Wrestlemania 13
Date: March 23, 1997
Location: Rosemont Horizon, Rosemont (Chicago), Illinois
Attendance: 18,197
Commentators: Vince McMahon, Jerry Lawler, Jim Ross
America the Beautiful: N/A

The company was severely on the ropes at this point with WCW and the NWO running rampant in WCW. The company was still putting on everything they could think of to keep up in the ratings but at this point it just wasn’t working at all. The television shows weren’t to the levels of the Attitude Era that we remember but they were coming fast.

This show more than any other was the launching pad for the Attitude Era but I’ll get to that when the time is right. The main event for this show is the Undertaker vs. Sid for the title, despite the fact that Steve Austin won the Rumble. This one is a bit complicated but here we go. Austin was eliminated by Hart in the Rumble but came back in without the referees seeing him.

He eventually put Hart and the rest out to win the match and the title shot. That same night, Shawn won the WWF Title back from Sid but had to vacate it due to “losing his smile” (more on that later). This led to a four way match at In Your House between Taker, Vader, Austin and Hart who were the last four men in the Rumble. The next night, Bret defended against Sid, losing due to Austin interfering.

A few weeks later there was a cage rematch, before which Austin and Hart were scheduled for a submission match at Mania. Taker interfered to help Sid, hoping to get a title match at Mania. Austin interfered, hoping to get Hart the title so he would defend it in the I Quit Match. Taker got his wish and the title match with Sid who won the cage match. That all brings us here, so let’s get to it.The show is presented by Playstation. That’s never go anywhere.

The opening video is about how there is an anger growing in the company that has messed up a lot of things recently. That would ultimately be called Attitude. No real opening other than that and it’s time for our opening match.

Headbangers vs. New Blackjacks vs. Godwins vs. Doug Furnas/Phillip LaFon

This is under elimination rules and the winners get the tag champions tomorrow on Raw. Headbangers were the guys that wore skirts, the Blackjacks were Justin “Don’t call me JBL just yet” Bradshaw and Barry “I had a career once” Windham, the Godwinns you know and Furnas and LaFon were a team that were just kind of around but never did much. They were more famous in ECW and Japan. Not bad, just not great.

Two guys in the ring at once and anyone can tag anyone. We get a quick clip of the original Blackjacks and the new ones say they’re awesome. It’s a big brawl to start of course thanks to the Blackjacks. Henry Godwin and Bradshaw start us off. Bradshaw hasn’t even been able to get his vest off yet. Ah there it goes.

One of the Headbangers in now against Phineas. This is a bit of a mess so far. Now it’s time for the Headbangers to explode but instead they dance a bit. Not as good as Too Cool but they’re trying at least. LaFon comes in and after a bit of a beating for him it’s off to…I think that’s Windham. Furnas comes in and gets a rana for two.

This is going all over the place and it’s hard to get into for the most part. Some Blackjack double teaming results in a suplex for Furnas over the top to the floor. Furnas/LaFon and the Blackjacks get into a brawl on the floor and I think it’s a DQ for the Blackjacks for shoving a ref and Furnas/LaFon are counted out.

It’s down to the Godwins and the Headbangers for the #1 contender spot. This turns into a regular tag match between two teams the feuded for what felt like forever and never got anywhere at all. Henry vs. Thrasher at the moment. Vince clearly doesn’t know which Headbanger is which and it’s kind of funny. Oh and Hillbilly Jim is the manager of the Godwins.

Phineas and Thrasher spit on each other a few times as Vince implies bestiality between Phineas and a few farm animals. Lawler calls Vince out of that and Ross of course talks about food. Mosh beats on Henry a bit and gets a nice springboard clothesline to Henry on the floor. To top that Mosh pops back up onto the apron and we get a Rocket Launcher to send Thrasher onto Henry on the floor.

Jerry asks Vince about White Zombie. Apparently Vince thinks Fleetwood Mac is a new burger at McDonalds. Ok a point there for a funny line. Thrasher misses a moonsault off the top and here come Phineas and Mosh again. Phineas cleans house and there goes Thrasher. Most breaks up the Slop Drop and it’s a big brawl. Mosh gets a top rope seated senton to Phineas to end it out of nowhere. They would lose the next night.

Rating: D+. This was ok, but that’s it. Having two teams go out that fast just didn’t work at all and this might as well have been the Godwinns against the Headbangers. Not terrible, but not great at all. The tag division was a total and complete mess at this point and it didn’t get any better for a few years and then it died completely for the most part.

Brian Pillman and Sunny talk about the WWF Hotline.

Honky Tonk Man joins us on commentary as he continues to look for his protégé. JR says that he and Lawler look like cousins (they really are.) Joke for insiders there. Obviously, Honky is here for the IC Title Match.

Lou Albano and Arnold Skaaland are in the front row.

Intercontinental Title: Rocky Maivia vs. The Sultan

Rocky Maivia would drop the y Maivia and add a The, becoming far more famous. Sultan is more commonly known as Rikishi and is famous in his own right. At this point, Rock is still a very nervous rookie but he won the future award or something like that the previous night at the Slammys, so the people knew he had it in him. For no apparent reason, Bob Backlund and Iron Sheik are managing Sultan here.

No one, I mean NO ONE, cares about Rocky at this point. Tony Atlas, Rocky’s dad’s former tag partner is here. Honky is looking for a perfect champion or something like that. Rocky is a nervous wreck it seems. He hammers on Sultan which gets him nowhere. Rocky can nip-up which is always cool to see. Sweet goodness how big of a push did both of these guys get in the future?

We head to the floor and Rocky clotheslines the post to give Sultan control. Honky goes into a big rant about how you can’t make mistakes when you’re the champion. That’s very funny considering who Honky is. Clothesline gets two for Sultan and we hit the nerve hold. Honky says he’d already have won the match and be in the dressing room combing his hair. He’s rather funny at this indeed.

Rocky tries to get something going but runs into a knee. Top rope headbutt by Sultan puts Rocky down even longer. One handed cover gets two. Rocky gets a sunset flip but Sultan chokes away instead. Belly to belly by the future Samoan gets two. This is painfully boring by the way. We hit the chinlock to continue the boring nature of this match.

Make that a LONG chinlock to continue the boring nature of this match. Here’s the comeback and it’s a double clothesline. Are they just not wanting this show to be interesting at all? Rocky hammers away and doesn’t do much else. A slam gets two. Rocky’s offense is painfully limited at this point. Maivia Hurricane (Spinning DDT) gets two and Rocky goes up top.

Cross body connects but there’s no referee due to the Sheik. Rocky goes back at Sultan and gets his head kicked off in a nice shot. Naturally it only gets two because an Arabian character can’t win anything in this era of course. Rocky gets one of the worst rollups I’ve ever seen to end this awful match.

Rating: D. How could a Rock match be this boring? This was completely awful and just boring beyond believe. Sultan was somehow less interesting than he would be as heel Rikishi which I didn’t think was possible. Rocky was getting there in the ring but the crowd HATED this gimmick he had so thankfully The Rock was born soon after. Anyway, awful match.

Post match the evildoers do evil and beat down Rocky until the other Rocky, Johnson in this case, comes in to save his son in a moment that is supposed to be charming I think but just extends this already bad segment.

The previous night’s Slammies are recapped.

Ken Shamrock, in this case not a wrestler yet, is the referee for the submission match later on and won’t be intimidated by either guy. He showed what he could do against Billy Gunn. He was a UFC star at the time so this was a big cross promotion thing. He had been what would become the world champion of UFC less than a year ago, so this would be like Randy Couture showing up. Big deal indeed.

HHH says he’s going to destroy Goldust. Chyna is with him and she has NO chest at all.

HHH vs. Goldust

The main point here is that HHH has Chyna who no one knows anything about. She’s supposed to be opposed by Marlena. Think about how this is going to go. HHH had been hitting on Marlena around this time and Goldust wasn’t happy. There’s your backstory. HHH’s music is just freaking sweet for a wrestling theme. When Goldust had his mind right he was a very good worker. Sadly enough that doesn’t happen often.

It’s weird to see Chyna this…manly looking. Yes somehow the more famous version of her was the girly one. Goldie goes into his crouch to start and comes out with the clothesline to get us going. Atomic drop and a clothesline to HHH sends him to the floor. Jerry makes fun of Goldie’s hair and says that Vince has a wig. Vince implies he wears a toupee which has always been a point of uncertainty.

HHH gets tied up in the ropes and it’s all Goldust to start us off here. The future Game can’t get anything going and walks into a powerslam after his tiny bit of offense. Goldust goes up but HHH makes the stop. He sets for a suplex but instead throws him over the ropes and down to the floor where his face hits the apron. Nearly a FREAKING OW MAN moment but not quite.

Helmsley starts to loosen Goldust’s jumpsuit to get better chops in. Why does Goldie’s clothing always come off at Mania? King makes fun of Chyna as HHH takes over completely here. Swinging neckbreaker gets two. Off to an abdominal stretch which was invented by someone named Wilbur Snyder apparently. This show is staying boring for a very long time and it’s not good.

We’re about 45 minutes into this and there hasn’t been a good match yet. Good thing one of the best matches of all time is coming. HHH gets a Flair knee drop for two. Small package from Goldust for two. HHH takes him right back down with a clothesline. Goldust can’t get a slam but can get a cross body for two. And now they hit heads to waste some more time.

HHH tries to go up top but Goldust gets a flying shot to HHH to take him down. Why do I think that’s something the Ambiguously Gay Duo uses as a double team move. HHH eats buckle and Goldust hammers away. Bulldog takes HHH down. Chyna moves for the first time all match, going after Marlena. Goldust has the Curtain Call but has to save Marlena. HHH knocks into Goldust which knocks Marlena into Chyna. Pedigree FINALLY ends this.

Rating: D. This went on nearly 15 minutes. This was far too long and far too boring. We’re almost an hour into this show and there hasn’t been a single good match in sight. Terribly boring match and thankfully this was the last time they fought as HHH started feuding with Cactus soon after this.

Shawn is on AOL and isn’t very good at typing.

Tag Titles: Owen Hart/British Bulldog vs. Mankind/Vader

There’s really no backstory here. Mankind now has Paul Bearer as his manager following Bearer’s betrayal of the Undertaker at Summerslam. On the way to the ring, the champions say they’re going to keep the belts. Ross interviews them and the champions also argue over who the leader of the team really is. This is an issue because Bulldog recently beat Owen to win the first ever European Championship.

Heel vs. heel here which isn’t something you see that often, at least not for a title. Owen and Vader start us off which is good as they had a solid match on a European PPV. After getting pounded down for awhile, Hart speeds things up to start which works pretty well, even taking Vader down with a spinwheel kick. Vader finally is like boy I’m Vader and powerbombs him.

Davey breaks up the Vader Bomb and somehow that counts as a tag so it’s Bulldog vs. Mankind. Delayed vertical to Mankind and Vader comes in to break up a pin. Here’s a (non-delayed) suplex for you too Trixie. Vader pulls the rope down as Bulldog hits it, sending him out to the floor. With Bulldog hammering on Mankind Vader drills him with the Urn to take over.

Vader kills Bulldog with a corner splash and adds on a middle rope splash which somehow only gets two. Off to Foley who hammers away on Bulldog in the corner. Backdrop takes Davey down and it’s off to Vader again. I love that move Vader does where he more or less hits a standing splash to take someone down. Davey managers to slam Vader off the top and here comes Owen.

Top rope dropkick takes down Vader and a sunset flip causes Vader to fall down. Cross body gets two. Vader is like screw this and runs him over. Why mess with the basics? The challengers get a Demolition Decapitator to Owen on the floor to more or less end him. Hey Stu and Helen are in the front row! I wonder if the fans know they’re sitting next to perhaps the best trainer of all time.

While Mankind puts on a chinlock we look at the crowd and announce the attendance plus say that we are LIVE. Owen gets a DDT out of nowhere but runs into a knee lift to take him down. We get a Wrestling Classic reference of all things. Vader hammers away at Owen in the corner then calls a spot to him. A suplex is reversed and Owen gets a spin kick to get two.

Out to the floor again and Owen gets a belly to belly suplex on the floor to Mankind. Enziguri back in the ring takes Mankind down and it’s off to Bulldog and Vader. Vader’s mask is off and Davey cleans house. He sets for the powerslam on Mankind but he hooks in the Claw. They get knocked to the floor and Mankind gets the Claw again on the floor. Yep it’s a double countout.

Rating: D+. Nothing special at all here and the ending completely sucked. This was a disjointed mess the entire time and it went over 16 minutes. It’s not completely horrible as the talent in there brings it up (I mean dude, the Bulldog is the worst wrestler in there. That says a lot) but still, this wasn’t anything special in the slightest. A definitive ending would have been nice too.

We recap Bret vs. Austin. Ok here we go. The idea is simple: Bret is losing his place in the company and thinks everyone is out to get him. He isn’t ready to go yet and wants to stay around. After losing the title he left for six months and when he came back the company was different. He talks about how everyone has screwed him over and how he doesn’t like it that well.

There was one guy that Bret thought was the cause of this whole thing: Enter Steve Austin. Austin calls Bret out on his complaining, saying that since he got back he’s done nothing but cry about how much he hates this new WWF. Austin went after Bret and drove him insane, resulting in a huge profanity laced tirade against Vince and the company on Raw.

Bret had already beaten Austin in a classic at Survivor Series, but Austin met up with him again at the Rumble. There Bret eliminated him but Austin came back in and threw Bret out and was declared the winner. Due to Shawn losing his smile, Bret won the title at Final Four and then lost it the next night but still wanted Austin more. Bret’s hatred of this new era was manifested in the form of Austin. The buildup here is incredible to say the least and there was almost no way this wasn’t going to be a classic. The question wasn’t would it be great, but how great would it be.

Steve Austin vs. Bret Hart

Ken Shamrock is guest referee due to knowing submissions. Remember that this is submission only. Nice ovation for Shamrock. Austin gets his famous entrance as actual glass shatters in front of the entrance when he walks through. The idea here is simple: Bret is a submissions master, but Austin can beat on you until you say you quit.

Austin gets in Shamrock’s face which goes nowhere. Bret definitely gets a face pop but it’s not as strong as it was before. Just to be clear: Bret is the face and Austin is the heel coming into this without question. Austin spears Bret down almost immediately and the fight is on. They slug it out and hit the floor for more punching. Austin gets sent into the post but manages to crotch Bret on the railing.

A clothesline sends Bret into the crowd. They head into the crowd and thankfully unlike ECW, there’s a camera there to get a good shot of the vast majority of the action. Bret takes over for a bit and there’s a guy with an NWO shirt on. Austin takes over and tries a Piledriver on the steps. Bret manages to backdrop him down the steps to regain control.

Back to ringside and Austin reverses Bret to send him CRASHING into the steps which go flying. He manages to knock the steps into Austin and hammers away. Hey we’re actually in the ring! Austin steps on Bret’s fingers which is a nice move. Spinning neckbreaker gets Bret out of trouble. The fans are still behind him at this point.

Vince bashes Bret saying that he’ll have an excuse for losing. Bret complained about Vince burying him in the commentary on his matches with Austin and he might have a point actually. Bret cannonballs down onto the knee of Austin and the Rattlesnake is in trouble. He works on the knee with his usual attacks but misses a second cannonball.

Austin pops up and drills Bret with a Stunner to take over. No pins though so he doesn’t have a ton to work with. Jerry says that isn’t good as it could cost him the match. Ross jumps in there and says that if someone is unconscious the referee would stop the match. That is a very important line as it establishes the procedure so they can say “we said that’s what we would do” if that came up.

Bret busts out the Heartbreaker (figure four on the post) for I think the first time on PPV and the crowd is into it. No submission of course as we’re not far enough into the match at this point. Bret grabs the bell and the fans aren’t sure about this. Scratch that as he gets the chair and tries to Pillmanize the leg. Yep the fans still love him.

Austin gets up and CRACKS Bret with the chair as he goes up to the top. Austin is all fired up now and pops Bret across the back with the chair. The fans sound afraid to cheer. Suplex puts Bret down. Middle rope elbow, a Bret move, hits for Austin. Ross gets in some GREAT jabs at WCW, talking about how this is a fight, not about covering a bald spot and various other jokes like that.

Stone Cold hits a Russian Leg Sweep (stealing the Five Moves of Doom again and busts out a Koji Clutch of all things. Never let it be said that Austin can’t wrestle when he has to. Boston Crab goes on to further work on the back. A rope is grabbed though and Austin isn’t happy at all.

Austin tries a Sharpshooter to a GREAT pop. Jerry: “Bret Hart could never submit to the Sharpshooter!” Vince: “Hey it could happen!” I wonder if Vince had some plans for Montreal already. Austin throws Bret to the floor to BIG heat. It’s very interesting to keep an eye or ear in this case on the crowd and see what they think of this match.

Out to the floor and Bret reverses Austin into the timekeeper’s table and ultimately the railing. Austin is busted open and now we get into the meat of this one. Bret hammers away on the cut to a pop but a far more mild one. Backbreaker and elbow off the middle rope from Bret and he grabs the chair. Down into the knee and Ross is morphing into JR.

Sharpshooter coming but Austin rakes the eyes to break it up. Bret hammers in the corner so Austin punts him in the balls which Vince says might have been deserved. Vince be nice. Austin wakes up and turns into the Rattlesnake, stomping the mudhole on Bret in the corner and adding a middle rope suplex for good measure. He gets the electrical cord from ringside and wraps it around Bret’s neck.

He tries to hang Bret over the top rope but Bret grabs the bell. He DRILLS Austin in the head with it to a pop from the crowd. They’re not sure what to do now. There’s the Sharpshooter and everyone rises to their feet. We get one of the most famous images in wrestling history as Austin screams in agony with the blood gushing down his head.

Austin starts to lose consciousness and JR is in his element here, shouting the entire time and it’s just great. For the first time ever, Austin breaks the Sharpshooter but Bret gets it right back on. Crowd is completely behind Austin here. He keeps fighting but eventually passes out and Shamrock stops it. Austin is DEAD but Bret isn’t done.

Bret tries to go after Austin again and the heat on him is insane. Shamrock grabs Bret and throws him off Austin. Ken is all like BRING IT ON but Bret walks away to some of the loudest booing you’ll ever here. Austin tries to get up and Shamrock leaves. Another referee tries to help Austin but he gets stunned. Austin walks to the back on his own and gets a standing ovation. Ladies and gentlemen I give you the double turn. The fans chant for Austin as he goes to the back, and the WWF has its savior.

Rating: A+. This is one of the greatest matches of all time. It’s a war from start to finish and also one of the most complex matches you’ll ever see. Bret was fighting time and the new Attitude in the form of Austin and despite the absolute best he could do, he couldn’t get his way in the end.

The fans are as big a part of this match as the guys out there, making Austin the new hero and Bret the top heel in the company in a single match. That’s hardly ever done and this is the perfection of it. Excellent match and 100% required viewing for fans, as well as the only reason to watch this show at all.

Also, some people, myself included, believe that that match was the official dawning of the Attitude Era. Truly historic.

The blood stain on the mat is kind of creepy. The announcers talk about what we just saw and how awesome it was.

The Nation talks about how they’re going to take it to the Legion of Doom and Ahmed.

Nation of Domination vs. Legion of Doom/Ahmed Johnson

This is a Chicago Street Fight and about the 19th blowoff to Ahmed vs. the Nation. The Nation has like 8 guys with them here but the official team is Farroq/Crush/Savio Vega. The Nation would have actors come out with them to make the Nation look bigger which is kind of a great idea. We hear that Mania 14 is in Boston but tickets aren’t on sale yet.

Remember this is the LOD’s hometown so they’re mad over. Ahmed even has the spikes going on. Ahmed is the original Ezekiel Jackson if you aren’t familiar with him. The LOD brings a kitchen sink with them, starting a joke that was funny a grand total of once. This is going to be a big old wild brawl.

The Nation jumps the good guys as they’re taking off their pads. Crush gets left alone in the ring and then the lackeys come in. Yeah that doesn’t work. No tags here thank goodness. The lawyer gets beaten up, prompting JR to shout that he just got debriefed! The nightstick comes into play as there is too much to call here.

Ahmed JUMPS over the railing with a tope con hilo into the crowd. Not bad for a guy that weighed about 280. Since that isn’t good enough he jumps back over it with a big shoulder block to take down Crush. Hawk swings a big board at Savio but it hits the rope and flies into the air. He catches it but misses Savio. Farrooq gets….I think that was supposed to be a piledriver on the French announce table but they fall off to the side.

The board is used on Hawk in the ring. Total insanity here. Farrooq gets shot in the face by a fire extinguisher. The guy that would become known as D’lo brings out a street sign. This is pure anarchy. Ahmed blocks a trash can shot and puts Farrooq through the French announce table. Crowd is totally behind LOD. The fire extinguisher is used again.

It’s rope time and apparently they’re going to lynch Ahmed. Animal CRACKS Farrooq with that sign. Back to the lynching, this time with Hawk getting in trouble. Crush hits Animal with a wrench of all things. Farrooq goes up with the rope in hand and gets pulled down to the floor by Hawk. Things start to slow down a lot due to exhaustion.

There goes the fire extinguisher again. Spinebuster to Farrooq by Ahmed and I think it’s Hawk firing the extinguisher at Crush. The Nation jumps into the ring and they all beat down Ahmed but the LOD pick off Crush and it’s a Doomsday Device for him. The 2×4 is used as a clothesline to take down Farrooq for the pin. Post match PG-13 takes Doomsday Devices and D’Lo takes a Pearl River Plunge.

Rating: B+. That’s probably way too high but I loved this match when I was a kid and I loved it here. It’s a total brawl from the minute the bell rang and they kept it up for about ten minutes. All kinds of weapons, all kinds of violence and Ahmed showing off the whole time. This match was very fun and they did exactly what they said it would be: a fight. Fun match.

In Your House is back next month. I think that would be Revenge of the Taker which was pretty good.

Here’s Shawn to do commentary on the main event. This was kind of a big issue as he was supposed to lose the title back to Bret in the rematch here. Obviously that didn’t happen as he “injured his knee” which he’s hinted at being fake over the years. His entrance takes forever as he’s limping and high fives everyone in sight.

Sid flubs his lines and says he isn’t afraid of the Deadman. Can we PLEASE get someone to say something else when they’re fighting Taker? It can’t be that hard, truly it can’t be.

WWF World Title: Sid vs. Undertaker

This is happening due to Shawn sitting out. It was supposed to be Bret vs. Shawn but Austin was substituted in for Shawn to face Bret. I’m assuming Austin would have gotten one of these guys instead but that’s never been fully answered. It’s weird seeing no Bearer with Taker in this time period. They’re filling in time here as Taker’s entrance takes forever. Shawn and Taker’s combined have taken about six minutes. Also, when’s the last time you saw Taker come out first?

JR points out that Taker has never lost at Wrestlemania, although he doesn’t mention the Streak directly. I love Sid’s pyro. Always awesome. And here comes Bret Hart to take some spotlight up. Vince cuddles Shawn, telling him not to go after Bret in a funny bit. Bret says he and Taker aren’t friends anymore and that Sid is a fraud as champion. He complains a lot and gets powerbombed for his troubles. Sid yells at him and Taker jumps him to start us off.

This might be the least interesting Mania main event in a very long time. Big boot by Taker and he throws Sid into the corner and hammers away even more. Splash in the corner and we hear about Taker never being given the chance to lead the company which is rather true indeed. Old School hits and Shawn says neither is used to not being the bigger man. One is listed at 6’10 and one is listed at 6’9. Wouldn’t one be bigger?

Sid throws on a bearhug as I guess he needed a rest two minutes in. He hammers away as the fans are more or less silent. They’re not sure who to cheer for as Sid is almost universally popular but Taker is Taker. Sid knocks him to the floor and Taker is sent onto the French announce table. Why pick on the Spanish when you can pick on the French I guess.

Gorilla has sent in word that this is No DQ. Good to know. Sid’s offense is rather limited shall we say. Camel clutch goes on as we rest even more. Middle rope double axe handle takes down Taker. Taker whispers powerslam to Sid, Sid says “HUH” Taker whispers again. Powerslam gets two for Sid.

Sid chokes away as this is so boring. Jerry and Shawn make fun of Bret to pass the time. Big right hand in the corner by Sid. Shawn says you can’t beat Sid while he’s standing up. What incredible insight! To the floor and Taker sends him over the railing. They slug it out over the railing and Sid comes back to ringside again. Back into the ring with Taker having a slight advantage.

Yep it’s another rest hold. This one goes on for awhile as have the vast majority of them so far in this match. Taker fights up from his knees and gets a powerslam to take Sid down for two. Oh look it’s ANOTHER rest hold, in this case a nerve hold. Big boot is blocked by a clothesline by Taker for two. Double big boot spot and both guys are down. Can someone put on a test pattern to give us something interesting to watch?

Sid crawls over to get two. He gets another axe handle off the middle rope for two. A clothesline gets no cover as we’re filling in time until the ending here. Another double axe gets punched in the ribs but Sid rakes the eyes to break the momentum. Sid goes up for like the 9th time but Taker stops him for once. Taker gets a top rope clothesline of his own for two.

Neither guy will go for their finishers yet and Jerry thinks they’re afraid of a kickout. Taker slits the throat but Sid reverses into one of his own. Wow that actually worked. Naturally it only gets two because this is Wrestlemania. They slug it out on the floor and Bret Hart pops up again to hit Sid in the back with a chair. Taker rams Sid into the post and back in the ring a chokeslam gets two. Jumping clothesline is ducked and Sid sets for the powerbomb. Bret comes back AGAIN and clotheslines Sid on the top rope. Tombstone gives Taker his second world title.

Rating: D. Sweet GOODNESS this was boring. This is one of the most lackluster matches I can remember in a long time. After two very good matches, one being a classic, just before this, this is a terrible way to end the show. Who though Sid going over 21 minutes was a good idea in the slightest? Taker’s title reign, much like this match, was boring. The commentary would make you believe he never held the title before.

Taker poses with the belt to end the show. Shawn applauds for like two minutes straight. Sid was gone after this.

Overall Rating: D. This is a show where one match was supposed to be a classic and it was. The other good match was more or less by accident and meant nothing. This was a bad time for the company but the brighter days were coming. The Border War was coming soon and it would breathe life into the company. Montreal would be the big break they needed and then Starrcade 97 completely saved them. The rest is history. If you didn’t guess, I’m trying not to talk or think about this show anymore. Terrible Mania and one of the worst ever.

In Your House 13: Final Four
Date: February 16, 1997
Location: UTC Arena, Chattanooga, Tennessee
Attendance: 6,399
Commentators: Jerry Lawler, Jim Ross

Well we’re in between the Rumble and Mania and DANG if it’s not a weird time in the WWF. There is no world champion at the moment but we’ll get to that. To begin with let’s recap the Rumble which should explain a lot. Three things happened there: Vader beat Taker with help from Paul Bearer, Shawn got the WWF Title back from Sid, and most importantly Steve Austin won the Royal Rumble in a stunning shock.

OR DID HE???

Well yes but he shouldn’t have. Your final five men were Bret, Taker, Vader, Austin and the fake Diesel (Kane). Mankind and Terry Funk were fighting on the floor which had the attention of the referees. During this fight, Hart eliminated Austin but no referee saw it. Austin got back in, eliminated Vader and Taker just after Hart eliminated Diesel. Austin took out Hart and the referees turned around to see him alone in the ring.

Austin is declared the winner and therefore the #1 contender. HOWEVER, Gorilla Monsoon doesn’t like this so he makes a match for this PPV which he dubs Final Four. Austin, Hart, Taker and Vader, the final four men in the ring in the Rumble, would have a match at the PPV for the right to go to Mania. Ok, that’s all well and good. However, there was a special Thursday edition of Raw where Shawn forfeited the title, citing a knee injury and a lost smile.

That night he had been scheduled to face Sid in a title match, so instead of just naming Sid Champion, the four way match at the PPV was now for the title with the winner facing Sid the following night on Raw for the title. Did you get all that?

That leads us here. Also on the card we have Furnas and LaFon (don’t ask) challenging for the tag belts as well as Rocky Maivia defending the IC Title that he took from HHH on the same Thursday Raw against HHH in a rematch. This is your last PPV before WM 13, so it better rock. Let’s see if it rocks or just Flex Kavanas.

Marc Mero vs. Leif Cassidy

We open with this, as in just after the recap we hear Sable’s music begin. You can tell the camera people either don’t care about this match or are just really stupid as Mero is in the ring and his pyro is going off before we even see him for the first time.

