Thunder
Date: March 4, 1999
Location: Lawrence Joel Memorial Coliseum, Winston-Salem, North Carolina
Attendance: 4,198
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan

We’re coming off a good Nitro (I’m as shocked as you are) and have ten days before Uncensored. The main stories seem to be a bunch of rematches from SuperBrawl, which isn’t the worst idea as the matches weren’t bad but the decisions were all wrong. Hopefully things are a bit better this time, though granted that would only make the show horrible. Let’s get to it.

We open with a clip from Nitro where Arn Anderson yelled at David Flair and the Blonde.

Ric and Arn are in the back and Arn doesn’t know what to do about David. Ric recaps the story with his son and says it leads to the rematch with Hogan at Uncensored. He isn’t changing a thing because David has to grow up on his own. Arn blames the Blonde and says Ric would have done the same thing when he was nineteen years old. Ric says when he was David’s age, he wasn’t stealing money out of his dad’s pocket or stabbing him with a stun gun.

Anderson hopes that this is just a game face because Ric isn’t this cold. Flair brings up the latest NWO parody and says he’ll be World Champion again. He’ll love David forever, but if David wants to run around with the NWO, he isn’t going to worry about it. Arn says if that was his son, there’s no way he could be out there in front of a crowd. Flair says he’s doing this to prove he’s still the man and that Hogan and the NWO haven’t changed anything. This was a lengthy chat but it helps clarify a few things.

The announcers do their welcome and recap.

We go back to Nitro to see Flair announce the cage match. This video takes us up to fifteen minutes into the show.

Video of Monday’s main event.

Rick Steiner vs. Hugh Morrus

Rick quickly sends him to the floor and bites the ropes. Back in and Morrus pounds away but gets caught in a powerslam. Jimmy Hart gets in a few cheap shots from the floor but it has almost no effect as Morrus is still in trouble. Another assist from Jimmy lets Morrus hit some running splashes in the corner but he takes too long going up for No Laughing Matter, allowing Rick to catch him in an electric chair. The Steiner Bulldog is good for the pin.

Rating: D+. This was nothing and it’s not a good sign for the rest of the show. I just waited twenty four minutes to get to a three and a half minute Rick Steiner squash. Why does this make me think that the next hour and a half is going to be a REALLY long sit? The match wasn’t long enough to be horrible but it was just a squash.

There was a commercial for Monday Nitro. In the video we saw Wrath, Randy Savage (where has he been since the night after Starrcade? He showed up there and hasn’t been seen since) and Syxx. As in the guy that showed up on Raw after Wrestlemania LAST YEAR. This is worse than the Steiner Brothers being in the Nitro intro seven months after they split up.

Here are Benoit and Malenko with something to say. Benoit congratulates the new Tag Team Champions and says they have no problem with losing to a better team. They do however have a problem with losing the way they lost. There will be vengeance Horsemen style. Malenko talks about Benoit’s Swan Dive off the top of the cage and pulls off his belt. He promises that Windham and Hennig will not leave Louisville with the Tag Team Titles. The rematch is going to be a lumberjack strap match.

Back from a break and we get an ad for Saturday Night. These air every week but two of the matches advertised are Juventud Guerrera vs. Rey Mysterio Jr. and Barbarian vs. Meng. Remember those before you read the next match on this show.

Al Greene vs. Sonny Onoo/Ernest Miller

Yes, REALLY. I know Meng vs. Barbarian would be a mess, but it would be a fun mess. On the other hand, this is the preferred method of torture in 19 countries. Announced for Uncensored, Sonny Onoo/Ernest Miller vs. Jerry Flynn. My jaw is hanging open after hearing that. I mean……wow I’ve got nothing. Miller does the whole warning thing to Greene but Al jumps him from behind.

What appeared to be a botched gorilla press sets up a headlock on Miller but he sends Greene to the floor. Sonny offers a distraction so Miller can take over as Tony talks about stipulations for the World Title match that you can only find out about at WCW.com. Back in and Miller drops Al with a superkick before tagging in Sonny. Greene is out cold and Sonny gets an easy pin.

Rating: D-. It could have been Mysterio vs. Guerrera but instead it’s being used to set up a Jerry Flynn match on pay per view. That’s all I need to say.

Gene brings out Perry Saturn, now in a dog collar with chains around his neck, for a chat. Saturn refers to himself as the Bald Bombshell because chicks dig a guy in a dress. Saturn says if Jericho has a chain fetish, let’s have a dog collar match at Uncensored. Jericho comes out and says he wants to keep this company rated G (there are SO many jokes) and get rid of all the R Rated freaks. If he has to tie a collar around his neck to get rid of Saturn, that’s what he’ll do. Saturn promises to wear an outfit so freaky that it’s going to shock Marilyn Manson.

Prince Iaukea vs. Bam Bam Bigelow

Iaukea scores with some early kicks but his cross body has no effect at all. Bigelow sends him to the floor and hits some slow motion forearms to the back. Inside again and we hit the chinlock as Tony talks about March being perfect for Uncensored because it’s such an unpredictable month. Right. Anyway, more choking gets Bigelow two and we hit an armbar to kill more time. Iaukea’s offense of course has no effect and Greetings From Asbury Park finally ends this.

Rating: D. This was long and dull with the announcers ignoring almost everything in the whole match. Bigelow getting a push is fine but could we find someone more interesting than dryer lint for him to fight? I’m glad he’s moving down into the midcard scene where he belongs though as the top level push didn’t have much staying power.

This Week in WCW Motorsports.

Vince/Horace vs. Curt Hennig/Barry Windham

This match sounds interesting at this point. Let that sink in for a minute. Non-title of course as a title match might be too interesting. Horace grabs a headlock on Hennig to start but Curt nails him with a clothesline. Stevie Ray comes out to brawl with Vince, leaving Horace alone two on one. Cue the Horsemen to attack the champions and it’s a fast DQ.

The champions bail before too much happens.

Here’s Hacksaw Jim Duggan, who hasn’t been seen in months since announcing that he has cancer. Duggan thanks God for letting him get back here and of course some fans boo. He thanks the fans and WCW for supporting him throughout this whole ordeal. Duggan says he’s proud to be part of World Championship Wrestling and thanks the doctor for removing his kidney to prevent the cancer from spreading. He tells us that if something looks or feels wrong, get to the doctor and get it checked out because early detection saves lives.

Duggan isn’t sure if he’s coming back to the ring, but he promises that he won’t be making any obscene gestures of saying any foul words. All he needs are his board and the American flag. If he gets a second chance, the last twenty years will be nothing compared to what he’ll do in the next few years. He says to remember that we are one nation under God and leads a USA chant before leaving. This was a very cool moment and brought a smile to my face. I got to meet Duggan at Axxess earlier this year and he couldn’t have been a nicer guy so it’s cool to hear stuff like this.

Cruiserweight Title: Chavo Guerrero Jr. vs. Kidman

Kidman is defending. Feeling out process to start and Chavo actually gives him a clean break. Chavo is sent to the floor and taken down with a big dive, followed by a slingshot legdrop back inside. Kidman misses a charge into the corner and a springboard bulldog drops the champion.

Back up and Kidman sends him into the buckle and nails a clothesline. The announcers talk about Mysterio becoming a legend for his victories over Nash and Bigelow, earning him a rematch with Nash at Uncensored. A Gory Bomb gets two for Chavo and we hit a chinlock on the champion. Back up and Kidman misses a charge, sending him out to the floor.

Guerrero sends him into the barricade and then back inside for another chinlock. Kidman sends him to the floor before bringing him back inside for two off a high cross body. Chavo avoids a charge in the corner and gets the pin but Kidman’s feet are on the ropes. Guerrero goes up top but gets powerbombed down, setting up the Shooting Star to retain Kidman’s title.

Rating: C+. This was nowhere near as good as the Psychosis match on Monday but it was still far better than everything I’ve sat through on this show. Kidman is becoming an ace at this point and is one of the most consistently entertaining guys on the roster. Chavo is very good in his own right and has gotten far better after losing Pepe.

We get a sitdown interview from Hogan with Hollywood talking about everyone hating him, even his family. He did the Hulk Hogan thing for the money, unlike Flair who is out there because he loves wrestling and wants to be cheered one more time. That makes him worse than Hogan could ever be because Hogan has a grip on reality.

Hogan loves that David Flair gave up everything his father did for him for a good looking woman. Ric Flair is the rottenest human being on this planet and all he wants is control of this business. Flair can have one more chance, but Hogan wants Flair to quit if he loses. He goes on and on about how much he hates Flair and how much it’s driven him as this somehow takes over six minutes.

Buff Bagwell vs. Booker T.

Before the match, Buff says he’d rather be paralyzed again than be in Winston-Salem. Feeling out process to start with Bagwell taking him down with an armdrag before dancing around a bit. Booker comes back with a slam and quick vertical suplex to send Buff out to the floor. Back in and Buff hammers away before nailing a dropkick. Mr. T. grabs an armbar before kicking Bagwell in the face. Buff sends him outside and poses a lot. A chinlock goes nowhere and Booker comes back with his usual stuff. The referee gets kicked down and Scott Steiner comes in with a chair to Booker’s back, setting up Buff’s Blockbuster for the pin.

Rating: D-. If you want to know what it means when the wrestlers phone in a match, this is a perfect example. Neither guy had any energy or emotion out there, which is usually something you can depend on from Booker. Speaking of Booker, did we REALLY need to have Buff Bagwell pin him, cheating or not? The guy is getting a US Title shot in nine days (against Scott Hall, who hasn’t been seen in awhile) and he loses to Buff Bagwell? Really?

Overall Rating: F. The best part of this show was a tie between the Duggan promo and a pretty good Chavo vs. Kidman match. Everything else was a waste of time a textbook example of why Thunder didn’t need to exist. It feels like nothing has happened on the show in months and this was as dull as it’s gotten yet. This was absolutely awful and makes me want to watch Uncensored even less than I did before.

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Monday Nitro #177
Date: February 22, 1999
Location: Arco Arena, Sacramento, California
Attendance: 13,921
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan, Larry Zbyszko

We’re FINALLY past SuperBrawl and things couldn’t be much lower for WCW if they handed all the wrestlers shovels and told them to dig their own graves. Hogan is still World Champion, Windham and Hennig are Tag Team Champions, Scott Hall is US Champion, Scott Steiner is TV Champion, and Rey Mysterio doesn’t have a mask. We’ve got three weeks before Uncensored, so hopefully things can improve a bit tonight. Let’s get to it.

We open with stills of the main event from last night with the Blonde interfering, setting up the masked David Flair to stun Ric and keep the title on Hogan.

The announcers introduce the show with Tony talking about how they’ve seen the Blonde for the last few weeks. You could have fooled me as they never MENTIONED her but apparently they did see her.

There’s an interview room set up in the back for David and Ric to have a sitdown meeting later.

There’s a Nitro Party at the University of California Berkeley as part of the countdown to Spring Breakout in five weeks.

Video on the Nitro Girls at Cal Berkeley.

Nitro Girls.

Stills of Goldberg vs. Bigelow.

Jerry Flynn vs. Mike Enos

Are they serious? They air the show they aired last night and now we get to sit through what is likely going to be a Jerry Flynn squash? This show is already getting on my nerves. Who looks at Jerry Flynn and sees someone that wrestling fans want to see winning matches? We’re coming off a pay per view with major ramifications and instead of seeing fallout, we get ten minutes of stills and Nitro Party stuff and now a jobber vs. jobber match. This company deserved everything it got in 1999.

Enos shoves him into the corner to start but gets kicked in the face and knocked to the mat. Flynn comes back with more kicks because he’s Ernest Miller with a mullet and no charisma. Enos throws Jerry outside and hits a clothesline off the apron followed by a slam. Back in and Jerry puts on an ankle lock but Enos easily gets up. Some kicks in the corner set up a cross armbreaker to make Enos tap out.

Rating: D. A Jerry Flynn match that consisted of a lot of kicking followed by some bad looking submission holds? But now he’s winning instead of getting beaten up by Goldberg. The match wasn’t horrible but it was just so uninteresting that there was nothing worth paying attention to.

The Blonde makes sure David is ready to talk to his father face to face.

Booker T. is ready and promises a lot of people will get the Harlem Hangover. Tonight he has Bret Hart and Gene says that surely the winner gets a US Title shot. Bret better be ready to go all night long.

Back to Cal Berkeley for more festivities. I have a bad feeling about the next month.

Scott Norton is back from Japan and Vince tells him that he (Vince) is now in charge of the Black and White. Norton doesn’t seem impressed but goes along with it.

Video on Mortal Kombat: The Series with Wrath as a guest star.

Video on Page vs. Steiner from last night. Tony tells us that the stipulation of Steiner getting Kimberly for thirty days if he won wasn’t official. Of course he tells us this NOW because he was too busy last night.

Van Hammer vs. Bam Bam Bigelow

A loud GOLDBERG chant starts before the match and Hammer actually takes over early on. Bigelow is sent to the floor and Hammer just stands in the ring, probably as bored by the show as the rest of the fans. Back in and Bam Bam hammers away as Tony tells us to watch the replay of Starrcade, and I quote, “To see one of the most disheartening moments in the career of Ric Flair.”

We hit the chinlock for a bit before Van Hammer fights up and hits a flying shoulder, though Bigelow doesn’t seem to notice and it’s back to the chinlock. A headbutt gets two for Bigelow and a small package gets the same for Hammer. Back to the chinlock as this match just keeps going. Bigelow lets go as the announcers talk about Hak, followed by the fourth chinlock in eight minutes. A running clothesline gets two on Hammer and Bigelow avoids a running boot in the corner (Hammer: “BUMMER!”), setting up the Greetings from Asbury Park for the pin.

Rating: D. They managed to fit four chinlocks into an eight minute match. You would think Bigelow would squash someone to get back on the winning streak after losing to Goldberg, but that would make too much sense and might be entertaining so we got this match instead. Again, who thought this stuff was going to make me want to stick around? Yeah the Flair sitdown interview sounds interesting and some of the fallout from last night might be good, but sitting through these matches isn’t worth it.

We go back to California where Scott Steiner and Buff Bagwell are getting off a Nitro bus. They go to a gym and see some decent looking women working out. One offers them to come see her later and gives Buff her address. They go and find a drag club where they’re given a note saying “race you to Raleigh”, which is near next week’s Nitro. This took all of thirty seconds and came off like a comedy bit.

In the arena, Scott Steiner yells at Goldberg during a photo shoot. These were separate segments.

Stills of Piper vs. Hall last night. Tony says Piper used a lot of great moves to get the advantage, “such as the atomic drop.” Is it 1973 all of a sudden?

Bret Hart vs. Booker T.

Winner gets a US Title shot at some point in the future. This makes me wonder: why is Bret wrestling on this show but not on pay per view? Feeling out process to start as this might actually get some significant time. Booker cranks on a wristlock to start but Bret nips up off the mat, only to be elbowed out to the floor. Back in and Booker grabs a headlock before an armdrag puts Bret on the floor again.

Hart comes back in and stomps away in the corner for his first advantage. We hit the chinlock on Booker but he fights up with some clotheslines in the corner. The ax kick connects for two and the fans are WAY into this all of a sudden. Booker puts on an armbar and we go to the back to see Disco messing with a guy in the satellite truck. At about 11pm, the NWO is going to take over the satellite feed and offers to triple the guy’s pay to take over the feed.

Back with Bret in control. How did he do it? Well he might have put on a grass skirt and done a rain dance as a sacrifice to the wombat god to make Booker fall over in a pool of orange juice. I know that sounds unlikely, but for all we know it happened because we were watching Disco talk to a satellite guy. Why couldn’t they do this before the match or if it’s SO important, do it during Bret’s chinlock or on a split screen?

Anyway, Bret drops an ax handle on Booker’s back and starts the Five Moves of Doom but sends Booker to the floor after the middle rope elbow. Booker tries to fight back but gets hit in the ribs with a chair. Back in and Bret stomps at the ribs but an elbow to the jaw stops Bret and a clothesline puts him down. Tony leaves to go moderate the Flair meeting as Bret suplexes Booker down and drops some legs. A belly to back suplex drops Booker but he rolls Hart up to escape a Sharpshooter attempt.

Instead Bret puts on the Figure Four but Booker survives for over a minute before making it to the rope. Back up and the flying forearm out of nowhere puts Bret down. There’s the spinning kick to the head as Booker’s leg is perfectly fine. He spins up and heads to the top but gets superplexed down. Bret gets the Sharpshooter on but Booker is right next to the ropes. Back up and Hart tries a sunset flip but Booker channels his inner Davey Boy Smith and falls down on Bret for the pin.

Rating: B. Booker’s lack of leg selling aside, this is one of the best WCW matches in a long time. It makes Booker look WAY more important and shows that maybe he’s getting a push for a change. The wrestling was good and more than that, Booker won completely clean with a nice counter. You can’t ask for more than that, except for maybe less Disco.

