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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Monday Nitro #57
Date: October 14, 1996
Location: Mid-South Coliseum, Memphis, Tennessee
Attendance: 6,930
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Tony Schiavone, Larry Zbyszko, Eric Bischoff, Bobby Heenan

We’re in Lawler country tonight as the seemingly never ending build for Halloween Havoc continues. Thankfully with this set of two I’ll be doing we’ll get to that show so we can get to November and Eric joining the NWO. The show tonight is nothing all that significant but we’re getting closer to 1997 which stuns me that we’ve gotten this far. Let’s get to it.

We open with a recap of Savage getting destroyed while Liz was held and forced to watch.

Dean Malenko vs. Brad Armstrong

Armstrong beat Dean on either Saturday Night or at a Clash. There are NWO fans holding up big signs on the non-camera side, because the fans behind them don’t need to see right? Nick Patrick and his neckbrace are refereeing again. There’s an NWO chant. Brad speeds things up and sends Dean to the floor. Malenko is heel still here. Into the ring again and Dean hooks something like a seated abdominal stretch.

The announcers talk about Sting being gone for awhile already. Man they had no idea what was coming did they. Brad gets some two counts, including one off a nice Russian leg sweep. Belly to back gets the same. Dean gets a SWEET rollup into a three quarter nelson for the pin. Armstrong got caught.

Rating: C-. Fairly uninteresting mat based match here but I’ve seen far worse. Brad and Dean worked a more technically based style here and while it’s good, it doesn’t do much for the audience. That being said, they were more interested in the NWO stuff than the match, but that’s modern wrestling for you. Nothing great but it was fine.

The NWO gets here.

Jim Duggan vs. Mr. Wallstreet

This is a rematch because this is the feud the world is dying for right? The idea is that Nick Patrick screwed Duggan out of a win in the first match so this has a different referee. Duggan uses power to start as Larry blasts Hacksaw every chance he can. Wallstreet comes back with a clothesline for one and then goes to a chinlock. Larry talks about the amount of water in the average human’s brain for no apparent reason. Leg drop by Wallstreet and it’s off to a chinlock again. Wallstreet jumps into a boot and Duggan tapes up his fist. Wallstreet gets it away but the three point clothesline ends him.

Rating: D. What in the world was this on TV for? It wasn’t a bad match or anything, but it’s IRS vs. Jim Duggan in 1996 on national TV. I don’t get it at all but I’d assume it’s because Duggan is one of Hogan’s buddies. Not a horrible match, but for the life of me I don’t get it. This was a rematch on top of that. Why did it need to be on Nitro? Isn’t that what Saturday Night was for?

Hugh Morrus vs. Jim Powers

The inexplicable kind of push of Jim Powers continues. Tony thanks “Mr. Lawler” for promoting the show. He’ll be at the flea market on Thursday, which is where the USWA had a lot of their shows around this time. I’m legit surprised by that. Powers slams him down and gets a cross body for one. Morrus rolls to the floor and I’m still wondering why Powers is getting TV time.

Back in and Morrus remembers he’s against Jim Powers and takes over. Suplex gets two. Flair isn’t here tonight. Morrus seems really bored out there and I can’t say I disagree with him. Flair’s shoulder injury is worse than previously thought. It would result in him being stripped of the US Title I believe. Powers gets a sunset flip for two.

A knee lift puts Morrus down as Teddy is complaining about Patrick’s cadence of the count. Oh yeah it’s bad as it takes four seconds to count one. Powers gets a small package and there’s no count because Patrick is holding his neck. A belly to back sets up the No Laughing Matter for Morrus’ pin. The count was fine there. Teddy gets in Patrick’s face post match.

Rating: D-. I get the idea of Patrick being crooked and not counting properly and all that. That’s an old standard angle and it works fine. But why in the world are they using it on Jim freaking Powers? I don’t get it. He’s JIM POWERS. They couldn’t use this on anyone else? Was this really the best option they had? Not the Steiners or someone like that? I don’t get it.

Greg Valentine vs. Lex Luger

Again I don’t understand why Greg Valentine kept getting time on this show. He’s fine in the ring, but why him of all the people that were available? Luger has taped ribs due to the attack by Anderson last week. Valentine goes for the arms instead. That’s what we mean by lack of psychology. Thankfully he wakes up and punches Lex in the ribs to take over. Luger can’t suplex him because of the injury.

Valentine works on the back as Anderson is watching in the back on a monitor. Greg works on the back as DiBiase and Vincent are standing in the crowd watching. Hogan has demanded to make an announcement tonight. Valentine works on the back some more. I’m glad the arm work only lasted a few seconds. Tony and Larry want to know where Sting is because they need him.

Luger’s back is rammed into the corner and it’s been all Valentine for the most part here. They collide and both go down. Lex starts his comeback and hits the forearm smash for two. Valentine gets an elbow up and puts his feet on the ropes for a rollup. As he’s arguing with the referee the ribs heal enough for the Rack to get the submission. At least he was wincing during the hold.

