Smackdown Date: June 13, 2002
Location: Bi-Lo Center, Greenville, South Carolina
Commentators: Michael Cole, Tazz
We’re ten days away from King of the Ring and it’s really not looking like the most interesting thing in the world. Granted you could say that about almost any show around this point but this one is looking even worse. Smackdown no longer has its own owner so things are changing all over again. Let’s get to it.
We open with a long recap of the big angle from Monday.
Opening sequence.
Here’s Vince to get things going, flanked by a bunch of security guards and with a table and chairs set up in the ring. Vince stands on top of the table and goes on a rant about how he put everything on the line and how powerful people only get more powerful. That’s why we’re going to entertain you tonight, starting with a CONTRACT SIGNING!
The boss brings out Undertaker and HHH for the very slow paced staredown. Undertaker signs, HHH throws out a chair and then signs, Vince talks and it’s a ratings bonanza! Security grabs HHH and the beatdown is on until HHH pulls out a well placed sledgehammer. HHH says he isn’t leaving until he gets his hands on Undertaker. A security guard gets beaten down and it’s time for a break. Back with HHH still in the ring as Billy, Chuck and Rico are standing on the ramp with the champs holding chairs. Threats of sucking on a sledgehammer ensue and Billy gets laid out.
With that not getting HHH anywhere, HHH he on the announcers’ table until the hammer actually breaks. Naturally there’s another hammer waiting but that can’t break the table either so HHH just kicks the thing over. Now it’s a monitor being destroyed, followed by a camera. Vince FINALLY comes out and makes HHH/Hogan vs. Undertaker/Angle for later. We’re over a fourth of the way through this show and they’ve only set up the main event. Oh and HHH beat up a Tag Team Champion. The camera gets destroyed too.
Back from a break with….replays!
Earlier today, Nidia made fun of Hurricane so he suggested she use her oral skills to tell Jamie Noble to come find him. A challenge is issued so Nidia licks his face. She’s no Catrina.
King of the Ring Qualifying Match: Test vs. Hurricane
Non-title of course. Test no sells some right hands to start and we can see the announcers’ table still on its side. Is HHH going to come back out here and hit them with his hammer if someone tips it back over? Hurricane avoids a charge in the corner but his crossbody is pulled out of the air. The chokeslam is broken up but a quick Eye of the Hurricane gets two on Test. And never mind as the Test Drive gets rid of Hurricane clean in less than two minutes. That would be two champions taken out in less than forty minutes.
Nidia and Noble come out and take off Hurricane’s mask.
King of the Ring Qualifying Match: Tajiri vs. Hardcore Holly
The table has been turned back over. You can stop panicking. Tazz picks Holly to win the whole tournament while Cole, who isn’t quite as stupid, picks Chris Jericho. Tajiri starts fast with the kicks, including the big spinning version for two. A powerslam gives Holly the same To change things up a bit, Tajiri kicks him in the head again for two more, followed by an Alabama Slam to give Holly the pin.
Rating: D. To be fair this was just to get to the final eight so Holly advancing isn’t the worst thing in the world. They kept it short but this was about three and a half minutes of them trading moves until one of them got pinned. Maybe they don’t quite have enough room on the roster for sixteen people but then we couldn’t have qualifying matches and those are interesting. Not as interesting as a thirty minute contract signing segment but you have to take what you can get.
Val Venis and Jericho trash talk each other.
GET THE F OUT! BARBERSHOP VERSION!
Chris Jericho/Lance Storm vs. Val Venis/Billy Kidman
Val runs Jericho over with a shoulder to start and a neckbreaker gets two. Kidman comes in with a bad looking high crossbody, though it could be due to Kidman’s trunks being about three sizes too small. The former Sudden Impact starts taking over on Kidman with Storm hitting a dropkick before Jericho misses a charge in the corner.
That’s enough for the tag off to Val as everything breaks down. The good guys mess up a spot with Kidman being launched into a dropkick (or maybe a hurricanrana), leaving him a little short and only kicking Storm in the chest with one foot. Val and Jericho go outside so Kidman can hit the shooting star. Jericho pulls the referee though and drops Kidman, only to have Billy roll Storm up for the surprise pin.
Rating: C+. I can always go for moving a cruiserweight up the ladder a little bit and Kidman is more than good enough to make that jump. Now I have no faith in WWE to not screw this up all over again as that’s certainly their custom, but at least he got a win here and it’s a win he could build on rather than one over Jericho where he would get beaten in their singles rematch.
Replays show Storm’s shoulder was up. So much for Kidman looking good.
Hogan doesn’t think much about Angle for attacking him last week after the big match with HHH (that one that didn’t even last seven minutes). See, Hogan and Angle are a lot alike. They’re both American icons, they both love the red, white and blue, they’re both former champions and they’re both bald. The only difference is Hogan lost his hair battle to mother nature. Hogan wants a fight with Angle at some point in the future and can’t wait to face him in the main event tonight.
Storm yells at Brian Hebner for screwing up and thinks it’s typical American behavior, especially from this family. To be fair, they haven’t done anything with Montreal in what, ten minutes at this point?
We look at Jackie Gayda costing Linda Miles her debut match on Velocity.
Linda has found a partner to help her fight Jackie and Ivory: Trish.
Vince is on the phone and says the camera cost $50,000. Angle comes in and accepts Hogan’s challenge for King of the Ring but can’t stand the idea that Hogan thinks he’s bald. Undertaker comes in but Vince tells him tonight is a calculated risk.
D-Von comes out, calls…..shall we say self pleasuring a sin and says he doesn’t do that anymore. Faarooq comes out and says he still does.
Faarooq vs. Reverend D-Von
Spinebuster ends D-Von in seven seconds.
Batista hits D-Von in the head with the collection box by mistake. This whole thing took about three minutes, which is likely due to the opening segment taking up a fourth of the show. That might not be the worst thing in the world.
Trish Stratus/Linda vs. Ivory/Jackie Gayda
Thankfully the veterans start things off with Ivory taking over, allowing Jackie to hit Trish in the face with a knee brace. It’s off to Linda for a slam and dropkick with Ivory making the save. A double flapjack plants Linda again but the Stratusphere sets up Stratusfaction for the pin on Ivory. It’s good that they kept this short for obvious reasons. I’d be rather annoyed if I paid for this show and had to sit through a pair of rookies having a horrible match because of some reality show.
Stacy, looking GREAT tonight, hits on Vince for becoming boss again. Vince kisses her and Stacy looks disgusted. Dawn Marie knocking at the door was ignored.
For the first time we see the brackets for the King of the Ring.
X-Pac
Rob Van Dam
Val Venis
Chris Jericho
Test
Hardcore Holly
Booker T.
Brock Lesnar
Angle and Undertaker attack Hogan.
Hulk Hogan/HHH vs. Undertaker/Kurt Angle
HHH runs out and blasts Angle during the entrances so it’s the HHH vs. Undertaker slugout to start. Angle gets back in and the double teaming has HHH in trouble as we get down to the regular tag structure. The champ is happy with letting Angle do most of the work and get in a cheap shot here and there. A right hand puts Taker down but that’s enough of a distraction to start the rolling German suplexes.
Cole thinks HHH might be thrown off by fighting two men at the same time. This would be your “Gee willikers Cole, you think so?” moment of the night. Undertaker comes in for some slow right hands before it’s back to Angle for a sleeper. A double clothesline drops Taker and HHH, followed by Angle going shoulder first into the post. HHH is able to send Kurt into the steps but grabs the sledgehammer to draw the DQ.
Rating: D. It’s hard to imagine that this took place for any reason other than “Hogan can’t be trusted for more than one match every few weeks”. The wrestling here was way too slow paced to work and I was very bored for the most part. HHH vs. Undertaker is looking horrible for a main event and Angle is going to need a miracle to make Hogan look passable.
The beatdown continues post match with HHH being left laying, only to have Hogan run out and attack Angle. HHH gets back up and the wig is ripped off. A lot of posing ensues to end the show.
Overall Rating: D-. I know Raw gets all the criticism but this show was a trainwreck. It was half an hour of waiting around until we get to the end of the first segment (with the Tag Team Champions being treated as cannon fodder) and then a bunch of short matches, including a seven second “match” which didn’t seem to serve much of a purpose. Things can get better but the main event is just killing this promotion right now.
Oh and as a bonus, here are the final four segments from a house show the Sunday before this show:
Billy and Chuck vs. Rikishi/Tazz
Chris Jericho vs. Val Venis
Swimsuit contestant
Hardcore Holly vs. Kurt Angle (Holly won)
Venis is probably a substitute for Edge but I have no idea where HHH was, as he and Angle main evented a house show the next night.
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Survivor Series Count-Up – 2008: The Cena/Jericho Special
Survivor Series 2008 Date: November 23, 2008
Location: TD Banknorth Garden, Boston, Massachusetts
Attendance: 12,498
Commentators: Michael Cole, Jerry Lawler, Todd Grisham, Matt Striker, Jim Ross, Tazz
The other major story on the show is Team Orton vs. Team Batista. Randy Orton vs. Batista had always been a match WWE wanted to push on a big stage but this is about as high as they ever got. They would face each other at various other pay per views in singles matches, but none as high profile as this one. Let’s get to it.
The opening video is the exact same thing it’s been for two years. Literally, they’re the same clips before we get to the stuff about the main events.
JR and Taz talk about the Hardy issue and say that ABC and TMZ picked up the story. I seem to remember that being a lie.
Team HBK vs. Team JBL
Shawn Michaels, Rey Mysterio, Cryme Tyme, Great Khali
John Bradshaw Layfield, The Miz, John Morrison, Kane, MVP
Shawn and JBL are feuding over Shawn being broke and needing money form JBL, Cryme Tyme (Shad Gaspard and JTG, two thug characters) are feuding with Miz and Morrison, Kane has been hunting Mysterio and Khali and MVP (in the middle of a massive losing streak that would result in a face turn and the US Title) are there to fill out the lineups. MVP and Mysterio get things going as all of the commentators are talking at once.
Rey hits a quick hurricanrana and a clothesline for two before it’s off to JTG for a double dropkick. JTG hits a HARD right hand but MVP gets in a shot to the ribs and hits the Drive-By (running kick to the side of the head) for the elimination. Khali immediately comes in and chops MVP in the head for the elimination to tie things up.
Kane comes in for the staredown of the giants and Khali clotheslines him down with ease. Khali slugs him down and easily breaks up a chokeslam attempt. There’s the chop to the head and Rey climbs on Khali’s shoulders for the splash and another elimination. Off to Morrison who speeds things up. Mysterio hits a quick kick to the head and it’s time for Shad.
Now Cryme Tyme vs. Miz/Morrison was a feud ahead of its time: their internet shows got in an argument and a wrestling feud followed. Shad misses a charge into the corner and it’s off to Miz. Since Miz isn’t quite the worker he is at this point, it’s back to Morrison very quickly. Shad runs over both members of the tag team and powerslams Miz down before hitting another overhyped elbow. Miz pops back up and hits the Reality Check (backbreaker/neckbreaker combo) to eliminate Shad.
It’s off to Shawn who comes in via a slow, dramatic step. He gets to face the Miz, meaning that entrance was wasted. To the shock of almost everyone, Miz takes over and double teams with Morrison to work over Shawn’s back. JBL, the slimmed down version, comes in to pound away and drop an elbow for two. Back to Miz who pounds away at Shawn’s bad eye, busting it open again.
Morrison comes in again to crank on a headlock and send Shawn over the top. Naturally Shawn skins the cat to come back in, as he has for years. At least Morrison jumps him when Shawn gets back inside. A forearm puts Shawn down and Morrison nips up in a little jab at HBK. Morrison misses the top rope elbow and it’s a double tag to bring in Miz vs. Mysterio. Rey hits a springboard hurricanrana into the 619 and the top rope splash puts Miz out.
JBL comes in and hits a hard shoulder to take Mysterio down. The crowd is WAY into Rey here. The fans think JBL can’t wrestle. Off to Morrison with a European uppercut followed by a backbreaker. Rey gets in a kick to the face but it’s off to JBL to hook an abdominal stretch with the leg being cranked on at the same time. Once Rey escapes, JBL uses something you don’t often see: a big boot to the back of the head. Rey blocks a belly to back superplex and hits a moonsault press to put JBL down and bust open his lip. There’s the tag to Shawn who hits the forearm and nip up of his own to send Bradshaw to the floor.
Shawn dives out to take Bradshaw out and loads up the superkick to send JBL running away. With JBL running away from the kick, Shawn slides back in and beats the count by one second, meaning JBL is gone via a countout. Morrison tries to superkick Shawn but Shawn is like boy these boots are older than you and kicks Morrison’s head off for the final pin and 3-0 victory.
Rating: C. This was fine but the ending was kind of anti-climatic. They were trying to save the Shawn pin over JBL which was a good idea as they would have a solid feud in the next few months which resulted in Shawn being JBL’s lackey because Shawn was poor. The guys other than the captains in this didn’t do much of note but that’s kind of the idea behind a match like this. Not bad but nothing great either.
HHH doesn’t think he needs to give his opinion on the Jeff Hardy situation. Either way, Hardy will be back. Tonight it’s going to be him vs. Kozlov and HHH promises to give the Russian his first defeat.
Team Raw vs. Team Smackdown
Raw: Beth Phoenix, Mickie James, Kelly Kelly, Candice Michelle, Jillian Hall
Candice is a model who wasn’t horrible in the ring, Maryse is a French Canadian bombshell and Natalya is a member of the Hart Family. Beth is the captain of Team Raw (and is dating Santino Marella) and McCool is captain of Team Smackdown. They’re also Women’s and Divas Champions respectively. For the sake of simplicity, only Michelle McCool will be referred to as Michelle. Beth and Michelle start things off with Beth controlling via a top wristlock. Michelle uses some decent chain wrestling to set up a dropkick to send Beth backwards a bit.
Maryse tags herself in and gets in a brawl with her own partner Michelle. Team Raw: “LET THEM FIGHT!” Good thinking. After the brawl is broken up, it’s Beth vs. Maria with Maria avoiding a charge and hitting a slow motion headscissors. Off to Kelly vs. Maria and hopefully this doesn’t last long. Victoria tags herself in and gets caught in a hurricanrana by Kelly for the pin. Kelly tries the same thing on Maryse for two so Maryse hits a backbreaker and gets the pin as well.
It’s 4-4 now and Mickie comes in while swearing a bit. A Thesz Press puts Maryse down and it’s off to Michelle again. They try to bridge into a backslide, fail miserably, and try again to a standoff. McCool hits a Russian legsweep for two and Mickie hits a clothesline for the same. Maria’s save hits McCool by mistake, allowing Mickie to hit the jumping DDT and pin Michelle. Mickie gets in an argument with Beth and gets rolled up by Maryse to tie it right back up.
Off to Candice vs. Natalya and they trade some rollups for two. Natalya busts out a Sharpshooter (it is the Survivor Series after all) but Jillian makes the save. Candice hits a spear for a quick pin on Natalya and it’s 3-2 with Jillian, Beth and Candice vs. Maria and Maryse.
It’s Jillian vs. Maria with Jillian getting two off a Samoan Drop. Maria grabs a quick victory roll to eliminate Jillian and ten seconds later, Candice hits a northern lights suplex to put Maria out. Maryse hooks an inverted figure four on Candice and we’re down to one on one. Maryse gets in a few shots and a rollup but the Glam Slam (double chickenwing slam) gives Beth the final pin very quickly.
Rating: D. As decent as last year’s was, this felt like your traditional Divas match. You had some decent workers but most of the girls are models who are there because of how they look in swimsuits. I’ve seen worse matches and the right choice was the survivor, but this just didn’t work for the most part.
Matt Hardy says that Jeff was hit in the back of the head with a blunt object, ending any drug speculation.
We recap Undertaker vs. Big Show. Show isn’t scared of Undertaker so he’ll win the casket match tonight.
Undertaker vs. Big Show
Casket match and the casket gets the full druid entrance. I wonder if those guys hang out at catering after this. They have a nice casket this year too instead of the normally generic ones. Show took all of 2007 off and lost a ton of weight so he’s still kind of slim here. Well slim for him that is. I don’t think the bell rang but Show starts throwing punches anyway. One misses though and Undertaker tries to dump him into the casket to no avail.
They head to the floor and Undertaker’s headbutt has no effect. Show pounds away at the ribs and rams Undertaker face first into the announce table to daze the smaller giant. The announce table gets loaded up but Show headbutts him instead of putting Undertaker on the table. Undertaker grabs one of those big monitors WWE uses and bashes Show’s head in a few times with it. A BIG leg to put Show through the table in the huge spot of the match.
They slowly start heading back to the casket but take a detour into the ring instead. Old School is countered and things slow down again. There’s a side slam from Show as the crowd is a lot less interested than they were when Undertaker was on offense. The casket it opened and Undertaker is put inside but Show has to close the casket himself.
Since Show won’t close the lid, Undertaker comes back with a bunch of punches and the jumping clothesline. Show hits a big elbow in the corner to slow down Undertaker (and the crowd) again. For some reason Show loads up a Vader Bomb when Undertaker is half up and gets chokeslammed down.
The casket is opened again and a big boot to the side of Show’s head knocks him inside, but Show blocks the lid from being shut again. Back in and Show hits the chokeslam….then destroys the casket. Show starts walking away and there’s a wall of fire to stop him from leaving. Well of course there is. Undertaker goes after him and gets punched down again, but here are more druids with another casket.
Show punches Undertaker a bit more and stands the casket up so he can ram Undertaker into it and knock both of them down. The casket is stood up again but it’s open this time. Undertaker punches Show to the edge of the stage before whipping Show into the casket, causing it to fall and shut to give Undertaker the win.
Rating: D. This is considered a horrible casket match by some people but it’s really not that bad. It’s certainly a bad match but the ending was kind of creative and what are you expecting from Undertaker vs. Big Show? They’re going to hit each other a lot and it’s going to be slow, so why do people act surprised when any match with either of these two or Kane is the same formula? Not a good match but it’s definitely not terrible.
Carlito and Primo (cousins) hit on the Bellas but can’t tell them apart. In something I never thought I’d have to say again, the Gobbledygooker pops up and the Colons think it’s Charlie Haas, but of course he pops up in the room and the Gooker is played by the Boogeyman. This would be another pointless segment.
Randy Orton doesn’t want to be team captain but his team will win anyway. He implies Cody is the weak link of the team. Cody says that if Randy is eliminated first, it’s addition by subtraction. The team has to hold them apart.
Team Orton vs. Team Batista
Randy Orton, Mark Henry, William Regal, Cody Rhodes, Shelton Benjamin
Batista, Kofi Kingston, CM Punk, R-Truth, Matt Hardy
Cody is being mentored by Orton in a group called Legacy, Shelton is US Champion, Matt is ECW Champion and Punk/Kofi are Raw Tag Team Champions. Orton cost Punk the Raw World Title back in October, Hardy and Henry are feuding over the ECW Title, Truth is chasing Shelton’s Title and Regal has been helping Orton against Batista. This is quite the intricate match for a change.
Punk immediately charges at Regal and hits the GTS for the elimination in about ten seconds. Shelton gets a very fast two on Punk before pounding away on his back. Off to Kofi who grabs a front facelock. Kofi is even more over here than usual as he went to college in Boston. Kofi tries a monkey flip but Shelton lands on his feet and brings in Henry to pound away slowly.
Henry apparently gets tired after a few seconds so here’s Cody. Matt comes in, does nothing of note, and tags in Truth who pounds away. Striker talks about what a killing Truth is making as we can hear a lot of spots being called here tonight. I don’t know if the ring is mic’d loudly or what but you can hear all kinds of stuff here. Batista comes in and everybody runs until it’s only Cody left to face him. Rhodes quickly tags out to Shelton but Batista takes him down with ease and gets two via a powerslam. Off to Matt vs. Randy as things speed up. A bulldog gets two for Matt but a moonsault misses.
It’s off to Henry who lost the ECW Title to Hardy a few months ago. Cody comes in and chokes a bit but there’s the double tag to Truth vs. Shelton. A victory roll gets two for Truth and he does his backflip into the splits spot. The spinning forearm misses completely and Paydirt (a jumping downward spiral) gets the pin for Shelton. Kofi immediately comes in with a springboard cross body for two and a dropkick to put Shelton down.
The Boom Drop gets another two for Kofi but Henry blasts Kofi in the back of the head. Henry comes in legally now for more quick pounding and it’s finally off to Orton. Orton does his really slow stomp but the knee drop misses. Randy drapes him over the top rope and hits the hanging DDT for the elimination. Punk is immediately waiting on Orton, who gets beaten up for a few moments but gets in a rake to the eyes and tags out to Cody.
Rhodes works on the arm for a bit but gets caught by the knee and bulldog combo for two. Punk goes up but Manu (the other member of Legacy who didn’t last long) distracts him long enough for Cody to shove him off the top. A DDT eliminates Punk quickly and we’re down to 4-2 with Batista/Matt vs. Orton/Cody/Henry/Benjamin. Matt comes in and hits a quick Side Effect for two on Rhodes but it’s quickly back to Henry. Matt hits an elbow to the back of Henry’s head and manages to pull off the Side Effect for two. That’s about it for Hardy as the World’s Strongest Slam takes him out, leaving Batista all alone.
Batista immediately spears down Henry to make it 3-1 as Shelton comes in. Benjamin gets caught in a spinebuster almost immediately and the Batista Bomb gets is down to 2-1. Cody comes in and peppers Batista with some right hands before charging into a boot. Batista powerslams Rhodes down and says Orton is next. Batista hits the Bomb on Rhodes but Randy made a blind tag while Cody was in the air. The RKO gets the elimination and win for Rhodes and Orton.
Rating: B. This was a kind of throwback to the old school Survivor Series matches where the numbers finally caught up with the big face and he got beat. Orton vs. Batista was one of the big matches that WWE never really got to do on the scale I think they were hoping for. They would have a long match next month at Armageddon but that’s hardly the second main event at Wrestlemania which they were capable of having. Still though, good stuff here and the best match of the night by far.
Kozlov says he’ll win.
Hardy is officially out of the title match tonight.
The recap video is pretty pointless now because the video is mostly about Jeff. Kozlov is here because HHH wanted to have some big epic match with him that no one but him was interested in. Jeff is here because he keeps getting so close to winning the title so EVIL Vickie wouldn’t let him in the match. Jeff invaded the contract signing and beat up a lot of people until he was put in the match.
Smackdown World Title: Vladimir Kozlov vs. HHH
HHH is defending. After the big match intros we’re ready to go. The fans chant USA of course and for once it’s actually appropriate. Kozlov, the amateur wrestler/combat sports expert, takes it to the mat with amateur stuff. Now remember that, because it’ll become important later. HHH gets on the mat with him and hooks a headlock. The fans now chant boring as we hit a standoff. Now they want Hardy.
They trade arm holds on the mat and then trade even more arm holds on the same mat. Back up and HHH hits the high knee and a facebuster followed by the DDT for no cover. The fans chant for TNA before HHH hits the spinebuster. Kozlov counters the Pedigree and hits the headbutt to the chest to take HHH down. Vladimir sends HHH into the corner and out to the floor where very little happens.
Back in and a fall away slam gets two for the challenger and he fires some shoulders to the ribs. A powerslam gets another two and it’s off to a body grip to slow things down even more. Kozlov hits a pair of backbreakers for two and it’s back to that grip. HHH comes back with some right hands but gets powerslammed down for another two. A comeback by HHH is countered into a belly to belly as Taz says Kozlov is going to win, further dooming him to lose. HHH hits a Pedigree out of nowhere and here’s Smackdown GM Vickie Guerrero.
She says he’s here and makes it a triple threat, with the third man being the returning Edge. Edge does the psycho eyes on the way to the ring and I think a cameraman fell off the ramp as he was filming. Edge spears down HHH and here’s Jeff Hardy to destroy the Canadian. His chair shot hits HHH though, allowing Edge to steal the pin and the title.
Rating: D. There’s a lot to say here. First and foremost, as usual I disagree with anyone who said this was the worst match of the year. It’s arguably not even the worst match of the show, but think about this for a minute: are you telling me there isn’t some terrible Divas match somewhere in the year worse than this? Or that Honky Tonk Man vs. Santino Marella at Cyber Sunday was indeed better?
