This is one of the first non-Big Four shows I ever did so please bare with me on how bad it is.

Bad Blood 2004
Date: June 13, 2004
Location: Nationwide Arena, Columbus, Ohio
Attendance: 9,000
Commentators; Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler

This is really just to get this show from any year off my list of shows. We have two main events here, one of which is the World Title match as Benoit defends against Kane. Naturally though we can’t have the guy with amazing talent or the belt headlining a show, so we also have HHH and Shawn in a feud that just wouldn’t die in the Cell.

This was another show where HHH was highly looked down upon for his ego, as Benoit, the guy that was more over and better than HHH was in the ring, was pushed to the side so HHH and Shawn can have a FORTY FIVE MINUTE Cell match. Yes, I’m going to have to watch these two go at it for 45 minutes in there. Just take me now. Let’s get to it.

And hey what a shock: the main video talks about Shawn and HHH far more than the world champion. So Shawn and HHH are going to have to do a lot to end this feud. Oh and that Benoit guy is doing something too. It should be noted that ONLY these two matches are even talked about in the opening video.

Raw Tag Titles: La Resistance vs. Edge/Chris Benoit

Dupree is now replaced by Rob Conway. King is wearing a purple jacket. You can tell it’s a slow night as Benoit is pulling a double shift tonight. Good night Lillian looks amazing in blue. So we have two Canadians vs. a team from French Canada. Why must we always have Canadian on Canadian violence? Edge and Sylvan start us off.

The talent and championship differences amaze me here. Benoit gets a great pop coming in. This is the rematch from when Edge and Benoit lost the titles to the French guys after beating Evolution for them. DANG Benoit could chop like there was no tomorrow. Naturally the heels take over to prevent the fans from thinking we were doing anything other than the standard tag team formula. We talk about John Glenn for no apparent reason. Oh he’s from Columbus. That makes sense at least.

They’re keeping Benoit out which makes sense as you have to let him save up strength. Edge gets an AWESOME counter to a double suplex as he lands on his feet and hits a double neckbreaker. That was freaking sweet. Benoit gets the Sharpshooter but it’s broken up at the last minute. Benoit now gets the Crossface on Grenier and holds it for about 40 seconds without the tap.

Great way to plug the move there guys. Kane comes out for the DQ though which at least makes sense here. He chokeslams Benoit and I want to break that bell guy. Kane vs. Benoit sounds really good actually. Into the stairs goes the champion as Kane leaves.

Rating: C+. I like Benoit and Edge so this worked fine for me. It also tied into the main match later on so there’s some continuity there which is always a good thing. This was a nice little refresher to set up for later in the show, but it also shows that the rosters can’t manage to do a whole show by themselves. Also, there was no way the titles were changing here so there was no drama. Still though, not bad at all.

We see Coachman getting ready in the back. He has Eugene tonight in what I’m sure will be a classic. He’s wearing a Michigan shirt and hat to draw cheap heat which is fine. Eugene hears Bischoff run him down and Bischoff plays the nice guy to make the save. Dinsmore, the guy that plays Eugene, really is talented and it’s a shame he has to put up with this. The idiocy of this gimmick is simple: a slow guy is wrestling. That just sums up the whole reason why this failed.

Chris Jericho vs. Tomko

Short version: Jericho is feuding with Christian because of Trish, Tomko works for Christian, Christian is hurt so we have Tomko left to fight for Christian. Jericho of course has bad ribs as is the requirement for a popular face. Trish is just ridiculously hot as a heel. This is more or less Jericho carrying things as he has to since he’s the only one in there with that pesky little thing called talent.

Tomko gets a nice gutbuster on Jericho to take over. There’s some black thing in the ring that’s driving me crazy. Tomko takes over again with a Boss Man Slam. That move is so simple and it works so well. I love moves like that. He really needs to grow his hair back. He just looks bad with it all short. After some Trish interference, we get the running enziguri and gets the pin. Well that was uneventful.

Rating: D+. This should have been on Raw but because of the single brand shows we get this instead which isn’t worth paying for. Jericho had the longest feud in history with Christian. Ok so it’s not even close but it felt like it. This was fine but just felt like a Raw match, which is never a good thing.

We recap Orton vs. Shelton which more or less was Shelton pinned Orton twice then Orton had Batista half kill him. Orton says that he’s a legend and he’s had the longest title reign in seven years. That’s really impressive actually. He walks into the arena and screams about how great he is to the crowd, all in one promo.

This is really awesome actually as Orton was just amazing in this role. WHAT THE HECK HAPPENED TO HIM??? He went from being this brash young rookie that knew how awesome he was and said he was better than everyone else and he was great at it. Why change that? Oh yeah he was getting over on Raw and we can’t have that, so sayeth HHH’s #1 commandment.

This was just when Shelton was gaining credibility. He has half the mic skills he has now and that’s saying a lot. The match is supposed to happen later but we’re doing it right now.

Intercontinental Title: Shelton Benjamin vs. Randy Orton

I like the booking here. It’s different and makes you feel like anything can happen. That’s painfully missing from modern wrestling and this was just five and a half years ago. There is a freaking gorgeous blonde in the front row. I need to go to Columbus more often. This is another thing the modern company is missing: well established midcard guys.

I get that Kofi and Miz are there, but they just don’t feel up to what these guys are. After a missed Stinger Splash from Shelton, here’s Flair who looks OLD all of a sudden. Orton hits the chinlock. I wonder if he gets paid per usage of that. He follows it up with a nice move as he sets for a shoulder breaker but shifts his arms forward to get a great falling neckbreaker instead. That looked great and it was one of the moves I used on Smackdown vs. Raw back in the day.

And we’re back in the chinlock again. Orton is a perfect example of the WWE anymore: flashes of brilliance but then the same old stuff all over again. Shelton bases a lot of his in ring work on that of Sting, meaning that he’s awesome. He makes his comeback and there’s a key to it: I’m buying it. They’ve managed to get me into this match and that’s all I can ask for. That Dragon Whip never gets old. The Splash hits this time and there’s the T-Bone but naturally Flair makes the save.

He really was so annoying back then and it got on a lot of people’s nerves including me as it was always the same thing. Shelton brings him in and beats him up as we get a thin reference to Sting. Shelton, ever the candidate for a Rhodes Scholarship, puts Flair in the figure four.

Just to show off though, while still having the hold on Flair, he hooks a small package on Orton for two. Ok that was cool. He hits a top rope crossbody in another of Sting’s old favorites but Orton rolls through and hooks the tights in a Flair move for the win.

Rating: B-. This was fun. I liked the middle with Shelton and Orton just going at it, but I could have done without Flair. I get that it fits the storyline, but Flair just got annoying by this point and wouldn’t leave well enough alone ever and it hurt the match for me. Orton would be world champion in three months.

Matt is with Lita who would soon screw him (and half the locker room) over. Matt gets thrown out of the arena because Bischoff thinks he’s going to interfere in Kane’s match.

Apparently the Cell is a soul searching event. HHH vs. Shawn is the storied rivalry of all time of the month.

Women’s Title: Trish vs. Lita vs. Gail Kim vs. Victoria

All four are too hot for words with Trish somehow possibly being the fourth best looking at the moment. Victoria is champion here. Trish vs. Lita never gets old especially when later this year they main evented Raw. That’s saying a lot and I don’t mean it was the last match and then there was a big angle to end the show. I

mean Trish vs. Lita for the title was the last thing you saw to end the show and it was built up all night. It was a very cool moment and I completely bought into it. Gail gets an AWESOME hold on Victoria. More or less it’s a headscissors combined with a crossface combined with an armbar but cooler than it sounds. Lita and Victoria botch something and we have no Trish for a long time, signaling that she’ll be winning. Yep there she is to roll up Lita for the title out of nowhere.

Rating: D+. They all looked great but other than that it was just your run of the mill Divas match but with four girls that could actually work which is the best case scenario.  Nothing more thant hat.

We recap Eugene vs. Coach which more or less is recapping Eugene. Now I’ve gone off about this before but I have to again as it makes sense here. Around this time, Eugene was the hottest character in the freaking world. I marked out for him like there was no tomorrow. He was a wrestling savant and it worked like a charm.

The idea was simple: the guy was mentally handicapped but he could outwrestle Regal. Bischoff put Regal with him as his manager and Eugene grows on him, making it like a cheesy but good movie. Rock came out one night and said he was Eugene’s friend, as did Chris Benoit. The whole thing worked at a ridiculously amazing level. Tonight he has Coach and in case you’re an idiot and can’t see this coming: Eugene wins.

Right there, that should have been the end of Eugene’s character. Either have him get injured, have him get hit in the head and become smart, or write him off and repackage him and pretend he was never slow or have him act like it was an act, but in no way, shape or form should this have continued beyond tonight. Actually wait. There is one way it could have continued: Regal and Eugene win the tag belts, which they eventually did.

That I could actually see as no one cared about La Resistance anyway, but after THAT, it goes no farther. Instead do you know who he feuded with next? He feuded with HHH, resulting in a 20 minute match at Summerslam. Let me spell this out for you.

At Summerslam, HHH, the Cerebral Assassin, the man that’s going to break Flair’s world title record, the guy that’s been in 5 Hell in a Cell matches as of this show, the guy that’s main evented at least three Wrestlemanias that I can think of, one of the best wrestlers ever, spent 20 minutes fighting a slow guy at the second biggest show of the year. Take a guess as to how the fans reacted to that.

Eugene got more heat than anyone I can remember in a LONG time. It’s the same thing WWE did with Santino. They had a good thing going but then they screwed it up by pushing him too far. He had no business even talking to guys like Batista. They screwed up Eugene even worse though by having him hang with HHH for a long time.

It completely bombed and they got lucky that he destroyed his knee and had to leave for 6 months. Anyway, that’s all later as right now he’s one of the most over guys on the roster so he’s got a match here.

Coach vs. Eugene

I think I smell a comedy match. Eugene’s song is so completely catchy that I’m going to have it in my head all night now. We get a massive Eugene chant. See what I mean? The guy was OVER. JR pushes home the idea that we all grew up wrestling fans and how cool it would be to get to wrestle someday on PPV. How can you not love that?

The fact that he really was a talented technical wrestler (in OVW he more or less wrestled the exact same style Benoit did and made it work perfectly well. The guy can go in the ring.) made it even better because it was actually believable that he was just imitating what he had seen over the years. Yes, I was a huge Eugene mark and still am for his old stuff.

In a funny spot Coach tries to shake his hand and gets brought to his knees by Eugene’s strength. In a unique spot, Eugene goes for a monkey flip and then locks his legs around his arms to make himself into a little ball. Coach rolls him around for a bit and then as he’s yelling at Eugene, Eugene pops his arm up, grabs Coach and flips him over with his legs for a rollup. It sounds stupid but that was awesome. I can’t stop laughing at this.

The fans start another Eugene chant to answer why he’s on this show. There’s nothing wrong with a comedy character. We get a criss cross and Eugene hits the floor and gets a teddy bear from the hot chick I mentioned earlier. Coach apparently doesn’t realize Eugene is gone for about 30 seconds.

Apparently he didn’t notice the overly large man at ringside in incredibly small electric blue tights hugging a stuffed bear, but then again I’m no coach. Anyone fighting Eugene had such an easy time getting heat. THEY’RE HITTING A SLOW GUY. And a random hot chick in a bikini brings out a plate of cookies.

Coach, who called the girl out, slams Eugene into the cookies. Coach slams Eugene into the turnbuckle, and it’s time. Eugene Hulks Up, but here’s Garrison (Lance) Cade for the interference. He rips the bear from earlier in half and Coach jumps the distracted Eugene. It doesn’t work though and a Rock Bottom and People’s Elbow ends this. Cade gets an awful Stunner after it. Regal comes out to congratulate him and Coach takes a somewhat better but still terrible Stunner.

Rating: B+. If anyone agrees here I’ll be shocked. I know it’s stupid but I love this guy. When he stays in comedy territory, it’s just a fun character and it works every time for me. Like I said, few are going to agree and I don’t care.

We recap Benoit vs. Kane which is Kane is jealous of Benoit for living his dream. It didn’t need much of a story, but in reality it’s Benoit needs a credibly challenger to further establish himself as champion so we get Kane so Shawn doesn’t have to job to him. Yeah that’s it.

Raw World Title: Chris Benoit vs. Kane

I love how he just holds up the belt and points at it. That’s simple yet effective which describes a lot about Benoit. DANG that little man can throw some chops! I’ve always been a fan of Kane’s for stuff like this. You need a guy to come in and be a credible jobber: bring in Kane. The guy has laid down for so many people over the years that it’s not even funny.

Benoit goes for the arm and that just completely fails. This is a very physical match but the good thing is you have two guys that can wrestle that style which makes it work far better. Kane just keeps powering out of submissions which is so simple that it’s perfect.

We have a good story here: Benoit can’t get the submissions and Kane knows it so he doesn’t have to be afraid of the champion’s usual offense so he has to adjust things to get the win while Kane is comfortable with his usual stuff, therefore giving him the advantage. Kane hits a chinlock and Benoit fights out of it so Kane just SMACKS him. It looked and sounded awesome yet it was so simple. I love that.

Kane is dominating here in case you couldn’t tell. And never mind as he sends Kane into the post and he goes THUD. That sounded awesome. These guys are pounding the tar out of each other and it’s making the match. Lawler wants to have a telethon for some reason. Benoit finally wakes up and hammers on the knee. Sorry for a lack of jokes here but it’s a good match, making it hard to joke about. Kane counters the Sharpshooter with power, which again is a STORY.

He finally gets the Sharpshooter to a huge pop. Shawn’s will be bigger though of course, because only he and HHH can get the biggest pops of the night of course. Remember that. And we hit the Germans which never gets old. Kane gets two sets of them for six in total which is scary strength from Benoit. There’s your headbutt and Benoit is down too. After getting out of the crossface Kane finally hits the chokeslam for two.

Kane goes old school (WOOT!) and tries a tombstone but settles for a big boot instead. Benoit FINALLY gets the crossface off the Kane lariat though and Kane’s arm isn’t even locked. It looks terrible but how many people can actually see that? In an AWESOME spot, Kane stands up off the Crossface so Benoit just slides across his back and goes for the other arm before just rolling him up off the crossface for the quick pin. That is BRILLIANT psychology there in case you were wondering.

Think about it: Benoit had been using nothing but submissions all night and hadn’t even gone for a cover after his big moves. He tries another submission and while Kane is so preoccupied with fighting it off he shifts to the rollup and gets the pin. That’s thinking in the ring and it ties into the entire match, which is what you call storytelling. Brilliant stuff there.

Rating: B+. I really liked this. While it’s not epic or a classic or anything, this is a very good match. The storytelling was there and you had two guys working hard and being physical which is all I can ask for. I like both guys too so that helps a lot. This was as good as it could have been and was proof that the title match can work without HHH or one of his goons, yet they would have the title back in just a few months, which of course sucks but it’s life so there we are. Great match and worth seeing.

Ad for the HOF DVD. This was the first year they resurrected that thing and made it into the worthless thing that it is today, rather than the very worthless thing that it was before.

In something that I’d like to see more often, we go to the back with Todd and Benoit and Benoit looks at some footage of the match and says what he was thinking at that time as Todd more or less throws him some softball questions. It’s basic stuff, but it’s nice to hear it from the guy that was in the ring 3 minutes ago doing it. He throws in the Benoit is for real line he was using over the summer and leaves holding up the belt.