Sable has got her classic look down now: long blonde hair, one piece black leather outfit, big earrings and sunglasses. Just…dang. Anyway, Cassidy is already in the ring so how good are you expecting this match to really be? I actually like Cassidy’s stuff better than Mero’s. Let that sink in for a bit. Your psychology for this match is Cassidy works on Mero’s knee. Mero is your face here…I think.

Actually it’s more like Sable is the face and Marc is hers but that’s neither here nor there. Snow really can carry a match when he’s allowed to. It’s not something anyone cares about though as it’s Leif Cassidy vs. Marc Mero but Snow (Cassidy in case you didn’t pick up on that) is handling this very well.

Everything he does makes sense and has a point to it. There’s no noticeably stupid moves anywhere which is a very nice break. He goes after Sable though and Mero rescues her. After this he hits like three moves and no sells the knee injury to hit his shooting star press to win it.

Rating: D. If I could split this up into two ratings it would be an F for Mero and an A for Cassidy. Mero was just awful out there. He was on defense for probably 80-85 percent of the match, slams Cassidy’s head twice, hits a bad Samoan drop and his finisher to win while no selling the whole point of the match. Snow on the other hand was crisp, solid, and logical. You’re facing a high flier, keep him on the mat.

That’s smart wrestling and something that makes sense to do. He even threw in a figure four, which to be fair was the absolute worst I’ve ever seen but he was at least trying. I was impressed with him but Mero was just awful. Sable of course was the highlight with her looks, but it was close.

Now we get a double shot of weirdness. To begin with, immediately after that match, Honky Tonk Man comes out. Now, that’s not incredibly weird because based on the reaction I would assume that he’d been around a bit lately as the announcers and the crowd don’t seem stunned by his appearance.

I know he had an angle coming up that had either already started or started tonight but we’ll cover that later. The really weird part comes when he’s about to get into the ring.

We cut to a video package recapping Shawn’s forfeiting the title which shows the entire speech, Gorilla’s announcement of the title being on the line in the Four Way, and then we go to an interview with Sid. Just comes from nowhere and while it would usually be fine, why have HTM come out and then show it? He didn’t even get to have his music end.

As for the speech, here’s my take on it: you can believe him or not, and I personally think that he was at least half telling the truth, but he’s made it clear that the knee was nowhere near as bad as he implied. He had a minor surgery that could have waited but he says he very well may be retiring because of it. All I know is this: for a long stretch in that interview you could hear a pin drop in the audience.

People were on the verge of tears because Shawn might have to go. You can like Shawn you can hate Shawn you can be indifferent to him as I am for the most part, but the people loved him and that simply cannot be denied. What I believe however is that he simply didn’t want to lose to Bret at Mania 13. It was very clear that was where they were going with things, but Shawn just didn’t want to do it so he backed out.

Anyway, Sid says he’s taking the title tomorrow.

Flash Funk/Bart Gunn/Goldust vs. Nation of Domination

Flash’s entrance takes a ridiculous amount of time as he and his ladies, who are sexy in an odd way, just have to have a full dance sequence in the ring. As his illustrious partners make their way to the ring, we get a recap to explain this “feud”. Apparently all three of our jobbers have been unfairly beaten by the NOD thanks to their gang mentality. The Nation makes their entrance and look like the NWO.

I kid you not, there are 9 people in this stable. A checklist: 2 white rappers, Clarence Mason, D’lo Brown, Farrooq, Crush, Savio Vega and two guys who were apparently actors hired to look like the NOD was bigger than it really was, which is actually a good idea. That’s a huge freaking stable and their coming through the crowd and rapping their own music was genius.

This match goes under 7 minutes so this is going to be a relatively short review. Basically here all that happens is a six man tag. It’s as simple as that. This is a basic 6 man tag match. It’s not great and it’s not bad. It’s just your standard run of the mill 6 man tag. Faces start strong, heel takes over, you get a face comeback and the heels win. There is however one sick spot in it. Funk is getting double teamed by Savio and Farrooq.

They send him into the ropes for a double clothesline but he grabs their arms and in one motion backflips over them to land a double clothesline of his own. I was very impressed by this move as it just looks sick. Finish comes when Crush drops a leg on Bart to let Farrooq pin him.

Rating: C-. Now stop me if you’re heard this one before: a cowboy, a pimp and a man that is of the homosexual persuasion walk into a bar. Seriously we have those three gimmicks against a group modeled on the Black Panthers. How over the top can you get? And Vince has the nerve to wonder why the NWO was destroying him in the ratings at the time? Give me a break.

In the back Doc is with Steve Austin. He talks about how Austin hasn’t beaten any of the three men he’s in the ring with. Austin says he did at the Rumble and there’s a conspiracy against him by everyone in the company with any kind of power.

IC Title: HHH vs. Rocky Maivia

This is the rematch from three days prior as Rocky shocked the world and took the IC title from HHH. Helmsley has gotten to the best heel music I can remember in a long time as he comes out to Beethoven’s Ode To Joy now. DAng that’s some sweet music for a heel. He’s also dropped the random woman valet which helps a lot as well in my eyes. He’s becoming much more deadly in the ring and the HHH character is coming soon.

Man HHH is a twig at this point, maybe cracking 245 soaking wet. Rocky was still a rookie at this point but you could see the star in him just begging to get out with a gimmick change. HHH was on the verge of stardom but not as naturally. Early on the botch a baseball slide spot but HHH does a great improvised spot where he turns it into a drop toehold. This is a pretty good match so far with some good one liners from the King.

HHH is so rich he takes taxis to drive in movies. You could see the chemistry that these two had even this young in their careers. They knew how to get the best out of one another and that’s not something that can be taught to you by anyone. The commentators do a comparison of the people that trained both men to kill some time. JR mistakenly says that was a nice slupex by HHH so you can see him starting to slip even 12 years ago.

HHH and Hebner do their usual thing of Earl not being willing to be intimidated by HHH. HHH hits a perfect jumping knee to the face which might be the best he’s ever done. This is a very good match as it’s hard hitting and has a lot of near falls. However, they of course ruin it with the finish. Goldust whom HHH was feuding with at the time comes and stands in the aisle allowing Maivia to hit a German suplex to get the pin.

Post match Marlena gets choked out by some big woman/man with black hair that would come to be known as Chyna. Goldust says “throw her in jail.” They did a decent job of implying she was just a fan but the replay of it kind of gives it away.

Rating: B+. This was a very good match and if it had a finish could have been great. These two just put on great matches together no matter what and this was no exception. Rocky would go on to have a nice little reign with the title while HHH would go on to do nothing over the Summer but would starting hanging out with Shawn Michaels and that creature that just interfered in a little thing that would come to be called DX.

Promo for Mania airs.

Kevin Kelly interviews Vader who says he’ll be taking down all three men tonight. Paul Bearer says the same thing.

Tag Titles: Furnas/LaFon vs. Owen/Bulldog

This was a strange match. The story is that the champions have been arguing a lot lately and at the same time they lost in a Survivor Series match to these same two guys, resulting in this tag match. Now I know nothing about the challengers at all but to be fair I really hadn’t seen much of them. These guys were actually good. They were great movers out there and had some great technical stuff.

The person that stood out the most though was the referee. He was just flat out bad here. He kept taking forever as he kept wanting people out of the ring etc. and while that’s fine to try to keep going, he took it way too far. Whenever there was a cover he’d check the two partners before he went to make the count. That’s a waste of time and looks bad. Also during the match the champions kept fighting, eventually seeing Bulldog intentionally clothesline Owen hard.

Now once that happens it’s like a new match starts. The second match is far superior to the first one. Once they change gears, things get very good very fast. There was a ton of near falls and I actually believed that there would be new champions on more than one occasion. I knew who was going to win and I still believed otherwise. That my friends is compelling wrestling. The champions get hit with everything but they keep getting up every time.

Finally the end comes and it is just strange. Bulldog gets one of the guys up for the powerslam and Owen hits the guy in the head with a Slammy right in front of the referee for the DQ. What in the world? Why would you do that when your partner was about to hit his finisher which people didn’t kick out of? They fight even more afterwards with Smith throwing down the title and then even breaking the Slammy. He finally leaves with his partners.

Rating: B-. Just like in the opening match this was a tale of two matches and two separate grades. The first half was just flat out bad. It wasn’t interesting and I was wanting to just fast forward through the match and get to the end. However once Owen and Bulldog got done fighting the thing turned into a great tag match.

The ending just made no sense at all and was just to further the Bulldog/Owen angle which mostly ended with the debut of the European Title later on that month in which these two faced each other for the title.

Doc is with the Deadman in that back who says he has rediscovered his edge which makes me expect the Rated R Superstar to pop up.

WWF Title: Undertaker vs. Vader vs. Steve Austin vs. Bret Hart

Lawler keeps asking what lucha libre means (the Spanish announcers keep saying it) and JR says rough wrestling for some reason. This is actually an over the top rope battle royal but you can also be eliminated by pin or submission, which is a very interesting twist. I’m not sure if I like it or not. It takes away Vader’s weight advantage but why would you try to pin someone when you can just knock them out of the ring?

Bret of course gets a prematch interview. He says nothing can stop him from taking the title tonight. Bret’s jacket really is cool. JR says that even Wrestlemania wasn’t this exciting. Suuuuuure. Starts off with both singles feuds being renewed. Very quickly Vader and Taker figure out that going through the ropes is legal. Everyone just beats on everyone with them trading partners which further supports my orgy theory from earlier.

Leaving the ring was critical here I think as it opens up a lot of alternative possibilities for these guys which is certainly a good thing. Vader gets cut BAD around his left eye. Like it looks as if it fell out and there’s just a hole there that’s shooting blood out of it. I finally found where it was and it’s not pretty. Within a few seconds he takes a chair to the face and he hits his eye on the stairs, right on the corner.

They fight all over the arena and all fight each other at least once and in some cases twice. That’s what makes this match work as well as it is: you can keep the fighting fresh. Austin even breaks out a top rope clothesline which never stops making my head shake given how bad his knees got later in his career. After that we cut to the floor where VADER HAS BRET IN A SHARPSHOOTER. What the heck???

Those things happen within a few seconds of each other. DAng I need my medicine after seeing that. Sadly enough it was a better one that the one Rock would use later in his career. We’re at 12 minutes and no one is out yet. That’s another thing that’s making this great is all four are in there for over half of the match so far. It’s more or less Bret wrestling Austin and Taker fighting Vader now.

Bret sets Austin for a belly to back suplex and Austin BACKFLIPS out of it. Man alive Austin was the cat’s meow before he got hurt. Vader’s eye is freaking sick right now. This whole thing is absolutely brutal and it’s a great match so far. We’re at fifteen minutes and it’s still all four guys in there. Just as I finish typing that Austin is thrown out as Bret Hart uses what we would now call the FU to eliminate him. Bret Hart used an FU. Sly can never see this moment.

His orgasm would flood Missouri. Taker gets knocked to the floor so we continue our orgy match with Bret and Vader getting it on for awhile. I will now pause to attempt to erase such a mental picture. Ok I’m back now as Vader goes to the top in a dumb move. Why would you do that when being knocked to the floor eliminates you?

Bret stops him and lands a superplex from the top rope which is freaking insane given A) how long they’ve been going and B) the fact that Vader’s gut needs its own zip code. Taker breaks up the sharpshooter on Vader which makes no sense at all and even the announcers question it. Austin comes back out and beats up Hart some more to pretty much secure the fact that he’ll be winning this.

Vader again goes to the ropes for a Vader Bomb but Taker sits up and hits an uppercut to the little Vaders to eliminate him so we’re down to Bret vs. Taker. Austin is still around after a chokeslam and for some reason he stops the tombstone. Taker and Hart both go for Austin but Taker is too slow.

He turns around and is clotheslined out to make Bret the champion again. Sid comes out for the staredown after Taker storms off. Sid says let’s do it right now as we go off the air in the middle of the showdown. I like that ending as it leaves us on a cliffhanger for tomorrow’s show.

Rating: A. This was a very fun match and the key to it was you knew there was going to be a new champion at the end so you had to watch all of it. Another key was that no one was eliminated until over half of the match was gone. This kept things fresh and made you want to stay until the very end to see how everyone went out. The leaving the ring was key as well as it allowed three separate one on one matches to occur throughout the match. Great match indeed and very fun.

Overall Rating: B-. First two matches were pretty bad but the other three more than made up for them. By the middle of the main event I was hooked. The second half of the show was great with another solid Rock/HHH encounter, a solid and surprising tag match and a great main event. Overall this show started slowly but kicked it into high gear at the end. Not great but certainly fun, this is worth a watch someday but don’t make it a top priority.

Wrestlemania 12
Date: March 31, 1996
Location: Arrowhead Pond, Anaheim, California
Attendance: 18,853
Commentators: Vince McMahon, Jerry Lawler
Star Spangled Banner: N/A

This show is a very different direction for the company, and while the match is remembered fondly, this is one of the lowest rated Manias of all time and I think that’s for one reason: there are only 6 matches. You have the iron man match, Diesel vs. Taker, and four other matches that hardly anyone remembers. Razor Ramon is on the box but was less than two months away from debuting on Nitro.

After what apparently was viewed as a big show the year before, tonight was all about Shawn Michaels. Looking back at the buildup, we all should have seen it coming. Shawn was the guy that never quite could put all of the pieces together but for the first time in forever he was healthy, he was trained properly and he was totally ready, but we’ll get to that later on. Let’s get to it.

The opening video is of course all about Bret vs. Shawn which is appropriate since that’s all this show is about. Something about champion vs. challenger or something.

Oh and because there was no time for it, the finals of a big tag team title tournament was held on the preshow with the Body Donnas beating the Godwins when Sunny flashed Phineas.

After no America the Beautiful or Star Spangled Banner, we get our first contest!

Vader/Owen Hart/British Bulldog vs. Ahmed Johnson/Jake Roberts/Yokozuna

Ahmed Johnson was nothing short of a tank. Imagine Lashley but about ten times more awesome. Nothing but pure power all around. Shame he was injured and then left the company. He was supposed to be the first black WWF Champion but that fell through. Anyway, this is because of Yoko turning face and going after Cornette who brought in Vader to settle the score. Hart and Smith were also in Cornette’s stable and Johnson and Roberts are there because they had contracts.

Yoko at this point was just embarrassingly fat. Apparently if Yoko’s team wins he gets 5 minutes with Cornette. He means nothing at all by this point and it’s rather clear. Yoko and Vader slug it out to start but soon it shifts to a big brawl. And then it’s back to Yoko vs. Vader with Vader getting knocked to the floor. Ahmed DIVES over the top to take down Vader.

Total insanity to start us off here so at least it’s fast paced. The giants explode again and it’s Yoko with the advantage. Owen comes in and gets beaten on for a bit until Bulldog saves him. Back to the fat boys here as for some reason they decided Yoko should be in there for three or four minutes to start us off. Vader punches him down in the corner and talks to him for awhile for no apparent reason.

Yoko gets a freaking Rock Bottom of all things and tags in Ahmed. He cleans house, destroying all three evildoers. Sunset flip on Vader results in Vader jumping up and going straight down. Bulldog gets in a few shots and Vince says Camp Cornette is like a herd of buffalo. Sure why not.

Owen gets a missile dropkick out of nowhere to take over. Enziguri to the back (which thankfully they say was to the back) puts Ahmed down. Back to Vader as this is a basic formula now. Is there a reason as to why Jake isn’t getting the beating so that Ahmed can get the hot tag later? Ahmed gets a shot to take Owen down and finally brings in Jake.

Mr. Fuji comes down to ringside as I’d assume he got lost or something. Jake calls for the DDT but Owen grabs the rope. Roberts gets caught in the corner and the beatdown is on. Vader mauls him for a bit as this is starting to get a big long. Top rope elbow by Owen gets two. Just to show what a different time it was, Jake kicks out of the powerslam from the Bulldog like it’s any other move. That’s just wrong.

Yoko finally gets the lukewarm tag and hammers Vader down in the corner. He looked like he was sticking a fork in the top of his head which explains the speed of those shots. Jake comes back in because he’s clearly fine after that long beatdown and Ahmed can’t come in yet due to affirmative action or something. DDT to Owen but Cornette saves. Vader takes Jake down and the Vader Bomb ends him.

Rating: D+. The wrestling really isn’t that bad, but it went on forever. Take 5-7 minutes out of this and it goes way up in value. The psychology made very little sense here which is a weird thing to see in a Roberts match. This went nowhere for the most part and feels really weird for a Mania opener. Nothing to see here.

We recap Piper vs. Goldust in one of the most homophobic feuds ever. Piper is president of the company and Goldust is turned on by Piper’s power. This set up the Hollywood Back Lot Brawl, which is just a fight in the back alley. Michael Freaking Cole does the voiceover for this. He was there in 1996? Hokey smoke indeed.

Goldust vs. Roddy Piper

Piper was seen earlier with a bat and a water hose. This was supposed to be Razor vs. Goldust but Razor is in rehab (I’m stunned to) so we get this instead. Goldust pulls up in a gold Cadillac and Piper stops it by spraying it with a gardening hose then beating it with a bat. The smash cuts here are really, really annoying. This is hardcore before there was hardcore and they get fairly brutal out there.

Obviously this isn’t live or anything like that as they filmed this earlier in the day. I’m not sure who thought this was a good idea but it’s certainly not one at all. Piper chokes him with a bat and sprays him down with a high pressure hose. Goldust gets a shot to Roddy’s pipe and drums and takes over.

Goldust just gets the heck beaten out of him for the most part as some of Piper’s punches are either legit or the best fakes I’ve ever seen. The son of the Dream gets in the car and Piper (or an extremely average impersonator) jumps onto the hood to keep from getting crushed. Goldust leaves and Piper chases him in a white Bronco. This doesn’t finish here so we’ll come back to the rest of this as it happens. This was REALLY bad as it was all taped and clearly edited and the crowd is of course silent after five minutes of just sitting around watching a TV monitor.

Steve Austin vs. Savio Vega

These two had a long feud for no apparent reason. Austin was the Ringmaster at the time and the Million Dollar Champion. They feuded for several months and it was just a waste of time. This gets PPV time but the tag team title match doesn’t. Of course it does. Savio is with Doc Hendrix and we get a quick look at them being paired together in the tag tournament and Austin screwing him over. Savio says he’s ready for anything.

It’s a brawl almost immediately and they roll around on the mat. We hit the floor and it’s Vega in control. DiBiase gets involved to give Austin control but that gets him nowhere at all. This is a boring match in case you didn’t get that. Showing the boredom of Vince we go to Roddy Piper on cell phone as he chases after Goldust on the freeway.

Savio hurts his arm on a clothesline as we hear about how great of a technician Austin is. Back to the phone stuff as Austin works on the arm. Middle rope elbow drills Savio for two as Piper yaps away. The sad thing is that this is a pretty good back and forth match but the crowd is dead because of being killed by the parking lot thing.

We continue the idiocy with aerial footage of Piper chasing Goldust. And of course, it’s of the OJ Simpson chase. Savio takes Austin’s head off with a spin kick but Austin takes over again. An elbow off the top (Austin was a completely different wrestler before he became the Rattlesnake and somehow better in the ring) misses and here comes Savio.

Naturally in an Austin match at Wrestlemania the referee goes down, in this case due to another spin kick from Savio. DiBiase slips in the Million Dollar Belt to Austin who clocks Savio with it twice to knock out him cold. Then in something I’ve never seen before, Austin wins with a reverse chinlock. Yes as in the mother of all rest holds. Savio is out so the match is over. Wow indeed. Only at Wrestlemania baby!

Rating: B-. This was a good match actually despite the idiocy of the whole Piper thing. Austin was great back in the day and when he wasn’t hanging out with various other morons so was Savio. This was a good match although they would go on to do some better stuff. Or maybe that had already happened. Yeah it had so this was the finale.

More Piper stuff as Vince says this is familiar.

We recap the whole mind games thing between Taker and Diesel. I think I have Diesel in their match tonight.

Another shot of the cars. Is there a point to this at all? Is it supposed to be tongue in cheek or something?

HHH vs. Ultimate Warrior

This is Warrior’s big return. HHH debuts some new chick named Sable. He’s rather new also here and the difference in size between then and recently is amazing. Warrior is allegedly 400lbs and bald according to Lawler, which shocks Vince. You know a lot of his lines are far funnier knowing what we know now. Naturally he looks like his old self. The fans react….I think. Vince wants you to believe the roof just got blown off but it’s simply not there.

HHH jumps him to start and I can’t believe how quiet the fans are here. I mean it’s eerie. Pedigree hits maybe 40 seconds in and Warrior beats him to his feet. Warrior hammers away and the slam and splash end this in maybe a minute and a half. He would be gone by late summer.
Wildman Marc Mero, the former Johnny B. Badd debuts here which caused a ton of jokes at his expense in WCW. In exchange he wound up getting the Intercontinental Title and the biggest pushes of his career. HHH comes up to glare at him and Sable stands by. They brawl for a bit and that’s about it.

Piper is on his way back here.

Undertaker vs. Diesel

No backstory given but that’s why I have a job here. Both guys had cost each other the title at back to back PPVs including the famous shot of Diesel being pulled under the ring by Taker during a match against Bret in a cage. Taker played a ton of mind games and this is the result. This isn’t quite a co-main event but it’s the other big match on the card for sure. Diesel is freshly heel here.

From everything I can find this is their first and only one on one match too. That makes sense as Diesel was gone in less than two months and was in WCW for the next five years. Once he got to WWE again he was in the NWO and never feuded with Taker. Once he was out he was on Raw and then Nash left for TNA. I will never get tired of Undertaker’s entrance. It’s simply awesome on so many levels.

They go at it from the opening bell and the crowd noticeably dies as soon as it rings. That’s rather odd. Taker goes onto offense and the fans cheer a bit so they’re definitely into this. They head to the floor and Taker hammers away with those uppercuts. I remember a friend of mine back in the day said Taker definitely couldn’t have had a boxing background. Methinks the punches he throws suggest otherwise.

Taker wants the Tombstone about two minutes in but it’s countered. Nash is moving out there which is very weird to see indeed. Taker with a cross body (???) for two. Old School can’t take Diesel down. The jumping clothesline misses as Diesel uses his training as Super Shredder in TMNT 2 to duck out of the way. Taker gets another uppercut to put Diesel on the floor. A chair shot misses and here comes Big Daddy Cool.

Diesel won’t let Taker get back in. It’s weird to see Nash with so much energy like this. Big boot puts Taker down. Side Slam gets two. Not quite as pretty as his usual ones but still a decent one. Diesel beats on him with his slow and methodical stuff but it’s not boring. Some guys just have a slower pace than others and Nash is one of them. Taker fights back a bit and both guys hit big boots. That was kind of cool.

Taker sits up to a big reaction. Diesel beats Taker to his feet and slaps on a bear hug. He isn’t CM Punk though so he’s not going to get a submission. Taker breaks the hold and it’s off to a headlock? A suplex gets Taker out of it and both guys are down for a bit again. Top rope clothesline and a good one gets two for Taker. He sends Diesel in and like an IDIOT, puts his head down and there’s the Jackknife.

And also like an IDIOT, Diesel doesn’t cover him. He just stands over Taker who isn’t moving an inch. Taker sits up so Diesel gives him another powerbomb. Diesel FINALLY goes for a cover but Taker grabs him by the throat. He must have waited for 40 seconds after that Jackknife so he deserves it. Diesel fights out of the grip twice but can’t do it a third time. He gets a suplex to get out of the choke but Taker sits up. Flying clothesline sets up the Chokeslam which sets up the Tombstone to make Taker 5-0.

Rating: B. This was good stuff and definitely Taker’s best Mania match to date and his best until Mania X7 against HHH. Also this made the Streak seem like it meant something as Diesel had been world champion for almost a year. Power vs. power rarely works and battles of the giants are usually bad but this was one of the best ones I’ve ever seen. Good stuff indeed.

Post match we get the at the time famous shot of Diesel laying on the mat completely unconscious.

Piper and Goldust are back so it’s time for the ending of the Brawl. Both cars get back and Piper parks right next to Goldust so the driver’s door can’t open. Good thing he was already out and into the arena. Roddy drops about 5 F Bombs as he’s looking for Goldie. They head into the arena and the fight is on. Actually Goldust backing away while Piper stalks him with a belt is on but you get the concept

They go into the ring and Piper hammers away. Officially this is still a match I guess. Screw the whole formatting thing as I guess you could call this the longest match in PPV history. Goldust takes over in the ring as he’s an active wrestler and therefore likely in better shape. Piper’s shirt comes off and Goldie chokes away.

Roddy gets back up and the crowd pops a bit for it. Goldust tries to kiss him and Piper fights back. Goldie goes up but Piper crotches him. And then Goldust kisses Piper. Oh you know it’s on now. Piper grabs him by the balls (does that mean he liked the kiss?) and slaps Goldust around a bit. Off come the clothes and Goldust has S&M stuff on. Piper kisses Goldust. Ok so in other words, he’s kissed him, groped his balls and spanked him. Sweet goodness indeed. Goldust leaves and I guess Piper is the winner. Sadly this gets the biggest pop of the night so far.

We recap the Bret vs. Shawn…feud I guess you’d call it. They’re both faces here but the idea is that Shawn has finally gotten to this point after working his entire life to get here. On the other hand you have Bret who is the best in the world and has been for a good while. It’s pretty clear that Shawn is going to win but the idea is to give a classic on the way.

Now this match has gotten a very argued opinion from the staff as some of us say it’s great and some of us say it’s very overrated. I like the match but let’s see how well it holds up. Both guys say nothing of note at all.

Gorilla Monsoon finally gets the roll he was born for: President of the WWF. That fits perfectly even though he rarely did anything.lding up the Iron Man Match and Shawn’s rise to the main event as a face. Nothing special here.

WWF World Title: Shawn Michaels vs. Bret Hart

We open with a rather good start as Shawn makes one of the most famous entrances of all time, riding down from the rafters on a zipline. That’s definitely one of his most famous moments and is still cool to this day. Bret’s entrance of walking through the curtain is a bit of a letdown by comparison. I like the basic fireworks Bret would get. Simple yet effective.

Hebner gives the instructions to both guys and you have to wonder if he can hear Bret tap already. They’re really playing this up as epic. It’s most decisions in an hour as you know but you can win a decision by count-out or DQ. So could the title change on a DQ only? I’d love to see them do that in a world title match. They used that as a loophole for 2/3 fall matches before.

There’s the bell and we’re off. Jerry says if Bret wins the first decision he’ll win while Vince says that’ll go either way. They hit the mat for a bit and we reach the issue here: you can more or less take a 57 minute nap and you’ll not miss the ending of the match. That’s why you don’t see these on TV. Bret gets a headlock as we get to our first rest hold/time killer of the match. I don’t think calling it a rest hold is fair as both guys have great cardio.

Jerry gets on Vince for being an idiot when he says there are no Bret or Shawn fans but only WWF fans. Preach it King. There’s a nice idea here of Bret wanting to wear Shawn down so he can beat him while Shawn is looking for a fast win and then go from there. Nice little contrast of styles there. Back down to the headlock as they sped things up for a bit.

They’re going slowly here for the most part but to be fair they’re conserving energy so it’s understandable. We get into an interesting debate here: which of these two is stronger? Jerry explains how much a hold like a headlock can take out of you. In other words, he’s using his experience in the ring to give an explanation of what we’re seeing. Almost like he’s analyzing it. What a novel idea!

Shawn works on the arm which is as good as anything else I guess. Stu Hart, Bret’s dad, is at ringside sitting next to Freddie Blassie. Jerry asks if Helen (Bret’s Mom) is here. He thinks it’s unlikely since she went shopping today and went to an antique store and they kept her. That got a chuckle if nothing else. Bret starts hammering away in the corner so Shawn speeds things up to send Bret to the floor.

The idea here is that Shawn is wrestling a very conservative and slower paced match to throw Bret off his game. That’s psychology again there people. Shawn works the arm but Bret throws him over. He skins the cat though and drives Bret down with an armbar again. We’re a little under 12 minutes in at this point.

Shawn goes back to the arm as we waste even more time than we usually do if you can believe that. Jerry suggests that maybe Bret should submit to get out of this armbar but says that probably wouldn’t be a good idea. Bret gets up and gets a modified almost spinebuster to put Shawn down and wants the Sharpshooter but Shawn counters.

A clothesline puts Shawn on the floor but Bret doesn’t want a countout. Bret is sent into the post and at 15 minutes into the match Shawn kicks the timekeeper’s head off! That looked great and he is DEAD. Back into the ring and Bret gets the chinlock again. The timekeeper is taken out on a stretcher. Bret yells at Hebner to check Shawn because it’s not a staring contest.

