Monday Nitro #141
Date: June 15, 1998
Location: Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum, Uniondale, New York
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan, Laryr Zbyszko

We’re past the Great American Bash and the main development is Sting holds both tag team titles. Seriously, other than that not a ton has changed. Hogan, Hart, Piper and Savage had their match which changed absolutely nothing and Booker is the TV Champion again. There’s not much else to say about the show, which is a good indication of how important that show was. We’re now four weeks away from Bash at the Beach so let’s get to it.

Public Enemy vs. Hugh Morrus/Barbarian

This opens the show as Public Enemy is on their way to the ring as Tony welcomes us to the show. It’s a street fight meaning the weapons are flying as soon as the Public Enemy hits the ring. As usual it’s pure insanity with everyone hitting everyone else in the head and Grunge being sent head first into a garbage can. Even Jimmy Hart gets in a cheap shot with a sheet of medal.

Hugh backdrops Rocco into a powerbomb from Barbarian and a bunch of garbage can shots keep Rocco down. Grunge comes back in with some trashcan lid shots to Barbarian as Morrus loads up a table on the floor. A frying pan to the crotch slows Morrus down but he’s good enough to bulldog Rocco. Jimmy tries some more shots to Rocco’s head, earning him a suplex into the ring. Rocco is eventually suplexed over the top and through the table, but he lands on Barbarian for the pin.

Rating: D-. I can’t stand these matches. I get the idea of appealing to the ECW fanbase but couldn’t they come up with something more interesting than just hitting each other in the head with metal? These matches don’t add anything at all and when it takes a few seconds to determine who won, there’s probably a problem.

We get the opening pyro display and the announcers’ usual recap of the recent events around these parts.

Earlier today Mike interviewed some fans to find out if they were ready for Nitro.

We recap the Wolfpack recruiting Page from last week.

Opening sequence.

Nitro Girls.

Here’s how to get a Nitro Party!

Here’s Savage for an interview. He has a message for Piper and that is….that he wants DDP in the Wolfpack. Savage talks about Wyatt Earp wanting to help the Wolfpack and goes into a sales pitch to Page for a spot on the team. He wants Page in a cage match tonight and if Page can beat him, Page can join the team with Savage’s full endorsement.

We get some stills of the tag match last night.

Chris Benoit vs. Fit Finlay

Tenay suggests that this is a #1 contenders match for the TV Title but I don’t think that’s official. Benoit takes him into the corner to start and this is going to be a physical one. The fans are all over Finlay from the bell and he seems a bit shaken by it. Finlay takes him down with a headlock and cranks on the arm a bit before just kicking Benoit in the face. We hit the chinlock on the Canadian before Benoit fights up and hits a backbreaker to send Finlay to the floor.

Finlay sends him back first into the apron before taking him inside for a reverse chinlock. Benoit stands up and drops Finlay down onto his back for two. We come back from a break with Finlay dropping a knee on Benoit’s face for two. Chris fights up again with some hard boots to the ribs but gets dropped throat first across the top rope. Finlay misses a charge into the post and Benoit hits the Rolling Germans to put both guys down.

Benoit is up first but the Swan Dive only hits mat and Finlay drops another knee to the head. These shots are making me cringe more and more every time. The rolling senton puts Benoit down again but Benoit goes into beast mode, countering the tombstone into the Crossface for the win.

Rating: C+. This took some time to get going but everything after the break was awesome. These two beat the crap out of each other, but the shots to the head are hard to sit through. It’s good to see Benoit get a win after losing the series though, so maybe there’s hope for him yet. Solid match here for the most part though.

Post match Gene comes into the ring to interview Benoit about the series with Booker. Benoit invites Booker out here to see him face to face for some business. Here’s Harlem Heat and Benoit stares Booker down, only to shake and raise his hand. Booker calls Benoit the best man he’s ever been in the ring with and Benoit says to say the word if Booker ever needs a good man in his corner.

This isn’t cool with Stevie who calls Benoit a pipsqueak. Benoit repeats what he said and Booker offers another handshake but Stevie blasts Benoit in the face. Cue Mongo (dang it) to pull Stevie off but Booker breaks it up. Harlem Heat leaves and Benoit says he’s here for one thing, and he holds up the four fingers.

Post breaks here’s DDP to answer Savage’s challenge. Well in theory at least as Page would rather talk about Hogan and Rodman. They’re both somewhere between a cockroach and that white stuff that accumulates at the corner of your mouth when you’re really thirsty (direct quote from the movie Con Air). Apparently there’s a tag match at Bash at the Beach with Page having a partner to be named. Oh and Savage is on for the cage match tonight.

We get a clip of Hogan and Rodman attacking Page with chairs last week. Apparently there are rumors that NBA superstar Karl Malone might don the tights and join WCW. I’m guessing that was the major announcement that wasn’t made on Thunder.

Nitro Girls.

Gene is in the ring again and it’s time for Piper’s weekly rambling. Piper: “GOD BLESS FRANK SINATRA!” Sinatra died a month before this, so I’m assuming it was a tribute, but that’s a bit late isn’t it? Anyway, Piper talks about remembering the Statue of Liberty wearing a kilt (I rescind my thought on it being a tribute and vote for Piper is nuts) and says he’s tough enough to make Rush Limbaugh lose weight and put Howard Stern on the Disney Channel. The smark crowd stops him with a loud RODDY chant but Piper confirms the cage match for tonight, but with him as the referee for no apparent reason.

Hiroshi Tenzan/Masahiro Chono vs. High Voltage

The Japanese guys are IWGP Tag Team Champions and are in the Black and White. Robbie Rage gets jumped to start but Kaos comes in off the top with a clothesline to take down Chono. High Voltage clears the ring and we take a break. Yes, this match is getting a break. Back with Rage stomping on Tenzan and putting on a reverse chinlock. Tenzan fights up as the announcers talk about Goldberg being with his sick mom tonight.

Chono comes in off the tag and everything breaks down for a few moments. Things settle back down with Kaos blocking a Chono suplex until High Voltage comes in for a double team. Kaos’ top rope clothesline hits Rage by mistake, allowing Tenzan to drop a top rope headbutt for two. Not that it matters as the Mafia Kick ends Kaos seconds later.

Rating: F. I can’t stand these matches as we’re just supposed to instantly care about people we haven’t seen in months because they’re wearing NWO shirts. Yeah Chono and Tenzan are awesome, but we need more than a few matches a year for the fans to realize that. On top of that the match was horrible with everyone looking sloppy and the match being a big mess. Given what I’ve seen from both teams, I blame this pretty much entirely on High Voltage.

Still shots of Giant vs. Sting last night.

Here’s the Wolfpack to a BIG reaction. Nash talks about how life is full of ironies, such as the last man to join the Wolfpack is the first one to bring home some gold. He brings out Sting for his pick of the partners but Sting wants to suck up to the crowd first. Sting talks about how everyone in the group has credentials, ranging from Konnan coming from a bunch of tough barrios, Luger holding every title there is to hold and Nash being a living, breathing monster. Savage isn’t listed as a possibility for some reason. However, he’s going to wait until the tag title defense tonight to make his announcement.

Kanyon vs. Sick Boy

Kanyon charges to the ring and the brawl is quickly on. Sick Boy is stomped into the corner and punched a lot before Kanyon pulls him down with a neckbreaker for two. Kanyon heads to the floor where a Lodi (in a safari hat because he’s odd like that) distraction lets Sick Boy take over. Back in and Sick Boy goes up but hops down, allowing Kanyon to hit a great looking forward electric chair for two. A faceplant out of the corner puts Sick Boy down again before the Flatliner gets the pin.

Rating: C-. This didn’t have time to go anywhere but Kanyon continues to look awesome. His offense was so different from anyone else and he had a solid look, but for some reason he never reached that higher level. The feud with the Flock is working though and I’m curious to see where it goes.

Here are Rude and Hennig with Curt now in the Black and White like he should have been all along. Rude talks about how everyone has been asking why they turned on the Wolfpack and it’s the stereotypical answer: money. If it had been Hennig in there with Goldberg, the streak would be over. That’s going to be the case one day because Hennig has won over 3,000 matches. Hennig brags about swerving Konnan and promises no swerves with the Black and White, even though he’s now swerved DDP, Flair and Konnan. He’d never swerve Rude though.

JJ Dillon is here to address the Cruiserweight Title issues from last night. The referee was right to call the match last night so here’s Jericho, already in celebration mode. He sings about being the champion and says there’s dancing in the streets. JJ says Jericho is the champion, but he has to defend against Malenko within 30 days. Jericho rips into Dean’s dad again, but thankfully Dean was about two feet from Jericho to jump him immediately. Malenko beats him into the back and throws Jericho into anything he can find, ranging from what look to be portable bleachers to a cardboard box. Security finally breaks it up.

Chris Adams vs. The Giant

Giant is smoking again. This actually lasts longer than I expected, going a full 20 seconds before the chokeslam ends Adams.

We look at Hogan and Rodman attacking Page again last week.

Here are Hogan and Bischoff for their weekly (or hourly depending on the show) chat. Hogan says that God created Hollywood on the seventh day. Back in the day when he was selling out MSG, the slimy one (Nash?) was wishing he could be like Hogan one day. As for Page, if he wants a piece of himself and Rodman, come get some, even if it means bringing in Karl Malone. Hogan and Rodman have already signed for Bash at the Beach, so make sure to check the show out to see who Page and his partner take a beating. This was short and actually accomplished something. I’m as shocked as you are.

More Nitro Girls and the Nitro Party video.

Hour #3 begins.

Here’s Sting for his decision. He wastes no time and picks Nash. Tony calls this a curveball, even though it was one of four possible options. Nash does a survey of which NWO the fans are here to see, which sums up this company in a nutshell. Lastly, he says Hennig is the Pack’s newest prey.

Tag Titles: Sting/Kevin Nash vs. Harlem Heat

Tony gets the continuity wrong before the bell, saying Sting has been a tag champion for a long time, even though it was clearly stated the titles were vacant coming into last night. Booker and Sting get us going in the best possible pairing for this match. Things start fast with Sting jumping over Booker before taking him down with a hiptoss. Booker bails to the floor for a meeting with Stevie before coming back in with the jumping forearm.

Stevie yells at Booker so T brings him in to try his own luck. Ray stomps Sting down but he comes back with some of those odd shots to the face of his own, allowing for the tag off to Nash. Kev comes in but walks into a slam, only to have Stevie miss an elbow drop. We take a break and come back with Booker missing a dropkick on Sting. Back to Nash for knees in the corner and the big boot to the jaw before the side slam gets two.

Off to Sting again who stomps a mudhole on Booker before actually hitting his jumping elbow drop. A Vader Bomb of all things gets two but a regular splash hits Booker’s knees. Ash comes in before Booker can make the tag though, meaning the match slows down again. Nash powers Booker down but tags back out to Sting before he breaks a sweat. You have to protect that hair at all costs you see.

The Wolfpack keeps up the fast tags with Nash coming back in but Booker escapes Snake Eyes and gets two off a rollup. Booker avoids the Stinger Splash and finally makes the tag off to Stevie. Sting walks into a powerslam but Stevie talks trash, only to get caught in the Death Drop for the pin about 10 seconds after he was tagged in.

Rating: D+. Not a terrible match here and at least Stevie did the job instead of Booker. The match was pretty dull though with Nash seeming to be as bored as you could imagine him to be and Sting just going through the motions as well. Harlem Heat was done as a top tag team but they were still good enough for a spot like this.

The announcers talk about the cage match.

Remember that video of Scott Steiner on a movie set with Hogan where they met Carl Weathers? Well here it is again.

The cage is already set up but first we get Bischoff talking to Scott Steiner in a sitdown interview. Scott says it’s nice to be in New York but it’s nothing compared to Los Angeles. He name drops a bunch of actors who congratulated him for the snow job he put on his brother. Just establishing the new character for Steiner, which I can’t imagine lasts long.

Nitro Girls.

Randy Savage vs. Diamond Dallas Page

There’s a top on the cage and Piper is the referee. Page climbs on top of the cage to pose before getting inside. We get the bell and Page goes after Savage’s bad arm, only to have Randy hit him in the bad ribs. Page goes up top but gets crotched down, only to pop up and go after Savage’s own injured ribs. A ram into the cage gets two so Savage sends him into the steel for the same. They ram each other into the buckle before Savage goes head first into the cage.

Back up and they hit heads to put both guys on the mat again. We take a break and come back with Page pounding away and scoring with a clothesline, only to be taken down by a low blow. Savage goes up for the big elbow but hurts his knee on the way down, allowing Page to kick out. Savage and Piper get in a fight over the speed of the count with Savage laying him out via a piledriver. Page comes back with the Diamond Cutter to put all three guys down.

The fans (or the PA system) wants Goldberg as all three guys get back up. Page punches Piper for trying to pull him off Savage, so Piper sends Page into the cage three times in a row. Now Piper beats up Savage, because Heaven forbid a match doesn’t focus on Piper at least once. Piper rams both of them into the cage….and the cage raises up. Cue the Black and White to fill the cage which lowers after they get in. The massive beatdown is on as the match is thrown out.

Rating: D+. This was more about Piper than either wrestler and that’s a big problem in WCW at the moment. Piper is playing WAY too big of a role and I have no idea why WCW thinks he’s the right man for this spot. The match itself was nothing special as both guys were banged up and basically going through the motions out there until Piper did his thing.

The NWO destroys Savage with Bischoff kicking a chair into his knee. The Wolfpack comes out to try for a save but they can’t find a way in. Nash runs (work with me here) to the back and finds the button to raise the cage and we go off the air.

Overall Rating: C-. While not great, this was SO much better than last week as they kept things moving. Rather than focusing on one story, the show focused on different stories at different times which made things a lot easier to sit through. Hogan only having one promo and a run-in at the end is a great example of this as he had something like nine appearances last week. The wrestling was passable and the stories were advanced as well, which is all you can ask for a lot of the time.

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Monday Nitro #140
Date: June 8, 1998
Location: The Palace of Auburn Hills, Auburn Hills, Michigan
Commentators: Larry Zbyszko, Bobby Heenan, Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay

We’re at the last Nitro before the Great American Bash and we have a new co-main event for Sunday of Sting vs. Giant for the tag titles. It’s hard to say what we’re going to get tonight as almost everything is set, meaning we’ve got a three hour commercial for a show that doesn’t sound all that interesting in the first place. Let’s get to it.

We open with Michael Buffer doing his Are You Ready schtick. Instead of a big match though, he’s introducing Hogan and Bischoff for the opening promo. They have a special guest with them though as Dennis Rodman is back. Bischoff sucks up to Hogan and Hollywood brags about having Rodzilla back with him. He dares Piper and Savage to come out here for a fight right now. Rodman gets the mic and says hey a lot and sucks up to the Detroit fans since he used to play for the Pistons. Bischoff tells the fans to bite him and Hogan brags about how awesome the Black and White are. Not much to see here.

We look at Sting joining the Wolfpack because we haven’t seen it in a few minutes.

Opening sequence.

Nitro Girls.

The announcers talk about the power struggle for a few minutes as is their custom.

We get some interviews Mike conducted with fans on Sting joining the Red and Black. I don’t think the main event of Starrcade got this much attention.

Here’s the Wolfpack with something to say. Nash, the hometown boy, sucks up to the Detroit crowd before praising Luger to sign Sting up and then get DDP to team with him on Thunder. Kev talks about being ready to walk out of the business about five years ago because he couldn’t get a break, but DDP believed in him. That being said, now DDP needs to make a decision.

The Wolfpack has had a vote and it was nearly unanimous (apparently Savage voted no in a nice bit of continuity): they want him in the Wolfpack. Two years ago Page decided to not go Black and White and that was the right call. Tonight though he can make the right call and join the Dream Team. This brings Nash to Hogan but the mic stops working. Hogan’s voice comes from the technical area where the Black and White are watching the show. Rodman is allowed to set off some pyro and turn off the lights to get rid of the Wolfpack.

Konnan interviews JJ Dillon in the back and asks him to prevent the Black and White from doing anything else tonight. JJ says that it’s the Wolfpack’s problem, not WCW’s.

Yuji Nagata vs. Jerry Flynn

Flynn gets in some kicks to the ribs and pounds away in the corner but misses a running kick, sending him out to the floor in a heap. Back in and a high collar suplex gets two for Nagata but Jerry comes back with a snap suplex of his own as the announcers talk about anything but this match. A leg lock gets Nagata nowhere so Flynn comes back with a DDT for two. Yuji comes back with a jumping kick to the face but Flynn hits a kick to Nagata’s head to even it up. Tony talks about some announcement we’ll get on Thunder as Jerry goes after Sonny Onoo, allowing Nagata to put on the Nagata Lock for the win.

Rating: D. I’m really tired of these karate showdowns because there’s nothing to any of these characters other than they like to kick people. Neither guy here is interesting in the slightest and it’s really questionable to have this as the first match in over half an hour. Is it any wonder why no one stuck around to watch these shows when Raw came on?

