Clash of the Champions #27
Date: June 23, 1994
Location: North Charleston Coliseum, North Charleston, South Carolina
Attendance: 6,700
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan

We finally wrap up this series here. This is the beginning of a new era in WCW as Hogan makes his major debut here tonight. The main event is the unification of the WCW world titles as Sting faces Flair. Other than that there isn’t much else here, but I thought ending with the main event that set up the first Clash was a good idea. Let’s get to it.

The announcers talk about the main event. Sherri is going to be in the corner of one of the two world champions but we’re not sure which.

Tag Titles: Cactus Jack/Kevin Sullivan vs. Nasty Boys

There are two referees for this due to how insane they are. Cactus and Sullivan are champions. This is a Slamboree rematch. Sullivan’s brother Dave is here and has a Hulk Selur shirt on. His gimmick was that he was dyslexic you see. Sags vs. Cactus gets us going and Jerry beats him down. Cactus fights back and the crowd is WAY into this. Everything breaks down about 30 seconds in and the brawl is on. Knobbs gets beaten down and the champs clear the ring.

Knobbs and Sullivan brawl some more. I wouldn’t expect a lot of wrestling in this match whatsoever. It breaks down again and we hear about some kind of conspiracy so Heenan makes Watergate jokes. Sullivan fights them off and slams Cactus off the top into both Nasties. We hear that Hogan is on the way so Heenan goes off on him, saying he better go get Hogan’s bags and all that so Hogan doesn’t have to.

Cactus gets a boot up in the corner and a discus lariat for two. The Nasties double team and get their first advantage over Cactus. Quickly off to Kevin who cleans some house but Sags breaks up the cover. He sends Kevin to the floor and into the barricade and Tony calls Sullivan odd. Heenan: “ODD???” Back to Cactus and a Cactus Clothesline puts him and Knobs on the outside.

Jack gets up on the apron and tries a backwards jump from the bottom rope but the Nasties move and he just crashes. How that man is alive I’ll never know. Back inside there’s some double teaming but Knobs misses a splash and Cactus makes the tag. Brian goes after Dave but Sullivan makes the save. Knobs goes back in and walks into the Double Arm DDT to keep the titles on Sullivan/Jack.

Rating: C+. This wasn’t meant to be anything more than a brawl and that’s all it needed to be. The fans were into it and everything clicked. Then some idiot decided that Jack wasn’t a good choice to be in WCW and that it was Paul Orndorff and Paul Roma that should get two title reigns before the end of the year. And people wonder why they went out of business.

Sting, the WCW International Champion, says he’ll win tonight.

Here’s a video on Big Bossman, now known as the Guardian Angel because WWF didn’t like him being called The Boss. So instead he took the gimmick of a Guardian Angel, which is something like a citizen’s police force in real life New York.

Guardian Angel vs. Tex Slazenger

Tex is Phineas Godwinn. He hits the Angel three times and Bossman counts for the hog farmer’s benefit. That’s enough I guess so Angel hits his usual stuff and the Bossman Slam (called a spike piledriver by that lunkhead Schiavone) ends this in less than two minutes.

Hogan’s motorcade gets here. Heenan makes OJ Simpson jokes because that was the hottest story in the world at that point. It was only six days before this show so the jokes are relevant here. Heenan keeps ranting as only he can do about Hulk. Hogan gets out to a pretty mixed reaction.

TV Title: Steven Regal vs. Larry Zbyszko

Regal said he couldn’t be beaten and laughed at Larry a lot, Larry decked him and won the title on TV. Jesse is on commentary now. Regal comes out in stereotypical British clothes including the powdered wig. Regal pounds him down to start and Larry is in trouble very early. Apparently Sherri is going to pick someone tonight, just not necessarily one of the world champions. Yeah, sure.

Regal, ever the pompous jerk, slaps Larry as he lectures him. Larry, ever the scrapper, gets all fired up and pounds him down as well. They go to the ramp for a bit but back in Regal takes him down. Larry counters a butterfly suplex into a form of a suplex for two. A regular suplex gets two. Piledriver gets two as does a swinging neckbreaker. Regal wants to throw hands and Larry is like uh, cool.

Larry blindsides him and it’s more of a brawl now. Off to a Regal chinlock but Larry reverses into a body scissors. They’re adding in enough brawling and cheating to their mat work to keep things from getting boring. Larry grabs a bearhug of all things before going off to a Boston Crab. Regal’s butler or whatever he is shoves Larry forward and Regal rolls on top, grabs the rope and gets the pin for the title.

Rating: C+. Fun match here and like I said the main thing was that they kept it interesting with the brawling instead of just the mat wrestling, which can get boring after awhile. Good stuff here and it would be Larry’s goodbye match as he didn’t have another major one until Starrcade in 1997. He was 41 when he retired, making him one of the few to get out early and on his own terms, which is always cool.

Gene hypes Bash at the Beach.

After a break, Gene is with Dustin Rhodes who has Arn Anderson with him. Dustin has been having issues with Colonel Parker’s Stud Stable and needs a partner. He picked ARN ANDERSON of all people, and amazingly enough, Anderson would turn on him before their first major match ended. Anderson says he’ll do it but it’ll be the old Anderson. That would be the old Anderson that broke Dustin’s daddy’s leg, but why not trust him right?

US Title: Johnny B. Badd vs. Steve Austin

Austin is champion and has been since December. Badd starts off very fast and chops away in the corner. Off to the arm work by Badd and a dropkick puts Austin on the floor. A top rope clothesline gets two. Off to a front facelock and then the arm again. Austin taps but ECW wasn’t popular yet. He gets a boot up in the corner and takes over. The crowd HATES Austin.

Badd gets fired up and a rollup gets two. And scratch that as the champ takes over again. A running dropkick puts Austin down but Johnny can’t follow up. DDT gets no cover but a SICK sound. He takes too long going up though and Austin crotches him. Badd throws Austin off but misses the top rope sunset flip which gets two for Austin. Another charge, this one by the champ, misses and Badd gets two this time. Things are getting good here. Austin gets an object from somewhere, hits Badd in the ribs and small packages him for the pin. We’ll ignore Badd’s shoulder being up.

Rating: C+. This started badly but got a lot better later on. The first part didn’t work for the most part but after that once they got going with the counters and near falls it got a lot better. The ending didn’t really work but that would get changed post match anyway, not that it really mattered. Fun match though.

Another referee comes out and they find the object. Badd rolls Austin up for a fast three (very fast) from the other referee. We’re told that we’ll hear the decision post commercial but since it’s HOGAN TIME (and yes, Hogan is the bigger deal by far) we’re not told what happened. Badd officially won by DQ.

Hogan gets a decent pop (which would be more impressive if we hadn’t seen Capetta, the ring announcer, firing up the crowd). He IMMEDIATELY brings up bodyslamming Andre and the fans aren’t all that thrilled it wouldn’t seem. When asked about the unification match, he wants a shot at the winner.

Flair pops up on the screen (drawing a pop as strong as Hogan’s if not bigger) and says he’ll win. This would be the beginning of Looney Flair.

Shaq in Hogan gear and with Hogan says Hogan is awesome. Ok then.

WCW World Title/WCW International World Title: Ric Flair vs. Sting

Flair: bigger pop than Hogan. Sting: WAY bigger pop than Hogan. Ok quick history lesson on the title issue here: as you know the NWA World Title is the famous one. Well eventually WCW had it’s own title. The NWA was incapable of being told that no one cared about them anymore, so they insisted there were two titles. Then the whole Flair walks thing happened so there were two titles for awhile.

WCW realized what everyone knew for years, which is that they didn’t need the NWA, so they dropped out. Flair officially owned the belt though, so there were two belts. The International Committee was a parody of the NWA Board. This match is a unification match and the way to finally get rid of whatever is left of the NWA in WCW. The big gold belt is the International Title here and would be the official title. Sting holds that one right now.

Sherri comes out before the match starts. She has the same face paint on that Sting has. Flair charges at Sting but the power stops him every time. Sting keeps nipping up and Flair backs off. Sting poses and Flair runs to the ramp. Back in and Flair still can’t get anything going and we get a Flair Flop on the floor. He yells at the fans as Heenan is freaking out. They keep pushing that this is a unification, which it really isn’t. The belt had been unified for years earlier but, say it with me, THE NWA IS STUPID, so they made something out of nothing here.

Flair pokes him in the eyes but tries chopping because that always works on Sting, resulting in Flair taking a bunch of clotheslines. The chops still don’t work so Flair goes for the knee, only to get rolled up for two. Flair takes another walk and Heenan’s freaking is getting hilarious. The idea is Hogan is driving Flair crazy and he’s off his game tonight.

Sting finally misses a splash in the corner and Flair is able to take over. Flair takes it to the floor quickly due to his old standard of asking the referee about the time. Flair covers with his feet on the ropes because that’s what heels do. No seriously, heels are supposed to cheat. Why don’t they do that more often? Sleeper goes on and Sting is in trouble. Sting manages to ram him into the buckle and there’s the Flair Flop.

Sting busts out the Slingshot and we get a second Flair Flop. Oh wait third. I forgot the one on the floor. Sherri cheers Sting on and he gets a suplex for a delayed two. Flair does the Flip and run the apron into a clothesline deal in the corner. Top rope superplex for Sting and he pops up and heads to the top. The big splash misses though and both guys are in trouble.

Sting no sells a regular suplex and Flair panics. He sends Flair to the floor and sets for a dive but Flair pulls Sherri in front and Sting crushes her. Back in and Sting puts Flair down again, but as he goes to check on Sherri, Slick Ric rolls him up and grabs the tights (again, that’s what heels do) and unifies the titles.

Rating: B+. Again, Sting and Flair are one of those pairings that automatically start higher than most. These two are seemingly incapable of having a bad match and they had another great one here. And then that didn’t mean anything for Sting as he went from world champion one month to being Hogan’s lackey for the next year. Flair turned into a raving lunatic and was “retired” for about six months starting in October. But hey, we got that Brutus Beefcake main event push. Who would want to see the planned Steve Austin world title reign anyway right?

Sherri gets in the ring and hugs Flair, because it was a swerve. See, THIS IS HOW A SWERVE WORKS. Sherri sacrificed herself, but the distraction from that sacrifice let Flair win the title. THAT IS HOW YOU DO A SWERVE!!! She and Flair beat down Sting post match until Hogan comes in for the save.

Hogan basically says he’s getting a title shot to close the show.

Overall Rating: B-. And with that, it ends. Not just the Clashes, but WCW’s chance to beat the WWF on their own. I’d have loved to see what they could have done without Hogan coming in. They had Austin ready to go as the top heel in the company, they had Foley mastering what would become the Attitude Era main event style, they had Steamboat around still, they had Sting to be the top face, they had an incredibly popular Flair (turned heel to avoid outpopping Hogan), they had guys like Regal, Badd and Pillman who could do whatever…and then Hogan came in.

He cleaned out the young talent or stuck them in endless midcard feuds, he ran Austin off, he made Foley into nothing (so Foley wisely bailed) and the whole place fell apart over the course of 1995 as it was ALL about Hogan. Savage came in at Starrcade 94 and was Hogan’s lackey. Nothing meant anything other than Hogan and had it not been for the Outsiders, I’m very curious as to where it would have gone. Anyway, good show and i’ve have loved to see where they could have taken things.

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Clash of the Champions #20
Date: September 2, 1992
Location: Center Stage Theater, Atlanta, Georgia
Attendance: 500
Commentators: Jim Ross, Jesse Ventura

This is the next to last one that I have to go and it’s a theme show. This is a show dedicated to WCW being on the Superstation for 20 years. Yeah you know that whole “longest running weekly episodic show?” It’s not even close. WCW/all it’s other names was on the air on Saturday Nights at 6:05 for roughly 28 years straight. Raw hasn’t even hit 19 years yet. Even when Vince took over for a few months in the mid 80s, it was still called World Championship Wrestling. Anyway let’s get to it.

The show opens with an old clip of Andre the Giant from probably the 70s. He has an interview tonight, which was his final American appearance.

The opening video is in the form of a scrapbook with various people that used to be big stars. This is always cool to see.

Tony and Missy are outside like they’re at a red carpet. Gordon Solie is here too and hello Andre in Princess Bride attire. Ron Simmons, the world champion, arrives. Now Bill Watts gets here. He’s followed by….HANK AARON??? I know he’s around every now and then but it’s still cool to see him. Bill Shaw, the legit president of WCW (who had no idea how wrestling worked) is here too. Jim Barnett, a promoter, is here, as is Bob Dhue (another legit boss) and BRUNO SAMMARTINO!!! He kind of bashes WWF by saying that he’s glad to be in a real wrestling company. Sting arrives on a motorcycle.

We go inside now and Robb Pitts, an Atlanta City Councilman, gives Bill Watts a proclamation. The Assassin in his mask in the background is an amusing sight. Dusty pops up and says some catchphrases. Assassin, Thunderbolt Patterson and Magnum TA are here too.

TV Title: Ricky Steamboat vs. Steve Austin

Austin is champion. This is the leftovers of the Dangerous Alliance angle which should have gone on at least another year but hey, it’s WCW so why let things go well? Austin is mentioned as a member of it here but I’d have thought it was long gone by then. The national anthem is sung after their entrances. It’s done by an 11 year old and Johnny B. Badd. That’s an odd combination. Oh ok he’s just walking her there.

This is no DQ, which means moves off the top are allowed. Also, Dangerously will be in a cage outside the ring. Steamboat also has bad ribs. Austin goes right for them but it’s mainly striking to get us going. Ricky grabs a headlock to take over and they go to the mat. The cage is now up in the air. Also you can vote on whether or not the top rope moves should be banned or not.

Still in the headlock and Austin taps but it doesn’t mean anything yet. Austin escapes and goes right for the ribs with a hiptoss and elbow drop. See how easy it is? Back to the headlock by Ricky as they’re kind of filling time here. They go to the corner and Austin steps onto the bottom rope with Steamboat on the middle rope, kind of like for a really low level belly to belly superplex. However, instead of that he throws Steamboat forward over his head so that Steamboat lands face first and ribs first on the mat. Cool move.

Steamboat can’t do much now due to the ribs so Austin locks on an abdominal stretch. Ricky starts his comeback and a middle rope cross body gets two. Austin takes a slingshot into the buckle for two. A tombstone gets two and the crowd is getting way into this. Austin gets two on a rollup with tights. Ricky blocks a superplex but jumps into a punch to the ribs. Shoulder block gets two for Ricky. He skins the cat but a BIG elbow sends him to the floor. In a sweet move, Steamboat slips under the ring and comes out the other side for the top rope cross body for the pin and the title.

Rating: B-. I liked this one a lot and they got the crowd into this. When a crowd of 500 people can be heard that clearly you can tell you’ve got something good going. It helps when you have this kind of talent out there. This would be a bigger feud in the next few years and over a bigger title as well, which is the idea. Then Steamboat got injured and someone decided that Austin wasn’t marketable. Idiots.

Here are some clips from the old days, in this case from Mr. Wrestling #2.

We get a video on some of the great tag teams that have competed here on TBS. We see stuff from the Assassins, the Briscoes, the Freebirds (probably from the 70s), the Road Warriors and the Rock N Roll Express. These are just like 20 second clips so there isn’t anything to say here. Roddy Piper is on commentary in the Warriors clips and sounds BOMBED.

Video on Halloween Havoc 1992.