This is getting really boring really fast as these rest holds are going on for like two or three minutes at a time. This particular one is about two and a half. Shawn comes back with a clothesline but his neck hurts and he can’t follow up. Bret gets one of his own and down goes Shawn. Vince goes into a speech about how awesome the WWF and Wrestlemania is while we’re in ANOTHER chinlock. It’s always cool to hear Vince talk about how great wrestling is as his love really comes out in his voice.

O’Connor Roll is blocked and Shawn gets a dropkick to go back to the armbar. Twenty minutes in now and of course we’re still in a hold. Shawn rams some knees into the arm and shoulder. He gets a wristlock on using his arms for leverage which results in Bret’s face being shoved into Shawn’s boot which looks cool. Vince talks about Jerry’s Kiss My Foot match with Bret which was always kind of funny.

Bret tries to reverse but gets rammed into the post. Shawn drops an F Bomb at a camera in his face. A shoulderbreaker has Bret reeling and is followed up by a double axe to the shoulder. Hammerlock slam as Shawn channels his inner Anderson. The shoulder goes into the buckle a few times as this is still very slow paced.

Twenty five minutes in and it’s still arm work. Bret hammers away but Shawn gets a DDT on the arm and hooks a cross armbreaker to kill the crowd again. Before the hold was on Vince suggested that Bret should submit. Why? It’s not like there’s a rest period or at least there isn’t one announced. Bret punches out of it and gets a second rope Stun Gun to break the hold.

Slingshot and Shawn “hits” the post. That gets two for Bret whose arm is kind of hanging there. So much for that as Shawn rams him into the buckle to take over again. Bret fights back again and there’s a bulldog. He goes up though and takes way too much time. I think they botch something as Bret grabs Shawn’s hair and rides him down kind of like a bulldog but with the knee in his back. The referee goes down in the collision which I don’t think was intentional. Thirty minutes even left and the referee is up in maybe 20 seconds so yeah that was unintentional.

Shawn gets a powerslam for two. Bret’s arm is magically better somehow. What a shock: Shawn does a ton of work and Bret makes it look like nothing. Bret gets a Piledriver for two. He goes up again and Shawn catches him one more time. Shawn starts drilling Bret, possibly out of anger for the total lack of selling.

Sweet Chin Music is ducked and Bret hits the floor for a bit. Shawn is like screw that and hits a HUGE dive to the floor to take him down. That’s the first big spot of the match and the crowd definitely reacted to it. Shawn goes up and hits a cross body but Bret rolls through for two. The fans are staying into it. Small package gets two for Shawn as they’re definitely picking things up here.

Perfectplex gets two for Shawn. Twenty five minutes left. Shawn gets a sleeper on which is a smart move. That gets broken up and Bret goes into the corner. Now we get the momentum changer of the night as Shawn gets backdropped over the corner and wipes out a cameraman with the only visual we see being Shawn flipping over his head.

Shawn gets rammed into the post on the floor and is reeling badly. Bret drops an elbow into the back. Backbreaker hits as we have 20 minutes left. This is getting close. Bret gets a Banzai Drop down onto Shawn’s back in an oddly cool move. In another cool spot Shawn does his flip in the corner and sits on the top so Bret runs up and does a belly to back off the top for two. Crowd is getting into these kickouts now.

Chinlock by Bret as we need to kill off more time. Shawn gets a sunset flip out of nowhere for two. They kind of just fill time in for a few minutes with nothing special going on. Russian leg sweep gets two. Shawn gets whipped over the corner and over the top, kicking Jose in the head as he goes down. That can’t be good. Is there a pile of dust anywhere? Bret whips Shawn into the railing and Jose goes down again! This is getting awesome!

Fifteen minutes left now. Belly to belly gets two. All Bret here. We finally get an answer about what the Sharpshooter hurts: the back. Shawn gets all ticked off and throws big bombs but Bret gets a shot to the back to take him down. Bret sets for a suicide dive on the floor and it looks rather stupid as Shawn has to stand up in a hurry to get hit by it.

Bret is willing to take a countout. He changes his mind though as he’s not quite ready to turn to the dark side. German suplex gets two as the crowd is getting into this. Shawn tries to fight from his knees so Bret KICKS HIM IN THE FACE. Freaking ow man! Back to the chinlock now with ten minutes left.

Nine minutes left and we’re still in the chinlock. Shawn fights it off with 8 minutes left. Shawn hammers him about the head and shoulders with seven minutes left. They’re moving VERY slowly. BIG superplex gets no cover as Bret wants the Sharpshooter instead of the relatively easy pin. Shawn is crawling away as Bret holds the foot with 6 minutes left.

Half crab is on for a bit. Backbreaker hits as we have five minutes left. Bret does the I HATE THIS SO MUCH spot as he jumps into a boot. Shawn hits a dropkick to send Bret into the corner. Bret’s chest eats buckle as Shawn can barely move. Four minutes left with both guys down. Forearm and nipup (camera missed it) and Shawn is all fired up.

Jumping back elbow to Bret. Jerry: Shawn Michaels has just gotten his 19th wind! Spinning double axe off the middle rope with three minutes left. Suplex sets up the big elbow for two. Gutwrench sitout powerbomb gets no cover with two minutes left. Moonsault press gets two. 90 seconds left. Kind of a botched rana off the top gets two.

Shawn slams him but collapses with a minute left. He goes to the top but Bret gets up. A dropkick misses though and Bret locks on the Sharpshooter with 33 seconds left! What a shock that it’s tied up and Bret finally gets his hold on with 33 seconds left! Shawn doesn’t give up as the time runs out and Bret collapses. Shawn is DEAD.

Gorilla gets into the ring as Bret is handed the title. Bret walks out and then the Fink says that it’s not over yet by orders of Gorilla. It’s sudden death! Bret is MAD and asks a very good question: why? Why should Shawn get another chance? The ruling was that there would be a 60 minute time limit and Bret survived that. This actually wasn’t fair to Bret at all.

There’s the bell and Bret goes off on Shawn. Jerry and Vince agree Bret is going to have to pin Shawn. Bret whips him into the corner and in one of my all time biggest mark out moments, Shawn grabs the ropes and vaults up, landing behind Bret and kicking Bret’s head off with Sweet Chin Music. The crowd pops and when I was watching live I JUMPED off my couch. Bret staggers up and Shawn kills him dead with another superkick to win his first and by far most famous world title.

Rating: B. Ok now this is going to draw some issues, but this match is not the masterpiece it’s built up to be for multiple reasons. First and foremost, WAY too many rest holds. There are two ways you could make this better. First, make it 30 minutes. Second: drop the Iron Man aspect. Imagine if those near falls were at one fall to a finish. This would have been otherworldly.

Bret’s lack of selling also kills this match badly. His arm was perfectly fine about 40 seconds after Shawn stopped working on it, making that whole 25 minutes TOTALLY POINTLESS. It’s certainly a good match, but this needs to lose about 20-30 or even more than that minutes to work as well as it could.

Finally, this isn’t even the best iron man match the company has ever had, at least not in the same universe as Rock vs. HHH. The reason that was better is simply that you had a reason to keep watching. Here it’s way too dull with the rest holds and the sitting around for so long. Good match, but definitely not a classic or even great for that matter.

At first he’s very reserved and stunned, but then Shawn celebrates like crazy to end the show.

Overall Rating: C-. Looking back, there’s really very little to this show. You have an overly long six man, a non match, a squash, a midcard match that went nowhere, a solid match, and a main event that was 40 minutes too long. That adds up to very little in my eyes. Check out the last 20 minutes of the Iron Man, the Taker/Diesel match and if you’re bored the first half of Piper/Goldust. There’s just nothing special here.

Wrestlemania 11
Date: April 2, 1995
Location: Hartford Civic Center, Hartford, Connecticut
Attendance: 16,305
Commentators: Vince McMahon, Jerry Lawler
America the Beautiful: Kathy Huey

Oh goodness, we did have to get to this eventually didn’t we? If you remember my review of WM 9 being the worst WM ever, I should have said it would be the worst for the next two years. This show is one of the most interesting in wrestling history from a reaction standpoint. From the fans’ perspective, this show is what’s played on a constant loop in the seventh circle of purgatory, minus the WWF Title match.

The number one issue I have right off the bat with this is that it’s from Hartford, Connecticut. Seriously, HARTFORD??? Wrestlemania has broadcast from New York, LA, Chicago, Toronto, Las Vegas, and now HARTFORD? It just doesn’t sound right. Another factor here is that there’s a whopping total of 7 matches. What’s the main event you ask?

Would it be Shawn Michaels getting his first WWF Title match since becoming a main eventer against his former bodyguard Diesel? Nope. We get Bam Bam Bigelow who was wrestling a clown last year against Lawrence Taylor, a former football player and current contestant on Dancing With The Stars. The sad thing is, I’m not making this up. The weird thing though is, this show allegedly brought the WWF back into the war with WCW.

The ratings were decent and it got the company the main stream exposure it’s looking for. Think of it like the modern day TNA: the hardcore wrestling fans like us mostly hate it, but the common fans eat it up. Go figure. Anyway, let’s get on with this so I can look for a hammer to apply to my head.

The opening video is about various Manias through the years which tends to be a theme in these opening videos.

Your celebrities this year are Pamela Anderson (actual celebrity), Jonathan Taylor Thomas (Randy on Home Improvement. Another child star that did nothing.), Jenny McCarthy (Mini-celebrity now, she was at the last SNME so points for that I guess), some guy from NYPD Blue, and Salt N Peppa, who hit on Bret Hart which just looks ridiculous. A special Olympian sings America the Beautiful, and it’s time for our first match.

Ok not quite yet as we get a very interesting chat from Vince and Jerry about what Wrestlemania is.  You don’t get to hear that much from Vince.  It’s short and sweet but it got the point across just fine.  NOW on to the match.

Lex Luger/British Bulldog vs. The Blu Brothers

No that’s not a typo, it’s spelled Blu. These guys have the gimmick of being two incredibly hick brothers from the mountains. You know them better as D.O.A., the Harris Brothers, or those two big white bald guys that are in every promotion on the planet. My goodness how far has Lex fallen in a year? He’s going after the WWF Title and next year is curtain jerking in a tag match?

The twins are named Jacob and Eli in case you were so bored you were actually wondering. Lex and Davey go by the name the Allied Powers. That delayed vertical suplex by Davey never gets old. It’s nothing short of amazing. Definitely like the fact that Bulldog’s tights are about 3 sizes too small.  Oh yeah we have a match to get to.

For some reason the Brothers come down second.  The Brothers try to jump them which winds up in a pair of powerslams for them.  Note that this is just a powerslam and not The Powerslam by Bulldog so it’s just a normal match.  Bulldog is in trouble early on as the power of evil double teaming has him hurting.

A double big boot puts Bulldog down as Luger is just worthless on the apron here.  The fans aren’t incredibly impressed.  Jerry says that Bulldog has only lost once at Mania which isn’t true as he lost at both #3 and #4.  Luger comes in and the fans pop just slightly.  I guess the jump back to WCW was the right move indeed.  Another powerslam gets no cover.

The loaded forearm gets two as the other twin makes the save.  Uncle Zebekiah gets drilled and it’s Twin Magic time.  One twin goes for a powerbomb/Piledriver but Luger makes a blind tag, allowing the Bulldog to hit a top rope sunset flip for the pin, prompting a fireworks display to go off.

Rating: D. Not bad, but just there. It’s nothing special at all and I’m not sure how many people really cared.  The crowd was about as dead as I’ve ever heard for a Mania opener, and that’s including The Executioner vs. Santana back in 85.  Wow I feel old for writing that.  Anyway this was pretty bad and could have been on any Superstars show back in the day.

Jim Ross talks to the Uncle who says this is what they deserved for being in the big city.  They pinned the wrong guy and that’s not the last you’ll see of the twins.

The NYPD Blue guy is with the Million Dollar Team (DiBiase’s stable of mostly jobbers) when he’s supposed to be in the dressing room of Pam Anderson but the mic doesn’t work. As an aside, during the show Lawler accidentally knocked some cords loose and he and Vince had to redo the entire commentary on the show from watching video. Due to that, the commentary you’ll hear on these matches isn’t live at all.

Lawler describes football as a game where eleven men spend hours trying to move a small object 100 yards, which is just like the post office.  What that has to do with this is beyond me but it sounded good at the time.  Oh it’s about the NFL guys here for the main event.

Intercontinental Title: Jeff Jarrett vs. Razor Ramon

No real story here other than they’re feuding for no apparent reason. Jarrett is in his country music gimmick here and even the Fink sounds bored out of his mind here. Jarrett won the title at the Rumble thanks to the Roadie (Road Dogg in case you didn’t know that) interfering. 1-2-3 Kid and Ramon are in the back and say that Ramon is ready.

Razor was so over back then it’s insane. Vince makes a weird comment saying that Ramon knows where he is at all times. Not sure why that’s a compliment. Don’t most people know where they’re located? It’s either a Vince line or a rib that 3 people get.  Razor is all over Jarrett to start this off.  Jarrett hits the floor and Razor gets to shoot off his pyro.  He gets about three covers in the first 2 minutes, all off punches.

Double J may have hurt his tooth.  Rollup gets two for Razor.  Roadie saves Jarrett from the Razor’s Edge and Jarrett tries to leave but the Kid is waiting in the aisle to stop that. Five minutes in and JJ’s biggest move has been a hard Irish whip. You know for all of his detractors, Jarrett can wrestle quite well. I’ve always wondered why he didn’t get the recognition as a star that he deserved.

Jarrett tries to get on offense but can’t get anything long term going at all.  He gets thrown to the floor again as the crowd dies all over again.  Jeff gets some dropkicks in and here comes the guy from Tennessee.  We hit the chinlock and the fans get going a bit.  At least it’s a fast one as Razor gets a backslide for two.  Sleeper goes on Razor and again it lasts just a few seconds.  Oh hey here’s another chinlock to keep us interested.

This match just isn’t flowing. It’s like they’re working move to move and it’s showing badly. In a really stupid looking sequence, they both hit the ropes and hit head to head. Then they get up and hit the ropes again and both punch each other. It’s more or less the same spot twice in a row. Just looked stupid. This referee is counting ridiculously fast too.

Fallaway slam gets two.  Discus punch gets Jeff down.  Can Razor do anything else besides punch and go for the Edge?  Razor hurts his knee going for a top rope bulldog, which is the same knee that was hurt THREE MONTHS AGO at the Rumble. Of course it’s still sore. Why wouldn’t it be?

Figure four by Jarrett as the Roadie pulls on Jarrett’s arms for more leverage. I’ve always wondered about that. How does it make it hurt more? I love how Razor’s knee is hurt badly, yet he can pick a 230lb man up, sit him on the top rope and belly to back suplex him from it without his knee giving out.

He gets him up for the Razor’s Edge but Roadie chop blocks him for the DQ. Post match, all four men brawl. JR asks Jarrett about his cheating and Jarrett says he’ll always be the IC Champion. If by always he means until he jumps to WCW and then back to the WWF, loses to Chyna after being hit by a fish and then is banned from the company because Austin hated him, they yes he’ll always be champion.

Rating: D+. This was WAY too many punches and rest holds. These two have had far better matches before, such as at the Rumble. Razor probably had 90% of his offense from throwing punches.  Jarrett wasn’t anywhere nearly as serious as he should have been at this point and that change wouldn’t come for many years.  Definitely a weak match from them.

Since there was no audio earlier, let’s redo the exact movements from the interview earlier on. Pamela Anderson is nowhere to be found. Shawn and Sid say that Diesel is afraid.

Todd Pettingil gets in a 3 point stance with a football player and that’s all there is to this pointless bit.

The Undertaker vs. King Kong Bundy

This is the result of a mini feud with DiBiase and Kama over the Urn being stolen for about the 12^th time.  A baseball umpire is refereeing the match for no apparent reason.  Bundy charges straight at him to start but that gets him nowhere.  Old School can’t take him down.  A bunch of clotheslines finally put the bald man down.

Bundy knocks him to the floor and Taker gets the Urn back.  Now of course Bundy is in big trouble as Taker is all ticked off.  Here’s Kama (Godfather) to steal it back again.  This is going as fast as I’m typing it so it’s not like I’m skipping over a ton of stuff.  Taker grabs Kama’s face but Bundy makes the save and Kama escapes.

Ross grabs an interview with Kama who says he’s going to melt it down and make a chain out of it and put it around his neck, which he wound up doing.  Bundy chokes away in the corner, showing off his vast array of offensive talents.  This referee is rather bad at counting.  Bearer plays cheerleader to try to get Taker out of a chinlock.  Avalanche hits in the corner but Taker is no Special Delivery Jones so it has no effect.  A slam and the jumping clothesline of all things end this.

Rating: F+. Oh man this was bad.  Taker was completely lacking direction at this point and it was painfully obvious that they had no clue what to do with him.  He would feud with Kama for a bit before feuding with King Mabel for a bit until FINALLY Mankind debuted to give Taker something to do long term.  Terrible match.

Oh look, the NYPD Blue guy still can’t find Pamela Anderson.  Steve McMichael says he’ll take down Kama.  The rest of the All-Pro Team says they’ll take care of the Million Dollar Team.  The NYPD Blue guy does find Jonathan Taylor Thomas beating Bob Backlund at chess though.  I never thought I’d have to type that.  Backlund’s rant about the world being screwed up is hilarious.

Tag Titles: Smoking Gunns vs. Owen Hart/???

Owen has a mystery partner here. The Smoking Gunns are a great example of the failure of tag wrestling during this time period. They were definitely talented, but absolutely no one cared about them. They’re practically forgotten but were one of the most successful tag teams from this time frame.

As you probably know, the partner is Yokozuna.  Oddly enough the partner comes out before the Guns, the champions, do.  This is of course about Bret somehow because Owen is completely obsessed with Bret.  Yoko weighs a few tons by this point and is straight up waddling to the ring.  The Gunns say they don’t care who the partner is.  Billy with a mullet and a mustache is freaky looking.

More fireworks for the champions here.  What’s with that tonight for the tag teams?  Owen and Billy start us off.  That’s the most talented combination out there I guess.  Apparently Owen and Neidhart were eliminated from the tag tournament to determine the #1 contenders so this is a result of that.  The Gunns work on the arm of Owen to start which lasts only a few seconds as it’s off to Yoko.

The leg drop misses and Yoko takes over again.  And never mind as it’s back to Owen again.  Cornette is yelling at the fans which is one of the more entertaining parts of the show.  Double Russian legsweep to the Canadian by the American cowboys.  Yoko gets sent to the floor as we’re in the Colossal Connection formula here: Owen does the vast majority of the work while Yoko is brought in as the heavy hitter.

Apparently Men on a Mission have turned heel on the Gunns.  Riveting indeed and unfortunately it set up King Mabel.  The Gunns hit a modified Sidewinder (side slam/legdrop combination) for two on Owen.  Yoko comes in and gets the legdrop on the back of Billy’s head to more or less kill him.  I’m surprised Yoko has been in the ring this long.

LONG nerve hold by Yoko on Billy to waste a lot of time.  Yoko misses a legdrop and Bart comes in.  Everything breaks down and Billy gets killed by a belly to belly from the fat man.  Banzai Drop ends Billy and Owen gets the pin for the title, which might be his first in the company if that’s possible.

Rating: D+. Eh just a tag match here.  The Gunns were boring beyond belief and Yoko was so fat that he could barely move at all.  This was simply to have a title switch on the show much like the first show in the series.  Boring match and somehow the best one so far I think if that’s possible.

Bigelow says he’ll destroy Lawrence Taylor.  There was a Mania Work Out and they had a skirmish there too.  This feud never really got going for me but the media actually paid attention so there’s that I guess.  This interview takes forever and nothing special is said at all.

Bret Hart vs. Bob Backlund

This is an I Quit match with Roddy Piper as referee for no apparent reason.  Vince says Roddy knows something about submission.  What in the world would that be anyway?  This was their second submission match technically as the other was a throw in the towel match that had to end in submission if I remember right.  Piper would be Commissioner by the next Mania.

Backlund is more or less crazy here which was rather impressive given how completely different he used to be back in his glory days.  I’m still mad about not getting Bret’s glasses when I was a kid.  The annoying kid next to me got them.  I did however get a Slaughter helmet.  Bret gets a headbutt to start and the fight is on.  Sharpshooter can’t go on early.

Vince doesn’t remember Piper losing to Bret at Mania 8.  Some fan he is.  Bret goes for the Sharpshooter again and can’t get it.  You couldn’t tell that from Vince as he keeps changing his reaction every five seconds.  “Yes!  No.  Yes!  No.”  Is he the Zodiac or something?  Figure Four goes on but Backlund reverses it.  Neither guy says they quit as we get a quick check-in with the German commentators for no apparent reason.

Bret works the knee again as this is rather boring.  Piper needs to quit asking them if they quit so often.  Backlund works on the arm as I try to find a good novel to read so I don’t have to watch this for awhile.  Backlund hooks a Fujiwara armbar and Bret says No to Piper.  That was a shocking line then apparently which is amusing given that in an I Quit match in 99 with HHH vs. Rock, HHH said Suck It when he was asked if he quit.

Backlund likes that armbar.  Jerry talks about breaking into a pyramid (what the heck?) and seeing a picture of Stu Hart with a headlock on King Tut (where does he get these jokes from?).  Sharpshooter almost goes on but Backlund gets to the ropes before it gets cinched in.  Bret charges again and his shoulder hits the post to put him in real trouble.

There’s the Crossface Chickenwing and Bret is in trouble.  And never mind as he casually reverses and gets a horrible version of it on Backlund for the submission.  You know, from all that devastating work that he did on Backlund’s arm the whole time.  This was an awful match if you didn’t get it.

Rating: F+. This was really bad. Backlund was just flat out too old to be a serious main event threat by this point and while Bret was sharp as ever, Bob just didn’t have it in him anymore. Bret has called it the worst match of his career and he might be right. Backlund’s I saw the Light thing led to an angle where he would run for President of all things. As you can guess, it went nowhere.  Also, having a Bret match lack any and all psychology is very weird indeed.

Backlund is leaving and says he saw the light.  This would mean he became a Presidential candidate.

Ok, the NYPD guy was annoying at first. Now he’s just making me mad. NO ONE CARES.  They’re changing the celebrities around.

More audio issues as Todd tries to talk to Diesel. He finally says that he’s going to keep the title. He slips up when he’s trying to say if he’s going to regain or retain the title and finally screams HOLD ONTO IT. This was back when Nash was actually really good and got the reputation he’s lived off for years now.

Celebrities are introduced as Jerry Lawler reveals he accidentally unplugged some cords.

WWF Title: Shawn Michaels vs. Diesel

The deal was supposed to be McCarthy came out with Diesel and Anderson, who was viewed as ten times hotter and more important than McCarthy (nonsense) would come out with the Rumble winner, Shawn. For obvious reasons, this got reversed. The NYPD Blue guy is the ring announcer and he’s miles better at this than he is as an interviewer. He shouts almost everything he says and for the sake of this, it works really well.

The story here is Diesel was Shawn’s bodyguard but realized he was awesome on his own so he turned face and won the WWF Title. Sid replaced him as the bodyguard and the exact same thing would happen in about a year. Shawn has finally morphed into the character that would make him a legend by this point.  As weird as this sounds, Diesel is a freaking beast at this point. Sweet intro, the music was cool, he has Pamela Anderson, just the complete look. What in the world happened to that?    Anderson simply couldn’t want to be here less if her life depended on it.

Shawn hammers away to start as we’re already into the power vs. speed area.  Diesel had been champion since a few days after Survivor Series so he had almost 7 more months with the title here.  Diesel sends Shawn to the floor as we look at the ladies.  Sid distracts the referee but Shawn can’t get in a shot on Diesel.  Suplex puts Shawn down.

Back to the floor again as Sid and Diesel stare each other down one more time.  Diesel counters a sunset flip as this is more or less one sided so far.  Nash gets sent to the floor but Shawn Skins the Cat and dives down to crush Diesel.  Baseball slide has the champion in trouble.  We look at Anderson again and sweet goodness does she want to be anywhere else but here.

The fans loudly chant for Sid, thus proving that this entire match is booked wrong.  Shawn hits a splash off the apron to the floor as Diesel is in trouble.  Back in the ring Shawn stomps away and hits a bulldog for two.  I’ve never liked that move at all.  Reverse cross body off the middle rope gets two again.  Shawn works on the arm and gets a LET’S GO SHAWN chant in his honor.

Ok make that he’s working on Diesel’s ribs.  A top rope elbow to the back gets two in what is for some reason a highlight reel clip for Shawn.  Never really have gotten why but it certainly is.  Off to the chinlock now as the fans still like Shawn better.  Diesel fights back and gets Snake Eyes to get some momentum going.  Flair Flip in the corner and Shawn hits the floor again.

Nash follows and it’s time to see Shawn’s tights pulled down as is the tradition for big matches he’s in for no apparent reason.  They slug it out on the floor and the referee twists his ankle getting down.  I guess it wasn’t an Attitude Era thing.  Back in the ring Shawn gets Sweet Chin Music but there’s no referee which would be a factor in Shawn’s reasoning as to why he lost.

It gets two and the fans boo loudly on the kickout.  Sid goes to an old school heel move and rips off the turnbuckle pad.  Diesel gets a suplex to avoid being rammed into it and both guys are down.  Shawn gets an arm over him for a long two as the fans aren’t seeming to care much here.

In a slick counter, Diesel catches a bulldog off the middle rope in a side slam.  Nice move.  Shawn circles Diesel but gets his legs tripped from under him.  Diesel goes old school with a slingshot into the exposed buckle.  If only that had actually been where he landed, as Shawn’s head hit the middle buckle instead of the top one.  Big boot and Jackknife end this anyway.

Rating: B. As you can tell, I really like this match. It’s not famous at all but it’s definitely solid all around. There was a story with the ribs, a controversy that would lead to rematches and a clean ending. The match also got enough time to put on something decent and it showed. Shawn was clearly coming into his own but still wanted to prove himself. Solid effort all around and a very good match.  These two had some of the most forgotten great matches of all time and this is one of them for sure.

Shawn and Sid complain to Ross and say it’s not over, which it wasn’t.  The celebrities celebrate with Diesel forever and Nash gets both chicks.

Shawn complains even more in the back.

Lawrence Taylor vs. Bam Bam Bigelow

If you have never seen a person die and you want to…actually if you want to I’d recommend psychiatric help. But anyway, right here you’re about to see a man’s career die right in front of your eyes.

Here it is. Let it be known throughout the universe and all the world, that the reason that WM 11 is called the worst WM of all time is this match and this angle right here. Here’s the idea: for those of you that don’t know, LT is one of the best football players of all time, bar none. He was at the Royal Rumble in the front row and Bigelow shoved him, leading to this.

Instead of the WWF Title being on the line in the main event of the biggest show of the year, we get a retired football player against a barely upper midcarder that was about 8 years past his prime. Do I even need to explain why this was a bad idea? Each man has a group of 5 supporters at ringside so it’s more or less a lumberjack match.  Their entrances take the greater part of forever.  Oh and Salt N Peppa sing LT to the ring.

Pat Patterson of all people is the referee.  There are so many jokes I could make about that I don’t know where to start.  This is by far and away the main event of the show which still makes my head shake.  I used to complain that Lawrence couldn’t wrestle but that was the point I think: he wasn’t supposed to be able to wrestle but rather be able to fight.

Diesel had been showing him some stuff apparently.  The bell hasn’t rung yet so we’re just hanging around and waiting to start.  Patterson wants a handshake but Lawrence slaps Bigelow instead and it’s on.  Taylor likes to throw forearms which makes sense as it’s a basic strike.  Taylor sends him to the floor with Bigelow doing the majority of the work to get himself over the top.

Bigelow misses a corner splash and Taylor gets a belly to back for two.  More forearms which keep working so naturally he keeps going with them.  Taylor gets in the face of the Million Dollar Team as we’re still waiting on the big brawl between the guys on the floor.  Lawrence gets caught on his way back in and now we get into the main part of the match.

They’re going very slow which is understandable here.  Falling headbutt misses Taylor but he can’t capitalize and Bigelow takes over again.  Boston Crab goes on which shifts into a sloppy half crab instead.  Ok now it’s shifted into more or less Bigelow pulling on Taylor’s leg.  This is a very different kind of match and not incredibly interesting.

The rope is finally grabbed and Taylor goes back to the forearms.  A suplex gets Taylor out of trouble for a bit and both guys are down.  Bigelow gets the advantage again and hits the Moonsault but hurts his knee, having to roll off.  He covers shortly thereafter and gets two to ZERO reaction.  I think the fans were confused or flat out didn’t care.  Either way it’s not a good sign.