Here’s Jericho with an envelope and something to say. It’s a registered letter from Ted Turner himself. The letter says that Jericho has asked Turner to look at the Cruiserweight Title loss. Turner praises him for tenacity and thinks Jericho has a lot of the same traits Turner himself had. After reviewing the tapes from Slamboree, it has been determined that Dean Malenko should not be the champion. However, Jericho’s incessant whining has sickened Turner, so the decision stands. Signed, Uncle Ted Turner.

We see Luger recruiting Page to the Wolfpack from Thunder.

Reese/Horace vs. Van Hammer/Juventud Guerrera

Hammer and Reese get us going but everyone comes in before too long. A double clothesline puts the Flock members down and Juvy hits a springboard seated senton to take Reese down. Juvy pounds away with right hands to send Reese to the floor before hitting a big dive, only to be caught in midair. Hammer dives on top of both of them to put Reese down so the good guys can stand tall. Well kind of tall in Juvy’s case.

We really get started with Hammer vs. Horace and Hulk’s nephew taking Hammer down with a Samoan drop. A running clothesline crushes Hammer in the corner and it’s off to an arm wringer. Horace wraps up the arm but gets caught in a cobra clutch slam, allowing for the hot tag off to Guerrera. A slingshot legdrop keeps Horace down but he gets up a big boot in the corner to put Juvy down.

The big man beating begins with Horace pounding away before hooking a reverse chinlock. Juvy fights up again and snaps off a quick hurricanrana before countering a belly to back superplex into a crossbody. There’s the real hot tag off to Van Hammer who cleans house but regular clotheslines don’t do much damage to Reese. A middle rope clothesline finally takes him down and a Cactus Clothesline puts Horace to the floor. Not that it matters though as Reese hits a chokebomb on Guerrera for the pin.

Rating: D+. Nothing special here but at least there’s a story going on here. Juvy needs to get the win in the showdown with Reese but having him lose in a tag match like this is ok. The match wasn’t all that good but it was a huge step up over the battle of the karate guys from earlier.

The Black and White has a party with some good looking women. Hogan promises a new member of the team soon and talks about how Skinny Legs Nash isn’t getting away with all those powerbombs Hogan had to pay for.

Hour #2 begins with a riveting interview with JJ Dillon. He reiterates that Luger and DDP aren’t tag champions because Giant had no authority to pick a partner to defend the titles. Sunday it’s Sting vs. Giant for both belts and the winner gets to pick his partner.

Eddie Guerrero vs. Scott Putski

Putski is a good example of a guy with a great look with almost nothing else to back it up. Guerrero runs into a hard shoulder to start but takes Scott down with a drop toehold. An elbow to the face sets up an abdominal stretch by Eddie as you can feel the ratings battle slipping away. Putski fights out and hits a scary looking release German suplex, dropping Eddie down on his shoulder. A short powerbomb puts Eddie down as Tony shills the big announcement on Thunder again. Eddie escapes a gorilla press and dropkicks the knee out but here’s Chavo for the DQ without actually doing anything.

Rating: D+. Believe it or not this might have been the match of the night so far. Putski wasn’t doing anything of note but he was throwing Eddie around pretty nicely. He would have been a good candidate to throw into a tag team as a silent enforcer. Eddie was his usual smooth self.

Chavo punches Scott out as Eddie bails. The nephew shouts at Eddie to come back because he needs his uncle.

Nash and Konnan, with the latter in different clothes than he was in earlier, say they’ve got some money from the 5,000 Wolfpack t-shirts they sold tonight so they can pay Hogan back now. The money is in a Swiss bank account down there. Down where you ask? Both guys laugh before they can answer.

Bischoff and Giant are at the tech area again because we haven’t heard enough from the NWO tonight. Apparently Giant hasn’t eaten in four days so he’ll eat Sting on Sunday like the chicken he is. Somehow this took two and a half minutes.

Here are Rude, Hennig and Konnan in his fourth appearance in ninety minutes. Rude cuts a heel promo on Goldberg but Konnan does his usual deal to get the crowd back on the Red and Black’s side. Rude and Hennig just don’t fit with the Wolfpack at all.

Chris Benoit vs. Booker T

Match #6 in the best of seven series for the TV Title shot on Sunday with Booker trailing 3-2. Feeling out process to start until with Booker taking it to the mat, only to have Benoit take over with a hammerlock. Booker counters into one of his own before lifting Benoit into the air into a kind of pumphandle slam. A spinning kick to the face puts Benoit down again and the Canadian bails to the floor.

Back in and Booker hooks another armbar as Heenan talks about Booker having more video equipment to watch tapes than Bob Crane (star of Hogan’s Heroes, eventually became a sex addict who made hundreds of sex tapes). Benoit fights up and hits a knee to the ribs to send Booker out to the floor. The Canadian gets two off an elbow to the face and a snap suplex for the same.

A belly to back suplex gets the same and the Swan Dive connects, but Benoit might have injured his shoulder and can’t cover. Cue Stevie Ray to give Booker a pep talk but his comeback is stopped with a German suplex for two. Booker comes back with a kick to the face and the sidewalk slam but Benoit fires off kicks in the corner to slow Booker down again. Not that it matters as Booker hooks a spinning sunset flip out of the corner for the pin to send up to a seventh match.

Rating: C+. This match is another instance of the same problem this entire series has had: the matches are still good but they’re running out of things to do to each other. Still though, I can’t imagine anything on the show topping what they did here. Thankfully there’s just one match to go in the series though.

Benoit kicks Booker’s leg out post match but Stevie runs him off.

Nitro Girls.

Nitro Party winner.

Hogan and Hart are in the sky box again so Hollywood can make gay jokes about Konnan. We get a pretty awesome Randy Savage impression from Hogan as he brings in Liz. Apparently she’s a gift to Bret and is no longer with Savage. Ok then.

We look at the end of the Booker vs. Benoit movie again with Tony actually praising Benoit’s heel actions. That’s new at least.

TV Title: Fit Finlay vs. Norman Smiley

Finlay grabs a headlock and a cravate to start but Smiley hiptosses him down and scores with a dropkick. Finlay comes back with a rake to the eyes and takes Smiley down into a Crippler Crossface. Back up and a running forearm puts Smiley on the apron for some shots to the chest. The fans do the wave and the announcers actually call it. Finlay puts on an armbar for a bit before planting Norman with the tombstone to retain.

Rating: D. The announcers spent more time talking about the wave, the announcement on Thunder, Booker vs. Benoit, or ANYTHING else they could come up with besides the match. Could it be because Finlay is clearly just a placeholder for the winner of the series and Smiley had no chance at all here? I’m sure this match had fans glued to their sets instead of watching whatever Austin was doing to McMahon at this point.

Hour #3 begins.

Here’s Tony in the ring for something actually interesting: a Sting interview, which I believe is the first one in over a year. Sting says Giant is fat and talks about how he beat up big guys like him at the first Great American Bash. He recommends Giant loses some weight and take a shower before Sting wins both belts on Sunday. This was nothing.

Back from a break with Tony still in the ring for even more talking. This time it’s Piper who compares himself to Barry Sanders and promises to hit Hogan and Hart in the head so much that they’ll feel like they just got out of a Red Wings’ game. Piper makes jokes about Karl Malone beating Dennis Rodman in the NBA playoffs and says Savage is from a test tube. This draws out Macho who will fight Piper after the tag match on Sunday.

Piper says they’ll fight in Baltimore but Savage wants to do it tonight. Hart and Hogan (appearance #5 tonight) pop up at the tech area again and apparently Liz is a present for Eric, who doesn’t need Viagra. Eric kisses Liz as Bret cracks jokes about Savage and Piper. Savage says he’s over Liz but not Piper and there’s a right hand to the Scot. Piper punches Savage back, sending him to the floor. This ran nearly ten minutes whereas Sting got about three.

The announcers talk. Again.

We recap Jericho’s tour of Washington DC last week as well as Jericho showing the 1934 NWA rule book to Malenko on Thunder.

Cruiserweight Title: Disco Inferno vs. Dean Malenko

Dean stomps him down in the corner to start and gets two off a powerslam. Disco comes back with a clothesline and an elbow drop for two but Dean puts him back down with a leg lariat. The Cloverleaf retains the title with ease.

More Nitro Girls, this time in pink.

The Black and White, including Hogan (#6) are with the girls in the lounge again to run down the Wolfpack some more before introducing a video of Hogan’s newest movie.

Video of Hogan (#7) and Steiner on a movie set where they run into Carl Weathers (Apollo Creed from the Rocky movies).

Back to the lounge for Hogan to talk about how awesome an actor Scott Steiner is going to be.

Video on Goldberg.

US Title: Goldberg vs. Chavo Guerrero Jr.

Chavo requested this match and says “be very very quiet. I’m hunting Goldbergs.” Chavo dives at Goldberg and is easily sent lying across the ring. A kind of fallaway slam puts Chavo down again and there’s a gorilla press into a powerslam for good measure. Eddie is cheering on the stage as Goldberg hits the two move combo to become 99-0.

Here’s the Wolfpack (appearance #5 for Konnan tonight) to offer Page a spot on the team. Page comes to the stage where Tony asks him for his decision. DDP talks about the talent he sees in the ring and says he can’t believe what he’s about to do. Before he can say what he’s going to do, Hogan (appearance #8) and Rodman come up behind and blast him with chairs. Sting and the Wolfpack chase the NWO off to end the show.

Overall Rating: N. As in NWO, because that’s all this show was about. This was a really good example of something WCW was horrible about: putting FAR too much of the focus on one idea instead of spreading the show around. Hogan was on TV in 8 (arguably 9) different segments in about two hours and twenty minutes of total air time. The guy has reached new levels of overexposure and we’re to the point that I just don’t care about what he’s doing at all.

On top of that, there was barely any wrestling at all on this show and the only stuff we got was decent at its very best. I mean, Booker vs. Benoit was a fine match, but it’s literally the sixth time they’ve done the match in two weeks. Of the other six matches, two were under three minutes, one was a karate off, one was a squash, another featured Ivan Putski and the last was a decent match featuring the Flock B-Team. Is it really any shock that Nitro hasn’t won a ratings night since April? Absolutely awful show this week with the NWO just crushing everything in their sight.

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Thunder
Date: June 4, 1998
Location: Peoria Civic Center, Peoria, Illinois
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Lee Marshall, Tony Schiavone

After Monday we have a major development in the form of Sting joining the Wolfpack as pretty much everyone figured he would. It really doesn’t change anything as WCW is just standing on the sidelines while the NWO civil war continues. Hopefully we get some of the Great American Bash card filled in tonight as the show is in ten days. Let’s get to it.

We open with the required recap of Sting joining the Wolfpack from Monday.

The announcers talk about the jump a bit.

Chris Benoit vs. Booker T

This is match #5 in the best of seven series for a TV Title shot at the Great American Bash with Benoit leading 3-1. They trade hammerlocks to start until Booker elbows him in the back to take over. A high side kick is good for two and the ax kick gets the same for Booker. Mr. T. stomps away in the corner but he whips Benoit in, only to be caught in the rolling Germans to give Benoit control.

A big back elbow to the face puts Booker down again and the Swan Dive connects for two. Stevie Ray is back at ringside to cheer his brother on. Benoit can’t get the Crossface and gets taken down by a spinwheel kick to the face. Booker hits a spinebuster and spins up, only to have his head taken off by a hard clothesline. Benoit makes the mistake of jawing with Stevie though and turns into the missile dropkick to close the gap to 3-2.

Rating: C+. As usual with this series, the matches are entertaining but they’re running out of new things to do. It also doesn’t help that with the series at 3-1, the endings to the next two matches are pretty obvious. On the other hand though, these have been by far the best matches on the shows almost every single night so they’re hardly a bad thing.

Here’s Giant with both tag belts and something to say. He doesn’t mind Sting joining the Wolfpack but thinks black and white would have looked better. However, he can’t live with being bodyslammed on national television like Sting did to him three days ago. Giant feels he should be able to pick a partner to be the tag team champions so here’s Brian Adams, apparently the new partner. Adams demands praise and says they won’t duck anyone as champions. Giant issues a challenge to Luger and anyone he can find to a tag title match tonight. I still want to know what Adams has on WCW to get this push.

Reese vs. Van Hammer

Reese shoves Hammer into the corner but Hammer shoves right back to frustrate the bigger man. Hammer slugs him into the corner but Reese comes back by just lifting Hammer into the air and dropping him down to the mat. A vertical suplex gets two on Hammer and for the first time ever, Lee Marshall has an interesting idea: could Lodi’s nonsensical signs be codes from Raven for what he wants the Flock to do? Hammer clotheslines Reese down but Horace blasts him in the back of the head, giving Reese the pin via a chokebomb.

Rating: D. Just a battle of the big men here as the Flock continues to spin its wheels. Reese was actually bigger than the Giant but is a great example of size not making a great wrestler. He’s not bad but there’s nothing more to him other than his size and that’s why he never went anywhere.

Post match the Flock beats down Hammer until Juventud Guerrera makes the save. He clears the ring until there’s just Reese left. Hammer gets Juvy out of the ring before he gets squashed like a grape.

Eddie Guerrero vs. Alex Wright

Before the match Eddie tells Chavo that Grandma has said to take time off and cool down, so Chavo needs to leave for a few months. Alex jumps Eddie to start but here’s crazy Chavo a few seconds in. Wright immediately throws him to the floor but the referee calls for the bell anyway. The match was maybe 30 seconds.

Chavo stalks Eddie to the back and Wright dances a bit.

Here’s Luger with something to say. Apparently there’s no point to the survey because this is clearly a Wolfpack town (based on how quiet the fans are I’d hate to see them in enemy territory). Luger has been named head of recruiting for the Wolfpack after all his success with Sting. The challenge is accepted for tonight and Luger names DDP as his partner, saying he has a Wolfpack shirt for Page too.

TV Title: Fit Finlay vs. Psychosis

Psychosis tries to slide between Finlay’s legs but accidentally dropkicks him in the knee in a painful looking botch. Finlay comes right back with some hard forearms to the back as the match immediately slows down. Psychosis is dropped throat first on the top rope and the fans are already chanting boring because the idea of a slow paced match doesn’t work for them. We hit a LONG chinlock and now the chants are justified. Psychosis finally fights up and tries to get some offense going, including a top rope Frankensteiner for two. Not that it matters though as Finlay picks him up and tombstones him to retain.

Rating: D+. The match wasn’t as bad as the fans thought it was, but it still wasn’t anything really worth seeing. The chinlock hurt it a lot and cutting this down by a minute or so would have helped a lot. Finlay probably won’t hold the title much longer as I can’t imagine the winner of the series not taking the title from him.

Clips of Sting being recruited by and joining the Wolfpack on Monday.

Glacier vs. Saturn

Glacier does his full entrance but as he’s warming up, Saturn comes in behind him and hits a sick German suplex for two. Ice boy bails to the floor but Saturn hits a great looking plancha to take him down again. Back in and Glacier gets a boot up in the corner followed by some rapid kicks to the stomach. Saturn crotches him on the top and hits a middle rope http://onhealthy.net/product-category/mens-health/ suplex, meaning he was in the middle of the rope rather than the corner. A Lodi distraction lets Saturn superkick Glacier down but the referee goes down in the process. Cue Kanyon dressed as a referee with a Downward Spiral to Saturn. Glacier hits the superkick for the pin.

Rating: C-. This was mainly advancing the story between Kanyon and Saturn, which is further proof that Glacier’s whining about kicks isn’t needed at all. Saturn looked good with his high impact offense and Kanyon was an offensive genius so he was his usual entertaining self. Still though, Glacier gets on nerves as always.

Here’s Hennig to ask the fans if they like Goldberg. Obviously they do, but surprisingly enough they seem pleased with the idea of Curt beating him up at the PPV. Unfortunately Curt’s knee won’t be healed by then so Konnan will be getting Hennig’s US Title shot, as long as Konnan gives Curt the first shot.

Cruiserweight Title: Dean Malenko vs. Silver King

Dean easily takes him down to the mat in a headlock before shifting over to another variation of one. Silver King fights up and chops away, only to get caught in a suplex. Dean takes him to the corner but here’s Jericho with a book. He rings the bell and apparently that’s enough to throw the match out. Those referees are trigger happy tonight.

Jericho says this is an NWA rule book from 1934 that he found in the Library of Congress. Apparently the Strangler Lewis Rule states that the champion can refuse to face anyone and since Jericho never agreed to wrestle Dean, JJ needs to come down here right now and vacate the title. When that fails completely, Jericho tells Dean to stop dishonoring his dead pappy and give him the belt right now. The belt goes upside Jericho’s head, sending him to the floor, swearing vengeance.

Raven vs. Disco Inferno

Raven charges right into the corner to stomp Disco down before raking his face. Disco gets an elbow up in the corner before choking Raven with wrist tape. A swinging neckbreaker gets two for Inferno but Raven easily sends him to the floor. Disco is sent into the steps and Raven sends both him and a chair back into the ring. Disco blocks a hiptoss and sends Raven face first into the chair before stomping a mudhole in the corner. Raven comes right back with the drop toehold into the chair and the Even Flow ends this easily.

Post match Raven calls out Kanyon for a one on one showdown, even laying down on his back to give Kanyon an advantage.

Before the next match, Tony acknowledges the passing of Junkyard Dog the previous Tuesday. Glad they worked that in after 90 minutes.