There’s no one walking in and it’s just Benoit talking about the win. I don’t know why but this was cool to me and I’d love to see it more often. It’s like 90 seconds so it serves as a little cool aside to the match and doesn’t take up much time. Naturally I don’t ever remember seeing it otherwise.

And with an hour left in the show we’re lowering the Cell. This is going to hurt isn’t it?

We recap the feud that would never die which here is because both guys tapped to Benoit or something. Again this is just a way for these two to upstage Benoit, because no matter how good of a match he just had, he can’t get past a Cell match, and of course Shawn and HHH couldn’t just go one on one or something simple like that as Benoit’s match might outshine them. When you hear people talk about Benoit not getting a fair shot as champion, this is the show they’re talking about.

Here’s Benoit’s title reign, which lasted about four months (remember the rosters alternated months on PPV in these days): Wins title at Mania, rematch at Backlash so it’s Shawn and HHH again, this show, vs. HHH at Vengeance, loses at Summerslam. Every single show where he was champion either had HHH and/or Shawn in the main event until he lost. HHH did what Hogan did after Mania 6: he stayed.

There was no need for HHH to stay in the main event all summer long and it’s why Benoit’s title reign sucked. No one bought him as champion because HHH, the bigger star, wouldn’t step out of the way to allow Benoit to become a bigger star and it killed Benoit’s credibility until next year he was right back in the midcard “where he belonged.”

Shawn Michaels vs. HHH

HHH is wearing white boots and black tights. That’s just criminal. The fans are kind of split here which is interesting. Naturally it starts off really slow with regular stuff where the cage is pointless. We hit the floor where you can see a small hole in the Cell which is odd. HHH is bleeding and nearly fifteen minutes in we get something other than fists and bad cage shots between these two. The greatness they bring in is a chair.

And Shawn’s back is hurting. Can we get anything original with him please? Maybe a legit knee injury? He’s never had one of those before. We go really hardcore with STAIRS. Shawn is bleeding pretty badly now too. HHH has more or less stopped bleeding at this point. We have over half an hour of this left too. HHH dominates and they keep saying the match should be stopped. We have a sleeper in a Hell in a Cell match.

The match is ok, but this just shows one thing to me: this did not need to be a Cell match at all. This completely could have been no holds barred or a street fight or anything like that. It’s pure overkill and nothing but a way to have a really long match and make sure that everyone knows that these two are THE top guys on the roster. HHH takes a chair shot and is bleeding a lot harder now which helps a bit. And now we have a ladder.

Seriously, what’s the point of all these weapons WHEN YOU HAVE A CELL AROUND YOU? Shawn needs to bleed a lot more as it’s not working at this rate. It’s table time as the Cell hasn’t been used in over 20 minutes now. The only thing it’s doing here is blocking the view of the camera of this street fight. Now we’ve reached the part of big time matches that I absolutely hate: the laying around between nothing but finishers part.

This is my major criticism of Austin/Rock III at Mania 19: it’s a 19 minute match and about 10 of that is nothing but finisher, two count, finisher, two count, repeat. That’s what they do here as we’re about over 40 minutes. Yeah about 1/3 of this show (as remember it won’t go 3 hours) is this match.

Oh and here’s your Shawn and HHH are great moment of the match: it takes THREE Pedigrees to end Shawn after a 45 minute match. Yeah, this isn’t all about them AT ALL. This again is why people got so fed up with HHH around this time, right here. HHH wins with a third Pedigree.

Rating: B-. This was WAY too long. It did nothing but cement the theory that HHH and Shawn only cared about themselves and were just clinging to their spots. There’s a big myth in wrestling that long means good which isn’t the case at all. This was good but it needed to be about 20 minutes shorter which could have gone to another match on the card. Oh that’s right: THERE WEREN’T ANY OTHERS BECAUSE THE SINGLE BRAND SHOWS WERE FREAKING STUPID!

Instead we get nearly an hour of Shawn and HHH making themselves look better than anyone else on the roster because they need the ego boosts. Yeah the match was ok, but it didn’t need to be in the Cell. It’s like when you’re playing basketball against a kid. Sure you can easily beat him, but that doesn’t mean it’s supposed to be done. Benoit needed to come out of this show looking great but instead this match is really all that’s remembered and I refuse to believe that that wasn’t intentional.

Overall Rating: B-. This was a hard one as it was back and forth with B and B-. It’s definitely a good show but far from great. Benoit and Kane were completely forgotten by HHH and Shawn not so much stealing the show but hijacking it. There was just no need for them to have either 48 minutes or the Cell here at all. I mean it just wasn’t needed at all. Those two were notorious for hogging the spotlight and they did it here again.

The match was ok but it needed to lose about 20 minutes to be really good as there was just WAY too much laying around and setting up stuff. Make that a 25 minute street fight and it’s an easy A. There really isn’t a bad match on the card but there’s nothing great either. Check out Kane/Benoit but if you watch the Cell, be prepared to hit fast forward a good amount.

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Monday Night Raw
Date: October 26, 1998
Location: Kohl Center, Madison, Wisconsin
Attendance: 10,220
Commentators: Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler

We’re another step closer to Survivor Sereis here and hopefully for Vince his month of terror ends. At the moment Austin is still fired so odds are we’re going to get some updates on his career options tonight. Also there’s a chance we’re going to get some of the brackets for the tournament at the PPV. Let’s get to it.

Here’s Vince and company to start and there’s a band setup in front of the Tron. Austin is here apparently and Vince holds him responsible for everything that happened last week. Vince doesn’t like the people and wants to know where they were when Austin was doing all this stuff last week. My guess would be they were here in Madison while Austin and Vince were in Milwaukee but maybe I’m missing something.

Vince goes over the stuff he was made to do last week, including ruining a perfectly good Armani suit. He’ll never forgive Austin for what happened last week. As for the letter that Austin gave him last week, it was a legal document. Austin better take stock of himself before he goes further. Austin pops up on screen and says Vince should take stock in adult diapers.

European Title: X-Pac vs. Steve Blackman

Apparently Chyna has taken a leave of absence from the company until her legal issues with Henry are over. The match is after a break and as we come back, Vince is telling his guys to look into the document that Austin gave him last week. He wants it broken. Blackman kicks Pac down to start and hits a side slam to put him down even longer. Off to the chinlock followed by a flying clothesline by Blackman. This has been a squash so far. Steve Regal comes out for no apparent reason and beats down X-Pac. The Outlaws come out and it’s a big brawl. The match is thrown out and was too short to rate, but it was nothing of note.

Vince is talking to his lawyers again and says they wrote the document so they can break it.

Cole is outside Austin’s locker room and we’ll hear from Austin after the next match.

Darren Drozdov vs. The Rock

I don’t see this being incredibly competitive. Rock is officially in the tournament. He takes Droz into the corner and pops him in the face to take over. Rock and those sideburns are so over it’s unreal. Droz armdrags him down and puts on an armbar, which has to be the highlight of his wrestling career. Sunset flip gets two for Drozdov until Rock realizes he’s The Rock and he’s facing Darren Drozdov. A low blow puts Droz down and they slug it out a bit. A powerslam gets two on Rock but a middle rope shoulder misses. Rock Bottom, Elbow, done.

Rating: D+. See, this is what you NEVER get anymore. This was a match for Rock to get on TV and get a win over a guy that has no business beating him. This doesn’t hurt Droz because he doesn’t mean anything and doesn’t lose anything by getting beaten up by Rock. Also, Droz got in some offense so it wasn’t even a squash. Can you imagine Cena doing this with say Titus O’Neal? Of course not.

Hawk gets left behind again.

Austin has been advised not to say anything tonight. “We” will have a statement later on though.

Vince’s meeting is over. Vince doesn’t get something apparently.

Here are the Outlaws for the celebrity appearance of the week. The band equipment was for Motley Crue who the Outlaws and Pac will perform with. They perform and that’s about it. The only wrestling related thing here is a bodyguard they have named Test.

Vince yells some more, talking about a contract and opportunities.

Kane vs. Gangrel

Kane is in the tournament also. Christian is at ringside and it doesn’t really mean much at all. Kane runs him over and is apparently popular now. Christian’s interference doesn’t do much good as Kane hits the top rope clothesline and the chokeslam gets the pin. Total squash.

Christian dives off the top at Kane but it only staggers him. He and Gangrel can’t do anything to slow Kane down but Edge makes it 3-1 and they get him down. Kane sits up and the group that would become known as the Brood runs.

Cole tells us that after the break, we’ll hear from the McMahon Family.

Here’s Austin who doesn’t know why Vince is so mad at him. He told the cops that the gun was a toy and he told Vince that there wouldn’t be any pain. Austin told Vince he wouldn’t feel anything and he didn’t, so maybe Vince should believe Austin when he says something. Or maybe he shouldn’t. Austin pulls out a paper which he says is a new contract, which guarantees him at least one world title shot. The only way he’s leaving is if he quits, and that isn’t happening.

Here’s Vince with his cronies who yells at Austin and says that Austin is in a match tonight whether he likes it or not. Austin points out what the fans are chanting at Vince which ticks Vince off even more. Vince closes his eyes and hates the way Austin got his contract, however that was. He talks about driving a wedge between something….and here’s Shane in the ring. Vince has no idea what’s going on but Austin hands Shane a mic and seems calm with it.

Shane says he doesn’t listen to Vince anymore and that he’s a stockholder in this company. He hired Austin back to get Vince’s attention. Shane goes into a huge rant about how nothing he ever did was good enough for Vince. It was always about Vince and how to get his ego stroked. Shane was always called Vince’s Boy instead of Shane and he’s sick of it. Shane is a man now and he’s no longer Vince’s Boy. Vince and Shane are both about to cry so Patterson hugs Vince. This was a big moment as this was more or less Shane’s national debut other than being a commentator on Heat.

Post break Shane is leaving and Austin throws him a beer.

Tiger Ali Singh vs. Godfather

Godfather runs him over to start and Singh runs to the floor. He sends Godfather into the barricade but gets his leg sent into the apron. This is much more a fight than a match. Back in and Singh works on the arm a bit but Godfather clotheslines him down. The move that would become the Ho Train hits Singh and but he comes back with a bulldog for one. Godfather dumps him to the floor and Babu gets shoved down. The referee goes down too and it’s thrown out.

Rating: D. For the life of me I do not get what they saw in Singh. The guy just wasn’t anything interesting at all and he was around for a few years. He’s the Million Dollar Man but the Indian version, which isn’t something I care to see at all. This was much more of a brawl than a match which is probably the best thing they could do here.

Oddities vs. Kai En Tai

This is an eight man tag with the Oddities being the ICP teaming with Kurrgan/Golga. Golga starts with I think Funaki, who is blonde here. Teioh comes in and gets crushed along with Funaki in the corner. Taka comes in as well and all three of them combine to get Golga down. Togo joins his partners and all four drop elbows on Golga before it’s off to Kurrgan. Violent J comes in and pounds on Funaki as the embarrassing part of the match begins. Everything breaks down and the Clowns double team Funaki and throw the referee down for the DQ.

Rating: D. The crowd popped for the Clowns but they always got on my nerves. They’re fine when they’re doing their JCP thing which is basically a big joke on the idea of wrestling, but when they’re taking up time on Raw to have fun imitating wrestlers, it gets annoying. The match was short though so it wasn’t that terrible.

Shamrock talks about his I Quit match tonight against Austin. He says he quits, and that’s the last time you’ll hear him say that tonight.

Marc Mero vs. Goldust

Goldust takes him down with a clothesline to start and pounds away in the corner. He hits a slingshot belly to back suplex for two but Mero gets in a low blow while Jackie offers a distraction. Goldust comes back and hits Shattered Dreams for the quick DQ. Not much here.

Post match here’s Sable to talk to Jackie even more. There’s a challenge for Survivor Series and I guess Jackie accepts.

Mankind is confident that he and Snow can win the titles tonight. They argue over whose prop is dumber.

Tag Titles: New Age Outlaws vs. Al Snow/Mankind

Mankind is in the tournament as well. Snow starts with Gunn and gets press slammed for his troubles. Off to Mankind who waves as he comes in. Road Dogg comes in with a wide variety of punches followed by the shaky knee drop. Snow cheats and I think dances on the apron. After a brief beating on the floor by Snow, Roadie gets sent back into the ring for Mankind’s Shake Rattle and Roll. It’s as ugly as you could imagine it as.

Double arm DDT looks to set up Socko but Billy breaks it up. The challengers fight over Head but no one swings it. Billy and Mankind go to the floor as Snow hits the Snow Plow on Dogg. The challengers argue over whether to use Socko or Head for the pin and it lets Roadie roll Snow up to retain.

Rating: D. This was another boring match in a long running series of them over the last two weeks. The ending was the usual swerve as one team was dominating and the other wound up winning on a fluke. Then again that could be the case for almost every Outlaws match for a long stretch of time.

Post match Henry and D’Lo run in to beat up the Outlaws.

Snow has Socko and Mankind has Head until they trade back.

Ken Shamrock vs. Steve Austin

This is an I Quit match, so if Austin loses he’s done. Shamrock is in the Tournament too, giving us four of the sixteen entrants. Austin doesn’t have his wrist tape which is a nice touch as he wouldn’t be ready to go here tonight. Shamrock jumps Austin as he gets off the ropes to take over quickly. Austin fights back and finally gets the vest off. Shamrock gets dumped to the floor and it’s time to fight.

Ken gets rammed into the announce table and choked by a cord as Lawler is freaking out. Shamrock comes back and they go into the crowd. That goes nowhere so they head back to the ramp with Shamrock still in control. Back inside and Austin is in trouble, being sent into the corner. Off to a chinlock which is quickly broken. There’s the Thesz Press but Brisco trips up Austin and gets beaten up for his efforts. Cue Mankind with the Claw on Shamrock and Austin adds a big chair shot to the head, giving Austin the win by knockout.

Rating: D+. These matches continue to be really dull. The I Quit aspect here was just a way to have Austin seem like he was in danger but it never got close to that at all. Like I’ve been saying with the majority of the matches lately from this time period: there’s not enough here to get me interested and the in ring stuff isn’t working at all for the most part.

The Stooges all get Stunners to end the show.

Overall Rating: C. These shows are suffering from the same problems they’ve been suffering from all year: when Austin and Vince aren’t on the screen, things aren’t all that interesting. Rock is still a work in progress and HHH is out with a knee injury. Other than that, there isn’t much going on here and it makes things less interesting to watch. The matches are just bad on top of that, with Russo being at his peak of insanity and bad endings. This would be the peak that would be made to look like 1986 AWA within a year of course but we’ll get to that later.

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One of two technically.Kane came out to save Miz from a beatdown and Rey Mysterio is doing Spanish commentary.  Good start to the show so far, other than Cole saying Kane debuted at Hell in a Cell.  Not quite Mikey.

Monday Night Raw
Date: October 23, 2000
Location: Hartford Civic Center, Hartford, Connecticut
Commentators: Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler

It’s the night after No Mercy and the big story is Kurt Angle shocked the world by beating Rock to become the new WWF Champion. Angle has only been around for about a year at this point and is still a goofy character so this was a pretty big surprise. Other than that Austin didn’t quite get his revenge on Rikishi for nearly killing him eleven months prior but you know that’s not over. Let’s get to it.