Michael Hayes tells Terry Gordy (not seen) that his men Arn Anderson/Bobby Eaton (seen) will kill him.

Arn Anderson/Bobby Eaton vs. Dick Slater/Greg Valentine

Arn and Valentine start us off. Slater and Valentine clear the ring and it breaks down very quickly. We get to Slater and Eaton with Slater in control. A Russian legsweep and feet on the ropes get two. This is heel vs. heel. Off to Anderson who gets caught in the corner and double teamed. This isn’t really working and I have no idea why they’re going heel vs. heel here. Slater works on Arn’s leg and Valentine hooks a Figure Four which Eaton breaks up. Spinebuster gets two on Greg and it breaks down again. Larry Zbyszko comes out and hits Greg with a cast by mistake and a middle rope Alabama Jam ends this.

Rating: D+. What an odd match. Having four heels (and good ones at that) out there made this into an “I can out heel you” contest which isn’t something I recall seeing. The problem is you’re not going to get anyone cheered out there and I really don’t get the point of it. Just an odd choice.

Bruno Sammartino has an interview and flat out says that he’s glad to be back in a real wrestling organization, unlike that other place he’s been with for the last ten years.

Teddy Long is in the VIP Room and instead of talking to Gordon Solie or Andre, he picks Bob Armstrong. They just didn’t get it at times. Now let’s talk to Thunderbolt Patterson. Dude, ANDRE THE GIANT IS SITTING NEXT TO YOU. Patterson actually says he’s glad to be alive to be here.

We get a quick statement from Mr. Wrestling #2 from Hawaii.

Ted Turner thanks us for 20 years. You have to give him this: he stuck with them as long as he could.

Bill Watts vacates the Light Heavyweight Title due to champion Brad Armstrong being injured. A tournament is promised but it never came. We go to Brad on a crutch who says he’s disappointed because he has to step down. He thinks he’s a failure and Brian Pillman, the opponent for later, comes out. He says it’s a disgrace because he’s supposed to get the title back but Armstrong is claiming an injury. Armstrong’s dad should be ashamed of him and Brad doesn’t know what to say. Pillman slaps him, officially turning heel.

Here’s a singles version of the same kind of montage we saw earlier for the tag teams. Way too many to name here but if they’re a big name they’re here. There are a lot of smaller named guys too. It sounds like it’s set to the Sting music when he came out at Starrcade 97.

Video on Ron Simmons, the WCW World Champion.

WCW World Title: Cactus Jack vs. Ron Simmons

Dig that old Doom music! Ole Anderson is referee here for no apparent reason. This is power vs. brawling of course so Ron tries to wear Jack down. Jack actually speeds things up and hits a flying headbutt to take over. Out to the floor and Ron is like yeah go ahead and jump. Back in and Cactus takes over using his evil ways. Simmons pounds him down in the corner but he charges into a punch.

Cactus Clothesline and they go to the floor. Swinging neckbreaker out there puts Simmons down and they go back in. Three clotheslines get a two count for Jack and it’s off to the chinlock. They trade headbutts and down goes Jack. Two three point shoulder blocks take Jack down again. Back to the floor and Cactus manages to drop his apron elbow to the floor which is one of his major moves. And Simmons is up again in like 4 seconds. Back in the ring, Simmons hits the spinebuster and powerslam to retain. Literally after the elbow, Jack had zero offense and the match was over 20 seconds later.

Rating: D+. I don’t get that ending at all. This was a pretty major feud for awhile, including Jack managing I believe Barbarian for the world title match at Starrcade. The rest of that match wasn’t anything of note either as Ron was pretty much like “yeah keep hitting me.” Really strange match, which is kind of a theme for the last two of them.

Masahiro Chono won a tournament in Japan to win the NWA World Title over Rick Rude. This would result in Chono and Muta getting time on WCW TV, because the NWA thought people cared. We get some clips of the match which looks pretty good.

Rude issues a challenge to Chono for a rematch.

Cactus Jack says he’s in pain but he has someone to help Barbarian and this someone knows Simmons very well. It’s Butch Reed.

Butch Reed/Barbarian vs. Dustin Rhodes/Barry Windham

Jack is on commentary here. Barbarian starts with Rhodes. The Texans cheat and fire off a bunch of double dropkicks to clear the ring. Barbarian is an interesting guy as he always had jobs. Think about it: he was around in the mid 80s, then got a pretty long run in WWF then this quick WCW run then he went back to WWF for a few months then was in WCW for the Faces of Fear. That’s pretty impressive for someone that was never anything more than a lower midcard guy.

Reed gets pounded on in the corner but Dustin misses a charge and falls to the corner. Cactus’ evil laugh is downright CREEPY. The monsters lure Windham in and double team Dustin some more. Cactus: “You can fool some of the people some of the time but you can fool Barry Windham all of the time.” It’s funnier when he says it. A clothesline puts Rhodes down and Reed pounds away on him.

Off to Barbarian who beats on Dustin even more. Standard tag team formula here and that’s perfectly fine. It still works so why mess with it? Reed comes in for a reverse chinlock as Jack says he’s playing a part in a plan but won’t elaborate on it. I don’t think that ever went anywhere. Dustin manages to get a clothesline but takes one of his own. There’s the double tag Windham comes in and speeds things up. He hits the superplex on Barbarian but goes to stop Reed instead. Everything breaks down and Barbarian kicks Barry’s head off for the pin.

Rating: C. This was fine. Barry and Dustin would go on to win the tag titles (the WCW versions, not the NWA titles, meaning that the team they beat still had tag titles because the NWA is stupid) in about a month. Barbarian and Reed would help Jack against Simmons then just kind of fade away.

Jack tells Simmons to be ready.

Here’s a video on the main event. It’s a Survivor Series style match with Sting captaining the Steiners/Nikita Koloff vs. Vader/Jake Roberts/Rude/Super Invader. Sting and Vader are obvious, Jake came in to feud with Sting as a HUGE signing that went nowhere. Koloff is feuding with Rude over the US Title, and the Steiners are Sting’s friends. Super Invader is Hercules of all people under a mask. He’s Harley Race’s goon so there are your eight men.

Sting/Nikita Koloff/Steiner Brothers vs. Rick Rude/Super Invader/Jake Roberts/Big Van Vader

Remember, elimination rules. Hercules is HUGE here as he must be on the good steroids. Rick vs. Vader gets us going. Vader pounds him down as only he can but walks into a SWEET belly to belly. Off to Koloff vs. Invader now. Invadercules takes him down and it’s off to Rude for our first rivalry pairing. Scott comes in as does Invader. No one has really stayed in long enough to get anything going other than the opening pairing.

Scott calls for the Frankensteiner but Rude makes a blind tag and takes Scott down before the Frankensteiner can hit. Roberts comes in to do nothing so it’s off to Vader who pounds Scott down in the corner. He whips Scott in and Jake isn’t paying attention so he gets knocked to the floor. Scott grabs a tilt-a-whirl on Rude, setting up double tags to Roberts and Koloff.

Nikita beats up everyone but Rude knees him in the back, allowing Jake to roll him up for a 4-3 advantage. Off to Sting vs. Invader and that kind of bulldog move that Sting does ties it up. Vader comes in to fight Sting but Sting tags out to Rick. There’s a BIG suplex to Vader. I could watch the Steiners throw people around all day. Rick goes up but jumps into a powerslam. That’s scary power. Vader just held him for awhile because he could. A middle rope splash only gets two. The crowd is way into this.

Off to Rude who puts on a front facelock. Rick powers to the corner but Jake came in for a distraction so the tag doesn’t count. Back to Vader who jumps off the rope but also gets caught in a powerslam by Rick. The Steiners try a Doomsday Device but Rick can’t hold him so it’s more like a regular top rope clothesline. But wait, since Bill Watts is REALLY FREAKING STUPID, that means Scott is disqualified.

Rick and Vader go to the floor and Rick backdrops him out there. Rick Rude comes over and hits the Rude Awakening on Steiner and only Vader beats the count back in. That makes it Sting vs. Roberts/Rude/Vader. He gets Roberts first and there’s the Splash but Rude breaks up the Deathlock attempt. Sting does what he can but he’s still against three guys. The bulldog gets two on Rude. He hits a slingshot suplex but Vader comes off the top with a splash on both guys for no apparent reason, drawing his own DQ. Jake pulls Rude over for a tag and Jake easily DDTs Sting for the winning pin.

Rating: D+. Bill Watts is really stupid. The problem with the top rope thing is it completely takes away the excitement that you can get from things like that. Watts wanted an old school, mat based style which is why he pushed the Miracle Violence Connection so hard. The problem with that is NO ONE ELSE LIKES IT. But who cares about something like that right? I mean, it’s TRADITION AND THE NWA BABY!!! The match was nothing special and was pretty dull due to the people being eliminated through such stupid means.

We hear the results of the poll about the top rope being reinstated: 88% want moves off the top to be legal again. Think that happened? Of course not.

JR says we’ll take a special look at Halloween Havoc, but it’s the same commercial we’ve seen three times already. Oh wait this has some extra stuff in it. Well at least it’s different. This announces that it’ll be Jake vs. Sting in Spin the Wheel, Make the Deal, which is WCW’s version of Raw Roulette. Naturally they didn’t rig the wheel so they got a Coal Miner’s Glove match, which was AWFUL. The announcement is in the form of a REALLY badly acted skit in I think a bar or something where Jake challenges him.

Overall Rating: D+. This was a weird show. The set looking exactly the same as WCW Saturday Night (it was on the same set) gave this a really weird dynamic. It’s not bad or anything but it felt more like a special edition of Saturday Night rather than a big time show. It did some setting up of Havoc but not much really. Oh and before I forget: Scott Steiner would win the TV Title shortly after this and would tease turning heel, but the Steiners would be in the WWF before Christmas.

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Clash of the Champions #13: Thanksgiving Thunder
Date: November 20, 1990
Location: Jacksonville Memorial Coliseum, Jacksonville, Florida
Attendance: 5,000
Commentators: Jim Ross, Paul E. Dangerously

We’re in a very dark era for WCW at this point as it’s the final days of the Black Scorpion story. This show is probably the lowest point that it reached for reasons that you’ll see. Basically, there’s some guy in a black suit running around taunting Sting and no one knows who he is. There have been a lot of false alarms and hints which tried to imply it was Ultimate Warrior, but you would have to be a BIG old school fan to get that. Anyway it sucks but let’s get to it.

After a very basic intro which is pretty downplayed by comparison to most of their videos.

JR and Paulie talk about the show. The main event is Flair vs. Butch Reed. If Reed wins, Teddy Long gets Flair’s yacht and limo but if Flair wins, the Horsemen get a tag title shot and Teddy has to be Flair’s chauffeur.

Freebirds/Bobby Eaton vs. Southern Boys/El Gigante

The Birds have an annoying manager named Little Richard Marley (jobber Rocky King) with them. And never mind as Hayes says El Gigante got beaten up and sent back to Argentina so it’s just going to be a tag match.

Freebirds vs. Southern Boys

Eaton gets thrown out. Garvin vs. Smothers starts us off. This is a two and a half hour show (TV time that is) and we have 11 matches so most of them are going to be short. The Southern Boys clean house and send the Birds to the floor. The lighting is TERRIBLE in the arena here. Hayes isn’t really the kind of guy that can make glittery purple pants look tough.

The Birds get knocked to the floor again and we eventually get to Garvin vs. Tracy Smothers (his partner is Steve Armstrong). Garvin gets slammed off the top and the Birds double team. So then Armstrong goes one up on them with a double clothesline off the top. Marley gets up on the apron as the Southern Boys take over. Marley trips Smothers as Armstrong dives onto Garvin, allowing Hayes to DDT Smothers for the cheap pin.

Rating: D-. Well that match was worthless. I never cared for either of these teams and this was a pretty good example as to why. Who in the world thought this was going to be an entertaining match? Nothing interesting here at all and the Birds might have used three moves other than a slam. Terribly uninteresting.

Here’s Sting who is fired up to be face to face with the Black Scorpion. And that’s it. This was like 30 seconds long. Oh wait we’re not done. The Black Scorpion’s voice comes over the PA (it’s Ole Anderson, the same voice as the Shockmaster) who says that we’ll see his great powers of black magic tonight.

Buddy Landell vs. Brian Pillman

Pillman has the Bengals trunks now and is way popular. Landell looks exactly like Flair and even is nicknamed Nature Boy. He jumps Pillman to start and beats him down. Brian tries for some quick pins but once they don’t work he just knocks Buddy to the floor and dives onto him onto the ramp. A piledriver out there doesn’t work and back into the ring they go. They fight to the floor and Landell sends him to the post.

Even Dangerously says that Landell is a Flair clone. I’m not sure I get the point in having a Flair character at the same time Flair was there but he had been doing it for years so it’s not like this is some quick character for him. He was popular enough on his own too. Out to the floor again and Pillman hits a SWEET springboard crossbody to send Landell into the railing. Dang that man could fly. Abdominal stretch by Buddy is followed by a backbreaker for two. Pillman blocks a superplex and hits a top rope cross body for a very quick pin.

Rating: C. This was again short but they had a decent little match out there. Pillman was a rising star and would be in WarGames the next year (almost getting killed in the process but that’s another review for another time). This was a very basic power/brawler vs. speed match but it worked out pretty well I thought.

Big Cat vs. Brad Armstrong

Cat is more famous as Curtis Hughes and is one of three monster heels in a loose stable at this point. He wanted Luger and I don’t remember them ever fighting. Armstrong is the Candyman here because he’s only had 9485 stupid gimmicks in his career and needed another. What exactly that name means isn’t exactly mentioned but who needs to know that?

Power vs. speed here. Basically picture Big Zeke for an image of Big Cat. As for what happens in this, picture any power monster vs. speed face match that you’ve ever seen and you have that here. Cat hits a trio of backbreakers and Armstrong is in trouble. There’s a bearhug to continue the predictable basis of this one. Armstrong makes a very quick comeback but gets caught in a Torture Rack (stolen from Luger to further the feud) and the referee stops it.

Rating: D. Like I said, this was every power vs. speed match you’ve ever seen. Paint by numbers would be a good name for this. It’s not horrible I guess, but I’ve seen this sort of thing so many times that there’s nothing to be gained from it. It did its job well enough though so it’s not a total waste of time.

Dick the Bruiser is a scary man and says he’ll be at Starrcade to referee the main event.

Z-Man vs. Brian Lee

Lee is more famous as either a guy in ECW, the Fake Undertaker in 1994 or Chainz in the early Attitude Era. More speed vs. big guy here but Lee isn’t quite a full power guy. He’s more tall than strong. Z-Man speeds things up but misses a cross body and crashes to let Lee take over. Off to a chinlock as this is going nowhere. Z-Man easily comes back and a missile dropkick ends this.

Rating: F. This show SUCKS. This was another match that did nothing at all and was just there which is getting really old really fast. Lee was awful and from what I can find this is his official tryout match. To the shock of no one, he didn’t get a job out of it. Nothing match and it didn’t work at all.

Mike Rotundo is officially Michael Wallstreet after inheriting a lot of money. He’s got a new manager in the form of Alexandra York who says the computer says if Wallstreet follows the plan, he’ll beat Starblazer with ease tonight. This angle lasted longer than it should have but almost got good near the end.