Rating: D+. Not a horrible match or anything but it was almost eight minutes long. Just like in the previous match, I don’t get it. WCW made some curious moves at this point but at the same time you can’t say that the results didn’t work so the complaints would be at a minimum here. Actually they’re not even complaints but rather questions.

Tony talks to Nick Patrick and tells him that the fine against Randy Savage will be $500 instead of $1 million. Also Savage has to miss the first five matches (not said if that means the first five Nitros or not) of 1997. Patrick says WCW will be hearing from his lawyers. Tony shows us a clip from NWO Saturday Night which was the NWO segment where they would beat up jobbers in an empty arena. They had their own referee in a ski mask and it looked a lot like Patrick. He says it looks more like Randy Anderson, who is about 6 inches shorter than Patrick.

Mike Enos vs. Randy Savage

Hour #2 begins during Enos’ entrance. There’s no Bischoff for commentary. Oh ok he’s going to interview Savage during the entrance. Eric intercepts him and there’s a TV monitor wheeled in. Savage says if Hogan is here, let’s do Halloween Havoc here tonight. Eric wants to talk about Liz and Savage says don’t go there.

We look at a video message from Liz sitting on a swing in front of a tree. She says she’s sorry and that she was doing things to get his attention when she thought she was doing them out of anger. Savage built her this swing apparently. To the best of my knowledge, the fans can’t see any of this. Liz asks him for forgiveness and says she’s made a lot of bad choices. The worst was siding with Hulk so he could hurt Savage. Liz needs Savage and begs him not to leave her alone. She feels the same way about him today as the day she said I do.

Back in the arena and Savage looks stunned. Eric says he didn’t know another way to do this. You know, because locker rooms don’t exist right? Savage doesn’t know what to say and has a great look on his face. Eric won’t shut up and leave him alone so Savage walks out and heads into a conveniently waiting limo. No match with Enos obviously.

Eric is on commentary now. The announcers debate whether or not it was a good idea to tell Savage about the message.

Eddie Guerrero vs. Cheetah Kid

Cheetah is allegedly Rocco Rock in a mask but I’m not completely sure on that. Oh there’s no way that’s Rocco. He’s ripped and much darker skinned. Ah apparently Cheetah Kid is a character Rock used to play when he was starting out. That makes much better sense. Apparently this is a local guy from Memphis getting a tryout. Works for me. Eddie flies around a lot but gets caught in something resembling an Angle Slam for two.

A nice powerbomb gets no cover for Cheetah. This is really just a tuneup for Eddie before his match with DDP at Havoc. Eddie gets sent to the floor and Cheetah hits a springboard dropkick as Eddie is on the apron. Cheetah goes up and gets crotched so Eddie can hit the rana off the top and the Frog Splash for the pin. Not enough to rate but Cheetah wasn’t bad at all. I’m curious as to who he was.

Video on Jeff Jarrett.

Lee Marshall is on the road and talks about how great it’ll be next week in Minnesota. Ok then.

Big Bubba vs. Jeff Jarrett

Since this is in Tennessee Jarrett is very popular. Eric makes fun of Jarrett’s country singer gimmick and says it’s about wrestling here. Bubba gives him a chance to run and Jarrett doesn’t seem interested. We do a Memphis level stall as both do various kinds of taunting before Bubba grabs a headlock. Now we’re talking about the WWF for awhile and the AWA. Oh it’s Hogan who said he made both of those companies. Well the AWA collapsed after he left so maybe he didn’t make it but he kept it alive for awhile in a way.

Out to the floor and Bubba keeps control. Jimmy Hart gets in some shots and Jarrett glares him away. Off to a chinlock so Bubba can talk to Jeff a bit. He hits a solid big boot to put Jarrett down. The announcers get bored so they talk about the NWO for awhile. Big right hand gets two for Bubba. He misses a charge into the corner and Jarrett hits an atomic drop but goes after Hart before the Figure Four. Bubba hits a spinebuster and smacks the referee. Jimmy slides in the Megaphone which is dropkicked into Bubba’s face for the pin.

Rating: D+. This was a Memphis match for the Memphis crowd which doesn’t do a thing for the TV audience. That being said, they’ve had the last few months of shows booked for them so I can’t complain about something like that. Jarrett would be the replacement for Flair soon and would get into a feud with McMichael soon enough. He wouldn’t get over or anything, but who cares about that.

Jarrett is announced as the replacement for Flair.

Harlem Heat vs. Faces of Fear

This was supposed to be for the titles but the Heat said no so it would be a guaranteed title match against the Outsiders. Meng vs. Booker starts us off and Meng hammers him down quickly. Here are Benoit, Mongo and Debra for no apparent reason. Oh that’s right they’re scouting the Faces of Fear for the PPV. Stevie comes in and hammers on Meng but after missing a dropped elbow it’s off to Barbarian.