US Title: Goldberg vs. Hugh Morrus

The announcers aren’t sure if Goldberg can use his power on someone like Morrus, because WCW announcers have the memories of banana slugs. Morrus jumps Goldberg to start but the champion pulls in Barbarian to make himself break a sweat. Jimmy Hart is thrown at both guys and a double spear puts them down. Barbarian and Morrus both get Jackhammers to make Goldberg 95-0.

Tag Titles: Giant/Brian Adams vs. Lex Luger/Diamond Dallas Page

We’re not sure if Page is going to accept the offer to join Luger or not but here he is with limited drama, albeit to his own music in a separate entrance from Luger. Page doesn’t have taped up ribs anymore. Heenan brings up a good point: neither of these teams have ever teamed together or at least not in a very long time yet they’re fighting for the tag titles. Tenay uses this as an opportunity to talk about the tag match at Great American Bash because why would a title match here and now be more important than a non-title match ten days from now?

Luger shoves Adams into the ropes to start and clotheslines him down before tagging in Page for a big reaction. A belly to belly suplex gets two for Page and it’s back to the arm. Back to Luger for a hiptoss as Tony says he doesn’t think Page would have come out here if a member of the Wolfpack had come out here, because apparently Tony doesn’t remember Luger is in the group. Luger misses a charge in the corner and it’s off to Giant to stand on his chest.

A Russian legsweep puts Luger down again and it’s back to Adams for a rake to the eyes and a legdrop for two. Back to Giant to throw Luger around with ease and plant him with a slam. Adams comes back in with a bearhug and a backbreaker before bringing Giant in again. The big man misses an elbow drop and it’s back to DDP via the hot tag. Page cleans house but Giant breaks up a Diamond Cutter attempt on Adams. Sting comes out to distract Giant, allowing Page to Diamond Cut Adams for the pin and the titles.

Rating: C-. This actually wasn’t terrible as they worked a basic formula and didn’t have the insanity that most WCW matches have. Luger and Page worked well enough together out there and Giant was his usual self. Adams was fine as a generic power guy which is all he ever should have been. Not bad here.

Not that it matters though as JJ calls in and says the title change doesn’t count because Giant had no authority to make Adams his partner. Therefore at the Bash, it’s Giant vs. Sting with the winner getting both belts and the right to pick his new championship partner.

Overall Rating: C+. This was the best Thunder they’ve had in months. The lack of main event guys until the last match gave everyone else a chance to shine and we actually got storyline development on top of the watchable matches. On top of that, every match seemed to have a purpose, with an insane FOUR title matches on the B show. Good stuff here actually.

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Monday Nitro #137
Date: May 18, 1998
Location: Providence Civic Center, Providence, Rhode Island
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Bobby Heenan, Tony Schiavone, Larry Zbyszko

It’s the night after Slamboree and naturally we’ve got more NWO drama and not much else. The main story is that Sting and Giant won the tag titles due to Hall turning on Nash, apparently aligning himself with Hollywood Hogan and the Black and White, despite them keeping him off TV for months and Nash standing up for him. This would be the third (fifth if you include Konnan and Hennig) yet to be explained turn in less than a month if you’re keeping track. Let’s get to it.

This is a one hour show tonight due to the NBA Playoffs. On Thunder it was announced that we would get an hour before the basketball game and a second hour after, but the second hour was just a repeat of the first. I’m not sure if it was a last second change or WCW just making stuff up to get ratings, but at least it’s less nonsense for me this week.

We open with the stills from last night’s main event. I think that was Nash’s official face turn after being a face for at least a month now.

Here’s Eric in the ring wearing a red velvet crown and siting on a motorcycle. He says it’s good to be king and as he ponders his future in this sport, he has to look back at the past. His television record is 98-2 and now his in ring record is 2-0, having defeated Larry Zbyszko and Vince McMahon. He wanted to beat Vince in the ring, but apparently that wasn’t going to happen. Now he has to look to the future which holds a record better than Bill Goldberg’s. He’s going to chase a dream which started last night. What that is isn’t specified but the music plays and he’s done.

Nitro Girls.

We get the video from Thunder with Saturn saying he hasn’t stolen the Cryonic Kick because it’s a basic side kick that has been used for thousands of years.

Saturn vs. Psychosis

Saturn pounds him into the corner to start but Psychosis slams him down for two. A dropkick knocks Saturn out of the air and a second one knocks him out to the floor. Psychosis hits a nice plancha to the floor but gets caught in a release dragon suplex back inside. The superkick and Death Valley Driver set up the Rings of Saturn for the quick submmission.

We get some stills from Bret vs. Savage last night, focusing on Hogan interfering, leading to Savage giving up to the Sharpshooter.

Here’s Piper with something to say. This isn’t likely to go well. He’s ticked off because of how much interference there was and he’d never do that job again. Apparently Liz was swearing a lot and it allowed someone Savage hit him in the back of the head (it was Hart). Piper wants Savage out here right now and here’s Macho himself. For once, Tony is logical here by saying Piper could watch the tape and see that it was Hart attacking him.

Piper says he isn’t a guy to apologize but if he was he’d apologize right now, but since he isn’t a guy to apologize he isn’t apologizing. He’s watched the tape and saw Hart hit him in the back of the head, so as Commissioner he’s naming Savage as the winner of the match via a disqualification. This is treated as the biggest news in the history of WCW but here’s Bret Hart to complain. He wants to fight but doesn’t want to do it two on one. Actually scratch that as he’s ready to go but Hogan and pals come out to stop him. The end result is a tag match at Great American Bash.

Buy the Randy Savage shirt!

Heenan replaces Zbyszko on commentary for the second half of the show.

The announcers talk about the Cruiserweight Title situation for a bit. We get a post match interview with Dean Malenko with Gene saying he can no longer call Malenko a loser. Dean says it’s water under the bridge because tonight was the beginning of his new quest. He isn’t done with Jericho because Jericho insulted his family. This title is for his dad. If Malenko has ever cut a better promo, I haven’t seen it.

Jericho freaked out after losing the belt last night.

Damian vs. Juventud Guerrera

There’s no opening bell but Juvy takes over with a quick spinwheel kick but charges into a boot in the corner for two. A dropkick sends Damian to the floor but he whips Juvy into the steps to take over. Damian dropkicks him from the apron but gets caught in a top rope hurricanrana back inside. Juvy gets crotched on top and Damian gets two off a kneeling Muscle Buster of all things. Juvy almost no sells it and gets two of his own off the Juvy Driver. The 450 totally misses but Juvy gets up and drops a quick elbow for the pin.

Rating: C-. Botched ending aside this was pretty fun. I prefer the elbow drop over pretending the splash worked because it was more or less two feet to Damian’s chest and certainly wouldn’t have kept him down. Also it’s nice that they’re mixing up the matches a bit with new names like Damian, even though he isn’t the biggest star in the world. It’s better than doing the same pairings over and over.

More Nitro Girls.

There seems to be some confusion as to what’s next. Tony says we’re going to Gene but here’s Goldberg for his match.

US Title: Goldberg vs. Glacier

Goldberg blocks a bunch of kicks to start and clotheslines Glacier down. Glacier misses an enziguri and it’s the spear and Jackhammer to make it 89-0.

Here’s DDP for his weekly interview. Gene lauds him for his win last night but Page doesn’t want to think about how he beat Raven. He did it for the fans who always jack him up, but now he has a new target. Page wants to be world champion and hopes he gets to take it off of Hogan because he hasn’t forgotten what Hogan has put him through for the last six months. Not much from DDP this week but it’s a new plot development.

Here’s the Black and White to close the show. Bret is with them but still in street clothes. Dusty is there too, despite ripping into Hogan last week on Nitro. Hogan talks about how great he is and laughs at the idea of anyone following Nash. Everyone is here tonight because of Hogan because he controls the money and the talent.

If there was any doubt to Hogan being great, here’s Scott Hall as the ultimate proof. Hall rubs his fingers together to symbolize money on the way to the ring, which is probably as good of an explanation as we’re going to get. Bischoff calls out Sting for his explanation. Giant comes up to Sting in the aisle and gets spat on, causing Giant to choke Sting down. Nash comes out with a pipe to scare

Overall Rating: C. This show continues to prove that three hours simply aren’t needed at all. This show covered almost every major story and gave us some watchable wrestling at the same time. The ending is all you would come to expect from WCW as we get about two minutes of storyline development which will lead to three hours of talking next week. Bischoff mentioning Goldberg is interesting though as it’s the first mention of him from the NWO. Page going after Hogan might be worth something too.

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Monday Nitro #108
Date: October 6, 1997
Location: Target Center, Minneapolis, Minnesota
Attendance: 14,357
Commentators: Larry Zbyszko, Bobby Heenan, Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay

We’re about three weeks away from Halloween Havoc and the card is starting to take shape. We’re also less than three months away from Starrcade and the biggest match in company history. As for tonight, the main event is Benoit vs. Hennig, presumably for the US Title. Tonight is likely going to be all about building for the PPV, which could stand a bit more work at this point. Let’s get to it.

After the usual banter from the announcers, here’s the NWO A-Team with something to say. Bischoff plugs Hogan’s latest TV movie, Assault on Devil’s Island, which debuts later this month. Hogan challenges Sting for later tonight, but he knows Sting won’t be here because Hogan is here and that no good dirty Sting is a coward. Apparently CNN is going to become the Hogan News Network as Hogan and the NWO are going to take over all of the Turner organization. They’ll be waiting for Piper later tonight and that’s about it.

Jeff Jarrett vs. Booker T

Debra and Jackie are in the respective corners. Things go fast to start with Jeff getting the first offensive move in the form of a hiptoss. Booker comes back with a fast kick to send Jarrett out to the floor. The advantage doesn’t last long though as Jeff suckers him in and pounds away a bit to take over. The fans think Jarrett sucks as he elbows Booker down. Booker spins right back up though and hits the side kick to take Jarrett down. The crowd is hot tonight.

We take a break and come back with Jarrett getting two off a top rope cross body. A clothesline puts Booker down as does a great looking dropkick. Jarrett is in full control but Booker comes back with a forearm to the face. Booker hits a spinwheel kick and a slam to put Jarrett in trouble. The ax kick gets two but the hook of the leg puts Jarrett’s foot on the rope. A clothesline puts Jarrett on the floor and here’s Mongo to yell. Debra slaps him so A Mongo chokes Jeff before sending him back inside. Booker grabs a rollup for the surprise pin.

Rating: C. Not bad here but it didn’t mean anything as Jarrett wouldn’t wrestle again in WCW for years. Thankfully he went over to the WWF and got to bore people on Raw. Booker was still a few months away from his singles push but once it started it kept going and going until WCW went under.

The announcers talk about Hogan vs. Piper at Havoc and say that it’ll change wrestling forever. I’m sure it will.

Billy Kidman vs. Alex Wright

Kidman is still a rookie here and looks very nervous. Billy shoves him into the corner to start and gives a clean break. Alex does the same and slaps Kidman in the face. Nice bit of a story there. Wright sends him to the floor and takes the opportunity to dance. Raven is in the front row and has Perry Saturn with him. Back in and Kidman hits a pair of dropkicks to send Wright out to the floor.

Oh wait we need to cut to the back to see Mongo and Debra arguing. Jeff Jarrett comes up and gets yelled at as well. Mongo says he has an idea and we go back to the match. Wright hits a top rope stomp and dances a bit more. A running corner clothesline hits Kidman and a bridging suplex gets two.

The fans look at presumably a fight off camera as Wright hits a clothesline for no cover. Kidman counters the German suplex into a jawbreaker and hits a middle rope dropkick to send Wright into the corner. A bulldog out of the corner gets two for Billy but he stops to look at Raven. The 450 misses Wright and after some dancing, a German suplex ends Kidman.

Rating: C. Decent match here which apparently was a rematch from Saturday Night where Billy beat Alex. The constant cutting away here got annoying but it actually led to something in this case. Wright continues to be someone that seems like he’s on the verge of a push but would be in the same place for months.

Ernest Miller vs. Mortis

Now here’s a fresh match. Miller takes over with a quick snapmare and a kick to the face for two. Ernest expands his moveset even further by going up top, only to get crotched by James Vanderberg. A top rope Fameasser gets two for the guy in a mask (Mortis) and he even uses the rope for good measure. It’s time for kicks because what would these two be without a lot of kicks?

Mortis keeps being EVIL by throwing Miller over the top rope while the referee is distracted. How EVIL can he get? Apparently Jackie is getting a TV Title shot at Halloween Havoc. A kind of Russian legsweep gets two for the EVIL one before he breaks up a sunset flip with a right hand. Miller rolls away from a top rope splash though and hits two kicks (I’m as shocked as you are), one being from the top, for the pin.

Rating: D. It would take Miller basically going crazy before he got interesting which makes these earlier matches pretty hard to sit through. The guy just wasn’t interesting as you can only take “karate guy” so far as a gimmick. Mortis continues to impress with that wide variety of offense he has. Oh and he’s EVIL so that helps.

Savage says he’ll beat Page at the PPV.

Scott Hall vs. Hector Garza

This is a rematch from two weeks ago when Garza won in a shocking upset. Hall has taped up ribs for reasons that I don’t remember. My guess would be alcohol related. Wait wasn’t he on crutches last week too? I think something is afoot. Oh and hour #2 starts. Hall does the survey and Hall says Nash has a bad knee so he’s not here tonight. Apparently they were watching Larry Zbyszko matches and laughed so hard that Nash fell over and hurt his knee. Points for a funny line if nothing else.

We take a break and come back for the bell. After said bell Hall decks Garza in the head and I think I know where this is going. There’s the fallaway slam but the ribs are hurting a bit. Hall shoves a referee into the corner to allow Syxx to hit a Bronco Buster on Garza. The Outsider’s Edge ends this quick as Hall shoves the referee down for a cover.

Post match Hall puts the referee in the Torture Rack and spray paints a Z on his back.

We get a look at Goldberg’s two wins over the last two weeks.

TV Title: Diamond Dallas Page vs. Disco Inferno

Tony, being the schmuck that he is, wonders if this match will change the Disco vs. Jackie match because the (arguable) co-main event of the PPV doesn’t change if one guy is a champion or not. Disco grabs a quick armdrag and you would think he just won the world title. They go to a lockup and Page tries an early Diamond Cutter but the champion’s slick hair lets him get to the floor.

Back in and Page grabs a quick headlock but gets shoved into the ropes for a hip toss. Disco is actually hanging in this. Scratch that as Page his a neckbreaker to send Disco to the floor, where he gets hit by a baseballl slide and a plancha from Page. Back in and Disco still won’t die as he gets an elbow up in the corner to stop a charging Dallas. Page comes back by channeling the power of hair metal and slugs Disco down before hitting the Pancake. DDP treats Disco like the glorified jobber that he is and hits a Diamond Cutter out of a fireman’s carry (TKO), only to have Savage run in for the DQ.

Rating: C. Believe it or not, this wasn’t that bad. Disco was much better in the ring than he was given credit for, but when you have an awful (or brilliant depending on how you look at it) gimmick like a disco enthusiast, it’s kind of hard to get your in ring skills noticed. It was pretty clear something was going to be screwy with the ending but that’s weekly TV for you.

Post match Savage sends Page into the post and loads up a piledriver on the floor but Piper comes out for the save. Savage shoves him away so Piper spits in his face. Somehow this spins Savage around and there’s a Diamond Cutter on the concrete. Piper and Page bail into the crowd as the NWO runs out to protect the unconscious Savage. Savage gets taken out on a stretcher as Tony is almost giddy over a man being knocked unconscious.

Post break and here’s Piper in the ring with something to say. Apparently if Hogan had twice the amount of hair he had now he’d still be bald. Also Hall is lying when he says he beat Piper (when did Hall say that?) so we get a clip of Piper beating up Hall at Slamboree. Apparently the Outsiders, injuries or not, are going to defend the belts next week or they’re stripped of the belts. Also Savage vs. Page is Piper’s Rules, which would translate to last man standing.

Cue Bischoff and Hogan with Hogan staring down Piper. The Icon stuff stops now because Hogan is the real icon around here. Apparently everyone is here because of Hogan and at the PPV, Hogan is going to prove to Piper’s family that he (Hogan) is the real man. Bischoff fires off a kick to Piper’s bad leg and Hogan pounds away. He holds Piper for a Bischoff kick but Piper, elite level ninja that he is, ducks out of the way and Bischoff kicks Hogan. Piper beats on both of them until the NWO runs in for the save and Piper skedaddles.

Apparently if Mongo beats Jarrett at Havoc, Debra is gone from WCW.

Cruiserweight Title: Eddie Guerrero vs. Ultimo Dragon

Eddie is defending. Apparently the main event of Benoit vs. Savage is canceled and it’s now Benoit vs. Hennig. After a quick armdrag by Eddie it’s off to a test of strength. Dragon goes down, only to bridge his body which won’t break even with Eddie’s full weight on it. That’s so awesome looking. Eddie elbows Dragon down but the challenger pops back up and hits a tilt-a-whirl slam to take over.