This match was indeed bad, but let’s think about this for a minute. Kozlov is supposed to be a combat sports expert and an amateur wrestler. So what did he do? He wrestled like his character was supposed to. Now was it boring? Absolutely. Was it a REALLY stupid move to put him in a World Title match? Absolutely. Were the fans interested? Not at all. If you want proof, back at Cyber Sunday the options for the title match were HHH vs. either guy, or a triple threat. The results were as follows:
Hardy – 57%
Triple Threat – 38%
Kozlov – 5%
Based on that alone, it’s clear that almost no one wanted to see HHH vs. Kozlov one on one. The interest just wasn’t there, so they booked a triple threat instead which there was interest in. Then they screw the fans out of their money by taking Jeff out of the match because of whatever their reasoning was. Then they flip the fans off AGAIN by having Hardy run in at the end. Hardy would pin Edge in another triple threat the next month to win the title in a shocker. Why this match didn’t happen here is beyond me, but again it’s screwing the fans out of what was advertised until the night before the show.
At the end of the day though, no one bought Kozlov as a real threat to the title. The guy just wasn’t going to be WWE Champion with the response he got, which is why Hardy was the interesting factor in this match. Without him, you have twelve minutes of your time being wasted until the ending, which should have been Hardy. Anyway, nothing to see here but it’s not the worst match of the year.
We recap Jericho vs. Cena. Jericho snuck into the Championship Scramble match last month at Unforgiven and stole the World Title while Cena was on the shelf. Tonight, Cena returns from a neck injury to try and get his title back. In his hometown. Against a guy that has literally only beaten him once. And we’re supposed to expect Jericho to have a chance because we’re supposed to ignore all that stuff.
Raw World Title: Chris Jericho vs. John Cena
Jericho is defending of course. Cena almost immediately tries the FU but Jericho bails to the apron. Jericho comes back with a headlock which works on the neck followed by a shoulder block to take Cena to the floor. John holds his neck a lot and looks shaken. Back in and Cena pounds away in the corner as they’re hitting hard but the pace of the match is pretty slow if that makes sense. Jericho takes over and things continue to go slowly.
Cena comes back with the Throwback and goes up for the Fameasser, only to come down because that’s the move that hurt his neck in the first place. Jericho takes over again and things go slowly. A kick to the side of Cena’s head puts him on the floor for a nine count. Back in and Cena slugs away but gets sent right back to the floor. Jericho throws him into the steps and heads back in for a neck crank.
After the hold is broken, it’s time for more choking followed by a full nelson. The hold lasts almost a minute and a half but Cena blocks the bulldog. A shoulder puts Jericho down but the second shoulder connects. Jericho misses the Lionsault but the Shuffle is countered into the Liontamer (kneeling Walls of Jericho)! He hasn’t used that in years but it looks awesome. Cena escapes the hold so Jericho puts on the regular Boston Crab instead. Cena, after being in the hold over a minute straight, grabs the rope to escape. Back up and Cena hits an FU out of nowhere but can’t follow up.
Both guys head up to the top with Cena slamming him to the mat, followed up by the top rope Fameasser. Cena is all fired up now but Jericho breaks up the FU and hits a Codebreaker for a delayed two. Jericho takes over and hits a clothesline followed by an EVIL smirk. He smirks a bit too much though and Cena grabs the STFU. Cena has to try to pull the hold back to the middle of the ring and Jericho kicks him away. The champ tries a small package but Cena pulls him up into the FU for the pin and the title.
Rating: C+. The match itself was fine but there was less drama in this than in a Donald Duck cartoon. At the end of the day, Cena does not lose to Jericho and he does not tap out no matter what. The wrestling was fine and it told a story and all that jazz, but I’d rather have a main event where I wasn’t sure what was going to happen than a match being designed for Cena to have everything come together and win and then everything coming together to win.
Cena celebrates to end the show.
Overall Rating: D+. I don’t know if it’s because I’ve been doing so many of these lately, but this wasn’t the most interesting show in the world. It was dull at times and almost felt like a chore to sit through. The first hour or so is WAY worse than the rest of the show, but even the last two thirds aren’t all that great. This didn’t work that well and it’s not something I want to see again.
Ratings Comparison
Team HBK vs. Team JBL
Original: B+
Redo: C
Team Raw vs. Team Smackdown
Original: D-
Redo: D
Undertaker vs. Big Show
Original: D+
Redo: D
Team Orton vs. Team Batista
Original: C-
Redo: B
Edge vs. HHH vs. Vladimir Kozlov
Original: D+
Redo: D
John Cena vs. Chris Jericho
Original: B
Redo: C+
Overall Rating
Original: C-
Redo: D+
I’ve flipped on the two male Survivor Series matches but other than that it’s about the same.
Survivor Series Count-Up – 2007: The Feud of the Year
Survivor Series 2007 Date: November 18, 2007
Location: American Airlines Arena, Miami, Florida
Attendance: 12,500
Commentators: Michael Cole, John Bradshaw Layfield, Jerry Lawler, Jim Ross, Tazz, Joey Styles
The company has finally settled down to the point where major changes are mostly done. The three rosters are working well enough and talent is moving from show to show fast enough to keep things interesting. There has however been one change, though it’s more the end of an experiment: all pay per views are now done by all brands, meaning there are no more Raw or Smackdown pay per views. Let’s get to it.
The opening video talks about how this started twenty years ago, as you would expect it to. It also talks about the main event matches tonight, as you would expect it to as well.
ECW Title: CM Punk vs. John Morrison vs. The Miz
Punk is defending and Miz (a reality TV star turned wrestler) and Morrison (formerly Johnny Nitro) are Smackdown Tag Team Champions. The team of course jumps CM at the same time because one on one, neither have a chance to beat Punk. Punk kicks the tar out of Miz’s head and gets a quick two on Morrison. Both challengers are sent to the floor where Punk takes both of them out with a suicide dive. Back in and Punk gets caught in a double suplex after the springboard clothesline fails.
Miz and Morrison double team Punk but Miz is the first of the heels to go extra heel, dumping Morrison out to the floor. He hooks a chinlock on Punk but has to let go to knock Morrison back to the outside. Punk kicks Miz in the head but Morrison comes back in with a backbreaker to CM followed by a cobra clutch (called a Japanese sleeper by Joey Styles).
Miz pulls Punk to the floor and rams him into the concrete to get us down to the challengers fighting. Morrison sends him into the corner chest first and hits the yet to be named Starship Pain for two. Punk comes back in and hurricanranas Morrison off the top into a powerbomb from Miz in a SWEET looking move. That only gets two but it got a BIG reaction from the crowd.
With Morrison pretty much dead, Punk kicks Miz in the face for two and hits the knee/bulldog combo for the same. Punk hits a backbreaker on Miz but Morrison grabs a rollup and trunks on the champ for two. Morrison escapes the GTS but gets knocked to the floor, allowing Punk to hit the GTS on Miz for the pin to retain.
Rating: C. Other than that hurricanrana/powerbomb spot, this was only ok. Punk had to carry the whole thing but you could see something special in Miz. It’s a little easier to see it now, but some people thought Miz would be the bigger deal because of this match. I’m not sure if I’d agree based on this match, but Miz did indeed look better than Morrison here. This was a pretty good choice for an opener, but the execution wasn’t great because Punk didn’t have enough to work with.
We recap MVP turning on Matt Hardy and taking out his knee. They had been partners for a long while before this but everyone thought MVP was evil the whole time, and this was the not very shocking turn.
MVP says that Matt won’t be competing tonight because he needs crutches to get by. That doesn’t surprise MVP, because Matt has always needed a crutch, be it either Jeff or MVP. Oh and he’s better than Matt.
Mickie James/Maria/Torrie Wilson/Michelle McCool/Kelly Kelly vs. Beth Phoenix/Melina/Jillian Hall/Victoria/Layla
One fall to a finish here and Beth is Women’s Champion. Maria is a gorgeous ditzy redhead, Torrie is a bombshell, McCool is a pretty blonde, Phoenix is a very strong woman, Jillian is ditzy as well and Layla is a British woman who dances a lot. The Divas Title doesn’t exist yet which is how things should have stayed. Melina falls off the apron during her splits entrance which is worth a chuckle. The second attempt works and thankfully she’s smiling after screwing it up.
Victoria and Michelle start things off with Michelle taking over with a headlock. A big boot puts Victoria (later Tara in TNA) down and it’s off to Torrie who isn’t very good in the ring. Victoria kills her mostly dead with a side slam and it’s off to Layla who is so bad here that she can’t even beat up Torrie. Kelly and Jillian come in and Jillian tries to scream a bit, only to get rolled up for two.
Thankfully Beth comes in to flatten Maria before handing it right back to Layla. Actually make that Melina, who misses a charge at Maria and crotches herself, allowing for the hot tag to Mickie. James beats up everyone in sight, has her partners take out Beth, and hits the Long Kiss Goodnight (spinning kick to the face after a kiss) on Melina for the pin.
Rating: D. Yes, the match sucked. Yes, most of the women in this are horrible wrestlers. Yes, if you’re complaining about these things, you’re missing the point. This was pure fan service as you had ten girls in either tight or barely there outfits and one hot woman kicking another hot woman in the head. If you’re looking for a wrestling match here, you’re in the wrong place.
Coach and Regal are in the back looking smug. Hornswoggle, who is Vince’s son at this point, is pacing very nervously. Remember that he faces Khali tonight.
Orton says history isn’t going to be made tonight. He’s going to beat Shawn because if Shawn uses the superkick, Shawn loses the match.
Shawn is here for revenge tonight because Orton has tried to hurt him and take his livelihood. Therefore tonight, Shawn is going to take the title.
Raw Tag Team Titles: Lance Cade/Trevor Murdoch vs. Hardcore Holly/Cody Rhodes
Cade and Murdoch (two rednecks) are defending. Rhodes (Dusty’s son) is brand new at this point and spent weeks getting beaten up by Holly before Holly respected him enough to team with him. Cody and Cade start things off with the rookie getting hiptossed down. The crowd pretty much died as soon as the bell rang, which should tell you about the tag team situation at the time as these are the best Raw had for their belts.
Off to the very redneck Murdoch who chops away but gets caught in a headlock. Yeah Cody didn’t quite get anywhere as a worker for a long time. Holly comes in and is immediately beaten down by Cade. The crowd is reacting a bit so it’s not totally dead but it’s nothing special. The heels are sent into each other and fall out to the floor as Holly takes over. We actually get a HOLLY chant for the only time I can ever remember.
A rollup gets two for Hardcore and it’s off to Murdoch via a blind tag. Holly gets his head kicked off and things slow back down again. The champs tag in and out a lot before Cade picks up Murdoch to drop him down with a legdrop for two. We hit the chinlock on Holly which goes nowhere so Holly suplexes Trevor down. Cade misses an elbow drop but Holly still can’t tag out.
Cade tries that dropping Murdoch into a legdrop move again but as almost always is the case, it doesn’t work this time. Warm tag brings in Cody who hits a missile dropkick on Lance for two. Holly and Cade fall to the floor and Murdoch hits something resembling a Canadian Destroyer (flip piledriver, though this was much more like a sunset flip than a piledriver) to retain.
Rating: C-. Another so-so match here but at the end of the day, it’s Hardcore Holly and a rookie Cody Rhodes vs. Lance Cade and Trevor Murdoch. That’s only going to take you so far as the fans aren’t going to care about it for the most part. I don’t get why they didn’t change the titles here as Holly and Rhodes would get the belts in a month (and hold them for SIX MONTHS) anyway.
The announcers explain the concept of a Survivor Series match to the uninitiated. That’s something you hardly ever see anymore: a basic explanation of WHAT IS GOING ON. Sometimes you need to slow things down a bit and tell people how things work. If you’re flipping through the channels and see something flashy like wrestling, you’re likely to stop but if you have no idea what’s going on, you’re not likely to stay. Gorilla Monsoon was a master at doing this.
Team HHH isn’t worried about being down 5-4 coming into the match (Matt Hardy was hurt) but Kane says he isn’t an underdog. We recap the Katie Vick angle (HHH: “Uh…..yeah sorry about that.” If you don’t know what this is, be glad and keep it that way.) and Jeff reminds HHH that he put him in the hospital. HHH is sorry about that too and says tonight they can unite in the idea of doing something terrible to someone else.
Team HHH vs. Team Umaga
HHH, Kane, Jeff Hardy, Rey Mysterio
Umaga, Mr. Kennedy, MVP, Finlay, Big Daddy V
Big Daddy V is a much fatter Mabel. Kennedy’s mic doesn’t work for the live intro at first so we can only hear the ending. Jeff is Intercontinental Champion and MVP is US Champion. Remember that we’re starting at 5-4 because Matt is gone. Rey and Kennedy get things going with Kennedy using a rare power advantage to take over. Kennedy pounds in the corner but gets caught in a sunset bomb before it’s off to Jeff for a BIG pop. Rey and Jeff combine for some Poetry in Motion and Kennedy is in trouble.
Scratch that trouble as Jeff runs into an elbow (JBL: “That’ll knock the purple out of your hair!”) and it’s off to MVP. MVP limps a bit which apparently is a fake injury. Or maybe he’s making fun of Matt Hardy. Off to the 550lb Big Daddy V who uses his big fat man offense on Jeff, before stupidly throwing Jeff to the corner for a tag to Kane.
V almost immediately belly to belly suplexes Kane down for two but Kane comes back with some clotheslines in the corner. A top rope clothesline puts V down again but Kane has to chokeslam Finlay. V hits a Samoan Drop and a big elbow on Kane for the upset elimination. HHH comes in and hits the facebuster on the monster but gets caught by a clothesline to shift the momentum right back.
We get the match that everyone is looking forward to in HHH vs. Umaga and the fans don’t react at all. Umaga takes him down with a belly to belly of his own and a headbutt has HHH in trouble. Umaga misses a middle rope headbutt and there’s the hot tag to Rey. Rey pounds away but almost immediately gets knocked down by the other monster. Mysterio goes after the leg but a hurricanrana is just a bad idea. Actually it isn’t as he swings Umaga into the 619, followed by a springboard seated senton for two. Umaga unleashes a BIG SAMOAN SCREAM and hits a spinning release Rock Bottom and the Spike to eliminate Rey.
So it’s all five villains vs. Jeff and HHH, and it’s not that the two superheroes are likely to run through all five and win or anything like that of course. Jeff vs. Kennedy starts things off and Hardy is in trouble quickly. I don’t think Jeff really gets going until he looks like he’s been thrown out of a building though. Jeff comes back with a dropkick but the slingshot dropkick in the corner misses due to an MVP assist. Cole talks about how that’s the second time MVP has caused that move to miss in three days. JBL: “Maybe MVP is just smarter than the Hardys.”
Off to MVP who hooks a chinlock on Jeff which goes on for a while. Jeff fights up but gets gets caught in a fireman’s carry drop. MVP starts talking trash to the fans and walks into a Twist of Fate to make it 4-2. Kennedy is in next and walks into an enziguri, which allows for the tag off to HHH. A high knee sets up a clothesline for two for HHH followed by a spinebuster. HHH sees the human whale known as Big Daddy V coming and avoids an elbow which crushes Kennedy and allows HHH to make it 3-2.
V gets both superheroes on the floor and crushes Hardy against the post to put him down for awhile. Back in the ring HHH and Hardy avoid a charge in the corner and hit a double DDT on V for the elimination. I’ve always wondered how basic moves when a monster is fresh is enough to eliminate them. These guys have no stamina at all.
It’s HHH/Jeff vs. Finlay/Umaga if you’re keeping track. Finlay comes in and pounds away on HHH while JBL talks about how great Finlay is. Finlay goes to the middle rope and jumps into HHH’s boot to put both guys down. Hot tag brings in Jeff for a hard Irish whip into the corner and the slingshot dropkick for two. Jeff goes to the apron and is immediately drilled by Umaga to give the evil foreigners control again. Finlay whips Jeff into the corner but gets caught by a Whisper in the Wind. A mule kick staggers Umaga and there’s the hot tag to HHH to meet Finlay. The high knee puts Finlay down and there’s a spinebuster to follow it up.
The Pedigree is loaded up but Umaga kicks HHH’s head off to break it up. The Celtic Cross (White Noise) is escaped and there’s the Pedigree to make it 2-1. Umaga DESTROYS HHH in the corner but the running attack misses by a mile. The Pedigree and Swanton Bomb connect and we’re done.
Rating: B-. The match was pretty fun stuff but once we got down to 5-2, it was a matter of guessing what order the five were going out in rather than who was going to win. That being said, it’s probably the right move as HHH would move on from Umaga after this and take to feud with Orton. That feud would follow Hardy vs. Orton at the Rumble, so this was definitely a launching pad for the two survivors back to the main event.
Shaquille O’Neal is here.
Hornswoggle is still nervous in the back. Tonight’s match is another of those tough love things from Vince. Speaking of the boss, he comes in and Hornswoggle immediately hugs his leg. This is one of those things that I think WWE missed about Hornswoggle: he acts like a child.
Allow me to lose control for a second. HE HAS A FULL BEARD! THE GUY IS IN HIS TWENTIES! HORNSWOGGLE IS NOT A CHIL……why am I annoyed by this? It’s Hornswoggle. Vince says he made this match because Hornswoggle is a McMahon and therefore has to rise to the occasion. He compares this to his battles with Turner and the US government. Vince gives him a pep talk and Hornswoggle is ready.
Here’s Shane McMahon to the arena, rocking a suit. Shane introduces Vince and apparently they’ll be in the corner of Hornswoggle tonight. Well that’s nice of them. JBL says this is going to be Biblical. Cole: “This isn’t the Bible.”
Hornswoggle vs. Great Khali
Runjin Singh, Khali’s manager, says we should have the wrestlers get together for the reading of the rules. This results in Singh talking over the referee as he translates. The fans want Shaq (Shaquille O’Neal) but they get the bell instead. The fans realize Shaq is here and Vince tells him to sit down. Vince tells the fans he doesn’t care what they want.
Hornswoggle takes off his jacket and hat and kicks Singh in the face. He kicks at the legs of Khali…and wisely runs away. Singh runs his mouth some more and gets GREEN MIST IN THE FACE! Hornswoggle dives on Singh and pounds away before hiding from Khali under the ring. The small guy finds that Irish club and calls Khali in but the stick is of course caught. Khali kicks him down but before the Vice Grip can go on, Finlay runs in for the save and face turn.
Rating: D-. Well, there was at least a purpose so it’s not a total failure. It should have been on Raw though and the whole story really wasn’t the most entertaining. At the end of the day, this is a big comedy angle designed to get……actually I’m not sure who this is designed to get over. Not that it worked anyway but some clarification would be nice.
Finlay beats up Singh and Khali with the club. It would eventually be revealed that Finlay was Hornswoggle’s father, but I’m not quite sure why Vince agreed to the whole thing in storyline.
Alfonso Soriano, a baseball player, is here.
We recap Shawn vs. Orton. Shawn had the title won in a previous match but Orton intentionally got himself disqualified and then punted Shawn to the shelf for a few months. Shawn admitted he wanted revenge but Vince banned the superkick for no apparent reason other than being evil.
Raw World Title: Shawn Michaels vs. Randy Orton
Orton is defending, if Orton gets DQ’ed the title changes, Shawn can get no more shots if he loses, and if Shawn attempts to use the Superkick, he loses the match. Shawn almost immediately goes to the cravate and Orton spends nearly two minutes trying to fight out of it. Now that’s a (European) headlock. Orton escapes in the corner and Shawn raises his leg for the kick but the referee says that wasn’t an attempt. It’s going to be one of those referees I guess.
Orton drops down as Shawn runs the ropes so Shawn gets on Randy’s back and chokes away. The hold switches to a front facelock as they’re spending a lot of time in holds so far. Randy finally gets to the floor where Shawn fakes diving over the top so he can dropkick him through the ropes before faking ANOTHER dive and hitting an Asai moonsault in a good sequence. Back in and Orton rolls through a crossbody for two before hitting an uppercut to take over.
Shawn fights up and throws on the required Sharpshooter until Orton finally makes the rope. Orton comes back with a thumb to the eye and snaps Shawn across the top rope to take over. The Elevated DDT hits for two. It’s off to a chinlock by Orton as the hold marathon continues. It’s not boring or bad but it’s a very different way of going about a match.
Shawn fights back but walks into a dropkick for two. He catches another dropkick in mid air and slams Randy down a few times before hitting the top rope elbow for two. By instinct, Shawn tunes up the band but he fakes Orton out by making him duck and grabs a rollup for two. Brilliant psychology there.
In a move I was shocked to see at the time, Shawn puts on a Crossface. Remember that this is just five months after Benoit so that’s not a move you would have expected to see here. Orton finally gets a leg over the rope and Shawn looks spent from that not working. He tries the hold again but Randy clotheslines his head off for two. Orton hits the backbreaker and loads up the same Punt which kept Shawn out for five months.
Randy gets a running start but Shawn grabs an ankle lock with a grapevine to make Orton scream. Orton uses the good leg to kick Shawn away and break the hold. Why don’t more people do that to Angle? Michaels tries the Figure Four but Orton kicks him into the post. Shawn pulls up the foot for the kick but since he has to stop, Orton hits the RKO for the pin to retain the title.
Rating: B. I was digging the psychology here as Shawn had to come up with all kinds of ways to beat Orton instead of the superkick. It says a lot about Shawn that the only way they could have Orton be able to hang in a fight with him was to take away Shawn’s big move. Orton would hold the title for another five months or so until HHH (of course) took it away from him.
Orton demands that Shawn say Orton is the future but Shawn is pretty out of it. Not out of it enough though as there’s the superkick we were waiting on.
Cole is talking about the main event and SAVE US. For those of you unfamiliar, this was a series of videos that popped up at random on shows with what looked like the Matrix announcing that someone was coming to SAVE US. It would be revealed the next night that it was the return of Chris Jericho.
The Cell is lowered.
We recap Batista vs. Undertaker. Batista lost the belt to Undertaker at Wrestlemania and they feuded for the title on a few PPVs. After a cage match on Smackdown, Edge cashed in the MITB contract and won the title from Undertaker. Later, Edge was hurt and had to vacate the belt, which was won by Khali. Batista eventually beat Khali for the belt and Undertaker came back to challenge him for it.
They fought at Cyber Sunday with Batista winning, which made them 1-1 with a few draws. Undertaker wanted one more match and Batista was perfectly cool with that, but Undertaker wanted it in the Cell. See how that worked? It was a natural progression with the Cell being the FINAL match between them (one on one at least). That’s a logical progression that you rarely get anymore.
Smackdown World Title: Batista vs. Undertaker
Batista is defending. Undertaker charges to start and is caught in a headlock before getting run over by Big Dave. Undertaker shrugs it off and tries an early chokeslam but Batista fights out of it. This is one of those feuds where you don’t bother with the basic stuff and go with the big power moves because that’s all that’s going to have any effect. Undertaker clotheslines him down and pounds away in the corner. We’re still in the early going here so this doesn’t mean a lot yet.
The Snake Eyes and big boot get two for Undertaker and it’s already chair time. Batista hits a BIG spear to take Undertaker down and gets the chair. That goes badly for the champ as Undertaker kicks the chair back into his face and gets two off a clothesline. They head outside and Undertaker keeps control with a solid shot into the steps. Batista gets raked against the Cell and there’s the legdrop on the apron.
To stay on the throat, Undertaker puts the chair over Batista’s throat and slams the bottom of the chair into the steps. The champ is bleeding from the mouth now. Back in and Undertaker covers by driving a forearm into the throat. Undertaker is kind of the heel in this match, which says A LOT about how over Batista was here. Back in, Undertaker loads up Old School but Batista catches him in the spinebuster in a cool counter.
They slug it out and Batista takes over with a clothesline that gets two. Batista hits a powerslam and takes it back to the floor. They’ve done a solid job here of having both guys dominate for a long stretch which usually works well for a big time match. Undertaker whips Batista into the Cell to take over again so maybe what I just said is nonsense. Batista gets rammed head first into the steel and things are starting to pick up.