Stevie hits a bicycle kick to put Barbarian down. Come on people, learn your racial stereotypes. He chokes away and brings in Booker to give some variety to things. Hook kick gets two. Meng breaks up what was presumably the missile dropkick and Barbarian hits a belly to belly superplex. Back to Meng who hits a Batista Bomb for two. A double headbutt has Booker in trouble but Meng won’t cover.

Booker gets a bad looking sunset flip and the Outsiders are here. They’re in the front row this time and the match comes grinding to a halt again. Everyone stops to look at them on the floor and I think it’s a double countout. Knowing this show there was a pin in the ring and we just didn’t see it but whatever.

Rating: D. Total clash of styles here and it didn’t work well at all. Everyone was pretty much just killing time until the Outsiders came out for the match to end. I’m going to assume it was a no contest. I guess it makes sense for this not to be for the titles but it wouldn’t have hurt anything I don’t think.

Eric talks about Savage and how Hogan is going to be in trouble at Havoc.

Here’s Hogan for the final segment of the show. The rest of the NWO complete with Liz comes out behind him. Current total number of males in the NWO: 8. Hogan thinks Savage could at least come out here and fight. He talks about being in Hollywood filming the next 3 Ninjas movie and can push whatever button he wants on Savage. Hogan calls Liz an actress and she tries to slap him but fails.

Here come the Nasty Boys in NWO shirts. Hogan calls them family and says if they need anything just to let him know. Knobbs has the contract and says there’s a screwup in it because the decimal point isn’t right. Hogan hasn’t signed it and says the Nasties shouldn’t have the shirts on yet. There’s the beatdown for the Nasties. Hogan says this is just a little bit of what will happen to Savage at Havoc. He says Liz wanted him when she and Savage were married. Liz is coming with him to Hollywood to finish his movie.

The NWO takes over the broadcast booth again to end the show.

Overall Rating: D+. Not their best show here as it feels like we’ve been building up to Havoc for six months at this point. The whole Savage vs. Liz thing is interesting but it’s nothing that was going to go anywhere since Savage would join the NWO early next year anyway. Thank goodness the next show is the last one before the PPV because it needs to move on to WW3 already. Weak show but not awful.

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Clash of the Champions 18
Date: January 21, 1992
Location: Kansas Expo Center, Topeka, Kansas
Attendance: 5,500
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Jim Ross

Time for another Clash, but this time it’s from a better era. This is during the Dangerous Alliance period, where the top heels in the company banded together to fight Sting and whoever he could get to back him up. However, he needed to win the world title first nad we need to set up that match tonight. Also we get Cactus Jack vs. Van Hammer in a falls count anywhere match which I remember fairly well. Let’s get to it.

The opening video is about Heyman wanting to take over the company with the Dangerous Alliance.

As usual Eric and Missy are more or less the hosts.

Vader/Mr. Hughes vs. Steiner Brothers

Scott vs. Hughes gets us going. The Steiners are insanely popular. Scott throws Hughes around for a few minutes and that’s exactly what I wanted to see. That’s what the Steiners were awesome at: throwing big guys around like it was no big deal. Hughes powers him to the corner and everything breaks down. The Steiners get sent to the floor so they wait for the monsters to pose and both go to the top at the same time. A double Steiner Line off the same corner gives the Steiners the momentum again.

Vader vs. Rick now and Vader goes old school monster on him. There’s a gorilla press and a splash in the corner but Rick keeps getting up because that’s what he does. Steiner Line takes Vader down and there’s an overhead belly to belly (great one too). Rick knocks him to the floor and dives off the apron, but gets caught and rammed into the post. Back in and Rick throws Vader off the top with a belly to belly superplex.

Off to Scott and the Steiners are all fired up here. Scott gets the best German suplex you’ll ever see to a guy the size of Vader. He goes up but his cross body is countered into a powerslam and a splash keeps Scott down. Tag to Hughes and it’s off to Rick soon thereafter. HUGE backdrop and Hughes is in trouble. Everything breaks down again and Vader accidentally hits Hughes. Vader and Scott go to the floor and the Steiner Bulldog ends Hughes.

Rating: B. That’s probably high but I’m a sucker for the Steiners throwing everyone all over the place like it’s nothing. They were so far and away better than all of the other teams at this point and it was very clear. Anderson and Eaton were champions at this point and the Steiners would get the titles back in just a few months.

Terry Taylor/Tracy Smothers vs. Brian Pillman/Marcus Bagwell

Tracy is still part of the Young Pistols and Taylor is the Taylor Made Man. According to Ross, a standard backhand chop is a judo chop. Didn’t know that. Pillman cleans house on his own and speeds things up but walks into a backbreaker for two. Off to Bagwell and the good guys clear the ring with a double dropkick. There are some double dives to the outside and Taylor/Smothers are in trouble.

