Monday Night Raw
Date: December 25, 2000
Location: McKenzie Arena, Chattanooga, Tennessee
Attendance: 7,223
Commentators: Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler

This is another request due to it being Christmas recently. One night late in WCW’s dying days, Raw has a show on Christmas night. If I remember right, Nitro didn’t air and I don’t think many people noticed. This is a few weeks after Armageddon and the 6 man Cell match so we’re rolling towards New Orleans and the Rumble which was very good. Let’s get to it.

And no this isn’t live of course. It was taped the Saturday before.

Here’s Stephanie to open the show. You know, the implants with a McMahon attached. She looks great though. The McMahons are celebrating Christmas at the moment, with Vince volunteering at a soup kitchen in Greenwich and HHH sending Steph here. Even Stephanie is getting into it, making something that reminds her of her mother: a fruitcake. We get a clip from the end of Smackdown, which is Rock and Undertaker arguing over something. Therefore tonight it’s Rock vs. Taker.

She brings out Edge and Christian with Angle as well. Angle is in his first reign as world champion while the Canadians are tag champions. Edge wishes Stephanie a Merry Christmas but they’re sorry that Foley isn’t here due to being fired last week. Christian insults Chattanooga for a bit and talks about Smackdown, which we see a clip from showing Edge pinning Rock to win the tag titles.

Angle does the same but with his own brand of humor. He’s given himself a Christmas gift and has flown out his family. Here’s an army of people that all look like Kurt. He introduces all of his family and all of their accomplishments. He talks about hitting Foley with a chair so the fans chant for Foley. Stephanie reminds us that he’s fired and the fans boo Kurt’s family. They sing Walkin In A Winter Wonderland until Jericho FINALLY cuts them off.

He tells Angle to shut up. Jericho liked the singing but instead it should have been the Twelve Days of Christmas. We have six Angles who will never be a laying, two valley girls and Stephanie, who gets all of her usual insults, in a a pear tree. For Christmas, Jericho wants the world title, and he wants it tonight. Angle yells but Stephanie cuts him off. The title shot is denied but instead it’s a six man: Angle/Canadians vs. Jericho/whatever team Chris wants. Jericho says that’s nice but he didn’t get anything for Stepahanie. What do you get for someone who’s had everyone? Jericho implies the Dudleys will be his partners.

Kurt gives his family a tour of the arena and runs into K-Kwik (R-Truth) and that’s about it.

Hardy Boys vs. Dean Malenko/Chris Benoit

Benoit is IC Champion and Dean is Light Heavyweight Champion. In the back, Matt tells Lita to stay in the back because she’ll get hurt. Lita goes anyway. Big brawl to start and Malenko pulls Benoit to the floor. Jeff is like cool man and hits a huge Poetry in Motion to the floor. That looked awesome. Benoit SNAPS off a dragon screw on Jeff’s leg to take over. That looked sick. Malenko works on the knee a bit as well but Jeff gets a SWEET spinning leg sweep cradle for two. A double dropkick puts the Radicalz down and it’s off to Matt. Everything breaks down and Lita hits Dean low. Top rope legdrop ends this.

Rating: C-. Nothing great here but the knee stuff was great. By that I mean one move but you get the idea. This would lead to Dean getting a date with Lita which wound up in a hotel room and Lita in some very nice lingerie. Anyway, not much to see here but it was nice to get the Hardys away from the Dudleys and Canadians.

Post match Matt gets put in the Texas Cloverleaf and Lita in the Crossface.

Post break Lita is being checked on when Benoit jumps Matt again.

Rock arrives and doesn’t care to hear about his match with Taker.

Debra is still Lieutenant Commissioner but it’s not fun without Foley anymore. She makes a triple threat Hardcore Title match with Raven, Blackman and Holly.

Vince calls Stephanie on voicemail and likes the match. He says he has to do something real quick at the soup kitchen but Trish’s voice is heard giggling.

We get a clip of Austin getting chokeslammed by Kane and then Austin demanding a match with him, which he gets tonight. Austin says he’ll beat Kane up tonight.

Hardcore Title: Hardcore Holly vs. Raven vs. Steve Blackman

Blackman is champion. Raven and Holly get into it before Steve gets there. I’m not sure what you want me to say here as it’s your usual one guy gets knocked down, the other two fight, the third makes the save. The challengers fight into the crowd but Blackman beats them both down out there. They go under the stage and into the back where Raven beats up what appears to be some stagehands. They go outside and Raven is thrown down some stairs. Holly finds a random 2×4 and swings at Blackman. He misses though and Blackman hits a German onto the hood of a car to retain.

Rating: D+. As I’ve said before, once you’ve seen one of these matches, you’ve seen them all. It’s just basic brawling with weapons that goes nowhere and then they have the ending. They had beaten this so far into the ground but by keeping it down to like three minutes per match, I think it’s ok.

Blackman is walking back to the locker room but Raven hits him with a board and steals the title.

The XFL is coming. OH YEAH!

Here’s Regal who is European Champion. Little trivia for you: he’s one of only two Europeans to hold that title. He blasts Americans for awhile until Kane comes out for his match. Ok then.

Kane vs. Steve Austin

Brawl to start with Austin hammering him into the corner. Regal is on commentary. A clothesline puts Kane down and another puts him on the floor. Austin gets pulled out there and Kane takes over. Regal gets up for some reason and Austin takes him down as well. Austin stomps on both of them as this is a total brawl. Back in the ring a big boot puts Austin down and they slow down.

A second boot is blocked and Austin goes for the knee. Kane fights back and wraps Austin’s leg around the post. Lawler says Kane is the official first entrant in the Rumble. Back in the top rope clothesline gets two. After a suplex gets two it’s a bearhug. Austin comes back with the Thesz Press and the elbow. Chokeslam, Stunner and Tombstone are countered until a Stunner hits. Regal pops up on the apron and Kane gets up. Regal finally gets in for the DQ.

Rating: C. This was fine. It was just a brawl that ran about seven and a half minutes and that’s all it really needed to be. The interesting thing is you could easily compare this to a lot of Cena’s matches on Raw today. There wasn’t anything to it for the most part and there wasn’t supposed to be. However Cena gets blasted for it and Austin is one of the most popular stars ever. Go figure.

Regal tries to bring in a chair but Austin clocks both guys with it instead.

Taker says he isn’t surprised by having to fight Rock later. He says Rock has the bark but he has the bite. Taker is still face here.

Cue The Kat in a robe. She has a gift with her. She gets in front of the announce table and grabs a mic. The gift is for JR and it’s the latest Divas video. As for King, Kat gets on the table and pulls the robe open to reveal some red lingerie. She shows the crowd too. Jerry gets a kiss also.

Stephanie barges in on T&A who says Trish isn’t here. She leaves and they imply Trish is with Vince.

Angle calls his parents as his brothers/cousin watch. Well that was pointless.