A chair shot keeps Batista down and the champ is cut open on the forehead. Batista blocks Old School again and hits a superplex to put both guys down. As Batista is crawling over to him, the Dead Man tries the Hell’s Gate (triangle choke) but it’s not on full. Batista makes the rope and heads to the floor for a breather, setting up the Undertaker Dive over the top rope.
Undertaker picks up the steps and tries to ram Batista with them, but the champ pulls himself up using the cage and kicks them back into Undertaker’s face. Batista picks up the steps and just rams Undertaker in the head with them four or five times to draw blood. Back in and Batista does the stupid thing of punching Undertaker in the corner and gets a Last Ride for his efforts. That only gets two and the pop isn’t huge from the crowd. They know we’re getting A LOT of finishers before a pin here.
There’s a chokeslam but it only gets two. The Tombstone is countered into a spinebuster for two and there’s another spinebuster for good measure. It’s table time and Batista easily powerbombs him through it….for two. There’s the pop from the crowd on the kickout that we were looking for. Now the Animal loads up the steps but Undertaker backdrops him onto said steps for two. The Tombstone hits….for two again, making Batista one of a handful of people to survive the Last Ride, Tombstone and a chokeslam.
Undertaker KILLS Batista with a Tombstone on the steps but someone pulls the referee out of the ring at two. It’s the returning Edge, who I presume was hiding under the ring the whole time. He steals a camera and clocks Undertaker with it before hitting a Conchairto on the steps. Batista has no idea this is going on after the Tombstone. Edge pulls the champ on top and the pin is pretty much academic.
Rating: B+. This was very good but it never quite got to that level that they were hoping for it to I don’t think. The problem is this was match was based on respect instead of hatred which takes a lot out of a match like this. Edge would win the title in a triple threat next month and eventually lose it to Undertaker at Wrestlemania.
After the Cell is raised, Edge beats on Undertaker some more to end the show.
Overall Rating: B. This was a nice surprise. The Tag Team Title match is some uninspired stuff but other than that (ignoring the non-match between Khali and Hornswoggle) there’s nothing bad on here at all. The Divas match is what it is and if the worst thing I have to do is look at Kelly Kelly and Maria in barely there shorts for five minutes, I’ve got a good show on my hands. The big matches delivered and the other matches aren’t bad so this is a solid show all around and worth checking out.
Ratings Comparison
CM Punk vs. John Morrison vs. The Miz
Original: B-
Redo: C
Mickie James/Maria/Torrie Wilson/Michelle McCool/Kelly Kelly vs. Beth Phoenix/Melina/Jillian Hall/Victoria/Layla
Original: D
Redo: D
Lance Cade/Trevor Murdoch vs. Hardcore Holly/Cody Rhodes
Original: D
Redo: C-
Team HHH vs. Team Umaga
Original: C-
Redo: B-
Great Khali vs. Hornswoggle
Original: N/A
Redo: N/A
Randy Orton vs. Shawn Michaels
Original: D+
Redo: B
Batista vs. Undertaker
Original: A-
Redo: B+
Overall Rating
Original: B-
Redo: B
The main thing I’ve learned about myself from these redos is that I was a lot looser with my grades back then. The redo grades here are a lot more toned down and it’s a bit harder to please me now.
Survivor Series 2005
Date: November 27, 2005
Location: Joe Louis Arena, Detroit, Michigan
Attendance: 15,000
Commentators: Joey Styles, Jerry Lawler, Jonathan Coachman, Michael Cole, Tazz
The main change here is that we’ve seen the rise of Batista and Cena, with the latter defending against Angle and a crooked referee tonight. On top of that we’ve got Raw vs. Smackdown in a major Survivor Series match which actually feels kind of big for once. Other than that there’s HHH vs. Flair in a Last Man Standing match which should be good. Let’s get to it.
The announcers talk about the main event and bragging rights to start things off.
Booker T vs. Chris Benoit
This is the first match in a best of seven series for the US Title, which would go on until January and saw Randy Orton wrestling four of the matches in Booker’s place. Benoit gets in Booker’s face in the corner and they tie up for a bit. Booker hits an awkward kind of slam but Benoit pops right back up. Benoit sends him to the floor and that goes absolutely nowhere. Back in and Chris takes him to the mat with a leg hold.
After Booker grabs a rope, it’s time for a test of strength with Booker (the heel here) kicking Benoit in the face to take over. When all else fails, kick the guy in the face. A suplex puts Booker down as does an elbow to the face. Booker hits a side slam for two and it’s off to an arm hold followed by an abdominal stretch. After Benoit escapes, Booker kicks his head off for two. This is moving somewhat slowly so far but it’s not bad.
Booker hits an arm trap neckbreker (like Sandow’s Terminus) for two and it’s off to a reverse chinlock. Benoit escapes a vertical suplex and it’s time to roll some Germans, but Booker escapes the third and kicks Benoit in the face again. Another attempt at a kick is caught in a legdrag but the Sharpshooter that follows it up doesn’t quite work, giving Booker a cradle for two.
A snap suplex gets two for Chris and we roll some more Germans. Benoit loads up the Swan Dive but Sharmell’s distraction lets Booker load up a superplex. Benoit goes psycho though and headbutts Booker to the mat, but the Swan Dive misses, allowing Booker to get a rollup with Sharmell holding Booker’s feet on the ropes for the pin.
Rating: B-. These two are awesome together and both series they had (they did this in WCW for the TV Title) were entertaining stuff. At the end of the day, sometimes there’s nothing wrong with throwing two people out there and letting them have a good match. This was a solid choice for an opener too as both guys got to show off and the fans were getting into it near the end.
Vince wishes Bischoff luck tonight and Montreal is referenced. Of course. Eric says he’ll screw Cena. Cena pops up and says “so Eric Bischoff screws guys. Good luck with that.” Vince then says to Cena, and I 100% quote, “keep it up my nigga.” Booker and Sharmell don’t seem pleased.
Women’s Title: Trish Stratus vs. Melina
Trish is defending and Melina has MNM, the Smackdown tag champions, with him. This is interpromotional apparently. Melina and MNM had kidnapped Trish and held her captive until the match was agreed to. Well that’s one way to do it. Trish and her psycho fan (the brand new Mickie James) come out fast with Trish sending Melina to the floor and diving on all three members of MNM. Trish is looking great here.
Melina gets thrown around by her hair, sending those furry boots flying. Trish headscissors her down and I think they botch a headscissors out of the corner with Trish kicking Melina in the face instead of getting the ankles around her head. Melina uses her basic abilities (meaning stretching to freakish angles to choke and kick a lot) before going to the floor for a cat fight with Mickie.
As the brawl is going on, MNM tries the Snapshot (elevated double team DDT) on Trish, only to get caught and ejected. Things calm down a bit and Melina puts on a surfboard, which may or may not be an excuse to have Trish’s chest shoved out while wearing tight leather. Trish fights back but Stratusfaction is countered into a face plant for two, drawing the primal screams from Melina.
Stratus comes back with some forearms but runs into a boot in the corner. The Stratusphere puts Melina down and there’s a spinebuster of all things for two for Trish. Chick Kick and Stratusfaction miss and Trish is sent to the apron, but Mickie pulls her out of the way of a charging Melina. Trish goes up and misses about 95% of a top rope bulldog but it’s good enough for the pin.
Rating: C-. This was much better than I was expecting given what level Melina was at here. Trish looked fine (and her wrestling was even good too) but she needed more to work with here. This would lead up to Mickie going totally psycho and evil, setting up an excellent match (other than the ending) at Mania between the two of them.
Watch Jake’s DVD! It’s full of lies but watch it!
Dmitri Young, a baseball payer, is here.
We recap HHH vs. Flair. HHH came back from injury and turned on Flair in their first match together. They fought in a cage match at Taboo Tuesday with Flair somehow pulling out one of the biggest upsets of his career. Tonight it’s a rematch in a last man standing match.
Ric Flair vs. HHH
Last man standing. Oh and Flair is IC Champion but this is non-title. Like HHH would ever actively go after a midcard title. HHH jumps Flair as he comes to the ring and beats on him in the aisle for a bit before we head inside. It’s chair time very quickly but Flair pokes HHH in the ribs with a kendo stick to block the shot. They head into the crowd with Flair chopping HHH through the fans. He swings one time too many though and HHH backdrops him back to ringside.
A suplex puts Flair’s back on the concrete and draws some loud swearing. HHH suplexes him back into the ring and Flair is in trouble. Some quick punches don’t do much good for Flair and we head back to the outside. Flair gets posted, but if that’s not enough to cut him open, HHH carves up his forehead with a freaking SCREWDRIVER. There is blood everywhere in just a matter of seconds, so HHH digs it in even more back in the ring.
HHH takes him down and the knee drop misses by about eight inches. The shot of the second one is even worse and they slug it out in the corner. We head outside again and Flair sends him into the steps to give Flair a breather. Flair pokes HHH in the eye but HHH hits a spinebuster to take him right back down on the concrete. HHH talks trash on the mic and Flair is like “boy Jack Brisco’s tights were tougher than you” and he grabs HHH by the balls. Well when there’s nothing else I guess that’s all you can do. HHH blasts him with the mic to break the grip. I guess that’s Stephanie only territory.
Flair is set for a Pedigree through the announce table but he backdrops HHH through the other table, drawing our first count of the match. That gets a nine and HHH grabs another chair. Back in and HHH has Flair dead to rights but instead of swinging the chair, HHH pounds away with punches instead. HHH pounds away in the corner, so Flair kicks him low again, followed by a chair shot for five. Flair is like YUM and bites at the cut on HHH’s forehead. Flair is kind of a weird dude sometimes.
Ric wraps HHH’s balls around the post and does the same to the leg, which is a smart move in a last man standing match. Then he crushes the balls FOUR MORE TIMES. DUDE FOR THE LOVE OF STEPHANIE GIVE IT A BREAK! Back in and Flair chop blocks HHH, before biting the guy’s thigh. Flair is a pretty sick guy at times no? He goes back to the knee (with kicks this time instead of teeth) but the Figure Four is blocked twice, the second time having Flair knocked to the outside.
For the first time, Flair pulls out a weapon of his own and whacks the knee with a chair. Now the Figure Four goes on and Flair is perfectly allowed to grab the ropes. HHH taps but it doesn’t mean anything here. That draws an 8 with a shaky call from the referee that HHH was up at one point. A double clothesline puts both guys down and HHH rolls to the floor. The Game throws in some steps and clocks Flair in the face with them. Flair needs to scream less. Sometimes you should just be stunned and dazed you know?
HHH charges with the steps again but Flair hits a drop toehold to send HHH into the steps face first. That only gets a nine so they slug it out. Flair sends him into the ropes but ducks his head like an idiot, allowing HHH to hit the Pedigree……which only gets eight. HHH Pedigrees him AGAIN, but Flair is up at 8 and flips off HHH. A THIRD Pedigree gets nine, so HHH “hits” (Get better directors already. This is ridiculous) him in the back with the sledgehammer to finally keep Flair down for ten.
Rating: B+. Bad direction and cuts aside, this was a very solid brawl. They beat the tar out of each other with Flair trying as hard as he could to have one last great moment, but not being evil enough anymore to hang with the new guy in HHH. This was good stuff and thankfully it more or less ended HHH and Flair’s time on camera together.
Flair is taken out on a stretcher.
Buy the Bret Hart DVD! No really, this one is awesome.
Trish and Mickie do an online interview.
Orton gives Team Smackdown a pep talk but talks about Batista as the weak link. Batista shows up and the tune changes. He thinks that since he’s world champion, he should be leader. JBL says it should be him. Batista glares at him and JBL stammers a lot.
Here are Edge and Lita with something to say. Edge is Mr. MITB at this point but doesn’t have a match tonight. Edge talks about how his own talk show, called The Cutting Edge, is debuting soon. Now that we’ve got that covered, let’s talk to Dmitri Young. Edge makes fun of the Tigers for not being able to win the World Series and calls everyone here fat. He makes fun of the Detroit sports teams and now they give Dmitri Young (“Come here Mark Henry. Oh wait…”) a live mic. Young talks about Edge’s balls and lists off all of Detroit’s titles before saying Edge has none. This took seven minutes somehow.
We recap Angle vs. Cena. Basically it’s “I’m Kurt Angle and therefore better than you. NOW LET ME SHOUT EXACTLY WHAT I JUST SAID AGAIN!” Cena is like bring it man and whatever rhymes with man!
Raw World Title: John Cena vs. Kurt Angle
Daivari, Angle’s crony, is the guest referee. The YOU SUCKS from the crowd are censored because of some Bischoff ruling. Daivari is rubbing Angle’s shoulders during the intros. Oh and Cena is defending. The champ is here….right on the mat with Angle working on the leg. Cena comes back with an armdrag into an armbar and some shoulder blocks to send Kurt to the floor. Daivari won’t let Cena go after Angle and Joey is way more excited about it than anyone else. Isn’t Daivari doing what a referee is supposed to do anyway?
Back in and Cena hits some elbows and a release fisherman’s suplex for no count from Daivari. Cena goes to yell at him and is immediately caught in the ankle lock. Cena finally gets to the rope but Daivari kicks his hand off. The hold is broken and Cena spinebusts Angle before slapping Daivari a few times. Angle won’t let Daivari DQ Cena, so Cena knocks them both to the floor.
Kurt gets all fired up and slams Cena into the steps and hits an overhead belly to belly on the outside. A second referee comes out as Daivari is still down. Daivari would be a wrestler one day, so how did he get so much better at being able to take punishment? I’ve never gotten that. Anyway, Cena puts on a reverse waistlock but Cena comes back with a cross body for two. Angle comes back with a knee lift and Cena is in trouble.
The fans are ALL OVER Cena all of a sudden, with a huge Cena Sucks chant. Off to a chinlock with Angle holding the leg back as well. Cena finally comes back with a jawbreaker and a DDT to put both guys down. They slug it out with Cena taking over via some clotheslines. Cena initiates his finishing sequence and is set for the FU, but Angle clotheslines the replacement referee.
A low blow puts Cena down and Angle calls in another referee to count two on the Angle Slam. Angle superplexes Cena down for two but the moonsault misses. Cena loads up another FU but Angle grabs the referee to escape. An uppercut puts the referee down AGAIN and Kurt throws Daivari back in, who is apparently STILL out cold after about ten minutes, breaking Davey Boy Smith’s record from 1994. A Smackdown referee comes down but Angle yells at him, allowing Cena to DDT Daivari. Kurt comes in and walks into the FU for the pin.
Rating: C. This was WAY overbooked and Cena was in over his head with Angle, but it wasn’t bad or anything. Angle vs. Cena was supposed to be a huge feud but it never felt like anything all that special. Cena wasn’t ready for a real showdown with Angle yet but he would get a lot better over the next year or so though. The referee stuff was kind of stupid though, especially with Daivari being out cold for so long.
Eric Bischoff vs. Teddy Long
Yes this is real, yes it’s happening on PPV, yes we’re supposed to ignore Bischoff being a martial arts expert from WCW and thing Teddy might have a chance in a straight fight, and yes this is going to SUCK. Teddy has some network consultant with him named Palmer Cannon who never lasted long. They’re both GM’s if that wasn’t clear. Teddy poses a lot on the corner and we haven’t had any contact after a minute. Teddy dances a bit and Eric misses a kick. There’s more dancing and no contact still.
We do the exact same thing AGAIN before Eric chokes Teddy with his sash. There are two referees in there for no apparent reason. Eric chokes away but Teddy takes off his shoe and whacks Eric in the head. Bischoff goes to the throat to stop Teddy again…..and here’s the Boogeyman. If you’ve never seen him, picture Darth Maul from the first Star Wars prequel if he ate worms. He sneaks up on Eric and lays him out with a pumphandle slam, giving Teddy the pin.
Rating: S. Six minutes. This match took SIX MINUTES. The WWE owes me six minutes of my life back. John Cena vs. Kurt Angle for the WWE Championship can only get thirteen minutes but this gets SIX? Who in the world thought this was a good idea? At least it went by….no actually it didn’t go by fast. This won worst match of the year and I can’t argue at all.
Team Smackdown is coming to the ring and the Smackdown D-list guys cheer them on.
The Raw guys do the same thing.
We recap Raw vs. Smackdown. At a 3 hour special Raw called WWE Homecoming, there was going to be a Smackdown six man tag but Bischoff turned the lights out on them because he said they were inferior to Raw. This prompted a multiple PPV running feud where they kept invading each others’ shows, setting up a battle for supremacy here.
Team Raw vs. Team Smackdown
Shawn Michaels, Carlito, Chris Masters, Kane, Big Show,
Batista, Randy Orton, Rey Mysterio, Bobby Lashley, John Bradshaw Layfield
Show and Kane are tag champions, Batista is world champion but is injured due to Big Show and Kane attacking him over and over, and Lashley is undefeated at this point. This hasn’t been mentioned yet on the commentary for pretty obvious reasons, but Orton is replacing Eddie Guerrero who died about ten days before this. Shawn vs. Randy gets things going and it’s a very slow opening with both guys feeling the other out.
Orton gets thing going by slapping Shawn so Shawn literally slaps Orton down to the mat. Three times in about 30 seconds, Shawn takes Orton to the mat with a headlock, Orton grabs a headscissors to counter, and Shawn escapes. Randy charges into a boot in the corner but slams Shawn down to take over again. The match is starting slow but the bickering from the commentators is funny stuff, as they’re taking this rivalry personally.
Off to Masters who gets his eyes raked by Orton but the power game of Masters takes over. Lashley comes in to a reaction from the fans and they do the two power guys collide with each other. Bobby takes over with a slam but Masters clotheslines him down. Masters tries the Masterlock but Bobby easily blocks it. Carlito is pulled in and thrown around as well, culminating with a powerslam for two.
Off to Shawn to see what he can do with this monster, but Lashley slams him off the top. A suplex puts Shawn down so Carlito comes in sans tag and takes the Dominator. Shawn is about to take one as well, but Kane breaks it up and chokeslams Lashley to give Shawn the pin. Rey comes in next and Kane hits him in the back as well to give Shawn another advantage. Masters drops some elbows on Rey to keep him on the mat which is the right move.
A gorilla press drop puts Rey down again and here’s Kane who misses an elbow. Mysterio starts speeding things up and gets two off a standing moonsault. Kane comes up with a very easy counter by kicking a charging Rey in the face. Off to a bearhug as this is the longest segment of the match so far. Rey fights out of it and slides between Kane’s legs to make the tag to Batista.
Big Dave gets in some shots but the bandages all over his arm and chest are a target for Kane. Kane gets in a shot and everything breaks down, allowing Batista to hit a spinebuster on Kane for the elimination. Big Show chokeslams Batista for a very close two but Kane and Big Show double chokeslam Batista to put him out. JBL immediately tries the Clothesline on Show but gets grabbed by the throat. JBL kicks Show low, but gets caught jumping off the middle rope. That’s freaking SCARY power by Show. Show superkicks Orton down and LAUNCHES Rey into the corner.
Orton guillotines Show into the Clothesline from JBL who tags….Mysterio? The 619 sets up the RKO which sets up another Clothesline which sets up a seated senton from Rey for the elimination. Cool sequence here as the team all went after Show to get rid of him. Show would DESTROY Rey on a special Smackdown to get revenge. Shawn goes after JBL on the floor and gets thrown away in a fallaway slam.
To recap, it’s Mysterio, JBL and Orton vs. Shawn, Carlito and Masters. It’s Masters vs. Rey now with Masters getting two after sending Mysterio into the corner. Off to Carlito for a legdrop and chinlock for a few moments. Mysterio fights up and makes a blind tag to JBL who ENDS Carlito with a Clothesline to make it 3-2. Masters and JBL slug it out a bit but Rey tags himself in. JBL kicks Chris in the face to give his teammate an advantage, setting up a 619 and the springboard legdrop to take out Masters.
So it’s Shawn vs. Rey/Orton/JBL and Shawn is STILL down on the floor from the fallaway slam. Mysterio starts with Shawn and things go faster. Rey hits the 619 to send Shawn across the ring, but the West Coast Pop jumps right into the superkick ala Shelton Benjamin for the elimination. JBL comes in and tries the Clothesline but gets superkicked down AGAIN to make it Orton vs. Shawn. There were about fifteen seconds between the two pins.
The RKO and superkick both miss so Shawn dives on Orton on the floor to take him out. The fans want Taker who was promised to be here tonight. There are the forearm and superkick followed by some clotheslines. The top rope elbow hits Randy but Shawn can’t cover. JBL is still at ringside for some reason and he grabs a chair. Shawn loads up the superkick again but JBL shoves down the outside referee and misses a chair shot. The distraction lets Orton hit the RKO for the final pin.
Rating: B. This was a direct copy of Team Austin vs. Team Bischoff from two years ago, even down to the final participants, but the results were a bit inverted. Here, the part before the solo Shawn part was better but Shawn’s solo part wasn’t as good. Also, Batista running in was better than JBL’s chair stuff here. It’s still probably a better match overall, mainly due to the better opening part.
The low level Smackdown guys come out to put Orton on their shoulders…..and there’s a gong. We’ve got lights, we’ve got chanting, we’ve got druids carrying a casket, and a Dead Man coming out of said casket. Taker walks into the ring and beats up some jobbers as the roster bails. Orton is scared to death to end the show. Hell in a Cell for these two next month.
Overall Rating: B. This show is pretty much never talked about other than occasionally the main event and that’s a shame. This is an entertaining and solid show all around with the only bad match being a battle of the GM’s, and even that only runs six minutes. You have a bloodbath in HHH vs. Flair, a fun main event with entertaining commentary and some solid wrestling all around. Nothing is great, but if you’ve got two hours and forty five minutes to spare, check this out as it’s quality stuff.
Ratings Comparison
Booker T vs. Chris Benoit
Original: B
Redo: B-
Trish Stratus vs. Melina
Original: B
Redo: C-
HHH vs. Ric Flair
Original: B-
Redo: B+
John Cena vs. Kurt Angle
Original: B+
Redo: C
Theodore Long vs. Eric Bischoff
Original: O (For Oh I can’t think about this anymore)
Redo: S (For Six Minutes)
Team Smackdown vs. Team Raw
Original: B
Redo: B
Overall Rating
Original: B
Redo: B
I’m surprised by how much more I liked the girls and Cena vs. Angle. They’re good but they’re not that good. Still a solid show though.
Survivor Series Count-Up – 2004: That’s a Weird Main Event
Survivor Series 2004 Date: November 14, 2004
Location: Gund Arena, Cleveland, Ohio
Attendance: 7,500
Commentators: Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler, Michael Cole, Tazz
Aside from the matches mentioned already, there are two other major matches. First up we have Team Kurt Angle vs. Team Eddie Guerrero to continue their rivalry which started back at Wrestlemania XX. Angle couldn’t take the title from Eddie but became GM of Smackdown, vowing to make Eddie’s life miserable. On top of that we have Undertaker (once again the Dead Man) facing off with Heidenreich, Paul Heyman’s latest monster. Let’s get to it.
We open with a video about the seventeen years this show has run already.
The set looks cool here as it’s made of six screens which I guess will act as the Titantron tonight.
Cruiserweight Title: Spike Dudley vs. Rey Mysterio vs. Chavo Guerrero vs. Billy Kidman
Spike is defending and is a heel here. This is one fall to a finish. Kidman hurt Chavo on a Shooting Star Press and seemed to be proud of it, which resulted in a heel turn for him. The other good thing here is that they don’t have to tag. As usual, this doesn’t last long before things break down. Kidman and Spike form a quick alliance, only to have Kidman dropkick the champ out to the floor.
Rey sends Kidman to the floor and it’s off to Rey vs. Chavo, who are still friends at this point. Rey spins Chavo around with a headscissors before Spike sends Rey into the corner and stomps away with some screaming thrown in. Chavo comes back in and a double clothesline puts he and Spike down. With Kidman on the apron, Rey hits a hurricanrana to send him out to the floor in a cool looking spot.