We get back to normal with Bagwell vs. Smothers and Tracy hits what was either a dropkick or a superkick to take over. We hear about Bagwell hanging out with Sting a lot lately as Tracy beats him up. He avoids a shot though and here’s Pillman again. A spinwheel kick gets two for Pillman. The heels double team to slow Brian down and Taylor suplexes him to the floor.

Pillman gets rammed into the post which gets two back in the ring for Tracy. Gutwrench powerbomb gets the same for Taylor. Back to Smothers and a jumping back elbow sends Pillman out to the barricade again. He comes back in with a springboard clothesline and it’s hot tag to Bagwell. Everything breaks down and Bagwell gets a surprise sunset flip on Smothers for the three count.

Rating: C+. Fun tag match here with Pillman flying all over the place and just being awesome. Smothers and Taylor are two guys that I’m not wild on but they did their thing here and it worked well enough. Bagwell was still a glorified rookie at this point but he never really developed past anything slightly above average, which is pretty telling.

Video on Jushin Thunder Liger. He and Pillman will tear the house down at SuperBrawl II for the Light Heavyweight Title which Liger recently won from Pillman.

Richard Morton vs. Johnny B. Badd

Badd is pretty new at this point and is still the gay character that we don’t acknowledge as being gay. He takes off the rainbow colored robe to put on a pink and blue boa. Badd has to fire the Badd Blaster (confetti gun) before we can get going. He tries to punch Morton so Morton wisely hides in the ropes. Double axe off the middle rope gives Badd control. A bad looking atomic drop by Morton lets him send Badd to the floor. Badd gets a sunset flip for two. This isn’t meshing at all. Powerslam gets two for Johnny. They slug it out and Morton tries a cross body which Badd rolls through for the pin.

Rating: F. Just awful here and the ending looked horrible with Morton barely running when he hit the cross body. It took Badd a few years but he would get way better. The Light Heavyweight division never worked like it was supposed to because they had no idea that there was a difference between being small and knowing how to wrestle small.

Badd and Pillman are with Bischoff and Badd puts a lips sticker on Eric’s cheek. They both want to fight Liger. Pillman gives a bizarre speech about Japanese automakers and how he’s defending the honor of Americans and bringing the title back to America. And then Badd puts lips on Brian’s cheek, earning him a right hand. I have no idea if that was a heel promo or not.

PN News vs. Diamond Dallas Page

Page is a manager recently turned wrestler and more or less is a jobber here. News is a very fat white rapper. He raps a bit before the match. This makes JR’s from two nights ago look bearable. Page (in a singlet) jumps him to start and they try running the ropes for a few seconds, but News can’t do it due to high levels of fat. News tries a dropkick to send Page to the floor as the announcers shill the WCW Hotline. All News until he misses an elbow. Page hammers away and gets two off a Russian legsweep. For some reason he tries a slam and guess how well that goes. News hits a belly to belly and a top rope splash for the pin.

Rating: D-. Barely better than the previous match but Page was trying. The problem was that he wasn’t very good yet. News….you’re fat and you need to go away. The match was nothing to see and was there to get News on TV, because WCW was stupid enough to think that was a good idea.

Here’s the WCW Top Ten.

10. Larry Zbyszko
9. El Gigante
8. Big Van Vader
7. Dustin Rhodes
6. Cactus Jack
5. Rick Steiner
4. Ricky Steamboat
3. Steve Austin
2. Sting
1. Rick Rude

Kip Allen Frey is introduced as the new boss of WCW. Why WCW insisted on having actual executives on TV as the boss characters is beyond me. They FINALLY woke up in like 1995 and had a character played by a wrestler (I mean Bockwinkel, not Watts, who actually was the boss). Frey was actually really good at what he did though, and SuperBrawl II would be proof of that. He had a very interesting policy: whoever had the best match at a televised show received (I believe) a $5000 cash bonus. Think that might get people motivated? He announces Sting vs. Luger for the title at SuperBrawl II.

The other thing Frey does is bring out the newest WCW color commentator: Jesse Ventura. This was a legit big deal and was probably the first high profile guy they took from Vince in a very long time. Jesse puts over WCW as the future and says he’ll be debuting soon, which also was at SuperBrawl.

Tony brings out Sting who high fives Jesse on the way to the ring. Luger (recorded) says he’s been gone to get ready for the match. In reality, he only had one contracted appearance left so he just sat out for two months. His match with Sting was HORRIBLE, and in one of the rare instances in history, it can be completely blamed on one guy instead of two as Luger didn’t care at all and gave maybe a 4% effort. Sting signs and the match is on.

For those of you wondering about Frey, he would be fired after the PPV because of an unspecified reason. The common answer is he was actually good at his job and that was simply unacceptable in WCW.

