IMG Credit: WWE

Summerslam 1999
Date: August 22, 1999
Location: Target Center, Minneapolis, Minnesota
Attendance: 17,130
Commentators: Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler

Well not much has changed since last year. Austin is still dominating the wrestling world, but he’d be injured very soon and get run over, leaving for a year. Tonight though, he’s facing the young stud known as HHH and Mankind in a triple threat for the belt. The only big change that’s happened is HHH and Rock have switched sides in the eternal struggle between heel and face.

Also, a lot of the Attitude Era favorites are here now, such as the APA, the hardcore title, the Big Show and Billy Gunn. Oh and Al Snow, but no one likes him. (Foley is my all time favorite. I couldn’t help it.) Angle has been there for about 4 months, Jericho has been there less than two weeks, debuting 13 days prior to this show, and Benoit and co. would show up at the end of January.

The big deal to this show is that there’s a special referee for the main event: the governor of the state of Minnesota, Jesse “The Body” Ventura!!!! This was huge at the time because he was in office at the time, so if nothing else it got a lot of mainstream publicity. Therefore, let’s get to this. Oh and one more thing: Smackdown would debut as a regular series four days after this.

We get a recap of guest referee history (coming soon to a history channel near YOU) which include Tyson and McMahon and McMahon Jr. HHH and Austin say they’ll beat up Jesse if they have to, but he says he has the power. Now we’re in the arena with a huge pyro show. Jesse is in the back with HHH and Chyna, saying that HHH has to follow the rules or he won’t be champion. We cut to Jericho from earlier today, waiting on someone. Harold Finkle comes running up and apologizes for being late.

IC/European Titles: D’Lo Brown vs. Jeff Jarrett

Yes, Brown has both titles. Jarrett comes out with Debra, who is in a bikini and a coat. He sends her back, much to the King’s dismay, but we see her with Brown who she accompanies to ringside instead. Ross tries to convince the people that the pop is for Brown and not Debra. Even I don’t buy that one Jimmy boy. They talk about Brown’s incredible weight loss as at one point he weighed over 400lbs, yet for this match he weighs in at about 250.

That really is not only impressive but should be applauded, if nothing else for the health aspect. Once again, the lady is the main focus of this match, or in this case her chest is. If her face wasn’t so unnatural looking, she’d be VERY hot instead of just having a huge chest. The match is short, yet interesting. We’re in the fast paced, more intense style that’s always fun. Here, Brown actually controls most of this, which isn’t something that you see very often actually.

Jarrett makes him look good, which is better because Jarrett would be gone within two months, heading back to WCW as a big name until they closed. Anyway, Debra gets on the apron, yet Jarrett grabs the guitar and yells at her. If he’s going to use the guitar and Debra is there, why not hit him while she has the referee? Anyway, Mark Henry runs out and helps Brown, only to nail him seconds later to give Jeff two titles. Debra wasn’t with Brown and it was a swerve, which is fine I guess. At least they didn’t’ try to make it something major.

Rating: B-. Solid opener here, with some nice intense stuff. Never been a fan of unified titles like this but I guess it’s ok. Debra was the big deal here, but unlike last year with Sable it was more subtle and it certainly wasn’t like having a big spotlight on her all night, which was a major plus. Not a great match, but good for an opener.

Edge and Christian say they’ll win the tag team turmoil match.

Tag Team Turmoil

I’ve always liked this idea. You have 6 teams. Two start and have a tag match. The losers are eliminated, and then the third team comes in. You keep going until there’s one team left. The winners get a tag title shot tomorrow night on Raw. Oh while Edge and Christian are coming out, JR is still upset about what Henry did, because D’lo was trying to help his career. My goodness what would he have been like had Brown not helped?

Anyway, we start with E/C and the New Brood, aka the Hardys, who are heels if you can believe that. The Dudleyz weren’t quite there yet, but very soon these three would start dominating the tag division as you already know. The match starts with a standard back and forth fast paced match. I’ll spare a lot of the details here as most of these are going to last about three minutes at most. It amazes me that you have these four guys and Matt is easily the least successful of them all.

Who would have believed that you have at least 13 world title reigns in there? That’s unbelievable. Anyway, we go to the floor and it gets insane. You can tell how much these four are loving this as they’re killing each other out there. When the Dudleys came in a few months or maybe even weeks, the ante would be upped even more, especially with the ladders becoming more prevalent. Anyway, Edge hits an electric chair followed by what I think is a diving elbow from Christian to eliminate the Hardys.

Out next are Mideon and Viscera. And here is where the match starts to become an issue with the time. This lasts all of two minutes so there’s not a lot I can say. It might be better for it to be short though, given the wrestling abilities or lack thereof in the new team out there. Big Daddy V is somehow more annoying here with that stupid looking yellow Mohawk of his.

He uses that spin kick which is one of his best ever, nearly hitting Edge in the shoulder. It looks impressive, but it never actually connects, at least not that I can remember. Other than that, this is exactly what you would expect. Christian gets beaten up, Edge comes in and they double team Vis before spearing Mideon for the pin, and we get team #4.

Ross is talking about how spent Edge and Christian must be. Why in the world would they be spent? They’ve been wrestling less than 10 minutes and they get about 45 seconds to rest between falls. To say they’re tired is just stupid. The next team is Droz and Prince Albert. I’ll spare you the jokes about piercings, but years later when I found out what the name meant, I wince every time I hear it.

Anyway, this is more or less a team that was just thrown together because there was nothing else to do with them, which can work just fine. The New Age Outlaws got together this way and it worked fine. Anyway, neither guy was anything special yet and for the most part, they never were period. In case you don’t know, Albert became the A-Train.

Sadly enough, Droz would be paralyzed within two months of this, never walking again for the rest of his life, at least since then. This one goes even shorter, with Edge hitting the Downward Spiral after about two minutes. This is the problem with matches like these: unless you let them go an hour, you make a lot of matches and teams just seem like wastes of time and filler.

The fifth team is the Acolytes, not yet the APA. APA was the team that lost the belts to X-Pac and Kane, the current champions, so this was their chance to get the belts back the next night on Raw. Anyway, they’re the big monsters here and one of my favorite teams at the time, at least until the Dudleyz came in a few weeks later to really breathe new life into the division, not that it really needed it at the time, but it didn’t hurt things at all really.

It’s weird to think that at the time, Simmons was by far and away the most successful of these four, yet in the end, he’ll be the least successful. They just beat the tar out of Edge before we go to a big brawl, with Christian taking over on Farooq. For no reason at all, the Hollies come down as the final team, despite not being in the match yet. I guess they just jumped too early? Anyway, Bradshaw, big clothesline, yeah.

Hollies and APA to end this, and this seems REALLY simple here. The bad team fight over who gets to beat up their opponent, which is something I’d just let them do. If they’re going to expend energy and hurt each other, why stop them? Bradshaw, the Einstein of this group, beats Hardcore up while he’s fighting with Crash.

They both do blind tags, leading to another fight. Simmons, the smart one, just lets them do it. Hardcore turns around and walks into a spinebuster for the pin. See how smart it is to just let them beat each other up? Post match, the Hollies go at it even more. Somehow they would become tag champions someday.

Rating: B-. This is a hard one to call, as it was really 5 matches in one, but there were a lot of squashes in there too. Edge and Christian were on display here, as it was obvious they were the best in the company at this point. Overall, this was fine, but it needed more time, which is saying something as it was almost 20 minutes as it was. These kinds of matches are cool in theory, but they have to be done just right. This one came close to doing that.

Show and Taker are just getting here. Yeah thanks for showing up on time.

We cut to a shot of Pepper, Al Snow’s Chihuahua. He says something about how Bossman promised to get both of them, which he eventually would.

Before the match, Road Dogg, who is billed as a big deal in the division despite winning the title only one time, He challenges the winner of the Hardcore title match for tomorrow night. The more I see of him, the more I really like him. He’s very solid in the ring, he’s great on the mic, the fans are into him, and he has a decent resume. Jericho interrupts him though, as a complete rookie at this point.

He hadn’t even been in the company two weeks at this point. Jericho is on an extension of the stage which is up in the air. This was when he was the king of the internet, kind of like Danielson is today. Everyone knew he had all kinds of talent but was being completely wasted in WCW. In a few months with Angle and Benoit being around, they would start tearing the house down every time they were in the ring together and really revolutionize the company as a whole.

You can tell they trusted Jericho a lot, as he debuted in an argument with the Rock. That’s saying a lot when you think about it. He insults Road Dogg as its clear WWF understood him FAR better than WCW did, putting him with two of the best talkers in the company immediately. He is just tearing Road Dogg apart here, as he has the entire crowd going nuts with insults. Roadie’s response: Why don’t you shut up, boy? Yeah, Jericho is light years ahead of him here.

If you can ever find it online, get a copy of Jericho and Foley’s promos together. It’s just them trading these amazing insults and one liners about each other as they both keep trying to top one another. It’s some of the funniest work I’ve ever seen.

Hardcore Title: Al Snow vs. Big Bossman

Roadie joins JR and Jerry for commentary for this match. He immediately threatens to punch Jerry for using the same lines over and over again, gaining cheers from half the audience. Bossman is champion by the way. They do something that’s pretty cool here, as they give Road Dogg a microphone and he follows them around the arena giving commentary. I really like his style as he sounds like a fan cracking jokes about the match as it goes.

He has a very smooth voice and he’s easy to listen to. It’s also a treat for the fans as they never get to hear anything when they’re in the arena. They go into the back and in a spot I shouldn’t laugh at, Bossman picks up Snow’s dog’s box and throws it and the dog across the floor. They fight towards a Pepsi case, which they knock over.

There was no Pepsi in it which is good because Pepsi sucks. This is actually cool as they go outside the arena and fight more. They go across the street which I’m assuming was closed off and fight on the patio of a bar. This is actually really cool when you think about it, but it easily could have gone bad had cops or something not been filled in on this and thought it was a legit bar fight.

Bossman hits him in the head with a yellow pages, which would hurt actually as those things are heavy, especially for a major city like Minneapolis and possibly St. Paul. They do a bunch of random brawling using a bunch of weapons. Snow with a moonsault off a bar. The funny part of this is I’m reviewing this on the night that IC, Norcal and D-Man got together at a bar.

For no reason at all, Road Dogg hits Bossman in the back with the nightstick, followed by Snow hitting Bossman with some pool balls, which allows Snow to pin him on a pool table. Snow runs back to the arena to check on his dog and for no apparent reason beats up Stevie Richards and Blue Meanie. In the process of this he steals a guy’s crutch, causing him to fall down.

Rating: B. This was a run of the mill hardcore match from this era, meaning it was fun. You have to grade some matches on a different kind of scale and this one of them. You can’t grade this like you would a Benoit/Angle match. For what it was, this was a fun match that worked.

Mankind and Ventura are talking. Ventura says that while Mankind is hardcore and Jess is fine with that, if Foley uses a weapon for the pin, Jesse won’t count it. This somehow turns into a political debate that I’d pay to hear.

There’s another Lion’s Den match tonight, but this one has weapons.

Women’s Title: Ivory vs. Tori

Now this isn’t the Torrie that hung out with Stacy. This is Tori that was just around for awhile, mainly hanging out with X-Pac. She never really did much and from what I remember was AWFUL in the ring. Looked hot though. JR apologizes in advance, knowing that it’s going to suck. They’ve been….I guess you’d call it feuding, but this is pre-Lita/Trish, meaning it’s horrible at best for the most part.

Apparently the dog wasn’t in the dog box when Bossman threw it. This makes no sense as he yelled into the cage before throwing it, but whatever. This was when Ivory was just done being Henry’s sex toy, meaning she was still quite hot as long as you didn’t see her full face. Tori is a women’s wrestler, so naturally she has a martial arts background. Here’s some examples of the epicness of this match: Ivory hits a legdrop. Tori literally does not move.

She doesn’t sell, she doesn’t react, she doesn’t do anything and it just looks bad. Ivory then shouts “get ready for the big swing.” Yes, she’s using a giant swing. The crowd is chanting Take It Off, so you get the idea. The finish…might be the worst I’ve ever seen. I’ve been a fan of wrestling for over 20 years, I’ve seen thousands of matches, and I honestly have no clue what this was supposed to be.

Tori goes for a sunset flip and botches it, leading to Ivory being back in control. That’s all fine and good. They botch it, with Ivory being pushed too far and being out of the pin. Immediately after this, they do the EXACT SAME SPOT, but this time instead of Ivory going down like she normally would, she just sits on Tori’s chest. Ivory then “covers” Tori, who’s shoulder is AT LEAST three inches off the mat, for the pin to retain.

The air was allegedly knocked out of her, but she’s up withing seconds and is just fine. Afterwards, for no apparent reason, Ivory throws her on her stomach and starts to unhook her top. While I’m not complaining…actually yes I am. This makes no sense at all other than to embarrass him I guess, but still what’s the point?

She gets it off but before she can fulfill her latent lesbian desires, Luna freaking Vachon, who I swear has been with the company forever, runs out for the save. It went nowhere as far as I can remember.

Rating: F. Oy this was bad. Tori is just flat out awful and while Ivory would become good, she wasn’t there yet. This was just terrible in any and all forms, with the ending being one of the worst I’ve ever seen. Terrible match to say the least.

Rock is with Michael Cole and embarrasses him, as it’s the best thing Cole did. Rock is just amazing here as he’s at his best, just before his hottest period, his summer long feud with HHH in 2000 over the title. For some reason tonight though, he’s against Billy Gunn, who is shown coming in with someone under a sheet.

We get a very different kind of video package, with Lawler and Ross doing prerecorded stuff which just sounds different. It’s odd to hear those two doing voiceover work. Anyway, basically both guy thinks they’re better with weapons than the other, so we have this to determine it.

Lion’s Den: Steve Blackman vs. Ken Shamrock

They start with Blackman pulling nunchucks from his tights which he swings very well. This is more or less a martial arts match in a cage with weapons. It’s actually cool to see two guys that can do this kind of stuff, but I don’t want to see the weapons in there. Seeing these two trying to choke each other out and kicking the heck out of each other would be fun based on the short bits that they do here. I think you can only win by KO or tapping.

We get a kendo stick brought in. So far the weapons use is limited, which makes this a lot better for me. Blackman was ok I guess, but he just bored me to tears a lot of the time. I hated his time as hardcore champion. Those sticks he would use just drove me insane. As I restart the video after typing that, he’s got the sticks. This fight is ok, but I’m still not sold on the weapons stuff. This is kind of like MMA I guess, but only parts of it.

It’s close to a hybrid I guess you could call it, and that’s just fine. This cage is really small actually. Blackman is dominating, but he keeps letting Shamrock get up and it’s just kind of pointless looking. Shamrock’s belly to bellies are just freaking sick looking. Shamrock kills Blackman with the kendo stick to knock him out and end this. Shamrock celebrates to end this segment.

Rating: B-. This is a very hard one to grade as I could see people loving it, liking it or hating it. I could certainly get the argument of there’s no point to having this on a wrestling show and there’s a certain amount of truth to that. However, there’s certainly wrestling in there, and while I’d prefer no weapons, this was fine I thought.

We get a recap of Shane attacking Test on Heat. This was a very cool angle that I always liked, which directly led to the McMahon-Helmsley Era the next year. Here’s the idea: Vince McMahon, back in the spring, had a stable called the Union, comprised of Test, Shamrock, Big Show and Mankind. They were there to simply help him fight off Taker and the Ministry. The reason you’ve never heard of them was they disbanded after literally a month.

Anyway, one night Stephanie was kidnapped and the Union rescued her. Due to this, Vince granted them all a favor of their choice. Most of them picked matches, but Test said he wanted a date with Stephanie. He got what he wanted, and they became an onscreen couple. Now you have to remember at this time, Test was something like John Morrison is now: young, cool looking, tough, and looking like the next big thing.

Shane, being the big brother, decides that a wrestler isn’t good enough for his sister. Let the HHH jokes begin. Anyway, Stephanie yells at him to stay out, so he gets his friends, the Mean Street Posse, to help him fight Test. Naturally, he beats the tar out of all of them and gives them all injuries. Eventually we get to this: Shane vs. Test in a Love Her or Leave Her Greenwich Street Fight. The idea is simple: if Test wins, Shane stays out of their relationship. If Shane wins, they break up.

Street Fight: Shane McMahon vs. Test

The MSP comes out before we get started, all bandaged up etc. There just happens to be a couch waiting on them. Test has bad ribs btw. Within a minute they’re already out in the crowd. Naturally the Posse is already interfering, but Test throws Shane into them. Stephanie, pre implants, is watching in the back. There’s a mailbox next to the Posse, so of course they use it in the match. It’s more or less a standard street fight.

The crowd is way into Test here, so I’ve always wondered why he never took off. We go back to the ring and Shane busts out a freaking corkscrew moonsault from the top. Every time he’s in the ring he does something impressive and this is no exception. It looks great to say the least. It missed, but it looked great. Test misses a boot and kicks the heck out of the referee. Shane hits the elbow through the table.