Too Cool vs. T&A

Grandmaster vs. Test to start. Stephanie comes out to watch, probably because of the jokes T&A made after she left. Sexay hits a middle rope dropkick and it’s off to Scotty so he can get beaten up for awhile. Albert comes in and Scott can’t do anything. Baldo (Albert) Bomb gets two as Grandmaster makes the save. Scotty gets in some kicks and a forearm to set up a double tag. Everything breaks down and Scotty sets for the Worm. Test kicks Scotty’s head off after it hits. He sets for the ending but Stephanie distracts him, allowing Grandmaster to roll up Test for the win.

Rating: D. Didn’t like this one at all. This whole show has felt like it’s just a labor to get through and that’s not good. To be fair though it’s Christmas night so it’s not like anyone is watching. Stephanie came in to mess with them, presumably to cost Trish’s team, but this went nowhere.

Post break, Albert comes in to talk with Stephanie. He offers his services to Stephanie for whatever she needs.

Chris Jericho/Dudley Boys vs. Kurt Angle/Edge/Christian

Jericho and Christian start things off. The fans want tables and Jericho tries a quick Walls attempt but settles for a slingshot into a rollup for two instead. D-Von and Edge come in and things speed up. Bubba comes in and does his always funny yelling. What’s Up to Edge. It’s Table Time already and everything breaks down on the outside. Edge hammers on Bubba but it’s quickly off to Christian.

The beating goes on for about 20 seconds before it’s off to Jericho and Angle. Jericho gets in a fight with Angle’s family who is all in the front row. The Dudleys put one of them through a table. The Dudleys and the Canadians fight up the ramp and Jericho hits a missile dropkick for no cover but the Lionsault eats knees. Angle Slam (and a good one too) beats Jericho.

Rating: C. This was going on so fast that it was hard to tell if it was good or bad. It certainly wasn’t boring and the big stuff looked pretty good. I liked it for the most part but much like the rest of this show and the show overall, it came and went and that’s all there really is to say about it.

The Angle family beats him down but the Dudleys make the save.

Edge and Christian say they’ll get the Dudleys for what they did.

Right to Censor vs. APA

It’s Buchanan/Godfather this time. Buchanan gives a very southern promo, talking about how evil the Dudleys are. Bradshaw starts with Godfather and the beating begins. Farrooq and Buchanan come in and the bald one takes a spinebuster. Bradshaw comes in and runs people over, including a top rope shoulder. Ivory interferes and Jackie runs her over. They get in the ring because Jackie has to get on my nerves at least once a year. Val Venis uses the distraction to run in and DDT Bradshaw. A Buchanan legdrop ends this. The match was nothing.

We get a video of Chyna taking a spike piledriver and injuring her neck. She had an MRI so we get a sitdown interview with her. Short version: I’m hurt, I’m sad, I’m successful outside the ring, I don’t like RTC, I’ll be back but not against men. Somehow that took six minutes.

Rock is in the back and cuts Kevin Kelly off because they are chanting his name. He gives his version of Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer and sings to Undertaker a bit too.

Undertaker vs. The Rock

I’ve never really seen these two have a good match so maybe this is the exception. Taker pounds him down and knocks Rock to the floor with one punch. Rock gets dropped onto the barricade and the table as JR is running out of room to run. Back in the ring Rock fires off a few rights and the jumping clothesline to take over. Swinging neckbreaker gets no cover but a Russian legsweep gets two.

Taker gets in a big boot and pounds away on the back. They mess up something so Taker hits a side slam for two. DDT by Rock gets two. More back work by Taker and this match isn’t breaking the streak these two have. Oh joy: it’s a bearhug. Rock fights out and now Taker hits a DDT of his own for two. Chokeslam and Rock Bottom are countered but a chokeslam hits. No cover though because he wants a Last Ride. And here’s Rikishi to interfere. Spinebuster to Taker but Rikishi pulls the top rope down and Rock wins by REALLY LAME DQ.

Rating: D-. What a boring match. They walked around, punched each other a lot, and that’s about it. The really bad ending didn’t help anything at all but hey, Rikishi is a top heel right? They don’t really give a reason or a thought as to whether or not it would work, but he was the next guy to feud with Rock I believe. Give me a break.

Rikishi stands tall to end the show.

Overall Rating: F+. OH MAN thank goodness it’s over. This was one of the least interesting shows I’ve seen in longer than I can remember. Nothing happened here, no one cared, no one wanted to be on the show it seemed, and nothing here would have seemed to have mattered. That being said, it’s unlikely anyone watched it but if one person did, it beat Nitro that night. Horrible show though.

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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

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 heck 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 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 tar 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 anything 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 like heck 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.

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Monday Night Raw
Date: March 4, 2002
Location: Frank Erwin Center, Austin, Texas
Attendance: 8,849
Commentators: Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler

We’re heading into Mania here with I believe only the go home show after this. The NWO is in town tonight and they’re not happy with Austin. This is a request for something that happens in here if I remember it right. The main event tonight is Angle vs. HHH in a cage, which I guess is some kind of softening up match for HHH that I’d assume Jericho had something to do with setting up. Let’s get to it.

We open the show with a shot of Vince who says Flair won’t be here tonight, drawing big booing. Vince says that therefore tonight it’s Fan Appreciation Night and announces the aforementioned cage match. His eyes look all crazy here and he says tonight things are back to normal. Oh yeah this was when Flair was making him crazy.

A member of the NWO will be in action tonight. No name is given but that’s intentional.

Steve Austin vs. Booker T

Now how’s THAT for an opener? Booker is mad about losing his shampoo deal and Austin has a bad knee due to the NWO. If I remember right they broke a cinder block over his leg. For no apparent reason his OTHER knee was bandaged afterwards but whatever. They go into the corner to start and it’s a brawl. Austin does some WHAT stomping and some WHAT chopping. Booker takes over with an elbow shot and stomps Austin down into the corner. Off to a chinlock and here’s the NWO, meaning the match is thrown out. It wasn’t long enough to rate but it was nothing special.

Austin VERY clearly blades on camera and then gets hit in the face with a wrench to bust him open. Booker is gone. There’s something so awesome about Austin and Hogan being in the same ring. This just kind of goes on. By that I mean for like 4-5 minutes. Hall Stuns him.

After a break, Austin is STILL in the ring. Ever Austin, he won’t take the stretcher out.

Scotty 2 Hotty/Albert vs. Test/Mr. Perfect

What a strange heel team. Test says Perfect is his partner for the fans or something like that. It’s not Booker due to him being in the match earlier. Albert vs. Perfect to get us going. Test comes in without his tag being seen so Test beats on him instead. Perfect comes in but can’t Perfectplex him and there’s the tag to Scotty. No one, I mean no one, cares. Everything breaks down and Scotty loads up the Worm on Test….and then he walks into a Perfectplex for the win. This was nothing.

Test and Perfect beat him down until Rikishi of all people makes the save. Perfect gets a Stinkface.

Angle makes fun of the What chants and is glad there’s a cage match tonight. HHH needs to worry about him. Angle says he has nothing to lose tonight.

Tough Enough 2 premieres Thursday.

We get a clip from Smackdown where Goldust stole the Hardcore Title from Maven.

Speaking of Goldie, he’s in the ring with Lillian for an interview. That was the first 24/7 rule usage in years so Goldust quotes movies. Taker was Hardcore Champion for awhile but no one challenged him out of fear. Cue Taz with a challenge.