We open with an In Memory graphic for Yokozuna. Ignore them incorrectly listing him as a three time world champion.

Here’s a bandaged up Rikishi to open things up. He wants to know where Steve Austin is despite knowing that Austin was arrested for trying to crush Rikishi with a car last night. Rikishi talks about the crime that was committed last night but he’s talking about Rock losing the WWF Title. Rikishi was down there to help Rock and even though they lost the battle last night, they’ll win the war. He asks Rock to come down here to hear what Rikishi has to say so here’s the Brahma Bull.

Rikishi apologizes for last night and that he didn’t mean for Rock to lose the title. Rock says that the two for them have done a lot together over the years, but Rock wants nothing to do with him or his apology. Not that it matters as Rock will be the WWF Champion again on his own, meaning without Rikishi’s help. Rikishi understands that Rock is upset, but he’s starting to hurt the big man’s feelings.

That doesn’t really sway Rock who says Rikishi can wipe himself with his feelings. Rock talks about Rikishi having a stomach ache from eating so many hamburgers and hot dogs and suggests Rikishi leave for good. Rikishi says he’ll be there for Rock whether he likes it or not, so Rock says he has to do what he has to do. A Rock Bottom lays the fat man out.

Trish pitches a Women’s Title match against Lita if it’s under bra and panties rules. Commissioner Mick Foley goes over the rules and accepts the idea.

Women’s Title: Lita vs. Trish Stratus

Lita is defending and remember that this is bra and panties. Lita tackles her down to start and takes it into the corner before this becomes a catfight. This is about two years before Trish was even remotely good in the ring so this isn’t going to be anything more than what you would expect. Trish rips off Lita’s top so Lita does the same to Trish. The champ is about to fall out of her top before suplexing Trish down, hitting the moonsault and completing the stripping to retain.

This brings out the furious Right to Censor to complain about how bad women like Lita and Trish are for America. Steven Richards brings out the newest member of the RTC: Ivory, dressed in something a Puritan would find too conservative. She’s in a white collared blouse and a long black skirt while ranting about the clothing women wear today being too revealing. Trish laughs the ideas off and we’ve got a new monster heel Diva.

Michael Cole is in the back with the new WWF Tag Team Champions, Los Conquistadors. This is a little complicated but I’ll get to the explanation later. Anyway, Edge and Christian come up to them to congratulate them on their win and prove that they’re two different teams. Remember that, as it becomes important later.

Here’s Benoit with something to say. He’s noticed that talent, will and determination are useless. Being the best technical wrestler in the world today doesn’t mean a thing. HHH may have beaten him last night but the only game that won last night was HHH getting help from his wife last night. Starting tonight, things are different because no one and nothing will stop him because his time is now. Prove him wrong.

Chris Benoit vs. Road Dogg

Benoit drives him into the corner to start and stomps Roadie down with ease. A backbreaker gets two but Benoit misses the swan dive, allowing Road Dogg to hit a few left hands. Dean Malenko comes out for a distraction though and the Crossface gets a quick submission. Basically a squash.

Cole tells Rikishi that no one wants him here but he says he’ll be here all night no matter who likes it.

HHH doesn’t like that people thought his era was over. Last night he proved Benoit wrong by showing he’s a better technical wrestler than Benoit is. Coach asks HHH about Stephanie helping Angle win the WWF Title last night but HHH says that’s his own business. However, Angle put Stephanie in harm’s way, so now it’s time for HHH to take it out on Angle.

We get a clip from last night of Austin trying to run over Rikishi and getting arrested last night.

Crash is in charge of the APA’s office while they’re out hurt. Test and Albert come in and kick him out.

Jericho gives a stagehand a Fozzie CD and plugs an upcoming performance on Heat. He turns around and spills his coffee on Kane, saying he hopes he didn’t burn him. You don’t talk about burning Kane and the Canadian is destroyed.

European Champion William Regal is in the ring and calls most of the fans uncivilized. He’s in the capitol of Connecticut which produces more handguns which kill more people than any other stage. Cue Jericho to interrupt, apparently not dead at Kane’s hands. He does have a bad left arm though.

European Title: Chris Jericho vs. William Regal

Jericho gets the mic to insult Regal but decides Willy isn’t worth it and charges in to get us going. The bell rings and Jericho fires off chops followed by a spinwheel kick and a clothesline for two. Regal avoids a charge to send Jericho shoulder first into the post and gets two of his own off a spinning powerbomb. A tiger bomb is countered into a suplex by Jericho but Regal goes after the bad arm to take him down. They slug it out a bit but Regal blocks a clothesline by going after the arm again. Regal loads up a neckbreaker but the not very nice Jericho kicks Regal low. There’s the Lionsault but Kane comes in for the DQ.

Kane lays out Jericho with a chokeslam and lights up the corners of the ring.

T&A (Test and Albert) can’t figure out how the initials for Test and Albert Protection Agency should be spelled.

Stephanie and Angle arrive and are greeted by paparazzi.

Here are Stephanie and Kurt for their first public appearance with the title. Stephanie gives him a long winded (I’m as shocked as you are) intro before confetti and balloons rain from the ceiling. The balloons are popped as Angle talks about how America is falling apart. For most people it’s overcoming poverty but for most people here it’s about overcoming being born in Hartford, like Stephanie has done. Angle brags about winning the gold medal in Atlanta but that wasn’t enough for him. Most people would just give up, but he’s not most people.

Four years later (it was three) he came to the WWF and now he’s proven that he’s the best in this company as well. Two months after he got here, he won the European Title and tourism grew by 38% in Europe. We get an over the top highlight package with Angle narrating. He won the Intercontinental Title two months later, becoming the first Eurocontinental Champion in history. “Well except for D’Lo Brown who doesn’t count.” Then he won King of the Ring, sending sales of crowns and scepters up an amazing 40%.

Last night was the crowning achievement though by winning the WWF Title. Angle’s rookie year really is incredible and I can’t think of a better one in wrestling history. Angle has a poem for us called What Makes A Guy Super Great. He gets about two lines down until Foley interrupts. JR: “THANK GOD!” Mick asks for an ovation for Angle on his title win, but says there’s something he didn’t get last night: a celebratory hug.

Stephanie was unable to give him one due to being unconscious from a Rock Bottom. Mick is one heck of a hugger, so he’d be willing to offer his services. Foley gets all teary eyed and announces Angle’s first title defense……….right here in Hartford, Connecticut….against HHH and the Rock in a triple threat. Awesome segment here with Angle at his very best. Goofy Angle is one of my favorite characters ever and this was some of his best work.

Chyna goes looking for Eddie but finds the two women she caught him in the shower with last week. She shuts the door and a lot of violence can be heard. Chyna leaves and the bodies are shown laid out everywhere. One of those girls is Victoria/Tara.

Too Cool vs. Tazz/Raven

Tazz and Raven formed a short lived ECW tag team around this point because there was nothing else for them to do. Scotty kicks Raven in the face to start and Grandmaster adds a middle rope dropkick to take Bird Boy down again. Tazz walks into a powerslam and Raven is kicked out to the floor. The distraction lets Tazz suplex Grandmaster down and the heels take over.

Raven bulldogs him down for two and it’s already back to Tazz as the announcers ignore the match to talk about a cookbook. Raven jumps into a boot to the face and it’s off to Scotty to speed things up. A superkick gets two on Tazz and everything breaks down. Raven accidentally hits Tazz and Grandmaster hits Raven with the guillotine legdrop. Tazz makes the save and Raven returns the favor by breaking up Worm with a DDT to Scotty for the pin.

Rating: D. Just a match here really and as basic as you could ever get. Just throwing people together into a team because they used to work for another company doesn’t really work that well. They wouldn’t o anywhere as a team as there’s just nothing interesting about them together.

Christian isn’t sure which glasses to wear in the match tonight. Pete Gas from the Mean Street Posse of all people comes in and asks to see Edge.

After a break Edge comes back into his dressing room and finds the place wrecked and Christian put through a table. Apparently the Dudleys attacked him and injured his shoulder. Edge says it’s just Los Conquistadors so he’ll win the titles himself.

Billy Gunn vs. Val Venis

Chyna is with Billy here so Eddie comes out before the match. Billy stops her from killing him, allowing Val to jump the Gunn (I’m here all week) and get things going early. A knee drop gets two for Venis and he peppers Billy with forearms. Billy grabs a quickly broken sleeper but gets countered into a blue thunder bomb for two. They clothesline each other down before Billy hits a Stinger Splash and a Jackhammer, only to have Steven Richards break up a Fameasser. Richards is pulled in for a bit but the Fameasser hits for the pin anyway.

Rating: D. Why Billy Gunn kept getting pushed is beyond me. He was athletic but there are some people that just don’t work as a singles guy. Billy just didn’t have it, but I’d be curious to know how much of that is because of his nickname. You can only get so far with his name and gimmick and he crashed into that ceiling far before this.

Stephanie isn’t sure whose corner she should be in tonight. She asks HHH what he wants but he says he just wants her safe.

Video on Jerry Lawler at Las Vegas Outlaws cheerleader tryouts. I think you can figure this one out.

Tag Titles: Edge vs. Los Conquistadors

Edge looks confused as the champions come to the ring. We’ll say Uno starts but is easily punched down. Uno grabs a quick small package for two and Edge is furious. Los Conquistadors both come in and hit Poetry in Motion as the fans suddenly get it. A Twist of Fate and the Swaton connect for the pin to retain the titles.

Post match the champions of course unmask as the Hardys. Cue Mick Foley to wonder how the Hardys can be the Conquistdors when they wrestled the Conquistadors last night. Foley has some footage from earlier which shows Edge and Christian admitting they were in the Conquistadors costumes last night. The problem with that is Edge and Christian weren’t allowed to challenge for the tag titles, but since they fooled him, the tag title change from last night stands. Unfortunately for Edge and Christian, tonight’s title change (there was a change?) stands as well, meaning the Hardys are YOUR Tag Team Champions.

Rikishi tells Cole to tell Rock that he’s helping him get the title back.

WWF Title: The Rock vs. HHH vs. Kurt Angle

Stephanie is in the back with Kurt and tells him to wait before going to the ring since he’s the champ. He finally gets in and the challengers both deck him in the face for making them wait. Kurt clotheslines HHH down but celebrates too long, allowing Rock to drop him with a clothesline of his own. HHH is knocked to the floor and Kurt pounds away on Rock in the corner while he has a chance. Rock comes back with a quick Samoan drop but HHH dives in for the save.

Now it’s Rock being sent to the floor to give us another mini-match. HHH stomps the champion down in the corner and gets two of his own off a neckbreaker. Angle comes back with a gorgeous German suplex but Rock pulls him out to the floor. Everyone goes outside and Rock and HHH get into a contest to see who can slam Kurt head first into the announce table the hardest. Stephanie tries to break it up so Rock stares her down, causing HHH to get in Rock’s face. Angle has the ring bell but Rock ducks and HHH gets blasted in the side of the head instead.

That leaves Rock vs. Kurt in the ring for a bit with Rock hitting a DDT but the referee is checking on the Game. Kurt suplexes Rock down for the same result as a stretcher is brought out for HHH. Angle hits the Olympic Slam out of nowhere and Hebner FINALLY slides back in to count two. HHH gets off the stretcher and stumbles back to the ring for a quick Pedigree on Kurt. Rock saves and clotheslines HHH down before hitting a Rock Bottom on the champion. This time it’s HHH with the save but Angle breaks up a Pedigree with a belt shot to the face. Rikishi comes out to beat up Angle and that’s a DQ somehow.

Rating: C+. This picked up at the halfway point but why did we have a DQ when Rikishi came in but not for a bell or title shot to HHH’s head? Either way, good stuff here as Angle fits this role perfectly: the guy who isn’t all there at times but can be a killer in the ring. Good stuff here.

Post match here’s Austin to go after Rikishi. He clotheslines Angle on the way down the ramp before pounding away on Rikishi, only to have Kurt come back in to go after Austin for the clothesline. I like that as it’s better than just having Angle come in for no apparent reason. Rikishi escapes and a Stunner to Angle ends the show.

Overall Rating: B-. The key difference between today’s shows and this episode is how many different ideas there were back in 2000. You don’t see the same finishes or repetitive matches or the same stories being used over and over again until we get to a PPV to shake things up. There’s an idea to everything going on and instead of using a batch of jobbers over and over again, you get some fresh matches. It makes the show WAY easier to sit through and far more enjoyable as a result.

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Monday Night Raw
Date: October 21, 2002
Location: Bridgestone Arena, Nashville, Tennessee
Commentators: Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler

Oh look: a Raw from 2002. This is I think the twelfth episode I’ve done from this show, and you would think it would be something fun. Instead, it’s the KATIE VICK EPISODE! Yep, this is the show where HHH climbs in a casket and rapes a mannequin, because this is a wrestling show baby! I think that about covers it. It’s the night after No Mercy and HHH is the champion of all that is Raw as the IC Title has been knocked out for the next eight months or so. Let’s get to it.

We open with a recap of the Katie Vick story. HHH claims Kane is a murderer, but Kane says it was an accident. This is the night after HHH beat Kane to unify the IC and World Titles but the feud must continue for some reason.

Here’s HHH along with Flair to open the show. HHH talks about how he’s proven the writers wrong when they said he didn’t deserve to be handed the title. He ended the IC Title last night and there’s no one that can do anything about it. HHH calls himself unstoppable and says that he might be the greatest world champion ever. Flair has a video that explains the Katie Vick ordeal. Oh boy. Kane isn’t here yet, but apparently tonight it’s Kane/RVD vs. HHH/Flair. This brings out Hurricane, Kane’s other partner, to beat up HHH and take the tape, but HHH beats Hurricane down and takes it back.

Jeff Hardy vs. Christopher Nowitski

Chris takes him down to start and Jeff is getting frustrated, which would be a recurring theme for him for the next few weeks. Jeff sends him to the floor and hits a big flipping dive to take over. Nowitski gets in a shot back inside and gets a few two counts. Hardy comes back with a Thesz Press and actually uses it as a pinning combination. Nowitski chokes away in the corner and gets two off a rolling side cradle.

A gutbuster gets another two on Hardy and this match isn’t going anywhere. Jeff fires away but walks into a hot shot for two. A spinning double underhook slam gets two for Chris and here comes Jeff’s real comeback. He fires away with right hands and a jawbreaker but Chris moves before the Swanton launches. Chris brings in a chair but Al Snow comes in to break it up. The chair winds up hitting Chris in the head but Snow pulls Nowitski away from the Swanton. It hits the chair and Chris steals the pin.

Rating: D. This just kept going. Nowitski was a great base for a character but he never got off the ground. The guy just wasn’t that good. He wasn’t especially bad but he just wasn’t that good. This match didn’t work well for the most part and Hardy would start turning heel soon after this, which didn’t work at all.

Eric Bischoff, the GM, is watching Big Show intimidate him recently. Stacy comes in to ask to referee a match tonight. Eric says yeah whatever but not the main event. Stacy leaves and here’s Show. Eric gives Show Jamal, Rico and Rosey tonight.

Snow talks to Dreamer about costing Dreamer a match recently. They have a Singapore cane match tonight. Dreamer leaves and Nowitski comes up. Nowitski doesn’t want/need Al’s help. Ok then.

