WCW/New Japan Supershow II
Date: January 4, 1992
Location: Tokyo Dome, Tokyo, Japan
Attendance: 60,000
Commentators: Jim Ross, Tony Schiavone

We’re back in Tokyo for the second co-promoted show with WCW vs. New Japan guys. There will once again be some matches cut here but those are pretty much gone period. The main event here is Sting/Muta vs. the Steiners as well as the IWGP Title being on the line with Choshu vs. Fujinami. On paper this looks pretty good so let’s get to it.

This wasn’t aired in America for about two months which is why Luger is still world champion here despite losing it to Sting in February and bolting.

Bischoff, still an annoying backstage interviewer, runs down the card for us.

Jushin Thunder Liger/Masashi Aoyagi/Akira Nogami vs. Hiro Saito/Super Strong Machine/Norio Honaga

From what I can find, this is a junior heavyweight match and Liger is the undisputed biggest star in it. He’s also the only one of these guys I know anything about. I’ve heard of all but one of them but I’m likely going to be confused here. There were two all Japanese matches before this by the way but from what I can tell they were nothing special.

Saito and Aoyagi start us off. We get perhaps the only tennis comparison in wrestling history not involving Jim Cornette as we’re told that the crowd here is like that of a tennis match in America which makes sense. Strong Machine comes in and hooks a sleeper. Aoyagi is in a gi here. Ah ok Nogami was on the show last year. I knew I had heard that name before.

Liger comes in and gets a small reaction but it’s more than anyone else has gotten. He cleans house but Saito stops him cold. It looks like Liger is going to be playing Morton here. Rolling Liger Kick allows him to get the tag so forget what I just said. Aoyagi is short. Keep in mind there is a 20 count here. Pretty fast paced match so far.

Honaga and company work on Nogami’s leg as the tagging gets quicker. All three heels (I think they’re heels at least) work over Nogami and he’s in trouble. He gets a nice dropkick though to bring in Liger. No one is really staying in trouble here very long and it’s going back and forth pretty quickly. Middle rope moonsault to Saito gets two for Liger.

Nogami sounds like a goat when he’s breathing hard. His abdominal stretch lasts a few seconds as we’re kind of shifting styles to more submission based stuff now. The faces (again I think) take over on Saito and as I say that he hits something like a spinebuster on Liger to get out. Honaga and Saito are regular partners apparently and wear matching tights.

Honaga gets a top rope Hart Attack style clothesline to take down Liger for two. Tilt-a-whirl backbreaker gets two for Liger. This crowd is a bit off putting but I get why they’re sitting quietly like that. It’s still just very odd. In a nice counter, Nogami hits a hard knee to the head of Strong Machine to get out of a pin. That’s different.

Strong Machine is in a mask which looks like Mr. JL. Aoyagi kicks the heck out of everyone but pure strength from Strong Machine ends that pretty quickly. Everyone comes in after some close two counts and Saito hits a Senton Back Splash (Husky Harris’ move) from the middle rope for two. Nogami gets a Dragon Suplex on Saito to end this rather quickly.

Rating: C+. This was fifteen minutes long? How is that possible? This seemed to absolutely fly by and while nothing spectacular it was certainly pretty good. Liger was clearly the biggest star out there as he should have been. None of the other five have had much of a career as far as I can tell. This was a fun match and pretty good on top of that. Good start.

The Enforcers vs. Michiyoshi Ohara/Shiro Koshinaka

The Enforcers are Larry Zbyszko and Arn Anderson. Both faces seem to be fairly big names but nothing huge. This is in the days of the Dangerous Alliance. Anderson wants a handshake but gets a hand slap instead. Larry and Ohara start us off. Larry of course stalls to start, or not start I guess, the match. Anderson comes in as Larry talks a lot.

Anderson throws out a Hennig neck snap which is probably the most aerial he’s ever gotten in his career. It’s weird hearing Larry yell like this when you can hear him so clearly. This is a lot more mat wrestling than we’re used to. Ohara comes back in and is apparently very young here. Larry shouting things like “hit that punk!” or something like that is rather funny.

This is a very basic match with the Enforcers not being as dirty as they would like I don’t think. Larry busts out some of his martial arts on Koshinaka which get him nowhere at all. Anderson is like move over and beats up Shiro. Now we get to some old school Anderson cheating and Koshinaka is in trouble.

Ohara gets the, I guess you can call it hot, tag to clean some house in there and we get the third Boston Crab in two minutes. Ross talks about how unsure Ohara seems which is true. Granted he’s a rookie so that makes sense. He’s also not incredibly good but there we are. Ohara gets one of the most awkward looking top rope elbows of all time.

Koshinaka comes in with some flying hips to the face and Ohara adds a suplex to Larry for two. Larry throws in an extra knee to the back of Shiro and the spinebuster just ends Ohara with ease.

Rating: C-. This was a bit weak but nothing all that bad. I couldn’t get into this one that well and it came off like a glorified squash that just happened to run almost thirteen minutes. It was ok but nothing really that special with the Enforcers never really being in any real danger. Decent enough though.

Dustin Rhodes/Dusty Rhodes vs. Masa Saito/Kim Duk

Well of course Dusty just had to grace us with his presence in a huge match like this. I mean it’s not like there’s some young guy that needed the exposure here or anything like that right? I’m sure there isn’t a guy that has never really gotten a spotlight before that could use a match on PPV in front of 60,000 people. Nah we’d rather have old fat men! Let’s get this over with.

I’ve never heard of Duk. Sweet merciful crap Dusty is a fat man. Saito is a big man but looks tough. Dusty simply doesn’t at all. Dustin and Duk start us off and we get a criss cross which Dustin controls. Ross REALLY likes the refereeing tonight for some reason. He’s complimented it in every match so far tonight.

Duk has been in two big spots so far: a head scissors and a back drop and both have looked very bad. The other guy was Dustin Rhodes who is usually very solid in the ring. I’m pretty sure I think I know who screwed up there. We hear about Saito being in the Olympic Games in 64. He refuses to tag in here, merely brushing him off. That’s rather funny.

The two fat men come in with Dusty gettinga nice round of applause. We fight to the ramp with Dusty firmly in control. Saito drops to his knees in front of Dusty. If he wants to blow him he’s going to have a lot of gut to hold up. Ross says Dusty has been inactive for a year or so. That’s very funny, as if Dusty has been active in his life.

Ross explains the difference between ring attendants and managers which is fairly interesting. Is there ANY reason why we have Dusty working the majority of the match here? Did anyone thought that was the right idea? We hit the nerve hold so we talk about the language barriers between Duk, a Korean and Saito, who is Japanese.

Saito misses a running kick and drills Duk to bring in Dustin again. Duk hits a Piledriver on Dustin for two. Back to Dusty vs. Saito which still isn’t incredibly interesting. Saito is good though so we have that to fall back on I guess. Thankfully Dusty isn’t in there long and Dustin walks into a Saito Suplex which is of course his namesake. It’s a modified belly to back.

They ram heads and both guys are down. Duk comes in but since he isn’t incredibly talented Dustin just beats the tar out of him, getting a dropkick for two and then after a few more seconds the bulldog (I can’t stand that move) ends this. The total lack of a reaction is still weird to me.

Rating: D+. Weakest match so far. Dusty and Duk weren’t worth much at all here. Ross saying he was funky like a monkey in total deadpan is hilarious for some reason. This was pretty bad but it could have been much worse. It got nearly 15 minutes and for some reason Dusty was in there more than his son. Odd.

El Gigante vs. Big Van Vader

No mask for Vader here and he’s a much bigger deal in Japan than he is in America at this point. There were two matches between the Rhodes’ match and this: Tony Halme vs. Scott Nortan and Shinya Hashimoto (JMT’s Avatar) vs. Bill Kazmaier with the former winning both times. Halme is more famous as Ludvig Borga.

This is of course a clash of the titans match which is rather interesting. Ross points out that Vader could be a monster in America if he tried to be a dominant singles wrestler and he’s absolutely right. If you don’t believe me just ask Sting. Dang that was a great feud. Nothing but clubbing blows here and we get the Claw by the giant. It’s weird seeing Vader as a face. He goes to the ramp and we get a double countout.

Rating: D. Bad match, but if you expected anything else other than a big brawl you’re an idiot. Vader looked great here and Gigante was very popular in Japan so this worked rather well. Nothing good at all but a fun brawl so all is fine.

Vader’s helmet shoots steam in El Gigante’s eyes post match.

Ad for Wrestlewar 92 which had an AWESOME main event.

Antonio Inoki defeated Hiroshi Hase in between these matches.

WCW World Title: Lex Luger vs. Masahiro Chono

It’s weird seeing Chono as a young guy. To you extremely old school guys, Chono was Lou Thesz’s protégé so you know he was great. Chono is yelling a lot. Luger is the monster heel at this point and incredibly arrogant but no one could beat him. Oddly enough, Chono’s finishing move here is the STF and Luger’s is a Piledriver called the Attitude Adjustment. It’s the Cena Special here I guess.

Ross talks about his days as a referee which I’ve never heard of at all. We get into a debate of Jack Brisco vs. Lou Thesz which is rather interesting. This is power vs. technical here with Luger’s basic offense vs. the ground game of Chono, who is rather good on the mat. Suplex gets two for Luger and the fans applause. Luger gets a DDT of all things.

Rack is countered into a backslide for two and there’s the Mafia Kick. If you’re not familiar with it, in short he gets a running start and kicks the other guy’s head off. STF goes on but rope is grabbed. Luger ducks a charging Chono who goes flying to the floor. We speed things up and Luger is in trouble. Chono comes off the top but Luger simply moves to the side and Masahiro eats canvas.

The Rack goes on but Luger loses his balance and we head to the floor. Rack goes on again on the floor and Chono is in big trouble. He slides in at about 15 which is a No Mercy trick. And of course Chono is fine seconds later. Low blow from Luger is enough for the pin. The no selling twerp deserved to get kicked in the balls.

Rating: C+. This was pretty good here and a very nice balance here of different styles and two guys doing pretty well against the other. Chono remains awesome of course and Luger played the role of the jerk to near perfection, making this pretty solid. I liked it if nothing else.

IWGP Title/Greatest 18 Club Championship: Riki Choshu vs. Tatsumi Fujinami

Choshu is the Greatest 18 Champion which is some weird deal where the WWF Martial Arts Title was renamed and meant little still but whatever. There’s a Hall of Fame thrown in too but I’m not particularly clear on it. This is a big rivalry apparently. Tatsumi is of course the IWGP Champion by default. Choshu invented the Sharpshooter in his biggest claim to fame.

Fairly long feeling out process to start us off. Choshu hits an FU on Fujinami, making me think Cena rented this tape a lot as a kid. Inoki trained Fujinami so we talk about his Ali fight because nothing of note is going on in this match. Lots of snapmares and chinlocks in the first four minutes or so. Tony forgets who is in the match, saying Chono is doing something or other.

Choshu gets the Scorpion Deathlock on and we debate whose is more effective. And of course Riki just lets go of it for no apparent reason. Fujinami puts the hold on Choshu but ropes are grabbed. Ross points out that both guys are in tights and are no frills wrestlers. You know, because black boots and black tights can work for promoting a wrestler, right Uncle Eric?

Dragon Sleeper goes on and not a lot is happening in this match. Octopus Hold from Fujinami which is an abdominal stretch with a leg wrapped around the head. It looks awesome if you didn’t get that. Choshu hits a top rope suplex for no cover. Dropkick from Tatsumi blocks the lariat. Choshu hits a Saito Suplex and then a second one. A lariat doesn’t put him down. A second doesn’t. The third does and it gets the pin. Well I’m glad he mixed up the moves there at the end like that.

Rating: C+. It’s ok but again, and I know I harp on this a lot, but when finishers are constantly kicked out of or don’t work, they kind of stop being finishers. That’s an argument I can never get through to people that are fans of this though so I won’t even try. This was a pretty good match but not a classic or anything. The lack of enthusiasm was kind of weird on the ending for a title change but it was still good.

Steiner Brothers vs. Sting/Great Muta

This should be good. Everyone here is rather popular and the non-traditional partners have separate entrances here. Muta gets a big old entrance with all kinds of acrobats for no apparent reason. Muta points to his throat immediately and spits some mist out. Sting comes in rather quickly to take on Rick. Rick gets the top rope bulldog maybe 90 seconds in for two.

Stinger Splash misses (called the Scorpion for some reason by JR) and Scott gets a powerbomb for no cover. Sting hits a tombstone and doesn’t cover either. What’s up with that as I channel my inner Helms. Muta comes in to a nice pop. Rick hits a nice suplex on Muta for two. Steiner gets what we would call an Angle Slam from the middle rope for two.

And there’s a Dragon Sleeper from Scott which is odd to see to put it mildly. Total Steiner dominance here so far. Spinning belly to belly from Scott and STILL no cover. What’s up with these guys here? Muta finally gets a suplex and tags in Sting to fight the fresh Rick. Muta back in and in a nice counter, Rick catches the handspring elbow in a German suplex. That was nice.

Sting takes Rick out with a plancha on the floor and Muta does the same to Scott. The Steiners both go up and hit both with shoulderblocks. We get a weird ending as Sting pins Scott and Rick pins Muta at the same time but Sting and Muta win for some reason. I think Rick wasn’t legal but it was an odd choice for an ending.

Rating: C+. This got a lot better at the end but the opening stuff wasn’t much at all. Not bad here but it could have been more as they only had 11 minutes which was one of the shortest matches of the night. Solid stuff though and nothing really bad. It just came off as lackluster and not meeting its potential.

A LONG highlight package takes us out. The replays show that the referee screwed up the last match as Sting wasn’t legal and Rick got the right pin but whatever.

Overall Rating: C+. Good show overall with nothing particularly bad outside of the short giants match. This was a fun show with solid Japanese stuff. It’s nothing great at all but at under two hours it’s hard to complain. Solid stuff overall though and kind of interesting to see a different style like this for a change.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

Monday Nitro #102
Date: August 25, 1997
Location: Carolina Coliseum, Columbia, South Carolina
Attendance: 8,048
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan, Larry Zbyszko

We’re past the Clash and the main change is that we have Sting vs. Hogan on the verge of being announced. Other than that we’re getting ready for Fall Brawl which is in like three weeks I think. The main event tonight is Savage vs. Luger as they renew an old rivalry. Other than that I wouldn’t expect anything big tonight. Let’s get to it.

We open with a recap of the vulture stuff from Clash which is over the top but fits well for Sting at this point.

Here’s Gene in the ring to recap JJ’s offers to Sting. He calls out “Earic” Bischoff to address the possibility of Sting vs. Hogan. Bischoff says ultimatums can come back to bite you, which means the WCW ship has to sail without Sting. JJ is on the phone (seriously? They couldn’t get JJ Dillon to a show?) and says that Eric is jumping to conclusions.

Apparently WCW was flooded with letters from fans so Hogan vs. Sting will happen. Eric FREAKS and says it won’t happen because Hogan is too busy, but if the match happened, Hogan would destroy him. Cue Sting who puts Eric on his knees and puts a Hogan shirt down his throat. Sting smiles for the first time in a year.

Raven jabbers a bit.

The Nitro Girls dance.

Ernest Miller/Glacier vs. La Parka/Psychosis

Glacier vs. La Parka to start with Ice Man kicking him in the face. I’m as shocked as you are I assure you. Psychosis trips up Glacier but gets caught by a spin kick from La Parka in a bit of heel miscommunication. A powerslam puts La Parka down and Psychosis screws up again by hitting his partner by mistake. They’re even now I guess. Miller comes in and gets caught in some EVIL double teaming on the floor while being stretched over the railing. Back in and the masked guys screw up AGAIN with La Parka kicking Psychosis in the head. Everything breaks down and La Parka hits Glacier with a wooden chair for the upset pin.

Rating: D+. What in the world was the point of this? Go show that Glacier and Miller aren’t a good team? I think we established that about the day they started teaming together. Other than that, it’s nice to see a new team who has done well before getting a win, even though they look like the Three Stooges at the same time. Nothing to see here, as usual.

Silver King and Ultimo Dragon come in as the brawl continues post match. Dragon gets beaten down, leading to this.

Silver King vs. Ultimo Dragon

Dragon is in trouble from the beating by all three other luchadores before we get going here. He says he’s ready to go and it’s on. King already misses a charge but a following kick in the corner connects with Dragon to take him down. A top rope legdrop and moonsault get two for King and we hit the chinlock. Silver misses a top rope elbow but takes Dragon’s head off with a clothesline.

King chokes away a bit but jumps into a dropkick as Dragon makes his comeback. He pounds away on King in the corner and adds a Muta Handspring Elbow. A kind of rana is botched by Dragon and both guys are down. They try it again and Dragon gets much higher this time and hits the rana perfectly for two. King goes up and after bumping the cameraman twice, gets caught in the super rana and the Dragon Sleeper for the tap out.

Rating: C-. Not much here but at least they’re trying to give these guys a story. What that story is I’m not sure but at least they’re trying somehow. Other than that though, the botch on the rana wasn’t great and it really slowed the match down. Silver King is a much bigger deal in Mexico, but in WCW he never amounted to anything.