Hardcore Title: Taz vs. Goldust

Taz takes over to start and kicks Goldie low. Jackie is the referee for no apparent reason. Shattered Dreams to Taz and here come the weapons. Taz kicks a trashcan into his head and there’s the Tazmission which is easily broken up with a trashcan lid shot, which is also good for the pin. NEXT.

The NWO is drinking Austin’s beer. Nash says he’s bored so let’s go take a walk.

RVD is fighting Regal later and won that shot after winning a triple threat last week, which we get clips of. Oh wait the match with Regal is at Mania. He gets Storm tonight and Storm pops up, saying he’ll be serious tonight. Rob says lighten up so Storm slaps him. Rob says that’s cool, we’ll settle it in the ring.

We look at a history of Christian freaking out on Arn Anderson because he wants to quit. DDP comes up and becomes his mentor or something. Page says we can start with a smile. Anderson has no idea what to think of this.

Page and Christian are in the back working on Christian’s Page-esque grin. It doesn’t work but Page says that’s a good thing. Christian gets a phone call and says pull the plug. His grandmother is about to die and apparently when she dies he gets a lot of money. Page has no idea what to think of that. Somewhat funny stuff.

The NWO beat up a stage hand wearing an Austin shirt.

Godfather is at WWF New York. He’s been back for like a month and a half and has done nothing at all.

Women’s Title: Jazz vs. Trish Stratus

Jazz is champion. Trish tries to fire away but Jazz is just too strong. Jazz slams her down and drops a leg for two. She hooks a wicked STF and Trish is in trouble. Trish finally makes the rope and makes her comeback. The not yet named Chick Kick gets two. Stratusfaction is blocked and Jazz literally throws her so hard she rips Trish’s top off. Now Trish hooks an STF on Jazz who also makes a rope. Trish won’t break on 5 and it’s a DQ.

Rating: D. The match sucked but it’s the first match out of four that I can actually rate. When you’re almost halfway done with the show and it’s the first match to break 3 minutes, you might be having a problem. For absolutely no apparent reason, Trish didn’t win the title in her hometown of Toronto at Mania. I still don’t get that.

Stephanie is on the phone with Y2J. Jericho is lost in Greenich and is trying to find Stephanie’s lotion called Pristine Mist. Of I remember this episode. HHH pops up behind her with a box. She finally sees him and gets off the phone. HHH makes Stephanie is a W**** jokes and Stephanie finds a bottle of her lotion in the box.

Here’s Taker on the bike. His match at Mania was with Flair, but Ric is taking care of a family emergency. Oh wait it’s not set yet. Taker is trying to get him to agree to the match. Got it. We get a clip from last week with Taker beating up Arn Anderson. Since that wasn’t enough though, Taker went on a little trip this morning. He says Flair is at a hospital tonight, because Taker left him no other choice.

This morning, Taker went to visit Flair’s oldest son, David. We see a clip from this morning where David is training at a WWF facility. Taker comes in and DESTROYS him. They go into a shower and Taker gives commentary. This is really reminiscent of Gunner going nuts a few weeks ago on Impact, but Twith more talented people. David: “What are you doing?” Taker: “What do you think I’m doing? Beating you up! That’s what I’m doing.” Taker kind of cuddles him and talks to Ric. It’s implied that Taker will beat up more Flairs if Ric doesn’t say yes.

Rob Van Dam vs. Lance Storm

Rob beat him last night on Heat which is why this match is happening in the first place. Er…second place. They quickly head to the floor and RVD hits the spinning kick to the back. RVD tries his rolling monkey flip into the corner but Lance kicks the knee out. Can’t argue with the thought process there. Van Dam fights out of the corner but Storm breaks up the Five Star attempt and hits a superplex for two.

Storm wraps the leg around the post and Rob is in trouble. How nice it is to see a match actually getting some time on this show. There’s a leg drag and Storm hooks the Mapleleaf. See? PSYCHOLOGY AGAIN!!! To be fair though, he was trained in the Dungeon so you know he’s going to be smart. Rob gets in a shot but can’t jump to the top due to the knee. Storm tries another superplex but gets knocked down and a sunset bomb gets two. Springboard clothesline gets two for the Canadian. A spinwheel kick puts Lance down and the Five Star ends it.

Rating: B-. For a five minute TV match, this was pretty awesome. It’s no classic or anything and it might be due to how weak the wrestling has been on this show so far, but I was digging this. Then again I like Storm’s in ring stuff so I’m extra biased. Still though, fun match and I was really liking it.

The NWO plays Rock Paper Scissors to determine who wrestles tonight and pours hot coffee onto the coffee checker. Who has a guy whose job is just to check coffee? Hall is wrestling tonight if you’re curious.

Music video on Rock set to P.O.D.’s I Feel So Alive. This was a recurring thing they were doing at this time, usually set to My Sacrifice by Creed. I could do without the song when I see him ask Hogan for the match at Mania, which is still a pretty awesome moment. This eats up a bit too much time. Rock is cool and all, but is there really a point to this?

Back to the NWO and we hear that Rock is going to be at Smackdown. They have a hopper with names in it. They use it to pick Hall’s opponent. Hogan: “I hope it’s not Andre the Giant.” They seem nervous, so I’ll set the Squash-O-Meter at about a 15/10.

The NWO is in the ring and Hall says the fans appreciate the beating he gave Austin. Whoever comes out next, he sees as Steve Austin.

Scott Hall vs. Spike Dudley

I’m as shocked as you are, and I knew who the opponent was. What exactly do you expect here? Jerry calls Spike Austin, Hall is in street pants and an NWO shirt, Spike gets in a few shots and it lasts about 150 seconds. Razor’s Edge ends it.

Mark Henry returns. Recently he won a strongman contest. He’s officially the World’s Strongest Man. And so it begins.

The cage is lowered.

We go to the back and Angle comes in to see Stephanie, who has her back to us. He sees her and says “Holy sweet mother of God.” I remember this and I thought it was hilarious. Not the payoff but Kurt’s reaction. The camera swings around and Stephanie’s skin is all messed up because HHH switched her lotion with something else. She freaks and it’s a pretty funny scene.

Kurt Angle vs. HHH

Cage match, escape only. They feel each other out to start for a few seconds but it’s quickly a fist fight. Angle goes for the door so HHH kicks him low. All Game so far. Angle finally hits a clothesline to take over. He goes for the escape but HHH throws him back to the mat. A low blow puts HHH down as Jerry keeps talking about HHH’s balls. Belly to belly puts HHH down and Kurt pounds him in the corner.

Here are some rolling Germans for HHH. He goes to leave but the door isn’t allowed to be open. Uh….why not? HHH comes back with a facebuster and up he goes. Angle’s attempted save misses but his second works. Back to the ring they go as Jerry talks about HHH. Angle Slam hits as the door was open for a bit. Angle walks into a Pedigree but here’s Stephanie.

