Friday, August 16, 2019

40 Years Ago This Month: Mulligan and Flair win the NWA World Tag Team Titles


by Dick Bourne
Mid-Atlantic Gateway

Forty years ago this month, on August 12, 1979, Blackjack Mulligan and Ric Flair won the NWA World Tag Team Championships from Paul Jones and Baron Von Raschke.

It was a big deal at the time. Although currently the U.S. champion, this was Ric's first championship win since first turning babyface earlier that summer after an angle with Paul Jones (as well as a separate angle with Buddy Rogers.) Flair had enlisted the aid of several wrestlers as his tag team partners (including Ricky Steamboat) in his quest to topple Jones and Von Raschke for the straps, but it was Mulligan who proved to be the right choice.

The match is remembered as much for the celebration afterward as for the match itself. A very bloody Ric Flair actually leapt into the arms of Mulligan as they held their titles over their heads in victory. It was an emotional scene in the Greensboro Coliseum seeing Flair and Mulligan with such camaraderie, especially given their long, violent, bloody feud just a year earlier.


Who would have thought at the time of the famous "Hat & Robe" angle that these two would hold the world tag team titles just over one year later.

40 years ago this month! Good memories!

http://www.midatlanticgateway.com/p/origins-of-mid-atlantic-title.html