As we come back from a break, we get an ad for WCW Magazine. One of the featured articles is about the most mysterious man in wrestling, whose eyes are blacked out. You can see long curly hair though and the phrase WHAT ABOUT ME underneath the picture. This sort of thing never ceases to amaze me.

Stills of Mysterio/Konnan vs. the Outsiders from last night.

Kaz Hayashi vs. Disco Inferno

Tony is back on commentary. Hayashi comes out in the Glacier attire he purchased on Thunder a few weeks back. Before the match Disco says that this match has an international competitor so he wants to sing the National Anthem. He gets most of the way through before his mic is cut off. Disco isn’t pleased and attacks Hayashi for a fast two. Kaz is quickly thrown to the floor but comes back with a kick to the head.

A headscissors puts Disco on the apron, only to have him suplex Hayashi over the top and out to the floor. Disco heads outside but Kaz slides back in for a suicide dive. Back in and we hit the chinlock on Inferno, but he avoids a dropkick to take over again. The middle rope elbow gets two for Disco and he hooks a chinlock. Back up and a powerbomb is countered by a Kaz spinebuster but he misses a backsplash. The Chartbuster gives Disco the pin.

Rating: C-. Not a great match but FAR better than you would have expected. The Glacier stuff comes off more like a joke than anything else as it’s literally just for the entrance and then it’s the same Kaz Hayashi. Disco is getting somewhere but he’s still presented as the same goof that he’s always been.

Brian Adams tells Norton that HE is the new leader of the Black and White. Norton’s confusion continues. Again, DOES NO ONE WATCH THE SHOW???

Nitro Girls in the arena.

Nitro Girls at Cal Berkeley.

Bobby Heenan has been named WCW Announcer of the Year by WCW Magazine.

Here are Buff Bagwell and Scott Steiner, with the TV Champion continuing his Rick Rude bit (he even calls the fans Sacramento scumbags) by bringing in a girl to fawn all over him. Page isn’t here tonight because of the beating Steiner gave to him last night. Steiner brings up the 30 days stipulation which doesn’t exist, though to the best of my knowledge the live fans have no way of knowing that isn’t true. The music starts but Steiner isn’t done yet. He’s hurt everyone else and tonight there’s someone else he wants to go after: Goldberg.

Stills from Benoit/Malenko vs. Hennig/Windham last night. If you look at the frozen images, you can see how stupid it is step by step.

Chris Jericho vs. Hugh Morrus

Ralphus is now in a blue dress with a bit lower neckline. Before the match, Jericho implies that Saturn is gay because he wears the dress despite not having to anymore. They hit the floor for a chase right after the bell before Morrus slams Jericho down. A delayed gorilla press puts Jericho on the mat again as Steiner vs. Goldberg is official for later.

Morrus misses a top rope elbow and goes outside, allowing Jericho to nail a top rope cross body to take out Hugh and Jimmy Hart. Some flowers to Morrus’ back put him down and we hit the chinlock inside. A slap to Morrus’ chest wakes him up and Heenan is in full comedy mode about Ralphus. Morrus does the Jericho strut but Chris kicks the leg out.

Back up and Morrus counters a hurricanrana with a powerbomb before nailing a running splash in the corner. Jericho avoids a charge in the corner and rolls him up for two with his feet on the ropes. Ralphus tries Morrus but Saturn comes out and strips the dress off the toothless wonder. Saturn goes in and hits Jericho with a Death Valley Driver, allowing No Laughing Matter to give Morrus the pin.

Rating: D+. This is a recent change to WCW and it’s getting annoying: long matches to set up a quick finish. I like long wrestling matches when they’re entertaining, but I can do without nine minutes of Chris Jericho vs. Hugh Morrus when we know Saturn is comingout due to Jericho’s earlier comments. The same thing was true of Kaz vs. Disco. It wasn’t entertaining but we had to sit through it forever anyway. I shouldn’t be able to make a sandwich during a Kaz Hayashi match.

Morrus gets in Saturn’s face post match and is shoved away. Saturn gets in the ring and tells Morrus to bring it. Referees break it up.

Hennig and Windham talk about how great they are until Benoit and Malenko show up and whip them with belts.

Kevin Nash vs. Rey Mysterio Jr.

Before the match, Nash says Hall might have cheated a little bit last night and the NWO is always standing for fair play. If Mysterio wants a match with Big Kev, come down and get one. Rey comes out and says that’s exactly what he wants. The bell rings and Nash offers a test of strength.

Instead it’s a knee to Rey’s ribs but he comes back with kicks the knee and a spinwheel kick puts Nash down. The Bronco Buster connects and the fans are going nuts….until Rey jumps into Snake Eyes. Nash throws him around the ring and loads up the Jackknife but Rey hammers on Nash’s head to knock him down and gets the huge upset. The look on Nash’s face is amazing.

Here’s Konnan’s new music video.

Horace, Norton, you know the deal.

Hennig and Windham come out and say the belts are the difference between being good and being great. Windham doesn’t think the Horsemen should get a title rematch and Hennig calls them sore losers.

Norton finally goes to Hollywood and asks what’s going on. Hogan says they’re looking for a leader and declares Norton the boss.

Nitro Girls.

Here’s Ernest Miller, who has bought Glacier’s entrance which starts halfway down the aisle. Before the match, Miller complains about the music and wants his James Brown song. As is now the norm, we got to the Black and White’s locker room where Disco tells Norton that Miller called him out again. Miller actually does it this time and we’ve got a match.

Ernest Miller vs. Scott Norton

Miller accidentally kicks Norton down to start and puts on a quickly broken cobra clutch. Scott hammers away but gets kicked in the chest. Another kick drops Norton but he pops up and powerbombs Miller for a fast pin with his fingertip.

Goldberg vs. Scott Steiner

Non-title. Bagwell ensures us that there’s no Goldberg and Steiner talks trash before Goldberg’s music hits. They stare each other down until Steiner pounds on his back but Goldberg no sells a ram into the buckle. A superkick drops Steiner and Goldberg hammers away. Steiner is lifted into the air for some gorilla press repetitions as we take a break. Back with Steiner asking for timeout but Bagwell offers a distraction so Steiner can clothesline Goldberg down.

Steiner sends him into the steps and then back into the ring for trash talk and pounding. The elbow drop gets two and a belly to belly suplex plants Goldberg. Bagwell cuts the turnbuckle pad off again and dumps the referee. Goldberg reverses a whip to send Steiner back first into the exposed buckle before spearing Bagwell down. Steiner and Bagwell walk out but Rick Steiner returns to nail them both. Goldberg wins by DQ.

Rating: C. This was a decent power brawl and I like that they had a DQ instead of a champion getting pinned. Steiner vs. Goldberg would be a great power brawl once Scott had actually gotten over. The fact that Goldberg was actually on defense for awhile here made things much better.

The Black and White comes out and are easily dispatched.

Here’s a minute long video on the Nitro Girls’ swimsuit calendar.

Disco yells at the satellite guy who isn’t ready to hijack the feed.

Tony is in the meeting room (which looks like a living room, complete with couches, a coffee table and a large TV) where David and the Blonde are already on the couch. We cut to the back where Ric arrives. Hogan and Nash are shown watching on a monitor.

We cut to an NWO produced video parody of the sitdown meeting. David tells Disco Okerlund that he’s the new Space Mountain. Nash reprises his Arn Anderson impression to talk about spots as Vince is dressed as a bear (Mongo) in the background. Scott Hall comes in dressed as Piper but doesn’t try an accent. Hogan is Flair (complete with a fake nose) and takes off his clothes while ranting about how amazing Hogan is and how expensive his clothes are. Hogan fakes a heart attack and Disco says call the Hotline for more. Disco was great, but I thought he was Schiavone at first.

Overall Rating: D. As usual, a few good matches are dragged down by the stupid overdoing it of the rest. The Flair interview was hyped all night long and then they do the false advertising again which is going to tick off fans. The best part about it: they did this to their highest rating in a week where both Raw and Nitro aired in six months. Next week’s rating dropped over 10%. It’s the same stupid stuff where WCW tries to be cute and winds up shooting themselves in the foot.

There is good stuff on this show though, with Booker FINALLY getting a serious win over a big name and Mysterio pinning Nash clean. However there was a lot of bad going on as well, with long dull matches that are there to fill time and the really bad ending. The Black and White stuff is really growing on me though, as it’s clearly building to something. Having the segments be thirty seconds instead of three minutes like they were on Thunder a few weeks back makes all the difference in the world.

Overall this show felt like a modern day Raw: if it was an hour shorter and cut out so much of the pointless filler, it’s FAR more entertaining and easier to sit through. Also it would be nice if they didn’t hype something up for three hours then do a parody. That kind of stuff could work when they were way out front but now it’s going to catch up with them.

Today is someone a little off. It’s Heiden-Heidenreich.

Heidenreich got his start in 2001 so we’ll pick things up there with a dark match on December 18.

Perry Saturn vs. Jon Heidenreich

Jon is a hometown boy and comes to the ring in a football jersey. They fight over a lockup to start until Saturn takes over with some hard forearms. A clothesline puts Saturn down and Heidenreich stomps away but Perry comes back with some kicks to the ribs. Heidenreich gets dropped with a legsweep and we hit the reverse chinlock.

That goes nowhere so Saturn picks things up with a spinning springboard dropkick for two. The fans think this is boring and Saturn gets one off a neckbreaker. Heidenreich comes back with a powerslam and spinebuster for two and a back elbow gets the same. This is already dragging. Saturn finally puts on a standing armbar of all things for the win.

Rating: D. I can see why this was kept in the dark. This match just kept going and the fans had no reason to care whatsoever. Heidenreich looked good and was decent in the ring but these guys had no chemistry together. Bad match and not a good way to get the fans into a show that’s about to start.

After a year in OVW, Heidenreich would show up in 2003, where fought Rico on Heat, December 14, 2003. This was before Armageddon 2003.

Rico vs. Heidenreich

Heidenreich catches him in mid air but Rico kisses his way to freedom. An atomic drop puts Rico down and a clothesline sends him to the floor. Rico’s manager offers a good looking distraction and Rico grabs a neckbreaker for a pin out of nowhere.

Heidenreich would be in OVW for most of 2004 before returning in 2005 to feud with the Undertaker. Here’s their big showdown at Royal Rumble 2005.

Undertaker vs. Heidenreich

Taker grabs a headlock to start and pulls Heidenreich towards the casket but (Jon) Heidenreich runs away. That works so well that we do it again and Jon is terrified. Since that didn’t quite work, Taker hooks the leg with a half crab, causing Heidenreich to crawl towards the ropes in front of the casket. As we ignore the problem of crawling to the ropes, Jon bails to the floor to take the fight out there.

Heidenreich sends Taker into the casket and pounds his head into it, which apparently isn’t a problem for him. Back in and Heidenreich pounds away in the corner, only to get caught in a modified triangle choke. Taker pulls the hold down to the mat and Heidenreich is almost out, so here’s Snitsky to break up the hold. After a double suplex to Taker, the monsters start pulling him to the casket…..which has Kane inside.

Kane, who was feuding with Snitsky over Snitsky punting a plastic version of the baby that Kane’s wife Lita (just go with it) lost, destroys both guys and takes Snitsky into the crowd. Heidenreich starts shoving the casket away very slowly before slamming Taker into the steps. Heidenreich slides the casket into Taker, which looks rather stupid as Taker had nothing behind him to be crushed against but whatever.

Back in and Jon puts on a cobra clutch which chokes Taker out enough to get him into the casket. Well mostly in at least as Taker sticks an arm out and chokes away. With Heidenreich’s torso in the casket, Taker drops the apron legdrop in the spot of the match. Back in and Heidenreich is suddenly fine, pounding away on the Dead Man and hitting a Boss Man Slam for a cover. Taker chokes his way out of the casket and wins a slugout, followed by a bad running DDT. Chokeslam and tombstone hit and we’re done.

Rating: D. This just didn’t work. At the end of the day, Heidenreich just didn’t work at all and he never came close to it. This was supposed to be a preview of Snitsky/Heidenreich vs. Kane/Taker at Mania, but thankfully they went with Kane in MITB and Taker vs. Orton in a great match, whereas Snitsky and Heidenreich didn’t even make it onto the show.

Heidenreich would drop down the card after this, but would still get a PPV match at No Way Out 2005.

Heidenreich vs. Booker T

No real backstory here other than Heidenreich needed a feud after Taker got done beating him up. This was made after Smackdown apparently when Booker thought Heidenreich was laughing at Booker after a loss. He reads a poem before the match which isn’t very good. It’s kind of hard to get into this as it’s about as thrown onto the card as you could want a match to be.

Basic match to start and Jon (not typing that whole name out every time) talks to himself and hits himself in the head. Pretty back and forth here as Booker hits him a good deal but can’t drop him. Jon wasn’t an invincible guy which more or less took away any fear he would instill in anyone else. Well that and when he raped Cole. Jon takes over and gets a key lock as this is rather uninteresting.

Booker makes a comeback but gets kicked in the face to stop that. And now back to the same hold as he had on before. Booker makes another comeback and hits a superkick to set up the Spinarooni. Jon is sent to the floor where he grabs a chair and blasts Booker in the throat with it for the DQ.

Rating: F+. It was too long, it wasn’t interesting, there was no story, the ending sucked and the wrestling was boring. Why in the world was this on a pay per view? Heidenreich was a pretty big misfire if there ever has been one as he never was interesting or a threat to anyone really. This was a great example of how worthless he was.

Let’s try to make this be a bit better. From Velocity on May 19, 2005.

Heidenreich vs. Mike Mondo

Heidenreich throws him around with ease as Josh Matthews complains about Heidenreich injuring him recently. Mondo’s forearms have no effect and he gets a huge shoulder breaker for his efforts. A dropkick doesn’t work on Heidenreich either and a gutbuster has Mike screaming. There’s a Boss Man Slam to complete the squash.

Heidenreich would turn face and somehow get a US Title shot at Judgment Day 2005.

US Title: Orlando Jordan vs. Heidenreich

Jordan got the US Title in JBL’s Cabinet from Cena and just kind of kept it. He was never anything special at all but he kept it for like 6 months. For those of you that haven’t seen Heidenreich, he’s uh…..different. And remember who he’s in there against when I say that. First up though, he needs to find a friend.

This was his thing at the time: he would pick a kid out of the audience to be his friend and would read them a poem. He chants WHERE’S MY FRIEND as he looks around for one. The girl is named Alex and she’s like 10. She can’t say the word Minneapolis. She’s REALLY excited about being sat in a chair and having a big tattooed man read her a poem. Chant and champ do not rhyme. This is one of those characters we would describe as out there.

Oh hey we have a match now. Cole talks about the Preakness winner being named Alex like the girl. That’s a very stupid man. Heidenreich beat Jordan on Smackdown to set this up. Belly to belly suplex gets two for Heidenreich. Out to the floor and they slug it out a bit. When Heidenreich hits him you can hear him say POW. I’m not sure if I should make fun of this or not. He might ask me to go get an espresso.

The fans chant Buckwheat Sucks which is rather appropriate for Jordan. You figure out what I mean by that. Heidenreich does his walk (don’t ask) and hammers away. Big boot gets two. Jordan gets a swinging neckbreaker for two as Alex is panicking. Jordan gets his WEAK DDT to end this abruptly.

Rating: D-. No idea why they thought Jordan should be champion but somehow he’s the best option here. Jordan was really bad at what he did and yet he kept winning for no apparent reason. Benoit beat him in like 30 seconds at Summerslam which was a breath of fresh air to everyone.

The title pushes would continue as Heidenreich was part of the New Legion of Doom and got a title shot at Great American Bash 2005.

Smackdown Tag Titles: MNM vs. Heidenreich/Animal

This is Heidenreich/Animal since Hawk died a few years ago. I think this is because of the LOD DVD. Despite MNM being an awesome tag team and the champions (and the predecessors to Miz/Morrison), what do you think is going to happen here? Heidenreich doesn’t have spikes because he’d have to earn them. They’re called Legion of Doom but they changed the music so I don’t consider them a team. Heidenreich runs off Mercury to start and then does the same to Morrison.

Animal throws him back in and Animal gets a big pop. A double suplex puts the champions down and man there’s a gut on him. This is a total squash so far. FINALLY the champions double team Heidenreich and take his knees out. Mercury works on the knee and the announcers try to compare Heidenreich, the guy that raped Cole remember, to Hawk. Morrison misses a cannonball down onto the knee so it’s back to Mercury. This is REALLY boring stuff. After he cleans house, a title shot to the head gets two. Snapshot is broken up and the Doomsday Device gives the not-LOD the titles.

Rating: D. There was zero reason to put this on PPV and it wasn’t a good match in the slightest. They were trying to go for the LOD formula of total domination, but the non-matching tights and the lack of anything resembling charisma (or talent) by Heidenreich kept that from working. Bad TV match and an awful PPV match. Somehow they would hold the titles for THREE MONTHS.

The team would feud with MNM, setting up this six person tag at No Mercy 2005.

