Wrestlemania 9
Date: April 4, 1993
Location: Caesar’s Palace, Las Vegas, Nevada
Attendance: 16,891
Commentators: Jim Ross, Bobby Heenan, Randy Savage

This is considered to be one of the weakest Wrestlemanias in history and I think that’s an accurate statement. Looking at the announced card, which was only eight matches long, I only see 2-3 that I would put on a Wrestlemania. Your main event for this evening is Bret Hart vs. Yokozuna, which is ok, but just doesn’t scream WM main event to me.

What amazes me the most about it though was this show was so packed they had to cancel one of the matches: Bam Bam Bigelow vs. Kamala. The theme of the show is the world’s largest toga (toga, toga, toga) party. Why does this scream BAD IDEA to me? Seriously, what’s the point behind this? It made the show seem stupid overall, but that’s just me. Anyway, let’s get started.

Our show opens with no National Anthem or America the Beautiful. What a crock already. After that, we see Gorilla Monsoon in a toga. God help me. He is our host for the evening, whatever that means. He welcomes us to the show, and throws it over to….Jim Ross? This was Ross’ debut and I vividly remember being stunned to see him in the WWF as he had been the commentator for WCW my entire life.

Ross runs down the double main event of Hogan and Beefcake vs. Money Inc. for the tag belts and the already mentioned WWF Title match. He throws it to Finkus Maximus, which is something even I couldn’t make up, who introduces Caesar and Cleopatra on an elephant, which Ross gives us a history lesson on. Macho Man is then introduced riding a sedan which is like a couch that’s carried as beautiful women feed him grapes.

Then in one of the funniest scenes in WWF history, Bobby Heenan comes in on a camel, but for some reason he’s riding it backwards. He gets to the broadcast position and is a mess, which is kind of funny. Finally, after almost 10 minutes of intros, it’s time for a match.

Intercontinental Title: Shawn Michaels vs. Tatanka

Michaels had dumped Sherri since last year but now is accompanied by Luna Vachon, who is proof that not all divas are hot. Tatanka is out next and he has never lost a one on one match. Sherri follows Tatanka out, yet it’s made clear she’s not with him. So they have stalkers now. Hey they match! Tatanka had pinned Shawn twice leading up to this match, once in a singles match and once in a 6 man.

Some of Savage’s comments to Heenan, such as shut up camel breath are just funny to me. There’s the first bell, eleven minutes into the show. The outside look is really cool here. They feel each other out at a rather fast pace to start. Top wristlock goes to Shawn and he follows it up with a headlock. Down to the mat with Shawn totally in control.

Tatanka gets a belly to back to escape and a SWEET counter of a top rope clothesline with an arm drag. Shawn to the floor and the girls have a staredown of awkward proportions. Back in and the stereotype works over Shawn’s arm which is apparently hurt coming into this one. Shawn hits a clothesline but it hurts him even further so it wasn’t worth it at all. Anytime Shawn gets something going he hurts his arm again, this time ramming it into the post.

Bobby: She (Luna) is something. Ross: Yeah what is she? Tatanka gets a shoulder breaker out of nowhere but drops an elbow instead of covering. Top rope chop but still no cover. He goes up again and jumps down into what we would call Sweet Chin Music. Today that would kill a guy and be on a highlight reel for years but here it’s just a momentum changer. Luna and Sherri do nothing of note again during a staredown.

Clothesline from the apron to the floor takes down Tatanka. Shawn yells at Sherri and gets a chinlock for awhile. Modified victory roll gets two as this is getting a lot of time. Another victory roll is countered into an electric chair drop to put both guys down again. Double axe by Shawn gets nothing as Tatanka stereotypes up.

Superkick is blocked and Tatanka gets a top rope cross body for a long two. Slingshot puts Shawn into the post and gets a very close two. Powerslam gets an even closer two. This is getting really good now and Tatanka is sent to the floor. Shawn shoves the referee and Tatanka gets the Papoose to Go for the CHEAP DQ! Dang it that was good stuff and got nearly 20 minutes.

Rating: B+. Very solid match that got the time it needed. If it had a real ending, this would be an automatic A. Tatanka was something interesting. He didn’t lose for his first two years which is an amazing streak, longer than even Goldberg’s. Shawn wasn’t quite up to the level of awesome he would reach but it was coming soon. He benefited a lot from the advent of Raw as it gave him a bigger way to get noticed and to put it mildly, it worked. Well that and Razor Ramon plus a ladder.

Luna beats up Sherri post match.

The Steiners say they’re going to beat the Headshrinkers.

Headshrinkers vs. Steiners

Pretty random tag match here but it works ok I guess. It’s your standard face team vs. heel team so that’s fine. We get the first use of JR’s code saying it’s going to be a slobberknocker, meaning it’s going to be awful from a wrestling standpoint. I was always a Headshrinkers mark for some reason, just always liked them.

Scott and Fatu start us off. Steiners control early on which is expected. Oh I forgot to mention: Fatu of the Headshrinkers is more commonly known as Rikishi. In a NICE looking move, Scott and Rick both go up the same corner and hits stereo clotheslines on the Headshrinkers. Nice one indeed. We get breaking news that Luna attacked Sherri again, and somehow, I’m more interested in the match at hand. What a stunner.

Afa rams his guys’ heads together to wake them up a bit. The referee is Bill Alfonso, who you might know as Fonzie from ECW. He was RVD’s overly hyper manager. Samu gets a splash in the corner and Rick just drills him with a clothesline. Afa blasts Scott with what would become known as a kendo stick. Savage gets upset, Heenan doesn’t see the Headshrinkers cheating which is one of his trademarks.

Heenan says he can’t see right with sunglasses on and JR says he saw it too. Heenan says JR is wrong because he’s from Oklahoma. JR’s reaction is priceless. Out to the floor for more pounding on White Thunder. Scott slams one of their heads into the mat and gets kicked in the jaw with a sweet kick for it.

Heenan says his head is like Prudential. Savage: I don’t know what that means. Bobby: It means the rock is hard. Savage: I didn’t ask you Heenan. The commentary for this match is light years ahead of the match itself. Samu gets a dropkick to show off a bit. Off to the nerve hold now, a Samoan trademark. Heenan says Oklahoma is a suburb of Kentucky, which offends JR for some reason.

Samu goes up but misses the big headbutt and there’s the tag to Rick and an eruption. He rams their heads together which is of course, STUPID. Dude learn your stereotypes. Headshrinkers hit a double team version of the move we call the Stroke, leading to one Headshrinker putting Rick on their shoulders for what we would call a Doomsday Device. In a freaking SWEET counter, Rick catches Fatu in the air from on top of Samu’s shoulders in a belly to belly suplex. Looked just absolutely sick.

Back to Scott who nearly kills Fatu with a belly to belly overhead. Scott suddenly remembers he’s better than Rikishi and hits a Frankensteiner, which might be the most impressive move that anyone has ever regularly done, to get the pin. It’s a standing hurricanrana by a guy of Scott Steiner’s size. Think about that.

Rating: B+. I liked this match a lot. Both teams are very solid and some of the stuff they did in this match was simply great. Top level stuff here which surprises me greatly. The Steiners are just scary good when they’re on their game and this is no exception. That powerslam/suplex spot by Rick is absolutely amazing.

Doink the Clown is a screwed up individual. He dresses up a Caesar statue in clown makeup and we get a recap of Doink vs. Crush. Doink also says Crush will be seeing double vision.

Crush vs. Doink the Clown

Crush had one of the best looks of anyone I’d seen from this era. He seriously could have been something special if he’d cared even a little bit at all. He was a decent wrestler with good size and power. I’ve never gotten why he didn’t pan out. Definitely a solid face challenger if nothing else. At about 6’6 and over 300lbs, he was quick and very strong. What’s not to like here?

Doink runs around the ring to start but gets caught by the big Hawaiian that I think Savage wants to make sweet love to down by the pond. Crush beats the holy goodness out of Doink for the majority of the match with basic power stuff. His finishing move was a head crushing move which was always kind of odd but it worked I guess.

The clown gets a guillotine clothesline and starts a comeback here, but it doesn’t mean much. In case I wasn’t clear here, Crush is the face in this match. A pretty weak looking Piledriver keeps Crush down for a bit and then he’s sent into the post. Doink jumps into a boot though and here comes the big man.

Doink tries to hide under the ring but gets caught. Back in the ring, Crush uses his head vice finisher on Doink but the ref got bumped. Another Doink comes out and hits Crush in the back with a cast then in the head. This leads to a pin for the real Doink. They check under the ring, where the other Doink came from and went to. They check and no Doink.

Rating: D. A Squash leading to a bad ending means not a good match. This feud went nowhere for the most part and I think it went on until at least the King of the Ring. Crush would soon start a big push which stalled like no other for some reason. Still though, this was really bad.

Todd Pettingil talks to some Japanese fans and after the WWF makes bad racial jokes, Razor Ramon is headed to the ring.

Razor Ramon vs. Bob Backlund

It’s total filler with no backstory but it’s Backlund in his first Mania match which is impressive since he’s in his early to mid 40s. Razor is the heel here but to put it mildly, he’s very popular. And yet Backlund would be the next guy to win the world title.

Backlund offers a handshake to start but Razor throws a toothpick instead. This is before he had gone insane if you didn’t get that. BIG Razor chant starts up and of course isn’t acknowledged. Backlund keeps tripping him up and does his stupid little dance. I never got the point of that at all but he always did it.

Razor stomps away after a slam. Bret Hart was knocked out cold by Luger at the Mania brunch today. This wasn’t ever addressed after this for some reason. Backlund gets a butterfly suplex which was kind of impressive. Atomic drop, his former finisher, gets no cover. In a great ending, Razor gets a small package out of nowhere to end it. Heenan gets in a great line: he beat the wrestler with a wrestling move.

Rating: C-. Not great but not awful, the ending gives this a decent grade. It’s not terrible and the ending surprised me. Razor had debuted just after Mania 8 and was pushed to the moon. He even got a title shot at the Rumble this year in a forgotten match. The breaking news during this match of Bret being knocked out earlier in the day leads to nothing. The last line of he beat the wrestler with wrestling was great.

In the back we see Gene with Money Inc. The feud they’re involved in at the moment began on a Monday Night Raw (The first Mania that can be said at as the show debuted about 3 months prior to this) when DiBiase tried to hit Beefcake with a briefcase.

Beefcake had been legitimately huge in a parasailing accident over a year ago and his face was badly injured. This led to a great Heenan line of, “It serves him right. His face has hurt me for years.” This attack led to Beefcake getting his friend Hulk Hogan to return to help him.

Also Jimmy Hart jumped from Money Inc to Hogan and Beefcake. Lastly, the night before the show, Hogan was injured, resulting in huge bruises around his eye. Now what really happened to him?

According to the storyline, DiBiase hired a bunch of people to attack him. The WWF said he was hurt in a jetski accident. The common theory in wrestling circles though is Savage thought Hogan and Liz (his real wife) were having an affair and beat the tar out of Hogan. Believe what you will.

Tag Titles: Money Inc. vs. Hulk Hogan and Brutus Beefcake

We get red smoke and Heenan says that can only mean one person. Then Jimmy Hart walks out. Just made me chuckle a bit. This is Hogan’s first match in a year and the pop kind of sucks. It’s big, but not mind blowing. The heels jump the heroes before the bell but Hogan and Beefcake fight them off with the music playing which always makes me mark out like crazy. There’s just something sweet about that.

We get to the real match which is actually quite good. I think just about everyone expected Hogan and Beefcake to somehow take the belts here. Money Inc. had absolutely dominated the tag division for over a year at this point so they were seen as very legit. The champions stall forever to get us started. That’s about what you would expect no?

Hogan’s eye looks terrible. IRS vs. Beefcake start us off. The champions beat him down and tag in and out but for some reason they don’t go after the face that much at all. IRS tries to hit him in the face like a very stupid man indeed. Beefcake takes over and off to Hogan who gets ten punches in the corner on the Million Dollar Man. It’s about five years too late but I guess it’s better than nothing.

More fast tagging by the challengers and Hogan gets a double axe off the middle rope to DiBiase who is getting destroyed here. They clear the ring again as this is one sided after a few minutes of the champions winning early on. The champions try to leave and we get the ten count thing like we did last year I think. Scratch that as it was at Summerslam.

Hogan vs. DiBiase again. Good old fashioned cheating has Money Inc right back in control though. Hogan does what he does best: gets his ass kicked. LONG Million Dollar Dream puts him down but he shakes his finger to get back up. He must be in that thing for two minutes or so. Beefcake comes in to put a sleeper on DiBiase to drive Heenan crazy.

Why does everything seem to go into slow motion during a Hogan match? It takes like a minute and a half to get the hot tag to Beefcake. IRS comes in as well and a cheap shot gives the champions the advantage again. Beefcake’s protective mask gets ripped off and his face gets beaten into oblivion which is always a good thing. Love him or hate him, the guy bumps like a master.

Beefcake finally gets a sleeper on IRS but DiBiase breaks it up causing the ref to go down. Hogan comes in and cleans house leading to a double cover. Jimmy Hart turns his jacket inside out, which just happens to be black and white striped in the biggest coincidence of ALL time (you have to say ALL time at any WM. It’s the law) and apparently they think that’s good enough to make him a referee.

Some pest of a referee comes out and ruins our celebration saying that there’s a DQ as Hogan used Beefcake’s metal mask to knock out Money Inc. Jimmy Hart beats up the other referee and we get Hogan’s music. Post match, Hogan poses and they steal IRS’ briefcase, which contains a brick and money.

Supposedly the brick caused it to hurt a lot worse, because of course hitting someone WITH A SOLID METAL BRIEFCASE didn’t hurt enough. There’s also money in it which Hogan gives to the fans. This literally goes on well over 5 minutes.

Rating: C+. This is a good tag match which is absolutely stunning in its own right. Hogan put on a great performance here as did Brutus. Money Inc was as great as ever and it boils down to a solid match. The main thing killing it was the ending. I mean REALLY?

Hogan hits has Jimmy get the pin and he celebrates? Dude, come the heck on now.It was really the best option, but I still hate it. This match works for one simple reason: it’s nearly 20 minutes long. Both faces get beaten down and we get a double comeback. There’s very little missing from it actually.

Mr. Perfect says he’ll break Luger’s winning streak.

Mr. Perfect vs. Lex Luger

The main perk here is Luger’s entrance with four chicks holding mirrors in gold thongs. Not bad at all. This sounds awesome on paper if nothing else. Luger has knocked out everyone he’s faced so far with the metal plate in his forearm. They fight over a wristlock to start and it’s a standoff. Big shot by Perfect and a knee lift sets up a dropkick and Luger hits the floor.

We talk about baseball as Heenan tries to explain the whole knockout thing and he says Savage knows a thing or two about baseball. That’s very true as he played in some minor leagues for White Sox, Reds and Cardinals organizations. Quite an athlete indeed. Perfect works on the knee which is smart as he can’t get knocked out from there.

LOUD chop by Perfect as he has controlled for the vast majority so far. As is my custom he gets reversed on a hard whip into the corner to give Luger the control. He gets a shot with the loaded arm into the back of Perfect to really take over. Backbreaker puts Perfect down even longer.

Perfect can’t keep anything going and Luger gets a cover with his feet on the ropes for two which Heenan blasts to no end. Powerslam gets two. Sunset flip gets two for Perfect and then hooks a sleeper for all of 2 seconds. Perfect keeps getting pin attempts but can’t get more than two on them. A slingshot puts luger into the buckle for two.

Missile dropkick gets a long two as Luger gets his foot on the rope. No heat at all on that either. They fight over a backslide and Luger leans forward enough to put Perfect’s feet in the ropes so that he can’t kick out for the pin. Post match Luger knocks him out with the forearm.

Rating: C-. Long and at least passable, but I couldn’t stand Luger’s gimmick at the time. The forearm was just a dumb way to end every single match and this is no exception. This was ok but it was really spotty at times and it never got into a flow at all. I’ve seen worse though.

Perfect goes looking for Luger. And for once he finds him and the fight is on again. Shawn jumps Perfect, starting their summer long feud.

Gorilla pops up for no reason at all other than to tell us what two matches are left.

We recap Undertaker vs. Giant Gonzales. Undertaker feuded with Kamala in the fall and beat him. Harvey Whippleman, Kamala’s manager said he would get revenge, so at the Royal Rumble he brought out Gonzalez, who boardered on 7’8. He beat the tar out of Taker and eliminated him, leading to this match.

The feud doesn’t end here as it would finally be settled at the Survivor Series in a Rest in Peace match, which meant No DQ. In case you’re wondering where you’ve heard this story before, it’s THE EXACT same thing that happened with Muhammad Hassan, which led to Mark Henry who combined to play the role of Kamala and then the Great Khali as Gonzalez.

They had a manager that wanted revenge on Taker, then Taker got beaten up by them, then won a no rules match. That’s why old fans didn’t like the Taker/Khali feud: we knew exactly what was coming and we were exactly right.

Giant Gonzalez vs. Undertaker

This is the first Wrestlemania entrance for Undertaker where he’s brought out in a chariot with a vulture on his shoulder which was REALLY cool for its time and is still awesome today. This should sum up how big Gonzalez was: Taker is a big old dude and he comes up to Gonzalez’s chest. Clubbing blows get him nowhere and here comes Taker.

Gonzalez chokes Taker who gets on the second rope to choke back but gets a low blow for his trouble down in his little demons. A low blow is no sold and we go to School (In 1993 the School wasn’t old yet). This was in that really weird period that stretched to about 1996 when Foley got there where they had no idea what to do with Undertaker so they just had him fight giants.

Giant chokes Taker down until the Urn goes up into the air. Taker goes into the steps on the floor as it’s ALL Gonzalez. Heenan proclaims him dead and almost has a heart attack when Taker is like boy I’m the Undertaker and just stands up and keeps beating on Gonzalez. Taker beats him down before Harvey throws in a cloth covered in chloroform which puts Taker down but it’s a DQ anyway. Yep this is bad.

Rating: F+. The match itself was just bad as there was one simple flaw: Gonzalez was just terrible. He was too big to be able to properly do anything in the ring and it showed badly here. It’s the only thing close to a blemish on Taker’s Mania record and that’s a shame. The idea that the commentators could smell a small rag in an open area like that is ludicrous to say the least, especially after all of 5 seconds of it being out.

Taker stays down for a long time with Gonzalez standing over him in triumph. They stretcher him out which isn’t something you see every day. The fans chant for Hogan for a bit, but then a gong rings. Today that would blow the roof off the place (despite there being no roof here) but here it only gets a solid pop. He staggers out and beats the fur off of Gonzalez which makes me wonder: WHY IN THE WORLD DID THEY DO THE DQ ENDING???

Gene recaps the feud with Hart and Yoko, and then Hulk Hogan makes sure he has the spotlight at the end of the show as he has to talk about how he’s in Bret’s corner. Oh and he calls Yokozuna a Jap.

WWF Title: Bret Hart vs. Yokozuna

Yoko wins this shot based on winning the Rumble. When you look back, there was absolutely no doubt who was going to win here. The idea is that Bret has no chance and they’ve spent the entire show telling us that Bret has no chance. Guess what happens in the match.

The problem with this match is very simple: Yoko is too fat for Bret to do much with. Bret’s offense is completely unbelievable here and that’s not a knock on him as no one for the most part could do much against Yoko. That’s also not a knock on Yoko as he was a decent big man (bring it on Irish).

Bret is sent to the floor after a nice attack to start but it’s clear he’s going to be in trouble. He ties Yoko’s legs in the ropes and gets him down so he can hammer away. Savage wants him to cover but is corrected by Heenan in a bizarre moment. Clothesline takes Bret down almost as soon as Yoko gets to his feet. Leg drop half kills Bret for no cover. The fans chant USA for their Canadian champion.

Bret gets a boot up for a BIG pop and a bulldog/jump on his back gets two. Side kick puts Bret right back down as this is bordering on a squash so far. Off to the nerve hold now which is basically a way to waste some time, which in a 9 minute match is rather stupid. Oh and all of Bret’s fans are Hulkamaniacs. Heenan points out the stupidity of the USA chants and is ignored. Bret gets in all the offense he can which is more or less getting him nowhere.

FINALLY he gets something as the buckle is exposed and Yoko’s head goes into it, sending him down to his stomach. Bret puts on a shockingly passable sharpshooter and the crowd is shocked. Mr. Fuji then throws salt into Bret’s eyes allowing Yoko to pin him for the title. Now let’s break down why this ending is so bad. Bret gets the sharpshooter on after Yoko shows no sign of his knees being hurt by Bret’s offense on them. I’ll let that go though as it’s a solid move that would hurt enough for a quick submission.

Fuji has done almost nothing all match. Bret sees him right in front of him as he takes FOREVER to get the salt out and throw it. Are you telling me Bret couldn’t have, I don’t know, CLOSED HIS EYES??? The referee sees Bret holding his eyes, sees the cloud from the thrown salt and sees Fuji holding a package of salt and thinks nothing of this, and to top it off, salt in the eyes is enough to knock Bret out for a pin? Come on now.

Rating: D+. The size difference here was too much, the time was bad, and the finish was insulting to my intelligence. The wrestling is ok, but just barely. Bret fights valiantly for the full nine minutes of this match and yes you read that right. That’s the biggest issue most people have with this match and this Wrestlemania. The biggest match was less than 10 minutes long.

BUT WAIT!!!

Hulk Hogan comes out because he can’t handle a *gasp* young and talented guy taking the spotlight or something evil like that, so he explains to Fumbles McWhoops our referee what happened and apparently Fuji has match making abilities now as tells Hogan that Yoko will put the belt on the line right now. Bret points to the ring which apparently means go for it.

Hulk slides in and we’re off to the races one more time. The fans are happy, but looking back this is beyond stupid. WHY would Fuji put the newly won title on the line against the greatest giant killer of all time after Yoko has had no rest while Hogan has rested for about half at least? And people wonder why the business was in so much of a hole as it was around this time.

WWF Title: Hulk Hogan vs. Yokozuna

Yoko attacks Hogan as he slides in then holds him for more salt. Hogan ducks, nails Fuji, clotheslines Yoko, drops the leg and wins his fifth title. No rating of course.

Hogan poses with the title as we go off the air.

Overall Rating: F+. This show is truly bad and the main reason behind that is the ending. Hulk Hogan had absolutely no need to come in and steal the spotlight all over again. I don’t care how big of a Hulkamaniac you are, and I’m a huge one, but there is no justification for that whatsoever.

Let Yoko leave with the belt and do this on Raw the next night. Aside from that, the rest of the matches are ok at best. There’s a few watchable matches here and there but there’s no reasoning to sit through the rest of the show for them. Wrestlemania isn’t supposed to be something you need to fast forward through to get to the decent stuff. BIG recommendation to avoid here as this might be the worst WM of all time.

 

 

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Royal Rumble 1996
Date: January 21, 1996
Location: Selland Arena, Fresno, California
Attendance: 9,600
Commentators: Vince McMahon, Mr. Perfect

We’re in the Monday Night Wars era now and it’s all about Shawn at the moment. He’s back from injury and in the Rumble tonight, looking to become the second person ever to win back to back Rumbles. Other than that we’ve got Bret vs. Undertaker which is another of those matches that can be hit or miss. It’s hard to say what we’ll get here….well not really because I’ve seen this show a bunch of times. Let’s get to it.

We open with Sunny in a bathtub, saying this show is graphic and view discretion is advised.

The opening video is about how the champion is defined by Hart, as in Bret Hart. Tonight though he’s against a force who has no heart, in the form of Undertaker. The IC Title match (Ramon vs. Goldust) and the Rumble are talked about as well.

Jeff Jarrett vs. Ahmed Johnson

Last month at IYH, Jarrett hit Johnson with a gold record to set this up. Johnson is basically Ezekiel Jackson with a bit of skill and charisma. Jarrett immediately bails to the floor to hide. Back in he tries a hiptoss and Ahmed is like boy are you stupid or something? A headlock is easily countered by a throw from Johnson and a clothesline takes Jarrett down. There’s a World’s Strongest Slam for two for Ahmed and things slow down again. Johnson misses a clothesline by a mile but Jeff sells it anyway of course.

A cross body misses as well but this time Johnson goes flying over the top, getting his hand caught in the ropes on the way down. A HARD whip into the steps puts Johnson down and we head back in. Ahmed starts no selling stuff and catches a dive in a bearhug. That goes nowhere so Johnson sends him to the floor and hits a big dive. Back in and Ahmed misses a FREAKING SWANTON (remember that he weighs like 280) and there’s the Figure Four from Jarrett. Johnson powers out of it twice, so Jarrett cracks him with the guitar off the top for the LAME DQ.

Rating: C-. I was always an Ahmed fan so this was an easy pass for me. The image of the Swanton looked great if nothing else, which is more than enough to give this a pass. Jarrett was such a mess at this point and never went anywhere in the WWF. The ending completely sucked though and it really brought things down.

BUY OUR STUFF!

Diesel isn’t worried about the Rumble tonight and doesn’t think it’s Vader Time. He doesn’t care who he faces at Mania, but he isn’t happy with Taker being the #1 contender.

Tag Titles: Smoking Gunns vs. Bodydonnas

The Bodydonnas are Skip (Chris Candido) and Zip (Tom Prichard with a BIG haircut). They have Sunny with them and my goodness is she smoking (no pun intended) here. The Guns are defending. Skip and Billy start things off with Skip taking over with a headscissors. Just like Ahmed earlier, Billy misses a charge against the ropes and crashes to the outside. Both Gunns get double teamed until Bart ducks out of the way, allowing a charging Billy to dive onto both Donnas on the floor.

Things settle down a bit and it’s back to Billy vs. Skip with the champion in control. Sunny hits on Bart until it’s Bart vs. Zip. A gorilla press puts Zip down but he makes a blind tag, allowing Skip to take over. The champions are fine with the double teaming stuff too, and take over on Skip very easily. Sunny gets on the apron and is knocked off just as quickly, giving us a nice upskirt shot in the process.

Now we get to the important part of the match as Billy goes to check on Sunny, allowing the Donnas to pound away on Bart. Skip hits a nice plancha onto Billy before suplexing Zip onto Billy for two back inside. Billy gets to play Ricky Morton for awhile, being put in a chinlock by Zip. This goes on for awhile until we get a sloppy spot where the Donnas collide and Skip rams heads will Billy. This would work a bit better if Billy wasn’t about eight inches taller than Candido.