To her credit she rams Teddy into the cage and slams the door on HHH’s head because that’s what you do to guys about to win cage matches. Angle goes to leave but Stephanie won’t let him out so he’ll hurt HHH more. HHH is busted a bit by a shot into the cage. Angle goes to leave but walks in on his own decision.

HHH counters with a slingshot into the cage and both guys are down. Stephanie slides a chair in but it’s right between the two guys so it’ll likely be a race to who gets it. Double clothesline puts both guys down. HHH grabs a DDT onto the chair and climbs. Stephanie comes in and cracks him with the chair the does it again. She grabs Kurt and pulls him out for the win while HHH is stuck in the ropes.

Rating: C. Did you know Stephanie was involved in this? If not, just open your eyes, because she’s in it EVERY TWO SECONDS. Angle could have been anyone out there and it wouldn’t have mattered. He was there as a soldier for Stephanie but in the end she had better luck against HHH than he did. Gee, I can’t imagine who wrote this storyline can you?

Overall Rating: D. The matches were short, the main event was weak, and if it weren’t for the 5 million videos about it, I wouldn’t have had any idea that Mania was coming. It’s two weeks before the biggest show of the year and the world champion doesn’t even make a cameo? Does something seem wrong about that? Anyway, nothing to see here and a really weak show before what I thought was an underwhelming Mania.

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This isn’t much of a surprise.Since everyone knows that this is Cena vs. Punk at MITB, I’ll talk about some of the other commonly named matches.

Orton vs. Christian – Smackdown.  This was by far and away the feud of the year for reasons i’ve already gone into.  This was probably my favorite of them, although you really can’t go wrong anywhere.

HHH vs. Taker.  Why is this on everyone’s list?  It’s not a bad match but for the life of me, I don’t get where everyone gets this idea that it was some masterpiece.  It needed to be about ten minutes shorter and THEN it’s a great match.  Way too much laying around when we’re all just waiting on Taker to win.  There was no drama for me here at all, especially with the HHH Tombstone.  Answer this: when has anyone not named Kane had success tombstoning Undertaker?  It’s a running joke.

Your picks/thoughts?

Monday Night Raw
Date: June 8, 1998
Location: Metro Center, Rockford, Illinois
Attendance: 8,000
Commentators: Michael Cole, Jerry Lawler, Jim Ross

Back for another week here as I start doing two of these in a row. That’s going to get me through these years a lot faster than I was going previously. Anyway, tonight we continue the build towards King of the Ring, probably with some more qualifying matches. Also we have Kane vs. Austin set but we need another main event for that show. Something big. Let’s get to it.

Here’s Vince to open the show with the Stooges. They’re all in tuxedos. This is a night of thanks according to Vinny Mac. He comes here with a heart of caring and sharing. We only know the Vince we see on TV. Tonight we’ll meet the real Vince. The fans chant for Austin and Vince says he’s here. Tonight, due to Vince giving a lot of money to charity, he’s being named Humanitarian of the Year. As his biggest humanitarian act of the year, he offers Austin an invitation.

King of the Ring Qualifying Match: The Godfather vs. Ken Shamrock

He isn’t a pimp yet but he does have the hat. The Nation is thrown out. Kama (The Godfather of the Nation) jumps him immediately and hits a corner splash. Ken speeds things up and tries his rana but caught in kind of a release spinebuster. The winner of this gets Mark Henry. Shamrock grabs a leg lock but Kama gets the rope. Ken gets his ankle worked on, as in the one that Owen hurt last month. Godfather hits the ropes but gets tripped into the ankle lock for the tap. Too short to rate but this was fine.

D’Lo runs out for the beatdown but Severn makes the save. They have a qualifying match later.

The top half of the tournament is now set:

Shamrock
Henry

Jarrett
Mero

The other half gets started tonight.

DX was in New York City this week to spread the word that Summerslam was coming to MSG. They annoy some people and a cop does the Suck It sign. One good looking girl flashes them. That was uncensored on some of their tapes.

Buy this Austin shirt! It’s only 30 bucks after taxes!

Faarooq/Steve Blackman vs. Marc Mero/Jeff Jarrett

So we have KOTR Qualifying Match winners vs. losers. Better than no story. Mero and Farrooq start us off and JR incorrectly says Faarooq used to be IC Champion. Mero takes a quick spinebuster and he’s in trouble early. Off to Jarrett vs. Blackman now which is one of the most boring rivalries I’ve heard of in years. Jeff fakes him out and hits a legsweep to take over.

JR thinks there’s something up with the Humanitarian of the Year jazz. Jarrett gets two off a suplex as does Blackman off a small package. Everything breaks down and Faarooq gets a good reaction beating on Mero. Jarrett stomps on Blackman but Faarooq rams Jarrett into a distracted Mero and Blackman rolls up Jeff for the pin.

Rating: D. Blackman vs. Jarrett just did not work. I don’t know what anyone saw in it but this feud went on for like three months. Granted neither guy was interesting at all at this point as Jarrett would need to get his hair cut off by X-Pac before he became anything of note. Blackman never quite got there.

DX is still in New York. You never see this kind of stuff anymore. Everything feels so clean and structured anymore.

After a break, DX is in fact still in New York. They help a little old lady across the street and just have a good time.

King of the Ring Qualifying Match: Scorpio vs. Owen Hart

This should be good. Just like earlier, the Nation gets thrown out. They fight over a wristlock to start and show off a lot. Owen knocks him to the floor and JR plugs upcoming shows. Top rope shoulder by Scorpio gets two. Back to the arm as JR isn’t sure if this would be an upset or not. The Canadian hits a German on the American for two. Owen’s top rope splash hits boot and Scorpio hits a spinwheel kick for two. The moonsault misses for Scorpio and he lands on his knee. Owen works on it a bit and the Sharpshooter ends this quickly.

Rating: C. Decent enough match but they didn’t have much time to work with. Scorpio couldn’t really be himself at this point and it hurt his time in WWF a lot. That being said, he was in his mid 30s here so he was pretty much past his prime. A few years before this though, the dude was awesome. Look up his mid 90s stuff and you’ll be entertained.

Taker is here. During the break he went into Vince’s office but didn’t find him.

Darren Drozdov vs. Chainz

We get a video of how Droz got the name Puke. I’ll let you visualize that yourselves. Droz is NOT a member of the LOD. He just hangs out with them and feuds with the people they’re feuding and is in their tag matches. Ok then. Chainz takes over and it’s official: Mankind vs. Taker is Hell in a Cell. Chainz misses a middle rope elbow and Droz does the same with a corner splash, allowing Chainz to win with a Death Valley Driver. Too short to rate but it was nothing of note at all.

Here’s Taker to beat up both guys and clear the ring. He wants Vince.

After a break….nothing happens. Ok then. Vince is at his party in the break and there’s no Taker anywhere. Ok then the sequel.

Here’s DX who does their schtick and then says they have business with the DOA. Cue the Legion of Doom who wants the tag titles. Animal demands a title shot at the Outlaws. HHH surprisingly says ok. Cue the DOA to interrupt as well. HHH: “Can’t anybody cut a promo around here?” They want a title shot as well so HHH says they can all suck it. Now Slaughter comes out (how long is he going to have this job for???) and makes a three way tag for tonight.