Lance Storm/William Regal vs. Bubba Ray Dudley/Spike Dudley

The winners get a title shot against whoever the champions are now. Apparently it’s Christian/Jericho. Storm runs down American before the match. Spike vs. Storm to start things off with the smaller dude taking over quickly. The fans want tables but other than that things are mostly silent. We’ve lost commentary for some reason and by the time that sentence is finished JR is back.

Off to Bubba who takes Lance down with a neckbreaker but Regal hits Bubba in the back of his recently concussed head to give Storm the advantage. Regal comes in as Kane arrives in the back. Everything breaks down and Spike ranas Storm off the top. Bubba catches the superkick from Storm and hits the Bubba Bomb. Spoke hits the Dudley Dog on Regal for the win and the title shot.

Rating: C-. This was one of those matches that was too short to go anywhere of note. Regal and Storm as the Unamericans were a solid team but the gimmick was only going to go so far, especially with Test weighing them down as their third man. Nothing to see here and thankfully D-Von would reunite with Bubba the next month.

Storm kicks Bubba in the head post match and Spike gets hit in the ribs over and over by Regal’s brass knuckles.

Trish is having her picture taken and has to talk to the photographer about her match with Victoria from last night. Jericho and Christian pop up and call Trish a w****. Apparently Jericho thinks Trish wants him. Geez is this some extreme foreshadowing? I really doubt it.

Here’s Eric with something to say. He praises last night’s HIAC match with Brock vs. Taker (it really was good) but he’s going to top it. How is he going to do that? Something called the Elimination Chamber. No word on what that is yet.

Test vs. D’Lo Brown

Stacy is referee so she can wear a revealing outfit. Test looks like an idiot with long hair and short tights. Stacy slaps Brown and rings the bell. Test launches him over with a big backdrop and pounds away in the corner. Brown gets his feet up to block a charge followed by a flying forearm. Brown drops a leg but Stacy interferes again. The Sky High hits but Stacy is tying her shoe instead of counting. The big boot from Test and a fast count give the Canadian the win. Stacy jumps in Test’s arms post match.

Victoria says that she isn’t lying about Trish sleeping her way to the top. Victoria is still insane here. Goldust pops up behind her to make fun of her in a Dustyesque voice. Booker shows up as well to do the same, minus the American Dream part.

Trish Stratus/Booker T/Goldust vs. Victoria/Chris Jericho/Christian

Trish has her full entrance and look down now. Jericho and Christian are tag champions which I think I mentioned earlier. The girls brawl to start and Trish fires off her kicks in the corner. Victoria drop toeholds her onto the bottom rope and it’s off to Christian vs. Trish as the genders don’t have to match here. Booker comes in to make this a bit more fair for Christian. A forearm puts Christian down and a side kick gets two. Victoria and her awesome rack distracts Booker and the Canadians take over.

Off to Jericho who pounds away but gets caught in the spinning sunset flip out of the corner. The fans are way into Booker which is a good sign. It means HHH has someone to beat at Wrestlemania for no other reason than HHH wants to win at Wrestlemania. Back to Christian who takes Booker down so Jericho can hit a top rope knee drop.

A spinebuster takes Jericho down and it’s off to Goldust. He cleans the lower level of the house, hitting a middle rope bulldog for two on Jericho. Trish comes in with a cross body to Jericho and Goldust kisses Victoria. Booker and Christian take each other out and Jericho takes Trish down and finishes her with the Walls of Jericho.

Rating: D+. This started off as ok but boring and evolved into a messy comedy (I think?) match. There was nothing of note going on here which is the problem with Raw at this point: it isn’t terrible but there’s no interest in it at all. The tag titles meant nothing at all at this point and wouldn’t for a very long time. Thankfully we had the Smackdow tag titles established last night and they tore the house down for a long time.

Booker saves Jericho post match.

Terri is at Kane’s door and we cut to HHH who says roll the footage. I’m sure you’ve at least heard of this before. It’s of a funeral home with a date of 1992. Kane (clearly HHH in a Kane mask and t-shirt that wouldn’t be released for another 9 years) comes up to the casket and talks to the dead “body” of Katie Vick. It’s a mannequin if that’s not coming through. Kane (it’s HHH the entire segment so don’t get confused. I know this segment can make you stupid but hang with me here) says that if Katie had let him touch her in the car, this wouldn’t have happened.

The idea is that Kane was driving and crashed, killing Katie. Katie “talks” to Kane, saying that apparently now that she’s dead she wants Kane. Kane talks about getting excited watching Katie cheerlead and he fondles her chest which is mosaiced. This is supposed to be something like a hidden video of a sex tape. Kane takes his shirt off and starts undressing the mannequin. He takes off her underwear and says he loves the smell of formaldehyde in the morning. Kane takes his jeans off and gets in the casket. Sounds are heard and we cut to shots of candles and flowers.

Usually I would give a long winded explanation of how awful this is for wrestling and how terrible it is, but I think the segment speaks for itself: it’s simulated necrophilia. I think that sums it up. When you look at the unemployment figures in this country, remember that someone came up with this idea and was paid to do so.

Al Snow vs. Tommy Dreamer

Singapore Cane match. We start with a cane duel and Snow gets in the first connecting shots to the legs. Out to the floor and Dreamer fires away more cane shots but Snow headbutts him down. Back in and Dreamer kicks Al low, followed by a missed cane shot from an interfering Nowitski to give Dreamer the pin. Nothing to see here.

Big Show vs. Rosey/Jamal/Rico

The big guys jump Show to start but he shoves all of them away with ease. The heavies are clotheslined to the floor and Show goes after Rico’s sideburns of doom. JR makes gay references about Rico and Show destroys more people. There’s a chokeslam to Jamal (Umaga) for the pin. Total squash for Show.

Post break Eric announces that Big Show has been traded to Smackdown. He would get the world title the next month over there. After Show leaves, Hurricane arrives (did he leave?) and stands in front of his own car. Ok then.

We get some clips of Shawn getting destroyed after his match with HHH at Summerslam. Shawn is in a wheelchair at The World (WWF New York) and says his rehab is going slowly. The final match he had with HHH can stand on its own merit as not only a great match but a tribute to God. HHH did indeed put him in a wheelchair like he said he would but Shawn vows vengeance and stands up. He’s coming for HHH again.

HHH/Ric Flair vs. Rob Van Dam/Kane

The good guys pound away on their respective feud partners (Van Dam beat Flair last night) in the corner and both heels get kicked in the face. Van Dam and Flair start and it’s the cartwheel moonsault to Naitch. A middle rope kick to the face puts him down again as HHH knocks Kane off the apron and it’s the barricade. Van Dan kicks the Game down but Flair breaks up the Five Star.

Van Dam gets sent into the post and seems to have hut his ankle. That gets two back inside as we’re finally into a normal tag team match. JR and King debate necrophilia, which isn’t something I expected I’d have to write. Off to Flair as JR is sounding ticked off. Flair and Van Dam slug it out but it’s off to HHH with the knee to the face. King tries to convince JR that necrophilia is funny but Captain Oklahoma isn’t convinced. HHH puts on the sleeper and Van Dam is in trouble.

The hold is broken and it’s off to Flair. Van Dam superkicks him down and Flair goes up and with JR verbally rolling his eyes, Flair gets slammed down. HHH comes in and beats on Van Dam, but Rob escapes and tags Kane. Never mind as the tag isn’t seen so it’s time to go back to the not interesting match.

Back in and Van Dam takes Flair down and makes the real tag. Kane cleans house as the announcers debate if necrophiliac and Hulkamaniac rhyme. This is what Raw has sunk to people. Van Dam goes up and gets crotched as Kane and HHH fight on the floor. They head up the ramp with HHH being rammed into the set. Van Dam kicks Flair in the face, hits Rolling Thunder and adds the Five Star for the pin.

Rating: C-. Not only was the match not that good, but it was based on necrophilia. I can’t emphasize that enough: this feud is continuing because HHH dressed up like Kane and pretended to have sex with a mannequin representing a corpse. JR sounded legitimately angry in this match and can you blame him at all?

In the back Kane destroys HHH in the back and throws him into various metal objects. Hurricane is standing next to his car with the trunk open. HHH tries a Pedigree but gets catapulted onto the hood of the car. There’s a chokeslam onto the hood and Kane throws HHH into the trunk and slams it shut. Kane sends Hurricane away and says to the trunk, and I quote, “Now I’m going to screw you. The only question is will you still be alive, or will I just wait until you’re dead.” Kane drives away with HHH in the trunk to end the show.

Overall Rating: D. Ignoring the white elephant on this show, it wasn’t a good episode. There weren’t any good matches and a lot of the stuff felt like it was there to fill in two hours. The Elimination Chamber was mentioned but after the announcement it was barely mentioned again. This show was based around one of the stupidest stories of all time and it’s even worse than it seemed at the time. It’s in poor taste, it’s not funny, and it makes you embarrassed to be a wrestling fan. Terrible show.

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

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

No Mercy 2002
Date: October 20, 2002
Location: Alltel Arena, North Little Rock, Arkansas
Attendance: 9,074
Commentators: Michael Cole, Tazz, Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler

This was requested by someone and I can’t remember who. In name only this seems like a weak card but it’s actually pretty stacked. We have HHH vs. Kane in a title unification match, the match of the year with Edge/Mysterio vs. Benoit/Angle for the first Smackdown tag titles and Hell in a Cell with Lesnar vs. Taker. Let’s get to it.

Nothing special in the opening video. THERE WILL BE NO MERCY! Yeah that’s all they’ve got.

Raw Tag Titles: Chris Jericho/Christian vs. Booker T/Goldust

The Canadians have the titles. Four separate entrances here which is kind of odd. Christian and Jericho just won the belts this past week on Raw. Booker vs. Christian starts us off. Christian is a glorified lower card guy at this point having been more or less completely left in the dust by Edge despite him having a title and Edge not at the moment. It sounds odd but it’s completely true.

Flying hips to the face of the Canadians keep Goldust in control. Jericho gets a middle rope dropkick as that first little bit was kind of quickly done and not in a good way. The fans are way behind Booker T. Goldust avoids a Christian dropkick and gets a rollup for two followed by a powerslam. No tag though as I guess he’s playing the face in peril here. Before I finished that sentence Booker comes in.

Apparently Booker and Jericho are feuding at this point so there’s your reasoning for the match I guess. You knew it wasn’t just because they’re both good tag teams right? Booker dominates for the most part here as he’s the hottest thing in the match and would get a title shot at Mania.

Back over to Goldust who hits Shattered Dreams on Christian and continues to abuse the balls of Christian by getting a drop toehold onto Jericho to send him into his partner’s crotch. Axe kick to Jericho gets two as Christian saves. Booker gets the missile dropkick and it’s Spinarooni time. Jericho goes for his running springboard dropkick but the ropes break. Well doesn’t that suck. Jericho bulldogs Goldust onto a title belt and hits a moonsault off the top to retain.

Rating: C-. You can’t hold the ropes breaking against them here but this match wasn’t very entertaining. It’s ok but it really is a Raw match with a bit more time on PPV. It wasn’t much at all with Goldust and Booker being a glorified comedy team as this is a backdrop for the Booker vs. Jericho feud which I’m never a fan of. Not terrible though.

Funaki, Smackdown NUMBER ONE announcer, is with Al Wilson. This was during the Dawn Marie marries Al Wilson to tick off Torrie. This resulted in Al “dying” and Dawn making out with Torrie in a lesbian/semi-incest angle that was insanely hot but irritating at the same time. This is WAY too long as they show a bunch of clips but they have to fix the ring so we have hot women to look at I guess. It results in a Bill Clinton joke of all things.

Torrie Wilson vs. Dawn Marie

They’re not even called Divas all the time yet. Sweet GOODNESS Cole looks toolish here. The girls look great though. Torrie drills her to start and it’s on early. This is when the girls were just AWFUL in the ring. It’s this era and the next 2-3 years where the bad stereotypes come from. Torrie kept getting ring time and looked like a rookie in her first match for the better part of three years.

Dawn drops a head into the crotch of Torrie and Tazz wonders if that actually hurts. This is just freaking terrible. Rolling catfight spot as this is going nowhere at all. They can’t even do clotheslines right. YOU STICK YOUR ARM OUT. Why is this getting extended time??? Finally Torrie wins with a swinging neckbreaker.

Rating: D-. Girls looking this hot can’t be a failure. That’s all it’s got going for it though and I want to get away from it as fast as I can.

RVD says Flair is awesome and lists off some catchphrases of Naitch. He even struts and woos and does his own version of the limousine riding bit. It’s MUCH funnier than it sounds and it helps that Flair is a walking cartoon character.

In the same shot we see Brock and Heyman showing up and they have no comment. There’s also a decent looking woman named Tracy that is accusing Taker of being a cheater in his marriage. Actually that’s true but who cares about reality?

Ric Flair vs. Rob Van Dam

Flair is heel here and Evolution isn’t quite formed yet but would show up on February 3 of the following year (no I’m not that big of a geek. That’s my birthday). At Unforgiven (JR says Vengeance) Flair turned heel and hit RVD in the stomach with a sledgehammer to save HHH’s title. They go at it on the floor for a bit and Flair’s shoulder goes into the post before the bell rings.

Or has the match started already? Top rope dropkick hits Flair as the bell rings. Ok so it hadn’t started yet. Flair is only 53 here so he’s still a young dude in theory I guess. Flair takes out the knee and we’re officially in the Flair Formula. The main talking point is that Van Dam said he flies coach in the prematch promo. Lawler will not shut up about it and it’s kind of annoying. Yes Lawler is getting annoying. I’m stunned too.

The standard Flair beating goes on for a LONG time. And now we’re talking about the Tracy girl. Well sure why not. We get to the Figure Four after maybe three minutes and naturally it doesn’t end the thing since Flair is a heel and he loses the ability to win with a submission. Van Dam makes his comeback as this is borderline predictable.

Ross slips in his more time on the canvas than Rembrandt line as Flair is slammed off the top. Rolling Thunder gets two as Flair gets a foot on the ropes. And then there’s the Five Star to actually end it. It’s kind of weird to see Flair just jobbing cleanly like that. Most odd indeed.

Rating: D+. You’ve seen it once and you’ve seen it 1000 times. And yes I know how ironic that is given the last thing I said about the ending. This again belonged on Raw and not here but that’s typical for the most part. This went nowhere for the most part as Flair at least is almost good for putting someone over. Pretty weak match though.

Show is talking to Stephanie and Bischoff comes up to complain about it. Show wanted to leave Raw but Eric wouldn’t let him. He would be there by Survivor Series and a heel under Heyman’s leadership.

Since the IC Title dies tonight we get a video package on the history of the title. Cool stuff.

Cruiserweight Title: Tajiri vs. Jamie Noble

Noble is champion here. Tajiri was the referee in a Noble/Nidia match on Smackdown for no apparent reason so Noble beat him up afterwards. Tajiri gets a baseball slide before the bell rings as that’s a running theme lately. Asai Moonsault hits and that’s about the extent of Tajiri’s offense for awhile.

Nice electric chair by Noble gets two. Pretty much domination by the champion so far. Tazz and Cole imply these three are in a three way relationship or something but that never went anywhere. The commentary is far more sexual in nature than what you would be used to in WWE today.

Jamie gets knocked off the top rope as he tries a suplex so Tajiri gets to miss a moonsault now. He does get a tornado DDT but doesn’t cover for no apparent reason. Both guys down now. Both guys up now. Tajiri unleashes that martial arts rush which is always awesome. Handspring elbow has Jamie in big trouble. German suplex gets two.

There’s the Tarantula and Jamie is reeling. Big kick misses and the Tiger Bomb is countered. There’s the kick and Nidia kisses the referee so he can’t make the count. And there’s the Tiger Bomb for two which is surprising. Tajiri goes for a victory roll but Nidia trips him so Jamie can dive into it for the Owen Hart at Mania X pin.

Rating: C. Not bad here and at least they allowed Tajiri to get in more offense than it looked like he was going to get. It’s nothing great or anything like that but this was definitely watchable and the whole thing worked pretty well. It’s a shame no one cared about this or it might have been interesting.

Tajiri kisses her post match. Noble kisses her too. Tajiri kicks the living heck out of him while he does though.

Benoit is looking for Eddie and says that Angle is kicking Chavo’s teeth in at the moment. Eddie goes off to find him and Benoit follows. Eddie finds the door they’re behind and makes noises with his mouth. Eddie thinks Benoit is faking so that Angle can take him down.

It’s clearly Chavo yelling but Eddie says that sounds like a little girl. And then Angle throws Chavo through the door. This was…..uh yeah. Apparently they did the same thing on Smackdown and Angle was suckering Eddie in. Out of context this is nuts but that makes sense.

We recap the monster Kane face push that resulted him in being the IC Champion and getting the shot at HHH here because it’s winner take all since WWE decided there was going to be one title per show for no apparent reason at all. Kane talked about being all happy for the first time in his life. And then, HHH asked Kane about Katie Vick.

Yes it’s THAT Katie Vick. The idea was that there was some chick that Kane knew (despite allegedly being burned horribly and never knowing anyone but Paul Bearer). He drove her home one night and they wrecked, killing her. Then HHH went to a funeral home and simulated sex with a mannequin while wearing a Kane mask, implying that Kane raped her corpse. This might be the lowest the company ever got.

Raw World Title/Intercontinental Title: HHH vs. Kane

Since Lesnar had gone to Smackdown as the Undisputed Champion the World Heavyweight Championship had been made for HHH as the Raw title. That was last month so the ending is pretty clear here. We hear the stupid line of that title dating back to 1904 (it was 1905 until they decided it was 04 when HHH got it) which is complete nonsense.

In short, the NWA Title was unified with a title that dated back to 1905. That title LOOKS like the NWA Title so it has the same lineage. That’s the extent of the WWE’s logic. Lawler says Kane needs Liquid Courage to face HHH. Well it would certainly help him with his covers. And now onto the match.

Kane pushes him around to start and then drills HHH. An amusing thing here is that Lawler keeps calling Kane the Animal. Batista was either already on Smackdown or would be debuting any week now. I think he’s already there though. All Kane so far. He beats on HHH for about the first three minutes more or less non stop. HHH gets a bad reverse neckbreaker to take Kane down. Naturally he sits up to take care of that.

Facebuster buys HHH some time and he sends Kane to the floor. Back in the ring and HHH hits another neckbreaker. Make that three. Dang he sticks to stuff he likes doesn’t he? Ross says if Kane wins he’ll be the first masked World’s Heavyweight Champion. I guess they’re pushing that whole separate titles thing. Spinebuster puts Kane down again.

HHH keeps up the offense on the neck and throat with a slingshot up into the middle rope to keep Kane down even longer. Off to a sleeper now and Kane is reeling. Down he goes as Lawler makes death jokes. Those are pretty creepy actually. This match is pretty plodding and not much is going on here at all. Sidewalk Slam by Kane gets no cover as he’s broken the sleeper and is in control again.

Top rope clothesline hits and here’s Ric Flair because a title match can’t be clean right? Down goes the referee and Flair won’t leave. What a shocker. Belt to Kane’s face gets a two without much drama at all. Hurricane, Kane’s partner, comes out and beats up Flair but walks into a Pedigree. Kane sits up and it’s on again.

HHH comes off the middle and top rope and neither of them work. Chokeslam is blocked and down goes the referee again. To the floor now and HHH takes a chokeslam through the Spanish Announce Table. Flair comes in with the sledgehammer but Kane stops it. HHH gets a low blow and a hammer shot but walks into a chokeslam. Flair (again) breaks up the pin and takes a chokeslam as a result. Back in and HHH hits the Pedigree to retain and retire the IC Title.

Rating: D. This more or less is what would happen in Raw World Title matches for the vast majority of the next year and a half. HHH would get dominated by a big guy but then Flair and the sledgehammer would come into play and HHH would of course retain. Kane more or less was done for a good while after this as he didn’t get to do anything because it was world title or nothing. That was the stupid part of the whole thing but it took about 9 months for them to realize it. The match sucked due to all of the garbage in it though.

Stephanie talks to the Tracy girl about the Undertaker thing and she admits Heyman made the whole thing up and she’s just going along with it. They had a relationship before he married Taker. This is “confidentially between the two of them.” I guess the camera means nothing.

We recap the tag team tournament and basically the two teams have been flying through the whole thing and are unstoppable. If Benoit and Angle fight they’re both suspended for a year.

Smackdown Tag Titles: Rey Mysterio/Edge vs. Chris Benoit/Kurt Angle

This was the undisputed match of the year so this more or less has to be awesome. Edge is about as hot as possible here and Rey is pretty new here. Yeah he had been around only three months or so here. Edge is just straight up awesome here and the whole thing is just greatness. Angle vs. Rey to start us off. We have what, about 25 world titles in there? Angle takes him to the mat and slaps him in the back of the head to be a jerk.

Kurt is really the only heel in this match. He literally throws Rey into his own corner because he wants a grownup apparently. Rey won’t tag out though because he wants Angle. They had a great opener at Summerslam so this works for me. Rey can’t get out of much of anything so he steps on Kurt’s foot and hits him with what can only be called an FU.

He busts out the speed and slaps Angle in the back of the head just like Kurt did earlier. The announce table being in pieces is funny for some reason. Here’s Edge to a big old pop. This is before Edge hurt his neck so he’s a totally different worker here. Off to Benoit now. Expect a LOT of play by play here as if the reviews I’ve heard are any indication there isn’t going to be much to make fun of.

The Canadians do a much more technical sequence and it’s a lot more entertaining than you would think a side headlock should be. Edge gets a knee to Benoit’s ribs and focuses on them for a while. Flapjack and a rollup get two. And there’s a knee from Kurt as Edge hits the ropes to give Benoit an advantage. They try the same thing again but Edge spears him this time.

Benoit and Angle double team Edge in a very nice sequence. Back to Angle now. The fans are all over him which is always good to hear. Better for them to be making noise at all than to be bored. Rear naked choke to Edge and Rey is getting antsy. Tazz adds in something by saying Angle is making sure Edge is facing his partner to mess with his head. Nicely done Mr. suplex machine.

Edge gets a big boot but walks into a belly to belly for two and here’s Chris again. Here are the rolling Germans as Edge is getting the tar beaten out of him. Benoit goes a little heel by drilling Rey to keep him from making the save. Benoit goes up for the headbutt and down he comes off a big old superplex.

There’s the big tag to Rey and he cranks things WAY up. The good thing is that he’s in there against two guys that can do the same thing. He sets Benoit for a Bronco Buster but goes with a running dropkick instead. HUH-FREAKING-ZAH! Rey and Benoit crank things up ever more but Benoit gets a counter and hooks up the Crossface until Edge finally saves.

Edge vs. Angle on the floor along with Benoit and Rey in the ring. 619 is blocked by Benoit but Edge hits a missile dropkick to drive Rey onto Benoit for a long two. This is all happening at a very fast pace. Rey goes up but Angle JUMPS from the mat to the top for the HUGE belly to belly off the top for another long two. Benoit’s face is like WHAT at that.

Angle in now vs. Rey as things slow down a bit. Rey starts a bit of a comeback but gets caught in a quick suplex and crashes for two. Back to the short and crazy Canadian now. After more of a beating Rey gets a headscissors to send Benoit into the post and we get double tags to bring in Edge vs. Kurt. Edge-O-Matic gets two and everyone is back in again.

Spear in the corner to Benoit and there’s the Bronco Buster. I withdraw my former HUZZAH! Spear in the corner again to Angle and Edge sits him on the middle rope. Rey runs at Edge who throws him into the air for a big old rana. Benoit looks to save with the diving headbutt but it crushes Angle and only gets two. Angle busts out a German from nowhere for two. He shouts at Edge to go to the middle which Edge does.

In a VERY nice spot, Rey runs at Edge who belly to bellies him into Angle to take down the bald one. That’s what he gets for calling spots that loudly. Benoit saves the spear and grabs the Crossface and Edge is in trouble but he gets a rope. He won’t let go so Rey hits a 619 out of somewhere. Angle Slam takes out Rey and Angle locks on the ankle lock.

Edge kicks off and grabs a small package for two. Spear gets two as Benoit saves and Rey takes out Benoit. Rey gets a running start at Edge again and Edge catches him and gives him a very nice launch into a moonsault to take out Benoit. SICK counter out of the Edgecution by Angle into the ankle lock. Edge counters that into an ankle lock of his own but Angle is all like OH NO YOU DIDN’T and counters into an ankle lock for the tap out and the titles. Sweet goodness as Cole says he’s going to applaud them for it.

Rating: A+. OH YES. Now this is what you get when you have two teams out there that are young and moving as fast as they can to make something look awesome. Smackdown was supposed to be the wrestling show back then and it certainly was.

These four plus Brock and Eddie were known as the Smackdown Six and were more or less there to have great matches every week. This is another fine example of it and it worked like a charm. Great match with some INSANE counters and saves and double teaming. Go watch it. Like now.

A doctor tells Taker that he shouldn’t give Taker a shot in the broken hand/wrist that he has. Nice to see him getting this maybe 15 minutes before the match starts.

Women’s Title: Trish Stratus vs. Victoria

Sweet merciful goodness Trish looks amazingly good tonight. She’s in her standard stuff but the blue with the long blonde hair and the big smile is WORKING. Victoria is currently known as Tara in TNA. Total bring the crowd down match after the awesome match they just had. Victoria is a bit more hardcore than the rest of the Divas. Trish was pretty good in the ring by this point and can more than carry herself.

You can tell that Trish has talent as she’s not afraid to go after Victoria here and clearly looks comfortable out there doing what she’s doing. When you watch the Divas today for the most part they clearly have to stop and make sure they’re doing everything right. With Trish like most of the male wrestlers, you can see she’s mostly going on instinct which is the better way of doing things.

Victoria in control here as she hits a front flip slingshot legdrop and then botches the living heck out of a monkey flip to the extent that Trish landed on Victoria rather than hitting the mat. Victoria throws on an old school backbreaker which is the kind where they throw the other girl over her shoulder and pulls down. A big spinning sideslam gets no cover so Trish gets an electric chair drop for two. Chick Kick gets two before a neckbreaker and rollup end it.

Rating: D. This was just there but the sloppiness of it hurt things. Trish was getting a lot better but still wasn’t as great as she would get. Victoria wasn’t a character yet and was just a bit nuts and said that Trish slept her way to the top of the fitness modeling world. She would get the title the next month in a hardcore match. This was pretty much nothing.

Post match Victoria kicks the blonde’s head off.

We get a clip of Rikishi being thrown off the top of the Cell in 2000. Rikishi is at the World (WWE nightclub/restaurant) and says the match is no joke. He predicts Taker wins it.

The Cell is lowered.

We recap Taker vs. Lesnar. They had a match at Unforgiven where Taker lost by DQ when he threw Brock through the set. In short he just didn’t want to put Lesnar over so they gave them two matches in a row. Lesnar has been champion for two months here so this is his second major title defense. Brock broke Taker’s hand and we threw in that Tracy chick who meant nothing apparently. This gets the music video treatment.

Smackdown World Title: Brock Lesnar vs. The Undertaker

In the Cell remember. Taker keeps lunging at Brock and gets taken to the mat for his trouble. Big powerslam gets two for the champion and there’s the cast to Lesnar’s ribs after he misses a charge in the corner. Brock tries to escape but can’t get out so he hammers on the arm instead. He goes with an armbar which isn’t something you often see in a Cell match.

Taker blasts him in the head with it which is a double edged sword. Actually it’s a hard cast but you get the metaphor. Brock is busted BAD. Heyman is all freaked out. Brock is bleeding but there’s been worse in ECW so I guess he’s mellowed. They hit the floor and Taker beats the tar out of him and covers on the floor for two. You can do that? I don’t remember that before.

More cast shots which all of a sudden don’t hurt him. I guess he’s lucky that the shot he got kicked in sometime between the first big shot with it and this set of them. Lesnar gets put in place for the apron legdrop but Taker goes up and drops a knee (I think) from the top instead for two on the floor again. Heyman shouts at Brock to get away from Taker. Taker kicks Heyman through the cage in a nice shot.

He follows that up by grabbing Paul’s tie and pulling on it to slam him into the cage. Taker gets out of the way of a charging Brock who crashes into Heyman too. Dang he’s taken a beating tonight. Brock gets a good shot in though and sends him into the cage. Heyman is busted open too. He slips his belt in and ties Taker up with it so Lesnar can annihilate him a bit. Heyman shouting YOU’RE GONNA DIE is great stuff.

Lesnar, a 300lb beast, swings a chair about ten times to drill Taker’s hand each time. So in other words, Taker is probably in need of major surgery now on it. Let’s see if it hurts at all. Brock gets the cast off or at least tries to. Heyman sounds demonic out there. There goes the cast completely as they’re actually in the ring now.

In a cool spot, Brock sits him on the top rope and uses the top of the cage to lift himself up and throw kicks at Taker. Taker blocks a superplex despite being more or less dead. He knocks Lesnar to the mat and manages to drop an elbow off the top with the right hand and seems to be just fine. Shocking isn’t it? I’m not used to seeing Taker’s bare hand. Taker kicks Brock into the cage and has momentum again.

Taker dives through the ropes and more or less completely misses but Brock sells it anyway. Cole thinks Taker’s broken right hand could be a weakness for him. Wow indeed. Steps to the head take Taker down again and busts him open. More steps to the head and Taker is more or less done. His face is COVERED in blood.

Back in the ring Brock gets a big spinebuster for two. ZERO pop for the kickout. And naturally Taker is able to throw big right hands and is “running on adrenaline” apparently. Oh give me a break. The blood on the camera is always a nice touch. Old School is blocked and Brock takes over again. Tazz: Undertaker has never been pinned or submitted. What the heck is this guy on?

F5 is reversed into a chokeslam for two which gets a bigger pop than the kickout did a minute ago. Brock goes for a Last Ride and is reversed. DDT gets two. Sweet GOODNESS Taker is bleeding badly. Brock does the punches in the corner which Taker counters with the Last Ride for two as Brock’s bloody hand grabs the rope.

In something SICK on the cover, Taker’s blood drips onto Brock’s face. That’s not good at all and really isn’t safe in the slightest. That’s a big reason as to why the blood policy is a good thing. Taker goes for the Tombstone and Brock is like screw this let’s end it and counters it before literally throwing Taker onto his shoulders for the F5 to retain. We then get what is supposed to be an iconic scene as he grabs the title and climbs to the top of the Cell where he holds it over his head to end the show.

Rating: C. Hard one to call here as the match itself is more or less crap. It’s about 27 minutes long and at least 15 of that is spent on the floor. Taker’s hand thing was eye rolling levels of stupid as all of a sudden a shot is able to heal 5 chair shots from Brock Lesnar to a broken hand. Brock looked great here, but the main reason this is a decent grade is the blood.