MNM vs. Legion of Doom/Christy Hemme

This is Animal/Heidenreich which never worked at all. They’re the tag champions here. My goodness Christy was gorgeous. She took a Snapshot on Smackdown so she’s injured coming in. Animal has a taped up shoulder too. Heidenreich pulls Nitro in and the beating is on before he can even take the fur coat off. Heidenreich is all fired up and hits a three point clothesline for two. Off to the large gut with the Animal attached but Mercury gets in a kick to the shoulder to take over.

He keeps kicking at it and knocks Heidenreich to take draw him in. MNM hits the Snapshot on Animal very quickly but it only gets two because of the delay in getting to the cover. Mercury snaps the shoulder over the top rope to let Nitro get two. The double team continues and Animal is in trouble. Neckbreaker gets two. Mercury goes up but jumps into an almost powerslam for two. Everything breaks down and Melina tags herself in. She dives onto Animal and gets caught. Off to Christy for a bad Hart Attack and then a HORRIBLE rana. As in the legs were around Melina’s arms. Doomsday Device ends Melina.

Rating: D-. Christy Hemme is a fine example of a girl that looks good in tight pants and a black bra. She’s incredibly attractive and sexy, but but she had no business being in a wrestling ring as a competitor. It didn’t work for her at all and she was only in the ring for about 45 seconds. Again though, she’s there for her looks and those work very well.

That would be about it for Heidenreich as they would lose the titles soon after and Heidenreich would be released at the end of the year. After bouncing around the indies for a bit, Heidenreich would pretty much vanish. Here’s one quick match from a show in the Netherlands on September 26, 2009.

Heidenreich vs. Fury

No idea who Fury is but he’s well built. They circle each other to start with Heidenreich yelling at the crowd a lot. Heidenreich offers a handshake and they shout at each other a bit. No contact two minutes in. Some hard forearms knock Heidenreich into the corner and even more forearms knock him to the floor. The ring mat is shiny.

Back in and Heidenreich hammers him down before pounding on Fury in the corner. Fury fights back and kicks Heidenreich in the back before putting on a chinlock. The fans start singing Heidenreich’s WWE song and we hit the chinlock. Back up and Fury hammers away, only to walk into a Boss Man Slam for the pin.

Rating: D-. Just get this over with already. It was five minutes of punching and forearms. Next.

One final one, from Hulk Hogan’s Australia tour in 2009.

Pimp Fatha vs. Heidenreich

Godfather does the usual intro and offers Heidenreich the women. He actually takes them up on it but a fight breaks out anyway and the match is on. Back inside and Heidenreich hammers away before getting yelled at as the referee. Godfather charges into an elbow in the corner and we hit a quick chinlock. Heidenreich tries an elbow after Godfather has already rolled away and a missed splash leads to what was supposed to be a rollup but was more like Heidenreich laying down so Godfather can grab the tights for the pin. Barely even a match but neither guy has wrestled on the big stage in years.

Godfather is the kind of guy that was far more entertaining than good. The pimp character could have opened house shows for YEARS and kept getting huge pops. No he wasn’t much to watch in the ring, but not everyone needs to be. I’ll give him this though: not many people could go to that many characters and have more than one be memorable. He was very charismatic and that’s more important than being good in the ring.

If there has ever been proff that Paul Heyman isn’t perfect…..well it’s ECW, but this is a good indicator as well. That’s almost everything I can find on Heidenreich, meaning these were his highlights. The guy had a good look but he just wasn’t very good in the ring and it really showed. To be fair though, when your first major feud is with Undertaker in a casket match, you’re kind of screwed coming out of the blocks.

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Monday Nitro #173
Date: January 25, 1999
Location: Reunion Arena, Dallas, Texas
Attendance: 15,103
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Tony Schiavone, Larry Zbyszko, Bobby Heenan

Man this month is flying by. The main story last week was WCW actually having a good episode of Nitro for a change. Things are actually looking interesting going into SuperBrawl, but there are still four episodes of Nitro for them to screw things up. We should be getting more on the latest NWO civil war, despite the last one being dropped for reasons that have yet to be and likely never will be explained. Let’s get to it.

We open with a recap of Vincent changing his name to Vince, which is probably some joke about McMahon that most people don’t care about at all. He’s a member of the Red and Black but is taking over the Black and White. The Red and Black was watching him on a hidden camera and didn’t approve of him for reasons of him being Vince. Why a hidden camera was used when there was a camera filming everything all night and the footage was shown on TV all night isn’t clear either.

The announcers discuss the events of Thunder because someone has to, before throwing us to a local airport earlier today. Hennig and Stevie Ray formed a secret alliance two feet away from the rest of the Black and White. Stevie is ready to revolt when the Red and Black arrives. Vince, in Black and White again, says they’re here.

Flair has Bischoff selling merchandise this week. I guess we’re back to this after a week of serious Ric. Instead of selling at a stand, Bischoff will be out among the people selling.

Nitro Girls.

Opening sequence.

Stevie Ray and his Rock style shirt is ready to meet with the NWO brass.

Disco Inferno vs. Al Green

Al has a bandage over his left eye and gets clotheslined outside in a surprise power display from Disco. A forearm to the back sends Green into the barricade as Disco is in full control. Green comes back with a back elbow as the fans are actually way into this. Disco’s running neckbreaker puts Green down again and the middle rope elbow gets two. The louder these reactions get, the more I think WCW has the really sweet canned stuff going tonight. Green suplexes Disco down but misses a charge into the corner, setting up the Chartbuster to give Disco the pin. Sweetened crowd or not, Disco looked good this time.

The Black and White argue over their cars to get to the arena. The Red and Black are shown watching from the plane and laughing. Now they get off the plane with Hall talking about trimming fat. Hogan is in a Black and White shirt as Stevie runs his mouth about all of the issues. Stevie says it’s a $500 shirt so I guess it’s mocking/parodying Rock somehow? Anyway the Red and Black destroys Curt Hennig as Hogan has his arm around Vince. Hogan never did have the best eye for talent. Stevie still doesn’t get to leave with the Red and Black.

Hogan and Nash (with matching fanny packs) leads the whole NWO into the building and the camera is actually allowed into the dressing room. Stevie is given a Black and White shirt but he’s not happy.

As this continues to go on, we go split screen to see Bigelow bringing a ladder down to the ring. Now it’s Bigelow on the full screen and he’s not happy with what Scott Hall did to him with the tazer. Hall may claim to be the king of the ladder match, but Bigelow has been hardcore and extreme in places that Hall would never dare to go. Bigelow wants another tazer ladder match against Hall. We go split screen again and Hall doesn’t seem to care one way or another.

Bischoff tries to rip off a customer at the stand but Doug Dillinger intervenes. I’ll give them this: yeah these segments are going on too long and are too frequent, but they’re actually making it look like Bischoff is being punished, which is the point of the things.

Here’s Ric Flair to list off all his catchphrases about his match with Hogan. He calls Horace Hollywood’s cousin and nephew and says the Horsemen could have killed him on Thursday but gave him a break instead. As for Bret Hart, he’s defending the World Title (Bret is US Champion) against an opponent to be named. Tonight Bret has Booker T. (already announced earlier in the show). Next, Nash isn’t allowed to interfere in the tournament match later because it’s going to be a lumberjack match. Finally, Hogan can find two partners to face Flair/Mongo/Benoit later tonight.

A very stoic Scott Dickinson is shown in the front row.

We see a clip from Souled Out with Hall shocking Goldberg and Bigelow.

Here are Hall and Disco with a ladder and the tazer. They stand the ladder up in the aisle and pose on top of it for a bit before Hall says the match with Bigelow is on.

Scott Hall vs. Bam Bam Bigelow

Bigelow punches him down to start but Hall punches him into the corner for the loudest spot call I can remember in a long time. More slugging out ensues until Disco trips Bigelow, earning him an ejection. Hall sends Bigelow into the ladder but Bam Bam drops it over Hall’s back, only to be sent face first into it again. They get inside for some ladder shots to Bigelow’s ribs but he runs Hall over with some brute force. Hall nails him with the ladder again and stomps it onto Bigelow’s back as we take a break.

Back with Bigelow being whipped into the ladder in the corner before a suplex puts him down again. Hall rides the ladder down onto Bigelow ala Shawn in 1994. The ladder is finally set up and Scott goes for a climb but Bigelow makes an easy save. Now Bigelow climbs to drop a headbutt, knocking both guys out for a few seconds. It’s Hall up first with a legdrop between Bigelow’s legs, setting up an elbow drop off the ladder. Bigelow suplexes Hall off the ladder but Scott gets up and dropkicks the ladder out from under Bam Bam.

Scott crosses himself before going up again but apparently missed a few Hail Marys because Bigelow moves the ladder from underneath him. Bigelow goes up and gets the taser, only to be low blowed immediately. Disco brings Hall another taser and leaves, walking into a spear from Goldberg. Hall and Bigelow circle each other with the tasers until Goldberg nails and shocks them both for the no contest.

Rating: C+. This was about a million times better than the Souled Out match because they mixed things up a bit. Instead of just doing the same spot over and over again, we actually got some different things for a change and it made the match so much easier to sit through. Good stuff here.

Scott Norton, Goldberg’s opponent later tonight, jumps him from behind so Scott Hall can escape.

Chuck Norris is here.

Gene is in the back with Bret Hart and asks him about his title match at SuperBrawl. Bret says Flair just has it out for him and wants to know what Booker T. has done to deserve to be in the ring with the US Champion. Bret wants to ax (his word) Booker a question: does he want the fans to see him get decimated and ripped to pieces?

Gene asks Bret who he should give a title shot to and Bret says he’s had his eye on someone. El Dandy is a heck of a wrestler and deserves a shot at the US Title. Gene doesn’t think much of El Dandy, setting up one of the most quoted lines in wrestling history. Bret: “Who are you to doubt El Dandy?”

Bret was going to give Dean Malenko a title shot but he’s conveniently injured. Gene and Bret argue about injuries until Bret says he’ll deal with Flair and his petty grudge, starting tonight. My favorite part about this whole thing is Gene dismissing the idea of a cruiserweight getting a shot at the US Title like a crazy thought. Little things like that only reenforce a lot of the complaints about WCW.

Tag Team Title Tournament First Round: Faces of Fear vs. Fit Finlay/Dave Taylor

Lumberjack match with a lot of lower card guys plus Rey Mysterio Jr. surrounding the ring. Remember that it’s a double elimination tournament. Finlay and Barbarian start things off with Finlay nailing an uppercut and putting on an early nerve hold. Barbarian presses out of a cover and sends Finlay to the floor. That goes nowhere so Finlay comes back in for some more uppercuts.

Barbarian slams Finlay down and it’s off to Meng for some clubbering. Taylor gets the tag and the Europeans clothesline Meng down. Meng and Taylor chop it out with the monster getting the better of it and bringing Barbarian back in to pick the bones. After a beating from both monsters, Taylor is allowed to tag Finlay back in for a brawl with Meng. Finlay gets in a few shots to the ribs but makes the mistake of going after Meng’s head.

Fit is sent outside again for nothing from the lumberjacks as the crowd still has nothing to care about. The rolling fireman’s carry has Barbarian in trouble but Meng breaks up Taylor’s butterfly suplex. A double headbutt gets two on Taylor as everything breaks down. Meng backdrops Taylor into a sitout powerbomb from Barbarian (not as smooth as it sounds) gives the Faces of Fear the win.

Rating: D+. Not a horrible match but it was really dull stuff. That’s the problem with a lot of tournaments: you have to sit through matches like these with teams that people don’t care about and only limited chemistry to make the match work at all. It was watchable from a technical standpoint but nothing more than that.

Hugh Morrus gets in the ring to celebrate as the newest member of the First Family.

We look at the other tournament match from Thunder.

Nitro Girls.

Norman Smiley vs. Perry Saturn

Saturn, still in a dress, on the way to the ring: “Smiley, you’re not getting jiggy with me.” Heenan: “Once again, he’s braless.” Norman gets headlocked to start before a double arm suplex sends him out to the floor. The announcers get into their usual argument over how to pronounce Smiley’s name as he stomps away at Saturn back inside. It’s not quite Big Wiggle time yet and Tenay says he’s a fan of the dance.

Both guys miss some strikes before Smiley gets two off a powerslam. We hit the chinlock on Perry and take a break. Back with Norman suplexing out of a headlock and hitting the spinning slam. Saturn gets two of his own off a rollup but Norman decks him with a clothesline. Saturn legsweeps him down, only to hit knees off a springboard Vader Bomb.

There’s the Big Wiggle to another good reaction but Norman isn’t done. In what might be a bit too far, Saturn is draped throat first over the middle rope and Norman lifts up the back of the dress for another Big Wiggle. After that disturbing image, Saturn freaks out and kicks Norman in the head, followed by a top knee elbow. Saturn does a dance of his own and hits the Death Valley Driver for the pin.

Rating: C+. Smiley is getting over despite being treated like a goon and losing every bigger match that he has. That’s usually a reason to push someone but given that this is WCW, it’s probably grounds for being off TV very soon. The dress was at least used for some more stuff than it was on Thursday so that’s an improvement……maybe?

Gene goes to talk to Scott Dickinson, who claims the suspension is unfair because he had no due process. JJ Dillon has a double standard and only wants to get over with Ric Flair. Scott storms off because referees are treated badly. They’re really wasting time on this story?

Herschel Walker is here.

We look at Flair’s speech again.

Booker T. vs. Bret Hart

Non-title. Thankfully Tenay brings up Bret injuring Booker’s knee last summer to give us some coninuity. Bret bails to the floor to start, comes in to get nailed in the face, then leaves again. More stalling ensues until Bret comes back in for a test of strength. Hart goes down but pokes Booker in the eyes to take over for the first time. A double arm DDT of all things drops Booker and Bret rakes his eyes across the ropes.

They head outside with Booker being sent into the barricade. Hart gives Booker a long time to recover for some reason before taking him back inside where Booker gets two off a small package. Booker nails the spinning kick to the face for two more but Bret nails the Russian legsweep to take control again. It’s time to go after T.’s knee with a cannonball and a wrap around the ropes. There’s a Figure Four but Booker finally turns it over as we take a break.

Back with Bret holding the Figure Four again but having to go to the ropes when Booker turns it. Bret stays on the leg but Booker nails a forearm out of nowhere. The series of kicks looks to set up the Harlem Hangover but Hart is out of the way. Bret goes outside and gets the title belt for a shot from the middle rope.

Booker is ready for him though and knocks Bret out of the air before superkicking him down. Back to the floor for a hot shot to send Bret into the barricade, followed by some choking with the camera cable. Booker throws him back inside and brings the cable with him. Randy Anderson takes awhile getting it out, allowing Bret to nail Booker with the belt for the pin.

Rating: B. Star making performance by Booker here as he easily hung in there with Bret for nearly fifteen minutes. The ending was a bit cheap but it plays up Bret being a champion that will do whatever he wants to win anymore instead of being the hero that he was for years. It’s nice to see him actually wrestle for a change.

Clips of Scott Steiner harassing the Nitro Girls last week.

Bischoff is selling foam fingers and seems to have a toupee on under his hat.

Scott Norton vs. Goldberg

Norton fires off chops to start but gets caught in something resembling an AA. A cross armbreaker doesn’t do much for Goldberg but a powerslam has some more success. Norton grabs a powerslam of his own and it’s completely no sold. Goldberg kicks Scott out to the floor but gets sent into the apron and barricade.

Norton can’t post him though and is sent face first in instead. They keep brawling on the floor with Norton nailing a hard clothesline to take over. Back in and a shoulder gets one on Goldberg followed by another clothesline. The powerbomb is countered and it’s the spear and Jackhammer to give Goldberg the win.

Rating: C+. Take two monsters and let them beat on each other for five minutes until one hits their finishers for the pin. This is what Norton should have been built up for several months ago and that’s what they did…..with several months of inactivity in between. Fun match even though there was nothing to it.

The NWO runs in and gets beaten up post match. The celebrities mentioned earlier plus Brett Hull of the NHL and Jean-Claude Van Damme get in to celebrate with Goldberg. Not exactly Mike Tyson but that’s a good visual.

Nitro Girls. Scott Steiner takes over the broadcast booth to ogle them during their routine.

Hollywood Hogan/Scott Steiner/Kevin Nash vs. Horsemen

This has A LOT of time, as in nearly half an hour. Hogan is still listed as a Presidential candidate. Before the match, Nash gets a cheap pop and Steiner says that Kimberly has been flirting with him out back. If she wants to tease him, she better be ready to please him. Hogan is glad that there aren’t any WCW or Ric Flair fans out here because they stink very badly. He’ll take care of Ric at SuperBrawl because Flair is the first one being hunted by the Pack.

After a break we get the Horsemen’s entrance and the opening bell. It’s a brawl to start of course and Benoit gets to beat up Hogan in one of the only times they ever had contact. Flair goes after Hogan but Nash makes the save. The NWO clears the ring to start as the announcers bring up Sting for the second or third time tonight. It’ll be nice to have him back. This turns into a discussion of Alex Wright no showing the show tonight.