Dragon hits a hard kick to the back and puts on a chinlock to kill some time. Eddie fights up and hits a suplex to set up an abdominal stretch. That goes nowhere so Dragon counters a release flapjack into a hurricanrana but Eddie snaps back up. A tilt-a-whirl backbreaker puts Dragon down again. That doesn’t get sold long either and here are the rapid fire kicks to stagger the champion. Guerrero heads to the floor where Dragon fakes him out before hitting a suicide dive to take Eddie down. Now it’s picking up a bit.

Back in and Dragon gets two off the dive he hit a second ago before putting on the Dragon Sleeper. Eddie gets his feet into the ropes though and Dragon has to break. Dragon puts the champ on the top rope for the super rana, only to get shoved down off the top. A tornado DDT lays Dragon out before hitting (most of) a long Frog Splash to retain.

Rating: B-. This started slow but once it picked up, it picked up BIG. I knew these two weren’t going to have a sluggish match as there’s just way too much talent out there to not put on an entertaining match. This was also good as Eddie had lost last week and he needed a clean win to keep him looking dominant going into the showdown with Rey at the PPV.

We look back at Hennig vs. Benoit on Saturday Night where Benoit had to fight off an invading NWO. The numbers caught up with him though and Benoit got beaten down.

Chris Benoit vs. Curt Hennig

I’m pretty sure this is non-title. Hennig talks to a fan in the aisle and Benoit jumps him to start. Benoit hits a big hard chop that sends Hennig into one of his usually overdone bumps but he hits his head on the steps. We head inside and the bell rings to start things off. Benoit is in full control and knocks Hennig off the apron and into the barricade. Back inside again and Benoit keeps stomping away before going to the middle rope.

Hennig finally gets in some offense in the form of a dragon screw leg whip to bring Benoit down. The Robinsdale Crunch keeps Benoit down and Hennig wraps the knee around the post. There’s a Flair cannonball but Curt uses the railing instead of the ropes. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that before.

We take a break and come back with Benoit hammering away back in the ring. Hennig goes into a RAGE and beats Chris down before taking off a buckle pad. Benoit reverses a whip to send Hennig into the buckle and rolls some Germans for two. Curt comes right back though by sending Benoit into the same buckle to set up the Perfect Plex for the pin.

Rating: B. Hennig’s intensity here made this a better match than I was expecting. These two beat the TAR out of each other and it made for a very entertaining match. The ending was a bit lame but I get why they wouldn’t want the newly lone wolf in Benoit to lose clean here. Benoit wanting to hurt Hennig more than beat him was the right move too, making this a very solid main event.

Post match the NWO comes out for the big beatdown but here’s Flair to get his revenge and try to destroy Hennig. Flair chases him to the back and into the parking lot but Hennig gets away. Ric comes back into the arena and says this is reality. He says he’s been Racked, Scorpion Deathlocked, leg dropped and put to sleep but he’s still right here. Flair talks about being Minneapolis born and bred before saying he’s the best of all time. He promises to get Hennig at Halloween Havoc if it’s booked or not. Flair rants about Hogan a bit to end the show.

Overall Rating: B. The wrestling was a bit slower tonight than last week, but this built up Halloween Havoc very well. The show has now gone from a show with barely anything I want to see to a show that actually sounds pretty good in theory. Nitro is starting to click again at this point and it’s pretty cool to see.

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Fall Brawl 1999
Date: September 12, 1999
Location: Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum, Winston-Salem, North Carolina
Attendance: 7,491
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay, Bobby Heenan

Well it’s the last Fall Brawl that I have left here and WCW is in its dying days here. Yes I know they went on for over a year after this but for all intents and purposes they were done in 2000. There’s no cage at all on this show and I don’t think anyone is going to particularly miss it anyway. Anyway other than that there isn’t much to talk about. Hogan vs. Sting for the title is the main event.  Let’s get to it.

Oh and one other thing: Bischoff was legit fired two days before this show, so let’s see what kind of differences we have here.

The opening video is about who you can trust. Not much to say other than that. Hogan says he’s a changed man and all that jazz. Oh and Luger won’t screw them over. He promises.

The announcers say they don’t know who to trust so that’s what makes this very interesting and all that jazz.

Eddie Guerrero/Rey Mysterio/Billy Kidman vs. Insane Clown Posse/Vampiro

Oh look: it’s the clowns. For some reason these guys kept getting put on major shows and told they were pro wrestlers so they pretend they are and waste a lot of time. The other team is the Filthy Animals apparently. Rey is unmasked with blonde hair here because that money from his mask sales was just not needed here. LONG stall to start because they’re freaking clowns.

Vampy doesn’t have his face painted which is a very weird look for him. They chill on the floor so we don’t have any of that wrestling stuff. White hot crowd. Ok so it’s Kidman against Shaggy 2 Dope. I hate this already. Kidman lets Shaggy get a shot in to start and Kidman is walking him through everything. A reverse Veg-O-Matic hits Shaggy and it’s off to Eddie.

Off to Rey vs. Violent Jay. He’s the bigger one and the blonde guy so it’s easy to tell them apart. Bronco Buster hits Vampiro and it’s off to Kidman. Since having Vampiro would be the best idea for his team, here’s Jay again. And yes I know it’ssupposed to just be the letter J but screw these idiots. DDT to Kidman and it’s off to Vampiro again. He hits a spinwheel kick off the top for two on Kidman.

The heels double team Kidman as Tony says his hair used to be like Vampiro’s. Vampy chops away and it’s off to Shaggy. You can tell very quickly that the clowns have very limited skill and training. They look like the Tough Enough guys going through spots. Rey’s knee is hurt and if I remember right this is legit.

Vampiro works over Rey for a bit more until it’s off to Eddie. Let the chopping begin! Vampy gets a nice spin kick to take Eddie down as it’s back to the clowns. Shaggy TOTALLY misses a top rope legdrop but gets two anyway. Eddie cleans house but Shaggy and Vampiro hit the absolute worst 3D you will ever see.

Shaggy was doing Bubba’s part and drops Eddie about two feet above the mat, more or less making it a very modified Samoan Drop by Vampiro. GET THESE GUYS OUT OF THE FREAKING RING BEFORE THEY KILL SOMEONE. Everything breaks down and it’s 3-2 due to Rey’s knee injury. The Shooting Star ends Vampiro finally.

Rating: D+. This is one of those matches where you have to praise one set of guys for the good stuff and blame the rest on the others. Point blank: the clowns don’t belong in the ring. They’re not good, they’re not interesting, they’re not wrestlers and they have zero business being out there. That being said, naturally they got time on all four major companies’ shows because someone hates me.

We recap the Cruiserweight Title match which is basically Lenny Lane as a gay guy who is champion defending against Kaz Hayashi who is the flavor of the month.

Cruiserweight Title: Lenny vs. Kaz Hayashi

In what may or may not be a great way to set this up, Kaz was facing Lodi and rolled up Lenny when he interfered to pin him and earn the title shot. Lenny and Lodi are the West Hollywood Blondes now and they’re just flat out gay characters now. Lenny does the stereotypical Rico-style stuff and it’s official that we have a comedy match. Kaz sends him to the floor and Lenny literally jumps into Lodi’s arms like he’s about to be carried over a threshold.

Kaz dives onto them and takes over in the ring. Lenny drops him down and does the whole sexy pin thing. Pretty nice gutwrench powerbomb gets two. Lenny goes to the floor and Kaz hits a huge tope con hilo to take over again. And never mind as Lodi gets a shot in to take over again and give Lenny two. Off to the chinlock to waste some time now.

Kaz gets a rana for two but walks into a bulldog for two. Belly to back shifts the momentum back to Hayashi. This is an awkward match to say the least. Kaz gets a pretty awesome slingshot bulldog for two and sets for his finisher, whatever that is. It’s something off the top apparently. Lenny reverses, only to get caught in a Ligerbomb out of the corner for two. Rana out of the corner gets two. Kaz sends the blondes into each other and gets a victory roll for two. Lodi interferes for two but the distraction is enough to let Lenny hit a Skull Crushing Finale to end it.

Rating: C-. This wasn’t horrible but it was certainly awkward for almost the entire thing. The ending was better but at the same time it was far more like a collection of spots rather than a match. That was a problem for Cruiserweights and with lower level guys like these, that’s not good. Not a terrible match or anything, but just kind of weak. Lenny would be stripped of the title by Turner Sports because they didn’t like his character, resulting in them finally saying Psicosis is champion just because we say so.

Sting comes out to the ring for a full on promo. In short he’s a lone wolf (or is it lobster) and isn’t friends with Luger. Flexy Lexy needs to stay out of the ring tonight so we’ll have him penciled in for run-in #3. Oh and this is business, not personal with Hogan. Say it with me: heel turn.

Brian Knobbs/Hugh Morrus vs. Shane Douglas/Dean Malenko

Pre-match the face team (Douglas/Malenko) do their thing, but Shane says the wrong city and state. Oh dear. Douglas/Malenko are part of the Revolution, which was supposed to be a youth uprising thing but turned into an anti-American thing like a month after this. Knobbs/Morrus are the First Family, which is Jimmy Hart’s very low level stable. This is also No DQ for no apparent reason. Big brawl to start so Dean kicks them both in the balls to take over. Shane comes back in and the Revolution cleans the ring out.

Double baseball slides take out the First Family as this is still a big brawl. The Revolution is sent into various metal objects and something goes flying that we can’t identify. Either way it half kills Shane. We get things down to normal now as Knobbs rubs his armpit in the face of Shane. Shane gets all ticked off and brings in Dean, who has little trouble taking care of Knobbs. Speaking of Knobbs, why in the world is he on PPV in 1999?

Dean works the arm and then the wrist. When you can make a wristlock look freaking sick, that’s a good sign. Off to Morrus and Shane again as this is more or less target practice for the Revolution. Knobbs and Shane go back to the floor for more brawling so back in the ring Shane is tagged in. Tony gets his first stupid line of the match in by saying they’ve kept this in the ring so far. It’s important to mention that it’s the first stupid line because we’ve been on the air about 40 minutes so far.

The Revolution clears the ring again and Shane takes over on Knobbs soon thereafter. Double teaming gets Douglas down so Knobbs gets to go on his, ahem, offense. Middle rope splash eats a foot which looks like it nearly broke Shane’s leg. Double tag with a small pop for Dean, who I think is half of the face team. Dean cleans house….and gets tripped up by Knobbs, allowing Morrus to take over and hit No Laughing Matter to end this. Clean. On PPV. Hugh Morrus pinned Dean Malenko. In 1999. And people wonder why the Radicals happened in four months.

Rating: D. The match was a mess, there seemed to be no po….oh screw it. WHAT THE HECK ARE THEY THINKING??? Dude, why in the world would this be the booking move? I mean really it’s HUGH FREAKING MORRUS and BRIAN KNOBBS going over Shane Douglas and Dean Malenko in 1999. This is so idiotic I can’t even begin to describe it. Dean, please just leave now. It’s not going to get any better, I assure you.

TV Title: Perry Saturn vs. Rick Steiner

Steiner is now a heel and all “rough” or something like that. Oh and the Steiners are all cool again. Steiner is champion and Saturn is in the Revolution. Take a guess as to what happens here. Steiner takes him down to the match rather quickly as we’re told Buff Bagwell isn’t here yet but there’s a replacement for him who will be named later.

Saturn gets his spinning legdrop for no cover. Suicide dive takes out Steiner and Saturn hammers away. No real reason for this match other than Saturn has been deemed a challenger. We touch on the death of referee Mark Curtis (Brian Hilldebrand) who passed away earlier in the week. Everyone is wearing a black armband because of it which is always cool to see.

Out to the floor and Saturn is sent into the steps. Bad DDT on the floor puts Saturn down even more. Other than a brief flourish at the beginning it’s been all Steiner because that’s what he does. I mean, it’s not like he’s going to sell for anyone. That would imply that someone young could be better than him and the people might somehow care about him even less. Perish the thought!

German sends Saturn flying. Off to a chinlock so that Rick can have a little breather. Off to a half crab as this is rather boring indeed. Saturn slaps the mat but we’re not going to call that a tap out because that’s not the planned ending. Back to the half crab which isn’t even cranked on. Basically he’s just got his leg up in the air a bit. Give me a break. Belly to belly gets no cover for Rick.

There’s another belly to belly and Saturn is down. Rick yells at a fan and Saturn is able to get a middle rope dropkick to take Steiner down. T-bone suplex gets two for the former Perry. And never mind that as Steiner takes him down with a powerslam for two. Death Valley Driver, Saturn’s finisher, gets two also. Saturn calls for the Rings of Saturn but instead goes for another DVD which is shrugged off. Steiner Bulldog is broken up but the second attempt hits so Steiner can retain. Give me another break.

Rating: D-. No one, I mean NO ONE, cared about Rick Steiner at this point. Therefore the obvious solution is to give him the TV Title for four months. He would lose it to Benoit the next night, so why in the freaking world wouldn’t you just do the title change here???? Oh that’s right: Benoit has to job to Sid because Heaven knows Sid is the guy that needs the US Title more than Benoit right? I freaking give up.

Here’s Hogan, saying he’s a good guy now and won’t stab anyone in the back. Oh and if anyone wants him, come get him. There are run-ins #1 and #2 for later I presume. The fans chant for Flair, who isn’t here I don’t think.

We recap what was supposed to be Berlyn vs. Bagwell. Berlyn is Alex Wright as a crazy ticked off German with a Mohawk and The Wall (get it?) as his bodyguard. Bagwell didn’t like him so that was your match. Then Bagwell didn’t want to lose and refused to go out to lose. Of course he did. The Berlyn character was delayed due to Columbine, so this was supposed to happen back in the spring.

Berlyn vs. ???

The replacement is Jim Duggan of all people. Berlyn jumps him in the corner and can’t put him down with a dropkick. Duggan starts a comeback after not being on defense for the most part. Clotheslines put Berlyn on the floor. Duggan massacres him for the most part. Remember that this is Berlyn’s debut. Berlyn hits a clothesline, Duggan won’t stay down. They slug it out and Duggan still won’t sell anything.

The fans want Flair and are rather patriotic at the same time. Off to a chinlock which Duggan at least sits still for, at least for a few seconds. Duggan fights up and stays on offense. Seriously, the guy won’t stay down more than like 2 seconds off any move. He does the whole nothing hurts him walk (as opposed to standing there and letting nothing hurt him) and dear goodness help me they’re trying technical stuff.

I think it would be a bit better to go out and watch a bunch of puppies get massacred. This is horrid and somehow gets even more boring. Another chinlock gets us nowhere because Duggan won’t sell anything, not even with facial expressions. Duggan hammers away even more and Wall pulls back the mats on the floor. A HORRIBLE neckbreaker finally ends this. Duggan was going to take it like a Stunner so Berlyn had to say “turn around” to end it. Horrid, horrid match.

Rating: G. As in GO AWAY DUGGAN. This was awful and the majority of that can be blamed on Duggan. If he won’t sell for Berlyn, how in the world can you expect the character to be taken seriously? Terrible match and oddly enough the second time this has happened to Wright.

Bagwell “arrives” and comes out to hug Duggan, who isn’t happy. I’m not either but I’m not getting a paycheck like he is either so there we are.

Video on how Harlem Heat is back together. They were champions again and then the Rednecks got them because that’s how WCW rolls. That of course all happened in less than a month, because WCW decided we needed NINETEEN TITLE CHANGES in 1999.

Tag Titles: Harlem Heat vs. West Texas Rednecks

The Rednecks are Barry and Kendall Windham with Hennig in their corner. They’re country singers and that’s about it. The Windhams are legit brothers. Booker vs. Kendall to start us off and Kendall bails to avoid a spin kick. Heat double teams Kendall and it’s off to Stevie. Now Stevie won’t sell anything. Naturally this is probably going to be praised, because WCW needs more guys to no sell so their other guys look bad right?

Barry comes in to hit a DDT for no cover. How he went from being as totally awesome as he was at one point to being here now is amazing. Odd to see two pairs of brothers here. Actually it isn’t but there isn’t much to talk about here. Hennig gets in a shot to make sure that Kendall can get a two count on Stevie. Stevie gets a powerslam out of nowhere to put Barry down.

Double tag brings in Kendall and Booker with the more famous one doing what he can. Down goes Hennig and Kendall does the same a second after. The double teaming begins on the floor as Booker gets caught. Off to the chinlock on Booker by Kendall as the fans chant for the Heat. That’s better than nothing I guess. Axe kick hits but it would have been a bit better if Kendall had waited until it actually hit to go down.

Spinarooni is broken up by Barry and it’s back to the floor for Booker. More double teaming continues and it’s back in to Barry. Barry gets a middle rope superplex (his old finisher) but Stevie makes the save. If this sounds really boring, I’m getting better at this emotion thing in the writing. Kendall gets a lariat mostly to the neck for two. Booker gets his sunset flip out of the corner for two.

The heels double team a lot, as you would expect from a team with an old school guy like Barry. There’s a sleeper to Barry as this is probably on the verge of ending. Back off to Kendall who hits a weak middle rope clothesline for one. Classic old school spot as the referee misses the hot tag. Stevie beats up everyone anyway and everything breaks down. Hennig hits Ray in the head with a cowbell but the referee won’t count BECAUSE HE WAS PAYING ATTENTION!!!! WOW!!!!! Booker is still legal so the missile dropkick he hits gets the tag titles back.