Cactus Jack vs. Van Hammer

Hammer was a guy that made David Otunga look like Lou Thesz in the ring, but man was he popular. After Sting and Hogan, he was probably my favorite when I was a kid. Jack is a crazy man and this is falls count anywhere. Hammer has a guitar with him and fires something out of the end of it into Jack’s eyes. A slingshot cross body gets two about a second after the bell.

A big leg gets one (he would usually use a big boot beforehand. Hammer was tall and blonde. You figure it out) and Jack takes over. Cactus Clothesline puts them on the floor where Cactus gets two. Jack peels back the mats on the floor and jumps off the second rope with a sunset flip, hurting himself more than Hammer. They’re on the ramp now and we get a wrestling hold in the form of a sleeper by Jack.

Powerslam on the ramp gets two for Hammer. This is a very hard hitting match. Jack keeps clotheslining him down while Hammer tries to wrestle. Hammer throws Jack off the ramp where he lands with a thud. A clothesline to the floor gets two. They brawl to the back as the fans boo (no big screens yet) and we take a break. The stuff after the break was taped earlier, because it’s 1992 and that’s how they rolled back then.

They’re out in the parking lot and Jack hits him with a 2×4. A traffic cone to the head and they fight over to the bulls that are in place for an upcoming rodeo. Missy Hyatt is there to get on my nerves. Hammer chokes him with a rope so they climb into the pen with the bulls. Abdullah the Butcher pops up dressed as a cowboy and whacks Hammer with a shovel by mistake so Jack can get the pin.

Rating: B-. Before the break, this was a SICK brawl. Post break, it goes downhill quickly. Butcher as a cowboy is a very strange vision and not one that I need to see every day. Hammer would never really mean much after this which is probably the best thing that could have happened to everyone involved. It has nothing on Sting vs. Jack but it’s still good.

Butcher and Jack fight a bit with Butcher throwing Missy into a water trough.

Freebirds vs. Brad Armstrong/Big Josh

The Birds are now faces and no one cared. I mean no one AT ALL cared. They’re still singers and have a song nowhere near as good as Badstreet USA. They dance through the crowd and I want this to end already. Big Josh is a lumberjack that liked to dance with bears. Armstrong used to be a Freebird lackey in a mask (never acknowledged as the same guy). Hayes and Armstrong start us off.

The Birds, despite being a long running tag team, really doesn’t work together all that well. Granted that might be due to Garvin not being all that good. Off to Josh who has far better luck. He stomps on Hayes’ ribs and I think this is face vs. face but I’m really not sure. Back to Garvin and Josh punches him for awhile too. They ram heads which has no effect on Garvin at all. Back to Armstrong who hits a bunch of dropkicks. Everything breaks down and the Birds cheat to hit a double DDT on Armstrong for the pin.

Rating: F. This was one of the worst tag matches I’ve ever seen. The song didn’t help either with the title being “I’m a Freebird, What’s Your Excuse?” This was horrible and thankfully the Birds weren’t around much longer after this. It didn’t work at all and was one of the worst matches I can remember in a long time.

Video on the Steiners and how awesome they are. We get some clips of them winning huge matches and hear about Scott’s arm tearing apart and putting him on the shelf for a long time.

The Steiners say they’ll get the titles back because they never lost them fairly.

Vinnie Vegas vs. Tommy Rich

Vegas is more famous by his real name: Kevin Nash. Vegas is in suspenders, a white collared shirt and dress pants. Snake Eyes end this in less than a minute.

Dangerously says that someone is getting taken out tonight. He lists off what might happen to each of them and it’s classic Heyman. You can see in his eyes how fired up he is here. He gets in the great line of someone is going to the Magnum TA Wrestling Retirement Home.

Arn Anderson/Bobby Eaton/Larry Zbyszko vs. Barry Windham/Dustin Rhodes/Ron Simmons

Windham still has a bad hand due to Zbyszko. Eaton vs. Windham starts us off and Barry is all fired up. It works against him though and he gets caught in a superplex which he no sells. Big lariat puts Bobby down and Windham hits his own lariat (his finisher) for two. Everything breaks down and the Alliance is all put in Figure Fours. Off to Larry vs. Ron with Larry trying to use power on him for some reason. Arn and Larry combined can’t overpower him.

Ron is beating them up all on his own. For some reason Barry and Dustin just let him fight on his own and to be fair, it’s working pretty well. Off to Dustin and they work on Larry’s arm. Bobby comes in and Dustin is all fired up, throwing him over the top (behind the referee’s back) and hitting a huge diving clothesline to the ramp. Off to Larry vs. Barry and Barry misses a lariat. That’s the big feud to this match as Zbyszko and Anderson broke Barry’s hand at Halloween Havoc.