Hot tag brings in Bart and everything breaks down with the champions taking over. The Sidewinder (side slam/guillotine legdrop combo) crushes Zip but Sunny’s distraction lets Skip break things up and take Zip’s place. Ignore the fact that one has the straps of his singlet up and the other doesn’t, and the fact that they look as different as Demolition did. In an ending the Expresses used back in the 80s, the Donnas load up a double suplex on Bart, but Billy spears Skip down, causing Bart to fall on Zip for the pin to retain.

Rating: C-. Tag wrestling at this time was really weak with very few solid teams anywhere to be found. The Gunns were ok at best and the Donnas were only popular because of Sunny. Billy would turn heel relatively soon and would eventually join up with Road Dogg to form the New Age Outlaws and turn the division completely upside down. Nothing much to see here but it certainly wasn’t terrible.

We get some of the Billionaire Ted skits, which were unfunny shots at Ted Turner. Not his wrestling company directly, but Turner himself. I’m still not sure why they decided to do these but no one liked them and they came off as mean instead of funny or witty. Note Vince Russo as one of the executives in the board room skit.

We recap Razor vs. Goldust, where Goldust is hitting on Razor to mess with his mind before the match tonight. To say Goldust’s character got them in hot water around this point is a huge understatement.

Intercontinental Title: Razor Ramon vs. Goldust

The yet to be named Marlena debuts with Goldie here. Razor is defending as is his custom. Feeling out process to start with Goldust playing his usual mind games, which means rubbing himself. Razor cranks on the arm before grabbing a headlock which goes nowhere. Goldust goes behind Razor and molests him a bit to psych Razor out even more. They head to the corner with Razor having his head rubbed a bit, ticking him off even more.

Razor goes for the arm so Goldust slaps him in the face. Perfect keeps making sex jokes as Razor slaps Goldust right back in the face. He spanks Goldie once as well, but the painted dude likes it. We head to the floor where Goldust hides behind Marlena as the stalling continues. Back in and Razor tries three straight headscissors before punching Goldust to the floor with a single shot.

We get more stalling which is called playing mind games before Ramon clotheslines him right back to the outside. Razor has to move Marlena out of the way, allowing Goldust to FINALLY do something, taking over with a shot to the ribs. Back in and Goldust focuses on the ribs, but not too much because that might mean we have some speed to this match. A bulldog gets two for Goldust as does a slingshot belly to back suplex.

Off to a sleeper, which Perfect suggests Goldust could use to do “whatever he wants” to Goldust. Much like everything else in the match, this goes on way too long until Razor fights up and kicks Goldust low. He’s so spent though that Goldie gets a two count, causing Razor to start his comeback. He fires off his usual punches and the chokeslam gets two. A belly to back superplex hit but Marlent distracts the referee, allowing the 1-2-3 Kid to come in and kick Razor’s head off. Goldust gets the easy pin and the title.

Rating: D-. Sweet freaking goodness this was dull. It went on WAY too long and had a bad ending on top of that, plus the stupid “psychology” from Goldust which wound up being more unpleasant than interesting or intelligent. Goldust would get WAY better when he became more of a comedy/parody character rather than this freaky dude that he was to start his WWF run. The matches got a lot better as a result too.

Wrestlemania 12 is coming.

We get the usual promos for the Rumble, but we start with a statement from Shawn’s doctor who says he’s back and healthy. Thankfully this is kept VERY short and he’s not dull. We hear from Owen, Roberts, Lawler, Horowitz, Vader and Shawn. Shawn would be the most obvious winner ever in the Rumble since…..well since last year when he was the absolutely obvious pick to win.

Vince and Perfect talk about the Rumble a bit.

Royal Rumble

HHH is #1, having lost a match on the Free for All to Duke Droese, who won the right to be #30. Henry Godwinn is #2 and I believe he’s feuding with HHH at this point. Helmsley pounds away in the corner to start but gets backdropped down very quickly. The intervals are back to two minutes this year thank goodness. Trips pokes him in the eye and chokes away until Bob Backlund is #3. Backlund saves HHH before pounding away on him. These wide shots are showing how nearly empty the upper deck is.

Jerry Lawler is #4 as HHH hits the jumping knee to the face of Godwinn. The fans chant Burger King and you know Lawler isn’t going to pass up a chance to rile up a crowd. He goes to get the slop bucket that Godwinn brought with him, but Henry clears the ring and gets the bucket, throwing it over the top onto Lawler and some of Backlund. Bob Holly is #5 and things slow down a bit until HHH erupts on Godwinn for some reason.

We get some slow paced elimination teases until Mabel is #6. Still nothing happens so here’s Jake Roberts at #7 to an ERUPTION. No one is eliminated yet. Jake throws in the snake and everyone but Lawler can get to the floor. After nearly giving him a heart attack with the snake, Lawler disappears for a good while as he hides under the ring. Mabel gets tied up in the ropes and pounded on for a bit until Dory Funk Jr. is #8.

The DDT is countered by HHH as we hear about a friendship between Terry Funk and Bruce Willis of all people. Backlund and Funk go at it because they’re both old and I doubt Dory knows most of the other people in the ring. Lawler is seen hiding under the ring. Yokozuna is #9 as there are WAY too many people in the match at the moment. Backlund puts Dory in the chickenwing and is eliminated by Yoko for a prize. Yoko crushes Godwinn in the corner but Mabel splashes Yoko, killing Henry in the process.

The 1-2-3 Kid is #10 but Razor charges down the aisle to chase him away (not eliminated). Officials get Razor off the Kid but it takes Mabel beating Razor down to stop the chases. It amazes me that Razor wasn’t in more Rumbles. Come to think of it….he was NEVER in a Rumble. Omori, a Japanese star that doesn’t mean much yet, is #11. At the moment we’ve got HHH, Godwinn, Lawler (under the ring), Holly, Mabel, Roberts, Funk, Yoko, the Kid and Omori in the match.

Wait where is Godwinn? I guess he went out off camera. Yoko and Mabel double team Omori until Jake pounds away on Yoko to the loudest reactions of the match so far. Funk hits a double underhook suplex on the Kid as Savio Vega is #12. He spinwheel kicks Mabel down, allowing Yoko to dump the reigning King (Mabel if you’re lucky enough to not remember that gimmick). Omori goes out thanks to Roberts and things slow down again.

Vader debuts at #13 and lumbers around while not doing much. He picks Bob Holly of all people to beat on first as Vega eliminates Dory. Vader pulls Savio back in from the apron for no apparent reason other than he wants to beat on him some more. Doug Gilbert from Memphis is #14 and HHH goes right after him for no apparent reason. Vader and Yoko slug it out to a big reaction but Vader has to stop to clothesline Roberts out.

The camera work in this is really bad as they keep looking at corners of the ring instead of the full thing, making us miss a lot of stuff. Savio pounds on Vader until one of the Squat Team members (BIG fat guys who are there because they’re fat and look alike) is #15. Vader sloppily throws Gilbert out and does the same to the Squat Team dude. Yoko and Vader slug it out again and people respond again.

The other member of the Squat Team is #16 but they both get in to double team Vader. The Mastodon (Vader) punches their faces in as only Vader can do before knocking them both to the floor. Owen Hart is #17 and everyone but Yoko is on one side of the ring for some reason. Vader and Yoko double team Savio who doesn’t seem interested in selling at all. A pair of splashes in the corner crushes him, as do a regular splash and the big leg from Yoko.

Shawn is #17 to a decent pop but significantly smaller than Jake’s. Vader throws out Savio as Shawn goes after HHH and the Kid. Vader and Yoko slug it out a bit before slugging it out a lot. They fight against the ropes, so Shawn gets a running start and dumps them BOTH AT ONCE. Now THAT wakes up the crowd. If that’s not enough, Shawn gorilla presses (!) the Kid to the floor as the ring is suddenly very thin. Hakushi is #19 as the big guys fight on the floor.

Scratch the floor part as Vader gets back in and cleans house, but none of the eliminations count because he’s not legal. Once he’s finally taken away, we’ve got Shawn, HHH, Holly, Hart, Hakushi and Lawler underneath the ring. Tatanka is #20 as Shawn thrown Jim Cornette, Vader’s manager, out. Hakushi hits a Muta elbow on Hart in the corner as HHH of course goes after Shawn.

Michaels teases a bunch of eliminations to try to make us think he’s not winning. Owen dumps Hakushi as Aldo Montoya (Justin Credible with a jock strap over his face) is #21. Shawn gets sent through the ropes to the floor, where he pulls Lawler out and sends him back into the ring. Tatanka puts out Montoya as Shawn puts out Lawler.

Here’s Diesel at #22 and house is cleaned. There goes Tatanka at the hands of the tall one and it’s time for Shawn vs. Diesel which gets a pop but is too short to mean much. Kama (Godfather) is #23 as this continues to go slowly. Shawn pounds on Holly (why is he still in this?) in the corner as Kama and Diesel slug it out. The Ringmaster (Steve Austin who is brand new here) is #24. He’s in white boots which is a really strange thing to see for him.

Shawn does his usual overblown self safe as Holly and Austin fight. FINALLY Holly goes out after nearly forty minutes. HHH vs. Austin happens about three years before it would mean anything. Barry Horowitz (with the AWESOME rock version of Hava Nagila) is #25 and he goes after Diesel. Well no one ever accused him of being brilliant. Shawn nips up to knock Owen to the apron, but Hart skins the cat back in. Cool little sequence there.

HHH punches Diesel, so Diesel grabs him by the head and LAUNCHES him to the floor. The Game made it about 48 minutes which isn’t bad at all. MAKING A DIFFERENCE Fatu (don’t ask. PLEASE don’t ask) is #26 and he doesn’t do much. Shawn and Owen can’t suplex the other one out so here’s Isaac Yankem DDS (Kane) at #27. The ring is WAY too full but Barry is put out to thin it out a bit.

Owen hits the enziguri on Shawn which put Michaels on the shelf leading up to this match. Shawn hangs on AGAIN though and puts Owen out while we’re looking at a double feature. Austin kills Shawn with a clothesline and here’s Marty Jannetty at #28. Fatu superkicks Kane as the burst of energy from Marty is already gone. Shawn and Jannetty go at it because they’re former partners. Perfect: “They’re rocking now aren’t they?” They punch each other down and the British Bulldog is #29.

Smith goes right for Shawn because of what happened last year. I love little bits of continuity like that which you never get anymore. Davey puts out Marty as Fatu GOES OFF on Austin before clotheslining him out off camera. Yankem puts out Fatu and here’s Duke Droese at #30. The final group is Shawn, Droese, Diesel, Smith, Yankem and Kama.

Smith and Michaels fight to the floor and Owen jumps Shawn for good measure. Shawn shrugs it off and goes in to dropkick Yankem out. Kama and Diesel put out Droese to get us down to four. Shawn clotheslines Smith out before skinning the cat back in. Diesel dumps Kama and Shawn superkicks the tall one (in the shoulder) out to win for the second year in a row.

Rating: D. Oh this was DULL. The problem here was that like last year (although to a MUCH weaker degree), there were very few guys you could buy as a winner here. It’s FAR better than last year’s match but the crowd was dead for long stretches of this, mainly due to boredom. You could see the star power of the future, but that’s the problem: they weren’t stars yet and no one bought them at this point. The match isn’t bad, but it’s definitely not good if that makes sense.

Diesel is ticked off about the ending and goes back in as Shawn is stripping. They do their old Wolfpack thing in the middle of the ring (a high five where Shawn has to jump) and all is cool. Shawn poses for a long time post match.

Oh yeah we’ve got a thirty minute match left to go.

WWF World Title: Undertaker vs. Bret Hart

Bret is defending and Taker is still in his skull mask period. Diesel is still straggling behind and stares at Taker during his entrance. They brawl with neither guy getting much of an advantage. Since this is WWF, we recap what we just say two minutes ago. After all that, here’s the world champion. Taker stands in the middle of the ring and Bret circles him for a bit. Hart pounds away in the corner and Taker stares at him.

Taker LAUNCHES him into the corner which is one of my favorite of his moves. He chokes Bret in the air and moves very slowly. Off to a smother hold which goes on for a LONG time. Bret finally makes the rope so there’s Old School….which sets up the smother again. Bret fights up and hits a middle rope clothesline followed by a regular one to send Taker to the floor. There’s a dive to take out the challenger as this finally picks up the pace a bit.

Bret tries to dive off the apron at Taker but is pulled out of the air and rammed into the post. Taker rams him into various other things until Bret reverses a whip into the steps, trying to damage Taker’s knees. Back in and Bret works over the knee as this is going nowhere. The Figure Four goes on….and on…..and on……and Taker turns it over.

Bret gets to the rope, so let’s put on ANOTHER LEG HOLD! It’s that always riveting one where Bret drops an elbow on the leg and just lays on it. This is also known as the Dusty Rhodes Special. He does however mix it up by trying to take off Taker’s mask. After being in this for literally about three minutes, Taker smashes his free leg on Bret’s head before we head back to the floor. Taker chokes away with a cord and sends Bret into the barricade as we head back in.

The champ goes back to the freaking knee as the fans loudly boo Bret. Taker’s leg is wrapped around the post a few times and it’s back to laying on the leg. Dear goodness get this over with already. We’re over twenty minutes into this and NOTHING has happened. To save my sanity the hold doesn’t last as long this time and Taker fights back. There are some legdrops and a clothesline as Taker’s knee seems fine. He loads up the Tombstone but Bret slides down his back and guillotines Taker on the ropes.

A DDT puts Taker down and Bret starts headbutting the back. We get the Russian legsweep but Taker sits up. The bulldog takes Taker down and there’s the middle rope elbow. Bret gives the fans a thumbs down and loads up the Sharpshooter. Taker grabs him by the throat to block it but Bret knees him in the ribs. A double clothesline puts both guys down and we lay around a bit more.

Bret is up first and takes off the buckle from a corner. He goes for the mask again and gets it off to reveal….the same Undertaker we’ve seen for like five years at this point. Seriously he looks fine. Taker fights back but gets rammed into the exposed buckle. That gets no sold and it’s a Tombstone for Bret. Since this is such a dull match though, Diesel pulls the referee out at two for a DQ.

Rating: D+. This started VERY slow but got better for the last ten minutes or so, but the ending brings it right back down again. If this had been a fifteen minute match or so it would have been WAY better, but they only had so many other matches on the card, meaning this had to be longer. Diesel would face Taker at Mania of course.

Gorilla Monsoon makes Diesel vs. Bret for the title at the next PPV.

Shawn says the 90s will be his time.

Taker comes in to yell at Gorilla, saying that Diesel won’t be champion on his watch. Gorilla makes it a cage match so Taker can’t interfere.

Diesel goes on a big rant about how he’s not afraid of the dark and says he’s going to have his hands in everything from now on because the WWF is running on Diesel Power. This was his official heel turn.

Cornette says Vader cannot be ignored. He pretty much was until Summerslam.

Overall Rating: D. This is a really weird show to grade because while most of the matches got bad grades, it’s not that bad of a show overall. Don’t get me wrong: it’s bad, but it’s really not as bad as it sounds. The first two matches are certainly watchable, but they’re not that good. The Rumble is also passable, but it’s dull at times. Not horrible, but definitely not worth seeing.

Ratings Comparison

Ahmed Johnson vs. Jeff Jarrett

Original: D+

Redo: C-

Smoking Gunns vs. Bodydonnas

Original: D

Redo: C-

Goldust vs. Razor Ramon

Original: D

Redo: D-

Royal Rumble

Original: D

Redo: D

Bret Hart vs. Undertaker

Original: C-

Redo: D+

Overall Rating

Original: D-

Redo: D

Amazingly enough I liked it a bit better this time.

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

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/01/15/royal-rumble-count-up-1996-shawns-texas-two-step/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

Royal Rumble 1996
Date: January 21, 1996
Location: Selland Arena, Fresno, California
Attendance: 9,600
Commentators: Vince McMahon, Mr. Perfect

Well it’s a year later and the roster is more or less the same. There are a few changes though. The biggest is Shawn has finally given up and turned face thank goodness and Taker is back in the title hunt. Bret has the title again and is facing him in the main event. Other than that, there’s a few new guys but a lot of this is the same. Nitro has debuted so the war has almost started.

The rest of the card looks similar to what we had last year with all three titles on the line plus the Rumble and one other match, but this just looks miles more interesting for some reason. The Rumble roster still looks weak but far better than it did before. This flat out can’t be less interesting than last year so let’s go.

I almost forgot: Shawn has been out with a ton of injuries including the concussion kick from Owen and tonight is his big return, so that’s easily your biggest story of the night here.

Oh yeah and a guy named Hunter Hearst Helmsley debuted. A bald guy from Texas is here too. They’ll never mean a thing.

There was a preshow match with HHH vs. Duke Droese. The winner got 30 and the loser got #1. Amazingly, HHH lost so there we are.

Sunny is in a bathtub and says that tonight’s show is viewer discretion advised. My goodness she was perfect. Anyway, Bret vs. Taker is previewed, along with a few other matches. There’s a picture of Razor hitting a belly to back suplex off the middle rope on someone. That someone: Jeff Hardy. Oh yeah and there’s that Rumble thing too. Finally, there’s talk of some monster showing up tonight. Some guy called Vader I think.

Jeff Jarrett vs. Ahmed Johnson

Ahmed is a relative rookie here, having been around for just a few months here. In other words, this should be a slaughter. This is fallout from Jarrett breaking a gold record over Ahmed’s head at the previous In Your House. I love how I now have seen that match and reviewed it as it ties things together a bit. In case you’ve never seen him, Ahmed is a freaking tank.

He’s more cut up than Ezekiel Jackson and even scarier looking. The only problem was he wasn’t as talented either. He’s killing Jarrett though so there we are. He was supposed to become world champion actually but he couldn’t stay healthy. There have been a ton of clotheslines in this match to say the least. I don’t mean a bunch in a row, but a bunch over a fairly spread out period of time.

Why is it that when something happens it’s unbelievable to Vince? He saw it happen so apparently it’s not too farfetched. Johnson is hulking up. That can’t be a good sign. Jarrett continues to imitate Ric Flair without the success by getting Ahmed in the figure four. You know considering how awesome Ahmed was, this is just really boring.

After powering out of that, Jarrett goes to the top with the guitar and El Kabong is enough for the DQ. Ahmed just stood there and waited to get hit in the head. Jarrett leaves and of course Ahmed is up in about 18 seconds and not even shaking it off. That was odd.

Rating: D+. Uh yeah. I’m not sure what to say about this one as it just wasn’t that good at all. Ahmed wasn’t really sloppy, but he certainly was limited. I’m not entirely sure why they had Jarrett not get pinned here. He really had nothing to lose here as he would be gone less than ten months later. Ahmed was supposed to look great here but he just didn’t, plain and simple. This is more of a headscratcher than anything else.

Buy WWF stuff, t-shirts in this case.

Billy and Bart, looking straight out of the 70s and 80s say they’re going to keep their titles. My goodness they were so painfully bland it’s painful.

Diesel says heelish things despite still being a face officially I guess. He mentions not having a problem with Taker, and we have a feud on the rise.

Tag Titles: Smoking Guns vs. Body Donnas

Sunny was hotter than anything on the planet, period. The Body Donnas are Tom Pritchard and Chris Candido, more commonly known as Chris Candido. Sunny starts off in the ring by saying ladies and gentlemen, children of all ages. Holy stolen ring intro in a few years. Sunny of course gets the biggest pop of everyone. She’s 23 here and was screwing Bret Hart at the time, so there we are.

We get an upskirt shot of Sunny which leaves Perfect speechless. In case you can’t tell, no one cares about the match but only Sunny. She really was excellent at getting all of the attention on her which is very good to be able to do. The Guns are giants compared to the heels. After the Donnas desperately try (and fail) to take over, Sunny is knocked to the floor. The only good thing is a nice back shot but whatever.

Perfect: she could have been hurt! Vince: she may be hurt! Thanks for being original McMahon. Naturally she was faking (don’t you hate when women do that?) and the Donnas get the advantage. Vince calls Zip Flip so there we are: we have found a gimmick so bad that even Vince McMahon can’t remember their stupid names. In a cool spot, Zip hooks his partner in a gutwrench release powerbomb (think Jack Swagger’s move but he just lets the guy go) onto Billy.

That was different as Perfect says. Since this match has been the most intelligent of all time, we have another odd spot as Skip runs into Zip and Zip is knocked into Billy so everyone is down. It leads to the cold tag to Bart who cleans house. Vince says he hits Skip or Zip or whatever his name is. Since it’s 1996, we can’t have a regular ending, so instead the Guns hit the Sidewinder (backbreaker/leg drop from the top) but Sunny distracts the referee.

In a bad looking spot, Billy sees Skip on the top rope clearly, but goes after Sunny instead. It was one of those moments that wasn’t supposed to look bad but accidentally did. The Donnas go for a double suplex but Billy spears one of them so that Bart lands on the other guy for the pin. Yep, that was stupid.

Rating: D. This show really isn’t starting out well at all. This was somehow worse than the previous match. Literally, looking at Sunny is all that this is good for. The match itself is just bad, the booking is weird and the ending leaves something to be desired. The Guns would forfeit the belts in about a month due to injury and the Donnas would get them in a tournament just before Mania, as in about 20 minutes before.

We see a big thing of the Billionaire Ted skits. These were funny at the time, but allegedly they ticked off Ted Turner so much that he revamped WCW, so in essence they nearly killed Vince’s company. There we go then.

Recap of Razor vs. Goldust. In essence, Goldust wants Razor, as in the way I want Ellen Page, so that apparently made Razor put the title on the line. Yeah that makes perfect sense.

Intercontinental Title: Goldust vs. Razor Ramon

Goldust debuted the night before Ahmed so there we are. Hey did you know that Goldust is bizarre? We need to make sure you know that he’s bizarre. Vince says don’t adjust your televisions. I’ve never gotten that expression. How many people actually get up and adjust televisions? What was going to go wrong with it in the last 10 seconds or so since the last segment ended?

Are we supposed to believe that it wasn’t right before? Also, if you have a really fuzzy picture and you had really bad eyesight, would it eventually look normal? Apparently the noise at the beginning of Razor’s music is from screeching tires. What vehicle is making that noise? This is Marlena’s debut as well. She looked really good back at this point.

In a funny moment, Vince goes over the rules to how you win a title and Perfect almost yells about how he’s won the title twice so why does he need to have it explained to him? That’s a really funny point when you think about it very little. Goldy grabs Razor’s chest a few minutes in so there we go. When asked about what he would do against Goldust, Perfect replies with kick him in the face.

I love Mr. Perfect, if nothing else for the rampant sex jokes and innuendos he’s dropping here. At one point when they’re fighting on the floor someone shouts out that Marlena has a nice rack, which is very true. This match seems like it keeps starting and stopping. They’ll do a bit and then Goldust will go all freaky. That’s fine for character development, but it makes for some bad matches which is what’s happening here.

We do however get a cool spot as Goldust hits a slingshot belly to back suplex that I’ve never seen before. Other than that though, there’s just not a lot to talk about here. Finally Goldust takes over, but still there’s no flow to this match. It’s hard to put into words, but you would know what I meant if you say it. Something just doesn’t feel right about it as it just looks choppy for lack of a better word.

On top of that he keeps groping and molesting Razor. That’s just annoying. Can you imagine in wrestling related anything someone that was constantly making gay references and puns and actions? It would drive me crazy. Anyway, it’s a sleeper and a standard comeback by the face.

Oh the fans are mostly dead for this. No Monty Python jokes here by the way. After some Terri interference, the 1-2-3 Kid comes in and heads to the top for a spin kick that clearly misses but I guess the air from it knocks out Razor for Goldust to get the pin.

Rating: D. Uh yeah, this sucked too. I don’t get it. For the most part there’s been talented guys in every match but nothing at all has worked so far. Granted that could be because we’ve had three matches and zero clean endings. Is it that hard to let one guy cleanly beat the other one?

Anyway, like I said earlier this match just feels choppy and it really hurts things. There’s zero flow here and it felt like watching a video game being played where the guy controlling it was just hitting all of the moves he programmed in if that makes sense.

A bunch of people say they’ll win that don’t interest me. Shawn’s doctor says he’s ready to come back.

After the explanation of the rules from Vince (none given to the live crowd), we’re ready to go.

Royal Rumble

HHH is in first and second it Henry Godwin, now rocking the best music in wrestling history: Don’t Go Messin With a Country Boy. These two had a pseudo-rivalry around this time so this works pretty well. We’re back to two minute intervals which almost guarantees a better match. They imply that winning two in a row is almost impossible as Hogan is continually buried.

Backlund is third, completely in his crazy man Presidential candidate (don’t ask) gimmick. Also, how bad of a string of draws does this guy get? The more I see of this guy the more I like him. He’s just amazing considering his age. Backlund still has the Iron Man record at this point. Fourth is Jerry Lawler as I’m already loving these two minute intervals better.

There’s far more time to let people get settled in and it helps a lot. The heat on Lawler is nuts with the Burger King chants. Godwin breaks up a triple team and gets the slop bucket. Everyone gets it at once as they’re on the floor and now we’re back in the ring with a Gallagher reference. Fifth is Bob Holly to fill the jobber quota a bit more. Backlund is on the floor or something I think as he hasn’t been seen in awhile.

He’s not out but he’s not in the ring either. Oh there he is. HHH has jumped twice in this match, which is more than in this decade combined I believe. Mabel, who is still King, is in at 6. He’s gained even more weight here and it even less interesting of a character if that’s possible. HHH is compared to Shawn. Oh dear.

Jake Roberts, on the nostalgia trips to end all nostalgia trips (notice the word choice I used for Jake) is seventh to a solid pop. He lets loose the snake and throws it over Lawler who is of course terrified of snakes. How much of a creep was Roberts? The only people he ever fought were terrified of snakes. That’s just pathetic. Anyway, Lawler hides under the ring as Dory freaking Funk Jr. is #8.

No one knows who he is, which is likely because he’s 56 years old at this point. With the NWA dead at this point, Vince mentions their name on camera. No one has been eliminated yet so we have eight people in and you can recap it yourselves you lazy pests. Jake almost gets a DDT on HHH to a pop but it doesn’t work.