Benoit and Steiner get things going with the power man running him over and kicking Benoit in the head. Scott runs into a boot in the corner though and Benoit fires off more right hands. A dropkick sends Steiner outside and Benoit holds up the fingers to Nash and Hogan. Kevin comes in for a knee to the ribs but Benoit runs him into the corner and chops away.

Off to McMichael for a slam, setting up the Swan Dive but Hogan makes a save. Steiner gets in a shot from the apron and Nash hits the big boot to take over. Hogan comes in and man alive is it strange to see him in there against Benoit. It doesn’t last long though as Hogan clotheslines Benoit down and suckers Flair in before hiding behind Steiner. A non-existent tag brings in Steiner for a belly to belly and two on Chris. Nash comes back in for the side slam and it’s back to Hogan with a belly to back suplex.

We take a break and come back with Hogan still on Benoit. Again he suckers Flair in but tags Scott to get in a few shots on the Canadian. The fans want Flair as Nash slams Benoit and elbows Ric in the face. Everything breaks down and Benoit gets caught in the Tree of Woe for some choking by Nash. Hogan whips Benoit with the weightlifting belt and suplexes him for another two count.

Choking ensues and it’s back to Nash for the foot choke in the corner. Nash misses a big boot in the corner but Steiner breaks up a hot tag attempt. We hit the bearhug on Benoit and he seems to pass out. Hogan wants the pin but can only get two. An elbow gets the same but the legdrop misses, allowing Benoit to FINALLY tag Flair. Everything breaks down and Bischoff comes in with a foam finger wrapped around a 2×4. Flair gets Hogan in the Figure Four but Nash nails him with the board for the DQ.

Rating: B-. This was the six man formula done very well and the match was very good as a result. Benoit is an excellent face in peril and he had the crowd going nuts for the tag to Flair. I’m fine with a messy finish here as you don’t want to have a champion do a job before a pay per view. If WWE could get that through their heads, a lot of my headaches would go away.

Bischoff pulls out some clippers but the lumberjacks from earlier make the save, for the 459th show of unity that WCW has needed against the NWO. The NWO bails but runs into Goldberg who cleans house to end the show.

Overall Rating: B. This was the best Nitro in probably a year at least. They actually slowed down and took their time for once while delivering some pretty good matches. Flair vs. Hogan has a good story to it and the other feuds aren’t bad at all. Unfortunately this was one of the shows where if you don’t like the main story you’re not going to like the show. Luckily they got it right for once and had a fast moving and entertaining show. Good stuff.

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Thunder
Date: January 21, 1999
Location: Market Square Arena, Indianapolis, Indiana
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan

We’re on the way towards SuperBrawl and the latest Hogan vs. Flair showdown. Nitro saw a few stories being set up for the pay per view with the second biggest one being Luger/Nash vs. Konnan/Mysterio. The Wolfpack has decided they want Mysterio’s mask to prove how big and tough they are. Let’s get to it.

We open with a recap of the David Flair story up to this point, including him knocking Bischoff out to shave his head on Monday.

The announcers show us clips from Souled Out with David Flair getting a beatdown.

Stevie Ray and the NWO B Team nearly get into an argument over being worthless. The Red and Black have sent them a note saying their private jet is stuck in Tampa due to bad weather. Horace and Brian Adams say they flew coach out of Tampa and never heard about a private jet.

Jerry Flynn vs. Disco Inferno

A clothesline puts Flynn down to start but he comes back with a series of kicks in the corner. More kicks have Disco in trouble but he snaps Jerry’s throat across the top rope. The dancing middle rope elbow and a swinging neckbreaker set up a chinlock. Tony wants to know where Hall is, despite the letter covering that in the previous segment. Jerry’s cross armbreaker is quickly broken and it’s time for more dancing. A spinning kick to the head puts Disco down again and a belly to belly gets two. Flynn misses another spinkick though and it’s the Chartbuster for the pin. The fans are into Disco a little bit.

Rating: D. It’s a Jerry Flynn match so I don’t know what else you would expect. Disco is starting to get over again with his goofy antics despite cheating to win all the time. That actually makes sense though, as it’s hard to boo a comedy character, even if he’s doing something heelish.

Back to the B Team locker room where Horace and Norton are playing with walkie talkies. That’s the whole segment.

After a break and the B Team is still arguing. Vincent calls Hogan but only gets voicemail. That’s a step above Orndorff in 1986 at least. Vincent tries Nash but an argument ensues with Stevie over who leads the team.

A limo has arrived so Horace goes to greet them. The Horsemen are inside instead and beat Horace down while Flair walks into the building. Mongo beats him up with what appears to be a vacuum.

Flair is in the ring for a chat with Gene. First up, Ric starts the tournament for the Tag Team Titles, even though they should be two weeks in. The finals are at SuperBrawl. Now the jacket comes off so it’s time to get serious. Flair rants about Hollywood keeping great talent in his shadow for twenty years. When Flair was in Kansas wrestling Rufus Jones in Kansas, Hogan was wrestling fourth on the card in Madison Square Garden. While Flair was with Harley Race and Ricky Steamboat, Hogan was in Hollywood making movies.

He brings up Hogan beating up David and promises to prove that he’s the real world champion next month. Guys like Jericho and Chavo Guerrero grew up wanting to be like Flair. That’s why it’s Flair’s reputation against Hogan’s fame. Flair may only have power for ninety days (even though it’s been nearly a month already) but at SuperBrawl, he’ll get what’s his.

This promo was the usual passionate speech from Flair, but it shows part of the problem with the feud and a lot of what Flair talked about in general. As a fan, why should I care about Flair having a match in Kansas twenty years ago against a guy that I’ve only heard of either in his promos or from a tape that’s ten years old if I’m under twenty years old? Odds are I’ve never seen the matches other than maybe some of his stuff with Steamboat.

I’m sure there are some fans at the time who had seen a bunch of those matches and care for them, but it’s not exactly the best way to get the masses to care. Granted that might be because Flair led with Rufus Jones instead of Steamboat or Race, who far more people would care about.

Instead, Flair is the grandfather that says rambles on and on about how much better things were back in his day while his grandkids roll their eyes and tune him out. He may be right, but the way he talks doesn’t help anything and makes me feel like he’s talking down to me more than making a good point about Hogan. What he said about his own career makes sense, but it doesn’t make Hogan look bad because he was in New York for a lot of his career.

Thankfully the feud is much more about Hogan beating up Flair’s son because that’s a much better reason to hate Hogan. The rest works in theory but it’s mainly giving me flashbacks to all the fun matches that Hogan had and putting Eye of the Tiger in my head, which isn’t going to make me boo Hogan.

The B Team is in the back and Horace’s knee is in bad shape. He’s also lost his shirt and Vincent is more concerned about getting him a new one.

We look at Jericho making sure Saturn wears a dress at all times he’s in the arena.

Al Green vs. Perry Saturn

The dress is red this week. Saturn: “Life’s a drag.” They lock up to start but Saturn trips up on the dress and falls to the mat. An elbow drop gets two for Al and that’s about the extent of his offense. Saturn comes back with a superkick and a throw before stomping away in the corner. A guillotine legdrop sets up the Death Valley Driver to complete the glorified squash.

We see some old clips of Raven at home and getting annoyed at his family.

Glacier vs. Kenny Kaos

Kaos gets kicked in the ribs to start but takes Glacier down into an ankle lock. A rope is quickly grabbed and Glacier comes back with more kicks and punches in the corner. Kaos knocks him out of the air and hits a clothesline to stagger the ice dude. A springboard clothesline is enough to give Kaos the pin.

Rating: D. I’m still trying to get my head around Kaos being half of the World Tag Team Champions. It’s just such a random choice and doesn’t seem to have served much of a purpose. He still comes off like a jobber and isn’t any more interesting than he was when he got the belt. The feud with Rage seems to be forgotten as well.

Back to the B Team for a big surprise: Vincent reveals a Red and Black shirt after the rest of the group goes to find the Horsemen. This is supposed to be a big deal.

Here’s the B Team in the ring because we’re supposed to care about them due to the shirts they’re wearing. Horace, despite having a bad knee earlier, walks to the ring fine but is holding his ribs. Vincent comes out last and gets a mic. Oh dear this could be bad. Vincent says that Horace and Adams will be in the tournament. Tonight, it’s Norton/Stevie/Vincent vs. the Horsemen if they have the guts. The other members aren’t cool with this for some reason.

Booker T. vs. Norman Smiley

Smiley goes to the ropes for an early break but is quickly sent to the floor. Back in and Norman takes over with some shots to the face but walks into Booker’s flying forearm. The Horsemen have accepted the NWO’s challenge. Norman kicks him down again and loads up the Big Wiggle but isn’t ready to dance yet. The spinning slam gets a mini dance and we hit the chinlock.

They head outside with Norman chopping away before taking it back inside for a belly to back suplex. Smiley stays down too until he backflips to his feet for the Big Wiggle. He slaps Booker in the face but walks into a powerslam. The Harlem Side Kick and 110th Street Slam get two for Booker and Norman rolls to the floor again. Norman is sent into the barricade and then back inside for the ax kick. Booker goes up for the missile dropkick but Norman rolls outside and takes the countout.

Rating: C. The match was ok but the ending brings it down. However, the important thing to this match is how we arrived here. Both guys have been on hot streaks and then they were put against each other in a match that wasn’t easy to predict. That’s old school booking and can set up some interesting matches. Unfortunately it’s nothing that’s done very often anymore.

We look at Scott Steiner harassing the Nitro Girls.

This Week in WCW Motorsports! Again, the car didn’t do badly but didn’t win.

After a break, here’s the EXACT SAME SCOTT STEINER CLIP.

World Tag Team Title Tournament First Round: Brian Adams/Horace vs. Chavo Guerrero Jr./Kidman

Horace, now totally fine, stomps away on Kidman in the corner to start before bealing him across the ring. Kidman comes back with right hands in the corner and a dropkick before it’s off to Chavo, who is almost immediately low bridged down to the floor. Adams throws him up over the top rope and back inside. Chavo’s cross body is caught in mid air but Kidman dropkicks Guerrero’s back to put Adams down.

The small guys do some nice double teaming to get two more on Adams but Kidman walks into a tilt-a-whirl backbreaker to change control again. We take a break and come back with Kidman walking the corner to bulldog Horace and make the tag to Chavo. Some dropkicks stagger the NWO members but Horace kicks him in the face to take over again. Another tilt-a-whirl backbreaker gets two on Guerrero and it’s back to Horace.

Kidman and Vincent get in a fight on the floor as the announcers mention that this is a double elimination tournament. That’s quite the information to leave out for most of a match. Then again I can’t imagine the tournament has been mapped out at all at this point. Kidman gets the hot tag and everything breaks down, allowing Vincent to hit Kidman with the slap jack to give Adams the pin.

Rating: C-. Good match messed up by another bad finish. The NWO B Team isn’t exactly something that makes me care as even their teammates treat them like they’re nothing. It doesn’t help that neither of these teams have any real chance to win the titles. You have to have filler like this, but it would be nice to have it be anyone but the Black and White.

MORE B Team stuff with Vincent congratulating the winners but getting yelled at for stealing the slap jack. Then they yell at him for the shirt he’s wearing.

La Parka vs. Rey Mysterio Jr.

Rey dropkicks La Parka down to start and avoids a charge in the corner to keep things going. La Parka backdrops him to the apron and stops to dance but is still able to catch Rey in mid air. He puts Rey on the top rope but gets caught by a hurricanrana, followed by a second one from the top to the floor.

Back in and La Parka slams him face first down for two and a kick to the chest gets the same. La Parka goes up but dives into Rey’s boots. He misses a charge into the post as well but is still able to crotch Rey on top. Mysterio gets launched face first into the buckle and La Parka goes up again. This time he’s the one getting crotched and Rey hits something like La Mistica for the pin.

Rating: C. This was better and had a surprising finish as Rey usually uses a huricanrana or some kind of rollup. La Parka didn’t look bad either, which is the case for almost all of the luchadores: if you give them time to show off in the ring, they can give you a pretty good match. It helps that he was in there against Mysterio of course.

Here’s an upset DDP with something to say. He isn’t cool with what Scott Steiner did to his wife on Monday. Page is used to men hitting on Kimberly but he didn’t like the things he was seeing. Kimberly wants to handle Steiner herself, but Page isn’t letting that happen. If Steiner wants a freak, Page will be his hook up.

The B Team is STILL arguing because Stevie is on the phone. The rest of the team goes to the ring for their match and Vincent tries to drink raw eggs ala Rocky. He spits it out but finds a hidden security camera. The Red and Black is shown watching from what looks like a limo. Hogan says they know what time it is. So if they were never at the building, who put in the camera?

Ric Flair/Chris Benoit/Steve McMichael vs. Vince/Stevie Ray/Scott Norton

It’s now Vince, despite being Vincent all night long. Steve and Stevie get things going for a power match but it’s quickly off to Vince. Mongo sticks out his chin so Vince can have a free shot, and that’s exactly what he does, taking over with kicks to the ribs. Vince gets taken into the corner for chops by Benoit and a big one takes him down. Norton comes in and gets chopped as well before it’s back to Mongo. McMichael gets powerslammed down but Vince misses a middle rope elbow. The hot tag brings in Flair who goes after the leg and everything breaks down. The Horsemen clean house and the Figure Four makes Vince give up.

Rating: D+. This was almost a squash with nothing at all happening. Thankfully Mongo would be gone soon as he’s somehow regressing despite barely having any skill at all in the first place. The guy just wasn’t that good and it showed really badly over the years. At least this was short.

Benoit crossfaces Vince to end the show.

Overall Rating: D+. This is a hard one to grade as there’s good enough wrestling and some passable stories, but the stakes are so low with the B Team being the focus of everything. Other than that, the wrestling was watchable but it’s really hard to care when you know this is going to mean nothing in the long run.

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Monday Nitro #172
Date: January 18, 1999
Location: Value City Arena, Columbus, Ohio
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay, Larry Zbyszko, Bobby Heenan

We’re past the first pay per view of the year and nothing has really changed. Last night Goldberg beat Scott Hall in the tazer match but Hall wound up knocking him out to end the show. The other main event saw the Flairs beat Curt Hennig and Barry Windham when David got a pin thanks to Arn Anderson. Hollywood Hogan came in and beat up David after the match as Ric had to watch, which should set up SuperBrawl. Let’s get to it.

We open with stills from last night of the tag match before going to the back to see Flair freaking out and throwing trash cans. Hogan will pay for what he did.

The NWO limo arrives and the Horsemen attack it with tire irons but the limo pulls off.

Flair comes out to the arena and rants about how Hogan works for him. The title match is made official for SuperBrawl. Flair says that it’s not him challenging because Hogan is going to have to kill him to keep the title. Hogan may have kids of his own, but he isn’t man enough to do anything by himself.

That brings Flair to Bischoff, who he knows is behind everything that happened last night. Bischoff comes out to the stage and has a mic of his own. Ric says Bishcoff has the chance to do something promoters have wanted to do for years, but we have to wait for the fans to boo Bischoff out of the building first. Tonight it’s Flair vs. Bischoff but Eric doesn’t seem to think it’s happening. His contract doesn’t say he’s a wrestler but Flair offers to put up his hair. That’s not enough for Eric and the match still isn’t on. Flair ups the ante and says Bischoff can have control back.

Now Eric is interested but David Flair comes out and yells loudly about what Bischoff did last night. David wants to fight Bischoff tonight and Eric is really interested. Now the deal is Bischoff vs. David with Flair’s hair and control of the company on the line. Bischoff leaves so Ric throws in Bischoff’s hair as a bonus stipulation. That was quite the rapid fire exchange.

Opening sequence.

Stills of the main event and Cruiserweight Title match from last night.

Nitro Girls.

More stills of the ladder match.

Chris Jericho vs. Booker T.

This was set up last night when Jericho interrupted a Booker interview. Booker raises the roof to start and Jericho gets annoyed. A wristlock into a clothesline puts Jericho down and he complains about whatever he can think of. He ducks a second clothesline but walks into a spinning kick to the face for two instead. A missed dropkick lets Booker catapult Jericho into the buckle and a belly to back gets two. Jericho sends him outside for a springboard dive to take him down.

Jericho grabs a suplex of his own for the arrogant two but the spinning sunset flip out of the corner gets two for Booker. We hit the chinlock by the Canadian before a knee sends Booker outside again for some choking. Back in and a nice springboard forearm gets two before Jericho goes after the back for a bit.

To the shock of no one, the announcers have ignored the match almost entirely to talk about Flair vs. Bischoff. Jericho goes up for the jump into a raised boot spot, allowing Booker to hit the side kick and spinebuster for two. Chris comes back with a flapjack but Booker spins up and hits another kick, followed by the missile dropkick for the win.

Rating: C+. This is what would help a lot of WCW’s problems: a nice, back and forth wrestling match. Booker continues his steady rise up the card due to staying away from all of the main event nonsense. It’s very nice to see him getting a push like this as he puts on some of the most consistently good matches week in and week out.