Back in and Rey tries the sitout bulldog on Chavo but Guerrero throws him onto Kidman in a seated senton. Chavo dives on both of them, leaving Spike standing ta….short actually. Anyway the champ dives on all of them but they step aside to let him crash. Chavo finally gets his hands on Billy back in the ring but Spike comes back in to break up a pinfall attempt.
Rey misses a moonsault over Spike’s head and gets thrown to the floor as a result. We get a Tower of Doom with everyone minus Rey involved, so Rey comes in and tries to steal a pin. Rey charges at Kidman but gets caught in a BK Bomb (Sky High) for two but Chavo breaks up the Shooting Star. Spike hits a running headbutt to Rey’s ribs but the Dudley Dog is broken up. The 619 hits Spike but Billy breaks up the West Coast Pop. Chavo hits the Gory Bomb on Spike but Kidman hits a slingshot legdrop on Chavo. Rey takes out Kidman and Spike steals the pin on Chavo to retain.
Rating: B-. Not a great match or anything here but it was fine for an opener. Rey was insanely popular still but Spike keeping the title was a great way to tick off the fans. There’s nothing wrong with a heel winning, as long as the opener fires up the crowd, which this did. Good choice.
Heidenreich is getting fired up by Heyman when Paul goes to get his jacket. Snitsky, another creepy heel of the day, comes in. He says he likes Heidenreich’s poetry and Heidenreich likes what Snitsky does to babies (as in punting them into the crowd). There’s WAY too much deep breathing here. This was almost who Undertaker and Kane fought at Wrestlemania before the company woke up and stuck Orton against Undertaker instead.
Intercontinental Title: Shelton Benjamin vs. Christian
Shelton, a young, very athletic guy who used to be in a tag team, is defending but the Waterproof Blonde version of Christian’s theme makes him far more awesome. Shelton is at the point in his career when he’s about to get on one of the biggest rolls in years but it never went anywhere past the Intercontinental Title. The champ cranks on the arm to start before they head to the mat. Keeping in mind that Shelton was a legit All-American wrestler, he’s just fine being on the mat with Christian.
Christian cranks on the arm but Shelton drops to the mat and immediately nips up which looked great. It didn’t do anything but it looked great. Christian talks trash and gets punched in the face for his efforts. Shelton skins the cat before hitting a great looking springboard clothesline for two. A HARD chop slows Benjamin down and Christian talks some more trash. Shelton counters a monkey flip by casually landing on his feet and grabs an Oklahoma Roll for two.
We head to the floor for a quick distraction by Tomko (Christian’s bodyguard) but Christian gets punched in the face instead. Tomko tries to cheat again and this time the distraction is enough to let Christian get in a shot. Why that creepy little bas…..never mind. A cross body gets two for Shelton but Christian immediately puts him back down with a neckbreaker. Off to a chinlock (Tomko: “BREAK HIS NECK!”) by Christian and he launches Benjamin to the floor as he tries to break the hold.
Shelton comes back with a hard whip into the corner to put Christian down. A Russian legsweep gets two for the champ as does a slingshot reverse suplex (called a reverse fisherman’s suplex by JR). Benjamin misses a Stinger Splash and gets caught in a reverse DDT for two. Tomko slides the belt in (hitting the referee in the foot in the process) but Shelton kicks Christian in the face.
The referee sees Christian holding the belt, which lets Benjamin hit a top rope clothesline for two. As the belt is being put out, Tomko kicks Benjamin in the face for two. The Exploder Suplex (Benjamin’s finisher, a snap floatover T-Bone suplex) is countered but Benjamin kicks Tomko down. The Unprettier is countered into the Exploder for the pin to keep the title on Benjamin.
Rating: B. I really got into this match at the end even though Christian didn’t have much of a chance at winning. The Tomko and belt stuff didn’t help anything but they had to try to slow Shelton down a bit. Benjamin was in the beginning of a very long run with the belt that would last until June, which was the longest reign in about six years.
Really good match here as Christian put Shelton over strong. There’s a reason this guy basically had the world title waiting for him on a plate whenever he stepped up enough to take it, but that never happened for various reasons. Namely he just stopped trying and coasted on his reputation, but that’s another story.
Angle complains to Edge about something Edge wrote in his book about him. Kurt makes fun of Edge for never winning the World Title. They trade some insults before Kurt leaves and runs into Eugene, Eric Bischoff’s mentally slow nephew who just happened to be a talented wrestler. Eugene lists off (slowly) some of Angle’s accomplishments before singing the You Suck version of his theme song.
Team Angle vs. Team Guerrero
Kurt Angle, Carlito Caribbean Cool, Luther Reigns, Mark Jindrak
Eddie Guerrero, John Cena, Rob Van Dam, Big Show
Eddie and Angle have been feuding since Wrestlemania. Carlito, the son of a Puerto Rican legend, debuted and beat Cena for the US Title before injuring Cena in a nightclub (or having someone do it. The attacker was never revealed but it might have been Carlito’s buddy Jesus). Big Show is feuding with Reigns (an enforcer type character) and Jindrak (a very athletic guy who didn’t do much in America) and Angle for shaving his head, and Van Dam is there as a warm body. Got all that?
Before the bell, Cena chases Carlito and Jesus to the back and gets in a brawl with them. Carlito and Jesus steal a car and speed away, which counts as an elimination. Back at ringside there’s a big brawl until Show (on a bad ankle) pulls Jindrak into the ring. Here’s Cena back to the ring to make it 4-3. Off to Van Dam who hits a spin kick before it’s off to Eddie for the slingshot hilo, followed by Rolling Thunder from Van Dam.
Eddie suplexes Jindrak down and armdrags Reigns as he headscissors Jindrak in a cool move. Angle comes in to stop his team’s bleeding but it’s quickly back to Reigns for a bunch of backbreakers for two. Off to Jindrak for a full nelson but Eddie sends him into the buckle. Eddie dives for the corner but Angle literally tackles Guerrero to break it up. Kurt hits a belly to belly before bringing in Reigns for more stomping.
Off to a chinlock from Jindrak but Eddie eventually grabs a jawbreaker to escape. Angle again blocks the tag and puts on a front facelock. One thing to note here: the entire time the hold is on, Cena is reaching out for a tag and encouraging Eddie. It doesn’t mean much, but it helps things from getting really boring. Little things like that can make a big difference. Watch guys like Rock and Hogan when they’re on the apron in tag matches. They’re ALWAYS doing something, even if it’s minor like clapping. It can make a difference.
Jindrak comes in but Eddie knocks him away and it’s off to Van Dam. Rob goes off (Cole: “He’s supple!”) and hits an enziguri on Angle to set up the Five Star but Jindrak pulls him away. The Splash hits Jindrak, allowing Angle to roll up Rob (using the ropes) for the pin. Angle heads to the floor so Eddie rolls up the illegal Jindrak, using the ropes as well, for an elimination to make it 3-2 (Eddie/Show/Cena vs. Reigns/Angle).
Eddie tells Angle to bring it on and there go the straps. Eddie tags in Show, making Angle tag in Reigns. Reigns gets in one or two shots but a chokeslam beats him quickly. Kurt rolls through a chokeslam into the ankle lock but Show sends him through the ropes to escape. Angle starts to walk up the aisle but Van Dam is waiting on him. Kurt backs up while still looking at RVD, and backs into Show. He reaches up to see how tall what he backed into is and shakes his head. Show throws Kurt back in to face Cena (in for the first time legally) and it’s an FU and Frog Splash for the final elimination.
Rating: C+. This wasn’t a good match but it was entertaining, which is more than you got from almost all of last year’s show. I’m guessing Cena and Carlito were injured as they didn’t do anything for the most part. Angle was great here and the look on his face when he backed into Big Show always makes me chuckle. Fun match here, which is all you need sometimes.
Maven (the first Tough Enough winner and on Team Orton tonight in the biggest match of his career) offers to demonstrate his skills to Coach but Snitsky jumps Maven and busts him open. This would be how they would keep Maven out of a PPV main event for most of the match when they realized that he was in WAY over his head.
Video on Heidenreich vs. Undertaker, where Heidenreich is the latest guy to try to kill Undertaker at Paul Heyman’s direction. This was one of those matches where they were trying to make it seem like Undertaker was in trouble but Heidenreich comes off like the villain in the fifth direct to video sequel in a horror series that has overstayed its welcome by two movies.
Heidenreich vs. Undertaker
Heidenreich comes out in a straightjacket because he might attack more plants, as had been his custom in recent weeks. Undertaker does the big long entrance to get the crowd back into things. He stares at Heidenreich for a few moments before the beating begins. A charge in the corner runs into a Heidenreich elbow but the Dead Man will have none of this being on defense stuff. Undertaker works on the arm but a Heyman distraction lets Heidenreich crotch Undertaker to break up Old School. He crotches Undertaker against the post again and we head to the floor.
Heidenreich pounds away on Undertaker against the barricade while shouting that he can beat him. Undertaker shrugs that off again and hits the legdrop on the apron for two. Old School hits the second time followed by a modified Downward Spiral for two. A big boot misses Heidenreich in the corner and it’s time for more punching on the floor. This isn’t one of those matches where the fans are worried about Undertaker as I don’t think anyone bought Heidenreich as a real threat.
A kick to Undertaker’s face sets up a chinlock and a clothesline for two. Another clothesline stops Undertaker’s comeback but a suplex stops the stopping of the comeback. Heidenreich sends him to the apron but Undertaker stuns him on the top rope. Undertaker channels his inner Kane (he had the name first) and hits a top rope clothesline for two. Back in and Snake Eyes/the big boot takes Heidenreich down again.
The chokeslam is broken up and Heidenreich gets two off a Boss Man Slam. Then like an idiot, Heidenreich punches away in the corner while Undertaker arms are down. The obvious Last Ride only gets two though as Heidenreich grabs the rope. Heidenreich tries a sleeper but Undertaker is like boy please and suplexes out of it almost immediately. The chokeslam and Tombstone finish this quick.
Rating: D. Like I said at the end of the day, did ANYONE buy Heidenreich as a real threat to Undertaker? The guy just wasn’t that good and he came off as more silly than a serious threat. Not much to see here and Heidenreich never got higher than he did in this match. Undertaker would move on to a much better feud with Orton soon enough to try and make people forget about this mess.
Bischoff says Maven is out of the main event and if he allows Orton to add a replacement, HHH will complain and Eric will lose his vacation, which is the point of the main event.
We recap Trish vs. Lita, which is happening because….well who else are they going to fight? Lita got pregnant with Kane’s baby but lost it because of Snitsky. Trish made fun of Lita for being a sl**, having a dead baby, and of course for being fat.
Women’s Title: Trish Stratus vs. Lita
Trish is defending. Lita is all ticked off and punches Trish, who is coming in with a broken nose, as soon as she gets in. Trish gets pounded even more and they head to the floor where Trish goes into a table and gets cracked with a chair 80 seconds into the match for the DQ. This wasn’t much, but these two would main event Raw in a few weeks. I don’t mean a match that went on last and then they had the promo that closed the show. I mean they spent the whole show hyping up Trish Stratus vs. Lita as the main event and Lita won the title and celebrated to end the show. It was quite the moment and a big deal.
Teddy comes in to congratulate Team Guerrero while Show is in a towel. Show hands the towel to Teddy and walks off. Cena: “THAT’S DISGUSTING!” Teddy makes Cena vs. Carlito for the title on Thursday. Why is Cena in his underwear?
We recap Booker T vs. JBL. Booker pinned JBL in a tag match but JBL says Booker isn’t in his league. Booker beat up Orlando Jordan (JBL’s lackey) and pinned him to earn the title shot. There really isn’t much to this one.
Smackdown World Title: John Bradshaw Layfield vs. Booker T
JBL is defending and Booker’s big yellow gloves don’t really do him any favors. Feeling out process to start as they trade really basic stuff for the first minute and a half. Booker knocks him to the floor and JBL gets the advantage coming back in. Back to the floor and Booker gets sent over the announce table. As they head back in, Jordan gets in a cheap shot to give JBL two. Still in first gear at best.
JBL hooks in a cobra clutch followed by an elbow drop and a chinlock. After that VICIOUS offense, Booker easily fights back and hits a superplex to put both guys down. Orlando gets in some more cheap shots on the floor but JBL walks into a Book End out there to give Booker his first real advantage. Back in and a missile dropkick gets two for Booker. They’re into second gear now but it’s just not an interesting match.
Booker goes up but another Jordan distraction lets JBL avoid a Houston Hangover (flip legdrop). Another sleeper by JBL is escaped but Jordan breaks up the ax kick. JBL hits a quick DDT for two and there goes the referee. Jordan comes in and pounds on Booker but Josh Matthews comes out to help Booker for reasons that aren’t important enough to explain. JBL destroys Josh but there’s the side kick to JBL. The ax kick takes him down as well but Jordan takes out the referee. Booker hits the Book End on Jordan but JBL clocks Booker with the belt to retain.
Rating: D. This just didn’t work. Basically they were redoing the HHH/Flair run from 2003 with Jordan interfering every ten seconds and the matches sucking and the crowd groaning when JBL retains the title. JBL is a hilarious commentator and a solid main event jobber, but the guy was painfully boring as champion.
Batista and HHH are ready for the main event.
We recap the main event which is Team HHH vs. Team Orton. Team Orton has united to oppose HHH’s tyranny and the winning team gets to run Raw for a week each. Snitsky has said that when Team HHH wins, he’s coming for HHH’s World Title, and Edge has said the same. Batista has been looking at the title too so HHH is rather nervous. This gets the music video treatment for the night. Maven and Snitsky stick out like two shattered thumbs in this whole thing.
Team HHH vs. Team Orton
HHH, Edge, Batista, Gene Snitsky
Randy Orton, Chris Jericho, Chris Benoit, Maven
HHH is World Champion and Maven isn’t here due to the earlier attack. It’s interesting to think that it would be Batista rather than Orton that would rise up out of this match as the real star. Not that Orton isn’t a star, but Batista was without a doubt the biggest star in the company in 2005 and part of 2006. For some reason Edge comes out last. Benoit vs. Edge to start which is fine with me. Benoit destroys Edge and knocks him to the floor to start but it’s off to Orton vs. Snitsky.
Orton pounds him down with ease before it’s Jericho in off the tag. HHH comes in but Jericho immediately elbows him down and brings in Orton to no response. Orton can’t challenge for the World Title because of some stipulation due to losing to Flair. What a great way to make sure the fans get behind him there right? It doesn’t matter how awesome he is because he’s not getting a shot at anything.
Batista comes in and has some better luck with Randy, firing off shoulders into the corner. Edge is in now and he mocks Orton’s pose in an often done bit. Edge draws in Jericho for no apparent reason, but it allows Orton to clothesline Edge back down. Off to Benoit as the fans are dead for this match. It couldn’t be because Orton is a lame duck and everyone knows it of course. Benoit cleans house and suplexes everyone in sight. Edge prevents a swan dive onto HHH, so HHH suplexes Edge onto HHH and swan dives both of them for two.
Everything breaks down even more and HHH gets caught in the Sharpshooter by Benoit. Snitsky makes the save and Edge gets caught in the Crossface. This time Batista saves, allowing HHH to Pedigree Benoit and give Edge the pin for the elimination. Jericho comes in to pound away on Edge but HHH and Snitsky get in an argument. Batista comes to HHH’s defense but has to break up the Walls on HHH instead.
Flair trips up Jericho and gets ejected for his efforts. Flair walks up the aisle but comes back a second later to allow Batista to kill Orton and Jericho. There’s the spinebuster to Jericho but Orton hits Big Dave with the belt, allowing Jericho to hit the enziguri on Batista for the pin. Jericho hits the springboard dropkick to knock Snitsky onto HHH on the floor but Batista kills Jericho with the clothesline before leaving.
It’s Snitsky vs. Jericho with Snitsky choking away. Edge comes in and pounds on his fellow Canadian but gets caught in the sleeper drop to put both guys down. Orton gets shoved to the floor and Edge and HHH double team him for a bit. Jericho DDTs Snitsky down….and here comes Maven. He goes right after Snitsky and takes him down with a forearm as things seem to go into slow motion.
Maven bulldogs HHH down and is all fired up, but Snitsky kills him with a chair shot for a DQ. HHH covers the dead Maven for the easy elimination. Edge keeps covering Jericho but can’t get more than a bunch of two’s. It’s Orton/Jericho vs. HHH/Edge now. A spear puts Jericho out and it’s 2-1 (HHH/Edge vs. Orton) with Orton in trouble. Orton says bring it on and is promptly beaten down in the corner.
Edge suplexes Orton down and holds him while HHH pounds away. Orton punches at HHH but gets DDT’d down for two. Edge comes back in and gets slammed down before getting dropkicked into HHH on the apron. That gets two off a rollup from Orton but he walks into a HHH spinebuster. We get the required heel miscommunication as Edge spears HHH down and walks into an RKO for the pin. It’s down to Orton vs. HHH with the champ hitting Orton low as Edge leaves. The Pedigree is countered into the RKO for the final pin.
Rating: B. The match was good stuff but as I said earlier, Orton pinning HHH doesn’t mean anything. Somehow Orton would get a title match at the Rumble where HHH would destroy Orton once and for all. I think I’m the only person on the planet that liked Orton’s first main event face run so I dug this at the time. It turned out they got lucky with Batista, but the Orton face run could have been more if HHH hadn’t hacked its legs off.
Overall Rating: B-. There’s some dull stuff here, but the good stuff really is solid as you can see the new generation ready to burst through. The main event was entertaining stuff and the fans did react to Orton pinning HHH clean. The Smackdown side of things was pretty lame but other than that, this was a solid show and I was digging it at the end. Good show.
Ratings Comparison
Spike Dudley vs. Billy Kidman vs. Chavo Guerrero vs. Rey Mysterio
Original: C+
Redo: B-
Shelton Benjamin vs. Christian
Original: B
Redo: B
Team Guerrero vs. Team Angle
Original: D
Redo: C+
Undertaker vs. Heidenreich
Original: D
Redo: D
Trish Stratus vs. Lita
Original: N/A
Redo: N/A
John Bradshaw Layfield vs. Booker T
Original: F
Redo: D
Team Orton vs. Team HHH
Original: B-
Redo: B
Overall Rating
Original: C-
Redo: B-
In a rare instance, I liked this a lot better the second time around.
Survivor Series Count-Up – 2002: It’s Still Annoying
Survivor Series 2002 Date: November 17, 2002
Location: Madison Square Garden, New York City, New York
Attendance: 17,930
Commentators: Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler, Michael Cole, Tazz
Aside from Lesnar, a lot of the roster for this show is the same. However, there are several wrestlers that have debuted for the company but aren’t on the show tonight. Over the summer, Batista, Randy Orton and John Cena all debuted and most of them made a strong impact upon arriving. We’ll be hearing more from them in the future but it’s not their time yet. Let’s get to it.
The intro video is almost all about the Chamber.
Dudley Boys/Jeff Hardy vs. 3 Minute Warning/Rico
This is an elimination tables match and it’s Bubba and Spike Dudley instead of D-Von due to the Brand Split. Spike and Bubba got put through the same table on Raw Monday to set this up. 3 Minute Warning (Jamal and Rosey) are two very large Samoans and Rico is their athletic stylist. The Dudleys and Jeff clear the ring to start and Spike is thrown into the arms of the Samoans. It’s Bubba vs. Rico in the ring at the moment, because putting Spike and Jeff against Jamal and Rosey is a great idea right? Bubba chops Rico HARD in the corner before things settle down.
What’s Up hits Jamal and we get to the tagging section of the match before everything breaks down again. Bubba tells Jeff to get the tables but Rosey runs over Bubba after Bubba sets up a table in the corner. A BIG backdrop puts Jeff on the floor and Rosey rams Spike’s head into a table. Rosey misses a charge and drives himself through a table in the corner but that doesn’t count because it wasn’t someone else putting him through.
Jeff tries a top rope dive at Rosey but literally bounces off. Rico brings in another table and gets caught in a Dudley Dog, but 3 Minute Warning catches him in a double powerbomb to put Spike through the table instead. Jeff and Bubba get slammed down but Bubba knocks Rosey off the top and Jeff sends Rico flying into a cameraman. Bubba pounds away but Rico hits a spinwheel kick to take his head off. Rico could go in the ring make no mistake.
Rosey and Jeff go out into the crowd and there’s a table out there with them. Well of course there is. Jeff is put on said table as Bubba gets kicked in the face by Rico. Jamal misses a splash and crushes Rico, allowing Bubba to Bubba Bomb Jamal and go to save Jeff. With Bubba’s help, Jeff goes up to the top of an entrance and hits a BIG Swanton through Rosey through the table to make it 2-2.
Back in the ring Jamal has Bubba on a table ready for a Rico moonsault, but he looks hesitant to launch. He looks over his shoulder and shouts “C’MON JEFF!” before staggering. THEN Jeff shakes the ropes and Rico crotches himself. Not the best response but that’s on Jeff more than Rico. Bubba tries a belly to back superplex through the table but Jamal moves it away. Jeff hits Whisper in the Wind to Jamal and follows it with a dropkick.
Hardy goes to the floor to get another table which he throws at Jamal. Jeff tries to run the railing but Jamal throws the table at Jeff, who goes flying through it. That doesn’t count which I can kind of agree with for a change. Jamal puts Jeff on another table and hits a HUGE splash off the top to eliminate Jeff. That looks awesome. Bubba beats on Rico in the ring but Jamal saves his sideburned buddy. Jamal goes up to try a top rope hurricanrana (I guess) on Bubba, only to get caught in a HUGE powerbomb through the table to get us down to one on one.
It’s Rico vs. Bubba with the former pounding away and pulling in another table. Rosey comes back in but Bubba pounds away on him too. Now Jamal is in there too and it’s D-VON to the rescue! He’s on Smackdown at this point so this is a big deal as people really didn’t jump from roster to roster. 3D puts Rico through the table to end this.
Rating: B-. That’s likely high but this was what you want to open a show. It helps a lot that this was a fifteen minute match instead of like six minutes like they are on Raw. This was fun and the pop for the reunion of the Dudleys (which would be permanent) was a feel good moment. Good stuff here and a good choice to open things up, especially in New York City.
Stacy is at the World (WWF New York) looking great. She introduces Saliva who is doing a mini-concert at the club. They perform Always here to eat up a few minutes and we get a video about the remaining matches.
RVD is stretching before the Chamber.
Cruiserweight Title: Jamie Noble vs. Billy Kidman
Jamie (white trash from a trailer park) is defending and has Nidia (Tough Enough winner) with him. Kidman (talented cruiserweight from WCW) grabs two very fast rollups for two each and make that four in the first 30 seconds. Jamie bails to the floor but Kidman throws him right back in. Noble comes back with a neckbreaker and it’s off to a bow and arrow. Kidman gets thrown to the floor and Noble hits a suicide dive. Tazz: “I think Noble has something up his sleeve, but he’s not wearing a shirt so he has no sleeve.”
Back in and Kidman speeds things up with a back elbow and a dropkick followed by an AA into a backbreaker for two. A Falcon’s Arrow gets two for Noble so Kidman loads up a belly to back suplex position but he slams Noble down face first instead. Kidman loads up the Shooting Star but Noble bails to the floor. That’s fine with Billy so he dives on Noble out there to take the champ down again.
Back in and Nidia distracts Kidman but gets knocked off the apron by Kidman. The BK Bomb (Low Down) gets two for Kidman as does a Tiger Bomb for Noble. They go up top and Kidman hits a sitout inverted DDT. That was pretty awesome looking but it only gets two. Noble hits an elevated DDT for two out of the corner so Kidman hits an enziguri to take over again. Billy loads up the Shooting Star but a Nidia distraction….only delays Kidman as he hits the Shooting Star for the pin and the title.
Rating: B-. These two got going good and strong at the end which is exactly what you want from a match like this. When you can get into the area of a match where it’s one big move after another and you’re just waiting on one of them to stay down, that’s a great sign. The Shooting Star looked great too. This wasn’t a masterpiece or anything but it was solid.
Angle and Benoit are in the back and Angle is incensed that Kidman could win a title. If he can win, then so can they, as long as Benoit stays out of the captain’s way. Benoit gets in his face but Angle says they should be friends to the end. Benoit offers a handshake but Angle says no way. Angle: “I don’t shake hands! Tag team partners hug!”