Here are Savage and Hall for a chat. Hall says you can’t have a party without the NWO and they’re the reason why everyone is here and watching on TV at home. Apparently DDP has joined the NWO even though Savage voted no. As for Luger, the slump will continue tonight when he takes the Big Elbow. Gene asks Page to come out and asks if the Diamond Cutter to Luger on Thursday was intentional or not. Page calls the question stupid and says he and Luger will settle their differences like men. Just advancing stories here.

Chris Benoit vs. Jeff Jarrett

Benoit drills him three times in a row to start and ducks the enziguri attempt from Jeff. Jarret heads to the floor and is immediately caught by a baseball slide, so he hides behind Debra like a coward. Back in and Jarrett misses a charge in the corner but manages to avoid the Swan Dive. Jeff goes up top but Benoit pops up for a superplex, but Jarrett hooks Benoit’s legs once they hit the mat for a fast pin. Short but intense as you would imagine from a Benoit match.

The Nitro Girls dance some more.

Mortis/Wrath vs. Faces of Fear

Apparently this is a rematch from Saturday Night where the Faces of Fear lost. Wrath and Barbarian start things off with neither guy being able to keep an advantage. Vandenberg grabs Barbarian’s leg and Wrath kicks him down for two but Barbie pops right back up. A top rope lariat gets two more for Wrath but he misses a middle rope elbow. Off to Meng for a double middle rope headbutt for two more. Everything breaks down so let’s talk about WarGames.

There’s no Jimmy Hart out here with the Fear dudes for some reason. Things calm down a bit and Wrath charges into a Meng boot in the corner. Back to Barbarian who gets caught by a cross body of all things. Not hot tag brings in Mortis to fire off kicks but Meng goes into MONSTER MODE….which lasts about four seconds before Mortis kicks him down for two. Everything breaks down again and Mortis jumps into the Tongan Deathgrip to end this.

Rating: C. I’ll give them this: they’re giving these lower level guys some programs which while not great do in fact exist. So many people today have nothing of note to do and just wait for a story to come along. This isn’t much of a story for these guys but it’s something to do and a chance for them to show their skills a bit. That’s kind of nice to see and the matches aren’t horrible or anything.

Wrath and Meng fight some more post match.

BUY THIS STUFF!

Hour #2 begins.

Here are the Horsemen with something to say. Flair wants to know RIGHT NOW if Hennig is with them or against them. Curt comes out but he says he’s still not ready to give Flair an answer at this point. However, Flair was expecting this so here’s Arn Anderson to give a final sales pitch. Anderson talks about how he’s never been the biggest, the strongest, or the best at anything, but he’s parlayed that into a wrestling career. Then a few months ago he had to have neck surgery which left his left hand (he’s a southpaw) too weak to hold a glass or button a button.

Then a few days ago at the gym, he dropped a water bottle and saw the water falling out of it like the sand in the hourglass of his career. Therefore, he’d rather walk away than endanger the careers of men he respects. Every time he got in the ring, he gave you everything he had and that’s how he wants to be remembered. However he has one more challenge and that’s to Curt Hennig. He asks Hennig to be the new Enforcer of the Horsemen, which is Anderson’s spot on the team. Hennig says it would be a privilege and shakes Arn’s hand to join the team.

US Title: Steve McMichael vs. Eddie Guerrero

Mongo (the champion) gets jumped from behind to start with Eddie going after the knee. A snapmare puts the champ on the mat and Eddie stomps away before hitting a DDT out of the corner for two. A headscissors gets the same as Mongo is in trouble. Steve comes back with some basic power stuff including a slam and another slam and then a SPINNING slam. A charge misses in the corner and Eddie goes up, only to jump into a Tombstone for the pin to retain. Nothing to see here.

Here’s Rey to update us on his knee injury. He shouldn’t have wrestled at Road Wild which brings out Konnan to run his mouth. Trash is spoken but Giant comes out to scare Konnan off.

Bischoff comes out and runs off Heenan and Tenay, saying he and Tony are doing commentary for the rest of the show. Ok then.

Cruiserweight Title: Yuji Nagata vs. Chris Jericho

I never got the appeal of Nagata. I know he’s a big deal in Japan but his WCW stuff bored me to death. Technical stuff to start with Jericho being sent into the ropes where he misses a spinwheel kick. Yuji takes it to the mat and fires off a HARD kick to Jericho. You know, because he’s Japanese and Japanese wrestlers kick a lot. Jericho comes back with a dropkick and slam to set up a springboard splash for two. We hit a chinlock for a bit before Nagata is put in the Tree of Woe for some kicks.

We take a break and come back with Jericho getting dropped stomach first onto the ropes. We head to the floor where Jericho comes back with a cross body and it’s back inside. Yuji punches Jericho coming off the top to break up an ax handle shot. Jericho shrugs that off, hits the Lionsault, the WCW-rare double powerbomb and hooks the Liontamer for the tap out to retain.

Rating: D+. This didn’t work for the most part for me. Nagata is another guy who is just there with no real character or anything resembling one aside from “he’s a big deal in Japan.” Therefore, it’s hard to care about him and it’s hard to buy him as a legit threat to Jericho’s title. Not bad but nothing interesting at all here.

Harlem Heat wants to be #1 contenders but they have to get past the Steiners apparently. Ray talks about not having to go up north (to WWF) or to Japan because they’re the big tag team of WCW. The Steiners come out to say they deserve another title shot because of how the previous match ended. Vicious and Delicious come out to brag and a fight breaks out.

More dancing.

TV Title: Alex Wright vs. Dean Malenko

Alex is defending. Dean messes with him by using amateur stuff on him to start before taking him to the mat for two. The champ heads to the floor and comes back in with a strategy of punch Dean in the face over and over. Sometimes it’s the simplest ideas that work best I suppose. There’s an elbow drop but the champion stops to dance instead of covering.

There’s a backbreaker and Wright bends Dean over his knee for a little while. Wright’s piledriver attempt is blocked into a backdrop. Malenko loads up a superplex but gets shoved down. Instead Dean settles for a dropkick but Wright goes to the eyes to break up the Cloverleaf attempt. A pair of suplexes take Dean down but Dean counters into another Cloverleaf attempt, drawing Dean and Eddie out for the DQ.

Rating: C-. This was just waiting around until we got to the ending. The matches tonight haven’t had much to them at all other than setting up stuff for the future. That’s ok for a bit but when that’s all that happens on the show it gets old. Dean needs Jarrett to go to the WWF already so he and Eddie can just do their thing without being dragged down.

Lex Luger vs. Randy Savage

Savage, an old Memphis man, stalls before we get going. Luger punches him into the ropes and gets pulled away by the referee, resulting in Savage getting in a punch to take over. Randy seems to be keeping things simple tonight with punches and a clothesline as we head to the floor. More basic attacking by Savage as he starts focusing on the ribs by sending Luger into the barricade.

Luger tries crawling around but gets kicked in the head. You can’t say Savage didn’t live up to his name. A double ax off the apron puts Luger down again, preventing him from getting back into the ring. Savage finally throws him back in and drops the top rope ax on him for two. A sleeper on Luger is quickly countered into a belly to back suplex and both guys are down.

Luger gets up first and starts his comeback with his complete assortment of non-Rack moves (punch, clothesline, atomic drop, forearm) before calling for the Rack. Hall of course runs in and rams the guys together by mistake. Page comes out and checks on Luger, resulting in Lex Racking him to end the show.

Rating: D+. This was again just there for the ending to play off the idea of Luger and Page having issues. Based on that, I’ll set the over/under for pleas for WCW to come together at 4 for the first hour of next week’s show alone. Savage and Luger fought forever in WCW so it’s kind of nice to see them rekindle that a bit here.

Overall Rating: D. This show just wasn’t very good. It was almost all angle advancement, but at the same time there weren’t any good matches to back it up. We’re heading into WarGames now and nothing is really set in stone yet. We can see most of the card though, and that’s the most important part. Anderson’s retirement speech is worth checking out, if nothing else to keep in mind for the parody that would follow.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

Monday Nitro #101
Date: August 18, 1997
Location: Birmingham-Jefferson Civic Center, Birmingham, Alabama
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay, Bobby Heenan, Larry Zbyszko

We’re about a month away from Fall Brawl and the final traditional WarGames match with WCW vs. the NWO. On top of that, we’ve got Sting vs. Hogan looming which would be huge financially, but not so great critically. I’m talking about the future so much because there isn’t much to talk about in the next few weeks other than the final Clash of the Champions a few days after this. Let’s get to it.

Raven reads us a poem about ugly people to start things off.

Harlem Heat vs. Vicious and Delicious

Buff and Ray start things off with Buff running his mouth of course. A hiptoss shuts him up for a bit but he comes back with a hiptoss of his own and some posing. Ray still tries to shut him up, this time with a slam and a tag off to his brother. Norton comes in as well to pound down Booker, only to get kicked in the face a few times. Back to Ray who gets grabbed by Buff to give the NWO a quick advantage. A few elbows are dropped before one from the top by Buff misses. Everything breaks down after the hot tag to Ray and Vincent comes in for the fast DQ.

Rating: D+. Nothing to see here as the Heat were out of the NWO’s league here and Vincent continues to be nothing of note. The match was short too but given that this is Nitro, I almost have to take the shorter ones just to have something to rate. The Heat weren’t long for WCW though as it would soon be Booker getting the big singles push.

Booker clears the ring anyway.

Barbarian vs. Mortis

This feud isn’t exactly lighting the world on fire but it’s nice to see a story getting to run its course. During Mortis’ entrance, we hear about Jericho winning the Cruiserweight Title on Saturday Night. Mortis kicks away to start and pounds Barbarian down into the corner. Barbie misses a charge into the post and Mortis hits a Fameasser off the middle rope for two. The guy not in a mask comes back with a powerslam and pounds Mortis down in the corner. Mortis goes up again but dives into a powerslam for another two count. The Kick of Fear ends Mortis a few seconds later. Wow Barbarian gets a clean win on Nitro. That’s different.

Post match Wrath comes in to take Barbarian out but Meng puts him in the Tongan Death Grip to knock Wrath out.

Here’s the NWO for their weekly chat. Bischoff is looking forward to the party on Thursday because Larry Z and Giant can’t come near him. Apparently Giant was arrested last week. Eric wants his own show for the NWO and says he’ll see us Thursday. Just hyping the Clash here.

Flair and Hennig have their weekly promo: “You’re a Horseman!” “No I’m not, but we’ll win our tag match against the NWO anyway.” More Clash hyping.

Stevie Richards vs. Scotty Riggs

Richards charges to the ring like a maniac. Riggs grabs the wrist to start before nearly botching a monkey flip. A dropkick puts Richards on the floor but he rams Scotty’s shoulder into the post to take over. Back in and a sitout spinebuster gets two for Stevie but Scotty comes back with some clotheslines. Richards loses his half shirt and gets caught in a side slam for two. Raven jumps the railing as Stevie hits the Stevie Kick for the pin.

Rating: D. I guess this was to set up future stuff but that didn’t make this any easier to get through. Riggs is just not that good and Richards is a comedy character which doesn’t make for an interesting or good match at all. Not much to see here but that would be the case for a lot of Nitro matches.

Raven lays out Richards with the Even Flow.

Eddie, Debra and Jarrett make fun of the fans and tell Wright that he has to win the TV Title if he wants to hang out with them.

The NWO says this Thursday is going to be their birthday.

Chris Benoit/Steve McMichael vs. Jeff Jarrett/Eddie Guerrero

Benoit and Guerrero start things off with Chris taking over with a gorgeous suplex to send Eddie crawling to Jeff. Jarrett won’t come in to face Mongo who he faces for the US Title on Thursday. Mongo goes after Eddie instead but Jeff sneaks in with a dropkick to the back of McMichael’s knee. The heels start working over said knee with some Horsemen style tactics. A Benoit distraction lets Mongo hit a three point stance charge to take out Guerrero and make a hot tag. Everything breaks down and Eddie has to break up the Crossface on Jeff. Mongo blasts Jeff with the US Title to give Benoit the pin.

Rating: C+. Short but very hot match here. I was hoping for more selling from Mongo of the knee, but they didn’t work on it that long so it’s not terrible I guess. As usual, the less Jeff Jarrett is involved in a Jeff Jarrett match, the more exciting that match becomes. He would be gone in about two months thank goodness.

We recap Sting’s segment with JJ last week.

The Outsiders say they’re ready for Page and Luger tonight. I believe that was the main event of the Clash as well.

Ric Flair vs. Syxx

Road Wild rematch. They have a pose off to start until Flair is backdropped and sent into the corner. It’s a Flair match. Did you expect things to start well for him? He chops Syxx down and takes over with a headlock followed by another after an escape. Flair pounds on the head and clotheslines Syxx down before going after the knee. Syxx comes back with an enziguri to set up the Bronco Buster, drawing huge heat from the southern crowd.

Some chops don’t get Flair that far as Syxx punches him right back down. A guillotine legdrop gets two and there’s the Flair Flip out to the floor. Back in and a second Bronco Buster misses and you can almost feel the crowd laughing as Syxx crotches himself. They punch each other down and it’s Flair up to backdrop Syxx down again. There’s the knee to the head and it’s time to go to school. That also means it’s time for Vincent, Bagwell and Norton to run in for the DQ.

Rating: C. These two fought each other quite a bit and we got some decent matches out of them most of the time. The respect angle was fine, especially when you have a punk like Waltman and a pretty big jerk in Flair out there talking about it. Not much to see here but it was designed to set up the Clash again, which is fine.

Hennig makes the save post match.

JJ and Nick Patrick are with Gene and Dillon says that Nick did nothing wrong at the PPV. Patrick questions Randy Anderson’s officiating, drawing him out for the always fascinating referee argument.

TV Title: Ultimo Dragon vs. La Parka

Dragon is defending of course. Things start fast with Parka getting flipped over and backdropped. Dragon does his headstand in the corner and fires away with the kicks to take the challenger down again. A dropkick sends La Parka to the floor and there’s a big dive by the champion to take him out again.

Sonny Onoo (La Parka’s manager apparently) kicks Dragon down and Parka sends Dragon into the steps. A powerbomb gets two for Parka so he puts Dragon in the Tree of Woe for a kick to the chest. Now let’s stand around for a bit! Dragon comes back, hits the super rana, Sonny’s interference fails, and the Dragon Sleeper retains the belt.

Rating: D+. Just a quick title match here with no doubt as to who was going to win. Dragon was pretty good at what he did but as usual, the lack of mic skills held him down. If we can’t connect with these characters, the matches have to be amazing for them to get over. Dragon was good, but not that good. He would lose the title soon enough anyway.

Curt Hennig vs. The Giant

Hennig slaps him in the face for some reason and is tossed into the corner accordingly. An attempted whip out of the corner fails completely for Hennig so Curt bails to the floor. Giant hits some of those LOUD chops to Curt’s chest and suplexes him down. He calls for the chokeslam and here’s Eric to say that Giant is violating the restraining order. Doug Dillinger (WCW security) won’t do anything about it so Giant goes after Eric, losing via countout in the process. Short and basically a squash until the ending.

Dillinger still won’t do anything so Larry Z comes out to corner Eric. Bischoff runs into the crowd and escapes as cops hold Giant back.

We recap the Sting segment from last week again.

JJ is in the ring with another offer for Sting which I’m sure will work this time. Apparently he doesn’t have a new contract for Sting tonight. Stupid me, thinking the rolled up paper in his hand that has been a contract the last two weeks is a contract again here. JJ says he needs answers from Sting soon or they may have to go their separate ways. Geez even the WCW on screen bosses are stupid. Sting has until the Clash to tell JJ what he wants.

Here’s Sting in the crowd and the fans go nuts. The fans chant Hogan and Sting points at them again. Even TONY FREAKING SCHIAVONE is saying how obvious this is. Sting takes a sign out of the crowd that says Hulk vs. Sting. And JJ STILL doesn’t get it. Apparently HOLDING UP A SIGN THAT SAYS THE MATCH ON IT isn’t telling him what Sting wants.

The NWO is having a birthday party on Thursday.

Tag Titles: Outsiders vs. Diamond Dallas Page/Lex Luger

The announcers point out that the Steiners are being passed over AGAIN here. I’m sure another #1 contenders match is coming up soon too. Hall and Luger start things off as we go past ten o’clock which was a different thing back then. Luger slaps Hall in the face and shoves him into the corner to get things going. He beats on both Outsiders in the NWO corner and Hall tags Nash.

The big man wants Page so they both stand in opposite corners for a bit. The high powered offense begins from Nash until Page takes him down with a swinging neckbreaker for two. Page fires off his shoulder blocks but Nash clotheslines him right back down. DDP escapes Snake Eyes and gets two off a Russian legsweep. Back to Hall for a clothesline and the fallaway slam for two.

Off to the abdominal stretch for a bit until Page hip tosses out of it. Nash breaks up the tag attempt to Luger and it’s time for corner elbows. The Outsiders change without a tag and the referee yells at them. Hall makes an overblown tag and now Snake Eyes hits for no cover. They change again sans tag and Anderson is fine with it now.

Off to a sleeper by Hall and Page is in trouble. His arm drops twice before Page comes back with a belly to back suplex to put both guys down. Nash breaks up the tag AGAIN and clotheslines Page down. Page busts out a headscissors of all things and finally tags in Luger. Not that it matters as the NWO runs in about five seconds later for the DQ.

Rating: B-. I was digging this until the obvious ending. We knew the titles weren’t changing hands here and the NWO would run in, but it was cool to see WCW guys hanging in there this long. They played the formula here and as usual, it worked as well as anything else was going to. Good stuff.

