Monday Night Raw
Date: November 28, 2011
Location: Colonial Life Arena, Columbia, South Carolina
Commentators: Michael Cole, Jerry Lawler

Things are a little bit different tonight and I’m not sure where they’re going to go tonight. Truth has been wellnessed away for the next month so I’m not sure what Miz is going to do. The main event tonight is Alberto vs. CM II so maybe we’re going to get Miz vs. Punk next? It’ll be nice to get through Del Rio’s title push though as he’s not interesting at all as the champion, given how much they’ve crippled him over the last five months. Let’s get to it.

Theme song opens us up.

We open things up with Piper’s Pit. He talks about how the fans have made him what he is today with their energy and all that jazz. Piper was never the biggest, the strongest, the best etc, but the fans made him what he was with their energy. Tonight his guest is someone who doesn’t care as much about the fans’ energy: John Cena.

Cena isn’t sure what he means about the fans not mattering to him. The Hot Scot plays a word association game with the fans where he says a legend’s name and the fans cheer for him. Then he says Cena….and the fans cheer for him. Cena says that’s the fans’ choice and that’s fine. Piper keeps trying to force this because Cena has to tell the fans what he thinks of them instead of just taking it because if he doesn’t, he’ll lose at Mania.

Cena says you’re going overboard with this. He talks about all of the big shows and matches he’s been on where he was booed out of the building, like Mania 22 and MITB and the TLC match in Toronto and One Night Stand (no opponent listed) which made MITB look like a bunch of schoolgirls. Cena says MSG was just New Yorkers being New Yorkers. Piper keeps pushing it and Cena points to some kids in the front row in his gear, saying that they’re having the time of their lives. He had three Make-A-Wish meetings today and they’re all here.

He tells Piper to read his shirt (Rise Above Hate) and says that’s why he’s going to be ok at Mania because he’s going to be himself as he’s always been, even with the fans booing. Piper talks about how his generation gave the torch to Cena’s generation and Cena’s generation raised it. However, that isn’t going to be enough because Piper says Cena is going to be in denial and hands him the Hall of Fame ring. Cena says he’s in a good place so Piper slaps him. Cena walks off and is mad. That came off as forced for the most part, because Cena was rational about the whole thing.

John Morrison vs. The Miz

This is falls count anywhere. Miz comes out with a ball bat or a pipe or something and jumps Morrison with it during Morrison’s entrance. He hits Morrison’s leg with it about 15 times and Morrison is down. I guess this is how Morrison leaves us. Morrison is being carried out but says he’s going back. He hobbles to the ring and they ring the bell. Morrison takes him down but Miz gets a shot in to the knee and wraps it around the post. R-Truth will be out a few weeks according to Cole.

Miz pulls out a kendo stick for a shot to the knee but somehow Morrison fires off a clothesline. Morrison picks up the stick and wears Miz out with it as they head to the floor. Miz tries to crawl up the ramp and Morrison uses the cane for a cane. That’s smart. Miz sends him face first into the big WWE logo though and Morrison is down. There’s the Skull Crushing Finale on the stage and the referee calls the match off at 3:24 with Morrison out cold.

Rating: C+. I enjoyed this one as Miz looked like a killer out there. His in ring stuff has always been the weakest part of his game so keeping him like a killer like this on his own is the right thing to do. I liked the match too as the history and emotion in it carried it to a better match than it should have been. Also this is a better and more definitive way to send Morrison off as it lets Miz get a push too. Good stuff.

Morrison goes out on a stretcher as Miz has a mic in the ring. He says this week it was John Morrison, last week it was R-Truth and next week, who knows? He’s the only superstar that can make this kind of impact. His face is completely stoic as he says this. Miz says he can do this because he’s awesome. I’m digging this.

Alicia Fox/Kelly Kelly vs. Bella Twins

They do the whole second coming thing on the Twitter graphic here. Beth and Nattie come out to th ringside and job around the ring. Then they leave. Ok then. Everything breaks down and Alicia gets a legdrop on a Bella for the pin at 1:45.

Video on Sheamus being all awesome.

Johnny Ace is on the phone and you guessed it: Brodus debuts NEXT week. Otunga comes in and wants to know why Ace is holding off Brodus’ debut for so long because he’s going to be mad. Ace says it’s to make Brodus mad. Alberto comes in and says he’s ready. Ace is worried about sponsors with Punk as champion. Speaking of the champion, he comes in and calls Ace spineless, Del Rio boring, and Otunga something about Jennifer Hudson. Punk leaves and it’s announced that if Punk gets intentionally disqualified, he loses the title.

Randy Orton vs. Dolph Ziggler

Barrett is on commentary. An inset Ziggler interview says he’ll win and show off. These two almost always have good chemistry so the match should be good. Ziggler grabs a quick rollup for two but Randy drills him with a clothesline to send him outside. Orton stomps away and Cole says vintage. He’s a lot less annoying tonight. Ziggler pounds him down and takes over as we head to the floor.

We get our first (I think) Twitter Trending line of the night and King talks about the WWE Social thing. Ziggler goes up but gets caught in a superplex from the top. That gets two and we take a break. Back with Orton hammering away and there’s the elevated DDT. He loads up the RKO so Ziggler RUNS, like an intelligent guy. Barrett gets up on the apron and Orton dropkicks him down, allowing Ziggler to run in with the Zig Zag AND HE GETS THE PIN AT 11:43!!! It’s about time!

Rating: B. Fun match but most important of all: ORTON JOBBED (ALMOST) CLEAN!!! Guys like him and Cena don’t need to win every time and having Orton put over Ziggler is great. It makes Ziggler look legit and it furthers Orton vs. Barrett. Good stuff here as was expected with this match. Ziggler could be HUGE is pushed right.

Ziggler does a handstand post match which is hilarious.

Here’s Daniel Bryan in the ring with Cole. Bryan says he earned the spot in the title match tomorrow while Cole calls Bryan a hypocrite. Bryan calls Cole the worst announcer in WWE. Cole brings up Bryan promising to cash in at Mania and then trying to do it early. We look at the video from Smackdown where Bryan tried to cash in and laughed in Cole’s face about it. Cole says he would have suspended Bryan for conduct unbecoming of a WWE Superstar. Bryan says the case guarantees him nothing so he took the opportunity he had. Tomorrow he has another opportunity in a cage with Henry.

Here’s the champ, limping but off crutches. Henry says he’s injured and isn’t completely ready to compete, which is Teddy Long’s fault. Bryan comes up the ramp with the case and says he can beat him. Bryan kicks him in the leg and says we’ll see tomorrow night. Henry is limping it off.

Zack Ryder vs. Jack Swagger

Ryder needs a clean win so that’s fine. Ryder tries to speed things up but walks into a belly to belly for two. Swagger beates him down for awhile but Ryder grabs a neckbreaker for two. Powerbomb is blocked and Ryder goes up. He jumps into a backbreaker and there’s the Vader Bomb but Swagger trips on Ryder’s body. The second attempt hits feet and the Rough Ryder ends this clean at 3:23.

Rating: C. This is the kind of win he needs: he got a clean win over a guy who isn’t going to be hurt by a loss at all. Ryder needs to win the US Title soon though, hopefully at the PPV. Still though, not much of a match, but I can’t complain as it gets the popular guy on TV and gets him a win. What more can you ask for?

Kane is still coming back with the mask.

We go back to earlier in the night and Piper’s Pit.

Here’s Santa Foley to plug Smackdown tomorrow. He gives us a poem and gets a cheap pop.

Punk swears a bit.

Raw World Title: Alberto Del Rio vs. CM Punk

Del Rio goes for the arm immediately so Punk fires off a monkey flip. Alberto takes him down again and fish hooks the mouth a bit because he’s that evil. Out to the floor where Punk hits a suicide dive to take over and we take a break. Back with Del Rio working on the arm again as you would expect him to do. Alberto goes up and hits kind of a shoulder block off the top to the arm for two.

Punk tries a top rope cross body but lands on the arm again. This is a pretty uninteresting match so far. Even Lawler points out how dead the crowd is. Backbreaker gets two for Alberto and he works on the arm again. A top rope double axe gets two. The fans want ice cream because they’re annoying. A big boot puts Punk down but the third attempt at coming off the top fails for Del Rio as he jumps into a kick for two.

The trade strikes and Punk starts his comeback with a neckbreaker for two. Punk sells the arm and hits the knee in the corner but the bulldog is countered into a Codebreaker to the arm for two. The Mexican hits a German to the American for two. GTS is countered into a DDT for two. Del Rio goes for the turnbuckle and the distraction lets Ricardo throw in a chair. Del Rio throws it to him and starts to fall but Punk throws it back first and falls himself. FREAKING BRILLIANT!!! The referee goes to DQ Del Rio but Punk rolls him up for a VERY close two. They actually take the buckle off this time and a GTS onto it ends this at 15:26.

Rating: C+. The match itself was pretty boring, but the ending to it was absolutely brilliant. There was some solid psychology here and everything worked well I think. Also, thank goodness Del Rio loses and we can hopefully move on to something else now instead of his stupid destiny nonsense. Boring match, very hot ending.

Ricardo takes a GTS post match.

Overall Rating: A-. I was DIGGING this show almost all night. Cole toned it way down tonight and it made the show a lot more bearable. They kept things fast paced tonight and instead of focusing on a single story all night, they fired a bunch of stuff at us but most of it was solid stuff. When you have a lot of stuff going on and almost all of it is good, there isn’t much complaining to be found. Great show.

Results
The Miz b. John Morrison via referee stoppage
Alicia Fox/Kelly Kelly b. Bella Twins – Legdrop to Brie Bella
Dolph Ziggler b. Randy Orton – Zig Zag
Zack Ryder b. Jack Swagger – Rough Ryder
CM Punk b. Alberto Del Rio – GTS onto the turnbuckle

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Best of the WWF Volume 18
Host: Sean Mooney
Commentators: Gorilla Monsoon, Bobby Heenan, Sean Mooney, Alfred Hayes

It’s another of these things and by the laws of science, wrestling and nature, it HAS to be better than Volume 16. After this one we’re going to be halfway through this series so at least we’re getting close to it being done. This is from late 1988/very early 1989, meaning I’ll enjoy it if nothing else. Let’s get to it.