Victoria (new Diva) is still psycho here and looking in a mirror. Then she thinks it’s Trish and goes nuts.
We recap Trish vs. Victoria. Victoria is batty and claims that it’s because she and Trish used to work together as fitness models, but Trish slept her way to the top. Tonight it’s about revenge in a hardcore match.
Women’s Title: Victoria vs. Trish Stratus
Hardcore rules here and Trish is defending in a rematch after she beat Victoria last month. Victoria immediately chokes her with Trish’s coat before getting a broom out of one of the trashcans on each post. Trish jumps the broom but Victoria takes her down almost immediately. Victoria chokes her with the broom in the corner but gets flipped to the mat.
Now Trish finds a trashcan lid but Victoria knocks the lid into her head with the broom. We head to the floor and Trish gets whipped HARD into the trashcan. Back in and Victoria hits her slingshot legdrop for two. The challenger puts a trashcan in between the top and middle rope but Trish grabs her legs and slingshots Victoria’s head into the can. Trish sets up an ironing board in the corner and whips Victoria into it for two.
It’s kendo stick time with Victoria taking a beating. She gets a boot up in the corner though and BLASTS Trish with a trashcan lid. Victoria has a bloody nose and sits on the middle rope, allowing Trish to try a hurricanrana out of the corner. Victoria counters into a kind of Boston Crab position, but Trish does a big situp and hits Victoria in the head with a can lid.
That only stuns her though so Trish BLASTS her in the head with a trashcan lid again to knock Victoria off the ropes and out to the floor. Victoria gets a mirror from under the ring but Trish superkicks her down. Chick Kick gets two for Trish and a bulldog gets the same. Victoria rolls to the floor and pulls out a fire extinguisher to blast Trish in the face. A followup suplex of all things is enough to give Victoria the pin and the title.
Rating: B. This was AWESOME with both chicks beating the tar out of each other. The story of the match worked really well too with Trish trying to wrestle her way out of trouble against a monster that wanted to hurt her no matter what. This worked really well and is one of the most intense Divas matches you’ll ever see.
Booker is getting ready.
Bischoff brags about the Chamber for a bit. Big Show comes up and says he’ll show Eric why trading him to Smackdown was a bad idea.
Heyman is worried that Brock can’t beat Big Show. Lesnar has legitimately injured ribs due to Show hurting him at a house show.
We recap Show vs. Lesnar. Lesnar beat Undertaker in the Cell last month, so Show beat up Undertaker to make himself the next challenger. Even Heyman says Brock can’t beat him.
Smackdown World Title: Big Show vs. Brock Lesnar
Lesnar is defending here and is mostly a face now. It’s on in a hurry as the fans are behind Lesnar. Show gets in a shot to the ribs in the corner and launches Brock across the ring. Brock is all like BRING IT ON and grabs a double leg to take Show down. They head to the floor and Brock gets rammed into the post. Back in and Brock pounds away before hitting something like a belly to back suplex. Show misses a charge and Brock “hits” a German, which means Show lands on Brock’s head. Brock tries an F5 but Show knees him in the ribs.
The referee gets bumped and Brock THROWS Big Show down with an overhead belly to belly. Heyman tosses in a chair and Brock cracks Show over the head with it. There’s the F5 and a new referee but Heyman pulls the referee out of the ring. This makes no sense and I’ll get to why in a second. Lesnar figures out what’s going on and gives chase, but charges right into a pair of chair shots to the ribs. Show chokeslams Brock onto the chair for the pin and the title. That’s Brock’s first ever loss.
Rating: D+. Most of that is for Lesnar’s INSANE power. Here’s why this match ticks me off: Lesnar had to get the title taken off of him because of injury. That’s fine. So they pick BIG SHOW to take it from him? This is the same idea as Nash beating Goldberg: you have an unstoppable monster and you take the title off of him for the sake of this veteran? You have Angle, Benoit, Eddie Guerrero and Edge on the Smackdown roster and you pick BIG SHOW? Now to be fair Angle got the title in a month, but why not just cut out the middle man and make a new star?
As for why Heyman’s turn makes no sense, the whole idea of the match was that Heyman didn’t think Lesnar could suplex, F5 or beat Big Show. He did the first two things and had Show beat until Heyman turned. Heyman is a lot of things, but he’s always been someone that knows what kind of a monster he’s got and sticks with them to the end. This is out of character for him, especially when an injured Brock had proven he could beat Show. So on top of being a bad match with bad booking, it makes no sense. Nice job WWE.
Show and Heyman immediately bail.
We recap the triple threat Tag Team Title match. Benoit and Angle beat Rey and Edge in the match of the year at No Mercy in a tournament final. The new champions argued over who is team captain and have to work together or they’re suspended. Edge and Mysterio won the titles on Smackdown in 2/3 falls match. Stephanie threw in Los Guerreros because these are the Smackdown Six and you can’t have just four of them together, even though we’ve had that for months. Not that I’m complaining though, because this is going to be AWESOME.
Smackdown Tag Titles: Edge/Rey Mysterio vs. Kurt Angle/Chris Benoit vs. Los Guerreros
Edge and Mysterio are champions and this is under elimination rules. It’s Mysterio vs. Benoit to start which is fine with me. Benoit hits a HARD chop but gets caught in a hurricanrana and a flapjack to give Rey what will likely be a short lived advantage. Off to Edge for a double hiptoss before Kurt gets the tag and a big pop. Chavo punches Angle in the back of the head and apparently that’s a tag.
Chavo gets shouldered down but nips up immediately. Off to Mysterio vs. Eddie which is one of those pairings that works no matter what. A headscissors takes Eddie down and it’s off to Kurt to face the masked man. They’re going very fast paced so far. Angle misses a charge into the post but Rey takes too much time on the top and gets run over by Kurt. The Olympian tags in the Canadian who suplexes Rey down for two.
Back to Angle who suplexes Rey down and gets in a cheap shot on Edge. The Angle Slam is countered but Angle clotheslines Rey down instead. Back to Chris as Tazz talks about Los Guerreros not wanting to get in yet. The battling partners tag in again so Angle can put on a front facelock. Rey fights up after about a minute in the hold and kicks Kurt in the face to take him down.
There’s the hot tag to Edge who cleans house with a bunch of suplexes. Eddie comes in and goes to the floor with Rey. Edge misses the spear and gets caught in a Crossface and ankle lock AT THE SAME TIME. Mysterio breaks both parts of the hold up and Chavo pulls Angle to the floor. Rey dives on both of them and Benoit Germans Edge but Eddie comes in off the top to sunset flip Benoit, sending Edge flying in a German for two each. Eddie gets suplexed to the floor with his head smashing into the apron on the way down.
Benoit rolls more Germans on Edge (Is it any wonder why he needed neck surgery five months after this?) and Eddie hits the Frog Splash on Edge but Benoit hits the Swan Dive on Eddie. Angle Slam and Ankle lock to Eddie while Benoit Crossfaces Edge. Chavo hits Benoit with a belt and throws it to Angle. Benoit thinks Angle hit him and Mysterio dropkicks Chris into Angle. Angle and Rey go to the floor and Edge spears Benoit for the elimination. Absolutely amazing sequence there which NEVER STOPPED.
Angle and Benoit destroy Edge and Rey before leaving. They lay out Los Guerreros too for fun. Eddie vs. Edge keeps the match going and Eddie suplexes the Canadian down before it’s off to Chavo. Chavo pounds away on Edge as Los Guerreros double team. We get down to a much more standard tag team formula with Edge playing Ricky Morton. Edge finally comes back with a double clothesline and it’s off to Rey.
Things speed up again with Rey flying all over the place and hitting a headscissors to put Chavo down. Edge spears both guys down and launches Rey up to hurricanrana Eddie off the top. That’s another awesome sequence. There’s the 619 to Eddie but Chavo hits Rey in the back to break up the West Coast Pop. Eddie puts on the Lasso From El Paso (a Boston Crab/Sharpshooter hybrid) for the tap and the titles.
Rating: B+. This was a match that felt like it got hacked to death. If you give these guys another 15 minutes (the match ran 20) and take away the belt shots, the match gets a lot better. The first half, as in before the first elimination, is INCREDIBLE. The stuff after that though is good but standard. Still though, these guys were the future of the company and it was a good sign to see them. Combine that with three guys named Batista, Orton and Cena that had debuted earlier in the year and you’ve got the next five years of WWE.
Christopher Nowitski (a Harvard graduate from Tough Enough) is here to make fun of New York in a really dull promo. Matt Hardy comes out to yell at him before blasting New York as well. The mouth running goes on even longer until FINALLY Scott Steiner debuts and murders them. Somehow this took nearly eight minutes. Steiner would go on to have perhaps the two worst PPV World Title matches in recorded history against HHH before being shunted down the card.
Shawn Michaels says he believes in himself but we get RNN BREAKING NEWS! It’s Randy Orton, who has a bad shoulder. He says there’s no new damage to his bad shoulder due to an extra pillow on the plane. This was the WAY over the top deal that Orton was doing which first turned him heel. I loved it but it got annoying fast, which is the right idea.
We recap the Elimination Chamber. HHH is the official WORLD CHAMPION OF EVERYTHING but Shawn beat him at Summerslam and wants a rematch. Bischoff wants to top the Cell so here’s his latest idea. The rules are mostly simple: two guys start and there are four more in individual pods. After five minutes there’s a new guy introduced and it’s elimination rules. The winner is world champion. The other four guys are there because they’re the biggest stars on Raw. This video is set to Always again and they’re not even trying to hide that this is mostly about HHH vs. Shawn.
HHH says that he’s awesome and he’ll keep the title.
Eric comes out and walks through the Chamber to explain everything I just said. Apparently the glass is bulletproof. This is the first time the Chamber had been seen and I believe the first time the rules have been explained.
Raw World Title: Kane vs. Chris Jericho vs. HHH vs. Shawn Michaels vs. Booker T vs. Rob Van Dam
Jericho is a Tag Team Champion with Christian, but the cool part here is that as he comes out, Saliva does his theme song live at WWF New York. HHH is defending of course. Shawn’s tights are….brown. This is one of those decisions that no one ever quite got and he was made fun of extensively for them apparently. I mean…..BROWN? Mankind wore brown for crying out loud. The wide shot of the Chamber really does look cool. Anyway the entrances take a long time and RVD vs. HHH gets us going.
Van Dam hits a spinwheel kick to take HHH down but walks into a facebuster. The Pedigree is countered into a backdrop over the top to hit the cage outside the ring. JR’s statements about the Chamber are already nuts as he says it has no soul or conscience. As in the pieces of steel and metal. Anyway, HHH is rammed into the cage over and over to bust him open and Van Dam hits Rolling Thunder over the top rope to land on HHH on the cage. There’s a floor made of cage surrounding the ring that is level with the mat if that wasn’t clear.
Van Dam goes up on one of the pods but his flip dive mostly hits the floor instead of HHH. Back in the ring and HHH gets stomped down in the corner as Jericho is added in as the third man. Van Dam immediately kicks him down and it’s five minutes until the next entrant. A cartwheel into a moonsault gets two on Jericho and they head outside the ring as well. In the first famous spot in the Chamber’s history, Van Dam jumps off the top rope, misses Jericho, and grabs onto the cage like Spider-Man before spinning back around to cross body Jericho.
HHH gets back up and hits the knee to the face of Van Dam which gives Jericho a two count. HHH and Jericho double team RVD before Chris tells Shawn to suck it. Van Dam’s back gets rammed into the cage wall some more and Jericho talks a lot of trash. Rob’s back goes into the cage over and over and we head back in to the ring. There’s a spin kick to put Jericho down as Booker T is in fourth.
Booker quickly clears the ring and we get a Spinarooni before Van Dam fights Booker one on one. Booker gets in some shots to Rob but walks into the stepover kick to give Van Dam control again. HHH gets back up and takes Van Dam down, only to get caught by the scissors kick from Booker. The next big spot of the match is Van Dam going up to the top of the pod and hitting the Five Star on HHH, with Van Dam’s knee hitting HHH’s throat, severely (and legitimately) injuring HHH’s windpipe. Since HHH can’t get up right now to eliminate Van Dam, Booker hits a missile dropkick to take Van Dam out.
Booker grabs a quick cover on HHH but only gets two. Jericho goes after Booker but gets caught in an Alabama Slam for his efforts. Kane comes in fifth and goes off on Booker and Jericho as HHH lays on the outside. Jericho gets launched face first into the cage wall and is then thrown through the bulletproof, yes BULLETPROOF, glass. This would become a running joke in the Chamber over the years.
JR says the Chamber has no soul or conscience again just to hammer home the point. Kane chokeslams Booker and Jericho adds the Lionsault to take Booker out and get us down to four guys. A Kane suplex gets two on Jericho as we’re waiting on Shawn to come in. HHH goes up top for no apparent reason and gets slammed down ala Flair. Jericho missile dropkicks Kane down and here’s HBK.
HHH is down in the corner of course so Shawn can only beat on Kane and Jericho. There’s the forearm to Kane but no nipup, leaving everyone down at the moment. Kane whips Shawn HARD into the corner where Shawn flips upside down. There’s a chokeslam for all three remaining guys not named Kane but instead of covering, Kane loads up a Tombstone on HHH. Shawn superkicks Kane down but he sits up. The Pedigree and Lionsault finally put Kane out and we’re down to three.
Shawn gets double teamed by HHH and Jericho and it’s time for Chris to dance. A few rams into the cage bust Shawn open. Jericho talks more trash and HHH walks around a lot. Shawn tries to fight back but his piledriver on the cage is countered to backdrop his bad back onto the cage again. There’s the Lionsault….for two.
Shawn comes back with a moonsault press to Jericho for two before putting Jericho in the Walls. HHH finally comes back from getting popcorn or something with a DDT to Shawn. Jericho and HHH finally get in the argument you were expecting and the fight is on. Jericho jumps out of the corner and lands in the Pedigree, but Jericho counters into the Walls. While holding HHH, Shawn kicks Jericho’s head off and it’s down to one on one.
So it’s Shawn, bloodied and injured and in his second match in four years, against an also injured HHH in the main event at Madison Square Garden. The spinebuster puts Shawn down and HHH backdrops him over the top. Shawn sends HHH into the cage but when Shawn tries to Pedigree HHH on the steel, HHH counters into a slingshot through the cage again.
Back in the ring all that gets two and it’s time for the slugout. A facebuster puts Shawn down and it’s another clothesline to put him onto the outside. The Pedigree on the steel is countered into another slingshot into the Chamber wall. Back into the ring and Shawn drops the elbow off the top of the pod. The Superkick is countered into the Pedigree and, say it with me, Shawn kicks out at two. Another Pedigree is countered into a backdrop, followed by the Sweet Chin Music to give Shawn the title.
Rating: D+. I’ve mellowed on this match in the last few years to the point where I’m not mad about it anymore. However, it’s still one of those matches where you look at it and say really. As in REALLY? We’re supposed to buy that Shawn can survive ALL of that and still win the title? You have to keep in mind this isn’t the Shawn who was having the match of the year for like five years running. No one expected him to go on as long as he did. At this point, making it to Wrestlemania would have been impressive.
That’s where this match loses it for me: we’re supposed to buy that Shawn is so great, so amazing, and so tough that he can basically walk off the street and be better than four of the top guys in the business? There comes a point where my suspension of disbelief is cut off and I can’t buy this anymore. We passed that at Summerslam, making this even more ridiculous. This match is also the reason we had to sit through the AWFUL match at Armageddon, where HHH and Shawn got to waste 40 minutes of our time by barely being able to move.
In short, this is way more than I can accept as far as the match being realistic. In wrestling, you have to accept that some stuff is ridiculous. That’s called suspending disbelief. However, there comes a point where that’s not the case any longer. It’s unrealistic in wrestling terms to accept that Shawn can survive all this and win the title. This was pure selfishness from Shawn and HHH, which would get WAY worse in the future. HHH wouldn’t make a new star for over a YEAR when he put Benoit over at Wrestlemania in the same arena.
As for the rest of the match, it’s acceptable, but WAY too long. The Chamber matches need to go about thirty minutes instead of the forty this one went. The last seventeen minutes here, as in the amount of time after Kane is eliminated, are REALLY repetitive and while they had good drama, they needed to be cut. Booker, RVD, Jericho and Kane were all there to fill in spaces and be there for Shawn and HHH to bounce off of. I don’t hate the match, but it really doesn’t work all that well.
Confetti falls to end the show.
Overall Rating: C+. The show overall is pretty solid actually but the main event is a good sized letdown. The Show/Lesnar stuff I went on about enough, but other than those two things the card is pretty solid. The triple threat tag is good stuff but the No Mercy match is even better. This show is worth checking out, but you won’t be thrilled by the Chamber.
Ratings Comparison
Dudley Boys/Jeff Hardy vs. Rico/3 Minute Warning
Original: B
Redo: B-
Billy Kidman vs. Jamie Noble
Original: C+
Redo: B-
Victoria vs. Trish Stratus
Original: C-
Redo: B
Big Show vs. Brock Lesnar
Original: D-
Redo: D+
Los Guerreros vs. Kurt Angle/Chris Benoit vs. Edge/Rey Mysterio
Original: B
Redo: B+
Shawn Michaels vs. HHH vs. Booker T vs. Rob Van Dam vs. Kane vs. Chris Jericho
Original: B
Redo: D+
Overall Rating
Original: B-
Redo: C+
Dang that’s a big swing on the Chamber. I don’t remember liking it that much the first time.
Smackdown Date: June 6, 2002
Location: Cox Convention Center, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Attendance: 6,000
Commentators: Michael Cole, Tazz
We’re two and a half weeks away from King of the Ring and it looks like we’re coming up on Hulk Hogan vs. Kurt Angle and HHH challenging the Undertaker for the WWE World Title. Neither of those are exactly interesting but I’ll take it over Hogan being in the main event again. We also get to find out where Edge goes from here after getting a pretty decisive win in his feud with Kurt. Let’s get to it.
Most of the roster is in the ring. Vince comes out and says the winner gets a title shot at King of the Ring. Just in case the next challenger wasn’t clear when Undertaker beat HHH up last week. This is another segment that didn’t need to air. Just have the ring announcer say this is for a title shot and then the announcers can repeat it. Vince: “The battle royal begins NOW!” So they’re not waiting until later and bringing everyone back out?
Battle Royal
D-Von, Lance Storm, Test, Val Venis, Albert, Faarooq, Kidman, Randy Orton, Hardcore Holly, Chavo Guerrero, Christian, Hurricane, Godfather, Al Snow, Mark Henry, HHH, Hulk Hogan, Chris Jericho, Hugh Morrus, Kurt Angle
Godfather, in his final match with the company, and Faarooq are thrown out early on to clear some space. D-Von follows them out and that’s got to be racist somehow. Test gets rid of Kidman to avoid an Affirmative Action issue and Christian throws Venis out. Christian is eliminated, followed by HHH being thrown through the ropes for a double beating by Test and Storm, neither of whom have been eliminated either.
Orton and Jericho go out next with Henry eliminating Storm and Chavo a few seconds later. A chokeslam to Angle is quickly countered and there go Hurricane and Hugh Morrus. Angle stays hot by getting rid of Albert and throwing Holly through the ropes. Henry is tossed as well and we’re down to Holly, Test, Angle, Jericho, HHH and Hogan. HHH knees Angle in the face and Holly actually throws Kurt out. So Holly is the latest veteran getting a push? Maybe, but he certainly does get a big boot from Test to get us down to four.
The evil Canadians double team our resident superheroes for all of five seconds before Jericho and Test are thrown out, leaving us with the big showdown. We get the staredown and Hogan rips off the shirt. Wouldn’t HHH benefit from kicking him while his arms are busy? Instead HHH hits a Cactus Clothesline and we’ve got two winners.
Rating: D-. This was bad even by battle royal standards with little doubt about who was winning. Why Hogan is still anywhere near the main event scene is beyond me as this run has been one of the biggest disasters in a long time. I get why they wouldn’t want to announce Hogan vs. HHH all over again but was there no better way to do this?
Post break Vince comes on screen to say he’s called Undertaker, who doesn’t care who he faces at King of the Ring. Therefore, there’s going to be a regular #1 contenders match later tonight, making that whole battle royal entirely pointless.
Angle thinks it’s Screw Kurt Angle Month and wants to fight Holly tonight. I get the idea of elevating people, but they’re elevating the same characters who have been around for years. Val Venis is still Val Venis, Test is still Test and Hardcore Holly is still Hardcore Holly. You can’t just throw these same tired acts out there and expect it to go anywhere. At least Storm has only been around for about a year and is still relatively fresh, but almost everyone else feels like a lost cause.
Billy and Chuck are annoyed at Rico for losing the titles. Rico comes in and says they’ve let themselves go, including Billy having a pimple on his cheek. Yes that cheek, which we get to see due to reasons of comedy.
Tag Team Titles: Rikishi/Rico vs. Billy and Chuck
Billy and Chuck are challenging and this is under elimination rules for no apparent reason. Rico and Chuck get things started and a wristlock makes Rico tap in five seconds. Tazz: “Looks like Rico has a limp wrist.” Cole thinks Rico did that on purpose. Rikishi cleans house on his own because the Brand Split has turned Rikishi into some kind of juggernaut who can beat up former Tag Team Champions. A Samoan drop gets rid of Billy so we’re down to Rikishi vs. Chuck for the Tag Team Titles in about two minutes.
The eliminated Billy sends Rikishi into the steps as Rico removes a turnbuckle pad. Something resembling Snake Eyes sends Rikishi into the buckle for two more. Billy’s interference fails so Rico kicks Rikishi in the face, setting up a superkick from Chuck to give Billy and Chuck the titles back, despite Rikishi’s foot being on the ropes.
Rating: F. I’m really not sure if this was an upgrade or another step down. To recap the last two weeks: Rico was thrown into this story by Vince (never involved again), won the Tag Team Titles, failed to screw his partner (and himself) over and then succeeded in screwing him over to give the titles back to Billy and Chuck. This story served no purpose other than to waste the teams’ time and devalue the titles without even offering any comedy. Oh and Rikishi is now a big deal for some reason.
I know the Dudleyz and the Hardyz are stale but they’re WAY better than this. Does Billy and Chuck vs. Matt and Jeff sound worse than this mess? Is there any reason why the titles aren’t on both shows? Raw doesn’t exactly have a ton of tag teams either but at least it opens up some more options. Do something with these things because they’re horrible right now.
Hurricane finds a note in catering saying whoever is leaving these notes is in his locker room. Wait…..wouldn’t he have JUST BEEN THERE? When was that note placed? Back from a break and Hurricane finds Nidia in his locker room. Apparently they hooked up once but Hurricane says it’s over. Cue Jamie Noble to jump him from behind because he’s with Nidia now. So there’s your next Cruiserweight Title feud and another vindictive woman because that’s one of the two ways WWE books women: vindictive or sleeping with anyone who can get them ahead.
Also, what was the point of the notes? The picture Nidia was cropped out of last week looked like any standard photo of a wrestler posing with a fan but it was supposed to be some relationship? Ok, fine, but what was gained by teasing notes if it was just “oh hi Hurricane, I’m Nidia. Remember when we used to sleep together, which doesn’t seem to cause any major issues?”? The division has all of four people at the moment. It’s ok to just introduce someone as a new challenger.
King of the Ring Qualifying Match: Christian vs. Big Valbowski
If officially renaming Val by one of his own nicknames is the best they can do for a repackaging, they’re in a lot of trouble. Christian jumps him at the bell (that’s getting way too common) and gets two off a suplex. Val comes back with a spinebuster and a reverse figure four of all things. He might not be the most interesting person in the ring but Val always seemed like he was trying and new holds like that are a reason why. The Unprettier is countered into the Blue Thunder Bomb to give Venis the pin.
Rating: C-. Not much here but I was always a bit of a Val fan. Neither is exactly an interesting option but Christian is much higher up on the totem pole than Venis. Like I said earlier: they’re trying to move some people up the roster but fans are going to see Val Venis and roll their eyes.