Flair and the Giant run in and a brawl ends the show.

Overall Rating: B-. Pretty good show here as they set up the Clash quite well. There’s some stuff on there I’d like to see (including a main event of Page/Luger vs. Hall/Savage which I listed wrong earlier). The Sting stuff would really come to a new level on Thursday which it’s needed to do for months now. Solid episode here as WCW is kind of on a roll.

Here’s Clash of the Champions if you’re interested:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/07/23/clash-of-the-champions-35-the-final-clash-probably-a-good-idea-too/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

Monday Nitro #100
Date: August 11, 1997
Location: Denver Coliseum, Denver, Colorado
Attendance: 7,444
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan, Larry Zbyszko

It’s the show after Road Wild and any momentum WCW has going for it is gone. The Outsiders kept the tag titles and Hogan got the world title back from Luger after five days. We’re coming up on Fall Brawl and ultimately the Sting vs. Hogan showdown. After Saturday, you can hear the NWO gloating from here. Let’s get to it.

We open with the Giant getting served with a summons. This can’t end well.

Here are the Outsiders and Syxx with the tag titles still, because why bother changing them after building it up perfectly for the Steiners to win them? Anyway, Syxx runs his mouth and the Outsiders point to their belts as proof that they’re still the best in the world. The fans are seemingly far more behind the NWO here than usual. The Steiners have no claim to being the best in the world because they don’t have titles of course.

Tag Titles: Outsiders vs. Bobby Starr/David Moore

Starr and Moore come out to the Steiners’ music to tease the fans a bit. Hall and Moore start things off and we get some hard chops in the corner. Off to Starr who is caught in the belly to back superplex. Nash comes in and jackknifes Starr for the pin. Short and to the point.

The Steiners come in through the crowd and clear the ring before posing with the belts.

Wrath vs. Meng

This is due to last week’s match with Wrath vs. Barbarian. The brawl starts on the floor with no one getting an advantage so we head back inside where Meng kicks his head off. We head right back to the floor where Meng is sent into the railing hit with a flip attack off the apron by Wrath. Back in and Wrath gets crotched and superplexed down for two as this is going at a very fast pace so far. A clothesline puts Meng down and a top rope cross body gets two for Wrath, but the Tongan Death Grip goes on almost immediately to end Wrath. Short but intense.

Both guys’ partners come out with Mortis and Wrath clearing the ring. Vandenberg has to run from the Faces of Fear.

Here are the Steiners and DiBiase for a chat. The brothers say they had the Outsiders beaten and they’ll get another shot. DiBiase complains about Nick Patrick’s questionable refereeing by compared to the refereeing of Randy Anderson in the main event. They’ll get the titles eventually apparently.

Chris Jericho vs. Eddie Guerrero

Jericho starts off with a gorilla press of all things but Eddie escapes a monkey flip. A modified hot shot puts Eddie down again and a spinwheel kick sends him to the outside. Back in and Eddie begs off but naturally he’s suckering Jericho in. After a poke to the Canadian’s eyes, Eddie hits a dropkick to the side of the head to take over even more.

Jericho comes back with three straight clotheslines but the Lionsault hits knees. A big release German suplex gets two on Eddie as does a tiger driver. Jericho loads up the Liontamer but settles for a giant swing instead. Eddie’s dizziness sends him to the floor where Jericho hits a plancha. Back in and Eddie guillotines him on the top rope and runs to the top for the Frog Splash for the pin.

Rating: C+. This was your usual decent match for these guys but with only about four and a half minutes to work with, there’s only so much they can do. The ending seemed like someone forgot how much time they had and said to go home immediately. Still though it was fast paced enough to work and these two are always worth checking out.

The Nitro Girls dance a bit.

Alex Wright insults the fans and doesn’t have much to say.

Dean Malenko vs. Jeff Jarrett

Weren’t these guys friends last week? Dean seems ticked off and keeps shoving the referee away to get to Jarrett, eventually suckering Jeff into the ring to pound away on the blonde dude. Malenko punches Jeff to the floor where he tries to walk away, only to get beaten up on the floor instead. Apparently Jarrett got himself pinned in the elimination tag on Saturday to make Malenko go it alone in a handicap match. The announcers didn’t tell me that or anything. I just happened to have a review of the PPV available and could check it for myself.

Back in and Dean fires off some leg lariats to send Jarrett right back to the floor. He tries to walk out again and sees McMichael waiting on him. We take a break and come back with Dean pounding away on Jeff even more. We head back into the ring for a belly to back suplex by Jeff as things slow down. Jeff starts to cannonball down onto the leg but the running crotch attack to Dean’s back hits rope. There’s a tiger bomb and the Cloverleaf from Dean but Eddie runs in for the DQ.

Rating: C. Jeff Jarrett continues to be very boring, but if this leads to Eddie vs. Dean I’m more than fine. The heel turn from Dean didn’t go anywhere at all and thankfully they got him away from Jeff as fast as they did. This wasn’t a bad match or anything but my lack of caring about anything Jeff Jarrett does drags it way down.

Post match Mongo runs in for the save but after they clear the ring, Dean beats McMichael up as well.

Here are Curt and Flair with something to say. Flair says that he loves Curt, but hates the fact that Hennig was seen talking to Bischoff. Hennig says he has business with Bischoff and it’s not a big deal. Flair offers Hennig a spot in the Horsemen again but Hennig has a main event tonight with Randy Savage to deal with. Flair says ok but after that, the Horsemen go to Nashville for the Clash of Champions. Hennig says he’ll be Flair’s partner in Flair’s tag match at the COTC, but it doesn’t mean he’s a Horseman.

Here’s Eric Bischoff on his Harley apparently with something to say. Apparently Luger is going to be punished for what he did last week when he beat Hogan. Some more NWO guys get in the ring and Eric congratulates Hogan and the Outsiders for their wins on Saturday. It’s Hogan’s birthday today but he’s on a movie set, so we get a Happy Birthday song from the NWO.

As for the Giant, he can’t come within however many feet of Bischoff due to the papers served earlier. Buff goes down the aisle and spraypaints a line that Giant can’t cross. Giant comes down anyway but JJ and Larry Z go to stop him. Giant says he’s willing to go to jail as cops surround him. Hall comes out and throws his toothpick at Larry to end a decent segment.

Hour #2 begins.

Chris Benoit/Steve McMichael vs. Steiner Brothers

Scott and Mongo start things off with Scott pounding him down with raw power. Make that Nitro power actually to avoid making people think of that other show. Mongo knocks him into the corner but walks into a belly to belly suplex for two. Off to Benoit vs. Rick and it gets intense in a hurry. They fight up against the ropes with Benoit chopping away before getting suplexed down.

Back to Scott for a gorilla press and an STF before Benoit fights away for a tag to Mongo. Rick immediately beats McMichael down but Steve comes back with a slam. He goes up for some reason and jumps into a release belly to belly suplex for a surprise pin. That didn’t look to go as planned as both Benoit and the referee looked confused. Maybe Mongo got hurt on the suplex.

Rating: C+. The intensity here was really good with both teams beating the tar out of each other when they were in there. The ending did seem to be rushed due to the suplex as Rick gave a look as if to say “we won?” at the end. Either way, the match was good while it lasted and the botch makes the Steiners look even stronger here, which is what they needed to do after Saturday.

Here’s Luger to apologize for losing the title on Saturday. Last week was the best moment of his life but he let us down after that. The title win was a moment where everyone came together to show solidarity (this would be roughly the 87^th time that WCW has finally come together for those of you counting). Lex isn’t worried about the officiating because he won the title with the same referee. He’ll come for Hogan again.

Buff Bagwell vs. Diamond Dallas Page

Buff hits a quick hiptoss to take over so Page sits down in the corner ala Jake Roberts, as in the guy who trained him. Page grabs the arm and does those driving shoulders of his into Buff’s arm. After a quick break to the floor by Bagwell, he comes back in and is shouldered right back down.

The discus lariat takes Buff down again but he immediately pops back up and chokes Page down. A neckbreaker gets two on DDP but Buff, ever the genius, argues with the referee over the count. Page punches him down and here’s Vincent on the apron. You should be able to see the ending coming here. Buff is shoved into Vincent and there’s the Diamond Cutter for the pin.

Rating: D+. Not much here but Page getting another win is nothing bad for him at all. Buff was doing his usual stuff here and looked decent in doing so, but when you have Vincent out there it’s pretty clear you’re not going to win. Why was he around now anyway since DiBiase had left the team?

Road Report from Lee Marshall.

TV Title: Ultimo Dragon vs. Mortis

Dragon is defending here. Feeling out process to start until Dragon fires off his rapid fire kicks to take over. Mortis elbows him down and chokes a bit but Dragon kicks him down and loads up the super rana. A Vandenberg distraction fails and Mortis is caught in a front superplex off the top. Mortis hits a Fameasser for two before loading up the Flatliner (Samoan Drop from the middle rope). Dragon counters into a powerbomb and the Dragon Sleeper retains the title.

Rating: C-. This was a fast paced match but they didn’t click for the most part out there. There wasn’t any kind of a flow to the match and it felt a lot more sloppy than it should have. Mortis would get a lot better once he became Kanyon and got to show off whatever freaky offense he had in mind that week.

Here’s JJ to offer Sting another contract. After talking about a bunch of legal stuff that doesn’t need to be explained, Sting lowers from the rafters. The contract is for a match with Syxx but Sting rips it up. He goes to leave but Gene stops him and asks Sting who he wants. The fans chant for Hogan and Sting points to the fans. More good stuff here as the ending was clear, but they had to have a reason to get there. The build for this really is getting good.

Buy NWO stuff!

Tape your Nitro parties!

Randy Savage vs. Curt Hennig

The announcers talk about Hennig being a free agent and Heenan sounds bombed. An elbow to the head of Hennig drops him dead and we go outside. Liz ducks away and Savage gets clotheslined as we take a break. Back with Hennig pounding on Randy in the aisle before heading back inside for the neck snap. Savage goes after the leg but gets leveraged to the floor. And here’s DDP to attack Hennig for the DQ. Not enough to rate but they didn’t do anything of note here.

Hall runs in to help Savage and Hennig bails. The beating goes on for a bit until Luger makes the save.

The announcers wrap things up to end the show.

Overall Rating: C. This wasn’t bad but it was mainly just fallout from the previous PPV. The Sting stuff is clearly going to be huge as the fans reacted to that about twice as loudly as anything else all night. Other than that, there wasn’t much here but Giant vs. the NWO is becoming interesting. We’re headed towards Fall Brawl now but that was only mentioned in passing, which is probably a good thing because it was another mostly B level show.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

Monday Nitro #99
Date: August 4, 1997
Location: Palace of Auburn Hills, Detroit, Michigan
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay, Larry Zbyszko, Bobby Heenan

This is an interesting episode as I’ve seen says this is the 100^th episode, but I’ve counted each one I’ve done and can only come up with 99. I haven’t missed any shows and there are only 99 counting this one so far. Two weeks in 1996 had no show at all so maybe they’re counting one of those to get to 100. Either way, the main event tonight is Luger vs. Hogan for the title, five days before their PPV title match. That clearly won’t go anywhere. Let’s get to it.

Oh and this is a three hour show.

Buffer welcomes us to this special show. This whole 99 or 100 thing is going to bother me but the best I can figure out is that WCW is just lying.

After the Nitro Girls dance a bit, here are Hogan and Bischoff with something to say. Hogan runs down Luger and says that he’s going to have “500,000 of his friends” watching on Saturday. It was about 1% of that but what difference does it match? Anyway, Hogan doesn’t like having to defend tonight, but Luger is going to pay for the mistake tonight. Hogan says something about defending against Scott Hall instead but it didn’t make much sense.

Curt Hennig vs. Mortis

Feeling out process to start until Hennig takes Mortis down with a knee lift. Curt goes after Vandenberg though and the masked dude takes over. Mortis misses an elbow and there’s the Hennig neck snap. Mortis comes back with a spinwheel kick for two but Hennig goes after the knee. PerfectPlex ends this pretty quick.

Rating: C-. I don’t like matches like this one as it’s hard to rate due to how fast it was. A lot of it was them walking around, but it was so short that it was still decent. This is what WCW’s massive roster helps with: they have have a guy like Mortis lose, but he can go and beat up other people and get his spot back. Also since there’s no shame to losing to Hennig, everything is ok for him. Why WWE doesn’t use their roster like this is beyond me.

Video on Sting not talking for the last year or so.

Dean Malenko/Jeff Jarrett vs. Hector Guerrero/Chavo Guerrero

Malenko and Chavo start things off and we hit the mat very quickly. That doesn’t last long so they run the ropes a bit until Dean gets taken down by a pair of dropkicks. Hector comes in to face Jeff and we have a strut vs. dance battle. A headscissors puts Jarrett down and frustrates him so he pounds away a bit. Hector makes a brief comeback but stops to jaw with Dean, letting Jeff take over again.

There’s the running crotch attack to a 619’d Hector (I’m still looking for a better name for that) before it’s back to Malenko. Make that back to Jeff again and Hector gets two off a backslide. Chavo breaks up the Figure Four and Dean is rolled up for two. Hector won’t tag and is caught in an electric chair. Dean hooks the Cloverleaf and we’re done.

Rating: C. The idea here was that Hector wouldn’t tag, presumably due to stubbornness, but it doesn’t make Jeff any more interesting. The guy is just flat out not interesting no matter how you try to push or package him. Malenko was fine but he needs to get away from this stupid tag team thing.

Raven still won’t talk so here’s Stevie Richards instead. Richards has a contract for Raven but there’s a snag. He’s been in Atlanta renegotiating for Raven and everything seems to be cool now. Raven looks at the contract, spits at Richards and decks him. He pulls back to punch Richards again, but Stevie blocks it and says no more.

Giant vs. Joey Maggs/Lenny Lane/Scott D’Amore

Chokeslam, chokeslam, chokeslam, about 90 seconds, interview time.

Savage pops up on the stage and says bring it before running from a fast walking Giant.

We recap the roll Lex Luger is on. Basically it’s a Luger highlight video.

High Voltage vs. Public Enemy

Kaos vs. Grunge to start and Johnny wants to dance. A swinging neckbreaker puts Kaos down as does a clothesline before it’s off to Rocco. Rage interferes but Kaos takes the time to pose instead of following up. Larry: “HE’S WASTING TIME!” Remember, this is LARRY ZBYSZKO complaining about stalling. High Voltage is coming off as the heel team here and it doesn’t suit them that well.

Rage comes in and pounds away on Rocco a bit more but jumps off the top into Rocco’s boot. My goodness how I hate that spot. Grunge comes in and beats up both guys as everything breaks down. The Public Enemy loads up the table but Rage moves, sending Rocco crashing through the wood. Not that it matters as Rage runs into Kaos and is rolled up by Grunge for the pin.

Rating: D+. As lame as the match was, there was an actual story being told out there. The idea was that High Voltage didn’t have the experience to hang with the Public Enemy and the veterans used that to their advantage. This is probably the last match I would have expected something like that from but points to these guys for putting it in there.

Alex Wright cuts in on the Nitro Girls dancing. The Girls leave and Alex talks some trash about Jericho, who he faces on Saturday.

Scotty Riggs vs. Alex Wright

Non-title here. Wright sends Scotty to the floor almost immediately and hits a double ax off the apron. A suplex on the floor keeps Riggs down but he sends Wright into the barricade to get himself a breather. Back in and Alex takes over again before dancing a bit. They both hit cross bodies with Scotty falling on top for two. They head up top and Alex headbutts him down before hitting a missile dropkick for the pin.

Rating: D+. Just a squash here to set up the title match at Road Wild. Wright using the dropkick was a nice touch as that’s one of Jericho’s finishing moves. Not much of a match here, but then again Riggs wasn’t much of a wrestler. At least he stopped using the American Males theme.

Hour #2 starts.

Here’s Luger to talk to Gene. Lex says that he was only focused on Saturday but now his focus has shifted to tonight. It’s his defining moment and tonight, he’s going to make history. Standard promo here but it did exactly what it needed to do. It’s such a simple science but no one can pull it off anymore.

Chris Benoit vs. Syxx

Syxx starts with that headlock of his but Benoit quickly elbows him down. A spinwheel kick puts Benoit down but Chris immediately legdraps Syxx out to the floor. There’s a suicide dive to take the NWO dude out. Back in and Benoit goes up, only to get caught in the Tree of Woe. Syxx hits a Bronco Buster to an upside down Benoit in a move I’ve never seen before. A top rope flipping legdrop misses Benoit though and Chris suplexes him down for two. Benoit loads up a belly to back superplex but here’s Jarrett to attack Benoit for the DQ.

Rating: C+. This was a nice fast paced match that had to be brought down by a stupid ending. This was done to further the tag match on Sunday which at least had a purpose. Not much to see here but Benoit was fast paced as usual and Syxx continues to be much better against smaller guys. Not bad at all here.

More dancing.

Booker T vs. Vincent

Nothing match as Booker beats up Vincent and side kicks him for the pin in maybe 45 seconds.

DDP talks about his match with Flair tonight, saying that while he and Flair have common enemies, Flair has his respect, but he has Flair’s number. I like that line.