Sean runs down the card for the tape.

Women’s Title: Rockin Robin vs. Sensational Sherri

This is in Paris and Sherri is champion. Sherri jumps her but Robin is a bit too fast for her. A jumping back elbow gets two as Gorilla and Brain talk about this being day #29 since Sherri defended the title. The spotlights are really bright and distracting. Gorilla and Bobby have a dinner bet on this match. Robin is totally dominant so far and gets two off a cross body. These girls at least know what they’re doing.

Robin really likes using a headlock. I mean she really likes it, as in I think she’s used about five in the first few minutes of it. Gorilla and Brain have such basic conversations and they’re just great. I’m fine with that when there’s nothing of note going on (front facelock here) but when Cole does it during a promo or a fast paced match, it’s stupid.

Sherri gets her first move, a full nelson, after about six minutes. It lasts all of ten seconds until Robin reverses to one of her own. Sherri finally takes over and again it lasts a few seconds as she gets rammed into the corner. Sherri gets rammed into more buckles and a jumping clothesline gets two. After nearly ten minutes, Sherri hits her in the ribs to take over. Her offense is really weak, similar to how most modern Divas wrestle.

Robin slams her off the top but she can’t follow up immediately. Cross body gets two. MAN Robin throws a hard chop. Sherri misses a spinning cross body and Robin gets two. Sherri avoids a dropkick but gets caught by a sunset flip for two. Sherri puts her on top for I’m guessing a superplex but Robin jumps off with a middle rope bulldog for the pin and the title.

Rating: B-. This was FAR better than I was expecting. Robin was actually pretty good and I was getting into this. It’s amazing what happens when the girls are actually having a wrestling match instead of trying to be all cute and show off how great they are. In other words, have wrestlers instead of models.

Brutus Beefcake vs. Jacques Rougeau

What an odd choice for a match, but WE GET HEEL ROUGEAU MUSIC!!!!!! Beefcake’s music is pretty awesome too. From what I can tell this is at a Superstars taping in Daytona Beach, Florida. Jacques keeps breaking cleanly to prove he’s a nice guy. He takes over quickly with a nice dropkick and Brutus is all confused. Thank goodness he’s fine.

A high knee puts Jacques on the floor and it’s time for hugs. Gay jokes abound from Mooney. Back inside (no pun intended) and Jacques takes over, hooking a camel clutch. The fans are all over Jimmy here. There’s a Boston Crab which is like a fetish for French Canadians. Jimmy shows off his value, hitting Brutus in the ribs with the megaphone while he’s on the floor.

He stays on the back and ribs, even hooking the abdominal stretch. Hayes complains about it since Gorilla isn’t on commentary here. Brutus ducks a cross body and the fans pop big. Very hot crowd here. There’s an atomic drop and Jacques sells it as it’s meant to be sold. Beefcake tries a splash (odd) but catches knees. Jacques is sent into his manager and the sleeper looks to end this, but Ray Rougeau runs in for the DQ.

Rating: C. Generic but fine here. Brutus was never in any real danger but I don’t get the ending. Why do they need to keep Jacques, a tag wrestler, from losing clean? Brutus was a solid midcard guy at this point and got a lot better around this point. Not a great match or anything, but for a TV main event this would have been fine.

Brain Busters vs. Young Stallions

In Toronto here I think. You could always tell as the camera was always off to the side a bit. There’s no Heenan here, although Gorilla says he might be in the upper deck in drag. That wouldn’t shock me actually. Arn and I think Powers start us off here and it’s a big brawl, won by the Stallions. Back to Tully vs. Powers and Blanchard isn’t sure what to do with him. Nice dropkick by Roma puts him down.

Off to Anderson who should be in the Hall of Fame. Roma (a future Horseman for some reason) snaps off some dropkicks and the Stallions rule the ring again. Blanchard tries to speed things up and that goes as well as anything else he’s tried. The Stallions work on Tully’s leg as this has been one sided so far. Anderson finally realizes he’s a Horseman and comes in with some double teaming to take over.

There’s a spinebuster which didn’t have a name yet. Roma gets beaten down like he’s a glorified jobber and Gorilla complains about the lack of perfection in the abdominal stretch. We get into a standard tag match with Roma being beaten down for awhile. Arn does his “test of strength on the mat and jump onto the other guys’ feet to crotch myself” spot. Blanchard gets taken down also and there’s the double tag. Everything breaks down and during the insanity, Tully cheats (atta boy!) and gets an illegal pin via a sunset flip on Powers.

Rating: C+. Fine match here and the 80s style never fails. It’s not a great match or anything but for a house show match that got about 12 minutes, it’s hard to complain about something like this. The Busters would get the titles later that year and would hold them until Tully got a little bit too high one day.

Here’s the Brother Love Show with Slick as the guest. This is from SNME 18 so I’m going to cut and paste as per usual. The guest is Hogan. Love always scared me to death back in the day. He was just freaky looking. Instead of Hogan he brings out Slick. Hogan is MAD and overacts beyond belief. We get to hear Jive Soul Bro as a consolation prize, making this show substantially better. Ah here’s Hulk. Nothing Love says means anything here as we’re just waiting on Boss Man to come in.

Love asks Hogan questions but keeps cutting him off before he can answer over and over again. He lets Slick answer because something tells me he’s not a nice person. Slick is as tall as Hogan. Never would have guessed that. The look on Hogan’s face is great actually as he’s not used to BLATANT DISRESPECT like this. Finally Hogan just grabs the mic and yells a lot.

Hogan talks about how fake Love is. This is going absolutely nowhere and I’m bored out of my mine. Hulk talks about being a judge and sentencing Love for something or other. He finally beats up Slick and Love. No Boss Man or anything which makes this a HUGE waste of time. Love gets handcuffed somewhere in there. Moving on.

The next match and angle are from SNME 17 so I’m going to cut and paste again. The angle that happened after the match is on the tape also.

We recap Roberts vs. Rude. The idea is that Rude had a gimmick going of giving a woman a kiss after his matches. He picked a woman in the front row and she declined. She said her husband was a pro wrestler. His name is Jake Roberts. Rude started wearing tights with Cheryl’s face on the crotch. Jake literally ripped them off of him and it was censored. In reality he was wearing a thong but you get the idea.

Rude says he’s never embarrassed of his body. Heenan talks about snake charmers hypnotizing snakes and hypnotizes Gene until Rude shouts RUDE AWAKENING. Funny.

Jake and his wife say really generic stuff.

Jake Roberts vs. Rick Rude

What a natural paring this is. No theme music for Jake yet. Rude is wearing those tights again. Jake goes for the tights nearly immediately. Is Cheryl not satisfying him? I’ve watched nearly six minutes of this match and there’s just nothing to say about it. Cheryl gets thrown out for slapping Rude. Vince saying that she shouldn’t be because it didn’t hurt him is very funny for some reason.

Jesse goes on a rant about Vince playing favorites and it’s just freaking boring. I don’t know why but this just isn’t interesting at all. It’s not bad or anything. It’s just not getting my attention at all. Rude dominates for the most part with Jake just punching and looking for the DDT. Rude Awakening is blocked. Jake totally fakes him out by pulling back a punch and there’s the DDT. Instead of the cover though he goes for the tights.

Heenan comes in for the DQ. And here’s Andre, who would beat RVD in any match they had I think should be mentioned, to beat Jake up. Jake gets the snake out and since Andre is a heel, he’s terrified of it. The look on Andre’s face is priceless. Jake throws the snake at him in a smart move. Andre then has a heart attack. WOW.

Rating: D+. Not bad, but just not that interesting really at all. They would have what I guess was supposed to be the other big match at Mania 5 but this was just not a very good match. Oh yeah Rude was involved here. Yeah I couldn’t really care less. Match was ok though.

Here’s a brief profile on the Bushwhackers who are brand new. Gene talks to them and they praise the USA and talk about pushing buttons. They get a 7up and Luke uses his teeth to open it. I mean he takes the teeth out and uses them as a wedge.

Another skit (same clothes) shows them eating a lot and generally being disgusting.

Gene goes to the woods to meet them for the third time and they pop out from under a pile of leaves. It’s camouflage training or something.

WWF World Title: Ted DiBiase vs. Randy Savage

Oh yeah. This is on Savage’s DVD. I love that Fink has to tell us that it’s a cage match, WHEN THE BIG FREAKING CAGE IS AROUND THE RING ALREADY. I know fans are viewed as stupid but come on now. This is escape only and we’re in MSG so the crowd is white hot. DiBiase jumps him as soon as the bell rings. He misses a knee drop though and they slug it out from their knees. This is looking more like a fight than a match which is always cool when you have the talent to pull it off.

DiBiase beats him down and goes up the cage but Savage makes the save. The crowd is way into this already. Savage blocks a shot into the cage, I think. Actually maybe he did because he’s down already. Ted runs again but Savage makes another save. DiBiase gets his feet caught in the ropes coming down so Savage goes up, only to get caught by Virgil to put him back into the cage.

Randy sends him into the cage and goes up but gets punched by Virgil again. They’re doing a lot of “one guy goes up, the other guys saves, then reverse it”, which is great for building drama. Liz asked Superstar Billy Graham earlier today for some advice. “My advice is to gain about 50 pounds so you’ll look better.” That man is an idiot! DiBiase goes for the door but Savage makes the save. Then reverse that order and they do it again.