Rating: D+. Match was weak but this is a fine sign of what Bischoff not being around means: the ending made perfect sense for a change and was actually kind of creative. No one cared about the match though, because we had seen it just a few weeks ago on Nitro. Nothing of note at all, as you could say about most matches tonight.

Recap of Benoit vs. Sid. Sid was doing the whole imitating Goldberg’s Streak deal and Benoit challenged him. Benoit is US Champion and part of the Revolution. You figure out what’s going to happen here.

US Title: Chris Benoit vs. Sid Vicious

Oh and Revolution’s theme song is a cover of The Beautiful People by Marilyn Manson. Just to hammer in WCW’s refusal to push young guys, Benoit and Malenko were having a #1 contenders match so Sid ran in to make it a no contest. He’s 79-0 at this point, with wins coming through means such as just chokeslamming people and not pinning them, beating people up in brawls and beating people up despite losing the match by countout or something like that. Go figure.

Sid throws Benoit around a lot and then stalls. Benoit gets tossed even more and then, like a good ring general, goes for the knee of a bigger man. Makes perfect sense right? He gets a dragon screw, a dropkick to the knee, some cannonballs down onto the knee and an Indian Deathlock in the span of about a minute. After all that, Sid popped up and was completely fine. It’s going to be one of those matches.

Sid stomps away in the corner with his knee being just fine. Benoit avoids a charge and goes to the floor, wrapping the leg around the post and then putting it between the steps and post, dropkicking the steps into the leg twice. That’s an attack that would put some guys out for weeks. Ok so to be clear: SID’S LEG SHOULD BE HURT. Back into the ring and Sid is able to catch Benoit flying through the air in a cross body. Benoit counters into a German and Sid flat out will not sell the knee at all.

Samoan Drop and the knee is still perfectly fine. Oh NOW he limps a bit, after destroying Benoit. By a bit I mean he kicks the ropes a few times and it perfectly fine. There’s a Cobra Clutch into a slam by Sid. That gets two so Sid hammers away on him and it’s off to the chinlock. The fans get distracted by something as Sid FINALLY starts to limp. You know, after he threw Benoit all over the place.

Sid goes for some power move but Benoit reverses and gets his feet up in the corner. Back to the knee and there’s the Crossface. Now as I’m sure you know, there’s a simple way of communicating that you want to submit and end the match: you slap the mat multiple times. This is commonly known as tapping out. SID SLAPS THE MAT TWICE. However that doesn’t count despite the referee looking straight at him and being maybe 5 inches from Sid’s tapping hand.

Benoit is TICKED as Sid stands up while the hold is still on and drags Benoit to the ropes. Remember the hold is on and Sid is on his feet. Gee it’s a good thing his legs are in such great shape isn’t it? Benoit goes up, Swan Dive misses and Sid casually moves out of the way and then snaps off a powerbomb with his arm and knee being just fine as he wins the US Title. Benoit would get the TV Title the next night and a WWF contract four months later as a result.

Rating: F. This stands for failure, because that’s what this was. First and foremost let me make this clear: Benoit did nothing wrong here. Not a thing. His psychology was good (take the big man off his feet), his offense was good (variety of attacks), his emotion was good, everything he did made sense and worked fine.

Then on the other hand we have Sid. This is the epitome of the problem with WCW and arguably the main reason they went under: Sid could have gone out there and tap danced for the 12 minutes this match had while Benoit put on the wrestling clinic of a lifetime and Sid’s push would have continued while Benoit would have been pushed back down the card. The reason for this being that Sid has been decided to be one of the “it” guys. He’s 39 here (Benoit was 32), he will not sell the knee making Benoit more or less a pointless jobber here, and he can’t do anything special in the ring at all.

And yet he’s going to get pushed. Why is that you ask? Because someone in WCW decided he would with no reason other than Sid gets pushed. Benoit was put in the list of people that weren’t getting pushed and that was that. So in other words, there’s no point for the young guys to try hard because it’s not going to get them anywhere. Sid of course would go on to be pushed even harder, winning the world title in January while Benoit thankfully left for the WWF. This match is a lot sadder than it sounds because Benoit is trying but Sid just won’t cooperate, which makes his push all the stupider.

We recap DDP vs. Goldberg with Page as the heel, working with the original Jersey Triad. Page beat Goldberg with a chair and that’s about it.

Goldberg vs. Diamond Dallas Page

This is more or less a midcard match because Goldberg had his time so it’s time for the REAL draws in the form of old Sting and old Hogan to run things here. So just to be clear here, Goldberg is 32 years old and has one loss against roughly 240 wins in his WCW career. He’s ridiculously popular and here he is in a midcard feud. Seriously, I want to know: how did WCW make money at one point?

The referee checks them for objects and finds a chain on Page. Page shoves the referee away and drops a roll of half dollars. Ok that was funny. Page is knocked to the floor quickly and comes back in for a feeling out process, only to get knocked all over the place for his efforts. Page is knocked to the floor again as it doesn’t seem like they know what their plan is here, which is unheard of for a Page match.

Page gets a shot in as Goldberg comes in again but can’t get the Diamond Cutter. Powerslam gets no cover for Goldberg. Page pulls out a third object which the referee didn’t find to hammer Billy Boy in the head and take over. The fans LOUDLY chant for Goldberg and pop even louder when he gets in some punches. Page drills him with the object again and the referee is cool with it I guess.

Off to the chinlock on the mat as Page cheats even more which this referee somehow still can’t see. I know the joke is that they’re blind but how can you manage to believe this isn’t being seen? Goldberg Goldbergs Up and even hits a big boot to complete the joke. Page gets a horrible jumping tornado DDT to get two and break the momentum though which is kind of surprising actually.

Another weapon shot sets up a spinning Rock Bottom for two. Here’s the rest of the Triad to cheat and that doesn’t work. Spear and Jackhammer end this like three seconds later. Oh and the last weapon shot made Goldberg legit bleed from the neck. Freaking ow man. Well at least it’s over I guess.

Rating: D. Remember when Page was one of the most awesome things in the world and more or less couldn’t be beaten? This is nothing like that. Page as a heel is awful, especially when he’s getting destroyed by someone like Goldberg. This was a weak match all around and no one bought that Page had a chance at all, which he didn’t.

We recap Sting vs. Hogan. Hogan says he’s a new man (despite being the old version of him) and then Luger says he has proof that Hogan is lying through his teeth. There was a Hummer that was trying to run Nash over a few months earlier and no one knew who was driving it (despite Sting being seen in the driver’s seat of it at one point) so Luger says it was Hogan (despite this Hummer being white and the original one being black). This would go nowhere, despite it being implied that Sid was revealed as the driver earlier in the year. It would be touched on AGAIN in April when it was implied it was Bischoff driving.

Anyway, Sting was found out cold on the floor and Luger blamed Hogan, despite Hogan swearing it wasn’t him. This is actually a lot more like the angle in 1995 that got dropped because Hogan got bored with it I guess and went back to fighting the Dungeon of Doom and the Horsemen until Hall debuted. Not that it matters or anything but Buffer takes forever to do an intro and I need something to pass the time.

WCW World Title: Sting vs. Hulk Hogan

Hogan is champion and is in red and yellow while Sting is kind of a tweener. They shake hands before the match and you can feel Sting’s heel turn coming. Here’s Bret before the match starts, wanting to wish them luck. He couldn’t do this as they come past the Gorilla Position? He actually leaves without doing anything. Thanks for wasting about two minutes there Bret.

They lock up on the ropes and the referee has to split them up. Hogan grabs a rollup for one. They actually wrestle a bit, blowing the minds of everyone. It’s slow but it’s not horrible I guess. Hogan takes him into the corner and strikes away a lot in a variety of methods. A pair of elbow drops gets two. Hogan gets a suplex which is no sold by Sting.

They hit the floor and it’s Hogan in control still. Why do I have a feeling this is Bound For Glory this year (2011)? He takes Sting down and drops more elbows, only for Sting to send him into the railing to take over. Back into the ring and Hogan hits a belly to back suplex for two. Off to a surfboard as Sting is in some trouble here. There’s an abdominal stretch to crank up the difficulty.

There’s a back rake by Hogan as this is going so slowly and no one in the building believes there’s going to be a clean ending. Ten punches in the corner set up some biting of Sting’s cranial area. Sting gets a cross body for two. A pair of Stinger Splashes hit out of nowhere but the third one misses and it’s Hulk Up time.

He hits the big boot and leg but here’s DDP to deck the referee and Diamond Cut Hogan, which only gets two. Diamond Cutter for the referee and Hogan stares DDP down but here’s Bret Hart to take out Page. Everyone but Hogan goes to the floor and here’s Sid who is sent out quickly. Luger is here with a ball bat but Hogan gets him too. Sting gets the bat and Hogan says Luger was the one. Sting drills Hogan with the bat to a huge face pop and the Scorpion gives Sting the win over the unconscious Hogan. That was supposed to be a heel turn but the standing ovation seems to make that feel like a failure.

Rating: D. They tried to wrestle and then proved why they shouldn’t be doing that. The whole thing didn’t work for the most part and the heel turn at the end was downright hilarious because no one wanted Sting as a heel. The people flat out aren’t going to boo him and it’s a waste of time to get them to try. This was another example of WCW having no idea what to do with the world title and it failing completely. This went nowhere and Sting would lose the title next month.

Overall Rating: F. Failure on all levels here as there weren’t any good matches, the ending sucked for the most part and they managed to bury an entire group in one night. Anyway, this whole show didn’t work, much like the entirety of 1999. The company was more or less dead at this point so they were trying whatever they could to make things work, such as turning Sting heel, which wasn’t going to work at all. Anyway, horrible show, much like the rest of the year was.

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Monday Nitro #150
Date: August 17, 1998
Location: Hartford Civic Center, Hartford, Connecticut
Attendance: 12,655
Commentators: Larry Zbyszko, Mike Tenay, Bobby Heenan, Tony Schiavone

This was requested a long time ago so I’m not sure why someone wanted to see it. We’re a little over a week after Road Wild 1998 where, believe it or not, the world champion Goldberg didn’t main event the show because Hogan was in a tag match with a celebrity. The company is starting to reel from the Attitude Era but tonight may be their answer if my memory is correct. Let’s get to it.

Here’s the NWO, led by Hogan and Bischoff, to open things up. Giant is part of the NWO again at this point too. Hogan says all the fans here are NWO Black and White fans because this is the house that Hollywood built. He’s sick of all the games with the media and dealing with all those lower level guys. Instead he wants Goldberg right here tonight in the middle of the ring because there is NO ONE he hasn’t beaten and no one he can’t beat. The fans chant Goldberg as Hogan says Giant will take out Goldberg and hand him the title tonight.

Opening sequence which is still the same as it was at the beginning of the year. Even the Steiner Brothers are still in it.

JJ Dillon talks about the very stupid WarGames this year which is a three team, nine man format because the greatest gimmick match of all time needed to be tweaked. Dillon announced Hogan, DDP and Nash as the captains for the three teams. There are three men to start, every two minutes there’s a three way coin toss and the person who earns the fall (which can be a pin this year) gets a title shot at Halloween Havoc.

We get a clip from Saturday Night with Dean Malenko wanting to reform the Horsemen.

Nitro Girls.

Nitro Party winner. Is there any wrestling coming anytime soon?

Steve McMichael vs. Sick Boy

The announcers spend the first minute or so running down Raw for the night because it was taped weeks in advance and their world title match only runs about ten seconds tonight. That’s likely because it’s two weeks before Summerslam and the WWF isn’t stupid enough to air a long title match that close to their second biggest show of the year. Mongo shoves Sick Boy to the apron but gets his neck snapped across the top rope. Sick Boy fires off some right hands and gets two off a slam.

A dropkick puts Mongo down for the same as the announcers talk about Saturn vs. Raven at Fall Brawl with the future of the Flock on the line. Sick Boy hits a clothesline as this is almost a squash so far. They slug it out from their knees with Sick Boy maintaining control but barely being able to get Mongo up for a suplex. Mongo gets in a shot to the ribs and a three point shoulder block followed by the tombstone for the pin.

Rating: C-. I miss the days when Mongo was nowhere to be seen. You know something? I don’t think I’ve ever seen a bad Sick Boy match. The guy looks smooth out there and very confident in what he does in the ring but after the Flock broke up he was more or less gone for good. Then again it’s WCW so it’s not like he would have been pushed anyway.

Here’s DDP with something to say. He’s the captain for Team WCW at Fall Brawl so he went out west to recruit his first teammate. This man wants to take out Hogan as much as Page does and Hogan has never beaten him. Page doesn’t name the guy before starting to talk about the NWO beating Page down before his US Title match with Bret Hart.

This brings out US Champion Bret (in a Hogan shirt) to say quick complaining and win or lose like a man. Page says back up of him Jack because he wants a match with Hart tonight. Bret lists off a bunch of guys that he’s crippled and put on the shelf, but Page is the scum of the earth so he’ll give Page the title shot tonight.

Gene brings out Raven for a chat but before anything can be said, Horace Hogan comes out with a stop sign. He says he’s watched Raven’s back for four months but hasn’t gotten anything in return for it. For the last two weeks he’s beaten Raven up but he wants one more match.

Raven says fine as long as it’s a tag match where he can pick the partners. Horace will have Kanyon and Raven gets Saturn because Saturn needs to get used to being subservient to him. Saturn and Kanyon come out with Saturn calling Raven crazy. He changes his mind a few seconds later because he wants to smack Raven when he comes over for a tag. JJ Dillon comes out to stop this interesting idea. The tag match can happen, but if Saturn tries to attack Raven, he’s gone for 90 days. Also the match must end by pinfall or submission.

High Voltage vs. Alex Wright/Disco Inferno

Wright is quickly taken to the mat by a wristlock and a belly to belly suplex. Tony rips on Raw again by saying WCW will give you action you want to see here tonight. So far we’ve seen Steve McMichael vs. Sick Boy and this classic. You might want to try that one again Schiavone. Off to Disco who is thrown around as well but here’s Meng to attack Wright because Meng is a monster.

A referee and a security guard get Death Grips as well. They finally mace him to no effect at all.

Eddie Guerrero is scheduled for a match against Konnan but he comes out with a bag and a cup of coffee. He says don’t go to a commercial or he’ll say this on another show. Eddie wants to talk to Eric Bischoff about business, but if this is the only way to get his attention then so be it. Eddie has been unappreciated for a year despite giving the best effort he can.

All of the young talent in WCW is held down for the sake of the people on top of the company. The fans are loudly booing. Eddie says he hasn’t done this for the sake of Chavo and his children and pours coffee on himself, referencing a meeting where Eric allegedly threw coffee on him (in his book Eddie said that it was actually Eric accidentally spilling the coffee on a table and it landed on Eddie). This would eventually lead to the LWO. I’m sure we’ll get Eddie vs. Konnan later though, because WCW would NEVER bait and switch us like that other company that WCW has spent the first hour running down.

Hour #2 begins.

Kanyon/Horace vs. Saturn/Raven

Raven and Saturn get in an argument before the bell but agree to get inside. Saturn and Kanyon get things going but Raven tags himself in, nearly triggering another brawl. The tag doesn’t count for some reason so Kanyon tries a fisherman’s suplex on Saturn, only to get caught in a belly to belly suplex. Off to Horace who catches Saturn in a bad looking flapjack, giving Kanyon a two count.

Kanyon stomps away in the corner and gets two off a backbreaker. In a surprise, Raven crotches Kanyon on the top to save Saturn as the Raw bashing continues. Raven comes in and rolls some Russian legsweeps on Kanyon but doesn’t cover. Back to Saturn for some kicks in the corner before Raven brings in a chair.

Kanyon is sat on the middle rope and Raven loads up a Diamond Cutter onto the chair (Tony: “Looked like a bulldog or a DDT.” So not only does he brag about how AMAZING WCW’s main event will be but he doesn’t recognize the most over move in the company for the last year and a half.) but Kanyon shoves Raven into the chair instead. Off to Horace who is only here to beat up Raven. A powerslam gets two for Hollywood Hogan’s nephew as Saturn makes the save.

Everything breaks down and Saturn and Raven are thrown into each other. Horace splashes both guys in the corner and Saturn does the Sting falling low blow spot. A powerbomb/neckbreaker combo gets two on Saturn and Kanyon spikes him down with a reverse electric chair (meaning Saturn was dropped face first off Kanyon’s shoulders). Horace brings in the stop sign but blasts Kanyon by mistake, allowing Saturn to hit the Death Valley Driver on Horace for the pin.

Rating: C+. This was a better match than I was expecting though more dissension between Raven and Saturn would have helped a bit. Kanyon continues to be solid in the ring with a bunch of nifty moves but Horace on the other hand was as generic of a big man as you could ask for. Still though, good stuff here.

The Flock comes in post match and Raven DDTs Saturn. He tells the Flock to get Saturn up but Kidman pulls Raven off of him, earning a DDT of his own. Horace gets a DDT as well.