Terry Funk is apparently friends with Bruce Willis. Well ok then. Funk fights Backlund in one of the only encounters you’ll ever see where Bob is ten years younger than the guy he’s fighting. Yokozuna is 9th as we’re way too full here. Those are words I don’t think Yoko ever used. As Backlund has the chicken wing on Funk, Yoko dumps Bob easily to a big pop.

I think he’s just about to or just has turned face. The Kid is tenth as we hit double figures. This hasn’t been bad as it’s pretty clear they’re saving the big guns for the end, but dang those guys are staying in there a long time. It’s not exactly a bad thing, but I’m not sure if I’m sold on it or not.

Razor chases him to the ring as Godwin is eliminated to absolutely zero recognition. I had to rewind it to see where he went out at. Razor chases Kid around for a bit which means nothing in the end. Mo is very annoying to say the least. I think Shane was there as an official to get Razor to the back. Some Japanese wrestler named Omori is number 11. He comes out to the Orient Express’ music, and I don’t have a clue who he is.

Thanks to Wiki, he apparently has a pretty good resume. That’s fine and good, but again we have the same old problem: ALMOST NO ONE KNOWS THAT VINCE. These foreign guys are fine to bring in, but dang it tell us why we should care. Don’t just say he’s a wild man from Japan. We need more than that. Tell us a big name he’s beaten, tell us some titles he’s won, tell us SOMETHING.

I don’t want to have to do a ton of research to figure out who one guy from Japan is in one match. He’s from All Japan Pro, that’s all we get. Even Vince says he doesn’t know a ton about him. Well thanks Vince. Savio Vega is 12th as nothing of note is going on. Dory is out there doing stuff that belongs in the 40s or something which is pretty cool looking.

The saddest part: I doubt half the roster today would be as smooth as he is out there in this match. Yoko puts out Mable and the smarks shed a tear as the completely unimportant Omori is put out by Roberts. To recap, we have HHH, Lawler (hiding under the ring), Holly, Roberts, Funk, Yoko, Kid and Vega in there at the moment. Perfect says he’s tapped into the Superstar line and knows who the next guy is.

Ok wait a minute. So first of all, you can find out the SECRET drawing on the Superstar line? I know they did that last year but I just don’t get what the point is. Why ruin the mystique of one of the biggest matches of the year? Second, you can tap into it? How many science geeks that were watching this (of the 4 or so that were) immediately tried to figure out how to do that? Third, Perfect is on the phone while calling a match? Dude I want that job!

Anyway, 13th is the debuting Vader. At the time, he was a complete monster and rapidly becoming one of the biggest heels in the company. He beats up Holly so he’s a good guy to me. Savio puts out Funk from the apron. Vader of course pulls him back in so there we go. Vader punches Savio, making him dance. Yeah I hate him too. Fourteenth is Doug Gilbert of the USWA, which is Lawler’s company.

Jake sets Vega for the DDT, arguably the most devastating and popular move in company history at that point, so right as he goes for it we cut to Holly trying to dump the Kid. We can see it hit between Holly’s legs and the pop is huge, but of course two career nothings are more important so there we are. In a VERY stupid looking spot, Jake hooks Gilbert for the DDT and then just stares at Vader for at least four seconds and then gets clotheslined over the top. That looked so stupid.

Ok so 15 and 16 are twins called the Squat Team. Yes that’s the best name they could come up with for them. They’re twin 450lb guys from Puerto Rico where they’re called the Headhunters. Ok, so we can’t just call them that generic yet far better name? They last less than two minutes combined as Vader just goes insane on the first one with two punches to knock them both out. That was AWESOME.

As the first one leaves his partner is coming out and they both go to the ring. Vader beats them both up at once until Yoko (still heel apparently) grabs one and is like “Boy get your fatness out of here and make me a sweater” while Vader beats up the other one and is like “BOY go marinate bake me a ham and set the table” and both guys are knocked out.

That was both stupid and pointless which is a nice combination. Oh and just after the first guy came in Doug Gilbert got hit with a freaking AWESOME chokeslam from Vader and thrown out. It looked awesome.

To recap, we have HHH, Lawler (under the ring), Holly, Kid, Vader, Yoko and Vega. Owen is 17th and a major heel at this point due to being the guy that hurt Shawn in the famous enziguri (how in the world is that spelled anyway?) that made Shawn black out. Yoko and Vader just beat the living tar out of Vega and Shawn is 18th as the roof isn’t blown off in the slightest.

There’s a reaction but dang there was nothing impressive about that in the slightest. Vader puts out Savio as Shawn hits HHH. What would the children think??? The crowd is awake but not much beyond that. Vader and Yoko fight at the ropes and Shawn runs up and dumps BOTH of them at once. Ok that was cool looking. The fans are very much insane now. Shawn gorilla presses Kid out in another cool spot.

Vader and Yoko keep fighting as Hakushi is now in to make it him, Shawn, Owen, Holly and HHH as we see the major problem already: it is so completely obvious that Shawn is going to win. Vader comes back in and throws him out to completely silence the crowd. All of a sudden this year that doesn’t count like it used to so Shawn is still in. Gorilla the Commissioner comes down to run off Vader.

Vader would kick dominate him soon which was quite sad. The heel heat on Vader is nuts. Maybe 45 seconds after Hakushi comes in we bring in Tatanka for a one night return for no apparent reason. I’ve always liked that hook of the steel bar that Shawn did. It’s an intelligent counter that works quite well. Owen throws out Hakushi as the Shawn Michaels plus the midcard Rumble continues.

Aldo Montoya is 21st to some of the weirdest music I can ever remember. It’s like techo and tribal mixed and it’s just failing. Shawn finds Lawler under the ring and throws him back in. Sometimes simple heel tactics like that are just made of win. Montoya and Lawler go out almost at the same time as Diesel tries to give Shawn a challenge at 22. I know looking at it now he looks weak but at the time he was a major player still so this was a big deal. He puts Tatanka out with ease.

He and Shawn go at it to a solid pop. Owen goes after Diesel to finally live up to the poster for this event. I have no idea why those two were on the poster. I also have no idea why they didn’t fight at Summerslam 95 instead of Mabel but whatever. I mean really, what match sounds more interesting: Diesel vs. Mable or Diesel vs. Owen? It would have at least been interesting to an extent instead of Diesel and Owen which was completely awful.

Kama is in next to no reaction at all. Yeah Shawn should have come out about 10 spots later than he did. Holly is more or less dead at this point as Shawn hits the ten corner punches on him. The crowd counts with him and I keep thinking it’s another person coming in. Apparently Ahmed has a concussion and is going to the hospital. So wait, it took AN HOUR AND A HALF to figure that out? Dude how bad is your medical staff???

The Ringmaster is in at 24. For those of you that don’t know, he would soon become known as Stone Cold Steve Austin. His manager, Ted DiBiase heading to WCW might have saved the company. He’s wearing white boots here which just doesn’t look right. Aww his boots have little stars on them! That’s so cute! He FINALLY puts out Holly though so he’s awesome already.

Austin is a much more technical based guy here with some very good athleticism. Barry Horowitz is 25th, coming out to his completely sweet rock version of Hava Nagila. How awesome is that? Perfect says that if Horowitz wins this he’ll get back in the ring. That made me chuckle for no reason at all. In a cool looking spot, Owen is leaning on the ropes to choke Shawn so Shawn nips up to kick Owen over, but Owen skins the cat to get back in. That was awesome looking.

The fans are DEAD here. Diesel puts out HHH with complete ease. That looked cool if nothing else. 26th is Fatu. WHY IN THE WORLD DOES HE GET THESE AWESOME DRAWS EVERY YEAR??? This is the making a difference Fatu. My goodness this was awful. It makes Rikishi look brilliant. Hey let’s plug the Superstar Line again! Apparently only the guy on there knows who is next. So is he running around telling people what order to go in?

Perfect changes his stance to he’ll quit if Horowitz wins. So wait, does that mean he’ll quit being retired? If that’s so does that mean he’ll wrestle again? Maybe he didn’t change his stance at all. Owen almost puts Shawn out but just won’t do it because it would probably get him fired. Isaac Yankem (Kane) is in next. Horowitz is gone. Owen hits the enziguri on Shawn again but this time doesn’t kill him.

Austin does the Shawn pose as I laugh. Austin vs. Diesel is a match that I don’t think ever happened. Owen is out due to Diesel and Shawn. 28th is Marty Jannetty as this match just needs to be put out of its misery. Apparently he’s been doing well in the singles division. Did I completely miss some time in the company history? The Rockers go at it in a fight that would have been good maybe 3 years ago.

British Bulldog is 29th again to ZERO reaction. 30th is going to be Duke Droese so there we are. Smith is heel here so he beats on Shawn. He dumps Marty quickly so if nothing else there’s a future for him in vermin control. Fatu puts out Austin. How many people would believe that in three and a half years he would run him over in a car and put him out for a year?

That’s just completely amazing and shows you that all kinds of things can happen in wrestling and you never know what’s coming. Kane knocks out Rikishi with ease as the announcers admit they have no idea how Austin went out due to there being a lot of action going on. No not really but I can’t argue with Vince right? Ok so there’s Duke and the final groups is, and I’m not kidding you here, Duke Droese, Kama, Diesel, Shawn, Bulldog and Yankem. WOW.

If you couldn’t tell who was going to win this and who he was going to eliminate last, you’re an idiot. Droese and Kane go out really fast so your final four are Bulldog, Diesel, Kama and Shawn. And before I’m done typing that Shawn kicks Diesel out to win it. Literally, the final four started and ended inside of 30 seconds. Shawn wins, shocking no one at all. Diesel comes back and they do the Too Sweet sign. Yep, that’s all they do and good night I’m bored here.

Rating: D. How can this show not seem that bad? I mean seriously, Ahmed freaking Johnson at this point has the match of the night, and that’s after guys like Chris Candido, Owen Hart, Shawn Michaels, Scott Hall and Dustin Rhodes have performed. Once Shawn came in, the match was over, period. No one thought for a second that anyone other than HBK was going to win, period. I mean look at this lineup.

The alternatives are the debuting Vader, Diesel, who had talked about Taker nonstop recently so his feud is set up, and……and……oh come on there has to be a third guy. Owen Hart wins it by default I guess: a career midcard guy with a cup of coffee in the main event a year ago that is clearly the first Shawn target. WOW. How in the world did this Rumble get a chance to do anything? There is no way this was ever, and I mean ever, was going to work.

The only thing CLOSE to making this work would have been Yoko, Diesel, Owen and Vader against Shawn at the end. I mean really, who else was going to win? This wasn’t interesting at all and other than for a few seconds, the crowd might as well have been asleep, and I can’t blame them a bit. This was just boring.

Bret says he’ll win in a generic interview, which is somehow the most interesting thing I’ve seen other than Vader and Yoko being put out in over an hour.

WWF Title: Undertaker vs. Bret Hart

This is happening because Bret is champion and Taker would have been far too big of a threat to Shawn’s popularity. Taker is wearing the skull mask at this point after Mabel and Yokozuna destroyed his face. For no apparent reason, Diesel is still at ringside. He gets in Taker’s face and there they go. Taker was just all kinds of awesome at this point, as he was reaching that mythical level that few get to.

He’s officially that kind of guy that’s awesome just because he’s who he is. Like today for example, it’s about two weeks after Kofi destroyed Orton’s car. That was AWESOME. Kofi got over in that one segment and granted I have no idea if it’ll still or not as you guys won’t read this for about two months, but the point is he might just fall off the map. A guy like Taker simply isn’t going to fall off the level he’s on barring anything completely insane happening.

He was just hitting that level around this time. He’s like Shawn is now: you can throw together a stupid storyline to put him in the title match and everyone will buy it because he’s just awesome enough to be in it. Bret’s pop is solid here, but this crowd just kind of sucks. Ok we’ve been in this match 3 minutes now and I think I already know what’s coming. I had a bad vibe about this match earlier on and it’s coming true now: they’re doing a formula match.

Yep, Bret’s going for the knee early. That means a long drawn out match where Bret works on the leg with a submission, Taker fights back, Bret hits the knee and uses a submission, Taker fights back, Bret hits the knee and uses a submission, Taker fights back, Bret hits the knee or a suplex move and sets for the Sharpshooter and somewhere in there we brawl on the floor with a weapon other than the belt or a chair being used. And what do you know I’m right.

Yes, for about 25 minutes, that’s all we get. During that Bret gets the stupid looking skull mask off of Taker that was just really annoying. PLEASE END THIS! Taker hits the Tombstone finally, and here’s Diesel for the cheap DQ to set up Diesel vs. Bret to set up Diesel vs. Taker. Ok, I know I have the benefit of hindsight here, but this was as predictable as humanly possible.

The signs were all there for Diesel vs. Taker, especially the fight before the match started. I mean seriously, who in their right mind thought Taker had a chance here? Actually he won, so who thought he had a chance of getting the title here? Whatever, I just want this show to end.

Rating: C-. While it was formula stuff, it was somehow by far and away the best match of the night, and that’s just pitiful. They went out there and did half an hour of stuff you could write a textbook with. Now I know that usually means greatness, but in this case I mean a book called Cookie Cutter Title Matches in 30 Elongated Minutes.

It might have been that I was just wanting this show to end, but this was boring as heck to me. I’m going with the C- because it gives it the best grade of the night just so Jeff Jarrett can’t have it. WWF>TNA, forever, even when you have to lie to get there.

Overall Rating: D-. Somehow, this passes. I have zero idea how, but somehow it passes. The matches all completely sucked, but it was like I kept wanting to like the show. That’s either really good or really bad and I’m not sure which.

This whole show feels like the forms you have to fill out to get something you know you’re getting: it’s pointless, you don’t like it, but you have to do it anyway to get to the end result. This show is just boring. I don’t know if it’s particularly bad, but it’s just so boring that it becomes bad. Don’t watch this unless you’re an insomniac.

 

 

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Royal Rumble 1995
Date: January 22, 1995
Location: USF Sun Dome, Tampa, Florida
Attendance: 10,000
Commentators: Vince McMahon, Jerry Lawler

Oh dang it 1995 WWF still exists. This is that year that no one likes to talk about and you have to fly through it as fast as you can or you might risk seeing something on it. The big twist this year is that the intervals in the Rumble are only 60 seconds, so the whole match is like 40 minutes long. The other problem is that Diesel is WWF Champion here. The good news is that he’s facing Bret Hart, one of the two men capable of dragging an awesome match out of him. Let’s get to it.

We open with the big deal about tonight’s show: Pamela Anderson arrives. She’ll be escorting the winner of the Rumble to the ring at Wrestlemania. A bunch of guys arrive to greet her.

Intercontinental Title: Jeff Jarrett vs. Razor Ramon

Jarrett is challenging and now has the Roadie with him. Razor starts with his usual assortment of punches and a fallaway slam to send Jeff to the floor. After a little toweling off on the floor, Jeff armdrags Razor down and struts. They trade arm holds until Razor gets taken to the mat where Jeff messes with his hair. Careful with the grease there Jeff. Razor gets annoyed and knocks Jeff to the floor for some more Memphis stalling.

Jeff gets back in and is immediately puts in an armbar where Razor can mess with Jarrett’s hair. Some dropkicks floor the champ and a clothesline gets two. Razor catches a boot coming and ducks the enziguri from Jeff, but Razor misses an elbow to keep Jarrett in control. We hit the chinlock followed by a sunset flip by Jeff for two. Another dropkick gets the same and Jarrett is getting frustrated.

Jarrett hooks a sleeper but Razor quickly counters. The counter doesn’t last long though as Jeff hits a swinging neckbreaker for two. Ramon slides behind Jeff in the corner and crotches him on the post to a big pop. We get a messed up (not botched mind you) spot where Razor was going to try a bulldog off the middle rope but Jeff turns around and it had to be a clothesline. Eh no harm no foul. Jeff backdrops Razor to the floor, injuring the champ’s knee. Roadie clips him in the knee and Razor gets counted out.

We won’t get to the rating just yet. Post match Jeff calls Razor a coward for taking the easy way out like that and calls him back into the ring. Razor pulls a Marty McFly and takes the bait, giving us another match.

Intercontinental Title: Jeff Jarrett vs. Razor Ramon

Razor tries some quick rollups for two but Jeff goes right for the knee to take over. Jeff does his best Ric Flair imitation but as he goes for the third cannonball down onto the leg, Razor kicks him over the top and out to the floor. Back in and Jarrett puts on the Figure Four, putting Razor in a lot of trouble. Razor escapes and starts his comeback with punches and the belly to back superplex but Jeff counters in mid air for two. Razor clotheslines him down and loads up the Edge, but the knee gives out and Jeff rolls him up for the pin and the title.

Rating: C+. I always remember liking this match and it holds up pretty well. Memphis stalling isn’t for everyone but it’s a good way of drawing heel heat, which Jeff might as well have been an iceberg for otherwise. Razor was awesome at this point and had good chemistry with Jeff, so this worked pretty well all around. The ending was smart as it was Razor’s trademark ending for house shows, but he would usually win in about 30 seconds with the Razor’s Edge. Nice to see them switch things up here.

Pamela Anderson has been given a lot of gifts from various wrestlers. One of the running gags on this show is that Pamela clearly doesn’t want to be here at all and has these “GET ME OUT OF HERE” looks on her face the whole night. Todd Pettingill tries to hit on her and completely fails of course.

Jeff says it’s time to celebrate.

IRS vs. The Undertaker

This is the start of the Undertaker vs. Million Dollar Team feud which went on FOREVER. The bell rings and we stand around a lot. IRS tries to jump Taker from behind and it goes nowhere. Taker glares him down to the floor and the stalling continues. IRS slides in, gets glared down, and hides on the floor again. Finally we head back in with IRS pounding away and getting kicked in the face for his efforts.

Taker grabs him by the tie and swings him out of the corner, followed by Old School as this is dominance so far. IRS and DiBiase get in an argument on the floor, causing DiBiase to call for some druids. Taker loads up Old School again but the druid shakes the rope and Taker goes down. A clothesline puts Taker on the floor where he beats on the druids a bit before IRS jumps him from behind.

The druids send Taker into the steps and there’s an abdominal stretch by IRS. That goes nowhere so Taker misses an elbow to really slow himself down. IRS hits some basic stuff as the crowd is almost completely silent. Druid interference gets two for IRS and also allows him to escape the Tombstone. A clothesline puts Taker down but he pops up and hits a chokeslam for the pin.

Rating: D. At the end of the day, this was about thirteen minutes of Taker beating up IRS. I mean….did ANYONE buy IRS as a threat to the Dead Man here? That was the problem with the eight month long feud between Taker and DiBiase’s group: no one on the team was a real threat to him at all. Bad match here but that had to be expected.

Post match Taker beats up the druids and has a staredown with King Kong Bundy. During the staring, IRS steals the Urn. There’s the launch of the feud and Bundy beats up Taker for awhile.

Diesel doesn’t have much to say about his match with Bret.

Bret is ready for his chance at the title.

WWF World Title: Diesel vs. Bret Hart

Diesel is defending in case you’re really slow. Bret tries to brawl to start but is almost immediately knocked down by a big shot to the face. A clothesline puts Bret on the floor where he chills for a bit. Back in and Bret goes after the knee like a smart Hitman. He puts on a quick Figure Four and after a good deal of time in it, Diesel gets to the rope. Bret does something you hardly ever see enough: he puts the same hold back on. Why don’t more people do that? He had Diesel in trouble, so why mess with what was working?

Diesel makes the rope again and heads to the floor where Bret hits a suicide dive to have the champ reeling. Diesel shrugs it off and sends Hart into the steps to get a breather. With Bret in the ropes, Diesel hits the running crotch attack to his back. There’s a backbreaker to Bret and Diesel bends him across the knee a bit. Bret fires off some right hands but gets whipped hard into the buckle to stop him cold.

The champ loads up the Jackknife but instead puts Bret on his shoulder for a backbreaker. Why he doesn’t JACKKNIFE HIM WHEN HE HAS THE CHANCE is beyond my intelligence as Bret escapes. A big boot (Diesel’s leg seems fine) puts Bret down for two, but Bret gets a boot up of his own, followed by a middle rope clothesline for two. Hart goes up and Diesel tries to slam him off, but the knee goes out, giving Bret a two count.

The kickout sends Bret to the floor and he pulls Diesel’s legs out for the figure four around the post. Actually scratch that as he ties Diesel’s legs together instead and pounds away. The Five Moves of Doom get two but Diesel grabs a rope to block the Sharpshooter. Bret clotheslines him to the floor but a dive is caught in mid-air. The tall guy rams him into the post and hits the Jackknife in the ring, but Shawn Michaels runs in to break up the count.

Shawn beats on Diesel’s leg which isn’t a DQ for no apparent reason. Shawn and Diesel had split up at Survivor Series if you’re wondering why this beating is happening. We get a ruling that the match must continue to the delight (yes I said delight) of the crowd. Bret goes back to the knee, hooking another Figure Four. Diesel can’t get to the ropes so he hits Bret in the bad ribs to escape. Ah selling, how I love you.

Diesel is all ticked off now and pounds away on Bret in the corner. A gutwrench suplex of all things gets two for the champ but a big boot in the corner misses. Bret wraps Diesel’s leg around the post and blasts it with a chair. There’s the Sharpshooter but now it’s Owen coming in for the save and a beatdown on Bret. I would say there’s a great tag match in there, but Bret and Shawn teaming up would mean the end of the world as we know it.

The match is going to continue AGAIN though and Diesel gets two on Bret. The place is starting to lose its minds over these near falls. Bret sends him into the buckle that Owen exposed and pounds away as Diesel is rocking again. Diesel comes back AGAIN with elbows and forearms to the face before punching Bret into the ropes where Hart’s legs are caught. Bret is holding his knee but you never know with him.

Yep, he stands up and lays back down in some classic Hart goldbricking. Diesel goes for the Jackknife but Bret fakes him into a small package for two. Bret tries an O’Connor Roll and the referee is bumped. Backlund, Michaels, Roadie and Jarrett run in and that’s FINALLY enough for the double DQ.

Rating: A. These two had MAD chemistry together and this was no exception. They knew how to work the David vs. Goliath (I’m not sure how fair it is to call Bret David actually) formula to perfection and the matches were great as a result. Why the company kept going with Diesel vs. power guys is beyond me, because his best stuff comes against small guys like Bret and Shawn and always has.

Backlund stays in the ring and puts the Crossface Chicken Wing on Bret. This set up their I Quit match at Mania which even Bret admits sucked. Diesel makes the save and hugs Bret.

More Pettingill and Anderson stuff.

Bob Holly and 1-2-3 Kid are excited to be in the finals of the tag team title tournament.

Tag Titles: Bob Holly/1-2-3 Kid vs. Bam Bam Bigelow/Tatanka

Shawn and Diesel split up and we needed champions. Holly and Tatanka start things off with Tatanka hitting a side slam for two. Holly comes back with a slam and a few dropkicks as this is going nowhere so far. Off to the Kid vs. Bigelow, with the big man running over both of the smaller guys with ease. Bigelow LAUNCHES Kid into the air but gets caught in a rana to send Bam Bam rolling.

Back to Tatanka who whips Kid into the buckles a few times before it’s off to Bigelow to pound on the small guy some more. In something that actually impressed me, Kid backdrops Bigelow to the floor. Both small guys try top rope cross bodies but they escape and dropkick the heels together. Things settle down with Tatanka beating on Holly for a LONG time. Bigelow comes in, allowing Tatanka to distract the Kid. Holly goes to the corner to find no partner and Bigelow splashes Bob.

Holly gets beaten down so badly that he goes to the wrong corner and tags in Tatanka. Thank goodness this isn’t the Attitude Era because it probably would have been legal in some of their matches. Tatanka comes in for more beating on Holly until Bob FINALLY gets in a clothesline for the hot tag to the Kid. Everything breaks down and Kid is LAUNCHED to the floor by Bigelow. Bam Bam loads up the moonsault but Tatanka accidentally hits the ropes to knock him to the mat. Somehow that’s enough for the pin and the titles for the Kid.

Rating: C+. This went nearly sixteen minutes which was just too long. It’s quite good but it would have been great if they cut off five minutes or so. Those launches by Bigelow were awesome looking as Kid continues to be an excellent seller of moves like those. The idea was that it was all Bigelow’s fault, even though Tatanka is totally to blame for Bigelow crashing like that. The Gunns would win the titles back the next night on Raw, making this whole thing pretty pointless.

Post match DiBiase and Tatanka leave Bigelow in the ring, where Lawrence Taylor, NFL legend, laughs at him. Bigelow shoves him down, and there’s Wrestlemania people.

We get a recap of the 94 Rumble, focusing on Diesel’s dominance and Shawn helping to eliminate him.

Shawn laughs a bit.

We look at the ending to the match from last year.

Luger says he wants the title. Lex, it’s been over for you for like eight months now. Let it go dude.

Vince apologizes to Lawrence Taylor.

Here’s Pamela Anderson to watch the Rumble at ringside and MAN does she look miserable.

Royal Rumble

Shawn is #1 and Bulldog is #2. Shawn immediately jumps Bulldog but this isn’t going to last long. Remember there are one minute intervals, which was just a bad idea in general. Smith gets a quick gorilla press, but why throw Shawn OUT when you can just slam him? That clearly won’t come back to haunt him later or anything of course. Smith charges into a boot and here’s Eli Blu (one of the Harris Brothers, who were the big bald bikers who were around for WAY too long) at #3.

Nothing happens so here’s Duke Droese (a wrestling garbageman) at #4. Eli fights Smith and Droese squeezes Shawn until Jimmy Del Ray of the Heavenly Bodies is #5. Nothing continues to happen because there isn’t enough time between entries. Sione (Barbarian) of the Headshrinkers is #6 as Del Ray is tossed out. Tom Prichard of the Heavyenly Bodies is #7 and STILL nothing is happening.

Doink is #8 as the Rumble is going way too fast. It’s like the original Rumble: not enough names to care about and nothing going on at the same time. Kwang is #9 and Rick Martel is #10, I believe in his last WWF match. There are nine people in the ring right now. Shawn is almost out but fights off Kwang to survive. Owen Hart is in at #11 and here’s Bret to jump him in the aisle. Owen survives and climbs in, only to be eliminated in three seconds.

