The night was November 24, 1983, and the event was the National Wrestling Alliance’s first-ever Starrcade. The event, which took place at the Greensboro Coliseum in Greensboro, NC was billed as “A Flare for the Gold.”
NWA Starrcade 1983 was sold out with 15,547 in attendance, and in a time before traditional pay-per-view, the event had a closed-circuit attendance of 30,000.
Below are the results from the show:
-Rufus R. Jones & Bugsy McGraw defeated The Assassins (Jody Hamilton & Ray “Hercules Hernandez” Fernandez)
-Kevin Sullivan & Mark Lewin defeated Johnny Weaver & Scott McGhee
-Abdullah the Butcher defeated Carlos Colon
-Dick Slater & Bob Orton Jr. defeated Wahoo McDaniel & Mark Youngblood
-Charlie Brown (Jimmy Valiant) defeated Great Kabuki to win the NWA TV title and retain his mask
-Roddy Piper defeated Greg Valentine in a dog collar match
-Ricky Steamboat & Jay Youngblood b Jack & Jerry Brisco to win the NWA world tag team titles with Angelo Mosca as referee
-Ric Flair defeated Harley Race to win the NWA title in a cage match with Gene Kiniski as referee
In 1987 Jim Crockett announced the NWA would do its first PPV event on Thanksgiving Day (November 26), Starrcade: “Chitown Heat”, at the UIC Pavilion in Chicago. Vince McMahon had created the Survivor Series to also be held on Thanksgiving Day. During this time, pay-per-view events were rare, as most of the cable systems only had one channel, so two PPV could not be run at the same time. Vince McMahon had prior success on PPV with 400,000 buys from WrestleMania III. At that time there were only roughly 5 million homes for PPV.
Both show ran on pay-per-view on that day. However, due to the success of the WWF’s Survivor Series, Jim Crockett Promotions would move the Starrcade pay-per-view shows to December.
NWA Starrcade 1987 Chi-Town Heat – UIC Pavilion – Final Starrcade on Thanksgiving Day
-Michael Hayes & Jimmy Garvin & Sting defeated Rick Steiner & Larry Zbyszko & Eddie Gilbert
-Steve Williams b Barry Windham to retain the UWF Title
-Ricky Morton & Robert Gibson defeated Stan Lane & Bobby Eaton in a scaffold match
-Nikita Koloff defeated Terry Taylor to unify the NWA & UWF TV Titles
-Tully Blanchard & Arn Anderson retained the NWA tag team Titles losing via DQ to the Road Warriors
-Dusty Rhodes b Lex Luger to win the U.S. Title
-Ric Flair defeated Ronnie Garvin to win the NWA world Title in a cage match
Attendance: 9,000 sellout
Closed-circuit attendance: 41,000
PPV buys: 16,500
First-ever WWF Survivor Series – Richfield, Coliseum
-Jim Duggan & Randy Savage & Ricky Steamboat & Brutus Beefcake & Jake Roberts defeated Harley Race & Hercules & Honky Tonk Man & Danny Davis & Ron Bass
-Velvet McIntyre & Itsuki Yamazaki & Noriyo Tateno & Rockin Robin & Fabulous Moolah defeated Leilani Kai & Judy Martin & Dawn Marie (not the later WWE/ECW valet) & Donna Christanello & Sensational Sherri Martel
-Brian Blair & Jim Brunzell & Jim Powers & Paul Roma & Tito Santana & Rick Martel & Dynamite Kid & Davey Boy Smith & Jacques Rougeau Jr. & Raymond Rougeau defeated Greg Valentine & Dino Bravo & Demolition Ax & Smash & Bret Hart & Jim Neidhart & Haku & Tama & Nikolai Volkoff & Boris Zhukov
-Andre the Giant & One Man Gang & King Kong Bundy & Butch Reed & Rick Rude defeated Hulk Hogan & Bam Bam Bigelow & Paul Orndorff & Don Muraco & Ken Patera
Attendance: 21,000 sellout
PPV buys: 350,000
Source: Wrestling Observer Newsletter, December 6, 2010.