Taker is destroying stuff in the back.

Edge is STILL coming.

Mark Henry vs. Vader

They stare it down in the middle of the ring and it’s a slugfest to start us off. Vader can’t suplex him nor can he slam him. Henry however can easily slam the Mastadon. Vader fights back and takes over with clotheslines. Now he can slam Henry. He goes up but jumps into a powerslam as Henry pounds away even more. Here’s Taker again and the match is thrown out. Too bad as that was kind of fun while it lasted. Too short to rate though.

Here’s some video from Over the Edge where Sable got fired.

King of the Ring Qualifying Match: Dan Severn vs. D’Lo Brown

D’Lo slaps Severn for some reason and Severn takes him down with ease. They trade grapples and Severn suplexes him with ease. The idea here is that Severn is a master on the mat but isn’t that good with striking. Severn basically squashes him and hooks something like an abdominal stretch on the mat with a leg trap for the submission. I think this led to D’Lo’s chest protector. Again, too short to rate, a running theme tonight.

Owen runs out post match and kicks Severn but Shamrock limps out for the save.

Tribute video on Sable. They make it seem like she’s dead.

Austin meets the Humanitarian guys.

Dustin Runnels vs. Val Venis

Val talks about how he and Dennis Rodman have a lot in common. He dominates the boards and Val dominates the broads. Yeah that was bad. Anyway the Attitude Era version of Rick Rude is against Runnels who is wrestling without pay. Dustin takes over and gets a BIG reaction. They go to the floor where Dustin takes over. Back in he works on the arm for a bit until Val takes over. They screw up….something as Val was supposed to clothesline him but Dustin fell to his knees instead.

Sleeper by Goldie is countered via a jawbreaker and Val pounds on him a bit. Off to a camel clutch and things slow down. An atomic drop has Val panicking which is kind of funny. Top rope clothesline gets two for Dustin. The bulldog gets two and here’s Taker AGAIN. Yeah it’s thrown out.

Rating: D. I see why Goldust was the best thing that ever happened to Dustin: he’s freaking BORING as himself. As Dustin he’s just Dusty Rhodes’ son and a tall guy from Texas. There’s no character there so Goldust actually made him interesting. Not much here but things would get interesting for these two later on.

DX sprays Doc Hendrix with Super Soakers.

Tag Titles: Disciples of Apocalypse vs. Legion of Doom vs. New Age Outlaws

During the Outlaws’ entrance, Taker beats up Sarge in the back. HHH and Pac are on the stage with various funny signs. Just two in the ring at a time. Billy vs. Animal gets us going. Billy brings in 8-Ball quickly and oh yay it’s more DOA vs. LOD. Let’s say that’s 8-Ball beating on Road Dogg. The twins take over and you can feel the energy being sucked out of the show while they’re in there.

Roadie finally brings in Hawk who just does not look right with hair. Neckbreaker gets two on Skull. Billy comes in and the match continues to go nowhere. The challengers are back in almost immediately and Animal pounds him down. Let’s say that’s Skull. Road Dogg comes in and takes a missed low blow. Back to Animal vs. Skull. GET THIS OVER WITH ALREADY. Finally we get to the ending as both of the Outlaws are brought in. And then Road Dogg quickly lays down for the pin before anyone else can get in. And that’s Outlaws 101. Shouldn’t they lose the titles though as they gave up the fal?

Rating: D+. Other than the ending, this was really boring stuff. The DOA vs. LOD feud went on FOREVER and never got interesting in the slightest. They were such a clash of styles and none of them had anything interesting at all to do. Boring match but the ending showed why the Outlaws are so memorable: they couldn’t beat the challengers physically so use your brains.

About ten cops are in the back as Al Snow comes out to yell at Lawler. And then Snow gets arrested.

Time for the Humanitarian ceremony. Vince and the Stooges come out in their tuxedos again. The cops have surrounded Taker in the back. Here’s Austin as well in his gear and a black tie. Cute. A football player gives Vince a plaque, even though the amount was less than promised. It took time to clear too. Vince hasn’t come for a visit either. The football player’s favorite superstar is Austin by the way. Another football player has a plaque for Vince, although he doesn’t remember getting a check from Vince. Austin is his favorite also.

Vince says he deserves these awards as Austin looks on. Brisco is behind Austin now. JR thinks something is up. He says there’s going to be a WWF Hall of Fame too. Austin reaches into Vince’s pocket and pulls out a roll of money which he gives to the football players for the foundations. There’s a gong strike and we have druids and a coffin. With the lights out, Mankind comes from under the ring and Kane is in the casket. They throw Austin in it and shut it to end the show.

Overall Rating: D+. This show DRAGGED. It felt like it would never end, especially with all of the Taker interference. You can also tell that WWF doesn’t quite have their advertising matches down yet because on next week’s show, there’s a tag team Hell in a Cell match with the three guys at the end and Taker, but that wasn’t important enough to mention. Not a good show and it felt like it went on forever.

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Monday Night Raw
Date: June 1, 1998
Location: Rosemont Horizon, Chicago, Illinois
Attendance: 16,157
Commentators: Michael Cole, Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler

So it’s the night after Over the Edge and Austin kept the title in a great main event. That being said, now we need a new #1 contender, so let’s have a big main event to decide it. That main event: Undertaker vs. Kane. Other than that there isn’t much here but we’re on the way to King of the Ring and one of the most famous matches and moments in wrestling history. Let’s get to it.

We open with a video narrated by Vince where he says the match was fair but Dude screwed up and Austin counted the pin with Vince’s hand in an awesome ending.

Foley is in the ring in normal clothes in a chair. He says it wasn’t a good night in Dudeville last night. Foley admits that Austin beat him up last night and that he listened to the wrong people. It’s time for the Dude to apologize. If that’s accepted, he’d like to have Vince come out here. Cue Vince who has no music yet. Foley says he knows he let Vince down but due to his injuries, he’s going to be out for awhile. Hopefully though when he comes back, he’ll be #1 contender due to the match he had last night.

Vince isn’t happy and demands Foley get down on his knees. Foley says this is a joke…right? Vince says Foley is the joke, so get on your knees. Foley says his kids are watching at home so he’s not going to embarrass himself on national TV. According to Vince, he’s already an embarrassment and a failure.

Foley says Vince is failing to understand how tough Austin is. Last night, when he hit Vince in the head, deep inside, it felt pretty good. Vince says do it again if it felt so good, but remember that college fund and the new mortgage. He wants Foley to have some guts for once and Foley (split sweatpants and all) sits down. Vince hasn’t fired Austin yet because he makes Vince richer. All Foley does is make Vince sick. Foley gets fired and his music comes on.

King of the Ring qualifying matches begin tonight.

LOD 2000 says they’re ready for the street fight tonight. They’re in the back near where the cars come in. Droz throws up a lot. Chainz comes in on his bike and the twins jump the LOD.