JJ Dillon suspends Scott Dickinson for thirty days. Also we’re getting Hall vs. Goldberg vs. Bigelow tonight. Dillon makes the Flair vs. Bischoff match official because apparently it wasn’t earlier.

We recap the opening segment and the announcers talk about it for awhile.

Gene is having a sitdown interview with Rey Mysterio Jr. and asks him why he hasn’t shed the LWO colors. Rey says the red, white and green are his brown pride and it’s not his time yet. Gene asks if the mask means the same thing it meant when he debuted and Rey says of course it does. The mask will never come off because it’s who he is. That question came out of nowhere. Also Rey isn’t intimidated by the NWO and will face Lex Luger anytime.

Here are the same stills of the Flair match that opened the show.

David Flair vs. Eric Bischoff

This is going much earlier than I expected. David comes out on his own here for some reason. We get an old school weapons check and now we’re ready to go. Some light kicks put David down and Bischoff walks over his back. Back up and David hits Bischoff with a roll of quarters for the pin, despite Bischoff’s foot being in the ropes and David pouring the coins over Bischoff after the match.

The Horsemen come out and we get the shaving. Bischoff’s hair goes from jet black to gray in front of our eyes. Eric wakes up and of course freaks out. It’s nice to see Bischoff get what’s coming to him, but just like the match three weeks ago, how many people remember this as compared to the Starrcade match?

A replay shows that Randy Anderson slipped Flair the roll of quarters. Schiavone, the most biased announcer of all time, is totally fine with this.

Jericho is with JJ Dillon in the back and makes it clear that Saturn has to wear a dress all the time when he’s in the arena, not just in the ring. Saturn comes up and says he’ll do it.

Here’s Konnan with something to say. Konnan talks about his former teammates being traitors and being in cahoots with Hogan since the team started. Nash and Luger got him back on his feet when his life was falling apart and then they turned their backs on him. When they did that, they turned on these people who put him here tonight. Konnan is going to be on them like a pair of tight jeans. He’ll get whatever help he needs and is coming for every member of the NWO he can. This was actually a really solid and serious promo from Konnan, which isn’t something you expect.

Stills of Luger vs. Konnan. Makes sense.

Stills of the Flair match from last night. Egads we get it already.

World Tag Team Tournament First Round: Bobby Duncum Jr./Mike Enos vs. Faces of Fear

In case you weren’t bored enough by the first go around on Thunder where the NWO interfered. It’s a brawl to start until we get down to Meng vs. Bobby. Duncum takes him down and dives over the top rope to take out Barbarian as well. Back in and everything breaks down again with a spike piledriver planting Barbarian and the Kick of Fear from Meng knocking Bobby on top for two.

Meng kicks Enos down as well and the Faces of Fear take over. A nice double top rope headbutt have Enos in big trouble and the standing version of the same move makes it even worse. Meng loads up a backslide of all things as everything breaks down again. The referee lets it go on far longer than you would expect before Meng plants Enos with a piledriver (not a tombstone Tony) and we cut to a split screen to show the NWO arriving. Hogan is ticked off about Bischoff’s hair and the NWO is coming to the ring. After some more brawling, the Red and Black comes in for the no contest.

Rating: D+. This started off as a fun brawl but went on WAY too long. The Faces of Fear are like the Nasty Boys: if you let them do their trashy brawling they’re fine, but when you try to make them have a wrestling match, things get bad in a hurry. Duncum’s dive at the beginning was good but he almost vanished after that.

Nash reiterates that there won’t be a tournament. Hall says the hair cut is Armageddon for WCW and shows us David’s blood on his weight belt. The title match is accepted for SuperBrawl and that’s about it.

Package on Goldberg vs. Hall vs. Bigelow.

Disco Inferno vs. Wrath

The dancer has the Wolfpack shirt and is wearing red and black tights. Wrath shoves him around to start and hits some hard chops. Tony talks about Alex Wright not showing up to be in Disco’s corner for reasons not explained. Hall sneaks out with the tazer as Wrath drives knees into the ribs. Disco comes back with the swinging neckbreaker and dancing elbow for two before we hit the chinlock.

Some shots to the knees have Wrath in more trouble but he backdrops Disco with ease. A hard dropkick puts Disco on the floor and Wrath follows up with a slingshot elbow to the jaw back inside. The Death Penalty looks to set up the Meltdown but Hall uses the Tazer to distract Wrath, allowing Disco to hit the Chartbuster for the upset.

Rating: D+. And that’s it for Wrath meaning anything at all. As soon as the first loss happened you could tell his career was going down, but this is a big fall down for him. This isn’t one that you can say he’s going to bounce back from either. Wrath’s push is officially dead in the water and he’s another talent wasted in WCW.

Nitro Girls but Scott Steiner interrupts. Scott hits on Chae but switches over to Kimberly to insult DDP a bit. End segment.

Scott Steiner vs. Perry Saturn

Non-title but Steiner doesn’t even have the belt with him anyway. Steiner rants about seeing Saturn in a dress in the back and wanting to beat some sense into him. Steiner makes sure to throw in a gay slur before getting punched in the face. Saturn hammers away for a bit and knocks Steiner to the floor, only to get kicked low back inside to stop the momentum.

Now it’s Saturn being knocked to the floor and sent into the barricade. Steiner takes a Michigan hat from a fan to really tick off the crowd but Saturn comes back with a suplex and right hands. A dropkick sends Steiner to the floor and a big dive puts him down as well. Back in and the top rope splash gets two as Saturn has to lay out Bagwell. Buff breaks up the Death Valley Driver and a belly to belly suplex lets Steiner put on the Recliner for the win.

Rating: D+. This was a bad clash of styles as Saturn works a more athletic style as compared to Steiner’s brawling. It didn’t work that well and the match was all over the place. Saturn was trying, but the dress looks more out of place here than I thought it was going to. Not a terrible match but it was an odd pairing.

Nitro Girls again.

Clips of Luger attacking Mysterio last week.

Here are Nash, Luger and the now augmented Liz with something to say. Nash: “Yo yo yo let me speak on this. OIL OF OLAY!” He heard what Konnan said but even Konnan knows that without the Wolfpack, he’d still be jerking the curtain. Konnan has no heart, endurance or soul and can talk about salads and potatoes all he wants, but all that matters is the money. Luger says he’ll take Rey’s mask if they get in the ring together tonight. He’ll even let Rey off if Rey hands the Wolfpack the mask in advance.

Scott Steiner goes into the Nitro Girls’ locker room but security runs him off.

Psychosis vs. Juventud Guerrera

Psychosis chops away to start and takes Juvy down with a quick swinging neckbreaker. Juvy comes back with a headscissors and we take an early break. Back with Psychosis taking Juvy down and we hit the chinlock. A running dropkick puts Juvy on the floor and a bottom rope suplex brings him back inside for two. Juvy quickly goes up but gets dropkicked out of the air for another two count. Psychosis fights out of a superplex attempt by crotching Juvy to send him outside.

It’s Psychosis hitting the big dive to send Guerrera into the barricade before a missile dropkick to the back of the head gets two on Juvy. Back up and Psychosis tries a German suplex but Juvy backflips out. Now obviously Psychosis should know Juvy flipped out as he could feel Juvy escape and also he didn’t hear Juvy hit the mat. Therefore, why he stood with his back to Juvy and celebrated is anyone’s guess. Why he turned around when Juvy was shouting JUVY DRIVER is due to general stupidity.

Thankfully he spins out and hits a reverse suplex for another two count. Juvy has been watching his Kidman tapes as he counters a powerbomb into something resembling a DDT. The 450 is countered with another crotching but he does the same to break up the guillotine legdrop. A superplex is countered into a top rope sitout gordbuster, setting up the guillotine legdrop to give Psychosis the pin.

Rating: B-. Well that was rather surprising. It’s nice to see a little curve thrown in there every now and then to keep things from getting too predictable. Thankfully that gordbuster wasn’t wasted on another near fall as Juvy should have been out cold for about a week after something that big.

Lex Luger vs. Rey Mysterio Jr.

The bell rings and Luger asks for a mic. He offers to let Mysterio leave in exchange for his mask and shirt. Rey says no and gets pummeled for his efforts before Luger throws him around with ease. Lex misses a charge into the corner and Mysterio hammers away before getting two off a split legged moonsault. Luger comes right back with a powerslam as Nash comes out. A press slam draws cheers from Big Kev and there’s the running forearm for good measure. Luger wants the mask and Rey gets all fired up but Nash comes in for the DQ.

Rating: D+. This was more of an angle than a match but I’ll give them points for having Rey in there with some far bigger names for a change. It’s like they’re actually trying someone else out in a higher level instead of having him run around in cirles for months on end. Imagine that.

Post match Luger and Nash hammer on Rey until Konnan makes the save with a chair. Logical story progression.

We see Diamond Dallas Page at the ground breaking of the Nitro Grill in Las Vegas.

Steiner follows Kimberly into a bathroom but security intervenes again.

Scott Hall vs. Bam Bam Bigelow vs. Goldberg

Bigelow and Goldberg double team Hall to start and the fans chant as you would expect them to. Goldberg gets jumped by the other bald guy but he knocks him down with ease. Now it’s Goldberg being double teamed but he spears both guys down at the same time to fire the crowd up again. Hall breaks up the Jackhammer on Bigelow so Goldberg hits it on him instead, only to have the NWO come in for the no contest. Too short to rate but Goldberg dominated most of it.

Goldberg is in trouble but the Horsemen come out with Flair chasing off the entire A-Team on his own. He catches Hall and chops him down before chasing the limo off to end the show.

Overall Rating: C+. It’s not a great show but it’s WAY better than the stuff they’ve been doing lately. This show had some good wrestling on it and some nice, logical story progression to cap it off. Hogan vs. Flair is the logical match for the next pay per view main event and thankfully they’ve got a lot of time to set up the match instead of having to fly through the build like they did for Souled Out.

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Monday Nitro #171
Date: January 11, 1999
Location: Thompson-Boling Arena, Knoxville, Tennessee
Attendance: 13,024
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Larry Zbyszko, Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan

Tonight we should be finding out some of the matches for Souled Out. Why should it be tonight? Well that’s because tonight is the go home Nitro for the pay per view. In its infinite wisdom, WCW had Starrcade, then Flair winning power the next night, then the Fingerpoke of Doom the next week, then Souled out less than two weeks later. The only match announced so far is David/Ric Flair vs. Hennig/Windham. Our big story at the moment is Nash vs. Giant to be the real big man of the NWO. Flair also promises to deal with the team tonight. Let’s get to it.

We open with a recap of Hogan announcing Nash vs. Giant for tonight. One might think putting this on the pay per view would be a good idea, but why do that when you can do it for free with four days’ build?

Here’s Flair for the opening chat. Gene asks him about the match at Souled Out and Flair lets out a huge MEEEEEAN WOO! BY GOD GENE because Bischoff hates it. Flair talks about he and his son coming to get some of Windham and Hennig on SUnday. This brings us to Hogan, who is signed up through 2001, so he’s not going to Hollywood or the White House. Good to see Flair keeping his sworn enemy around for two years.

Flair also brings out JJ Dillon as the Chairman of the Executive Committee, along with more money, a new car and a female limousine driver. JJ makes his first match: Hogan defending the title at SuperBrawl against someone to be named by WCW. On Sunday, we’re also getting Goldberg vs. Hall in a shock stick above the ring match for the main event.

Ric has one more piece of business to tend to: the LWO. They come out minus a few members (Gene: “Que Pasa?”) and Flair calls them the most talented people in the world. He knows Eddie is in the hospital right now with a broken leg and knows the NWO had something to do with it. That’s something I miss in wrestling. Why do we have to know the real reason someone is hurt or injured? Blame it on someone else and make a story out of it.

So what if the real story is online? Is it that much harder to believe than some of the other gaps in logic/stories you hear on TV? Look at the injury to Daniel Bryan (in 2014 in case you’re reading this in like 50 years). Instead of having him announce his broken neck and then get beaten down by Kane, don’t have him mention anything and have Kane attack him. Kane looks like a monster, Bryan gets off TV, everyone wins.

Anyway Flair tells them to take the shirts off and join the WCW bandwagon. They’re promised money, cars, women, or whatever else they want. Most of them take the shirts off and Flair promises to go to Tijuana with Juvy next week. Rey won’t take off the colors ironically enough, but who needs Rey Mysterio when you have a Villano and Damien? We’re STILL not done though as Flair knows we’re a match short so he puts himself in a match with Curt Hennig.

Video on Flair and tradition. He gets to list off people like Jack Brisco and Wahoo McDaniel because that’s what half of his promos are about.

The announcers talk for a bit and hint at Eric Bischoff having a new assignment.

Clip of the LWO getting beaten down on Thunder.

Gene brings out Saturn because we don’t have enough talking to open this show yet. Saturn talks about how great Flair is before saying he got ripped off. He wants a rematch with Jericho and gets both Chris and Ralphus. Jericho says the record books show two straight fair wins over Saturn and now Perry is out here caterwauling like a ten year old.

Saturn is crying so much he should be wearing a dress. That’s a good idea and Jericho pitches a third match and if Saturn loses, he wears a dress for the rest of his career. Saturn says no but Jericho runs his mouth long enough to get the deal made. Chris is worried that Saturn doesn’t have the legs to make the dress work.

The Cat vs. Perry Saturn

Scott Dickinson is referee because this story won’t die. Miller tries a sneak attack to start but gets suplexed down and hammered on in the corner. A ticked off Saturn pounds away with right hands but Dickinson physically pulls him off. The announcers try to tell us a history between Saturn and Dickinson but they lose me as soon as I remember it’s about a mostly bald referee.

Miller kicks him in the leg and poses a lot before we hit the chinlock. A dropkick to the knee puts Perry down again (Tony calls it a knee to the ribs because he’s stupid in 1999) but Saturn comes back with a quick suplex. He hits a frog splash but Dickinson is with Sonny Onoo, allowing Jericho to come in and hit Saturn with a shovel. It knocks Saturn into Dickinson though and that’s a DQ.

Rating: D. Did Saturn run over Bischoff’s dog or something? He’s plummeted through the floor since the biggest push of his career and it seems like it’s just going further and further. I don’t know why I’m surprised, but I don’t see why the Dickinson stuff is needed at all. This same story could be told with just Jericho.

Jericho puts Saturn in a dress.

We see Flair ranting about Bischoff on Thunder.

Opening sequence, about 40 minutes into the show.

Nitro Girls.

Time for more not wrestling as we see Bischoff arriving in Atlanta for a meeting with WCW and Turner brass. Bischoff’s security card doesn’t work so he has to call the receptionist to get in. It’s funny you see. He has to sign in and this is humiliating I guess. Security guard: “Mr. Bischoff….” Eric: “Do you know who I am?” Security guard: “No sir.” Eric is shown waiting presumably for hours for Flair and ranting to the new receptionist.

Ric will finally see him and apparently the secretary has a new house and stock options. Flair is in Bischoff’s old office, complete with a robe hanging from the coat rack. Bischoff liked a few moments of last Monday and claims no responsibility for what happened with the NWO. Flair promises to spend ninety days (isn’t it like 80 now?) making Bischoff as miserable as he can. Ric gives Bischoff all of the personal stuff he left in the office and assigns him to the ring crew. Bischoff gets to ride in the truck down to Knoxville. This ate up over eight minutes for one joke. Tony promises more on this later.

Now it’s back to Gene who has a cake. He brings out Chavo Guerrero Jr. and of course Pepe…..for the horse’s birthday. We get a huge HAPPY BIRTHDAY sing a long until Norman Smiley comes out to bring some sanity to this show. Actually scratch that as he’s upset about not being invited and wants to make amends with the horse. Smiley of course attacks Chavo, sends him into the cake and does the Big Wiggle. This still isn’t done though as Norman takes Pepe outside and throws him in a conveniently placed wood chipper.

Hour #2 begins with us looking in on Raven playing Backgammon with James (Sandman). Raven asks to see his high school yearbook and is told it’s in the garage. He goes to find it but instead finds a folded up picture of Roddy Piper. James asks what that is but Raven quickly brushes him off.

The NWO motorcade arrives and the Black and White wants to know why they didn’t get such a nice entourage. Hogan, thankfully without the flannel shirt, walks to the ring flanked by the Hell’s Angels. The bikers rev their engines a lot then leave so Hogan can talk. Hollywood talks about being under contract and winning the title in a hard fought battle. He’ll still be president of course.

Nash, a former Tennessee Volunteer, promises to show the world who the real giant is. Scott Steiner says he’ll beat up Diamond Dallas Page and threatens to hurt Schiavone if he calls Page the People’s Champion again. He promises to show Kimberly what it’s like to be with a real man. Hogan thanks the Angels and that’s it. This interview proved one thing: we’re not getting an explanation for the NWO’s merging are we?

Kaz Hayashi vs. Rey Mysterio Jr.