Off to Dustin and he misses a cross body, sending him flying and therefore crashing onto the ramp. Dustin takes a cell phone shot to the ribs and the Alliance is in control. Back in the Anderson Spinebuster gets two. Dustin gets in some punches but walks into a DDT. Arn’s cover is delayed though so it’s only two. Off to Eaton who hits a top rope elbow instead of the Alabama Jam for two.

Eaton misses a corner charge but Anderson saves the tag. Then we get to the big problem Arn has in his matches. Dustin is on the mat and Arn goes to the middle rope. He jumps off with a double axe handle and Dustin hits a boot to the jaw. What in the world was Arn going for, since he was jumping at the feet of Dustin the whole time? Either way it’s off to Barry vs. Larry Z and everything breaks down. Eaton comes off the top and jumps into the cast on Barry’s hand and that’s good for the pin.

Rating: B. Very fun tag match here and it shows the reason the Dangerous Alliance worked: everyone on the team was REALLY good and considering they only feuded with talented guys, the matches were almost a guaranteed awesome showcase. JR called the Alliance an All-Star team in this match and that’s about as good of a description as you can give them.

Tony is with the winning team in the back and Barry says he doesn’t care who says what because he’s coming for revenge. Awesome stuff again as Windham is all fired up.

Sting/Ricky Steamboat vs. Rick Rude/Steve Austin

Austin is TV Champion and Rude is US Champion. My goodness Sting is ridiculously popular. Remember that Top Ten thing earlier? Check out #1-#4. Steamboat vs. Austin starts us off and Austin still has hair here. Jesse has joined commentary to replace Tony here. Ricky takes over to start and Steve has no idea what to do with him. Steamboat gets a bunch of two counts on Steve and fires off a superkick to knock him down. Rude takes a kick as well and the ring is cleared.

Rude comes in and he wants Sting. He slaps some of the paint off him and here’s the Stinger to the biggest pop of the night. Rude, ever the heel, hides in the corner immediately. Sting hits a pair of atomic drops and we get the best selling ever of that move. Sting rakes the back and we get some classic Jesse/face commentator banter of how can Sting do that and claim to be a hero.

Sting hooks a modified camel clutch for some reason. Rude’s ribs are his strong point so why put a hold on them? Now it’s Steamboat and they do the non-tag thing. The fans swear they did though and that’s good enough. They do it again as Austin tries to come in. JR, speaking of Sting: “Well he’s the legal man! That’s what you want right?” Sting tries to cannonball down onto Rude’s ribs but does the Anderson spot and lands balls first on the knees.

Austin vs. Sting in what would have drawn at least seven figure buys in 1998. Rude hooks a front facelock and keeps Sting from tagging. Back to Austin who punches the mat in an attempt to block a sunset flip and there’s the hot tag to Steamboat. Rude takes his head off as Sting was trying to come in and the Alliance controls some more. Austin avoids a rollup and everything breaks down. Sting and Austin fight up the ramp and then they come back. That was kind of pointless but whatever. Austin picks up Steamboat but Sting dives off the top with a crossbody and both pin Austin at the same time.

Rating: B. Remember the previous reason as why the six man was good? Same reason here but with four guys and better talent involved. The Alliance angle had YEARS worth of material in it but instead they lasted about six months because this is WCW. The Alliance was one of the greatest gatherings of talent ever, but it never became a memorable team because of WCW’s incompetence in promoting stars.

By the way, everything in that last sentence starting with the word one was from Arn Anderson, not me. So it’s not just my opinion but from someone on the team itself.

Rude and Austin annihilate Steamboat post match, whipping him with a belt as Sting tries to protect him.

Overall Rating: B+. This was a free TV show and we got pretty much 80% good stuff. When’s the last time you remember 80% of Raw or Impact being good to very good? The first half of 1992 was pure gold for WCW and once Luger’s laziness left and Sting got the title, it was all gravy for a long time. Then Vader came in and Sting had his best matches ever with him, so it got even better. Good show, but I still like 17 better I think.

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Monday Nitro #56
Date: October 7, 1996
Location: Savannah Civic Center, Savannah, Georgia
Attendance: 4,300
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Eric Bischoff, Larry Zbyszko, Bobby Heenan, Mike Tenay

Please let this be more interesting than last week. I don’t think I can take another one of those shows. This is another build to the Halloween Havoc PPV show and hopefully we’ll get some followup on the Liz in the NWO hotel room stuff from last week. The main event is Flair vs. Savage (it’s been a few months so I don’t mind as much) and another Benoit vs. Steiner match for some reason. Let’s get to it.

We open with a clip of the end of the show last week. I don’t think we saw what was in the package that Vince brought in, which he seemed a bit nervous about.

We get a clip of Harlem Heat winning the tag titles back from Public Enemy on WCW Saturday Night.

Harlem Heat vs. Public Enemy

Nice to see them get this out of the way quickly. And this is non-title……why exactly? The new champions don’t even get an introduction. That’s a very odd way to start a title reign isn’t it? This is about respect or revenge or something like that. The Heat takes over pretty quickly but Patrick is knocked to the floor and is down as we take a break. Back with Liz trying to get in Savage’s dressing room. She walks in but Randy is gone.