Starblazer vs. Michael Wallstreet

Apparently Starblazer is (mostly) career jobber Tim Horner under a mask. How can we possibly be five matches into this show? York (Terri Runnels) shows him the computer’s plan and the fans chant boring less than a minute into this. Starblazer hits some fast dropkicks to send him to the floor. Join the WCW Fan Club! Back in they speed things up and Wallstreet throws him to the floor. Blazer makes a brief comeback and they fight over a Boston Crab for some reason. This FINALLY ends with the Wallstreet Crash, a Samoan Drop, for the pin.

Rating: D-. I have never seen a crowd that dead for a match. I mean they were not moving in the slightest. Wallstreet was such a boring character and they didn’t really ever develop him at all. He was at least better as IRS due to the character having something to talk about. Still though, bad match.

The WCW Top Ten:

Tag teams first.

10. Norman The Lunatic/The Juicer
9. Big Cat/Motor City Madman
8. Tim Horner/Candyman
7. Master Blasters
6. Southern Boys
5. Ricky Morton/Tommy Rich
4. Freebirds
3. Nasty Boys
2. Ric Flair/Arn Anderson
1. Steiner Brothers

Singles:

10. Bobby Eaton
9. Z-Man
8. Michael Wallstreet
7. Brian Pillman
6. Terry Taylor
5. Arn Anderson
4. Ric Flair
3. Lex Luger
2. Sid Vicious
1. Stan Hansen

Here’s a video about the International Tag Team Tournament which had one team from a bunch of countries/continents.

Ready for something that’s bordering on full blown racism?

African Tag Team Tournament Finals: Colonel DeKlerk/Sergeant Krueger vs. Kalua/Botswana Beast

DeKlerk is Rocco Rock before he gained a ton of work. I have no idea who Beast and Kalua are and I can’t find any information on them at all. Probably local guys. Naturally the “Africans” (yeah they’re just from Africa, even if one is named Botswana Beast) are black and the white South Africans are pretty American, as Krueger is Matt Osborne, as in Doink the Clown/Big Josh.

Krueger starts with let’s say Kalua. At least the Africans (as in not the white South Africans) are in regular tights and not tribal attire. Dangerously talks about how great DeKlerk is and all the titles he’s held on different continents. DeKlerk busts out a standing Lionsault but lands almost in a reverse DDT. Beast is a huge man and no sells a lot while his gut shakes. Beast destroys DeKlerk but gets caught with a clothesline. Another powerslam puts DeKlerk down for two. Things break down and they do the slam with a dropkick to the back for the pin as DeKlerk pins Beast.

Rating: F. It was stupid, they’re not from Africa, and I feel like I need to report this to Jesse Jackson. Just dreadful and the match SUCKED on top of that.

Sam Muchnick invites us to watch Starrcade in St. Louis. Old school fans will smile at that.

Recap of Luger vs. Hansen for the US Title, which is about Hansen FINALLY ending the title reign of Luger went on over 19 months. He did it clean too.

Vignette of Paul E. and his Motorcity Madman, another of that trio of heels I mentioned earlier.

Luger isn’t worried about the Madman. He wants Hansen but Big Cat shows up. Luger punches him once, Cat goes down, Luger goes to the ring. Cat gets up and says that was a mistake. Luger looked AWESOME there.

Motorcity Madman vs. Lex Luger

Madman is a nobody who got a cup of coffee in WCW and nothing happened with him. Lex is just ungodly popular. Big Cat sneaks up on Lex and they slug it out. Cat gets beaten back until referees break it up. The Madman jumps Luger as literally the entire two front rows are walking out at the exact same time. They must have been from somewhere else in the arena because the rows are full. There must have been 30-40 people walking though. Lex mostly suplexes the big guy as this is really just a power display for Lex. Madman hits a forearm and side slam but Lex hits a clothesline for the quick pin. Just a squash.

Nick Patrick speaks for the referees and says they’re worried about the Steiners vs. the Nasties. Ok then.

Renegade Warriors vs. Nasty Boys

They’re Chris and Mark Youngblood, a regular tag team who are Indians. JR says if the Nasties can beat the Steiners, he’ll quit announcing. Paulie FREAKS and is now Nasty Fan #1. Mark starts with Sags. It quickly turns into a brawl with Knobs taking over. Chris helps cheat which sets up an armbar. Back to Mark and now it’s Sags getting his arm worked on. Out to the floor and Knobs sends Mark into the railing. Chris bangs on a tom tom drum so Knobs DDTs Mark’s arm. Really bad match so far. The Steiners FINALLY run in and beat down the Nasties, probably as punishment for this. It’s a double DQ.

Rating: F. Oh just AWFUL here. The only thing people wanted to see was a brawl between the Nasties and Steiners, but somehow the WWF was able to get the Nasties over to WWF very quickly after this. I mean this is November and the Nasties were at the Rumble in January. I’ve never gotten how that can be done but it happened in this case.

Vader is back.

Sid Vicious vs. Nightstalker

Nightstalker is Brian Clark, or Adam Bomb. I remember seeing Nightstalker coming down the aisle and that exact camera angle watching this as a kid. I love stuff like that. Sid is a Horseman and very popular here. Test of strength to start which is won by Sid but Stalker hooks a bearhug. He talks to Sid the whole time. Clearly they’re exchanging green bean casserole recipies.

Sid pounds him into the corner and JR says this won’t be pretty. Sid’s arm is hurt and this is going nowhere. We get a rib claw and here’s Big Cat AGAIN. What is this, his 4th appearance? Sid knocks him down so Stalker brings in his ax. Yes, an ax. Sid gets it, hits Stalker with it, and gets the pin.

Rating: F. GET RID OF BIG CAT. He’s nothing interesting, he’s more boring than Big Zeke Jackson, and he’s been in half the matches tonight. Nothing to see here and a horribly bad match. Also, there’s the fact that SID HIT HIM WITH AN AX TO END THE THING. Let that sink in for a minute.

The Freebirds pat themselves on the back until the Southern Boys come up. Garvin offers to fights with an arm behind his back and here’s El Gigante to chase them off.

Missy Hyatt hypes an upcoming TV show.

We look at the Steiners attacking the Nasties earlier.

Steiner Brothers vs. Magnum Force

I can’t find who Magnum Force is anywhere. They’re one of those old school teams referred to as Magnum Force #1 and Magnum Force #2. The Steiners are the US Tag Champions but this is non-title. Scott starts with let’s say #1. The people are walking AGAIN. There has to be something to that. Rick vs. #2 in now. This is going nowhere. A quick Steiner Line ends this and the Nasties run in. Total squash and the Nasties run quickly.

The Horsemen say they’ll win. The official main event hasn’t been announced yet but it’s Flair or Arn vs. Reed or Simmons.

We recap Sting vs. Black Scorpion. The idea is that it’s someone from Sting’s past (eventually supposed to be Angel of Death, who no one was going to remember) and he’s trying to take Sting out. Sting beat a fake one at a previous Clash but the real one came down later. Then in Chicago, the Scorpion kidnapped a fan, put him in a magician’s box, and made him disappear. Then the Scorpion interrupted a title match. Tonight, they’re going to have a chat.

Sting comes out for the Danger Zone, Paulie’s talk show. He says a little bit and here’s the Scorpion to kidnap another fan. The “fan” gets a box put on his head and his “head” is spun around 360 degrees. Then he gets put in a cage and turned into a leopard. And remember, This was supposed to be the TOP HEEL ANGLE OF THE YEAR. Scorpion jumps into a box and disappears. He was narrating the thing the whole time but you couldn’t understand 90% of it.

I mean WOW. This is a fine example of what we mean by “insulting our intelligence.” This was a bad magic show, not a wrestling match. At the end of the day it wound up being Flair under the mask, which makes the whole thing even dumber. I have no idea what Ole Anderson was on when he thought this was a good idea, but man I want some of it.

We recap Doom vs. The Horsemen. They both wanted to be on The Danger Zone and it all broke down. They had a match at Halloween Havoc where it was thrown out. The aforementioned bet was made: yacht/limo vs. title shot/Teddy as a chauffeur.

All four guys come out and there are coin flips to determine who the singles guys are.

Ric Flair vs. Butch Reed

Power vs. Flair here and you know he knows how to work that match. Reed uses power and punches him out a lot. There’s the press slam and Flair is in trouble early. After a brief fight on the ramp we go back inside and Reed hooks a backslide for two. A dropkick puts Flair down but he goes to the eyes like a Horseman. He tosses Reed to the floor thanks to an accidental distraction from Simmons.

Anderson adds in some cheating on the floor but back inside they trade chops and Reed gets a slight advantage. There’s a Flair Flop and a Flair Flip, resulting in him getting popped in the face by Simmons. Flair takes over and hits a knee drop but a second one misses. Reed slaps on a figure four and Flair’s leg is in trouble.

After Flair makes the rope he avoids a middle rope elbow and Reed is in trouble. It turns into a slugout and they need to wrap this up. Reed really likes gorilla presses. He goes up top for a shoulder block but it basically hits Flair’s knee. I don’t think he was aiming for it but there you go. Reed gets sent to the floor where the referee was and everyone is down. Anderson clocks Reed with a chair and Flair steals the pin.

Rating: C-. Pretty good match but the last five minutes weigh it down a bit. The ending is a big mess but the idea was that Simmons got lost in it and therefore couldn’t make a save. It’s certainly not bad and is easily the best match of the night, but to be fair given what you had up to that point, that shouldn’t surprise anyone. Decent stuff, but cutting four minutes or so off would have made it way better.

The big WCW letters are tilted to the left for some reason.

Overall Rating: D-. This is the worst kind of show: the boring kind. Other than the main event which is just ok, there’s nothing going on here worth seeing. That’s what I can’t stand reviewing: shows where it’s clear no one is giving any effort and no one wants to be there. It was a horribly dull show with nothing at all to see. Steer FAR clear of this one.

Clash of the Champions #8: Fall Brawl 1989
Date: September 12, 1989
Location: Carolina Coliseum, Columbia, South Carolina
Attendance: 2,600
Commentators: Jim Ross, Jim Cornette

We’re in 89 here and since it’s anywhere between late summer and early winter, it’s Fall Brawl. This has nothing to do with the regular PPV because there were about 5 other shows with that name. Anyway, the main event here is supposed to be Flair/Sting vs. Funk/Muta. Funk is hurt via Flair though so it’s…Dick Slater? This is one of those transitional periods for WCW but Funk vs. Flair was the main feud so let’s get to it.

We open with a clip from Great American Bash where Funk and Muta destroyed Flair until Sting made the save.

The word on the street is that Gary Hart has something planned. Here’s Gary Hart who says there are no problems in his camp.

Road Warriors vs. Samoan Swat Team

The Samoans come out to the Halloween theme song. Dangerously is managing the Samoans. The Samoans are Fatu and Samu, more famous as the Headshrinkers. Samu hits the floor to hide but Animal throws him right back in. Hawk gets sent to the floor and takes a powerslam for two back in. Bearhug eats up some time and there’s the unseen tag. A very modified version of the Demolition Decapitator gets two. Fatu comes off the top and jumps into a boot (you know the spot I’m talking about) and Animal is tagged to clean house. Everything breaks down, Heyman’s phone hits a Samoan and the Device ends Fatu.

Rating: C. Man the crowd was excited for this. It was a power match and a pretty quick one at that but sometimes that’s all you need to have. Decent enough match though and at times that works best. The Warriors were just about to jump over to the WWF but they were still as popular as anyone.

The Samoans yell at Heyman and fire him post match. He wouldn’t manage again until the summer.

Cuban Assassin vs. Z-Man

There were a lot of assassins in wrestling. This is Z-Man’s debut. For once this isn’t Jack Victory under a mask but rather just a guy from Cuba. Off to a quick armbar as Z-Man controls early. Zenk channels his inner Jericho and uses about a dozen armdrags and armbars. Of all things a sleeper ends this.

Rating: D-. This was one of the weakest debuts I’ve seen for a face in a long time. Z-Man was really boring here and the ending didn’t prove anything. He’s a cruiserweight style guy so he uses a bunch of arm holds and then a sleeper for the end? Seriously? I’m thinking it wasn’t exactly the WWF screwing him over that got him out of there. He has some crazy ideas about it or whatever, but it could very well be that he’s REALLY dull.

Here’s The World According To Theodore R. Long. He’s in a recording studio and plays it kind of like a radio show. It’s really stupid and it’s basically just a rundown of upcoming house shows.

It’s Ric Flair Day in South Carolina. The governor gives him a plaque. Ok then.

Ranger Ross vs. Sid Vicious

Sid is just SCARY over. He hits Ranger in the head and they go to the floor. Ross gets in a few strikes but the move we would call The Eye of the Storm and a powerbomb end this quick.

Now we get a vignette of Robin Green (Nancy Sullivan/Benoit/Woman, the innocent manager of Rick Steiner) and Missy Hyatt get a limo to go shopping. I have no idea what the point of this is. You also can’t hear a word they’re saying because the car is so loud. This is like a high school show in the late 80s. Now they go jewelery shopping. I think this is supposed to be Robin being all out of character.

The Freebirds say they’re awesome.

World Tag Titles: Freebirds vs. Steiner Brothers

The Birds are champions and this is the Steiners’ first shot at the titles. Scott is a totally different guy here, to the point where he was a nod of the head away from being handed the world title and being made the focus of all of WCW in about 1991. Flair flat out said you say the time I’ll lay down for you. Think about that for a minute. Then he destroyed his arm and didn’t get the title for 9 years. That’s wrestling for you.

Missy and Robin are here with the brothers. Scott is in regular trunks here so you can tell he’s brand new. Scott vs. Hayes starts us off. Hayes stalls a lot and then stalls a lot more. Scott speeds things up but runs into the left hand which is one of Hayes’ big moves. A top rope cross body by Hayes is rolled through for two and Scott cleans house. Garvin comes in and Scott runs over him too. A SWEET reverse German hits and here’s a tag to Rick. Scott looked like Kurt Angle out there.

Rick knocks both of the Birds to the floor and gets on all fours. Hayes comes in next and dances a lot, just ticking Rick off even more. There’s a powerslam and one for Garvin as he tries a sneak attack. Hayes gets in a few punches so Rick just mauls him and hits a release belly to belly. Rick then misses one of the hardest charges ever into the corner. Garvin comes in with his DDT finisher but Scott makes the save.

Back to Hayes who sends him out to the floor for more of a beating. Rick gets beaten down for awhile as we’re just waiting for Scott to come in and start breaking stuff. Garvin comes back in and hits a running knee to the head for two. Time for a chinlock but Rick snapmares out of it. Why don’t more people use that as a counter?

There’s the tag to Scott (thanks for telling me JR. No seriously, the camera cut to the crowd so we didn’t see if he made it or not) and it’s Frankensteiners (and I mean standing ones, not ones out of the corner) and a BIG powerslam for Hayes. Scott hits the ropes but someone (presumably one of the girls but we intentionally can’t see which) trips him and a quick DDT keeps the titles on the Birds.

Rating: B-. If you’ve EVER been unclear about why people rave and rave some more about Scott Steiner, go find this match right now, keeping in mind that he’s 24 here and had been on national TV as a wrestler for about 3 months. This was one of the most impressive performances I’ve seen in a LONG time. By the way, it was Robin that tripped Scott. She turned heel and debuted Doom soon thereafter. The Steiners got the titles in November.