That’s the real battle here: who has the better top rope elbow drop? For some reason in a match where there are no rules, the referee has to be distracted. That’s just kind of pointless don’t you think? Back in, Test kicks out to a big pop. For the life of me I don’t get why they dropped his push. He seems to be really over, at least in this match. More or less this is a four on one match, but it’s three jobbers and a part time wrestler.

This really shouldn’t be too much of a challenge, but they’re making it work. The Stooges are here to make the save though, as you don’t mess with the Real Americans. They beat up 2 of the Posse, allowing Test to kick the 3rd in the head, then beat the tar out of Shane with a SWEET looking elbow for the pin. Stephanie runs out to celebrate.

Rating: B. This was a very good street fight. The Posse interfering makes perfect sense as Shane isn’t a polished wrestler and would need help to win. The crowd was WAY into this too. There were good weapons spots, big moves and a solid ending. In short, this was very good and very fun.

Anyway, moving on we have the recap of the tag title match, which is the new champions Kane and X-Pac vs. Big Show and Undertaker. Taker was probably the most evil in his entire career at this point, more or less being the devil. This was around the time that X-Pac was trying to humanize Kane, which never really worked. These kinds of matches are why X-Pac gets the reputation he gets.

Against guy his size he works really well and he’s a fun guy to watch. However, putting him in the ring with three guys whose smallest is the 6’10 328lb Undertaker just does not work at all. He looks out of place and you get into the area where it’s about his heart, which makes even less sense. Also, the X Factor was a horrible move.

It’s a facebuster for those of you unfamiliar with it. For someone his size he needs to be using the ropes for a big high impact move. Those two things changed, Waltman could have been a decent guy. Instead, he’s more or less universally hated, which I don’t think is fair.

Tag Titles: X-Pac/Kane vs. Big Show/Undertaker

The announcers are asking about whether or not the challengers can trust each other. Kane has a different outfit which is his old red and black but inverted. It looks fairly awesome actually. Taker’s music is just freaking SWEET around this time. For some reason this feels like a No Mercy match to me. I mean the N64 game that is. Not sure why that’s the case but it feels like one.

Basically, this is what you’d expect: faces clean house to start and it gets down to Pac vs. Taker, but the size gets the better of it until Kane comes in. They do a spot that I really like as Taker is about to chokeslam Pac through the table but Kane just pulls him in over the top rope. I think I’m getting where the NM aspect comes in. Kane would be the first player, saving his much weaker partner from the other two guys on Expert mode.

He hits a move, goes for a cover, and saves his partner. Eventually he starts to get beaten down though, as would be expected I suppose. Watching Taker and Kane fight is almost always fun. The history there just makes it fun. It’s odd to see Kane as the face, and there’s a joke there somewhere, vs. Taker as the heel. Just realized the flaw in my No Mercy analogy: Big Show wasn’t in it, and Taker was a biker.

Pac gets in and finally gets the beating that we all knew was coming. The main thing here of course is the heart of X-Pac which I think I’ve mentioned before. Anyway, Show beats on him for awhile but since he hasn’t had a twinkie (I’m sure Rhodes or DiBiase would do) in awhile, he goes to the resthold of doom. We get one of the moves I’ve always hated: the Bronco Buster. Dang can someone just shoot whoever made that move?

Pac kicks out of a Showstopper and Taker is TICKED. He tags himself in, punches the small one, and tombstones the living heck out of him to get the tag titles. The belt looks small in Show’s hands.

Rating: D+. This just didn’t do it for me. I mean, I know the ending to about 95% of these matches, but a lot of them get me into it. This simply didn’t at all. It was just there and it wasn’t interesting, there was no drama, and it didn’t work. I think the issue here is you have three guys that combine to be over 1000 pounds, and then someone that barely clears 200.

The problem is that there’s far too much of a difference between the sizes and it just didn’t work for me. It would be the Rock N Sock Connection that would take the belts from these monsters in I think about three weeks.

Ventura gives his same speech to Austin.

Rock vs. Billy Gunn

This was a really weird period for Rock as he was over beyond belief, but Austin was just way too big of a star for Rock to get that top spot. The neck surgery was coming, and Rock would be launched so far into the stratosphere that you couldn’t see him anymore. By the way, this is being written just after Night of Champions ended, so if there’s some anti-Hardy remarks in here, don’t be surprised.

Anyway, Rock was thrown into worthless feud after worthless feud, even being paired with Gangrel for all of a minute. That should speak volumes for how out there they were with him. Anyway, Gunn has a fat lady with him, saying if Rock loses he kisses her, not his, so the ending is pretty obvious already. There was no point to this feud but it filled Rock’s time I guess. Billy Gunn…..where do I begin? This guy was given so many pushes and he never could get it right.

Somehow, this was his most successful gimmick. They’re on the floor and Rock puts King’s crown on Gunn before punching him. Why has no one ever used that as a weapon? If a cookie sheet hurts, that has to have some force behind it. For some reason, Lawler starts going over the possible types of underwear that the fat lady could be wearing. Ross’ reactions are just funny here.

They do the standard near falls, with Rock taking the fameasser, which for you young guys that don’t know, it’s what Cena does with the leg drop from the top, but Billy just got a running start. It always sucked though as he never got the leg in the right place. Eventually, the woman comes in and sets up in the corner, and you know what’s coming. Yes, Billy takes it which makes the woman smile. Rock is on fire here, drilling the Rock Bottom and the Elbow, as the fans are losing it.

Rating: B-. Seriously, the guy headlines Mania and this is the best they can do for him at the second biggest show of the year? That’s just kind of pathetic. Anyway, this was pretty bland, with no one thinking Rock would lose, but unlike in the Hardy/Punk match, they got the booking right! Ok I think I’m good now. Anyway, Rock wins, he looked good, he got the big pop, and his time was coming, but no one knew it yet.

Oh great. Now I get to recap the buildup for the main event. Sit back, because this might be the most complicated story outside of TNA in wrestling history. Ok, so one night, there was supposed to be a triple threat match to determine the #1 contender for Summerslam, but we didn’t know who the 3rd person was. We had HHH and Taker, but no third person. Commissioner HBK decided that the third person was Chyna.

Now, earlier in the night, someone had jumped Austin and hurt him. Austin shows up at the end of the show with a chair and kills HHH with it, implying he’s the one. It’s a hardcore match, so Austin throws Chyna onto HHH, making her the #1 contender. From what I remember reading, there was actually a debate going on about not only having Austin vs. Chyna, but actually GIVING HER THE TITLE.

Luckily, this lasted all of 9 seconds though as they came back to reality. Anyway, HHH is mad about this, as at the time he was completely obsessed with being the WWF Champion. It was one of the best builds for someone being desperate to be champion that I’ve ever seen. His theme music was My Time at the moment, so everything for him was about claiming his destiny as WWF Champion.

The next week, we got HHH vs. Chyna for the spot. For no reason that I can remember at all, Mankind runs out and hits HHH with the stairs, allowing Chyna to pin him. THEN the next week, Mankind says that he wants a piece of the Summerslam action, and due to the obvious sexual tension between he and Chyna (find this promo. I don’t ever recall laughing so hard at wrestling as the look on Chyna’s face is one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen.)

Anyway, Mankind wins, but THEN Shane returns to announce that right here and right now, we’re having a no holds barred match to determine the undisputed #1 contender for Summerslam. HBK and Shane are both referees. Mankind gets the Claw on HHH, but the Game lands a belly to back onto a chair and we get a double pin.

Note: in one of the funniest and stupidest things I’ve ever heard, during this package (pun coming), we hear every curse word I can think of that you can say on TV, yet they censor Chyna saying balls. This amazed me to no end.

WWF Title: Steve Austin vs. Mankind vs. HHH

Before the match, Jesse cuts a short but great promo, talking about how the media has said that he’s a disgrace to the office for being there. He says he’s proud he was a wrestler and he’s proud to be here tonight. That is just awesome. You have to stop and think for a second: at the time, Ventura was the governor of Minnesota. This wasn’t some American Idol guy or NBA impersonator.

This is a major politician, who was considered a dark horse candidate for the White House. Another person called a dark horse candidate in the past: President Obama. Just think about that. Imagine 4 years ago having Barack Obama refereeing the main event of Summerslam and clearly being excited about it and not just waving and looking like he’d rather pound a rusty spike into his face.

You can tell Jesse is having fun up there and wants to be there. That’s a nice thing to see. For the most part, people that are wrestlers are proud of it and it’s not just something you do and then don’t do. Oh apparently Foley is in this because HHH injured his knee with the hammer. We get the shots of the walk towards the entrance, which I’m not sure if I like or not. Nothing beats the shot of the fans when the music hits, and I don’t want to see the guys before that.

HHH was wearing some weird vest made of chain link around this time. I never got the point of that. Foley’s pop is actually very solid so you know he’s still over, which is odd as he would be retired in about 8 months. Austin’s pop is MASSIVE. Foley is very smart here, staying on the floor at first and letting Austin and HHH fight. That’s brilliant, and it’s coming from one of the craziest wrestlers of all time.

Austin and Mankind beat up HHH, so Mankind hugs him and offers a handshake. Right hands follow. It’s your standard wild brawl to start with HHH and Austin doing most of the work. Wow. Upon a bit of research, Austin is only 34 here. It’s hard to think that his career was mostly over at this point. Chyna interferes and low blows Mankind, so Jesse throws her out.

The cool thing about Ventura is that he was always a guy that wasn’t afraid of anyone, and as a Navy SEAL, you knew he was tough. He’s perfect for this and has to be the best guest ref I can think of. Mankind and HHH work together, which you’ll never hear again. This match is just kind of going with the motions so far and while it’s good, it’s not great. HHH sets for what might have been a figure four while Mankind drops a leg.

It’s Hogan and Flair vs. Austin. This partnership lasts all of 18 seconds and it ends with a Cactus clothesline before Mankind runs across the apron and flips onto HHH. Mankind is doing flippys. Maybe he does belong in TNA. HHH is working on Austin’s bad knees which makes sense. Austin and HHH go into the crowd as Foley follows. You know one day someone needs to land a piledriver on the floor.

We always get it teased but we never see it. MORE VIOLENCE BLAST IT! Foley takes a good stunner. He just falls to the side, plain and simple. HHH breaks it up with a chair, and Jesse says he won’t count it. That’s just awesome on so many levels. Shane slides in to break up the fight between HHH and Jesse. The mouth on Jesse could rival Austin’s if my lip reading is working. Jesse throws Shane over the top as I’m loving this. This is just awesome.

He says that was for your old man you little bastard. Vince vs. Jesse NEEDS to happen. Who cares if they’re both senior citizens? Correction: Jesse is….58? WOW. I would have had him pushing social security. So….wow he was in his late 40s here? That explains a lot. Late 30s as well for the Mania stuff? I’m impressed. Mankind breaks up the pin on the stunner as we’re running very low on time.

HHH gets the pedigree, but Foley breaks it up and hits the double arm on Austin to win the title and shock the world. The fans are almost dead silent for about ten seconds, then go nuts as someone not named HHH is champion. HHH is just losing it in the corner as Jesse hands Foley the title. HHH lands about ten chair shots to the legs of Austin as he can’t believe he didn’t get the belt again.

He’d win the next night on Raw, with the rumor being that he was supposed to get it here, but Austin refused to job for him. That’s never been confirmed one way or the other though, and since this was the Attitude Era, it certainly could be wrong.

Rating: B+. This just didn’t have the main event feeling to it. Jesse definitely lived up to the hype here as he was about as good as you can get for a special guest referee. The match itself was good, but the ending was out of nowhere. It wasn’t bad or anything, but this was the definition of a swerve.

NO ONE saw this coming as the stars aligned for HHH on this night it seemed. Anyway, Foley winning was a nice surprise and kind of his last hurrah, saying that he still had it before the completely underrated feud with HHH started in about 2-3 months time.

Overall Rating: B-. This show was good, but just good. The matches are good enough, the main event was a twist, the fans were happy I suppose and there were some fun moments, but there’s no big spark to make it a great show. This would have been awesome as something like Judgment Day or No Way Out, but for Summerslam, it’s just a good show.

Mild recommendation, as it’s your traditional Attitude Era stuff: if you like this era you’ll love it and if you’re not a fan you’ll be very mildly entertained but get bored at some parts. It’s ok, but just barely.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s History Of In Your House (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/05/31/new-paperback-kbs-history-of-in-your-house/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

IMG Credit: WWE

Smackdown
Date: July 23, 2019
Location: American Airlines Arena, Miami, Florida
Commentators: Tom Phillips, David Otunga

Depending on what you thought of last night’s Raw Reunion, this show either has a lot to live up to or a very easy path to being the best show of the week. We’re less than three weeks away from Summerslam and that means we could be in for an eventful night as the card gets filled in. If nothing else, we should be hearing about Kofi Kingston’s opponent, which shouldn’t be hard to figure out. Let’s get to it.

Here are last week’s results if you need a recap.

We open with a recap of Shane McMahon vs. Kevin Owens over the last few weeks.

New Day is on commentary instead of the advertised Shawn Michaels, who will be on MizTV instead.

Here’s Shane to open things up. He talks about getting to see some old friends last night but he was glad to not see Kevin Owens. Speaking of Owens, he has challenged Shane to a match at Summerslam. Shane accepts, and shows us a clip of Owens quitting on Raw last year in a story that went nowhere. That’s what Shane wants: if Owens loses at Summerslam, he’s gone from WWE.

Cue Owens (Xavier Woods: “I don’t like him but I want to see him beat Shane up!”), to say Shane was smart to find that footage. That was the low point of Owens’ career and he’s a different man today. Owens knew Shane would accept because Shane loves the spotlight. The match is on but Owens isn’t quitting because he’ll beat Shane for good. Owens wants to fight right now but Shane cuts him off and says not until Summerslam. Tonight, Owens can fight Roman Reigns instead.

Post break, Elias and Drew McIntyre are very happy with Shane’s decision but Shane thinks it needs to be more special. That’s why Drew will be the guest referee and Elias will be guest timekeeper. Elias: “I always wear my watch. I got this.” Shane can be guest ring announcer too.

Shinsuke Nakamura vs. Apollo Crews

Non-title. Crews shoulders him down to start as New Day interrogates Tom about whether or not Crews will get a title shot for winning here. We get a crazy long delayed vertical suplex, with Crews walking around for a bit before finally dropping Nakamura after thirty seconds. Nakamura gets set outside and taken down by a big flip dive as we take a break.

Back with Crews getting kicked in the head and taking the sliding German suplex. Kinshasa is blocked with a kick to the head and an Olympic Slam gives Crews two (I bought that because that’s what would happen to the new champ). Crews gets caught on top though and it’s the running knee to the ribs. Kinshasa is blocked with a pop up face plant but the standing shooting star misses. Now Kinshasa can connect for the pin at 8:13.

Rating: C. This seems to be Crews’ sweet spot: the athletic performances where he impresses but never wins the big one. That’s not a terrible place to be as Crews can do a lot of very impressive things in the ring. At the same time though, what does it say that Nakamura surviving against a jobber to the stars nine days after he wins the Intercontinental Title is a relief?

Post match Nakamura hits another Kinshasa to leave Crews laying as New Day wants someone to come help him.

Mandy Rose and Sonya Deville get a match against the IIconics next week and if they win they might get a title shot.

Ali talks about how he has to change the story around here. He was on track to being a star but then he got injured. Now he needs to restart his story and become WWE Champion. No one is writing his story and it ends with him achieving his goals.

It’s time for MizTV. After a quick plug for Miz and Mrs., here’s a package on Raw Reunion. Back in the arena, Miz introduces his guest tonight: Shawn Michaels. New Day nearly has a fit singing Shawn’s music, with Big E. playing the belt like a guitar. Miz talks about Shawn being on Raw Reunion last night, with Shawn saying he’s been on both sides. He understands what it’s like to be a young guy who wants those ol…..legends to get out but like Steve Austin said, they’re all family.

Shawn talks about inducting Seth Rollins into DX/the Kliq (Miz: “Thanks for the invite.”) and moves on to the Summerslam match with Brock Lesnar, only to have Dolph Ziggler interrupt. Miz wants to punch him in the face again but Ziggler has something to get off his chest. A lot of people used to idolize Shawn but he keeps coming back time after time to wave to the crowd. Ziggler: “It was as embarrassing as Goldberg in a wrestling ring.”

Last November, Shawn broke Ziggler’s heart when he came back to wrestle last November because he embarrassed himself. Shawn won’t disagree with him but what’s more embarrassing is working your whole career but being known as a second rate Shawn Michaels wannabe. Ziggler calls Shawn a Shawn wannabe so Miz tells Ziggler to do something about it. Ziggler goes to leave but Shawn grabs his arm and has to duck a punch. It hits Miz by mistake and since this is an angle, Miz goes down from one right hand. Ziggler superkicks Shawn and leaves.