Wrath vs. Barbarian

Now here’s an odd match. Barbarian knocks him back into the corner but gets clotheslined down for two. Wrath takes him down but can’t hit the Death Penalty (two arm Rock Bottom) as we head to the floor. Barbarian sends him into various metal objects before we head back inside. Back in and Barbarian goes up but jumps into the Death Penalty for the pin. Too short to rate but it wasn’t very good.

Meng comes out to stare down Wrath. Wrath bails.

The hometown Steiners come out and introduce Ted DiBiase as their surprise new manager. DiBiase was one of the original members of the NWO so this is a big deal. He starts off by saying that he’s seen the error of his ways before almost saying the World Wrestling Federation tag titles were on the line on Saturday. Cue the Outsiders to laugh this off and say that DiBiase is a dead man.

More dancing.

Lee Marshall does his thing.

Konnan vs. Psychosis

Konnan pounds him down to start before nearly clotheslining a horn off. A low dropkick hits the masked man and Konnan sends him to the apron. Psychosis comes back in with a top rope spinwheel kick for two. That’s about the extent of his offense as Konnan hits the 187 and Tequila Sunrise for the fast tap.

Rey, still on crutches, comes out to confront Konnan post match. Konnan kicks the crutches away but Rey is faking it and breaks a crutch over Konnan’s back.

Glacier/Ernest Miller vs. Damien/Silver King

King and Glacier get us going and the kicking begins. Glacier cranks on the arm a bit but King kicks out of it pretty quickly. Damien trips up Glacier but the ice enthusiast kicks Silver down anyway. Off to Miller but the luchadores pound him down pretty quickly. Miller comes back with a bunch of kicks and here’s Glacier again. A backdrop gets two on Damien but Glacier is double teamed a bit. Uninterested tag brings in Miller who uses his karate stuff, finishing Damien with a spinning kick off the top.

Rating: D. At the end of the day, Miller was so unbelievably boring in this role and it took a long time to get him to a level where anyone cared about him. Silver King and Damien actually got a win or two so they were only somewhat jobbers to the stars. Not much to see here though.

Here’s Bischoff with something to say. He’s here to complain about the attack by the Giant from last week and calls out JJ Dillon. The alleged boss of WCW comes out and Eric yells a lot, threatening legal actions against the Giant and violence against Larry Z. If there was a point to this getting six minutes of TV time, I have no idea what it was.

Hour #3 begins and the Nitro Girls dance on the announce table.

Diamond Dallas Page vs. Ric Flair

Hennig comes out and shakes Flair’s hand to mess with Page’s mind. Page runs Flair down and slaps him in the face to tick him off. Hennig went to the back already so this is one on one. Page pounds away in the corner and Ric is in trouble early. Flair comes back with a poke to the eye but Page counters a backdrop attempt into a sweet sitout powerbomb for no cover. Hennig comes back out and we take a break.

Back with Flair in control and Page down in the corner. Page comes back with right hands and slams Flair off the top, but a Hennig distraction lets Flair get in a shot to the knee. There’s the knee drop and Flair is in Nature Boy mode. A quick Figure Four is broken up because Page is in the ropes.

Flair pounds away even more and tries to suplex Page over the top and out to the floor. DDP counters of course and puts Ric in the Figure Four instead. Flair pokes the referee in the eye, allowing Curt to come in. Page cradles him to slow him down, but it lets Flair escape the hold. There’s a Flair Flip in the corner and Ric goes up, only to dive into a clothesline. Page calls for the Cutter but Hennig comes in for the DQ.

Rating: C+. This was fine but they more or less had a big sign saying RUN-IN COMING. That’s fine though as you can’t have these guys losing five days before a PPV match. I mean, this is WCW, not some crazy company like WWE that has guys in prominent matches getting pinned on go home shows.

Page clears the ring post match.

Hector Garza/Lizmark Jr. vs. Villanos

This would be IV and V for you Villano enthusiasts. Garza and IV start things off and things speed up quickly. Hector moonsaults out of the corner and clotheslines IV down before hitting a superkick. Off to Lizmark for a dropkick but V comes in and ducks the same move. Some armdrags put V down but the Villanos double team Lizmark to take over. Back to Garza who gets caught in a double gutbuster.

We head to the floor where Garza is dropkicked into the barricade. That gets boring so it’s back inside where everything breaks down. Garza dives on I think IV before Lizmark and V go to the floor. IV is backdropped to the floor so Garza can hit the big corkscrew plancha. Back in and Lizmark dropkicks IV a few times, but the referee gets distracted and the switch from the brothers is enough for Lizmark to get rolled up for the pin.

Rating: C. This was fine but it was nothing more than a bridge between the big stuff later on in the show. Garza had the making of a big star and was getting over pretty well in the earlier days of TNA before getting busted for steroid possession. The other three guys never amounted to anything in the States.

Here’s JJ to offer Sting a contract. Basically “we’re sorry we thought you were lying because we were too stupid to use common sense and tell that it wasn’t you the whole time. Maybe we should hit Turner up for vision insurance. Anyway, wanna fight Curt Hennig?” Sting lowers from the rafters and rips up the contract. See, this is something that actually deserved the six and a half minutes it got.

WCW World Title: Lex Luger vs. Hollywood Hogan

Dang man how long has it been since Hogan wrestled on Nitro? They trade hammerlocks to start and Hulk heads to the ropes. More feeling out until Hogan pounds away in the corner to take over. The fans are WAY into this here. Hogan keeps beating on him and drops a bunch of elbows. A clothesline in the corner has Lex in trouble and Hulk chokes away. Luger comes back and rams the champ into the buckle a few times to get himself a breather. Hollywood takes his head off with another clothesline and we take a break.

Back with Hogan still in control and hitting a suplex for two. A belly to back suplex puts Luger down again and a big right hand gets two. The big boot and legdrop hit for two and the pop is really weak for some reason. Another legdrop misses and it’s comeback time. Luger decks the Outsiders and Savage as they try to run in. The forearm takes Hogan down and there’s the Torture Rack to give us a new world champion.

Rating: B. The match itself was as by the book as you could get, but that’s exactly what it should have been. The rating is almost entirely for the moment, which is WAY better here than I remember it being. Hindsight would say it was obviously only going to last until the PPV, but still man this worked really well. I’m actually surprised at how much I liked this.

The locker room empties out for the celebration. The fans go NUTS too. Everyone goes to the back and we see Giant and Luger polishing the belt to get the NWO paint off as champagne is flowing everywhere.

Hogan loses his mind in the other locker room.

Overall Rating: B. This was supposed to be a special show, and I don’t often get to say this about WCW, but they absolutely nailed it. The wrestling here is ok at best, but they did a good job of setting up the PPV, they had a good start to the new part of the Sting angle, and the ending is actually excellent. I know it doesn’t mean anything in the long run, but at the time this was a cool moment. Good show here which almost shocks me.

Here’s Road Wild if you’re interested:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2012/05/23/road-wild-1997-you-can-see-the-problems-mounting-up-already/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

Monday Nitro #98
Date: July 28, 1997
Location: Charleston Civic Center, Charleston, West Virginia
Attendance: 9,575
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Bobby Heenan, Larry Zbyszko, Tony Schiavone

Back on Monday here as we’re getting closer and closer to Road Wild. Hopefully we can continue the roll they’re on that started last week. The main stories going are on what side is Hennig on and Luger vs. Hogan, both of which should wind up being interesting ideas. Other than that there are some decent stories going on and I’m enjoying this show more lately. Let’s get to it.

The Nitro Girls do their thing.

Curt Hennig/Ric Flair vs. Vicious and Delicious

Hennig (POP) starts with Norton. Scott elbows Hennig down almost immediately and chops him to the floor. We head inside for Hennig’s arm work to go nowhere, so here’s Flair. Nice job of making your new guy look inept there WCW. Norton runs Flair over and hits a big shoulder block to take him down again. Off to Bagwell but his posing lets Hennig get in a shot to the back of Buff’s head to slow things down. Buff pounds on Flair in the corner so Flair chops him down.

Bagwell misses a dropkick and it’s Figure Four time. Hennig and Norton get in a fight and Flair lets the hold go for no apparent reason. We take a break and come back with Norton choking Flair in the corner. Flair pounds back at Norton but double teaming puts him down again. Norton and Bagwell double team Flair for a bit but Bagwell gets chopped down, allowing the hot tag to Hennig. House is cleaned and Syxx goes after Flair. Flair pulls Norton. to the floor and the PerfectPlex pins Bagwell.

Rating: C-. Really basic match here which was designed to put Hennig over. It did a better job at putting Norton over but at least they were trying. Hennig would be the biggest story in the company for the next few weeks, and unlike Jarrett a few months before, Hennig would actually be OVER by the end of it. See what talent and charisma can get you? Jarrett had talent but it wasn’t the right character for him at all.

Here’s Luger for a chat. By chat I mean strip session to show off how ripped he is. Luger talks about how ready he is for Hogan. However, he mentions a clause in Hogan’s contract that says Hogan has to defend his title every so often, so next week it’s Hogan vs. Luger for the title.

TV Title: Prince Iaukea vs. Ultimo Dragon

Dragon is defending and runs the Prince over to start. The headstand in the corner mesmerizes another opponent and the champ puts on a reverse chinlock. The wide section of empty chairs that were full during the first match is a telling sign about the interest in this match. Then again, the people in the match could probably tell you the same thing. Dragon loads up the super rana but Prince superplexes him down instead. We get a pinfall reversal sequence before Iaukea dropkicks the champ down for no cover. A superkick gets two and Iaukea blocks the Dragon Sleeper. The second attempt works though and Prince taps.

Rating: D+. Dragon was good but man alive Iaukea wasn’t interesting at all. The problem with the TV Title is that it went on guys the fans were given no reason to care about. Dragon is indeed very talented and can put on entertaining matches, but his matches aren’t great enough to make people overlook his lack of personality. That’s the problem with a lot of the luchadores and other guys in WCW and there was no way around it.

Here’s Flair who says that Hennig is officially the newest Horseman. Here’s Hennig who says he’s not a Horseman but Flair says Hennig is just laying low.

Texas Hangmen vs. Steve McMichael/Chris Benoit

The Hangmen are Mean Mike and Tough Tom. They’re masked guys who I have seen in Memphis wrestling before. Benoit starts with let’s say Tom and gets hit by Mike in the back to give Tom the advantage. Off to Mongo who runs over both Hangmen and powerslams Mike down. Some clotheslines do the same thing and we’ve got a phone call for Tony from the Outsiders. Hall tells Tony he better accepts the charges. Tony: “Well if it’s 1-800 Collect I will.”

They were a sponsor at the time, making that somewhere between clever and eye roll inducing. The match gets ignored as the Hangmen take over on Mongo. Steve comes back with a bulldog and there’s the tag to Benoit. The call finally ends as everything breaks down. Mongo can barely tombstone Mike but it sets up the Crossface by Benoit for the win.

Rating: D. Phone call aside, this wasn’t very good. The Hangmen were jobbers and that’s fine, but the Horsemen looked to have a lot of trouble with them which they shouldn’t have had. Not a good match or anything and it didn’t showcase the Horsemen. The phone call didn’t help anything either, especially since it didn’t accomplish anything and it only said the Outsiders would be on the show next week.

Cruiserweight Title: Chris Jericho vs. Alex Wright

Jericho is defending here. The opening part of the match is ignored for the sake of house show ads as Wright slaps Jericho in the corner. They fight for arm control with the champion taking Alex to the mat. Those big stretches of empty seats in the crowd are kind of distracting. A spinwheel kick puts Wright down and out to the floor, causing the match to come to a halt.

Jericho dives onto Wright but gets suplexed down to change momentum. Wright stomps Jericho down in the corner but misses a top rope knee drop. The Lionsault hits Wright’s back but Jericho doesn’t cover. Wright goes to the apron and gets put in a sleeper by Jericho who is in the ring. Alex guillotines him down and hits a German suplex for the clean pin and the title.

Rating: C. This was an interesting match as you had Wright losing most of the first few matches after his turn before winning the title completely clean here. The fact that it was a clean pin helps, but I’m not exactly sure what the point was in jobbing him out the last few weeks to give him the belt here. Still though, not bad.

Here are Jarrett, Malenko and Debra with something to say. Dean says he’s in with Jarrett and Debra is shaking hands with Wright as he walks up the ramp. Apparently Jarrett was seen with Eddie Guerrero on Saturday Night and Dean isn’t cool with that. Jeff says people just want to be with winners. Debra runs her mouth of course. Thank goodness Jeff and Debra would leave in just a few months.

Hour #2 begins and the pyro is back.

Syxx vs. Diamond Dallas Page

They slug it out to start until Page busts out a pumphandle backbreaker for two. That’s a new move for him I believe. A neckbreaker puts Syxx down as well, followed by an elbow to put him on the floor. Syxx comes back with some kicks in the corner and there’s the Bronco Buster. Vincent comes out but Page avoids the Buzzkill. He hits the Cutter on Syxx but the Vincent distraction lets Hennig come in and blast Page with something in the back of the head. Syxx gets the easy pin.

Rating: D+. This didn’t have the time to get anywhere but the match was more about an angle than the wrestling. Page was on such a roll at this point that seeing him lose was actually a shocking sight. Today, you see people losing almost all the time, which makes wins and losses mean very little.

Tony: “CLEARLY CURT HENNIG IS PART OF THE NWO!” Very clearly indeed.

Dean Malenko vs. Hector Guerrero

This should be good. They head to the mat to start with both guys fighting for arm control. Dean takes Hector down with a snap mare as we hear about a Bobby Heenan personal appearance in Milwaukee. He says he’s the human being that made Milwaukee famous, which should get a chuckle out of old school fans. Off to a headscissors on the mat by Malenko but Hector escapes into a modified STF. They trade rollups out of the corner followed by a sunset flip for two for Guerrero. Here are Jarrett and Debra as Dean puts the Cloverleaf on for the tap out.

Rating: C-. Technically fine but this Jarrett stuff is really dull. Allegedly he’s trying to form his own team to fight the Horsemen, but at the end of the day it’s Jeff Jarrett leading the charge. That makes it pretty hard to get interested in the team at all, especially with Debra getting to talk about them every week. Nothing special to see here.

Chavo Guerrero comes out to check on his uncle and gets beaten up as well.

Konnan speaks Spanish and says he doesn’t like Rey. Apparently Rey is filling an Affirmative Action quota. Of Americans? Konnan vs. La Parka later.

Lee Marshall is in Detroit.

Giant comes out for his match but Savage is in the crowd with something to say to him. They’ve got a match at Road Wild. Giant says what Savage is about to see is just a preview.

Giant vs. Great Muta

The bell rings and here’s Eric Bischoff to commentary. Thankfully during his full entrance and the walk to the desk, nothing happened in the ring. Muta fires off some fast kicks but gets caught in the corner and chopped a lot. Giant pounds away in the corner so Muta bails to the floor. Back in and Muta goes to the eyes before firing off some dropkicks. Some more shots to the knees take Giant down and there’s the Muta Elbow. Giant shoves him off of a cover and shrugs off some top rope shots. He grabs Muta by the throat and after covering his eyes from the Mist, the chokeslam gets the pin.

Rating: D+. What did you expect from this match? There are only a handful of ways to fight Giant and going after the knee is the mos common answer. The covering of the eyes is one of those things that seems to be common sense but no one ever does. Muta is a really talented guy but he was basically a jobber in the NWO. Much like the rest of the show, nothing of note to see here.

Post match Larry Z comes to the announcers’ desk and grabs Bischoff. He drags Eric to the ring for a chokeslam to a good pop.

Konnan vs. La Parka

Konnan immediately beats him down and hits his rolling clothesline. La Parka dropkicks him out of the air and hits a legdrop for two. Tony of course is gushing about the chokeslam. La Parka gets a chair with Konnan’s name on it but Konnan dropkicks it into his face. 187 and Tequila Sunrise end La Parka. Quick match.

Psychosis comes out for the save post match.

The announcers talk about the world title match next week and we get a phone call from JJ Dillon. Apparently he and the executive committee want Sting back in the ring by September.

Randy Savage vs. Scott Steiner

Savage slaps him in the face to start before shoving referee Randy Anderson into Scott to take him down. Steiner comes back with a gorilla press slam to send Savage to the floor. Savage throws a chair into the ring and we take a break. Back with Steiner hitting a belly to belly suplex, sending Savage to the floor. Just like old times, Randy hides behind Liz and sends Scott knees first into the steps.

They fight into the crowd with Scott in trouble. Back to ringside and Steiner is rammed into the barricade to keep Randy in control. We head back inside and Scott catches Savage off the top in another belly to belly. Rick and Liz get in an argument, allowing Steiner to backdrop Savage over the top and out to the floor, which should be a DQ. Now Steiner throws Savage into the crowd, possibly injuring Randy’s shoulder.

Back to ringside and they brawl a bit more with Scott maintaining control. Steiner gets two on a small package followed by a butterfly powerbomb for no cover. A Super Frankensteiner puts Savage down but Liz throws in her shoe. Cue the Outsiders for the SHOCKING, yes SHOCKING I SAY, run-in DQ.

Rating: C. This wasn’t bad but it was mainly brawling. Scott didn’t know how to wrestle a main event style match at this point but his singles push was coming. Granted it was years before it actually worked but they were trying at least. The ending was obvious because the announcers were so sure that the Outsiders weren’t there that they had to be there. As usual, not much to see here.