Norman the Lunatic vs. Brian Pillman

Norman is more famous as Bastian Booger. He’s just what his name says here: a lunatic from the state hospital. Pillman is young, undefeated, and AWESOME at this point. He comes out with the University of South Carolina Cheerleaders and goes off, hitting all kinds of high flying moves which Norman can’t even begin to keep up with. After a springboard clothesline and a dive to the floor, Brian goes for Norman’s key (he brought it with him and freaked whenever anyone touched it) but it goes nowhere.

Middle rope splash gets two for Norman. Out to the floor and Norman splashes him against the post. A second one misses though and a missile dropkick puts Norman down and PILLMAN SLAMS HIM!!! AND A BACKDROP!!! A middle rope cross body is countered into a powerslam for two. Holy crap this is AWESOME. Out of nowhere Pillman grabs a crucifix for the kind of upset pin.

Rating: B. WHERE IN THE WORLD DID THIS COME FROM??? I know I said Pillman was awesome but I didn’t expect that. Pillman was flying all over the place and pulling off stuff that would make Rey Mysterio jealous in 1996. This was incredible and as you can see, Bill Watts was an idiot for wanting to ban this kind of stuff because….why did he want to do that anyway?

Gary Hart insists Terry Funk is here when everyone else says he isn’t.

Mike Rotundo vs. Steve Williams

This is pretty much the very final blowoff of the entire Varsity Club. Williams is freshly face again and gets caught coming in but he’s like “Boy I’m Steve Williams” and clotheslines Williams down then does the still scary gorilla press reps on the slam. Back to the floor where Rotundo hammers away and the fans are all over Rotundo as he hooks an abdominal stretch. Rotundo keeps knocking him down and hooks a chinlock. Even in that Williams won’t stop moving.

Back up and Rotundo puts his feet on the ropes to cheat but Williams won’t go down. A jawebreaker finally gets Steve out of the hold but an elbow misses. The idea here is that Rotundo knows if Williams gets any kind of momentum going then Rotundo is going to die so he has to keep moving every chance he can. A pair of thumbs to the eye slows Williams down and Rotundo goes up. Williams slams him off after getting a RUNNING START.

I’ve told you this before but this guy was the Brock Lesnar of his day. Just SCARY strong and a legit amateur wrestler. Williams misses a charge but Rotundo accidentally dives over the top. Back in the Stampede is countered but Williams holds on and takes him to the mat in kind of a rollup for the surprise pin. The count was cool looking as the referee dove and counted at the same time, sliding on each count.

Rating: B-. Another fun match. This show has rocked so far and Williams just blew away Rotundo here. The idea here was that they never stopped moving out there. Even the rest holds had something going on like using ropes for leverage and Doc (Williams’ nickname was Dr. Death and JR often called him Doc) kept fighting to get out of them. That’s the difference between working and being boring: you can take almost anything in a match and make it more entertaining but you NEVER see that today, which is a shame.

Lex says he’s awesome.

US Title: Tommy Rich vs. Lex Luger

Lex is champion but Rich is an old NWA superhero so he’s very popular here. Lex is a total heel but he was so awesome at this point that you couldn’t help but cheer for him, meaning he gets a bigger pop than Rich here. We hear about how great Rich used to be and JR manages to get cowboy boots into the analysis somehow. Not much to start but Luger uses his power to keep control. He’s a heel but keeps getting cheered.

Rich gets in a right hand and grabs an armbar which gets him nowhere. Cross body gets two and it’s back to the arm. Lex avoids a dropkick and powerslams him for two. He works on the back a bit but Rich hooks a sunset flip for two and Luger goes outside. Back in Lex works on the back some more but the Rack is countered. Superplex gets two. Lex goes up (???) and misses a top rope splash.

Rich starts his comeback and pounds away, hitting a middle rope punch for two. Thesz Press gets the same due to Lex putting his foot on the ropes. In some trivia for you, that’s what he won his world title with. Rich misses a punch and hits the post, only to grab a sleeper while Lex is on the apron. Luger hits a hangman on the top rope for the pin to retain.

Rating: C. Decent match here but not quite as energetic as the previous two matches. Rich is a guy that I think you have to watch a lot of to get the appeal of. Not a great match or anything but more competitive than you would think. That being said, Rich was pure Memphis and that style doesn’t work well with Luger’s power game.

Gary Hart has some more to say. He’s going to let the nation know about something. Hart has a letter from a doctor and there’s a tape from Funk in a hospital bed with a bad arm. Funk talks about how he almost lost his arm and no matter what he’ll be at the Clash tonight.

Sting and Flair (in the classic black robe) say bring it on Funk.

Great Muta/Dick Slater vs. Sting/Ric Flair

Muta is TV Champion here and I think undefeated. He and Sting start which should be awesome. This was one of the hottest feuds of 89 and definitely one of the best. They speed things way up to start and Sting knocks him to the floor very quickly. Back in and they fight over a headlock but Sting grabs an armdrag and works a wristlock. The crowd is WAY into this.

Flair comes in and the fans wake up even more. This is the first time he’s ever been in the ring with Muta. Muta takes a bunch of chops and punches so he collapses into the corner to bring in Slater. Flair beats him up too until Slater sends him into the corner and over the top. Flair runs the apron, hits a running chop to Muta, goes up and hits a top rope elbow to take out Slater.

Dirty Dick (worst nickname ever) kicks Flair to the floor and Muta dives on him. Everyone heads to the floor and it all breaks down. The good guys rule the ring and Hart, the manager, calls a conference. Slater has a cast on his forearm/wrist. Naturally Flair and Sting work it over. This is still the smart Flair, as in the one before Hogan made him an idiot. Sting grabs an armbar and so does Flair. They’re tagging very fast.

Slater comes in and is immediately suplexed for two. Back to Muta quickly and the dominance continues. Muta does the classic heel move of raking the eyes and hits the Handspring Elbow to keep Flair in trouble. Slater comes in and pounds away before sending Flair to the floor. Muta back in now and he hits that snap elbow. A nerve hold is broken and it’s off to Sting. This has been good so far.

Stinger Splash to Muta but Gary Hart comes in to hit Sting in the back of the head with a roll of coins to break up the Deathlock. That only gets two and now both the fans and JR are really getting into this. A powerbomb by Muta gets two. They go to the floor and Flair makes a running save. Back in Slater puts on a sleeper but Sting breaks it up with a jawbreaker and both guys are down.

There’s the hot tag to Flair and he does his best Fifi imitation to clean house. Everything breaks down and Muta gets dropkicked to the floor. Sting goes to pull him back in but takes mist in the face. Oh and it’s yellow too! Slater hits Flair with the cast to bust him open. Down goes the referee and here’s Terry Funk with a plastic bag to TRY TO SUFFOCATE FLAIR. TAKE THAT PG ERA!!! It’s all thrown out of course.

Rating: B+. Pretty awesome tag match here and it plays up to the feud that was going on with Funk vs. Flair, setting up an I Quit match at a future Clash. Slater didn’t really mean much in this as they shifted it back to Muta soon here. Very good tag match here that really needed a finish but still great.

Sting takes a branding iron to the knee. Flair apparently got mouth to mouth by Pillman to wake him up. I’m sure he’s glad that wasn’t on camera. Flair gets medical attention to end the show.

Overall Rating: A. THIS is how you do a TV show. Other than the Z-Man match which is less than four minutes long, there isn’t a bad match on here and you get two or three very good ones, plus a total star making performance by Scott Steiner. Couple that with a great main event that moves the feuds forward and this is one of the best Clashes I’ve ever seen. Find a copy of it because it’s worth seeing.

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Clash of the Champions #28
Date: August 28, 1994
Location: Five Seasons Center, Cedar Rapids, Iowa
Attendance: 4,200
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan

We continue our march through the final Clashes with the final one I have to go chronologically. The main event here is what else: Hogan vs. Flair for the title. Hogan had come in back during the summer and everything they had going had been thrown out for the sake of pushing Hogan (and his friends soon after) to the freaking moon. Also for no apparent reason, Antonio Inoki is on the card here. Let’s get to it.

We open with a video from Bash at the Beach where Hogan won the title in his first match. Heenan: “Tell me it’s a nightmare!”

The opening video is all Hogan vs. Flair and it’s one of those weird remixes where they say a word like five times in a row before continuing the sentence. Flair has a surprise tonight.

Austin and Steamboat are arguing in the back. Call the Hotline to see why! I’m not kidding: that’s what they say.

Here’s the National Anthem. The guy gets the words wrong. He’s a country singer because that’s all WCW knows about.

Nasty Boys vs. Pretty Wonderful

Pretty Wonderful are tag champions and Orndorff/Roma. This is non-title though. This is a grudge match as a result of a big brawl where Pretty Wonderful hit Knobbs with a crutch. Pretty Wonderful stalls and the fans like the Nasties a lot better. Tony says a lot of big stars aren’t here tonight for some reason. Gee that makes me want to watch more of this show. Brian and Paul start but it’s off to Sags quickly.

Roma tries a top rope cross body but is easily caught in a slam. They be clubberin Tony! Out to the floor and Orndorff chokes away a bit on Jerry to take over. Tony goes into a big thing about how WCW listens to the fans and Heenan says wrestling is cool again because WCW is number one. Yeah when I see Paul Orndorff and Paul Roma as tag team champions in 1994 and hear about the debuting Honky Tonk Man, I think it’s cool.

Sags is knocked to the floor and holds his eye for awhile. I guess this show is so cool it burns his retinas. Orndorff hooks a chinlock and this match sucks. Knobbs tries to come in without a tag and the champs double team. Orndorff calls for a piledriver but Sags is too fat. Off to Knobbs and everything breaks down. Roma hits a top rope splash on Knobbs and Sags hits a top rope elbow on Orndorff and the Nasties (with the illegal man getting the pin) win.

Rating: D-. Pretty Wonderful was just AWFUL so they kept the titles for about half of the year. The Nasties were just kind of there until we got to a better team really late in the year in the form of Harlem Heat thank goodness. The match was junk, but did you really expect anything else?

Hulk says to call Hulk’s Hotline.

Here’s Hogan but a guy pops up behind him with a pipe and hits him in the knee before anything is said. Hogan uses the Mr. Nanny acting skills to say his knee is really hurt. It takes awhile to get him out. Eric is there too and we hear that he’s Executive VP. I didn’t know they had revealed that this early.

US Title: Ricky Steamboat vs. Steve Austin

Austin is champion and he already beat Steamboat via some circumstances (Austin got DQ’d, Steamboat insisted they keep going, Austin pinned him) at Bash at the Beach so this is the second match. We go split screen to see Hogan leave in the ambulance. Ricky takes him to the mat quickly and Austin complains of a hair pull. That brings a smile to my face due to the future.

Austin has Dragon Slayer on his tights. If Austin gets disqualified, he loses the title. We stop commentary on the match while a stage manager gives Heenan a live report of what happened to Hogan. We’ll ignore the fact that everyone could see it and point out that WE CAN’T HEAR HIM! He’s whispering in Bobby’s ear (and I know because the camera went off the match to look at him doing so), making this totally pointless.

They chop it out and Steamboat takes over. He grabs the arm as Heenan rants about how he wouldn’t care if Hogan can ever wrestle again. We get a SWEET pinfall reversal sequence and Ricky grabs the arm once again. We finally see this loudmouthed fan that the announcers have been complaining about all night. It’s Barry “Smash” Darsow as the new character the Blacktop Bully. He was a truck driver and a bully. And people wonder why this company was always struggling.

Tony says Austin has held the title since December of 1983, or about 11 years at this point. It’s more like 9 months and December of 93 but you can’t expect him to be able to tell time or complicated things like that. After a quick chase on the floor, Steamboat hooks a sleeper but Austin kind of drops down and drives Steamboat’s chin into his shoulder. I’d jot that down if I was him.

We hear that Sting who was in Chicago, has chartered a plane and is on his way here and will wrestle in Hogan’s place if need be. Ricky stays on the arm and hits a top rope chop. Back to the Bully shouting as Austin apparently counters with something. We didn’t get to see it but why would we need to do that? They fight from their knees and Austin grabs a chinlock.

They chop it out again and Steamboat hits a double to take over. They chop it out for the third or fourth time and Austin hits a suplex. A second is blocked and Steamboat puts him on the ropes. The cameras glitch so we get a random shot of the entrance. Austin knocks him back to the mat but gets crotched. Ricky loads up a superplex but Austin hits a release forward suplex.

He comes off the top but gets caught and Steamboat makes his comeback. I’m not sure how much of a comeback it can be after such a short time on defense but whatever. Top rope crossbody gets canvas and here’s more Blacktop Bully. Steamboat Hulks Up and hammers away. A spinebuster gets two. Austin goes up but gets caught in an electric chair drop for another two.

This is getting really good. A few pinning combinations get two for Steamboat. Austin dumps him over but Steamboat holds the rope. If he had hit the floor it would have been a title change. Austin goes to slam him BUT YOU CAN’T SLAM RICKY STEAMBOAT!!! Ricky gets his small package and the US Title.

Rating: B. Very good match here which is even more impressive when you consider Steamboat destroyed his back in this match and had to retire before he defended the title. Austin was supposed to get a rematch at Fall Brawl but since Steamboat was hurt, Austin was awarded the title and Jim freaking Duggan of all people took the title from him in about 45 seconds. But Hogan never did anything bad for WCW and it was just a coincidence that a washed up guy like Duggan got the US Title over someone young and talented like Austin and that Duggan just happened to be a friend of Duggan right?

Eric doesn’t know anything at the hospital but Hogan said it felt like something tore. Heenan couldn’t be happier.

Here’s a music video for a guy arriving soon: the Honky Tonk Man. It would be guys like him and Duggan and Orndorff that were pushed instead of guys like Austin and Foley and Pillman and others like that. This song couldn’t be more of a ripoff of his old song if they tried. WWF song lyrics: “I pick a mean guitar, I wear the blue suede shoes, you ought to hear me sing the snakeskin blues.” WCW song lyrics: “I play a mean guitar, I play the rhythm and blues, you better not step on Honky’s blue suede shoes.” The music sounds almost EXACTLY the same too. Jimmy Hart wrote both too.

Nick Bockwinkle says Hogan will have to forfeit the title if he’s not here later.

We recap the Rhodes Family vs. the Stud Stable. The idea here is that Dustin has feuded with Colonel Parker’s stable forever and needs a partner. For some reason that no one has ever come up with a reason for other than Dustin is an idiot, he asked Arn Anderson. You know, the guy who is most famous for BREAKING DUSTIN’S DADDY’S LEG. As anybody with enough common sense to say that putting your face in a fire is a bad idea, Anderson turned on him and joined Parker after about 5 minutes.

So one night Dustin was talking about needing a partner and Dusty came out. They had a strained relationship because Dusty was never around because he was off being a famous wrestling cowboy. Dusty uses the same line of Dustin offering up his innocence and being paid back in scorn that he used when Sapphire turned on him. I don’t really know what it means but I don’t know what Dusty means most of the time. Dusty offered to be Dustin’s partner and Dustin hugged him to say yes. I’ll give Dusty this: the man could talk like few others ever could.