You really could feel the energy go away when Ziggler’s music hit. Shawn is absolutely right about Ziggler doing the same stuff for years and just being known as a Shawn wannabe, but Shawn was famous for one show stealing performance after another. Ziggler is known as being the guy who just stays around and sucks the life out of any angle he’s in. Feel free to leave anytime.

Charlotte vs. Ember Moon

Charlotte knocks her down but here’s Bayley for the distraction into the rollup to give Moon the pin at 47 seconds.

Post match Moon throws Bayley in to Charlotte, who kicks her in the back of the head. Moon Eclipses both of them. Please, not a triple threat.

Michael Cole replaces New Day on commentary.

Here’s Kofi Kingston to announce his Summerslam opponent. Before he gets jumped from behind though, he wants Randy Orton out here right now. Orton comes out and Kofi talks about their history from 2009. That would have been in Madison Square Garden when they were in the ring together and the fans were chanting Kofi’s name.

We see a clip of the huge Boom Drop through the production area which should have made Kingston the next big star. That’s not what happened though and Kofi accuses Orton of holding him back. It didn’t work though and now Kofi is WWE Champion. Orton admits that he help Kofi back because he wasn’t ready then. He’s still not ready now though and that title is a fluke.

Orton has been on top for eighteen years and he never had to work hard a single day. He’s gotten where he is by being Randy Orton and hasn’t had to throw pancakes or fake a Jamaican accent. Orton takes credit for Kofi getting a title shot at Wrestlemania because he injured Ali before the Elimination Chamber so Kofi could take his place. Kofi wants to prove himself at Summerslam and Orton agrees to the title match at Summerslam. The RKO will be waiting for Kofi. This was a heck of a segment and them bringing up the history was a very nice surprise.

Samoa Joe vs. Kofi Kingston

Non-title and Orton is at ringside. They fight over arm control to start with Joe grabbing the ropes to give us a standoff. Kofi goes right back to the arm and has to fight out of the corner with some chops. A dropkick puts Joe on the floor and that means the big dive over the top. Back in and Joe hits a hot shot, followed by the Rock Bottom out of the corner for two. We take a break and come back with Kofi fighting out of a neck crank and hitting the Boom Drop. Trouble in Paradise is loaded up but Orton comes in for the DQ at 7:37.

Rating: C. This was more of a storyline segment than a match and there’s nothing wrong with that (and Joe actually didn’t get pinned). Kofi vs. Orton is suddenly a lot better than it was looking and Kofi hanging with Joe and not beating him is a good way to help set things up. Kingston is looking a lot stronger these days and the match with Orton could look be quite a good one.

Post match Orton can’t hit the RKO on Kingston so he hits it on Joe instead, leaving Kofi to hit Trouble in Paradise on Orton.

Here’s Finn Balor for a chat. We look at Bray Wyatt returning to attack him last week on Raw with Balor saying that he can’t explain the Fiend. He isn’t scared of Wyatt though….and it’s the return of the Firefly Fun House. Wyatt says he and his friends are fans of Finn but the Fiend doesn’t like him, no matter how many times they tell him how super duper he is. The Fiend has accepted Balor’s challenge for Summerslam. Things get more serious though with Bray saying the Fiend isn’t so nice because the Fiend is power. Let him in. The Fiend appears on the screen and growls the same thing.

We recap last night’s wild ride of 24/7 Title changes.

Charlotte wants to know why she was left out of the title match or off of Summerslam in general. She’s going to wrestle at Summerslam and she’ll have a better opponent than Ember Moon.

Roman Reigns vs. Kevin Owens

Shane is guest ring announcer, Elias is guest timekeeper and Drew McIntyre is guest referee. Shane does his own rather insulting versions of Big Match Intros but Owens grabs the mic to say he’ll drop Shane tonight no matter what. Reigns takes it away and says he’ll take care of Owens tonight. McIntyre breaks up some early lockups in the corner so Reigns punches him in the face and sends him to the floor. The match is thrown out at we’ll say 1:00.

Post match the fight is on with Shane and company getting the better of things. Owens breaks up a spear from Shane though and it’s superkicks a go go. A spear drops McIntyre and a Stunner drops Elias. Shane tries to escape but gets caught with a Superman Punch and a Stunner. Another Stunner drops Shane again and Owens promises to hurt him even worse at Summerslam to end the show.

Overall Rating: C+. Fans who didn’t like last night’s show probably enjoyed this one a lot more. They announced three matches for Summerslam as the rapid fire build continues. What matters here is they started getting the card ready after last night’s big detour. Summerslam is looking good, though they have a lot more buildup to take care of first. This felt a little more serious than previous weeks, though it certainly didn’t feel like an all new show or really anything close to one. It was good though and these shows are blowing away anything that WWE was doing in the last few months.

Results

Shinsuke Nakamura b. Apollo Crews – Kinshasa

Ember Moon b. Charlotte – Rollup

Kofi Kingston b. Samoa Joe via DQ when Randy Orton interfered

Kevin Owens vs. Roman Reigns went to a no contest when Elias and Shane McMahon interfered

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s History Of In Your House (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/05/31/new-paperback-kbs-history-of-in-your-house/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

IMG Credit: CRAB Wrestling

Vice Effect
Date: June 8, 2019
Location: Old Ox Brewery, Ashburn, Virginia
Commentator: Jason Heat

Odds are you haven’t heard of this one but a colleague of mine works for the company and asked me to take a look at it. Since I have an issue saying no to anyone (I really need to work on that.), here we are. This is from CRAB Wrestling (Championship Rassling And Beyond) and they might want to change the name. Let’s get to it.

This show is available at Independentwrestling.TV, which is an indy wrestling streaming service. It costs to watch, but if you use the code UNCHARTED you can get 20 days free.

As usual, I have no idea what any of this is going to be or who these people/stories are.

We go straight to the graphic for the opening match with no intro video.

There is a crowd there. Not a big one, but there are people in the building and that’s what matters.

Jason Heat is on commentary with a host of different commentators moving in and out of the booth all night.

Capital Vices vs. Ugly Ducklings

That would be Sin/Money vs. Rob Killjoy/Lance Lude, with Coach Mikey. Sin and Money high five fans, which you don’t quite expect from people named SIN and Money. They’re wearing what seem to be bloody aprons so some violence would be expected here. Mikey is holding a sign that says QUACK and the Ducklings quack quite loudly. The Ducklings lead the fans in a QUACK chant with all the fans putting their hands in, though they wait for a kid in a duck mask for a nice touch. Hold on though as we have an issue with a lack of tag ropes.

Rob works on Money’s wrist to start as we hear about Lude and Sin being a former team. More wristlocking sets up an armbar and Money gets tripped to the mat. Missed dropkicks give us a stalemate and the fans seem to applaud. Lude comes in off a blind tag for a double Regal Cutter on Money but it’s off to Sin for the reunion showdown. Lude kicks him in the ribs and the fans don’t like that for some reason.

A leapfrog is blocked with a failed powerbomb attempt and Lude grabs a Black Widow. The Ducklings get smart and double team Sin down, setting up a series of splashes called Duck Duck Goose (I chuckled) for no count as the referee wants Lude out of the ring. That doesn’t happen though as Lude throws Killjoy at Money for a Stunner (Knuckleduck) into a standing shooting star. Money isn’t legal though so Sin throws the Ducks together for the eternally dumb DDT your partner spot.

The Vices pick Lude up from the mat and throw him onto Mikey and Killjoy in a big crash. Back in and Sin’s splash gets two on Lude but something like a Stundog Millionaire allows the tag off to Killjoy. A springboard middle rope dropkick puts Sin on the floor and a springboard moonsault takes him down again. The back to back dives take the Vices down but they’re right back in with a Downward Spiral/guillotine legdrop combination.

Lude makes the save so he gets crushed with an assisted running Liger Bomb out of the corner. Killjoy gets smacked in the face but comes right back with discus forearms to the front and back of Sin’s head. A monkey flip into a cannonball (Launchpad McQuack. I was expecting Duck Hunt.) crushes Money for the pin at 12:09.

Rating: C. The idea worked well here, though it went on a bit too long with the back and forth stuff in the second half going on a minute or so longer than it needed to. The other issue I had was with the names. I’m not sure what was so sinful or money focused about the Vices and the Ducklings don’t do anything that makes them seem or look ugly. Maybe those things are explained better in promos but I didn’t get the idea as well here.

That being said, the match was a good example of power vs. speed and the stuff from the announcers about Lude and Sin’s history together helped a lot. The Ducklings are a rather nice opening act match and could be some solid underdog challengers later. That crowd cheer at the beginning was a cool deal and works well in a small setting. It’s a good opener and the wrestling was completely acceptable, which is far from a guarantee in the indies.

Post match the Vices call them back into the ring because this isn’t over. The Ducklings get back in the ring as Sin talks about how great they are (I think, as it’s a little hard to understand). We get some handshakes and everyone poses until the Ducklings and Mikey are left in the ring to get some cheers.

Breaux Keller vs. Dame

Keller’s Prime Time Pro Wrestling Title isn’t on the line (so they probably shouldn’t announce him as the “reigning, DEFENDING champion”). Dame seems rather divaish and enjoys getting his picture taken. Actually hang on again because he needs to do his own intro. He’s here to steal your boyfriends, girlfriends and the show. Ring announcer: “Yeah what he said.” Keller is rather high energy and has some size to him. An early waistlock takedown gets on Dame’s nerves and Keller rips off the skirt to annoy him even more.

A bulldog onto the ropes sets up a running knee to Dame’s face and it’s time for a breather on the floor. Back in and Keller nails some Stinger Splashes in the corner, with the fans wanting one more. Since Dame is smart enough to listen to the chants, he rolls away so Keller can crash. A dropkick to the leg sends Keller face first into the buckle and a kick to the arm gives Dame two. The arm is fine enough that Keller can come back with chops in the corner so Dame cuts him off with a neckbreaker.

Dame’s chinlock lasts as long as a chinlock is going to last so he switches to a triangle choke over the ropes. That gets the fans worried in a hurry but Keller superkicks him out of the air. Dame dropkicks him outside but stops to pose for his personal photographer. Keller slaps the photographer in the back of the head to tick Dame off. A dropkick takes Dame down and a running X Factor gets two.

Back up and Dame’s springboard is countered into a Michinoku Driver for two more. Dame manages to sneak in a low blow though and a springboard Rear View knocks Keller silly (Apparently it’s rather hard. I don’t think I needed to know that.). The triangle choke goes on until Keller gets a foot on the rope. Dame goes up top so Keller pulls him back down with a super hurricanrana. The Gutter Butter (fireman’s carry gutbuster) finishes Dame at 11:34.

Rating: C-. I’m not sure on this one. The characters were good and I bought their mannerisms and such, but it felt like they were shifting from character mode to wrestling mode several times throughout the match. There were moments that felt like the characters were just gone and it was a match between any two wrestlers. It also felt like they were just trading spots at times instead of building towards something. It’s not like it was a disaster or anything, but it felt like a match that needed some more focus.

UPDATE!

Dame quotes Bohemian Rhapsody and says he is real life and a fantasy. At the end of the day, he is still a star so nothing matters to him.

Lady Frost vs. Genesis

Frost has Victor Benjamin in her corner and Genesis is in a mask. We hear about Lady Frost’s thermodynamic powers, which I guess make her the reverse Kane. They trade rollups to start to no avail until Frost hits a clothesline. Some knees to the ribs have Genesis in trouble and a kick to the face makes it worse.

A PerfectPlex gets two as the jokes are strong on commentary (Jason: “Genesis not ready to make an exodus just yet.”). Frost hits a chop to the stomach before getting a rather dainty two. Hold on though as it’s time to smile at Benjamin, allowing Genesis to have a breather on the floor. Benjamin adds a trip to Genesis (Fans: “SHE TRIPPED!”), allowing Frost to choke on the ropes.

A front flip into a Cannonball connects, drawing snowballs from the crowd. Genesis wins a forearm off though and hits a running crotch to the face (commentary called it knees but I saw no knees making contact). Holy Death, which appears to be a hammerlock spinebuster, is countered with a stomp to the foot and a running flip neckbreaker (Icebreaker) finishes Genesis at 7:16.

Rating: C-. I was surprised by how well this went as commentary mentioned that both women only had about a year of training. It was smart to keep this one short but the women certainly didn’t embarrass themselves. Genesis has some size to her and they played into that a bit along with Benjamin on the floor, though neither played into the finish.

Dezmon King sounds nervous about facing Bobby Shields but insists he’s ready.

Dezmon King vs. Bobby Shields

Shields is called the Body and billed as “coming straight from the gym”. King on the other hand is from Space Station 27 (they have great pulled pork). Commentary talks about King being trained here before being sent on excursion to Tattooine after a trip to Krypton didn’t go well. Shields stalls for a long time to start and we get our first significant contact, a chop to Shields, about two minutes in. That means more stalling but this time King follows him out and chops away on the floor.

Back in and Shields goes head first into the buckle, setting up the cartwheel into a basement dropkick, ala Jay Lethal. Shields gets ticked off but gets dropkicked in the side of the head to cool him back down. A quick reversal lets Shields throw him outside and you can see the annoyance on Shields’ face. Back in and some jumping knee drops get two on King as the aggression is starting to pay off.

The chinlock lasts all of a few seconds so Shields pulls him down by the head. Shields’ jumping knee to the face and a hard clothesline get two. Another running crotch shot to the face in the corner (the knees were more together this time) gets two on King and a backdrop sends him outside in a nasty crash. Shields isn’t done as he slams King on the floor and throws a bunch of chairs on top of him.

That’s good for a nine and King is back with a space (spine) buster (Jason: “It’s out of this world!”) for a breather. A delayed gutwrench powerbomb gives King two but Shields is right back up with a boot to the head. That and a Lionsault get two more but this time it’s King right back with a spinning Rock Bottom. The referee gets bumped and grabs her ankle though, allowing Shields to hit a superkick. The Gory Bomb finishes King at 15:06.

Rating: C. Not bad at all here as Shields looked like a fairly seasoned veteran and King looked like someone with a lot of natural talent. Commentators suggested that he hadn’t wrestled long so some more experience will help him out a good bit. I liked the alien idea but King didn’t really do anything that would make it seem to apply to him. For the top positive, the match flew by and certainly didn’t feel fifteen minutes.

Team Prime Time Wrestling is ready to face Team CRAB. The manager (Mr. Gator) promises to end the war that CRAB started and one of the wrestlers talks about attacking CRAB from within.

Team CRAB vs. Team Prime Time

CRAB: Mack Buckler, Mikey Banker, Christian James, Ivan Ali

Prime Time: Derron The Artiste, Eel O’Neal, John Kermon, O’Shay Edwards

I’ve seen Edwards before as he had some nice performances over Wrestlemania weekend. Buckler and Banker are the CRAB Tag Team Champions. Edwards and Banker start things off with Banker running his mouth a lot. They take turns taking each other down and Banker hits the gyrations. A missed charge lets Edwards hit an Oklahoma Stampede to take over though and since Banker is done, Edwards drags him over to the corner.

Buckler tags himself in for a clothesline off with Buckler actually winning things. O’Neal comes in and commentary is right there to explain about Banker and Buckler beating him up in front of his girlfriend. That explanation took five seconds and tells you why he’s ticked off. Good job there. Ali comes in and gets headscissored, only to come right back with a heck of a clothesline for two.

We get a somewhat awkward exchange in the corner that looked to be mistimed, allowing Ali to knock all of the Prime Time guys off the apron. It takes a bit longer with Edwards but Ali charges into him by mistake. James and Kermon come in with the latter picking up the pace but hitting Edwards by mistake. Banker comes in and gets kicked in the back for two, allowing Derron to come in and strike away.

Derron’s charge hits Edwards AGAIN (third time in a row he’s been knocked down by his partners), allowing Banker to nail a Downward Spiral. Edwards is ticked off though and comes in for some rolling German suplexes to Banker. Buckler makes the save with a Sky High so Derron hits him with a heck of a clothesline. It’s back to O’Neal with the Baltimore crab as everything breaks down. Derron unloads on Banker in the corner but gets caught in a bad looking spinning full nelson slam.

Edwards is back up and decks O’Neal before walking away from Derron’s tag attempt. He flips Gator off and walks out (with Gator following him), making himself look like a star and leaving this as a handicap match. Derron is the only Prime Time guy left standing and the beatdown is on with O’Neal and Kermon watching from the floor. Kermon teases getting back in and is dropped with a single kick. Ali hits a belly to back faceplant and James steals the pin at 11:58.

Rating: C+. I liked this one better than most of the other matches on the show, which is rather surprising as the gimmicks were toned down here and it was a lot of guys in tights. However, they made the story clear and the commentary was right there to explain what was going on, making it a well told story. Edwards looked like the biggest star in the whole match and that seems to be by design. Good story here with a lot of little things adding up.