Here’s the NWO Black and Red (the Wolfpack) with something to say. The Wolfpack is Nash, Konnan, Sting (looking like a lobster in red paint) Luger and Savage (injured at the moment). They’re the cool NWO and formed a few months ago because if there was one thing missing in WCW, it was a face NWO team. Sting talks about WarGames coming up and how much he’d love to be involved again. Konnan does his usual schtick before Nash talks about how great it is to be in Connecticut. If you’re not part of the Wolfpack, prepare to be hunted by the Pack…and that’s it.

Scott Norton vs. Scott Putski

Putski is wearing a long coat that makes him look like a pirate. Norton chops him in the corner to start but Putski comes back with a neckbreaker. A Vincent distraction lets Norton snap off a powerslam and a powerbomb ends Putski in less than a minute.

Here’s the Black and White with something else to say. Hogan loves the new WarGames rules because he can take care of all the garbage at one time. Nash is a turncoat and Page is a creep who doesn’t follow the rules. Bischoff is the boss around here and the man that brings in the new talent, even though there’s no one Page could bring in that Hogan can’t handle. There go the lights and it’s time for the reveal of DDP’s surprise partner.

A voiceover says something about destruction and someone walks out but we can’t see who it is. The lights come up and it’s the Ultimate Warrior (just called the Warrior here). Hogan immediately panics because he thought Warrior was dead. A LOUD Warrior chant comes up as Warrior asks who holds the power now. Warrior stands there for awhile before saying people anticipated his arrival. Hogan offers him the NWO shirt off his back but Warrior says it doesn’t smell good.

Warrior talks about how wrestling has tried to recreate something which is recreateable with Hogan at the figurehead. Those sort of things are irreplaceable and Hogan must realize that right now. Warrior pauses for about thirty seconds after each sentence. The fans chant that Hogan sucks but Warrior wants to tell him something he doesn’t know. Warrior talks about history teaching us things but Hogan has misplaced pieces of his history. He mentions that Hogan never beat the Warrior, which brings up an interesting point.

On Warrior’s WWE DVD, Hogan said this was the ultimate no-no. Why? Some of the biggest matches of all time, including the most watched match in American history, have been rematches. Are we supposed to say Warrior lost the match? Also remember that Page brought it up earlier in the show and flat out said it instead of implying it like Warrior did (Warrior said Hogan never beat him, not that he beat Hogan). Earlier Hogan mentioned wanting to get his belt back from Goldberg. Are we supposed to forget that Hogan lost his only match against Goldberg? I never got why this was such a big deal in Hogan’s mind.

Anyway Warrior says he defeated the undefeatable and conquered the unconquerable because while Hogan was great, Warrior was Ultimate. After talking for about ten minutes, Warrior introduces himself to Disciple, saying that must be Hogan’s barber. I believe that’s the first actual confirmation that it’s Brutus Beefcake. Bischoff says Warrior knows who he is and Warrior says if Bischoff gets involved, it will lead to his demise. Also Warrior is going to send him a bill for something that isn’t specified.

Warrior talks about destiny and waiting for the next superhero. Hogan has been rationalizing adolescent behavior and embodies intolerable evil. Warrior isn’t here to beat Hogan up because everyone has already beaten Hogan up. Nice line there. Next week Warrior is going to launch a revolution that not even Hogan can control. That’s next week, same Warrior time, place and channel. Seriously he said that. Smoke fills the ring and Warrior disappears.

This went on FOREVER and easily could have been cut in half to get the same point across. Between Warrior’s incessant pauses, the repeating the same stuff in different terms over and over and talking to Bischoff about bills, this could have been cut down to about six or seven minutes instead of the fifteen that it took. Also it’s more of the same idea for WCW: take something that was a big deal a long time ago and try to get something more out of it. Yes it would work short term, but it was shown to not work in the long term.

More Nitro Girls. Tony is only pretty sure that the Warrior was DDP’s shocker.

Dean Malenko vs. Curt Hennig

This has potential. Curt bails to the floor and we take our second break in about two and a half minutes. Back with Dean pulling Hennig into the ring but Curt taking it right back to the floor to beat on Malenko. Back in and Dean goes off with forearms in the corner, only to be taken down by a clothesline. Hennig cranks on the neck but Dean backdrops Curt down.

A snapmare gets two for Malenko but he runs into a boot in the corner. The HennigPlex is countered with knees to the ribs and Dean suplexes Curt a few times. Tony rips on Raw’s main event again as Hennig escapes the Cloverleaf. A Rude distraction and a shot to the back sets up the HennigPlex to end Dean a few seconds later.

Rating: D. I expected WAY more from these two. They never got out of first gear here and seemed perfectly happy going like that for about five minutes. It’s nice that Dean is back after being gone for a few months in the spring, but Curt seems to be doing exactly what he was doing back in April. That’s not a good sign at all.

Hour #3 begins.

Here are Buff Bagwell, Scott Steiner (with literally half of his body in bandages) and some frumpy old woman. Scott talks about Rick hitting him in the elbow last week, and everyone knows that the elbow bone is connected to the shoulder which is connected to the neck bone, and that’s why his knee hurts. Steiner’s doctor, who is apparently a man, says that Scott is indeed hurt. Scott can’t hold his arm up so clearly he can’t face Rick at Fall Brawl. This brings out Rick who says he wants the match so Scott says he’ll do it at Fall Brawl. The team split up six months ago and we’re still waiting on the match?

Nitro Girls part 3.

TV Title: Chavo Guerrero Jr. vs. Chris Jericho vs. Stevie Ray

Chavo has gone nuts and has a stick horse named Pepe for a friend. Jericho is TV Champion after beating Stevie, who became champion after Booker T couldn’t defend the title due to injury and allegedly gave Stevie power of attorney to defend the title. At least I think that’s what happened as the announcers don’t sound entirely sure. One fall to a finish here with Jericho throwing Chavo into Stevie to start. Jericho bails out to the floor so Stevie throws Guerrero on top of him in a nice power display.

Chavo comes back in with a high cross body for two on Stevie but now Jericho wants to hook up with Guerrero. A running forearm and middle rope bulldog get two on the champion but now Ray lifts Chavo into the air again, only to have Jericho break it up for two. Ray takes them both down with a double clothesline but the smaller guys come back with a double suplex.

Chris and Chavo hit a double missile dropkick from the same corner but Jericho breaks up Guerrero’s cover on Ray. Ray runs over the referee but knocks Jericho out with a blackjack. Guerrero puts a sleeper on Stevie Ray but here’s Giant to chokeslam Stevie, which apparently is what gave Jericho the title in the first place. Chavo gets up but staggers out of the ring. Jericho gets to his feet….and wins by countout because Ray can’t get up? Uh….sure, but why not just have Jericho cover the unconscious Stevie for the pin?

Rating: D+. Bizarre ending, bizarre booking and unexplained interference aside, there were a few decent spots in here to carry things. This is a good example of how watching all of the shows coming up to this could have helped out a lot. Chavo getting to show personality is definitely a good thing though as he’s very talented but didn’t have the character to back it up.

US Title: Bret Hart vs. Diamond Dallas Page

Bret is defending, having traded the title with Lex Luger over the last week. Page gets a quick two off a belly to belly but Bret bails to the floor to avoid a Diamond Cutter. DDP follows him to the floor and pounds away, sending Bret into the barricade. Back in and Page fires off elbows in the corner and gets two off a suplex. Page goes to the corner to rain down right hands but Bret hits him low.

The referee must have been following a piece of lint in the air because it was right in front of him but Bret wasn’t even admonished. Bret drops Page face first onto the buckle to take over even more as momentum shifts. Hart rakes the eyes across the top rope ala Arn Anderson but Page grabs a quick small package for two. We hit the Five Moves of Doom with the elbow getting two. A hard whip into the corner puts Page down again and a good looking piledriver gets two on Page.

DDP pops right up and pounds away on Bret in the corner before taking him down with a discus lariat. A top rope clothesline gets a near fall on the champion and the Pancake gets the same. The referee gets pumped and Bret pulls out a foreign object to blast Page in the head. Then in a bizarre moment, for some reason he puts the object in Page’s tights and drags Page on top of himself but kicks out at two.

The Sharpshooter goes on, Page slaps the mat on three separate occasions (as in three sets of taps) and shakes his head up and down but the referee does nothing at all. Page grabs the rope for the break and grabs a Diamond Cutter out of nowhere. The referee does his job for the first time all match by noticing Bret’s foot being under the rope. Bret claims that Page hit him with something so the referee checks him, only to find the object for the DQ. We’ll ignore that the referee had a completely unobstructed view for the last several minutes and would have seen Page hit Hart or put it back in his tights.

Rating: B-. Good match here but the strange booking brought it down. The ending makes sense given the setup, but the setup made no sense. I get that Bret put the object there as a safety net, but why not just pin Page when he was knocked out? Also there were way too many instances here with the referee coming off like an idiot. These two had good chemistry together but I don’t remember a match between them not being overbooked.

More Nitro Girls, this time with the WCW version of Wrestling Buddies.

WCW World Title: Goldberg vs. The Giant

Tony bashes Raw again, saying they’re going to give the fans what they advertised, unlike their competitors. Giant has Disciple with him. Goldberg’s music hits and the fake chants pipe in. I rarely notice those so they must be really bad here. Buffer introduces Goldberg as the unified WCW/NWO World Champion.

Giant charges at him in the corner to start and slams Goldberg down, only to have Goldberg pop up and slam Giant right back. Giant clubs him down again and hits a quick Russian legsweep for no cover. Goldberg is sent to the floor but has to knock out Disciple. The champion posts Giant but the big man is able to suplex Goldberg in from the apron, only to have Goldie pop right back up. The spear connects but Disciple comes in for the DQ.

Rating: C-. It was indeed longer than ten seconds, but the whole thing didn’t even last four minutes. If I’m WCW, I’d have a bigger match than that if I was going to spend almost three hours bragging about how good it was going to be. This is like a kid bragging that he got a D on a paper when his friend got an F. Goldberg’s power moves were impressive but there was nothing to the match at all. Two straight DQ finishes didn’t help things either.

Goldberg spears Disciple down and hits him with the Jackhammer but Scott Hall comes in to beat the champion down. Nash comes in for the save, takes out Giant and pulls Hall off of Goldberg, only to take a spear meant for Scott. Nash basically no sells it and stares Goldberg down to end the show.

Overall Rating: C+. This was a pretty entertaining show all around, but there are some big problems and you can see them coming soon. The Warrior idea is a Band-Aid and nothing more. Yeah it might have gotten them a quick boost, but even WCW had to know this wasn’t going to be a long term solution.

At the end of the day, this is the Hulk Hogan Show, not Nitro. Look back at Page’s promo. He isn’t bringing Warrior in to help him win the title or to help WCW win WarGames. Page brought Warrior in to help him get Hogan. Hogan has lost to Sting and Goldberg in the last eight months and it rolls off of him. Nothing ever changes with him and he just keeps rolling along. How is that interesting TV? Good show, but not for the main stories as usual.

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Spring Stampede 1998
Date: April 19, 1998
Location: Denver Coliseum, Denver, Colorado
Attendance: 7,428
Commentators: Bobby Heenan, Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay

Allegedly we have a double main event tonight but in reality only one of the matches has received any focus at all. The two matches are Sting vs. Savage for the world title and Giant/Piper vs. Hogan/Nash in a bat match. Take a guess as to which is getting all the attention. Hogan and Nash’s problems have gotten nearly all the focus for the last few months and I’m sure they’ll dominate the show tonight. Let’s get to it.

The opening video is about the power struggle in the NWO. Sting is there too but why waste time on the guy you spent all of 1997 building up as the great hope for WCW?

Something I miss about PPVs from this era: the sets were always unique. Here there’s a western theme with covered wagons and bails of hay. Today you just have the set except for the occasional show outside of Wrestlemania. It’s a nice change of scenery.

Savage has had the cast removed from his arm and the main event is now No DQ just because.

Perry Saturn vs. Goldberg

Goldberg is 73-0 and has a US Title shot tomorrow night on Nitro. He and Saturn have been staring each other down for weeks now and this is Goldberg’s toughest match to date. Goldberg is billed from Dawsonville, Georgia which I never remember hearing before or after this show. Saturn goes right after him with chops but Goldberg counters a leg lock into a pumphandle suplex. Something resembling a belly to belly puts Saturn down but Goldberg has to toss Kidman off the apron and onto Perry before following up.

Back in and Saturn trips Goldberg down and hits a springboard legdrop to keep him down. A middle rope splash gets one and Saturn takes him into the corner for some kicks to the chest. Goldberg easily blocks a vertical suplex into a swinging neckbreaker, followed by a gorilla press into a World’s Strongest Slam for no cover. Kidman distracts Goldberg again though and Saturn hits a release fisherman’s suplex to take over.

Out to the floor and Goldie is sent into the steps as Tenay talks about how Goldberg has never gone this long before. A hurricanrana puts Goldberg down on the floor again but Saturn slips off on what looked to be an Asai Moonsault. Thankfully he landed on Goldberg or that could have been much worse. Back in and a top rope spinwheel kick takes Goldberg down and Saturn hooks a Fujiwara Armbar. Now it’s a cross armbreaker but Goldberg lifts him up into a kind of powerbomb to escape.

A side slam puts Saturn down and there’s the Bret killer superkick for no cover. There’s the spear but a Kidman distraction lets Saturn hit him low to escape the Jackhammer. Saturn takes him to the middle rope but Goldberg press slams him from said ropes. Cool looking move. Cue the Flock but Goldberg fights them off (including a middle rope dropkick to knock Reese off the apron) and spears Kidman. Saturn takes him down into the Rings of Saturn but can’t get them on full. Goldberg powers his way out into a fireman’s carry before powering Saturn up into the Jackhammer to make it 74-0.

Rating: C+. This was better than I was expecting though Goldberg didn’t look great throughout the match. To be fair though this was by far his longest match to date despite it only running about eight minutes. They did a good job of testing Goldberg here and the crowd was into him as always. His career was about to take off and this was a good step for him, though they made the winner of Page vs. Raven pretty clear here.

Ultimo Dragon vs. Chavo Guerrero Jr.

If Guerrero wins, he’s free of Eddie’s control but if he loses Eddie is going to be twice as hard on him. Dragon has the awesome looking red, white and green attire with a Mexican flag cape to match. The fans are all over Eddie to start as Chavo takes Dragon to the mat and ties up his legs. Dragon reaches around to grab a headlock before things speed up with Dragon taking over via a legsweep. There’s the headstand in the corner followed by Dragon’s kicks to put Chavo down again.

Eddie is hiding his head under a towel like he did on Thunder as Dragon puts on a chinlock. That goes nowhere so Dragon changes it up to a standing reverse figure four, only to have Chavo reverse into a bridging Indian Death Lock with a chinlock. As usual that hold can’t stay on long though so Chavo takes him down with a headscissors and stomps away in the corner. We hit the chinlock on Dragon as the starting and stopping continues.

Dragon fights out of a headscissors on the mat and hooks a camel clutch chinlock of all things. That goes nowhere either so it’s a seated surfboard (as in Dragon is sitting down and pulling on Chavo’s face) to make Eddie apologize to Mama Guerrero. La Majistral gets two for Dragon but he gets clotheslined down for two by Guerrero. They trade rollups for two each but Chavo gets crotched on top to slow him down again.

Guerrero fights out of the super hurricanrana but Dragon suplexes him from the apron to the floor. The Asai Moonsault puts both guys down so Eddie can yell in Chavo’s face. Chavo gets back in first and tries a dive but jumps over Dragon, barely grazing him on the way down.

Back in and they clothesline each other but it’s Dragon up first with an enziguri. Dragon goes up but gets dropkicked low on the way down. Eddie shouts to get him but Chavo doesn’t want it that way. Chavo eventually tries a suplex but gets small packaged for two. A brainbuster puts Dragon down but the tornado DDT is countered into the Dragon Sleeper for the submission.

Rating: C+. More good storytelling with the Guerreros as Chavo has gone from a pretty basic cruiserweight to a guy having morality issues and wanting to get Eddie off his back. Eddie hasn’t been in the ring much lately but he’s in his element yelling at Chavo and bringing up the Guerrero Family in some hilarious moments. Good stuff here.

Diamond Dallas Page is on WCW.com, talking about going from pinning Savage a year ago to the US Title match here tonight.

TV Title: Chris Benoit vs. Booker T

Booker is defending and there’s no time limit after two straight draws between these guys. They lock up into the corner to start and it’s a clean break by the two good guys. A shoulder sends Benoit to the mat and then out to the floor, holding his head. Benoit seems to be ok though and goes after Booker’s legs back in the ring. Booker superkicks him back to the floor as the stalling continues. That might have something to do with the show being in Denver, meaning the air is very thin and it can be difficult to breathe.

Back in and Booker takes his head off with a clothesline for two before we hit the armbar. Benoit gets bored of the rest hold though and takes Booker into the corner for a mudhole stomping. Booker comes right back with a backbreaker for two and it’s back to the armbar. Chris fights up again and drapes him over the ropes before knocking him out to the floor. Back in and a hard chop takes Booker down and a snap suplex gets two. Off to the chinlock by the challenger as the wind clearly isn’t there for either guy.