Dusty Rhodes/Dustin Rhodes vs. Bunkhouse Buck/Terry Funk

It’s a brawl to start of course and Funk brings in a chair. The younger guys, Dustin and Buck, start us off which is probably a good thing. Off to Funk who is quickly knocked to the floor. Off to Dusty who gets a big reaction. An elbow puts Buck down and Funk wants in. Back to Dustin and everything breaks down. Some heel miscommuncation puts the heels down but Dustin is knocked the to the floor. Here’s Anderson and Dusty is in trouble. That doesn’t last long as Dustin comes back in and hits clotheslines for everyone. Bulldog takes Buck down and Arn runs in for the DQ.

Rating: D+. Pretty boring match here but this was more about setting up WarGames. Yes, THIS was what they used for WarGames. Not Flair and company vs. Hogan and company. Hogan didn’t even wrestle at the show. Dusty was there for nostalgia purposes and that’s about it. Nothing to see here and it was a really boring feud all around.

Post match Dusty cleans house but Parker’s bodyguard Meng comes in. Dusty thinks about hitting him then thinks about an elbow but then says wait a minute. He goes outside and gets a wooden chair which he breaks over Meng’s head. Meng doesn’t move and hooks a nerve hold as the Stud Stable leaves the Rhodes boys laying.

We go back to the hospital and Hogan’s lawyer has advised him to relinquish the title. He’ll get the first title shot in exchange. Hogan won’t listen of course so apparently he’ll try to wrestle. Hart and Brutus come up and say Hogan is going to do what he wants.

Flair does one of his usual ranting and screaming promos about how he wants the title handed to him by Hogan. Flair had been doing really well as the face champion but Hogan was here so they turned him into a psycho heel which made him look like an idiot, because Hogan can’t lose right?

Hogan is on his way back here. Oh joy. Heenan PANICS.

Steven Regal vs. Antonio Inoki

This is based on the idea that Inoki is having his Final Countdown retirement tour and got a plaque in WCW. Regal protested so here’s a match. I don’t think anyone really got the point of this. Inoki fires off kicks as Tony butchers the name of Rikidozan. They go to the corner and I don’t think anyone knows who Inoki is. This is a very technical/foreign style match which means it means nothing to most American fans.

Regal hits a headbutt and they go to the mat with Regal dominating. Inoki heads to the floor and Regal won’t let him back in. This is really not working at all. The fans are quiet so Tony plugs Fall Brawl a bit. Inoki grabs the arm and Hogan is back at the arena. They go to the mat for a leg lock and I really can’t tell who is in control. Bockwinkle comes out and Inoki uses a blatant choke to take over. Regal kicks away and the announcers are talking about Hogan. This has been about 90% strikes. Butterfly suplex gets two for Regal. Inoki throws on another choke and Regal is out as Heenan freaks again.

Rating: F. This isn’t wrestling. I don’t know why it happened or why Regal, the TV Champion, was choked out this fast. This didn’t work at all and no one knew who Inoki was. “But KB he’s a legend and you have to respect him.” Or I could watch people have entertaining matches and have a point to being here. Just a thought.

WCW World Title: Hulk Hogan vs. Ric Flair

Flair says give me my title. Hogan takes awhile to get there and then charges right at Flair. Now before I get into this, remember that Hogan allegedly has a severe knee injury and is fighting RIC FLAIR. Hogan takes him down and shrugs off a chop. The shirt is shoved down Flair’s throat and Hogan bites the forehead. Heenan advises Flair to go for the knee so they go to the floor where Flair chops him.

Hogan is limping a bit but other than that looks fine. Back in the ring and Hogan keeps beating on him with what appears to be the robe. Flair pokes him in the eye, snapmares him down….and goes up. Like I said, Flair was made to look like an idiot at this point. Flair is knocked to the floor again as this is a total squash so far. Up the aisle now and Flair gets beaten down some more.

The champ misses a chair shot and Flair hits some knees to the back (instead of the knee) and suplexes Hogan. Hulk is up first and drops elbows to keep momentum going. Flair Flip in the corner and he gets clotheslined to the floor. A fan tries to hit Flair with a cane. This match runs about 15 minutes. Seventeen and a half minutes in, FLAIR HITS HIM IN THE KNEE!!!

An early Figure Four attempt is countered and Flair hits a chop block. To the floor for the fifth time in about 8 minutes and there go the bandages. There’s the Figure Four (wrong leg, even Tony points this out) and after about 55 seconds, Hogan grabs Flair’s leg and shoves it off of his own. He Hulks Up and hits the big boot and legdrop but his knee gives out. Another Figure Four goes on and Hogan Hulks Up again and makes the ropes. He rolls into the ropes and Sherri, Flair’s manager, hits him with a shoe. Hulk falls to the floor and loses via countout.

Rating: F. No. No. No. NO. Flair looked like an IDIOT here and for what? To show that Hogan can’t feel pain in his knee? This was ridiculous and was nothing more than a sign of things to come. Hogan wouldn’t lose the title for over a year and Flair would look stupider and stupider every time they fought. Just pathetic.

The Masked Man comes out and they double team the knee. Another Figure Four goes on but Sting runs out for the save. Flair leaves with the belt.

Hogan is taken back to the hospital to end the show.

Overall Rating: D-. You could see the problems that would kill this company staring you right in the face here. I’ll go with this: the rumored main event for Starrcade was going to be Austin vs. Flair. Instead, we got Hogan vs. Brutus Beefcake. Foley was run off and Austin was fired for being too unpushable. Strange how that decision was arrived after Hogan got there no? 95 was just awful as it was basically the late 80s all over again and until they caught a miracle in Hall and Nash, this was a horrible long term idea. At the end of the day, WCW isn’t around anymore, so what does that tell you?

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Clash of the Champions 24
Date: August 18, 1993
Location: Ocean Center, Daytona Beach, Florida
Attendance: 8,903
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Jesse Ventura

Since I only have six of these to go in total, I think it’s time for an old fashioned marathon. I’ll knock these out as fast as I can so I’ll finally be done with this series. It’s only taken me a few years so we might as well get it done. This is from late 93 which is about as awful as WCW ever got, if you can possibly fathom that. The main event is Vader vs. Davey Boy for the title. Let’s get to it.

The opening video talks about a Flair For The Gold with the WarG……..OH MY GOODNESS IT’S THIS SHOW!!!!!!!!!!!! Oh we’ve got something VERY special coming up later on. You just wait.

Brian Pillman is injured so Steven (William) Regal is replacing him in the tag title defense.

Tag Titles: Steven Regal/Steve Austin vs. Arn Anderson/Paul Roma

Anderson vs. Austin to start. Arn’s white trunks seem to grow every year. Austin pounds him down as Jesse complains about Regal being part of the blondes now. The Horsemen take over to the audience’s delight. Austin gets launched over the top but it’s momentum or whatever. How does that even work? YOU THREW HIM OVER, so why isn’t it a DQ? They brawl to the floor for a bit and Austin brings Regal back in.

Roma, the biggest excuse ever for a Horsemen, and that includes Mongo, comes in and works on Regal’s arm. He speeds things up but Austin trips Roma (who looks a lot like Ricky Steamboat in the long white tights) to give the champs the advantage. Both guys take turns on Roma as this is going nowhere. Austin goes into the buckle but Roma doesn’t tag because he’s an idiot.

Austin gets him into the corner so Anderson, allegedly the best tag wrestler ever, tries to come in. Roma gets the required rollup but there’s no referee of course. Roma hits Austin’s Stun Gun and both guys are down. Regal breaks up a tag and we get the “face makes a tag but it doesn’t count so the heels change without one and it does count” deal. Roma gets a dropkick and there’s the tag to Anderson. The place ERUPTS too. Everything breaks down and a miscue by Regal’s manager lets Arn grab a rollup for the pin and the titles.

Rating: C-. This was already better than any match on the previous Clash. Austin would go on and start a US Title feud in a few months while the Horsemen faded away. This was during the Disney Tapings era, so the Nasty Boys had already been filmed as champions. The titles would change at Fall Brawl, which is another reason why this was an awful time for the company. They would tape MONTHS worth of shows in advance and that was it. All the mystery was gone and no one gave an effort because of it, which is stupid. Imagine if that had happened to Punk in 2011.

2 Cold Scorpio vs. Bobby Eaton

This should be SWEET. On top of that we get the Midnight Express theme. Scorpio is one of my old favorites and he’s young and awesome at this point. Eaton is heel here I guess. Scorpio gets a nice spinning sunset flip for two but Eaton clotheslines him down. Scorpio runs the corner and hits a top rope cross body and grabs an armbar. A regular cross body misses and Bobby takes over.

Eaton hooks a hammerlock down onto the mat. This hasn’t exactly been the high flying spectacle I was expecting. Even Jesse points out that this isn’t what he expected. Scorpio counters and sets him into a superplex position. Instead of using that though, while standing on the top he jumps up and dropkicks Eaton to the floor and adds a plancha. Cool sequence. Eaton hits a neckbreaker back inside to take over. Top rope elbow (why not the Alabama Jam?) gets two. And never mind as Scorpio takes him down and the 450 (called a 360 by Tony) sends both knees into Eaton’s chest for the pin.

Rating: C. I love Scorpio so I’m not going to complain much about this. Good match I guess but they didn’t really hit a level that I was expecting. To be fair though Eaton was just a jobber to the stars and the match wasn’t bad or anything. Just kind of disappointing I guess. Scorpio would get a two week tag title reign later in the year.

Max Payne vs. Johnny B. Badd

Payne stole the Badd Blaster (a confetti cannon) and shot Badd in the face with it so Badd’s face is burned and he’s wearing a mask. This is mask vs. Norma Jean, which is what Max calls his guitar. Max jumps him and drops an elbow into the boas. Jesse: “Right into the boas Tony!” Johnny fires back with punches but the cross body is ducked. This is power vs. speed.

Payne rips off the mask but Badd is wearing another one. Tony’s total lack of shock kills the surprise. There’s a hammerlock slam which is supposed to set up his Fujiwara Armbar finisher but Badd escapes with a small package. Well he did say he used steroids didn’t he? Payne misses a middle rope splash and Badd steals the pin. Well that was nothing. Too short to rate.

Badd says he’s going to unmask on Saturday Night. He’d look the same.

It’s time for A Flair For The Gold, which is Flair’s talk show. THIS IS IT!!! This has an actual set which looks like a living room. Flair comes in through the door and has Fifi his French maid walk around a bit. He brings out his guests, Sting and the British Bulldog. They’re here to talk about WarGames and the place is WAY into this. Flair was a face at this point and was as popular as he’d been in the 90s.

Sid and Harlem Heat, three of the four opponents for WarGames show up. They want to know who the mystery partner is. Sting says the line of “prepare to be shocked, because our partner is none other than THE SHOCKMASTER!”

And here it is: the absolute dumbest, stupidest, worst and completely lowest point for WCW. An explosion goes off (remember this is LIVE) and a wall bursts open. Shockmaster falls over part of the wall, knocking off his glittery Stormtrooper helmet. He tries as hard as he can to put it back on (after revealing to anyone paying attention that he’s Tugboat/Typhoon from WWF, making him a total failure anyway) and finally gets back on his feet.

The whole segment is a total joke now as the fans don’t know what to make of this. Bulldog and Harlem Heat are dying of laughter and try to hide it but you can here the covered laughter very clearly. Shockmaster finally gets it together and with Ole Anderson providing the voice, he says Sid has ruled the world long enough and asks if Sid wants a piece of him. Now keep in mind the voice: he sounds like a cross between a really bad Power Rangers villain and the Cave of Wonders from Aladdin. On top of that, he says Dusty Rhodes will be on their team in WarGames. It would actually be DUSTIN, not Dusty. And it’s over.

I mean WOW. What people seem to overlook is how bad this was going to be no matter what. Answer this: what exactly is a Shockmaster? It sounds like a static electricity prevention thing you would see in a store labeled As Seen On TV. Second, it’s Fred Ottman under the mask. When did anyone ever see the “Sailing Superstar” and think this guy deserved a huge push? Third, it’s a glitter covered Star Wars helmet. Just add all this up and think about how bad it would have been WITHOUT the famous part. Now add that in and look at what you have. My goodness it’s amazing that they stayed in business.

TV Title: Ricky Steamboat vs. Paul Orndorff

Orndorff is champion. Tony and Jesse crack up laughing about what we just saw. This gets big match intros too. Interesting trivia note: the TV Title is the belt that would become the Cruiserweight Title but with a different nameplate. And there go the lights. It looks like a late 80s show now with most of the crowd being covered in darkness. Feeling out process to start as they fight over a top wristlock. Steamboat bridges out of it and that looked AWESOME.

Steamboat misses a dive and lands on the ramp where Paul takes over. A top rope elbow to the head gets two. A slam gets a bunch of two counts and it’s the second chinlock of the match so far. We hear about Flair vs. Sting for the NWA Title this coming Saturday night which is almost an afterthought here. Steamboat sends him into the buckle and a top rope chop gets two, as does a regular one.

A big chop sends Orndorff to the floor but again it’s not a DQ. Steamboat busts out a huge dive which gets a nice reaction. Ten years later it would have gotten a huge pop. Orndorff tries a bunch of covers and Jesse hands him the TV Title for some reason. He drops it and tries the piledriver but Steamboat reverses and here’s a sweet pinfall reversal sequence. Top rope cross body is rolled through for two. Orndorff tries to slam Steamboat and apparently he never watched Mania III because in the same ending, Steamboat rolls through into a cradle for the pin and the title.

Rating: C. Eh not bad here but slower paced than most would like. It could have been a lot worse though, which is the right idea. Steamboat was in the role of veteran that people really respected and could still pull out a good match when asked to, namely due to pure raw talent. Good match but nothing great. At least it got the title off Orndorff though.

Orndorff piledrives him on the belt on the ramp post match.

Harley Race and the Kongs (two very fat guys in masks who were worthless) say that they’re coming for Flair and Sting.

Sting/Ric Flair vs. Colossal Kongs

Sting clears house on his own, easily slamming both guys like it’s nothing. Race freaks out, shouting about how it’s impossible. It’s a big brawl and Flair goes to the floor with one of them. Sting casually beats one of them up, hits the Stinger Splash and a top rope splash for the pin as Flair beats up Race. Total and complete domination.

Sting and Flair say they’ll renew their feud on Saturday for the title.

Rick Rude/The Equalizer vs. Dustin Rhodes/???

It’s a mystery partner. This feud has gone on for about 5 months now and has yet to get interesting. It’s mainly Rude vs. Rhodes but Rude brought in the Equalizer to equalize things. He’s more famous as Dave Evad Sullivan and is AWFUL. Rhodes’ partner is going to come out in some car that the fans can win. And it’s Road Warrior Animal. Rude panics and yells at him as Hawk comes up from behind. He’s the real partner. Not exactly a point to the switch but whatever.

The fans are fired up and it’s Hawk vs. Rude to start us off. They go to a test of strength which Hawk easily wins. Off to Equalizer who gets dropkicked to the floor almost immediately. Hawk tries his neckbreaker and Equalizer falls down, drawing some laughter from the crowd. Rude comes back in and we hit the chinlock but Hawk counters into an electric chair position for a Doomsday Device with Dustin playing Hawk.

Rude beats Dustin down and swivels at Hawk. Some heel miscommunication allows the tag to Hawk and it doesn’t count for no apparent reason. Hawk launches Rude at Equalizer and everything breaks down. As the referee is putting Rude out, Equalizer goes to slam Dustin. Hawk comes off the top to shoulder block both of them down and Dustin gets the pin.