Linda and Jackie (the Tough Enough winners) come in to introduce themselves to Vince. The boss is of course impressed but here’s Ivory to yell about respect and etiquette. Vince makes a match….for Velocity. Their big draws so far have been a lingerie match and now this. And people wonder why Velocity never went anywhere.
Kurt Angle vs. Hardcore Holly
Holly ducks a right hand to start and scores with a hot shot. A sleeper slows Holly down and Cole calls Holly the toughest man in WWE today. Ok then. Holly reverses into a sleeper of his own which is reversed into a belly to back suplex to put both guys down. Angle goes shoulder first into the post and a powerslam give Hardcore two.
Things are picking up a bit so Angle picks Holly up off the top turnbuckle for the running belly to belly superplex. Holly comes right back with a powerbomb but the Alabama Slam is countered into an ankle lock. There’s no tap since Holly is tough so Angle rolls him up, while grabbing the rope, for the pin instead.
Rating: C+. Actually good here, which is the case for most of these veterans receiving renewed pushes. They’re certainly better than stuff like Tommy Dreamer’s vomit over on Raw but they’re not exactly interesting. That being said, I’ll definitely take veterans having watchable matches over gross out humor every single day.
Holly hits the Alabama Slam but can’t get the wig off as Kurt hits him low. Angle grabs a chair but gets it knocked into his own head. Why Holly doesn’t go for the wig again now that Angle is knocked out isn’t clear.
Torrie Wilson visits Maven in the hospital (broken leg) and a banana is involved. Maven tells the nurse he’s very elevated. The nurse (one of the worst actresses I’ve seen since Nidia) leaves and Torrie takes off her top. We cut to Tajiri at the nurse’s desk, trying to find Maven’s room. For some reason Tajiri grabs his side like he’s having an appendicitis but stands up and goes to Maven’s room.
We look back at the end of the battle royal and the announcers argue over Hogan vs. HHH.
Tajiri is now posing as a doctor and gets called away for an emergency. Shouldn’t the orderlies realize he’s an impostor? Also have we gotten an explanation for why this story is continuing if Maven is supposed to have a broken leg?
King of the Ring Qualifying Match: Edge vs. Chris Jericho
And never mind as Edge has a shoulder injury from the cage match and can’t compete. He has to be out for awhile but he’s always willing to take the risk. When he comes back, his only goal is to win the Undisputed Title. He can’t wrestle tonight though, meaning Jericho advances. Jericho jumps him anyway and the beating is on until Venis makes the save.
Stacy Keibler and Dawn Marie get all catty over who gets Vince. I wonder who wrote this one.
Storm tells Kidman that the office thinks Kidman is boring but Kidman gets in a jab at Storm’s haircut.
Maven is all smiley as Torrie stands next to him. Cue Tajiri to mist her and kick him in the knee. So the medical emergency went nowhere and served to waste even more time on a show full of wasted time.
Lance Storm vs. Billy Kidman
Billy tries to fly early on but gets dropkicked off the top for his efforts. A springboard clothesline gives Storm two and a hard DDT is good for the same. The half crab is broken up but Storm crotches him to avoid the shooting star. Lance superkicks him for the pin to end this entertaining filler.
HHH doesn’t have anything to say about Undertaker beating him up or having to face Hogan.
We look back at Jericho attacking Edge.
Hulk Hogan vs. HHH
Hogan starts with his variety of clotheslines and punches, one of which sends HHH outside onto his bad elbow. What doesn’t kill HHH (which is nothing) makes him stronger though and he sends Hogan into the post to take over. Back in and we hit the sleeper on Hogan with the announcers asking how much damage that does to the elbow.
The answer seems to be “not much” as the hold stays on until we get two arm drops and a finger wave. It’s Hulk Up time with the big boot setting up a missed legdrop. The Pedigree is countered and the legdrop gets two. Hogan is shocked at the near fall and gets Pedigreed for the clean pin in less than seven minutes.
Rating: D. Well ok then. This could have been HHH vs. almost anyone but it happened to be the fastest clean job Hogan has ever done (I can’t imagine he’s ever done one faster and there aren’t many to pick from in the first place). HHH vs. Undertaker was obvious and I’d prefer they use Hogan for this instead of some up and coming name as there’s not much of a rub to be gotten from a short match with HHH going over clean.
Hogan shakes HHH’s hand but Angle and Undertaker (who Vince had been calling “at home” all night) come in for the beatdown to end the show.
Overall Rating: D. This is a weird one as it’s very clear that Smackdown is suffering from a weak roster. There’s way too much down time and a lot of what they have comes off like filler. I get the idea of pushing the older veterans and I’ll take that over throwing out disasters which have no chance of going anywhere. It’s not a horrible show by any stretch but they’re really in need of some fresh talent around here. The big goal should be to develop some fresh talent and if that means sacrificing the Torrie loves Maven and Dawn and Stacy love Vince segments, so be it.
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Survivor Series Count-Up – 2000: How Did HHH Survive That?
Survivor Series 2000 Date: November 19, 2000
Location: Ice Palace, Tampa, Florida
Attendance: 18,602
Commentators: Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler
The other major story for this show is the Undertaker, who is now a biker instead of dead and possibly the devil himself. He returned in June and is already back in the title hunt with a shot against new champion Kurt Angle tonight. Angle shot up the card faster than almost anyone else in history, winning the belt less than a year after debuting. Let’s get to it.
The opening video is about HHH of course. This is one of those instances where I’m fine with the focus not being on the title match. Angle vs. Undertaker is big but HHH vs. Austin is far more important.
Steve Blackman/Crash Holly/Molly Holly vs. T&A/Trish Stratus
Molly, brand new and still quite cute here, is the third Holly cousin. T&A are Test and Albert, managed by Trish. This was during the time where T&A took over the APA’s offices and called themselves the T&APA. Blackman is Hardcore Champion. Albert and Blackman start things off and apparently Crash is here because the APA left him in charge of the office. He comes in and dives into a slam from Albert, only to be caught in a cross body.
Trish wants to beat up Crash but kicks Albert low instead. Off to Molly so Trish runs like a cowardly heel is supposed to. Test comes in so Molly bails. We’re doing a lot of running around here without anything of note happening. Crash hits a nice slingshot hurricanrana for two but gets his head kicked off by Test.
Test’s pumphandle slam doesn’t work and Crash kicks Test into Albert. Trish comes in and misses an elbow so it’s back to Molly. Albert pulls Molly’s hair from the apron but Trish can’t do anything with her yet. Blackman’s tag isn’t seen and T&A beats on Molly for a second before everything breaks down. A bulldog gets two for Trish but Molly finishes her with a top rope sunset flip.
Rating: C-. The match wasn’t terrible or anything, but why wasn’t this a dark match? The story is barely there, the wrestling was just ok, and I don’t think this really fired up anyone for the show. I don’t get the thinking here but maybe they just wanted to get this out of the way before we got to everything else? That’s all I can think of. At least Trish and Molly looked good.
Molly is about to fall out of her top and Jerry loses it.
Christian is sick so Edge and Christian can’t help Angle in the World Title match. They’re on for beers after the show though.
Tiger Ali Singh and Low Down (Chaz (Mosh from the Headbangers)/D’Lo Brown) can’t get into the building. Singh was around for years and never went anywhere.
Radicalz vs. Team Chyna
Chris Benoit, Perry Saturn, Dean Malenko, Eddie Guerrero
Road Dogg, Billy Gunn, K-Kwik, Chyna
The Radicalz are the people I was referring to when I said a lot of talent would be leaving WCW for the WWF. These four were the backbone of WCW and all left at once, arriving in the WWF in January as a unit. Once they left, you could see WCW’s days being numbered as they took a lot of good matches from WCW and sent them over to the WWF. Kwik is better known as R-Truth. Eddie is Intercontinental Champion and Dean is Light Heavyweight Champion. I would call this Team DX but they’re actually not together anymore.
Saturn and Gunn get things going here but it’s quickly off to Chyna for a double suplex. Chyna pounds away in the corner as we’re waiting on the Eddie vs. Chyna showdown. A powerslam gets two on Saturn and there’s the handspring elbow but Saturn catches her. Chyna comes back with a DDT to drop Saturn but everything breaks down. Eddie hits Chyna in the back with a title belt and Saturn gets the easy pin.
Dogg comes in next but gets suplexed almost immediately. Off to Eddie who pounds away and dropkicks Dogg’s knee out. Dean comes in but it’s quickly back to Eddie for a slingshot hilo onto the knee. Eddie goes up but runs his mouth too long, allowing Dogg to superplex him down. There’s the hot tag to Billy who immediately charges into a triple team in the Radicals’ corner. Smart guy that Billy. Billy fights them off and takes over on Eddie with a gorilla press and the One and Only (sleeper drop) for the pin and elimination.
Off to Dean vs. Kwik with the latter flipping out of a hip toss. Kwik tries a Downward Spiral but Dean falls backwards instead. Wow they screwed that one up. Benoit comes in but wants nothing to do with the hipping and the hopping so he Germans the tar out of Kwik for the pin to make it 3-2. Off to Saturn vs. Road Dogg with the former taking over. Dean suplexes Dogg down for two and it’s back to Saturn for a northern lights suplex to get us down to Saturn/Benoit/Malenko vs. Billy.
Billy gets to fight Dean first with the Radicals taking over quickly. Benoit low bridges Billy but Saturn accidentally superkicks Benoit on the floor. Back in the ring Dean ducks his head and the Fameasser makes it 2-1. A Jackhammer gets two on Saturn with Benoit making the save. Benoit hits the Swan Dive for two is shocked on the kickout. Chris is sent to the apron and Gunn tries to suplex him back in, only for the Warrior/Rude ending with Saturn tripping Billy and holding his foot for the pin.
Rating: C. This was fine but it never got to be anything interesting. Kwik’s original run with the company never worked and the whole tandem rapping thing with Road Dogg didn’t work at all. Gunn was into that awkward singles stage of his which never worked the way the company wanted it to. Not bad here but it was nothing better than fine.
Rock is here and doesn’t want to be interviewed by Lillian Garcia.
Jericho talks about a beast that is about to explode, meaning himself against Kane. Jericho spilled coffee on Kane and made burn remarks, setting up this feud. Unfortunately Jericho didn’t get the Sanka on a Pole match he mentions here.
Kane vs. Chris Jericho
Big pop for Jericho. Jericho pounds away to start but the offense doesn’t have much effect. Kane slugs him down in the corner but Jericho keeps speeding things up. We head to the floor with Jericho diving mostly over the top to take Kane out. They head back to the apron and Jericho dropkicks Kane down to the floor. The steps get kicked into Kane’s face and the Canadian keeps control.
Jericho tries a top rope cross body but is easily caught and slammed down for two. He’s coming into this with a bad after Kane threw him through a window on Raw. Kane pounds him down in the corner but Jericho escapes a belly to back suplex with some right hands to the head. Jericho charges into a big boot and Kane hooks a freakish over the back choke, as in their backs are to each other with Kane pulling on Jericho’s chin while Jericho is in the air.
Kane pulls the buckle pad off but neither guy can get rammed into the exposed steel. Kane uppercuts Jericho down over and over but Jericho keeps popping back up. Back to the floor with Kane still in full control. Kane goes up but gets crotched to slow him down. Another attempt at the clothesline jumps into a dropkick to the ribs and things speed up a bit.
Jericho blocks a big boot and goes up top with a missile dropkick getting two. Chris’ flying forearm is caught but he slides down Kane’s back and rams him into the exposed buckle. There are the Walls on Kane for a good while but Kane finally crawls to the ropes. They get their legs intertwined and fall to the mat where Kane kicks Jericho off. In an embarrassing looking botch, Jericho hits the bulldog but Kane is too far away so the masked dude has to scoot over so it can hit. Not that it matters as he catches Jericho by the throat and chokeslams him for the pin.
Rating: C-. This didn’t work for me. The idea was supposed to be about Kane hating Jericho for insulting him, but instead this was just a wrestling match. On top of that it wasn’t a particularly good one with Jericho not really doing anything beyond his basic stuff. Their last man standing match at Armageddon was much better.
Terri tells the Radicals that HHH has a plan for later.
European Title: Hardcore Holly vs. William Regal
Regal is defending and he complains about American manners before the match. Holly pounds away to start and Regal is more than comfortable in a fist fight. Regal trips Holly up and sends him shoulder first into the post. The fans don’t seem to care about this and I can’t say I blame them. Regal works on the arm for awhile before waving to the fans. Off to a cross armbreaker for a bit before Holly is stomped to the floor. Regal works on the arm a bit more but gets caught by a crossbody for two. A low blow stops Holly and it’s back to the arm. Holly finally snaps and goes to the floor, grabs the belt and hits Regal for the DQ.
Rating: D-. LAME match here as it kept going forever (even though it didn’t even last six minutes) and no one cared. Then on top of that Holly just goes to the floor and gets the belt for a DQ? Why would he do something like that? My guess is his brain was melted by how boring this match was. I have no idea what they were thinking here.
Angle is warming up in the back when Trish comes up. Tonight is the start of Angle’s second year in the company and Trish points out that Stephanie isn’t here tonight, so maybe Kurt needs some “special” assistance. Angle appreciates it but doesn’t need Test and Albert. Kurt was so hilarious back then.
We recap Rock vs. Rikishi. Rikishi was revealed as the driver of the car that ran over Austin. When he was explaining what he did, he said that he did it for the Rock. Rock rose up the card during Austin’s absence because while Austin was there, the Samoans were being held down. Yes, they turned it into a race thing. Rikishi was in a car driven by HHH and drove at Rock, hitting him in the chest with a sledgehammer, leaving Rock in bad shape coming into tonight.
Rikishi vs. The Rock
Rock charges at the ring and it’s on quickly. Right hands knock Rikishi against the ropes and Rock hits a Samoan Drop. He grabs a chair but Tim White disarms him, allowing Rikishi to score with a superkick. A single stomp to Rock’s injured chest gives the fat man control. Rikishi hits a legdrop and Rock is already in trouble. Rock tries some right hands but Rikishi takes him right back down with a side slam for two.
Rock sends him to the floor and sends Rikishi’s head into the steps. Seriously, Rock, you’re half Samoan. You know better than that. Rikishi pops back up and drops Rock chest first onto the barricade to take over again. The referee gets run over and we head back into the ring. Rikishi pulls out a sledgehammer but walks into a Rock Bottom before he can swing it. The referee crawls back in for a delayed two.
Rikishi headbutts him in the chest to take over again. A Samoan Drop puts Rock down and Rikishi sits down on him for two. Rikishi rams into Rock in the corner and loads up a Stinkface for the humiliation part. Rock explodes out of the corner with a clothesline and both guys are down. A superkick misses and Rock spinebusters him down. The People’s Elbow gets…the pin? A single elbow apparently is enough to keep Rikishi down for about 40 seconds while Rock crawls over to him. That’s one heck of an elbow.
Rating: C+. This took a bit to get going but once they got to the big slugfest stuff it was a lot better. At the end of the day though, Rikishi just did not belong in this world and he never worked as a heel. He’s a fat guy in a thong and not a guy that people want to boo. Thankfully his main event run was only going to last until a bit after Armageddon and then it would be back to the midcard where he belonged.
Post match Rikishi destroys Rock and lays him out with a bunch of Banzai Drops to the bad chest.
HHH is with the Radicals when Foley comes in and bans the Radicals from ringside in the main event. HHH doesn’t care so Foley makes it No DQ as well. HHH still doesn’t care. Methinks evil is afoot.
Women’s Title: Ivory vs. Lita
Ivory is in the RTC (Right to Censor, a group parodying the Parents Television Council, who was going after the WWF at the time) and is defending here. Lita (former valet and now high flying wrestler) goes straight at her and the fight is on fast. A quick hiptoss puts Ivory down as does an enziguri. Ivory comes back with a clothesline as Jerry panics over seeing Lita’s thong. Ivory hits a right hand and HOLY SWEET GOODNESS Lita is busted open! I mean she is GUSHING. During the replay of it, Lita botches a hurricanrana and drives Ivory’s head into the mat. I’m not sure which of those hurt worse.
Steven Richards (RTC leader) comes out so Lita throws Ivory to the floor and hits a big dive to take both of them out. A cross body gets two for Lita but the moonsault misses thanks to Steven. Ivory misses a belt shot and gets suplexed down. Lita takes her own top off but the moonsault hits knees. Apparently Ivory pulled the belt up and knocked Lita silly to retain.
Rating: D. This was like any Raw match you would have ever seen. That’s the theme for this show so far: most of the matches are nothing special and could have been on most TV shows. Lita looked out of it in there, which says a lot for her as she got WAY better in a few years, as did Trish. Nothing to see here.
Coach (geeky interviewer) has no updates on Rock.
Jericho jumps Kane and beats him up, setting up their rematch.
We recap Angle vs. Undertaker. Angle won EVERYTHING his rookie year and Undertaker is Undertaker. That’s about the extent of the feud.
Undertaker says this is his show and he’ll win the title.
WWF World Title: Undertaker vs. Kurt Angle
Angle is defending. Before the match, Angle asks us for a moment of silence to reflect on our favorite Angle moment of the last year. We get some Florida can’t vote right jokes before Angle lists off his accomplishments in the last year. Undertaker cuts him off before Kurt gets to the Eurocontinental Title. This is the match where Undertaker is wearing the stupid looking light camouflage pants.
Angle stalls on the floor to start and won’t get in the ring to fight. Undertaker goes out and gets a chair as Angle is in the ring. The champ hides behind the referee and Undertaker throws the chair over to Kurt to even the odds. As Undertaker is removing his coat, Angle blasts him with the chair and the bell finally rings. Undertaker pounds away in the corner to start but apparently punches himself out, allowing Kurt to hammer away in the corner. A legdrop gets two on the champ as Undertaker pulls him up.
Old School (I know it’s called that because Undertaker shouts OLD SCHOOL before going up) connects but Undertaker would rather walk around than cover. Angle bails to the floor before the chokeslam can hit and things slow down again. This is Angle’s game at the point: hang in there long enough until he can find an opening and attack. Back in and Angle snaps off a suplex to take over and send Undertaker to the floor. Now Angle is telling him to get in the ring and fight. Nice touch.
Kurt dives off the apron but gets caught with ease (Kurt: “OH GOD NO!”) and rammed into the post. Undertaker does it again because he can and Angle is in trouble. Back in and Undertaker stays on Kurt’s weakened back but Angle gets in some shots to the leg to take over. The leg gets wrapped around the middle rope but Undertaker comes back with a Fujiwara Armbar. Here are Edge and Christian for a distraction a second before Angle taps out. Like every other schmuck face, Undertaker lets go of the hold when he has Angle dead to rites.
Angle picks the leg and takes Undertaker down again before hooking a leg lock. This goes on for a bit because the fact that Undertaker hasn’t tapped out in ten years has never taught a heel that his hold is no better than anyone elses who has failed in the past. Undertaker escapes and bails to the floor to beat up the Canadians who are finally ejected. Back in and there’s the chokeslam as Undertaker’s leg is fine. Edge and Christian (so much for the ejection) have the referee again so the chokeslam only gets two.
A quick rollup with tights gets two for Kurt and a Russian legsweep gets the same for Undertaker. After a quick breather for Angle on the floor, he comes back in for a bad Figure Four on the challenger. Undertaker reverses and Angle gets the rope as is the custom for this sequence. A powerslam gets two on Angle but Kurt goes right back to the leg. Kurt throws the Figure Four on around the post but gets kicked away.
Back in and Undertaker is right back up to his feet because he doesn’t feel like selling tonight. There’s only so much Angle can do when all the work he does on the leg doesn’t mean anything because Undertaker won’t even limp. Angle hits Undertaker low and like an idiot tries a Tombstone. The counter is academic and Undertaker plants Kurt who rolls out to the floor.
Kurt dives under the ring but Undertaker pulls him back out. Back in and Undertaker hits the Last Ride….but the referee won’t count the three. Why not? Because that’s not Kurt Angle. That’s ERIC Angle, Kurt’s nearly identical brother in identical tights. Kurt comes in and rolls Undertaker up with a handful of tights for the pin to retain.
Rating: C+. That’s actually a brilliant ending and it keeps both guys looking strong at the same time. They used the same thing with Brock Lesnar vs. Angle in 2003 and it still worked there too. As for the match, most of the praise for it should go to Kurt and most of the blame should go to Undertaker.
Angle could wrestle the match of his life, but if Undertaker won’t sell the knee injury, it doesn’t make a bit of difference. That can’t be blamed on Kurt though, and the match wasn’t terrible as it was. These two would have MUCH better matches down the line too.In a bit of trivia, this was the first time in seven years that the title hasn’t changed hands at this show.
After some replays, Kurt runs from the arena to a waiting car to escape.
The XFL cheerleaders are here.
Team Dudley Boys vs. Team Edge and Christian
Dudley Boys, Hardy Boys
Edge and Christian, Bull Buchanan, Goodfather
Buchanan (a mostly generic power guy who could fly around a bit) and Goodfather (Godfather of course) are the RTC and they’re actually Tag Team Champions here instead of one of the other three teams. Bubba and Bull start things off but the crowd is kind of dead so far. Bubba elbows him down for two and it’s off to D-Von. A big boot puts D-Von down and it’s off to Goodfather for another boot to the head but no cover. Off to Christian who pounds away at D-Von but walks into a reverse inverted DDT. This match isn’t exactly taking off.
Matt comes in to clean house as everything breaks down. The Hardys take off their shirts to reveal camoflauge shirts to match the Dudleys. In the melee, the Edge-O-Matic (a reverse X Factor) pins Matt. D-Von vs. Edge now with the former hitting a swinging neckbreaker for no cover. D-Von takes down both Canadians with a double clothesline but a Buchanan distraction lets Christian hit the Killswitch for the elimination to make it 4-2.
Bubba comes in and throws Christian around a bit before it’s off to Jeff. The fans want tables but they get Jeff sent to the floor and a tag to Buchanan. Back to Bubba who runs over the Bull a few times and beats up Goodfather a bit too. The Canadians get backdropped a few times before Edge accidentally spears Buchanan down, giving Bubba an easy pin. Christian accidentally splashes Edge giving Bubba another easy pin. It’s Jeff/Bubba vs. Christian/Goodfather.
They botch something but Goodfather hooks a Death Valley Driver for the pin on Bubba. Jeff gets to start with Christian but knocks Goodfather off the apron first. Christian misses a charge and hits post. The Swanton eliminates Christian and about twenty seconds later Val Venis (also RTC) clotheslines Goodfather by mistake, giving Jeff the winning pin.
Rating: C-. Much like the rest of the show, this wasn’t bad but it was nothing interesting for the most part. The tag division would get going again soon with TLC II which was somehow even better than the first edition. Having Jeff win here is fine but without Matt at this point, the fans didn’t really care. Granted that could be said about the rest of the show too. Again, another acceptable match but nothing I’ll remember in an hour.
Jeff gets beaten up but the Dudleys and Matt make the save and put the RTC through tables.
Austin is walking.
HHH tells the Radicals they know what to do.
We recap Austin vs. HHH. You know the story by this point: Rikishi had a boss and it was revealed to be HHH. HHH explained that he did it because while Austin was gone, HHH rose to the top of the company and even took over everything. Tonight is the big fight between the two of them and it’s No DQ.
Steve Austin vs. HHH
No DQ remember. After a little staredown, Austin goes right at HHH and beats him around the ring. The initial beatdown goes on for a few minutes with Austin focusing on the back in a bit of a strange choice. HHH comes back with a facebuster but Austin immediately hits the Thesz Press to take him right back down.
They head to the floor with Austin still in full control. Austin picks up a big piece of metal but HHH knocks it away. They fight over to the production area and then to the back and then back to the arena in a few seconds. Back in the aisle, HHH counters a suplex into one of his own to put Austin in even more trouble. They fight back to ringside and Austin is thrown onto the announce table before fighting back, sending HHH into the steps.
After destroying the timekeeper’s area, Austin blasts HHH with a monitor to bust him open. The beer cooler is thrown around, leaving a huge puddle on the floor. Austin has a seat on the steps and has a beer because he’s thirsty. HHH gets thrown into the ring but Austin stops to yell at JR, allowing HHH to get in some shots. A Stunner is countered into a neckbreaker and both guys are down.