Back up again and Booker misses a dropkick and Benoit suplexes him down again. The Swan Dive gets two but Booker comes back with a suplex of his own to put both guys down again. A snap suplex from Chris gets two and a belly to back gets the same. We’re past the regular TV Title time limit and Benoit starts rolling Germans. Benoit takes him up top instead of covering and drops Booker with a belly to back superplex to put both guys down again.

A very delayed cover gets two for Chris but he walks into a spinebuster to put both guys down again. Booker hits a flapjack and spins up, drawing a mixed reaction. The ax kick accidentally takes out the referee and Benoit grabs the Crossface, drawing an unseen tap. Benoit goes to hep the referee but gets caught by the side kick for the pin to retain Booker’s title.

Rating: C+. Good match here but the altitude was clearly taking its toll on both guys. At the end of the day though, Benoit not getting a title is getting annoying. He had the feud of the year with Raven, took the TV Champion to two straight draws and still can’t get a title reign. The match was good, but did you expect anything else from these two?

The referee is helped from the ring.

Curt Hennig vs. British Bulldog

This is one of those feuds that no one cares about but just won’t go away. Rude and Neidhart will be handcuffed together to make sure we get to see this enthralling match. Bulldog pounds away to start and stomps Curt down in the corner before going after the hamstring. They head outside with Neidhart pulling Rude away from interfering. Apparently Hennig has a bad knee coming in so the leg work makes sense. Bulldog kicks at the leg very slowly as Rude is pulled back again.

The slow motion continues as Bulldog is hitting the leg about twice a minute before going for the Sharpshooter. A cop, who is clearly Vincent, goes after Neidhart and gets choked down, allowing Rude to get a key and unlock himself. Neidhart is cuffed to the post as Hennig escapes the hold and sends Bulldog into the post for the pin, meaning the stuff outside accomplished absolutely nothing.

Rating: F. The fact that this is on PPV makes it a failure alone. The match was horrible too with the knee work taking forever and boring the fans to death. At the end of the day though, no one cares about these guys or this stupid feud because it’s somehow about Bret Hart despite him barely being involved with it anymore. Without Bret, there’s no reason for anyone to care about the matches at all, making this feud very boring.

Bulldog and Neidhart get beaten down as the bell rings a lot, making this segment even more annoying.

Cruiserweight Title: Chris Jericho vs. Prince Iaukea

Jericho has beaten almost everyone of note so Iaukea is one of the few guys they have left to challenge him. Jericho is wearing a headband which I don’t think has any reason for existing but is awesome anyway. He dedicates this match to the fallen hero of WCW: Dean Malenko. Jericho takes Iaukea to the ropes but gets caught in a wristlock.

Off to a headlock on Jericho but he flips out, only to be caught in the headlock again. Back up and Jericho shoulder blocks him down but walks into a dropkick. Really basic stuff so far and Iaukea hooks another headlock. Jericho tries to skin the cat but gets dropkicked to the floor, followed by a flip dive off the apron from the Prince. Back in and we hit the headlock again because Iaukea is running out of offense.

Jericho drop toeholds him into the ropes and suplexes Iaukea down for two. Time for a chinlock because this match was starting to get slightly entertaining. Jericho slams him down and does his big strut. He takes WAY too long on the top rope and jumps into the feet, giving Prince control again. A Samoan drop and a springboard flip attack gets two but Jericho counters a victory roll into the Liontamer, only to have Iaukea next to the ropes.

Iaukea counters a middle rope sunset flip for two before both guys go to the top and fall down to the floor in a somewhat scary scene. Back in and the Liontamer is countered again but Jericho grabs the rope to escape the northern lights suplex. Back up and Iaukea’s middle rope sunset flip is countered into the Liontamer to finally end this.

Rating: D+. The buildup to this match was boring, Iaukea was incredibly boring and the match itself was very boring. As I’ve said before, at the end of the day there’s nothing interesting about Iaukea at all and any number of guys could have done the same thing he did. Nothing to see here other than a lot of headlocks and sunset flips.

Jericho steals Iaukea’s skirt thing for his trophy case.

Raven quotes Shakespeare to WCW.com.

Scott Steiner/Buff Bagwell vs. Lex Luger/Rick Steiner

Buff has his wrist in a cast but it doesn’t look too professional. JJ comes out and says he thinks it’s fake so here’s a doctor to check the injury. The wrist is fine so let’s fight. Seriously, this was created, executed and ended in less than five minutes. Rick goes right for his brother but gets jumped by Buff. Bagwell gets caught by a powerslam and a Steiner Line but Scott gets in a cheap shot to put Rick down.

Scott comes in while Rick is down and chokes a bit before bringing Buff back in. Buff slams him down and grabs the “injured” hand before getting two. Back to Scott who gets two but runs back to Buff at the kickout. Buff hooks the chinlock but lets it go to argue with the referee.

Back to Scott for a chinlock of his own, though he at least adds in a knee to the back to spice things up a little. Rick charges into Buff’s boots in the corner but catches him in a backdrop to put both guys down. The hot tag brings in Luger but Scott breaks up a quick Rack attempt. Rick nails Buff and it’s time for the showdown but Scott runs. The Rack ends Buff a few seconds later.

Rating: D-. There was no reason whatsoever for this to be on the PPV. It was a glorified Nitro match as the Steiners had about a minute of contact but the real showdown still didn’t happen. That’s wrestling booking in general: keep coming back for the next show to see the stuff you’re interested in. The trick though is you have to give us those moments eventually which rarely happened in WCW.

Call the hotline to find out who is in the back!

La Parka vs. Psychosis

This is a bonus match. La Parka dances a lot before chopping Psychosis down. Psychosis comes back with chops of his own before sending La Parka into the buckle. La Parka stands him on the top turnbuckle but Psychosis jumps backwards into a headscissors takeover to send skeleton man to the floor. A suicide dive takes La Parka down but he gets back inside first anyway. Back in and a clothesline gets two on Psychosis before he’s sent to the floor for a springboard split legged moonsault. Heenan: “Another move I never thought of trying.”

Psychosis might have a bad shoulder but he launches La Parka face first into the buckle. Not that it matters as La Parka kicks him in the head to put Psychosis on the floor again. Back in and Psychosis tries a springboard hurricanrana but can’t get up to the top for a few moments. I guess the fans booing is better than their dead silence. Psychosis misses a top rope splash and gets caught in an Alabama Slam for two. La Parka poses on the ropes but gets dropkicked down, tying his legs up in the ropes. The guillotine legdrop from Psychosis finally ends this torture.

Rating: D. It’s not easy to complain about free wrestling but man alive this was dull stuff. There was no story to the match other than a forgotten chair shot from a few weeks back. The match being very sloppy didn’t help things either and the fans clearly weren’t pleased. Was Juvy not available for this? He was always good at firing up a crowd which would have helped things out a lot here.

The announcers talk for awhile to fill in even more time. Heenan goes into some analogy comparing Savage to a wounded dog with a long series of examples. Now they talk about the tension in the NWO and how it might be a big swerve.

The Giant/Roddy Piper vs. Hollywood Hogan/Kevin Nash

This is a bat on a pole match. The idea here is Hogan and Nash can’t get along at all and they’ll likely turn on each other. Piper immediately goes for the bat but Hogan makes a save by ramming him into the pole. Roddy gets caught in the Tree of Woe for some stomping before it’s off to Nash to pull him out of the corner. Back to Hogan (literally all Nash did was drag him to the other corner) for more old man offense but Piper won’t sell any of it.

Roddy comes back with right hands and pulls off Hogan’s bandana. Piper pulls out what’s left of Hogan’s hair, earning himself a poke in the eye. Hogan takes him down again and goes up but Piper makes the easy tag to Giant. The biggest man pulls Hogan down and spanks him, sending Hogan to the floor in pain. Back in and Piper chokes Hollywood with the weightlifting belt but a low blow allows for the tag off to Nash. It’s time for the battle of the giants and Giant easily sends him into the corner. Nash gets a boot up to stop the charging Giant and fires off his usual stuff in the corner.

Kev walks away to pose but Giant snaps to his feet, setting up a double big boot to put both giants down. The double tag brings in Piper to face Hogan with Roddy pounding away to take over. Nash comes in and gets a low blow as everything breaks down. Giant dropkicks Nash to the floor as Piper puts Hogan in the sleeper. Piper goes up and gets the bat but Hogan knocks it out of his hands and throws it away.

Cue Disciple with another bat so Hogan can blast Giant in the back of the head. Piper avoids a shot to his bad hip and Hogan hits Nash by mistakes. Now Piper gets the bat and knocks Hogan to the floor before knocking Nash down. Disciple grabs Piper’s bat and throws Hogan the original bat so he can blast Piper for the pin.

Rating: D. To the shock of no one paying attention, this match sucked. It was basically the same thing they’ve been doing for weeks now with Nash and Hogan accidentally hitting each other but the NWO standing tall again. The biggest problem though is the quality of the match. Usually good drama can hide the fact that a match sucks, but if it’s bad drama, people notice how bad the match is. That’s what happened here and that’s really bad when this was the main event for all intents and purposes.

Hogan tells Nash to powerbomb Giant but whacks Nash in the back with the bat, basically throwing him out of the NWO. Giant breaks the bat over his knee and swears vengeance on Hogan.

Slamboree ad, which they try to make sound more epic than Starrcade. Side note: why did WCW have so many PPVs that began with the letter S? Souled Out, SuperBrawl, Spring Stampede, Slamboree, Starrcade.

US Title: Diamond Dallas Page vs. Raven

Page is defending, Raven has the belt itself, this is under Raven’s Rules and the winner gets Goldberg tomorrow. Sick Boy tries to interfere at the beginning but gets a belt to the face for his efforts. Page shoves Raven into the corner and pounds away to start before hitting a belly to back suplex. A big dive to the floor takes out Raven and Sick Boy but Raven knocks Page off the apron, reinjuring the ribs. Back in and Page counters the Even Flow into a swinging neckbreaker for two.

Raven bails to the floor to avoid a Diamond Cutter and the fight heads up to the set. Page throws Raven off a stagecoach into some bails of hay before diving off said coach to take Raven down. Raven is thrown into a corral and beaten down by a trashcan. Now Raven goes through another wooden fence and suplexed onto the website table. Page is kicked into a wall and Raven blasts him in the head with a piece of metal.

They head to some VIP area with Raven diving onto Page to send him through a table. Raven pulls a bullrope off a horse and chokes Page down before grabbing a trashcan. The can freaks Tony out, despite it being used about two minutes ago. Raven wraps the rope around Page’s neck and drags him back to the ring where Sick Boy has a kitchen sink. The sink is only good for two for Raven and it’s back to the rope choking. Page fights up and drop toeholds Raven onto the sink as Tony and Heenan make plumbing jokes.

Kidman tries to interfere but splashes Raven by mistake, giving Page two. Sick Boy blasts Page with a crutch to give Raven two so Raven calls in the rest of the Flock. Hammer accidentally clotheslines Raven down so Page knocks him out with a sink. A low blow puts Page down and here’s Reese for a chokebomb, giving Raven another two count. Lodi throws in the stop sign but Page knocks it into Raven’s face and takes out a few Flock members. Kidman gets a Diamond Cutter but Horace Hogan debuts by hitting Page with the stop sign, allowing Raven to DDT Page on the sink for the pin and the title.

Rating: C. I’m not a fan of this garbage brawling style but this could have been worse. It’s good that Raven finally won the title that he’s been chasing for months and it makes sense as the numbers and style finally caught up to Page. I wasn’t liking the way most of the brawling was treated as comedy spots when the feud has been serious though. It was a reversal of what had made the feud good up to this point and hurt the match a good deal. Still though, not bad and a decent way to wrap the feud up.

The announcers basically guarantee that Goldberg is winning the title tomorrow night.

WCW World Title: Sting vs. Randy Savage

Alleged main event time. This is also No DQ because having three straight hardcore/weapon based matches isn’t copying WWF and ECW at all. Sting, the lamest of all lame duck champions, is defending here. Savage jumps Sting during the entrances and sends him into the barricade as the bell rings. Back in and Savage chokes a lot but hurts his bad hand throwing a punch. Sting comes back with a shot to the ribs and we head back outside again.

Savage walks up the aisle until Sting throws him through another wooden fence. Sting sends him into the hay and through another fence before hitting him with another bale of hay. Tony: “That can be very abrasive to the skin.” Mr. Schiavone, don’t ever change. Back to ringside for the missed Stinger Splash into the barricade and a posting by Savage. They get in the ring for a change and Sting backdrops out of a piledriver, only to have Savage punch him back down.

They head back to the floor because neither guy is interested in having a match at the moment. Savage is suplexed on the floor and sent into the barricade. Sting heads back inside but Randy hits him low and drapes him over the top rope for two. Savage clotheslines Sting into the referee before piledriving the champion down.

Sting no sells it by popping back up but has to no sell a Liz chair shot instead of going after Savage. Liz gets hit by the Stinger Splash so Savage lays him out with a chair. Cue Hogan of course to break up the elbow and Sting hits a quick Death Drop but there’s no referee. Nash comes in and powerbombs Sting down, giving Savage the pin and the title. There’s a problem though: Savage is holding his knee, which would wind up being a torn ACL.

Rating: D. This was an angle with a few wrestling moves thrown in to pad things out. At least it ends the joke that was Sting’s title reign so we can get the focus back on that earth shattering Hogan vs. Nash feud. That’s the focus of this match: the power struggle in the NWO. Sting looks like nothing as 1997 is pretty much left in the dust lie it never happened. Nice work on that WCW.

The last shot of the show is Hogan yelling that Savage has his belt and that Nash will pay.

Overall Rating: D+. This was almost exactly what was expected: a dull show that kept us in the same loop we’ve been in for months with the focus entirely on the NWO once again. None of the matches here were worth seeing other than maybe Goldberg vs. Saturn to see Goldberg’s first match with some length to it. Other than that we had a bunch of feuds that no one cared about and more worthless angle advancement. Where was Bret, who said that anytime Sting needed him he’d be there? Apparently dealing with Savage, Hogan and Nash doesn’t warrant Bret’s help? Bad show here as WCW is getting into big trouble in a hurry.

Here’s the original review if you’re interested:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2012/05/24/spring-stampede-1998-with-bales-of-hay-and-covered-wagons/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews, and pick up my new book of Complete 2001 Monday Night Raw Reviews at Amazon for just $4 at:

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Thunder
Date: April 16, 1998
Location: Fargodome, Fargo, North Dakota
Commentators: Lee Marshall, Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan

It’s the final show before Spring Stampede and by now the news has broken that Nitro lost in the ratings on Monday for the first time in nearly two years. It should be interesting to see if things change up at all tonight to try to right the ship. Other than that tonight is going to be the final push for the PPV, meaning more NWO whether anyone likes it or not. Let’s get to it.

We open with a recap of the main event from Nitro with Bret Hart cleaning house to save Sting.

NWO video on Buff Bagwell, showing him looking in a mirror.

Buff Bagwell vs. Rick Steiner

Rick throws his collar around to get Vincent off the apron before scaring Buff to the floor as well. Buff armdrags him down and poses so Rick punches him in the face. An atomic drop and a clothesline put Buff on the floor as Lee wonders who brought Scott Steiner to the NWO. Didn’t we cover that like months ago? Back in and Buff pounds away at Rick’s head, which actually has an effect. Buff’s middle rope ax handle is caught in mid air and Rick throws him around a few times. Rick loads up the bulldog but here’s Scott Steiner to shove him off the top for the DQ.

Rating: D+. Nothing to see here with the whole match existing tos et up something else at Spring Stampede. They’ve been pushing this battle of the Steiners for months now but there’s no sign of the actual showdown coming. Then again why bother pursuing a match that could be a big deal and bring in some money when you can keep pushing Buff Bagwell?

Hogan is amused at Savage’s injuries and is ready to take the title back from Sting soon.

Here’s Nash with something to say. He’s tired of hearing Hogan talking about how amazing he is because Hogan is afraid. Nash should be champion right now and would be if not for Hogan and then Hart interfering in his title shots. Bret made a huge mistake by messing with Nash on Monday and Hart will be dealt with. Back to Hogan: if he doesn’t do what he’s supposed to do on Sunday, Nash will drive a stake through his heart. He’s ready for Giant and Piper and tonight he’s ready for Sting and Bret with Savage as his partner. Just hyping up the big tag matches here.

We get the same video on Goldberg from Nitro.

Goldberg vs. Barry Darsow

Goldberg vs. Saturn is official for Sunday. Barry tries to match power with Goldberg and is easily run over and thrown into the corner. Heenan: “This could be a very hair raising experience for Barry Darsow.” Darsow is bald if that clears anything up. Barry sends him over the top and out to the floor but Goldberg comes right back in with the spear. The Jackhammer makes it 73 in a row.

We get the same video on Page vs. Raven from Nitro.

Here’s JJ Dillon to say that the winner of Page vs. Raven has to defend the US Title against Goldberg on Monday night. I’m jumping the gun a bit here but that means that both of Goldberg’s title shots this year have been announced four days in advance. You would think he’d get more hype than that.

TV Title: Booker T vs. Rick Fuller

Booker fires off kicks and forearms to start, only to run into a powerslam from the much bigger Fuller. Fuller slams him down again but misses a charge into the corner and walks into a spinebuster. The ax kick and side kick set up the missile dropkick to retain Booker’s title. Squash for the most part.