LT gets a gutwrench suplex that is called a Jackknife for two.  Enziguri puts Taylor down again and this is really needing to end like now.  Top rope headbutt gets two and a tiny reaction.  Taylor makes his big comeback and hammers away with the forearms and now the crowd is getting into it.  In the big spot of the match, LT goes to the middle rope and hits a flying forearm to get the pin.  Taylor might have been hurt but he seems ok.  DiBiase rips into Bigelow post match, setting up his failure of a face turn.

Rating: D+. Well they tried.  I’ll give them that: they tried.  For the life of me I don’t get why this is what they closed the show with.  Well actually I do as it was certainly the biggest match, but it shouldn’t have been if that makes sense.  Taylor’s offense made sense as he kept at it with the forearms, but the match didn’t work for the most part.  Still though, not completely unwatchable but not incredibly good.

Overall Rating: F+. Yeah this show is still boring.  It feels more like an In Your House rather than what it should have been, which is the biggest show of the year.  Shawn vs. Diesel is good and that’s about it.  Everything else is completely forgettable to say the least and the main event is one of the biggest headscratchers of all time.

To give you an idea of how odd this show is, it runs less than two and a half hours.  Think about that.  Wrestlemania ran less than two and a half hours.  The show was shockingly well received though and it got a solid buyrate for the time.  It doesn’t hold up well at all and that’s what kills it.  95 simply wasn’t kind to PPV and this is probably the second worst show of the year, after Summerslam.  Bad show.

Wrestlemania 10
Date: March 20, 1994
Location: Madison Square Garden, New York City, New York
Attendance: 18,065
Commentators: Vince McMahon, Jerry Lawler
America the Beautiful: Little Richard and the Harlem Boys Choir

This show is ALL backstory so get used to that word. Yokozuna had won the title back from Hogan at the first King of the Ring PPV after a Japanese photographer’s camera blew up in Hogan’s face. Hogan left the WWF and wasn’t seen there again for almost 9 years.

On the 4th of July in the previous year, Yokozuna held a huge thing on a US ship, challenging anyone to bodyslam him. There were a ton of people showing up to do it but no one could. Finally a helicopter landed on the ship and out walks the former heel Lex Luger.

He nails Yoko with the forearm and kind of slammed him, although you could argue it was a hiptoss. This launched Luger into one of the biggest face pushes of all time, resulting in his title shot at Summerslam. Luger knocked Yoko unconscious but he knocked him out of the ring as well.

Luger wanted another title shot but was told he would have to win the Rumble to get it. Bret Hart also wanted his rematch at Mania but was told HE had to win the Rumble. Low and behold they’re the final two. They go out at the same time, and we have a tie. The WWF President Jack Tunney decrees that there will be a coin toss deciding who gets the match first.

The loser will have to have a match before getting their title shot and no matter what, whoever comes out of the first match with the title would have to face the loser of the title match. If Bret lost the toss he would have to face Owen and if Lex lost he would have to face Crush. Lex wins the toss so Bret would be the one to close out Mania. I hope that made sense.

This Mania was a new beginning for the company as there was no more Hulk Hogan to carry the load. With him gone, it was time for the young guns to step up and take over. Following last year’s awful Mania, something big had to happen here and it went about as well as it could have given the ridiculous story that I just listed off to you.

There was also a thing called a ladder match that I’m sure will bomb completely. Anyway, after Little Richard rocks the house, it’s time for what is still likely the best opening contest of all time. Also our own NSL was in attendance.

We open with a highlight reel of the first Mania which really is a cool thing.  The first one was absolutely amazing from a mainstream perspective.

We recap Bret vs. Owen.  Bret had been feuding with HBK all of the previous year which resulted in a Survivor Series match between Shawn’s team and Bret’s team of him and his three brothers. Owen was accidentally knocked off the apron and into the railing leading to his elimination.

Later Bret attempted to help his brother get his first title by teaming with him to go for the tag titles. Bret was injured during the match and it wound up costing them the match. After the match, Owen kicked Bret’s leg out from under him, fully turning heel. This was the showdown that had been building for awhile.

Bret Hart vs. Owen Hart

Ok so this is considered the best opener ever, so let’s see if it’s still that good.  Remember Bret has to be in the main event later tonight against the winner of Lex vs. Yoko for the title.  There’s the bell and it’s game on.  It’s MSG so the entrance is behind the ring rather than off to either side.  Owen keeps celebrating every tiny victory which is funny stuff.

Naturally it’s a technical style to start which is exactly what you would expect it to be.  A little leverage sends Owen to the floor so Owen slaps him in the face.  Almost all Bret to start as Owen can’t get much going but it’s being destroyed at all.  Rollup gets two for Bret and it’s to the mat with Owen.  Bret speeds it up again and sends Owen to the floor where he’s very frustrated.

Now it’s Bret with a slap and a rollup for two again.  Crucifix gets two and to my shock and awe, Lawler says Bret is the better wrestler.  You’ll likely never hear that again.  There’s that spinwheel kick and Owen takes over for real for the first time in the match.  Bret’s back meets post on the floor and Owen SCREAMS at him.  Camel clutch goes on and Owen yells some more as you have to wonder how legit that is.

Belly to belly puts Bret down for two.  Of course it’s only two.  It’s not like Owen could ever beat him or something.  Give me a break.  Owen tries to suplex Bret back in but Bret reverses but Owen reverses that into a BIG German for a long two.  Bret grabs a small package for two as Owen continues his dominance.  Owen gets a Tombstone out of nowhere and Bret is in trouble.

No cover though as Owen goes up for a splash which hits.  Too bad it hit the canvas and not Bret, but it did indeed hit something.  Russian Leg Sweep gets two for Bret.  The middle rope elbow gets the same.  Owen gets an enziguri “out of nowhere” and goes for the Sharpshooter.  Bret reverses into an attempt of his own but can’t get that either.

Bret with a Pescado but hurts his knee and amazingly enough isn’t goldbricking.  Owen goes after it and Vince is surprised for some reason.  That reason would be that Vince from this era is a very stupid man.  The leg goes around the post and Bret is in trouble.  Owen’s mocking of Bret is great as for him it’s personal.  Well granted it has to be personal as it’s between two people but you get the idea.

The blonde Hart gets a leg lock which gets two as Bret’s shoulders are down.  Lawler points out that it would be smart for Bret to give up so he has a better chance in the title match later.  That’s actually very true.  Figure Four by Owen and WOO Bret is in trouble.  Bret rolls out but Owen grabs a rope as we keep going.  Bret comes back with an enziguri as for once Vince’s WHAT A MATCHUP isn’t overkill.

Owen’s selling is awesome as every time he gets hit he stays in one place like he’s been shot.  Bret gets a Piledriver to probably tick off Jerry a bit.  A superplex gets two as Bret can’t finish him.  A sleeper from Bret is countered by a low blow as Owen takes over again.  Owen gets the Sharpshooter as Bret is in trouble again after the back and knee work from earlier.  Ladies and gentlemen, PSYCHOLOGY!  Oh how I love it.

Bret counters into his own but Owen is right in front of the ropes so it’s not like it means anything.  Bret finally starts throwing punches but they’re to the ribs which Vince makes sure to point out.  Owen reverses a whip-in but Bret gets his feet up.  Bret goes for a Victory Roll but Owen rolls into it and gets a rollup for the pin to silence the entire arena.  Awesome finish to an awesome match.

Rating: A+. This match had been viewed as one of the best matches of all time and it holds up today. The psychology here is off the charts here as both wanted the submission but Owen goes for the pinfall and uses Bret’s own wrestling technique against him.

The best thing about this match is simple though: Owen pinned him perfectly clean. The better man won and that’s what makes the match so much better and one of the best ever. This was proof that a match could work on basic wrestling and the buildup for it. Classic all the way.

We get a post match promo in the back from Owen talking about how great his victory was and everything he says is absolutely right. He even gives credit to Bret for putting on such a great match. Love this promo. Excellent start to the show so far.

WM Moment: WM 2 Battle Royal.

The president of the hair club for men has a toupee for the Fink. Humorous if nothing else.  Is there any reason why some dude named Bill Dunn is doing the announcing here and not the Fink?

Bam Bam Bigelow/Luna Vachon vs. Doink/Dink

This is what gets to follow that opener.  These guys feuded forever for no apparent reason and no one cared.  This has the distinct look of a comedy match here and I don’t it’s going to end well.  Thankfully Howard does the announcing here.  Doink is played by some dude from Puerto Rico here I believe.

Bigelow jumps the big clown and we’re off.  A dropkick puts him down and hopefully this is dominance.  Vince’s overall conclusion about Lawler: he’s not a nice person.  Off to Dink and Luna as I search for a reason to have this at Wrestlemania.  Get on with this already.

Luna misses a top rope splash and it’s back off to the big guys.  You know, the future pyromaniac and the full grown wrestling clown.  This is after a classic match and before one of the best gimmick matches of all time.  And we get to the “comedy”, and I use that term loosely, of the match.  Bigelow sits on a sunset flip attempt and the beating is on.  After some time is wasted, a top rope headbutt ends Doink finally.

Rating: F. This was a complete waste of time.  Thankfully this is the end of the feud and it was never mentioned again.  Bigelow went from potential IC Champion to this in six years.  There’s your explanation as to what a knee injury can do for you.  Get on to something else.

Post match Luna and Dink do a stupid segment that just extends this longer with nothing coming from it.

There’s a Bill Clinton impersonator here for some reason.

WM Moment: Attendance record at WM 3.

Randy Savage vs. Crush

No backstory here but that’s what I’m here for. Crush had challenged Yokozuna for the WWF title and got beaten pretty badly. Yoko hit some banzai drops on him and put him out of action. Savage came in at the very end to help Crush, after he got hurt. Savage was about to be reinstated as a wrestler when he and Crush got into a fight at ringside. Savage was suspended from commentating but came out of retirement to wrestle. They had been feuding since November but this was their big match.

Savage is a full blown legend at this point, along the lines of what HBK is at this point. Needless to say, he was mad over in this match. The rules here are you get a pinfall but then the person has sixty seconds to get back into the ring. Therefore you could get a ton of pinfalls in this.  Savage charges at him in the aisle and the fight is on.

Crush gets Snake Eyes on the railing and the first pin is in less than a minute.  Fuji blasts him with the flag and Savage makes it back in with seconds to spare.  Crush is dominating and gets him in the Tree of Woe.  Fuji hands him some salt but Savage is like boy I wrestled in Memphis and throws it back in Crush’s face.  That and a slam sets up the elbow but no cover.  Oh ok he throws him to the floor and THEN gets the pin.  That was smart.

Fuji has to grab some water to throw on Crush to kep the match going which is kind of funny.  They hit the floor for awhile and it’s all Savage for the most part here.  Savage reverses a backdrop in the aisle and we head to the back.  Savage slams him on the concrete and then in an incredibly creative finish, Savage uses a rope and ties Crush upside down from a scaffold to get the guaranteed win.  Awesome ending to a fun match and also the extent of Savage meaning anything as a WWF wrestler.

Rating: C+. This match was a real grudge match and you could see the emotions coming out. This was the precursor to what would become hardcore and the last man standing match. The falls having to be outside of the ring was just a bad idea though and holds it back. Savage as the legend is something that really works well for him.  I’ve always liked this match for some reason, partially because Savage was still awesome at this point and was clearly having fun out there.

Todd talks to the fake Clinton again. It’s pointless. To be fair though, he’s a pro imitator and it’s made to look legit so this is a huge improvement over what we usually get.  IRS is there with him and congratulates him for raising the taxes.  I’ll spare you a long rant on that one.

We recap fan fest which is the precursor to Axxess.

Savage goes into the crowd to celebrate as we see another WM moment with Savage winning the belt.

Women’s Title: Alundra Blayze vs. Lelani Kai

For some reason, Kai’s music here is the same that Harley Race came to the ring to during Flair’s retirement ceremony last year. Very odd indeed as there’s absolutely no connection between the two that I know of. Kai was the Women’s Champion going into the first Mania, 9 years before this.  She was the best option they had?  Seriously?

Blayze is more common known as Madusa in WCW.  Sunset flip out of the corner gets two for the champion.  This isn’t going to be anything special at all is it?  Another sunset flip is the high point of it so far.  The crowd is DEAD.  A slam gets two as I think you can get what’s going on here.  All Blayze does is leverage stuff although I’d bet a lot of this ending with a German suplex.  This needs to end badly and the German finally does it.  Moolah, Mae and Nikolai Volkoff are sitting together for some reason.

Rating: D-. The match itself isn’t bad, but this is at Wrestlemania and it’s clear that this match was thrown onto the card. There’s no story, no build, no time given to it, and no one cares. Blazye was solid, and in case you can’t place here she’s far more famous as Madusa in WCW. The problem she had though was there was no competition for her anywhere at all. She was the woman that dropped the Women’s Title in the trash on Nitro which allegedly triggered Montreal.

WM moment: Roddy sprays Morton Downey Jr. at WM 5. Funny actually.

Tag Titles: Men on a Mission vs. The Quebecers

Zero transition between the previous moment and this.  Oh my I had forgotten about M.O.M. This very well may be the worst gimmick of all time. The idea behind the team was that they would help young kids improve their lives in the inner cities by preaching positive values to them.

Of course there’s one thing they need to get over. What’s the one thing that every young kid is into? What does everybody love? No not head you sick freaks. Get your minds out of the gutters. They love RAP of course. Therefore, the team had a rapping manager named Oscar.

The team was therefore Mabel (more commonly known as Viscera or Big Daddy V), Oscar, (more commonly known as annoying) and Mo (more commonly known as Felix, the bum that washes your windows in exchange for a non-urine soaked blanket and a bag of Funions). Mabel, Oscar, Mo. M.O.M.

Now after that description, what’s coming next is absolute proof that Satan himself is a wrestling fan: THEY GOT OVER. Yes, somehow this team was wildly popular to the point that they were regular tag title contenders, even winning the belts at a house show literally by mistake. Mabel fell on one of the Quebecers and he couldn’t kick out in time because of the weight.

Anyway, this is for the tag titles so let’s get it over with. It’s a basic formula for MOM: Mo does all the work until Mabel comes in to clean house. For some reason that no one knows, we cut to the back for an interview with some annoying blonde tv show host? Before she can talk though, HBK interrupts for some reason but the girl doesn’t mind.

They pose for a picture until Burt Reynolds interrupts. He says Shawn should shave his chest before Shawn leaves. Can someone pick Bex up off the floor? Apparently the girl’s show is called Up All Night and Burt makes a joke saying she keeps him up all night and they both wish there was something they could do about that as the dirty jokes of Mania continue their hallowed tradition.

We go back to the arena after that totally random moment for the Quebecers entrance. They’re accompanied by Johnny Polo, a.k.a. Raven in a gimmick that astounds me to this day. Considering what he would become in less than two years, to be Polo here is amazing.

Oh I forgot to mention: MOM’s outfits are shiny purple and gold with the writing on Mabel’s chest saying whomp there it is.  Let’s get this over with.  The champions jump the apparent Laker fans and double team Mabel.  Mo gets a cross body on Pierre and a big old legdrop from Mabel to the back of Pierre’s head nearly kills him.

The Quebecers do a sneaky switch and Mo, of course, is in trouble.  Jacques backdrops Pierre onto Mo for two.  I want this to end very soon.  Mo hits the ropes and kind of rolls forward to take down Pierre.  False tag to Mabel sets up a missed guillotine legdrop and the tag to Mabel to ZERO reaction.

Mabel misses a charge into what must be a hard buckle as it somehow gets through the layer of flab known as Mabel’s gut.  On their second attempt the Quebecers actually get a suplex on the fat one.  A Cannonball gets two on Mabel as this is DRAGGING.  Mabel hits his spin kick and the double splash from him and Mo for no count.  After another double splash the champions take a walk for the countout.  Well at least it’s over.

Rating: F. This was dull stuff and the ending was completely awful.  Mabel was so fat that he fell on a Quebecer at a house show and it was enough to accidentally switch the titles.  Mo was totally worthless to the point that Mabel was the better one.  What does that tell you?

Another Mania moment is the Ultimate Challenge from Mania 6 which is awesome.

We bring in the celebrities which are a bit weak this year.  Some chick from USA and some actor named Donny Wahlberg are here.  OH!  That isn’t a TV station they’re saying.  It’s NKOTB: New Kids on the Block.  WOW this is even worse than I thought it was.

WWF Title: Yokozuna vs. Lex Luger

Here we have the first of two WWF Title matches tonight. Due to Lex Luger winning the coin toss he gets the first crack here. The winner of this match faces Bret Hart in the main event, which is stupid as Bret already lost but that’s logic and therefore doesn’t belong in wrestling. This is a rematch from Summerslam and the theory is that Luger has Yoko’s number.

First though we have a guest referee: Mr. Perfect, who hadn’t been seen in forever.  This Donny dude isn’t a bad announcer actually.  The fans chant USA almost immediately.  Perfect is in a referee shirt and matching pants, making it look like he’s in pajamas.  Manly pajamas mind you but still pajamas.  They stare it down in the middle and Luger hammers away.

Clothesline hits but Yoko doesn’t move.  Yoko hits one of his own and Luger certainly does move.  To the floor and Yoko eats steps so we go back into the ring.  This isn’t looking good early on.  Luger goes aerial and gets a cross body for two.  Lex goes for a slam but can’t get the fatness up again so Yoko gets going again.  Granted he didn’t get going in the first place but it sounds better that way I guess.

Yoko tries to get the buckle off a corner but Lex stops him with punches.  We hit a nerve hold which is a nice way to say Yoko is tired and needs to lean on someone to rest for awhile.  Two minutes have passed and nothing has changed.  Literally, ALL nerve hold for that stretch.  It’s broken up, Luger fights him off, gets knocked down again and we hit the nerve hold again.  We’re seven minutes into this match and over half has been nerve holding.

Luger is sent to the floor and Fuji trips him which is somehow the most interesting thing we’ve had going on so far.  Oh look: MORE NERVE HOLDING!  I get that Yoko isn’t able to move that well and needs to conserve energy for later, but maybe, just maybe, THAT MEANS THIS WAS A BAD IDEA!  Luger gets some clotheslines and slams Yoko before the forearm hits.

Cornette and Fuji are brought into the ring which gets them nowhere.  Luger covers Yoko who is out cold but Perfect won’t count due to the loaded arm.  It’s a heel move but it’s perfectly legal which is my favorite kind.  Perfect won’t count, Luger isn’t happy because he thinks Perfect has better hair, Luger shoves him and it’s a DQ.  At least it’s over.

Rating: F. Sweet merciful crap this was dull.  Luger’s offense consisted of various clotheslines and punches.  Aside from that there was probably 1/3 nerve hold.  The fans have one of the loudest BULL chants I’ve ever heard.  This was an awful match to put it mildly and the ending kills it even worse.  Just awful all around.

While it’s a ridiculous finish, allegedly it was Lex’s own fault. There’s a fairly popular theory in wrestling that Luger was supposed to leave WM with the title but went out to a bar and got drunk before telling a bunch of the people that he was going to win it. WWF found out and changed the plans, leading to this finish. Whether that’s true or not, I wouldn’t be surprised. Luger’s push was monumental at this point and him getting the title would have made sense.

Luger screams at Perfect in the back over what happened.

WM moment: from WM 7, the awful blindfolded match. Even Vince says “yet another WM moment” as he’s getting sick of them too.

Harvey Whipleman and the Fink get into an argument. Adam Bomb runs out to protect Harvey from the horrible terror that is the Fink and his slaps of death. Earthquake runs out for this.

Earthquake vs. Adam Bomb

Seriously? Quake still had a job in 19 freaking 94??? This is literally three moves long. Belly to belly, powerslam, Earthquake, pinfall. What in the world was the point of this?  No rating of course.
Jim Cornette cuts another of his great fast talking promos that so many people should study. Really, this guy is gold. You can just hear the passion flowing out of him whenever he speaks.

Another Mania Moment is Taker appearing at Mania 8.  There was nothing to it and I have no clue why this was listed here.

Intercontinental Title: Shawn Michaels vs. Razor Ramon

No backstory again, so here I am to save the day!  The idea here is Shawn was the IC Champion but was fired/released from the company for testing positive for steroids. He was the IC Champion at the time and was stripped for not defending it often enough. However he was rehired a few months later and still had the title belt. He said he was the real IC Champion, despite Razor Ramon having won it in his absence. The solution: this match. Put both belts above the ring and the first person to go get them wins both.

The announcer says there are no rules in this match, then lists off how you win.  That sounds like a set of rules to me.  Dang if you can’t trust wrestling what can you trust?  I can’t really overstate the importance of this one enough as it made both guys’ careers and changed wrestling forever, as now instead of being about power and muscle guys, younger and more athletic guys were stealing the show with high flying and innovative stuff.  Huge stuff to say the least.

Also for a bit of known trivia, Shawn vs. Bret was the first ladder match nearly two years before this.  Razor stares at Diesel as we get going.  Shawn tries to move around and use his speed so Razor grabs him by the throat and hits a chokeslam.  The cameraman runs into the referee on the floor as it’s been far too long since I watched this match.

Diesel hits a clothesline to Razor on the floor and is thrown out almost immediately.  NOW we get to the good stuff.  Razor hits a HUGE clothesline to send Shawn to the floor as this is incredibly hard hitting already.  Razor peels back some mats on the floor but the fight goes back to the ring.  Shawn backdrops his way out of the Razor’s Edge and Razor crashes onto the concrete.

IT’S LADDER TIME as this is about to get awesome.  Shawn gets the baseball slide into the ladder into Razor’s ribs and the Bad Guy is in trouble now.  The ladder is fully in the ring now and Shawn begins his dominance.  The ribs take a big old pounding now as Shawn literally drops the ladder on his back.

Shawn goes up but Razor grabs a foot.  Oh great it’s Shawn’s back again.  And do we really need to zoom in on it?  We get the famous spot of the match as Shawn jumps off the ladder with a splash onto Razor which has aired in about 1000 highlight reels.  Shawn goes up again but Razor shoves the ladder over, sending Shawn into the ropes to put both guys down.

We get the always cool Wile E. Coyote shot from above which is cool to see as Razor looks a bit dead.  Shawn goes into the ladder in the corner and crashes to the floor.  So far all of the big bumps involving the ladder have been done by Shawn as the biggest Razor has done was being thrown over the top before the ladder came into play.

Slingshot into the ladder and Shawn hangs on so it falls backwards and crushes him against the floor.  Razor is alone in the ring now with the ladder and goes up but Shawn dives in off the top for the last second save.  Both guys climb and the slug out is on.  Razor slams him off the ladder and takes a rather slow fall down onto the ropes to the point where he doesn’t actually hit the ground.

Shawn dropkicks him off the ladder and Razor takes a decent enough bump this time.  Razor is still down so Shawn just shoves the ladder on top of him.  Why mess with the simple stuff?  Big Piledriver to Razor has his down for a good while now.  Shawn gets in another famous spot as he rides the ladder down onto Razor and both guys are in pain again.

And alas it has to end as Shawn puts the ladder over top of Razor which doesn’t really do much.  Razor gets up, shoves the ladder and along with it Shawn over.  His leg gets caught in the ropes and Razor climbs unhindered to the top to become the undisputed Intercontinental Champion.  Shawn did the majority of the bumping here but the idea of Shawn doing everything in this is absurd.

Rating: A+. The best gimmick match of all time at that point by a long shot.  This is one of the handful of WWF matches give five stars by Meltzer and for once I agree with him.  These two beat the tar out of each other and it still more than holds up over fifteen years later.  This is what made Shawn and Razor, which is rare to see for two guys.

There was a scheduled ten man tag scheduled that had to be cut for time reasons. It was held on Raw a few weeks later. Nothing special.

DiBiase tries to buy the President who brushes him off.

We get a pretty sweet video package on Bret, further cementing his title win tonight. A similar package airs on Yoko but it’s far worse, and it leads us to the main event.

WWF Title: Yokozuna vs. Bret Hart

This is the first time ever that we get a rematch in the main event of Mania. A bunch of mid 90s celebrities introduce themselves and maybe 10 people care. Seriously, this NEVER works as they’re outdated in two years 99% of the time. However, the guest referee is introduced: HOT ROD HIMSELF, Rowdy Roddy Piper! Holy goodness, this makes absolutely no sense but who cares???  Burt Reynolds is the drunk ring announcer for the evening.

Yoko is out first, as if Bret needed anymore guarantees that he’ll be winning here. This is a year after their first match and Bret has come a LONG way since then and here it actually seems that he’s got a chance to pull it off. If you watch WM 9’s main event and then this one back to back, you’ll see exactly what I’m talking about.  A very subtle difference also is Bret’s music. Last year he was using the Hart Foundation’s old music, whereas this time it’s his own song.

This match also truly feels like a main event. You really get the feeling that this is truly it. The more I see the finish the more I like it. Oh yeah we have an actual match here.

Yokozuna jumps Bret to start as Bret’s knee is still messed up from earlier in the night which is the kind of continuity you rarely get anymore.  Yoko misses what can only be described as a running Frog Splash and both guys are down.  Piper counts a bit fast for my taste.  Bret gets a headbutt and hurts himself.

Down goes Yoko off a solid shot as the crowd is clearly pretty tired.  Bret knocks him back down with just strikes which isn’t considered a huge deal this year.  Huge difference there which helps a lot.  Piper drills Cornette for interfering.  Legdrop hits Bret and he’s in big trouble.  He fights back and gets a bulldog for a long two.  You can’t blame Piper as he DOVE to get the hand down.

Bret gets up and limps ever so slightly.  NICE.  A clothesline puts Yoko down for two again.  Bret comes off the middle rope and jumps into a belly to belly and the Canadian is in trouble.  Yoko takes him to the corner to set up the Banzai Drop but he literally slips and falls off the ropes and Bret climbs on for the pin to get the title back.  It sounds corny but this surprisingly worked.

Rating: C+. The main reason this match is miles ahead of last year’s is it gets a little more time. With Yoko you can’t go much longer than 15 minutes as he gets tired as well as he starts to run out of moves that he can use. This match clocks in at about 11 minutes, which doesn’t sound like much when compared to the nine and a half that it got the year before, but the time really does help.

There’s far less of the match dedicated to Bret trying to find a way around Yoko’s size and he just goes for it from bell to bell and it’s a huge improvement.  He comes off as a challenger and not an underdog the entire time which helps it out a lot.  Rather than having Bret doing whatever he can to survive, Bret looks like a guy looking for a way to win, which is a subtle but key difference.  FAR better than last year.

Luger comes down to congratulate him as the locker room empties for the big celebration.  Owen won’t get in there though and we have the feud for the rest of the year.

Overall Rating: A. You have a 9 match card with two all time classics and do I really need to go on?  This show is all about that and the rest is just kind of there, but all the bad stuff is pretty short.  When you have two A+ matches on one show, it’s kind of hard to say it’s anything but great.  The one criticism I have: why wasn’t Luger vs. Bret the main event?  Either way, this was a great show as it feels epic on all levels and it comes off that way too.  Definitely worth seeing.

In Your House 27: St. Valentine’s Day Massacre
Date: February 14, 1999
Location: The Pyramid, Memphis, Tennessee
Attendance: 19,028
Commentators: Jerry Lawler, Michael Cole

Well, the Rumble has come and gone and therefore the Road to Wrestlemania has officially begun. I remember that night as my father’s piece of crap car died on the interstate coming home and I couldn’t see the show. Anyway, two major events happened there. One was the famous I Quit match where Rock went much farther than was agreed to when he hit a handcuffed Foley about 12 times in the head with a chair after saying he’d only do it 3 times.

A record of Foley’s voice from earlier in the night was played to say that he quit, therefore giving Rock the title. How did Mankind get the title you ask? I would show you but freaking WWE has put a copyright claim on something 10 years old that was on free TV in the first place since they’re afraid people will see it and know what an emotional moment is like. Anyway, it was a lumberjack match with Rock and Mankind where the Corporation and DX were at ringside.

Austin ran out and hit Rock with a chair to give Mankind his first title. The other big thing that happened at the Rumble was Vince won it by last eliminating Austin in what very well may have been the worst Rumble of all time with Austin and McMahon coming in 1-2 and then Austin being “in the hospital” for most of the match. That’ll get a review of its own in January but let me make this clear: it sucked.

Anyway, Vince wins but says he won’t fight Rock at Wrestlemania since he just doesn’t want to. Apparently that’s illegal so he has to defend it here in a cage match with Austin or Austin gets it anyway. That…kind of makes sense I suppose. I don’t remember anything from this show other than the cage match, so let’s see how much it sucks.