LOD 2000 vs. Disciples of Apocolypse

This is a street fight and you can see the sky out back. There’s a referee out there for some reason and I really hope this is the blowoff. This isn’t a match at all so I’m not going to try to call it like one. Hawk swings a big metal pole at Skull but misses. They’re slowing down a lot now as you would expect. Animal goes off on 8-Ball with a trashcan. Droz and Chainz are the only ones left up and Taker arrives at the arena in street clothes and beats them both up. This was by no means a wrestling anything so no rating.

After a break, Taker (who looks REALLY fat in sweats) is looking for Vince.

Val Venis vs. Papi Chulo

Chulo is more famous as Essa Rios but his chick who would eventually appear with him is more famous as Lita. We hear about LOD being at the Rupp Arena box office for tickets for a Raw. Not only did I not hear about that appearance, I never heard about that Raw. Val says he’s not happy to see you. That’s a gun in his pocket and it doesn’t shoot blanks. Total dominance by Val to start and he hooks a camel clutch and manages to gyrate while holding it. That’s impressive.

Val beats him down as Cole mentions that Papi Chulo means Pimp Daddy. I think that would be Val’s partner eventually. JR rants about Foley being fired in public, which is almost bizarre given what would be coming for him eventually. Chulo gets a quick comeback but gets caught in a Samoan Drop. Money Shot ends this.

Rating: C-. Val was always solid in the……uh I mean he was always hard to…….he was good at getting on the ground and……HE COULD WRESTLE OK??? This was a total squash and Chulo was nothing more than a jobber at this point so this was about as predictable as it could get.

Taker walks out in street clothes and after a break part of his promo is cut off. He wants to talk about Vince. Ten years ago when he first arrived here (more like seven and a half but whatever) Vince was known as someone that would give an opportunity. He gave Taker an opportunity to be himself: to be the Undertaker. Shortly after he arrived, he became the slayer of the dragons. Vince knew Taker would be loyal so he gave him nothing but giants to face. As in the guys the handpicked champions couldn’t beat but Taker could. Taker kept the company safe for Vince and the handpicked guys.

Taker knew his time would come and then once the kingdom was safe, he got his opportunities. He’s a former two time world champion, but his times with the belt didn’t last long. Well the first one was six days so no argument there. The second was almost four and a half months. That might be a stretch. They’ve been short because Vince didn’t want him representing the company. He’s been loyal though and after all of his own handpicked guys left for greener pastures and more money (are we actually seeing a Taker “shoot”?), he had to fight his own brother.

Now whoa whoa WHOA. Now things are getting confusing which is how you can tell Russo had his hand in this. Taker has done half of this in kayfabe and half not in kayfabe. He talked about how he was loyal to the company and how others left for more money, but also how he could beat everyone else which is kayfabe. Now which are we in, because Kane of course isn’t really his brother, but based on the story he really wanted to fight Kane. Bearer had a chance to say whatever he wanted to say about Taker’s life and it was all for the sake of ratings. After all that, he never, and I quote, lost his smile.

After all that, he watched Steve Austin rise up to the top. The only thing Austin ever did was come to the ring and fight him like a man and that’s all he wanted. After everything else, right now, he demands his shot at the world title. That’s enough talking from him, so Vince needs to get out here. Vince comes out and says that before he answers that, he’s got something to say. Taker attacked him last week and came after him last night. He says Taker has all those qualities like loyalty, but what has Taker done for him lately?

Also, Bearer has said a lot of stuff and Vince wants to know if it’s true that Taker’s mom was a w****. If Taker wants to be the #1 contender, tonight he needs to defeat his opponent in the main event tonight. That opponent: Kane. Taker doesn’t look all that happy about the decision.

King of the Ring Qualifying Match: Marc Mero vs. Steve Blackman

Sable is gone now after losing to Mero last night. They show brackets but since this is just a qualifying match, it has no purpose on the bracket. Why not just make it a 16 man tournament and have these guys all be in it? What’s the point of showing the qualifiers on the brackets? Mero says Sable isn’t here but he has a new chick. And this was the night that the world has met the horror known as Jackie Moore.

Mero hammers away to start and this is kicking vs. boxing. He gets kicked to the floor and Jackie hugs him better. Blackman hammers on him a bit more but Jackie distracts Blackman so Mero can him him low. A Shooting Star ends this. Pretty much a squash. Sable would of course be back by the PPV. I mean she’s on the poster and all that.

Steve Austin was on a radio show earlier today. Vince called in and they hyped the show up.

Edge is still coming. Allegedly he was a Raven rip-off. I’m not sure about that but there are similarities.

D-Generation X vs. Nation of Domination

It’s the Outlaws/HHH vs. Owen/Henry/Rock and this is elimination rules. DX does a quick promo before the match which is nothing special. All of the seconds get sent to the back. HHH vs. D’lo starts us off. Off to Roadie who gets caught in a spinebuster for two. Gunn comes in and hits a quick piledriver to get rid of Brown. Rock comes in and DX isn’t sure what to do. Rock Bottom takes out Road Dogg and it’s tied up. Those two eliminations took about two minutes total.

The leaders go at it for a bit but it’s quickly back to Billy. A blind tag brings in Owen with a missile dropkick for two. Billy misses a splash and a spinwheel kick makes it Owen/Rock vs. HHH. Chyna comes out because Slaughter has no authority at all apparently. After a break Chyna is on the floor as Rock is hammering on HHH. Owen comes in and hits a long middle rope elbow for two.

The future Game gets a sunset flip but Rock has the referee distracted. Rock beats him down and the People’s Elbow gets two and a big reaction. I think they knew they had struck pure gold with Rock but they were seasoning him a bit first. Owen argues with Chyna as HHH counters a Rock Bottom into a quick Pedigree for the pin and it’s one on one. And never mind as Owen hits a spinwheel kick but Shamrock returns to beat down Owen, giving the Nation the win.

Rating: C. Nothing great and the ending hurt it but this was fine. What I really want you to notice is how HHH and Rock were not rushed. They had a summer long rivalry that culminated in a big gimmick match at Summerslam. Instead of just appearing and suddenly winning a briefcase or something and being thrown into the world title picture, they were slowly seasoned and allowed to get a lot bigger over time. That’s just forgotten in today’s product.

Severn runs out to help Shamrock fight the Nation and they stare it down but Severn leaves. HHH punches Shamrock because he cost DX the match so they have a pull apart brawl. I don’t remember that going anywhere.

Vince and Kane shake hands in the back.

King of the Ring Qualifying Match: Jeff Jarrett vs. Farrooq

Please….get rid of Tennessee Lee already. I can’t take much more of him. Before the match, the Godwinns are introduced as Southern Justice who are Jarrett’s lackeys now. Farrooq starts off fast and shrugs off the punches from Jarrett. The fans want Flair I think. I don’t think I heard that right because it would be very random to chant that. Farrooq beats on him even more and gets two. Southern Justice gets involved and Lee gives Jarrett a belt to whack Farrooq with for the pin. This was nothing, again.

Video on how Vince is a charitable sort of fellow.

