By the 1980s, Tommy was the Senior Referee for Jim Crockett Promotions and refereed most of the NWA World Heavyweight Championship matches.
World Cup | FIFA World Cup | World Trade Center | World Series | 2010 FIFA World Cup | World Bank | World Health Organization | Guinness World Records | 1978 FIFA World Cup | World Series of Poker | Allies of World War II | BBC World Service | ATP World Tour 250 series | World Heritage Site | World Boxing Association | World Boxing Council | 2006 FIFA World Cup | World Wide Web | As the World Turns | World Trade Organization | ATP World Tour 250 Series | World Rally Championship | World Intellectual Property Organization | World Economic Forum | Western world | Miss World | Rugby World Cup | World Meteorological Organization | World Championship | The Real World |
The Big Gold Belt was first introduced in 1985 to replace the original NWA World Heavyweight Championship belt of the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA) that had been used since 1973, historically known as the "domed globe." Jim Crockett Jr. of Jim Crockett Promotions commissioned Charles Crumrine, a silversmith in Reno, Nevada that specialized in western belt buckles, to produce it.
On January 6, 1983, he defeated NWA World Heavyweight Champion Ric Flair in a "unification" match to win the title and also create the WWC Universal Heavyweight Title, but the match never made it to NWA television.
Reprising that shared role between the two started from 2004-2005 in WWE, Christian Cage originally brought Tomko in to TNA as a personal enforcer in late-2006 to help him regain the NWA World Heavyweight Championship.
While competing in the United States with the National Wrestling Alliance, Steele defeated Naoya Ogawa in a three way match with Brian Anthony in Charlotte, North Carolina on September 25, 1999 to become one of the youngest wrestlers to win the NWA World Heavyweight Championship although he lost the title back to Ogawa one week later in Thomaston, Connecticut on October 2.