Odd intro as we have almost an old school film looking thing of Austin and McMahon’s feud. It looks like a Marx Brothers show. Anyway, there’s also Mankind vs. Rock in a last man standing match so at least we almost have a double main event. They try to make it sound like all of these matches are the end to the feud which is just funny. Lawler is of course wildly popular.

Goldust vs. Blue Meanie

His name is Bluedust for the night now. If you’re looking for a point to this, you’re a freaking moron. Same music for both guys and Meanie weighs 323lbs. Hokey smoke. We get a recap of the “feud” which partially consists of Meanie wearing nothing but a bunch of grapes and Goldust getting covered in blue paint. This is mind numbingly stupid. They brawl or at least I think they do.

Meanie grinds over Goldust and gets spanked for it. Dusty must be so proud. Somehow Meanie has gained 27 pounds during the match as he’s the 350lb man when he goes for a moonsault but he’s listed at 323 during the introductions. That says so much about how much they cared about his character doesn’t it? After he misses that, he gets the Curtain Call like it’s nothing at all. Goldust does Shattered Dreams afterwards to a big pop. Teddy Long was your referee here.

Rating: F. This was one of the dumbest things I have ever seen. It went three minutes, no one was interested in it, and it made no sense. Why were they fighting, what’s Meanie’s deal, and who booked this crap? None of those were ever answered which I think is a good thing for all parties involved.

McMahon spit on Austin on Heat.

Hardcore Title: Al Snow vs. Bob Holly

Belt is vacant for no apparent reason. Oh Road Dogg is hurt. Makes sense I suppose. They’re not in the ring together at all as it’s a standard family friendly hardcore match. Holly wants to get rid of his image as Sparky Plug. Cole says he was a cup of coffee as a tag team champion (yes that’s how he worded it) and he held the IC Title for a cup of coffee.

That was a pretty short cup then as that never happened. There was a Raw special the previous night that no one remembers and I guess nothing really happened on. Why have a Raw the night before a PPV? I don’t get that but I hope Vince doesn’t remember it as he’d do it again in a heartbeat. At the time there was no 24/7 rule so the belt wasn’t a complete joke as it would later become.

Holly is a welder by trade. If he’s a welder, WHY IS HE A WRESTLER??? Geez Cole don’t make it sound like he does this on weekends or something like that. This is one of the most famous hardcore matches as they actually go into the woods and into the Mississippi River. Holly keeps hitting Snow with sticks and pieces of wood. There’s a chain length fence there because it’s Tennessee law that all hardcore matches come complete with weapons.

They hit each other with some unidentifiable stuff, one of which is described by Cole as “Holly with a….Al Snow with a kick to the midsection.” It was that kind of a match. After an insane brawl that isn’t that impressive, Snow is rolled into the fence and pinned despite his arm being so far off the ground he’s almost rolling over. It was like they said hey, we’re out of time and no one is going to care anyway so end this ridiculous match.

Holly immediately runs back into the arena and the cameras follow him the entire way. During his run, Cole says he’s become the fourth Hardcore Championship. I know that announcers aren’t perfect but Cole is just becoming ridiculous.

After Holly comes back in and gets the belt, he says the brilliant line of “If you think this was hardcore just wait until Last Man Standing.” That’s great Michael. Just make it seem like there are other guys tougher than this but the belt isn’t worth their time. We cut to the banks of the river again where Snow is still stuck in the fence and screaming to let him out which is quite funny for some reason.

Rating: C+. While there would be many hardcore matches in the future, this one wasn’t nearly as silly. It felt a bit more I guess you would say realistic in that it wasn’t as corny as some in the future but the river and the woods were just a weird idea. It was ok and better than some of the future ones, but that’s not saying much.

We see the Ministry earlier in the day having some kind of ritual. This group got WAY too intense to be on a wrestling show, or at least I always thought they did.

Big Bossman vs. Mideon

There’s no point to this other than to have Corporation vs. Ministry. Mideon is the former Phineas Godwinn and is now a soothsayer for no apparent reason. It amuses me that Dennis Knight has elevated his game in the Ministry and he may never have won a match in this gimmick. I agree with the fans who are loudly chanting boring. This is heel vs. heel so what are you really expecting?

The styles are almost exactly the same and there is no chemistry at all. We see about 5 rest holds or let’s both lay down and take a little nap spots in a six and a half minute long match. As Cole and King are chattering away Bossman hits his slam for the pin. Ministry runs out and beats down the Bossman after Taker appears as well. They take him off and this would lead to the Cell match at Mania which was complete and utter crap.

Rating: D-. The only appealing thing here is they kept it short. This match was terrible for all of the listed reasons. It was more or less a battle of jobbers here and why would I want to watch that, especially heel vs. heel and power guy vs. power guy. Made no sense and wasn’t any good either.

D’lo and Mark Henry are in the back with the newcomer Ivory. Brown cuts a very good promo talking about how they’re going to win the titles. Brown has a very good voice actually.

Tag Titles: Mark Henry/D’lo vs. Jeff Jarrett/Owen Hart

Owen and Jeff are some of the most forgotten tag champions ever. Anyway, Ivory has been there less than a week as a favor to Henry and is the antidote to Debra or something like that. Lawler sounds like he’s losing his voice. Yet again this match is all about looks as Ivory says if Debra interferes she’ll rip her clothes off. I think the Nation rejects are your faces here for that very reason.

That and no one in WWF history liked Jeff which is a shame as he’s better than half the guys on the roster. This is just an excuse to get another victory under the champions belts to make a stupid pun. There’s nothing of note here as Henry is in trouble for a lot of the match until we get a hot tag to Brown who lands a running powerbomb that isn’t a Sky High Cole.

Brawl follows and Henry gets a guitar to the knee leading to the Figure Four and the tapping like a drunk man. Have you ever seen a drunk man tap out? Neither have I. Anyway, Ivory rips Debra’s top off to make sure the fans haven’t died of boredom which is likely a good idea.

Rating: D. Dear lord this show is AWFUL so far. Owen and Jarrett just didn’t work tonight which is odd as they’re two of the best in ring workers of this era. Henry is his usual awful self while Brown is solid as usual. This was just another filler and it wasn’t a good one at that.

Mankind talks about how Rock attacked his knee on Heat.

Recap of why Ken Shamrock hates Val Venis. Val screwed Ken’s sister Ryan.

Val Venis vs. Ken Shamrock

Billy Gunn is the referee here for no good reason. Here’s your match of the night. This is for the title I guess. Ryan does look insanely hot in this tiny white dress. As Val does his thing Billy lays in the corner which is kind of funny. Ken wants to avenge his sister despite Ryan not seeming to mind much. Lawler’s voice is dying fast for some reason so we get mostly Cole.

Lawler tries but it’s just not working. The first half of this match is very back and forth with no one really getting an advantage. About ten minutes in though Billy Gunn makes it much funnier by saying stuff like “dang I didn’t know that was a pin.” And when Venis has Shamrock in a submission and is shouting ask him, Gunn replies with ask him what??? It’s funnier in context I guess.

Allegedly there was a bribe offered by both guys with Ryan offering sex. Shamrock hits a DDT but Gunn blatantly stops at two. Venis isn’t even moving and Gunn just doesn’t count it so Shamrock asks what he is doing. Eventually the ankle lock is on and Ryan pulls Val who Ken is holding to the ropes because obviously a twenty something year old stick can pull two grown men while wearing heels.

Ken asks what the heck is she doing and gets slapped. Gunn keeps Ken from Ryan. Anyway, Shamrock hits Billy but Gunn fights back and sends him into a small package to lose the title. Post match Gunn beats up both guys.

Rating: B-. This was hard to grade. It’s like they weren’t sure if they wanted to do a comedy match or a regular one and they kept changing their minds. Billy is funny here but it’s nothing mind blowing. Both guys were ok in the ring but there was no need at all for Gunn to be involved here at all. Seriously, what does he add onto this match? There’s nothing here at all that’s great but it’s not bad at all.

Recap another part of the faction war as DX is fighting with the Corporation as well.

Triple H/X-Pac vs. Kane/Chyna

This would be the big match before Chyna turned face again at Mania to rejoin HHH before turning heel again 20 minutes later along with HHH as Kane turned face. Shane is on commentary but this is back when he was just a spoiled punk with a lot of money. The big showdown in this match is supposed to be HHH vs. Russia. However HHH is in the match all of 2/14 minutes and the rest is X-Pac getting beaten up.

Shane and X-Pac get into it which would lead to their European Title match at Mania. This is a pretty good tag match as Sri Lanka could at least hold her own in there with someone as awful as Waltman. Pac is beaten down to lead up to the hot tag which is warm at best.

The problem is HHH like most wrestlers has issues with hitting Indonesia. I will give him credit though as he does get in a few good right hands. X-Pac and Shane go at it which allows the big brawl all over the place and it leaves Asia and HHH alone. HHH sets Mongolia for the Pedigree but Kane comes back for the chokeslam which gives India the pin.

Rating: B. This was a solid tag match I thought. X-Pac was at his best when he was getting the heck beaten out of him and he wasn’t good for much else. This was all about getting HHH and Chyna together but that never really happened except for a few moments at the end. She was fine in there though and you almost forgot she was a female which is a nice plus. Decent match but nothing mind blowing.

Recap of Rock/Mankind, which more or less says this feud is awesome, this is the Rock’s chance to get the title match and you know it’s going to be awesome.

WWF Title: Rock vs. Mankind

This is last man standing.  Basically everyone expects them to just massacre the other here which is likely.  Rock comes out to cheers which is interesting as he’s certainly the heel here.  He’s in workout gear here which is smart as at times you have guys out there in tights looks stupid.  This makes sense.

It’s nice to see Foley come out as the champion here as it just looks good.  It’s not something you see that often in this company but he certainly earned it.  Foley turns his back on Rock intentionally and offers him a free shot and then does it again.  Rock busted up Foley’s legs on Heat so Rock wisely goes after them.

King’s voice sounds bad as I think his voice is going quickly here.  He’s certainly trying though.  Foley gets a belt shot to the face for a count of 8.  Cole declares Making the mayor of Parts Unknown.  I like that line actually.  We’re up by the set now and it’s a brawl, which is the idea here.

Foley DDTs Rock through a table set up near the stage which gets a limited response which I think is due to it being too early as we’ve only been fighting for about five minutes at this point.  Cole insults the Hardcore match earlier again, showing how completely idiotic he can be at times.  I’d love to see Holly waiting for him behind the curtain with a chair for him and shouting ARE YOU CRAZY?

Back into the arena as Foley’s knee is giving out on him.  It’s back and forth here but more Foley than Rock.  In the ring for the first time in a good while and Foley drops the People’s Elbow but Rock rolls out of the way.  Suplex on the floor as this is solid stuff so far.  Make that three of them.

While Foley is getting counted Rock has a seat in Cole’s chair and does a little commentary.  He tells Foley to come get him so Foley gets a hobbling start and FLIPS at Rock.  That’s not something I expected to type.  With Rock leaning over the table Foley drops the elbow off the apron for a count of eight as Mankind picks him up.

Back in the ring Mankind gets steps kicked back into his face to put him down.  More work on the knee now as Rock gets a shot with a chair.  And then we get the stupid chair hits the ropes and hits the chair swinger in the head.  I’ve never liked that one at all.

Rock backdrops Foley off the table but his head slams into the table, making it look SICK.  Cole is freaking out like a girl in a slasher movie at this.  People’s Elbow has Mankind reeling.  He manages to get up and grabs a mic to cut some more promos on Mankind.  And now he’s singing Smackdown Hotel, which is borderline sacrilege as this is in Memphis.

Mandible Claw goes on but the referee gets bumped.  Well of course he did.  And remember there MUST be a winner.  DDT by Rock gets 9.  BIG chair shot misses and Foley gets a DDT on the chair.  Rock gets up but walks into Socko twice in a row.  Wouldn’t you think the first time was a good enough idea?

He gets a Rock Bottom as a counter to the Sock and both guys are down.  Both guys get chairs and they cave each others’ skulls in for the double knockout, getting ten and ending the match.  Yeah that ending is stupid now and always has been.  The decision gets booed out of the building which is exactly what it deserves.

Rating: B-. The ending is what holds this back for me but like I said it was all they could do to get that ending. These two beat the living tar out of each other and it was a brutal match. Matches like these can be seen as more fun when you know they’re not ending for at least 15 minutes.

That gives you 15 minutes of just free beatings on each other. It made both guys look strong in that they took the same beating and both lost but at the same time both kind of won. Rock would win the title the next night in a ladder match so I’m really not sure why they didn’t just give it to him here.

Recap of Vince and Austin. Apparently Austin already has the shot at Mania but he just wants the match with McMahon.

Cage Match: Vince McMahon vs. Steve Austin

Cage is the blue style but it’s painted black which is a nice touch. This match can be summed up easily: Austin tries to kill Vince. This is the most one sides match I have ever seen for the first half with Vince having no offense at all. Austin beats him around the cage, in the crowd, at ringside and on the cage until we get the big bump from the match as they’re hanging on the side of the cage and Vince is knocked off and slams his head on a monitor.

Everyone thought he was legit either hurt or dead. However the more I watch it he more I’m convinced it was a work as Austin goes back to beating on him. If he was really hurt, that would never happen. I think it was designed to look real but just got too close to being real. Oh, the match just NOW started. They’ve been fighting for 12 minutes and NOW we get the bell. Vince gets in a low blow here and there but that’s the extent of his offense.

Austin can leave twice but Vince flips him off both times and Austin comes back to beat on him some more. He calls for the Stunner when Big Show, called Paul Wight here, debuts and beats the heck out of Austin. He beats on him for awhile before McMahon says to throw him into the cage. He does and in one of my favorite spots ever, the cage breaks and Austin drops down to win the match. McMahon looks devastated as the show ends.

Rating: B-. This was about Austin screwing Vince again and in my mind shouldn’t have gone on last. The title match was more of a massacre than this but I guess they wanted to send the fans home happy. Show debuting was a big deal I guess and this set up the main event at Mania which should have been Austin vs. Vince. It was short but brutal which I guess is what they were going for?

Overall Rating: C-. This show was pretty bad. It just never got going and is all about two matches, one of which is pretty forgotten. This was all built up to the cage match and that’s the only thing anyone really remembers. Mankind and Rock is brutal and fun so I’d recommend that and the main event.

This wasn’t supposed to be anything huge other than just to get to Mania which is fine. The first part of the show is just awful though with nothing of note and only a few moments of decency at all. Watch the main events and that’s all that’s worth anything here.

Wrestlemania 9
Date: April 4, 1993
Location: Caesar’s Palace, Las Vegas, Nevada
Attendance: 16,891
Commentators: Jim Ross, Bobby Heenan, Randy Savage

This is considered to be one of the weakest Wrestlemanias in history and I think that’s an accurate statement. Looking at the announced card, which was only eight matches long, I only see 2-3 that I would put on a Wrestlemania. Your main event for this evening is Bret Hart vs. Yokozuna, which is ok, but just doesn’t scream WM main event to me.

What amazes me the most about it though was this show was so packed they had to cancel one of the matches: Bam Bam Bigelow vs. Kamala. The theme of the show is the world’s largest toga (toga, toga, toga) party. Why does this scream BAD IDEA to me? Seriously, what’s the point behind this? It made the show seem stupid overall, but that’s just me. Anyway, let’s get started.

Our show opens with no National Anthem or America the Beautiful. What a crock already. After that, we see Gorilla Monsoon in a toga. God help me. He is our host for the evening, whatever that means. He welcomes us to the show, and throws it over to….Jim Ross? This was Ross’ debut and I vividly remember being stunned to see him in the WWF as he had been the commentator for WCW my entire life.

Ross runs down the double main event of Hogan and Beefcake vs. Money Inc. for the tag belts and the already mentioned WWF Title match. He throws it to Finkus Maximus, which is something even I couldn’t make up, who introduces Caesar and Cleopatra on an elephant, which Ross gives us a history lesson on. Macho Man is then introduced riding a sedan which is like a couch that’s carried as beautiful women feed him grapes.

Then in one of the funniest scenes in WWF history, Bobby Heenan comes in on a camel, but for some reason he’s riding it backwards. He gets to the broadcast position and is a mess, which is kind of funny. Finally, after almost 10 minutes of intros, it’s time for a match.

Intercontinental Title: Shawn Michaels vs. Tatanka

Michaels had dumped Sherri since last year but now is accompanied by Luna Vachon, who is proof that not all divas are hot. Tatanka is out next and he has never lost a one on one match. Sherri follows Tatanka out, yet it’s made clear she’s not with him. So they have stalkers now. Hey they match! Tatanka had pinned Shawn twice leading up to this match, once in a singles match and once in a 6 man.

Some of Savage’s comments to Heenan, such as shut up camel breath are just funny to me. There’s the first bell, eleven minutes into the show. The outside look is really cool here. They feel each other out at a rather fast pace to start. Top wristlock goes to Shawn and he follows it up with a headlock. Down to the mat with Shawn totally in control.

Tatanka gets a belly to back to escape and a SWEET counter of a top rope clothesline with an arm drag. Shawn to the floor and the girls have a staredown of awkward proportions. Back in and the stereotype works over Shawn’s arm which is apparently hurt coming into this one. Shawn hits a clothesline but it hurts him even further so it wasn’t worth it at all. Anytime Shawn gets something going he hurts his arm again, this time ramming it into the post.

Bobby: She (Luna) is something. Ross: Yeah what is she? Tatanka gets a shoulder breaker out of nowhere but drops an elbow instead of covering. Top rope chop but still no cover. He goes up again and jumps down into what we would call Sweet Chin Music. Today that would kill a guy and be on a highlight reel for years but here it’s just a momentum changer. Luna and Sherri do nothing of note again during a staredown.

Clothesline from the apron to the floor takes down Tatanka. Shawn yells at Sherri and gets a chinlock for awhile. Modified victory roll gets two as this is getting a lot of time. Another victory roll is countered into an electric chair drop to put both guys down again. Double axe by Shawn gets nothing as Tatanka stereotypes up.

Superkick is blocked and Tatanka gets a top rope cross body for a long two. Slingshot puts Shawn into the post and gets a very close two. Powerslam gets an even closer two. This is getting really good now and Tatanka is sent to the floor. Shawn shoves the referee and Tatanka gets the Papoose to Go for the CHEAP DQ! Dang it that was good stuff and got nearly 20 minutes.

Rating: B+. Very solid match that got the time it needed. If it had a real ending, this would be an automatic A. Tatanka was something interesting. He didn’t lose for his first two years which is an amazing streak, longer than even Goldberg’s. Shawn wasn’t quite up to the level of awesome he would reach but it was coming soon. He benefited a lot from the advent of Raw as it gave him a bigger way to get noticed and to put it mildly, it worked. Well that and Razor Ramon plus a ladder.

Luna beats up Sherri post match.

The Steiners say they’re going to beat the Headshrinkers.

Headshrinkers vs. Steiners

Pretty random tag match here but it works ok I guess. It’s your standard face team vs. heel team so that’s fine. We get the first use of JR’s code saying it’s going to be a slobberknocker, meaning it’s going to be awful from a wrestling standpoint. I was always a Headshrinkers mark for some reason, just always liked them.

Scott and Fatu start us off. Steiners control early on which is expected. Oh I forgot to mention: Fatu of the Headshrinkers is more commonly known as Rikishi. In a NICE looking move, Scott and Rick both go up the same corner and hits stereo clotheslines on the Headshrinkers. Nice one indeed. We get breaking news that Luna attacked Sherri again, and somehow, I’m more interested in the match at hand. What a stunner.

Afa rams his guys’ heads together to wake them up a bit. The referee is Bill Alfonso, who you might know as Fonzie from ECW. He was RVD’s overly hyper manager. Samu gets a splash in the corner and Rick just drills him with a clothesline. Afa blasts Scott with what would become known as a kendo stick. Savage gets upset, Heenan doesn’t see the Headshrinkers cheating which is one of his trademarks.

Heenan says he can’t see right with sunglasses on and JR says he saw it too. Heenan says JR is wrong because he’s from Oklahoma. JR’s reaction is priceless. Out to the floor for more pounding on White Thunder. Scott slams one of their heads into the mat and gets kicked in the jaw with a sweet kick for it.

Heenan says his head is like Prudential. Savage: I don’t know what that means. Bobby: It means the rock is hard. Savage: I didn’t ask you Heenan. The commentary for this match is light years ahead of the match itself. Samu gets a dropkick to show off a bit. Off to the nerve hold now, a Samoan trademark. Heenan says Oklahoma is a suburb of Kentucky, which offends JR for some reason.

Samu goes up but misses the big headbutt and there’s the tag to Rick and an eruption. He rams their heads together which is of course, STUPID. Dude learn your stereotypes. Headshrinkers hit a double team version of the move we call the Stroke, leading to one Headshrinker putting Rick on their shoulders for what we would call a Doomsday Device. In a freaking SWEET counter, Rick catches Fatu in the air from on top of Samu’s shoulders in a belly to belly suplex. Looked just absolutely sick.

Back to Scott who nearly kills Fatu with a belly to belly overhead. Scott suddenly remembers he’s better than Rikishi and hits a Frankensteiner, which might be the most impressive move that anyone has ever regularly done, to get the pin. It’s a standing hurricanrana by a guy of Scott Steiner’s size. Think about that.

Rating: B+. I liked this match a lot. Both teams are very solid and some of the stuff they did in this match was simply great. Top level stuff here which surprises me greatly. The Steiners are just scary good when they’re on their game and this is no exception. That powerslam/suplex spot by Rick is absolutely amazing.

Doink the Clown is a screwed up individual. He dresses up a Caesar statue in clown makeup and we get a recap of Doink vs. Crush. Doink also says Crush will be seeing double vision.

Crush vs. Doink the Clown

Crush had one of the best looks of anyone I’d seen from this era. He seriously could have been something special if he’d cared even a little bit at all. He was a decent wrestler with good size and power. I’ve never gotten why he didn’t pan out. Definitely a solid face challenger if nothing else. At about 6’6 and over 300lbs, he was quick and very strong. What’s not to like here?

Doink runs around the ring to start but gets caught by the big Hawaiian that I think Savage wants to make sweet love to down by the pond. Crush beats the holy goodness out of Doink for the majority of the match with basic power stuff. His finishing move was a head crushing move which was always kind of odd but it worked I guess.

The clown gets a guillotine clothesline and starts a comeback here, but it doesn’t mean much. In case I wasn’t clear here, Crush is the face in this match. A pretty weak looking Piledriver keeps Crush down for a bit and then he’s sent into the post. Doink jumps into a boot though and here comes the big man.

Doink tries to hide under the ring but gets caught. Back in the ring, Crush uses his head vice finisher on Doink but the ref got bumped. Another Doink comes out and hits Crush in the back with a cast then in the head. This leads to a pin for the real Doink. They check under the ring, where the other Doink came from and went to. They check and no Doink.

Rating: D. A Squash leading to a bad ending means not a good match. This feud went nowhere for the most part and I think it went on until at least the King of the Ring. Crush would soon start a big push which stalled like no other for some reason. Still though, this was really bad.

Todd Pettingil talks to some Japanese fans and after the WWF makes bad racial jokes, Razor Ramon is headed to the ring.

Razor Ramon vs. Bob Backlund

It’s total filler with no backstory but it’s Backlund in his first Mania match which is impressive since he’s in his early to mid 40s. Razor is the heel here but to put it mildly, he’s very popular. And yet Backlund would be the next guy to win the world title.

Backlund offers a handshake to start but Razor throws a toothpick instead. This is before he had gone insane if you didn’t get that. BIG Razor chant starts up and of course isn’t acknowledged. Backlund keeps tripping him up and does his stupid little dance. I never got the point of that at all but he always did it.

Razor stomps away after a slam. Bret Hart was knocked out cold by Luger at the Mania brunch today. This wasn’t ever addressed after this for some reason. Backlund gets a butterfly suplex which was kind of impressive. Atomic drop, his former finisher, gets no cover. In a great ending, Razor gets a small package out of nowhere to end it. Heenan gets in a great line: he beat the wrestler with a wrestling move.

Rating: C-. Not great but not awful, the ending gives this a decent grade. It’s not terrible and the ending surprised me. Razor had debuted just after Mania 8 and was pushed to the moon. He even got a title shot at the Rumble this year in a forgotten match. The breaking news during this match of Bret being knocked out earlier in the day leads to nothing. The last line of he beat the wrestler with wrestling was great.

In the back we see Gene with Money Inc. The feud they’re involved in at the moment began on a Monday Night Raw (The first Mania that can be said at as the show debuted about 3 months prior to this) when DiBiase tried to hit Beefcake with a briefcase.

Beefcake had been legitimately huge in a parasailing accident over a year ago and his face was badly injured. This led to a great Heenan line of, “It serves him right. His face has hurt me for years.” This attack led to Beefcake getting his friend Hulk Hogan to return to help him.

Also Jimmy Hart jumped from Money Inc to Hogan and Beefcake. Lastly, the night before the show, Hogan was injured, resulting in huge bruises around his eye. Now what really happened to him?

According to the storyline, DiBiase hired a bunch of people to attack him. The WWF said he was hurt in a jetski accident. The common theory in wrestling circles though is Savage thought Hogan and Liz (his real wife) were having an affair and beat the tar out of Hogan. Believe what you will.

Tag Titles: Money Inc. vs. Hulk Hogan and Brutus Beefcake

We get red smoke and Heenan says that can only mean one person. Then Jimmy Hart walks out. Just made me chuckle a bit. This is Hogan’s first match in a year and the pop kind of sucks. It’s big, but not mind blowing. The heels jump the heroes before the bell but Hogan and Beefcake fight them off with the music playing which always makes me mark out like crazy. There’s just something sweet about that.

We get to the real match which is actually quite good. I think just about everyone expected Hogan and Beefcake to somehow take the belts here. Money Inc. had absolutely dominated the tag division for over a year at this point so they were seen as very legit. The champions stall forever to get us started. That’s about what you would expect no?

Hogan’s eye looks terrible. IRS vs. Beefcake start us off. The champions beat him down and tag in and out but for some reason they don’t go after the face that much at all. IRS tries to hit him in the face like a very stupid man indeed. Beefcake takes over and off to Hogan who gets ten punches in the corner on the Million Dollar Man. It’s about five years too late but I guess it’s better than nothing.

More fast tagging by the challengers and Hogan gets a double axe off the middle rope to DiBiase who is getting destroyed here. They clear the ring again as this is one sided after a few minutes of the champions winning early on. The champions try to leave and we get the ten count thing like we did last year I think. Scratch that as it was at Summerslam.

Hogan vs. DiBiase again. Good old fashioned cheating has Money Inc right back in control though. Hogan does what he does best: gets his ass kicked. LONG Million Dollar Dream puts him down but he shakes his finger to get back up. He must be in that thing for two minutes or so. Beefcake comes in to put a sleeper on DiBiase to drive Heenan crazy.

Why does everything seem to go into slow motion during a Hogan match? It takes like a minute and a half to get the hot tag to Beefcake. IRS comes in as well and a cheap shot gives the champions the advantage again. Beefcake’s protective mask gets ripped off and his face gets beaten into oblivion which is always a good thing. Love him or hate him, the guy bumps like a master.

Beefcake finally gets a sleeper on IRS but DiBiase breaks it up causing the ref to go down. Hogan comes in and cleans house leading to a double cover. Jimmy Hart turns his jacket inside out, which just happens to be black and white striped in the biggest coincidence of ALL time (you have to say ALL time at any WM. It’s the law) and apparently they think that’s good enough to make him a referee.

Some pest of a referee comes out and ruins our celebration saying that there’s a DQ as Hogan used Beefcake’s metal mask to knock out Money Inc. Jimmy Hart beats up the other referee and we get Hogan’s music. Post match, Hogan poses and they steal IRS’ briefcase, which contains a brick and money.

Supposedly the brick caused it to hurt a lot worse, because of course hitting someone WITH A SOLID METAL BRIEFCASE didn’t hurt enough. There’s also money in it which Hogan gives to the fans. This literally goes on well over 5 minutes.

Rating: C+. This is a good tag match which is absolutely stunning in its own right. Hogan put on a great performance here as did Brutus. Money Inc was as great as ever and it boils down to a solid match. The main thing killing it was the ending. I mean REALLY?

Hogan hits has Jimmy get the pin and he celebrates? Dude, come the heck on now.It was really the best option, but I still hate it. This match works for one simple reason: it’s nearly 20 minutes long. Both faces get beaten down and we get a double comeback. There’s very little missing from it actually.