If you like bloody matches, RUN out and find a copy of this show. Taker’s blood is absolutely insane as you can’t see his face and it looks like there’s a hole in his forehead. It’s a big brawl but Taker was really looking bad out there, both from how his face looked to how he was working. I didn’t like the match, but the blood was insane.

Overall Rating: D+. This isn’t quite a one match show but it’s very close. The tag match is required viewing, but other than that there isn’t anything absolutely worth seeing. The Cell match is a very case by case basis of whether or not you should watch it. Other than that though everything here is very hit or miss and nothing you couldn’t find anywhere with relative ease. This show isn’t terrible, but it’s not very good. Tag title match is absolutely worth seeing though. Other than that, not really worth it.

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In Your House 25: Judgment Day
Date: October 18, 1998
Location: Rosemont Horizon, Rosemont, Illinois
Attendance: 18,153
Commentators: Jerry Lawler, Jim Ross

So we’re just three weeks (dang it happened back then too) from Breakdown and your two main things are as follows: there is no WWF Champion. After the double pin last month, Vince said that the title is vacant. The following night on Raw, Vince tried to have a ceremony but Austin interrupted with a Zamboni, (the thing used to smooth ice) and attacked Vince.

Vince announced Taker and Kane with Austin as referee for Judgment Day. Taker and Kane broke his ankle because of it. HHH was stripped of the IC Title because he hurt his knee and Shamrock won a tournament for it. D’lo got the European Title back too.

Standard opening, but they get a little insane by having a missile go off with the words WWF on the side. A bit intense don’t you think?

Al Snow vs. Marc Mero

Snow continues to get big pops and I have no freaking idea why they didn’t push him as something. He was over and could work a good match. Oh that’s right, Vince didn’t come up with the gimmick so it wouldn’t have worked. I can’t stand him sometimes. Anyway there’s no point to this match so it should be better than most on this show. Jeff Jarrett joins us as he and Snow had been fighting lately.

He’s gone in all of 2 minutes though so that was a fairly pointless thing. This is a decent opening match with the best line being Al Snow is so dumb his dentist says his wisdom teeth are stupid. It’s exactly what you would expect here as they go back and forth a bit with Mero missing the SSP (by a freaking mile. Seriously he completely missed.) Snow gets rolled up and his shoulder is so clearly off the mat it’s awful but he’s counted anyway for two. TKO gets reversed into the Snow Plow to end it.

Rating: B-. It was a short opener so what more did you want from it? Not a bad match but just ok. Jarrett made no sense with the run in at the beginning so that part was a waste of time. Mero of course sucked a bit and Snow was good as always. I’ll never get how Snow wasn’t a bigger star than Mero was. I simply don’t get it.

Austin is shown coming into the arena and having to dress in the referee’s locker room. Slaughter has to be the most useless man in wrestling history.

DOA vs. LOD

This is a twist as it’s a 6 man with Droz and Ellering in the ring. That’s fun as I now have 6 reasons to hate this match instead of just 4. Hawk has admitted his “demons” which is the bad storyline that I’ve been referencing. The LOD with regular haircuts just do not work at all. They’re the hometown boys though so the pops are……..pretty mild actually. They exist but it’s nothing solid.

Droz actually looks the most like an original LOD member. He also busts out a jumping reverse elbow which is one of my all time favorite moves. This is a fairly short match with the LOD dominating for the most part. Hawk looks fine for someone with an addiction problem but oh well. Anyway, Ellering does next to nothing as was expected. Eventually the Doomsday Device is hit, resulting in Droz stealing the pin. Hawk isn’t happy.

Rating: C+. It’s very short and an overdone feud that wasn’t interesting, but it wasn’t a bad match. Droz was better than I remember him being but he was ok at least. He had a unique look which helped him out a lot, making him look more like the LOD than the LOD> Not a terrible match, but nothing that wouldn’t fit on a Raw.

Christian vs. Taka Michinoku

Christian has his cocky walk going already here even as a rookie. This is going to be a much happier review as I just finished seeing my boy Punk get the WHC back. Anyway, this match yet again shows what’s wrong with this division in two parts. Number one, Taka has been champion ten months now. That’s too long for what’s supposed to be a fast paced division and WAY too long for an inaugural champion.

Second, and this is the most important of the problems, they’re wrestling a heavyweight style. The big spot here is a crossbody block. Ricky Steamboat used that for years and he’s certainly a heavyweight wrestler. Sting used to use it. See what I mean? In a division like this, I want all kinds of flips and top rope moves and dives etc. CM Punk, who is the NEW WHC I might add, is more of a light heavyweight than Taka was.

Christian wrestles a heavyweight style as well. See how this is a problem? Anyway, Christian reverses the driver (what small guy uses a piledriver anyway?) into a rollup for the pin and the title as Edge looks on from the crowd.

Rating: C-. It was way too short, there weren’t enough high flying moves, and no one knew who Christian was at t the time. It gets a passing grade simply because it ended the mind numbing Taka reign which went on about 8 months too long and killed the division before it ever got off the ground. Not a great match, but passable I suppose.

Venis and Goldust are recapped, leading to…

Val Venis vs. Goldust

Before the match Goldust hijacks Val’s mic so he can’t do his shtick. That’s a nice little thing that plays up to Goldust and the psychological games. Anyway, apparently dressing in gold is quite intimidating these days as the guy that Val destroyed last month now scares him. Ok then. Anyway, it’s a pretty standard match here and Val uses a diving cross body and does it better than Taka did. See what I mean about the boring moves?

One thing I really don’t like about this match is that they use too many rest holds and they spend too much time with them. Things like that slow down the match and just suck all of the life out of the crowd. Anyway, the main thing is that Terri is on the floor and still wearing her wedding ring despite Val making out with her earlier. During the match Goldust’s glove comes off and he’s still wearing his ring as well.

Other than that, there’s not a lot to say about this match as while it’s entertaining there’s not much going on in it. Finally Terri gets involved as we know this is the finish. Val almost hits her and walks into a low blow for the pin.

Rating: C+. It was a pretty standard match but yet again that doesn’t mean it wasn’t good. It’s ok with both guys being solid in the ring to make this a decent enough match. It’s nothing mind blowing, but it’s perfectly acceptable wrestling.

We’re told that Shamrock has beaten up HHH and injured his knee again and HHH is in the hospital. X-Pac says he’ll deal with Shamrock tomorrow but tonight he’s getting the worthless title tonight.

European Title: X-Pac vs. D’lp Brown

Brown is from Milan, Italy now which is a little touch I always liked from some of the champions. Apparently the Nation has finally broken up which I can’t say is a bad thing. It ran its course and has split, which is how it was supposed to go. Now I’ve never been a fan of X-Pac but I like this match quite a bit for some bizarre reason. It’s solid all the way up until the ending where it just completely dies for me.

These guys go back and forth with Brown using my favorite counter as he just raises his foot up to stop the Bronco Buster. They hammer the heck out of each other and with the guys of smaller size working together, the match works much better than most of what Pac does. Brown just can’t put him away and I’m actually getting into it a bit.

Mark Henry, who is suing Chyna for sexual harassment, comes down to the ring for no apparent reason, allowing X-Pac to get hit with the belt. Brown hits a bunch of big moves but Pac keeps kicking out. Eventually he goes up top for the splash but Pac is up already.

Now for the stupid part. He dives face first and lands in the X-Factor. WHY WOULD HE JUMP LIKE THAT? What was he going for? It makes no sense and exposes the match, which just makes things bad. Hate the ending as it ruins what was otherwise a good match.

Rating: B-. If the ending was good, this would be a B or maybe even a B+. I really liked the flow here despite my disdain for Sean Waltman. Everything had a nice flow to it but of course we couldn’t just have a clean finish. We just had to have the interference and the belt shot and the ridiculous looking ending didn’t we? Just left a bad taste in my mouth.

Paul Bearer might be in Taker’s locker room.

Tag Titles: Headbangers vs. New Age Outlaws

This started when Road Dogg had a boom box broken over his head. Outlaws are WAY over here as no one wanted to see the bald guys win again. They hadn’t done anything in forever and they weren’t any good to begin with. Why would we want to see them as champions again, or even for the first time. The problem here is that there is absolutely no heat on this match at all.

It’s all about the Outlaws and no one wants to see the Bangers do anything. Gunn gets beaten on for a good while and they use an arm bar on him late in the match. Ross thinks that’s not a good move and he’s right. Seriously, an arm bar? Why not a Saskatchewan Spinning Nerve Hold? Or maybe an ARM BAR? If that doesn’t work, you could try an ARM DRAG. As a final solution though, I’d go with an ARM BAR.

Now that my bad Chris Jericho impression is over, let’s continue with the match. Yeah it sucks. We keep waiting on the hot tag but it never comes. They set Gunn for their finisher but Road Dogg blasts one in the head with a boom box for the DQ and the biggest and I think only pop of the whole match. Why did he have a boom box there? I don’t know, I guess because he felt like it.

Rating: C-. The Outlaws were solid faces here while the team they were against just plain sucked. I don’t get the appeal to this team and I never have. What was so amazing about them that I’m just not seeing? They were ok and that’s pushing it. No one thought they were winning here and this was the last feud they had.

Mankind cuts a very funny promo bashing Shamrock and talking to Mr. Socko.

IC Title: Ken Shamrock vs. Mankind

No real reason for this other than one is a big face and the other wants to be a big heel. Shamrock had won the belt Monday so he’s just not going to lose here. Mankind is 6’4??? When in the world did that happen? According to JR at least he is, but I always thought Foley was more around the 6’2 range. Edge and Orton are 6’4, and I think they’re both fairly taller than Foley is. This starts off with Shamrock just beating the tar out of Foley with strikes and punches.

Foley gets little offense in as usual and of course makes Ken look like a million bucks which Shamrock couldn’t do if his life depended on it. That’s where Foley truly shines and this is no exception. However he gets the claw on for all of one second and it’s enough to bring the match to a screeching halt. The commentators are talking about how Foley is a loveable idiot that is doing nothing but trying to please Mr. McMahon but is constantly ridiculed and manipulated by him.

For some reason the chair shot by Shamrock is completely ignored. The comeback is on as Foley uses the same offense he always uses and still makes it look good either way. All of his big moves are hit ranging from the Cactus Clothesline to the corner punches to the double arm DDT.

Shamrock gets the ankle lock on him but instead of tapping, Mankind puts the claw on himself, knocking himself unconscious. Shamrock hears this and snaps, beating up the referee and Mankind until other referees come out, allowing Mankind to put the claw on him and limp away.

Rating: B+. This was exactly the way this match should have been. Both guys worked pretty hard out there with Shamrock not actually beating Mankind but winning anyway. Foley made him look good which was likely what his instructions were. Good match but not great.

Cole tries to see Vince but Bossman doesn’t like the idea.

Rock vs. Mark Henry

This is fallout from the Nation’s split I suppose, not to mention a beatdown they gave Rock on Monday. Henry has a poem for Chyna. The pops for Rock are there and they would never leave again. The classic style is there too as the Rock has finally arrived. The commentators do nothing but talk about how big Henry is. Did you know he’s a big man and a former Olympian? Rock uses his normal stuff which works well against big men like Henry.

He shows some unusual power for himself by suplexing the big fat waste of 3 people’s skin. Soon thereafter Henry is beating him down to lead to a comeback. With D’lo’s help Henry survives the elbow and a splash finishes the Rock. I know it’s short but the match is five minutes and two seconds long. How much can I really say about it?

Rating: C. The shortness hurt this one and it hurt it bad. There’s no need to make this match just five minutes long. I know that Henry was limited in the ring and still is today and that Rock wasn’t ready for a main event spot yet but he could do more than 5 minutes. I even get Rock losing here, but not that fast. The time is the main thing here as it just takes a lot away from what could have been an ok match.

Massive recap and blah.

WWF Title: Undertaker vs. Kane

Austin is the ref and if he doesn’t do things right he’s fired as we’ve been over already. Austin of course is the biggest star in the whole match as is expected here. If you’ve seen one match from these two you’ve seen them all and this one isn’t particularly great as Taker is more of a heel. It’s more of two big guys fighting instead of Taker against Kane in one of their epic struggles.

It’s a slow pace which is what you would expect from these guys, but there’s no burst of high speed offense like there are in the other matches. Austin really is reserved here as we all know it’s just building to the big deal with him in the finish. It was kind of obvious to me that something would keep there from being a straight new champion crowned here.

Your psychology here is that Kane’s knee gets worked over the whole match. Since this is the Attitude Era though, it has no bearing at all on the end of the match. As they fight, Kane starts beating up Austin for no reason at all. Chokeslam puts him down long enough for Bearer to come out and turn on him as he joins Taker all over again. Anyway, Austin sees him blast Kane with the chair and refuses to make the count.

He stuns Taker (who staggers around and never falls) before chairing him. Austin counts three on both men then declares himself the winner. He goes to the back to find Vince but Vince appears as the Titantron is raised after Austin returns and fires him as he breaks out the catch phrase for the first time. Austin says to play his music and has a beer bash to end the show.

The next night would be the famous Austin’s Got A Gun show where he is stalking Vince all night and Vince wets himself as the gun says Bang 3:16 to end the show. Shane would rehire him but for no good reason at all screw him over weeks later. Why rehire them just to screw them instead of just letting him stay fired? God bless kayfabe.

Rating: B-. It was ok but once again this was more about the angle than about the title. I like a lot of what Russo did but I will never agree with his stance on titles being just props. It should mean something to be the World Heavyweight Champion.

I get that Austin was the biggest star on the planet but it makes the title look weaker. Never once been a fan of that and never will be. As for the match it’s one of Taker and Kane’s weakest entries but that’s because it wasn’t about their rivalry as they were just two guys fighting over a belt.

Overall Rating: C+. This was a pretty solid show I think from a wrestling standpoint. However, it kind of falls flat at the end as the final moments meant nothing since Austin would be in the tournament at the Survivor Series the following month.

The show serves as a good lead in to the Deadly Game tournament but other than that it’s just not there. While the in ring work is pretty good, there’s no substance as far as storylines go which drops this pretty far in my eyes. It does feature 5 title matches, but the European and IC matches are the only ones I really liked. It’s a decent show but don’t expect too much. Rated just slightly above average.

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Monday Night Raw
Date: January 15, 2001
Location: Bradley Center, Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Attendance: 13,936
Commentators: Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler

We continue on the Road to the Royal Rumble here as this is the final Raw until the show. Austin is of course the hottest thing in the world at this point and is on the verge of winning his record setting third Rumble. Also we’re looking at Angle trying to hold onto the title as he gets ready to face HHH on Sunday. This should be fun though so let’s get to it.

After a brief tribute to Martin Luther King Jr. we’re ready to go. The holiday was around this time remember.

Rock/Taker vs. Kane/Rikishi later tonight.

Hardy Boys/Lita vs. Right to Censor

It’s Ivory, Venis and Richards here. WOW that siren is annoying. Ivory issued a challenge to Chyna on Heat the previous night which would result in Chyna actually losing to her at the Rumble. Val and Jeff start us off here. Jeff of course outmaneuvers Val with ease to take over. Off to Matt and it’s all Team Extreme to start. Spin Cycle (a weird double suplex kind of move) from the Hardys to Val.

