National Wrestling Alliance (1986-1988) Arn Anderson and Tully Blanchard were founding members of the Four Horsemen, and often teamed up for six and eight man tag team matches with
Ric Flair and
Ole Anderson. Blanchard was the number two
heel in the NWA, behind only
NWA World Heavyweight Champion Ric Flair, winning the
NWA United States Heavyweight Championship, the
NWA National Heavyweight Championship and the
NWA World Television Championship. Meanwhile, Anderson was designated as the "Enforcer" of the stable, and teamed with Ole Anderson as the final version of The Minnesota Wrecking Crew. In the spring of 1987, Ole was kicked out of the Four Horsemen, and was replaced with associate member Lex Luger. The Horseman would next receive a stiff challenge from ex-Horsemen
Lex Luger, and longtime
Horseman rival
Barry Windham, who were dubbed the Twin Towers.
Second reign Arn and Tully regained the titles less than a month later on April 20, 1988 when Barry Windham turned on his tag-team partner and joined the Four Horsemen. (and, by default, members of
the Heenan Family). It was commonplace for the WWF at this time to assign wrestlers to some sort of gimmick, or new identity. Aside from the Brain Busters team name, Anderson and Blanchard were allowed to keep their names and ring persona. The only changes Arn and Tully made to their style were pointing to their heads to show they were smarter than everyone else and the use of a spike piledriver as a finishing move. The Brain Busters made their
pay-per-view (PPV) debut at the
1988 Survivor Series in the 10 team tag match, where they eliminated the
Hart Foundation, before being eliminated via double disqualification with
the Rockers. This led to a match with the Rockers on
WWF Superstars of Wrestling where both teams were again disqualified before the match could even get started. This kicked off a red hot series of
house show matches. One match in particular on January 23, 1989 at
Madison Square Garden was rated as one of the 50 greatest matches in the
Pro Wrestling Illustrated (PWI) 10th anniversary issue, where the Brain Busters narrowly defeated the Rockers as Anderson held down Marty Jannetty's leg as Blanchard pinned him. The teams wrestled to a double countout on the March 11, 1989 ''
Saturday Night's Main Event XX''. After their WrestleMania win, the Brain Busters finally got to face the
WWF World Tag Team Champions Demolition and defeated them by disqualification on the May 27, 1989 ''
Saturday Night's Main Event XXI''. The Brain Busters defeated Demolition for the titles in a rematch on July 18, 1989 in a
two out of three falls match. After losing the first fall, by pinfall, the Busters won the second fall, via disqualification, and won the third fall, with a distraction from Bobby Heenan and a steel chair thrown in from André the Giant, the Brain Busters ended Demolition's then-record-breaking 478-day title reign and became the first team to win both the WWF and NWA World Tag Team Championship. they then lost the titles back to Demolition on October 2, 1989, in an equally controversial fashion as Blanchard, who was the illegal man, was pinned after receiving the Demolition Decapitation finisher. On November 1, 1989, Tully Blanchard failed a drug test and the lack of a suitable replacement saw him replaced by Heenan who would wrestle for the first time since WrestleMania V. Arn Anderson left the federation more or less immediately after the pay-per-view and returned to the NWA in December. However, the NWA refused to rehire Blanchard when news of his failed drug test became known, thus ending the Brain Busters for good. Tully Blanchard would renegotiate a new contract with NWA a few months later, but ultimately declined what he considered to be a very low offer (reportedly half of a previous verbal agreement), and instead signed with the
American Wrestling Association (AWA). ==Championships and accomplishments==