Mr. Perfect says he’ll break Luger’s winning streak.

Mr. Perfect vs. Lex Luger

The main perk here is Luger’s entrance with four chicks holding mirrors in gold thongs. Not bad at all. This sounds awesome on paper if nothing else. Luger has knocked out everyone he’s faced so far with the metal plate in his forearm. They fight over a wristlock to start and it’s a standoff. Big shot by Perfect and a knee lift sets up a dropkick and Luger hits the floor.

We talk about baseball as Heenan tries to explain the whole knockout thing and he says Savage knows a thing or two about baseball. That’s very true as he played in some minor leagues for White Sox, Reds and Cardinals organizations. Quite an athlete indeed. Perfect works on the knee which is smart as he can’t get knocked out from there.

LOUD chop by Perfect as he has controlled for the vast majority so far. As is my custom he gets reversed on a hard whip into the corner to give Luger the control. He gets a shot with the loaded arm into the back of Perfect to really take over. Backbreaker puts Perfect down even longer.

Perfect can’t keep anything going and Luger gets a cover with his feet on the ropes for two which Heenan blasts to no end. Powerslam gets two. Sunset flip gets two for Perfect and then hooks a sleeper for all of 2 seconds. Perfect keeps getting pin attempts but can’t get more than two on them. A slingshot puts luger into the buckle for two.

Missile dropkick gets a long two as Luger gets his foot on the rope. No heat at all on that either. They fight over a backslide and Luger leans forward enough to put Perfect’s feet in the ropes so that he can’t kick out for the pin. Post match Luger knocks him out with the forearm.

Rating: C-. Long and at least passable, but I couldn’t stand Luger’s gimmick at the time. The forearm was just a dumb way to end every single match and this is no exception. This was ok but it was really spotty at times and it never got into a flow at all. I’ve seen worse though.

Perfect goes looking for Luger. And for once he finds him and the fight is on again. Shawn jumps Perfect, starting their summer long feud.

Gorilla pops up for no reason at all other than to tell us what two matches are left.

We recap Undertaker vs. Giant Gonzales. Undertaker feuded with Kamala in the fall and beat him. Harvey Whippleman, Kamala’s manager said he would get revenge, so at the Royal Rumble he brought out Gonzalez, who boardered on 7’8. He beat the tar out of Taker and eliminated him, leading to this match.

The feud doesn’t end here as it would finally be settled at the Survivor Series in a Rest in Peace match, which meant No DQ. In case you’re wondering where you’ve heard this story before, it’s THE EXACT same thing that happened with Muhammad Hassan, which led to Mark Henry who combined to play the role of Kamala and then the Great Khali as Gonzalez.

They had a manager that wanted revenge on Taker, then Taker got beaten up by them, then won a no rules match. That’s why old fans didn’t like the Taker/Khali feud: we knew exactly what was coming and we were exactly right.

Giant Gonzalez vs. Undertaker

This is the first Wrestlemania entrance for Undertaker where he’s brought out in a chariot with a vulture on his shoulder which was REALLY cool for its time and is still awesome today. This should sum up how big Gonzalez was: Taker is a big old dude and he comes up to Gonzalez’s chest. Clubbing blows get him nowhere and here comes Taker.

Gonzalez chokes Taker who gets on the second rope to choke back but gets a low blow for his trouble down in his little demons. A low blow is no sold and we go to School (In 1993 the School wasn’t old yet). This was in that really weird period that stretched to about 1996 when Foley got there where they had no idea what to do with Undertaker so they just had him fight giants.

Giant chokes Taker down until the Urn goes up into the air. Taker goes into the steps on the floor as it’s ALL Gonzalez. Heenan proclaims him dead and almost has a heart attack when Taker is like boy I’m the Undertaker and just stands up and keeps beating on Gonzalez. Taker beats him down before Harvey throws in a cloth covered in chloroform which puts Taker down but it’s a DQ anyway. Yep this is bad.

Rating: F+. The match itself was just bad as there was one simple flaw: Gonzalez was just terrible. He was too big to be able to properly do anything in the ring and it showed badly here. It’s the only thing close to a blemish on Taker’s Mania record and that’s a shame. The idea that the commentators could smell a small rag in an open area like that is ludicrous to say the least, especially after all of 5 seconds of it being out.

Taker stays down for a long time with Gonzalez standing over him in triumph. They stretcher him out which isn’t something you see every day. The fans chant for Hogan for a bit, but then a gong rings. Today that would blow the roof off the place (despite there being no roof here) but here it only gets a solid pop. He staggers out and beats the fur off of Gonzalez which makes me wonder: WHY IN THE WORLD DID THEY DO THE DQ ENDING???

Gene recaps the feud with Hart and Yoko, and then Hulk Hogan makes sure he has the spotlight at the end of the show as he has to talk about how he’s in Bret’s corner. Oh and he calls Yokozuna a Jap.

WWF Title: Bret Hart vs. Yokozuna

Yoko wins this shot based on winning the Rumble. When you look back, there was absolutely no doubt who was going to win here. The idea is that Bret has no chance and they’ve spent the entire show telling us that Bret has no chance. Guess what happens in the match.

The problem with this match is very simple: Yoko is too fat for Bret to do much with. Bret’s offense is completely unbelievable here and that’s not a knock on him as no one for the most part could do much against Yoko. That’s also not a knock on Yoko as he was a decent big man (bring it on Irish).

Bret is sent to the floor after a nice attack to start but it’s clear he’s going to be in trouble. He ties Yoko’s legs in the ropes and gets him down so he can hammer away. Savage wants him to cover but is corrected by Heenan in a bizarre moment. Clothesline takes Bret down almost as soon as Yoko gets to his feet. Leg drop half kills Bret for no cover. The fans chant USA for their Canadian champion.

Bret gets a boot up for a BIG pop and a bulldog/jump on his back gets two. Side kick puts Bret right back down as this is bordering on a squash so far. Off to the nerve hold now which is basically a way to waste some time, which in a 9 minute match is rather stupid. Oh and all of Bret’s fans are Hulkamaniacs. Heenan points out the stupidity of the USA chants and is ignored. Bret gets in all the offense he can which is more or less getting him nowhere.

FINALLY he gets something as the buckle is exposed and Yoko’s head goes into it, sending him down to his stomach. Bret puts on a shockingly passable sharpshooter and the crowd is shocked. Mr. Fuji then throws salt into Bret’s eyes allowing Yoko to pin him for the title. Now let’s break down why this ending is so bad. Bret gets the sharpshooter on after Yoko shows no sign of his knees being hurt by Bret’s offense on them. I’ll let that go though as it’s a solid move that would hurt enough for a quick submission.

Fuji has done almost nothing all match. Bret sees him right in front of him as he takes FOREVER to get the salt out and throw it. Are you telling me Bret couldn’t have, I don’t know, CLOSED HIS EYES??? The referee sees Bret holding his eyes, sees the cloud from the thrown salt and sees Fuji holding a package of salt and thinks nothing of this, and to top it off, salt in the eyes is enough to knock Bret out for a pin? Come on now.

Rating: D+. The size difference here was too much, the time was bad, and the finish was insulting to my intelligence. The wrestling is ok, but just barely. Bret fights valiantly for the full nine minutes of this match and yes you read that right. That’s the biggest issue most people have with this match and this Wrestlemania. The biggest match was less than 10 minutes long.

BUT WAIT!!!

Hulk Hogan comes out because he can’t handle a *gasp* young and talented guy taking the spotlight or something evil like that, so he explains to Fumbles McWhoops our referee what happened and apparently Fuji has match making abilities now as tells Hogan that Yoko will put the belt on the line right now. Bret points to the ring which apparently means go for it.

Hulk slides in and we’re off to the races one more time. The fans are happy, but looking back this is beyond stupid. WHY would Fuji put the newly won title on the line against the greatest giant killer of all time after Yoko has had no rest while Hogan has rested for about half at least? And people wonder why the business was in so much of a hole as it was around this time.

WWF Title: Hulk Hogan vs. Yokozuna

Yoko attacks Hogan as he slides in then holds him for more salt. Hogan ducks, nails Fuji, clotheslines Yoko, drops the leg and wins his fifth title. No rating of course.

Hogan poses with the title as we go off the air.

Overall Rating: F+. This show is truly bad and the main reason behind that is the ending. Hulk Hogan had absolutely no need to come in and steal the spotlight all over again. I don’t care how big of a Hulkamaniac you are, and I’m a huge one, but there is no justification for that whatsoever.

Let Yoko leave with the belt and do this on Raw the next night. Aside from that, the rest of the matches are ok at best. There’s a few watchable matches here and there but there’s no reasoning to sit through the rest of the show for them. Wrestlemania isn’t supposed to be something you need to fast forward through to get to the decent stuff. BIG recommendation to avoid here as this might be the worst WM of all time.

Wrestlemania 8
Date: April 5, 1992
Location: Hoosierdome, Indianapolis, Indiana
Attendance: 62,167
Commentators: Gorilla Monsoon, Bobby Heenan

Star Spangled Banner: Reba McEntireThis was an interesting entry in the series as well. You could clearly see things beginning to change in the WWF at this point. Ric Flair had arrived and was the reigning WWF Champion, Hulk Hogan was talking about retirement, Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels were singles wrestlers, and a lot of the goofiness was gone. This show was billed as possibly Hogan’s farewell match which was a really strange thing to hear no matter who you were.

Hogan had been the face of the company for nearly ten years and the possibility of him leaving was a scary though. This show also was different in that it cut down the number of matches from 12-14 to 9, which cut out a lot of the mindless filler and gave more important matches more time. It was held under a dome, just like WM 3 and had a very large crowd.The WWF Title wasn’t on the line in the last match of the show but rather in the middle, which was another rarity. Anyway, on with the show! A running joke of the show is that Elizabeth allegedly dated Ric and posed for special photographs for him which Flair promised to show. To the best of my knowledge, nothing ever came of this.

We open with Reba McEntire singing the National Anthem which is a nice thing to hear again. She is eventually helped out of the ring by Tito “El Matador” Santana.

Tito Santana vs. Shawn Michaels

Shawn is finally full heel after the legendary barber shop window incident. You can tell Heenan is rolling tonight as he gets in a great line almost immediately by saying he things Tito and Reba are siblings. “Sure. That’s Arriba McEntire.” I love listening to Heenan when he’s on his game and he certainly is here. We get the old school orgasm sounding music with Sherri “singing.”Shawn has challenged the winner of the IC Title match apparently. We waste some time as Sherri de-jackets Shawn. They imply there are some heel shenanigans coming. We get started and naturally it’s fast paced. A headlock keeps Tito in control and we have a special 900 number. There is some demon child shouting in an EVIL voice at Shawn and it’s kind of creepy.

Back in and Tito is dominating for the most part. We get a LONG headlock by Tito but they somehow keep it entertaining. That’s the difference between talented guys and generic guys: talented guys keep things moving even during things like these. They’re trying to get rollups and fight out of the hold and move around. They make it a contest which gives the fans something to keep their interest. That’s very important and separates the greats from the regulars.

Tito gets knocked over the top and is all dizzy headed. Where’s Jesse to say it’s because of a bad taco? Now Shawn hits the chinlock and has Tito in trouble. Tito gets up and walks into what would evolve into Sweet Chin Music. I guess here it’s Sour Jaw Humming? The Tear Drop Suplex, Shawn’s finisher, is blocked and the forearm connects to send Shawn to the floor.

Tito beats the tar out of him on the floor and gets a slingshot forearm/shoulder to have Shawn in real trouble. Shawn’s bumping like a madman because it’s Wrestlemania. The forearm hits and Shawn goes outside again. And then we get what has to be a botched ending as Tito goes to suplex him back in but Shawn falls on him for the pin. I guess Sherri was supposed to cheat but they messed it up somehow. That’s all I can come up with for that ending.

Rating: B-. Rather solid stuff here with both guys knowing exactly what to do out there. The scary thing is that Shawn would get about ten times better in about two or three years. This was fine for an opener and it worked well for what it was supposed to do. Good stuff from two good workers.

The Legion of Doom are tired of being off center. They bring back Paul Ellering. Who’s Paul Ellering you ask? That’s the same question most of the people have. What they fail to mention is Ellering was their manager during their hottest period in the NWA. Without knowing that, this interview makes little sense.

The Legion of Doom are tired of being off center. They bring back Paul Ellering. Who’s Paul Ellering you ask? That’s the same question most of the people have. What they fail to mention is Ellering was their manager during their hottest period in the NWA. Without knowing that, this interview makes little sense.

Jake Roberts isn’t afraid of the Undertaker. This feud goes back a long way actually. Roberts and Taker had both been heels and had crashed Savage’s and Liz’s wedding. Jake and Savage had a match, after which Jake was waiting backstage to hit Liz with a chair. Taker stopped this, turning face in the process.

Jake had been a guest on Taker’s show, The Funeral Parlor. He had locked Taker’s hand in a casket and DDTed Paul Bearer before attacking Taker with a chair. This did absolutely nothing though. Taker says Jake needs to be ready to meet his maker. It’s Jake’s last match as he would go to WCW and fight Sting for awhile in a totally forgotten feud.

Undertaker vs. Jake Roberts

Talk about a contrast between the previous match and this one. This likely isn’t going to be anything special at all to put it mildly. Bobby suggests Jake has a chance here. That’s so cute. We hit the floor almost immediately with Taker dominating. He’s the face here if I didn’t mention that.

Pure dominance here as we get Munsters and Addams Family references from Heenan, who feels like he has two brilliant minds on occasion. This match is meandering pretty badly here. DDT out of NOWHERE and the crowd is stunned. Could the Streak be over at one??? Taker sits up before Jake gets to his feet which is unthinkable.

Short arm clothesline and Taker is up again. Jake PLANTS him with another DDT and goes after Paul. Taker sits up again. If those had been KB DDTs he would have stayed down. Taker goes after Jake and a Tombstone on the floor ends Jake’s WWF run in emphatic style. The pin is of course academic.

Rating: D+. Nothing that great here but I’ve seen worse. They were still going for ways to make Taker look awesome as they had no idea what to do with him. They knew he was something special and he’s a former WWF Champion but at the same time, what do you do with him? It was a problem they had until a guy named Mankind showed up.

Brutus Beefcake is here for some reason.

We see a double interview with IC Champion Roddy Piper and challenger Bret Hart. Bret is serious and Roddy isn’t. This doesn’t sit well with Bret and we’re ready to go. There are peanut butter and jelly sandwiches mentioned, making me hungry.

Intercontinental Title: Bret Hart vs. Roddy Piper

Staredown to start as this should be awesome to put it mildly. Arm drag by Piper to start which surprises Bret to put it mildly. Bret does the same and down goes Piper. This is shaping up well. Gorilla gives his strategy for the match from both perspectives. Heenan: I’d nail them out back with a tire iron.

After some nice amateur stuff Piper spits at Bret to make sure everyone knows he’s the heel. Test of Strength which is odd to see from guys like this. Bret grabs the arm and Piper can’t fight out of it. Gorilla lists off some of the countries that are watching Mania which is always cool to hear.

Bret hurts his shoulder on an armdrag and of course was faking as Heenan predicted. It results in a small package for two and Piper is hot. Bret gets a cross body and we hit the floor. Back in and Hart adjusts his boot, allowing Piper to lay in an uppercut to be the definite heel in this. That’s certainly the right choice at least. STIFF punch to the face follows.

Bulldog puts Bret down and he’s in trouble. Bret is busted BAD which was an unauthorized blade job but Bret lied and said it was hardway to avoid a fine or suspension. Flair bladed later on and nearly got fired over it. Bret gets a sunset flip out of nowhere to break Piper’s momentum but it just ticks him off and the beating continues.

Heenan again suggests going to get a chair and blast Bret with it. Bret gets a forearm out of nowhere to send Piper to the floor as the demon child from the Shawn match is at it again, this time in the pink corner. Both guys go down and Piper’s head is on Bret’s stomach but it’s not classified as a cover for no apparent reason. Heenan counts anyway but it doesn’t count of course because that’s not the finish.

Piper goes up so Bret drags him down by the hair. FREAKING…..nah it wasn’t that bad. Snap suplex gets two. Bret unleashes the Five Moves of Doom but the Sharpshooter is blocked. Well of course it was as he didn’t go for the elbow yet. He tries it out of order and gets caught by a boot. They slug it out from their knees and Bret takes control again.

Down goes the referee as we set up the ending. Bret eats steps and it’s all Piper here. Piper grabs the bell but can’t bring himself to swing it, thus preserving his face status. Heenan: “USE THE BELL! HIT HIM! WAFFLE HIM WITH IT! GIVE IT TO ME I’LL HIT HIM WITH IT!” Piper opts for a sleeper instead but Bret climbs up the ropes and backflips onto Piper for the pin to regain the title.

Rating: A. This match is as solid as they come. There’s very little that I find wrong with it aside from possibly the ending. Piper not using the bell was perfect, but after that it’s like they were told they had to end it immediately, which to me wasn’t good. Aside from that brief moment though, this was an excellent match.

Piper gives Bret the belt post match.

Bobby Heenan has a surprise, and he introduces via satellite, Lex Luger. Lex is a totally arrogant bastard here and he does it perfectly. This takes far longer than it should have.

Duggan, Slaughter, Virgil and Bossman make generic insults to their opponents.

The Nasties, Repo Man and Mountie counter with even weaker promos.

Jim Duggan/Sgt. Slaughter/Virgil/Big Bossman vs. Nasty Boys/Repo Man/The Mountie

Good night who picked these teams? It’s like a great melting pot of the undercard. This match is introduced by Ray Combs who was a popular game show host at the time. He makes some bad jokes at the expense of the heels. One decent line: “Repo Man was an unwanted child. His parents were hoping for a boy.”

My goodness how far have these guys fallen since last year? Nastys were tag champions, Mountie had been the IC Champion earlier that year, Bossman was in the IC Title match last year and Virgil had a fairly high profile match. Quadruple clothesline takes down everyone not named Repo Man. There are going to be WWF guys on Family Feud against World Bodybuilding guys.

Duggan vs. Sags starts us off officially. It’s a huge trainwreck of course with no real reason for anyone to be in there against anyone as none of these people were feuding at all. Everyone fights everyone for a little bit and nothing stands out whatsoever. Everything goes insane of course and the Nasties screw up, allowing Virgil to pin Knobbs.

Rating: F. No one cared and the match was a mess. This has to be a sold out crowd now with as much filler as we just saw. Awful match and at least it was short.

We recap Flair vs. Savage. Flair had arrived in November with the WCW Title, which is one of the most complicated stories in wrestling history so I’ll stay out of why he was allowed to have it, and claimed he was the REAL world champion. Due to him helping Taker beat Hogan for the WWF Title and the controversial way that Hogan won it back, the title was declared vacant. The winner of the 92 Rumble would be the new champion. Flair wins after Sid eliminated Hogan and Hogan pulls out Sid.

Flair and Perfect have a picture that is allegedly Liz from photos that she gave him before she met Macho. They had threatened to put these up on the big screen for everyone to see. This had been built up for months as the main feud in the company with neither one really having a clear advantage.

Flair had all these stories about he and Liz and some clearly doctored photos of the two, but nothing ever concrete. Macho Man won’t talk to Gene. However he will talk for a Coliseum Video exclusive. He says nothing of note.

This was supposed to be Hogan vs. Flair. Why that match never took place has never really been answered for sure, but the common answer is that the WWF started a real steroid policy and Hogan knew he was in trouble. After this show he took a near 8 month hiatus from the company, which even furthers that theory.

WWF World Title: Ric Flair vs. Randy Savage

What makes this match work even better is Heenan’s completely biased announcing. He doesn’t even pretend to be fair and it’s great. Savage jumps him in the aisle but Perfect makes the save. Totally personal feud here and even more proof that Hogan wasn’t needed to have a dramatic and great storyline for the world title. Savage no sells an atomic drop and hits a clothesline to take over.

Savage is even more insane here than usual if you can imagine that. Flair manages to backdrop Savage over the top to break his momentum though as Heenan cheers him on. There’s no Liz in sight at the moment. Flair chops away and Savage is in some trouble. Heenan is drooling over the thought of seeing the centerfolds of Liz that Flair promised.

Flair sends him to the floor and keeps working on the back. Total dominance here as Savage is sent back in. Savage gets a punch in and the fans pop huge just for that. A neckbreaker out of nowhere puts Flair down. Heenan needs a drink. He must have never been thirsty in WCW. Flair is slammed off the top with Savage stepping onto the bottom rope which isn’t something I’ve ever seen before.

Savage unleashes the clotheslines and even gets one as Flair is coming off the top for a long two. Heenan nearly had a heart attack off of that one. Savage sends him to the floor and hits the double axe to send Flair into the railing. He CLEARLY blades on camera which was a huge ordeal backstage as it wasn’t authorized at all and they nearly fired him over it. It’s a good one too.

Double axe off the top gets two. Crowd is WAY into this. The elbow hits but Perfect dives in for the save at the last possible second. Hebner doesn’t throw it out though and all three of the heels are furious. Perfect throws Flair an illegal object and Savage is knocked out cold….FOR TWO! The place erupts on the kickout and Heenan is beside himself.

Perfect grabs a chair and drills Savage in the knee (although it looked like he hit the knee that Savage isn’t holding) and the challenger is in trouble. Here comes Liz! A group of suits try to stop her, and one of them looks like a big dollar sign. As he’s coming down the aisle, he looks like money. You would be able to say HERE COMES THE MONEY. (It’s Shane McMahon if you have no idea what I’m going on aboug).

Flair goes after the knee like a shark smelling a big pile of Shark Chow and the Figure Four goes on. Like an IDIOT, Flair slaps Savage for not staying down. After literally being in the hold for over a minute Savage turns him over as Perfect cheats for the second time in the hold. Flair goes for a slam but Savage grabs a small package for two as the crowd is losing their collective mind.

Flair WOOs at Liz and hammers away even more. Knee Crusher (to the wrong leg) but Savage spins around and grabs a rollup with a handful of trunks (as we see Flair’s back AGAIN) to win the title again and blow the roof off. Post match Flair hits on Liz and she slaps the heck out of him. Perfect and Flair beat the tar out of Savage post match.

Rating: A+. I don’t love it as much as IC does, but this was amazing stuff. It went on forever and never got boring. The main big thing about this match is simple: there was a huge feud and title match, without Hulk Hogan. That hadn’t happened in almost 10 years and it proved that the WWF could live without him.

That being said, this is a totally underrated classic with both guys going insane and Savage fighting through impossible odds to win the title that he deserved. This was great stuff and of course it goes on halfway through the show as a world title change pales in comparison to Hogan vs. a monster right? Go watch this match as it’s awesome on a ton of levels.

Post match we get two of the best promos I’ve ever seen. You need to see these.

This feud was absolutely amazing on a ton of levels and the matches being great only pushed that further.

We see a clip from the Wrestlemania “press conference” where the #1 contender to the world title was named. Hogan was named the challenger and Sid was furious. He turned on Hogan in a tag match on SNME in a bad match where Hogan managed to beat Flair and Taker on his own afterwards.

Sid destroyed the Barber Shop set and got shampoo all over his face in a typically bad Sid bit. He destroyed a bunch of jobbers to bad 80s music apparently. And that of course transitions us to this.

Tatanka vs. Rick Martel

We get a pure filler here. Heenan’s commentary here is great as he’s trying to be deadly serious but any mention of Flair sets him off. Tatanka has Native Americans with him, despite no one caring at all. Martel just doesn’t care at all here and I can’t say I blame him at all.

If you ever want a textbook example of going through the motions, look right here. Neither care and while they’re not being lazy per se, there’s no story or spark in this match. It’s literally two guys performing moves on each other. Tatanka gets a roll up for the pin. I know that’s short but seriously, NOTHING happened here and there was no point to it being here.

Rating: D. They were kind of trying, but it kind of sucked. Nothing great here at all and just a filler after the title changing hands. Boring match and no one could have cared less. Well ok they probably could but it wouldn’t have been by much.

We see Money Inc. saying that they’re ready for the Natural Disasters. DiBiase is completely different than he was just a year ago, but it works just fine all the same.

The Natural Disasters are coming for the belts.

Tag Titles: Natural Disasters vs. Money Inc.

Heenan is still ticked and it’s still funny. Gorilla singes the praises of the challengers (the big fat guys) which more or less secures their loss here. Quake and IRS start but DiBiase comes in soon afterwards. The challengers overpower DiBiase who runs of course like a scared little girly man.

The big guys dominate as you would expect them to with Quake shoving DiBiase all over the place and then doing the same to IRS for awhile. Typhoon comes in and due to his high level of suck the champions beat him down pretty easily. This isn’t really going anywhere at all.

False hot tag to Earthquake gets us nowhere as we’re waiting to get to the ending so we can get to the “main event” because Hogan has to close out Mania right? Not much of a match going on here with a totally dead crowd. Finally we get the tag to Earthquake, the fat guys dominate and the champions leave to take the countout loss.

Rating: D-. Bad, bad match that no one wanted to see. The whole thing felt like it was weighed down by more weight than half of the Disasters weight multiplied by two. This went nowhere at all. The Disasters would get the titles eventually at a house show.

Brutus Beefcake reaffirms Hogan’s divineness.

Owen Hart vs. Skinner

This might last 90 seconds. Skinner hits a reverse DDT that does nothing. Hart rolls him up using the ropes and pins him. This was nothing.

Rating: N/A. Nothing at all here and a waste of time that could have gone to a real match.

Want to join the WWF Fan Club? Actually it does look pretty sweet.

Sid Justice is just hilarious. Anyone that calls Gene a fat blubbering stupid oaf is nothing but sweet.

We see an interview with Hogan and Vince from a week ago as Hulk teases that he’s retiring soon.  Sid isn’t pleased.

The point of this match is simple: Sid threw Hogan out of the Rumble and Hogan then pulled Sid out of the Rumble, giving Flair the belt. On a SNME, they teamed up to face Flair and Taker. Sid bailed on Hogan, who somehow still won the match. That brings us here. Hogan has talked about retiring, so this could be his last match. Sid jumps Hogan while his music is still playing. Hogan comes back to his music which is really pretty sweet.

Hulk Hogan vs. Sid Justice

The match is about what you would expect from these two. Hogan jumps Sid to start and beats him up while the music is playing. We finally slow things down with Sid taking over using, you guessed it, power moves. It’s all either guy can do so that’s what they went with of course.

We go back and forth to start, Sid takes over for awhile, and then Hogan comes back. Test of Strength gets us nowhere. Sid lands a move that I don’t think anyone had seen before in the WWF. It’s like a slam while he’s choking him. I can’t think of a name to use for it though. Anyone have any ideas?

Sid pounds away on Hogan for a good while as you would expect him to. We head to the floor for a bit and nothing happens at all. Now we hit the EVIL nerve hold that doesn’t really do anything. Hogan has had that put on him by people far more useless than Sid though so this gets Sid nowhere at all. Sidewalk Slam gets Sid out of trouble.

Hogan kicks out of Sid’s powerbomb, which was also a very rare move at the time. Hogan makes his standard comeback leading to the boot and slam. Sid kicks out of the legdrop! Sid’s manager Harvey WHipleman interferes causing the DQ, when all of a sudden Papa freaking Shango comes out for the double team.

As they beat on him, for absolutely no good reason the Warrior returns for the first time since about June for the save. This was a legitimate shock as no one believed that he was coming back. It definitely worked though and is a great surprise to end Mania, but it set up no more contact between Hogan and Warrior as far as I can remember. Double pose down to end the show.

Rating: D. It’s Hogan at Mania so it’s at least watchable. The original ending was Hogan has Sid beaten and Shango breaks up the pin for the DQ, but Shango missed his cue. Sid wasn’t being a jerk when he kicked out. He simply didn’t have another option. The ending made little sense though. It led to Warrior vs. Shango (which I was at the blowoff match), yet why Shango attacked was never explained.

As for the match, this was pretty freaking bad. No one bought this as the real main event but it’s Hogan so he has to go on last. The Warrior returning was a great thing but at the end of the day it should have been overshadowed by Savage and the title change. I’m not surprised though. After all it is Hogan.

Overall Rating: B-. It’s certainly not bad, but it’s nothing epic. Why, in Hogan’s last match, wouldn’t he go over clean? The Warrior returning meant nothing at all either. However, the rest of the show has some absolute gems in it. Make sure you see the IC and World Title matches as both are classics.

