Menu
(for thousands of other Z-Man images)
 
Click to see more great pages on Sports and Recreation.