10 Things You Should Know About Nick Bockwinkel's Wrestling Career In The 1970s

While WWE tends to dominate the pro wrestling conversation — even in discussing history — there are a number of legends who don’t get as much of a spotlight as they may deserve, even if their work isn’t too hard to track down. One such legend is Nick Bockwinkel, four-time world champion in the Minneapolis-based American Wrestling Association.

RELATED: Nick Bockwinkel: The Greatest Wrestling Heel Modern Fans Have Never Heard Of

Some fans may remember him for his run as an authority figure in WCW in 1994 and 1995, but Bockwinkel really came into his own as a performer in the 1970s, becoming an incredible heel and a main eventer in AWA. Let’s take a look at what Nick Bockwinkel’s career was like in the whole decade, which includes his entry into the AWA and his ascent to the promotion’s very top.

10 Wrestled For Georgia Championship Wrestling

Debuting as a teenager in the 1950s, Nick Bockwinkel traveled the NWA territories, making his way to Georgia Championship Wrestling for a run lasting from 1969 to 1970. Previously a babyface, during his time in GCW Bockwinkel ended up turning heel, developing a persona of a Californian with a superiority complex and setting the stage for his later run in AWA as one of its great bad guys.

Besides honing his craft, Bockwinkel also found in-ring success, capturing the NWA Georgia Heavyweight Championship — the top regional prize — as well as the Television Title.

9 Feuded With Dory Funk Jr. For The NWA World Title

In the old NWA territory days, each region had its own championship while the NWA World Champion traveled around, visiting each territory and taking on its top stars. In 1970, Dory Funk Jr. was in the midst of his 1,563-day reign as World Champion and made his way to Georgia, where Bockwinkel was unable to dethrone him.

Their series of matches — marked by his growing frustration — helped further his development as a heel, and Funk himself considered Bockwinkel one of his best challengers.

8 Arrived In AWA In 1970

Nick Bockwinkel left Georgia in September 1970, and by the end of the year made his way to Minneapolis to debut for the American Wrestling Association. Wrestling for the company until his retirement in 1987, the AWA would not only be Bockwinkel’s home but also the promotion with which he’s been associated ever since.

RELATED: What Happened To The AWA (& 9 More Facts About The Company Fans Should Know)

Less than a year after debuting, Bockwinkel got his first shot at the AWA World Heavyweight Title, losing to champion (and promotion founder) Verne Gagne by disqualification. This would be the first of about 20 title shots that Bockwinkel had within his first five years with AWA.

7 Tag Team With Ray Stevens

While it took Nick Bockwinkel several years to reach the top of the AWA, he initially found success in the tag team division when he teamed with fellow heel Ray Stevens. Together, Bockwinkel and Stevens were an effective heel tag team and one that put on some tremendous matches to boot, like their bout against Red Bastien and Billy Robinson.

On top of being great bad guys, the duo was also successful, capturing the AWA World Tag Team Championship three times, and also held a tag title in the Florida territory.

6 Managed By Bobby Heenan

After losing the AWA World Tag Team Championship in 1974 to The Crusher and Billy Robinson, Nick Bockwinkel and Ray Stevens grew paranoid and began to complain that forces in AWA were conspiring against them. They needed someone on their side, and so they gained a manager in the form of Bobby “The Brain” Heenan, who’d end up becoming one of the greatest managers of all time.

The men’s association with Heenan would soon pay off, as he interfered to help Bockwinkel and Stevens win back the belts from Robinson and The Crusher.

5 Nearly Got Shot At A Show

The aligning of Nick Bockwinkel and Bobby Heenan was, as modern fans might expect, a bona fide heat magnet, especially back in the days when fans weren’t “smart” to wrestling’s kayfabe nature. In early 1975, Bockwinkel (backed by Heenan) was taking on Verne Gagne at a show in Chicago, during which Heenan was interfering in the proceedings as usual.

Heenan’s meddling didn’t just make the fans angry — it made one fan angry enough to pull a gun and shoot at the heels to defend Gagne. The bullets missed, but reportedly several fans in the crowd were injured.

4 Won The AWA World Title In 1975

It would only take about five years for Nick Bockwinkel to reach the top of the American Wrestling Association, albeit at the age of 40. It was in early November 1975 when Bockwinkel finally dethroned Verne Gagne, capturing the AWA World Heavyweight Championship for the first of what would be four times.

RELATED: 10 Wrestlers Who Won Their First World Title In Their 40s

The title change almost wasn’t meant to be, however. After over 2,600 days as champion, Gagne wanted his son Greg Gagne to become the new champion, but AWA co-founder Wally Karbo insisted that Nick Bockwinkel was the way to go.

3 Held The AWA World Title For Nearly Five Years

Verne Gagne’s reign with the AWA World Title ran about seven years, but Bockwinkel’s reign was nothing to sneeze at either, lasting an also-impressive 1,714 days or about five years.

During those five years, Bockwinkel enjoyed hundreds of successful title defenses, with notable contenders including Andre The Giant, Ernie Ladd, Dusty Rhodes, Jumbo Tsuruta, and rematches with Gagne, among countless others. He finally lost the belt back to Verne Gagne in July 1980 in a bout at Chicago’s Comiskey Park.

2 Feuded With Ray Stevens

While Nick Bockwinkel and Ray Stevens enjoyed tag team success together, the two ended up becoming rivals later in the 1970s. After months away from AWA, Stevens returned to AWA, where his old manager Bobby Heenan had built a whole stable in The Heenan Family, including not only Bockwinkel, but Blackjack Lanza and Bobby Duncum.

Stevens was welcomed back into the fold, but Heenan regularly slighted and ignored him, resulting in the heel getting frustrated enough to turn babyface against the group. As a result, Stevens had several shots at Bockwinkel’s World Title, though he was never able to beat the champ.

1 Wrestled Several Title For Title Matches

On several occasions, while champion in the 1970s, Nick Bockwinkel took on champions from other promotions in bouts with both titles on the line. The first of these happened in Japan’s International Wrestling Enterprise as he and Ray Stevens defended the AWA World Tag Team Title against IWA World Tag Team Champions Rusher Kimura and Great Kusatsu.

In 1979, he ended up wrestling in four title-for-title matches, putting the AWA World Title up against Ricky Steamboat’s NWA World Television Championship (twice), Kimura’s IWA World Title, and even Bob Backlund’s WWE Championship.