This show led to Savage holding the title over the Summer yet rarely defending it. Flair would win it back in the Fall before dropping it to Bret Hart just under a year later. Shawn’s singles debut is obviously a big deal and the fillers go by quick. Of the 9 matches, 6 are pretty good if not great so this is an obvious recommendation

Wrestlemania 7
Date: March 24, 1991
Location: Los Angeles Sports Arena, Los Angeles, California
Attendance: 16,158
Commentators: Gorilla Monsoon, Bobby Heenan
America The Beautiful: Willie Nelson

Now this was a most interesting show and one that I’ve always liked for some reason. The theme for this show was Stars and Stripes in light of the Gulf War. At the Royal Rumble, Sergeant Slaughter had won the WWF Title with the help of the Macho Man by beating the Ultimate Warrior.

Slaughter was an Iraqi sympathizer and therefore, the epitome of evil at the time. It was clear that a Real American would have to rise up to confront him and take the title back. Fortunately, the WWF had the realest of all Real Americans in Mr. Hulk Hogan.

Your other big match was the previously mentioned Ultimate Warrior vs. Randy Savage. These two would meet on this show in a career ending match. There’s also Mr. Perfect vs. Big Bossman for the IC belt and the Nasty Boys vs. The Harts for the tag belts.

We see the Rockers talking about how the Rockers are going to beat their opponents which is about the same interview that they did for their entire time in the WWF. This is close to the end of the Rockers’ run which mainly is because you can really see the star in Shawn begging to be let out.

The Rockers vs. Haku/Barbarian

Due to Heenan managing the heels, we get Hacksaw Jim Duggan on commentary. Duggan is dressed like Uncle Sam which works fine for him. After running down the two main matches for a bit it’s time to set started.  Shawn vs. Haku opens us up here.  It’s your basic power vs. speed match to start which means it’s solid all things considered.

Everyone is in maybe 90 seconds in though and we get to an interesting part: the Rockers hit a double superkick to both guys, and the heels are up in maybe 4 seconds.  In other words, Sweet Chin Music did nothing at all.  Was it a technique thing that made them better later on?  I’ve never gotten that.  Off to Barbarian vs. Marty now which sounds painfully bad.

Sunset flip doesn’t work for Marty but Barbarian punches mat instead.  The Rockers were rather awesome at this point which is always cool to see.  Now we get to the majority of the match as Marty plays….well Marty, taking a BIG beating from the monsters.  It amazes me how these guys could have the same formula so often and make it work so many times (and yes I know the Expresses did it first).

We get the bearhug as Marty is reeling.  Granted it might be that he’s stoned or drunk but we have no evidence thereof.  Granted it’s Marty so him being sober would be most odd indeed.  Did Barbarian ever not have steady work?  Marty manages to get free but misses a second rope cross body and is caught in a SLICK powerslam to crush him for no cover.

Barbarian misses a top rope headbutt though and amazingly his Samoan head is actually hurt.  It does the needed job though as here comes Shawn off the hot tag.  Shawn manages to fight off both guys for far longer than you would expect him to.  A thumb in the eye doesn’t get Haku anywhere as Shawn gets a sunset flip for two.

Everyone comes in again and the Rockers wake up with double teams all around.  They unleash the high stuff (remember it’s Marty out there) and a cross body from Shawn gets the win.  Very fun match here and it worked rather well.  Duggan leaves since Heenan is going to take over on commentary now.

Rating: B. This was the perfect opener. There’s not much of importance here and that works well. You don’t want your fans to get emotionally invested in the first match and get them worn out in the early going. This match was fun, fast paced, and not too serious. Perfect choice for the opener. On a side note, this makes Shawn 1-2 at WM.

We see Alex Trebek, Regis Philbin and some ugly woman who are the celebrities for WM 7. Seriously, Alex Trebek? Regis I can understand, but this is the best you can do, in Los Angeles? That can’t be a good thing. They really have nothing to say of note.

Texas Tornado vs. Dino Bravo

This should be interesting. Power vs. power here so it’s likely not going to be that good. Bravo uses the absolute worst atomic drop I’ve ever seen. He just drops Tornado and it’s very sad indeed. Bravo hits his finisher and no one really is surprised when Tornado kicks out.

This is one of those matches that is on there for the purposes of filling in the card and everyone knows it.  Bravo is LONG past his point of usefulness and Von Erich just never clicked in this company past a hot debut period.  This is nothing at all and it knows it’s nothing at all.

Tornado locks in his Claw Hold and after about ten seconds the announcers acknowledge it. He then hits the spinning punch of death to pin Bravo as there’s literally no commentary for about 10 more seconds. They really didn’t care and neither do I.

Rating: F. When Gorilla Monsoon, the man that likely cared as much about the WWF than anyone else has nothing to say, you know it sucks.

Slick and Warlord babble about beating up the British Bulldog

British Bulldog and his dog Winston say they can beat the Warlord. You know, if Davey hadn’t had that stupid mascot, he could have been legendary. Everything about him just screams GIVE ME THE TITLE! At least in this interview it does.

Warlord vs. British Bulldog

Warlord has that sweet half mask at this point. The Bulldog hails from Leeds. Just thought I’d throw that out there. Power vs. Power again here, but I’m not as worried as I was about the last one. Considering this is Stars and Stripes Wrestlemania, the Bulldog’s pops are insane. Heck those would be great pops anywhere.

He had the look, the talent, the moves, the fan support, everything he needed to be a mega star. What that never happened is beyond me, but I think it wore yellow and red.  I’m really not wild on having back to back power vs. power matches but this is definitely an upgrade.  Davey runs through Warlord to start us off here and sends him to the floor with some shoulder blocks.

Crucifix doesn’t work as Warlord counters into a Samoan Drop for no cover.  Gorilla and Heenan are stealing the show.  Heenan: “I was knighted by Queen Elizabeth you know.”  Gorilla: “You keep this up I’ll have you crowned as well.”  We get the loudest pop for a bearhug that I’ve EVER heard as this crowd is really quite hot.  Total slugout here for the most part but it’s working.

Warlord gets a belly to belly out of nowhere to take Bulldog down and the crowd will not stop cheering.  This is rather impressive.  Warlord wastes time like the idiot that he is but for once it doesn’t cost him.  On to the weakest chinlock I can remember in a very long time to waste some more time.  Smith fights up and hits a VERY good dropkick to take over.

It amazes me how versatile he was at this time and wouldn’t get his big push for over a year and a half.  Granted some of that was due to Flair showing up and changing the whole thing which can’t be blamed on Vince.  Piledriver attempt by Davey is blocked into a backdrop into a sunset flip for two.

There’s the full nelson from Warlord out of nowhere and Davey is in trouble.  He can’t lock in the fingers though so there’s a chance for escape for our hero.  The fingers aren’t locked and Davey is able to bust out of it in a surprise which hadn’t been done before I don’t think.  A second later, Davey picks Warlord up and walks around with him for a bit and DRILLS him with the powerslam to end it.  This was a miracle.

Rating: B-. I liked it. Bulldog is completely carrying this match though and it’s clear who the top talent here is.  By far and away Warlord’s best match ever and something that I probably have overrated.  It’s awesome for some reason though and I think a lot of it is due to the crowd being WAY into this.  Very fun match indeed.

Jimmy Hart and the most overrated tag team I’ve ever seen, the Nasty Boys, are going to take the tag titles by cracking the foundation. The Harts disagree. Neidhart is pretty good on the mic, but Hitman is clearly the star here. This was at the very end of their run as a tag team and Bret is like Shawn at this point: ready and just waiting to be told to go for it.

Tag Titles: Nasty Boys vs. Hart Foundation

For God knows why, Jimmy Hart is wearing a motorcycle helmet.  Bret and Sags start us off here.  Bret manages to beat up both guys on his own as you can see the singles push dripping and ready to come out.  Anvil vs. Knobbs now.  Who named these two guys?  The Nasty Boys I mean.  Anvil hammers away and Brian is in big trouble early on.

Both Harts have managed to clear the ring on their own which is always a cool thing to see.  Back off to Bret again as it’s ALL Harts for about the first five minutes or so.  Bret takes a clothesline though to send him to the floor.  Anvil chases Jimmy and let’s talk about Hogan.  To the shock of absolutely no one, Bret gets beaten on for the vast majority of the time he’s in, as is his custom.

Heenan tries to imitate Gorilla’s commentary when he gets all technical about body parts in a funny but too short bit.  Sags gets a chinlock on Bret and cranks on it which gets him nowhere again.  Knobbs plays Monkey See Monkey Do as he locks in the same move which gets him nowhere either.

Neckbreaker gets two for Sags as it’s so cute to see him try to wrestle out there.  He REALLY likes that chinlock as we see it again.  Now Knobbs try it again.  They’ve probably spent 3-4 minutes on that freaking chinlock over and over again.  We get the oldest and one of the best tag moves in the books as Anvil gets the tag but it isn’t seen.

Heel miscommunication sets up the REAL hot tag and Neidhart cleans house.  The Harts were awesome as a team and it’s a shame they’re not credited more than they are.  I know they’re considered great but you don’t hear them talked about much anymore, or at least not enough for my liking.

Everything breaks down one more time and it’s a Hart Attack for Knobbs.  And there comes the infamous Megaphone as Anvil is getting rid of Sags.  Knobbs gets the pin on Bret to steal the titles.  Jimmy’s near orgasm where he rolls all over the ground and kicks his feet and kisses the title is pretty hilarious stuff.

Rating: C-. They were trying, but you can’t sell the Nastys going over the Harts to me no matter what. I think this was their last time teaming together as well as Bret went for singles competition after this.  The Nastys held the titles over the Summer before losing them at Summerslam to the LOD in their first title reign.  Not terrible but the Nastys have never done it for me at all.

We recap Roberts vs. Martel.  Now this match is 90% backstory. Jake Roberts was on the Brother Love Show and for some reason that was never explained, Rick Martel came out and sprayed Jake’s bag with Arrogance, his cologne that he carried everywhere with him and when Jake went to stop him, Jake got hit in the eye with it, allegedly blinding him.

I’ve always assumed Jake had an injury or something because he was out nearly 8 months over this. He finally came back to feud with Martel, and this was the match in which he would get his revenge. To play up on the blindness, both men’s heads have hoods over them from which they allegedly couldn’t see.  This was voted worst match of the year I believe and I think I know why.

Jake Roberts vs. Rick Martel

Remember, neither guy can allegedly see here.  Jake looks somewhat drunk here.  Let the stupidity begin as the crowd has to tell them where the other guy is.  No contact a minute in.  Their feet touch a bit and Martel falls over Jake as we’re in a glorified comedy match.  We get proof they can see as Martel sets for a backdrop and Jake runs around him.  In a kayfabe sense, why would ANYONE do that?

They back into each other and then charge and miss each other.  This is so painfully stupid I can’t imagine what the person that came up with it was on.  Must have been a bondage enthusiast.  Martel gets a slam as the biggest move of the first three and a half minutes then misses an elbow.  Heenan starts repeating Monsoon in a funny bit.

Martel finds the referee twice in a row which gets him nowhere of course.  Jake does a thing where he runs his finger around the ring and the crowd cheers when he points at Martel.  Now he’s clapping.  How are we five minutes into this already?  Heenan: why doesn’t Martel peak?  Gorilla: that’s cheating!  Heenan: so what???  That’s an excellent point actually.

Apparently the snake now weighs 500lbs according to Heenan.  The fans chant DDT.  I think they want the pesticide to kill themselves.  It must be a better treatment than having to watch this.  Martel runs into the bag in the corner and we STILL have had a total of maybe 20 seconds of contact in over six minutes of the match.  I can’t refer to it as wrestling or action as it has been neither.

Jake gets a headlock and is sent to the floor off a counter.  Heenan: HEY MARTEL!  HE’S ON THE FLOOR!  Martel, like an idiot, goes to the floor and grabs a chair which he pokes around with.  He swings the chair at a post and hurts his hand.  They finally find each other, I think out of boredom.  Boston Crab goes on and Jake is in trouble.  Never mind as he kicks him off and gets the DDT to finally end this mess.

Rating: F. What they were thinking here I don’t have a clue, but this was just a terrible match. The fans were into it for some reason but for almost 10 minutes they do nothing but hunt for each other or land a punch or two here and there. Just a complete waste of time.

That woman from earlier is in the locker room as the Nastys celebrate. What is the point of this again?

Undertaker vs. Jimmy Snuka

And so it began. You know where this goes.  No promos or anything as Taker was just squashing people at this point.  We start with a LONG staredown and again no contact.  Bearer is as freaky looking as ever.  Taker drills Snuka and we’re finally getting going here.  The jumping clothesline takes Snuka down and it’s one sided already.

Heenan tries to figure out the Urn which hasn’t been done in nearly 20 years so far but whatever.  Gorilla says people with white coats and a net are coming after Bearer.  That would be after his son actually but who’s counting?  Snuka comes back with pure jobber offense that gets him a grand total of nowhere.  He hotshots himself to the floor though and that should just about do it.  Taker catches a springboard cross body and the Tombstone kills Jimmy with ease.

Rating: D+. This is mostly for historical significance as the match itself is nothing. It’s a squash and a fairly bad one at that. However, no one at the time knew what would come from this. Truly a piece of wrestling history and you have to wonder if anyone could have dreamed that this would be the first in a streak that got Taker what, three or four world titles at Mania?  Remarkable.

We see a video package highlighting the events leading up to the Career Ending Match between Macho Man and Ultimate Warrior. Back when Warrior was champion, Macho Man wanted a title shot and he attacked Warrior to get one. Sherri, in one of the most sexually dripping promos of all time, literally gets on her knees and begs Warrior for a title shot. He says no.

At the 91 Rumble, Warrior defended against Sgt. Slaughter. Sherri came out and got Warrior to chase her, allowing Savage to beat him up. Warrior winds up coming back and almost winning, but here comes Sherri again. He reaches to grab her and Savage pops up and blasts him in the head with his scepter, allowing Slaughter to drop an elbow and pin him for the title. That brings us here.

Ultimate Warrior vs. Randy Savage

If WM 6 was Warrior’s greatest match, this is his second greatest. Before the match though, Bobby Heenan sees none other than Miss Elizabeth sitting in the front row. She hadn’t been seen in the WWF in nearly a year at this point so this was very surprising. Amazingly enough, Heenan can spot her from at least 50 yards away, when the camera can barely recognize her 10 feet away. You have to love kayfabe.

Warrior walks to the ring which freaks everyone out.  I’ve seen this match a few dozen times and it still works every single time.  This feels totally epic which is exactly the idea.  Warrior has the belt on the back of his tights which he never would win again.  Feeling out process to start as of course Warrior has the power advantage.

Warrior overpowers him to start and controls early on, much like Hogan did to Savage two years ago.  In case I forgot this is a career ending match.  How in the world did I forget to say that?  Sherri comes in so Warrior throws Savage at her to send her back to the floor.  We hit the floor where Savage tries to play mind games by throwing in a chair.  That gets him nowhere.

All Warrior so far but it’s incredibly early so it means nothing at all.  Savage finally gets Warrior to make a mistake and Warrior is sent to the floor.  Sherri keeps interfering but thankfully they don’t throw the match out because of it.  This is the largest PPV audience ever which is laughable to think they could know that halfway through the show but whatever.

Warrior cranks it up again and then does something very odd (I’m shocked too).  With Savage down on one knee and with his head down, Warrior goes for a flying tackle which more or less looks like a flying headbutt because Savage is still down.  It was just weird looking and I have no idea what he was thinking at all.  Anyway it lets Savage take over.

Double clothesline puts both guys down though.  And now we pause to look at Sherri’s rather nice figure.  In a nice nod to Mania 3, Savage gets rolled up off a slam but there’s no referee due to Sherri.  There goes said referee so it’s a free for all now.  Sherri takes off the shoe and goes up but it hits Savage in the head by mistake.

Savage gets a rollup for two as Heenan says he can’t even talk anymore which Gorilla doesn’t even reply to.  You can tell he’s into this.  We now hit one of the more famous parts of the match as Savage goes up and hits FIVE elbow drops from the top when I think only Hogan and George Steele (yes that George Steele) had ever kicked out of one.

The reaction from Heenan to the kick out is absolutely excellent.  Savage is SHOCKED.  Warrior Hulks Up and hits four or five clotheslines to take Savage down.  Gorilla Press and splash only get two though and now Warrior is SHOCKED.  Warrior looks up into the sky to ask “his gods” about whether it’s his time to leave and he walks out.

Savage jumps him instead and brings him back and we go on.  Warrior is draped across the barricade but Savage misses and is more or less dead on his feet.  Warrior throws his body back in and hits a bunch of BIG shoulder blocks with Savage selling like no one else could, making himself look like a rag doll.  He hits the floor three times and is just dead.  Warrior puts his foot on the chest and is triumphant.  That’s the basis for KB vs. Sabre for you OCW fans.

Rating: A+. Combining the post match stuff with the match, this is easily the best segment to date in Wrestlemania history and is easily one of the best of all time. It’s a shame it’s almost forgotten today due to Vince’s vendettas against both guys.  This is an absolute classic and DEFINITELY the best Mania match in a very long time.  I’d put it maybe in the top five Mania matches in the WWF Era and easily top ten ever at this show.  Great match and absolutely worth seeing.

The real memory of this match comes afterwards though in what is likely considered the most emotional moment in WWF history. Savage is still out cold in the ring and Sherri comes in and freaks out on him, saying that he ended her career too. Both commentators are saying to give him a break and that no one else, not even Hogan could have taken this kind of a beating and survived.

Sherri starts to kick him with her high heels when Savage couldn’t hold off a toddler at this point. With her beating Savage up, Miss Elizabeth jumps the guard rail and for the first time ever, attacks someone by throwing Sherri out of the ring as the crowd is stunned to see her. Savage tries to get up but doesn’t know who was beating on him. He turns to see Liz and almost falls to the ground again in shock.

The referee tells him it was Sherri kicking him and he’s even more confused. Liz opens her arms and after a few moments Savage hugs her as the crowd absolutely loses it. Savage puts her on his shoulders and there is nothing but cheering and crying from the crowd. Heenan is beside himself at “this sickening display.”

Finally they’re ready to leave and in the ultimate display of his love, Savage refuses to let Liz hold the ropes open for him as she did for years and instead holds them open for her, truly showing he’s a changed man.  This is probably the best emotional moment ever at this point and still holds up to this day.  Incredible stuff and again, definitely something worth seeing.

We go from one of the most emotional moments in wrestling history to… a debate on instant replay. Yes you read that right. Vince McMahon acts on moderator (C.M. > Vince) between Paul McGuire and George Steinbrenner of all people as they argue over instant replay.

During the debate, McGuire calls Steinbrenner a butt head, leading to Vince to call on his instant replay “officials” to review it. As this continues to spiral into udder stupidity, the Bushwackers are the officials. They say that there’s inconclusive evidence, therefore the insult stands. Finally this ends and we go back to the arena. This was somehow stupider than it sounds.

Trebek talks to Demolition who scares him off.

Regis talks to…….GENICHIRO TENRYU?????  He’s here with Kitao who isn’t anyone special but I’ve heard of him.  They can’t understand Regis.

Trebek is scared of Jake.
Demolition vs. Tenryu/Kitao

I know who the two Japanese wrestlers are, but why in the heck are they on Wrestlemania? Demolition was little more than jobbers at this point. After they lost the titles to the Harts at Summerslam 90 Ax had left so this is Smash and Crush. They had also gotten Mr. Fuji back at this point.

Crush and Kitao start us off here.  Kitao is a big old boy too.  Fuji gets a cane shot in almost immediately as it looks like dominance from Demolition to start.  Heenan makes Japanese jokes as this is mostly dominance.  Somehow Kitao is named Fred.  Tenryu comes in and avoids the Decapitator and hits a big powerbomb on Crush to…get the pin?  WOW.  This was Demolition’s last match too.  Odd indeed.

Rating: W. As in what were they thinking here? I know that Tenryu is a Japanese legend, but no one knew who he was at Wrestlemania. The crowd is silent when Demolition lost. This wasn’t even a loss but rather a squash. This whole match made absolutely zero sense.

Big Bossman says he’s coming for Heenan after he gets the IC Title.

Heenan says he’s not afraid of Bossman.

Intercontinental Title: Big Bossman vs. Mr. Perfect

Bossman is insanely over at this point having been running around with Hogan all through the second half of the year. Heenan had been talking trash about Bossman’s mama, and you don’t talk bad about a Southern boy’s mother. Bossman went to war with the Heenan Family and the only person left was their top wrestler, Mr. Perfect.

Considering Bossman weighs more than Kane, the stuff he can do in the ring is mind blowing. He moves like someone Chavo’s size.  All signs point to this being the changing of the title.  Perfect throws the towel at Boss Man so Boss Man spits at Perfect.  Perfect’s selling goes insane of course and it works great.  Boss Man throws some GREAT punches.

I feel like I’m watching a match on fast forward.  A charge misses though and we slow things WAY down all of a sudden.  Boss Man pulls his belt out which is allegedly a foreign object but I’m not sure how.  It would seem perfectly legal to me as he brought it in with him didn’t he?  There’s the abdominal stretch as the belt didn’t get Boss Man very far at all.

There’s that neck snap from Perfect which is always fun to see.  Perfectplex is blocked though but Boss Man can’t get anything going at all.  Perfect gets a reverse neck snap which we would more or less call a Blockbuster today.  He goes up but does the jump into the boot spot to set up Boss Man’s comeback.

Perfect gets the tar punched out of him which doesn’t take much as I don’t think there’s much tar in him for the most part.  Boss Man rams into the steps though and Heenan gets some shots in.  The crowd pops like a cherry though as here comes Andre.  Heenan LOSES IT and Andre grabs the belt just because he wants to.  He DRILLS Perfect with it but the Heenan Family runs in for the save before Boss Man can get the title.  The overly large faces clear the ring.  Odd finish.
Rating: C-. This again is historic as it’s Andre’s last WM appearance. It really is sad to see him in such physically bad shape. He would be dead in less than two years, just after the debut of Monday Night Raw, I believe the day of the third show.  For the life of me I do not get why Boss Man didn’t get the title here as every single sign on the planet would have pointed to it.  No clue what the reasoning was here though.

We see Bossman and Andre saying that the war with Heenan isn’t over. Actually it was.

The following people are here and talked to by Gene:

Lou Ferrigno (the Incredible Hulk)

Donald Trump

Chuck Norris

Henry Winkler (FONZIE!!!!!)

What an odd grouping indeed.
Earthquake vs. Greg Valentine

This is about as close to nothing as you can get. Hammer gets in a few elbows and then goes down with ease to the Earthquake splash.  It was a squash that somehow went three minutes but you get the idea.  There was a powerslam thrown in there somewhere.  Hammer did manage to get Quake down and go for the Figure Four but it went nowhere.  Why in the world is Valentine a face anyway?

Rating: N/A. Very little here and to have someone as good as Valentine reach this point in his career is kind of sad.  Total squash despite the fact that Earthquake was about to become a tag team guy with Tugboat.

The LOD want the belts from the Nastys and they’re going to make Power and Glory sour and gory.

Legion of Doom vs. Power and Glory

This match lasts less than a minute as LOD destroy Hercules and Paul “I was a Horsemen blast it” Roma.  Back to back squashes though?  Really?  Match ran 59 seconds somehow and the Doomsday Device ended it.

Rating: N/A. The only thing keeping this above failing is the LOD’s music. They were so over it’s not even funny.

We recap the events leading up to DiBiase and Virgil. Over the years, Virgil did every disgusting thing that DiBiase told him to do and finally he snapped. Roddy Piper began encouraging him and we get to this match. At the Rumble Virgil and DiBiase had been a team and Virgil got pinned. DiBiase blamed him and told him to wrap the belt around his waist, but Virgil hit him with it instead.

Virgil vs. Ted DiBiase

DiBiase rarely ever lost at this point so this was viewed as a squash. Virgil actually goes on for ten minutes. Roddy Piper is in his corner on crutches as he had recently been in a motorcycle wreck.  Virgil tags DiBiase with punches to start which are about all he’s got.  DiBiase hits the floor as he’s all frustrated now.

Back in the ring and DiBiase takes down Virgil with a clothesline to get control for a bit.  The common idea here was that Virgil couldn’t wrestle but he had been trained and was a regular wrestler in the indies before he came to WWF and had at least two matches before this one in a WWF ring.  DiBiase gets a Piledriver as Virgil is in trouble.

Beautiful gutwrench suplex gets two.  DiBiase sends him to the floor and then yells at Piper.  He kicks out the crutch from under his leg to send him down because he’s a bad man.  Piper hooks the top rope and Piper hits the floor.  More yelling and shoving of men on crutches ends this though as we have a countout with Virgil winning in a shock.

Rating: C-. This feud was years in the making and the emotion was there, but it was on way too late in the card and the people wanted to see Hogan. Having Virgil get the win was huge though.

Slaughter and General Adnan, a.k.a. the Iron Sheik, say that there’s a new set of rules, and there’s a chance he might accidentally get counted out or DQed tonight.

The Mountie vs. Tito Santana

No point at all to this one but we’ll throw it in here to fill in some time.  Tito runs Mountie around for a few seconds, Mountie can barely do anything, Jimmy slis him the shock stick and Mountie uses it on Santana and pins him. Absolutely no one cares and neither do I. Only significance is Santana continues to have been at every Wrestlemania thus far which I think only Hogan is the other person to do so.

Rating: N/A. Nothing special here as it was a pure filler.

We finally get to the recap for Hogan and Slaughter. The main idea is that Slaughter is threatening to lose on purpose so Hogan doesn’t win the title.  Slaughter is an Iraqi sympathizer so the feud was based off Operation Desert Storm, or as it’s more commonly known, the Gulf War.  Pay no attention to the fact that the war was already over by this point.

WWF World Title: Hulk Hogan vs. Sgt. Slaughter

Hmm.  I think I may have to bet on this Slaughter guy.  It seems likely that he’s going to win it as I think this Hogan chap is overmatched.  Is there any reason as to why Alex Trebek is the guest announcer here?  I mean dude, IT’S ALEX TREBEK!  Anyway, Hogan of course is absolutely insanely over but that pop would start to die off rather soon.

Regis is on commentary for this which is even weirder.  Long feeling out process as they feel out each other’s power.  Hogan sends him to the floor which gets him a few good shots in.  Slaughter begs off back in the ring but gets an eye rake like the evil….American that he is.  Yeah this was kind of a weird setup.  Heenan keeps talking about some party he’s having on Prime Time Wrestling.

Slaughter in control now as Regis shows that he has zero business being a commentator on the main event of Mania, as he has nothing to say.  That’s not his fault of course, but he is just kind of there.  No one wants to come to Bobby’s party.  That’s rather amusing indeed.  Hogan takes over again and does more or less nothing special at all.

A knee to the back sends Slaughter into the buckle.  A slingshot makes him completely miss the post but we’ll say it hit anyway.  After a good long beating, Hogan shows how stupid he can be and goes up to the middle rope which doesn’t work.  He more or less no sells the shot Slaughter gets on him and goes to the top?  What the heck???  Adnan interferes and Hogan pulls a Flair in a funny spot.

Slaughter Cannon sends Hogan to the floor.  He beats the tar out of Hogan with a chair on the floor which gets him somewhere for a change.  The referee won’t count him out or DQ him though.  Well that’s certainly nice of him isn’t it?  Back in the ring now with Slaughter hooking a Boston Crab after pounding away for awhile on the back.

You know this hold would look a bit more realistic and painful if Hogan wasn’t just barely beneath the rope and that by moving maybe 8 inches up the hold would be broken.  Granted that might just be me overthinking this.  Slaughter works on the back forever and gets a chair shot to the head to bust open Hulk.  Can we please just get to him breaking the camel clutch and getting the title back?

THANK YOU!  Slaughter gets his UNBREAKABLE, yes UNBREAKABLE I SAY, hold on Hogan who of course, just like he did to the Sheik, breaks it.  Slaughter gets him down again (to humble him perhaps?) and drapes the Iraqi flag over him because he is a very stupid man.  Hogan kicks out and you can fill in the blanks yourself.

Rating: C+. Easily more about symbolism, but there was one major flaw: the war was already over when this match took place. It was like TNA in levels of being behind the times.  This was a fairly decent match though and I thought it worked well enough for what it was supposed to do.  The Hogan pop was starting to die off though and it would become much clearer in the future.

Overall Rating: C. This really isn’t one of the great Manias but it has one of the best moments of all time. The problem in this Mania is the mid card is just awful. The big midcard match ended in a DQ and was a way to get Andre on the show. There’s just nothing here and with Savage stealing the show from Hogan again, it hurts the show a bit.