Post match the rest of the team isn’t happy at James but Banker grabs a rear naked choke on Derron. Buckler says they showed who they are tonight but James wants credit for the win. James didn’t stick to the plan but says he won by himself. He isn’t representing CRAB anymore because he’s now part of New South Pro Wrestling, which will be here to face CRAB on August 3. The brawl is on and they fight to the back.

Hang on though as here are Gator, O’Neal and Kermon. Gator will address Edwards at a later date, but for now he wants to talk about Derron. He just couldn’t get the job done so he is FIRED, which makes commentary happy because Derron jumped from CRAB to Prime Time. O’Neal and Kermon carry him out.

CRAB Title: Logan Easton LaRoux vs. Isaiah Frazier

Frazier is defending and comes out with two belts. Logan (best known as Race Jaxson in Chikara) seems to be a rich guy, who takes the mic from the announcer to do his own entrance. Feeling out process to start with Frazier flipping out of a wristlock, leaving Logan to flip the crowd off. The fans are split as Frazier takes him down into a front facelock and some rollups give Frazier two.

Logan chills in the corner and offers a handshake, but Frazier blocks a surprise cutter attempt. That’s enough for Logan to bail to the floor for a breather, but the distraction brings Frazier outside for a chase. Logan is fine enough to hit a dropkick and slingshot dive to the floor, meaning it’s time for some posing. Back in and a jumping enziguri cuts Frazier off and they slug it out on the floor as I want that woman’s Scooby Doo shirt.

Logan suplexes him onto the apron and it’s time for the chinlock. Frazier actually reverses into one of his own, which isn’t something you see too often. That’s broken up as well and Logan’s middle rope dropkick gets two. Choking in the corner ensues and the referee shoves Logan away off the break. A backsplash crushes Frazier as commentary argues about how Logan can have tricks up his sleeves when he has no sleeves. Frazier fights out of the corner until a double crossbody puts them both down.

It’s Frazier up first with a Blue Thunder Bomb for two and Logan bails to the floor to avoid a running knee. That’s fine with Frazier, who hits a big corkscrew dive. Logan manages to steal a beer but it gets spat out off a right hand to the face. They fight into the crowd where Frazier even lets a fan (I’m sure) get in a chop.

A kid gets to punch Logan in the chest but he’s right back with a jumping DDT as they go back inside. Isaiah slips off of Logan in a bit of a botch but Logan is right there with a brainbuster for two. Frazier smashes him with a running knee but one of Logan’s lackeys breaks up the cover. Commentator Josh Fuller runs in with a belt shot to give Logan the pin and the title at 16:36.

Rating: B-. This felt like a main event match with an angle at the end to set up the big title match. Logan felt like the rich guy he was supposed to be and came off as a snobbish heel. Frazier didn’t seem to have much of a character but he was easy to get behind and had some athleticism going for him. It was the best match of the night and both guys felt more important than the rest of the show, which should be the case for the title match.

Fuller says he and Logan don’t care about Frazier’s story because there is only one champion of the 1% to end the show.

Overall Rating: C+. I was rather pleasantly surprised by this show. There’s nothing great or must see, but you get two hours of completely watchable matches from a lot of people you’ve probably never seen before. Nothing is close to terrible or even bad really and that alone is going to keep it as a positive show.

The other thing I liked here was the amount of characters that this show had. I was worried about seeing a lot of guys in board shorts and t-shirt with the same generic/non-existent gimmick that you seem to see at dozens of indy shows. What we had here instead was one gimmick after another and they stood out from each other for the most part. The eight man tag didn’t have them, but that’s fine for one match out of six. It was a very nice surprise and made the show roughly 285% easier to watch.

Overall, this show wasn’t too long, had some perfectly watchable wrestling and felt like a fun night. It’s nothing that came off as great and there are things they need to fix, but all things considered, this was a very fun show and something I’d check out again in the future. Considering what messes you can get with indy companies trying to be WWE on a micro budget, it was cool to see a company just doing their own thing without being ridiculous or going too far. This was to the point and worked well, which is a lot better than going insane and making a mess of things. Rather good show here and worth checking out.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s History Of In Your House (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/05/31/new-paperback-kbs-history-of-in-your-house/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

IMG Credit: WWE

Monday Night Raw
Date: July 22, 2019
Location: Amalie Arena, Tampa, Florida
Commentators: Corey Graves, Renee Young, Michael Cole

It’s a big night around here with Raw Reunion, featuring just about every big name you can think of who didn’t have anything better to do tonight. In other words, it’s time to try to get people to watch the show and since we don’t have many people of this generation to present (or Summerslam in less than three weeks), here we are. Let’s get to it.

Here are last week’s results if you need a recap.

Here’s John Cena to get things going so they’re not wasting time around here. The fans are very pleased to see him. Cena: “WAIT A MINUTE! You mean all I had to do was be part of the Raw Reunion and now you’re all nice to me???” Cena lists off some of the big names scheduled to be here tonight because this is his home. He might not be around here as much as he used to be but this is his home so let’s get this started.

Cue the Usos with Jimmy saying WHOA WHOA WHOA. The people are happy with Raw Reunion but they want the three of them to drop some rhymes. Cena politely declines but Jey says these people are here to see the doctor. That gets Cena’s attention, with Jey making it worse by saying Cena left them for the movies. Cena gets back in and says he isn’t getting bested.

Cena: “Ya’ll look just like your mug shots. How was it getting arrested?” Cena tries to leave again but the Usos say hang on because here’s Rikishi. That’s enough for Cena to leave again, but Rikishi tells him to back it up and turn around. Rikishi can’t let him leave all fast and furious and dancing is loaded up, only to have the Revival cut them off. Hang on again though as here as here’s D-Von Dudley.

Jimmy Hart and Hulk Hogan are in the back with Hogan saying he thinks he can beat someone up tonight.

Usos vs. Revival

Non-title with Booker T. joining commentary and Rikishi/D-Von in the corners. A Wilder distraction lets Dawson get in a cheap shot on Jimmy and the villains take over. Dawson hits a belly to back suplex and steals the bandanna to throw at Rikishi. Jimmy gets knocked off the apron and out to the floor as we take a break, now with the screen in screen ala Smackdown.

Back in a hurry with Dawson elbowing Jimmy in the face and Wilder grabbing a chinlock. That’s broken up and Dawson misses a charge, allowing the tag off to Jey. The Samoan drop plants Wilder but Dawson shoves him out of the way of a high crossbody. Jimmy is right back with a running Umaga attack in the corner but Dawson makes a blind tag. A German suplex/middle ripe uppercut combination gets two with Jey making the save. D-Von and Rikishi stare each other down so Dawson yells, allowing Jey to hit a superkick. Jimmy’s Superfly Splash is good for the pin at 7:54.

Rating: C+. Another fun match between the two talented teams, though I’m still trying to figure out what D-Von has to do with the Revival. This probably sets up a title match at Summerslam which we’ve seen before, but it’s not like there are many other serious teams to challenge Revival at the moment.

Alicia Fox (not sure if she’s considered a legend or if WWE forgot she worked there) and Dana Brooke are in the back when Kaitlyn comes up. Torrie Wilson comes in and we must cheer her, only to have Santino Marella come in for the Cobra cameo. Drew McIntyre pops in and sneers at them.

We look back at R-Truth having to deal with Hurricane and Drake Maverick at Comic-Con.

R-Truth and Carmella think Big Bird could help deal with his problems when Renee Michelle pops in. It’s a ruse though as Maverick steals the pin and the title. Charly Caruso is shocked but Godfather, complete with music, shows up to hit his catchphrase. Dancing ensues. Graves: “Do you think she knew who that was?” Renee Young: “No.”

Cedric Alexander vs. Drew McIntyre

Rematch from last week where Alexander beat McIntyre. Drew goes right after him in the aisle and tries to send him into the post, only to post himself by mistake. A moonsault off the middle rope connects but Drew sends him into the post. The reverse Alabama Slam into the apron drops Cedric again and there’s no match.

Maverick goes into the locker room to get his stuff and runs into a crate of worms. Cue the Boogeyman to scare Maverick to death when Pat Patterson of all people comes in to steal the title. Pat: “Brisco is gonna love that.”

Viking Raiders vs. Curt Hawkins/Zack Ryder

Christian is out for commentary. Hawkins and Ryder double dropkick Ivar to start and an STO/Russian legsweep combination takes Erik down. A right hand drops Ryder though and Ivar hits his seated senton out of the corner. Ivar gets slammed onto Ryder, who is over for the tag to Hawkins a few seconds later. A suicide dive takes Ryder out and the Viking Experience finishes Hawkins at 2:38.

There’s a party in the back when Maria Kanellis comes in to yell at Mike for talking to Eve Torres and Eric Bischoff. Eric teases an offer to come to Smackdown when Maria comes in. She isn’t happy with Mike not rubbing lotion on her stomach to prevent stretch marks from the baby, which is going to ruin her modeling career. Maria is the breadwinner now and Mike has messed up again. Ron Simmons comes in and does the catchphrase, complete with Jimmy Hart’s megaphone.

The Club (now dubbed the OC) is in the back and talking about how awesome it is to be the only club that matters. They’re the ones who matter instead of these so called legends. AJ isn’t sweating Seth Rollins tonight but if Rollins wants more after he loses, they can make a statement. The OC is the most dominant group in WWE history then, now and forever.

Gerald Brisco has stolen the title from Patterson when he runs into Kelly Kelly, who pins him to win the title. Good thing they had her music cued up in case someone ran into her.

Here’s Samoa Joe for a chat. He talks about Raw Reunion, which is a plague to WWE. Tonight is about putting on rose colored glasses and indulge the fans’ addiction to nostalgia. Tonight you could have seen him wrecking people left and right and painting in brutality but instead you got the Usos and Rikishi spitting limericks at John Cena.

Cue Roman Reigns to interrupt because he doesn’t like his family being insulted. Joe gets in his face but Reigns says he knows what happens when you insult someone on the island. The fight is on and Joe goes for the eyes before sending Reigns shoulder first into the post. They head back inside with Reigns managing a Superman Punch to send Joe outside. Joe bails and Reigns says not all Samoans are cowards. That sounds like a challenge and the match is made for later.

Roman Reigns vs. Samoa Joe

Well it is later. Reigns sends him into the corner to start but misses a charge into the post. Joe takes him down into an early neck crank but Reigns fights up, earning himself an elbow to the face. A toss sends Reigns outside for the suicide elbow in a big knockdown. It works so well that Joe tries the same thing but Reigns moves this time. That means a big apron dropkick, followed by the clotheslines back inside. The Superman Punch is blocked and Joe hits a big boot for two. Joe escapes the Koquina Clutch to send him outside, setting up an ugly looking spear for the pin at 5:49.

Rating: C. This was all about hitting each other really hard and the motif of throwing each other outside over and over again was a fine way to keep things going. I’m not sure what Reigns is going to be doing at Summerslam but at this rate, I’m not sure Joe is going to have anything to do since he keeps losing so often.

It’s time for MizTV and after a plug for Miz and Mrs., here’s Seth Rollins. We look at Rollins winning the battle royal last week and then look at the title change from Extreme Rules. Miz calls the whole thing a predicament, which Rollins finds funny. He makes fun of Paul Heyman’s introduction of Lesnar and then Brock himself. Lesnar looks like Godzilla but Seth is ready to fight him.

Rollins says Lesnar is a Rollins wannabe but here’s Heyman on screen to interrupt. His name is Seth Rollins’ dose of reality and brings up Rollins cashing in on Lesnar four years ago. Rollins says that makes Lesnar a wannabe so here’s Heyman in the arena to say this is the last time….and Rollins cuts him off to say Heyman better be ready to walk the walk. Rollins teases coming up the ramp so Heyman runs. The reality is that Lesnar is no conqueror or beast because he is a man. Any man can lose and at Summerslam, Lesnar will lose. As for tonight, Rollins isn’t resting and gets to face AJ Styles so he can wrestle the best.

Sami Zayn interrupts the party (now with Jillian Hall) to say this is a huge waste of time. This is like watching the Attitude Era through the Face App and these people need to go home. Don’t come back at Wrestlemania or the Hall of Fame and just go home. Cue Rey Mysterio to say show some respect for the people who came before him (It’s Torrie Wilson, Jimmy Hart, Jillian Hall and Rikishi. I see one and a half people worth respecting in that group.). Kurt Angle comes in and we’ll be having a match next.

Kelly runs into Candice Michelle, Melina and Naomi in the back. As luck would have it, Melina just got her referee’s license and Candice wins the title, meaning the Go Daddy dance is back. Alundra Blayze comes in and makes her tap to win the title. She admits she isn’t going to be champion very long and leaves.

Sami Zayn vs. Rey Mysterio

Jonathan Coachman is on commentary. Sami knees him in the ribs to start and ties him in the Tree of Woe to take over. A running knee in the corner gets two and we’re already off to the chinlock. Back up and a spinning hurricanrana is countered into a sitout powerbomb for two on Rey.

Sami loads Rey up for something but gets caught in a tornado DDT for his efforts. It’s too early for the 619….and here’s Rob Van Dam, who is under contract to Impact but is here on a one night deal. Sgt. Slaughter, Hurricane, and Kurt Angle come out as well, allowing Rey to hit the 619 into a Frog splash (complete with finger points) for the win at 5:02.

Rating: D+. This was just there for the cameos and that’s fine. Rey is still active so it’s not like some random legend embarrassing a current star, which happens far too often at shows like this. Sami is a good punching bag and always has been, though at some point he needs to win a little something to maintain his credibility.

Ric Flair arrives.

The Street Profits are in the back with Dawkins needing some eye drops after spending some time with Van Dam in the bathroom. Ford is annoyed at not being invited and it’s even worse when he finds out Mark Henry and Ric Flair were there. Ford: “LIKE WOO???” Dawkins: “WOO!” Boogeyman was there too and Ford is about to lose it, made even worse when Godfather calls him.

Here’s Blayze in the arena to pull out a trashcan to drop the title but Ted DiBiase cuts her off and buys the title. We get the evil laugh and my night is made.

AJ Styles vs. Seth Rollins

Non-title and Jerry Lawler is out for commentary. Rollins grabs a headlock to start as Lawler goes over the 24/7 Title changes (Lawler: “I remember when those Stooges were asking for seconds at the Last Supper and now they’re winning championships!”). Some chops against the ropes have AJ in more trouble and a discus forearm rocks him into the corner.

An OC distraction lets AJ knocks Rollins off the apron and it’s time for all three of them to stare at Seth. HHH and Shawn Michaels come out for the big staredown and we take a break. Back with the match continuing as all four are still on the floor. Rollins hits the big springboard knee but the OC comes in for the DQ at 8:07.

Rating: C-. This didn’t have time to go anywhere and was all about the DX moment, which is perfectly fine. Also, it’s nice that they didn’t have the champ lose, which I almost expected after the Revival loss earlier. It was fine for a cameo and there’s nothing wrong with that on a show like this.

Post match the OC tease the Too Sweet but the fight is on. The OC grabs chairs but the Road Dogg, Kevin Nash, Scott Hall and X-Pac. Road Dogg talks about all of the members of DX, including Chyna’s spirit to make seven. Dogg: “Dang I forgot Billy.” They’re the OG’s so the OC bails. Rollins gets to do the catchphrase.

DiBiase gets in his limo and a pair of three counts and yelling is heard. Maverick comes out with the title but the mob chases him off.

Here’s Mick Foley for a chat. He talks about the 24/7 Title but the chase goes through the ring (Foley: “COME TO PAPA!”). They all leave so Foley wishes them a nice day. He’s had a lot of great memories on this show and wants to relive his favorite. That would be the title win on January 4, 1999…..and here’s Bray Wyatt. He puts Foley in the Mandible Claw and laughter is heard.

Here are Alexa Bliss and Nikki Cross for a Moment of Bliss. Nikki gets to introduce Becky Lynch as the guest but before anything can be said, here’s Natalya to interrupt. Bliss: “Whatcha doing out here?” Natalya wants Becky to say anything to her face but Bliss shows us the post match promo from last week.

Natalya rants about the lack of respect from Becky, even after they wrestled in Japan fourteen years ago. Becky laughs it off and brags about winning the Raw Women’s Title in the main event of Wrestlemania. The title is the scalp of the MMA woman and the fight is on. Referees break it up with Bliss and Nikki leaving with their coffees.

Post break Natalya says Becky made it personal when the Women’s Revolution was built off the backs of women like her. She’ll get a beating in Toronto.

Maverick goes to the limo when R-Truth comes up to steal the title again….and leaves in the limo with Maverick’s wife. Carmella is left with Maverick, who eventually realizes his wife is gone.

Braun Strowman vs. Randy Rowe

Strowman: “Don’t blink. This ain’t gonna last long.” Some huge beals set up a huge boot to put Rowe down. Strowman pulls him off the mat for a huge powerbomb and the win at 1:36.

Here are the legends (including Alicia Fox, who I believe was announced as a legend appearing despite being under a regular contract) for the big closing segment. Ric Flair and Hulk Hogan come out to toast Raw, with Hogan getting to give the speech and catchphrases.

With that out of the way, here’s Steve Austin and the coolers are ready in the corners. Austin talks about everything that all the legends have done and how this is all his family. The people in the stands are family and everyone watching the show around the world are part of the WWE family too. Austin talks about doing a podcast with Hulk Hogan today (oh that could be great) and then listening to a bunch of Ric Flair stories all night long.

Then he ordered room service but wasn’t done yet so he went downstairs and ran into Ron Simmons. Austin beat him to the catchphrase and talked to a bunch of other legends earlier. Those legends need to get down here because it’s time for beer drinking and toasting. The music plays but Austin asks if we have some time left. He talks about being in South Africa with Gerry Brisco years ago but then they’re out of time so he hits the catchphrase to end the show.

Overall Rating: B-. This was a very different kind of show and that’s exactly the point. They did a great job with the legends as none of them overstayed their welcome and the 24/7 stuff was as good as it could have been. The show flew by for a change and I was wanting to see what was coming up next. Having the matches be so much shorter is helping things a lot, though an actual Summerslam build would be nice at any given time. This was a fun night though and they did it exactly as they should have.

Results

Usos b. Revival – Superfly Splash to Dawson

Viking Raiders b. Curt Hawkins/Zack Ryder – Viking Experience to Hawkins

Roman Reigns b. Samoa Joe – Spear

Seth Rollins b. AJ Styles via DQ when the OC interfered

Rey Mysterio b. Sami Zayn – Frog splash

Braun Strowman b. Randy Rowe – Powerbomb

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s History Of In Your House (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/05/31/new-paperback-kbs-history-of-in-your-house/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

IMG Credit: WWE

Summerslam 1998
Date: August 30, 1998
Location: Madison Square Garden, New York City, New York
Attendance: 21,588
Commentators: Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler

Venis beats up the referee and gives him the Money Shot post match.

Mankind laments the destruction of the hearse and plugs the Brisco Brothers Body Shop. Maybe he can use his sledgehammer after all.

Kai En Tai vs. Oddities

Four straight top rope splashes keep Golga in trouble and four straight legdrops get no cover. The referee is fine with letting all four of them in there but can you blame him at this point? Golga clotheslines all four of them at once (that looked cool) and all three Oddities come in, leaving Yamaguchi-San to get beaten up by Luna Vachon. A triple quadruple chokeslam lets Golga pin all four men at once for the win.

Jeff Jarrett vs. X-Pac

Sable/??? vs. Jacqueline/Marc Mero

More heel miscommunication puts Jacqueline on the floor and Mero gets crotched on top. Sable busts out a top rope hurricanrana for two, followed by the worst “accidental falling headbutt into a low blow” from Jacqueline to Mero. Edge plants Mero with the Downward Spiral (actually called that) and picks Sable up for a splash to give her the pin.

Owen Hart vs. Ken Shamrock

This is in a small theater adjacent to MSG. The match is held in a small, circular cage which is about as blatant of a ripoff of a UFC cage as you can get. You win by submission or knockout. Hart is a member of the Nation but Severn is the only person here with him. Shamrock easily takes him down to start until Owen counters into a leglock. Ken gets dropped with a spinebuster but floats over and unloads with right hands.

Both guys are bleeding from the face and Owen scores with a powerslam and a nice belly to belly. The Sharpshooter is on but Ken crawls over and climbs the cage to escape in a nice counter. Something like a tornado DDT out of the corner drops Owen but he grabs the dragon sleeper, only to have Shamrock climb the cage and roll over into the ankle lock for the submission.

Austin will do whatever it takes to retain the title tonight.

Tag Team Titles: New Age Outlaws vs. Mankind

Mankind is defending on his own and comes out with a big metal dumpster because this is a hardcore match. The Outlaws are in South Park shirts, which still look weird at this point. Mankind and Billy duel with chairs until Road Dogg sneaks in from behind to take over. They start cracking Mankind in the head with whatever metal objects they can find but a swinging neckbreaker on the floor gets two on Gunn.

The Outlaws put Mankind in the dumpster but Kane is inside, sledgehammer in hand. With Mankind out of camera range, Kane slams the hammer down into the dumpster and everyone goes silent.

Intercontinental Title: The Rock vs. HHH

HHH is smart enough to break up whatever Rock had in mind though and plants him with a DDT. They climb the ladder again and Rock shoves him down and into the ladder in the corner, only to have HHH bounce into the standing ladder to knock Rock throat first into the top rope. Rock is up first and grabs a ladder, only to have HHH blast it with a chair over and over to get a breather.

WWF World Title: Steve Austin vs. Undertaker

Ratings Comparison

Original: B

Redo: C+

2015 Redo: B

Oddities vs. Kai En Tai

Original: C-

Redo: C-

2015 Redo: C+

Jeff Jarrett vs. X-Pac

Original: B

Redo: C

2015 Redo: C+

Marc Mero/Jacqueline vs. Sable/Edge

Original: F

Redo: C-

2015 Redo: D

Ken Shamrock vs. Owen Hart

Original: B-

Redo: B

2015 Redo: C+

Mankind vs. New Age Outlaws

Original: D+

Redo: D+

2015 Redo: D+

HHH vs. The Rock

Original: A+

Redo: A+

2015 Redo: A

Steve Austin vs. Undertaker

Original: B-

Redo: B-

2015 Redo: B-

Overall Rating

Original: B

Redo: A-

2015 Redo: B

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/08/01/history-of-summerslam-count-up-1998-the-biggest-summerslam-ever/

And the original redo:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2013/08/03/summerslam-count-up-1998-rock-and-hhh-ascend/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s History Of In Your House (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/05/31/new-paperback-kbs-history-of-in-your-house/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

IMG Credit: WWE

Summerslam 1998
Date: August 30, 1998
Location: Madison Square Garden, New York City, New York
Attendance: 21,588
Commentators: Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler

Venis misses a splash and gets caught in a belly to back suplex to give Brown control again. Val comes back with an overhead t-bone suplex but walks into a clothesline followed by a legdrop for two. A leg lariat and a middle rope elbow gets the same and Val is holding his back for some reason. Brown follows up on the injury with a Texas Cloverleaf but lets it go after only a few seconds. Did he learn submissions from No Mercy? Brown misses a middle rope senton and both guys are down. The fans are much more into this than you would expect them to be.

Val hits some running knees to the ribs and a backdrop for no cover. He tries a high cross body but gets caught in a Sky High (lifting powerbomb) which gets a delayed two count. Brown hits a quick DDT but dives off the middle rope into a powerslam for two. A butterfly suplex sets up the Money Shot (top rope splash) but Brown gets his knees up.

Val slams the referee and hits a Money Shot.

Mankind is mad that Austin broke the hearse (“I have to take it to the Brisco Brothers Body Shop.”) because he wanted to put Kane in it later tonight. Mankind has a sledge hammer and wants to use it on someone.

Insane Clown Posse plays the Oddities to the ring to a HUGE reaction.

Oddities vs. Kaientai

Two members of the team combine to slam him and four straight top rope splashes followed by four straight legdrops get no cover. A quadruple dropkick has Golga in trouble but a quadruple clothesline puts Kaientai down. The hot tag brings in Kurrgan who takes down everyone in sight and hits a wicked side slam on Funaki. Everything breaks down as managers Luna Vachon and Yamaguchi-San get in a fight. A quadruple chokeslam is good for the pin by Golga on everyone from Japan.

Jeff Jarrett vs. X-Pac

A Jarrett leapfrog is countered into a sitout powerbomb for two and Howard is starting to panic. Another Bronco Buster attempt is countered by a low blow but Jarrett stops to hit the Fink, allowing the X Factor to connect for a VERY close two. Southern Justice is back but Dennis Knight (Phineas) drops a guitar, giving Pac the shot to Jarrett for the pin.

Rating: C. Not bad here but it went a bit too long for what they were trying to do. If Southern Justice could come out at the end, where were they for the other ten minutes of the match? The haircut was the move that Jarrett needed as he changed his entire character from Tennessee Guy to chauvinist pig soon after this.

Jacqueline/Marc Mero vs. Sable/???

This is the final blowoff of the long Mero vs. Sable feud. The mystery partner is Edge who has only been around for a month or so at this time. The guys start things off with Edge hitting some quick Japanese armdrags. Off to Jackie who demands Sable come in but runs off to Mero as soon as the blonde comes in. Edge hits a quick flapjack but Jackie trips him up to give Mero a free shot.

Rating: C-. The match kind of sucked but Sable was WAY over. You have to remember how big of a deal she was back then to keep this in context. Sable was the final thing you would see on Raw a lot of the time, much like Cena is today. The biggest problem I still have with this match is what JR says at the end: “SHE DID IT!” This was all about Sable and Edge, the guy they were trying to rub, could have been any other guy.

Owen Hart vs. Ken Shamrock

Hart comes right back with a powerslam and a belly to belly sets up the Sharpshooter. In an awesome counter, Shamrock crawls over to the cage and pulls himself up the wall to escape the hold. A tornado DDT off the wall puts Owen down and a spinwheel kick does the same. Owen sends him into the cage and tries a dragon sleeper but Shamrock walks up the cage to backflip out and the ankle lock gets the submission.

Austin is ready.

Tag Titles: Mankind vs. New Age Outlaws

Mankind and Kane are the champions but as mentioned Kane is missing. This is no holds barred and falls count anywhere, making this a hardcore match. The Outlaws are ridiculously over and Mankind is approaching his face turn if not almost already there. Billy and Roadie bring a dumpster to the ring but Mankind meets them with the cookie sheet. He and Billy both get chairs and Mankind wins a quick duel but the numbers game catches up with him.

Intercontinental Title: The Rock vs. HHH

The champion starts his climb but HHH flies in off the top to break it up, but the ladder falls on him to keep both guys down. A hard ladder shot puts Rock down again and HHH drives the top of the ladder into his ribs. Rock pulls HHH off the ladder and the future Game lands on his knee, legitimately injuring it and requiring several months off to heal up. Some elbows to the knee make the pain even worse but the ladder being dropped on it is far more painful.

WWF World Title: Undertaker vs. Steve Austin

Kane pops up at the entrance but Undertaker tells him to go back. The brawl keeps going but Austin goes to the floor to make sure Kane is gone. A somewhat sloppy chokeslam brings Austin back in but he clotheslines Taker to the floor. They fight into the crowd with Taker backdropping Austin onto the concrete. Back to ringside with Austin being rammed back first into the post, making JR scream that Austin may be paralyzed. That would be two years in a row if true.

Post match Taker hands Austin the belt and walks away to stand next to Kane in the entrance.

Ratings Comparison

Original: B

Redo: C+

Oddities vs. Kaientai

Original: C-

Redo: C-

Jeff Jarrett vs. X-Pac

Original: B

Redo: C

Marc Mero/Jacqueline vs. Sable/Edge

Original: F

Redo: C-

Ken Shamrock vs. Owen Hart

Original: B-

Redo: B

Mankind vs. New Age Outlaws

Original: D+

Redo: D+

HHH vs. The Rock

Original: A+

Redo: A+

Steve Austin vs. Undertaker

Original: B-

Redo: B-

Overall Rating

Original: B

Redo: A-

Most of the matches are rated higher and the overall rating is lower. Sounds like one of my old reviews.

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/08/01/history-of-summerslam-count-up-1998-the-biggest-summerslam-ever/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s History Of In Your House (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/05/31/new-paperback-kbs-history-of-in-your-house/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

IMG Credit: WWE

Summerslam 1998
Date: August 30, 1998
Location: Madison Square Garden, New York City, New York
Attendance: 21,588
Commentators: Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler

If there has ever been a Summerslam that could be put on par with Wrestlemania as far as build up and importance goes, this is it. The Attitude Era of 1998 was going full speed ahead with nothing in sight stop it as Austin vs. McMahon was dominating the wrestling world. The idea is that there was a conspiracy led by Vince to get the title off of Austin. The reason you had to see every show was no one knew who else was in on it.

That’s just downright creepy if you can ignore the fact that it’s professional wrestling. The main enemy of Austin was Undertaker, so guess what tonight’s main event is? This show was the crescendo of the summer and is exactly what a Summerslam is supposed to be like in my eyes. Every storyline was heavily built up, the showdowns were worth drooling over, and it’s in Madison freaking Square Garden.

Also, this show has some historical significance, as it was on this night that HHH and Rock launched themselves into the highest level of the company. For the better part of a year DX and the Nation had been feuding. However this was really just window dressing for Rock vs. HHH, and tonight was the final match in the feud: Rock defending the IC title against HHH in a ladder match. I’ve been looking forward to this match since I started this review as it’s one of my favorite matches ever. I’m going to call this the Milenko Special for something that comes in the second match. I’m actually looking forward to this, so let’s do it.

The buildup is perfect now and it just looks awesome. Excellent work here and it makes it look like a big time show.That wasn’t the intro, so we get this one. Basically Taker and Kane are together and Austin isn’t surprised, but he’s not afraid. What kind of a face would he be if he was? Vince says that Taker has to have Kane there with him to make sure he wins. Remember that line. The video cuts off really abruptly for some reason and it doesn’t go well. This is the home video so AC DC is edited out. Ross and Lawler are here and run down the card of course.

European Title: Val Venis vs. D’Lo Brown

Apparently Austin broke a hearse that either of the Brothers could have been in. The name graphic for Val is placed perfectly as it covers his crotch as he’s gyrating and taking off the towel. He says he’s in the big apple and does his came, saw, came again line. As he’s doing this they cut to a gorgeous woman in the front row that is jaw dropping. Brown is billed from Helsinki after having been from Lisbon on Raw.

The announcer’s voice when he reads Helsinki is great as if he sounds like he’s thinking what in the world is wrong with my eyes? They keep talking about the hearse. This was back when Heat meant something. They need to bring it back as a preshow. At the time Brown was using the chest protector like Orton used the cast. He got injured about two months before but it’s a slow healing injury I guess. We go to a random shot of the crowd but the camera zooms in on someone.

It’s some guy in an open shirt and sunglasses with long blonde hair. His name is cliff or rock or something. Oh Edge, yeah that’s it. I’m sure he’ll never amount to anything. Back to the next big things, Val Venis and D’Lo Brown. Oh I forgot to mention the entrance. It’s the kind where when you look at the ring the entrance is straight ahead and it’s designed to look like gates.

Again, that’s just awesome looking as this show is being treated like a mega show and it’s paying off. Brown busts out a Texas Cloverleaf which oddly doesn’t get a bad Europe joke. A lot of the sound bites here are used in one of the Smackdown video games. Val goes up for…something and gets caught in the Sky High which is awesome but unnamed at this point. This is a good match so far which isn’t something you’d expect out of these two.

We have some solid chemistry here actually. Val really was good in the ring, at least better than he’s given credit for. He keeps going up top but it’s never in the right position for the splash. He finally gets one off but Brown gets the knees up. Crowd is marking hard for Brown actually. Correction they think he sucks. Could we possibly have dueling chants? We have more sex jokes from Lawler that are really under the radar if you don’t know what to listen for.

SWEET looking Low Down from Brown but it misses. Eventually Val steals the chest protector and goes for the splash but the referee tries to stop him and he gets crotched. Brown gets it back but Venis beats him up before putting it on again. Referee tries to stop him but he gets fired across the ring for the stupid DQ finish. Post match, the referee gets beaten on.

Rating: B. Very good match here, but the ending is just weak to me. I get that they didn’t want to do the title change but wanted Val to look strong, but they couldn’t do a count out or something? The referee thing was just stupid and it didn’t work for me. Either way, this was a great opener and it worked very well. Sometimes you find guys like these two that just work well together. When you find something like that, it’s a bonus.

Cole is in the back with the hearse as we find out that Kane and Taker weren’t in the hearse, but Mankind isn’t happy. He brought it apparently, and now it’s only good for giving the Brisco Brothers Body Shop some work. He also has a sledgehammer, which I guess HHH stole from him.

Oddities vs. Kai En Tai

This is a handicap match, because I guess three giants against four tiny men isn’t fair? Anyway, ICP plays the Oddities to the ring which actually gets a very nice reaction. They get all the fans waving their hands, including one scantily clad woman that needs to be dancing more. Apparently the Japanese team doesn’t like the Oddities for no apparent reason.

The Oddities are the Giant Silva who is taller than Khali and less talented, Kurrgan who was an interesting character until they turned him face, and Golga who is Earthquake in a mask and obsessed with Cartman from South Park. Ross says he likes ICP which stuns Lawler. This is mostly a comedy match, as no one on the planet thought the Oddities would lose. They were actually an interesting concept, but you need more odd characters than just three big guys.

In a funny spot, Kurrgan gets on his knees to fight Funaki, which sadly makes them about the same size. We get a tug of war between Kurrgan and the other team over Kai En Tai’s manager, Yamaguchi San. He may be the most annoying manager ever, even surpassing Slick, who had a cool song to make up for his annoyance. As the crowd somehow gets even quieter, all four small guys run in and attack Silva, which also doesn’t work.

Ross tries to compare him to Andre as I glare at my screen. Anyway, eventually Tenta, or Golga I guess, the most talented guy in this match is tagged in and gets beaten down surprisingly. The four man team actually is fun to watch as they work really well together. He comes back with a quadruple clothesline as this is going on WAY too long.

A double, double chokeslam followed by a huge splash finally ends this as ICP tries to bring the crowd back to life. I will give the Oddities this: the dancing was pretty funny.

Rating: C-. This was fairly funny, but it just went on way too long. It’s almost a ten minute comedy match, which is about twice as long as it needs to be. The gimmick was fine, but we get it: Kai En Tai couldn’t do crap here. You don’t need to make us see that over and over again.

Jeff Jarrett vs. X-Pac

This is hair vs. hair. Jarrett has Southern Justice with him as we continue to try to validate the Godwinns being employed. On Heat, the trio shaved Fink’s hair. I don’t remember him having much to begin with but ok. Debra desperately needs to get here. Fink is apparently an honorary DX member for tonight only. Sarge sends Southern Justice to the back. Fink doing the crotch chop is one of the greatest things of all time.

He also says suck it as part of my soul dies. Jarrett is the perfect size for someone like X Pac to fight. Like I’ve said, when Pac is fighting someone closer to his size he’s far less annoying and can be enjoyable. They’re working a fast paced match here and it’s working better. They keep going for awhile as this is turning into a good match. Fink gets up on the apron and Jarrett condemns himself to eternal torment by hitting him. This leads to an X Factor but Southern Justice comes out again.

They miss with the guitar and Pac drills Jarrett with it for the pin. The army of people that Jarrett has given haircuts to plus the Outlaws run out to help with the haircut. He’s not shaved, but he gets his short haircut that he had for years.

Rating: B. This was a solid match. Both guys can work a faster pace and in this case it was the right way to go. Both are far better when they don’t try to move up and fight like heavyweights. It was hard hitting and fast paced, which made this a very good little match.

Doc is looking at the Lion’s Den, which was a pretty cool concept. That’s up later on.

Cole is with the Rock, who attacked HHH earlier and hurt his knee. He rips into Cole as only he can do, which is always funny. He also says he’ll win.

Marc Mero/Jackie vs. Sable/Mystery Partner

Mero is doing the boxer thing at this time. There’s no clue who Sable’s partner is here. This is mainly over Sable vs. Mero, which was an interesting concept but it just didn’t work in the end. They tried so hard to make Sable a big deal as a wrestler and it just never worked that well. The partner is…..EDGE! Edge was still a rookie at this point so it’s really get how big he was going to become.

Anyway, this is more or less all about Sable, so it’s naturally not going to be that interesting. I swear that woman had a bigger ego than Hogan at times. She comes in and beats on Jackie for a bit because heaven forbid that Edge, the young guy who has a lot to prove still gets significant ring time. Eventually Edge does and immediately throws a great suicide dive over the top rope onto Mero before spanking Jackie to a big pop.

See what happens when you let someone with that little thing called real talent into the match? It gets a lot better and the crowd is more into it. The problem with Sable was simple: only horny men cared about her. Other than that, she was pretty much worthless. This is really just getting bad at this point. Not the in ring stuff, but how this is all about Sable.

Edge beats Mero up, then Sable comes in and gets a hurricanrana out of it, despite the rules earlier being men vs. men and women vs. women. Jackie helps out with the worst looking spot I’ve ever seen. Somehow Mero is too far from the corner for the falling headbutt spot, so Jackie steps forward and THEN collapses onto Mero’s crotch. Edge knocks him out even more, just so Sable can have Edge lift her up for a splash to get the win.

Ross of course screams SHE did it, after which Lawler (thank goodness) says THEY did it. I knew I always liked Jerry better. The referee raises Sable’s hand first, then goes back and raises their hands together. Ok now I’m just being picky. Post match, it’s all about what Sable did as this is just stupid now. Edge just kind of leaves as Sable celebrates. Commentary: Oh yeah Edge was good too.

Rating: F. Not for the match, which was ok, but for Sable. This match was a love letter from Sable to Sable and it was just bad to say the least. It was all about her and Edge, Jackie and Mero were just along for the ride. Edge did 90% of the work and was an afterthought.

Sable did two moves on her own, one of which was sloppy at best, yet the whole thing was about her. Even at the end of the match when JR said she did it, you knew this was all about her. That’s just flat out stupid no matter who it is. This really was stupid to me and it left a bad taste in my mouth.

We now get what to me was one of the funniest interviews I’ve seen in a long time. Mankind is panicking because he can’t find his sledgehammer (which he had like 30 minutes ago and we haven’t seen him do anything since then but whatever) and he doesn’t have a partner against the Outlaws. He and Kane are the tag champions at this point and it’s a hardcore match (billed as falls count anywhere and no holds barred but you get the idea).

He says that Cole should be his partner in getting their heads kicked in and he hands him a belt. This is something that should never be done again. Anyway, Vince comes up and we see the brilliance of these two characters. Foley is putty in Vince’s hands and you can see him just manipulating Mankind with a few short and simple words. It really is well done here. He promises Mick that if he wins, he’ll get him in the MSG hall of fame.

He brings Foley some weapons, which inspire Foley. Foley says that he thinks he has 13 words for the Outlaws: How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood? This is as bizarre as it sounds and maybe it’s the Foley mark in me, but I loved it.

Recap of the Owen/Shamrock feud, which was an ok idea, but it didn’t need Severn involved. Short version: Owen hates Shamrock for no apparent reason, so he got Dan Severn to train him and they’re having a match in a small octagon called the Lion’s Den, which is named after Shamrock’s training facility.

Lion’s Den Match: Owen Hart vs. Ken Shamrock

This match is taking place in a theater adjacent to MSG. I know that because Ross said that this match is taking place in a theater adjacent to MSG. So this is the WWF version of the UFC cage but they’re wrestling a WWF style match in there, which is about what you’d expect I guess, as it’s pretty clear Shamrock wouldn’t have much trouble in a real MMA fight with Owen.

Hart would hang on for awhile, but it’s not likely he would have much of a chance in the long run. The cage offers some different effects, but it’s nothing earth shattering. It’s better than a normal match would have been though, as it suits Shamrock very well. Speaking of that, he hits a sweet move as he gets a running start and plants his foot on the cage to jump backwards and catch Owen with I think either a back elbow or a dropkick.

Either way it looks very good and he nailed him with it. The cage isn’t really offering a lot of differences, but the main one is on whips. With no ropes, you’re just hitting cage, which has to hurt pretty badly. Hart gets the sharpshooter, which Ross says no one does better. Remind me never to leave WWF.

This is likely the coolest spot of the match as Shamrock crawls to the cage and climbs it while in the Sharpshooter, forcing the hold to be broken. The problem is they just brush over it, despite it being brilliant. Owen gets a choke on him but Shamrock runs up the cage to backflip out of it and gets the real ankle lock, not the Angle lock, to get the win.

Rating: B-. This was a weird concept and I guess it worked. It didn’t really fail, but it just wasn’t the best thing in the world. Overall the in cage stuff was fine, but it just wasn’t to my liking and I’m glad it only happened like three times.

Austin says he’ll do whatever it takes to keep the title.

Tag Titles: Mankind vs. New Age Outlaws

Like I said, there’s no Kane so this is virtually a hardcore handicap match. The announcer calls it a no holds barred pinfalls match count anywhere, so I wonder what he did during that long break they had for the Lion’s Den match. Both of the Outlaws are rocking South Park shirts, and remember this is back when that was a brand new show. There’s a dumpster at ringside. The Outlaws do a conchairto with cookie sheets.

I’ve always wondered why there were cookie sheets at ringside. Apparently the Outlaws should tag. Why? What are they going to do, get disqualified? This is really short and you can probably guess how it ends. Dang it I just realized I didn’t put up any matches from this show. You’ll live I suppose for this one.

Anyway, WZ is down right now so it’s not like I have anything else to do with my time. Anyway, the Outlaws win after a spike pile driver in the general area of the title belt. Now they’re going to put him in the dumpster. Post match, Kane is in the dumpster and drills Foley’s unseen body with the sledgehammer.

Rating: D+. This was really short and wasn’t that good. For a match like this, it can work but it needs a lot more than 6 minutes. Granted, I don’t think they were looking for a classic in this. It was just too short to get going and it felt like it was over just after it started.

Recap of DX vs. Nation, including the DX imitation of the Nation, which I’m sure you’ve all seen a million times. We also see D’Lo Brown pinning HHH for the European Title. It’s amusing that this is supposed to be DX vs. the Nation, yet all we see is HHH and Rock for about 95% of this. Oh yeah and that REALLY dumb time limit draw in a 2/3 falls match. All of that leads us to this. HHH’s promo before Summerslam from Raw: At Summerslam, you’re gonna bow to me! That’s all he said and that was perfect.

Ladder Match: IC Title: HHH vs. Rock

This is going to be good. The DX Band plays HHH to the ring, which is really cool actually. I think HHH is being followed by a nuclear power plant. Oh never mind. That’s just Chyna’s neon green outfit, not nuclear fallout. HHH picks Chris Warren, the singer, up and carries him around the ring while he’s still singing, which looks a bit stupid. I’ve never gotten the point in destroying the band’s equipment after a performance.

Oh yeah and at the time there was a bad storyline with Chyna and Mark Henry that ended with Henry almost sleeping with a transvestite. Yeah it was worse than it sounds. They start out with just standard stuff, but are out by the ladder inside of three minutes. In a bit of a surprising move, they don’t touch it yet. I like that. Save it for a solid buildup and then go for it. That being said, it’s in the ring less than 2 minutes later.

In a painful looking spot, Rock goes up the ladder but HHH comes off the top rope to stop him. He gets that done, but the ladder falls on him. He didn’t know it was coming, or he’s the greatest seller I’ve ever seen, and I’m leaning towards the former. Here we have a great example of why theatrical moves like the People’s Elbow are stupid. Rock has the ladder set up and drops an elbow off the apron down onto HHH who is laying on it.

How is that different than the People’s Elbow? In short, it isn’t, yet the People’s Elbow can win world titles. Explain to me how that makes any sense at all. Anyway, HHH’s knee gives out soon after this, as he has to put all his weight on it to stay up. Now that’s the focus of the match, which is something I really like. Now, instead of just big spot followed by big spot, we have a reason to pay attention to what’s not involved with the ladder.

That’s putting psychology in as well, as JR puts it: one legged men don’t win kicking contests, and they don’t climb ladders either. We get a Home Improvement reference to really date the show a bit. It’s rare to see two heavyweight guys in a match like this, but that doesn’t mean that it’s going to be bad. Here you have two guys where it’s more about the feud rather than the prop and the gimmick, which is more or less a guaranteed way to make the match better.

Oh yeah the ladder is big and yellow for no apparent reason. We get an extra ladder to make things a bit more interesting. Henry and Chyna get into it on the floor as HHH stops Rock from winning. Soon thereafter Rock is busted open but HHH can’t climb the ladder because of his knee. Rock makes the save as HHH has to climb like a turtle. See, that’s nice for a change.

Instead of having the guy climb all slow for no reason other than to fill time and give the other guy a chance to catch him, we have a real reason. See how much better and more intelligent that seems? HHH’s knee is hurt, so he can’t climb. Behold the wonders of psychology, even in gimmick matches. Rock is down, so HHH gets a chair and just wears him out with it.

Since it’s a gimmick match though, Rock is back up inside of 20 seconds and land a People’s Elbow on the ladder. They fight over the ladder but HHH gets up it a bit. However, he jumps off onto Rock and lands right in the Rock Bottom. HHH catches him though because the ladder is almost broken. He pulls him down with one hand since he’s the Game and lands the Pedigree as both guys are pretty much dead, with good reasoning.

They’ve beaten the living tar out of each other and it’s a tossup at this point. Ross is losing his mind at this point. With both guys down, Henry throws powder into his eyes and since the ref didn’t see it, it’s ok. It’s a ladder match. What could he do anyway? Even blinded, HHH climbs the ladder perfectly. Rock goes after him but Chyna low blows him. HHH gets up the rest of the ladder and grabs the belt to blow the roof off the place as DX runs out to celebrate.

Rating: A+. This right here is what WWE needs so desperately to do today: give two young guns nearly half an hour and let them go steal the show. This match worked for many reasons, but the biggest was it wasn’t about the ladder and big spots. It was about the two guys trying to get the win, with the spots being something that helped them accomplish that goal.

The knee injury was great as well, with HHH barely being able to walk for a large part of the match. The crowd was WAY into this as the pop for HHH winning the title and ending the feud was great. This is an absolute classic and to me could rival Shawn and Razor.

We go to “exclusive home video footage” of Rock heading to his locker room. Hearing the people say they need to get Taker ready isn’t something that should air. More or less, Rock says he’s still the people’s champ, no matter what.

This is the culmination of the entire summer, which was the theme being the ending of the road being here at Summerslam. That’s actually really smart. Apparently Taker says no Kane. Ross says this should be a classic. That’s just funny. No video package or recap or anything. That’s VERY rare.

WWF Title: Undertaker vs. Steve Austin

I’m sure you know the story, but just in case: basically, Taker is accused of being the main guy in a giant conspiracy against Steve Austin, which Vince denies every time. All the signs are there though, so Austin believes that it’s Taker who is the mastermind. Now, this would result in one of my all time favorite angles, and the ONLY time when a Vince Russo angle got to where it was supposed to go and got him labeled a genius.

Eventually, Taker and Kane took the title from Austin in a “triple threat”, which was really a handicap. However, Taker started turning crazy as Rock won the title. Eventually, Taker formed the Ministry to fight Vince and struck out on his own to take over the company. Vince and Shane, who was new as a big time character, formed the Corporation to fight Taker, but Shane kicked Vince out.

This is where the angle got intense, as Taker started being very satanic in nature, burning crosses, sacrificing people, and more or less bringing in religion to the shows. This leads to the big one, which is Taker kidnapping Stephanie at the end of Backlash. In perhaps my all time favorite segment, he was attempting to marry Stephanie, but Austin comes out and single handedly takes out the Ministry.

A few weeks later, Taker has the belt and says that the Higher Power is coming soon. It turns out that the higher power is Vince. Vince destroyed his family, tortured his daughter, and nearly ended his whole company, all to get the WWF Title off of Steve Austin. Holy goodness was this cool at the time. It all culminated in Austin being named CEO, which after a few other things, led to Austin beating Taker for the title on Raw, which if my memory is right is still the highest rated single match in wrestling history.

WOW I went off on a tangent there. Sorry about that but I love this stuff. As Taker is coming out, you can hear someone that sounds like Lawler shout GET OUT EARL. You can see Earl slide out, just as pyro goes off in the ring. That was insanely close. They do the real glass for the shatter here which is always cool looking. Austin is rocking the Smoking Skull belt here.

There’s a moment in this match that changes the whole thing. It’s said that these two simply couldn’t have a good match together. I disagree. At In Your House 15, they had a very good one. However, like I said, there’s a moment in here where things change drastically, which I’ll mention when we get to it. This starts off very weird, with them battling over control of each other’s arm.

Austin even uses a drop toe hold into a fujiwara armbar. Now, a lot of you may be thinking, how is this different than Hogan and Sting sucking the life out of Starrcade 1997? Well, the answer is kind of unclear. I think the main thing is that they keep the pace going fast. While it’s mat based at first, they never stay in the same place twice. They keep the energy high, which is smart.

Not everything has to be punching and kicking to make it work, so they threw in something different. Now I’m not saying that it worked as the crowd is clearly a lot more silent now, but they’re far from dead. I think what they’re going for is a slow build to a big finish, and there’s not a thing wrong with that. What there is a thing wrong with is what happens next.

Taker whips him in and ducks. Austin, naturally, kicks him in the face. That’s a very standard move and it makes good sense. However, due to Taker’s height, his head slams into Austin’s chin, breaking his jaw. For the rest of the match, Austin is clearly off balance, and it makes them look bad. While Austin is clearly the bigger face, Taker isn’t really a full heel here, but he’s leaning more towards that way.

The announcers point out that Austin is hurt and just doesn’t look right. Dang something about Summerslam just doesn’t agree with him for some reason. We get some standard Taker beatdown stuff, but Old School is countered with an….no that had to be an error. I couldn’t have seen that. Austin couldn’t have used….an arm drag, could he? I…I think he might have. Ok this joke is stupid he used an arm drag.

As this happens, Kane comes out but Taker sends him back, which is odd indeed. Not sure if that was really needed actually. Austin works the knee, which makes a lot of sense. Psychology isn’t something you see that often from Austin, but he’s certainly an intelligent wrestler. He gets a bad reputation as nothing but a brawler, and that’s just not fair. They go to the crowd which is always fun.

The crowd is coming to life and dying again and again, but I think it’s more alive than dead. Austin goes for a stunner and the people go nuts, just for him grabbing at Taker’s head. That’s saying a lot. Austin is taking a freaking beating here. I’m not sure if I like this match or not. It’s certainly not terrible, but it’s nothing great. I think it’s another case of a match having insane hype and there’s just no way they can live up to that.

Taker keeps choking him to buy him more and more time to clear his head, so you at least have to give him points for that. Austin is on the Spanish announce table, as Taker goes up to the top. In a SICK looking spot, Taker hits Austin with a diving leg drop. Now for the problem: the table doesn’t give. The momentum just sends them sliding off of it, but the table is still standing.

That just can’t be a good idea and must hurt horribly. Think about that: Taker is billed at 325 so we’ll say 290, and that slams onto Austin who is on a table. DANG. He kicks out of this in the ring, which stuns JR. Ha, that wasn’t even meant to be a pun, but I laughed. Laugh people. We get the double clothesline, which even gets a pop. You have to love New York crowds. They’ll get excited about ANYTHING.

Alright, now we get to the end. We start (laugh again) with Austin’s comeback, which is standard stuff: punches and the double bird elbow. You can REALLY tell that Austin just isn’t all there. It’s showing really badly. Taker reverses to send Austin chest first into the corner, but he hits something that looks like a bad stunner. Even the announcers say that wasn’t a stunner.

Taker kicks out and hits a pretty bad chokeslam, then goes for the tombstone. Instead though, for some reason he can’t get Austin up so he crotches him on the top rope. They look like rookies out there. The rest of the match I thought was pretty good up until now. Lawler keeps trying to convince us that they went through the table, which is a lie. The ending is very weird and comes out of nowhere.

Taker is dominating, and goes for Old School again. He jumps, but Austin gets his arm up to low blow Taker. Kick, stunner, pinfall…really? Even the referee looks a bit confused for this one. Taker remains a semi-face by handing the belt to Austin after the match. Austin can barely get to the corner ropes right so he’s way out of it. Kane comes out to watch Austin right next to Taker. They leave together as Austin celebrates.

Rating: B-. This is a hard one to grade. Given the injuries to both, this was good. Factoring those out, this was bad. However, I’ll certainly make exceptions as both were hurt while trying to make something happen in the course of a match. It certainly wasn’t awful, but it wasn’t that far from it.

I see why people criticize it, but like I said earlier I think this suffers a lot from its hype. This match was built up as huge, and there was no way it could match that. Overall, I liked it though. Austin won clean, which needed to happen. It built him into an even bigger star, and Taker didn’t exactly lose everything because of it. I liked it, but I could see people hating it.

Overall Rating: B. I thought this was a very solid show, with the only bad match being the Oddities, but what do you expect from a comedy match with only a small bit of talent to go around? I still hate the Sable thing. It was just flat out overkill and wasn’t needed, since it only happened to build up her massive ego even more.

You have a flat out classic in the ladder match and what I thought was a good main event. It’s a solid show and definitely the biggest and best built Summerslam I’ve seen so far and maybe the best ever. This was a Wrestlemania like atmosphere and it definitely paid off. A very solid recommendation here, but not the highest.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s History Of In Your House (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/05/31/new-paperback-kbs-history-of-in-your-house/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

IMG Credit: WWE

Main Event
Date: July 18, 2019
Location: Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum, Uniondale, New York
Commentators: Renee Young, Byron Saxton, Sam Roberts

It’s another week where things should be getting more interesting but since Eric Bischoff hasn’t taken over Smackdown and Paul Heyman has less than four weeks to set up Summerslam, there isn’t much time to set up anything all that interesting. In other worlds, expect more of the normal Main Event stuff. Let’s get to it.

Here are last week’s results if you need a recap.

Opening sequence.

Dana Brooke vs. Sarah Logan

Yes again, because it’s Main Event. They lock up against the ropes to start with neither being able to get anywhere. Logan misses a forearm and gets knocked into the corner, setting up a bulldog from Brooke. The running backflip splash gives Brooke two and it’s time for a slugout. Logan’s pop up headbutt puts Brooke down and we hit the howling. The chinlock goes on, followed by a running knee to Brooke’s ribs for two. That means the standing Texas Cloverleaf but Brooke is in the rope in a hurry. Logan misses some running knees in the corner and it’s the Swanton to give Brooke the pin at 5:50.

Rating: D. We’ve seen it, we’ve seen it again, we’ve seen it a third time and this was the four pack. These rematches for matches that aren’t good in the first place are a Main Event staple and a case where you can all but imagine WWE just saying “yeah do whatever we did last week”. It’s not worth getting annoyed over, but with everyone on the roster, you can’t throw someone else out there for a change?

We look at Undertaker/Roman Reigns beating Shane McMahon/Drew McIntyre at Extreme Rules.

We look at Kevin Owens coming after Shane McMahon.

From Smackdown.

It’s already time for the town hall with the roster on the stage. Shane says anyone can say anything they want as long as they’re respectful. Roman Reigns goes first and says that no one respects Shane. That doesn’t work for Shane, so Reigns is going to be fined and dealt with later. Charlotte goes next and thanks Shane for treating her and her family so great. Liv Morgan, who Owens mentioned last week, calls her out for having everything handed to her. Charlotte: “Do you work here?”

They argue for a bit until Shane calls them off and Buddy Murphy goes next. Murphy says he doesn’t like Owens being rude to Shane and wants to slap the taste out of Owens’ mouth. Shane approves of this and declares Murphy no longer the best kept secret in Smackdown history.

Apollo Crews says no one likes Shane and gets called out by Zelina Vega, likely setting up a match with Andrade. Elias says that he is not Kevin Owens but New Day cuts him off. Kofi Kingston rants about how no one gets an opportunity under Shane. That’s enough for Shane, who says the town hall is over. Everyone leaves but Cesaro wants Aleister Black to pick a fight with him tonight. Shane makes the match in a hurry and Cesaro leaves. Cue Owens behind him and there’s the Stunner, after Owens misses Shane’s head on the first attempt. Owens runs off into the crowd to a rather positive reaction.

From later in the night.

Dolph Ziggler vs. Kevin Owens

The threat of a Stunner sends Ziggler outside for a flip dive but the Swanton hits raised knees back inside. Ziggler gets two off a Fameasser and the chinlock goes on. Owens fights up and hits a superkick, setting up the Swanton for a rather close two. Cue Shane with a small army behind him to surround the ring. Ziggler hits the Zig Zag off the distraction for two (I bought that as the finish) and Owens slaps him in the face.

Ziggler pounds away in the corner and sends Owens hard into the post (Shane: “That looks like that hurt.”). A superkick misses and Owens hits the Stunner, only to have Shane pull him out of the ring. Owens hits another Stunner on Shane on the floor before running away in a smart move at around 6:15.

Rating: D+. This was almost all storyline advancement but they had me on the Zig Zag. Thank goodness they didn’t go that way as it would have been the dumbest thing they could have done. Owens looked great coming out of last week and Extreme Rules, so thankfully they didn’t go in the wrong direction by having him get pinned here.

Shane promises to make Owens pay to end the show.

From Raw.

Finn Balor vs. Samoa Joe

Note that the recap and Reigns interview took place after Joe’s entrance. Do they really need to get the crowd ready for a match like that and then have them sit there? Joe takes him down by the wrist to start but Balor is back with a headlock takeover out of the corner. That’s reversed into a crucifix though and Balor is pinned at 1:24.

Post match Joe tries to choke Balor out but gets stomped in the chest. The Sling Blade sets up the Coup de Grace to get Balor’s heat back. The match was so short he probably didn’t even take his coat and shoes off. Balor poses but his music stops and the lights go off. We hear a beatdown taking place in the ring and the lights come back on to reveal….Bray Wyatt, in the Fiend mask, with Sister Abigail to Balor. Fans: “HOLY S***!”

Titus O’Neil/No Way Jose vs. Eric Young/EC3

Here’s your random tag match of the week, though to be fair that’s kind of what I was asking for in the previous match. EC3 sends Jose into the corner so it can be off to Young in a hurry. That’s fine with Jose, who brings Titus in to take over on Young in a hurry. Titus slams Jose onto Young and we take an early break.

Back with Jose hitting an airplane spin for two on Young but an EC3 distraction lets Young knock Jose off the top. EC3’s running neckbreaker and Young comes back in for the stomping. A suplex gets Jose out of trouble and it’s back to Titus for the house cleaning. Jose comes back in as everything breaks down, with EC3 grabbing a rollup for the pin at 8:48.

Rating: D+. Yeah this happened. It was four people being brought in for a random tag match and that’s perfectly fine, though it’s not like any of it mattered in the first or last place. I do like the idea of having random teams like this as it’s certainly better than having the same matches over and over, which can get a lot less interesting than something like this. Still means nothing, but it’s better than the usual.

We recap Brock Lesnar cashing in Money in the Bank to win the Universal Title at Extreme Rules.

From Raw.

Battle Royal

Roman Reigns, Seth Rollins, Big E., Sami Zayn, Cesaro, Braun Strowman, Rey Mysterio, Baron Corbin, Bobby Lashley, Randy Orton

The winner gets Lesnar at Summerslam, Lashley has taped ribs and Lesnar and Heyman are watching from the stage. It’s a brawl to start with Corbin going after Rollins and Strowman punching Lashley in the bad ribs. Cesaro starts running at everyone in the corner to take over, including the Swing to Rey. Another one to Big E. is broken up and Lashley dumps Cesaro for the first elimination. Strowman does the same to Lashley and it’s time for a Strowman vs. Big E. showdown.

Big E.’s running splash staggers Strowman and Big E. manages the Big Ending but walks into the RKO. Sami gets rid of Big E. but walks into the RKO. The 619 connects and Orton gets rid of Zayn. There’s an RKO to Reigns followed by another 619 but Reigns shrugs off both finishers and Superman Punches Orton through the ropes. Rey hits a springboard seated senton on Roman but gets tossed by Orton. We’re down to Corbin, Rollins, Reigns, Strowman and Orton with the latter on the floor.

Strowman puts Corbin in the ropes so Reigns can hit the apron dropkick. A superkick from Rollins is enough to get rid of Corbin and get us down to four. Reigns spears Rollins by mistake and Strowman puts Roman on the apron. It’s the Chris Benoit/Big Show elimination but Rollins knocks Reigns out as well. Rollins thinks he’s won and has to hang on when Orton comes back in to throw him to the apron as well. The hanging DDT brings Rollins back in and Orton stops to stare at Lesnar. The RKO is broken up with a superkick to the ribs and the Stomp is enough for Rollins to get the title shot at 7:47.

Rating: C-. Well that was fast (the women’s match probably took up too much time). This was going to be Rollins or Reigns winning and Seth is a much better pick than Roman in storyline terms. I don’t need to see him fight Lesnar again, but that is the kind of thing you have to expect here. I’d rather they go with this than rush what could be a big story in four weeks so at least it makes sense.

Post match, Heyman promises that Rollins is going to be conquered. Rollins tells Heyman to shut up and promises a repeat of Wrestlemania. Lesnar teases coming down for a fight to end the show.

Overall Rating: C-. For once, this wasn’t all that bad as they got in and out with a nice collection of moments from a not terrible week. What mattered here was having a balance between Raw and Smackdown which you don’t get all that often. It’s still not good, but I do like that random tag match for the sake of mixing something up for a change. Not an awful show, but Raw and Smackdown are still a lot to take most weeks.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s History Of In Your House (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/05/31/new-paperback-kbs-history-of-in-your-house/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

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IMG Credit: Ring of Honor Wrestling

Best In The World 2019
Date: June 29, 2019
Location: UMBC Events Center, Baltimore, Maryland
Commentators: Ian Riccaboni, Caprice Coleman, Colt Cabana

It’s another pay per view and in this case, the show isn’t looking half bad. They’ve managed to build things up better than usual with television and I’ll take that over what they tend to put together. The main event is Matt Taven defending the World Title against Jeff Cobb because for some reason we deserve Taven as champion around here. Let’s get to it.

Kickoff Show: Flip Gordon vs. Rush

Rush shoves him in the face to start but smiles at Gordon trying to slap him in the chest. A shove by the throat puts Gordon on the floor and Rush drives him into the barricade as this is one sided so far. Back in and a basement dropkick to the back of the head lets Rush get in some pushups.

Flip finally manages a kick to the head and a springboard missile dropkick for a breather. Rush is fine enough to sent him into the corner for the kick to the face and TRANQUILO. Back up and Gordon scores with a kick and strikes to the head, knocking Rush down for one of the only times.

The Star Spangled Spear gets two and Gordon nails a jumping knee to the face, which just seems to wake Rush up. A powerbomb out of the corner gives Gordon two and he sends Rush outside for the suicide dive….which is countered into a whip into the barricade. That’s good for some near falls back inside, followed by the Bull’s Horns for the pin on Gordon at 10:21.

Rating: C+. Rush is all but guaranteed to get a World Title shot soon, though I have a feeling that they might wait until Final Battle to let him run through Matt Taven. It says a lot when they have someone as pushed as Gordon get mauled like this as Rush is clearly someone they want to push to the moon. Just give him a story and we can see how far he goes.

Post match Rush says that he’s going to the top. I think at least, as the audio doesn’t come through that clearly.

The opening video talks about how everyone here is the best but they’re here for different reasons, such as competition, territory or just to be the champion. Nice enough video, especially as this isn’t ROH’s strongest suit.

Dragon Lee vs. Dalton Castle

Lee’s brother Rush destroyed Castle in sixteen seconds at Supercard of Honor so Castle is fighting someone close to Rush without actually having to fight him. Lee goes right with the dropkick into the corner and the Bull’s Horns for two, followed by another dropkick to put Castle on the floor. A hurricanrana off the apron is countered into a powerbomb onto the apron and Castle sends him over the barricade.

Castle tosses him into the chairs and a DDT gives Castle two. The waistlock goes on and of course it’s time to rip at the mask. You know, because it’s always time to go for the mask. A bodyscissors with a half nelson keep Lee down and Castle shakes his head. The mask is ripped and that’s enough to fire Lee up for a whip to the floor. Castle is rocked by a suicide dive and a slingshot dropkick keeps him in trouble back inside.

A reverse hurricanrana gives Lee two as Castle can’t get anything going. Castle’s quick Bang A Rang attempt is blocked and a gutwrench powerbomb is countered into a hurricanrana. Another clothesline sets up the Bang A Rang for no cover, with Castle pulling Lee into the corner instead. The Bull’s Horns finishes Lee at 14:23.

Rating: C+. Castle continues to be someone who feels like the next breakout star, even though he is a former World Champion. That isn’t a good sign for Ring of Honor though as the other companies are going to come after him. When someone has that kind of charisma, you certainly can’t blame them either, and that’s going to be a problem for them.

We recap the Beautiful People showing up earlier this year and calling themselves the Allure for the sake of trying to not make it as obvious. They’ve gone after Kelly Klein and this is their in-ring debut.

Allure vs. Jenny Rose/Kelly Klein

It’s Angelina Love/Mandy Leon for Allure with Velvet Sky on the floor. Klein and Rose go straight to the brawling before the streamers can even be tossed out of the ring. Love drops Rose and yells at Klein, who comes in for some sneering. A shoulder drops Klein again but she’s right back with one of her own. Rose comes in for a double suplex on Love but Velvet gets in a cheap shot to take over.

Some running knees in the corner have Rose in more trouble and Leon gets in a cheap shot to Klein on the floor. Love dives onto the two of them as the announcers recap Mandy and Jenny’s history together. A spinebuster gets Rose out of trouble and it’s back to Klein for the house cleaning. Everything breaks down with Jenny spearing Mandy on the apron. That leaves Klein to hit a super fall away slam for two on Love but Velvet gets on the apron. The distraction lets Mandy get in a shot with a shoe, setting up the Botox Injection to give Love the pin on Klein at 9:30.

Rating: D. Yeah what else were you expecting here? The Beautiful People are back, even though they were a big deal over ten years ago. Love is still fine in the ring and Sky is still good enough at what she does while Leon….well Love and Sky are still good. That being said, it’s not like anything else is working in the division so it’s not the worst idea.

Post match the lights go out and we see a video of someone playing with dolls. Then the dolls are broken apart and the screen says MANEATER. It’s the rather scary looking Maria Manic showing up so the Allure bails, leaving Manic to beat up security, including a spinning torture rack and a Razor’s Edge toss to send one onto the rest.

We recap Jay Lethal vs. Kenny King with Kenny wanting to prove that he is the best after the first two matches of a best of three series.

Jay Lethal vs. Kenny King

Lethal won’t shake the hand so you know this is serious. They fight over arm control to start with King taking him to the arm and kicking Lethal in the back. The Fujiwara armbar goes on but King lets go to load up Lethal’s cartwheel into a basement dropkick. Lethal is ready for that and does it himself, followed by a snap suplex for one. King’s springboard is dropkicked out to the floor but he’s able to sit Lethal in a chair.

That just earns him a drop toehold onto the chair and Lethal teases Pillmanizing the arm (which King did to him recently to no apparent damage). King gets up and suplexes Lethal onto the apron to take over and it’s a Boston crab back inside. That’s broken up so they slug it out with Lethal nailing a middle rope missile dropkick. Lethal hits King’s Royal Flush for two, followed by another dropkick to send King outside again.

The suicide dive is countered with a spinebuster and King debuts a shooting star press of all things for two. Lethal is right back up with the Figure Four but lets go as a woman has thrown in King’s walking stick. Instead it’s the Lethal Injection for two on King and the shock is on. The woman runs off but King uses the distraction to hit a Blockbuster, his own Lethal Injection and the Royal Flush for the pin at 14:37.

Rating: B-. This was better than anything else on the show so far and it was a rather nice match. They have some chemistry together, though I’m still not entirely sure how much potential there is in King. Lethal on the other hand is the standard around here and someone who can be put in this spot and guarantee the big match and higher quality match against anyone. Good match here.

We recap Jonathan Gresham vs. Silas Young. Silas cheated to beat Gresham and has since declared himself the greatest technical wrestler in ROH. This sets up a Pure Rules match, with Young being the best jerk wrestler in years around here, as you had to expect.

Jonathan Gresham vs. Silas Young

Pure Rules (No fists to the face and if you do it twice it’s a DQ. Also, three ropes breaks and then falls under the ropes count.). They lock up against the ropes to start with Silas grabbing a hammerlock. Gresham is fine on the mat until Young gets up with a slap to the face (legal). Back up and Gresham uses his first rope break to get out of a waistlock as Young carried him over to the ropes in a smart move.

Young tries to do it again so Gresham pulls him down by the wrist for a save. Gresham blocks a stomp on the mat and grabs the leg as he gets back up. That’s enough to send Young over to the ropes and they’re tied at a rope break apiece. The Octopus sends Young straight back to the rope for the second break and frustration is setting in.

Back in and Gresham takes him down without much trouble before hitting a hard chop. Young punches him in the face, which is his only warning before a DQ. They head outside with Gresham being whipped into the barricade (There are no rules against that?) and then getting caught in the abdominal stretch back inside. The half crab sends Gresham to the ropes for his second break so they’re down to one each.

Young hits a backbreaker/clothesline combination to set up a seated full nelson. That means Gresham’s third rope break so he can start fighting again. Gresham goes up top but his back flares up, allowing Young to grab another full nelson. This time Gresham has to slip out and try the Octopus, but he gets clever and grabs Young’s hand to put it on the rope to get rid of the last break.

They forearm it out and trade failed suplex attempts until Young suplexes him over the top for a big crash to the floor. Back in and the referee goes to fix the apron, allowing Gresham to hit an uncharacteristic low blow. Now the Octopus can go on and with no breaks yet, Young taps at 18:15.

Rating: B-. This was a match with a big, long story coming in and I’m not sure how well the payoff worked. Gresham going with the cheating to win doesn’t feel right, though it certainly could lead to something. If nothing else, it was awesome to see Young being such a jerk leading into the match. What we got here wasn’t bad, but I think it slipped under the weight.

We recap the Briscoes vs. Colt Cabana/Nick Aldis. The Briscoes got annoyed at the NWA during the Crockett Cup so they laid out Villain Enterprises, Aldis and Cabana. However, Cabana is injured so Eli Drake has been put into his spot in a surprise.

Eli Drake/Nick Aldis vs. Briscoes

Mark and Eli start things off and it’s a long lockup with Drake sending him into the corner. it’s already off to Aldis vs. Jay with the latter slapping on a headlock. Jay knocks Drake off the apron so Aldis slugs away, only to get caught in the wrong corner. The big double shoulder has the Briscoes in control and the fans rather pleased.

Drake is right back in though and a double suplex puts Mark down. That means the E-LI-DRAKE elbow for two but that’s more than enough selling, meaning Jay comes back in for the double clothesline. Drake avoids a charge in the corner and hits a jumping neckbreaker, allowing the tag back to Aldis.

Everything breaks down and Mark hits an Iconoclasm for two on Drake. Aldis’ distraction lets Drake run the corner for a superplex, followed by a Burning Hammer of all things for another near fall. Jay comes back in and Redneck Boogey connects for two more. Mark hits a running dropkick through the ropes to Aldis, followed by the Bang Bang Elbow. The brawl is on and it’s a double countout at 10:57.

Rating: D+. I knew the ending to this one coming in and I still got annoyed at the double countout. I get why it needed to happen as you don’t want a big tag team to lose but you also don’t want the World Champion/newcomer to lose. That doesn’t make it any better, but it does make a little more sense. It doesn’t help when it was a pretty weak match in the first place without any time to really go anywhere. Drake looked awesome though, as usual.

Post match James Storm comes out so Drake spits water in his face and the two fight to the back. That leaves Aldis to get laid out on a table as Ian has to hold Cabana back. Kamilla Kane comes out with security but that goes nowhere, allowing Mark to hit the Froggy Bow through the table. After the Briscoes leave, cue Marty Scurll to check on Aldis and help him out, teasing that Aldis could be the surprise new member of Villain Enterprises.

We recap Shane Taylor vs. Bandido for the TV Title. Bandido beat him in a non-title match, annoying the rather dominant Taylor. Rather simple story and there’s nothing wrong with that.

TV Title: Bandido vs. Shane Taylor

Taylor is defending and Bandido slaps him in the face to start. That ticks Taylor off so Bandido can start ducking and dodging in a fast manner. They head outside and this time Taylor catches him with a powerbomb onto the apron to take over. Back in and the chinlock goes on but Bandido kicks him in the head for the break. Another kick to the head sets up a corkscrew crossbody to send Taylor outside.

You don’t do that against a luchador and it’s a running dive to take Taylor down again. Back in and another middle rope moonsault keeps Taylor in trouble but he catches a charge in the corner with something like a chokeslam. The middle rope splash gives Taylor two but Greetings From 216 is broken up. A superkick rocks Taylor but the 21 Plex is blocked with a grab of the rope. The powerbomb and a knee to the head set up a package piledriver for two on Bandido.

That means frustration sets in so Shane goes up….AND BANDIDO CATCHES HIM IN MID AIR??? That’s the kind of thing that impressed people when Diesel did it to Bret Hart so good freaking grief man. Bandido powerslams him for two and a shooting star gets the same. Another 21 Plex attempt is countered into the Greetings From 216 to retain the title at 12:35.

Rating: B. It takes a lot to truly shock me with a spot but Bandido, who is far from a big guy, pulling Taylor out of the air, actually stunned me. I don’t remember the last time that happened but my goodness it was awesome. Bandido is a lot more than just a high flier but he’s awesome at that too, making this one a very nice surprise.

Go to house shows!

Buy Honor Club!

Six Man Tag Team Titles: Mark Haskins/Tracy Williams/PJ Black vs. Villain Enterprises

Haskins and Williams (part of Lifeblood) and Black are challenging but the champs come out in Legion of Doom spikes so they win by default. They even have custom titles to make things that much better. Haskins and Scurll start things off and it’s time to fight over some wristlocks. Since they’re British, that means some very snazzy escapes until it’s a standoff with the fans rather pleased.

PCO and Black come in with Black’s kicks not having much effect. A superkick doesn’t do much either so PCO hits a pump kick, meaning it’s time for the other pair to come in for the first time. Williams blocks a chop and pulls King into an armbreaker over the rope. With that broken up, they strike it out again until Scurll comes in to crank on Williams’ eternally bad arm.

The challengers are sent to the floor for a cannonball from King and an assisted cannonball from PCO for the big crash. Back in and King charges into a German suplex from Williams. It’s right back to Scurll, who gets caught in the wrong corner for a Rocking Horse from Black. Some running kicks to the head get two but Scurll is right over for the hot tag to King.

A backsplash crushes Haskins and Williams and everything breaks down. PCO dives onto Williams and Black, leaving Haskins to take a backsplash from King onto Scurll’s knees for two. PCO comes back in but a chokeslam attempt is quickly blocked. Everything breaks down again (Were they ever back together?) and it’s an assisted piledriver for two on PCO (with the referee counting to three after the kickout to annoy Lifeblood).

Back up and PCO gives Haskins White Noise, leaving Black to superkick Scurll. PCO clotheslines Black to the floor but Williams powerbombs him onto the apron. Black’s springboard moonsault gets two on Scurll but King busts out a springboard double wristdrag n Williams and Haskins. Well of course he does. Scurll is back up as King Gonso Bombs Black and the PCOsault retains the titles at 16:58.

Rating: C+. The issues here are the same as always in a Six Man Title match: it’s entertaining and fun, but there is little in the way of actual tagging and these teams still don’t do much other than fight in title matches. That doesn’t make them bad, but it limits how high up they can go on the totem pole.

Post match the Soldiers of Savagery run in for the beatdown but Bandido makes the save. Cue Bully Ray (of course) with a chair but Flip Gordon (Ray is there so of course Gordon is too) with a kendo stick for the staredown. Ray leaves so Lifeblood offers Flip a shirt, but he doesn’t put it on.

Instead the lights go out and it’s Scurll coming up on screen to announce the newest member of the team: FLIP GORDON, who is on screen next to Scurll (recorded) and then in the ring to beat up Lifeblood. Eh I’ve heard of worse twists and it’s not like Lifeblood means anything anymore. The rest of the Villains come out for the beatdown, including the 450 from the top to put Williams through the table. Since it’s Flip, that was a dislocated elbow, though it’s not clear if he’ll miss time.

Ring of Honor World Title: Jeff Cobb vs. Matt Taven

Cobb is challenging after asking for a title shot instead of wanting a rematch for the TV Title. On the other hand, Taven is champion because Ring of Honor invested so much time into him and have to get their money’s worth, even as the attendances die with him on top. We get a handshake to start and Cobb hits a hard shot to put Taven on the floor early on.

Back in and Taven tries to speed things up, only to have Cobb catch him without much effort. An overhead belly to belly and a delayed suplex slam keep Taven in trouble so let’s have another breather. This time Cobb follows him out but gets caught with a cheap shot. Taven nails the suicide dive and Cobb’s shoulder is banged up. Back in and the frog splash misses, leaving Cobb to hit a one armed pumphandle drop.

The standing moonsault gets two and a northern lights suplex is good for the same. Cobb hits the swinging belly to back but a powerbomb is countered with a hurricanrana. Taven knees him in the head a few times for two and the Climax gets the same. A wheelbarrow suplex drops Taven but the Tour of the Islands is countered into the second Climax to retain the title at 9:48.

Rating: C-. So you remember all of Taven’s matches where he wasn’t all that interesting and people were sacrificed to get him over? This was one against Jeff Cobb that ran 9:48. For the life of me I don’t know what Ring of Honor sees in him but it’s certainly not something I can get behind. He’s just so completely average and right now, this company needs something a lot more exciting than that. The matches are perfectly fine (and he’s capable of very good) but there’s just nothing between the matches to make me care about him. Cobb will be back, but my goodness they need to get the title on someone else soon.

Overall Rating: B-. This show was very back and forth with some rather good matches and some stuff that makes me want to see whatever else is on. The wrestling is still much better than the storyline stuff so the show was fun, but I need a lot more stuff to care about. It was a good enough show, but some of the matches feel as uninteresting as you can get. They need to fix their creative issues and get rid of Taven as champion before it’s too late, though given all of the other companies growing so fast, it might already be.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s History Of In Your House (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/05/31/new-paperback-kbs-history-of-in-your-house/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

IMG Credit: WWE

Summerslam 1997
Date: August 3, 1997
Location: Continental Airlines Arena, East Rutherford, New Jersey
Attendance: 20,213
Commentators: Jerry Lawler, Vince McMahon, Jim Ross

Hunter Hearst Helmsley vs. Mankind

Chyna comes inside and tries to drag HHH out as Mankind climbs over the top. He gets down to the apron and takes off his mask but climbs back up. The fans chant SUPERFLY as Mankind goes up, rips open his shirt to reveal a Dude Love heart, and drops an elbow off the top of the cage. Mankind climbs out and reaches the floor just before Chyna can drag HHH out to the floor.

Rating: A-. This was great stuff with Mankind overcoming everything HHH and Chyna could throw at him before hitting the huge spot to win it. There was a very good story built up between these two which would finally be blown off in a street fight at the first Raw in MSG. Great opener here and the fans were WAY into it. You could see the future in these two and it was awesome.

Call the Hotline!

Todd Pettingill (he still had a job at this point?) brings out the governor along with Gorilla Monsoon and the Headbangers for some reason. She got rid of some entertainment tax on wrestling shows to allow the first show in New Jersey since the 80s. Gorilla gives her a WWF Championship belt as a thank you present.

Video on the local festivities leading up to Summerslam.

Goldust vs. Brian Pillman

Goldust is a face by this point. Pillman jumps him to start but Goldust hits a jumping back elbow out of the corner. He pounds on Brian in the corner and kisses him to the floor but Pillman is ticked off. Brian drops Goldust with a clothesline and goes after Malena, only to be headed off by Goldie with an uppercut. Back in and Pillman takes him down with a snap suplex but Goldust crotches him off the top.

Godwinns vs. Legion of Doom

The LOD are actually referred to as Road Warriors here which is rare for the WWF. LOD cleans house to start, sending the Godwinns to the floor with Hawk hitting a clothesline off the apron. We get started with Phineas vs. Animal with the latter missing a charge into the corner, allowing the hog dudes to double team him. Animal comes back with a double clothesline of his own to send the Godwinns to the floor.

Rating: D+. This was supposed to be about revenge but the match never acted like that at all. The Godwinns were horrible as heels and this was a very dull match as a result. LOD still had a little bit in the tank here but they were going to explode in the next few months but almost no one cared.

We recap British Bulldog vs. Ken Shamrock which is another spinoff from the Border War. Bulldog was about to lose an arm wrestling match on Monday so he laid Shamrock out with a chair and shoved dog food down his throat.

European Title: Ken Shamrock vs. British Bulldog

Post match Shamrock chokes Bulldog out for a VERY long time, to the point where Bulldog would be dead. The referees get suplexes.

Los Boricuas vs. Disciples of Apocalypse

Jesus hits a Fameasser on Skull to set up another four on one beatdown. We hit a chinlock but 8 Ball breaks it up to prevent further boredom. Skull finally gets over for the tag and everything breaks down. Chainz is sent to the floor and punches Ahmed who responds with a sitout powerbomb on the concrete, giving Miguel an easy pin in the ring.

A 12 man brawl follows.

Intercontinental Title: Steve Austin vs. Owen Hart

Owen takes him down by the knee and wraps it around the ring post right after the bell. Back in and Austin fires off right hands and hits the Thesz press before hitting the HARD whip into the corner ala Bret. Austin pulls him around by the hair and stomps the stomach for two. Back up and Austin works the arm with a wristlock as the fans chant USA. Owen does his spinning nip up to counter but Steve casually pokes him in the eye.

WWF World Title: Undertaker vs. Bret Hart

Bret brings a chair into the ring and lays out Undertaker with no Michaels to see it. Shawn limps back into the ring but the count only gets two. Bret erupts on Shawn and flips him off before pounding away in the corner again. Shawn picks up the chair and is spat on by Bret. Shawn swings the chair but knocks Undertaker out cold, giving Bret the pin and the title.

Rating: B+. This took a lot of time to get going but with thirty minutes to use they had more than enough time to waste. Hart winning was definitely the right move after he spent all summer on top of the company. This opened up a lot more options than Taker was providing, which is what a champion is supposed to do.

Post match Undertaker is FURIOUS and goes after Shawn. The Hart Foundation celebrates to end the show.

Ratings Comparison

Hunter Hearst Helmsley vs. Mankind

Original: A

Redo: A-

Brian Pillman vs. Goldust

Original: D

Redo: D

Legion of Doom vs. Godwinns

Original: C-

Redo: D

British Bulldog vs. Ken Shamrock

Original: D-

Redo: D

Disciples of Apocalypse vs. Los Boricuas

Original: D

Redo: D-

Owen Hart vs. Steve Austin

Original: B

Redo: B

Undertaker vs. Bret Hart

Original: A

Redo: B+

Overall Rating

Original: B

Redo: C+

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/07/31/history-of-summerslam-count-up-1997-shawn-vs-taker-begins/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s History Of In Your House (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/05/31/new-paperback-kbs-history-of-in-your-house/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6