Shawn puts out Droese and Timothy Well (partners with Steven Dunn in the tag team of Well Dunn) is #12 and is out almost immediately. Martel and Prichard go out faster than I can see them and Kwang superkicks Doink out. Luke of the Bushwhackers is #13 and during his entrance, everyone but Bulldog and Shawn are gone. Literally, four people were put out inside of six seconds. Luke is out almost immediately and it’s Shawn vs. Bulldog again.

Here’s Jacob Blu at #14 and HE TOO is gone in like fifteen seconds. This is so stupid. King Kong Bundy is #15 and he beats on both guys for about twenty seconds before it’s Mo at #16. Mo is like the fifth guy to last less than thirty seconds. If your roster is this weak, CUT THE FREAKING MATCH DOWN. Nothing else happens until Mable is #17 for the showdown with Bundy. Mabel dumps him out as Butch is #18 and is gone in less than 20 seconds as well. More on this later.

Lex Luger is #19 and he goes right for Mabel for no apparent reason. He eliminates the fat purple and gold dude before gorilla pressing Michaels down like an idiot. Mantaur, a stupid monster character, is #20. He beats on Luger and Bulldog until Aldo Montoya (Justin Credible with a jockstrap on his face) is #21. Henry Godwinn is #22 as we’re waiting on a bunch of people to get thrown out so everyone can go home. I think this is one of Henry’s first matches.

Billy Gunn is #23 so naturally Bart Gunn is #24. Bob Backlund is #25 and also lasts about fifteen seconds due to a Bret Hart attack. Steven Dunn is #26 as there are like ten people in there. Bret and Backlund fight in the aisle again and old man Dick Murdoch is #27. Mantaur misses a charge at Bart and Adam Bomb is #28. For the second year in a row, Vince decides Adam Bomb is going to win the Rumble. Seriously.

Fatu is #29 and Luger eliminates Mantaur. Crush is #30, giving us a final group of Shawn, Bulldog, Luger, Montoya, Godwinn, Bart, Billy, Dunn, Murdoch, Bomb, Fatu and Crush, or WAY TOO MANY PEOPLE. Thankfully Crush immediately eliminates the Gunns to clear the ring out a bit. We cut to Anderson who gives a very uninterested wave and points to the ring. You know, because this is SO beneath her. Well, not beneath her enough to give the check back or anything but you get the idea.

Dunn is put out off camera and Murdoch almost puts Shawn out. Luger makes the save due to a lack of intelligence as Murdoch tries headbutts on Fatu. Naturally it doesn’t work at all because YOU DON’T HEADBUTT A SAMOAN. Bomb is backdropped out and Shawn throwsn Montoya out. Luger saves Shawn AGAIN and Crush eliminates Fatu. There are six guys left: Murdoch (who hits a dropkick and airplane spin on Godwinn), Godwinn, Shawn, Bulldog, Crush and Luger.

Murdoch gets dizzy from the spin and falls out to get us down to five. Lex dumps Godwinn and we’ve got four left. Michaels and Crush double team Luger as Bulldog gets a breather. They dump Lex and we’ve got three guys left. Smith gets double teamed until Shawn turns on Crush and is lifted into the air. Bulldog uses the distraction to eliminate Crush and it’s one on one. Davey destroys Shawn and presses him onto (not over. That would make sense) the top rope. Shawn is knocked over the top, but in the famous finish, he hangs on and ONLY ONE FOOT touches, allowing Shawn to come back in and eliminate Smith to win.

Rating: D. This is a hard one to grade, because the stuff that was decent was in fact decent. The problem is there wasn’t much stuff that falls into that category. First and foremost, SEVEN PEOPLE OUT OF THIRTY did not last thirty seconds. If they’re that meaningless to the match, simply do not put them in the Rumble. It looks stupid and there’s no reason to have them out there.

Second, the time intervals. These were a major issues because there’s no time to get ANYTHING going in the match. When you count ten seconds or so to get into the ring (some people take up to twenty), you’re looking at about 45 seconds of action with the new guy before someone else comes out. That’s just not enough time to get anything going at all.

Third, and this is probably the biggest problem of the match, look at the roster here. At a glance, I see four people with actual chances to win: Crush, Luger (they’re both BIG stretches), Bulldog, and Shawn. After that there’s Owen Hart but he was one of the guys that didn’t make it thirty seconds in the ring.

Then you’re looking at guys like Montoya and Well Dunn and the Bushwhackers (who amazingly still had jobs in 1995) and the Heavenly Bodies (by my count there were five tag teams in here, or one third of the match. WAY too many guys at that level) and Dick freaking Murdoch. This is a match that was BEGGING for a midcard to come in and fill in some spots. Guys like Ramon and Jarrett and Bigelow and Tatanka would have helped this match a ton, but instead we get all these fillers. That’s a big reason why this didn’t work.

Anderson poses with Shawn to end the show.

Overall Rating: C+. This is a hard one to grade because as good as the world title match is, the Rumble sucks it right back down. IRS vs. Taker isn’t anything good but it’s much more boring than bad. The opener and tag matches are good so I can’t complain much there. 1995 would be AWFUL for the most part though, mainly due to all of the problems you could see coming in the Rumble. Still though, not an awful show by any stretch and it has a great world title match.

Ratings Comparison

Jeff Jarrett vs. Razor Ramon

Original: B+

Redo: C+

Undertaker vs. IRS

Original: D

Redo: D

Bret Hart vs. Diesel

Original: B-

Redo: A

Bob Holly/1-2-3 Kid vs. Bam Bam Bigelow/Tatanka

Original: D+

Redo: C+

Royal Rumble

Original: D+

Redo: D

Overall Rating

Original: C-

Redo: C+

What in the world was I thinking on the title match? It was great.

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

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/01/14/royal-rumble-count-up-1995/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

Royal Rumble 1995
Date: January 22, 1995
Location: USF Sun Dome, Tampa, Florida
Attendance: 10,000
Commentators: Vince McMahon, Jerry Lawler

Well, another year has passed and other than some different jobbers in the midcard, the only big change is Diesel has replaced Luger atop the company. Yoko is now a non factor, Bret is of course in the title hunt, and Luger is in the midcard doing jack. Other than that there are just not a lot of differences. Of course we have the Rumble, but other than that and a Diesel vs. Bret title match, we’ve got nothing of note.

This was a very weird period for the company as they were pretty much booking as they went instead of having long term plans. At the same time in WCW, everything was more or less thrown together. Also, there’s still no Nitro at this point as it was about seven and a half months away. There’s just not a ton going on at this point in wrestling and it’s clear that a change was needed. However, that wouldn’t come for over a year and a half, and as you’ll see, that was WAY too far off. Let’s get to this.

Your big deal here is that Pamela Anderson is here and will escort the winner of the Rumble to Mania. This would turn out to be one of the worst celebrity things that I can remember as she just looked like she absolutely HATED being there. If you’re getting paid to be there, at least try to not look like you’re just wanting to go get smashed. The intro is as generic of a beach thing as you can possibly imagine. Why does Vince have to be such a freaking mic hog? It’s really annoying.

Intercontinental Title: Jeff Jarrett vs. Razor Ramon

These two feuded for what seemed like forever. Razor is of course the champion here as that’s all he ever did. Razor’s intro has reached Orton levels. Jerry gets in a funny line about how Jarrett, a country singer here, is going to star in a Broadway play: Phantom of the Grand Ole Opry. That’s just great. As we have a long feeling out period, we keep seeing the Roadie, who is more commonly known as the Road Dogg.

These two had some awesome chemistry to say the least. The gimmick that Jarrett had hurt him a lot I think. He was hard to take seriously, which is unfair because he looked good, he sounded good, he wrestled well, and he just overall worked as a big time guy. However, due to his gimmick and eventually the guitar he just failed. I’ve never gotten that. Take this match for example: everything is working fine and it’s a pretty solid match.

I don’t have anything to really make fun of in it. Granted that could be because Razor was incredibly underrated here so that might have something to do with it. Razor does all his usual stuff, although instead of the bulldog from the middle rope we get a clothesline. These two are having a very solid match out there if I do say so myself. We go to the floor though and Roadie clips Razor’s knee to send him down.

That causes the count out but Jarrett is intelligent for a change and says that he doesn’t want it that way so we need to keep going. They went for almost fifteen minutes to get to this point if that tells you anything. It was a lot of feeling out stuff but at the end of it we more or less had a stalemate. Razor gets back in and we’re ready to go again. I’ve never gotten the term restart the match. Why don’t they get new entrances?

That’s what started the match and if you’re going to redo them you might as well redo those too. With Razor’s knee destroyed, Jeff of course gets the Figure Four on a bit later. Lawler channels his inner Monsoon and says stick a fork in him, he’s done.

However, since Razor is a face and therefore comes equipped with healing powers, he escapes and makes his comeback. If Vince says he’s got him! No wait he doesn’t, one more time I’m going to scream. He gets Jarrett up in the Edge but his knee gives out and a small package gives Jarrett the title. That was good.

Rating: B+. That was a solid opener. Razor was a big deal at the time and him jobbing to Jarrett should have been the start of a big push for him but for some reason that wasn’t the case. These two were both solid workers that were likely told to just go out there and have a good match and that’s just what they did. This was a great opener.

Some annoying looking woman can’t find Jarrett. Hint: HE’S IN THE RING!

Todd is with Pamela Anderson who has gotten lots of gifts from wrestlers because apparently wooing her will make them win the Rumble. I really hate this.

The annoying woman has found Jarrett but calls him Razor. He looks good with the belt.

IRS vs. Undertaker

This was during the epically long Taker vs. DiBiase’s Million Dollar Team feud. This was actually billed as Death vs. Taxes. I give up. Apparently Taker was at a monster truck rally the night before, in character. That’s just amusing to no end. They say he was there watching his favorite monster truck: Grave Digger. There’s just something hilarious in that. As expected, there’s not a ton here.

Look at the guys in there and tell me you were expecting a solid match with a straight face. IRS simply isn’t a legit opponent here, plain and simple. This is a lot of IRS trying to fight Taker and naturally failing while Lawler says the Druids, who worked for DiBiase, should be at ringside. I’m quite bored during this match as it’s just not interesting at all. Taker apparently was at the NFL 75th Anniversary Black Tie Dinner. WOW that’s an image.

After more beating on IRS, DiBiase brings in the Druids because this wasn’t uninteresting enough. The Druids mess up Old School as the ring sounds weird. This just needs to end like NOW. It’s completely boring and feels like a bad joke or something. Lawler thinks the urn has something to do with Taker’s power. That’s so stupid I don’t even know where to begin. It’s the SMOKE inside the urn, not the urn itself.

IRS gets out of a tombstone because of the Druids and hits his finisher: a clothesline called the Write Off. Yep, his finisher is a clothesline. After sitting up for like the 4th time, a bad chokeslam ends this FINALLY. Oh wait here are the druids for even more wasting of time. King Kong Bundy comes out and allows IRS to steal the urn. I really couldn’t be any less interested. Oh and apparently the cheering of the fans works as well as the urn. I give up.

Rating: D. Oh man this was bad. It ran about 12 minutes but it felt like 45. I mean really, Death vs. Taxes? Who thought that was going to be a good match? This should have been about half as long as it was and a glorified squash. No one bought Taker as being in any kind of danger here and it’s clear that this was just not going to be competitive. It was also really boring with the Druids and DiBiase taking too much time. Just a horrible waste of time.

We get interviews from earlier in the day where Todd pesters the heck out of Bret and Diesel who don’t want to talk to him.

WWF Title: Bret Hart vs. Diesel

Diesel is champion and Bret wants to be champion, end of backstory. They point out that Bret has won two triple crowns while Diesel has won it faster than anyone else (Punk broke that record.) Diesel goes over to talk to Lawrence Taylor and it starts. I really don’t get what they thought that was going to accomplish. Actually I do as it got them a ton of mainstream press, but the fans got screwed over in about 3 months.

WE ARE LIVE! Vince, I hate your marketing obsession. They’ve bought the show. You don’t have to sell it to them again. This actually starts with a slugfest, which naturally doesn’t work for Bret. There’s a bit of a story going on here as Bret is trying to get at Diesel’s legs using all kinds of little tricks and quick moves while Diesel is just straight ahead power. I like that. Bret gets the leg and hammers it early which is odd.

We’re 5 minutes in and we’re on our seconds figure four. Vince says it’s perfect. Vince is wrong. Lawler uses that line I hate about how they’re the same size on the mat. No, Diesel is indeed still taller than Bret. Bret is acting a bit heelish here which the announcers point out. I love that suicide dive that Bret uses. It just looks awesome. Granted any version of that looks great.

Apparently one elbow from Diesel is like 10 average punches. So he has the strength of ten men. That’s amusing indeed. In a funny moment, Diesel gets Bret up in an Argentinean Back Breaker which starts like a powerbomb but Diesel stops to put the hold on. Bret gives a look to the referee and then realizes what’s going on. It looked funnier than it sounded.

In a weird spot, Bret wraps Diesel’s legs around the post and ties them with his tape to beat on him. This lasts about 5 seconds as the referee frees him. That was kind of stupid. We go to the floor…again and Bret hits a pescado but is caught and posted. Diesel goes for him again but then remembers to sell the knee injury. Thanks for that one big guy.

Diesel hits the jackknife but Shawn runs in for the save. He beats on Diesel and works on his leg, yet that’s not enough for a DQ. Well thanks guys. I guess we’re building up some screwjob credits for two and a half years from now. Bret hooks his third figure four of the match as the fans are so bored with it I’m amazed. Lawler channels his inner Heenan and keeps changing his pick. Dang it Nash sell the freaking knee!

Ok, this whole Bret can’t get disqualified thing is freaking stupid. He cracks Diesel in the knee with a chair and that’s not enough for a DQ. The referee has no issue with checking on a submission after that. Owen runs out for the save as this has just gotten stupid. Hey we’ve used chairs, posts, tape and run ins. Why not an exposed buckle? How can no one get that Bret is likely playing possum as he’s done it about once a match for years. Oh sure. Let’s knock out the referee now.

Owen, Shawn and Backlund and Jarrett and the Roadie run in and FINALLY we get the DQ. So let me get this straight: it was always going to be a double DQ, yet we had to sit through all of those run ins, weapon shots and just absurdity to get there? Why did the heels have to wait for the referee to go down? No one else got disqualified earlier for it.

The announcement of the draw, so apparently they still didn’t get disqualified, gets booed out of the building. Bret gets put in the chicken wing but Diesel breaks it up as his knee is just fine all of a sudden. I hate that. The faces shake hands which I’m ok with. Oh NOW the knee hurts again. Thanks for that one Nash.

Rating: B-. I know I blasted the ending and a lot of this match, but that likely wasn’t fair. This really was a solid match for about 80% of it, but dang they did too much with this. If you want to have the ending the way you had it that’s fine, but why have the run ins earlier in the match like that? I just don’t get that part. I get not wanting to have either guy be made to look weak, but this was just too much overkill for my taste.

That being said, when it was just Bret vs. Diesel, there was a of great stuff in there. The psychology was there, but Diesel, I can’t emphasize this enough: SELL THE KNEE NEXT TIME! I mean Bret worked the heck out of that thing and Diesel barely limped half the time. Anyway, this was solid enough, but the booking didn’t make a ton of sense in my eyes.

Holly and 1-2-3 Kid are in the back and say they believe in themselves.

King draws a picture of himself kissing Anderson using a telestrator. He’s talented but that was pointless.

Tag Titles: Bam Bam Bigelow/Tatanka vs. Bob Holly/1-2-3 Kid

This is the final of a tournament after Shawn and Diesel split and dropped the titles. Holly and the Kid are doing the whole underdog that won’t die thing that no one likes but Vince insists we’re always enthralled with. The heels are completely dominating for about the first 8 minutes or so. I know that’s kind of a blanket statement, but dang this just isn’t even close.

Why should we buy either of these guys as having a snowball’s chance in the world of beating Bigelow or Tatanka. They mention Lou Albano which is still kind of sad. We get it: Holly drives cars. As if we don’t have enough dominance here, Kid accidentally hits Holly. Vince points out that the faces haven’t been around for long and were thrown together. Way to bury the teams they’ve beaten Vince.

Oh apparently they were supposed to be the Smoking Gunns but there was a rodeo accident. I don’t want to know. Holly actually tries to tag in Tatanka. This is just stupid at this point. The faces make a brief comeback which given the way they booked it is something close to believable. Kid is launched to the floor and Bigelow goes up for the moonsault. Tatanka picks that moment to hit the ropes though, and Bigelow crashes to the mat back first.

Holly hits a running forearm to knock the stereotype to the floor and the referee starts a double count. He gets to EIGHT and Kid puts an arm over Bigelow for the pin, SEVENTEEN SECONDS after he hit the mat. So let me get this straight. Falling about 12 feet to concrete keeps you down for about 5 seconds in the Kid’s case, but falling about 6 keeps you down at least 20 seconds? Yeah I hate this match.

As if that’s not enough, the Gunns would win the belts the next night on Raw, which makes me want to know something: WHY DIDN’T THEY JUST WIN THE FREAKING TOURNAMENT??? If you want to put the titles on the Cowboys, that’s fine. However, why not just have them go over Bigelow and Tatanka here?

Oh that’s right: to further Bigelow’s mindless face turn that happened because he kept losing to guys like Kid and Lawrence Taylor of all people. Where did that turn wind up? Oh yeah: Japan and ECW. Thanks for taking care of your audience Vince.

Rating: D+. I HATE matches where one team completely dominates and then a mistake at the end gives the other guy/team the win. That’s just lazy booking and it makes the winners look completely weak. Bigelow and Tatanka shouldn’t have won, but the faces should have been the freaking Guns. How hard is it to just think for a minute and not overbook the heck out of a match? This is Vince’s biggest flaw as a booker: he over complicates everything.

Post match, Taylor is laughing at Bigelow so the big bald man shoves him and we have our Mania main event. Man I hate 1995 wrestling. This takes 10 minutes somehow.

We get a ton of interviews about the Rumble that I don’t feel like recapping. Everyone says they’ll win and say stuff about Pamela Anderson because she’s more important than Wrestlemania.

Royal Rumble

Oh wait we have to let Pam look bored out of her mind and pretend to be into this for awhile first. I hate celebrities being in wrestling. Anyway, Shawn is first and Bulldog as second. Oh and this year it’s one minute because we just HAD to have all those other matches and we don’t have time for actual intervals. Good night Shawn calls spots loudly at times.

Bulldog has Shawn in a gorilla press but of course slams him instead of throwing him over. Shawn is getting the tar beaten out of him as Eli Blu (Skull of the DOA) comes out as 3. We’re 10% of the way through already which is just stupid. Oh come on we’re at the countdown already? Duke Drose is 4th. What kind of a name is the Dumpster? It’s just stupid.

His gimmick was a wrestling garbage man. That’s beyond any and all logic whatsoever. Let the countdown begin! It’s Jimmy Del Ray who means nothing at all for the most part. We get some heel vs. heel mullet action with him fighting Shawn. Sixth is Sione (Barbarian) as I already hate this match. Del Ray is the first guy out as Shawn keeps surviving in impressive ways.

In at seven is Tom Pritchard, Del Ray’s partner because we have to keep a high level of suckage in there. Vince is in full blown over the top mode here as he asks Lawler if every guy that he likes is going to win the Rumble. Also notice that Vince always says Royal Rumble instead of just Rumble. He has to make sure it’s said correctly. Doink is eighth as this match is rapidly catching 93 as worst Rumble of all time.

Everything is all over the place and the time intervals are just killing it. Granted the whole and complete lack of interesting talent is killing it too. Kwang is in at 9 as I’m thinking about throwing on some Family Ties which I’m not a fan of but it would be more interesting than this.

We’re at double digits with Rick Martel who never changes at all. Del Ray is the only elimination at the moment so the ring is full. That’s another issue with this: You can’t get rid of people without making them look weak, but at the same time you can’t let the ring get this full because it’s too cluttered. That clock is really starting to tick me off. Owen is number 11.

Bret runs out to jump him though on his way to the ring in the most interesting thing in the whole match so far. Now everything starts going insane. Timothy Well (of Well Dunn) is number 12 to a big pop? No actually Bulldog threw Owen out about a second after he got in. At the same time I think Martel went out and Droese was thrown over and landed on Earl Hebner in an unplanned spot. Well is gone also.

Oh Martel just got thrown out. Pritchard is out and we have Doink, Barbarian, Shawn, Bulldog, Eli and Kwang. Doink is out as Luke of the Bushwackers comes out. In an elimination that you can only see on the screen and isn’t acknowledged by Vince or Jerry, Barbarian throws out Kwang and then he and Eli eliminate each other. That leaves us with Shawn, Bulldog and Luke. This is making my head hurt.

He’s in there about 10 seconds as Shawn throws him out. He still had a job at this point? Why? Jerry is timing people with his Mickey Mouse watch. That sounds like a simple comedy one liner right? This confuses the HECK out of Vince. You can tell he’s just thrown completely off by it which granted could have been him fighting back laughter. Now I want a Mickey watch. Jacob Blu (8-Ball of the DOA) is number 14 as we’re nearly halfway done and 15 minutes hasn’t passed yet.

Shawn dumps him in about 15 seconds and we’re back to the first two all over again. Former Wrestlemania main event level talent King Kong Bundy is our halfway man. We get a replay of Owen being eliminated, which was a mere five minutes ago. This show should be shown to ROH fans as a torture method. Mo is in next and Bundy becomes my hero by putting him out in three seconds. Naturally Mabel is next as we continue the dumb tag partners in a row tradition.

Of course he goes right after Bundy and we have a bad battle of the big men which can indeed get old. Eighteen (seriously?) is Butch. Bundy is gone and Butch follows soon thereafter. Both guys (Mabel and Bulldog) try to put out Shawn as Luger the midcard guy is 19th. Dang he fell very far very fast. He puts out Mabel with ease.

Mantaur is number 20 as my eyes roll. He’s supposed to be half man and half bull I think but it was never really explained. This is easily his crowning achievement though so take that for what it’s worth. 21st is Aldo Montoya who is more commonly known as Justin Credible and more commonly known as the guy wearing a jockstrap on his face. Henry Godwin is 22nd and the sixth guy in along with Luger, Mantaur, Bulldog, Shawn and Montoya.

He’s a heel here for no apparent reason. We see Pamela who looks like she’s being told she is about to drink yak urine. Our Jordan entrant is Billy Gunn. WAIT A SECOND! He was too injured to fight in the tournament but he can fight here. I hate Vince. Oh apparently they were injured to keep them out of the tournament but they get a title shot tomorrow instead? I’d just fake injuries to get title shot after title shot.

Bart is of course 24th because tag partners always get the same numbers. In case you can’t tell I hate this match to a great extent. Bob Backlund is next as we have 5 left. Oh look it’s Bret playing policeman again. They would fight at Mania in an ok at best rematch from Survivor Series. Next is Steven Dunn since we have to further lower our intelligence. In case you can’t tell, the final two will be Shawn and Bulldog.

Backlund is out after being in about 15 seconds. Bret stays in the spotlight by jumping him again. As that happens, Dick freaking Murdoch is in at 27. He’s 48 here and would be dead in about a year and a half. He’s also in the KKK but that’s not likely to be mentioned. No one has a clue who he is by the way. It amazes me that he can get an entry here. Were they that hard up for talent that he’s the best they can get?

What’s even worse is he’s more energetic than most people in there. Adam Bomb who should have been pushed harder than he was is 28th. There’s like 10 guys in there and I’m not even bothering to recap them as it’s obvious what’s going to happen in case you can’t tell. Fatu is the penultimate guy. Luger gets Mantaur on the ropes and shakes him up and down to get him out which just looked stupid. He’s out though.

Crush who also should have been pushed is number thirty. Like I said I’m not wasting my time on listing them. The Gunns go out at the same time because of Murdoch and Crush. Murdoch looks pretty good out there actually. We go back to Anderson who points back at the ring as in get off me so I can be miserable and then get my check. I think there’s 9 people in there. Let’s up the stupidity a bit as Vince says that never again will two guys go out at the same time and hit at the same time.

Of course, this ended the show last year and JUST HAPPENED. Luger saves Michaels for no apparent reason. Bomb goes out. I nearly spit out my drink as Vince says he was a favorite. That’s just amusing. He’s young and over and decent. There’s no way he could do anything of note. Montoya is out and AGAIN Luger saves Michaels. Is he that scared of the power of Murdoch? The final six are Luger, Murdoch, Godwin, Bulldog, Shawn and Crush.

Murdoch is by far the most interesting guy in here as he hooks an airplane spin but falls out when trying to dump Godwin. Shawn sprints at Luger which is awesome. This just needs to end as it’s not interesting at all. Godwin is out and we’re at the final four. Crush puts out Luger and I think some nachos sound good here. The heels beat on Bulldog for a bit as we’re just wasting time. Crush tries to jump Shawn but Bulldog sneaks up and drops Crush to get us down to the starters.

We get the famous ending as Bulldog clotheslines Shawn up and over and the music hits for the celebration. But wait. What’s this? Shawn jumps back in and nails Smith to put him over the top and he’s declared the winner. For the only time this will ever be said, Vince is awesome on the mic here. Fink announces that only one foot hit and Vince is stunned. We go to the replay and in one of the coolest and most impressive things I’ve ever seen in wrestling, Shawn’s foot does not touch.

That’s amazing and very risky as if he slips one inch, and who could blame him if he did, the next few months have to be completely altered. Anyway, Shawn wins and he and Pam “celebrate” as it looks like she wants to scream. She even leaves halfway through it as Shawn poses to end the show.

Rating: D+. This has been called the Jobber Rumble and it fits perfectly. I mean look at the list of people. The only ones that were ever going to have a chance were Shawn and Luger, both of whom were midcard guys at best here. The whole thing was just messed up with no monsters to save anything and no one that was a big star to be a big surprise. That’s just stupid.

The one minute intervals are just flat out stupid too. There’s zero time to get going at all and it was just stupid. This did however get two things right: the ending was downright inspired. That’s one o the best ways I can think of to end the thing and the key to it for me is Shawn won completely legally. He earned the win and that’s the most important thing as it ties into the other thing they got right: a midcard guy got elevated.