Post match the Outsiders beat down the Steiners until Giant makes the save. He calls out Nash but Nash hides behind security. The security steps aside and says go get him….but we’re out of time. Well we could see Nash get in, but we need to see Giant chokeslam Bischoff one more time to end the show.

Overall Rating: D+. The show wasn’t terrible but this felt like a big commercial for next week’s show which in theory is a commercial for the PPV the following Saturday. On top of that, considering there’s a world title match the next week, there wasn’t a lot of focus on it. It seems more like Giant vs. Savage is the world title match when you look at how much hype they got. The matches here were nothing special either.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

Monday Nitro #97
Date: July 22, 1997
Location: Jacksonville Memorial Coliseum, Jacksonville, Florida
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Bobby Heenan, Tony Schiavone, Larry Zbyszko

This is a special show on a Tuesday for reasons that weren’t given. Anyway the main event tonight is a match I remember pretty well for some reason as Benoit and Flair challenge the Outsiders for the tag titles. Other than that we get to hear if Luger’s challenge to Hogan for a title match at Road Wild is accepted or not. Let’s get to it.

We open with the Nitro Girls of course. They’re certainly better looking than Tony and Larry.

Here are Hogan and Bischoff to really get things going. They have a microphone and are standing in the ring, so Tony deduces that they obviously have something to say. You can’t buy analysis like this people. They decide to lay down on the mat and take it easy for this interview. Hogan says that most of the people in this arena and in the back are here because of him. Now that we’re in the 90s, he sets the pace for wrestling.

Hogan talks about how Konnan is another step of the way closer to world dominance. I wouldn’t exactly call it that but it’s his company I guess. Luger wants what Hogan has, because Hogan is the best. Hollywood says he’s smarter than Luger is and he wants him in a title match one on one. He accepts the challenge for Sturgis. Hogan seemed to be rambling a lot more than usual here which is weird for him. He may sound crazy most of the time but he usually makes it sound decent.

Konnan vs. Tsubusa

I can only find two other matches for Tsubusa, both of them in six man tags in Japan. He’s a masked guy with a shiny cape and that’s about it. The 187 and Tequila Sunrise make Tsubusa tap out in about 25 seconds.

TV Title: Ultimo Dragon vs. Steven Regal

No entrance for either guy and Regal is defending. The champ cranks on Dragon’s arm but Dragon speeds things up to escape. Dragon has the awesome black and gold attire on tonight so you know he’s going to be on his game. Regal gets kicked hard by his challgener before doing his headstand in the corner. Steven takes him down and pounds away on the mat before putting dragon on the top, only to get taken down by a sunset bomb. A reverse suplex puts Dragon down so Dragon comes back with the kicks and a Dragon Sleeper to win the title out of nowhere.

Rating: C+. Dragon is one of those guys that had the skill in the ring and was better than most of the other cruiserweights, but the lack of personality always held him back. Now that being said, this was solid stuff because it was what Dragon was best at: matches where he had someone solid to work with and you got a good match out of it in the process. Solid stuff here, especially for a four minute match.

Here’s Flair to announce who the next Horseman is going to be. The choice is…..Syxx? Yeah that Syxx. Syxx comes out and makes fun of the Horsemen for being old (the announcers actually bought Syxx as the new member of course) and Flair says Syxx almost cost him his job. Ric belts him in the face and Benoit comes out to stand between Syxx and Flair. Syxx promises Outsider revenge and that’s that.

More dancing.

Giant vs. Great Muta

They circle each other for a bit, Giant no sells some dropkicks and grabs Muta by the throat, and Muta mists him for the DQ.

The NWO (Vincent and Savage in this version) comes out for a beatdown but Giant shrugs them off. Luger comes out to help but Giant grabs him for a chokeslam….but puts him down before he chokeslams him. He was blind for that fight and the near chokeslam on Luger. I’m not entirely sure what the point of the Luger stuff was there.

Dean Malenko vs. Steve McMichael

Mongo throws him down to start as we hear about the Nitro Parties, which is exactly what it sounds like: a bunch of people watching Nitro and filming it. Mongo puts on a headlock followed by a shoulder to take Dean down, but a knee drop misses. Steve blocks a sunset flip out of the corner and hits a kind of World’s Strongest Slam for no cover. Malenko comes back with a good German Suplex which pops the crowd a bit.

Another powerslam kind of move puts Dean down and here are Debra and Jarrett for a distraction. Mongo goes after him but gets guillotined on the top rope, allowing Dean to hit a dropkick and one of the worst looking small packages of all time (Mongo’s fault) for the pin. This was supposed to be an upset because of the size difference, but does anyone buy Mongo as a bigger talent/star than Dean?

Rating: D. The best way to sum this match up is in four words: Mongo bad, Malenko good. Really that’s all there is to it. McMichael tried but he just never got better no matter how long he was in the ring for. He couldn’t even get rolled up without it looking terrible. When Dean Malenko can’t carry you to a decent match, it’s clear you’re not that good.

Post match Gene asks Malenko why he’s associating with Jarrett. Dean doesn’t answer because Mongo comes up. Security takes him off and Jeff pitches a partnership idea to Dean. Malenko says ok and Debra runs her mouth because WCW feels we haven’t suffered enough tonight. Jarrett runs his mouth a bit more and apparently Dean is going to think about it some more.

Eddie Guerrero vs. Hector Guerrero

Hector takes him down with a headscissors but a dropkick misses. Eddie starts stomping but we head to the floor for a chase. Back in and Hector uses a side roll to roll Eddie around the ring about four times for two. Eddie comes back with some biting but another headscissors sends him to the floor. Hector hits a big plancha on the floor but back inside, Eddie powerbombs him down and hits the Frog Splash for a fast pin.

Rating: C. This is the same problem I’ve mentioned before: Hector is a talented guy, but other than his name, he doesn’t mean much to most WCW audiences. I get what they were going for here with the sibling rivalry thing but it’s hard to care here because Hector isn’t a guy we know as far as his stuff in WCW goes.

Post match Dean comes in to beat up Eddie. He puts him in the Cloverleaf but Hector breaks it up. Dean then beats up Hector as well.

Hour #2 begins with no pyro again.

JJ Dillon says he’s got a major talent acquisition to announce. Dancing Stevie Richards comes up to say that he’s signed a contract. JJ wants to talk about Raven so Stevie says he needs to go see Raven in the front row. Dillon offers Raven the contract, saying that everything he wanted is in the deal. Raven is confused but Richards says that he negotiated Raven’s contract himself. Apparently Bird Boy is almost making as much money as Richards and gets a rental car with a tape deck. Raven goes on another rant and rips up the contract. Oh and he hits Richards too.

Lex Luger vs. Scott Norton

Bagwell and Vincent are here with Norton. Luger hits a hip toss to start but Norton comes back with a clothesline to take over. Luger comes back and here’s the NWO run-in to give Lex the DQ win.

Luger cleans house and Racks Vincent. Lex talks a bit until Hogan comes out to exchange some brief insults.

The Outsiders arrive and Konnan is here to meet them.

La Parka/Psychosis vs. Mortis/Wrath

Tonight it’s Hall/Nash vs. Benoit/Flair, presumably for the titles. Before the bell, we cut to the back to see Hennig and Flair talking. Apparently it was supposed to be Hennig coming out earlier when Syxx appeared. Wrath and La Parka start things off with the skeleton man (La Parka) taking over with some kicks. He goes up but jumps into an elbow so it’s off to Psychosis vs. Mortis. Mortis stomps away in the corner but Psychosis breaks free and goes up…..and falls without being touched at all. Ah the perils of live TV.

Psychosis comes back with a dropkick and everyone falls to the floor, where La Parka hits a big corkscrew plancha to the floor. Psychosis slides in to try to dive on Wrath, only to get caught and slammed onto the floor. Mortis suplexes Psychosis back in for two but misses a top rope backsplash. Onoo and Vandenberg get in a fight, as do Wrath and La Parka. Psychosis rolls up Mortis for two but there’s no referee to count. Wrath picks up Psychosis for a powerbomb and Mortis makes it a powerbomb/neckbreaker combo for the pin.

Rating: C+. This was WAY better than you would have expected and got pretty entertaining by the end. The botch was bad but it happens every now and then and there’s almost nothing you can do about it. La Parka and Psychosis didn’t look like jobbers here, but rather a tag team that got beat by a better one. This was a surprisingly fun match and I liked it way more than I was expecting to.

Post match La Parka breaks a wooden chair over Mortis’ back but Wrath kicks his head off to stand tall.

Buff Bagwell vs. Booker T

This is before Booker means anything as a singles guy. Buff armdrags him down and things speed WAY up, resulting in a hiptoss to take Booker down. He immediately spins up and kicks Bagwell down to take over before knocking Buff to the floor. Back in and Bagwell chokes away a bit and slaps Booker in the back of the head. A clothesline turns Booker inside out for two.

Bagwell and referee Nick Patrick get in a shoving match and Bagwell hides in the corner. HHH and Earl Hebner used to do the same spot at house shows. Booker comes back with a big forearm to the face and some atomic drops for no cover. The Harlem Side Kick gets two but Patrick gets hit in the side of the head. Norton clotheslines Booker down and the Blockbuster gives Buff the pin.

Rating: C-. Bagwell was a low level NWO guy but he had a pretty good finisher which I would like to see make a comeback as someone signature move. Booker would get way better in the next year or so before becoming the company’s top star in just a few years. Decent match here but it was a little boring.

Mysterio is here on crutches, saying he’s refused surgery on his bad knee. He talks about how he’s not scared of anyone or anything, but here’s Konnan to kick the crutches away. Some luchadores come out to defend Rey but Konnan says he’s got the Wolfpack watching his back.

Curt Hennig vs. Michael Wallstreet

Wallstreet is still doing his “I hate WCW thing”. Of all the people you waste an idea like that on, you pick Wallstreet? The fans want DDP who hasn’t been here tonight I don’t think. It’s officially Hennig vs. Page at Road Wild. The PerfectPlex wins this in about 35 seconds.

Here’s Page to slug it out with Hennig but Page gets sent into the buckle to give Curt the advantage. The PerfectPlex is countered into a Diamond Cutter and the place goes nuts.

The Nitro Girls dance to Alex Wright’s music.

Tag Titles: Outsiders vs. Ric Flair/Chris Benoit

I’m pretty sure this is a title match. Tony says it is, and while this is probably a bad idea, I’ll go with it. Pay no attention to the Steiners winning like 84 #1 contenders matches in a row prior to this. We start with a brawl and Flair vs. Hall get us going in the ring. The Horsemen stand tall (not as tall as the Outsiders but tall in the metaphorical sense) until we officially start with Benoit and Hall.

Scott tries to pound him down but Benoit hits a dragon screw leg whip and a northern lights suplex for two. Hall bails so it’s off to Nash for a try at the Canadian. Actually make that the Carolinian who is immediately shoved down by Big Kev. Nash does all of his usual stuff in the corner but Flair comes back with punches to the face. Syxx pops Flair in the back of the head, giving Nash two off a side slam.

Back to Hall for the fallaway slam for two more. Nash comes in for some more high quality choking and the running crotch attack while Flair is throat first across the middle rope. Hall hits a running clothesline in the corner to keep Flair in trouble. Nash hits a big over the shoulder Snake Eyes on Flair before it’s back to Hall. Flair grabs a sleeper out of nowhere but Hall reverses into one of his own, only to have Flair quickly suplex out of it.

There’s the hot tag to Benoit who cleans house on both Outsiders. Clotheslines put both guys down and Flair stops Syxx from breaking up the Swan Dive. The headbutt gets two on Hall until Nash makes the save. Benoit punches out of the Jackknife but a Hall distraction lets Nash hit the big boot for a pin out of nowhere.

Rating: C+. I remember this match being a lot better. The ending seemed very rushed and likely happened because they were out of time. If you gave this match another five to seven minutes, it could go way up in quality. Benoit getting a chance to shine is always a good thing, as he was really starting to come into his own at this point. Not a bad match but nothing great either.

Syxx puts Flair in the Buzzkill on the bad arm until Mongo makes the save. The Steiners come out to stare at the Outsiders as we go off the air.

Overall Rating: C+. This was a better episode of Nitro as you can see Road Wild’s card coming together pretty well. Tonight had some good action and a lot of it too, as we had ten matches on a single card. This worked pretty well as WCW is starting to roll a bit heading into the biker PPV. Pretty good stuff here tonight.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

How in the world do I not have this up yet?

Bash at the Beach 1996
Date: July 7, 1996
Location: Ocean Center, Daytona Beach, Florida
Attendance: 8,300
Commentators: Bobby Heenan, Tony Schiavone, Dusty Rhodes

So this is it. This is the show where everything changed for WCW. There had been an invasion by Hall and Nash, who up to this point I don’t think had been named, and we had Sting, Luger and Savage joined together to fight them off. There’s also a mystery third man that no one knows yet.

That right there is what causes the whole change in wrestling. It launched WCW into the stratosphere and causes WWF to be about as sick as you can get without dying. The rest of the show is pretty much forgotten and with good reason. Let’s get to it.

If you’re looking for what I think about the beginning of the NWO, scroll down to the end of this and you’ll find it.

This is subtitles The Hostile Takeover. Yep it’s so hostile that they’re being given ring music, a match on the show and the main event spot on the PPV. I wonder if they got catering too.

There are security guards at the table with them. Ok then.

Rey Mysterio vs. Psychosis

Rey had debuted at the PPV the month before this. This should be awesome as they have all kinds of history together. Tenay replaces Bobby for this one. Rey is YOUNG here, only being 21 at this point. Rey starts off with a half crab. We hear about how popular these two are, talking about how the masks are sold in the streets. I always wanted a Kane mask. Finally they get tired of the leg locks and go all lucha on us.

And then they hit a chinlock. Sure why not. Psychosis hits the guillotine legdrop that would be his finisher later but it’s just two here. You know for a match with these guys, this is pretty freaking boring. Rey finally starts throwing some ranas to make things interesting. West Coast Pop gets two. And let’s talk about the main event. Heenan is here too actually.

We hit the floor and Psychosis hits a perfect senton to the floor on Mysterio. It’s a back splash, not the Hardy move. This referee is really annoying. He has a hitch in his count just like that Armstrong referee that got released a few months ago. So after almost ten minutes they realize they’re Rey Mysterio and Psychosis and just go the heck off with high spots.

Psychosis goes for Splash Mountain (Razor’s Edge into a sitout powerbomb from the top) but Rey shoves off in mid air and hooks him into a hurricanrana for the pin. That’s still one of my all time favorite endings to a match. Mysterio would win the Cruiserweight Title the next night on Nitro.

Rating: B+. This started VERY slow but once they realized the crowd was only halfway into it, they cranked it WAY up and it turned into nothing but awesome high spots. See, this is a FAR different Rey than you’re used to today. This is when he was the best cruiserweight ever. He was pulling off stuff that is just flat out insane.

Then he destroyed both of his knees and slowed way down to where he was like 3rd best in the world. Either way, he’s amazing at this time and had some of the most jaw dropping spots ever. Also keep in mind: this is the very beginning of this division. Today it’s common to see this all over the place in America, but it had only debuted in mainstream wrestling less than a year ago at this point, so this was mind blowing stuff. Great opener and the crowd is white hot now.

Konnan says he’ll keep the title. When asked what happened to end the match, he says Psychosis had him up for a top rope Splash Mountain but Rey reversed into a top rope Frankensteiner. YOU CAN’T BUY THIS KIND OF ANALYSIS PEOPLE!

Apparently you can and it’s called Mike Tenay. Got it.

John Tenta vs. Big Bubba

This is a Carson City Silver Dollars Match. In other words, there’s a sock full of silver dollars on a pole and either Big Boss Man or Earthquake has to climb it. Keep in mind that Eddie Guerrero vs. Regal and Steiners vs. Harlem Heat for the tag titles took place on the Main Event, which was the TV show that aired before this. Who in their right mind thought this was a good idea? Oh that’s right: they’re Hogan’s buddies.

Bubba shaved half of Tenta’s hair and half of his mustache, making him look even stupider. Is there a point to the bag of silver? Not at all, but why let that stop them? Tenta finally wakes up and tries to take the pole down. Keep in mind that you win by pinfall so the pole isn’t even needed. Then again why would logic make sense here? Earthquake gets tied to the ropes with athletic tape. Only one arm though.

Who in the name of hollandaise sauce thought this was a good idea? Boss Man comes over with some scissors to cut the rest of his hair but Quake uses them to cut the tape. Ok that’s smart at least. We get our first intelligent thing of the night as Bubba tells Jimmy Hart to climb the pole. Tenta gets them and nails Bubba in the jaw with the silver dollars for the pin. THIS GOT NINE MINUTES.

Was this supposed to be a joke that went bad? Again, Harlem Heat vs. the Steiners for the TAG TEAM TITLES didn’t go on PPV, but this did. WOW. Oh and I forgot to mention: THIS IS THE TALLEST POLE EVER. Tenta is 6’7 and wasn’t even half as tall as that thing. Seriously, WHO THOUGHT THIS WAS A GOOD IDEA??? He pours the silver dollars on Bubba afterwards. So not only did he beat him up, but he pays him for it? Is this some kind of weird fetish?

Rating: S. As in SERIOUSLY? This makes the PPV and gets almost ten minutes? I get that Hogan was running things, but this is ridiculous to put it mildly. The match was boring and the whole cutting the straps on the pole went nowhere. This was just freaking bad all around.