Side slam by Richards gets two for Matt. Only the girls in this didn’t wind up in TNA at some point. I’m not sure what that says but I don’t think it’s good. JR and the King get to make fun of the RTC which is a parody of the PTC which was a major thorn in the side of Vince because they didn’t like what was on TV so they talked about it incessantly. Double suplex gets two for Steven.

Matt fights him off and gets a middle rope legdrop for two. Good thing that didn’t happen today or Steven would be buried under the ring. Off to Jeff who cleans house. The fans want Lita and Ivory accidentally tags herself in. Litarana to Val and a spear to Ivory. Ivory tries to run but Chyna throws her back into Lita and a Twist of Fate to end it.

Rating: C+. Formula based but fun match here. Both teams worked pretty fast paced and the RTC didn’t drag this out somehow. Not a great match or anything but for an opener this was fine. Chyna coming out for the save helped a lot as there was limited point to having Lita vs. Ivory. Fun match to start the show.

Chyna accepts the challenge.

Stephanie and HHH arrive.

We get a clip from Smackdown of Austin destroying Edge/Christian and the Dudleys.

Here’s HHH for a little chat. Stephanie looking good in a black leather dress. HHH talks about how he hears the same thing everywhere he goes. Everyone says to him to take care of the Game. HHH says unless he’s provoked he won’t go after Austin tonight. Stephanie says that order will be maintained tonight by Vince, who is here live via satellite.

Vince is surrounded by XFL stuff and has an XFL ball. It launched on my birthday which isn’t one of my prouder moments. If HHH provokes Austin then he loses his title shot. If Austin provokes HHH, he’s out of the Rumble. Vince aged a lot in the last decade as he looks very young here. Tonight it’s Austin/Dudleys vs. Edge/Christian/Angle which should be interesting. Vince has to leave now for a meeting but he has his phone on. Odd way for him to go but whatever.

It’s odd because the segment isn’t over yet. HHH says that Angle is champion because HHH has allowed him to be so. He says he never lost the title (Rock pinned Vince in a6 man to win it) and Angle has never won defended against him due to being busy with Austin. He talks about Kurt’s title reign and how Kurt can bring all the help he wants because HHH will win the title on Sunday anyway.

Here’s Kurt with a rebuttal. Angle is disappointed in Stephanie because she blew it because she picked HHH over him. Speaking of games, Donkey Kong has a better chance of taking the title from Angle than HHH does. He’s the big smelly ape that people actually like. Angle has someone in his corner, which is someone that the McMahons know quite well: Trish. Remember she was sleeping with Vince at the time.

Trish makes innuendo about her sleeping with Vince so Stephanie calls her a w****. That would seem to be accurate in the story. Stephanie makes a spanking match with Jackie vs. Trish. Yeah because that’s such punishment. She can’t wrestle so let’s make her do something where there’s no wrestling required. Long segment, running nearly 10 minutes.

Back and we get a clip of Trish volunteering to get a spanking from Vince on Smackdown to explain things a bit more. HHH isn’t sure how Vince is going to take this. Stephanie needs acting lessons in a fierce way.

Hardcore Title: Test vs. Raven

Well at least they both have good music. Raven brings out his shopping cart full of weapons. Fire extinguisher to the face gives Raven control to start but he walks into a full nelson slam to take him down. Here’s Hardcore Holly as I think you know what’s coming. Blackman comes out too and it’s a big mess. As in a bigger mess than usual if that’s possible.

Raven tries to leave but Test follows him up the ramp. Test picks him up and rams Raven’s face into the WWF.com sign above the entrance. Abandon all hope ye who log on? They go to the back where Regal jumps both of them, allowing Raven to pin Test. No rating of course as this was maybe two minutes. Raven drives off in a waiting car. This might result in Raven’s ninja.

Blackman and Holly make a match for later tonight. Good thing they had a time slot all emptied up and waiting on someone to fill it in isn’t it?

XFL ad makes me laugh.

Here’s Rock to do his usual awesome stuff. We’re six days from the Rumble and Rock has a tag match with Taker vs. Kane/Rikishi. Excuse the Rock for not doing cartwheels and backflips of joy. This is a one night partnership but today is a very special day because it is the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Rock has a dream of his own and that is to win the Rumble. Nice transition there. He emulates I Have A Dream but switches out free at last with whipping in a funny line. Good stuff here although kind of short by his standards.

The Dudleys say that tonight it’s a one night partnership with Austin and after the match is over, they’ll have a Dudleyville Discussion with Austin.

HHH and Stephanie call Vince to talk about Drew Carey wanting to do something at the Rumble. Ah wait that’s not why they’re calling. They’re calling to make Rock happy so Vince changes it to Rock/Kane vs. Taker/Rikishi. Uh, ok?

Some Milwaukee Bucks are here.

Undertaker/Rikishi vs. Rock/Kane

Some odd pairings here. Rikishi is #30 in the Rumble. Tough Enough is coming. It’s now 2011 and it’s on its way back. Kind of ironic isn’t it? Not really but it sounds good and these entrances are taking a long time so I need something to pass the time. Rock vs. Rikishi to start. Rikishi knocks him back into the corner and goes for a Stinkface but Rock hits a big clothesline out of the corner to avoid a bad facial.

Kane tags himself in and Rock isn’t too thrilled with that. Samoan Drop takes Kane down as I continue to wonder what Vince was thinking when he picked Rikishi as the big bad. Kane manages to slam him in an impressive spot. Top rope clothesline takes him down again. How exactly was that hellacious though? I’m not getting that part.

Off to the Deadman now (with a tag most would call a right hand to the jaw) as the Brothers square off….again. Rock returns the favor and tags himself back in to give us the eternally bad pairing of Rock vs. Taker. Taker beats him down and hits Old School. Rock fights back but both guys go down to a double clothesline. Swinging neckbreaker puts Taker down for a second as this is a brawl.

Everything breaks down and Kane clocks Rikishi in the head with the bell. He’s a Samoan. That isn’t supposed to work. Spinebuster takes down the Rock but Kane jumps Rock to wild heat. Taker tries to give Rock the Last Ride but Rock dead weights him or something before the second attempt ends Rock.

Rating: C. This was a main event tag match and not much more. It’s fine in that regard but sweet goodness I don’t get why Rikishi was pushed so hard. Did someone really think that was a good idea? Not bad here but it’s nothing I’m going to remember in about five minutes. At least it built to the Rumble somewhat.

Benoit is bringing a ladder to the arena.

After a break here’s Benoit on top of said ladder. He talks about how awesome Jericho is and what an honor it’ll be to wrestle him in a ladder match. Benoit has made a little video for us called the best of Benoit vs. Jericho. As predicted it’s all Benoit destroying Jericho. Naturally Jericho comes in from the crowd and destroys Benoit.

The Dudleys and Edge/Christian get into it in the back and the Dudleys are left laying, including a Conchairto to D-Von.

HHH and Stephanie talk about Austin not having partners now. Stephanie thinks she should call her dad for….uh…no adequately explored reason.

Hardcore Holly vs. Steve Blackman

Ladies and gentlemen, this is what the world has been waiting for! For no apparent reason this isn’t hardcore. They trade strikes and reversals to start us off. Blackman drapes Holly over the ropes and shoves the referee (Teddy Long) maybe 40 seconds in. Holly with some low blows and it’s still not a DQ. A chair is taken away from him and Blackman goes to get some more stuff. Teddy walks off as I hope this isn’t the referee strike angle. I always hated that thing. Not really even a match.

HHH/Steph call Vince who says if Austin can get some partners he can have replacements. Vince asks about Trish and Stephanie…I think gets on him about it?

Trish Stratus vs. Jacqueline

At least Trish looks great in leather pants that are skin tight. I have no idea how you’re supposed to win this as they both have straps. I’m assuming you win by pinfall. As Trish is about to be whipped here’s Angle for the save. Jackie tries to spank her but only gets her pants down. Her thong-clad hips are slapped by the strap and I guess Jackie wins. This was whatever.

We get a clip of Kai En Tai dancing with Too Cool but then turning heel for no apparent reason.

K-Kwik/Too Cool vs. Kai En Tai/Tazz

Kwik is commonly known as R-Truth. Some odd pairings here to be sure. Tazz cuts a brief promo. Kai En Tai’s dubbing gimmick is something I wasn’t a fan of back in the day but now I find it hysterical. Scotty and Funaki start us off. Too Cool hits a Hart Attack of all things. Taka tries a rana but gets caught in a nice sitout powerbomb by Grandmaster. Tazz surprisingly does the worst of his team as Truth comes in. The Worm hits Tazz but after Funaki interference the Tazmission beats Truth.

Rating: D+. Nothing special here in the slightest. It was a quick six man tag to fill in a spot on the card. Tazz would be face by Mania and I have no interest in the other five guys here. Yeah there really isn’t much else to say about this match is there? Why was this on the card again?

Angle suggest that Trish head back to the hotel and put some salve on her. She was somehow curvier at this point.

Royal Rumble Moment: Too Cool and Rikishi dance in the ring. That was awesome.

HHH and Stephanie conspire evily.

Info for Tough Enough is given. This would result in Maven and Nidia who both meant a grand total of nothing.

We recap the Chyna/Ivory thing from earlier in the night which is an odd time to have this on. Ok then.

Billy Gunn is at WWF New York and they ask him how he feels about Chyna coming back so soon. He’s not sure about it but it’s her call. Oh and he might win the Rumble. That’s hilarious.

Kurt Angle/Edge/Christian vs. Steve Austin/???/???

That’s quite the heel team as they’re all champions at this point. Out of nowhere the APA run in and they’re the partners apparently. Austin and Angle start but Angle tags Christian in almost immediately. Off to Edge and Bradshaw now which goes badly for the Canadian. Double spinebuster to Edge as Farrooq comes in. It’s weird to see Austin beat up Edge. They’re tagging that fast mind you.

Angle vs. Austin now and Austin shockingly BACKFLIPS out of a suplex. Edge and Christian grab some chairs but can’t hit a Conchairto on Austin. The APA chases them off and we’re down to the two stars. Superplex gets two for Austin. HHH comes out to the ramp and Austin stares him down. Low blow by Angle and Kurt takes over. Austin manages to counter an Angle suplex and takes over again.

There’s a belly to belly for Austin’s trouble though as Angle pops those hips like only he can. Angle Slam is blocked as they’re flying through this. Thesz Press and Austin hammers away. Angle goes up but jumps into a Stunner to end it. More or less a one on one match but that’s fine by me.

Rating: C+. WAY fast here and it worked pretty well I thought. This works fine as HHH not getting involved here and having Austin do his dirty work for him was perfectly fine as it kills two birds with one stone for him. The tag team aspect meant nothing for the most part but the match was still incredibly energetic and fun.

HHH comes down to the ring and begs Austin to hit him, offering him the first shot. Austin goes to the floor and gets a chair while HHH screams at him to hit him. Austin walks away and makes the symbol of the title around his waist. HHH calls him a pussy, making him charge back but Angle comes up from behind HHH and gets the Slam but Austin gets a Stunner on him to end the show.

Overall Rating: C+. Well the wrestling was pretty bad, but everything was covered for the Rumble. The PPV was awesome so that helps a lot, but I don’t think anyone actually believed Austin would lose. There were only five matches and everything got some build, but this was pre-Brand Split so there was always Smackdown for more building and the final build. Fun little show, but nothing great or memorable at all.

Here’s the Royal Rumble if you’re interested:

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

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NXT
Date: September 28, 2010
Location: U.S. Cellular Coliseum, Bloomington, Indiana
Commentators: Josh Matthews, Michael Cole

Back in Bloomington this week as the show was taped. There’s a chance this is the final episode on Sci-Fi but that hasn’t been confirmed yet. On my digital preview there’s a sci-fi show on next week, but a week later, on the 12th, NXT is listed. It’s likely a misprint but interesting nonetheless. Let’s get to it.

We open by recapping musical chairs. It amuses me how they’ve just given up on this being a wrestling show at all and are just trying to make it as entertaining as possible. Talk the Talk is a bit better but it is kind of interesting to see WWE say how talking is very important and apparently more important than wrestling.

No Punk to start us out which makes me a sad reviewer.

Striker brings out the girls who mostly look good. Maxine still has the straight hair which looks really weird on her for some reason. Voting for the first elimination begins tomorrow on WWE.com which is where the results show will likely be seen. There’s a wheelbarrow in the aisle and they have to run around the ring with it, fastest time wins.

Maxine is first but before we start we need something in the wheelbarrow. And here’s Hornswoggle to make me roll my eyes. Cole asks what this has to do with being a Diva as Maxine sets the mark at 14.7 seconds. Horny bites her tights after she shoves him out of the wheelbarrow.

Naomi goes second and beats her time but they keep the clock running anyway for some reason as they have a tendency to do, putting her in second.

Jamie gets 14.4 to take the lead.

Kaitlyn is fourth and flies through this, getting 12 flat. Cole gets the line of the night as he yells at Josh: YOU’RE ANALYZING A WHEELBARROW RACE! He’s annoying but you can’t deny that he’s right.

AJ is the next to last girl and is rocking an I Love Nerds t-shirt. She’s nowhere close and Horny hugs her for a long time.

Aksana goes last and gets 13.9 to give Kaitlyn the win. What a great way to spend the first 13 minutes of a wrestling show.

This Week in WWE History is about Madison Square Garden and in particular the Raw where there was a triple interview with Dude Love, Cactus Jack and Mankind where Cactus returned and had a great falls count anywhere match with HHH. Oh and Austin gave Vince the first Stunner between the two. And now, back to the wheelbarrow racing show.

We profile AJ and how nerdy she is. We get a cool clip of her in line for tickets to Wrestlemania in MSG which I’m assuming was 20. That’s very cool that she is in a clip from footage like that as a kid for some reason.

Diss the Divas later tonight. Oh joy: more reading from scripts.

And now we recap Raw. I wonder how long they can go without actual wrestling on this show. Well that’s enough content so we need another commercial now.

Yep next week we’re on WWE.com. Not sure how that’ll effect the reviews but I’ll get it up somehow.

We profile Kaitlyn now who wants to be herself. And ANOTHER commercial. It’s 10:35 and there has not been a single piece of wrestling whatsoever. They’re coming back for 2 minutes of profiles etc and then a commercial.

Back from a break and we recap Smackdown with the Taker vs. Kane segment. When I say that, I mean they PLAY THE WHOLE THING. I don’t mean a highlight package, I don’t mean a synopsis, I mean Kane is talking about Undertaker and the druids are about to come out and Paul Bearer is about to return. If you’re curious as to what’s going on see my Smackdown review because I’m not talking about something I reviewed four days ago.

Time for Diss the Divas which is exactly what it sounds like. Aksana goes first and says she’s hot which she is. Her diss to the Divas is they don’t look as good as she does and she’s in better shape.

AJ goes second and is rather adorable. This is by far the highlight of the show which is hardly saying much. AJ says she belongs more here and she should be the winner because she’s not the typical Diva. This would come off better if Cole would SHUT UP. It’s one thing to get on the girls but it’s another thing to talk over them so we can’t even hear them.

Kaitlyn does an impression of Naomi by sticking her hips out. Naomi literally kicks it and that’s all for Kaitlyn.

Jamie says Aksana belongs in a circus and AJ is a ten year old but Jamie is awesome. Striker is more or less begging them to pick this up as it’s awful.