Rating: D. Pretty boring match here and I really don’t get what Hawk adds to anything here. To be fair though, it’s not like he ever meant anything after about 1991 anyway. Not a terrible match but they needed something more interesting than Dustin vs. Rude. The US Title would FINALLY go to Dustin soon after this.

WCW World Title: Davey Boy Smith vs. Vader

Buffer says the DQ rule is waved, but doesn’t mention that he means if Vader gets disqualified he loses the title. Also note that this is the WCW Title and not the NWA World Title. They would be unified next year thank goodness. Race is Vader’s manager. After a break they get into it on the ramp with Bulldog being clotheslined down. Smith shows off INSANE power with a delayed vertical out there.

We go back into the ring but Smith’s slingshot splash gets knees. They go to the floor quickly and Vader accidentally splashes the railing ala Sting. A slam gets two back inside. Vader slows things down and goes after the knee. Samoan Drop puts Smith down and a moonsault misses. Smith gets a sunset flip for two. A splash onto the back puts Smith down and he’s in trouble.

Time for a chinlock to eat up a few moments. Davey manages to come back and hooks a crucifix, which was one of his finishers but it only gets two here. Vader pounds him down in the corner and goes up again, only to get crotched. Back inside it’s Davey’s turn to pound him down. Vader gets in a boot though and the Vader Bomb gets two. The champ comes off the top but jumps into the powerslam, knocking down the referee in the process. Smith tries another powerslam but Race pulls the leg and Vader falls on top for the pin.

Rating: C-. Decent power match but I wasn’t thrilled with it. Smith’s style wasn’t all that great to mesh with Vader’s. It took someone with more speed or just an all out brawler for that to work, and it really didn’t click here. Still though, this was a decent main event, but the lack of star power really hurt things.

Cactus Jack makes his return with 15 seconds left and takes Vader down. The reaction is there but the time isn’t so we’re done.

Overall Rating: D. Not their best work but you have a classic comedy moment to check out so it’s worth something for that. This era was just awful for the company but brighter days were coming soon. The problem in short was that the stories just weren’t interesting and the two titles were a bad idea at this point. To be fair though, a lot of that can be blamed on the NWA. Not the worst show ever, but other than Shockmaster it’s not worth watching.

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Clash of the Champions 5: St. Valentine’s Day Massacre
Date: February 15, 1989
Location: CSU Convocation Center, Cleveland, Ohio
Attendance: 5,000
Commentators: Jim Ross, Magnum TA

I was going to do a WCW Saturday Night but it was partially cut off so I took it off my list and you get this instead. This is a buildup show to Chi-Town Rumble which means that other than the world title match, there isn’t much to build up to. The main event is for the six man titles, which actually did exist.  There’s probably a reason you’re not familiar with them though.  Let’s get to it.

Steamboat is ready for tonight.

Magnum and Jim talk about the US Tag Title match, which is under Freebird Rules. The main event is Sting/JYD/Michael Hayes vs. the LOD/Tenryu for the six man titles.

Midnight Express vs. Russian Assassins

We hear the director tell the announcer to talk. The Russians combine to weigh 288lbs. I don’t think that’s correct. If nothing else we get to hear the Express’ music which is still awesome. Lane starts with let’s say #1. One of them is Jack Victory and the other is Angel of Death. JR says that Russian #1 weighs 330lbs, kind of disproving the combined 288. Lane fires off his kicks and it’s quickly off to Bobby for some arm work.

And here’s a random kid in the crowd wearing sunglasses. The cameramen in this era had some odd tendencies to jump around like that. Off to Lane vs. #2 and we look at more fans. Bobby is already back in and they’re tagging very fast. Lane is back in and we get an inset promo from Paul E about the Midnight Express vs. Midnight Express match on Monday at the PPV.

Bobby escapes the heel corner and Paul jumps in on commentary. Well in theory he does as JR introduced him but there’s no Dangerously. Cornette and the Russian manager Paul Jones almost get into a fight. Ok now Dangerously is here. He talks about his game plan which is to speed things up. Cornette BLASTS an Assassin with the tennis racket and dances a bit.

Lane beats up #2 and the Assassins hit the floor for a powwow. They switch on the floor because they’re Russians and therefore evil. Lane is playing Ricky Morton here which is ironic if nothing else. Off to a bearhug by let’s say #1. #2 comes in and hooks a snap suplex and a bearhug of his own. Why is that such a Russian move? The Assassin looks like he’s resting his head on Lane’s chest.

Stan escapes and misses something that looked like a front flip attack into the corner. Cross body gets one on the Assassin. The other one comes in as Lane stays on defense. A Russian misses something and everything breaks down. There’s the tag to Eaton and he manages to hit the Rocket Launcher for the pin on we’ll say #2.

Rating: D+. Long and not all that good. The Midnigts were awesome but this wasn’t their best year. The match was a bit longer than they needed, but this is a two and a half hour show so they needed to fill in the time somehow. That would become very evil in the next match. Be afraid as well as warned.

Ricky Steamboat says he’s back in the NWA to fight for America and the family way against bad stuff like drugs. O…..k. He’s having a tuneup match tonight. We get a clip from a Flair vs. Steamboat brawl. Steamboat wins and rips Flair’s clothes off.

Steven Casey vs. Butch Reed

Casey is an NWA career jobber that never did anything. Reed appears to be popular here but I don’t remember him ever being a face. Casey takes over to start with some speed stuff and hooks an armbar. While he does let it go a bit, he goes back to it over and over again. After about two minutes it’s broken and let’s look at the crowd. Reed stalls and here’s another fan. Then Reed stalls again. Now Reed works on the arm to mix things up a bit.

Casey is undefeated. Good for him. Now he reverses into an armbar of his own. This is looking like a LONG one people. Reed fights up, gets punched down, and it’s an armbar again. Butch goes to the floor and now it’s time for a test of strength. Casey, a blonde idiot, accepts the challenge against a guy who was billed as one of the strongest in the NWA. Casey goes down but eventually counters into, you guessed it, the armbar.

Ok this is something I talk about a lot but usually the opposite. There are a lot of people that work on limbs because it’s a very basic psychology move. The key thing though is that interesting guys mix up their attacks. Casey, a guy that had about two matches in his televised career that people can find, both of which are loses to bigger names on COTCs, is doing the same thing over and over again and it’s REALLY boring. It’s so simple yet a lot of people don’t get it.

Reed pounds him down and here’s a chinlock for some excitement. Casey gets up (finally) and tries to speed things up but he gets sent to the floor to slow things down again. A dropkick by Casey misses so let’s look at the fans again….AND BACK TO THE CHINLOCK. Reed puts a foot on the rope (the bottom one) but it doesn’t really add anything here. This is supposed to be building up Reed for Sting at the PPV. I really don’t want to see that match now so that’s a failure so far.

Casey fights back and even his punches in the corner are boring. A monkey flip puts Reed down and there are a pair of dropkicks. Reed grabs a gorilla press and again he slows things down. Dude, JUST GET IT OVER WITH ALREADY. And then he finally does with a top rope shoulder block for the pin at SEVENTEEN AND A HALF MINUTES. I’ve seen world title matches at Wrestlemania that didn’t go that long!

Rating: S. Seventeen and a half minutes for what can only be called a squash. Seriously, that’s what this was. Casey was a jobber (arguably to the stars) and he got almost twenty minutes to get beaten up by Reed. You know, other than those times where he unleashed the power of the armbar. Just awful and let this be a lesson to you: just because a match goes long, it does NOT mean it was good.

Here’s Flair and the army of women. He talks about how he’ll keep the title because he’s the champ and gets whatever he wants. Flair is in a fur coat and has the girls show off a bit. It’s the best thing going today don’t you know. He calls out Steamboat (sign of the times: you can barely understand him because the equipment isn’t that great) and here he is. Flair shows off the women and makes fun of Steamboat for being with the same woman every night.

Steamboat says he despises everything that Flair stands for and how he represents the NWA. Flair brags about all of his stuff like his suit and coat. Flair says go home and help the wife with the dishes and it’s on. Steamboat rips the clothes off again as Bob Caudle just kind of stands around. Why does Flair always wind up in just his underwear? Is it a running rib that I just don’t get? This eats up a few minutes. Hiro Matsuda, Flair’s manager, helps but Steamboat fights them off and they brawl into the crowd. Man those are loud chops. Steamboat wins and puts on Flair’s suit.

Lex Luger vs. The Blackmailer

It’s Jack Victory in another mask. Luger gets a US Title shot at the PPV and get it for the second time. That isn’t his huge 19 month reign though. He would lose the belt and win it back 15 days later. Can you tell I’m trying to fill space before we get to this? Is the Blackmailer really the best name they can come up with? Doesn’t he need to have blackmail on someone for that whole idea to work? Luger throws him around with raw power to start and here’s a fan. Seriously, what is the deal with that?

They exchange headlocks and Lex looks bored. A shoulder puts Blackmailer on the floor. Matsuda is here as well to try to scout Luger or something. Belly to belly takes down Luger but he pops right back up. For a change of pace, here’s a headlock on the mat. Powerslam puts Blackmailer down. This is just DRAGGING. Back to the headlock instead of a cover or going for a finish.

Lex gets clotheslined to the floor and this is done. I don’t mean it’s a DQ but this is just not going to recover and the show is officially done. There’s nothing left they can do to get a show out of it worth anything. Naturally, we have almost an hour to go. Blackmailer stomps him off the apron and MY GOODNESS JUST GET TO THE ENDING ALREADY!!! A sunset flip for Lex gets two and Blackmailer beats him down again.

Time for MORE CHINLOCKS. I know Victory has already had a nearly 15 minute tag match and now this but hey, MAYBE YOU SHOULD HAVE GOTTEN SOMEONE ELSE TO BE IN THIS MATCH. Lex finally fights out of it with a suplex and Hulks Up. After hitting basic power stuff, Barry Windham’s (the US Champion) superplex gets the pin.

Rating: F. I just got done watching my Cowboys lose to the Giants and now I get to see this? This was another thirteen minutes of this show that just will not go away and die like it needs to do. There’s just nothing here at all and the show should have ended a few hours ago, but here it is, still going.

Rick Steiner, who is a bit crazy and TV Champion, talks about his rematch with Rotundo at the PPV. Alex, a face drawn on his hand, will have his back.

US Tag Titles: Varsity Club vs. Fantastics

Williams and Sullivan are the champions but Rotundo is taking Sullivan’s place because he can. I’ve always liked the Fantastics so maybe this can get things going a tiny bit. Rotundo vs. Rodgers to start us off. And now let’s stall a lot. Here are more fans for those of you watching for them. Rotundo rides him on the mat for awhile and we hear that the Varsity Club wants to win by submission. Ok then.

Rodgers grabs a headlock and a clothesline gets two. Off to Williams who as I’ve explained is kind of the Brock Lesnar of his day. The Fantastics double team him with a double dropkick until it’s off to just Fulton. Williams easily takes him to the mat and hooks a chinlock, the move of the night. Rick Steiner in an inset interview says that he’ll be ready for Rotundo in Chicago. Steiner would lose the title, but he’d start a little tag team to fill in his time after that.

Back to….the fans. Rotundo is back in…and never mind he’s back out again. Rodgers’ dropkick is no sold and Williams mauls him a bit. Fulton pounds on Rotundo in the corner a bit but Williams shoves him to the floor. We get the classic referee misses the tag spot so Williams can keep beating on him even more. Williams does his always awesome gorilla press spot, where he lifts Fulton up a bunch of times in a row.

Oklahoma Stampede, Williams’ running powerslam out of the corner, is blocked and there’s the hot tag to Rodgers. He hits a middle rope fist and Williams is in a little bit of trouble. Everything breaks down and Fulton comes back in illegally. Rodgers hits a top rope cross body but Rotundo gets in a shot to the back of Rodgers for the cheating pin.

Rating: D. This was BY FAR the best match of the night so far and even it was pretty bad. The Fantastics were in over their heads will Williams who was just a machine at this point. The Club was almost done at this point but they were still a pretty solid force. Anyway though, not much here, although way better than anything else on the show up to this point.

Bob Bradley vs. Ricky Steamboat

Bradley is only somewhat known as Battle Kat from WWF. He was a weird flying guy but really bad and in a mask that would make a six year old’s work look great by comparison. Ricky’s wife and kid are here with him so I wonder how it’ll go. Steamboat knocks him to the floor with his chops and punches but Bradley gets a few slams to take over. The fans want Flair.

Bradley goes to the floor and gets in some more shots. This is going NOWHERE at all. Bradley is nothing new at all and is as generic as they come. He goes into the middle buckle and it’s off to the armbar. Here’s a not very good looking blonde in the crowd. She has nothing to do with this but we see her anyway. After a bunch of armbars, Bradley misses a top rope splash and the top rope cross body ends this.

Rating: D. Another dull match that was just another squash but at least this one was only a few minutes long as opposed to going on forever. Flair of course would win the title from Flair on Monday, but would only hold the belt for about two and a half months. That’s often forgotten: he barely had the title for long at all before Flair got it back.

Rip Morgan vs. Rick Steiner

Steiner is the TV Champion but this is non-title. Morgan’s thing is he’s from New Zealand and he used to work for the Sheepherders. Both guys are insane so this is going to be, uh, different. Rotundo says he was embarrassed by Steiner but he’ll get the title back on Monday. That’s true. Morgan pounds away to start but Steiner drills him to take over. And now let’s stall.

Morgan takes his time getting back inside the ring and fires off some knees in the corner. They ram heads and Rick loses some more. A powerslam by Steiner gets two. JR tells us AGAIN that this company has been around since 1905 and we wrestle here. First of all, it was 1948. Second of all, WHAT ELSE WOULD THIS BE??? THE COMPANY IS THE NATIONAL WRESTLING ALLIANCE. WERE YOU EXPECTING A BOWLING TOURNAMENT??? Morgan hooks a chinlock but misses a splash. Steiner fights back with basic stuff and the belly to belly ends this.

Rating: D. I know I’ve used that a lot, but my goodness this has been horrible. This show has just gone on and on and on. This was the shortest match of the night, running only about 5 minutes, but it was still another dull match that doesn’t make me want to see the matches on Monday or anything like that. At least it’s over soon.

The Six Man Title challengers are very fired up and all of them (two of them former Mid-South guys) say they’ll win. They go into a caged area and Kevin Sullivan pops up to lock them in.

Since they’re still caged in and no one in Cleveland have bolt cutters, here are the replacements.

Six Man Tag Titles: Road Warriors/Genichiro Tenryu vs. Varsity Club

Yep it’s a bait and switch main event. Big brawl to start and for some reason they’re on a wide shot. Oh ok so it’s we can watch the original challengers try to get out of the caged stairs. Everyone in this is a heel. Well in theory that is. No one knows Tenryu and and the Warriors are still popular anyway. Tenryu gets beaten down for a bit and it’s off to Williams vs. Hawk.

We’re literally on our 5th shot of the three guys trying to get out. Oh hey they did. Animal gets his arm worked on for a long time as the other three (Hayes/JYD/Sting if you’ve forgotten) aren’t here yet. Hawk’s tag isn’t seen and I have no idea if they’re good guys or bad guys. The original challengers FINALLY get here and it’s thrown out.

Rating: F. No point, no thought, no caring from me.

A huge brawl ends the show.