Shawn goes from IC Title dude to world title shot at Mania in less than 40 minutes. That’s what the Rumble could be for yet never is. They got the end right, but the road getting there was just awful. This could be worse than 93 but I don’t think it quite is.

Overall Rating: C-. This show is just not great at all. It’s the epitome of just being there. It’s not good or bad although it’s leaning towards that latter of the two. The matches are just uninteresting and this feels like it could be on any show at all. Yes we have three title matches, but while they’re good, they could easily have happened on Raws or any run of the mill PPV.

It’s a show where the matches don’t add up to the whole show, as this just feels completely empty despite having some decent stuff on it. I’d say check this out only in extreme cases of boredom or for hardcore fans only. The casual viewer will just be bored to tears, which the ratings around this time reflect. This show was bad, but the individual stuff was ok I guess.

 

 

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s Complete 2004 Monday Night Raw Reviews (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

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Royal Rumble 1994
Date: January 22, 1994
Location: Providence Civic Center, Providence, Rhode Island
Attendance: 14,500
Commentators: Vince McMahon, Ted DiBiase

This is one of those shows where the good stuff is good but the bad stuff is REALLY bad. The main idea here is that someone has to stop Yokozuna, and it’s going to be one of three people: Bret Hart or Lex Luger who could get the shot by winning the Rumble, or the Undertaker who has a casket match against Yoko tonight for the title. Oh….this is going to be a long night. Let’s get to it.

Vince is on commentary here and gets to do his carnival barker stuff. The guy knows how to make a show sound exciting, I have to give him that. DiBiase comes out to do commentary with McMahon due to having to retire late in 1993 due to a bunch of injuries.

Tatanka vs. Bam Bam Bigelow

Bigelow is in Ludvig Borga’s spot because Borga broke his ankle. Bigelow pounds on Tatanka to start and dropkicks him into the corner. Tatanka literally bounces off of Bigelow before coming back with a chop to take Bigelow down. A DDT puts Bam Bam down again but Tatanka goes up for a cross body, missing Bigelow by a mile. This is a REALLY hot start so far. Bigelow crushes Tatanka in the corner with a splash and things slow down somewhat.

Tatanka gets in a shot to the head and tries a top rope sunset flip, only to have Bam Bam sit on him. When all else fails, sit on the other guy. Off to a bearhug for about two minutes before Bigelow drops him with a shoulder block. Tatanka starts his war path thing so Bam Bam decks him in the head with an enziguri to drop him. The moonsault misses though and Tatanka goes up again, this time hitting the cross body for the pin.

Rating: C+. Shockingly hot opener here and if you cut the bear hug in half or so, this is a really solid match. They stuck to the formula really well here and the match was good as a result. This is one of the nice surprises in wrestling: on paper this sounded horrible but it turned out to be a pretty nice match. Good opener.

We recap the tag title match, which is a rare instance where it’s all about the challengers rather than the champions. Owen Hart was the only Hart Brother eliminated in the Survivor Series match against Shawn and his Knights, which ticked him off. Owen had been whipped into Bret on the apron and the distraction let Shawn roll Owen up for the pin.

This caused Owen to cut a heel promo, talking about how he was tired of being in Bret’s shadow and wanting a match with him to escape it. Bret of course said no, but instead offered to team up with Owen to get his brother his first championship. Owen talked about leading the team but seemed genuinely ok at this point. For some reason we also see the Quebecers losing the tag titles to the 1-2-3 Kid and Marty Jannetty for a single week for some reason.

The Harts talk about all the teams they’re going to give title shots to once they win the belts tonight.

Tag Titles: Bret Hart/Owen Hart vs. Quebecers

The Quebecers are managed by Johnny Polo, who would change his name to Raven in ECW. Pierre and Bret start things off with the challenger taking over. Off to Owen to work on the arm with his signature spinning counter to a wristlock. Off to Jacques and they botch something, but Owen hits a quick suplex to keep things on track. An enziguri gets two for Owen and it’s back to Bret.

After a bunch of rollups by Bret, everything breaks down and the Quebecers take over. Actually scratch that as Owen hits a kind of spear into a rollup for two and the Harts stand tall. It’s Bret vs. Jacques with Hart in control until it’s back to Owen for a gutwrench suplex for two. Bret comes back in, only to get powerslammed down by Pierre. A pair of knees to the back gets two and it’s back to Jacques.

That goes nowhere so Pierre comes in to jump into a boot. Owen comes back in and belly to bellys Jacques down before hooking the Sharpshooter. Pierre bulldogs Owen down for a fast save of course and it’s back to Pierre legally. Owen dropkicks both Quebecers down and it’s off to Bret again. For some reason both champions are allowed to stay in the ring for way too long. Pierre is atomic dropped to the floor, and now we get to the turning point of the match: Johnny Polo holds the ropes open to send Bret to the floor. Bret comes up holding his knee and he’s in big trouble.

Pierre rams the knee into the barricade to further the damage and the match turns into a kind of sloppy brawl on the floor. Owen finally throws Bret back into the ring and the leg work begins. Jacques puts on a half crab but Owen makes a fast save. The champions load up the Cannonball (kind of an aided Swanton) but Bret rolls away. Instead of tagging though, Bret tries the Sharpshooter….and the referee stops the match for the knee injury.

Rating: B-. This is one of those matches where you can look at it in multiple ways. From a match standpoint, it’s a standard tag match with the faces and heels doing exactly what they would be expected to do. On the other hand, the idea here was about setting up Owen’s heel turn, and the ending does that perfectly. There was no reason for Bret to not tag at the end and it sets Owen off as it should.

Post match Owen glares at Bret and paces back and forth. Bret manages to pull himself up but can barely stand up. Owen kicks the leg out, officially turning heel to HUGE booing. He leaves so here are some officials to come check on Bret. Ray Rougeau, a reporter for WWF at this point, comes out to interview Bret while he’s on his back in agony. For some reason that cracks me up.

Owen is in the back and goes on a huge tirade about how selfish Bret is and how Bret cost him the biggest match of his career. Bret is being carried to the back and has to watch this promo on the video screen. Owen’s face here is great as he unleashes all this pent up anger and frustration on Bret, saying he’ll win the Rumble because he doesn’t have to count on Bret. This would be the top feud for the next eight months or so.

Intercontinental Title: IRS vs. Razor Ramon

Guess who is defending here. JR and Gorilla Monsoon do commentary for this match. IRS goes on a big rant about how evil the crowd here is for not paying their taxes, even though they have about three months left to file. Razor goes off on IRS to start, knocking him out to the floor. IRS comes back with some forearms but Razor punches him right back down to take over again.

Ramon hits a bunch of basic stuff like atomic drops and clotheslines for some two counts, but IRS ducks under a clothesline to send Razor out to the floor. Back in and IRS goes up but jumps into a boot. For one of the only times I can EVER remember this happening, IRS avoids the foot and drops an elbow for two instead. WHY IS THAT SO HARD FOR PEOPLE TO DO???

We hit the chinlock for well over a minute before Razor fights up and hits the fallaway slam. The referee gets knocked out in the corner and IRS grabs his briefcase, only for Razor to take it back and clock him in the head with it. No referee though, so Razor loads up a belly to back superplex. There’s still no referee, so Razor sets for the Edge, only to have Shawn run out and clock him with the fake IC Title. IRS finally wakes up and pins Razor for the title.

Rating: D+. This wasn’t bad but the overbooking hurt it a lot. This should have lasted about three minutes less and it would have been a lot better. Oddly enough I don’t remember IRS being champion at all, but then again this is the remastered version so maybe they really cleaned things up.

Or maybe another referee comes out to explain the interference and the match is restarted. Razor hits the Edge to retain.

Bearer and Undertaker are making a coffin for Yoko.

We recap the world title match, which is Yoko being scared of Taker and Taker being one of the last hopes to stop the monster. Apparently the contract was signed before Yoko and company knew it was a casket match. Taker I believe debuted his popping out of the casket spot in this feud.

WWF World Title: The Undertaker vs. Yokozuna

They stare each other down to start and Taker fires off his uppercuts to stagger the champion. A clothesline puts Yoko down and another uppercut puts Yoko on the floor. Taker is sent into the steps and it’s immediately no sold, scaring Yoko to death again. There’s Old School but the jumping clothesline misses as Yoko ducks. Why does no one else ever think of doing that?

They fight over a chair on the floor which winds up going upside Yoko’s head. There’s a plastic chair to the back of the champion but Yoko grabs the trusty salt to blind Taker. Now it’s Taker’s back getting hit with the chair and we head back inside. A clothesline puts Taker down but he fights out of the casket. Taker wins a slugout in the middle of the ring but Yoko belly to belly suplexes him down. Come on. You know that’s not holding him down. Taker pops up and grabs Yoko by the throat and hits a DDT to put the champion down again.

Yoko is placed in the casket but here’s Crush to block Taker from closing it. Taker slugs him down so here’s Great Kabuki and Tenryu but Taker beats them down as well. Yoko is still out cold in the casket. Bam Bam Bigelow comes in now and it’s 4-1 in the ring. One has to wonder why Paul Bearer doesn’t go over and close the casket but this match doesn’t seem to be the most logical one. Fuji and Cornette have stolen the Urn.

Yoko finally gets out of the casket as Bearer beats up Fuji and Cornette, stealing the Urn back. He uses it to recharge Taker, who fights off all four mercenaries. Now it’s Adam Bomb to make it technically 8-1 but Taker fights everyone off with the salt bucket. Jeff Jarrett comes in as well, as do the Headshrinkers. That makes it NINE wrestlers (Yoko, Crush, Kabuki, Tenryu, Bigelow, Jarrett, Samu, Fatu, Adam Bomb) against Undertaker.

AND HE GETS UP. Diesel comes out and they get Taker in the coffin but he fights ALL OF THEM OFF. Yoko steals the Urn and hits Taker in the head with it before opening the Urn. Green smoke comes out of it and Taker now is powerless. Everyone hits a bunch of moves on him as this goes on WAY too long. After ALL THAT, Taker is put in the coffin and Yoko retains the title.

Rating: F. On a major wrestling show, The Undertaker just fought off ten men until green smoke was released to drain him of his power. I’ve seen Japanese anime that makes more sense than this. Oh and the match itself, as in the one on one part, might have gone about six minutes.

BUT IT GETS WORSE!

The heels all push the coffin away when a gong goes off. Smoke comes out of the casket…..and a FREAKING CAMERA FEED FROM INSIDE THE CASKET POPS UP ON THE SCREEN. Taker says his soul lives in everyone and he can’t be extinguished. He says there’s going to be a rebirth of the Undertaker and he won’t rest in peace. Then electrical noises go off and we get something like an inverse camera shot (as in it’s all in black and white but what is white is black and what is black is white).

Then, to REALLY hammer home the point, the image on the screen starts to rise up through the top of the screen (which should be the top of the casket, meaning it should be ramming into the people that put him in the freaking casket) and A FREAKING BODY RISES OUT OF THE TOP OF THE SCREEN. AS IN A TANGIBLE BODY (which might have been played by Marty Jannetty).

In other words, WWF just said Taker is something like Jesus. Oh and one other thing to really make sure this is stupid: YOU CAN’T SEE IT. All I can see are some quick shots of it when flashes go off. This is one of those things that embarrasses me as a wrestling fan. I mean…..WOW.

The usual Rumble interviews eat up some time.

Royal Rumble

Scott Steiner is #1 and Samu is #2. Also the intervals are every 90 seconds this year so the entrances will come in faster than ever. Scott pounds away to start and hits a butterfly suplex as Samu tries to hang on. He does indeed survive and kills Scott with a clothesline. Rick Steiner is #3 and Samu is in BIG trouble. After some suplexes he’s out very quickly (but not before getting his head caught in the top and middle rope which is always kind of scary looking), giving us the Battle of the Steiners.

That battle literally lasts six seconds as Kwang (Savio Vega in a mask, allegedly Asian here) is #4. Scott suplexes Kwang down and Owen Hart is #5 to BIG heel heat. The heels take over and Owen actually dumps Rick out. That’s one of the rare times where the constant pushing against the ropes worked. Bart Gunn is #6 and things speed up a bit. No one really does anything so here’s Diesel at #7. This is where things pick up as this match is without a doubt Diesel’s coming out party.

He beats on everyone and throws out Bart, Scott, Owen and Kwang inside of 45 seconds. Bob Backlund is #8 and immediately goes for the leg. He actually gets Diesel up against the ropes and upside down, but Diesel will have none of that. Who would believe these two would have a world title match in Madison Square Garden later in the year? Backlund is gone quickly. Billy Gunn is #9 and doesn’t even last fifteen seconds.

We cut to the back where Kabuki and Tenryu are destroying Lex Luger. After Diesel stands around for a bit, he has to throw out Virgil who is #10 in about thirty seconds (causing DiBiase to laugh loudly and get in some good verbal jabs). Note that the fans are LOUDLY chanting for Diesel here, who had NEVER gotten a reaction until this point. No one has been able to stand up to Diesel at all so far. #11 is Randy Savage. This should be a bit better challenge I’d think.

Savage goes right for him and pounds away on the big man in the corner before peppering him with jabs. He has Diesel in trouble but Jeff Jarrett is #12 to save the not yet Big Daddy Cool. We hear about Jarrett wanting to become WWF Champion so he’ll be a famous country singer in Nashville. And people wonder why he never got over until he completely changed everything about his character.

Savage is thrown to the apron by Jarrett but Randy comes back and eliminates Jeff with ease. Crush, who Savage HATES at this point, is #13. Diesel just kind of chills in the corner as Savage beats up Crush. The numbers finally catch up with Savage though until Crush eliminates him with ease. Doink is #14 and he gets beaten up as well but not tossed. Here’s his big rival Bam Bam Bigelow at #15 and it’s 3-1 now. Bigelow easily thorws the clown out ala the Spike Dudley throw from ECW.

Mabel is #16 and dang there are some big guys in there. He goes right for Diesel in a terrifying preview of Summerslam 95. Mabel cleans house until Sparky Plugg (Bob Holly as a racecar driver and debuting here as a replacement for the 1-2-3 Kid) is #17. Shawn Michaels is #18 and stares down Diesel to start. Everyone gets on Diesel and Shawn gives the final push to eliminate him. Diesel gets a VERY audible ovation and chant as he leaves.

Mo, Mabel’s totally useless partner, is #19. Nothing of note happens so here’s Greg Valentine in a one night only appearance at #20. Mabel misses a charge in the corner and Shawn is gorilla pressed by Crush but not eliminated for some reason. Tatanka comes in at #21. To recap we’ve got Plugg, Valentine, Tatanka, Mabel, Bigelow, Crush, Michaels and Mo in there. Valentine puts Michaels on the apron but can’t get him out.

Kabuki is #22 and almost everyone gangs up on Mabel to dump him out. It’s amazing how much easier it is to see with the big fat purple tub of goo out of there. Lex Luger (looking FINE after that attack like 15 minutes ago) is #23 and he cleans house. There are ten people in the ring right now but there goes Kabuki at the hands of Lex. Luger clotheslines Bigelow down and here’s Tenryu at #24.

There are WAY too many people in there right now. Like seriously, do we need FREAKING MO in there? Or Valentine? Those are bodies you could dump out and no one would care. Luger and Tenryu go at it as Shawn is almost dumped out. Bastion Booger is supposed to be #25 but he’s not here for some reason (Vince says it was supposed to be Bret Hart but more on that in a bit). I believe there are nine people in there at the moment so Booger not coming in was a good thing. Granted it was a good thing either way but you get the idea. Rick Martel is #26 and nothing happens.

For your big face pop of the match (other than Diesel): Bret Hart is #27 and limping very badly. Today, people would have a bandage on the knee and charge to the ring because modern wrestling is stupid. Fatu is #28 and DEAR FREAKING GOODNESS THROW SOMEONE OUT ALREADY! A bunch of guys team up and FINALLY throw Crush out as Marty Jannetty is #29. Naturally he goes right for Shawn and punches Shawn to the apron.

Adam Bomb is #30, giving us a ridiculous THIRTEEN FINAL PEOPLE in the Rumble. The final group is Bigelow, Sparky, Shawn, Mo (seriously, FREAKING MO?), Valentine, Tatanka, Luger, Tenryu, Martel, Hart, Fatu, Jannetty and Bomb. Bret saves Shawn (shocking I know) to dump out Sparky, thank goodness. Bret beats on everyone as we still need to get rid of more people. Everyone beats on everyone for awhile and nothing is happening. DiBiase: “The smart thing to do is go after Bret Hart’s knee.” Vince: “The smart thing to do is throw people out of the ring.” Did….did Vince just burn Ted Dibiase?

Martel dumps Valentine but is quickly dumped out by Tatanka. Luger throws out Bomb and Mo is FINALLY put out as well. Bigelow tosses Tatanka and Lex forearms Bam Bam out. Jannetty goes out to get us down to Luger, Hart, Fatu, Tenryu and Shawn. Tenryu rams Shawn and Fatu’s heads together which only hurts Shawn of course. Luger and Bret put out Tenryu and it’s Bret vs. Shawn (duh). Luger goes for Fatu’s head and gets superkicked for being stupid.

The heels put Luger on the apron but he fights them both off and clotheslines Fatu into a 360. Bret dumps Fatu and Luger dumps Shawn and we’re down to two. They slug it out and Luger picks up Bret, but they both fall out at the same time, giving us a double elimination to end the Rumble.

Rating: C+. This is a hard one to grade. The pacing is TERRIBLE with guys like Sparky Plugg and Mo staying in for over twenty minutes each, but the action is solid for the most part. The stuff with Diesel is excellent and it truly made him a star. The ending stuff once they got rid of about seven guys in 90 seconds was good too, but stuff in the middle didn’t work all that well.

Post match there’s a disagreement over who wins but both guys have their music played. This would lead to a somewhat complicated decision where there was a coin toss and two world title matches at Mania. This goes on for about eight minutes or so but it’s just the referees arguing and both guys saying they won. Replays don’t really show us anything either. They do a good job here of making it impossible to tell who won, unlike in 2005 when it was clear that one of them (I want to say Cena) hit first. They’re finally declared co-winners to end the show.

Overall Rating: C-. This show is one where it’s very hard to come up with an overall grade. I really liked the opener and the tag match and Rumble were both good, but when a show has what might be the dumbest moment in wrestling history (and that covers A LOT of stupid moments), it’s brought down a lot. Early 1994 was not a good time for the WWF but once they finally picked Bret as the guy, things got a lot better.

Ratings Comparison

Tatanka vs. Bam Bam Bigelow

Original: B

Redo: C+

Quebecers vs. Bret Hart/Owen Hart

Original: A+

Redo: B-

Razor Ramon vs. IRS

Original: C+

Redo: D+

Yokozuna vs. Undertaker

Original: F

Redo: F

Royal Rumble

Original: B

Redo: C+

Overall Rating

Original: B

Redo: C-

DANG I liked this show a lot better on the first viewing.

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

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/01/13/royal-rumble-count-up-1994/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s Complete 2004 Monday Night Raw Reviews (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/08/26/new-book-and-e-book-kbs-complete-2004-monday-night-raw-reviews/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

Royal Rumble 1994
Date: January 22, 1994
Location: Providence Civic Center, Providence, Rhode Island
Attendance: 14,500
Commentators: Vince McMahon, Ted DiBiase

A year later, and while the roster hasn’t changed a ton, it’s matured a lot. Yoko has dominated the title scene since winning the title from Hogan in June after the mess that was Mania 9. He’s taking on Taker tonight in their first of the two casket matches that they had. Yes, it’s that match. We also have Razor in another title match and not in the Rumble as he’s now a face and fighting IRS for the IC Title.

The Rumble is more or less Yokozuna and his cronies against Luger with Hart on the side. Yoko had been feuding with Luger but Luger can’t have another title shot. Since the Rumble winner gets a title shot, Luger and Cornette who also worked for Yoko made a deal: Luger can fight in the Rumble but Cornette gets to bring in some guys that will represent Yoko.

That would have been nice to have been told to us on the PPV, but why waste time with that when we can remind you that WE ARE LIVE! Also, we have the next chapter in the brother war, which will be nothing but awesome so let’s get to it.

The crowd is hot if nothing else. Vince on commentary just works better for some reason, despite me loving Monsoon and Heenan. DiBiase I think was a surprise on the mic here as he just kind of pops up after Vince does the main intro. You have to give him this: he’s absolutely insane about his product. I defy you to find someone more dedicated to his company. There’s a reason why he’s the most successful promoter of all time.

DiBiase gets insane heat and it’s a shame he broke his neck and was pushed down the card so far over the years. He says he was in every Rumble to date, which just isn’t true, so at least he’s got the theory behind being a commentator down already: lie about stuff and hope no one remembers.

Note: this is important for one major reason: Brooklyn Brawler actually WON A MATCH in the dark match, beating Jim Powers. He is officially the joke of the company.

Tatanka vs. Bam Bam Bigelow

This was supposed to be Ludvig Borga but Borga hurt his ankle and never came back. Tatanka starts out fast and this could be a solid match, on this LIVE SHOW! He gets a nice jumping DDT on Bigelow as I can’t believe it but Tatanka is actually impressing me. Luna is with Bigelow here in one of the strangest concepts in wrestling history that worked beautifully. For the first time ever, guys in the earlier matches are going to be in the Rumble as well which is something long overdue at this point.

Both announcers have a small orgasm over a running splash. God bless overhyping. Why does Vince always suggest stuff? I don’t get that at all. This isn’t bad at all, but the bear hug isn’t helping it. Vince says that only in the WWF will you ever see a man of Bigelow’s size use a moonsault. That is of course until he went to both WCW and ECW and did it there too. It misses though, and Tatanka hits a basic cross body off the top for the win. Wow that came from out of less than nowhere.

Rating: B. This was actually good for what it was: an 8 minute opener. Tatanka won clean and the fans were into him so it got a good reaction. That’s what an opener is supposed to do: get the crowd built up a little bit. This wasn’t anything great but I’ve certainly seen worse matches. I liked this one a lot though, so there we are.

We hit the recap button on Bret and Owen’s issues and their teaming up. This stems from the Survivor Series match where Owen was the only member of his team eliminated, which for some reason ticked him the heck off. I guess it was because Bret was in a way the cause of him getting eliminated, but at the same time you could argue that it was only Owen’s fault.

Bret said that he would love to help Owen forge a path and legacy in the company, and his way of doing this was helping Owen get his first championship: the tag team titles. How that helps Owen get out of Bret’s shadow was never explained but whatever.

We see clips of the Quebecers losing the belts and then getting them back a week later. That was really pointless as it kind of makes them look weak but we can overlook that. We go to Bret and Owen with Todd as Owen is behind Bret in some great symbolism.

Tag Titles: Bret/Owen Hart vs. Quebecers

Quebecers are managed by one Johnny Polo, who in less than a year would be in ECW as a character called Raven. So I’ve watched about 15 minutes of this so far and I have no complaints. It really is a great tag match. I’m not going to go into the discussion of this match as it’s really good and there’s nothing I can poke fun at other than DiBiase and Vince trying to sound cool which fails epically. Anyway, after about 13 minutes, we get to the point.

The point of the first 13 minutes: Bret and Owen are awesome. Eventually, Bret has the ropes pulled apart and hits the floor, injuring his knee. Following an overblown sequence in which his knee is hit by a chair, the post, the guard rail and a golf club, his knee is a bit hurt. We hit the ring again and Bret is just getting destroyed. His knee is gone and he can barely stand up. He does however dodge the Quebecers finisher and looks for Owen.

However, there’s no tag. Why isn’t there a tag? There isn’t one because Bret goes for the Sharpshooter but his knee gives out and the referee calls for the bell due to injury. Owen is TICKED and I can’t blame him. As Bret limps to his feet, Owen kicks him in the bad knee, sending him to the mat in agony and turning Owen heel, setting up the EPIC feud for the rest of the year.

On his way to the back Owen says that Bret was selfish and all he had to do was tag Owen and they would be champions. Bret is still holding Owen down and Owen has had enough of it. Despite Bret being in agony, Vince sends Ray Rougeau to the ring to find out about him. Well isn’t that nice. As Bret is being stretchered out we go to the back with Todd and Owen.

Owen, with Bret watching him on the stretcher, goes into a great angry rant about Bret’s ego and never having a title because of Bret. This is a great promo by Owen here as he just lets out a ton of anger and yells at Bret, although we do get the famous botched line as he says it felt so good when he kicked Bret’s leg out of his leg, instead of out from under him. Anyway, this was awesome. DiBiase applauds him.

Rating: A+. It’s a great match and a better angle that set up one of the best matches and feuds of all time. What kind of a grade do you expect me to give it? Go find this segment as it’s just excellent all around.

IC Title: Razor Ramon vs. IRS

Fink is very excited to announce this match. IRS is really solid on the mic to say the least. JR and Gorilla do commentary here as the other guys do Radio WWF I guess. Razor is insanely over. My goodness the quality of commentary just shot up. The battle royal that Razor kind of won the IC Title in has jumped from 20 people to 30 people in just a few months. Razor is rocking the baby blue tonight.

IRS apparently stole the necklaces and jewelry from Razor and has it in his briefcase, which Gorilla calls a briefer for no apparent reason. The crowd is on fire for this. That’s making up for it being just above average as a match. IRS takes over here and we’re in a formula based match here and there’s not a thing wrong with that. We hear talk of issues with Michaels and Razor. Oh yes. Also, Razor cost IRS a loss to a man named PJ Walker. He’s more commonly known to you as Justin Credible.

We’ve got a ref bump and Razor prevents the briefcase shot and knocks IRS out with it. Razor sets for the edge but here’s Shawn with his IC belt to nail Razor with. Why can’t we watch the ladder match now? IRS…gets the three count? Wait what? Ah there’s the other referee to explain things here. They did the same thing with a Borga match on a tape I think. We’ll ignore the referee’s decision being final too. The Edge ends this about 8 seconds later.

Rating: C+. This was about Shawn and Razor, but that’s fine. IRS is a fine choice for a midcard heel to keep Razor busy until he gets the major feud going. The match itself was probably about the level of something you would see on Raw or a house show, which doesn’t mean that it’s bad. This was adequate, that’s the best thing I’ve got for it.