Back to the match as Rock is in a camel clutch. Harlem Side Kick gets a very delayed two. Off to a chinlock after Sherri cheated a bit. This isn’t the most interesting match in the world. Rock gets double teamed down in the corner again. The NWO is in the arena. I don’t think I see Hogan in there though. The match of course stops and they have a microphone. The Outsiders threaten Harlem heat and make Slim Jim puns.

During this whole things it’s almost all chinlocks and rest holds. Larry wants to know how they got on WCW’s frequency. That’s a really good question actually. The NWO shuts up as Booker misses a middle rope elbow and both guys go down off a clothesline by Rock. Public Enemy takes over until Colonel Parker interferes and Rock falls off the top onto the table. The Heat goes after Grunge’s bad knee with a chair and they drop a top rope knee onto the chair onto the bad knee for the pin.

Rating: D. Boring match in the first place which is dragged even further down because of the Outsiders stuff. I’d still like to know why this wasn’t non-title. I mean, the Heat wins and they look pretty dominant doing it, so why not add on something like a title stipulation to make it more interesting? Not much to see here but part of that is due to the match stopping cold because of the Outsiders.

A limo arrives and Jeff Jarrett has jumped ship to WCW.

We get a clip from Saturday Night of Nick Patrick fining Randy Savage one million dollars. No word on if it was ever paid or not, but I remember this moment as it aired.

Diamond Dallas Page vs. Jim Powers

After a basic power man opening by Powers, we get a quick promo from Page about Eddie. Nothing too special, but it’s nice to hear them actually talk about their upcoming matches. Cross body gets two for Powers. He tries a full nelson but Page escapes and the Cutter ends this. Quick match.

Page roughs up Teddy Long post match but just shoves him.

Here’s Macho Man to a big ovation. He brings out….oh for crying out loud he brings out a racecar driver. This is what you would expect from it to be. I still don’t care. The NWO car wrecked so Savage declares victory for WCW. So uh….about that ex wife possibly joining the evil team stuff? Can we talk about that or anything like that? Nope, it’s still racing chat.

Savage takes like two minutes teasing how high he finished in the race. He finished 10th and this is supposed to be a big deal. Savage talks for four minutes and doesn’t talk about Liz AT ALL. It’s all racing crap and I’m tempted to fast forward. Oh and he’ll beat Hogan. Liz FINALLY comes out and Savage won’t talk to her. Well there was really a point to that.

Faces of Fear vs. High Voltage

High Voltage is Rage and Kaos. The Tongans jump them and it’s Meng vs. Kaos to start. Jarrett will wrestle tonight. The Horsemen are in the aisle since they’re against the Faces of Fear at Havoc. Total dominance here as Rage is beaten down. Powerbomb gets two. A slingshot into a big boot (nowhere near as cool as it sounds) ends this.

Rating: D. Nothing match here but it was a decent enough squash. High Voltage was never worth anything but Kaos was Rick Steiner’s pick to be one half of the tag champions at one point for no apparent reason. The Faces of Fear got a mini-push until the end of the year and got the title match at Starrcade. Just a squash here.

Glacier vs. Mike Wenner

What a great jobber name. It’s pronounced Winner. Glacier has the weird lights like Sin Cara has at the moment. He takes Wenner down with the leg sweep and goes for the arm. The fans think this is boring and I’m not going to argue with them that much. Glacier hits an over the top rope dive and a spinning kick ends this. Total and complete domination. He wouldn’t be on Nitro again until December.

Glacier does martial arts until the second hour starts.

Eric announces Jarrett as part of the NWO. Where did he get this information?

Jeff Jarrett vs. Hugh Morrus

Jarrett hadn’t been on TV in the WWF for about 8 months so this wasn’t exactly the biggest shocks ever. Eric keeps telling us that Jeff is in the NWO and I still don’t get where he got that from. Heenan asks Eric where he went last week and Eric brushes it off. Morrus takes over after about a minute and Jeff misses an enziguri. The announcers are blasting him every chance they get. I think it’s something about Jeff wanting a shot in WCW and Eric saying no, so it must be the NWO that brought him in.

Jarrett takes over with a great dropkick for two. Powerslam gets two for Morrus. The announcers want to know where the NWO is because they usually have their members’ backs. Maybe because no one ever said he was in the NWO? Morrus misses a top rope elbow and Jarrett wins it with the Figure Four.

Rating: C-. Eh this was just ok. Jarrett would be around for about a year before he headed back to the WWF to be a really annoying country singer which he would be for another year before he got his hair cut and turned into a male chauvinist pig. This was just a basic introduction to Jarrett which was fine.