Light Heavyweight Title: Taka Michinoku vs. Sho Funaki

The match starts immediately and Taka hits a HUGE dive to take Funaki out in the aisle. Back in and Taka’s tornado DDT is countered as Funaki takes over. Another Kai En Tai member gets involved so Taka snaps off a moonsault to the floor to take them both out. Al Snow is disguised as a Japanese photographer. The other photographers take pictures of him. Funaki takes over with a fisherman’s buster but a top rope elbow misses. A missile dropkick to the back and the Michinoku Driver keeps the title on Taka….again.

Paul Bearer is very confident in Kane.

Al Snow yells at Head.

King of the Ring Qualifying Match: Mark Henry vs. Terry Funk

Vince is on commentary so he won’t miss Taker vs. Kane. JR says this is a contrast of styles. Now there’s an understatement. Terry tries to pound on him but a big clothesline puts him down. Out to the floor where Funk’s back goes into the post. Funk manages to send him into the steps and gets a chair. In a SCARY sight, Terry tries an Asai Moonsault but lands on the railing. If there’s a way to fake that I’d love to know what it is. In the ring a splash gets two. A slam and legdrop get two, brother. Funk grabs a small package for two so Henry powerbombs him and splashes him again, finally getting the pin.

Rating: C+. WAY more entertaining than you would have expected it to be. It’s not a great match or anything but Terry is an absolute master at drawing sympathy and making you think that he just might somehow be able to pull off the huge upset. Very fun match even though it only lasted four minutes or so.

Austin is coming and Vince does the face.

After a break here’s the champ who also jumps in on commentary.

Undertaker vs. Kane

Winner gets Austin at King of the Ring. Vince again proves how much of a master he is at promoting stuff as he talks about how big this is going to be. Taker sends the referee out immediately and it’s a brawl. They go to the floor and Taker gets in some shots on Paul. Old School hits but Kane hits a chokeslam for no cover. They’ve been going a hundred miles an hour the whole time.

After a brief thing on the floor they’re back in with Kane in control. They slug it out and Kane pounds away on him. There’s an energy to them here and it’s making this a lot better. Kane hits a big boot but misses an elbow. Taker grabs a chokeslam but Kane pops up. Taker even busts out a Russian Legsweep and legdrop for two. There goes the referee as Taker hits the Tombstone but there’s no referee.

The fired Mick Foley runs out onto the apron and grabs the Mandible Claw on Taker. Foley has the Mankind mask on again. Taker knocks Kane down again but Kane sits up. He takes his eyes off Kane for a split second to punch Bearer and that’s enough for a Tombstone to send Kane to King of the Ring.

Rating: B-. WHY IN THE WORLD DID THEY NOT DO THIS AT WRESTLEMANIA??? This was exactly what Undertaker vs. Kane should be: an all out brawl. They never stopped going in this and it made for a much better match. Kane is supposed to be this outcast that was raised all alone and Taker is to blame for it, so would you expect him to use a chinlock? Of course not. He should be out for blood and he was here. Very fun match.

Kane stares Austin down and makes the sign of a belt around his waist which Austin says will never happen. The fires comes off the posts and Austin doesn’t flinch. Kane leaves and Foley fights Taker to end the show. JR: “They’ll have to settle this feud.” That’s an understatement.

Overall Rating: C+. Other than the DX/Nation stuff and the AWESOME last segment and the surprisingly good Henry vs. Funk match, there was pretty much nothing here. That’s kind of the Attitude Era in a nutshell: the show is usually nothing great but the stuff that is good is so good that it’s all you remember. This set up the main events of King of the Ring really well and that’s the entire point.

On a related note, starting now I’ll be doing two Raws from 98 and 01 in a row. It’s taken me over a year to get to June of both series and I don’t want to spend two years reviewing two years of Raw.

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Smackdown
Date: July 4, 2002
Location: Fleet Center, Boston, Massachusetts
Commentators: Michael Cole, Tazz

This was a requested show and I don’t really know of anything significant on it other than one match which really wasn’t anything special. Anyway, we’re just barely into the WWE era at this point and we have an Undisputed Champion. Oh wait if that’s the case I think I know why this was a requested show, other than the date that is. Let’s get to it.

We open with a video of Edge talking about getting hurt in a cage match with Angle. He said he’ll be back and that’s tonight. Jericho came out and laughed at him about it, triggering a brawl. Jericho cracked the shoulder with a chair. Later in the night (or month, it’s not really clear) Jericho was about to do the same to Hogan when Jericho’s own music played. Edge came out for the save in his return. You would think this would lead to a match tonight or at the PPV, but it actually lead to a match at the Smackdown after the PPV, which is a little weird.

I miss the Beautiful People as Smackdown’s theme.

Oh I almost forgot: this is right around the time the company switched from WWF to WWE.

Lillian Garcia sings America the Beautiful. Lance Storm and the UnAmericans cut her off and I think I can hear Finlay being fired from here. Christian asks if the people know why Independence Day is celebrated. It wasn’t the day Will Smith defeated a bunch of aliens you know. Storm tells us what happened back then and about how the Americans went all over the world using its military force where it had no business. Test talks a bit as well. This is going on too long now.

Lance Storm vs. Rikishi

Feeling out process to start and Storm speeds things up. He strikes away and drops down onto the chest on a sunset flip attempt. The other UnAmericans interfere during the Banzai Drop, allowing Test to hit a big boot to Rikishi’s head and knock him to the mat. Storm gets the easy pin. This wasn’t much.

Taker, the Undisputed Champion, is here.

Here’s your historic moment, although it was last week. Kurt Angle issues an open challenge and a young kid debuts and takes the challenge. His name: John Cena.

Stacy goes up to the locker room and Henry answers. She asks if Cena is in there and here he is, in the green trunks and looking like a deer in the headlights. She says Vince wants to see him and he walks off. Stacy likes what she sees.

D-Von/Batista vs. Big Valbowski/Randy Orton

Orton had been around for a few months here but was just a young kid. Batista was the deacon for Reverend D-Von and had debuted last week as well. Orton has hair here. Batista beat up Orton last week so this is the rematch Orton requested. Val (I’m not typing that whole thing) starts against Batista. He tries to take Batista’s knee out but gets run over by a HUGE clothesline.

Off to D-Von and the veterans do some basic stuff. Orton comes in to a screaming girls pop. He’s always had a sweet dropkick. D-Von gets a neckbreaker out of the corner for two. Orton gets beaten down but manages to bring in Val. Venis gets a Blue Thunder Bomb but Batista makes the save.

Orton comes in and hot shots D-Von, but Big Dave (first name unknown at this point) puts him in a fireman’s carry and rolls through it like Kenderson does. That’s a new one. Or old one in this case I guess. Everything breaks down and Orton misses his top rope cross body. The spinebuster ends this. Cole: “Batista is an animal!”

Rating: C-. This was fine and it’s amazing to see guys like this in their very young days. You never know what you might have in any given match and this is proof of it. I’m sure they knew they had something, but I don’t think anyone knew how big they’d be. Somehow, these two pale in comparison to the guy that would be in the next segment though. The match was fine.

Jericho rants to Vince about how Edge came back and stopped him from taking out Hogan for good. Vince says Jericho sounds obsessed with Edge. I’m distracted by a swimsuit shot of Stacy in a thong behind him so I have to rewind it for a bit. Vince makes Jericho vs. Edge at Vengeance, which wouldn’t happen. Instead he would face the guy that comes into the office next.