A quick headscissors puts Kaz down and gets sent to the floor for a big old flip dive over the top. Back in and a slingshot headscissors drops Hayashi again but here’s Lex Luger to attack Kaz for the DQ after less than two minutes.

Luger wants to know why Rey didn’t take the shirt off and decks the “helpless” Rey (Tony’s word as Rey was standing there looking at Luger when Lex jumped him, because there’s no way a small guy could ever fight a big one). A quick comeback is thwarted by Luger as the announcers make it sound like Rey is 12 years old and worthless.

Konnan calmly walks down for the save but doesn’t attack Luger. Instead Konnan says there’s no point to attack Rey because he’s no threat to the NWO and doesn’t have a title they want. Luger says he (Luger) wasn’t in Konnan’s video so they don’t have to do everything together. Nash comes in and the beatdown is on. Hall zaps him a few times and Konnan is off the team. The fans want Sting but get no one.

We see Hogan making Giant vs. Nash tonight.

Here’s Giant with something to say. Giant admits that he was suckered in by Macho Man (who hasn’t been seen since that one appearance) and he’s sick of Hogan complaining about it. Tonight, he’s fighting to get a piece of Nash and then a piece of Hogan. He’s about to unwrap himself from the wrong things he’s gotten caught up in.

Booker T. vs. Lenny Lane

This is what we’ve waited for? Feeling out process to start with Booker grabbing a headlock and easily taking Lane down. A running forearm puts Lane on the floor and Booker rams him into the barricade. Back in and Lane scores a boot to the jaw and a bulldog but stops to showboat. T. shrugs them off and it’s a side kick, the ax kick, the spinebuster and another side kick to pin Lane.

Rating: D+. This was nothing special and there wasn’t all that much to it. At the end of the day, we’re an hour and a half into this show and this is the longest match we’ve gotten so far and the rest has been a lot of talking. Booker continues to fight his way through the card and is getting no recognition for it. Is there any shock that so many people left?

We get an NWO produced sitdown chat between Hogan and Nash talking about how awesome their match was. Tony brings up a good point: Why did Flair allow this to be on the show?

Recap of the Hell’s Angels being here and not doing anything earlier.

TV Title: Diamond Dallas Page vs. Scott Steiner

Steiner is defending and Page has walking pneumonia. Scott shoves Page into the corner a few times but gets caught by the driving shoulders and some right hands. Page fights off both Steiner and Bagwell to finally fire up this crowd. Bagwell breaks up a superplex attempt and Page is in trouble. The beating begins as Steiner throws him to the floor and stomps away before sending Page into the barricade.

Back in and a running kick to the head has Page in even more trouble as the crowd is already dead. The spinning belly to belly gets two and Scott yells at the referee for counting slowly. Off to a chinlock for a few moments before a hard clothesline sets up Scott’s pushups.

Bagwell gets in some cheap shots on the floor but Page nails Steiner with a discus lariat for a quick two. Steiner charges into a boot in the corner and Page makes his comeback with right hands and clotheslines. The Pancake connects but Vincent comes in for a distraction so Steiner can shove Page into the referee. Bagwell throws powder into Page’s eyes so Vincent takes a Diamond Cutter. Page thinks it’s Steiner, even though Vincent is wearing a shirt, allowing Steiner to hit some bad chair shots to set up the Recliner for the three arm drops.

Rating: D. I waited this long for a match this bad? It wasn’t so much the action but that it’s the same NWO formula we had for so long but with an ending instead of the lame run in. I feel sorry for this crowd as they’ve sat through a very boring show and now they get this match as one of the features on this show. Also what was the point of the powder? They could have done the exact same thing without Page being blinded.

Goldberg talks about Starrcade being a big mistake when he thought Nash would have a faie match. He won’t make that mistake again. Ignore the fact that it wasn’t cheating as there were no disqualifications.

We see Bischoff setting up the ring earlier. This is supposed to entertain us somehow. Seriously it’s just several minutes of the guy in charge of the ring yelling at Bischoff for being slow and Bischoff insulting him.

Another clip of Nash winning the title and the end of last week’s show because we have to fill this show with as many replays, videos and interviews as we can.

Now it’s a REPLAY OF BISCHOFF PUTTING UP THE RING. Just…..wow.

Scott Hall vs. Bam Bam Bigelow

The fans aren’t interested in the idea of Goldberg getting shocked again. Bigelow runs him over to start and stops the driving shoulders with a clothesline. A poke to the eye has Bigelow in trouble and Hall slowly hammers away in the corner. Another clothesline puts Hall down and a delayed vertical suplex gets the same. Disco Inferno comes out for a distraction as Wrath shoves Bigelow off the top. Inferno slides Hall a taser which the referee somehow doesn’t hear, even though the cameras pick up the sound, allowing Hall to fall on top for the pin.

Rating: D-. This was somehow even less interesting than the previous match with punches and clotheslines before two run-ins and an electric stick got the pin in a four minute match. I’d guess this sets up Wrath vs. Bigelow at the pay per view, which puts us at I believe four matches for the show.

More from Goldberg, saying Nash knows he can’t beat him on his own. Luger’s turn surprised Goldberg more than anyone else for some reason.

Wrath and Bigelow got in a fight in the back to set up their match. Not that we get to SEE this or anything, but here’s a clip of Nash nearly killing Giant a year ago.

Nitro Girls.

Ric Flair vs. Curt Hennig

Feeling out process to start with Flair slapping him in the face a few times. Despite hating Hennig, Ric goes for a hammerlock and struts a bit. A backdrop puts Flair down and Barry Windham is at ringside less than a minute in. David Flair comes out to even things up as well as he can and we go to a break. Tony: “The tape machines are rolling.” Heenan: “BUT NO ONE IS RUNNING THE MACHINES!”

Back with Hennig eating an elbow in the corner but slamming Flair off the top. Curt slaps on the Figure Four but Ric pokes him in the eye to escape. Hennig sends him outside for a Flair Flop right in front of David. They send each other into the barricade until Flair takes him inside for a suplex to put both guys down. Back up and they collide to put each other down again. Ric sends him outside and Barry nails David. They get back in and Ric puts on the Figure Four, drawing in Barry for the DQ.

Rating: D+. I can only give it that because it’s slightly better than the previous two matches. The opening part of the match drove me crazy though as Ric is supposed to hate Hennig but treated him like any run of the mill jobber at the beginning. The idea of Ric and David wrestling a tag match together makes my head hurt, but that could just be the migraine that this show is giving me.

Goldberg says the phrase is now Who’s Left. He finally says Hall is first.

Nitro Girls.

Giant vs. Kevin Nash

Buffer says this is the home of the NCAA Champions of the Universe. Giant seemed like he quit the NWO earlier but comes out to their music here. You can’t blame them for not remembering that as their minds are still recovering from the comedic genius of Eric Bischoff using a wrench and carrying ropes. The trade poses to start and a headbutt staggers Nash before Giant stomps away in the corner. Nash avoids a charge and gets two off a big boot and an elbow drop.

Kevin hammers away in the corner as Tony points out that Sunday is the first WCW Souled Out rather than the third NWO Souled Out. I’d still love to hear the meetings where WCW thought people would care about which organization was putting on the pay per views at any point after the first Souled Out when it was still a new idea. Nash hits the picture frame elbow in the corner and Hall gets in a shot of his own.

We get a nice power display as Nash slams Giant but the bigger man powers out of the Jackknife attempt. Hall comes in and gets taken down as well before splashing both of them in the corner. A double headbutt puts them down and Hall gets chokeslammed. Nash pulls out a wrench (apparently the same one Bischoff used earlier in the day, which is treated as a big deal for some reason) to knock out Giant, literally with the referee looking right at them, for the pin.

Rating: D. And that’s it for Giant in WCW. It’s really hard to feel bad for him when he went on to become a multiple time World Champion and multimillionaire in the WWF, but it’s always bothered me that Giant never got to beat Nash even once. Giant would be 27 a month after this and still has a pretty high profile job fifteen years later. This is the start of a trend for the WWF: taking young stars from WCW instead of the older veterans. Giant would be the first of many and it would slowly chip away at WCW’s future.

Giant gets spray painted to end the show, giving me a flashback to two and a half years ago.

Overall Rating: F. This was one of the worst shows Nitro has ever produced. The best match of the night was either Booker T.’s glorified squash of Lenny Lane or Flair vs. Hennig in a nothing match ended with a run-in DQ. Other than that it was a night of recaps, unfunny comedy bits as Bischoff is humiliated, and videos that don’t go anywhere.

One thing I don’t think WCW ever got: most fans really didn’t care about the tradition that they kept talking about. Their idea of tradition seemed like the same old people instead of the same old style, and that just wasn’t going to work. It was an idea when the NWO was a different offering, but now that idea has gotten stale as well. With both options being dull, why should I watch?

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Thunder
Date: January 7, 1999
Location: Richmond Coliseum, Richmond, Virginia
Attendance: 8,597
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan

It’s a new year but somehow it feels like we’re still in 1997. Hogan is World Champion again and he has the full NWO behind him including Lex Luger and the Outsiders. This is the first show after the Fingerpoke of Doom, which is kind of uncharted territory. So many people remember the Fingerpoke of Doom, but after that you barely hear any TV talked about until Russo came in. Let’s get to it.

We open with a recap of Flair vs. Bischoff which earned Ric control of the company ten days earlier. You would think this would be a montage of what happened Monday, not ten days ago. There is a clip from Monday, though it’s about what Flair did on his first night in power. This eats up nearly five minutes.

The announcers talk about Bischoff a bit before we talk about the World Title situation from Monday. Tony: “Words cannot describe what happened on Monday.” You mean when Nash laid down to give Hogan the title and the NWO reunited? That’s something you can’t describe? We see the ending segment again, plus some bonus footage from after the show went off the air. Goldberg wanted to fight Nash but I believe the Atlanta Falcons got in the ring instead. Nash didn’t come out so this really doesn’t mean much.

Gene brings out Flair for a chat. He asks Ric about what happened on Monday and Flair is very serious. Flair talks about the tradition in this building and wrestling Harley Race here eighteen years ago. They were two men fighting to be the World Heavyweight Champion. That brings him to Hogan and Nash. Flair has spent his entire career walking behind Hulk Hogan and ten years from now, they’re going to look at their kids and have to explain what they’ve done.

Flair lays down and demands that Gene count him. He demands to know why Nash gave the World Title to Hulk Hogan. Flair shook his hand on Nitro and gave him the match so this is all on the President. He lists off every member of the new NWO and singles out Luger for having no leadership.

As for Bischoff, he spent hours sitting there silently before erupting at the end. Bischoff will be in a meeting with Harvey Schiller, Ted Turner and Flair to figure out what to do about Hogan and Nash this coming Monday. Flair lists off a bunch of legends and says they all used to be World Champions. Hogan and Nash are not taking away what that title means.

We see the clip of Jericho talking to referee Scott Dickinson on Nitro.

Ernest Miller vs. Perry Saturn

Starrcade rematch. Miller holds him off with kicks to the air before taking Saturn into the corner. A superkick puts Saturn down as the fans are trying to care about this show at all. Saturn tries a sunset flip, gets punched in the face, and then pulls Miller down after some posing anyway. Miller gets caught by a head and arms suplex for two but a Sonny distraction lets Cat get in another kick. Falcon’s Arrow gets two on Miller but Jericho pulls the referee to the floor. Tony: “The world has turned upside down.” Miller rolls Saturn up and Dickinson runs in, counts a one, and gives Miller the match.

Rating: D. Saturn is now feuding with a referee. How long ago was he at war with Raven in a hot feud? Four months? This was a waste of time and I can’t blame Saturn for wanting to get out of the company as fast as he could. Do Jericho and Saturn even have an issue? Jericho started stuff with Miller after Starrcade and now he’s feuding with Saturn because…..WCW?

Both NWO camps arrive with Hogan in a Red and Black shirt with a flannel shirt over it, complete with a red and black Harley-Davidson toboggan. Giant is the biggest star in Black and White and asks Hogan what’s up with this. Hogan says give him five minutes and they’ll have a meeting. Hogan looks like an idiot. We follow the Red and Black into their dressing room….and that’s all for this shot.

We look at Luger turning heel. Thankfully Tony brings up Scott Steiner recruiting him, so there is at least a backstory for it, even though it could have just been part of the NWO merger.

Cruiserweight Title: Kidman vs. Psychosis

Kidman is defending. They stall to start until Psychosis cranks on a wristlock into a hammerlock. Kidman rolls him out to the floor and hits a nice plancha as we go to a break. Back with….an ad for the Nitro Girls calendar. Now we’re back with both guys down on the floor. Apparently Psychosis hit a big top rope backsplash to the floor to get them in that position. Not that we get to see it or anything, but Tenay seemed to think it was rather spiffy.

Back in and the BK Bomb gets two on Psychosis before he tries a powerbomb of his own. You know what that means, but Juventud Guerrera runs in for the DQ before we get the Shooting Star. No rating due to the commercial but we didn’t get to see many of the high spots anyway.

Rey Mysterio comes out for the save but here’s the Red and Black. The cruiserweights get destroyed but Mysterio is allowed to leave. Nash talks about the match of the century on Monday where Hogan took the title. Hogan says Flair can’t handle the fact that tradition has been taken to a new level. He promises to take back the wrestling business and rips on Goldberg for having police and Atlanta Falcons protecting him. On Monday, we’ll see what backup is all about.

Cue the Black and White who aren’t looking very pleased. You can see Psychosis being taken out as they hit the ring. Giant wants to know why Hogan didn’t come talk to him but Hollywood says it was just bad timing. Hogan loves all the Black and White guys but thinks there’s a problem. It was Giant that got suckered in by the Macho Man (who hasn’t been seen since the night after Starrcade) and it’s time to trim some fat around here.

The Red and Black are all cool, but Giant is jumping in Hogan’s face. There’s only room for one giant in the NWO, and Kevin Nash has never dropped the ball. Giant says he’s the giant, because his name says he is. Hogan respects that and declares love for the Black and White. Since this is business, how about Nash vs. Giant on Monday for the giant spot on the team? Giant agrees.

This Week in WCW Motorsports. There are too many jokes to pick from.

Ad for the WCW/NWO Thunder game for Playstation.

We go to Raven’s house where his family and Kanyon are trying to get him to go back to therapy. He’s sitting there in ring gear and all of the women say the same things over and over. Raven says he doesn’t want to go back and everyone talks over each other. Raven finally walks off. His sister is being played by ECW’s Chastity.

Jerry Flynn vs. Bam Bam Bigelow

Neither guy has music. Twenty six seconds and Greetings From Asbury Park ends Jerry.

Tony wants to know where Konnan was on Monday. That’s a fair question actually.

Gene brings out Curt Hennig and Barry Windham for a chat. They talk about Ric sending his son to a slaughter, even though Ric’s career is already over. Hennig says not only will it be a handicap match, but Flair will have a handicapped kid.

Juventud Guerrera is trying to leave but Gene flags him down because Gene is an annoying man. Juvy rants about someone getting to Eddie before switching to Spanish. Gene: “You don’t have to talk to me in Mexican. You can talk to me in English.” Juvy looks terrified and escapes while talking about the Wolfpack.

Disco Inferno vs. Chavo Guerrero Jr.

No NWO shirt for Disco anymore. Pepe has a neck brace after what happened to him on Monday. Disco doesn’t know what to make of it so he grabs a wristlock instead. A shoulder puts Disco down and it’s time to dance. Some clotheslines put Inferno down again as they’re barely past the first month of wrestling school so far. Disco bails to the floor and Pepe rides Chavo around the ring a bit.

Back in and Chavo fires off some chops as we hear about the Tag Team Titles being vacated due to Rick Steiner’s injury. Flair has announced a tournament, but Tony is cut off by Norman Smiley coming out to do the Big Wiggle with Pepe included. Chavo goes to save the horse and gets caught by the Chartbuster for the pin.

Rating: D. The match didn’t have time to do anything as it was more about continuing Chavo vs. Smiley rather than anything with Disco. I’m glad Smiley has a feud now but couldn’t they do more for him than have something about dancing with a wooden horse? Well in theory they could, but it might take something away from 87 NWO segments a show.

Tag Team Title Tournament First Round: Fit Finlay/Dave Taylor vs. Super Calo/Lizmark Jr.

Finlay and Calo get things going as Tony talks about seeing Jimmy Snuka and Paul Orndorff winning the World Tag Team Titles back in the 70s. A headlock annoys Calo so Finlay sends him flying with a shoulder instead. Taylor gets in a kick from the apron and Finlay scores with a clothesline. Lizmark and Taylor come in with the masked man nailing a dropkick and stopping for what looked like a dance. Finlay comes back in to clean house and then hand it back to Taylor. Lizmark misses a moonsault press and a floatover butterfly suplex sends Finlay and Taylor to the next round.

Rating: D+. The match wasn’t horrible but these matches not even getting to five minutes is getting very annoying. I get that it’s a special kind of show, but usually you get a long match to fill in some of the time. This is the fifth match of the night and the only one that got more than five minutes had a commercial in it. It doesn’t help that it’s not even anything interesting, though paying some attention to the tag division is a nice idea.

