Acronym SCW Style American Wrestling First episode date 1982 | Founded 1978 Headquarters San Antonio, TX Owner(s) Joe Blanchard | |
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Similar Championship Wrestling from Holl, AWA All‑Star Wrestling, Georgia Championship Wrestling, USA Action Extreme Team, Love Me - Love Me Not | ||
Southwest Championship Wrestling (SCW) was a professional wrestling promotion that was owned by Joe Blanchard and based in San Antonio, Texas, from 1978 to 1986, when it was purchased by Texas All-Star Wrestling and absorbed into that company.
Contents
Venues
Its television matches were usually taped at The Junction, a small boxing venue in San Antonio, although occasional matches from cards at San Antonio's HemisFair Arena were also seen.
Television
Starting on December 5, 1982, Southwest Championship Wrestling became the first weekly wrestling program on the USA Cable Network, airing Sundays at 11:00 a.m. Eastern Time. As a result of the new national exposure, SWCW staged a one-night tournament in Houston, Texas, to determine an "Undisputed World Heavyweight Champion." Adrian Adonis was the winner of this tournament, and as a result he was presented with the oldest existing championship belt by Lou Thesz as well as a brand new belt. The 75-Year Old Belt is now on display at the National Wrestling Hall Of Fame Dan Gable Museum in Waterloo, Iowa
However, because of a particularly bloody match between Tully Blanchard and "Bruiser" Bob Sweetan (which USA refused to air), the inability of the promotion to keep paying USA the $7,000 per week to keep the time slot, and a monetary offer made to the cable channel by WWF owner Vince McMahon to replace Southwest Championship Wrestling with his own programming, USA canceled the program (in spite of the high ratings the show was garnering for the network) and turned the time slot over to WWF All American Wrestling. Adonis' "undisputed championship" simply faded from SCW storylines within a few months and was abandoned in September 1983, and in April 1985, the promotion was sold to Texas All-Star Wrestling.
Working alliance
Southwest Championship Wrestling had many working alliances with other wrestling promotions such as the American Wrestling Association when its world champion Nick Bockwinkel defended his title at SWC cards. Southwest Championship Wrestling also had talent exchange deals with World Class Championship Wrestling in Dallas and the World Wrestling Council in Puerto Rico.
Rights of Footage
In 2010 JADAT Sports Inc. bought all the footage of SCW and Texas All Star from Ronnie Martinez. They have released a DVD "Best of the 80s Volume I" which contains mostly SCW footage. Available at MVD entertainment.com. The Southwest Championship Wrestling tape library is one of the few classic wrestling tape libraries not owned by World Wrestling Entertainment.
Championships
For most of the promotion's existence, the World Heavyweight Champion of the American Wrestling Association was recognized as SCW's top champion as well.