The announcers talk for a bit and Tony has a lei on. The others talk about how important this is and Tony looks like an idiot. Bobby says he’s been asking people not involved in wrestling if they know who the third man is. He’s surprised that they didn’t know. Do I even need to make fun of this?

Team WCW says they’re ready for the Outsiders and don’t care who the third man is. They all have their faces painted like Sting. Oh and Luger is full face now, which at least makes sense for this.

Lord of the Ring: Diamond Dallas Page vs. Jim Duggan

This is a taped fist match for the stupid ring that DDP won last month that is now worthless since his title shot was revoked. So apparently in this you can tape your fists more than you usually can? I hate WCW. I truly do hate it at times, but at least it improves for a bit after this. The fans chant USA, even though both guys are Americans. That always made my head hurt.

I’d love to see someone that Duggan was fighting get fired up more than he did because of the chants and shout about how they’re MORE American than Duggan. Apparently 10,000 people were turned away. Maybe it would be better if they got an arena that held 10,000 people in the first place. Duggan has his feet taped together around the post. Again, is there some kind of tape fetish in this company? And he just gets out through some unseen method.

Again, Guerrrero vs. Regal and Heat vs. Steiners. Just thought I’d remind you of that. Page uses the ropes to avoid a suplex and Tony gets on him for it. Why? It’s a legal move. Everybody is shocked that Duggan can manage to take control without tape on his fists. Thanks for the vote of confidence in Duggan. After being on the floor for 8 seconds, Duggan slides Page in and walks into the Diamond Cutter for the pin. Duggan throws some tape on his fist and knocks Page out anyway. Another waste of time.

Rating: D-. Again, WHAT WAS THE POINT OF THIS? For the life of me I can’t think of one. Either way, the match was terrible and I still fail to see the point in it. Just a waste of five minutes or so.

Giant and Taskmaster say they’re not worried about the Horsemen. Giant is still world champion here.

Lee Marshall talks to Benoit and Anderson who get the aforementioned heels later tonight. Arn of course cuts a decent promo.

Public Enemy vs. Nasty Boys

It’s a tag team dog collar match with a former ECW team. Pay no attention to the Stevie Richards/Raven vs. Pit Bulls dog collar match less than a year before this in ECW. WCW never stole anything from ECW at all. Not a thing. Have you noticed a significant lack of young talent on this card other than the openers or DDP? Bischoff is missing if that means anything at all. Sags and Rock are attached and Knobs and Grunge are attached.

We almost immediately go split screen which has the ocean behind it and only half of the screen is covered by the split screen due to the MASSIVE BATB logo on the top of the screen. Brilliant. A trash can full of trash is brought in. Sure why not. We go up to the beach set and Johnny Grunge gets knocked down and is in pain. He was beaten by an inflatable pink shark. Somehow this has stopped being absurd. That’s a new one on me.

They fight for about five minutes on the beach. This is entertaining at least. I know I don’t say that often but this is one of those matches that reaches the point of insanity that makes it amusing. The announcers not taking it seriously at all helps a lot too. We get a table brought in. Keep that in mind. Rock gets piledriven on the floor and there’s no cover. Knobs hits a GREAT trash can shot on Grunge.

There goes the first table. We’re back in the ring now with another table. Now this one noticeably looks different than your modern Dudley tables. Sags is on the table and Rock goes up. He gets pulled into a front flip and bounces off the table. Remember that Rock weighs about 300lbs. Sags goes up and drops an elbow onto Rock onto the table. It STILL doesn’t break.

Rock comes unhooked from the chain when he’s whipped into the chain of Knobs and Grunge and it clotheslines him. That’s also enough for the pin. Rock knocks Sags from the apron to FINALLY break the real table. Most tables are precut and weakened to make going through them easier. This one wasn’t apparently.

Rating: C+. Not bad actually. They woke up and realized that there’s no point in trying to have these two teams have a coherent match. This was just pure insane fun and it actually worked pretty well. The shark was funny if nothing else. The commentary helped too as they just had fun with it like they were supposed to. Fun match.

Gene is in front of the Outsiders’ locker room. He doesn’t go try to talk to them or anything, but he’s in front of it. Love that hard hitting reporting!

Cruiserweight Title: Disco Inferno vs. Dean Malenko

I hate to say it, but that song is catchy. He says everyone is here to see him dance and once he wins the title he’ll dance. The guy had charisma and energy. You can’t take that away from him. And let’s talk about the main event more. Ok to be fair, this was a huge match for a change rather than the usual run of the mill main events so I can’t complain that much.

They talk about how awesome the cruiserweights are even though a lot of the really great ones aren’t there yet. This is all Malenko so far. Malenko’s in ring work is really underrated as far as the flying stuff goes. He actually was ranked as the best in the world in the PWI 500 in 97. I was surprised by that. Maybe six minutes in, Disco hits his first offense which is a punch. And now he just goes off in the longest string of offense he’s ever been on I think.

It lasts all of a minute. Heenan says pincovers. I thought only Taz used that term. Most odd. Disco hits his Stunner which was his finisher but checks his hair first. Dean starts busting out springboards of all things. He really could do just about all of it. Dean just goes off and hooks the Cloverleaf for the tap out. Malenko just going off like that made it work for me.

Rating: C+. This wasn’t bad, but the ending was never really in doubt. Inferno looked pretty decent if nothing else, but it’s not like it meant much as Rey would beat Dean the next night in the opener to win the title. Decent little filler match though.

Kimberly says nothing of note. She’s in a towel though so I can’t complain.

Joe Gomez vs. Steve McMichael

So Gomez is a career jobber and McMichael is in his PPV debut as a Horseman. Any bets on what happens here? Mongo is allegedly one of the meanest people Dusty has seen in the last 10-20 years. Wow. This is another of those matches where you know there’s no drama as to the winner. The crowd is DEAD. McMichael just isn’t that good yet. To be fair he never became any good but at least he has an excuse here.

Apparently this is his third match. That’s saying a lot. Gomez is called a rookie here despite having been wrestling over ten years at this point. This is just going on too long. That’s what this boils down to. This match is just too long. They’re making it look like he can’t finish anyone off. He should win this in like 2 minutes and we’re over five already. It makes him look inept rather than elite.

There’s your boring chant. Gomez starts his comeback and they botch the heck out of a sunset flip. Thankfully they realize that it’s going bad and just end it almost immediately. This would have been a success if they cut about 4 minutes out of it.

Rating: F. This was supposed to be a squash and Mongo was supposed to look dominant. Neither happened as Mongo looked like a BAD rookie that had no idea what he was doing. I get that he needs ring time, but he needs to get it in far shorter spurts. This can be blamed on the booking far more than the people in it though. Again, you cut four minutes out of this and it’s light years better.

Flair cuts a promo and forgets he’s fighting Konnan and says that he’s fighting a man with 1000 holds. Right. Gene gets hit on by Woman again which was something I never got at all.

US Title: Konnan vs. Ric Flair

It’s nice to see a guy like Flair going down to Konnan’s level. This is the kind of stuff you just flat out do not see in modern wrestling. Konnan looks…weird. They shill Nitro tomorrow. Once I get done with the PPVs, I might start doing some Nitros and Raws. Just not sure how many of them. We hear about Flair’s cardio which is in a word, unmatched. The Surfboard never stops looking totally awesome.

Konnan Hulks Up and we go to the floor. Konnan gets a running start off of the apron and takes down Flair and Liz at the same time. That’s just WRONG. With the referee distracted Woman kicks Konnan square in the balls. Even the fans cheer for it, I’m assuming out of sympathy. In case you forgot about it, let’s talk about the main event! Konnan makes ANOTHER comeback and Flair is in something resembling trouble.

This is a very different Konnan here as he looks like a guy that actually could win something. Flair gets put in the figure four which for some reason is surprising despite it happening in about every match he’s ever in. The rolling clothesline hits and you can tell we’re running out of time here.

Konnan hooks an abdominal stretch into a rollup for no count as Liz is with the referee. Lucky bastard. Woman pops Konnan with the shoe to the head and throws his feet on the ropes (completely unneeded but it’s what great heels do) to win his first US Title in over 15 years.

Rating: C+. Not bad but it never got me going on this one. Flair getting the belt gave it some legit credibility that it had been lacking recently after runs from One Man Gang and Sasake so this was a big deal. Konnan never was as important as he was here again though, but this was just an ok match. I don’t think anyone thought Flair would lose though.

Gene goes to the Outsiders locker room and there’s a third voice in there. He’s not sure who it was but he’s heard it before. Even knowing who this is, the drama is there man. They’re building this perfectly and I’m excited about this.

Chris Benoit/Arn Anderson vs. Taskmaster/The Giant

Ok so there are two things to keep in mind here. If the Horsemen win, a Horseman gets a shot at the Giant the following night for the title. The second thing is that no one can beat the Giant so they’re going to focus on Sullivan. They brawl in the aisle and Mongo runs out with the briefcase he had to nail Giant who chases Mongo to the back, making it a handicap match for a bit.

It means nothing as Giant is back in like 8 seconds. Ok then. Now Benoit and Sullivan were having a GREAT feud where most of it was shoot stuff as Benoit had (kayfabe) stolen Woman, who was in real life married to Sullivan. In real life, Benoit and Woman had an affair and in real life Woman left Sullivan for Benoit. So in other words, they legit hated each other and were in brutal fights with each other.

Sullivan gets to get beaten on forever as we realize that the match is over once Giant comes in. So he gets a tag (to a freaking POP) and the Horsemen run. Benoit and Sullivan fight up to the announce area as Giant beats Anderson up like a jobber and the chokeslam ends it in like a minute. Benoit dives off of the announcers’ stage to plow into Sullivan.

That could have been a top five ever feud if Sullivan hadn’t sucked so much. Benoit is just destroying him at this point until Woman comes out and yells at Chris to stop it. This never went anywhere because of the NWO. Benoit was just awesome back then, even moreso than he would become. Giant carries Sullivan off like a 6 pack which is kind of funny.

Rating: D+. This did its job and that’s it. There was nothing to the match but somehow it went eight minutes. This was just a filler to set up the next chapter in Benoit vs. Sullivan and to be fair it did that, but we’ll never know where it went after that.

And now the reason why this is the most important show in WCW’s history up to that point: the main event. Since this is legitimately one of the biggest matches ever, I’ll have a special section at the end talking about the NWO at this stage. I’ll save the latter stuff for when it happens, but this will focus on the beginning through about Uncensored 97 where Hogan vs. Sting became the clear end goal. So I’m not skipping this, but I’ll save it for the end so scroll down if that’s what you’re here for.

We recap the invasion and see Hall walking onto Nitro and making history back in May. Those two debuts were some of the biggest shockers I can ever remember. They both blew my mind and even me, perhaps the biggest WWF mark here, forgot Raw existed for a little bit. There’s no commentary of voiceover here.

It’s just clips and occasional audio with them. Not that it really matters but Hall and Nash cost Sting and Luger the tag belts. This whole thing comes down to one question: Who is the Third Man?

Sting/Lex Luger/Randy Savagevs. Kevin Nash/Scott Hall/???

In case you don’t remember, the WCW guys were selected by putting the names of the top 6 WCW wrestlers based on win/loss record over the past I think six months or a year in a hat and drawing them out. The others were Hogan, Taskmaster and Giant. Hall and Nash come out alone and don’t have names yet. Tony gives them their names here. Until then they were just the Outsiders.

I’m not one for six man main events but this feels huge. Partially because it is huge. Gene goes into the ring before the WCW guys are here to find out who the third man is or for that matter where he is. The build for the drama here is epic. They’re milking this for everything they can.

The commentators aren’t even trying to stay unbiased which for once is nice. Even Randy Anderson is taller than Gene. Buffer is almost as tall as Scott Hall. Wow I didn’t realize that. The bell rings and we actually start with a handicap match.

The paranoia of the announcers actually upgrade this, marking the final time the WCW commentators don’t make me want a stiff drink in the history of WCW. Luger and Hall start. Now we get to the interesting part about a minute in. It turns into a big brawl and Nash and Luger are in the corner. Sting launches a Stinger Splash and nails Nash.

He also nails Luger, whose head and neck are rammed into the turnbuckle/bar attaching the turnbuckle to the ring. He’s OUT. They bring out a stretcher to carry him to the back and we have a 2-2 match with the third man on the way out. Now this does a few things. First of all, it makes the Outsiders look like they have a chance. Being realistic, there was no three man combination in the world that could have beaten Sting, Luger and Savage at this point and looked dominant.

That’s a WCW All-Star team to put it mildly and it would have been a waste of time to try. By making it two against what would become three, it makes WCW, the faces, at a disadvantage as they should be (are you listening TNA?). Also, this throws out a tiny piece of meat to the smarks as Luger and Sting had been the top candidates to be the third man.

It opens a door for Luger coming back and never being hurt and it opens a door for Sting to have done that on purpose. Either way the match pretty much stops at this point while we wheel Luger out. Tony says the Outsiders planned that somehow. That makes no sense but whatever. Crowd is RABID here.

Savage comes in but when Nash goes for a big elbow he lands on Savage’s head so Sting has to come in. Nash beats the tar out of Sting as does Hall so Savage is going to get the hot tag. There’s no real penalty or reward if the Outsiders win. They’re doing something brilliant here as they’re pacing things out to the point where we forget about the third man.

That’s very smart booking and I’m in awe of how this match is going. Tony says the Outsiders should get hurt. Wow. I’m not sure if that’s awesome or not. Savage FINALLY gets the hot tag and you actually can barely understand the announcers over the crowd. Nash gets a low blow on him though…and here comes Hulk Hogan. Heenan asks which side is he on.

The Outsiders clear the ring….and Hogan turns heel, dropping a leg on Savage and then another one. To say the crowd is ticked off is an understatement. This is legitimately a shock as NO ONE, not Meltzer, not Keith, not Reynolds, no one called this and if they did they were wrong at the time because from every report I can find, this decision was made the day of or the day before the show as Sting was scheduled to be the third man until Hogan agreed to do it.

This was a legitimate shocker and it lived up to every bit of the hype. Hogan turning was the one thing that made this angle work as I’ll get into later on. This was a great moment and I was about to cry when it happened. The fans flood the ring with garbage as Gene gets in. Hogan cements his heel status by saying the fans need to shut up if they want to hear what he has to say. That line alone makes this promo.

He says the name and the rest is history. Hogan claims the success for making WWF. I’m shocked too. Hogan says he’s bored with WCW and is joining up with the Outsiders and calls them the new blood of WCW. This is the one problem I had with both this turn and Austin joining the Alliance in 2001. Both guys said they were bored with the companies they had been in and wanted better competition.

If you’re going to be fighting the company you used to work for, won’t you be fighting the same competition you were fighting before? Hogan’s title win was over Giant who he had fought at I think three PPVs and his first defense was against Flair and you know that history. That just never made sense to me.

He throws in the for some reason semi-famous line about Bischoff selling meat from a truck in Minneapolis which is actually true. Hogan runs down the fans and does his trademark line. Tony says Hogan can get out twice and we’re done.

Rating: A+. This was about launching the NWO. It worked.

OverallRating: B+. Not even considering the main event, this is a very good show all around. There’s one bad match early on, but you completely forget about everything else by the main event. There’s some great stuff on here and you could easily use this show as a definition for how to build drama to the ending. That was all that mattered but it worked like a charm at the end. Great show and well worth watching all the way through.

Despite all that happened to it later on and all the insanity that came from it and how it eventually became an albatross that brought WCW to its knees (and yes, most of the blame can still go on Hogan for reasons I’m sure we’ll get to later), when it began this was one of the best storylines in the history of wrestling (and yes X and others, I know Bischoff stole it from Japan).

Having an invasion could have been the best idea in the world. However, I think it peaked as soon as the Giant and Fake Sting joined. The problem simply was that at that point, it stopped being about an invasion and it was just a big faction in WCW. Hogan had to be there or else it was two guys beating up WCW guys. Hogan was virtually unbeatable in WCW so they needed him on board or everyone would just be waiting on Hogan to come in and save the day for WCW all over again.

The problem became that EVERYTHING became about the NWO. Angles such as Benoit/Sullivan and DDP’s benefactor were just dropped and it was NWO all the way. This is a big part of why the company failed in the long run. People got tired of the NWO and WCW had nothing else to throw out there.

Over in the WWF at their peak you had Austin vs. Vince but you also had the IC Title all over the place, you had the hardcore stuff, you had a (terrible) lightweight division, you had DX vs. the Nation and Rock vs. HHH. The midcard wars were going on and while they were tied to Austin vs. Vince, at the same time they were their own feuds. In short, there were a lot of things going on in the company other than just the main event.

Now, the NWO came out red hot and was the #1, #2 and #3 reason why WWF got its head handed to them and the early days of it were the best. That night where Rey got thrown into the trailer was one of the sickest things I have ever seen in wrestling and I was legit scared of the NWO after that. To say they nailed the start of this was an understatement. The NWO was a brilliant idea and it saved both WCW and Hogan.