Naomi says this is about wrestling and entertainment and has them beat in those areas. Kaitlyn only won last week because Naomi messed up. Shame AJ won last week but whatever.

Maxine says the same thing she’s said every week as AJ and Kaitlyn conspire and play patty cake in the background.

AJ wins the competition over Naomi but just slightly, giving her the most victories and immunity.

And here’s Vickie to make sure we get her face time this week since this is the Vickie/Cole show. She bashes Kaitlyn who more or less turns face and wants Vickie in a match. Vickie accepts but gets a BIG OLD SLAP to Kaitlyn. That was Stephanie level slapping and somehow the highlight of the show. They “brawl” to end this joke of a show.

Overall Rating: F. This was an absolute joke. They can’t throw in a two minute match just to give us something? I don’t watch this show to see a segment I already watched. The show is moving to WWE.Com and I can’t imagine this show is going to make people want to watch it. I love the WWE but I never want to hear them complain about ratings again, not after this. Horrible show with no appealing value at all like this show usually has with its bad comedy. I feel sorry for the people that paid for tickets to it.

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

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This is another very old review which needs to be redone.  Not a bad idea actually.

In Your House 24: Breakdown
Date: September 27, 1998
Location: Copps Coliseum, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
Attendance: 17,405
Commentators: Jerry Lawler, Jim Ross

Summerslam has passed and Austin, much to everyone’s surprise, kept the belt by beating Taker clean. If my memory is right, that was the only time that happened from 1991 to 1998 but I could be wrong on that. Other than that, HHH ended the DX vs. Nation war by beating the Rock for the IC title. The rest of the show is pretty weak as it was kind of meant to be the end of a lot of storylines and now create new ones.

The main idea was that Vince is completely fed up with Austin and wants the title off of him at any cost, so he’s made the main event for tonight of Kane vs. Taker vs. Austin in a triple threat for the title, knowing it would be a handicap match. Also on here we have a triple threat in a cage with mankind, Shamrock and the Rock for the #1 contenders spot. The rest of the card looks like Typical Attitude Era stuff, so let’s get to it.

The intro is all about Vince wanting to get the title off of Stone Cold at any cost, talking about his master plan which includes shots of John Kennedy and various other historic leaders. This is WAY over the top to say the least.

Owen Hart vs. Edge

This is really just a matchup of an upper midcarder and a rookie. I really like this match actually as both guys are solid in the ring. Edge is working a style that is very good for him with a mix of what he does now with technical stuff thrown in. He’s staying move for move with Owen which is no small task to say the least. We get a lot of near falls and since I don’t remember who wins this, it’s a very exciting match.

Edge was getting a cult following at the time and he was still a rookie, which really is an impressive feat. Both go for their finishers and Edge lands a decent DDT. They’re going back and forth here in a great pace that’s really showing Edge off well. Owen of course is as solid as ever but this is pretty even.

Eventually Edge has Owen in trouble but a long blonde haired fan jumps the railing and distracts Edge allowing Owen to roll him up for the win. Dang , that guy that jumped the rail must totally reek of awesomeness and charisma.

Yeah it’s Christian debuting.

Rating: B+. This match was very good and an excellent opener. Two Canadians so it’s almost face vs. face, meaning the crowd is way into it. Edge was showing off here as he proved he can go with anyone. Owen was his usual solid self on the mat and I really didn’t know who was going to win until the end. That’s the sign of a good match in my opinion.

Bad promo for the Superstar Line.

Too Much vs. Scorpio/Al Snow

This comes after Raw when Snow regained his contract by beating Slaughter in a boot camp match. Now in case you don’t remember that, Lawler will mention it 18 times in the next match. After that the Stooges ran down to beat him up but Scorpio made the save. Too much is here because we needed a heel tag team to job to the new faces I guess. This is an ok match but it’s nothing special.

Snow as always is entertaining here as a very underrated worked and character. Scorpio is someone I’ve always enjoyed as well so this should be ok. For some reason they bring a chair in and after the faces distract the referee, both use it for running poetries in motion on Too Much, but Scorpio botches him and lands on his back.

Other than that it’s a pretty up tempo match here with both teams doing a good job at keeping the fans excited. At the end everything just breaks into a huge fight with there being no idea who the legal men were with there being all kinds of covers by all four men. Finish comes off of the Snowplow.

Rating: B. This was another fun match. There was no point to it at all but it was just fun. The characters were fun and wild with everyone all over the place. Snow was easily the star here which is an odd thin since he w treated as nothing but a comedy character for th majority of his career. This was very fun though and while not great, it was entertaining.

Droz vs. Marc Mero

Only thing of note is that Jackie won the Women’s Title on Monday night. We’re not told who the champion was, so I’m assuming it’s nothing of note at all. Droz is considered to be a freak with talk of him eating deer hearts after hunting and sleeping with boa constrictors. Great things to talk about wouldn’t you say?

Once again there’s no real point to this match other than having a face lower mid card guy against a heel lower mid card guy. Nothing at all of note happens here until Jackie hits Droz in the head with a shoe, leading to the Shooting Star Press, here called the Marvelocity.

Rating: D. No point, no good action, no drama, no good grade. There was just nothing here at all and it was clear that no one cared about it. Not much else to say.

Bradshaw vs. Vader

Again, no point to this match that I know of but it’s no holds barred. Oh and it’s falls count anywhere so it’s a hardcore match. Bradshaw has shaved the beard so we now have the traditional look that we’re used to of him. He says Vader is too far to beat him.

This was Vader’s last match with the company on PPV and his last televised match would be in about 3 weeks in the well known and used Edge vs. Vader match. We get some good news though; the Brawl For All is over. Ross says he doesn’t want Vader between him legs. Oh apparently they’re fighting because they failed as a tag team.

Glad I missed those pairings actually. Here comes the weapons as Bradshaw nails him with the bell. Bradshaw’s power moves here are very well done with all kinds of suplexes and slams that put him over really well. I’ll never understand how finishing moves lose their power as Bradshaw gets up from the Vader Bomb, which put HBK down several times, but can’t put a young Bradshaw down here? Then for a weird finish, the clothesline from JBL doesn’t pin Vader, but a neckbreaker does?

Rating: C+. This was fine for what it was. Putting the hardcore thing in there helped a bit as it kept the weaknesses they had from being exposed, but at the time neither really relied on them too much. The destruction of Vader on PPV is finally ended here which is nothing more than a shame. Bradshaw was given a mini push but eventually they got it right with him in the APA.

We see a thing on WWE.com with Jason Sensation doing various impressions of wrestlers. He was a comedian but some of his voices were dead on. His Taker voice is absolutely perfect.

D’Lo Brown vs. Gangrel

Brown lost the European title to X-Pac on Raw apparently. Yeah I don’t care either. Gangrel’s entrance and music is just awesome to put it mildly. As far as his in ring work goes, that’s another story entirely. He had this weird running elbow drop that I never liked as it was just odd looking. At the time everyone was trying to figure out what the deal with Edge and Gangrel was.

They never explained it but soon the Brood would form. You can feel Russo’s hands all over this as you have two over the top gimmicks as well as no real face or heel character but rather two guys that could be either or. Botched hot shot sends D’Lo face first into the top rope which isn’t something you see that often.

There’s really not much going on here as this whole card just feels like filler with this being the worst of that category so far. Henry comes out and attacks Gangrel, leading to the Sky High for the pin. After the match Gangrel drinks from his cup which lets him beat both of them up.

Rating: C-. There’s nothing here, but both guys have fairly cool gimmicks so I’ll say it just passes. That’s the issue with this so show far: everything just feels like pure filler and it’s not working well. Give me something with some meat to it if you want me to care. There’s no build here or anything and I feel like I’m watching a house show.

Recap for the triple threat for the contendership. This match already happened on Raw but Taker and Kane beat them all down. Promos from all three follow. Shamrock is far better than what he used to be, but he’s still pretty bad. Rock’s popularity has arrived as his pop gets bigger and bigger but he’s still far from what his peak would be. Now we get to Mankind. I have never seen a more off the wall promo.

He references Bill Clinton’s scandal with a girl that even he would have turned down in high school as the only thing that comes close to being as pointless as the people’s elbow. WOW. Also, Rock had referenced sugar coated testicles, which Foley thinks should be a new cereal. Mankind the face has arrived.

The Rock vs. Ken Shamrock vs. Mankind

Remember this is for the #1 contenders spot and it’s in a cage. Shamrock gets no reaction. He got no reaction in the Attitude Era. Let that sink in for a minute. Mankind’s is solid but Rock’s is just big. This is the older format of triple threats where it’s pretty much a bunch of one on one matches that rotate. I really like the feeling in this match as there’s a good amount of drama and it’s not the watered down variety of today which just absolutely sucks.

These guys beat the living tar out of each other and it’s really working well. They’re fighting hard and the fans are into it. Since we’re in Canada, the heel Rock is getting cheered. All kinds of big spots here as the cage isn’t the star like it is anymore. It’s also the big blue one which is a lot better in my eyes than the one they use now. Anyway, these guys are beating the living tar out of each other with everyone getting dangerously close to winning only to have it snatched away.

Rock lands a double People’s Elbow that has the people going INSANE. Pop of the night so far with ease which is odd as he was the heel coming into this. These guys work each other over very well here with all three being very close again. Both guys are down but Foley dives off the top of the cage with an elbow that crashes. Somehow a chair gets in and Rock just starts killing Shamrock with it.

Foley gets it and both guys are down, but as Foley goes up the cage Rock covers Shamrock for the pin. After it Foley thinks he’s won and raises his hand in victory but then sees Rock and is ticked, ripping out his hair. Rock heads to the back as Shamrock is beating on things with the chair and scaring your favorite Oklahoma representative.

Rating: B+. While I hate the pinfall ending in cage matches, this added a very nice psychology concept to it with Foley trying to be the hero and the heel Rock taking the easier way to get the win. Very subtle yet very key to making the match a bigger success.

You could see that Rock was the biggest star here but it was Foley that was carrying things in there. Vince continues to try to make something out of Shamrock and just epically fails at it. This was a slower paced match but it worked very well as they were all working hard and had the crowd into it as well.

We get a recap of Goldust vs. Venis which was during the time that Rhodes was in the preacher gimmick and Venis made a movie with Terri called the Preacher’s Wife of the two of them sleeping, or I guess not sleeping together.

Val Venis vs. Goldust

This is during the religious period for Dustin who would keep saying HE IS COMING BACK, meaning Goldust. Val brings Terri out who is very scantily clad. Val hits a spinebuster almost immediately but gets powerbombed shortly thereafter. This shouldn’t last that long.

Dustin tries to leave and gets his head taken off for his troubles. Very basic match to start here as Dustin is supposed to be just a man fighting for honor out there while Val is on a hot streak at the moment. Russian leg sweep sets up the grind for Val and then a camel clutch.

Dustin is called a youngster despite being around over 8 years at this point. Take it off chant at Terri. Terri looks at Val dreamily during a long chinlock. Almost all Val here as he goes up for a middle rope suplex but lifts Dustin up and just drops him to the floor in a pinful looking move.

Val goes to the floor and gets consoled by Terri. Bulldog by Dustin gets two which is probably the extent of his control here. Yep the powerslam sets up the Money Shot to end it.

Rating: D. All angle here as this just DRAGGED. It went on for nearly ten minutes here and just didn’t get interesting at all. We get the idea here and didn’t need to have it hammered into us. Nothing special at all and just an extended TV match. The angle was done here I think for all intents and purposes, at least the Dustin aspect.

Recap of DX vs. Jeff Jarrett. Yeah I don’t care either.

DX vs. Jeff Jarrett/Southern Justice

Southern Justice are the Godwinns for those of you that can’t get to sleep at night. This is as bland of a 6 man as you could possibly ask for. It’s a mini feud that no one remembers and fewer cared about. X-Pac gets beaten on, wild brawl, Pac takes a guitar to the head, Fameasser in the ring, match over.

Rating: F. I have no idea why but I hated this match deeply. I think it was just that it was a freaking waste of time. There’s filler that is good and filler that is bad. This was of the latter variety.

Promo and recap which you know the drill of by now. If you can’t tell I really just want this show to end.

WWF Title: Steve Austin vs. Undertaker vs. Kane

Kane can’t pin Taker and vine versa, making this a handicap match. We see a clip of Austin beating up Vince on Heat. If anyone helps Austin he’s stripped of the title. Austin jumps Taker with a chair as he’s on his way to the ring and beats the tar out of him. Austin was a lot of things but above all else he was smart.

Kane vs. Austin in the ring now as Taker is trying to get up. Top rope clothesline misses as Austin just steps aside. Taker comes back with a chair and Austin is in trouble. Total brawl the whole way so far but that’s what it’s supposed to be. Stunner out of nowhere on Kane but Taker saves.

The Big Red Machine is down forever from that as it’s Taker vs. Austin now. Jumping clothesline takes Austin down but Taker gets caught by a Thesz Press. Heel miscommunication occurs so Austin can get back up which lasts like 4 seconds. The Stooges and Slaughter come out to stand on the stage as it’s ALL Brothers of Destruction at this point.

Back near the stage and Austin makes a brief comeback but gets his Piledriver reversed by Taker. Austin charges at Brisco and half kills him but Slaughter kicks him in the head. Taker brings Austin back to the ring like he’s carrying him to the gallows. Where’s Luke when you need him?

And we replay the beginning of the match for no apparent reason. Back in the ring now and Austin is getting destroyed. He goes nuts and gets some shots in but Taker catches him. They’re doing really well here at making it look like Austin has a chance and then snatching it away. He’s never quite defeated though which is a nice touch.

Austin caves Kane’s head in with a chair but Taker saves. Taker covers but Kane breaks it up, giving Austin a glimmer of hope. Taker breaks up a Kane pin and then drills him to a ROAR. Kane and Austin send Taker to the floor and now it’s one on one.

After a brief reconciliation Taker and Kane need more counseling as they fight again. Austin gets to rest a bit here and fix his knee braces. Double clothesline and both guys are down, prompting Austin to sit up in a funny moment. Finally they get together and hit a double chokeslam and a double pin. Fink does the announcement but pauses before he announces the winner.

Vince comes out and takes the belt. They would have a one on one match at the next PPV where no one would win again, setting up the Deadly Game Tournament at Survivor Series where Rock turned heel to become McMahon’s star. Austin kills everyone in sight and gets flipped off by Vince to end the show.

Rating: C-. This is ok but it’s just a bit boring. Austin fighting insane odds is always fun but the good thing here is they didn’t have him overcome them. That would have been too much for anyone and I think they got that. Having this go over 20 minutes was WAY too long though as it took Kane and Taker all of 40 seconds to beat Austin once they got together. Decent and booked mostly right but too long.

It made the buildup for the rest of the feud great as Austin wouldn’t get the title back until Mania 15. Austin had a great run with the belt but taking it off of him for about 5 months made his next win all the greater. Kane and Taker would fight at the next PPV for the title with a certain redneck as the referee.

Overall Rating: C+. It’s an ok show but that’s it. There are certainly some good matches but the show just dies a painful death before the main event. The Venis match and the DX match are just flat out draining. That’s how I would describe this show: draining.

While there are more good matches than bad, those that are bad are very bad and come towards the end of the show which is what matters most because it’s what’s remembered most. It’s an ok show, but it could have been booked much better. Thumb squarely in the middle.

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