Overall Rating: F. This show ran two and a half hours. You could pretty easily have fit everything into about 40% of that and it would have been fine. I’ve watched about 30 Clashes now and this is BY FAR the worst one. There’s no point in most of this and these matches didn’t make me want to watch Chi-Town Rumble at all. It was a good show too, which makes this show all the worse. Absolutely horrible show and I need a stiff drink.

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Clash of the Champions 11: Coastal Crush
Date: June 13, 1990
Location: McAlister Field House, Charleston, South, Carolina
Attendance: 4,100
Commentators: Jim Ross, Bob Caudle

This is right before the Great American Bash which is where Sting grabbed thr brass ring and got his first world title. The main event is Junkyard Dog vs. Flair and I have no idea why. Anyway, this is mainly a nothing show, but we also get some Steiners vs. Doom awesomeness so I can’t complain there. Let’s get to it.

The Southern Boys say they’re ready for the Freebirds.

The Birds respond by singing their own theme music.

Southern Boys vs. Freebirds

This is the Southern Boys’ (Steve Armstrong and Tracy Smothers) national debut. The Birds jump them which doesn’t work out all that well for them. Smothers and Garvin officially start us off. Smothers gets beaten down in the corner but breaks through and draws the Birds in for Steve to hit a top rope cross body to take them both out. Things settle down a bit and Garvin takes over on Armstrong.

Back to Hayes who works over the arm. This is a pretty basic match so far but nothing has been all that bad. Elbow gets two for Hayes and it’s back to the arm. The arena they’re in is on the campus on the Citadel whose coach won some award the day of this show so it’s nice timing. In other words, there’s not much to talk about here so I’m repeating what JR says. Armstrong finally breaks through to make a tag to Smothers and he cleans house. Everything breaks down and Garvin covers Smothers but Steve comes off the top with a flying headbutt and puts Tracy on top for the big upset.

Rating: C+. Great example here of what you do to start a show. They had a fast paced match with a hot ending and that’s all you need to do to start a show. I enjoyed it, even though there wasn’t much to it. That being said, at times that’s all you need to do and it was a very fine opener.

Tommy Rich vs. Bam Bam Bigelow

Bigelow looks strange sleeveless. Rich hammers away to start but runs into the size and power game. Tommy, who used to be world champion while Bigelow never war, works on the arm and gets a rollup for one. Bam Bam just goes off, tossing Rich all over the place and then choking past five for the DQ. Bigelow wasn’t in WCW long if I remember right.

Rating: D-. This was pretty much nothing but a way for Bigelow to look dominant. I don’t remember him in 1990 at all and I know he wasn’t on most of the PPVs later in the year at all. I’ve checked and this and Capital Combat were the only two major shows he was on all year. It was an NWA/Japan thing so he went to Japan for good for a few years until he went back to the WWF in late 92.

A man is coming. His name is Vader. He’ll debut at the Bash.

This guy will be as well: El Gigante. He has an interview with Gary Michael Capetta of all people. It’s in Spanish because Gigante can’t speak much English. I speak enough Spanish to understand it but thankfully they translate it.

Samoan Swat Team vs. Mike Rotunda/Z-Man

Rotunda is Captain Mike here which is post Varsity Club for him. The Swat Team is Fatu and Samoan Savage, who is better known as Tama from the Islanders. Rotunda vs. Fatu gets us going and the Samoan is knocked to the floor. Off to Z-Man who dropkicks Fatu to the floor again. Back to Rotundo who gets a cross body for two. The Samoans cheat to take over. Oddly enough they don’t have a manager which is rare for the wild savages.

Rotunda gets caught and beaten down. By the way, changing the last letter of his name is intentional. You’ll hear it as either depending on what year it is. Nerve hold goes on and Bob Caudle says it’s like hitting a mule in the head with a 2×4. Can someone call PETA? Rotundo gets beaten down on the floor but comes back with a double clothesline to take over. Z-Man comes in and misses most of the kicks that are sold anyway. Savage hits a Vader Bomb but the faces switch (WHAT?) and Rotunda steals a small package win.

Rating: D+. I’m in awe over that ending. One: Rotunda has shorter hair. Two: He’s in black, Z-Man was in white. Three: They don’t look alike. Four: FATU LOOKED STRAIGHT AT HIM FOR THREE SECONDS. The match was ok other than that though, and it was fine for the spot it had on here which was just a five and a half minute filler.

Video on Mean Mark.

Mean Mark vs. Brian Pillman

For those of you unfamiliar with Mark, I’ll save his reveal to the end of the match. Mark has Dangerously with him and jumps Pillman to start. He’s a big monster and that’s about the extent of his character. Oh and he’s mean. Pillman tries to use speed but Mark just kicks him down like he’s nothing. Crucifix doesn’t work at all and Mark stomps away. Off to a chinlock and Mark is so new he can’t even do that right. An elbow in the corner misses but Brian can’t get anything going. Mark knocks him to the apron but he skins the cat and hits a missile dropkick. And then they botch the ending off an Irish whip so Mark hot shots him for the pin.

Rating: D. Boring match here but it set up Mark for his US Title shot at the Bash. His finisher was the Heart Punch which is exactly what it sounds like. Mark would only appear like 5 times in the NWA before his final appearance at the Bash. He would be in the WWF in November as an unhurtable monster called Kane. That was just his first name. His occupation was an undertaker. He soon dropped the first name and just went by his job title.

US Tag Titles: Rock N Roll Express vs. Midnight Express

The Midnights have the belts. That Midnight song is just AWESOME. Eaton vs. Gibson to get us started. These two teams probably wrestled about a thousand times so they’ll have a decent match just by muscle memory. The problem here is that they’re getting old which makes that a little bit harder. They spend a few minutes working on getting to a lockup. Off to Lane who does a little better with his kicks.

Gibson kicks him in the head to knock him back down. Off to Morton and my goodness the hair gel bills in this match could bankrupt a small country. These two are called the cream of the crop by JR and I can’t say I agree. They’re moving fast here but somehow it’s still in first gear. Nothing here is anything interesting at all. Morton finally gets a rana to speed things up but the Midnights have a meeting instead of keeping things going.

Off to Eaton but Morton escapes the corner again and grabs the arm again. The Midnights can’t get anything going here. Morton tries another armdrag but Bobby punches him down to finally give the Midnights the advantage. Morton counters a superplex in mid-air but Lane breaks up a rollup. Everything breaks down and the challengers hit stereo rollups for stereo twos.

Things slow down again and Eaton hits a suplex to Morton before bringing Lane back in. Off to Eaton quickly but he misses a charge in the corner and Gibson comes in for probably the last tag of the match for his team. Morton and Eaton go to the floor as Gibson goes after the legs. Off to a sleeper instead but Bobby breaks it up which gets two for Eaton. Everything breaks down again and the double dropkick takes Eaton down. Lane breaks the cover up….and that’s a DQ. Seriously?

Rating: C. This was one of the weakest Express Collisions I’ve seen in a very long time. Granted it probably had a lot to do with them getting later into their mainstream careers. Not much to see here but the Midnights would lose the titles soon and they would be retired before too long, which was probably the right idea.

Doug Furnas vs. Barry Windham

Furnas is billed as the World’s Strongest Man. Windham is a Horseman. Furnas runs Barry down and JR is talking about football. Sunset flip gets two for Doug and Barry bails. Furnas kind of botches a backflip off the top and doesn’t quite get Barry up for a gorilla press. Clothesline gets two. Barry gets his knee up and takes Doug’s head off with a clothesline. JR can’t stop praising Furnas to get on to the match. Powerslam gets two for Furnas. They hit the ropes for a bit and Barry grabs a belly to back and puts his feet on the ropes for the pin.

Rating: C-. Decent power match here but nothing too great. Furnas went to Japan soon after this so he didn’t mean all that much. Windham was a Horseman for a few more years but mainly did tag team stuff. He has a really forgettable career around this time actually. Not much here but it was ok.

Sid (after being told to go by the director) says he’ll take out Luger.

Lex Luger vs. Sid Vicious

Sid jumps him to start and but Lex hits a clothesline and pins him in like 20 seconds.

World Tag Titles: Steiner Brothers vs. Doom

The Steiners had been unstoppable but Doom had shocked the world and won the titles at a PPV called Capital Combat. Doom has the old Ron Simmons’ music which is still awesome. The masks are gone too. Ron vs. Scott gets us going. Scott busts out something I’ve never seen before: a floatover fallaway slam. It isn’t really falling away either as he doesn’t let go. Both Doomers take one and the ring is cleared.

A Steiner Line to the back of the head puts Simmons down and it’s off to Reed. Scott throws him around too. I can easily see why they were thinking he was the heir apparent to the world title here. You know, except for the whole Sting guy. Rick comes in now but Nick Patrick gets in the way and Ron gets in a right hand. Rick is like cool man and hits a belly to belly to send Ron flying.

Now it’s Rick’s turn to beat up Doom on his own. Reed FINALLY goes to the eyes to take over. They go back to the Doom corner and Rick fights back out of it with ease. On the floor Doom gets it together and takes Rick down via a clothesline. Simmons beats on Rick back inside and you can really tell that Doom isn’t that experienced yet. While Scott is with the referee Rick gets tossed to the floor. Reed comes in and drops a middle rope elbow for two.

Reed misses a running knee into the corner and Rick hits a double axe off the middle rope. Back to Scott and things speed way up again. Everything breaks down and Teddy throws in a foreign object. Scott takes Simmons down with a superplex but Reed clocks him with the object. Rick covers Simmons at the same time and it’s a double pin, but Scott was legal so Doom wins it.

Rating: C. These two could have good matches every time they went out there and this worked well enough. Doom would hold the titles longer than any team in the history of WCW, now losing them until February of the next year to the Freebirds who lost them to the Steiners before they won them from Doom. And yes that’s accurate.

JYD says he’ll win.

Paul Orndorff says he’ll beat Anderson.

Paul Orndorff vs. Arn Anderson

I don’t remember Orndorff around this time at all. He’s a face and Anderson is by definition a Horseman. Anderson is TV Champion but this is non-title. Slow start with Paul working on a headlock. Make that a sleeper. Now it’s a figure four. You know that’s going to get a pop in the south. After the leg is slammed into the post, Anderson hooks the spinebuster to break the momentum.

Orndorff gets a sunset flip and pulls the trunks down which thankfully is on a different camera side. Off to an abdominal stretch. Arn finally gets caught grabbing the ropes and we go to a chinlock instead. Orndorff comes back with punches and things speed up a bit. It’s still not all that interesting though. Anderson gets the knees up but Orndorff reverses a small package for the pin.

Rating: D. Just a dull match here but I’ve never liked Orndoff’s stuff at all. Well his stuff with Hogan was good but his WCW stuff always bored me. I think it’s more that he had one incredible feud and that was about it for him. Boring match and Orndorff never got the title I don’t think.

The Horsemen say that they’ll win the main event tonight and Flair will keep the title. This was pretty rambling though.

NWA World Title: Junkyard Dog vs. Ric Flair

JYD gets a full jazz band intro. He takes Flair down with a right hand and is trying to keep this basic, which is probably smart for someone of his intellect. There the on all fours headbutt. A punch puts Flair on the ramp and we get a Flair Flop. Back in a few chops are no sold. A punch in the corner gets the same result. Now a knee drop is no sold. Ok we get it: he has a hard head.

Now they stand around for awhile because that’s been done a few times already in this match, so let’s do it again. Dog punches him again and there’s Flair Flop #2. Ole distracts the referee so Flair hits JYD in the head with a chair. Guess how much it’s sold. The answer would be NONE. Flair jumps into a punch and this is really quite bad. Flair hits a knee to the back…and then gets slammed off the top. He pounds away and the Horsemen run in for the DQ.

Rating: F+. This was just bad. I have no idea what the point in making JYD look so strong was but it didn’t really work at all. Flair didn’t get anything more than a few chops here and there and it made him look awful. This didn’t work at all and the champ looked like a joke. He would lose the title in a few weeks, but man at least make him look strong beforehand.

Sting and his boys clear the ring and Sting stalks Flair to the back.

After a break, Rocky King yells about the Horsemen. Thankfully someone intelligent sounding (Sting) talks quickly and says he wants Flair. Their title match hadn’t been announced yet. He suggests the Bash for the shot and says he’ll beg if he has to. The Horsemen come back and it winds up being Sting vs. Flair in the ring as everyone else is held back. Sting pounds on Flair as the credits roll.

Overall Rating: C-. Not the best show ever but I’ve seen a lot worse. The problem is that the wrestling is ok, but it’s not really interesting. You had a bunch of matches on here that ran about five minutes and that really isn’t enough to get some interest going for things. This didn’t really set up the Bash. Almost all of these people were on the PPV but their matches weren’t announced here. Not much to see but it’s nothing horrible.

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Monday Nitro #23
Date: February 5, 1996
Location: Jenkins Center, Lakeland, Florida
Commentators: Eric Bischoff, Bobby Heenan, Steve McMichael

We’re FINALLY at the go home show for Superbrawl which would turn out to be an absolute disaster. Anyway this on paper looks like a decent card but I’m not completely sold yet. These Nitros are so hit or miss that it’s unreal. Anyway this should be ok and if nothing else we don’t have to hear about how awesome Superbrawl will be after this so let’s get to it.

By the way this is around the time when they started the overrun so these shows are going to get a bit longer.

Eric and company run down the card for tonight and talk about Hogan a lot. His eye injury is the main topic of discussion of course.

WCW World Title: Chris Benoit vs. Randy Savage

Yes please. Benoit is a Horseman here which is why he’s getting this show. He’s not well liked at all due to said affiliation and has zero chance of winning here but this should be fun either way. Please give them some time? Big pop for Savage as this is more or less his hometown. He has Woman and Liz here with him. Guess what would happen with them at the PPV. Just guess.

Now let’s make fun of WWF for a bit. Have to take care of that no? Benoit holds up the four fingers at Savage and the crowd doesn’t seem to care. Benoit was known as a guy with talent but he hadn’t proven a thing yet so this isn’t a real challenge. He takes over though and sends Savage to the floor. This was also normal though as Savage’s style consisted of 1. Get beaten up. 2. Get beaten up a lot more. 3. Elbow. 4. Win. That was how most Savage matches went for a few years including here. Well maybe not the last two but you get the point.

Savage can’t get anything going and Benoit chops away in the corner. There’s the snap suplex as Eric says that historically Superbrawl is one of the biggest PPVs in history. Swan Dive hits as this has been ALL Benoit. Benoit works on the back as apparently he isn’t trying to win so he can wear Savage down for Flair on Sunday.

Out to the floor goes Savage and Benoit tries a suicide dive to the floor but goes short and slams his head onto the foot of the railing. Sick SICK shot and totally legit it seems. Flair runs out to try to give Benoit a chance to remember what planet he’s on. Flair and Anderson beat down Savage for the DQ. Woman also turns heel and beats him up. Hogan makes the save with a chair.

Rating: B-. Given what they had here, this worked rather well. Savage is beaten down for the PPV and Woman turned heel. That spot with Benoit had to be at least partially botch as even Benoit isn’t crazy enough to do that on purpose. Pretty good TV match and always good to see Benoit get a chance to shine.

Savage is helped out so Hogan gets to talk now! The crowd is about 60/40 for Hogan here. Flair sneaks up on Hogan and hits him low. Liz can only watch. Flair goes after the bad eye as Giant comes out. BIG chair shot and Zodiac stops Giant for some reason. Savage comes back out for the save. Randy yells at Liz, asking why didn’t you warn Hogan. That’s a very good question. If you didn’t get it, Liz would turn on Savage at the PPV.