The next year and a half were some of the most interesting shows of all time. Note that I said interesting and not good or anything like that. Either way, I’m looking forward to the next bunch of PPVs, but we’re going to reach a point eventually, and it’s not going to go well. Still though, this was GREAT and probably the biggest and best played shock in wrestling history.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

Monday Nitro #96
Date: July 14, 1997
Location: Orlando Arena, Orlando, Florida
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Bobby Heenan, Tony Schiavone, Larry Zbyszko

It’s the night after Bash at the Beach and not a lot has changed because not a lot was on the line last night. Hogan and Rodman lost as Luger made Hogan tap out for the second time in less than a month. Other than that, Hennig was the mystery partner but he walked out on Page halfway through the match. Road Wild is in a few weeks now and there’s a good deal of stuff to get through before we get to that. Let’s get to it.

Michael Buffer intros us to the show and introduces, for the first time ever, the Nitro Girls. Basically they’re cheerleaders who lasted for YEARS. Kimberly is their leader for an excuse to keep her on television. The girls dance around on chairs for a bit.

The announcers talk about how awesome the end of last night’s show was. For some reason the audio sounds really weird here. We talk about the fake Sting from last night, which Larry points out the flaw that somehow no one got last night: if that’s the real Sting, he’s now taller than Hogan.

Alex Wright vs. Prince Iaukea

They do nothing of note for about a minute and here’s Giant to chokeslam the referee to a BIG pop. The match just stops and Giant chokeslams the Prince and some security.

Giant says he’s had it with the NWO, especially Kevin Nash. He knows it was Nash that attacked him with the bat last night and he wants a piece of him NOW. Instead he gets led off by more security.

Eddie Guerrero vs. Chavo Guerrero Jr.

This is a result of Eddie walking out on Chavo last week in a tag match. Chavo hammers him to start and sends Eddie flying to the floor, where the younger one hits a HUGE dive to take both guys out. Back in and Chavo gets crotched followed by a rana from Eddie. He tells Chavo to say hello to grandma and punches Chavo in the face again. Chavo charges into an elbow but comes back with a pair of suplexes for two each. His Frog Splash hits Eddie’s knees though, and it’s an Eddie powerbomb and Frog Splash for the pin.

Rating: C. This is one of those matches that would have been better with more time. These guys know each other very well and know how to bounce off of each other really well. Chavo would get WAY better and Eddie was always solid, so there was almost no way this wasn’t going to be at least decent.

Post match Eddie hits another splash until Hector comes out for the save.

Here are Page and Kimberly with something to say. Kimberly looks great here in a white bra and shorts. Page says six months ago he had a match in Minneapolis and after the show, he went out for a few beers. He ran into Hennig and they realized they had a lot in common. Page says he would have asked Sting for help last night, but Sting has already helped him too many times. Luger and Giant were busy so they were out. That left Hennig, but apparently Hennig isn’t a standup guy. Page says he’s full of surprises, and if you don’t believe him, ask Savage about La Parka.

The Nitro Girls dance a bit more in smaller outfits.

Harlem Heat promises to beat up the Outsiders.

Vicious and Delicious vs. Steiner Brothers

For the sake of simplicity, Scott Steiner will be called Scott and Scott Norton will be called Norton. Scott and Buff start things off as we hear about the Steiners facing the Outsiders for the titles at Road Wild. Buff takes Scott down and dances a bit, resulting in Rick smacking him in the back of the head. Scott hiptosses him out of the corner so Buff complains of a tights pull. A dropkick puts Scott on the floor so Scott comes back with a BIG clothesline to take over.

A gorilla press puts Bagwell down as the fans are very into this match so far. Another clothesline sends Buff to the floor and it’s off to an armbar back inside. Here’s Rick to bark a lot as we see Konnan getting out of the NWO limo. There’s your newest member I guess. Nash arrives as well and is limping pretty badly. Back in the arena and everything breaks down with Vincent cheating a bit behind the referee’s back. Norton rams Rick’s head into the mat and it’s back to Buff, who jumps into a belly to belly from Rick. Hot tag brings in Scott who cleans house until Mura and Chono run in for the DQ.

Rating: C. This was a fine tag match before the lame NWO ending. The idea is the NWO is trying to wear the Steiners down before they get tot he Outsiders at the PPV which is a good enough idea. That’s the idea with WCW: the build up was fine, but the execution at the end almost never worked.

The Steiners come back and beat up the NWO.

We see a clip from last night where Raven cut one of his usual poetry style promos to Gene. As for tonight, Raven says he’ll do what he has to do and the only announcement is that there is no announcement. Richards mentions that he (as in Richards) has signed with WCW so Raven headbutts him.

Chris Benoit vs. Mike Enos

Last night Benoit FINALLY got rid of Kevin Sullivan so tonight he can go back to beating people up. Benoit stomps away on Enos in the corner but Mike comes back with knees in the corner. We hear about the return of Clash of the Champions, which would be the final edition of the show. Enos hits a fallaway slam off the middle rope and a neckbreaker gets two. A kneeling piledriver gets two more and it’s off to a bearhug. That gets broken up quickly so Enos powerslams him down for two. Not that it matters as Benoit Crossfaces him for the tap out.

Rating: C. This was a bit better than a squash as Enos got in a lot of offense and was in control for most of the time. Then again Benoit was supposed to be banged up because of the match last night and he won anyway so it’s not a big problem or anything like that. Decent little match here.

More dancing as we’re in hour #2, but there’s no pyro for it or anything.

La Parka vs. Super Calo

Kimberly flashes a Diamond Cutter sign at La Parka as he comes in. Savage runs in less than a minute in to beat up La Parka for the DQ.

The real Page of course runs in and beats up Savage. Curt Hennig comes in and knocks out Page with a foreign object. Hennig didn’t look at Savage or anything like that so it looks like he’s in business for himself. Savage hits the elbow on Page.

Hennig says that five years ago, Page used to ask Hennig for his autograph. Page wouldn’t last thirty seconds with him, just like he can’t with his wife. Flair comes out and tries to recruit Hennig again.

Lee Marshall from Jacksonville.

Here’s the NWO with something to say. Before they get out, we’re told that Nitro is on Tuesday next week. Nash is brought out in a wheelchair after having changed into ring gear since he arrived. A lot of the team is here, minus Hogan. Konnan is with them too. Apparently Nash is APALLED at being accused of being Sting last night. He would NEVER attack another combatant from behind. Nash stands up and talks to Konnan, who opens his shirt to reveal the NWO shirt. They very slowly wheel Nash to the ring.

Harlem Heat vs. Syxx/Scott Hall

The announcers and Harlem Heat have called this a street fight all night but it appears to be a normal match. Booker and Syxx start things off as Heenan talks about how everyone needs to buy the PPV replay to see what happened again and be sure of what they saw. This is something that’s missing from wrestling anymore: this mentality of YOU HAVE TO SEE THIS. Anymore it’s more like “here’s what we’ve got, please watch.”

Syxx takes him into the corner but Booker Spinaroonis up and kicks Syxx’s head off. Here’s Hall off a tag to face Stevie. Stevie immediately pounds him down in the corner and Hall is in trouble. Hall comes back with a middle rope bulldog for two but Stevie clotheslines him right back down. A double punch from the Heat gets two on Scott as things slow down. Hall puts an armbar on Booker but Mr. T. kicks him in the face to escape.

Hall gets double teamed a bit and a slam by Ray gets two. We hit the chinlock for a bit before Scott suplexes out of it. Booker comes in with the ax kick for two and they slug it out a bit. Nash stands up before sitting right back down. Booker superkicks Scott down for two and everything breaks down. Nash gets up and blasts Booker, allowing Hall to hit the Outsider’s Edge for the pin.

Rating: C. Another decent match here with an ending that everyone could see coming a mile away. That’s not always a bad thing, and in this case it was the right call because you’re going to get Nash booed if you have him shown to be a liar. The Heat continue to be treated like nothing of note in the huge Steiners vs. Outsiders feud which never really got paid off.

The Girls dance some more.

Great Muta/Masahiro Chono vs. Public Enemy

The NWO team jumps them on the floor and Rock takes the Mafia Kick from Chono. In a visual I could live without, Chono does the Public Enemy dance on the floor. Back in and the Public Enemy pound away in the corners to clear the ring. Things finally get going like a normal tag match with Chono vs. Grunge. Chono chops away in the corner but gets caught in a neckbreaker. Rock comes in with a double ax and here’s Muta.

He barely stays in at all so here’s Chono again to miss the Mafia Kick. Rock “hits” a moonsault press to take him down and it’s off to Muta vs. Grunge. Muta mauls him until Rock kicks Muta in the back to slow things down. Off to Chono vs. Rock again as things break down. A Vincent distraction lets Muta hit the Green Mist, allowing the Mafia Kick to end Grunge.

Rating: D+. It was clear here that Public Enemy was completely overmatched and they had no chance at winning in a straight match. Chono and Muta are both great and they’re two of the three Japanese guys that most American wrestling fans would recognize (Liger would be the third). That helps a lot as most of the time when a foreigner is brought in, it’s “here’s this guy who is awesome and you should just accept him based on how aewsome we say he is.” That doesn’t work at all, which is why Muta was the best choice if the Japanese guys were going to be in the NWO.

US Title: Ric Flair vs. Jeff Jarrett

Jarrett has Debra with him, as apparently she’s jumped from Mongo. Flair beats on Jarrett to start with a ton of chops and punches. Jarrett dropkicks him to the floor and backdrops him n the outside to take over. Back in and Flair rolls through a cross body for two but he goes shoulder first into the post. Flair almost immediately goes up and jumps into a dropkick but Jeff doesn’t cover, sending Heenan into a fit.

A superplex puts Flair down but Jarrett won’t cover again. Jeff has two Figure Fours broken and Flair gets two off a small package. Jarrett takes down his straps and Flair pounds away in the corner. During the match, Debra commandeers a camera and cuts a promo about how hard her life is because she lives with McMichael. After almost a minute of this, Mongo comes out to yell at her. Flair gets Jarrett in the Figure Four….and Mongo comes in to stomp on Jarrett for the DQ. You couldn’t wait another minute???

Rating: C-. It’s Jarrett vs. Flair. You know this is going to be at least passable if not pretty good. The ending was annoying but it makes sense as it’s all about emotion for Mongo instead of logic or titles. Decent match here as Jarrett and Flair were their usual smooth selves and could make any move look easy.

The Horsemen beat down Jarrett.

Here’s Luger for the main event interview. Luger talks about how he’s had some bad moments but last night made up for them, as he got to Rack Hogan, Rodman in Savage in less than two minutes. Luger challenges Hogan for the title at Road Wild and says if anyone from the NWO wants to fight before then, bring it on. Here are about eight NWO guys and a fake Sting follows them out. Actually make that the real Sting, who is enough to keep the NWO from running in to end the show.

Overall Rating: C-. Not a terrible show here as the majority of the episode dealt with fallout from last night. We’re moving towards Road Wild now which should be a decent card given what they’ve got to build up for the show. Luger is white hot here and would deserve the title shot he got. See how easy it can be to logically book a show? Why can’t WWE get that today?

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

Survivor Series 1993
Date: November 24, 1993
Location: Boston Garden, Boston, Massachusetts
Attendance: 15,509
Commentators: Vince McMahon, Bobby Heenan

This is a show that I remember watching a lot as a kid but I think my tape ran out about halfway through it. Stupid VHS. Anyway, the main event tonight is a battle for AMERICA with a bunch of foreigners (like from that far off nation of Hawaii) against a bunch of Americans. Other than that we have Bret’s team vs. Shawn’s team. No really. We’re mostly back to the team vs. team formula this year. Let’s get to it.

I remember watching this when I was a kid and I always liked the theme of going through the skeleton of a building. It looks cool.

Vince and Bobby talk a little bit about the concept and we’re ready to go.

Team IRS vs. Team Razor Ramon

IRS, Adam Bomb, Diesel, Rick Martel

Razor Ramon, 1-2-3 Kid, Marty Jannetty, Mr. Perfect

IRS and Ramon are feuding over Razor’s IC Title, Martel was the guy Ramon beat for the title, Diesel and Adam Bomb are just there to fill in spots, Jannetty and Kid are a semi-regular tag team and Perfect….isn’t here. Ramon talks about Perfect leaving (his back messed up again and he just kind of left for five months) but he’s got a treat for us. He’s got a surprise partner and it’s……RANDY SAVAGE! Heenan LOSES IT and the crowd does too. This is when Savage wanted to murder Crush, who is in the main event tonight.

Heenan apparently called Perfect no showing this and Vince says Heenan was right for once. Bobby: “FOR ONCE???” Oh yes Bobby is feeling it tonight. Ramon and Martel start things off with Rick working on the arm. They fight for the arm and hit the mat for a bit before popping back up. Razor slaps him in the face and rolls through a cross body for two. Martel gets caught in the fallaway slam (BIG pop for that) for two.

Razor hits a pair of atomic drops and a clothesline for two. Off to Adam Bomb who shoves Ramon into the corner with ease. They collide and Razor is knocked down in something which shouldn’t surprise anyone. They have a test of strength with Bomb controlling again before Ramon fights up and suplexes Bomb down.

Martel tries to save but elbows Bomb by mistake. Harvey Whippleman (Bomb’s manager) gets up on the apron and is knocked down, causing a big fight between IRS’ team. Ramon’s team, somehow thinking coherently given how many drugs must be in them, actually uses common sense and lets them fight. We get things settled down and it’s the Kid vs. Bomb. Kid tries a sunset flip and Bomb (about 6’8 and 300lbs) is like boy please.

Off to Diesel who throws Kid around even harder. Who thought it was a good idea to put the Kid in there against the biggest and strongest opponents? A gutwrench powerbomb from Diesel leaves Kid laying and a big boot does the same. Kid finally hits a spin kick and it’s off to Savage who destroys the entire team, including sending Bomb into Diesel. A slam puts Diesel down and the flying elbow makes it 4-3. Write that down as you may never see Nash do another clean job.

Martel charges in and rams Savage face first into the buckle. Since it’s 1993, Martel’s offense has almost no effect and Savage takes over. Off to IRS who has a bit better luck as he takes Savage into the corner but gets cross bodied for two. Back to Ramon who works on the arm but as he hits the ropes, Martel hits Razor in the back to slow the Bad Guy (Razor’s nickname) down.

Bomb comes back in to power Razor around a bit but it’s quickly back to Martel. Make that IRS who works on Razor’s back. We hit the chinlock and the heels switch a few times without tagging. Off to Macho Man again who knees IRS into the corner. A slam looks to set up the Elbow but here comes Crush. Savage sees him and immediately goes after him but is sent back into the ring and rolled up by IRS for the pin and elimination.

Savage chases Crush into the back and looks for him in the locker rooms as the match is still going on. Savage doesn’t find him so we’ll continue this game later. We come back to the ring to see Adam Bomb choking away on Jannetty and stomping him in the corner. Martel hooks an abdominal stretch for a few seconds but a corner charge hits the post and it’s back to Ramon.

Razor pounds away on IRS and hits a chokeslam followed by the Razor’s Edge for the pin and the 3-2 advantage. Everything breaks down and as Razor loads up the Edge on Martel, IRS hits him in the ribs with his briefcase. Ramon rolls to the floor and gets counted out to tie things up again. So it’s Jannetty/1-2-3 Kid vs. Martel/Bomb. The Kid gets sent to the floor and slammed down by Bomb who hits a slingshot clothesline to take the Kid down back inside.

Off to Martel as the Kid is in a lot of trouble. Martel drops some knees on the back for two as Vince says the Kid has a lot of heart. Heenan: “THEN KICK HIM IN THE HEART!” Martel jumps into a right hand to the ribs and there’s the tag to Jannetty who cleans house. Back to the Kid way too soon for a double back elbow and a sunset flip to eliminate Martel. Kid immediately tags in Jannetty who sunset flips Bomb for the pin ten seconds after Martel was eliminated. REALLY hot ending here.

Rating: B. I really liked this match as it was fast paced and a ton of fun. If you cut about five minutes from this, it’s a classic. Having Jannetty and the Kid be the survivors was a very nice surprise and it gave the fans something to cheer for. Really liked this one and it puts the show off on the right foot.

Shawn is in the back with the IC Title. There are two of them at this point as Shawn was suspended while champion but he kept the belt. That gives us two belts which is a problem. Maybe we should put them above the ring and make the guys climb a ladder to get them while having one of the best matches ever. Anyway tonight it’s Shawn and his Knights (that’ll make sense later) vs. the Hart Family.

We go to a Hart Family interview earlier with Family Feud (game show) host Ray Combs. They all say that Shawn is in trouble for going after Stu recently and it’s going to be a massive Hart Attack. Back to Shawn who says he’s not ready for the Harts and he makes fun of all five of them, including Stu. Shawn is really clicking as the insanely arrogant heel by this point.

Jannetty and Kid celebrate with Ramon. Savage is off chasing Crush.

Ray Combs talks about the Hart Family being at ringside. Pay attention because it’s amazing enough to have them all in the same place without suing or trying to kill each other. Helen is there too. Combs gets in some jokes about Shawn which aren’t really funny but this is filler stuff anyway. Vince of course laughs like there’s no tomorrow. While Combs bombs out there, here’s the idea of this feud.

Bret and Jerry Lawler had been feuding for months and it was building up to this show with Bret’s family coming to help him against the King and his Knights. Then some chick said Lawler raped her and Lawler had to be pulled from this show (the girl later admitted she made it up and Lawler wasn’t in trouble), so Shawn, the guy Bret had feuded with last year, was brought in as a replacement. It was likely the best option they had but it was completely out of place after the months of build they had set up.