Paul Bearer says nothing out of the ordinary.

WWF Title: Undertaker vs. Yokozuna

This is a casket match. For your backstory here, it’s pretty simple: Taker is the only top face that hasn’t fought Yoko yet, so this is his shot. Oh and of course Yoko is scared. Yoko comes out first with Cornette, who looks like his twerpy best from the 80s and Fuji. In something that I wish I was making up, Vince cuts off DiBiase to say we are LIVE! I know I make fun of that a lot, but come on now Vinny.

Anyway, this is considered an epic battle, but Taker is just beating the tar out of him. They’re trying to make Taker look like a god here and they’re doing a pretty epic job. However, despite being slammed into the steps and being fine, salt to the eyes apparently is his kryptonite as all of a sudden the same move has him messed up. Back in the ring, Yoko’s offense that has killed the likes of mere Hogans has no effect here.

Taker beats down Yoko with relative ease and after maybe 6 minutes has him in the casket ready to close the lid when we get to the real part of the match: the run-ins. Crush is first, fighting Taker back but naturally getting beaten down. Kabuki of WCCW fame and Tenryu run in next but are also stopped by Taker. Bigelow comes out as Crush and the others are back up. It’s 4-1 now and Fuji has stolen the urn.

Yoko is back up now too, but Paul Bearer actually takes out Cornette and Fuji to get it back! Here he comes again! Taker is fighting them off again, but a shot from the salt bucket apparently does nothing at all. Adam Bomb is here now. Here’s Jeff Jarrett to make it 7-1. The Headshrinkers make that number 9 but Bearer holds up the urn and TAKER COMES BACK AGAIN!

Ok, now wait a minute. I can get him coming back 4-1, considering Tenryu and Kabuki were just henchmen and he’s shown that he can beat the tar out of Yoko on his own. Crush is tough but Taker is better, so that’s actually plausible. But come on: NINE guys?

Oh if that’s not enough, Diesel is here too and finally they get him in the casket. Just remember the match is still going on here. Something occurs to me. These guys are coming down presumably because they hate Taker or they’ve been bought off I’m assuming.

A question rises from this: WHERE ARE THE OTHER FACES??? I mean DANG. Savage hates Crush, Luger hates half the guys in there, Tatanka had a match with Bigelow earlier tonight, it’s the mid 90s so I’m sure Razor has beaten half these guys for the IC Title already. The Steiners can’t stand the Headshrinkers, and yet not a single one of them come down. I don’t think that was ever addressed but it makes no sense.

If nothing else, Taker could have been turned heel when he got back over that, but I guess it wouldn’t fit witht he character. Blast it has a big logic hole in it though. Anyway, Taker AGAIN fights back, this time from in the casket but Yoko steals the urn and hits him with it, which apparently is more powerful than 9 guys beating on him but whatever. The top comes off the urn, and green smoke comes pouring out of it.

Taker stops getting up, and after a ton of finishers and big moves, FINALLY they close the casket. Bigelow jumping on top of it as soon as it’s shut made me chuckle for some reason. However, we’re not done yet. The heels, all 12 of them, start wheeling the casket back, and the gong is heard. Smoke similar to the kind from the urn starts coming out of the casket as the lights go out.

On the screen, we see a shot of Taker lying on his back (despite being thrown in on his stomach/side) and his eyes pop open. He gives a ridiculously over the top speech, which amazingly can be heard throughout the arena, more or less saying that he’ll be back. Oh also, we’re led to believe this is inside the casket, despite seeing the bottom of the lid of the casket is plain wood. We hear electrical sounds and the screen looks like it’s being electrocuted, until the image of Taker actually explodes.

I don’t mean that in a figurative sense. I mean it looks like the Death Star blowing up, but all that’s left is a negative picture of Taker, as in his body and clothes are all white and his skin is black if you know what kind of picture I’m talking about. Oh we’re not done yet. That image is then changed so that it looks like he’s rising up out of the screen, and then to top it off, a man (allegedly Marty Jannetty) is on top of the screen and raised up on visible strings into the rafters.

There’s just one problem: On PPV, YOU CAN’T SEE ANY OF THIS! I’ve seen this show about 10 times and until I read about it, I had zero idea what was going on that Vince and DiBiase were freaking out about. This time I knew what to look for and I could see it, but DANG I had no idea that’s what was going on for years.

Vince and Ted scream about how supernatural that was. After the heels run off, Bearer has the now smokeless urn and is pointing up while pushing the casket away. That was just…uh yeah.

Rating: F. This is an F for one reason: they have just completely screwed up Undertaker’s character. This match, and more importantly the smoke from the urn being the source of Taker’s power reminded me of the Midi-Chlorians from Phantom Menace. You don’t explain the Force. You just know what it is and what it’s capable of, but you never question it.

That’s why Taker worked so well. We just knew he had powers and abilities, but by trying to explain them or show what they were was just a waste of time. This was insane and just didn’t work at all. Taker would be out for about 7 months until LESLIE FREAKING NIELSEN was brought in to “solve” the case in a horrible comedy bit at Summerslam. Yeah, Vince really didn’t have a freaking clue how Taker’s character worked. This was horrible. Oh and the “match” sucked too.

Savage says he’ll win the Rumble and get Crush.

Jarrett says he’ll win too.

Tatanka says there’s no friends and he’ll win.

Diesel says he’s going to Mania. Well I’d hope so. I’d hate for Vince to keep his own employees from going.

Doink is excited.

Shawn says he’ll be the new champion at Mania.

Luger says this is his big chance.

Vince and DiBiase says anything can happen and keep talking about Taker.

Royal Rumble

After Howard goes over the rules, we’re ready to go. Oh and it’s 90 seconds this year instead of 2 minutes. Number one is Scott Steiner and he gets Samu of the Headshrinkers. What a coincidence AGAIN! They punch the heck out of each other and again, the idiocy of power vs. power is shown. Also considering this is Samu this isn’t going to go well at all. The clock is sponsored now. I give up.

Rick is #3, so shockingly a team has gotten almost consecutive numbers. How do people not catch this time after time? As the Casio clock, so at least it’s a watch company, gets us to zero, Kwang is 4th. He’s more commonly known as Savio Vega in case you’ve never heard of him. As he comes out, Samu misses a cross body and gets his head caught between the top and middle ropes to be eliminated soon after.

Kwang hits the Muta mist to Rick to get it to one on one. DiBiase points out how easy it would be to just have the Steiners beat on everyone as they came at them which is true, but what does he know? Vince says Rick is smarting from the mist still. I think he said that so that it can be said that Rick is smart for the only time in his career. Scott is rocking the Triforce on his singlet so if nothing else he looks cool.

Owen Hart is fifth to some HUGE boos. He takes out the visually impaired Rick without much trouble and the double team on Scott begins until Bart Gunn is in at 6th. This is going too fast. Apparently something has happened in the back. Well it’s good to know that everyone isn’t just sitting around doing nothing. Diesel comes in at 7 to apparently clear out some of these guys.

At this time he’s just a body guard with zero character to him at all. In about 40 seconds he drops all four guys and we have Backlund in at 8 and it’s one on one. Well at least we have something close to a story going here with the dominant giant. He hits the ring and starts crawling on his stomach. It looks dumb at first but DiBiase does his job and points out that Bob is going after Diesel’s legs.

People on Raw and Smackdown: PAY ATTENTION! That is what an analyst is supposed to do. He explained something that might have been a bit confusing otherwise and he’s got the resume and experience to be believable. See what I mean? It looked a bit odd, so the analyst said what’s going on. That wasn’t complicated at all, but some clarification is always a good thing. They can do more than make stupid jokes you know.

Bob actually gets Diesel close to out but just can’t do it which is fine. A few seconds later Diesel is on his own again, which for some reason surprises DiBiase. And Ted, you haven’t been in every Rumble. You’ve been at them all, just not in them all. Get your facts straight.

Billy Gunn is next, and apparently you can find out the order of the wrestlers by calling the WWF Hotline. WOW. Ok, where to begin with why that’s stupid. #1, it ruins the mystique of knowing who is in the match. 2, that’s the first time we’ve heard about that all night long so nice job of advertising. 3, who in the world thought that was a good idea? Never mind, it’s a Vince McMahon show and there’s money to be made. All is explained.

Anyway, mullet man is victim #6 of Big D, lasting maybe 15 seconds. What’s up with the way he punches? It’s like he hits people with the wrist. We see a clip from earlier to Tenryu and Kabuki jumping Luger in the back. Yeah you can tell it’s been a dominant performance if we have time for a segment during the match. The power of Shane Stevens stops them though.

Virgil is #10 as an alternate for Kamala and despite DiBiase laughing hysterically over it, Diesel drops him in about a minute. Wow we’re already a third done with this. We have a story here though so I’m very proud. This is a new approach to the match that really is working. Also we don’t have to worry about the ring filling up with jobbers. Ah here we go: Randy Savage is number 11 and he hammers the big man.

See this is a smart way of doing the Rumble: they had all those guys like the Gunns and Virgil and Kwang that weren’t going to mean a stupid thing and got them in and out so the bigger names can be around later on. That’s very smart and it gives you a bonus of making Diesel look amazing. I’ve always been a bit surprised that DiBiase and Savage’s feud from 88 was really never mentioned on WWF TV after it ended.

There was never any mention of them having any issues or of DiBiase main eventing a Wrestlemania or anything like that. It’s like it was forgotten, and it’s not like DiBiase is on bad terms with the company or something like that as far as I know. He’s made a ton of appearances over the years yet you never hear about it. Anyway, Jarrett is 12th as I have visions of WCW dancing in my head.

I kind of liked the Jarrett story of using wrestling as a springboard to country music. That’s very original if nothing else. Savage takes him out with relative ease so we’re back to him and Diesel again. It’s Crush to a huge reaction from the audience. He and Savage were in the middle of a mega feud at this point which was just purely awesome. For the life of me I don’t get why Crush never got a huge push.

Him against Hart would have been very interesting at least to me. Doink comes in because I guess there wasn’t enough stupid comedy to meet the quota. Savage is gone and we’re at two monsters against a clown. He actually is smart though as he just watches the big men fight. He actually sprays water from a flower and steps on their toes. Thankfully they wake up and beat the tar out of him as Bigelow comes in at fifteen.

This is going really fast but there’s a bit of a flow to it here and it’s not as bad as I expected it to be. Bigelow puts Doink out with the same thing he did to I think Spike Dudley in ECW, which had just started to be booked by Heyman two months prior to this show.

Since he’s an idiot, Crush hits Diesel when they have Bigelow an inch away from being out. Mabel is 16th as the smallest person out there is Crush as 6’9 and about 310lbs. Diesel goes right for him as I’m digging this planning of the Rumble. There’s been distinct segments here and that’s a major plus. And here’s Bob Holly to screw that up. He’s subbing for 1-2-3 Kid. WOW that’s not a good way either way.

WE ARE LIVE! WE GET IT ALREADY VINCE! What’s the freaking point in showing wide shots of the crowd and saying how live we are? I didn’t buy this PPV to be shown the audience. I bought it for the matches, so quit showing big wide shots of the stupid crowd and emphasizing that you’re live. It means jack and no one cares but you. WOW how many things could that be said about that he’s come up with?

Shawn is in at 18. All of the big guys get on Diesel and Shawn gives the final shove to put him out. That gets no reaction at all. He gets some applause on his way out though, and you can hear the wheels turning in Vince’s mind. Mo, the most worthless wrestler of all time is in next. Greg Valentine (seriously???) is in at 20 to a decent pop (seriously???). 21 is Tatanka to a short but loud pop.

To recap, we’ve got Crush, Bigelow, Mabel, Holly, Shawn, Mo, Valentine and Tatanka in there at the moment. Kabuki is in next as someone else that no one knows. A bunch of people jump Mabel and he’s out, which surprises Vince for no apparent reason. Luger sprints out with apparently no damage at all to him from the earlier attack and naturally goes straight after Kabuki, and there he goes.

In a STUNING, yes STUNNING I say, turn of events, Tenryu is next at 24. The buzzer rings for 25 but no one comes out, which was apparently Bret Hart. To recap, we have Crush, Bigelow, Holly, Michaels, Mo, Valentine, Tatanka, Luger and Tenryu. Luger and Michaels could have been an interesting feud. Martel, more commonly known as he who will not go away, is 26th and it amazes me that we’re this close to being done.

At 27, in the words of Vince, IT’S BRET HART!!! He’s limping badly so of course everyone goes for his knee. He’s barely in there when Fatu is out at 28. We’ve got WAY too many people in there at the moment with something like 11 or so. A ton of people get together to eliminate Crush as Marty Jannetty comes in and goes right for Shawn. Now, since we have 10 guys in the ring, what’ the best thing to do? Why, go to the back to hear from Crush!!!

Yep, they actually cut from the ring to Ray Rougeau in the back with Crush for an interview. Savage jumps him and they brawl. This would have been stupid if it went on for 20 seconds, but it lasts over a minute! Also you can see Adam Bomb clearly standing there getting ready to come out so it also gives away #30. We get back to the ring and apparently nothing has happened, but geez how freaking stupid was that? They hate each other, we get it already.

Ok, so with Bomb, who Vince says will win the Rumble, gives us a final group of Bomb, Bigelow, Holly, Shawn, Mo, Valentine, Tatanka, Luger, Tenryu, Martel, Fatu and Jannetty. Oh and they figure out that the guy that didn’t show was Bastian Booger.

Bret and Shawn eliminate Holly. They work very well together. I hope those two do more in the future. With such great teamwork they could really do some great things. Ok bad jokes are mostly over as we have 11 people left. Dang that’s just too many at the end. Bret Hart beats on Mo which has to be the highlight of Mo’s career. Bret is limping everywhere, so he wins salesman of the year already. Valentine is out.

They’re just kind of mulling around at this point. Martel is out by Tatanka. Bomb is out as we’ve rapidly picked up the pace. Mo is out and gets no recognition by name. I love that. Bam Bam just throws Tatanka out like a jobber. Are these guys all double parked or something? Bigelow does a Flair Flip and goes out by Luger. Jannetty goes out and we’re down to five with Luger, Hart, Tenryu, Michaels and Fatu. Hart and Luger get rid of Tenryu to take us down to four.

Bret and Shawn go at it, as I’m completely unstunned. Shawn and Fatu go out on stereo backdrops and we’ve got Luger vs. Bret. They go right at it and dump each other out at the same time. Both men are announced as the winner individually and since Hart gets a bigger pop I guess he wins.

They’re named co-winners, even though later on we would see video where Luger clearly hit the ground first. Tunney comes out and makes the official co-winner decision. This led to a coin toss where the winner would get the first title shot at Mania and the other guy had to fight someone “of an equal level”, which led to Bret vs. Owen. Had Bret won the toss, Luger would have fought Crush.

No matter what, the person that didn’t get the shot would get the title shot later in the night against whoever had the belt after the first title match. I like that system a lot better than the triple threat which wasn’t around in the WWF yet. Granted that could be because we’ve seen so many triple threats that they’ve lost their luster. Anyway, that ends our show.

Rating: B. This was a good Rumble. I was quite surprised that the intervals worked as well as they did here, since the shorter ones usually don’t work that well. This had a lot of segments in it and you could tell that it was well planned. 92’s was better simply because of star power, but this is easily the 2nd best so far.

I really liked this match and it did a lot of good things, including advancing stories and making you interested in seeing how they would fix the issues brought up in the match. That to me makes it a success. It’s not great, but it’s very good.

Overall Rating: B. This was a mostly solid show. If you factor out the Taker/Yoko debacle this is an instant A. Razor vs. IRS is probably the weakest match but it works very well and certainly isn’t bad at all. The Rumble itself is a good one and the tag titles is must see stuff.

You factor in all those things and this was a very good show. There’s more here than just the Rumble, but that’s the centerpiece. Overall definitely a good show and well worth checking out, as long as you’re not a diehard Taker fan because you might want to shoot your TV.

 

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s Complete 2004 Monday Night Raw Reviews (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

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Royal Rumble 1993
Date: January 24, 1993
Location: ARCO Arena, Sacramento, California
Attendance: 16,000
Commentators: Gorilla Monsoon, Bobby Heenan

This is a pretty forgotten show for reasons that should be obvious. First of all, this is 1993, one of the worst years in company history from a creative standpoint. Bret is defending the title against Razor Ramon (his only world title shot ever) and we’ve got the Rumble for the title shot at Wrestlemania for the first time. I don’t know if that’s official here, but the winner did indeed get the shot at the biggest show of the year. Let’s get to it.

Historical note: this is 13 days after the debut of Monday Night Raw.

Steiner Brothers vs. Beverly Brothers

For you ECW freaks, Bill Alfonzo is the referee. Scott and I think Blake start things off. This is the Steiners’ first major match and the fans seem to love them right off the bat. Scott immediately takes him to the mat with a top wristlock, causing Blake to freak out with a claim of tights being pulled. That sequence worked so well that they do it again. Heenan is very excited about the debut of Narcissist, which is Lex Luger as a guy obsessed with his muscles. In other words, Lex Luger debuts tonight.

After Blake stalls some more, here’s Beau to taunt the not legal Rick. There’s the tag to Rick who chases Beau around and hits Blake in the process. A powerslam puts Rick down and I don’t think Gorilla knows which Beverly is which. Since this is a Steiners match, it’s time for suplexes! Scott nearly kills Beau with a belly to belly and everything breaks down for a bit, allowing the Beverlies to take over on Scotty.

We get into a standard formula with Scott having his back worked on by both villains. Blake chokes with a tag rope in the corner for two. Heenan: “Gotta hook the tights.” Gorilla: “WHAT?” I love how shocked he sounds every time Heenan says something like that. Beau puts on a Boston Crab but Scott easily pushes out of it. Blake blocks a tag and let’s make sure that we’re LIVE still. What was WWF’s obsession with that?

Scott avoids an elbow drop but Blake breaks up the hot tag again. The crowd is silent when the Beverlies are on offense. Scott comes back with a butterfly powerbomb to put Blake down and Scott actually dives through the ropes and tags at the same time. Rick cleans house and there are Steiner Lines for both Beverlies. Scott pounds on Blake in the corner and counters a Doomsday Device with a victory roll for two. The Frankensteiner to Beau gets the pin.

Rating: D+. Pretty dull match here as the Steiners were clearly going to dominate the entire time. The Beverlies never got above lower midcard status and their biggest feud was against the Bushwhackers. What were you going to expect them to do against the freaking STEINER BROTHERS? Nothing here but a squash.

We recap the Rockers’ time together and their split. If my eyesight is correct, you can see Shane Douglas as a jobber. After the Barber Shop incident, Jannetty was out for months. He finally returned on Superstars, setting up the match tonight for Shawn’s Intercontinental Title. During his return, Jannetty accidentally hit Sheri with a mirror, which is important to know for the match.

Intercontinental Title: Marty Jannetty vs. Shawn Michaels

Sherri is at ringside with the question being who would she side with? Why would she side with Marty anyway? I never got that. Apparently it’s because Shawn never called her while she was in the hospital….which she was in because of Marty. So why would she ever go with Jannetty? Apparently Jannetty was drunk during this match. That might make things a bit funnier if nothing else.

Jannetty controls to start, sending Shawn to the floor twice with a knee lift and a clothesline. Marty punches Shawn down on the floor and poses in the ring. He tries a punch off the top but gets caught in the ribs on the way down. Shawn loads Marty up on his shoulder and in one of the only times I can ever remember it working, rams Marty shoulder first into the post.

The champ rams the other shoulder into the post because he hit the right one the first time, and you just don’t do that. Back in and Shawn hits a shoulderbreaker before sending Marty to the floor again. Back in and the shoulder goes into the buckle, followed by a double ax right down onto it as well. We hit the armbar but Marty fights out quickly. He tries a comeback but walks into a DDT on the arm for two.

Quick sidebar: why is that move called a single arm DDT? It’s a hold used on the arm, but the double arm DDT is used to hurt the head. Also a regular DDT uses just one arm, so why is this called a single arm DDT instead of the regular one? These are the kinds of things I think about when I’m bored by a match.

Anyway, Shawn does the always stupid looking jump into the boot spot. I mean he jumped RIGHT AT Marty’s feet. What could he possibly have been trying there? Marty avoids a charge in the corner, sending Shawn’s shoulder into the post instead. Marty speeds things up and pounds away, only to have Shawn slingshot him out to the floor. Shawn goes to pick him up but Marty suplexes him out to the floor.

Sherri finally does something by slapping Shawn, who gets belly to back suplexed into the ring. Shawn gets launched to the floor again as the pace picks up a bit. A powerslam puts the champ down but Shawn avoids the top rope punch. Marty stops himself before crashing and gets two off a DDT. Shawn misses a superkick and gets caught by one of his own for two. The crowd is getting into this.

Marty slingshots Shawn so he gets to do his big bump onto the post. There goes the referee via an elbow to the face and Sherri comes in. She swings her shoe but hits Marty by mistake of course. Shawn yells at her a lot and then superkicks Marty in the chest for the pin to retain.

Rating: C+. This started slow, picked up a good bit during Marty’s comeback, and then had a horribly uninteresting ending. Seriously, that’s it? These two would have a rematch soon after on Raw which won Match of the Year in a contest for least bad match of the year for all intents and purposes.

In the back, Gene yells at Sherri to calm down. Marty comes to the back for some more brawling.

Heenan and Gorilla argue a bit.

Bam Bam Bigelow vs. Big Boss Man

Bigelow jumps Boss Man in the corner to start and Boss is in trouble early. He gets whipped into the corner and a Bigelow forearm knocks him to the outside. This is one of those “do one move then stand around for awhile” matches. Boss Man comes back with some clotheslines and some punches to the “face” in the corner. Another right hand and a bulldog puts Bigelow down but Boss Man’s charge is countered by a backdrop to the floor.

Off to a body vice by Bigelow which is a rather dull move as usual. A hot shot puts Boss Man down for two and some shots to his back keeps him down. We hit the body vice again but Boss Man comes back with a suplex. It hurts him more than Bigelow though, as Bam is up first. Boss Man starts his real comeback with a punch to the face and a running crotch attack to Bigelow’s back. Bigelow gets a boot up in the corner and clotheslines Boss Man down. The flying headbutt gets the pin.

Rating: D. This was pure filler and not even entertaining filler. Bigelow was on the rise at this point while Boss Man would be gone in less than two months. On top of that, the match was really dull with Bigelow laying around and working on Boss Man’s back most of the time, which doesn’t make for an interesting match at all.

We get a clip from WWF Mania (Saturday morning show) of Razor beating up Owen to hype the world title match.

Razor says he’s got gold around his fingers and neck and now he wants it around his waist.

Bret says he’s ready.

WWF World Title: Razor Ramon vs. Bret Hart

Feeling out process to start with Razor getting the early advantage with some right hands. A knee in the corner misses and Bret has on the Figure Four in less than 90 seconds. Razor gets the rope so Bret drops elbows on the knee instead. The leg gets wrapped around the post before Bret goes after the other leg in the corner for some reason. Ramon comes back with a whip to send Bret ribs first into the post.

Now we get to the best part of any Bret Hart match: him getting the tar beaten out of him. Some backbreakers on the floor keep Bret down and we head inside again. Razor pounds on the ribs some more and hits the fallaway slam for two. Helen Hart (Bret’s mom) is in the front row. There’s the chest first into the buckle bump from Bret for two more and it’s off to the abdominal stretch, another Razor trademark.

As always, Bret reverses Hall’s hold into one of his own before getting hiptossed over. Bret is sent to the floor on a kickout and gets two on a sunset flip. We hit the reverse chinlock by Razor, followed quickly by a bearhug. Bret bites his way out of it and sends Razor to the outside in a quick move. The champion follows it up with a suicide dive and the comeback is on.

Bret pounds away in the corner over and over as we hit the brawl. For a guy known as a technical master, Bret brawled an awful lot. Not that he’s bad at it or anything but it happens really often. There are the Five Moves of Doom but Razor gets to the rope before the Sharpshooter is on. The second attempt doesn’t work either as Razor pulls the referee into a pile with the two of them.

Ramon goes right back to the ribs and Bret’s momentum is stopped dead. A belly to back superplex is blocked by Bret into a belly to back suplex for two for the champ. Razor clotheslines Bret down but Bret escapes the Razor’s Edge into a backslide for two. In a pretty awesome ending, Bret counters a test of strength into a sunset flip in a sweet flip counter, followed by grapevining the legs together on the mat and turning Razor over into the Sharpshooter for the submission.

Rating: B. Good match here and again, why did Razor never get more title matches? I know he wasn’t the kind of guy to make the world champion, but are you telling me that when the company was falling apart at times they couldn’t throw him in there as a token challenger? I would have bought him as legit threat to any champion, but it never happened. I’ve never gotten that. Anyway, solid match here as you would expect from these two.

Heenan unveils Narcissist, which is Lex Luger in front of a bunch of mirrors. Lots of posing commences and Heenan sounds like he’s in love. Well at least extreme lust. Luger says he’ll be dominant. Not much here. A curtain is lowered over Luger and Heenan actually gets on his knees, begging to see more. I’ve heard of overtones but this is ridiculous.

Here are Caesar and Cleopatra to hype up Wrestlemania. They read a proclamation about it and this is really stupid.

Royal Rumble

Ric Flair is #1 and Bob Backlund, going through a career resurgence at the time, is #2. Backlund drops Flair with a shoulder and does his little dance. Flair pounds him into the corner but Bob backdrops him down. Papa Shango is #3 and is dumped out by Flair in less than thirty seconds. Backlund it sent to the apron and Flair stomps away. They chop it out until Ted DiBiase, I believe half of the tag champions here, is #4.

Heenan makes fun of Backlund as the double teaming ensues, prompting Gorilla to threaten to knock Bobby out. Backlund is beaten on even more until Brian Knobs is #5. The Nasties are good guys at this point and happen to be feuding with Money Inc. Guess who he starts swinging at. Knobs almost dumps Flair but only gets him to the apron. Things slow down for a bit until Virgil is #6. The faces team up to fight the heels as not a lot is going on at this point.