Both guys go up on opposite sides of the cage but Virgil makes the save. DiBiase jumps down for absolutely no apparent reason and stomps on Savage some more. A suplex is countered by Savage and he goes for the door but Virgil slams the cage on his head to break it up again. Graham goes on another rant about how Liz needs to gain weight to help her man. Savage makes another save as DiBiase goes for the door. He goes off on DiBiase as Virgil climbs up again. A fan climbs the cage to help Savage but Randy rams the heels’ heads together and climbs down to retain.

Rating: B. Solid old school style cage match here with the whole thing being based around drama and near escapes. Graham being an idiot got old fast, with him wanting the premiere sex symbol of wrestling ever up to that point to put on 50 pounds of muscle. Seriously, he said that. Anyway, fun match with lots of drama and DiBiase as the most evil thing around makes for a good main event.

Overall Rating: B+. I really enjoyed this. I don’t know if it was just that I’m a big fan of this era, but this was a really enjoyable 90 minutes of wrestling. It was one of those things you would see at a video store for like eight dollars or so and on that note, you can’t complain at all about it. Good stuff with a good main event is all you can ask for from these and it’s a great way to escape the horrors of Volume 16. Good stuff.

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

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

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

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

Harlem Heat vs. Public Enemy

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

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

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

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

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

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

Diamond Dallas Page vs. Jim Powers

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

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

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

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

Faces of Fear vs. High Voltage

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

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

Glacier vs. Mike Wenner

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

Glacier does martial arts until the second hour starts.

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

Jeff Jarrett vs. Hugh Morrus

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

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

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

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

Buy the NWO shirt.

Renegade vs. Arn Anderson

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

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

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

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

Lex Luger vs. Dave Taylor

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

Anderson jumps Luger with a chair as Luger is leaving.

Chris Benoit vs. Rick Steiner

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

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

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

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

US Title: Randy Savage vs. Ric Flair

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

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

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

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Monday Nitro #55
Date: September 30, 1996
Location: Gund Arena, Cleveland, Ohio
Commentators: Bobby Heenan, Eric Bischoff, Tony Schiavone, Larry Zbyszko

We’re still getting closer to Halloween Havoc here. The card here looks pretty uninteresting other than a few matches sprinkled here and there. This show gets a little boring until we get to 1997 and the focus is totally on the build for Sting vs. Hogan, which I can’t say I disagree with from a booking standpoint as it was the biggest match ever for WCW. Let’s get to it.

We talk about the NWO racecar and how shocking it would be if Kyle Petty was their driver. You know, for all the NASCAR fans that we had in 1996.

We throw it to Eric who lies about the roots of the company going back to 1905. He talks about tradition and all that jazz which is almost all he knows how to write so there you are. Eric basically cuts a promo here and my head begins to hurt as we have to hear about how he’s awesome and we see the focus shifting to him, which would happen a lot more over the next year. The massive NWO chant doesn’t help things.

Tag Titles: Juventud Guerrera/El Technico vs. Public Enemy

Technico is Billy Kidman under a mask. Even though they won the titles last week I completely forgot about Public Enemy being champions. Rock vs. Juvy starts us off and this is a squash. The champs hit something like Demolition’s old finisher for two. They turn Kidman’s mask around and hit the old Quebecers’ Cannonball to end this. Quick match here and a total squash.

Kidman goes through the table.

Benoit and Mongo say if the NWO wants a fight tonight, they’ll be ready. For the life of me, how did they never just let the Horsemen go nuts and go to war with the NWO old school, picking off one of them at a time until there was just Flair vs. Hogan? Benoit says he’s ready for Rick Steiner.

The NWO is in a hotel and Hogan’s son is there too.

Alex Wright vs. Dean Malenko

Dean has Rey’s mask which he stole recently. Tony tells everyone that the NWO is at the Marriott in Cleveland. This comes after Syxx could be heard ordering room service and saying the room number in the previous segment, making WCW all the stupider. After some feeling out processes, Malenko takes over with a belly to back as we take a break.

Back with Wright speeding things up and hitting a Japanese armdrag to take over. That doesn’t last long as they head to the floor where Dean takes over again. Dean works on the leg but Wright starts his comeback. He and Dean both miss top rope shots but Wrights grabs a cradle for the upset pin.

Rating: C. Decent match here and for TV, this was fine. Wright still never got the push that they always seemed on the brink of with him, although he’d win the TV Title sometime in 97. This wasn’t much but Dean would become Cruiserweight Champion again before too long if my memory is right.

We look at Saturday Night where Savage snapped as Liz was standing there watching and being all nervous. Savage beat up Nick Patrick too.

Savage is supposed to come out for an interview but is nowhere to be found.

Eddie Guerrero vs. Jim Powers

Nick Patrick is referee here and has a neck brace on due to Savage’s attack. Powers is of course a power guy and this turns into a fight as I think Powers is the almost kind of sort of a heel here. Overhead belly to belly puts Eddie down for a very delayed two. Now let’s look at the NWO fans holding up signs. Back to the chinlock and this isn’t going anywhere at all. Powers hits a superplex for two. Eddie reverses a powerslam into a German and gets the pin, but the idea is that Powers got a shoulder up in time (he did) but Patrick missed it.

Rating: D. This also went nowhere. The Patrick storyline went on forever but this didn’t mean anything without there being a clear heel to cheat for. Eddie didn’t have much to work with here either as Powers was a jobber and not a very good one at that. At least Eddie would fight DDP for awhile after this which was a lot more interesting and entertaining.

The NWO is still in the hotel room when the Nasty Boys come in. Everyone talks about Kyle Petty. For the love of chicken wings, NO ONE CARES.

Arn Anderson berates Liz for what happened last week with Savage.

Hugh Morrus vs. Brad Armstrong

Power vs. speed here and about a minute in we start hour #2, which isn’t going to distract the fans from the match or anything right? Time for the announcers to talk about Savage for the rest of the match. Oh and also about the Nasty Boys possibly defecting. Eric says he doesn’t want to take anything away from this match. Take a guess what he does next. Just take a guess. All the talking about the match for the next minute or so: he counts a pin and says there’s a clothesline. No Laughing Matter (two of them) ends this.

Rating: C-. The match wasn’t half bad, but the commentary gets really annoying really fast. If I hadn’t been looking at the screen, I wouldn’t have had any idea what was going on in this. That’s WCW for you though: spend the matches talking about other stuff, because it’s not like anyone is going to get sick of hearing about it right?

Anderson and Woman yell at Liz about how it’s business or something.

Eric leaves out of fear, apparently wanting to go find the hotel the NWO is in….which Tony told us earlier.

Arn Anderson vs. Chris Jericho

Tony is in on commentary now. This match is the internet’s dream match but here we’re going to talk about the possibility of Eric joining the NWO. About two minutes in Tony gives us some token chat about the match. Jericho works the arm and Liz is watching in the back. Arn is sent to the floor where Jericho teases a dive but Arn gets out of the way. Chris is a step ahead of him though and puts on the brakes, hitting a shoulder block off the apron.

Woman gets involved to let Arn take over and Jericho’s inexperience starts becoming a problem. Arn takes over as Liz walks away from the monitor in the back. Anderson works on the arm but jumps into a dropkick to switch control again. A springboard clothesline sets up a top rope back elbow (love that move) for two. Lionsault misses and Arn grabs the DDT (BIG reaction for that) for the pin.

Rating: C+. Did you expect anything else here other than a good match? Jericho had a lot of the tools he would use later on to become a superstar and Arn was just about to the end of his career here, as I don’t think he was active much past January of 97. Still though, good stuff here and Jericho looked like a guy that got caught by a veteran, not someone that got crushed. That can make all the difference in the world sometimes.

Buy the NWO shirt.

Liz leaves.

Lex Luger vs. Mr. Wallstreet

Luger vs. Arn at Havoc. I’ve never been a fan of Luger in the black boots. It never worked for him. He takes over quickly on Wallstreet with power stuff and drops some elbows for two. Wallstreet grabs an abdominal stretch and we talk about Bischoff some more. Time for a chinlock as this isn’t much of a match as far as being interesting. After that, more chinlock. Luger grabs a rollup after like two minutes for two. This is horribly boring. Wallstreet takes over AGAIN with a clothesline as this needed to end like 4 minutes ago. A suplex is finally countered into the Rack for the submission.

Rating: F+. This got SEVEN AND A HALF MINUTES. There’s no reason to have a match with these guys in it go that long at all. Boring match which was about half chinlock. Luger looked like a joke out here and it didn’t work at all. Weak match and nothing interesting to see at all.

We recap the entire Sting saga. As a peace offering, the WCW car is now the Sting car.

Rock N Roll Express vs. Faces of Fear

Meng vs. Morton to start with the power guy taking over to start. Morton tries like three sleepers, none of which work at all. Both teams switch off and there isn’t much to see here so far. We take a break with it being a stalemate. Look at the car before we go though because you’re southern and have to like car racing! Back with a sunset flip not working for Gibson. The second attempt gets two.

Ricky Morton plays himself, taking a piledriver from Meng for two. Morton hammers Meng’s head for no apparent reason so Barbarian kicks him in the face. That’s the basic answer for most problems it seems. Powerbomb kills Morton dead but it only gets two. A backbreaker sets up a camel clutch. Do they have camels in Tonga? Morton fires off a cross body out of nowhere for about two.

And never mind as Barbarian takes him right back down again. The announcers are talking about how they want to kill the NWO as the Faces of Fear hit a double headbutt for two. Gibson keeps making the save. I wonder if Morton is like DUDE, let them pin me already! Top rope headbutt misses for Morton and it’s a not hot tag to Gibson. The Express tries double teaming and hits the double dropkick to Meng but Barbarian kicks Gibson’s head off to pin him.

Rating: D+. Not a terrible match but this went on too long. It was over ten minutes and then there was the time during the commercial that we didn’t even get to see. The Express was just old at this point and the whole idea of their team was done about 8 years earlier. Nothing to see here, which is a running theme tonight.

Public Enemy comes out to stop a beatdown and gets destroyed themselves, including an attack on the knee of Grunge.