The complete lack of drama in the main event doesn’t help things either as Slaughter spent all night talking about losing on purpose and you never once see that in the main event. It’s not a bad show, but it’s far from great. Watch it for the Savage and Hogan matches and if you just need to kill some time, the opener.

Wrestlemania 6
Date: April 1, 1990
Location: SkyDome, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Attendance: 67,678
Commentators: Gorilla Monsoon, Jesse Ventura
O Canada: Robert Goulet

If you remember what I said in the last review about WM 5 being the first standard WM, this one is the first standard blockbuster Wrestlemania. This Mania has the truly huge show atmosphere to it and there are two main reasons for it. Number one is the crowd is massive. At over 67,000 people, this would be the second biggest crowd for a Wrestlemania for the next 11 years.

Second, you had the second biggest Wrestlemania Main event of all time which was title for title. Absolutely no one knew who to pick in this match. That to me is what makes a match at least a notch higher up. Also the actual look of the show changed. If you watch 4 and 5, you see the older look to it.

I’m not sure how to put it into words but if you watch either of them and then 6 one after another you’ll see what I mean. 6 simply looks much newer. I know that it’s a year later, but the jump is a huge difference. The card is long and while there’s some filler, it’s good filler. I’m a sucker for this show but I’ll try to be objective.

To begin with, one of the most memorable things about this show is the opening. It shows the night sky and talks about the constellations in it. Eventually we get to constellations of Hogan and Warrior. Vince’s booming voice over this scene makes the show and the match just seem epic.

Koko B. Ware vs. Rick Martel

Ok so not every match can be great. The newest WWE HOF member still makes me shake my head. Martel is a better choice than he is but that’s a topic for another thread. This is the WM debut of Martel’s Model gimmick. For this show the ring carts from WM 3 are back. For those that haven’t seen them, they’re small motorized carts that the wrestlers ride to the ring in. Kind of a cool idea.

I assume they’re used to prevent people from having to make the very long walk to the ring. You can tell how great Koko is. Gorilla’s line talking about how good he is: “He’s proven he can take anybody to the limit.” Read as, he can’t beat anyone. Koko only stands 5’8. Never knew how short he was. Martel is only 6’0 but it looks pretty funny to see the tiny face like that.

They actually thought this was the best possible opening match for Wrestle-freaking-Mania? Really? Frankie was always kind of cool. Martel jumps him to start and Koko is in trouble early on. Koko had a decent dropkick and that’s about it. Yet he’s in the Hall of Fame and Randy Savage isn’t. Amazing.

Martel sends him to the floor and Koko is in trouble. Ha I said that just as Gorilla did. The crowd starts a small boring chant and I can’t say I blame them. Boston Crab is blocked early. In the clipped version the first Boston Crab attempt is shown going on as Martel turns him towards the ropes and he winds up in the middle of the ring with it. Odd indeed.

Koko hits a pair of flying headbutts that just look awful. On the third one in one of the dumbest spots I’ve ever seen, he fakes the headbutt and after a second, Martel falls anyway. I could get that he was bracing himself and fell or something, but Koko gets a long two out of it. WOW. Missed cross body leads to the Boston Crab for the submission.

Rating: D. This was a squash and a bad one. Koko truly is bad in the ring. He’s bland and for whatever reason was popular. Bad way to start a show. Koko was one of those guys in the 80s that wasn’t any good but was pushed on occasion as a midcard threat anyway and more or less was a jobber to the stars. Weak opening match.

Andre and Haku, the Colossal Connection, are called the Colostomy Connection by Gene. Heenan says if you want to talk about evacuation…Wow again. They say they’re going to eliminate Demolition. Gene, as they leave: “The Colossal Connection, they’re anything but regular guys.” My goodness.

Demolition wants to destroy and demolish the Connection and take the belts back.

Tag Titles: Demolition vs. The Colossal Connection

This is Demolition’s rematch from when the Connection beat them in I believe December. It was also their chance to become three time tag champions. The crowd chants Weasel at Heenan which sounds great in this huge arena. This match is absolutely nothing but power all around. In something that I never realized before and someone correct me if I’m wrong but this was Andre’s last televised WWF match.

Andre jumps them to start and the challengers are in trouble early. Apparently the Harts want a shot at the winners. Smash and Haku officially start us off. I have a feeling we’ll be seeing the Islander a lot. Those big screens in the back are rather cool.

Andre only pops in every once in awhile to throw punches and choke. The perk of him being so freaking huge is that a simple move like one of those is enough to take a guy down and have it look very realistic.

This whole thing is pretty much just ok at best. Haku vs. Demolition isn’t a match I particularly care to see but it’s all they could do. I would kind of question putting the titles on the Connection simply to give Andre a title run in his career but it’s better than ignoring him I suppose. Axe gets beaten down for the majority of the match.

Haku wrestles almost all of the match here as Andre was in bad shape at this point. Haku accidentally superkicks Andre into the ropes and Demolition lands their finisher to pick up the titles. Post match, Heenan goes nuts on Andre in the corner, at one point clearly saying he’s the freaking boss. Then in something that boggles even my smark mind, Bobby slaps him. The look on Andre’s face is nothing short of great.

He grabs Bobby by the throat and slaps him a few times and punches him. He catches Haku’s thrust kick and beats the tar out of him too. Heenan and Haku get thrown off the cart as Andre leaves on his own to the crowd losing their minds. The sad part though is how hunched over Andre is. Truly a sad sight.

Rating: C-. This was a fun little match that wasn’t entirely predictable. The post match stuff is even better than the match. Ticked off giants are just plain fun. It’s more or less just a way to give the fans something to cheer for which works fine I guess. Nothing special at all but fun.

In the back we see Earthquake and Jimmy Hart who says that there’s going to be an earthquake and Earthquake says Hercules will crumble.

Hercules vs. Earthquake

Do I have to watch this? Seriously, what are you expecting here? Quake is undefeated here and is putting people in the hospital left and right. He tries to jump Hercules to start and Herc pounds away with punches.

We get a test of strength and being a heel, Earthquake cheats after getting in trouble. He pounds away with fat man moves before Herc gets a shot in. After a bunch of big power shots he can’t take Earthquake off his feet.

And then like an IDIOT, Hercules tries for the backbreaker (torture rack) and gets drilled. You freaking deserve that for being stupid. A few shots put him down and the Earthquake Splash ends it. He deserves pain like that too.

Rating: D-. I liked Hercules, but this was just bad. It wasn’t quite a squash but it might as well have been. He beats Hercules up more afterwards and he deserves it for being stupid enough to try the Rack like that. Earthquake would be top heel by August.

Some old lady named Rona Barrett talks to Liz who is going to be more active in wrestling.

Brutus Beefcake is going to end Mr. Perfect’s “perfect” record. He shows off how sharp his scissors are by snipping at the paper the record is on and the paper doesn’t cut. Amazing indeed.

Brutus Beefcake vs. Mr. Perfect.

Perfect beat the tar out of Beefcake at the Rumble so this is little more than a grudge match. Can’t beat that. That Brutus music is downright awesome. Gorilla STEALS Jesse’s line about Brutus looking like a hand grenade went off in his pocket. Wouldn’t that result in a bad leg injury?

They start off hard and fast again which is a tradition so far tonight. Brutus dominates to start, sending Perfect flying. He might still be undefeated here but I’m not sure. Things slow down a lot as we talk about conditioning.

Gorilla isn’t sure what the weak spot is on Hennig. I’d recommend hitting him in the face. Brutus goes for the sleeper as Mary Tyler Moore is here. This Mania is officially awesome. Genius slips the scroll to Perfect which gets two. I love that neck snap Perfect does. Beefcake makes his comeback and hits a slingshot into the post for the pin out of NOWHERE.

Rating: C. Compared to what’s come before it, this match is Steamboat and Savage. Brutus, for all his faults, wasn’t that bad in the ring. Having a guy with him like Hennig helped a lot, and this might be Brutus’ biggest win ever. The postmatch beatdown is very old school pink on pink action fun as well.

Post match the Genius gets a haircut for his troubles.

To say this match is interesting would be an understatement. We see a video recapping the buildup. This match came about because Piper eliminated Bad News from the Rumble and Bad News came back in and eliminated him. They fought to the back. For those that don’t know, Brown was legit. He is the only American heavyweight to win a medal in Olympic Judo, and also made Andre the Giant back down in a real fight in Japan after Andre made a racist joke. Anyway, 3 weeks after the Rumble, Bad News made a joke about Piper’s kilt which is just too far.

In a promo that would never be allowed to air today, Piper is in the back and says he’s the Hot Rod, but at other times he’s the Hot Scot. At that point, he turns around and you see that half of his body is painted back right down the middle. After a brief karaoke of Billy Jean, Piper insults Brown’s looks in a funny promo and says he’s going to shut Bad News’ big mouth, but Brown doesn’t know if it’ll be Hot Rod or Hot Scot that does it.

I’m still not sure what the point of the whole painting thing was.

Roddy Piper vs. Bad News Brown

I think this is no DQ but I’m not sure. This isn’t so much a match as it is a fight. Very few wrestling moves and mainly punches and kicks but it was designed to be that way. The fighting is fun because it’s what these two are best at. Surprisingly Piper is ripped here in by far the best shape he’s ever been in.

Allegedly that paint took weeks to get off due to a rib from Andre and someone else. Not sure how true that is. Yeah there’s no wrestling at all here. Sometimes that’s a great thing though and here that’s exactly what this should be like.

The way Brown beats up Roddy and then Roddy just casually pokes him in the eye is great. Brown gets sent into exposed steel and is down. Piper pulls out a white glove as we continue the Michael Jackson theme night which I suppose is what the black and white thing is about. Match ends in a double count out and it means nothing. They continue brawling all the way up the ramp and into the back.

Rating: A. This match was nonstop fighting and was insanely fun. There was next to no wrestling in it but that that’s what made it great. I loved this match the first time I saw it and it’s still great. And yes that’s highly biased.

Steve Allen, the former Tonight Show host, is in a bathroom with a piano with the Bolsheviks practicing the Russian National Anthem. He makes a few jokes but finally says he’ll do the real Russian Anthem. He opens his mouth and a toilet flushes. Steve runs to save his own life.

Hart Foundation vs. The Bolsheviks

The Harts want Demolition. This match literally lasts 19 seconds. Harts knock the Bolsheviks down during their singing, land the Hart Attack and it’s over.

Rating: N/A. What can I say about 19 seconds? Funny if nothing else. The pop for Hart is coming too. It’s not there yet but you can see the star in him. Granted that might be the Canada thing

Wrestlemania 7 is coming to the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum and there will be over 100,000 fans there!

Edit from the future: no there won’t be. Ticket sales bombed and they moved it to the Sports Arena in the same town which held about 16,000 people.

Barbarian vs. Tito Santana

Tito does a promo that I literally couldn’t pay attention to. This match screamed HOUSE SHOW to me. It’s two guys in a ring doing moves on each other. There’s little psychology and less meaning to most of it. It’s not bad wrestling, but there’s no spark to it at all. Santana is a great worker, but this match just did nothing for me.

Yeah this isn’t much at all. Santana does a bit, Barbarian hits the floor to hide a bit with Heenan, Jesse makes enchilada jokes, Barbarian comes back in, and we let the destruction begins. It’s not bad but at the same time this isn’t much at all.  It’s not boring, but I wonder why this is on Wrestlemania.  Barbarian wins with a clothesline off the top that was sweet looking.

Rating: D. Like I said, it’s not bad at all, but it just did nothing for me. I don’t get the need for this being on here though as Tito was destroyed both here and at Summerslam by the Powers of Pain. I guess I get the idea of having them get good matches (in theory) but really? This needed to be on Mania?

Next up is a recap of the upcoming mixed tag which I believe was a first at the time. Sapphire, as worthless of a person as there ever has been in wrestling, is shown beating up Sherri which just infuriates me, and Macho King feuding with the Common Man Dusty Rhodes. Fairly cool concept for a feud really, even though Dusty boarders on Communism in his promo. He also talks about having the Crown Jewel but no one knows what they mean.

Macho King and Queen Sherri vs. Dusty Rhodes and Sapphire

The King having people carry him to the ring on the throne was always just insanely cool to me for some reason. The fun part of this for some reason was figuring out the women’s weight based on the male’s weights. Sherri at about 130-140 and Sapphire at 180-190, which Jesse says is impossible and I think I agree with him. The more Dusty promos I hear the more I like him. His mic work is great.

Dusty says that they have something Macho doesn’t have, which is the Crown Jewel. The Crown Jewel is none other than Elizabeth. For the first time in way too long, Savage absolutely loses it. The crowd pops louder than they’ve done all night as she goes to Dusty and Sapphire’s corner.

Liz is definitely good looking in blue. The genders have to match up here so that’s good. Sapphire is just horrible. One of her attacks is a hip into the other chick’s hips. I can’t believe I’m going to say this but GET BACK TO DUSTY!

Dusty does what he can here and it’s just not working for the most part. A lot of this is the girls doing what they can which isn’t much for the most part as they’re just not very good. Well Sherri is but she can’t work miracles. Savage destroys Dusty until the required big comeback makes the save.

This match is all over the place the entire match and it’s incredibly fun. Rhodes is at his best when he can just go crazy in a match and that’s what this is. Dusty is in the ring the entire time almost which is the best thing possible. Dusty is just on fire the whole time and Savage is his usual great self. Sapphire finally gets in the ring and proves my theory: she is awful. Sadly enough, she pins Sherri in a dark day for wrestling. Liz actually dances with Dusty and Sapphire to Common Man after the match.

Rating: D-. Sapphire literally drops this about a full letter grade. She was flat out awful and there is no reason she should have pinned Sherri at all. Dusty and Savage carry this to a decent grade though. It’s a sad day that Dusty Rhodes is the workhorse of his team but that was the case here.

Hey, did you know WM 7 will be in Los Angeles? Don’t know if the promo that aired earlier would get the message across or not.

Heenan is upset. Okerlund is all over the place tonight as he says, “Bobby Heenan where do you have the ba…guts to insult Andre the Giant?” You can clearly see Bobby almost lose it after that. He declares war on Andre and says he’ll be getting a new Heenan Family together.

That old woman from earlier is with Gorilla and Jesse in the back and yet again, I couldn’t care less. Allegedly there’s a clip of Jesse in an adult movie out there somewhere. Never heard anything about that and I don’t think it’s true.

Macho Man cuts a promo that makes literally no sense. I think it’s about Dusty Rhodes.

Demolition is glad to have won the titles in the fifth promo in a row. They say the Harts can bring it on.

In promo #6, Hogan cuts one of his most famous promos ever, telling Warrior that the power lies in the palm of his hand. He also says that he can save all of the Little Warriors with the training, the prayers and the vitamins. Hogan goes on to say that his Hulkamaniacs want to help them. Rewatching this, it’s clear that Hogan would lose. He mentions that the winner or the loser doesn’t matter, but what kind of winner or loser you are.

At the end of the show, he hands the belt to Warrior and holds up his hand, being a “good loser.” Wow it’s fun to see these in a different light. Also starting to wonder if “take your vitamins” is a tongue in cheek reference to taking steroids, but that might be a stretch.

Guess what’s next? Go on, guess. If you said Promo #7, I’ll get you a ham sandwich. In an equally famous promo, Warrior says that Hogan’s life can be lived through the Warrior, but it will be in the darkness. Everything is about accepting challenges, but Hogan has never met a challenge like him. He’s going to bring the Warriors and the Hulkamaniacs together as one.

Rockers vs. Orient Express

See, this is what I loved about the 80s and early 90s: the tag division was AWESOME. There were at least 8 distinctly gimmicked teams fighting all over the place. There were jobber teams, midcard teams and main event tag teams. These teams almost always had great matches together. They had a great one at the 91 Rumble so hopefully this holds up.

Tanaka vs. Jannetty opens us up. Surprisingly enough this is pretty fast paced to start. Fuji interferes with the cane to set up Marty as the Ricky Morton for this match. And never mind as Shawn is already back in. Tanaka takes him down with a cross body for no cover.

The fans are into this which is always a good sign. It’s actually Shawn as the face in peril here which is the custom of the Rockers. It’s weird to see the Rockers getting outworked. Marty comes in to more or less no pop which is odd.

The double teaming by the good guys begins and Tanaka takes a big old flipping flip off a double back drop. Fuji trips Janetty and salt goes into his eyes as he falls into the crowd. Are we sure he’s not just drunk? He gets counted out to let evil win the day.

Rating: C. Semi-filler, but that doesn’t mean it has to be bad. This is definitely the weakest of their feud which is saying a lot as this was sitll fine. Not a bad match but not great really. The ending more or less sucked but that isn’t incredibly bad. It set up a future match I guess but I wasn’t big on it.

Steve Allen is with Rhythm and Blues. Allen says he hasn’t been so excited since he heard Pee Wee Herman was straight. Good grief this show was pushing things for 1990.

Jim Duggan vs. Dino Bravo

Duggan waves the American flag in Canada. Well no one ever said he was intelligent. Jesse is impressed by the crowd as he should be. It’s huge. This is your standard power brawl and with Duggan in there, it’s likely not going to be that great. Surprising no one, it’s pretty dull.

The crowd is into it though so that’s good. Here’s some punching. And some kicking. Plus some more punching. Ooo it’s a back breaker. Yeah it’s one of those matches. Never been a fan of these matches but they’re trying…..ok not really but it sounds good.

Earthquake and Hart interfere of course. We get an argument about manager’s licenses and all that jazz which goes nowhere. Eventually the referee yells at him leading to a 2×4 to Bravo’s back and a pin. Post match Quake beats the heck out of Duggan.

Rating: D+. It was bad but they kept it short which was very smart. These two were thrown out there on a ton of Superstars shows which went nowhere. This was too short and it never went anywhere at all which doesn’t surprise me at all. Weak match and filler. It’s just not a good sign when there’s nothing to bring the crowd down from. You can tell they’re here for one match only.

Video package showing Jake Roberts stealing DiBiase’s Million Dollar Belt which happened over the course of about a year for some reason. Jake is in the back and cuts what might be one of the best promos I’ve ever seen. He starts by saying this is the biggest match in DiBiase’s career. At that moment I thought this was going to suck because 2 years ago he was main eventing WM for the World Title.

But then Jake started talking about DiBiase’s values and his life, and something impressive happened: I believed him. That my friends, is why Jake Roberts is considered great. He was able to make you believe something that wasn’t true. That is what psychology in wrestling is. He did something that made you believe in what he was trying to sell to you. Greatness indeed.

Ted DiBiase vs. Jake Roberts

If there are two better 80s performers that never got a real chance in the main event, I’d like to see them. Jake dominates at first and goes to town on DiBiase’s arm but as DiBiase pretends to bail, Jake gets caught by him. I hope this is a Canadian tradition and not a sign of boredom but the Wave begins in the SkyDome which really is an impressive sight in a crowd that big. I kind of see it as disrespectful though.

A wide shot shows that the ring is on a pedestal/platform kind of thing which really is cool. Jake immediately goes for the DDT but can’t get anywhere with it. This is your standard match between these guys with a LONG chinlock. These two fought time and time again, usually for the Million Dollar Belt, and it never went anywhere.

Jake makes his usual comeback and then gets taken down again. And there’s the chinlock again. Was Ted afraid to do much other than something like that? Apparently it’s to get through the Wave. Well that makes sense. Jake makes his comeback and still I will say that no one bumps as well as DiBiase does for his size. They go outside and DiBiase locks in the Dream again but goes into the post.

Virgil him back in before the 10 though and DiBiase gets the win. Post match Jake comes back and beats both men up, sending money flying everywhere. Virgil gets away with the money but Jake gets a picture perfect DDT on DiBiase and the fans explode. You can see the head slam off the mat and it looks great. Jake then hands out the real $100 bills that DiBiase dropped, including one to Hollywood legend Mary Tyler Moore.

Rating: C. Well they tried but the whole Wave = chinlock thing messed up a lot of their stuff. They tried as hard as they could but the crowd was against them here. This was a huge feud and DIBiase gets the title back via countout but whatever. The number of matches is hurting the show again.

In the back, we hear Slick talk about why Bossman turned face, which was because he wouldn’t be paid off by DiBiase to do his bidding, saying that he was a fair law enforcer. That split up the team of Bossman and Akeem so we get this match. Bossman, which is really a great gimmick, another great feature of the 80s, says that he’s proud to be an American. Great way to be a face buddy.

Akeem vs. Big Boss Man

Bossman’s eyes are sweet looking on the way to the ring. Before the match, DiBiase, the guy that tried to buy off Bossman in the fall, comes from under the ring and beats up Bossman so Akeem dominates to begin with. Bossman lands a great boot to the face though to break the momentum.

He’s down and trying to get his breath but then just snaps up like absolutely nothing is wrong with him. It looked REALLY bad. He goes off on Akeem and a few seconds later an amazing Bossman Slam considering Akeem’s size gets the pin. Post match, Bossman punches Slick.

Rating:N/A. Just another quickie and it gets nowhere at all.

Sean Mooney is in the crowd and asks if people are looking forward the Rhythm And Blues singing. Mary Tyler Moore is apparently a wrestling fan and I now love her even more than I did before.

Now we get the famous scene from this show: the Pink Cadillac carrying Rhythm And Blues. The reason this is famous? The owner and driver of the car is none other than future two time, two time WCW World Heavyweight Champion, Diamond Dallas Page. He was just about to debut in WCW at the time. He actually might have already but if he had he had been there all of a month.

They perform their new song, Hunka Hunka Hunka Honkey Love (Word wants to murder me for that) and it’s bad. You can see Jimmy Hart is the only one that has a clue what he’s doing which makes sense.

For those of you that don’t know, Jimmy Hart was the main person responsible for all of the mind blowing songs used in the WWF in the 80s and early 90s. Back in the 60s he was lead singer for a band called the Gentrys that had a big hit called Keep On Dancing. They went on tour with the Beach Boys so apparently they had something going for them. Hart brought that legit talent to wrestling music and it worked really well.

For God knows what reason, the Bushwackers appear selling programs at ringside. Realizing that these are the worst disguises of all time, they pull them off and run off Rhythm and Blues before destroying their guitars. Kind of funny, more stupid though. The funniest part of this is Jesse referencing a CD and Gorilla doesn’t sound that sure as to what it is.

Yet again, WM 7 in Los Angeles. The sad thing is I remember the real commercials that had the ticket number in it that’s been edited out since. I could literally quote the ticket number in this if I wanted to. That’s kind of sad.

New SkyDome attendance record of 67,678 people. These announcements are always kind of cool to me. However, the fans seem completely uncaring about this.

Rick Rude vs. Jimmy Snuka

This match is pure filler before the main event. Steve Allen is on commentary here. Standard match here for these two. Back and forth which makes it a decent match. Snuka doing the hip swivel is funny if nothing else. Rude wins with a Rude Awakening. Steve Allen has some very funny lines in this and it boosted the match a lot. For those that may have forgotten, Allen was kind of like the Jay Leno of his time, just not quite as famous but very close to it.

Rating: C-. Funny and that’s it. No one cares as it’s time for Hogan vs. Warrior.

And now it’s time for the main event. First up of course is a recap though. It stated with the two of them saying nice things about each other in their promos and then they wound up being alone together in the Rumble. They do a nicely choreographed routine ending in a double clothesline, but DANG was it exciting to see it at the time. This would be like Hogan and Austin today.

A week later they were in a tag match with Mr. Perfect and his manager/partner the Genius. Hogan and Warrior win but afterwards the brawl continues. Hogan gets nailed by mistake with a Warrior clothesline. A month later Warrior is in trouble against Earthquake and Hogan makes the save after the match for Mania had been announced. Two weeks after that, same scenario, just switch Hogan and Warrior.

In other words, Earthquake was a very scary man. Hogan tries to get up and Warrior runs back and forth. Hogan has his back to him and Warrior raises his arm for a clothesline but stops dead. Then Hogan turns and puts his fists up. Warrior hits the ropes again, hops to the floor and runs away. Seriously, this guy was messed up at times.

Intercontinental Title/WWF Title: Hulk Hogan vs. The Ultimate Warrior

This was dubbed The Ultimate Challenge and both belts were on the line. Warrior’s music hits and I don’t ever recall a crowd going from dead to insane so quickly, at least not until Austin and the glass shattering began. Everything about this match is absolutely epic. Even the entrances just feel big if that makes sense. This is what Wrestlemania was supposed to end with and it works perfectly here.

Absolutely great job in building this up as face vs. face was very risky and still is hard to do today. Hogan’s ovation is clearly louder, but not by much. In one of the coolest scenes ever, Hogan’s music plays and as we pan from the crowd to the entry way, Warrior is seen standing on the middle rope doing his press slam motion. I marked out beyond belief just for the entrances.

It’s hard to do, but they awakened the inner young fan in me, the Hulkamaniac that lurks inside my soul. One thing I’ve always wondered: when Warrior comes to the ring, he clearly has his symbol painted on his chest, yet 5 minutes into the match it’s gone without a trace. That’s too fast to have been knocked off and wouldn’t there be traces if it was sweated off?

Crowd is white hot for this. Both guys shove each other away. And now for the iconic moment of the match: the test of strength. Warrior puts Hogan down but Hogan comes back and puts Warrior down. Hogan gets a slam and Warrior pops up. Warrior gets a slam and Hogan doesn’t pop up.

Hogan goes to the floor and holds his knee. This will NEVER be mentioned again after it gets better. The key thing here though: it lets Hogan be able to say that Warrior didn’t beat him at his best. The referee keeps trying to protect Hogan and Warrior is like screw you short man.

Naturally Hogan is fine now so the knee thing is completely forgotten, never to be mentioned again. Hogan gets the worst chinlock ever to take over for awhile. He puts Warrior down and waits awhile before covering after a clothesline. Ok then.

Back to the chinlock now as this is going more or less nowhere at all. A belly to back suplex fills in the wrestling quota for tonight. He gets his fourth chinlock to fill in time. Double clothesline and both go down after Hogan has taken next to no punishment this whole time.

Warrior does an Undertaker sit up before Taker was around. Warrior Warriors Up and the bald man is in trouble. Bear hug goes on Hogan. There are FAR more rest holds in this than I remember. This one goes on for like two and a half minutes.

And down goes the referee. Hogan gets what would be a three count. Warrior gets what would be a three count. Warrior hammers away and manages to get the press slam and the splash for two as the fans are in shock.

He Hulks Up as Warrior pounds away on him. Three punches and a big boot set up the leg drop. The leg drop amazingly misses and Warrior hits a big splash and wins the title in one of the biggest shockers of all time.

Rating: A+. This match lived up to the amazing hype that it got and showed that Hogan could work a long match that wasn’t in his normal formula. It also showed that Warrior did indeed have the capabilities to wrestle well if given the right opponent, which he had also done with Rude. While I think Hogan should have kept the title, that doesn’t mean that it was a bad match, because it was great.

The finish made sense and didn’t make Hogan look weak but made Warrior look strong. That’s hard to do. I don’t know what I can say about this match that hasn’t already been said. For both men, it’s likely the match of their lives. They have nearly 68,000 people in the palms of their hands for nearly 23 minutes and it never lets up once. Everything is a small war and the crowd knows it. Every little thing in this match is done well and that makes it a classic.

Both men do their signature no pain things, and you literally didn’t know who was going to win. When Hogan hulked up, I truly believed for a split second he was going to win. That’s great work. The finish to this epic struggle came when Hogan missed the leg drop and Warrior splashed him for the pin, and wrestling changed forever. Jesse’s shout of THE WARRIOR’S WON THE TITLE is absolutely perfect.

After Hogan hands him the belt and steals a bit of the spotlight, the arena goes a bit darker and pyro goes off all over the place. The big screens show Warrior shaking the ropes with the belt in hand and it’s just amazing to look at. A great ending to a great match and show.

Overall Rating: C+. This was a really hard decision for me because based on the main event, the Brown/Piper match and a few others, this show is really great to watch. However, there’s some flaws that keep it from being perfect. For one thing and I didn’t really touch on this, the time it took to get to the ring was just way too long. I know there’s not much they could do about that, but it really slowed things down at times.

Also, there were too many short matches. The card doesn’t need to have everyone on the card. Take the opener for example. That was a waste of nearly 10 minutes counting introductions. Finally, WAY too many backstage promos. We don’t need an interview before every match. It’s just overkill at that point. However, those are simply keeping a great show from being legendary.

This show had the real Wrestlemania feel to it and it shows. It was supposed to be an epic show and it lived up to it. The matches were for the most part good, stories were advanced, things were memorable, and it was fun. Definite recommendation here as so far, it’s the second best Mania and arguably the best along with 3. Los Angeles, here we come!