DiBiase tosses out Knobs and we’re down to four in the ring again. Here’s the pretty new Jerry Lawler at #7 in a HUGE cape. I think he’s a heel here but Flair grabs him for some chops almost immediately. Flair goes to the floor through the middle ropes so Virgil goes after Lawler. Flair gets back in and Jerry immediately goes after him. Oh never mind as Heenan is praising Lawler. He’s a heel alright.

Max Moon (presumably played by Konnan) is #8. He hits a few moves and is dumped by Lawler before anyone else shows up. Lawler’s attire is really intricate here with lots of writing on it instead of the usual two color design. I kind of like it for a change. Japanese legend Genichiro Tenryu is #9 and he starts a chop-off with Flair as you would expect them to do.

Things slow down a bit until Mr. Perfect is #9 at a full sprint. Heenan: “OH NO! OH DEAR GOD NO!!!” Perfect immediately goes after Flair so Ric goes to the top. There’s the slam off the top and the Hennig Neck Snap as Heenan is having a heart attack. We hear about the loser leaves the WWF match tomorrow on Raw between the two of them, which is a very rare match for some reason.

Skinner is #11 and he does nothing before Perfect shoves Flair out to a HUGE pop. Lawler (looking very different here for some reason that I can’t place) pounds away on Hennig as we’re back down to six people in there. That’s usually the right amount so thankfully they’ve gotten through the first third without things getting too hectic. Koko B. Ware and those big green pants of his are #12. Heenan: “Koko B. Ware could go to Wrestlemania to face Bret Hart. Gorilla: “What’s wrong with that?” Heenan: “IT SHOULD BE RIC FLAIR!!!”

Perfect dropkicks Skinner out and not a lot is going on again. Here’s Samu at #13, giving us a group of Backlund, DiBiase, Tenryu, Virgil, Perfect, DiBiase, Lawler and Ware. Lawler and Perfect keep going at it in a feud that could have been AMAZING in Memphis. Berzerker is #14 as we need to get rid of some people in there. Lawler misses a charging punch on Perfect and there he goes. With Perfect distracted, DiBiase and Ware team up (you’ll NEVER hear that again) to kick him out with an assist from Lawler. Virgil was thrown out during that melee, getting us down to just six again.

The Undertaker is #15 to a BIG pop. Gorilla calls him the odds on favorite. I’m not sure I’d go that far but whatever. Berzerker goes to the floor and beats up Backlund (not eliminated) with a chair. Taker puts Samu out and no sells a lot of Tenryu’s stuff before dumping him as well. We’ve got Backlund (mostly dead on the floor), Taker, Berzerker, DiBiase and Ware in at the moment. Terry Taylor (he still had a job at this point?) is in at #16 and he’s gone in less than thirty seconds thanks to DiBiase, as is Ware.

There’s a chokeslam to DiBiase and Taker dumps him, leaving Berzerker against Taker. In one of the biggest “oh great it’s this guy” moments ever, Giant Gonzales debuts as Taker dumps Berzerker. Gonzales, a legit 7’7 tall, stares down at Taker as Damien Demento (don’t ask) is #17. Gonzales chops Taker out for an illegal elimination. In case you’re not familiar, Gonzales is a monster who makes Great Khali look like Lou Thesz. Speaking of Khali, he was literally the same character as Gonzales in a repeat of the same exact story the Undertaker was involved in in 1992. In short, both of them sucked and were really tall.

Gonzales destroys Taker for a bit as Demento still won’t get in. IRS is #18 as the Giant is still beating up Taker. It’s IRS, Backlund and Demento at the moment with Taker out cold in the corner. Tatanka is #19 as Paul Bearer uses the Urn to revive Taker. This of course is all the fans focus on, making the match in the ring look even less interesting than it already is, which is saying a lot when you think about it. Lots of choking ensues until Jerry Sags is #20.

There is NOTHING going on here and I don’t think Typhoon at #21 is going to help things at all. Fatu is #22 and my goodness I have never heard more silence for an entrance. NOTHING is going on here and Earthquake is #23. He immediately goes after….Typhoon, his partner. They have a fat man brawl for a bit until Quake dumps him out. Carlos Colon, aged 44 and called a youngster by Monsoon is #24.

Colon dumps Demento as the eliminations are keeping the crowd on life support. Quake can’t put Backlund out as Tito Santana is #25. Fatu misses a charge at Backlund and eliminates himself. We’ve got Quake, Backlund, Santana, IRS, Tatanka, Colon and Sags in there at the moment. Rick Martel is #26 who is STILL feuding with Santana. Why did they never have a big match to blow off that feud? It went on for like four years or so.

Earthquake dumps IRS and now we get to the first interesting part of the match in WAY too long: Backlund is sent to the apron and the crowd collectively gasps until he gets back in. Gorilla actually swears at how big the reaction is. Yokozuna is #27 and it’s time to clear some space. Yoko and Tatanka chop it out and there goes the guy with red hair (figure out which is which).

Colon is out and it’s time for the fat man showdown with Quake vs. Yoko. They collide a few times and no one moves so Quake pounds him into the corner. Owen Hart is #28. Quake splashes Yoko in the corner but the second attempt misses. Yoko suplexes Quake out and that more or less seals the winner. Repo Man is #29 and is immediately dropped by Yoko. Everybody gangs up on Yoko and it doesn’t work at all.

Randy Savage is #30, giving us a final group of Savage, Yokozuna, Repo Man, Owen, Martel, Santana, Sags and Backlund. They’re not even trying to hide the winner at this point. Yoko dumps Tito as Owen dropkicks Sags out. Owen skins the cat to save himself before being dumped by Yoko and possibly injuring his knee. Repo is out and we’re down to four. Backlund actually picks up Martel to sit him on top and punches him out. The place is WAY into Backlund here, so he goes after Yoko. A pair of dropkick put Yoko against the ropes but Backlund charges into the elimination, drawing a standing ovation.

So it’s Savage vs. Yoko and the beating of the small man begins. Yoko flattens him over and over again until Savage fires off a bunch of kicks out of the corner. The fans are trying to get behind Savage and there’s a top rope ax handle. One to the back gets Yoko down to one knee. Uh…why would you want to knock a guy this big DOWN in a battle royal?

Either way he superkicks Savage to knock him down again and there’s the belly to belly. The legdrop crushes Savage but the Banzai Drop misses. In one of the STUPIDEST endings ever to the Rumble, Savage hits the elbow and COVERS, getting launched over the top rope on the kickout to send Yoko to Las Vegas for the title shot.

Rating: D. This was one of the worst Rumbles of all time. The main problem here is the period after Taker, the only guy you could actually see eliminating Yoko, was eliminated. From then until the time Backlund got close to the longevity record (which he got), there’s NOTHING. It’s a bunch of lame midcarders standing around lifting each others’ legs in the air. Why would I want to see that at all? Anyway, nothing to see here and a BAD Rumble.

Overall Rating: D+. There’s a reason no one cares at all about 1993 WWF: it’s really not very good. The title matches here aren’t bad but other than that, this show is pretty freaking terrible. The Rumble sucks the life out of the show, as the highlights are a two minute segment between Flair and Perfect and the Backlund part at the end. When the whole match is 65 minutes long, that doesn’t hold up. Weak show here.

Ratings Comparison

Steiner Brothers vs. Beverly Brothers

Original: C-

Redo: D+

Shawn Michaels vs. Marty Jannetty

Original: C

Redo: C+

Bam Bam Bigelow vs. Big Boss Man

Original: D+

Redo: D

Bret Hart vs. Razor Ramon

Original: B

Redo: B

Royal Rumble

Original: D+

Redo: D

Overall Rating

Original: D

Redo: D+

Not much change here.

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

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/01/12/royal-rumble-count-up-1993/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s Complete 2004 Monday Night Raw Reviews (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/08/26/new-book-and-e-book-kbs-complete-2004-monday-night-raw-reviews/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

Royal Rumble 1993
Date: January 24, 1993
Location: ARCO Arena, Sacramento, California
Attendance: 16,000
Commentators: Bobby Heenan, Gorilla Monsoon

Well, a bit has changed in the last year. For one thing, about two weeks before this, a show called Monday Night Raw debuted. This completely changed the world of wrestling forever. No longer did we have to watch Sunday morning Superstars to get wrestling. We now had it every Monday night in prime time. That really did change the world of wrestling forever. Other than that, Hogan is more or less gone at this point.

He would be back just in time for Mania to steal a title that he had no business being around after guys like Bret and Flair had worked so hard for the past year, but he’s Hulk Hogan and therefore awesome and can get away with stupid moves like that. Savage is on commentary for the most part now but he occasionally wrestles like he’s doing tonight. More on that later though.

Also tonight, we have the relatively rookie wrestler named Razor Ramon getting a world title shot. He was never actually in the Rumble. He always was in some kind of title match or injured. That’s saying a lot. Anyway, not a lot of people remember this show, which could be good or bad. Let’s see how it goes.

Oh and Narcissist debuts tonight.

Alfred Hayes does stupid stuff with fans as I need a revovlver.

Beverly Brothers vs. Steiner Brothers

I guess we can officially say we have a Rumble tradition as this is the fourth year running for a tag match opener. There is ZERO talking during the Beverly entrance. The Steiners get a traditional one though. Rick and Scott were there for little more than a year, but it worked very well I’ve always thought. They’ve been here about a month at this point though so this is their showcase match more or less. Wow that’s a bad draw for them as the Beverlies suck.

Heenan points out that the headgear Rick wears could be a weapon. Technically yes but it’s far better than cauliflower ear. Gorilla and Bobby are at it again, but Gorilla says the Beverlys have been successful. Did I miss something here? Scott gets an armbar and control according to Gorilla, which sounds like something on a game show. Also according to Gorilla, his taxicab driver said he could have sold his ticket for 50x its face value.

So in other words the driver admitted he might illegally scalp it. Yep that’s very smart there buddy. They reiterate that this is the first time where the winner of the Rumble is guaranteed a title shot at Mania, and thereby the tradition is born. Since it’s their first big match, let’s have them get beaten down for the most part. That’s perfectly logical isn’t it? The Steiners are getting beaten up here really badly and it’s just a poorly booked match.

If you’re going to have tag jobbers, then have them look like jobbers. By doing this it looks like Rick and Scott can’t beat a couple of horrible guys. We are LIVE! I always get a kick out of those. They come from nowhere and they don’t tell you anything at all. Also, what kind of an expression is getting a kick out of something? Wouldn’t that hurt instead of being amusing? The Beverlies are bad. Like, really bad.

We finally get to the hot tag but the fans are kind of bored here as it’s just taken too long to get to that. The tag looks awesome as Scott is on the ground and dives for Rick but he goes through the ropes and lands on the apron. That was sweet looking. Rick more or less beats them up by himself until Scott comes back in.

They set him up for a Doomsday Device move but in another SWEET counter, Scott rolls up one of them into a victory roll and the Frankensteiner ends it soon after. The ending two minutes were great but the rest was just bland.

Rating: C-. This is mainly for Rick’s beard and mustache which I think are alive. There’s no way those things aren’t at least creatures of some sort. As for the match, I don’t get why they would have the Beverlies, one of the most boring teams of all time, go in there and beat up Rick and Scott, one of the best of all time, for such a long time. It just made them look weak and while the dominated the end, I didn’t care by then, which defeats the purpose of the match as a whole.

We hit the recap of the Rockers as I’m surprised Okerlund is still with the company at this point. He and Heenan would definitely be gone by the end of the year. Anyway, the Rockers were awesome minus that whole winning anything. We have the Barbershop Incident and Marty was out for a long time.

Shawn started doing this thing where he would fix his hair in front of a mirror in the ring. Marty came from the crowd and Shawn saw his reflection in the mirror which was awesome. After the beatdown swung it at Shawn and hit Sherri who was Shawn’s manager. That led to this match.

Intercontinental Title: Marty Jannetty vs. Shawn Michaels

Sherri is here first as I think they’re trying to go with a Mega Powers Explode angle here. The aisle seems very short here for some reason. The arena is good sized so I don’t know why they would have to do that. Shawn’s belt is blue here for no apparent reason. Shawn is already selling like a mad man. In another unintentional funny moment, Gorilla answers the question of has a woman ever been in love with you by saying are you kidding me?

This is mainly about Sherri because she’s clearly more important than the title involved here. More or less we’ve had all Shawn beating on Marty here as we have this continuing theme of the faces getting beaten up. It’s mainly working on Marty’s left arm which confuses Gorilla for no apparent reason. Watch a string of matches and tell me how many times you see a guy working on the right arm. It simply doesn’t happen.

This is reminding me of the Hardy matches when they feuded as there’s just something odd about seeing these two fight. It’s just not working for me. I don’t get the need for the long pauses in commentary. It’s kind of annoying. Why does Shawn oversell everything? He hits the post shoulder first so both guys have bad wings at this point. In case you missed it the first time, WE ARE LIVE!

We apologize for taking you away from a decent match to let you know that, but we feel a shot of the crowd and a reminder that we’re LIVE is more important. For one of the only times that I can ever remember, the reverse suplex to the floor works for Marty. Sherri smacks Shawn on the floor and only Bobby and Gorilla seem to care. Wow Marty Jannetty can’t do a DDT to save his life.

They’ve picked up the pace a lot here and the crowd is suddenly alive. For reasons of it being required the referee goes down. Marty holds Shawn for a shoe shot from Sherri as my love for alliteration grows. Of course it misses and she’s completely distraught. Amazingly no one seems to care. Ok not really but I wanted to make it seem like it meant something. In a rather dumb ending, Shawn yells at Sherri, Marty gets up, Shawn kicks him and we have a pin. Sherri won’t talk to Gene in the back.

Rating: C. Well, the opening was just off for them but then they turned it up again. The ending was just odd all together though. The problem is these two had a far better match a few months later when Marty actually won the title, which for some reason didn’t happen until May which I’ve never gotten. The chemistry was there to an extent, but at the same time it just wasn’t clicking, which I know sounds weird but I can’t word it any other way.

In the back, Sherri is overreacting at an insane level as Gene even curses. Shawn runs back and looks like he’s going to hit her but Marty runs in for the save. For some reason an orange goes flying. This was just dumb.

Bam Bam Bigelow vs. Big Boss Man

My, that’s a lot of Bs. Boss Man is just about gone here and is a complete jobber to the stars at this point. Bigelow is freshly returned to the company here and this is I think his first non squash match. There’s zero story here, which just furthers the squash theory. We’re eight seconds in and Boss Man is looking destroyed already. This is all Bigelow here as the announcers aren’t even talking about the match but rather something about Gene and Bobby in Vegas or something.

You can clearly see the fans leaving to get food or whatever in droves. I don’t get why Boss Man was never pushed really hard in the midcard. He’s a jobber here and he’s getting solid pops. They go to the corner and Bigelow gets the traditional 10 punches to the neck. It’s also a fairly morbid match as both men are dead now. Bigelow’s submission here is just holding onto Boss Man from behind. Yep that’s it.

This is just not interesting at all and it’s going on for too long which seems to be a running theme tonight. FINALLY Boss Man does something and he gets a decent back drop on Bigelow. That’s pretty impressive. In another stupid ending, he just clotheslines Boss Man down and hits the headbutt to end it. What’s with that lately?

Rating: D+. It saddens me to see a guy that I always liked like the Boss Man reduced to this. This was a squash and not a very interesting one either. Bigelow completely destroyed him here in the IC Special. I just don’t get why Boss Man was pushed so far down. He wasn’t bad at all and apparently they saw something in him as they kept bringing him back. This was about 10% Boss Man if that, which really is a shame. Bigelow would have a strong initial run and then just fall completely flat.

We see a clip of Razor beating up Owen. Yep that’s not very interesting. Gorilla and Bobby sound odd here. We get a short promo from Razor saying he’ll beat Bret.

WWF Title: Razor Ramon vs. Bret Hart

This was allegedly supposed to have been Warrior instead of Razor. I’ve read that from multiple sources including Bret himself, so I think there might be some truth to it. Warrior had been in the title picture when Bret took it from Flair from out of nowhere. If nothing else it makes sense here for Warrior to have gotten the shot here. I think they went with the right choice in Razor though. Granted Warrior had been thrown out for steroids allegedly so there we go.

Anyway, Razor had been hanging with Flair as a top heel for no apparent reason and then he got a world title shot for no apparent reason. I think he was supposed to be this incredible tough guy but it never really was explained why he was so awesome. Granted he certainly was, but it would have helped a bit.

His character was more or less taken straight from Scarface, but he got incredibly lucky: at the meeting where he pitched the character, Vince and Pat Patterson thought he was improving it and thought he was brilliant. Even still it’s a great character, but DANG what a way to get over good with the boss. Bret, rocking the pink jacket, says that Razor has made it personal.

I guess that’s because of the Owen attack which is kind of a story so I’ll take that over nothing at all. Razor is really young in his WWF time here, having been there about five months at the time. In a very cool shot, we see Bret ready to come through the curtain and getting himself fired up. He stands there for a bit looking like he’s in a coma and at a high point of his music he snaps forward and turns into the Hitman. That was sweetness.

Stu and Helen are of course here as is their custom. Bret winning here is pretty much a given, but a title match is better than nothing at all. Before the bell, just a quick reminder that WE ARE LIVE! This is working pretty well at the start as it’s fairly clear that Razor has a limited but solid offense. He had nearly 10 years experience at this point, but he’s not a great worker yet.

Over the next few years he would just nail the character so well that it could be kind of overlooked. We have a not entirely short early beatdown by Bret which is fine as he’s making Razor look solid. Razor is helping himself as well with some good selling. Naturally we have Bret in trouble soon after this, as Razor works on the ribs. This goes on for awhile and again since the match is pretty good I can’t really comment on it that much.

It’s a very basic style with Bret being in trouble a lot but coming back with some basic offense here and there. Razor keeps him down though and avoids the Sharpshooter at all costs. Bret finally gets off the mat for a bit and we go at it some more. For no reason whatsoever, Ramon uses back to back Greco-Roman knuckle locks, more commonly known as a test of strength. Brain says this could help him work on the ribs. Am I missing something here?

Bret doesn’t get moving quickly that often but when he does it really does work. In a GREAT ending sequence, Bret rolls down the back of the Razor’s Edge and gets a sunset flip for two. Razor kicks out and Bret grabs the legs, locks the Sharpshooter on from the mat and turns Razor over for the tap. OH YES!

Now that is Bret just being awesome out there and using his natural skills to just flat out beat someone he’s in there with. That’s awesome. It’s almost the same ending he used against Perfect in 91 at Summerslam, but dang it’s still cool.

Rating: B. This was a solid enough match for sure, but it could have been just a hair better. I have no clue how, but I know it could have been. Bret was at his best out there, sort of showing Razor where to go without holding his hand. This is what they built the company on for a long while, until somehow Hogan managed to sneak in and take the world title despite not having been doing anything even remotely associated with it for about a year.

Heenan is ready to unveil Narcissus. He’s actually in the arena and not on satellite which surprises me. This was a big deal for the fans of WCW who didn’t know that Luger had jumped. Heenan is liking Luger’s body WAY too much here. It sounds like he wants to jump him or something. Also Luger is posing to some really bad pop/techno music.

I don’t know why Heenan wasn’t associated with him more than he was. I never got that. Bobby gets in a jab at Perfect before Luger talks. He doesn’t help the overtones by mentioning the people getting on their knees before him. It’s an over the top yet effective intro so I’ll give them that.

Caesar and Cleopatra are here for the foreshadowing the idiocy of the World’s Largest Toga Party at Mania. They look so bored out there and they actually try to make this sound serious. It’s just dumb so move on PLEASE.

With no big string of interviews this year, we’re ready for the Rumble.

Royal Rumble

Flair is out first as he wins the award for worst luck in Rumble history. He would get 30 about 14 years later so that’s all fine I guess. He would lose a loser leaves town match the next night on Raw, so guess how he does here. Anyway, we have a battle of the old guys as Bob Backlund is in at 2. He gets zero reaction which is a shame as he really was great. Both guys are wearing red which is interesting looking. HA I beat Heenan to pointing that out!

Wow actually Heenan would last until the end of the year. Sorry for referencing something I said a few pages ago but I just looked that up during a dead spot. Gene would be there until September. I had those dates way off. In at three is Papa Shango which is just about the oddest pick you could have to join these two. Surprisingly he lasts about 20 seconds as Flair sneaks up on him to put him out.

That’s not something I expected but it makes sense. Flair and Backlund are having what should be a pretty historic encounter here, but good night I just couldn’t care less. This would have been epic 10 years earlier, but geez this isn’t interesting at all. DiBiase comes in at 4 as the talent out there is insane. He and IRS are tag champions at this point.

Heenan is sharp here but he’s not up to what he was last year. Granted that’s nearly impossible to pull off. My goodness DiBiase and Flair would be an epic duo. I don’t think the feud would work though. Fifth is Brian Knobbs who was kind of feuding with DiBiase’s team at this time. Wow he just doesn’t fit the mold of the other three in there. DiBiase gets his face rubbed into Knobbs’ arm pit. And people wonder why he left doesn’t associate with wrestling much anymore.

Virgil is in the ring maybe 2 seconds after his buzzer goes off so I’m thinking he jumped early. Naturally he and DiBiase go at it. My goodness he was generic. Backlund is 43 years old by the way. DiBiase puts on Knobbs for a little retribution. At far less than two minutes after Virgil, Lawler comes in at seventh. Flair goes through the ropes to kill some time.

It’s just completely odd to hear Heenan talk about Lawler. We get another funny now line as Bobby says Lawler is Vince’s boss. Again less than two minutes go by and we have Max Moon who may or may not have been Konnan. We’re almost at 1/3 of the way through this and it’s not that interesting at all so far.

Lawler is wearing white/gray which looks like it has flowers on it. It’s really odd looking. Lawler puts out Moon as Genichiro Tenryu of all people is number nine. I can feel the smarks cheering from here. He goes for Flair as I request not to be soaked with semen until after 9pm. Heenan says that Tenryu must be the inspiration for chop suey with all those chops. No that would be Kobashi. Wow I spend too much time on WZ to know that.

Gorilla doesn’t have a running clock this year which I think is a first. Oh he’s told something. Apparently it’s been 20 minutes. Considering I’m watching this online and we’re at 18 minutes on the counter and the match didn’t start until about two minutes, we know that’s a lie. Not to mention he says this before #10 comes out, and with two minute intervals and considering that 1 and 2 are there together, math wise we could only be at about 16 minutes max.

Perfect is in at 10 as Heenan has a bigger heart attack than when Hogan came in last year. Naturally he goes straight at Flair which was a great rivalry that I wish we had gotten more of. For a recap, we currently have Flair, Backlund, DiBiase, Virgil, Lawler, Tenryu and Perfect in there. Perfect really was awesome at this time as this was the height of his face run. He would beat Flair clean the next night (or a week ago depending on how you look at it) in a great match. Bobby is FREAKING here.

You know I wonder what would happen if say Flair won the Rumble and then lost his career the next night. Would there not be a Mania title match? Literally as I finish typing that question, Gorilla says that should that happen there wouldn’t be a title match. It’s like we’re psychos or something! Anyway Skinner is 11th as this is just kind of looking bad so far. Perfect dumps Flair to a HUGE pop. That’s good to hear.

The Hall of Famer Koko B. Ware is in at 12, wearing but not rocking the bright green pants. Who did he sleep with to get a job for so long? I’d love to know. Perfect continues being awesome by putting out Skinner as Heenan challenges Monsoon to a fight. The Rumble is 13 years old now as it’s Samu. Nothing is happening here as we’re really just going through the motions.

Berserker comes in and we now have Backlund, DiBiase, Virgil, Lawler, Tenryu, Perfect, Ware, Samu and Berserker. Good night that’s a lot of jobbers. Perfect drops Lawler to get us down to 8. DiBiase, Ware and Lawler team up to take out Perfect after a long struggle, which disappoints me as he certainly could have gone on a lot longer as a bigger deal.

Virgil is gone too and we’re at 6. The first half ends with Taker who is allegedly the favorite in this match? Sure why not? Taker drops Samu with relative ease as hopefully he’s the guy that drops the jobbers.

Berserker and Backlund are on the floor fighting but are both still in it. Taker throws out Tenryu as I’m guessing that he didn’t get a fair break, he could outwrestle everyone in this match put together, and he had a five star tag match with some other Japanese legend about 4 days prior to this? He also should be going to Mania for some massive crossover show with another company being brought in to make it an international organization.

The fact that no one popped for his entrance, anything he did in the ring or his elimination is irrelevant as well because they just don’t get it and the in ring work is more important than ratings. Just thought I’d spare some morons some keystrokers of idiocy there. Taker vs. DiBiase is an interesting…oh blast it Terry Taylor is in this match. He’s on the Garvin scale of annoying wrestlers. THANK YOU TED DIBIASE! He put out Taylor and Ware in one shot!

Granted he got chokeslammed just after it but I’m happy now. There he goes though so we’re at Backlund, Berserker and Taker at the moment. Since we just had a cool moment, let’s have a stupid one here as Giant Gonzalez debuts. For those of you that don’t know it’s a guy that’s taller than Khali but with about ¼ of his wrestling ability.

The thing is they used the same exact storyline to introduce Khali: Daivari, or in the original case Harvey Whippleman, had managed a guy he had sent after Taker (Kamala and then Hassan/Henry) who Taker had destroyed. The monster appeared, beat up Taker a few times, leading to a major fight that Taker would win. See? It’s the same thing and the main reason why Khali was hated.

We old school guys knew what was coming step by step and it just didn’t work. Gonzalez, who isn’t named here, wears this weird suit that makes him look like a caveman. I can’t believe that at the time, people actually compared him to Andre the freaking Giant. Taker puts out Berserker to make it him alone with Gonzalez. In a standard camera shot, Gonzalez’s hips are above the top rope.

Taker comes up to his shoulders. Damien Demento comes in at I think 17 and Gonzalez throws Taker out, which for some reason counts. Yep that’s about it. Backlund and Demento aren’t in the ring but they’re still in the match so keep that in mind. Taker gets beaten down by Gonzalez which actually was a big deal at the time. This goes on WAY too long as IRS comes out at 18.

About a minute later Tatanka comes in as we realize that the Rumble more or less has started over, which is freaking stupid but whatever. Taker tried to sit up but fails so Paul Bearer has to help him. Sara, Michelle McCool, Paul Bearer, write your own joke. Taker limps after Gonzalez because the Giant worked on his leg. Yep, a monster worked on his leg in his debut. That’s just absurd. No actually it’s stupid.