Recap of Hogan vs. Nash, despite them not being opponents anytime soon.

Tony announces Scott Steiner/Buff Bagwell vs. Lex Luger/Rick Steiner at the PPV. Scott Steiner comes out to say he and Buff aren’t showing up because his parents don’t want to see him fight his brother.

Chris Benoit vs. Scott Norton

Benoit pulls Vincent to the floor for some chops before going in and being chopped down by Norton. A few elbow drops have Benoit in trouble and a slam puts him down again. Benoit comes back with some chops but Norton just punches him down with no selling at all. A splash in the corner crushes Benoit and a shoulder sends him all the way to the floor.

Benoit avoids a charge into the post but Norton is back inside first and still in control with a powerslam. Chris escapes a shoulder breaker and takes Norton down with two German suplexes. Norton charges into the post and gets caught in the Crossface, only to have Vincent come in for the DQ immediately.

Rating: D+. What’s the point in Benoit even being out there if Norton won’t sell a single bit of his offense? Norton went into the post twice, both off his own power, and still wouldn’t stay down. Also for the thousandth time or so, WHY CAN SCOTT NORTON NEVER LOSE A CLEAN FALL??? Benoit is going into a PPV title match but can only get a DQ win over Norton because…..I’m thinking Scott Norton has photos of Eric Bischoff smoking crack while wearing women’s lingerie and shoving an old lady down a flight of stairs.

Post match Booker comes in for the save but gets shoved down for his efforts.

Here’s Giant with Piper on his shoulders and something to say. Giant steps over the top rope with Piper still on his shoulders. That’s rather impressive. Piper rambles on and on as he is known to do. His odd line of this promo: “What’s the opposite of Big Sexy? Pee Wee Herman?” Piper gets off Giant’s shoulders and pretends he’s a tiger that has to be tamed. He spends the next minute and a half or so saying he and Giant will win. Piper: “We’ll bring the bat, you bring the balls.” Again, someone keep Piper away from live mics. Please?

Curt Hennig vs. Super Calo

Rude is on commentary as usual. Curt easily takes Calo down and hits a quick Hennig Necksnap for no cover. Calo avoids a charge in the corner and gets one off a quick missile dropkick. Curt will have none of that and stomps Calo down before ending him with the Hennigplex. Squash.

Cruiserweight Title: Chavo Guerrero Jr. vs. Chris Jericho

During the entrances, Tony rants about how WCW delivers the matches they promise, in reference to Austin vs. McMahon not happening. I would say I remember Ric Flair talking about that last week, but he never showed up as advertised. Chavo pounds away to start, only to get kicked in the ribs and suplexed down for two. Jericho charges into a boot in the corner and gets clotheslined down for two as well as Chavo stays in it. An atomic drop sets up a rollup for two more on Jericho but he trips Guerrero up and hooks an early Liontamer. Chavo crawls over to the ropes but Eddie slaps his hand away twice, forcing Chavo to tap out.

After the quick match, Iaukea comes out with the scale from last week to knock Jericho off of Chavo. They fight to the back, leaving Eddie and Chavo alone in the ring. Uncle Eddie calms Chavo down and says that if Chavo beats Jericho on Sunday, he’s free. Chavo is facing Ultimo Dragon on Sunday but at least there’s a story to the match now.

Here are Hogan, Bischoff and Disciple with something to say. After Eric sucks up to Hogan for awhile, he talks about realizing what he had when Hogan came to WCW in 1994. Hogan runs down Savage and Nash and understands why they’re both jealous of him. He brags about the 3 Ninjas movie and being on the Tonight Show before saying he should get the next world title shot because he’s just that awesome. Nothing much to see here and he didn’t even mention his opponents for Sunday.

Here’s JJ with something to say. First of all, Goldberg will receive his first major title shot this Monday on Nitro. This confirms one of two things: either the TV Title, which Goldberg had a shot at last year, isn’t a major title or WCW doesn’t remember matches that happened five months ago. Also, due to Savage’s injuries, there might have to be a replacement in the world title match. The options would be either DDP, Nash or Hogan. JJ says Savage can wrestle on Sunday if he has a doctor’s clearance, but tonight he just can’t be wearing a cast.

This brings out Savage to say that JJ should be outside watching for red and yellow Vipers that are running over people. JJ says there’s no concrete evidence as to who attacked Savage so he needs a doctor’s clearance and no cast on Savage’s arm. Savage says he’s getting the title shot on Sunday no matter what.

Giant vs. Bryan Adams

Nothing match as Giant shrugs off Adams’ offense (including Adams going up top and just falling off) and kicks him in the face, only to have Vincent run in to break up the chokeslam and draw the DQ.

Post match the B team comes in but gets destroyed as well.

Video on Raven.

Silver King vs. Perry Saturn

Saturn side steps a fast dropkick and hits a running elbow in the corner, only to get caught in a tornado DDT. Saturn avoids a charge in the corner and superplexes King down before the Rings of Saturn gets the submission.

Video on Diamond Dallas Page.

Page says to say he’s ready for Raven but thinking about fighting Goldberg gets him even more jacked up. Goldberg and his buddy Jack Hammer has been running through WCW and Page wants to know if Goldberg can be banged. He’s getting his belt back on Sunday, but the fans are oddly silent during this entire speech.

Sting/Bret Hart vs. Randy Savage/Kevin Nash

Tony goes off about how they’ll deliver what they promised no matter what. Savage has the cast on, despite JJ saying he couldn’t wear one tonight. Bret and Savage get things going but Nash comes in before any contact is made. Nash and Bret pound each other into the corner with Nash hammering Bret in the back to take over. There’s the foot choke in the corner but Nash charges into a boot in the opposite corner.

Bret clotheslines Nash down and fires off right hands before bringing in the world champion. Savage gets the tag and is put in the Scorpion about ten seconds later. Nash pulls Randy out to the floor for a long stall before it’s Bret vs. Nash again. Bret escapes Snake Eyes by shoving Kevin into the corner, only to be punched in the face for his efforts. There’s the side slam but Hart avoids the elbow, only to have Savage break up the Sharpshooter.

Nash puts on a sleeper of all things but Bret suplexes his way to freedom. A double tag brings in Savage and Sting but Nash breaks up the Stinger Splash as everything breaks down. Nash and Bret fight to the floor and the Stinger Splash hits Savage’s cast. Savage goes up for the elbow and waits forever until Hogan and Disciple run in for the DQ because why would a world title match need story development?

Rating: D. This was the usual lazy main event match from all parties involved. Savage being injured excuses his lack of effort but the other three guys just looked bored out there. To be fair though Bret has nothing to do, Sting is the lamest of all lame duck champions and Nash is Nash so why bother trying at all?

Post match Hogan goes after Savage’s bad arm but Nash makes the save to end the show.

Overall Rating: D+. This is a strange one to grade as the show did a good job of building up to Spring Stampede, but Spring Stampede is one of the least interesting shows in a long time. Why they don’t just do Nash vs. Hogan is beyond me, but I’d guess neither guy was willing to do a job for whatever reason they always gave. The show had its moments but the NWO drags it down as usual.

Here’s Spring Stampede if you’re interested:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2013/09/07/spring-stampede-1998-2013-redo-here-lies-1997-we-hardly-knew-ye/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews, and pick up my new book of Complete 2001 Monday Night Raw Reviews at Amazon for just $4 at:

And check out my Amazon author page with wrestling books for just $4 at:

Clash of the Champions 35
Date: August 21, 1997
Location: Nashville Municipal Auditorium, Nashville, Tennessee
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan, Dusty Rhodes

Clash of the Champions more or less was WCW’s Saturday Night’s Main Event. They started it up to go head to head with Wrestlemania 4 and actually put a solid dent in it. The show went on for 9 years but by the end no one cared at all. The show was just worthless as there was already two hours of television a week so in essence we were just getting an extra Nitro two weeks a year, which is why this is the final one.

As for current storylines, this is at the height of the NWO’s power but Sting is looming. I think you know the story there. The main event is Luger and DDP vs. Savage and Hall. See what I mean about how this just isn’t that interesting of a show? Let’s get to it.

The opening video just runs down the card. Other than the stupid tag team main event this sounds pretty decent.

We get a clip of Dillon saying that Sting has until Thursday to make his demands as Sting had ripped up two contracts with match offers in them. Sting came through the crowd and got in the ring and the fans chanted Hogan. Sting pointed to the fans who were chanting it. This angle was freaking sweet too. And then Hogan and his ego just had to kill it dead.

US Title: Jeff Jarrett vs. Steve McMichael

Jarrett used to be a Horsemen and stole McMichael’s wife Debra so Mongo wants to get the title to get some revenge or something. This was the epitome of a feud that no one wanted to see but would never die. Mongo is a Horsemen here meaning we get to hear the sweetest theme music of all time. Jarrett was neither interesting nor good at this time whereas Mongo never was either of those things so we’ll give it to…dang who do we give this one to?

Actually let’s just hope this ends fast. We take a break and come back with Jarrett throwing Mongo into the steps (His name was Steve Mongo McMichael in case you were wondering). Debra chokes him and I still couldn’t care less. The WCW midcard just completely sucked and while we were having Owen vs. Austin followed by Rock vs. Austin in WWF at this point for the IC belt, this just doesn’t hold up. Jarrett puts on a sleeper as a great visual representation for this match.

Mongo gets his own and Debra gets up on the apron. For no apparent reason Eddie Guerrero runs out with a belt and goes up top but hits Jarrett by mistake. Mongo covers for the title with ease. Debra tries to get him back and fails at it.

Rating: D+. At least it was short. These two feuded forever and no one cared ever. It just wasn’t interesting at all but they thought they could just slap the Horsemen name on it and get a good reaction from it through the south. There wasn’t much here though so the time was good if nothing else. Mongo held it for less than a month before Hennig turned heel and took it.

Alex Wright comes out and speaks in English and Gene warns him to speak in English which was very stupid. It’s as simple of a promo as you could ask for. He has Ultimo Dragon tonight.

Gene is with the guys from a show called Dinner and a Movie. In essence they showed a movie and made food with a play on words of the movie title. It was an ok idea but why are these guys on a wrestling show? There’s your problem with WCW right there: too much corporate interference.

Stevie Richards vs. Raven

Raven “didn’t have a contract” at this point and insisted on wrestling only in No DQ matches. This is a grudge match or something as Richards was tired of Raven pushing him around. Richards had allegedly had a career ending neck injury but miraculously healed and showed up in WCW a few weeks later. They point out Raven’s ankle issue as he has a thing on his shoe to balance out the fact that his right leg is shorter than his left.

The Raven drop toehold hits to the chair as this is just a squash match so far. He throws in a bulldog onto the chair for good measure. Richards comes back with some decent stuff but at the end of the day he remembers he’s Steven Richards and the other guy is Raven and the best DDT other than Jake Roberts (who trained Raven) ends it.

Rating: C+. It was a squash and a quick one at that so we’ll just call it a bit above average for the DDT, which is the coolest move in history. Richards would be gone in like two weeks or so.

We get a cool video about Ultimo Dragon, explaining a bit of his history and his name. WCW hit the ball so far out of the park with this division that it’s insane. The name was called Ultimate Dragon but that was incorrect, as it was supposed to be Ultimo Dragon: Final Dragon, as in the final student of Bruce Lee, who he emulated in the ring. That’s the kind of thing that you just never get in WWE and it’s why the cruiserweights worked so well.

That and they never took them seriously. The shot of the J-Crown (8 titles from around the world which were defended on WCW television and included a WWF light heavyweight title that was active for 20 years but only in Japan, meaning that a WWF Title was defended on WCW television multiple times in 1996 and 1997) titles being piled up is just awesome.

TV Title: Ultimo Dragon vs. Alex Wright

When Dragon won the title a few weeks prior, it was the match where no one talked about the match whatsoever other than the final three count as the whole match was nothing but talking about the NWO. At the end they more or less said hey we have a new champion! Now back to what we were talking about. It was just ridiculous how that was all they talked about.

Wright was a guy that they tried so hard to push but it just never played out like they wanted it to. He was this young hotshot that was somewhat over as a face so of course they turned him heel and no one cared after that. Dragon really was underrated in the ring. In WWE they just threw him into the cruiserweight division and let him die off because that division sucked so hard it was pathetic. These two feuded for the better part of a year and I don’t think anyone ever cared.

There was no focus at all on the title or anything as it was always about the NWO. Dragon gets the Asai moonsault that he invented and does better than anyone else. The commentary is all about them as well which is NICE. We hit a very nice ending sequence as they fight over pins but Wright hits a SWEET German suplex for the pin and the title.

Rating: B-. This was a good match but pretty boring at times. The problem was that while these two had good matches, it’s Ultimo Dragon vs. Alex Wright. There’s just no heat at all and it’s not a great matchup while being a good match if that makes sense.

Cruiserweight Title: Eddie Guerrero vs. Chris Jericho

Eddie is challenging here and is freshly full heel. Eddie’s cowardly heel stuff of running on his knees always made me chuckle. How much commentary do you really need on a Guerrero vs. Jericho cruiserweight match? The Canadian goes for that running springboard dropkick to the guy on the apron that he uses a lot but slips and botches it badly.

I guess once a year is understandable. In a quick ending, they hit another fast series of pinfalls but Jericho actually keeps Eddie down and gets the pin. Eddie jumps him after the match.

Rating: C-. WAY too short here but we just had to have Mongo and Jarrett earlier instead of on Nitro right? The ending sequence was fun as always and these two just flowed together pretty well. They needed more time though and that’s why the grade is low.

Silver King/Villano 4/Villano 5/Psicosis vs. Super Calo/Juventud Guerrera/Hector Garza/Lismark Jr.

More or less the idea here is go out there and do a bunch of flips like you do every night without ever getting pushed more than a tiny bit against each other. This is Lucha rules, meaning if someone goes to the floor then they don’t have to make a tag for someone else to come in. I used to hate Mike Tenay but he’s worth his weight in gold here.

There’s no real point to saying who is in as they move in and out so fast that it’s hard to keep up with them. We hit the big pile on with everyone hitting their big over the top rope until Psicosis hits the guillotine legdrop off the top onto Super Calo for the pin.

Rating: B-. It was just over the top and ridiculous which is what these guys did best. This was very fun and it worked well as it always did. These guys were well paid to go out there and just get the crowd going and that’s what they always did.

The cooking guys join the NWO. Tonight is their one year anniversary but Hogan isn’t here tonight because he’s in Canada doing a Hollywood movie. That’s WCW for you. We go to a commercial and come back to DDP Diamond Cutting one of the movie guys.

Konnan/Syxx vs. Ric Flair/Curt Hennig

Hennig was kind of an associate Horseman at the time but soon he would join the NWO and injure Flair. If there was ever a guy tailor made to be in the Horsemen, it’s Hennig. Syxx (X-Pac) more or less beats up Flair but we’ll ignore the pop he’s getting for doing it. That doesn’t exist. Flair gets his knee knocked out as Hennig hits the Fisherman’s Suplex on Konnan to get the win. This was a five minute train wreck.

Rating: C-. This was just insane and it felt like it was about two minutes long instead of the five that it actually was. Hennig denies being a Horsemen but also denies not being a Horsemen while only saying one thing. He actually does this which is impressive.

He would go heel soon enough in another dumb move because he was perfect for the Horsemen. He had the look, he could talk, he was over, he had the attitude and he was great in the ring. Naturally he was thrown into the NWO and forgotten about.

WCW Tag Titles: Lex Luger/DDP vs. Randy Savage/Scott Hall

About ten guys come out for the NWO and they have their party for it being their birthday. Apparently Nash is letting Savage defend his half of the tag titles for no apparent reason. Yeah of course we just throw two guys together that have never teamed together before (according to the ring announcer) and give them a tag title shot.

In WWF they would have won the titles. People keep popping the balloons that the NWO dropped so it sounds like people keep shooting guns or something and it’s really annoying. And for no apparent reason everyone other than Nash leaves. It’s exactly what you would expect from a match where the titles simply weren’t going to change hands.

The faces dominate early on but then the heels take over to set up the hot tag. Luger gets Hall in the rack but takes an accidental Diamond Cutter and gets pinned. What else is there to say here?

Rating: C+. It’s ok and that’s about it. What more do you want here? They had an ok match that no one cared about on a show that not a lot of people actually watched. Are you looking for something huge here?

We come back and Bischoff talks forever and then the lights begin to flicker. They go off and we see Sting in the rafters with a vulture. The famous speech in a child’s voice follows and the lights go out again and the bird is on the top rope. The NWO is terrified and Nash pulls the belt back to swing it at him as we go off the air. Think about how stupid this was for the live audience for a minute.

Overall Rating: C-. You could see that this was about the name of the show and nothing more. Yeah there were four title matches but that happened at almost every Nitro. Yes two titles changed hands but who cares? It’s just not an interesting show as Nitro was lighting the world on fire on Mondays on a weekly basis. Ten years earlier this was an awesome idea but here it just didn’t hold up at all. Not bad, but only watch if you like this time in WCW. Otherwise it’s nothing of note at all.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up my new book of Complete 2001 Monday Night Raw Reviews at Amazon for just $4 at:

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