Not that the match matters as the NWO comes in to clean house. Hall says tradition bites and there’s no tag wrestling around here because the Outsiders were undefeated. The tournament isn’t going to happen.

Booker T. vs. La Parka

La Parka dances a bit but gets forearmed for his efforts. Booker easily sends him outside but gets caught in a chase, allowing La Parka to hit some chops in the corner. Time to dance! La Parka fires off some right hands in the corner as Tony says there’s no way Booker is getting a World Title shot anytime soon. Booker easily comes back with the ax kick for two and the whip spinebuster. Tony is of course talking about some meeting with human resources. La Parka clotheslines Booker out to the floor and brings the chair in, only to have Booker kick it into his face for the pin.

Rating: C-. The match probably wasn’t that good but after this show I’ll take anything. La Parka wasn’t the best in the world but he was having a decent match here and actually trying. Booker continues to look like someone capable of getting a rocket push at the drop of a hat, but like Tony said, that simply wasn’t in the cards at this point.

Back to Raven’s house with him sitting by the pool and Kanyon cleaning. A man with blond hair named Jim shows up and throws Kanyon in. Apparently the man is related to the family and gets into a chat with them as Raven goes inside. You might know Jim better by his ring name: the Sandman.

We see Konnan beating Chris Jericho for the TV Title back in November.

Chris Jericho vs. Konnan

We cut to the back to see La Parka laid out with the NWO circle of spray paint around him. Konnan (still in a Konnan Red and Black shirt) does the catchphrases and finally gets jumped while he talks forever. Why did no one ever figure that out before? Konnan fights back with a shoulder but walks into a spinwheel kick. Another clothesline puts Jericho on the floor and it’s right back inside for a chinlock.

That goes nowhere so a release hot shot puts Konnan down instead. Back up and Konnan spins around into a bulldog for two followed by the rolling lariat. Scott Dickinson is bumped and Jericho pulls out a foreign object for two but Saturn pulls Dickinson out. Back in and Konnan gets in a cheap shot and Saturn counts a fast three because why not.

Rating: D+. This show is rapidly killing me as this referee nonsense is such a waste of Saturn’s skills. They tried to throw in something about them coming from the same wrestling school but at the end of the day, it’s Saturn feuding with a referee and Jericho by proxy. Why am I supposed to be interested?

Tony and Tenay brag about doing commentary in the Thunder game. Heenan: “Why wasn’t I invited?” Tony: “You’re very obnoxious.”

Chris Benoit vs. Barry Windham

Apparently Tony gave human resources a very bad report on Eric Bischoff’s commentary Monday. They fight against the ropes to start as Tony lists off a bunch of people Bischoff has treated horribly over the years. Benoit and Windham fight to the floor as the announcers still ignore them.

Back in and Benoit backdrops Barry and chops away in the corner. Windham nails a quick low blow to take over but gets caught in the release German. Back to the floor with Benoit being rammed into the barricade but coming back with a clothesline inside. The referee goes down again as Benoit hits another German but Hennig comes in. He gets caught in the Crossface but Barry is back up to kick Benoit in the head for the pin.

Rating: D. Think back to all the battles and matches Benoit has had. Think back to the wars with Kevin Sullivan. Now imagine a single kick to the back of the head being enough to pin him. It’s just a way to cap this awful show with another stupid moment that doesn’t make sense or please any fan.

Mongo comes out for the save to end the show.

Overall Rating: F. This looks to be the start of a really bad time for WCW. We had terrible matches (none of which seemed like anyone was even trying save for maybe Booker T. vs. La Parka) and WAY too much NWO stuff. I see no reason whatsoever for the LWO to have to be destroyed. Did we really need to prove that the guys who just destroyed GOLDBERG could beat people up? It’s clear that there was no thought put into this save for the main event angles and that’s not a good thing. The main event was just there and the announcers spent half the time talking about Tony and human resources. REALLY bad sign here.

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Do you know who today’s Wrestler of the Day is? Yes Yes Yes. Oh good. Let’s get….No No No. Oh ok then it’s Yes Yes Yes. Make up your mind. No No No. QUIET ALREADY! It’s Harlem Heat.

Booker T. and Stevie Ray were both trained by Scott Putski and teamed up as the Ebony Experience in the Global Wrestling Federation. From June 1992.

Ebony Experience vs. Geekoid II/Johnny Mantel

Geekoid is a man in all black with a mask. Booker and Mantel get things going and it’s an early feeling out process. Mantel is shoved to the mat and crawls backwards until he crotches himself on the post and falls outside. Back in and Mantel slams Booker down and brings Geekoid in, only for Booker to tag off to Ray for some arm cranking. Stevie gets taken into the corner for some double teaming by the heels and we hit the chinlock.

We take a break and come back with Booker getting a tag and hammering on Geekoid as everything breaks down. Booker cleans house and powerslams Geekoid for two. Stevie tries to come in but only causes Booker to get laid out and sent to the floor. Back in and a suplex gets two on Booker and we hit the chinlock. This match is dragging really badly.

Mantel comes in and gets caught in a sunset flip but the referee is with Stevie. Since this match hasn’t gone on long enough, Johnny hooks a wristlock but gets punched in the jaw. Stevie finally comes in off the hot tag and cleans house. Booker dropkicks Geekoid down and Stevie sunset flips Johnny for the pin.

Rating: D. Who in the world gave this mess fifteen minutes? Apparently there’s another Geekoid so why wasn’t he in there to make this a more logical tag match? Booker and Stevie didn’t look bad in there but they had the most generic opponents I’ve seen in years. WAY too long.

The team arrived in WCW in 1993 under the name Harlem Heat, under the names Kane (Stevie Ray) and Kole (Booker T.). Their first major match was at Fall Brawl 1993 as part of a WarGames match.

Sting/Shockmaster/Davey Boy Smith/Dustin Rhodes vs. Vader/Harlem Heat/Sid Vicious

WarGames again. This is the mother of all gimmick matches in WCW and something that a lot of people with they would bring back in WWE, me being one of them. The idea is it’s 4 on 4 in a double cage match. Two people start us off, one from each team. They go at it for five minutes and then we have a coin toss (the heels will win). The winning team gets to send in another man for a 2-1 advantage. That last two minutes and then the losing team gets to send in its second man. After two more minutes the winning team gets to send in its third. You alternate until everyone is in and it’s first submission wins.

Harlem Heat are Kane and Kole here but I’ll be calling them by their more famous names. Vader is the other world champion here, the WCW World Champion. Animal is advising the faces here for no apparent reason. Dustin has really bad ribs here. Shockmaster is the hilariously infamous falling man that is more famous as Typhoon/Tugboat. Dustin starts without his partners wanting him to and gets Vader.

Dustin hammers Vader down surprisingly enough and pulls his boot off to beat on Vader even more. Well it’s resourceful if nothing else. Dustin is able to fight Vader off as well as anyone else has been able to do in a very long time. His ribs end that run though and there’s the Vader Bomb. Remember that you can’t end the match until after everyone is in the ring. That’s a great rule that makes sure there’s additional violence.

Rhodes fights back AGAIN and puts Vader down. That could be a heck of a Clash of the Champions main event actually. More boot shots (with the boot itself mind you, not a foot in it) to the head of Vader and Dustin is surprisingly in control. The heels win the coin toss which I literally think was a perfect record for them over the years. Dustin counters a dive off the top by Vader into a powerslam in a nice move.

Kane (Stevie Ray) comes in second. Dustin tries to fight them off but Vader gets a shot in to the ribs to take him down almost immediately. A minute in (remember everything now is just two minutes) and Dustin is in trouble. I’m not entirely sure why they sent in Vader so soon but whatever. Sting comes in but Vader and Stevie wait on him by the door like smart people would do.

2-1 is nothing for Sting though as he fights both guys off. I could watch Sting vs. Vader all day. Dustin is back up but is bleeding badly. His grandma is here tonight. Dusty’s mom is here. Let that sink in for a bit. Vader is sent into the cage and stumbles into the cameraman in a funny moment. Sid comes in to fight Sting in an old rivalry. Chokeslam takes Sting down and it’s all Sid.

The pops Sting gets for even the most basic moves are amazing. Vader and Sid ram Sting into the top of the cage for fun. With thirty seconds left it’s going to be the Bulldog in next. Yes Tugboat is batting cleanup. Davey comes in and Sid jumps him immediately. He fights off Sid and Vader by himself. He was a straight up tough guy in WCW if you haven’t seen any of his stuff there. In a nice touch Sting and Bulldog do to Sid what Vader and Sid did to Sting moments ago.

Kole (Booker T) comes in so there’s just Shocky left to come. Everyone is in one ring so that ring is completely overcrowded. The announcers make fun of Shockmaster falling which is funny stuff. They finally split up a bit and the match gets more interesting as a result. Sting takes down Stevie but hurts himself in the process. Sid gets caught in a Figure Four but here’s Shockmaster to even us up. Tony: Hey he made it through!

He’s bigger than Vader which isn’t something you often see. He beats up everyone in sight and after just over a minute and a half he throws Booker in a bearhug and it’s over. Wow so Typhoon beat a multiple time multiple time multiple time multiple time multiple time world champion? Sweet goodness man.

Rating: C. That’s bad for a WarGames match mind you. It’s ok, but the lack of starpower kind of hurts this here. Sid is an afterthought and Vader got beaten down like a fat jobber. Dustin Rhodes looked the most impressive out there which is odd. This was kind of weak and did nothing to set up the next shows or anything. Shockmaster was gone almost immediately after this and no one cared.

Here’s one of their final matches before going away for awhile. From SuperBrawl IV.

Harlem Heat vs. Thunder and Lightning

Thunder and Lightning were rookies, meaning this had no point being on PPV. Harlem Heat would one day become great but here they’re relatively new. They debuted in August so it’s not like they’re well known or anything. Also they’re named Kane (Stevie Ray) and Kole (Booker T). Heenan rips the white guys like there’s no tomorrow as he’s in his element here. Seriously, Thunder and Lightning is the best name you can come up with?

I never got the Heat having their names changed. They look exactly the same as they would in later years with the same outfits and everything but their names were changed. It helped a lot but I never got the point to it. You could tell that Booker had that it factor to be a big deal. Tony thinks the winner here should get a title shot. We get a camera into Flair’s dressing room to show that he is indeed sitting in it. Apparently Steamboat gets a title shot at the next PPV.

That one is coming soon. Thunder gets the hot tag and no one cares. His dropkick misses completely but Kane (that just sounds weird to type) sells it anyway. Kole kicks the heck out of Thunder for the pin.

Rating: C-. This wasn’t bad but I just couldn’t have cared less. Heenan calling them Batman and Robin the whole time was funny if nothing else. This just wasn’t very good. It’s not bad to be fair, but this got 10 minutes for two rookie teams. Who thought this was a good idea?

Harlem Heat would return in the fall with a new look and new names (Booker T. and Stevie Ray) win their first Tag Team Titles in December and defend them at Clash of the Champions XXX.

Tag Team Titles: Harlem Heat vs. Stars and Stripes

Harlem Heat won the belts earlier in the month and this is the rematch. We have no Stars and Stripes to start but we do get Nature Boy Ric Flair with two very nice looking women. He walks by Vader with no incident and goes to his seat. Booker and Bagwell get things going with Marcus stomping him down in the corner but running into a boot in the corner. He comes right back with a dropkick for both champions as Stars and Stripes stands tall.

It’s off to Patriot for a double backdrop on Booker for two. He cranks on Booker’s arm as the fans chant USA. Stevie comes in but walks into a wristlock from Patriot before it’s back to Bagwell for the same hold. A knee to the ribs stops Marcus cold and the champions take over. The advantage only lasts for a few seconds though as it’s quickly back to Patriot for more arm work. A belly to belly gets two on Booker but Stevie saves his brother from a monkey flip.

Back to Stevie for some heavy stomping and he draws in Patriot so Booker can choke from the apron. A running forearm gets two for Booker and it’s off to the chinlock. Marcus fights up but both guys try cross bodies to put him right back down. Sherri gets up on the apron for a distraction so Bagwell’s tag to the Patriot doesn’t count. She takes her shoe off but accidentally hits Booker by mistake. Bagwell rolls him up for two but Stevie kicks Marcus in the face to give Booker the pin to retain.

Rating: C. It’s not bad and more entertaining than the other matches tonight. They let the match have a little more time and things got better as a result which is usually the case. Harlem Heat was getting much better and this more or less ended Stars and Stripes as a team. Good enough to get by.

Bunkhouse Buck and Dick Slater would take the belts in June but Harlem Heat would get a rematch at Fall Brawl 1995.

WCW Tag Titles: Bunkhouse Buck/Dick Slater vs. Harlem Heat

The talented tag team is challenging here. The idea here is more about the managers though as apparently they like each other. The match is going to suck though. Oh and along with this, we only have Arn/Flair and War Games. We’re an hour and five minutes into the show. That simply can’t be a good sign. I also have issues with a guy names Dirty Dick. Also, they gave THESE TWO the tag titles after like 5 months of Heat vs. Nasty Boys?

I don’t like the Nasties, but they’re light years ahead of these morons. Booker and Slater start so at least the one good wrestler in the match is starting us off. Slater is one of those good old southern boys that allegedly was really talented but never shook either the southern stigma or the lack of talent to get over. Crowd is deader than Booker’s career at this point. Again I love how two hicks like this are supposed to be trained wrestlers.

There’s something amusing about that. Yeah the idea here is that Sherri has a bump on the head and isn’t herself. Somehow this was put on national TV as a mainstream wrestling company with angles like that. Wow indeed. Apparently Dick Slater is one of the best wrestlers in the history of the sport. I can barely laugh at how stupid that is.

On the floor the managers are playing this messed up cat and mouse game that is just rather creepy. The fans prove they’re still alive with a short and incomprehensible chant. It’s weird hearing them talk about Booker as a power guy. That’s most odd indeed. Heenan seems like he wants to talk about Buck being undressed. Ok then. The heels are controlling most of the match here.

You can tell the match itself is pretty awful as I’ve barely talked about it. I’m trying very hard to think of anything else to talk about so that I don’t have to actually pay attention. Fact: I used to have this tape and this match cured my insomnia over a summer. I didn’t sleep regularly for a month but this match put me to sleep in five minutes. That’s saying something. We talk about WarGames to kill some time.

This match needs to end BADLY. And trust me, since this is WCW< I’m sure that will mean both possible things. Stevie gets the I guess you could say hot tag to get the crowd to do nothing at all. And here is that finish as Parker and Sherri get into the other ring and kiss. At the same time the Nasty Boys are here and rip Slater’s boot off to smack him in the head with it to give the Heat the titles. While this is happening, Sherri and Parker are still kissing. I hate this show.

Rating: F+. This was just terrible. The ending sucked and the match was worse. Who thought that Buck and Slater were the best options? Seriously, the American Males were on the preshow. They’re not the best in the world by any stretch of the imagination but they’re better than Buck and Slater. It’s stuff like this that is freaking idiotic and gave WCW the bad name it had.

This was a dream match and took place on Nitro, January 22, 1996.

Tag Titles: Sting/Lex Luger vs. Harlem Heat

Heenan is ranting about something after we get back which apparently is that he isn’t being allowed to talk. This is happening because Sting and Luger decided they were going to be a tag team now so they’re #1 contenders. We start it off after a brief commercial. Back and there’s the bell and it’s Luger vs. Stevie to start us off. Luger gets beaten down a bit but managed to bring in Sting who cleans house, beating up both champions at once.

Scorpion goes onto Stevie but Booker makes the save. Booker gets an armbar on Sting as this is going very quickly but it doesn’t seem like much is happening at the same time. Luger breaks up a cover as Sting is getting beaten down pretty badly. Sting tries to fight back but gets clothesline on the top by Stevie. This is about as going through the motions as you could ask for.

Harlem Heat is rather boring indeed. LONG nerve hold by Booker wastes a good deal of time. Sherri, Harlem Heat’s manager, isn’t here since she’s about to get married tomorrow which didn’t happen either. Booker goes up but the Harlem Hangover misses. Jimmy Hart runs out again and slips Luger something. With the referee distracted Luger drills Booker with what turns out to be a roll of silver dollars for the pin and the titles.

Rating: D+. I couldn’t get into this one again. I don’t know what’s going on with these guys tonight but the show has been off by a step all night. I don’t know if it’s the being out west or what but this hasn’t worked at all for the most part all night despite there being talented guys out there. Sting and Luger would hold the belts for a few months.

Harlem Heat would get the belts back in June and defend them at Clash of the Champions XXXIII.

Tag Team Titles: Sting/Lex Luger vs. Steiner Brothers vs. Harlem Heat

Harlem Heat has the titles coming in and this is a Triangle Match, meaning two guys are in the ring at once and everyone else has to tag in and out (it doesn’t have to be to your partner) with the first fall earning the win. The Steiners returned in March and were immediately back in the title scene. Luger is a full good guy once again. Colonel Parker comes out after Sherri and Harlem Heat despite being their co-manager at this time.