Tony talks to Jeff and says he’s part of the NWO because he got out of a black limo. I’m serious. That’s their rationale for saying that Jarrett is in the NWO: the color of his car. Jarrett talks about Hogan bragging about how he made promoters like Verne Gagne and Jerry Jarrett (Jeff’s dad, big time promoter in Memphis back in the territory days), and says that Hogan didn’t make either of the Jarretts. He goes on an old guys are awesome rant and tells the NWO to stick it.

Buy the NWO shirt.

Renegade vs. Arn Anderson

Renegade still had a job at this point??? He was an Ultimate Warrior rip-off (same mannerisms, look, style, Hogan talked about him being the Ultimate Surprise etc) and he squashed Anderson for the TV Title in 95. The problem was he made Warrior look like Shawn Michaels in the ring. Anderson controls to start and breaks up a sunset flip. Renegade is looking like the jobber that he should have been.

The fans chant for the DDT as Eric sings WCW’s praises, in this case that of Harlem Heat. Anderson works on the arm while Eric kind of bashes the other announcers for bailing on him. You know, like he did to them last week but we’re not supposed to remember that I guess. Renegade gets a shot in and Tenay suggests that Jarrett might be the swinging point for WCW. Oh dear. Eric still doesn’t trust him. Handspring elbow by Renegade but the second is broken up. DDT ends this.

Rating: D+. Squash here and that’s fine. I still don’t get why Renegade has a job at this point but I guess there’s a logic to paying him a bunch of money somewhere. Nothing to see here and the Ultimate Warrior doing a cartwheel elbow is pretty stupid when you think about it. Nothing match and nothing to see here.

Anderson hammers on him post match until Luger makes the save.

Lex Luger vs. Dave Taylor

Why did Luger go to the back and come out again two minutes later? Luger says in an inset promo that he wants the TV Title back and that he’ll be ready for Anderson. The match is just what you would expect: Taylor gets in a few shots and then the Rack ends it. Basically a workout for Luger.

Anderson jumps Luger with a chair as Luger is leaving.

Chris Benoit vs. Rick Steiner

Scott is injured but is here with Rick anyway. Steiner goes right after him to start and pounds him down with ease. I still don’t get why this mini-feud is even happening. Belly to belly gets two. Off to a chinlock and we talk about an Olympic silver medalist talking about joining WCW, which wouldn’t happen. Another suplex has Benoit holding his neck and head, which makes me wince a bit given what we know now. After a two count we take a break.

Back with Benoit in control with a chinlock but he goes to the corner and pounds away when the cameras are back on. Scott goes after Nick Patrick a bit and Patrick freaks. An NWO limo arrives with Hogan inside with Giant. The match isn’t that important I guess. Hogan says watch this place because he has business to take care of. Benoit had Rick in a chinlock at the time so at least he was smart enough to think through it.

Eric rants about Jarrett some more and Benoit hooks another chinlock. Rick wakes up and hits a huge Steiner Line but Benoit just gets mad because of it. He chops Rick so hard Rick’s headgear falls off. FREAKING OW MAN! Swan Dive gets two. Benoit jumps into a suplex and then a DDT gets two for Rick. The top rope bulldog gets….two? Since we were having a decent match, here’s Debra to make sure it gets screwy. Mongo goes for the briefcase but Rick steals it and waffles Mongo with it (great looking shot) and then hits Benoit for the pin.

Rating: C+. Without the shenanigans and distractions, this would have been a pretty solid match. Rick certainly wasn’t much in his later career, but when he was on he was on pretty well which was the case here. Benoit was so hungry at this point and you could tell how awesome he would be if they gave him the proper push, which unfortunately never really happened.

US Title: Randy Savage vs. Ric Flair

After Savage’s entrance, the NWO is shown in the back and Hogan tells the Nastys to watch his back. He wants to talk to Savage on his own. DiBiase has the NWO contracts for the Nastys. We cut to the back and the NWO is standing over Flair who is out cold. Vincent takes the US Title belt with him. There was a sound resembling a lead pipe shot before we cut there. Liz is there and looks terrified. I think this was due to Flair needing legit shoulder surgery.

Liz is stalked into the arena by Giant who has the title. Hogan jumps Savage and beats him down with a chair. This beating goes on for like 7 minutes as Heenan shouts a very good question: WHERE IS THE REST OF THE LOCKER ROOM??? Trash is thrown into the ring and they do his outline in spraypaint. Hogan declares Liz and Savage null and void because he owns her mind, body and soul. Something about a contract is mentioned. Hogan says he’s going to destroy the broadcast booth and here’s an NWO monster truck. WHAT AM I WATCHING???

Overall Rating: C-. Better than last week for sure, but this show is crawling towards Halloween Havoc about as slowly as you possibly can. Most of the card is announced and they’re building things up, but the problem is everything is pretty much set and there is n’t much to have as far as matches on Nitro goes. Not a great show, but WAY better than last week’s.

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