HHH sends Austin into the post and bends him around said post, now working on the back as well. A brief Austin comeback is stopped dead by another neckbreaker. HHH’s psychology is working well here. Austin comes back with that whip spinebuster but the middle finger elbow misses. They head back outside with both guys getting whipped into the barricade. HHH gets the advantage and loads up a Pedigree on the steps but gets backdropped through the announce table in a cool spot.
They head back inside and HHH bails to the corner. Apparently all the years of mudhole stompings haven’t clicked in yet. There’s the Stunner but Austin stops before covering. Instead Austin gets a chair and sets to Pillmanize (wrap a chair around a body part and stomp on it) the ankle. He thinks twice of that and wraps the chair around HHH’s neck instead. HHH rolls to the floor and they fight up the aisle again.
This time they head to the production area and then through a curtain and into the back, the same place they went for a few seconds earlier. HHH rams Austin into an anvil case but Austin sends him into a soda machine. Here are the Radicalz to attack Austin and give HHH a breather.
After referees pull back the Radicalz, Austin chases HHH into the parking lot where HHH gets into a car. All of a sudden HHH is on a mic in a stupid moment but you have to go with it. Austin is nowhere to be seen until he drives in on a forklift, to lift up the car with HHH inside. HHH screams for mercy and is dropped down, destroying the car to end the show.
Rating: B-. This was ok but it never got to the point they were reaching for. The problem here is the same as it was in 1996 for Austin: everyone remembers the rematch far better because it’s probably better. This wasn’t that great, but it was ok and a good first brawl between the two. It’s not PPV main event good, but for a big brawl it was acceptable.
Overall Rating: C-. This is a really hard one to grade. The problem with this show is that while nothing on it was bad, nothing on it was good either. Nothing on this show is something that I will ever want to watch again because nothing on it is anything above ok. If you have to see every show in the series you won’t hate it, but there’s no reason to watch this other than for the sake of completeness.
Ratings Comparison
Steve Blackman/Crash Holly/Molly Holly vs. T&A/Trish Stratus
Original: D+
Redo: C-
The Radicalz vs. Team Chyna
Original: B-
Redo: C
Kane vs. Chris Jericho
Original: B-
Redo: C-
William Regal vs. Hardcore Holly
Original: D-
Redo: D-
The Rock vs. Rikishi
Original: B
Redo: C+
Ivory vs. Lita
Original: D+
Redo: D
Kurt Angle vs. Undertaker
Original: B-
Redo: C+
Team Dudley Boys vs. Team Edge and Christian
Original: C-
Redo: C-
Steve Austin vs. HHH
Original: D-
Redo: B-
Overall Rating:
Original: D+
Redo: C-
That main event is the big surprise as I HATED it the first time but I thought it was pretty good here. Odd indeed.
Survivor Series Count-Up – 1999: Out With The Austin, In With The Angle
Survivor Series 1999 Date: November 14, 1999
Location: Joe Louis Arena, Detroit, Michigan
Attendance: 18,735
Commentators: Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler
The WWF is comfortably in control of the wrestling world but it’s not stopping them from putting their foot on WCW’s throat. They’re on fire at this point and they know it, which is a very dangerous thing. It will get even better for them in the future as more and more talent will start leaving WCW for the WWF but that won’t be as apparent until next year. Let’s get to it.
We open with a video about the world title match tonight which they promoted knowing that it wasn’t going to happen. How classy of them.
Team Godfather/D’Lo Brown vs. Team Dudley Boys
Godfather, D’Lo Brown, Headbangers
Dudley Boys, Acolytes
The Dudleys (Bubba Ray and D-Von in case you somehow don’t know that) are brand new, having been around maybe a month or two. The Acolytes are Faarooq and Bradshaw and they just like to fight. This is the debut of Brown as Godfather’s partner in pimping. The Headbangers are dressed as pimps as well in a funny sight. Bubba still has a bad stutter here which was his whole gimmick for a few months. Godfather makes fun of him to tick the Dudleys off even further.
Bubba vs. Mosh (in afro) start things off. Bubba steals said afro but things speed up and the Dudleys are in trouble. A HARD clothesline takes Mosh down and it’s off to D-Von. The Dudleys were awesome at this point and were like nothing anyone had seen in years. Even their look was totally different and it worked very well. Off to Thrasher who has an afro held on with a chinstrap.
Bradshaw comes in and pounds away on Thrasher a bit before pounding him upside the head. Thrasher misses a corner charge and Bradshaw’s running clothesline eliminates him quickly. Off to Mosh vs. Faarooq with the latter missing a charge in the corner to little effect. Back to D-Von as Jerry talks about wanting ho’s for Christmas. Mosh hits the running crotch attack to D-Von but it’s off to Bubba via a blind tag and the 3D puts out Mosh, making it 4-2.
Brown comes in with a forearm to Bubba’s head and drops a leg for two. For absolutely no apparent reason, Bradshaw blasts Brown with the chair for a DQ, and does the same to Bubba as well, knocking him out cold. D-Von and Faarooq both want the pin and get in a fight over it, resulting in a double countout for a double elimination despite neither of them being legal. That would be the Dudleys’ first real feud.
Back in the ring Bubba gets two on Brown as it’s apparently 2-1 now. A suplex gets two for Bubba and it’s time for the bouncing punches from Ray. Brown comes back with a Sky High for two and loads up a top rope hurricanrana, only to get caught in an awesome middle rope sitout powerbomb for two. A double clothesline puts both guys down and it’s hot tag to Godfather. The Ho Train sets up the Low Down for the final elimination.
Rating: C. I remember reading someone say that Godfather was the perfect opening act because you were guaranteed a good pop whenever he was out there. The more I see of him in matches like this, the more I agree with that statement. The guy wasn’t great or anything but the fans loved him and he was always a fun character that you didn’t have to take too seriously. That kind of fun character is a great choice for an opener and this was a fine opener here too.
Remember that one of the best of all time debuting tonight? We get a video telling us how awesome his name is and how awesome his life has been so far. His name is Kurt Angle.
Kurt Angle vs. Shawn Stasiak
Stasiak is most famous for being an idiot in the a few years’ time and being the son of the most forgotten world champion ever in Stan Stasiak. Never heard of him? I think that proves my point. Angle immediately hits a fireman’s carry takeover and the boring chants start about fifteen seconds in.
They head to the mat with Angle hooking a hammerlock. The fans chant for the Redwings because someone actually wrestling in a wrestling match is an evil idea to fans in 1999. Stasiak comes back with a clothesline and a vertical suplex for two. Off to a chinlock which Kurt escapes pretty quickly. Angle comes back with a clothesline and goes to get the mic. He demands not to be booed because he’s the best in the world.
Back in and Kurt hits something like a dropkick but is put right back into the chinlock. The hold is broken again and Angle comes back with a powerslam for two. Stasiak hits a lay out F5 but misses a top rope cross body. The Olympic Slam gets the pin and starts one of the hottest rookie years ever in wrestling.
Rating: D+. For a debut, this wasn’t great. However, this would be the start of one of one of the best careers of all time. Angle being serious wasn’t the right choice for him and it wasn’t until he became a total goof that took himself WAY too seriously while being stupid at the same time that he became the awesome Kurt that we know and love. It helped that he could go with anyone in the ring too.
We get a clip from earlier on Heat where HHH called Austin and Rock to the ring in an attempted ambush but the combined forces of Road Dogg and X-Pac didn’t stop two of the biggest stars ever. He wasn’t quite the Cerebral Assassin yet.
Team Val Venis vs. Team British Bulldog
Val Venis, Mark Henry, Gangrel, Steve Blackman
British Bulldog, Mean Street Posse
Venis is an adult film star and Gangrel is a vampire. Even JR says that Val’s team has nothing in common. The Posse is a group of three guys from Greenwich, Connecticut who wear sweater vests and never won a match that wasn’t a hardcore match that they won by mistake. I have no idea why this match exists but my guess is “we have no idea what else to do with these fifteen minutes.” Bulldog is European Champion here which is likely a title Val wants.
The captains start things off and after some quick offense from both, it’s off to Pete Gas (the Posse was Rodney, Pete Gas and Joey Abs). Pete is scared to death of having to actually wrestle so it’s back to Bulldog. Once Venis is down it’s off to Pete who hits a slingshot to send Val chest first into the buckle. A belly to back suplex gets two for Pete as Jerry asks where JR would get nice clothes in Oklahoma. JR: “Arkansas.” Off to Blackman for the only thing he could do: martial arts. A bicycle kick eliminates Pete in a hurry.
Off to Rodney who has even less luck against Blackman, immediately getting taken down. Gangrel comes in and gets caught in a crucifix for two before realizing he’s fighting Rodney. He pounds on the Posse dude, shrugs off a cheap shot from Joey, and plants Rodney with the implant DDT for the elimination. Joey, by far the best of the three Posse members, comes in and gets to face Mark Henry. Joey actually hits a hot shot but crotches himself on the middle rope. Mark does about what you would expect him to and splashes him for the pin.
So it’s 4-1 now and Bulldog comes in to fight Henry. Mark runs Bulldog over with ease and it’s off to Gangrel. Gangrel goes up top and is immediately crotched and superplexed down to make it 3-1. Blackman is in next but he misses a middle rope headbutt. He argues with the referee and gets caught in a fisherman’s suplex to make it Henry/Val vs. Bulldog. Val gets to start but it’s quickly a double team. Jerry: “Hey what’s this?” JR: “Well it looks like Mark Henry and Val Venis double teaming the Bulldog King.” Val gets sent to the floor but Henry splashes Bulldog, allowing Val to come in off the top with the Money Shot for the pin.
Rating: D-. This was as worthless as it was advertised. The Posse is one of those groups that is funny in retrospect but at the time they were wasting PPV time when there had to have been better options for this spot. Venis would have been a bigger deal a year ago so I’m not quite sure why he was in this spot either. Little trivia note: this is the shortest four on four Survivor Series match ever, breaking the record set about 20 minutes ago.
Michael Cole walks in on the Divas locker room and has to rub oil on Ivory’s stomach.
Fabulous Moolah/Mae Young/Tori/Debra vs. Ivory/Luna Vachon/Terri Runnels/Jacqueline
Thank goodness this isn’t an elimination match. For some reason Moolah and Mae were wrestling in 99 with Moolah even winning the Women’s Title at one point. Keep in mind that they both retired about ten years earlier. Tori is a psycho fan turned wrestler, Ivory is a former valet turned wrestler, Luna Vachon is a veteran and rather strange looking, and Terri is eye candy. Jerry’s face when Debra comes out is hilarious. Ivory is Women’s Champion at this point. Moolah jumps the champion in the aisle to start but gets shoved down for her efforts. We officially start with Tori vs. Jackie but Luna comes in for some double teaming.
Keep in mind that Tori is a wrestler in name only, Mae and Moolah combined to be over 150 years old, and Terri and Debra are there as eye candy. After less than two minutes, a double clothesline from the old chicks gives Moolah the pin on Ivory. This may have been the worst idea this side of the birth of a hand. If you don’t get that reference, consider yourself lucky.
Moolah and Ivory “brawl” post match.
X-Pac lists off everything wrong with Kane and says he’ll win tonight. Short and simple here.
X-Pac vs. Kane
X-Pac turned on Kane when they were partners, starting a feud that went on for MONTHS. X-Pac eventually stole Kane’s girlfriend Tori as well, turning her into a smoking hot woman instead of a smoking hot bad wrestler. Earlier today, Tori and Kane said they don’t take what X-Pac has done personally. Kane has the awesome inverted tights colors tonight which he didn’t wear often enough. X-Pac jumps Kane during the entrance and we start fast.
Kane no sells all of the shots to his head. I’ve always wondered if the mask is supposed to absorb the offense from the other guy. Kane chokes away and uppercuts X-Pac down for no cover. Kane goes up but gets dropkicked in the head on the way up in a nice counter. We head to the floor for a bit where X-Pac sends him into the post to take over. Kane comes back with an uppercut but gets kicked in the head to take him back down.
More kicking slows Kane down but the Bronco Buster is countered by a hand around the throat. Tilt-a-whirl backbreaker puts X-Pac down and there’s the top rope clothesline. Kane loads up the chokeslam but Road Dogg comes in to break up the pin. Kane stalks the Dogg to the floor but walks into the X-Factor for two. The tombstone is loaded up but HHH comes in with the title belt shot to the head to draw the DQ.
Rating: C+. I liked this a lot more than most matches that X-Pac had going on at this time. The problem was that X-Pac would win all of his matches against monsters and it would get more and more unrealistic every time. Here though Kane took a lot of offense from X-Pac but it didn’t really hurt him, which is what made this much better. The feud would go on WAY too long though and it dragged things down
Post match Kane gets beaten down until Tori comes out. X-Pac kicks Tori in the face and Kane snaps, sending DX “scattering like quail” according to JR.
The Rock says nothing because HHH shows up and they brawl.
Big Show vs. Mideon/Viscera/Big Boss Man/Prince Albert
Mideon (Phineas Godwin) and Viscera (formerly known as Mabel) are former members of the evil Corporate Ministry stable. Albert is a huge man with a big bald head. This was supposed to be Big Show and Kaientai (Japanese comedy team) and Blue Meanie (…..I’m not sure how to describe Meanie) but Show beat them up so he could do this himself.
This is during the Boss Man vs. Big Show feud, which is based around Boss Man making fun of Show for having his dad die (kayfabe). It led to a bad moment at a “funeral” where Boss Man stole the coffin and dragged Show along the ground on top of the coffin with a car. Show chokes Albert to the floor and chokeslams Mideon for the pin in less than 20 seconds. Albert is gone 10 seconds later to a chokeslam, as is Viscera. Boss Man is like screw this and walks out. Show wins in less than 90 seconds.
Austin is in the back but HHH comes up to attack him too. HHH runs away with Austin chasing after him. Austin winds up in a parking garage and is run over by a car which speeds away. This was the way that Austin was written off TV for the better part of a year to have major neck surgery. He had needed it forever but it wasn’t until now when the company could afford to let him off for that long.
The question would eventually be who ran him over, and it would eventually be revealed as Rikishi (yet to debut on Raw) in one of the biggest WHAT WERE THEY THINKING moments ever. Test (young Canadian wrestler), Stephanie (Vince’s daughter, dating Test at this point) Vince and eventually HHH show up to look at Austin with most of them being concerned. JR goes to see him as well. Vince accuses HHH and DX but they deny any involvement.
Intercontinental Title: Chyna vs. Chris Jericho
Jericho has only been around a few months and is challenging here. Chyna (HHH’s former bodyguard and a woman capable of fighting men) has Miss Kitty here who isn’t even hiding that she’s eye candy, coming out in a bikini and boots. It’s a brawl to start and Kitty is shoved down because Jericho is a jerk. They head to the floor with Jericho’s knees going into the steps, but Chyna misses a dive off said steps to give the Canadian control.
Back in and Jericho gets hot shotted onto the ropes and put in the Tree of Woe. Chyna tries a German but Jericho kicks her low….with no effect because Chyna is Chyna. A standing hurricanrana takes Jericho down but he pops back up and clotheslines her to the floor. The springboard dive takes Chyna out again as JR talks about not being into the match due to what happened to Austin. For once this is an acceptable statement.
Jericho throws Chyna over the announce table and pours water over her head because, again, he’s a jerk. Back in and a missile dropkick gets two for Jericho and Chyna gets the same off a small package. Chyna tries to make a comeback but Jericho bulldogs him down for two and a BIG face pop. A spinwheel kick puts Chyna down and Jericho is swaggering. A clothesline puts Chyna on the floor and Kitty gets kissed. By Jericho that is.
Chyna comes back with a spear and posts Jericho as the crowd noticeably gets quieter. Back in and Jericho hits a layout powerbomb for two and frustration is setting in. The Lionsault misses and Chyna hits the springboard elbow and a DDT for two. With about two minutes left, Lawler mentions a stipulation that Jericho will get a sex change if he loses. That’s kind of a big deal Jerry.
With the referee down, a belt shot to the head gets two for Chris but Chyna comes back with a Pedigree for two of her own. Jericho puts her in the Walls but Chyna finally makes the rope. The place boos the escape to show where their allegiances lie. Jericho loads up a superplex but a Kitty distraction lets Chyna hit him low and a Pedigree (kind of) off the top gets the pin to retain the title.
Rating: B. This took a bit to get going but they hit a groove in that ending sequence. The most important thing here though was Jericho wrestled her like any other opponent rather than making a spectacle out of her being a woman. These two would stay at it for a while until Chyna went nuts and eventually started wrestling women, which was the downfall of her career. Well that and being nuts and HHH breaking up with her, but that’s another story.
HHH comes in to see Shane, Stephanie and Test. He still denies having anything to do with it but wants to know if the match is now one on one. Shane says he’ll think of something. Note that Test is there with Shane.
Team Too Cool vs. Team Edge/Christian
Too Cool, Hollys
Edge/Christian, Hardy Boys
This is just after the Hardys (another team you should know) and the Edge/Christian (same) had the first tag team ladder match which would launch them into stardom soon after. Too Cool (Grandmaster Sexay and Scotty Too Hotty, a pair of dancing nitwits) are still stupid here, as opposed to later on when they would be stupid and WAY over. The Hollys (Hardcore and Crash) are cousins that like to fight a lot. The Hardys have Terri in their corner. Edge and Scotty get things started as Jerry talks about Scotty’s pants. They chop it out in the corner before things speed up a bit and Edge spinwheel kicks him down.
Off to Crash vs. Matt with Matt getting two off a suplex. Crash gets crotched on the top and punched to the floor. Grandmaster sneaks up on Matt for a sunset bomb to the floor. We unleash the dives as everyone small enough to try a big dive busts one out with Jeff capping it off. Back in and Christian powerslams Crash for two. The Hollys hit a Hart Attack on Christian for two of their own and Hardcore is in.
We’re promised an update on Austin at the end of this match because THIS MATCH of all things is more important than a guy being hit by a car. Off to Grandmaster whose bulldog is countered and he goes flying so far that he kicks the camera, giving us a cool visual. Off to Hardcore vs. Edge, who starts spearing a lot of people. Grandmaster stops to dance and is immediately speared down. In the big melee, Hardcore rolls up Edge for the pin. Fifteen seconds later, Scotty hits a top rope DDT to eliminate Matt, making it 4-2.
Jeff and Scotty do a fast pinfall reversal sequence before Scotty hits the not yet popular Worm. A sitout powerbomb by Scotty with Grandmaster assisting gets two as does a middle rope missile dropkick from Sexay. Too Cool hits the second Hart Attack of the match for two on Jeff. Everything breaks down but the Hollys get in an argument. Terri gets on the apron for a distraction which lets Christian hit both of Too Cool low. Jeff hits a 450 on Scotty for the elimination.
So it’s Crash/Grandmaster/Hardcore Holly vs. Jeff and Christian. JR goes on a rant about Austin as Christian and Jeff try some Poetry in Motion, but Hardcore comes off the top with a missile dropkick in a SWEET looking counter. Grandmaster adds a guillotine legdrop for the elimination. Christian immediately hits a reverse DDT on Grandmaster to get us down to Christian vs. the Hollys.
JR continues to brood and want an update about Austin. Jerry needling him makes me chuckle as he’s awesome at being a jerk. Crash beats on Christian for a bit before it’s off to Hardcore again. Back to Crash who gets caught in the Killswitch for the pin. Christian tries a victory roll on Hardcore but he falls on top to get the pin on Christian for the win.
Rating: C+. The problem here was that the pairing that this should have been based around, Edge and Christian and the Hardys, were on the same team rather than getting to tear the house down against each other. The other two teams didn’t mean anything and the ending of this sucked. Once the Dudleys got involved with the brotherly pairs, it was all gravy for almost two years.
Shane says that Vince is at the emergency room with Austin. Austin never lost consciousness but is still undergoing tests. Shane says there will be a triple threat tonight, but Austin won’t be in it. Test is there once again.
Tag Titles: New Age Outlaws vs. Mankind/Al Snow
The Outlaws are defending. Ross accuses Billy of being the driver but Lawler doesn’t care at all. Mankind says Austin will get through this. Gunn and Mankind get things going with Billy getting two off a neckbreaker. We hit a sleeper like a minute in and then we look at the Head. JR and Jerry are arguing again as the guys in the ring go to the floor, making them guys no longer in the ring.
Dogg accidentally hits Billy in the face and it’s off to Snow. JR talks about Snow having his action figure pulled off the shelves at Wal-Mart because some stupid professor said that having a severed head included in a toy would send the wrong message to her kids about violence to women. This is going to be a quick sidebar.
First and foremost, it’s not a severed head. It’s a mannequin head and simply LOOKING AT THE THING would tell you that. Second, if you’re concerned about what kind of impression a toy would give to your kids, either A, don’t buy it for them, or B, tell them why you don’t like it. Heaven forbid you have to tell your kid he can’t have something he wants because you deem it inappropriate. Third, and this is the part that I like best, Snow mentioned in a promo that clearly the stores care about their customers because they pulled the figure from the shelves, but the guns, bullets and knives are still on the shelves.
Anyway, now that the people who can’t think before they run their mouths and have to decide how people should live their lives because apparently people aren’t smart enough to make decisions for themselves are out of the way, let’s get back to this dull match. Mankind pounds on Roadie in the corner and hits a running knee to the head. Snow pokes Road Dogg with a chair in the ribs which isn’t a DQ for some reason. Neither is the shot to Dogg’s back from Mankind.
Back inside, Mankind hooks a reverse chinlock followed by a lot of stomping in the corner from Al. Mankind gets two off a knee lift as things continue to go slowly. Snow hits his headbutts but Road Dogg fires off some lefts and a big right to take Snow down. Everything breaks down and the crowd is DEAD for this. They head to the floor with the Outlaws taking over.
Snow gets beaten on for awhile before clotheslining Dogg down and it’s not hot tag to Mankind. Mankind pounds away for a bit but gets caught by the Fameasser for two. Snow hits the Snow Plow on Road Dogg and here’s Socko. Both Outlaws get Clawed but they both hit Mankind low to escape. Snow hits Billy with Head to give Mankind a two count, followed quickly by the Outlaws hitting a spike piledriver on Mankind to retain.
Rating: D. This got better at the end but the twelve minutes before that were way too dull to be considered good. Mankind and Snow were there to fill in spots and while that’s ok, it doesn’t make for an interesting match. It didn’t help that the crowd was deader than Billy Gunn’s career for most of the match. Nothing to see here.
Since Vince is at the hospital, he won’t be refereeing the main event tonight.
We see Austin get run down again.
WWF World Title: The Rock vs. HHH vs. ???
HHH is defending and this is one fall to a finish. The third man is…..shockingly not Test but rather the Big Show. I mentioned Test over and over again tonight because every sign on the planet pointed to him being the guy but they went with Show instead. That’s not to say this is a horrible idea or that it doesn’t make sense because there were no clues or anything beforehand, but it was certainly a surprising pick.
Rock and HHH attack Show to start but to no avail. Show shoulder blocks them down but Rock breaks up a chokeslam on the champ. Rock and HHH team up to clothesline Show to the floor but Rock is quickly pulled outside. All three guys wind up on the floor with HHH getting dropped on the barricade. Back in and Show misses a splash in the corner and gets caught in a Russian legsweep for no cover.
The People’s Elbow gets one on Show as HHH saves. HHH chokes Rock in the corner but Show gets back up and side slams Rock for two. Show kicks HHH to the floor and knocks the champ up the aisle. The fans don’t seem to be sure what to think of Show in this spot but they’re not bored. Rock charges up the aisle to clothesline Show down before going after HHH again.
HHH gets knocked through a production table and Rock is in control. Scratch that theory as Show comes in and beats the tar out of HHH, only to have Rock hit Show with a fire extinguisher. Rock and HHH start heading back to the ring but HHH suplexes him in the aisle. Show is back because the guy can’t be kept down. Show drops HHH on the announce table but Rock drills Show in the head with the bell. Rock and HHH hit a double suplex on Show through the table for the WHOA spot of the match.
