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The Cauliflower Alley Club announced the passing of former WWF Tag Team Champion Randy Colley, best known to most wrestling fans as Moondog Rex. Colley passed away on Saturday 12/14 at the age of 69. The CAC announcement reads:
Born in Flint, Michigan, Colley broke into the business in the late 1970s as one half of the Dalton Brothers, working the Florida, Gulf Coast and Georgia NWA territories. In Florida, they feuded with Jackie Welch & Roy Lee Welch and worked with Les Thatcher, Robert Fuller , Bob Roop and others.
As Randy Colley, he had a run in Mid-Atlantic for the Crockett family, working underneath matches. He would work St. Louis and return to Florida, working as an undercard heel.
Colley found tag team success with a number of personas but after The Dalton Brothers, it was teaming with Jody Hamilton as one version of the Assassins Tag Team after Hamilton and his original partner Tom Renesto went their separate ways that brought him success. The duo held the Georgia Tag Team Championships on several occasions and had a memorable run in both the Alabama and Memphis territories. In Memphis, they feuded with Robert Fuller and Bill Dundee for the AWA Southern Tag Team titles. In Georgia, they challenged Ricky Steamboat and Jay Youngblood for the NWA World Tag Titles in Atlanta’s Omni.
Moving to the WWWF territory in 1980, Colley was originally billed as Ripper Hawkins when he debuted but was renamed Moondog because he was told he had a resemblance to Moondog Mayne. He and Moondog King were put together and The Moondogs, managed by a then-heel Lou Albano were designed to be a mangy, wild, insane tag team, carrying and biting on raw bones wearing trademark – cut-off and ripped up blue jeans as they terrorized enhancement talents on WWF’s weekly TV from Ag Hall in Allentown, PA.
With the territory built around brawlers and scrappers as heels, they were perfect foil for the clean cut, more scientific babyface teams. Colley’s ring name was quickly changed to Moondog Rex. The duo looked insane and fearsome on promos, wacked out of their minds as Albano ranted and raved about all the terrible things they were going to do.
Due to the nature of TV being so regional at the time, Colley was splitting time in New York working as Rex and Florida, working under his real name.
On 3/17/81, Moondogs Rex and King defeated Tony Garea and Rick Martel for the WWF Tag Team Championships. When King had issues making dates (visa issues according to some accounts), Moondog Spot was added to the team to make it a trio with any combination defending the belts. The team would work main events all over the territory on house shows, sometimes teaming with Albano against a collection of top babyfaces.
Rex would also occasionally challenge then-WWF Champion Bob Backlund on live events. As Rex, Colley challenged Hulk Hogan for the WWF title in 1984 in a bout that aired on All-Star Wrestling in the United States and in Canada, Maple Leaf Wrestling.
The Moondogs remained a staple as the WWF national expansion began, working with The British Bulldogs and even The Wild Samoans. The team were also regulars in Puerto Rico for the World Wrestling Council for a time with Rex and Spot capturing the Tag Team titled on numerous occasions.
In Memphis, Rex and Spot had a memorable run against the Fabulous Ones as The Moondogs in 1980s, a feud that was immortalized in video stores everywhere with the Madmen, Maniacs and Lunatics VHS tape. They also had a long run against Bobby Eaton and Stagger Lee (the future Koko B. Ware) in the territory. As part of the team gimmick, the promotion would hold Bone On A Pole or Anything Goes matches to help push the over the top, wild nature of the brawling team.
The Moondogs later returned in the 1990s, feuding with The Rock N’ Roll Express for Jim Cornette’s Smoky Mountain Wrestling in 1993. This led to a return in Memphis where they feuded with Jerry Lawler and Jeff Jarrett in an extremely crazed feud that captured the attention of many at the time and was again, chronicled on a VHS tape about the feud.
While perhaps best known for his work as one of the Moondogs, Colley performed under an eclectic number of personas and acts in different area over the course of his career.
After leaving the WWF in 1985, he ventured to Bill Watts’ Mid-South Wrestling, debuting under a mask as “The Nightmare.” He was given a big heel push, managed by Eddie Gilbert, defeating Terry Taylor to win the North American Championship, which was the top belt in the territory. After winning the title, he was rechristened “The Masked Champion” and “The Champion.” The Champion had a falling out with Eddie Gilbert (who turned babyface) and Sir Oliver Humperdink became his new manager.
After losing the North American title to Dick Murdoch, Colley reverted back to the Nightmare moniker. He was unmasked by Jake Roberts in an angle designed to turn Roberts into a babyface, but retained the Nightmare name. When Gilbert turned heel again, he and Colley won the Mid-South Tag Team Championships and feuded with Porkchop Cash and Mad Dog Boy. Colley left the territory without losing the titles, so Dick Murdoch substituted for him, losing the belts with Gilbert to Steve Williams and Ted DiBiase, who were pushed as a big babyface team at the time by Watts.
Colley was credited with coming up with the gimmick for the Demolition tag team in the WWF in the late 1980s, obviously a takeoff of Hawk and Animal, The Road Warriors, who were the top tag team outside of the WWF at the time. He was cast as the original Smash, teaming with Bill Eadie (most known as the Masked Superstar at that point in his career) as Ax. Colley was the one to suggest Eadie, who was wrestling regularly in Japan at the time, for the role.
After a few TV appearances, Colley was replaced by Barry Darsow as Smash. It’s been said that WWF officials felt Colley was too recognizable as Moondog Rex for the gimmick. There were several instances of fans chanting “Moondog Rex” at TV tapings in New Jersey, which led to WWF making the call. Colley chalked it up to fans in the Northeast remembering who he was and felt that had the team debuted on the next set of tapings in Florida, there would have been no such recognition from the fans.
Instead, Colley was put under a complete bodysuit and mask and put into the Shadows enhancement tag team with Jose Luis Rivera, another long-time undercard WWF performer. He would also work under a mask as the Assassin. Meanwhile, Demolition went on to have a long, healthy run with several Tag Team title wins and were one of the centerpiece teams for the company for several years.
After his WWF departure in 1989, Colley worked for Stampede Wrestling in Canada under his real name, teaming with Roger Rhodes.
Meanwhile, in Continental Wrestling and in Puerto Rico, Colley would perform as Detroit Demolition, pretty much performing in the same persona and outfit as his version of Demolition Smash. He teamed with Bob Carter to defeat (as irony would have it) The Nightmares, Danny Davis and Ken Wayne for the Continental Tag Team titles in 1988.
Colley would eventually migrate to World Championship Wrestling in the early 1990s, working enhancement matches as The Nightmare (back under the mask) or as Moondog Rex, including a bout against Junkyard Dog at the 1990 Halloween Havoc PPV. He was a regular on WCW house shows as Rex for several years.
Colley was also part of a quickly dropped gimmick as one-third of would-be WCW stable the Desperadoes. Cast as Deadeye Dick, he was to be teamed with Black Bart and Dutch Mantel with the idea that they were searching for Stan Hansen to be their mentor. Vignettes were filmed and began to air but the idea was quickly discarded and forgotten after WCW head Jim Herd didn’t care for the direction.
After his WCW run, Colley, as the Moondog, would work overseas in Europe (He had worked regularly for Otto Wanz in Austria and Germany from the mid-1980s on) before quietly retiring beyond the occasional pro wrestling convention appearance.
Colley's cause of death has not yet been announced.
On behalf of everyone at PWInsider.com, I'd like to express our deepest condolences to the family, friends and fans of Randy Colley.
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