On July 27, 1986 Buddy Landel returned to Mid Atlantic Championship Wrestling and defeated George South at a television taping in Atlanta, GA. Accompanied by former foe turned partner Bill Dundee, Landel and Dundee both attacked South after the match. On the July 12th episode of "World Championship Wrestling", announcer Tony Schiavone conducted a sit-down interview with Buddy Landel who claimed that he and not Ric Flair was the real "Nature Boy". In his first month back he was programmed against opening level competition on house shows, facing and defeating Rocky King, Sam Houston, and Todd Champion. While Landel remained undefeated, Flair would not respond until the September 6th episode of NWA Pro, where he stated that he was "Space Mountain" while Buddy was "Ride the Wild Mouse". That same weekend on NWA Worldwide Landel and Dundee claimed that Flair would only wrestle an injured competitor like Dusty Rhodes. Landel however would never wrestle Flair in this time period and instead faced Magnum TA and NWA Mid-Atlantic Heavyweight Champion Ron Garvin, wrestling each to a draw when they faced off.