Rock and HHH head into the crowd to brawl as this has been a wild fight for the majority of the match so far. Back to the ring and the referee gets clotheslined down by Rock by mistake. The Rock Bottom and Pedigree are both countered, the latter being countered into a catapult into the buckle. There’s the Rock Bottom but there’s no referee. Shane runs out in a referee’s shirt to count two.
Another Rock Bottom hits but Show pulls Shane out of the ring. Rock goes after Show on the floor which goes quite well for the giant. Show puts him on the table and goes back into the ring to knock HHH down before going back to beat on Rock some more. Rock gets thrown into the steps and HHH has the belt, only for Shane to take it away. HHH Pedigrees Shane and they’re all back inside again. Here’s DX to go after Big Show and Rock but here’s Vince as well. He knocks HHH out with the belt and a chokeslam makes Show champion.
Rating: C-. This didn’t work that well for me at all. Show has no connection to the feud at all which hurts things a bit, but at the end of the day there was no real flow to the match at all. Show winning is a good pick as it gives some closure to the week for him where his dad died and all that, but his title reign wouldn’t work all that well due to him mainly feuding with Big Boss Man. Still though, decent moment but a bad match.
Show celebrates to end the show.
Overall Rating: D+. This is a very back and forth show as the stuff that was interesting was interesting (although not necessarily good) and the stuff that was bad and dull was VERY bad and dull. This show is much more about setting things up for the future, which is ok, but it doesn’t really do much for those of us watching this. Not really recommended, but there are some far worse shows out there.
Ratings Comparison
Team Godfather/D’Lo Brown vs. Team Dudley Boys
Original: B-
Redo: C
Kurt Angle vs. Shawn Stasiak
Original: C+
Redo: D+
Team Val Venis vs. Team British Bulldog
Original: D+
Redo: D-
Team Mae Young vs. Team Ivory
Original: N/A
Redo: N/A
Kane vs. X-Pac
Original: C+
Redo: C+
Big Show vs. Team Big Boss Man
Original: N/A
Redo: N/A
Chyna vs. Chris Jericho
Original: B
Redo: B
Team Too Cool vs. Team Edge/Christian
Original: B
Redo: C+
New Age Outlaws vs. Al Snow/Mankind
Original: D+
Redo: D
Big Show vs. HHH vs. The Rock
Original: C+
Redo: C-
Overall Rating
Original: B
Redo: D+
I liked most of the matches better the first time and the overall rating was higher. Simple and easy, as usual.
Survivor Series 1996 Date: November 17, 1996
Location: Madison Square Garden, New York City, New York
Attendance: 18,647
Commentators: Jim Ross, Vince McMahon, Jerry Lawler
I had three options for an older redo this year (this one, 1988 and 1992) but this one had the most Survivor Series matches plus Steve Austin vs. Bret Hart, which was more than enough to sway me over. This is an interesting time for the company as they’re just starting to get squashed by WCW but the future is here tonight. Let’s get to it.
Free For All: Team Bart Gunn vs. Team Billy Gunn
Bart Gunn, Aldo Montoya, Bob Holly, Jesse James
Billy Gunn, Salvatore Sincere, Justin Bradshaw, The Sultan
This would be the Kickoff Show today. I’ve actually never reviewed this and there’s a chance I’ve never even seen it before. The team names are pretty arbitrary as there’s little rhyme or reason for these pairings, save for maybe the brothers, meaning no one is really a captain. James (Road Dogg of course) is a country singer here and the REAL Double J as part of a stupid angle with the departed Jeff Jarrett. Ok so I might have With My Baby Tonight (his self-performed theme song) on my iPod. At least the angle wasn’t a total loss.
As the Sultan (Rikishi) and Aldo (Justin Credible as a Portuguese man with a jockstrap for a mask) start us off, JR mentions that Austin vs. Hart is a #1 contenders match, which really wasn’t mentioned very often on the actual pay per view. Montoya actually does some damage to Sultan by dropkicking him out to the floor but a cover results in him being launched off. A bad looking piledriver sets up the camel clutch and Montoya is eliminated in a hurry.
Holly comes in with a bulldog as we see Aldo walk up the ramp opposite the cameras (an MSG standard). Sultan grabs a chinlock and we take a break to come back with Sultan slamming Bart on the floor so Sincere (a flamboyant yet still generic Italian) can baseball slide him in the face. Back in and Bart grabs a side slam to get rid of Sincere and tie the match up.
Bradshaw (who JR says is going to be something special) comes in and kicks the freshly tagged Holly in the face. We go to a split screen to see Austin running Dok Hendrix out of his dressing room and come back to Bradshaw hitting the Clothesline From an Undisclosed Location to eliminate Holly.
Jesse immediate rolls Bradshaw up for the elimination (ignore Billy kicking Jesse and breaking up the pin at two while the referee keeps counting anyway), leaving us with Jesse and Bart vs. Billy and Sultan. A rollup gets rid of Sultan but the Fameasser (yet to be named) does the same to Jesse. We’re down to a battle of the Gunns and Bart gets tied up in the ropes for some trash talking. Billy calls him an SOB, meaning he isn’t likely to get a Christmas card from his own mother. Bart stands up for Mama Gunn and hits a running forearm for the pin.
Rating: C-. This is a good example of a match where you have to consider the purpose. They weren’t trying to settle any big score here or blow the roof off the place. This was about getting the fans warmed up before we got to the real show and the fast pace did that well enough. Billy vs. Bart wasn’t anything interesting but at least it was a little story to tie things together. Nothing good but it did its job well enough.
The opening video looks at the WWF taking over New York (including the Hall of Fame banquet at a hotel, which would be the last one for seven and a half years) before going into a look at the two major matches. You know you have a stacked card when you’re getting hyped over two matches that don’t even include Undertaker vs. Mankind or any of the show’s namesake matches.
Team Furnas and Lafon vs. Team Owen Hart/British Bulldog
Doug Furnas, Phillip Lafon, Henry Godwinn, Phineas Godwinn
Owen Hart, British Bulldog, Marty Jannetty, Leif Cassidy
This is Furnas and Lafon’s WWF debut as they were brought in to challenge Owen and Bulldog for the Tag Team Titles. Marty and Lafon (I can never remember which is Furnas and which is Lafon) start things off with a nice little acrobatics display, capped off by a hard shot to Marty’s jaw. Leif comes in instead as the announcers talk about slander. The slow pace continues and it’s off to Phineas for a headlock. JR: “You ever see Hilary Clinton do that?”
For some reason Leif thinks it’s a good idea to slap Phineas in the face and spit on him. Well to be fair, given all the sweat and liquid on his overalls, it’s not the worst idea in the world. Owen comes in to wake the crowd up and it’s time to pick Phineas apart. The heels start working Phineas over as JR wants a third referee out here.
Marty hits a good looking back elbow to the jaw as the announcers start talking about Bret, though at least they tie it in to Owen. Today that would go off on a tangent and turn into ripping on Byron Saxton. I mean, he deserves it but it’s still annoying. Marty goes up top so Phineas tries a superplex. JR: “Now how stupid was that?” Oh dang it I always forget how annoying heel JR is. Even heel Cole wasn’t this bad.
Henry comes in, kicks Marty in the gut, and Slop Drops him for the first elimination. Not that it means much as Owen rolls Henry up to tie the score five seconds later. Phineas cleans house (has a fit, whatever) but Bulldog makes a blind tag and powerslams him to go up 3-2. Furnas comes in to speed things WAY up (and turn up the quality as well), only to miss a dropkick, which JR calls one of the best in the business. Like I said, heel JR wasn’t the best.
Leif comes in to cover and the former powerlifter sends him flying on the kickout. The bad guys get smart with a blind tag and a springboard missile dropkick to wipe Furnas out in a great looking visual. JR goes into yet another rant about the referees not catching the heels cheating, which is a really weird complaint for a heel to have.
Cassidy misses a charge and Furnas brings in Lafon for a snappy looking reverse superplex to get us down to two on two. The lack of a reaction to Leif being eliminated really shouldn’t surprise anyone as he was just so out of place in this match. Owen comes in for a belly to belly and a middle rope elbow (both of those looked very smooth) for two. A low blow to Furnas has Vince freaking out but JR, the heel commentator here, lets it go right past him. Again: it was a bad character and you could sense he wasn’t a fan of the whole thing.
It’s back to Bulldog who is quickly sunset flipped for the elimination, which is a big deal as it means Furnas and Lafon can pin Owen and the Bulldog in a two on two match. Bulldog leaves Lafon with a parting gift of a chop block though and Owen follows it up with the Sharpshooter. Furnas is in for the save and hits that dropkick of his (basically a dropkick with a backflip), followed by a German suplex for the final pin.
Rating: B. This was more like it for the opener as they set up the next challengers for the Tag Team Titles, though the first part with the Godwinns really brings it down. It also doesn’t help that the crowd didn’t care for the most part, and can you really blame them? The good guys were people making their debuts and hog farmers. It’s good wrestling but not the brightest idea.
Paul Bearer insists he WILL NOT get into the cage and be hung above the ring. Mankind will crush Undertaker like the cockroaches he used to eat for dinner.
Undertaker vs. Mankind
Bearer is in an individual cage above the ring and if Undertaker wins, Bearer is his for five minutes. The entrance is an important one as Undertaker descends from the rafters and debuts the sleeveless leather attire that would become his signature look for the next several years. It marks the evolution of the original character to the newer, sleeker fighting machine that could hurt people at will.
It’s a brawl to start (duh) with Undertaker using a drop toehold (?!?!?) followed by a fireman’s carry into a cross armbreaker. Undertaker gets smart by working over Mankind’s hand, which JR thinks is illegal. Mankind takes it into the crowd and is quickly backdropped right back to ringside but pops up for a cannonball off the apron. There’s something to be said about someone launching their body at someone else.
Undertaker’s comeback is cut off by a Texas piledriver and the Mandible Claw goes on. Undertaker is smart enough to send Mankind straight outside for the save and both guys are spent from the physicality. A kick to the chest sends Mankind flying hard into the barricade for a sick sounding THUD. You just can’t fake that kind of brutality. Well you can but it’s easier to believe it’s real with Foley.
Old School is broken up so Undertaker opts to punch Mankind in the face multiple times. The chokeslam is countered with the Claw, only to be countered by a big chokeslam with the camera going wide for an awesome visual. Mankind is back up though (as always) and pulls out a spike to stab Undertaker a bit. Amazingly enough, Undertaker doesn’t care to be stabbed and Tombstones Mankind for the pin instead.
Rating: B. This was a BIG change of pace for Undertaker as he was moving faster and acting like a much more well rounded wrestler, which he would be for a long time. These two were solid together as always as they just beat the heck out of each other for long stretches of time and that’s always worth a watch. This is one of their lesser known matches but it’s certainly entertaining.
Post match the cage is lowered and Undertaker goes right for Bearer, only to have the Executioner run out for the save, allowing Bearer to escape. That would be Undertaker’s next match before he continued attempting to murder Bearer and Mankind.
Sunny comes out to replace Lawler on commentary. When you look at so many of the women who would come after her, Sunny really is remarkable. She looks great but she’s also dripping with charisma, which so few women (or men for that matter) have at this level.
Team Helmsley laughs off the idea of Team Marc Mero because they’re a man down due to Mark Henry being injured.
Team Hunter Hearst Helmsley vs. Team Marc Mero
Hunter Hearst Helmsley, Jerry Lawler, Goldust, Crush
Marc Mero, The Stalker, Rocky Maivia, Jake Roberts
There’s a lot to cover here. Helmsley is Intercontinental Champion, having stolen the title from Mero with the help of the now departed (to WCW) Mr. Perfect. The Stalker is Barry Windham who used to be a military themed guy but is now just Barry Windham with a big mustache. Roberts is Mark Henry’s replacement as Lawler and Roberts are feuding over Jake’s alcoholism.
Oh and it’s Rocky’s debut after weeks of videos talking about how amazing he is. The mind blowing part: they undersold what he would become. The commentary gets even more entertaining as Sunny goes nuts ripping on Sable, claiming to be all natural even down to her hair.
We hit the stall button to start with no contact for the first two minutes. After several tags, Goldust and Mero finally lock up as the announcers discuss Mr. Perfect without saying he’s gone. Marc’s armbars don’t go anywhere so it’s off to the Stalker as JR rips on Barry’s attire. Helmsley comes in and immediately runs from Mero, meaning we get Crush vs. Rocky for his in ring debut. Thankfully that lasts all of ten seconds before it’s off to Lawler for some great selling. Vince actually mentions the name Dwayne Johnson as Sunny suggests being able to take Rocky all the way to the top.
The heels start taking turns on Rocky until he backdrops Helmsley for a breather. Jake gets the hot tag to clean house despite looking a good bit out of shape and very pale. Lawler comes in and slowly hammers away while making alcohol jokes. The DDT scores out of nowhere and it’s 4-3 in a hurry. The mustache with the Windham attached suplexes Goldust for two but a shot from the apron sets up the Curtain Call to tie us up.
Both captains come in as the crowd stays mostly silent. Again though, is there any real reason to care? Crush isn’t interesting, Roberts looks awful and no one knows who Rocky is yet. Helmsley grabs an abdominal stretch and Goldust pulls on the arm, sending heel JR into his second frenzy in an hour.
The referee finally catches Helmsley cheating to break the hold and it’s a Merosault (moonsault pres) to get rid of Hunter. Crush comes in and gets dropkicked to the floor, only to avoid Mero’s slingshot dive. As we’re watching the replays, the announcers completely miss Crush giving Mero the heart punch (exactly what it sounds like) for the elimination. Jake gets the same thing and is eliminated ten seconds later.
So we’re down to Rocky, meaning we get a closeup of his ridiculous looking hair. To his credit, even Rock has said he looked ridiculous at this point. Rocky slugs both guys down and does that stupid arm flailing thing of his. A crossbody puts both guys down and Crush heart punches Goldust by mistake. Rocky hits a second crossbody to get rid of Crush and a shoulder breaker ends Goldust for the win. The pin gets a nice pop, though it might just be because the match is finally over.
Rating: D. They accomplished the goal of giving Rocky a good rub to start (hence why you have goons like Crush around to take a fall like this) but this was WAY too long. You could probably cut out five to ten minutes here and do just about the same thing. Windham was worthless (as he was for most of the time after 1990 or so) and there were way too many stretches of boring non-action dragging it down.
Now it’s time for the real main event as we recap Bret Hart vs. Steve Austin. I know Shawn vs. Sid is going on last but make no mistake about it: this was the most important and anticipated match of the night. Bret had been gone since losing the WWF World Title to Shawn at Wrestlemania XII and Austin has turned into a disrespectful rebel who doesn’t care about legacies or what anyone before him has done. You can see the fire in Austin’s eyes and Bret is the only one that can stop him. Or slow him down at least because there may be no stopping Austin anymore.
Austin says he’s ready and isn’t worried.
Bret says this is about respect, which he’ll receive from Austin no matter what.
Steve Austin vs. Bret Hart
The winner gets the title shot next month. Even Vince has to acknowledge the face pop Austin receives here in New York. Bret gets a great face reaction of his own but Austin really isn’t impressed with the pyro. JR thinks this might come down to a submission, which might be some great foreshadowing for Wrestlemania. He goes even further by saying Bret isn’t a clown or a trashman because he’s a wrestler. Uh, Doink and Droese were wrestlers to Jim. We’re still not ready to go as Vince possibly spoils the main event by saying the winner of this gets Sid.
Austin flips him off to start and we’re ready to go. Feeling out process to start as JR goes back to that submission idea. Vince: “How ironic would it be if Steve Austin put the Sharpshooter on Bret Hart and made him submit?” They trade wristlocks to start and you can see some extra fire in Bret for this match.
Bret takes him down and stays on the arm with a hammerlock until a hard elbow to the jaw puts him down. Austin keeps slugging away until Bret pulls him into another armbar. Bret: “ASK HIM!” Did Jericho get that from Bret? Steve comes right back with a hot shot and starts choking on the bottom rope.
We hit the chinlock and JR goes back to that submission idea again. That’s three times now and it’s really not adding anything new. Back up and it’s time for the slugout with Austin easily taking over as you would expect. Bret comes back with his usual offense but gets shoved chest first into the buckle, again as is his custom. Austin’s superplex is broken up though and Bret goes all the way to the top for the elbow.
They head outside with Austin driving the back into the post as the brawling continues to favor Austin while Bret wins the wrestling. Makes sense. Of course as soon as I say that, Bret throws him through (yes through) the barricade and Austin is suddenly reeling. Just because it’s required, they fight over the announcers’ table with Austin taking over (JR: “It seems that it always happens to the Spanish guys!”) and dropping an elbow onto Bret. The table actually doesn’t break though in a very rare sight.
Back in and we hit the abdominal stretch as Austin continues to know how to focus on a body part. The referee catches Austin holding the ropes (which doesn’t add leverage but helps block a hiptoss counter) so it’s time for a slugout, capped off by Bret hitting a Stun Gun for two. Austin is right back up with a top rope superplex but Bret does the lifting the legs spot (looked horrible here as they were both down for several seconds before going for it) for two.
The Stunner hits out of nowhere for two and JR makes a REALLY good save by saying Bret only kicked out because Austin rolled him away from the ropes. That protects the move, which is completely lost on today’s product. Austin grabs a Texas Cloverleaf, followed by a Bow and Arrow of all things. Unfortunately Austin makes the mistake of trying to mat wrestle with Bret and has to grab the ropes to avoid a Sharpshooter. Back up and Austin grabs the Million Dollar Dream but Bret walks the turnbuckle and flips back onto Austin for the surprise pin.
Rating: A+. Like this would get anything else. I know most people (including myself) say that the I Quit match made Austin a star but he’s not getting to that match without this one. Austin was always a great talent but this was the moment where you knew he was ready for the main event stage. Notice something important about the ending: Bret caught Austin for the pin rather than really decisively beating him. It shows that as great as Austin is, Bret was just that much better and used his experience to win.
Make no mistake about it though: this is a masterpiece and one of the best matches of all time. Unfortunately there was a rematch that is somehow even better and this is a bit forgotten as a result. I’ve heard people say they like this one better and I really can’t argue against that. It’s a must see match and an incredible lesson in giving someone the rub of their career.
JR: “I don’t think anyone, including Shawn Michaels or Sid, could have beaten Bret Hart in this ring on this night.” Vince: “I totally disagree with that.” No followup or anything and the tone was very heelish.
Sid says he’ll win.
Faarooq/Vader/Razor Ramon/Diesel vs. Flash Funk/Savio Vega/Yokozuna/???
Here’s another match with a bunch of notes. Faarooq debuts his traditional Nation look here, thankfully ditching the ridiculous blue gladiator gear. Flash Funk is also making his debut after years as the far better 2 Cold Scorpio. That would be fake Razor and Diesel (duh) with the former just looking horrible. Fake Diesel at least looks like the real thing if you look at him from the right angle. Again, the original idea here wasn’t bad: it’s the gimmicks that got them over instead of the people. Unfortunately that falls apart because Fake Razor looked horrible.
Jim Cornette (Vader’s manager) sits in on commentary and JR says he’s the same size as Yokozuna. Cornette sounds like he wants to cry when he sees Funk for the first time. JR: “I’ve never seen the yellow and red look so good here in the Garden.” The mystery partner is Jimmy Snuka, which gets a mild reaction from the MSG fans and a groan from the audience at home who already saw a legend return with Roberts earlier.
Vader slugs Funk down to start but is quickly sent outside for a moonsault to the floor. You can hear the ECW chants before they even start. Back in and Vader gets tired of this flying nonsense and powerbomb Funk in half. Yokozuna comes in for the embarrassing fat man offense as JR rips on the refereeing again. It’s off to Vega vs. Ramon as the crowd isn’t sure what to care about here.
JR and Cornette argue about whether JR could manage a Wendy’s. JR: “I could if you were in town.” Razor screws up the fall away slam and thankfully it’s off to Funk vs. Diesel so we can get something watchable. Vega comes back in and gets pummeled in the corner as this is already dragging horribly. Snuka get the tag to a pretty anemic pop and quickly runs into Diesel’s knee. In a big surprise, Snuka actually slams Vader. Not bad for a guy who hasn’t been around in forever.
Jimmy almost runs over for the tag back to Vega, who hits maybe 10% of a spinwheel kick on Diesel. Faarooq rams him into the post and the Jackknife ends Vega to hopefully start wrapping this up. The Superfly Splash ends Ramon less than a minute later and then the remaining six come in for the big brawl, resulting in a massive DQ and no winner.
Rating: F-. If there’s a worse Survivor Series match not involving four clowns, my therapy must be working because I’ve completely blocked it from my mind. This was HORRIBLE with eight people that the crowd wasn’t interested in seeing and a nothing ending that only made things worse. Absolutely terrible here as they couldn’t even have Vader survive to give him a bit of a rub?
We recap the main event which is basically Shawn fighting another monster but this time it’s someone he used to trust. Yeah this is hardly anything interesting and feels like a major letdown after Austin vs. Hart. Also, given how badly the ratings were doing around this time, there’s almost no way Shawn is keeping the title here.
WWF World Title: Shawn Michaels vs. Sid
Shawn gets a John Cena style pop as a sign of the times. Sid is challenging of course and pounds Shawn down early on with JR getting right to the point: Sid isn’t technically sound but he can hit you really hard, which is all he needs to do. Shawn speeds things up with some left jabs and a headlock takeover.
The threat of a powerbomb sends Shawn bailing to the outside and we have a breather. Back in and Shawn gets smart by going after the knee, including a Figure Four (actually done on the proper leg). The hold is turned over and Sid sends him shoulder first into the post to take over. Shawn goes right back to the knee and the fans boo him out of the Garden. Thankfully they catch on to the idea and Sid blasts Shawn to the floor with a clothesline.
Back in and Sid gets in a few kicks to the face, followed by a big backbreaker for two. We hit a cobra clutch of all things (Sid would use that occasionally and it always looked weird for someone his size) before a chokeslam drops the champ. Shawn hits his flying forearm and is loudly booed, though the nipup draws a high pitched pop.
Sid grabs a camera and hits Shawn’s manager Jose Lothario in the chest, followed by Sweet Chin Music to the giant. With Jose grabbing his chest, Shawn goes to check on him instead of retaining the title. Sid tries to throw Shawn back in and the referee gets bumped, allowing Sid to hit him with the camera. The powerbomb gives Sid the title (somehow the first title he ever won) to a BIG face pop.
Rating: B+. I don’t like the ending with the camera thing but it’s still a really well put together match. This was pretty much Ric Flair vs. Sid and since Shawn knows how to wrestle a Flair match as well as anyone ever (including Flair), there was almost no way this wasn’t going to work. They let Shawn walk Sid through the match and that was all they ever needed to do.
Shawn checks on Jose as Sid poses to end the show.
Overall Rating: B. This is a hard one to grade as the Survivor Series matches were horrible but everything else ranges from very good to masterpiece. That’s more than enough to say this is a great show and worth checking out. If nothing else there are so many debuts and repackages here that it’s worth checking out for pure history. The MSG crowd helps provide so much energy and the show is just a lot of fun (save for the one horrible match, which only lasts about ten minutes). See this one at least once but watch Bret vs. Austin as many times as you can.
Ratings Comparison
Team Jesse James vs. Team Billy Gunn
Original: N/A
2012 Redo: N/A
2016 Redo: C-
Team Furnas and Lafon vs. Team Owen Hart/British Bulldog
Original: B-
2012 Redo: C+
2016 Redo: B
Undertaker vs. Mankind
Original: C+
2012 Redo: B
2016 Redo: B
Team Jerry Lawler vs. Team Jake Roberts
Original: D
2012 Redo: C+
2016 Redo: D
Steve Austin vs. Bret Hart
Original: A+
2012 Redo: A+
2016 Redo: A+
Team Vader vs. Team Yokozuna
Original: D-
2012 Redo: F
2016 Redo: F-
Shawn Michaels vs. Sycho Sid
Original: C-
2012 Redo: B
2016 Redo: B+
Overall Rating
Original: B-
2012 Redo: B+
2016 Redo: B
This was mostly the same as four years ago, save for me liking Rocky’s debut a lot more back then. That smile must have made me go weak in the knees.