They try to say Gonzalez was 8 feet tall. It was more like 7’7 but whatever. Jerry Sags is in next at 20 as we get the amazing coincidence again of having a member of the tag champions against a member of the challengers twice in the same Rumble for I think the third straight year. What a coincidence!

Typhoon comes in as Heenan says that they’re getting fresher. Well not really but since this Rumble has completely sucked I can understand his lack of good lines. Fatu is in at 22, more commonly known as Rikishi.

The problem with the reset earlier is beginning to show as we’ve got an army of nothing but jobbers out there that simply aren’t going to win. There’s also the issue of the roster here just flat out sucking. Earthquake is 23rd so we have the Disasters in there together. He goes right at Typhoon as their team was just about to split up. Quake dumps him out with relative ease as I really want this stupid match to end but we’ve got another 7 guys to come out.

Oh for the love of cheese Carlos freaking Colon is in next as Gorilla calls him a youngster. He’s 45 here and older than Backlund. To the majority of you his kids are more famous: Carlito and Primo, although they’re far less talented. He puts out Demento though so he’s already paying dividends. In next we have Tito Santana as we’re getting close to the end here.

VERY allegedly, he was supposed to win this at one point, but since he’s the only person to claim that I have a huge problem believing it. Fatu is out. To recap, we have Tito, IRS, Backlund, Sags, Earthquake, Colon and now Martel as I’m guessing he’ll fight Santana. Of course he does. DANG man they feuded for what, 4 years about a team that was together less than one. That’s even better than the Evolution feud. IRS is out.

Heenan redeems himself a bit by saying Backlund is like a spider monkey. GORILLA MONSOON SAID A BAD WORD! I have never once heard him curse and he did it like it was nothing. Actually there was a tiny little hesitation before he said it which makes me feel better. Yokozuna, who is a relative newcomer at this point, is number 27. He throws out Tatanka with more or less ease and does the same to Carlos. We get Yoko vs. Quake as Owen comes in at 28.

Heenan says he can’t hear Gorilla despite them being on headset together. Yoko actually belly to bellys Quake over the top. That was cool looking. Repo Man is 29th as I’ve made a counting error somewhere in here. Ah there we go it’s fixed now. Everybody gangs up on Yoko but amazingly he fights them all off.

The 30th guy is Savage, so the final list of guys is Backlund, Santana, Sags, Owen, Repo Man, Martel, Savage and Yokozuna. Ok, now in case you’re just an idiot when it comes to old school, you can pretty much guess who this comes down to in the final two. Yoko puts out Santana and then the same to Owen. Repo is gone and we’re down to four. Have to give it to Backlund: this is impressive. He knocks out Martel clean as Heenan is amazed.

Yoko puts him out to a chorus of boos. It amazes me that he was jobbing to Razor at Mania in a glorified squash match. He goes over an hour, setting a new Iron Man record to a great reaction and gets treated like that. If nothing else put him out there with Shawn or Santana and let them tear the house down old school style. So we’re down to Savage against Yoko as Backlund is getting a big ovation.

We get a short one on one match here as Savage gets his ask kicked for a good while. But then, there’s a comeback! Savage has Yoko in real trouble and does something no one else has ever done by knocking him off his feet! Then we get to the ending which I’m not sure if I like or not: Savage has Yoko down and goes up for the elbow. He covers Yoko, who powers out of it, throwing Savage over the top to win the Rumble.

At first I hated this, but the more I think about it the more it makes sense. Savage is as intense as anyone has ever been, so for him to get his mind clouded by being on such a role and go to what is his instinctual finish makes sense to me, even though it’s obvious that it’s scripted. I can live with this and it was a creative way to eliminate him and keep him looking strong at the same time. The Japanese flag waving for a Samoan wrestler takes us out.

Rating: D+. This was BAD. The Gonzalez thing divides the match in half and the first half is even more boring than the first. Backlund is the undisputed star of this match though as he went out there for over an hour and put on a great performance that never once was too farfetched to believe. As for the ending, this is something I wanted to address. I’m torn on whether or not this was the right ending to the Rumble.

I know that Vince wanted to push Yoko as the monster heel, but I think he was completely missing the boat here. What I would have done for my summer feud: Savage vs. Bret for the title. Now think about it. Those are two of the best workers of all time. Are you telling me that those two wouldn’t have put on a freaking classic at Mania? This is where my issues with Vince show up. No one, I repeat no one, can convince me that Yoko was a better choice for the huge push than Savage.

If you don’t believe me, watch Bret vs. Yoko from Mania 9. Yoko was just too fat to be in any real trouble and the match sucked as a result. This was Savage’s first real chance to shine with Warrior and Hogan gone. It’s not like he was incredibly old at the time (he turned 41 in November of that year) but he certainly would have worked for a feud over the summer.

He won multiple world titles down the line in WCW so he certainly still had the it factor. The fans were behind him and Bret hadn’t really gotten a big rub at all. Beating Savage clean certainly would have done that for him.

However, Vince continues his love affair with big huge men that can’t do a ton in the ring (by comparison to Savage that is) so he goes with the David vs. Goliath match, stupidly not realizing that the only thing that could make Yoko look credible for a full match was a power guy, which he got in Luger later in the year.

Either way, the Rumble sucked as once you got down to the final ten there was zero doubt who would win. The announcers were bored out of their minds too, which for Monsoon is saying a lot.

Overall Rating: D. Well let’s see. We have two ok matches, an ok one and a really boring main event. Yeah the D is a generous grade I think. The Ramon and Bret match is the only thing worth watching here as other than that the whole show is just flat out boring. Marty and Shawn is ok at its absolute best but it just falls flat on its face for the most part. The Rumble is just atrocious.

Nothing of note happens, Savage and Yoko are the only two that you think have a shot at winning, with Hogan gone there’s no real A-list star in the match, and it just doesn’t work. Gonzalez also kills the thing by eliminating Taker after about five minutes which isn’t good either.

This whole show was just awful other than a few moments, which certainly weren’t enough to validate this as one of the major, and at the time only, shows of the year. Don’t watch anything on here, not even the best match as it’s like saying someone is the best poster in the prison. Just a bad show all around.

 

 

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s Complete 2004 Monday Night Raw Reviews (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/08/26/new-book-and-e-book-kbs-complete-2004-monday-night-raw-reviews/

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Survivor Series 1995
Date: November 19, 1995
Location: USAir Arena, Landover, Maryland
Attendance: 14,500
Commentators: Vince McMahon, Mr. Perfect, Jim Ross

It’s time for the annual redo and I’m curious to see what we’re going to see here. We have some big stuff on the show, including Diesel defending the WWF Title against Bret Hart in a match whose result should be pretty clear after how badly Diesel’s last big title defense went. Let’s get to it.

Mr. Perfect gets a big intro to do commentary. That’s quite the different way to start things off, though it’s how Gorilla Monsoon and Jesse Ventura came out to open the first Survivor Series so points for likely unintentional tradition.

The opening video looks at Diesel vs. Bret Hart, which is all that matters on this show.

Underdogs vs. BodyDonnas

Underdogs: Barry Horowitz, Bob Holly, Hakushi, Marty Jannetty

BodyDonnas: 1-2-3 Kid, Skip, Tom Prichard, Rad Radford

And they wonder why things were falling apart at the moment. Sunny handles the BodyDonnas’ intros, though Radford is only a BodyDonna in training and Prichard isn’t Zip yet. The Kid is kind of on loan from Ted DiBiase, who paid off Jean Pierre LaFitte for the spot, and is here as well. Cue Razor Ramon to go after the Kid, who recently turned on him so things aren’t going so well for them. Marty and Prichard start things off with Marty being taken into and having to fight out of the corner in a hurry.

Tom accidentally knees Kid off the apron and Sunny needs to start the rally clap. Holly comes in with a hurricanrana on Radford (Perfect: “Now that was a good looking wrestling move.”) and it’s an armdrag into an armbar. It’s off to Hakushi (for a very positive reaction) but Radford plants him with a spinebuster. Kid comes in to a far more negative reaction and hits the quick legdrop before handing it off to Skip. The belly to back superplex is countered into a crossbody though and it’s off to Holly vs. Prichard. Granted the fans want Barry, but they seem happy to see Prichard missing a moonsault.

That’s enough for Holly to go up with the high crossbody to get rid of Prichard at 5:40. Skip is right back in with a rollup to pin Holly at 5:47 though and we’re tied up again. Hakushi comes back in and kicks away at Skip but the Vader Bomb hits knees. Skip’s super hurricanrana connects but he falls down as well, meaning it’s Kid coming in to kick away. You don’t do that with Hakushi though, as he fires off the strikes and hits a running headbutt for two (JR: “He almost knocked the price tag off the Kid!” Good line.).

The springboard splash misses though and we go split screen to watch an annoyed Ramon and company. It’s going to be made even worse when the Kid kicks Hakushi in the back of the head so Radford can get the pin (with tights) at 8:32. Barry comes in and gets beaten down because he’s Barry Horowitz and that’s all you should have expected. Some right hands stagger Kid but he hands it off to Radford for a gutwrench suplex.

For some reason Skip tells Radford not to pin him, which is only going to go badly. I mean not as badly as being named Skip but how much lower can you go? Radford stops for some pushups and of course Barry grabs a three quarter nelson (as so many people grab) for the pin at 11:50. That gives us the, ahem, epic Barry vs. Skip showdown (yes I do feel stupid writing that) but the Kid gets a blind tag and knees Barry down.

The running legdrop finishes Barry at 12:48 (yes off a legdrop, because Barry Horowitz), leaving us with Skip/Kid vs. Marry. That’s a main event in most flea markets in the country, especially if the person putting the show together wants to get creative. Or if Marty’s partner got lost and started talking to a nice moose. Skip misses a charge into the corner but is fine enough to elbow Jannetty down. They go up top and Marty goes huge with a super powerbomb (dang) for the pin at 15:22.

The Kid is right in there to kick Marty in the head over and over, but a Swanton misses to put them both down. Marty is back up with a dropkick for two….and here’s Sid, also part of DiBiase’s Corporation. The fans chant for Razor as the Rocker Dropper gives Marty two. That’s enough for DiBiase to get on the apron and offer a distraction though, meaning Sid can snap Marty’s throat across the top to give Kid the pin at 19:08.

Rating: D+. If this is their big opener, they’re in a lot more trouble than I thought. This was nothing to see whatsoever, with the wrestling being fine at best and the story being rather pathetic. We’re supposed to get excited about a team whose most successful member is Marty Jannetty with Barry Horowitz as captain? To start a pay per view? I know 1995 was bad but come on now. Not a good start here and I’m almost scared to see the rest.

Post match Sid and Kid celebrate in a somewhat funny bit.

Razor Ramon breaks a lot of stuff over Kid and company winning.

Camp Cornette and Dean Douglas aren’t happy with Razor being annoyed before tonight’s Wild Card match (a cool concept where the teams were fairly random, so of course they never did it again). Owen says Razor needs to get his priorities straight and Dean says they’re going to be fighting without a team member.

Team Aja Kong vs. Team Alundra Blayze

Aja Kong, Bertha Faye, Lioness Asuka, Tomoko Watanabe

Alundra Blayze, Chaparita Asari, Kyoko Inoue, Sakie Hasagawa

Yeah I think this might be better, as the women are making a short term visit from Japan to try and make the women’s division mean something. I mean it didn’t work, but it was worth a try. Kind of like Vince calling a match like this, but thankfully JR is in there to help carry things. Harvey Wippleman is here with Kong’s team and Blayze is Women’s Champion.

Asuka goes straight to a giant swing on Asari to start but it’s quickly off to Blayze, whose who into the ropes….doesn’t quite work as Asuka falls down. Odd visual but a slam works a bit better, seeing up the Sky Twister Press from Asari. The German suplex gets rid of Asuka at 1:43 so they’re starting fast.

Watanabe comes in to stomp away but Blayze sends her outside for the big dive from the top. Back in and Hasagawa rolls some butterfly suplexes but Watanabe is back with a top rope seated senton. Kong comes in and slugs Watanabe down but she snaps off a German suplex for a breather. A quick Saito suplex gets rid of Hasagawa at 3:59. Asari comes in and gets slammed, setting up a middle rope splash for the pin at 4:25.

That sets up the Blayze vs. Kong showdown but it’s off to Inoue after about five seconds of slug out. Kong quickly counters a sunset flip by sitting on Inoue’s chest for the pin at 5:04 and Blayze is on her own. Faye, one of the more disgusting ideas that WWE ever had (see, she’s fat and stupid but she’s strong so it works), comes in to stomp away but Blayze piledrives Watanabe (originally a powerbomb but Blayze couldn’t get her up) for the pin at 6:31.

Bertha comes in again to kick at Blayze’s leg but some heel miscommunication lets Blayze hit a German suplex to pin Faye at 7:12. Faye doesn’t seem to mind as she leaves Kong to headbutt Blayze. A superplex gives Kong two and some hip thrusts in the corner have Blayze in more trouble. She’s right back up to kick Kong down and a standing moonsault gets two. Blayze catches her on top but gets shoved down, setting up the spinning backfist for the pin at 10:03. Now play that Orient Express music!

Rating: C+. The action was WAY better but there’s only so much you can do with seven falls in ten minutes. The women’s division basically didn’t exist outside of Blayze, Faye and whomever else they brought in from Japan at this point, which is probably why the division was dead in a few months. This was a very fun change of pace, but there’s only so much you can do with this many time restraints.

The Bill Clinton impersonator is here and I’m still not sure why…until he thinks Bam Bam Bigelow is from the Flintstones. Yeah this is Vince show.

Bam Bam Bigelow vs. Goldust

Goldust has only been around for about a month and promises a great performance that will make you remember his name. After a quick stall to start, Goldust hammers away a bit and then bails to the floor to mess with Bigelow’s bald head. Back in and Bigelow hammers away to send Goldust outside again.

The fight is on with Goldust hitting the post but he’s fine enough to take it back inside and clothesline Bigelow to the floor. The front facelock goes on for a bit before Goldust throws him outside (again). Back in and Bigelow gets in a belly to back suplex but Goldust slaps on a reverse chinlock. That’s broken up with an electric chair but Goldust is right back up with the bulldog for the pin at 8:32.

Rating: D. It would take Goldust some time to really get the hang of things and we weren’t to that point yet. Goldust was more of a movie guy here instead of the weird guy he would become, which was what worked when he meshed it together with the movie stuff. The problem is his wrestling consisted of throwing Bigelow to the floor and then hitting a bulldog, which isn’t quite thrilling. This was it for Bigelow as well and he was eventually off to ECW.

Bob Backlund visits the Clinton impersonator and wants to know why he’s here.

We recap the Royals (Mabel) vs. the Dark Side (Undertaker). Mabel and Yokozuna crushed Undertaker’s face and now it’s time for revenge.

Royals vs. Dark Side

Royals: King Mabel, Hunter Hearst Helmsley, Jerry Lawler, Isaac Yankem

Dark Side: Undertaker, Savio Vega, Henry Godwinn, Fatu

So it’s the Royals vs. the Bone Street Krew. This is Undertaker’s return after a month away due to the crushed face and he has a big skull mask on as a result. Fatu and Helmsley start things off with Fatu hitting a backdrop into a clothesline. A very early Pedigree attempt is cut off with a stare from Undertaker so it’s off to Godwinn to scare Lawler away. Yankem comes in to stomp Godwinn down but Henry is right back up with a clothesline. The jumping elbow gets two but Yankem hits a belly to back suplex.

Helmsley comes in for some uppercuts as we hear about how is still undefeated (dang that makes me feel so old). Godwinn gets in a rather delayed gorilla press and throws Helmsley into the corner for the tag off to Lawler. Vega comes in as well and Lawler starts bouncing off of him like a pinball. Lawler manages a kick to the face and celebrates so Vega knocks him down again. It’s off to Fatu to work on Lawler’s arm but a cheap shot from the apron cuts him off. Yankem gets in the jumping elbow but Mabel misses the charge in the corner, allowing Vega to hammer away.

A big Boss Man Slam cuts that off and Vega gets caught in the corner. Yankem comes back in and hits a dropkick (!), followed by a knee from Helmsley (, at best) for two. Vega manages a Rock Bottom to Helmsley but Lawler, fearing a bad case of death, cuts off the hot tag to Undertaker. The piledriver plants Vega….but he pops up and brings in Undertaker to start the destruction.

Lawler’s partners all run away and it’s the Tombstone for the first elimination at 12:20. Yankem tries to deck Undertaker but gets caught with the jumping clothesline, setting up the Tombstone for the pin at 12:43 (and they were never seen together again). Now it’s Helmsley coming in and being scared off by a single glare.

Helmsley tries to leave but gets sent back to the apron, where Undertaker chokeslams him back inside (good one too) for the pin at 13:36. That leaves Mabel on his own and he hits the belly to belly suplex. The legdrop, which crushed Undertaker’s face, connects….and Undertaker sits up. That’s enough for Mabel, who runs off for the countout at 14:25.

Rating: B-. It’s rare to have the first twelve minutes of a match be absolutely nothing but the last two and a half minutes completely save the match. Undertaker was a wrecking ball here and there was no one touching him. I’ve been watching wrestling for over thirty years and a ticked off Undertaker is the scariest thing that I have ever seen. I loved the Undertaker stuff here and I was getting excited watching it all over again. It’s a great ending and Undertaker can destroy Mabel once and for all before finally finding a great opponent. Like Mankind for instance.

Post match Undertaker chokeslams Mo to blow off some steam.

Bret Hart isn’t worried about British Bulldog next month because he’s ready to face Diesel and knows what’s coming. He feels like Wayne Gretzky, who has to find out if he still has this every year. Tonight, Diesel is finding out that he can’t hang with him.

Diesel is ready to face Bret because he doesn’t need to go long with Bret. He doesn’t get paid by the hour and it’s all power tonight.

Jim Cornette, now with the other team, says he’s been here all day and Ted DiBiase just wants to win. Shawn Michaels comes in to say he’s got this and Ahmed Johnson doesn’t say anything, thank goodness.

Team Shawn Michaels vs. Team Yokozuna

Shawn Michaels, Ahmed Johnson, British Bulldog, Sycho Sid

Yokozuna, Owen Hart, Razor Ramon, Dean Douglas

Ted DiBiase is with Sid and company while Jim Cornette is trying to figure out who he is supposed to help here. Shawn gets a great pop and it’s no shock that he was on the way to the main event. Commentary uses this chance to make jokes about the government balancing a budget because of course they do. Owen and Shawn start things up with Shawn sending him to the floor and giving Cornette a spank with the tennis racket. Back in and Owens hits a belly to belly to cut Shawn off and it’s Dean coming in to slug away.

Shawn takes him down anyway and hits the top rope ax handle, only to get punched in the face again. Dean’s Vader Bomb misses though and Shawn hits a moonsault press for two. Johnson comes in and gets triple teamed with Dean grabbing a chinlock. Back up and a powerslam plants Dean for no cover, even Ahmed poses over Dean after putting him down. Shawn comes back in and the threat of the superkick sends Dean bailing to the floor. Razor isn’t having that and punches Dean into the rollup for the pin at 7:28.

Owen charges in but gets drop toeholded so Shawn can tag Bulldog in. A spinwheel kick cuts Bulldog down and it’s quickly off to Shawn vs. Razor, which is treated as a big showdown. Eh fair enough after the two matches they had. Shawn ducks a clothesline and hits an elbow in the face but Razor hits a very quick Razor’s Edge. Johnson makes the save so Razor hits a running knee lift to put Shawn down. For some reason it puts Razor down as well so Shawn brings in Sid to hammer away in the corner.

Yokozuna comes in for a cheap shot but Sid doesn’t mind and stays on Razor’s back. A double clothesline puts both of them down so Sid goes up top, only to get slammed off the top. Razor gets in a few right hands (I’ve always liked those) but Sid hits a quick chokeslam. Shawn comes in to superkick Razor but hits Sid by mistake. He doesn’t seem to mind so Bulldog….legdrops Sid by mistake, allowing Razor to get the pin at 16:17.

Bulldog comes in to beat on Razor as Sid powerbombs Shawn, allowing Razor to get two. The fresh Owen gets the tag and stays on Shawn’s back before Yokozuna hammers Shawn down in the corner (Perfect: “Welcome back to Syracuse Shawn!”). We hit the nerve hold for a bit before Yoko and Owen hit a double headbutt. Owen misses the diving headbutt though and now the hot tag can bring in Ahmed to clean house. The Pearl River Plunge gets rid of Owen at 21:47.

Razor comes in to slug away at Ahmed (a match between those two could have been interesting) but Ahmed doesn’t know how to STAND IN ONE PLACE for the middle rope bulldog, meaning Razor has to settle for a regular bulldog instead. Likely frustrated by Ahmed being kind of awful, Razor punches Bulldog and Shawn but walks into a spinebuster. Cornette offers a distraction though and it’s the Razor’s Edge to Ahmed. Bulldog breaks that up but here are Sid and the Kid as Razor comes back with the fall away slam.

The distraction lets Bulldog hit the running powerslam for the pin, leaving us with Shawn/Bulldog/Johnson vs. Yokozuna. It’s Shawn getting pounded into the corner to start, which certainly pleases Cornette. Yokozuna drops the big leg but the Banzai Drop only hits mat. The falling tag brings in Ahmed for a slam (less of a slam than Lex Luger’s) but Bulldog makes the save. Shawn and Ahmed get rid of him and it’s the superkick into a screaming splash from Ahmed for the pin at 27:24.

Rating: C. I really liked the idea here and it’s something that could have been done again for years, but for some reason it was only a one off. That being said, the match certainly had some problems, including Johnson looking like he had no idea what he was doing half the time. The match also just kind of came and went without much of a flow. Cool concept, but only a decent execution.

Clinton hits on Sunny and easy jokes are made.

We recap Bret Hart vs. Diesel for the WWF Title. They have had two great matches before as Bret knows how to take the giant down but Diesel is good at the power stuff so it is time for the big showdown. Bret says one of their matches went to a no contest so it’s his title, which Diesel doesn’t see to agree with.

Commentary plays up the technical vs. power here and it makes a lot of sense.

WWF Title: Bret Hart vs. Diesel

Bret is challenging and anything goes. They both unhook turnbuckle pads to start and it’s Diesel hammering away in the corner. That’s enough to send Bret outside so Diesel drops him face first onto the barricade. Bret gets choked against said barricade but he kicks at the leg back inside. Diesel cuts that off with a right hand to the head and then whips him hard into the steps. A chair to the back drops Bret again as it’s one sided in the first few minutes.

The Jackknife is blocked and Bret starts biting to change things up. A choke on Diesel’s back has some more success and now it’s time to kick at the leg. There’s an elbow to the knee and Bret cranks on it for a bonus. Some cannonballs down onto the leg make it even worse and we hit the Figure Four. Diesel grabs a rope and Vince says it has to be broken, but Perfect accurately points out that it doesn’t because there’s no DQ threat to make Bret do anything.

Bret lets it go anyway but it’s way too early for the Sharpshooter. Diesel kicks him away and into the buckle so it’s a bunch of forearms to put Bret down. Unfortunately it puts him down in the corner, where he slides to the floor so Diesel can have his leg wrapped around the post. Bret gets creative by whipping out a cable and tying Diesel’s leg to the post, earning himself a boot to the face. It doesn’t seem to matter much though as Bret gets in a middle rope shot to the face.

The chair is brought in and is promptly kicked into Bret’s face but Diesel is still tied to the post. Bret unloads on him with the chair, including some shots to the knee. Diesel slams him off the top though and unties himself, setting up a big whip into the corner. Vince: “Bret should give up!” Well then tell someone to ring the bell Vince. Diesel can’t hit the running crotch attack so he jumps down onto his back instead.

Snake Eyes drops Bret again but he’s back with right hands to the face. Bret’s middle rope bulldog gets two and Diesel heads to the floor, where he misses the slingshot dive. Diesel knocks him hard off the apron and through the announcers’ table (I believe debuting the spot), leaving Bret mostly dead. Back in and Bret collapses when Diesel tries the Jackknife…and then small packages him for the pin and the title at 24:02. Diesel: “MOTHERF*****!”

Post match Diesel snaps and powerbombs Bret before hitting a referee.

Rating: B+. These two had some great chemistry together and that was on display again here. Bret could brawl when he needed to and he mixed that in with taking apart the knee to have a great match. It also helps when you have him in there to walk Diesel through everything, which is what makes their matches work so well. Diesel could be brought up to another level and there was no one who could do that better than Bret. It was WAY past time to change the title though and thank goodness they did it here.

We get the highlight package….and then go back to commentary for a recap of the heel turn and the sign off. That’s different.

Overall Rating: C+. This was a really weird show as I would have thought only the main event bailed everything out but the rest of the show is mostly good, with only the opener and Goldust vs. Bigelow being pretty bad. The show just doesn’t feel that important and it comes off more as a show that was good in spite of itself, which is rarely a good thing. The main event is good and Undertaker cleaning house is great, but nothing else stands out here in the slightest.

BodyDonnas vs. Underdogs

Original: A-

2012 Redo: B

2020 Redo: D+

Team Bertha Faye vs. Team Alundra Blayze

Original: D

2012 Redo: Redo: C+

2020 Redo: C+

Goldust vs. Bam Bam Bigelow

Original: C

2012 Redo: F

2020 Redo: D

Dark Side vs. Royals

Original: B-

2012 Redo: D+

2020 Redo: B-

Team Shawn Michaels vs. Team Yokozuna

Original: C+

2012 Redo: C+

2020 Redo: C

Bret Hart vs. Diesel

Original: C+

2012 Redo: A

2020 Redo: B+

Overall Rating

Original: B-

2012 Redo: B

2020 Redo: C+

Where in the world was I on that first match???

Here’s the original if you are interested:

https://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2020/10/30/survivor-series-count-up-1995-original-bret-vs-the-giant/

And the 2012 redo:

https://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2015/11/03/survivor-series-count-up-1995-wild-card/

 

 

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s Complete 2004 Monday Night Raw Reviews (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/08/26/new-book-and-e-book-kbs-complete-2004-monday-night-raw-reviews/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6