Kevin Sullivan/Hugh Morrus vs. Arn Anderson/Brian Pillman

Before the match we get a clip of their brawl the previous week. Sweet goodness I could listen to that Horsemen music for a long time. Bell rings after a break with Morrus vs. Pillman. I think this is Pillman’s last Nitro. Bischoff points out how scary it is to have Anderson be the sanest guy in the match. Pillman can’t hurt Morrus as this was when they wanted Morrus to be something special I think.

Big press slam puts Pillman down and the same goes for Anderson. We hear about the strap match on Sunday. I’ll post my review of the PPV at the end of this review. Make sure to check that out as it might be the most bizarre stories in wrestling history. Off to Morrus vs. Anderson and Anderson hits a spinebuster for no cover.

Pillman comes in, slaps Morrus and then tags in Anderson. I liked his insane bits back in the day like this. Anderson with a chinlock now as we haven’t had Sullivan in here for the majority of the match. Back off to Pillman and then right back to Anderson. Other than the opening I don’t think the Pillman has been in there longer than 15 seconds.

It’s been about 85% Horsemen here and Morrus is sent to the floor. Pillman sends him into the railing and the laughing dude is starting to laugh. Bischoff says we’re awaiting word from the coroner for word about Hogan and his eye. I give up. Sullivan vs. Pillman now and the fight is on. Sullivan bites his face and wants blood. Anderson saves his partner and Anderson gets a broom broken over his back by someone we can’t see. The Dungeon (Morrus/Sullivan) beats on Pillman with the strap for the DQ.

Rating: D+. Basic brawl for the most part but the Sullivan vs. Pillman was interesting to say the least. It was some of the best acting that has ever happened in wrestling and evolved into Benoit vs. Sullivan. This feud went on forever and thankfully the NWO came in to end it. Basic match but it set up the PPV match well enough.

Marcus Bagwell vs. Ric Flair

Bagwell is an American Male here. Woman is with Flair now. Somehow he looks a bit more effeminate than she does. Paul Orndorff pops up at the announce booth and says you never know when payback is coming. Nothing ever came of this I don’t think. After a quick break we’re back with the bell. Savage has taken Hogan to the hospital. Better than the coroner I guess.

Basic start here as Bagwell beats Flair down for awhile. Yep this is Flair Formula personified. Bagwell uses basic stuff and is all fired up to be in there and having some success with Flair. Flair gets in a cheap shot and here he comes. It’s the same thing every time but it works. Bagwell gets a rollup for two to counter the Figure Four. He misses a crossbody and hits the floor though.

Here comes Flair with some stomps. Back in and we get the Flair knee drop. They slug it out in the corner with Bagwell taking over. And never mind as he gets kicked in the face to take him down. Bagwell gets back up and gets a middle rope suplex for two. Slingshot splash eats knees and I think it’s time to go to school. Yep and it’s over.

Rating: C. Not bad here and a nice little quick shot for Flair before the PPV. This is fine for what it was supposed to be as Bagwell gets to rub elbows with Flair and Flair gets a convincing victory over someone that he should be able to get a convincing victory over. This was fine.

Flair won’t let go until Savage makes the save.

Tag Titles: Road Warriors vs. Sting/Lex Luger

This is the blue period for the Warriors that looks stupid. Animal vs. Sting to start. LOUD LOD chant to start us off. Animal might have a bad back here. Naturally Sting works on the arm instead. Sting controls to start and gets a top rope clothesline for two. We come to a pause and Sting shouts to the crowd. See, that’s smart. He keeps the fans from getting cold and just a shout like that can do it.

Off to Hawk and Luger now. Is Sting the weakest person in the match somehow? Big shoulder tackle takes down Luger so it’s off to Sting again. The guy with more singles success moves out of the way of a charge in the corner but can’t get the Scorpion. Off to Animal who is sent into Luger as the champions take over. Luger hammers on the back as the fans chant for the challengers (Road Warriors if that wasn’t clear).

We take an unannounced break as the building lost power apparently. Bischoff implies WWF had something to do with it. What the heck??? TNT is letting the show go on a bit longer because this is a big match, meaning we’re officially beginning the overrun. Front facelock as this match is really pretty boring. Powerslam by Luger takes down Animal.

Everything breaks down and Luger gets a suplex on Animal but walks into a powerslam with no referee. Jimmy Hart comes out of nowhere and slips Luger some big metal plate that is apparently used to keep doors open. He drills Animal in the bad back with it to get the pin to retain. At least it’s over now.

Rating: F+. This was absolutely awful. These four never were able to have a good match together and this was no exception. Sting and Luger didn’t care and the Warriors were so far past their expiration date that it was unreal. Bad match indeed and an odd choice to end the show.

The Road Warriors demand a title shot at the winner of Sting/Luger vs. Harlem Heat, whenever that happens.

Overall Rating: C-. This was decent at times but at the end of the day it feels like it’s just there. Nothing really ever got going with it and while they kind of set up the PPV a bit at the same time this show didn’t need to happen and the PPV build would have been the same thing for the most part. Other than the Woman turn, nothing happened here at all. Not bad but not needed at all.

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Monday Nitro #58
Date: October 21, 1996
Location: Mankato Civic Center, Mankato, Minnesota
Attendance: 4,034
Commentators: Eric Bischoff, Bobby Heenan, Mike Tenay, Tony Schiavone, Larry Zbyszko

It’s FINALLY the last show before Halloween Havoc which took forever to get to. The main event tonight is Benoit vs. Savage which should be good, although it probably won’t be up to their capabilities due to the whole Liz thing from last week. This should be a better show than last week’s which was nothing all that interesting. Let’s get to it.

We open with talking about Savage and the Liz tape from last week. Larry reiterates that WCW needs a leader.

Chris Jericho vs. Bobby Eaton

Should be good. Tony says Sting is here and has a match scheduled with JL. Syxx and NWO Sting are here. After a break we’re ready to go. Patrick is referee and is still hurt. Jericho speeds things up to start and hits a dropkick and shoulder block to control early. Eaton comes back with a bad powerslam for no cover. Jericho hits the springboard dropkick to put Eaton outside. If Jericho wasn’t so pale I’d think he was the Cheetah Kid from last week.

Eaton works on the arm back in the ring. They slug it out and this match probably needs to end soon. They’re just not clicking out there. Jericho sends him into the post and they hit the floor. The Canadian’s elbow hits the post but Eaton misses a shot and stumbles up the aisle. Back in and Eaton hooks a swinging neckbreaker for no cover. A top rope kneedrop mostly hits for two. Jericho hits something like a jumping superkick and then a missile dropkick for the pin.

Rating: D+. Really surprising here as the match didn’t click at all for the most part. The ending was a lot better but other than that they looked totally out of sync. Jericho would get a lot better and I don’t think Eaton would be around much longer after this. Jericho would get Syxx on Sunday.

Jericho says that in six days he’ll get the first win over the NWO. He actually would, but it wouldn’t be until World War 3.

Video on Mysterio and how awesome he is.

Dean Malenko vs. Jimmy Graffiti

Graffiti is more commonly known as Jimmy Del Ray of the Heavenly Bodies. Graffiti takes over early and looks pretty stupid in his shirt with the word Graffiti on it and jean shorts. A Batista Bomb gets two for Graffiti as does a superkick. Malenko comes back and knocks him to the floor where he lands on the top of his head. Fake Sting is watching this and filming it. This prompts Tony and Larry to discuss if Rey has joined the NWO.

Dean hits a clothesline in the corner and a suplex but the Cloverleaf is broken up. Graffiti gets in his bit of jobber offense and they both go to the floor off a Malenko cross body. Back in and Graffiti tries something resembling a dropkick but gets caught in a powerbomb kind of move. The Cloverleaf ends this clean. It gets the Power Pin of the Week which is a sponsorship thing despite it not being a pin.

Rating: C-. Just a long squash here as Graffiti was never any threat to Deano Machino. I really don’t know why they brought in Del Ray of all people but he was fine for a jobber role I suppose. Dean would get the title back from Rey on Sunday before losing it to Ultimo Dragon at Starrcade.

Diamond Dallas Page vs. Craig Pittman

We get a montage of Diamond Cutters before the match. Teddy is with Pittman here. He really didn’t have a good group of guys around this time. Teddy and Patrick get in an argument about 2 seconds after the bell rings. Page rams Pittman into Long to take over quickly. This has all the makings of a squash. Page pancakes him down for two. Pittman kicks out and shoves Page onto Patrick, injuring the referee’s back to a big pop. Out to the floor for a bit where Pittman works on the arm. Code Red (cross armbreaker) goes on but Teddy distracts the referee for no apparent reason. Diamond Cutter ends this.

After the too short to rate match, Teddy is accused of being NWO. He yells at Patrick and Patrick says it was Teddy’s fault, which is true.

Tony talks to Nick who says he didn’t hear Page give up. He’s accused of being the NWO referee again and he says it’s Randy Anderson again.

We look back at two weeks ago where Flair was attacked to write him off TV for his legit shoulder injury. We also see Jarrett challenging the Giant for Havoc.

Ron Studd vs. Jeff Jarrett

Flair comes out to watch this match. He gets in the ring before it starts and tells Jarrett to strut. The fans aren’t all that thrilled. Flair struts and gets cheered, so they do it again. Ric shakes Jarrett’s hand and that’s that. The match actually starts now and Studd is a giant. Jarrett manages a suplex and a bad figure four ends this.

Jarrett says it’s time for WCW to band together to take out the NWO. Also Giant won’t be able to chokeslam him. Flair comes up and says that he’ll be back to get his revenge for his injury.

Hour #2 begins. The announcers talk as usual.

Lex Luger vs. Roadblock

Roadblock weighs about 400lbs. He goes right after Luger and that doesn’t work all that well for him. A clothesline sends Roadblock to the floor and he’s rammed into various metal things. Back in Luger slams him but can’t hit the jumping elbow. In an inset interview, Anderson says that time is running out on Lex and he’ll make him quit Sunday. A kneedrop gets two for Roadblock. Luger starts Hulking Up and calls for the Rack but drops the big guy twice. The third time works and Roadblock insta-taps.

Rating: D+. Just a basic power match for a hero to show off like Luger did here. Roadblock was another huge guy that did practically nothing while the other guys would beat him up and it was supposed to be impressive. I think Luger would beat Anderson on Sunday in one of Anderson’s last big time matches.

Buy the NWO Shirt!

Lee Marshall is in Phoenix and Nitro is there next week. Why did they keep doing that? I still don’t get it.

Harlem Heat vs. American Males

Eric talks about the Braves beating New York tonight, which he says needs to become a tradition. It’s a jab at Vince so Heenan cracks up. Eric says this is non title but Patrick holds up the titles anyway. More WWF jabs as Riggs vs. Ray starts us off. Power vs. speed here with the power team taking over, hitting a World’s Strongest Slam to put Riggs down. Bagwell comes in and we talk about Savage a bit.

Marcus throws Stevie over the top but it’s momentum or whatever despite Bagwell THROWING HIM OVER THE ROPES. We take a break and come back with Booker getting worked over by Bagwell. Booker powerbombs him down and the Outsiders are here. The NWO wants Nitro apparently. Stevie pounds away and since that’s the extent of his offense it’s back to Booker. The Hangover misses and here’s Riggs again. Everything breaks down and Riggs goes after the Heat’s managers, allowing the Harlem Side Kick to end him.

Rating: D. This was really boring as the Heat seemed completely uninterested. The Males would be split up next month as Bagwell would turn heel for the first of about 8,000 times. This wasn’t much of a match and it wasn’t very good, primarily due to Booker having to do all of the work for his team.

Faces of Fear vs. Fantastics

The Fantastics? REALLY? They brought these guys out of mothballs? Don’t get me wrong: they were my favorite 80s NWA tag team so I’m not complaining, but this is late 1996. This falls under the category of Greg Valentine. This would be their only WCW match too. Fulton chops away at Meng and he’s like dude….no. The announcers talk about Savage some more and they’re not sure if he’s here, despite him being scheduled for the main event.

A double dropkick puts Meng on one knee and the announcers say that the Fantastics have no chance in this. Eric keeps telling us the Braves score because that’s required for some reason. Fulton tries to fight back and Eric laughs when he punches and kicks. A piledriver kills him dead but Fulton makes the save. The double headbutt hits and Eric is all happy because Sting might be here. Hot tag brings in Rogers and he gets in some offense but his cross body gets caught and a big boot from Meng ends this.

Rating: D-. I love the Fantastics, but I have NO idea what they were thinking bringing them in here. They looked old and pale and the Faces of Fear destroyed them. It was a total squash and Eric was burying them on commentary. It’s not like they were a regular team either. This was their only match in WCW and I think Rogers would go to ECW for awhile. I don’t get this one at all.

Remember that Liz video that Eric was afraid messed Savage up? Let’s watch it again, because that’ll get Randy’s head straight right? Liz still loves him is the point of this. Eric says he has more footage for later.

JL vs. Sting

And it’s the NWO Sting. The whole NWO comes out to watch. A few fans are fooled for a bit but it becomes clear what’s going on pretty quickly. The NWO comes out of the crowd sans Hogan. Total squash and the Deathlock looks to end it in like a minute, but the REAL Sting comes out. He’s in all black and has white facepaint. The match is thrown out.

Sting debuts the Death Drop and he destroys the Fake Sting. The NWO lets this happen so everyone thinks Sting is NWO. He hooks the Deathlock and the NWO comes in. DiBiase offers him a spot on the team and the whole team tries to tempt him. Eric is WAY too intense about this. I get that it’s supposed to be serious but he gets all melodramatic about it.

Hall asks a legit question: what does Sting have to show for carrying the WCW banner this whole time? Sting talks about the Fake Sting and says the real version may or may not be in their price range. The only thing for sure about him is that nothing’s for sure. He leaves and you can hear the money being printed from here.

Chris Benoit vs. Randy Savage

Eric has left to try to flag down Savage. Here’s Savage but he’s all in black and they’re “street clothes”. I’m not sure what street people walk down looking like that but I don’t think I want to be there. Eric apologizes and rolls some tape. It’s from the 3 Ninjas movie set with Hogan hosting things for lack of a better term. Hogan talks to the director and says he has a lot of things he needs to do and that it can’t go over budget.

The NWO takes over production of the film. Giant is the new director, Hogan is producing and Liz has a cameo. Hogan makes Liz say she loves Randy. Hogan is in a wig here and it’s really not working for him. This is really bad. Hogan sends Liz to his trailer with Giant escorting her. Hogan comes into the trailer and yells at her. He and Giant talk a bit more to end this.

Back in the arena Savage isn’t sure what to do. There’s no match of course. Savage says it just occurred to him how fragile friendships and relationships can be. Business and marriages can be fragile too. Life is also fragile and with that Savage leaves. Eric calls him back…and that’s it.

Overall Rating: D-. Really weak show here, which is the second in a row. Havoc sucked and the Savage vs. Hogan match was a big reason why. It wound up being a comedy match and Savage was just fine after the last two weeks of him being all mopey and depressed. This built up the PPV a bit but overall, there wasn’t much here. At least we don’t have to hear the words Slim Jim’s every 8 seconds now.

Here’s Halloween Havoc if you’re interested:

http://forums.wrestlezone.com/showthread.php?p=2182496#post2182496

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