Hart Family vs. Shawn Michaels/Knights

Bret Hart, Keith Hart, Bruce Hart, Owen Hart

Shawn Michaels, Blue Knight, Black Knight, Red Knight

The Blue Knight is Greg Valentine, the Red Knight is Barry Horowitz and the Black Knight is Jeff Gaylord (indy guy who never meant anything on a national stage). Stu Hart is here with his sons as if there was somehow any doubt as to who was getting destroyed here. Ray Combs sits in on commentary and while he’s not incredibly funny, he sounds like he’s having a blast out there and is enjoying himself which is all I ask for from a celebrity. Heenan vs. Combs on commentary is a good back and forth jab fest if nothing else.

Shawn and Owen start but Shawn wants Keith, who along with Bruce haven’t wrestled in years. Keith speeds things up and Shawn gets sent into the interfering Red Knight. Shawn tries to throw Keith into the corner but Keith takes out Red and Blue. An armdrag takes Shawn down and it’s off to Keith for an armbar. Shawn’s suplex attempt is countered into a small package and it’s back to the armbar.

Michaels slams Keith down and it’s off to the Red Knight vs. Owen. Owen fires off some shots to the arm and it’s off to the Black Knight. That goes nowhere at all so it’s off to Blue vs. Bret. Bret hits some atomic drops and a clothesline for two. Back to Keith who continues the armbar marathon and it’s Bruce time again. Back to Shawn with a backbreaker and some elbows to the back.

Red comes in and suplexes Bruce down for two. Back to Black (who is not Kane as has been mentioned before) who is the biggest of the Knights and gets rolled up for two. It’s back to Shawn who gets rammed into the corner before the Red Knight pokes Bruce in the head. Bruce hits a clothesline and it’s off to Bret vs. Black. An O’Connor Roll and small package both get two for Bret and he takes over. The backbreaker and middle rope elbow get two and it’s off to Owen.

A spinwheel kick puts Black down and everything breaks down. Shawn and all three Knights get sent into each other in the middle of the ring and a missile dropkick from Owen pins Black. Off to the Red Knight and Owen works over the leg. Back to Bret and they make a wish on Red’s legs. Keith comes in again and the leg work continues. I’ve been watching this show for years and for the life of me I can’t stop confusing Bruce and Keith.

Red tries a knee lift and hurts his own knee in the process. Some fans chant boring and they’re right in doing so. Back to Bruce who pops Red in the face. The Hitman comes in and we get another wishbone split. Red sends Keith into the buckle to escape a figure four attempt but misses a knee drop instead of tagging. Keith puts on a Figure Four but Shawn makes the save and it’s off to Blue.

Those boring chants are getting a little bit louder. Blue works over Keith’s arm and it’s off to Shawn with a top rope double ax to the arm. The shoulder gets sent into the buckle and Shawn cranks on the bad arm. Back to Red whose leg seems fine now. Rey cranks on the arm around the post which results in more double teaming. Heenan has been ripping the Harts apart the entire match, including a nice jab here: “None of them look alike.” Keep in mind this is as Keith is having his arm destroyed.

Blue stays on the arm including a legdrop on it and a hammerlock slam. Off to Shawn who misses a Rocket Launcher. Off to Bret, prompting Shawn to tag out to Red. Red immediately gets caught in a spinebuster and the Sharpshooter to make it 4-2. Blue comes in to clothesline Bret and both he and Keith are now hurt. Bret is thrown back in and suplexed down for two.

Blue drops a very Greg Valentine elbow and Heenan says he knows who the Blue Knight is. Vince: “Who is that?” Bobby: “The guy in the ring that just dropped an elbow on Bret Hart.” I love you Bobby Heenan. Back to Shawn for a chinlock to kill even more time. I’m not sure how much there is of it left as this has been going long already. Blue comes in for another two off another elbow as Bobby lays into Helen Hart.

Bret hits a middle rope clothesline and he makes the tag to Owen. The crowd just does not care here and the lack of any reaction is kind of sad. A middle rope elbow gets two on Blue and Bruce and Shawn come in at the same time. Shawn goes to the floor and goes after Stu, only to get BLASTED IN THE FACE. Bobby: “I’ve always liked Stu.” A missile dropkick puts Blue down but Shawn’s saving elbow hits Blue as well. Shawn is sent to the floor and the Sharpshooter eliminates Blue.

It’s 4-1 and Shawn is drinking water. All four of the Harts hammer on Shawn and it’s Bruce who gets two off an elbow drop. Bruce charges into a boot and Shawn chokes away a bit. The superkick puts Bruce down but that’s still not a finisher and only gets two. Bruce gets in a boot and makes the tag to Bret to a small reaction. Bret hits a slingshot to the buckle for two. Shawn gets in a kick and it’s off to Owen.

Now here’s where it gets interesting: Bret is trying to get it together on the apron and Owen is rammed into Bret, knocking him off the apron and into the barricade. Owen is distracted and pinned. All of the brothers and Stu go to check on Bret and Owen FREAKS, storming to the back and shouting WHAT ABOUT ME! This would start the feud of the year in 1994.

Bruce comes in and drops an elbow on Shawn for two. Bret is still getting up after the crash he took into the barricade. Bruce and Shawn hit head to head twice in a row to really stretch this thing out. Keith comes in with an abdominal stretch (including the toe around the ankle) but Shawn hip tosses out of it with ease. Back to Bret who pounds away and Shawn gets crotched on the top rope. Bret picks the leg but Shawn escapes the Sharpshooter and walks out for the countout.

Rating: D. This was…….long. At the end of the day it ran 30 minutes when it should have been about 15. The only thing that mattered here was Owen and the future angle vs. Bret. Shawn being in there didn’t help much, but it needed to be Jerry Lawler and without him this didn’t mean anything of note. Not a good match and the length hurt it a lot. They were against things they couldn’t really help here and that’s what brought it down a lot.

Owen comes back and gets in Bret’s face during the celebration. Stu tries to calm Owen down but Owen rants about getting no recognition and celebrates in the ring on his own. Helen loses it as well.

Gorilla and JR are going to do commentary on the next match as Heenan and Vince are going to do Radio WWF, which didn’t last long. During the change over, Gorilla threatens to kill Heenan which was his trademark at this point.

We recap the Foreign Fanatics vs. the All Americans. Ludvig Borga hit Tatanka with a chair and pinned him with one finger, breaking his two year undefeated streak. Tatanka got beaten up by Yokozuna. This led to the Steiners and Luger picking a new partner in the Undertaker. This led to an awesome moment with Taker opening his coat and having an American Flag inside of it (with 13 stars for some reason). Luger then beat up Quebecer Pierre for no apparent reason. The Fanatics added the EVIL FOREIGN Hawaiian Crush. This must be the intermission.

Here’s Jim Cornette to introduce his team for a very out there match.

Smokey Mountain Wrestling Tag Titles: Heavenly Bodies vs. Rock N Roll Express

This is part of an agreement the companies had at the time which didn’t quite work that well. The Express (Ricky Morton and Robert Gibson) are the champions and they’re defending against the Bodies (Tom Prichard and Jimmy Del Ray). It’s a brawl to start with the Express being sent to the floor. Gibson is pulled back in but Morton pulls both of the Bodies out to the floor. Ricky follows that up with a suicide dive to take both of them out at the same time.

Things slow down and we start with Gibson vs. Del Ray. Things are going to go very fast in this match and that’s exactly how it starts with Gibson flipping out of the corner and hitting a headscissor takeover before bringing in Morton. Prichard comes in and gets booed louder than all of the Knights in the previous match combined. Morton can’t quite get above Prichard on a leapfrog and he ducks a Del Ray superkick which takes Prichard down instead.

Both Bodies get monkey flipped out of the corner and we get the always dumb looking rowboat spot, which is where all four of the heels’ legs are rotated around by the good guys. Gibson works on Prichard’s leg and the Express take out Del Ray in the corner before Morton works on Prichard’s leg as well. Tom finally gets in a shot and it’s off to Del Ray who is immediately armdragged down.

In a nice move, Gibson blocks the buckle before Morton’s back hits it to prevent the Bodies from getting the advantage. It’s all Express other than the first fifteen seconds or so. The Bodies have a quick huddle on the floor and the fans are bored. It’s Prichard vs. Morton now with the heels taking over for the first time since the beginning. Off to Del Ray who is suplexed down onto Morton for two.

Back to Prichard for some more choking. There wasn’t a tag but that’s why the Bodies are heels. Del Ray hits an Asai Moonsault to the floor and it’s back to Prichard in the ring who hits a powerslam for two. Off to a chinlock as this match is turning into an old school tag match of the NWA style. A Trash Compactor (a kind of spinebuster/guillotine legdrop combo) gets two but Del Ray’s powerbomb is countered into a rana for two.

Ricky hooks a small package for another two and Del Ray hits a moonsault press on Morton for ANOTHER two. This is why it’s called Playing Ricky Morton people. The guy was a master at it. A double DDT puts the Bodies down and Morton rolls over to make the tag to Gibson.

Now we get to the point of the match: Prichard throws Morton over the top, which is a DQ in SMW, but this is in the WWF. Gibson gets confused and decked for his confusion as Morton gets beaten down even more. There’s the double dropkick to Prichard but it only gets two. Del Ray comes off the top with a tennis racket (Cornette signature) shot to Gibson for the pin and the title.

Rating: B-. This was a strange match as from a technical standpoint it was quite good and in SMW it would have been the main event of a big show, but we’re not in SMW. We’re in the WWF here and these people don’t mean anything. There’s a deep history here of a ton of matches with various gimmicks to them, making this a huge feud. The problem is all we’re told is they’ve been feuding for years. It’s the same issue you have with Japanese wrestlers: just being told how great they are doesn’t mean anything to most fans. We need to see these things, not be told about them.

Team Bam Bam Bigelow vs. Four Doinks

Bam Bam Bigelow, Bastion Booger, Headshrinkers

Bushwhackers, Men on a Mission

Ok. I can get through this. Four years ago I stopped watching this midway through but I’m going to get through it this time. The Doinks are all dressed like a clown and their identities were secret until they were unveiled here. Luke comes out on a scooter, Butch has a wagon, the Men on a Mission come out on foot. Mabel needs the exercise so that’s a good idea. Notice that there’s no actual Doink in the match and the fans aren’t going to be pleased here.

A LOUD We Want Doink chant starts up and Bastion and Luke start things off. Booger is a VERY fat guy in a too small singlet in case you’re not familiar with him. Luke bites him on the ample singlet before stomping on Bastion’s foot. Afa bites Butch’s balloon and it’s off to Samu. Then he bites a water balloon and gets rolled up by Luke for the pin. Fatu (Rikishi) comes in and Luke hurts his own head off a headbutt attempt.

Booger comes in and drops a leg on Luke and it’s off to Bigelow with a headbutt to the ribs. Booger comes back in and sits on Luke before stopping for a banana. Another drop by Bastion misses and the Battering Ram puts him down. Mabel drops a leg on Bastion and it’s 4-2. Fatu comes in to offer meat to Luke and takes over, but here’s Mo on a scooter for a ride around the ring. Bigelow comes in and destroys the scooter and Fatu hits the top rope splash….and stops for a banana.

Butch comes in with a bucket of something….scratch that as there’s nothing in it, but Fatu slips on a banana peel as he jumps from it and Butch rolls him up for the pin. Bigelow is all that’s left and he gets to fight Mabel. Bam Bam can’t do anything to the power of fat but Mabel misses a splash. The other Doinks come in and get beaten up also but Butch throws something on Luna. Mabel splashes Bigelow and a dog pile (which is allowed) gets the pin.

Rating: Awe. I am in awe. We had falls from a water balloon, a banana peel and a bucket of something being thrown on Luna. There’s nothing else I can say about that and I’m not going to try.

As Bigelow is leaving, Doink (whose actor has recently changed) pops up on screen to laugh at Bam Bam. The next step in this feud: a midget named Dink of course.

The Doinks, including the real Doink, celebrate in the back. Why the REAL Doink couldn’t be in the arena isn’t answered.

The Foreign Fanatics are in the back and Cornette talks about their battle plan. He talks about how they look at the All Americans as one man. You can take a man out by taking out his heart, his mind and his soul. The Steiners are the heart, but if you take it out, he has no will to fight. The Undertaker is the mind, but if you take it out, the man is confused. Luger is the soul, but if you take it out, you’ve defeated him completely. I’ve always liked that.

Before the match, we get a history lesson about Boston. No seriously, this happens. Thankfully it turns into some promos from the All Americans.

Foreign Fanatics vs. All Americans

Yokozuna, Crush, Ludvig Borga, Jacques

Lex Luger, Undertaker, Steiner Brothers

The Quebecers are the tag champions and have Johnny Raven Polo as their manager. Yoko is world champion. Jacques and Scott start things off and Jacques offers a handshake. Scott says screw you in classic Freakzilla style. Scott hits a quick belly to belly for two and it’s off to Rick. Jacques brings in Yoko and things slow down almost immediately. Rick hits a clothesline and a shoulder to knock Yoko out to the floor but it doesn’t do much good.

Off to Borga who died in the last year or so. Rick gets knocked to the floor but comes back in off the top with a shoulder for no cover. Borga misses an elbow and Rick goes up again, coming off with a cross body. Borga rolls through it and Rick isn’t moving at all, giving Borga an easy pin. Rick finally starts moving and holds his leg, so I’m thinking that’s a legit injury. Rick can’t stand up on the floor.

Scott comes in next and gets to fight Jacques. Rick eventually limps off on his own power which is a good sign at least. Scott hits a great gorilla press but Crush catches a falling Jacques and I guess that’s a tag. Steiner wants nothing to do with a test of strength so Crush pounds on him a bit. A butterfly powerbomb puts Crush down and apparently Savage is back in the building. Crush kicks Scott down and here’s Macho.

Crush throws Scott down to the floor over the top but he won’t go after Savage. Randy gets sent to the back and the dull match continues as Scott may have hurt his knee on that fall. The knee gets targeted now with Crush firing away some kicks and Savage is coming back AGAIN. Scott dropkicks Crush to the floor and Crush goes after Savage for long enough to draw a countout.

Jacques goes after the injured Scott now with a rear chinlock followed by an elbow to the jaw for two. Scott somehow hits a gorilla press on Jacques and there’s the tag to Lex. He slams Jacques down and drops a middle rope elbow for the elimination. It’s now Lex, Taker and Scott vs. Borga and Yoko. Borga comes in to face the still limping Scott. Taker hasn’t been in the match yet.

Borga pounds on the ribs and whips Scott in the corner so he can clothesline Steiner down. Borga goes up top but gets suplexed back down for two. Yoko comes in and pounds away, but Scott gets in some offense. He tries the freaking Frankensteiner which goes about as well as you would expect it to, resulting in a legdrop from Yoko eliminating Scott to get us down to two on two.

Luger comes in as we’re almost 20 minutes in with no Taker at all yet. Borga, a Finn, waves the Japanese flag. Yoko misses a splash and Lex pounds away, only to get clotheslined down with ease. Off to Borga who runs Luger over again and kicks him in the ribs. Back to Yoko who misses a charge, and it’s FINALLY off to Taker.

Taker hits his running DDT and sits up but a Borga distraction lets Yoko suplex Taker down. There’s the situp and another after a clothesline. A legdrop keeps Taker down and there’s the Banzai, but Yoko goes for another, and Taker moves. A clothesline puts Yoko on the floor and they brawl to a double countout. See you at the Rumble boys. Taker was legally in the match for less than two minutes and forty seconds.

So it’s Lex vs. Borga now and as Taker and Yoko brawl on the floor. Ludvig has taken over and drops a leg on Lex. A side slam puts Lex down for two and Borga gets more two’s off various other power moves. He isn’t covering well though so he isn’t ready to pin Luger yet. A suplex puts Borga down and they clothesline each other. With Cornette distracting the referee, Borga hits Lex with Fuji’s salt bucket for two. Lex gets fired up and hits a powerslam and the loaded forearm for the final pin.

Rating: D+. This didn’t work either. Taker was the main draw of the match and he wasn’t even in there for a tenth of the match. Yoko vs. Taker would go on to screw up two PPVs and Lex would never get the title, basically making the second half of 1993 totally pointless. This match didn’t work at all, and a lot of that is due to the heel lineup. Unless there was an injury or something, I don’t get why Pierre was taken out.

Santa comes out to celebrate with Luger just like last year.

Overall Rating: D. Let’s take a look at this card: great opener, WAY too long second match with the wrong main heel, a match from another company, the banana peel/water balloon match, and the main event with an evil foreign Hawaiian (insert your own lame Obama joke here). This show comes off as very long and dull, with most of the matches being completely uninteresting. It was uninteresting back in the day too, as this show got the lowest buyrate in the history of the Survivor Series up to this point. Next year would be another head scratching show.

Ratings Comparison

Team Razor Ramon vs. Team IRS

Original: B

Redo: B

Hart Family vs. Team Shawn Michaels

Original: D+

Redo: D

Rock N Roll Express vs. Heavenly Bodies

Original: B

Redo: B-

Four Doinks vs. Team Bam Bam Bigelow

Original: N/A

Redo: Awe

All-Americans vs. Foreign Fanatics

Original: C-

Redo: D+

Overall Rating:

Original: C+

Redo: D

It was almost the same until the overall rating. I don’t get how it jumps up that high off just a few better grades.

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

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/11/12/history-of-survivor-series-count-up-1993-usa-usa-usa/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews