 | |
| Acronym | AWF |
|---|---|
| Founded | 1994 |
| Defunct | 1996 |
| Style | Professional wrestling |
| Headquarters | Chicago,Illinois,Minnesota |
| Founder | Paul Alperstein |
| Owner | Paul Alperstein |
TheAmerican Wrestling Federation (AWF) was aprofessional wrestling federation founded by Paul Alperstein active from 1994 to 1996. The promotion was based in Chicago, Illinois, but held shows in many other eastern states of the United States. The AWF used the European wrestling format of timed rounds, 4 minute rounds with judges and points, in the vein of boxing matches.
The company had two championships, the AWF Heavyweight Championship, and the AWF Tag Team Championship. The last AWF Heavyweight Champion,Tito Santana, actually defended the championship after the AWF closed in 1996. The company closed for financial reasons, producing a syndicated show but failing to gain a following.
Paul Alperstein, a promoter fromChicago, founded the AWF in 1994 and was on-air president of the company. The company announced its launch at a press conference at theOfficial All Star Café inTimes Square featuringMissy Hyatt, Santana, andSgt. Slaughter.[1]
He intended to reintroduce rules as a significant part ofprofessional wrestling. This was carried out by the use of timed rounds and judges in every match, which is similar to the rules of professional wrestling inEurope and as well asboxing.
Each round was four minutes long with a one-minute rest period between rounds. Title bouts were scheduled for twelve rounds while all other fights were scheduled for three. One referee and two judges were assigned to each match. The winner of each round was decided by both the judges' scorecards and the referee's scorecard. If a match lasted the full amount of scheduled rounds, the winner was declared as whoever had the majority of points on each of the three scorecards.
Another rule implemented was that throwing opponents over the top rope resulted in an automatic disqualification.
Only a few wrestlers in this organization had experience in European wrestling, most notably England'sChris Adams and "Mr. Ambassador" Steve Casey (not to be confused with the World Class wrestler of the same name). Wrestlers such asTito Santana,Bob Orton, Jr.,Jim Powers,Koko. B Ware,Johnny Gunn andGreg Valentine, headlined AWF's events between the mid-1990s.
Santana and Orton were seemingly considered the top wrestlers in the company, with Santana presented as the topbabyface and Orton as the topheel.
The AWF used tournaments for its titles, each wrestler would advance in the tournament by defeating the respective opponent, like in a normal match. Points scored in a card during a tournament.
Jim Brunzell was named AWFcommissioner by Alperstein in hopes that he would make sure the above rules were enforced. Brunzell even refereed the first match for the AWF Championship in 1994, between Orton and Santana.
The promotion held severalhouse shows and was building towards apay per view event, but it closed in December 1996 for financial reasons.
A full decade later, Santana defended the AWF championship belt at a November 2006National Championship Wrestling event inYork, Pennsylvania against former AWF wrestlerSalvatore Sincere. The storyline was that Santana had dodged Sincere during their AWF days in the mid-1990s and Santana agreed to put the belt on the line against Sincere. Santana won the match for his last title defense, albeit unofficial.
In 1995, the company introduced a program calledWarriors of Wrestling for syndication. The initial run consisted of footage shot from 1994 to 1995. The program resurfaced throughout the United States in late 1996 with new episodes. The announce team consisted of Mick Karch as announcer andTerry Taylor as color commentator. Taylor was replaced byLord Alfred Hayes in 1996.Ken Resnick handled interview segments. Resnick was eventually replaced byMissy Hyatt in 1996.
In 2005, the entire run of 1995 episodes was released as a 4-discDVD set by Highland Entertainment. It is unknown when or if a second volume will be released with the remaining episodes as there were many not in the DVD set.
As of January 2006, reruns can be seen on Europe's Clear Television via the cluster ofAstra satellites at19.2° east.
| # | Order in reign history |
| Reign | The reign number for the specific set of wrestlers listed |
| Event | The event in which the title was won |
| Successful defenses | The number of successful defenses the champion had during her reign |
| — | Used for vacated reigns so as not to count it as an official reign |
| N/A | The information is not available or is unknown |
| + | Indicates the current reign is changing daily |
| # | Wrestler | Reign | Date | Days held | Location | Event | Successful defenses | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Tito Santana | 1 | November 29, 1994 | 676 | Chicago, IL | Live Event | 3 | DefeatedBob Orton Jr. in a tournament final to become the inaugural champion. |
| 2 | Bob Orton Jr. | 1 | October 4, 1996 | 1 | Fort Lauderdale, FL | Live Event | 0 | |
| 3 | Tito Santana | 2 | October 5, 1996 | 62 | Fort Lauderdale, FL | Live Event | 0 | |
| — | Retired | — | December 6, 1996 | — | N/A | N/A | — |
| # | Wrestler | Reign | Date | Days held | Location | Event | Successful defenses | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Tommy Rich andGreg Valentine | 1 | May 21, 1995 | 565 | Chicago, IL | Live Event | 3 | DefeatedKoko B. Ware andTony Atlas in a tournament final to become the inaugural and sole champions. |
| — | Retired | — | December 6, 1996 | — | N/A | N/A | — |