Back to the hotel room and this is still the same stuff from earlier. The car driver is here too now.

Chris Benoit vs. Rick Steiner

Patrick runs his mouth for some reason before the match. After a break we’re ready to go. This turns into a slugout, which we ignore, but that’s not the point I guess. The American hits a German on the Canadian to take over. Rick grabs a chinlock after throwing Chris around a bit. Big Steiner Line puts Benoit down as does a powerslam. Debra distracts the referee so Mongo can pop Steiner with the briefcase. Benoit falls on top for the pin. He got destroyed other than that.

Rating: D+. I wasn’t getting the idea here. I know they were pushing the idea that the Horsemen weren’t going to be outnumbered again, but was there really a need to have Steiner look totally dominant over Benoit here? I really don’t get that, as the Steiners were nothing but a tag team while the Horsemen were always tagging or in singles interchangeably. I don’t get this but whatever.

The NWO talks even more to end the show. Liz is there with them now. She’s joining them so they’ll spare Savage….I think. Vince brings in a package and Liz leaves. Savage storms up the hallway and screams at her as she drops a paper. He keeps yelling as we go off the air.

Overall Rating: D-. This wasn’t that the show was bad, but my goodness was it boring. There was WAY too much NWO on here with so much of the focus being on that freaking racecar driver. The matches almost all sucked other than Jericho’s match and that one was just ok. The ending sets up a nice cliffhanger, but we need to get to 1997 fast, because not much else happens until we get there and to Page’s face turn. Bad show and probably the weakest since the NWO arrived.

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Clash of the Champions 30
Date: January 25, 1995
Location: Casear’s Palace, Las Vegas, Nevada
Attendance: 3,200
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan

Back to 1995 WCW because all of the time I had suffered through it wasn’t enough I guess. This is another attempt by me to end this far too long stretch of stuff I’ve done with WCW. Tonight, the main event is Hogan/Savage vs. Butcher/Sullivan and we also get Sting vs. Avalanche because…well because someone has to fight him I suppose. I’m not looking forward to this but let’s get to it.

We run down the card which includes a video of Savage shaking Hogan’s hand instead of slapping him in the face at Starrcade. You know, because that would have made things interesting and such.

Flair may be here, despite being retired.

TV Title: Arn Anderson vs. Johnny B. Badd

This was voted on by fans. Anderson has Colonel Parker with him as manager at this point and is champion. This is a rematch after Anderson stole the title earlier in the month. Fans are walking around in droves in the crowd. Badd takes over and Anderson chills in the corner to break the momentum. Anderson takes over for a few seconds but for some reason tries to go up top. His career record up there is worse than Flair’s so Badd dropkicks him down to the floor.

Badd adds a big dive to the floor and works on the arm in the ring. The idea here is that Anderson can’t keep up with Badd’s speed. The announcers talk about how WCW had the only wrestling show in the top 100 cable shows. This is pre-Nitro so that’s on the weekends only, which is pretty impressive. Johnny tries to jump over Arn in the corner but gets caught and clotheslined on the top like a Stun Gun.

Off to a chinlock which doesn’t last long and Arn keeps control. He sets for the traditional jump off the rope into the boot but Arn, ever the genius (no sarcasm) landso n his feet and drops an elbow for two. Badd starts his comeback and knocks Anderson out cold to the floor. Colonel Parker pours water on Anderson and Chase the Manager begins. Badd comes in but gets caught in a DDT to end this.

Rating: D+. This started off pretty well but after that it fell apart quickly. This feud would go on at least until Uncensored where they had a boxing match for not much of a reason. This went nowhere after it became a kick and punch and chinlock match. It could have been worse, but this was a clearly screwy ending coming a mile away.

Kevin Sullivan says that Flair and Vader both may be here plus a guest for Vader. Sullivan says that even though Hogan is surrounded by friends, he’s going to get stabbed in the back. Butcher (Beefcake) says nothing significant in his heel promo.

Video on Alex Wright, who was a hot commodity at this point.

Alex Wright vs. Bobby Eaton

This was far more common back in the day: take a guy like Eaton and put him in the ring with a guy like Wright and let Eaton make Wright look great. It was very common back in the day and very effective. Wright grabs an armbar which doesn’t last long. A headscissors takes Alex down but we’re right back to the arm again. Alex misses a dive and lands on the top rope as Eaton takes over.

Eaton hooks a chinlock and this isn’t going anywhere for the most part. Wright grabs a suplex but hurts his own neck on it to shift momentum again. Spinwheel kick puts him down and a missile dropkick gets two. This really isn’t as good as they were expecting I don’t think. Cross body for two. Eaton pops up out of nowhere and hits the Alabama Jam (top rope legdrop) for two but Wright hits another cross body for two.

Rating: D. This didn’t do much at all for me here. The first few minutes were really boring and then after that, the whole thing was nothing but Wright hitting something for two and then hitting another one of something he hit earlier for the pin. I know Eaton was good but this didn’t work at all for me.

Gene talks about Hogan vs. Vader and how they can’t fight until SuperBrawl. Here’s Vader (US Champion at this point) who says Race might be here tonight and he has a ticket for him. He asks who is the man and gets a mixed response. Vader has looked for Hogan everywhere but there’s been no Hulk. He says Hogan is hiding but Vader will have a ticket tonight.

Tag Titles: Harlem Heat vs. Stars N Stripes

Bagwell/Patriot are the challengers. And they’re late. Instead….here’s Ric Flair. He was retired at this point due to the events of Halloween Havoc. Heenan goes over to shake Flair’s hand, being the suckup that he is. Flair takes a seat in the front row. Here are Stars N Stripes. Booker vs. Bagwell to start with Bagwell hammering away. This is a return match after the Heat basically stole the titles.

Bagwell dropkicks him to the floor and the challengers clear the ring. The fans chant USA. Why can’t Harlem Heat be patriotic? They’re from New York which is certainly part of the United States. Patriot hammers away on Stevie and works on the arm a bit. Really basic tag match here and not much to say for the first three to five minutes.

Bagwell is getting beaten down at the moment, taking that spinning forearm smash for two. The fans show their anti-New York sentiment again. The announcers talk about why Vader has two seats at ringside since Harley Race isn’t here. Heenan: “Maybe he’s going to use the other chair to crack Hogan over the head.” A few seconds of silence pass. Tony: “Maybe he’s going to use the other chair as a weapon.” Heenan never got a break.

The champions keep beating down Bagwell but Sherri gets on the apron to keep the tag from being noticed. The American comes in anyway and everything breaks down. Sherri’s shoe comes in somehow and Bagwell gets an O’Connor Roll on Stevie. Booker kicks his head off to reverse the control though and the Heat keeps the titles.

Rating: D. Total meh match here. This felt like they were told there had to be a tag title match so here’s a quick one so that we can say we had one. It’s not that the match is bad but rather that it’s painfully boring. The Heat would hold the titles for like 5 months until the Nasty Boys won them after they lost them. Long story, don’t ask.

The Monster Maniacs (Hogan/Savage) say exactly what you would expect them to say.

Off to the Control Center which discusses SuperBrawl. One of the things we learn here: Vader has a ticket to tonight’s show. Top notch reporting there Gene!

Sting vs. Avalanche

Guardian Angel (Big Boss Man) is guest referee. Big brawl to start and I think it’s going to be a safe bet that if you’ve seen one of these Sting vs. monster matches you’ve seen them all. Flair has left his seat. Avalanche drops an Earthquake on Sting but poses instead of covering. You know, because THAT has a great track record. There’s a powerslam for two. Sting takes him down and does the falling headbutt to the balls spot. There’s the Splash in the corner and make it two of them. Ok three and the fourth sets up a slam for the Scorpion to end this.

Rating: C-. Dull match but Sting’s incredible charisma helped it a lot. The splashes in the corner worked well enough and the slam is always impressive. The inherent problem with WCW at this time though was that none of these monsters ever got a pin, which really hurt things after awhile because this feud would go on for almost a year.

Nick Patrick came out to call the submission. Angel got in Sting’s face and they brawled, with Angel helping for a double beatdown on Sting. Alex Wright and Stars and Stripes make the save.

Angel says he was disrespected. He says he’s Big Bubba Rogers again.

Hulk Hogan/Randy Savage vs. Kevin Sullivan/The Butcher

Vader is up and all annoyed for Hogan’s entrance. Flair is back in his seat now also. Hogan and Butcher are set to start us off but Butcher stalls like a true southern man. Savage comes in and this is totally one sided to start us off, which is about what you would expect. Back to Hogan who beats on Beefcake even more. Hogan hits a jumping knee (called a boot by that moron Schiavone) but Butcher hooks the sleeper, which put Hogan out at the last Clash.

Now we get one of the weirdest moments ever in wrestling history. Butcher puts Hogan out with the sleeper but lets go early ala Adrian Adonis at Mania 3. The heels celebrate so Savage comes in to wake Hogan up. It doesn’t work, so Savage goes up top and drops the big elbow on Hogan. For absolutely no logical reason at all, this wakes Hogan up and he’s fine again. WHAT SENSE IS THAT SUPPOSED TO MAKE??? I mean who came up with that idea??? Cocaine is a powerful drugs kid.

The heels start cheating and take over with evil tactics, including throwing Savage to the floor. It turns into a standard tag match with Butcher and Sullivan hammering away on Savage. Savage is on the floor and is all shaky as Hogan checks on him. I think they’re playing up that he might have a concussion without saying he’s got a concussion. Back inside he gets rammed by the Tree of Woe because Hogan got drawn into the ring.

The sleeper doesn’t work and Savage kicks Brutus away for the hot tag to Hogan. Notice the pretty weak pop for him coming in for the save WCW. Everything breaks down and Savage drops the elbow on Brutus but Hogan gets to drop the leg for the pin, because goodness knows we can’t have the new guy get the pin.

Rating: D+. It’s just a main event tag match and not a very good one. The problems that WCW had are really showing themselves here: Hogan never loses. I mean he never even got close to losing. He never broke a sweat here and Savage doesn’t even get the pinfall. Also, having Kevin Sullivan and Brutus Beefcake as the top heels didn’t help anything. Vader got beaten up by Hogan so much that he gave up and went to the WWF.

Vader comes in post match for the big staredown. Vader beats him down easily and powerbombs him….and Hogan pops right back up, showing that Vader has zero chance at all of beating him clean. Hogan and Savage clear the ring and stand tall. As Vader leaves, he manages to plug the show: “The champ goes down February 19 in Baltimore. Be there and witness history!” He shouts that at the camera as he leaves. See how simply you can add something to the show’s build? Why is that so hard? Oh because we need things trending on Twitter right?

Hogan and Savage pose for two minutes to end this. Running short on time I guess.

Overall Rating: D. This was boring. That sums up WCW in this year: everything was predictable and only Hogan and his friends got significant time. Not an interesting show at all and not even a big commercial for SuperBrawl (which sucked) really. It wouldn’t be helped at all until Giant came in around October to FINALLY give Hogan a challenge. Bad show, and this whole year isn’t worth watching.

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Ring of Honor
Date: November 26, 2011
Location: Davis Arena, Louisville, Kentucky
Commentators: Kevin Kelly, Nigel McGuinness

We close out November with this one and to be honest I can’t say I care in the slightest. Unless things pick WAY up next month, I think I’m dropping this at the end of the year. There’s no enjoyment for me about it at all and I don’t see this show getting any better anytime soon. Let’s get to it.

We open with a recap of last week’s strike fest which drove me crazy. Literally in the whole package there’s nothing in the form of a hold fro the champion other than the ankle lock which goes against the entire psychology he’s going with. I can’t stand Richards as champion. I really can’t.

The Briscoes talk about Haas/Benjamin and the All Night Express, who they say they’ll take out to get the titles back at Final Battle. They’re going to take out Coleman and Alexander tonight.

Coleman and Alexander say they’re not people just to be run over.

Caprice Coleman/Cedric Alexander vs. Briscoe Brothers

The idea is that Haas/Benjamin took 13 minutes to beat Coleman/Alexander and the Briscoes say they can do it faster. I still have no idea if the Briscoes are faces or heels, or how to spell their names for that matter. Jay Briscoe vs. Alexander starts us off. We’re told about ROH on Twitter and using the hashtag WatchROH. What a third rate promotion. Instead of saying random catchphrases, they’re telling people to watch their show. What lunkheads.

The not-famous team starts off hot, sending the Briscoes to the floor and hitting stereo dives. The Briscoes are in trouble here until they realize they’re the most famous tag team ever in the company….and there goes the referee. Here are Haas/Benjamin with chairs and the it’s thrown out at about 3:20. A lot of that was the chase out of the ring so I’m not going to bother rating it. This was just filler until we got to the run-in.

Michael Elgin vs. Raphael Constantine/Sean Casey

The jobbers are from ROH. Truth Martini is on commentary. And now he’s off after saying he’s going after Eddie Edwards instead of Richards. I have no idea what you’re expecting to see here. It’s an exhibition by Elgin to dominate people who have nothing to do with the product and company for the most part. He no sells everything and gets Casey on his own. Ok now this is going too long as they’re kicking out of stuff. Elgin tries a backdrop on Constantine but drops him on his head. Then he picks them both up at the same time for a double Alabama Slam, pinning both at 5:03. Ok the finisher was cool.

Rating: D. Whatever here man. See, there’s a way to do a squash and this wasn’t it. Elgin looked like he wasn’t sharp and want’s ready to do what he was doing in there, which is the last thing you want out of a squash. Ok the last thing you probably want is death but whatever. Not much to see here, but that double Slam was cool.

Cornette thinks he’s ready to offer Kevin Steen a settlement. Next week he wants Steen, Jimmy Jacobs, the attorney and Steve Corino in the ring where he’ll make the offer.

Inside ROH is a video on Dan Severn, who is an MMA master and a UFC Hall of Famer, because wrestling fans want to see MMA right? Edwards says this was a secret but it wasn’t stolen from Davey. Davey went to Japan and that’s not Edwards’ fault. Severn talks forever and we talk about Best in the World for the 19th time this week.

Now Roderick Strong runs his mouth a bit because that’s what Roderick Strong does anymore.

TV Title: El Generico vs. Jay Lethal

This is a rematch from when Lethal won the title on I think the first episode. Bennett and Evans come out to watch the match. They exchange feeling out process stuff to start and fly around the ring a little bit. Generico is faster here but not by much. Generico takes over and hits what we would call Starship Pain for two. He gets sent to the floor and misses a moonsault off the barricade, allowing Lethal to pop him with a superkick as we take a break.

Back with lethal hooking a hold which is similar to a surfboard. The camera was on Bennett and Evans so it’s not like we got to see it or anything. There’s nothing to talk about here. Lethal does some stuff, Generico does some stuff. Generico hits a Mafia kick in the corner and we have about three minutes to go, which is accurate for once.

Lethal hits a handspring ala Tajiri into a cutter. Bennett picks up the TV Title belt and puts it on which doesn’t seem to mean much. They speed things way up and Lethal is knocked to the floor. Bennett taunts him and we finally get a brawl between them. Lethal drills him and takes Generico down back in the ring. He loads up the top rope elbow but Bennett gets the referee and it’s a time limit draw at 15:00.

Rating: C+. Yeah it’s fun but most importantly, THERE’S A FREAKING STORY TO THE MATCH!!! My goodness that’s nice to see. Bennett stealing the belt is an old idea but it’s still something that can work. Also they actually sold some shots in this, which is more than I can say for guys like Richards. Decent match, but I’d like to see some actual pins with this title on the line. It makes Lethal look weak that he can’t beat anyone clean.

Generico hits a big dive to all three of them and we’re told the title picture is now a three way race. You mean we’re including a guy that got beat and then was beaten again here but didn’t get pinned because the referee was distracted? Why is he involved in it?

Overall Rating: D+. It wasn’t the worst show they’ve ever had, but this isn’t going to be on my watch list for much longer. There’s nothing here and I don’t see why anyone would want to watch it. Richards vs. Edwards is boring me to tears as it’s all about who can strike the most and stealing a trainer. Instead of having Edwards turn heel and get a heel trainer, which would be interesting, they bring out Dan Severn because he’s an MMA guy and this is an MMA company, at least in the main event. Nothing to see here.

Results
Briscoe Brothers vs. Caprice Coleman/Cedric Alexander went to a no contest
Michael Elgin b. Raphael Constantine/Sean Casey – Double Alabama Slam
El Generico vs. Jay Lethal went to a time limit draw

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Smackdown
Date: November 25, 2011
Location: Mohegan Sun Arena, Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania
Commentators: Michael Cole, Booker T, Josh Matthews

After Survivor Series it looks like we’re moving closer to Show vs. Henry III at TLC. The build up for it looks like it’ll be a chair match which is fine as I don’t want to see them in a ladder match. Other than that, I’m not sure what else we could see on the show tonight. Hopefully the show before the live one next week should be good. Let’s get to it.

We open with a recap of Show vs. Henry at the PPV and Show breaking Mark’s leg post match.

Here’s Henry to open the show, on crutches. He talks about pain and says he’s hurt but not broken. The fans aren’t all that enthused with him. A champion fights through pain, but he can’t compete tonight due to Teddy Long. Here comes Big Show who complains about Henry intentionally lost but next time….and Henry says there won’t be a next time. They stare it down and Show knocks him out cold.

HERE’S BRYAN!!! HE CASHES IN THE CASE AND GETS THE TITLE (AFTER ROLLING HENRY OVER LIKE A BURRITO)!!! Cole loses his mind and calls Bryan a hypocrite as Bryan nearly breaks the title throwing it around so much. HUGE pop for the title change, but since the fans are interested in that, here’s Teddy to say that Henry wasn’t awake so it didn’t count. I guess if you cripple Bryan’s continuity you have to keep the MITB continuity to balance things out.

Cole’s celebration is great, cheering Teddy on the entire time. Henry gets up and takes the title back before leaving. Bryan gets the case back but is really ticked off. However, Teddy gives him the consolation of putting him in the main event with Barrett, Rhodes and Orton in a fatal fourway #1 contender match for the world title shot next Tuesday.

Justin Gabriel vs. Hunico

The title match next week is in a cage and Big Show gets the title shot at TLC. Hunico takes over and the announcers are ignoring everything going on in the match. Time for a chinlock and this match is far more boring than you would expect it to be. A slingshot dropkick puts Gabriel in the corner but he fights back and hits a corkscrew plancha to the floor. A Lionsault gets two. They go up to the corner where Gabriel gets knocked off. A Swanton Bomb ends this at 4:22.

Rating: D+. This got better once Gabriel went on offense but other than that everything was really dull. Gabriel can dive really well and I have no idea what the point was with having Hunico get a push. The guy is such a generic character and there’s no point to any of his push at all. He’ll get a mild push and then will fade back to FCW. Not much to see here.

Video on the European tour. Punk: “I can’t pronounce any of the cities we went to.”

Beth Phoenix/Natalya vs. AJ/Kaitlyn

Think this will be a squash? It’s the blue show so that means the evil ones will dominate. Alicia is on commentary with them here. Kaitlyn vs. Nattie gets us going and the Canadian one is in some trouble. I don’t see this lasting. Off to AJ and there goes the advantage. A rollup gets two for the smaller one. And there’s the Sharpshooter for the tap at 1:04. Kaitlyn doesn’t break it up that quickly.

The heels do the double beatdown post match and the CRY thing until Alicia makes the save. Kaitlyn isn’t really interested.

Kane is still coming back in the mask. My question about this is based on an old Chris Rock line: “We know what you look like!”

Teddy is in his office and says Foley is going to host next week. Cue the still hot Aksana who asks about mistletoe. Henry comes in to complain and says he’s injured. Teddy says he needs a huge main event and the doctors said Mark is ready to go. Henry gets all mad and we’re told it’s a cage match, which Matthews told us earlier. Mark is all mad and says Teddy will get his.

Sheamus and Ryder says they’ll be Broskis after Ryder gets the title. He sings a techno version of Sheamus’ song and Big Pasty gets all mad. Then he smiles and Ryder can breathe again.

Jack Swagger/Dolph Ziggler vs. Sheamus/Zack Ryder

Ryder comes out, and for the first time ever I see a star in him. Sheamus and Ziggler get us going and it’s a pretty nice chess game with both guys looking for control but not being able to get anything past a few seconds worth. Off to Swagger (two time world champion according to Josh) who takes the ten forearms in the ropes. Ziggler tries to cheat so Ryder goes aerial with a flip dive to the floor as we take a break.

Back to Sheamus who hits the slingshot shoulder block. He nearly botched it as he jumped late so his legs landed on the ropes for the most part. Swagger manages to get in a shot to bring Ziggy back in and momentum shifts again. Back to Jack very quickly but he misses the Vader Bomb. You know, he doesn’t do much very well anymore. Off to Ryder but Swagger doesn’t tag.

Broski Boot hits and everyone heads to the floor. Ryder beats up both guys on his own until the numbers finally catch up with him so that Swagger can hammer away a bit more. The fans cheer for Ryder as Ziggler’s elbow gets two. A double team Fameasser gets two on Ryder and a surprisingly big pop for the save by Sheamus. Dropkick gets two for the US Champion.

This match is getting some solid time. Swagger takes a cheap shot on Sheamus to draw him in with some solid tag team strategy. He puts Ryder on the top rope and slaps him. That wakes up the Jersey Shore dude, allowing him to get in a shot from the middle rope for the double tag. Sheamus vs. Ziggler now with Sheamus in total control. Swagger breaks up the High Cross as Ryder makes a blind tag. Brogue Kick puts Swagger down and the Rough Ryder pins Ziggler again at 12:20 shown of 16:50.

Rating: B. I liked this one a lot as the face team was seemingly thrown together but we got a fun tag match out of it. You don’t need to have much going on there but it works just the same if you can get the crowd into it. Having someone like Vickie and Ryder out there guarantees that, and we got a very fun match out of it. Good stuff.

Bryan complains to AJ about having it taken away earlier from him. Barrett comes up and runs his mouth so Bryan tells him off. He leaves and AJ kisses Bryan on the cheek.

Ted DiBiase vs. Heath Slater

Hey Slater still has a job. Who knew? Just after the bell, Jinder Mahal pops up on the screen and says something in whatever language that is. He complains about DiBiase hanging out with commoners in the parking lot like he’s been doing lately. Slater jumps DiBiase and we get going. We talk about Tim Tebow for a bit as Slater hammers away. He works on the arm a lot and the announcers ignore them. And never mind as Dream Street ends this at 4:50.

Rating: D. Nothing match here and I don’t know if they’re actually going to go with Mahal vs. DiBiase as it’s not the most interesting feud in the world. That being said it’s still better than nothing I suppose. Neither guy is all that interesting but it wasn’t a horrible match I suppose.

DiBiase takes a knee in prayer after the match.

We get a clip of Rhodes throwing the water in Booker’s face on Monday. Rhodes says he didn’t like hiding behind a mask and now he’s free to do whatever he wants to do.

Daniel Bryan vs. Randy Orton vs. Cody Rhodes vs. Wade Barrett

Winner gets Henry in a cage next week for the title and this is one fall to a finish. Barrett and Orton fight in the ring as Bryan and Rhodes go to the floor. Now we get to an interesting showdown with Orton vs. Bryan. And there’s a commercial before there’s any contact made at all. The pairings that started the match are back again, this time with the locations reversed.

The heels double team Bryan until it’s back to the two big stars. Orton escapes the pumphandle slam but Rhodes helps the Brit out and the double teaming continues. Bryan comes back with a missile dropkick but what appears to be a top rope rana attempt is countered into a Doomsday Device by Rhodes and Barrett for two. We take another break and come back to see Orton get two on Rhodes via a suplex.

A big boot puts Orton on the floor and a Boss Man Slam gets two on Bryan. The Beautiful Disaster gets two on him as well. Rhodes is sent to the floor so Bryan hits a big suicide dive to put him down. Orton comes back in and loads up his ending sequence on Barrett. Bryan kicks Orton’s head off for two. Rhodes takes over on Orton for a bit but Randy fights back and pulls off a superplex but Barrett comes in to steal the two count.

Everyone is down in the ring but Orton gets up first. He throws the heels to the floor and hooks the elevated DDT on Bryan. Here comes the RKO but Barrett pulls him to the floor and plants him with a DDT. Cody tries to steal the pin on Bryan but Bryan reverses itno the LeBell Lock for the nearly instant tap at 11:47 shown of 18:47.

Rating: C+. This was long and there were a lot of good spots, but the problem was that it felt like it was all over the place. The commercials were at odd times as well which made things a little awkward. Still though, pretty good match and for a TV main event, I don’t think anyone can say it was bad.

Rhodes beats down Bryan but walks into an RKO.

Overall Rating: B+. Very solid show tonight with a lot of stuff happening here. Most importantly, how nice is it to see something new being entered into the main event for Tuesday? Instead of seeing something like Orton vs. Henry again, we’re getting a breath of fresh air in there and that’s all it needs to be. Good things all around here tonight.

Results
Hunico b. Justin Gabriel – Swanton Bomb
Beth Phoenix/Natalya b. AJ/Kaitlyn – Sharpshooter to AJ
Sheamus/Zack Ryder b. Jack Swagger/Dolph Ziggler – Rough Ryder to Ziggler
Ted DiBiase b. Heath Slater – Dream Street
Daniel Bryan b. Randy Orton, Wade Barrett and Cody Rhodes – LeBell Lock to Rhodes

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Impact Wrestling
Date: November 24, 2011
Location: Impact Zone, Orlando, Florida
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Taz

It’s Turkey Day here in the Impact Zone and that usually means a pretty fun show from these guys. There’s always the chance of the return of the turkey suit which thankfully isn’t coming out of a huge egg and dancing with a bald interviewer. Expect a bit more build towards Final Resolution but the majority of things should be a bit lighter tonight, which is fine. Let’s get to it.

We open with a video of last week with Storm looking for his attacker with Angle being the reveal at the end of the show. There’s still tension between Storm and AJ.

Here’s Angle, who along with Storm will captain teams for an elimination tag later. On Thanksgiving? You don’t say! Kurt says it wasn’t an attack from behind. James just didn’t see him coming. Cue Storm who says this is beyond personal. It’s business now and if Angle says he won’t jump someone from behind, here’s his chance to fight face to face. Angle says this is about Storm stealing the title from Angle so Angle cost him the title in Georgia. Immortal plus Daniels comes out so Storm SHOWS HE HAS A BRAIN by hitting Angle once and running. Anderson, AJ and RVD come out for the big brawl.

Eric Young brings an old referee back on a homemade bicycle. Rudy Charles brings out the turkey suit.

We recap Mexican America losing the tag titles last week to Morgan/Crimson.

Tag Titles: Mexican America vs. Crimson/Matt Morgan

A big brawl to start is won by the champions and it’s down to Anarquia vs. Morgan. The beating begins as the champions pound him down. A double chokeslam ends this in 1:57. Total squash.

Eric Young says Sting has said there’s officially a turkey suit challenge later on. It’s a regular match and the loser has to wear the suit. Rob Terry gives him a pat down and says he’s not on the list. If Robbie doesn’t do it, he’s stripped of the title. The Robs go to find Sting and Young admits Sting didn’t say any of that.

Here are Karen and her associates. She calls out five of the Knockouts (Tara, Tessmacher, Winter, Angelina and Velvet) and gets them very quickly. The fans want a rematch but the fans (according to Karen) want more skin. Tonight it’s the first lingerie ball.

The face Knockouts whine about the match. Yeah…..I’d buy that if the pigeons weren’t always being let loose.

The heel Knockouts are happy when Mickie comes in to yell at Gail in private. They leave the door open and Mickie yells at Gail for going against whatever she said when she wasn’t in there. Mickie gets beaten down.

Angelina Love/Winter/Madison Rayne vs. Tara/Velvet Sky/Brooke Tessmacher

They’re all in lingerie/thongs. The anger over it isn’t working at all but they look good. Scratch the thongs actually. It’s a regular six person tag. Winter shows off and looks good like that. Tessmacher rips her shirt off and is in the exact same thing she wrestles in. For chicks that are ticked off, they don’t seem to mind posing on the ropes. Velvet is in less clothing than usual. They have a pose off until FINALLY the evil ones jump them. There’s a quick commercial as Tara and Winter get us going.

Back with the good chicks in control and Tessmacher gives Winter a Stink Face. Yeah we get it: it’s embarrassing or whatever. Do an actual move please. Tessmacher gets beaten down as Taz is talking about Helen Keller. Madison is far more covered than she usually is. Hot tag finally brings in Velvet and house is cleaned. Madison grabs a belt but Mickie comes out for the save. Velvet’s bad facebuster ends this at 13:18.

Rating: F. Dumb premise, dumb anger, no thongs, dumb match.

Here’s Hardy in a mask but it’s actually Jeff Jarrett. He wants to know why the fans love Hardy. Is it because he looks like a clown? Perhaps the bizarre promos or the stupid chances he takes for the fans. Jarrett wants Hardy’s fans to grow up and embarrass the company they work for. Here’s Hardy at a full sprint to beat down Jarrett. Immortal plus Daniels makes the save. Immortal comes out (plus Daniels and Roode….oh no) and here’s Team Storm for the save. Jarrett sends Hardy into the steps and then does it again. Immortal stands tall.

We get a history of the turkey suit match which is one of those funny things that you can get in wrestling.

Robbie E vs. Eric Young

Robbie jumps him on the floor and beats up the turkey suit also. This is non title. Rudy counts really slowly. He won’t drop the suit for the count and we’re in a total comedy match here. Robbie gets what was presumably loaded punch for the pin at 2:14. The referee sees it and reverses the decision. Oh wait he restarts the match. Robbie shoves the referee and a piledriver ends this clean. Total comedy match and there isn’t a thing wrong with that.

Big Rob has to put on the suit because Robbie is out cold.

Rudy and Eric train for next year on a bike but Rudy crashes.

Team Angle vs. Team Storm

AJ Styles, Mr. Anderson, Rob Van Dam, Jeff Hardy
Jeff Jarrett, Bully Ray, Christopher Daniels, Bobby Roode

There’s been talk all night about Hardy being on the team but he’s not mentioned here. Storm is in street clothes. Oh wait Angle and Storm aren’t wrestling. Ok then. So it’s 4-3? This is an elimination style match so it’s Survivor Series rules. Roode sits in on commentary because he’s not loose yet. AJ vs. Daniels gets us off because we need something new. After nothing of note happens there it’s off to Jarrett vs. Anderson.

Van Dam comes in and this is starting pretty slowly. Rob gets caught in the corner and Ray takes over on him with a splash. Not hot tag to Anderson who takes over with some elbows and a neckbreaker for two. Ray hits a Rock Bottom and Roode heads to the ring. He steals a tag and gets the pin on Anderson to make it 4-3 or 4-2 depending on how you look at it.

Here’s AJ to speed things way up with a backdrop. I think the ankle is ok now. Roode hits him low right in front of the referee for….not a DQ. Ok yeah it was but there was no bell. Ah there’s the announcement. We take a break as Daniels pounds on AJ. Back with Ray coming in to beat down AJ even more. AJ counters Angel’s Wings into a rana and then the Pele puts Daniels down.

Hot tag brings in RVD who cleans house with various kicks. Rolling Thunder puts Daniels down but Angle breaks up the Five Star. He and Storm fight up the ramp but RVD gets rolled up and pinned to make it 3-1. Daniels is bleeding from the mouth. It’s a 3-1 beatdown and Ray tells Daniels to give him the moonsault. It eats knees/feet because Ray shouted GIVE HIM THE MOONSAULT. Ray accidentally takes out Jarrett and a Pele puts Ray down.

Cue Hardy as all four are down. He’s pulling his pants up as he comes out. What was he doing before that??? Hardy slips on the apron as he comes out but there’s the hot tag anyway. He cleans house and the Twist takes out Daniels to tie things up. Twist to Jarrett is countered so Hardy gets a small package to take him out instead. A HUGE boot takes Hardy down for two and Jarrett hammers on Hardy a bit more. AJ makes a blind tag and hits the forearm on Ray to win it at 18:45.

Rating: C-. Not bad here and it makes Hardy look like a star which is the right idea. It’s nothing we haven’t seen a bunch before but it didn’t need to be. Hardy stands tall and we’ll get to some post match stuff here in a few seconds. For a Thanksgiving show main event, this was certainly fine.

Roode lays out both winners with the belt post match.

Overall Rating: C. I’m going with right in the middle here. On a normal week this would have been around an F, but the thing you have to remember here is that it’s Thanksgiving. There’s no reason to assume this show was going to be anything of note and it wasn’t supposed to be. No one is going to watch the show, so why waste anything big on it? You see Raw do this a lot and there’s nothing wrong with that. Not an interesting show, but all things considered this was fine. Well ok it was bad but there are a lot of things to consider on it.

Results
Matt Morgan/Crimson b. Mexican America – Double chokeslam to Anarquia
Brooke Tessmacher/Tara/Velvet Sky b. Winter/Angelina Love/Madison Rayne – BeauDT to Rayne
Eric Young b. Robbie E – Piledriver
Team Storm b. Team Angle last eliminating Bully Ray

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NXT
Date: November 23, 2011
Location: Mohegan Sun Arena, Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania
Commentators: Matt Striker, William Regal

It’s the Thanksgiving week show and the show is somehow back up to three finalists. Only this show could go from two finalists to three to two to three again and take a few months to do so. This is the 38th episode of the season, putting this on the verge of being as long as the first three seasons combined. I thought just the third was ridiculous but this passed that long ago. Let’s get to it.

Here’s Young to open the show with I believe new music. We get a clip of Young beating up O’Neil and his finisher is called the Gut Check. It’s the fireman’s carry into a double knee to the ribs. Young says this is his show and wants to know where the people were last week when he beat O’Neil down. Is there a difference between being beaten up and being beaten down? He says his usual stuff about how he’s done a ton of stuff and how O’Neil hasn’t done anything.

Cue Reks and Hawkins of all people who say that the only thing Young accomplished was jumping Titus, which they’ve done a bunch of times. They’re impressed with Young and say they’re very similar. They think he has the It Factor but here are O’Neil and Watson. They make fun of Reks’ lack of charisma and cut Young off. Titus talks about getting eliminated a year ago in this town but he’s back to show his agenda. There’s the brawl but Striker makes O’Neil/Watson vs. Reks/Young.

Yoshi Tatsu vs. Johnny Curtis

Bateman and Maxine are on commentary for no apparent reason. We talk about the wedding and then realize that’s stupid so we talk about Johnny Curtis. That makes it stupider so let’s talk about the wedding again. Regal offers to explain the misery of being married, since he’s been married 16 times. Regal talks about Bateman’s mother in law and implies sex. He even admits they’re ignoring the match. Can’t fault him for lying.

Curtis goes to the apron for a slingshot legdrop and shakes his hips at Maxine. Regal: “I think that was for me. At my age you have to take what you can get.” Suplex gets two for Curtis. Bateman makes another joke about Curtis and Maxine dating so they walk off. The wedding is in eight weeks, which I guess means we’ll be here until January. Yoshi fires off the chops and a spinwheel kick puts Johnny down. The top rope spinwheel kick ends this at 4:35.

Rating: C. This was fine. Yoshi is a solid hand while Curtis….well he’s Johnny Curtis. That should summarize this match as well as I can put it together. Not much to see here but it advances Bateman vs. Curtis I guess because we need to see it right? Not much to see here but Yoshi’s stuff is always fun to see.

Bateman goes to the ring post match but doesn’t attack Curtis.

Maxine and Bateman argue more in the back about what Curtis did during the date. She cancels sex until future notice. Curtis comes in and implies Maxine wants him.

Here are the Usos who do their dance before their promo. Jimmy talks about being nervous every time they come out here. They represent every Samoan ever in wrestling history. Jey talks about people like Yokozuna, the Wild Samoans, Umaga (didn’t expect to hear that name) and Rikishi. They talk about how Uso means brother but saying Us (pronounced Oos) can mean friend, close person, etc. They start a call and response chant with the audience of we say Us, you say O, which gets a surprisingly strong response. The fans like these guys.

This brings out JTG and Tamina, who says this isn’t about heritage because she’s an independent woman. Let’s have a match.

JTG vs. Jimmy Uso

Jimmy knocks him to the floor quickly so he can glare at Tamina a bit. Off to a chinlock by JTG as we list off the huge Samoan family tree. Stinger style splash in the corner hits JTG and there’s the running him smash in the corner, which is credited to Rikishi but it’s an Umaga move I believe. A superkick and frog splash are enough for the pin at 3:50.

Rating: C-. Why are the Usos on NXT? The fans like them, they’re decent in the ring, they have a gimmick, and they’re on NXT. I have no idea what the thought of this company is about them, but they’re more than good enough to be something on one of the main shows, but they’re not getting that at all here. It’s WWE I guess.

Percy Watson/Titus O’Neil vs. Darren Young/Tyler Reks

Young vs. Watson gets us going. My goodness what a difference a gimmick change makes for Watson. O’Neil comes in and Young runs. He’s now the Big Deal Titus O’Neil. Reks talks trash so Titus hammers him in the face. This goes on for awhile until Watson comes in and cleans house. The heels go to the floor so Percy dives onto them as we take a break. Back with Titus getting two on Reks off a move we don’t see.

Back to Watson who doesn’t do as well. We talk about Bateman getting a Smackdown contract and we hear about how this season is about getting to one of the main shows. So at least there’s no talk of season 6. Regal talks about WWE 12. “I HAVE ABS!!!” Young hooks a chinlock on Watson to eat up some time. Gordbuster gets two for Reks. There’s your double tag to Young and O’Neil but Hawkins throws in the cane, so that the Gut Check can end Titus at 11:00.

Rating: D+. Boring main event here with neither team being interesting in being out there it seems. We have a heel team now I guess which is fine, but I’ll spare you the drill here on “but where is this going”. We’ve been past that for a very long time and there’s no point in saying it all the time. Too long of a main event though.

Overall Rating: D+. Pretty ho-hum stuff tonight with not much going on of note. This was more of a show about advancing the existing storylines rather than adding anything new to the mix. In other words, if you liked the rest of the storylines, you’ll like this. Nothing to see here for the most part though and it wasn’t much of a show.

Results
Yoshi Tatsu b. Johnny Curtis – Top Rope Spinwheel Kick
Jimmy Uso b. JTG – Frog Splash
Darren Young/Tyler Reks b. Percy Watson/Tyler Reks – Gut Check to O’Neil

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Best of the WWF Volume 16
Host: Gene Okerlund, Outback Jack, Frenchy Martin
Commentator: Gorilla Monsoon

This one has a theme tying it together: we’re going Around The World. I don’t see this ending well. The tape would be from the late 80s, I’d be 87-88 from the looks of things. Well, I certainly like that era so I could think of worst things that we could be looking at. Let’s get to it.

The hosts say nothing of note at all.

Giant Machine vs. Tatsumi Fujinami

This is from Japan (duh) and Tatsumi is the face (duh part 2). We have Japanese commentary here so I have no idea what’s going on. The information I can find says this is from 1985. Oh and Giant Mask is Andre the Giant of course. Tatsumi goes for the leg to start so Andre punches him in the face and suplexes him. Fujinami was the father of a lot of what we would call Cruiserweight stuff so this is a lopsided pairing.

Andre grabs an armpit claw so Fujinami goes for the mask, getting locked in an armbar for his efforts. Tatsumi manages to get him down and tries a Boston Crab but Andre shrugs it off with relative ease. A big boot misses and Tatsumi gets an enziguri to take Andre down to one knee. He pounds away but Andre is like boy please. Tatsumi hits a sunset flip but the referee is distracted by Andre’s manager, so Fujinami slams the referee for the lame DQ.

Rating: D. There’s only so much Fujinami can do here due to the size but Andre sold like I’ve rarely seen him do which was a nice thing to see. This was a style and size clash which really became a problem. Not a horrible match, but this was only going to be able to be so good all things considered. Fujinami is usually awesome.

The hosts talk about Gene going to Japan. Sure why not. He annoys some people and makes Mr. Fuji jokes. Gene goes to a record store and finds the Wrestling Album. He goes into a huge tower and looks at various things, but mainly spies on women at a swimming pool.

Jumping Bomb Angels vs. Bull Nakano/Condor Saito

Nakano is a little famous but isn’t as crazy looking here. I don’t know the Angels’ names so we’ll go with white and black since those are the colors of their outfits. No idea if there’s a story here or not. Big brawl to start and it’s white vs. Saito to get us going. I don’t know if she’s related to Mr. Saito or not. Nakano has some trouble so it’s back to Saito again. She hooks a leglock on black angel as these girls are LOUD.

Condor works over black angel for a good while and this is hard hitting stuff. These aren’t the Divas out there with cute outfits and three pounds of makeup either. They’re fighting hard and having good matches, which you never see anymore. Condor beats the tar out of white and it’s back to Nakano. I don’t think there’s been three straight seconds with no screaming in this.

White does the bridge out of the pin attempt that she used at Survivor Series 87 and messed up the timekeeper with. The Angels double team a lot to take over as this is pure power vs. speed. White vs. Condor now and White hooks a Figure Four. Now Condor bridges out of a pin. Is that just a Japanese thing? The heels (?) double team Black now with Nakano having a nunchuck or something like one. Black takes over with a cross body and everything breaks down again. They spill outside and it’s a double countout.

Rating: C+. Fun match here as joshi is something that is always fired up and intense beyond belief which is was here. The heels would be less famous than their opponents and I’ve never heard of Condor before but she’s pretty and this was a solid performance from here. Knowing what was going on would have helped a lot here.

Gene insults his third culture by having a head scarf on now.

Mr. Fuji vs. ???

This is in Kuwait and we’re not getting any English commentary on this whole tape are we? This is joined in progress with Fuji in control. Allegedly the guy is from the Kuwaiti royal family. He’s blonde and looks like a cross between Flair and Tommy Rich. I think this is outside. We’re told that this is about 5 minutes in. Ok then. Out to the floor quickly and I have no idea who thought this tape was a good idea. This is a squash and the Cobra Clutch ends it. I have no idea why this is on here.

Barry O/Mike Sharpe vs. Killer Bees

Now let’s get to something STUPID. We’re in Puerto Rico for this and it’s outside. The catch: it’s POURING rain. I mean there are puddles in the ring. The ring looks like something you would see at an elementary school based indy company. Thankfully Gorilla is on commentary here (he was the owner/promoter of a Puerto Rican company and sold interest to Vince in exchange for lifetime employment. There’s your trivia for the review) so I know what’s going on.

Sharpe vs. Blair with Sharpe accidentally hitting Barry O (as in Orton, Randy’s uncle) for some heel miscommunication. Off to Brunzell (I think, it’s that hard to see) and this is ridiculous. They can’t take a single step without water going everywhere. This is clearly a safe working environment right? Barry gets beaten down for awhile until the heels cheat or maybe Brunzell slipped. The referee falls down as everyone is slipping. Brunzell rolls up Sharpe out of mercy to end this.

Rating: N/A. It wouldn’t be fair to rate this match as they couldn’t perform like they’re supposed to due to the water. The match was nothing to see but the weather was, which isn’t something you often can say.

Ultimate Warrior vs. Hercules

From Italy, likely around 88. The commentary is in Italian but at least I know who everyone is. They walk around a lot before much contact is made. Mania 4 is mentioned so I’d bet this is post that show, which was on 3/27/88. Very basic power match here with Warrior in control for the most part. Warrior drops him with the press slam but misses a splash to put both guys down. Full nelson goes on but Warrior easily breaks it. Herc is no Masterpiece I guess. They fight to the floor for a weak double countout. This was nothing.

Jim Duggan vs. Andre the Giant

I think this is from the same show as the Warrior match. Stalling to start as Duggan won’t put the board down. Remember that this is in Italian so it’s hard to tell what’s going on. The referees like talking about the referee’s name (Tim White) for some reason. We finally get going and Duggan charges right into a punch and let the fat man offense begin. Andre sends him to the floor and does the Duggan thumb up. Ok point for a funny idea.

Andre hammers him with the basic offense that he was known for….well that he was always known for. He sits on Duggan in the corner and we hear about Hulk a bit. Duggan fires away and Andre has a headache. Off to a choke and this is going nowhere fast. Andre chokes with his strap as he is known to do and they talk about White again. What is up with that?

I think I’m learning Italian from this. Referee is publico and Duggan is translated to Hacksaw Jim. Duggan fights back and gets Andre tied up in the ropes as is his custom where he pounds away. Andre’s strap is down which is a weird look for him. He escapes and pounds away as we get a Hogan chant. Andre covers his ears, allowing Duggan to get in a shot. Andre misses a kneeling headbutt but a boot/splash ends this.

Rating: D-. Andre was in horrible shape here but the Hogan chant and Andre covering his ears made me chuckle a bit. This feud went on forever and never went anywhere, other than Duggan knocking him out with the board to the head once. The match was bad, but it was due to Andre’s horrible condition (not his fault).

Duggan fights back with the board post match.

Gene is now in Australian Outback gear. We go to the Outback where Gene is with a koala bear. He talks to some Australian guy and asks about the WWF and fish. And here’s Ricky Steamboat. Well he’s more entertaining than anything else so far. He has a koala as well and now let’s go look at some kangaroos. Steamboat’s shorts leave very little to the imagination. SD Jones and Paul Roma are in the background for some reason. Steamboat names the kangaroo Henry. Jones and Roma come in and praise the fans a bit and Australia is awesome!

Jack and Frenchy argue for no apparent reason.

Now it’s time to hear about where Outback Jack is from. He’s from Humpty-Doo. I kid you not. We see what I believe were all the skits and promos about him coming. First up we see him looking at a crocodile and he says if you can take it here, you can take it anywhere. Now he’s in a jeep and goes to a bar for a beer. Now he beats someone armwrestling with a bunch of empty beer cans next to him. Now a cow is drinking beer. Now Aborigines are painting his face around a fire. Now he’s wrestling some big animal. Now he’s walking in the woods. Now we’re done. WHAT WAS THAT???

Harley Race vs. Junkyard Dog

This is in Paris from 87 and Race is the King. Andre the Giant is referee and is a member of the Heenan Family with Race so guess what happens here. Dog takes over to start and Race sells like crazy for him. Andre cheats as a referee as French commentary gets on my nerves. Race takes over because he’s awesome and this is really needing to end soon. Chinlock time which doesn’t last long at least. Dog suplexes him for a cover but Andre won’t count.

Race clotheslines him down and it’s back to the chinlock. Uh Dog, you can move you know. Out to the floor for nothing of note. GET TO THE ENDING PEOPLE! Dog Barks Up and pounds away but Andre gets in his face. Powerslam gets no count because Andre is evil you see. A belly to belly and a headbutt set up another headbutt but Race hurts his head this time. The on all fours headbutts put Race down again but Race hits him in the throat. Race wins for some reason off that.

Rating: F. This. Got. Ten. Minutes. I can’t imagine what could be left on here, but I’m almost done.

The hosts argue even more.

Fabulous Rougeau Brothers vs. New Dream Team

In France still and the New Dream Team is Bravo/Valentine. We have 11 minutes in the tape to go. I can get through this. I know I can. Joined in progress for no apparent reason. Ray is in trouble and the fans cheer for the French boys. Valentine gets caught with a knee to the balls so Bravo comes in again. Time for a bearhug to keep the high level of this tape going. A piledriver is countered but Jacques can’t get a tag in.

Valentine mocks wanting to box Jacques for no apparent reason. The beating goes on like six minutes and Bravo hits his side suplex finisher on Ray but it’s not a finisher yet I don’t guess as Ray pops up and takes Bravo down. There’s the hot tag and everything breaks down. Sleeper to Valentine but Bravo breaks it up. A figure four is attempted but Ray sunset flips Valentine for the pin.

Rating: D. It’s a bit better, but good night would it have killed them to give us ANY bigger named team? Horribly dull match and I don’t even want to think about how much longer this could have been. Weak match but given how weak the teams were in there (bad time for the Rougeaus at this point) and a perfect ending to an AWFUL tape.

Overall Rating: Who. As in WHO THOUGHT THIS WAS A GOOD IDEA????? I mean MAN this was horrible. Out of like 8 matches, one has English commentary. The biggest star on the tape is I guess Duggan, and if this was from 88 he’s probably the third or fourth biggest face in the company. No Hogan, no Savage, no DiBiase, no one interesting in other words. I have no idea what the thinking here was, but this somehow has taken the spot of worst Coliseum Video ever, and if you’re familiar with that series, you get what that means. Get me ANYTHING else to watch please.

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