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Steven James (born March 16, 1965), better known by his ring name Steve Armstrong, is an American professional wrestler. He is the son of fellow wrestler "Bullet" Bob Armstrong, and has three brothers who also wrestled: Scott, Brad, and Road Dogg.
target="_blank" rel="nofollow"> Wayback Machine: During this time they feuded with The Stud Stable.
On June 13, 1990, they faced off against The Fabulous Freebirds at the Clash of the Champions XI "Coastal Crush" show and were victorious. Jimmy Garvin and Michael Hayes were able to gain a measure of revenge by defeating them on the June 16, 1990 episode of WCW Worldwide after holding the tights. An appearance by the Midnight Express' manager Jim Cornette would transition the Southern Boys to their first feud. This led to the first PPV showing for Smothers and Armstrong, as they fell to The Midnight Express on July 13, 1990 at the Great American Bash 1990. Smothers and Armstrong would continue to feud with the Midnight Express before transitioning to a series against the self-declared "Southern Champions" The Fabulous Freebirds. In August they engaged in a "best of three" series against The Freebirds, and on September 5, 1990, they defeated Hayes and Garvin at Clash of the Champions XII "Fall Brawl: Mountain Madness".
On the September 22, 1990 episode of World Championship Wrestling the Southern Boys fell once more to The Midnight Express in a match where the winner received a United States Tag Team Championship shot. On the October 6 episode of The Main Event, the duo fell to the newly arrived Nasty Boys. Their televised slump continued at the Halloween Havoc 1990, where they were defeated by The Master Blasters after Jim Cornette interfered in the match. Cornette and Stan Lane departed from the promotion immediately afterwards, and there was no resolution to the Southern Boys/Midnight Express storyline. They moved instead to a house show series with the Blasters (Al Green and a rookie Kevin Nash).
1991 saw an immediate reversal of fortunes for the young team. In January they opened the year with several wins over The Master Blasters, and on February 24, 1991 at WrestleWar 1991 they beat The Royal Family (Jack Victory and Rip Morgan). A few days earlier at TV taping in Montgomery, Alabama they were renamed The Young Pistols. In March they began a house show series against Moondog Rex and Dutch Mantell, the latter who would ultimately become The Desperados. On May 19, 1991, their televised win streak came to an end when they were defeated by The Freebirds at SuperBrawl I in a match to claim the vacated United States Tag Team Championship after "Badstreet" (a masked Brad Armstrong) interfered. This began a renewed feud with the Freebirds, and on June 12, 1991, they teamed with Tom Zenk to defeat Michael Hayes, Jimmy Garvin, and Badstreet at Clash of the Champions XV.
That summer an injury to Scott Steiner led to the WCW World Tag Team Championship being vacated. On August 3, 1991, the Young Pistols participated in a tournament to crown new champions; they were defeated by The York Foundation. On September 21, 1991, they received a non-title match against the eventual winners of that tournament, The Enforcers (Arn Anderson and Larry Zybysko but were unsuccessful. That fall, the Pistols continued to face The York Foundation on the house show circuit.
At Halloween Havoc 1991 the Pistols began to show the first signs of an attitude change, stating that they did not care who was the "WCW Phantom" (eventually revealed that night as Rick Rude), but were instead waiting for a United States Tag Team Championship title shot against The WCW Patriots (Firebreaker Chip and Todd Champion). On the December 8, 1991 episode of The Main Event they finally received their shot. After initially being declared the winners, the match was restarted and the Patriots won. The following week they declared that they were unconcerned with what the fans thought, confirming a heel turn. Later that night the Pistols defeated the WCW Patriots to win the United States Tag Team Championship.Graham Cawthon (2025). 9781499656343, CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform. ISBN 9781499656343
The Young Pistols entered 1992 as champions and defeated The Patriots in another rematch in the January 18 episode of WCW Pro. On January 25 on WCW Worldwide they beat former champions Tom Zenk and Brian Pillman. However, their run with the titles ended on the February 16 episode of WCW Pro where they lost the championship to Ron Simmons and Big Josh. In February the Young Pistols moved to a house show series against The Steiner Brothers. They were scheduled to team with The Vegas Connection (Vinnie Vegas and Dallas Page) in an eight-man tag team match against El Gigante, Big Josh, Johnny B. Badd, and Mike Graham at SuperBrawl II on February 29; however, the match was cancelled.
In April 1992, Armstrong departed WCW, leaving Smothers as a singles competitor.
Although back as a performer in WCW, he was mainly used as a jobber working with his brother Scott as The Armstrongs or James Brothers on Saturday Night, WCW WorldWide and on rare occasions on Monday Nitro. On the February 17 edition of WCW Saturday Night they again fell to Men at Work. In June 1996 they were defeated by Public Enemy, and on the July 1 edition they were defeated again by Arn Anderson and Ric Flair. On the July 28, 1996 edition of WCW Worldwide they fell to Lord Steven Regal and Squire Dave Taylor. On the August 22 taping of WCW Pro, The Armstrong Brothers would finally gain their first WCW victory when they defeated Bill Payne and Rick Thames. They would go on to face The Amazing French Canadians and The Faces of Fear during the remainder of 1996.
The Armstrong Brothers would continue teaming in 1997 and faced The Amazing French Canadians and The Steiner Brothers. On the April 13 edition of WCW Worldwide they defeated The Southern Posse. After this they moved on to a brief series of matches with Harlem Heat, and in May 1997 defeated the new duo of Jim Powers and Bobby Walker, the latter put together by Teddy Long. After this they were winless for the rest of 1997 in matches with Chris Kanyon and Wrath, as well as The Public Enemy. Their pairing continued into 1998 but again saw little success. They were winless against High Voltage in multiple encounters. On the September 13 pay-per-view Fall Brawl '98 they were involved in an angle when WCW Worldwide announcer Mike Tenay attempted to interview them, only to be interrupted by Ernest Miller who then attacked both brothers. Thirteen days later they would defeat The Power Company on WCW Saturday Night. On November 30, 1998, the duo enjoyed the biggest victory of their WCW tenure when they upset Raven and Kanyon on WCW Monday Nitro.
Success continued for The Armstrong Brothers in 1999. On January 6, they upset Alex Wright and Disco Inferno in Mobile, Alabama. On the January 9 edition of WCW Saturday Night they defeated Nick Dinsmore and Mike Sullivan. The winning streak was stopped in April on WCW Saturday Night when they were defeated by Disorderly Conduct. On April 27, at a television taping in Bismarck, North Dakota they faced the NWO for the first time and defeated Vincent and Stevie Ray. On April 29, on WCW Monday Nitro the team faced Raven in a handicap match and were victorious. Scott's teaming with Steve finally came to an end on March 1, 2000, when The James Brothers faced WCW World Tag-Team Champions Big Vito and Johnny The Bull at a WCW Saturday Night taping.
On March 29, 2000, Steve made his last televised appearance for the promotion as he lost to Hugh Morrus on Saturday Night.
In August 2002 he worked under The Bullet mask for TNA Wrestling, having a match with Jeff Jarrett.
In October 2005 he had match with Elix Skipper for the NWA Wrestle Birmingham in the Boutwell Memorial Auditorium.
In December 2008 he had a tag team match alongside his father against Aaron James and Michael Patrick for the Great American Wrestling Federation.
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