Booker T. and Scott get things going as Tony brags about WCW broadcasting nine hours of live television in the last six days. Scott throws him across the ropes and Luger adds a shot from the apron to send the champions outside. Luger comes in off a tag and gets pounded down in the corner by Stevie but Lex comes back with kicks and stomps of his own. Rick tags himself into the match and comes in with a Steiner Line for both guys. Luger is forced out as Rick hits the top rope bulldog for two on Stevie.

We take a break and come back with Rick catching Booker in a powerslam but Sting tags himself in to go after T. A top rope ax handle gets two on Booker and Sting hiptosses him to the floor. Back in and a gorilla press puts Booker down again before it’s off to Luger for a suplex. Booker tags his brother in and Stevie scores with some heavy forearms to Sting. Scott reaches over to tag himself in and cranks on Sting’s arm.

Tony mistakenly says Luger returned last year at a Clash of the Champions as Scott reverses a Sting suplex attempt and lays Sting out with a reverse DDT. A tiger bomb lays Sting out again and it’s back to Rick for a hard chinlock. Luger fights up and explodes out of the corner with a clothesline of his own but walks into a German suplex.

Back to Scott with a belly to belly on Luger before he heads up top. Luger catches him in a fireman’s carry which is incorrectly called the Rack as everything breaks down. Scott hits a Frankensteiner on Booker but the Outsiders run out and attack the other wrestlers on the floor, drawing a questionable DQ from Nick Patrick.

Rating: C+. The match was entertaining but started to fall apart near the end. It didn’t help that the entire twelve minute match was spent building up to the crooked referee story which is only so interesting. This wasn’t bad but the Outsiders were clearly going to get the titles sooner or later so it was just filling in time.

What would wrestling be without a gimmick match? From Uncensored 1997.

Public Enemy vs. Harlem Heat

This is for the #1 contender spot which meant nothing because it’s not like the Outsiders ever wrestled. Oh and this is Texas Tornado rules. In essence this is a street fight and the weapons are in as soon as the bell rings. This is one of those brawls where they’re going to beat on each other for a good while until they get tired and then it drags for awhile until we get to the ending.

The white guys beat up Stevie until Booker makes the save. Booker actually gets two on Grunge. Extension cord comes in and Rock accidently hits Grunge. Various comedy weapons are brought in and this is going nowhere for the most part. Dusty laughs a lot at stuff that really isn’t funny. The guy enjoyed his work to be sure.

There’s a toilet seat in there which is the main focus of the “comedy” here. The announcers don’t pay a bit of attention here as you would expect. Sherri helps a bit and Dusty loses whatever he had left. More weapon shots and choking follow as it occurs to me that Sherri and Public Enemy are all dead. That’s a rather saddening thought. Dusty freaks over a pizza pan being brought in.

Grunge gets crotched as we hit the slow down period. We get a shot of Sherri hitting Rock so we shift to a camera view where we can’t see anything but the ring because I guess a woman hitting a man hurts the southern mentality or whatever. There was a low blow in there somewhere and Dusty cracks up over it.

There’s a purse brought in with some form of electronics in it. Rocket Launcher gets two on Grunge. Sherri gets rammed into the railing and Booker goes through a table. Here are Mongo and Jarrett for no apparent reason. Ah apparently Heat is replacing them. Briefcase to Grunge sets up the Harlem Hangover to end this after FAR too long.

Rating: D+. This was your standard wild brawl that wasn’t really wild and wasn’t anything resembling good but it’s not terrible for a toss your brain out and let them destroy each other fight. It definitely got far too tedious more than once but these can be entertaining if they don’t go too long. This went too long but was still kind of entertaining so points for that I suppose.

The war against the NWO would continue at Road Wild 1997 against a slightly lower level team.

Harlem Heat vs. Vicious and Delicious

That’s Norton and Bagwell. Buff and Booker get us going here. Booker hooks the arm but Bagwell dropkicks him into the corner and it’s off to Norton. Ray comes in for a power vs. power brawl and Norton gets slammed. Back to Booker for a suplex which gets two but a spin kick is countered into a kind of powerbomb. Buff cleans house for some reason but Booker knocks him to the outside.

Booker hooks a chinlock which is a heel move but since they’re against the NWO, wouldn’t that make them faces? Bagwell fights up and hits a clothesline to set up the tag to Norton. Stevie breaks up the tag as I can’t get over the heel/face dynamic being so backwards here. Cue Jackie to really make this match great. Harlem Heat had been promising a surprise before this and I guess it’s her.

Bagwell comes back from the beating with a powerbomb of all things and it’s off to Norton off a hot (?) tag. Vincent’s interference fails so Ray beats him up. Norton hits Booker with the shoulderbreaker but Jackie interferes enough to let Booker side kick Norton down for the pin. What an odd match.

Rating: D. I’m not sure what the idea here was but it really didn’t work all that well. First of all, the heel/face dynamic was completely backwards here, as the NWO team wrestled as faces. Harlem Heat wrestled as heels and had Bagwell in trouble most of the time, plus Norton got a hot tag and the Heat had a manager interfere. Oh and Jackie sucks but you already know that. I don’t know what was going on here but it didn’t work.

Since we’ve been in a bit of a drought, here’s a match from Nitro on December 22, 1997.

Harlem Heat vs. Scotty Riggs/Lodi

Heenan is offering to buy Rude dinner to prevent pain and agony. They stand around for a long time to start until it’s Booker vs. Riggs. Mike Tenay joins in on commentary again to give us Bobby, Mike and Rick. Booker easily takes down Riggs and they trade wristlocks. Scotty takes him down with a dropkick to give the Flock its only advantage of the match, but Booker spin kicks him down with ease. Off to Stevie Ray who misses an elbow and it’s off to Lodi for the first time ever.

Ray immediately clotheslines him down as the punishment continues. A backbreaker keeps Lodi down and it’s off to Booker for the ax kick. The Heat hit a double suplex for two before Stevie chokes with his knee. A bicycle kick gets two on Lodi as the Heat are barely breaking a sweat here. Stevie hits what would become known as the AA as Riggs walks out on his partner. The Big Apple Blast (Hart Attack with a side kick from Booker instead of a clothesline) ends this massacre.

Rating: D. Unless you’re a big fan of Harlem Heat, there’s no need to see this match. It felt like they were intentionally filling in time with nothing special at all. Harlem Heat didn’t even have a match on the upcoming PPV yet they get a ten minute segment here to destroy a pair of jobbers? That doesn’t do much for me.

That would be their last win together for over a year and a half, as injuries, the NWO and singles pushes would split the team up for a long time. They would reunite in fall 1999 and get a title shot at Road Wild of that year.

Tag Titles: Jersey Triad vs. Harlem Heat

It’s Kanyon and Bigelow here. Bigelow’s belt falls off as he comes out because he’s fat. Big brawl to start and they botch something. I’m really surprised that Bigelow, who looks like a biker, is getting booed here at a biker rally. Ray vs. Kanyon finally gets us started. The announcers are actually breaking the match down and talking about how the Heat are rusty but are brothers so they work together naturally. See how much better it works when you talk about the match?

Stevie slams both of them and the Triad chills on the floor for a bit. Kanyon comes in and wants Booker so here we go again. We talk about Charles Robinson being a biased referee which again pertains to the match. I don’t know how to handle this. They remedy themselves by talking about the main event a bit as this match is going nowhere. The reason would be that the Triad is chilling on the floor.

Ok so it’s Stevie vs. Bigelow now. Off to Kanyon after Bigelow takes him down after some, shall we say, really boring stuff. Time for a chinlock as we’re waiting on the hot tag to Booker so we can get to the ending of the match. The champions set for a spike…something (piledriver I think) but Stevie slingshots Kanyon into Bigelow for a crotching. Here’s Booker to clean house but the Axe Kick is broken up. Everything breaks down and here’s DDP for interference. He accidentally rams into Bigelow though and a missile dropkick by Booker gives the Heat their 8th tag titles.

Rating: D+. Not the worst tag match I’ve ever seen but it could have been a lot better. Kanyon and Bigelow were probably the weakest combination they could have thrown out there, but Page has a singles match later in the show. The Heat would hold the titles for 8 days so it’s not like this was any huge title reign or switch.

They would lose the titles nine days later, win them back a month later, lose them back a month later, then get another rematch six days later at Halloween Havoc 1999.

Tag Titles: Konnan/Billy Kidman vs. Harlem Heat vs. Hugh Morrus/Brian Knobbs

Morrus/Knobbs are the First Family and are managed by Hart. This is under hardcore rules and there are two referees. Remember that. Kidman and Konnan have the belts and wear them out despite not being champions. They’re thieves apparently and have stolen Flair’s socks. The first shot of the match is Knobbs hitting Ray with a trashcan and the brawl begins.

Yep it’s a big mess. Booker throws Knobbs into the first row and the cameramen can’t keep up with everything. This is a case where split screen would be a good idea. The First Family screws up a bit and Morrus takes a trashcan shot. Jimmy gets caught in the ring and runs as Booker stalks him. Knobbs makes the save, pelting a trashcan at him. I don’t mind it as much when you can get the pin out there.

Knobbs is double teamed by the Heat who send him through a casket. Kidman is dropped on a chair as the Heat beat up Knobbs in the back. Scratch that as the Heat screw up and it’s table time back in the arena. Morrus hits his moonsault on Konnan through the table. We cut to the back to see Stevie hit Knobbs with a mummy and Booker gets the pin. 26 seconds later, Kidman pins Morrus (via something we totally miss) and we have a controversy. Not really, but it’s WCW so logic and the laws of time and space take a backseat to Russo’s brain.

Rating: F. This wasn’t wrestling. This was proof that the Hardcore matches in WWF had some logic and thinking behind them. Let that sink in for a few seconds. This was junk and the “controversy” was really stupid because there were two referees and Harlem Heat clearly got the pin far earlier. Kidman and Konnan would win the titles the next night, making this whole thing totally pointless.

We’ll wrap it up with the last match the team had together, when Booker was World Champion. From Thunder on July 19, 2000.

Harlem Heat vs. Rick Steiner/Jeff Jarrett

Commissioner Ernest Miller is on commentary. This is the result of an attack on a Tuesday edition of Monday Nitro. Booker and Rick get things going with Rick hammering away. T. comes back with a spinwheel kick as Scott Steiner’s chick Midajah tries to interfere, only to have Miller handcuff himself to her. Stevie charges into Rick’s boot in the corner and the heels take over. Ray comes back with a bicycle kick to Jarrett and the fight heads to the floor. A chair is brought in but Miller takes it away.

The distraction lets Jeff grab a Russian legsweep before tagging off to Rick. We hit the chinlock for a bit before it’s quickly back to Jarrett who walks into a belly to back suplex. Booker comes in off the hot tag and cleans house. A spinebuster gets two on Rick as everything breaks down. Jeff crotches Booker to break up the missile dropkick and superplexes the champion down, only to have Booker hook the leg for a fast pin.

Rating: C. This was actually fine. I can’t believe I’m saying that but it really wasn’t bad at all. This is what happens when you let some talented wrestlers get in a ring and have a basic match: it’s not that bad. It needed some more time to go anywhere but this was definitely entertaining, which is a rare thing for WCW at this point.

Harlem Heat is a team that was very good when they had the right opponents but weren’t always the best at bringing a team up to another level. Booker T.’s singles career also outshines the team a lot, but they were definitely a huge success together. They won ten World Tag Team Titles and that’s not something that just happens.

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Smackdown
Date: April 4, 2014
Location: Verizon Center, Washington D.C.
Commentators: Michael Cole, John Bradshaw Layfield

This is one of those weird shows where everything is about hyping up Wrestlemania. There will be a lot of hype videos and stuff from Axxess plus a few matches taking place in the arena. This is going to be a shorter review than normal as it’s all about setting up Sunday rather than anything tonight. Let’s get to it.

Opening sequence.

Dolph Ziggler vs. Titus O’Neil

Titus throws Ziggler around to start and drops a big leg for two. The announcers run down most of the people in the battle royal as Titus hooks a chinlock. Back up and Titus runs into a pair of boots to the face followed by a cross body and some right hands from Dolph. Ziggler hammers away in the corner even more and drops Titus with a neckbreaker. Titus avoids the Fameasser and gets two of his own off a big boot. He loads up some backbreakers but Ziggler escapes and nails the Zig Zag for the pin at 4:00.

Rating: D+. Not much to see here but that’s the point for a show like this. It sets up more of the battle royal and keeps Ziggler on a winning streak for the first time in far too long. I’m not saying the guy should be World Champion, but having him lose far more often than he wins is ridiculous for a former champ. I’m not wild on Titus losing but I can live with it being to a name of this magnitude.

Andre the Giant video.

Video on HHH dominating everyone he’s faced over the last eleven years. I think this is slightly different from the video on Monday.

Speaking of Monday, we also get clips from HHH and Stephanie’s promo on Raw, followed by the ending of the show.

We get a sitdown interview with Batista conducted by Booker T. Big Dave talks about coming back to the company and being shocked at everything he’s seen. Booker agrees that things have changed and we get clips of Batista ranting about the real men being gone. Daniel Bryan is clearly just the flavor of the month and Batista is going to squash him like a bug at Wrestlemania. The fans are living vicariously through Bryan but Daniel just isn’t the real deal. Orton is a big corporate sellout and Batista can’t wait to kick his face in. You can guarantee that Batista walks out with the title and he’ll be enjoying the boos.

Los Matadores vs. Real Americans

Fernando starts with Swagger as the fans chant WE THE PEOPLE. The masked man tries a headscissors out of the corner but gets sent to the apron. He comes right back with an armdrag and it’s quickly off to Cesaro to try his luck. Cesaro gets armdragged as well and a headscissors puts him down again. Diego comes in with a slingshot headscissors of his own and the Real Americans want to caucus. Zeb slaps Cesaro to get his attention and not-Antonio isn’t happy.

The slap works as Cesaro comes in with a running dropkick of all things followed by some running European uppercuts in the corner. A release gutwrench suplex sends Diego flying and we take a break. Back with Diego fighting out of a chinlock and taking both Real Americans down with a double DDT. He still can’t make a hot tag though as Cesaro slams him down and drops a big elbow for two. Back to Swagger who throws Cesaro onto Diego in the corner, followed by a big running clothesline for two.

Diego avoids a charge in the corner and backdrops Cesaro to the floor. The Patriot Lock doesn’t work but Cesaro makes a save, allowing Swagger to hit a belly to belly for two. The Vader Bomb into the double stomp gets the same but Diego sends both Americans to the floor. He FINALLY makes the hot tag to Fernando as things speed up. A running elbow gets two on Cesaro and a top rope cannonball gets the same. Diego sends Swagger to the floor as well but Cesaro kicks him in the face. Fernando dives into the Swing and the Neutralizer is good for the pin at 12:19.

Rating: C. I’m not big on the Matadores but this was an entertaining match. It’s cool to see teams like them get some extra TV time around this part of the year because everyone else is busy. The Real Americans could win the titles on Sunday and it’s nice to see them getting a win here.

Video on AJ Lee which transitions into a video on the Vickie Invitational.

Video on Cena vs. Bray, including their segment from Raw.

Package on Shield vs. Kane/Outlaws, including a big chunk of Kane vs. Reigns from Raw.

We get a sitdown interview with Orton, again conducted by Booker T. He talks about winning the title back in December and how it means he’s the top man in the industry. As for the triple threat, Orton knows HHH a lot better than he knows Bryan, but he also knows HHH is brutal. When they step into the ring together, HHH is just another guy.

Orton took what HHH said about holding his hand as a compliment because HHH called him a technically gifted wrestler. This came off as him not wanting to yell at his boss. We get a quick clip of Occupy Raw and Orton calls him a fad. There’s no guarantee that Bryan will make it into the match though so Orton isn’t worried.

As for Batista, he’s missed four long years and is stuck in the past. Back in the day he would have been an opponent but now he’s just a guy. Orton promises to keep the title on Sunday. I liked this more than I thought I would have as it felt like it was more from Orton the person rather than Orton the character.

Video on Brock vs. Undertaker.

Here’s Hogan in the arena to close the show. He’s glad to be back here in Washington and is pumped up to be the host. Hulk talks about his own great Wrestlemania memories like the main event of Wrestlemania I, Wrestlemania XVIII against The Rock and of course Wrestlemania III against Andre. That match makes the battle royal so important to him and we see the trophy on the screen. Hulk calls it beautiful and asks what we’re going to do when it runs wild on YOU and that’s the show.

Overall Rating: C+. This was all you could expect from a Wrestlemania weekend Smackdown. The wrestling obviously wasn’t the point here and it would be ridiculous to treat this like a regular show. All the videos worked well and every match was covered so what more can you ask for? Wrestlemania looks good and I’m excited to be going so it’s a good episode this week, despite it being different than every other show all year.

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