Here’s Cena who is nervous to meet Vince. Vince says that he liked Cena’s performance last week and introduces him to Jericho. Cena extends his hand politely and Jericho rips him apart, talking about how he’s the first undisputed champion and how Cena needs to show respect. He asks what kind of Ruthless Aggression Cena has so Cena slaps him to the floor.

During a break Jericho demands a match with Cena tonight.

Angle talks about beating Cena last week but he feels even better this week. He’s got a world title shot and is feeling strong. He asks Marc Lloyd if he’s seen the new highlight reel. Angle has beaten up Taker and then made Hogan tap at KOTR. Then last week he threw Taker in the ankle lock for just a few seconds. What better night than the Fourth of July for Angle to win the title right?

Billy and Chuck are gay and have hot dogs. Make the jokes yourselves.

Tag Titles: Edge/Hulk Hogan vs. Billy/Chuck

This is the big match from this show. Edge is a Hulkamaniac from when he was a kid so this is his dream match. Hulk vs. Chuck starts us off. Hogan is just crazy over here. It’s an old WWF town so that goes without saying. Chuck hammers him into the corner and it’s off to Billy. Edge comes in and hits an Edge-O-Matic for two. Chuck snaps off a pretty sweet overhead belly to belly for two and control. The fans want Hogan as Edge gets tossed over the top. Rico and Billy try to double team him but Rico kicks Billy by mistake. Edge takes Chuck down in the ring and I want you to notice something here.

Hogan has been on the apron for about four minutes and he’s barely stopped moving. It could be pacing back and forth, it could be clapping for Edge, it could be pointing something out to the referee, it could be shouting for Edge to kick out, it could be trying to get the fans to cheer. He doesn’t just stand there uninterested, and the crowd picks up on that. It’s a very important thing you can do in tag wrestling and it gets the fans to notice you. Cena is really good at this. It’s an old rule that I’ve told you time and time again: if you play to the crowd, they’ll respond to you.

Anyway there’s the hot tag to Hogan and he Hulks Up on the way in. Billy is pounded on (he must be used to muscular men doing that to him by now though) as is Chuck. We get the old school double noggin knocker and it’s a big boot to Billy. Chuck hits a superkick to break up the legdrop and Hogan brings Edge back in with a double clothesline off the top. Rico breaks up the spear so Hogan knocks him down. He crotches Rico on the apron and Edge spears Billy for two. A double big boot and a pair of legdrops to Chuck are enough to give Hogan his first tag title.

Rating: B-. I can’t help but smile at this. This wasn’t supposed to be a serious match and if you get mad about Hogan doing this you miss the point. This was about feeling good and nostalgic and giving Edge a rub. This did all of that and was actually a pretty good tag match on top of that. Hogan as basically the Andre to Edge’s Haku was perfect for him and this was really fun. They would lose the titles in less than three weeks but this was what the whole thing was about and it worked perfectly. Very fun match and moment.

Chris Jericho vs. John Cena

Dig that totally generic rock music for Cena! Cena charges in but gets beaten down quickly. He spears Jericho down and pounds away and they go to the floor. Back in the ring Cena hits a slingshot and spinebuster for two. He’s got a fire in his eyes and you can see the star in him if they mold him properly. Jericho heads to the floor and suckers Cena in to take over. He takes too much time coming off the middle rope though and jumps into a dropkick.

Powerslam gets a very close two. He counters the Walls and this a DDT for another two. A corner splash misses for the American and Jericho takes him down with the bulldog. Lionsault misses and Cena hits his second high angle spinebuster for two. However Jericho is too good for him as he backflips out of a belly to back and hits a Flashback (sleeper drop) and pins Cena with his feet on the ropes.

Rating: B. Very fun match here which at the time was shocking. Remember that this is Cena’s second match on TV and he’s taken Jericho and Angle to the limit. They would fight again at Vengeance and Jericho would actually get beaten fairly clean. As a little trivia, to the best of my knowledge, this is the only time that Jericho has ever beaten Cena one on one on TV or PPV. Think about that for a minute. They’ve fought so many times and Jericho only won the first one.

Jericho offers a handshake post match and tries to beat him up but Cena hits the Protobomb and stands tall.

Rey Mysterio is coming.

Here’s a clip from Raw where the NWO and Shawn Michaels said that HHH would be joining the NWO.

We go back to Divas Undressed on Saturday where Torrie won the Golden Thong Award. Stacy says it was because Torrie sleeps with Maven, who was a judge. Torrie said Stacy was sleeping with Vince. Naturally we’re having a bra and panties match to settle things.

Earlier today, Jamie Noble and Nidia celebrate their new found fortune by getting a new truck and a new trailer because Noble’s aunt died. Oh and he has money now that he’s Cruiserweight Champion. Running water almost makes Nidia cry. They break in the bed.

Stacy Keibler vs. Torrie Wilson

Bra and panties remember. What do you want me to say here? They try to do some moves, most of them don’t work, they strip each other, they’re both hot, Torrie wins. She strips too.

We get a recap of the ladder match from Monday with Jeff vs. Taker, which I need to get to someday. Hardy got destroyed over and over again but he kept getting up after the match. Taker hit a Last Ride and Hardy got up again, saying he was still standing. Taker raised his hand and stopped hurting him.

Taker says he’s upset at Vince because Vince said Taker faces Rock at Vengeance whether Taker is still champion or not.

WWE World Title: The Undertaker vs. Kurt Angle

Taker runs over him with power to start and Angle bails to the outside. I think these are both tweeners at this point. Angle keeps trying to run Taker down and it doesn’t work at all. Finally he wakes up and takes it to the mat. Angle celebrates an armdrag and gets kicked to the floor for his troubles. Snake Eyes/big boot combo get two. Angle counters the chokeslam into a German to shift control again.

It turns into a fist fight in the corner with Taker gaining control. Shoulder block puts Kurt down as does a DDT for two. Here comes the Tombstone but Angle slides down and hooks the ankle lock and Taker is in trouble. That gets reversed but an Angle Slam (which looked like it was in slow motion) gets two. Ankle lock on again and Taker’s escape gets a big pop. Chokeslam puts Kurt down but the ankle injury keeps him from immediately covering.

Here’s the almost famous ending. Taker loads up the Last Ride but Angle wraps his legs around Taker’s neck in a triangle choke. Taker bends down into kind of a rollup. The three count hits at the same time that Taker taps (although if you watch very carefully, Taker starts tapping before the three hits. It’s less than half a second though so it’s fair). There’s no winner so there would be a triple threat at Vengeance.

Rating: B-. Pretty good match here between two guys that could do big matches like these with ease. Tazz’s eventual line summarizing this was perfect: The Undisputed Title is disputed. If I remember right this was something that happened in a UFC main event and was one of the first signs of WWE paying attention to them. I remember reading that somewhere so it may not be accurate. Anyway, good match.

Overall Rating: A-. Huge and I mean REALLY huge show tonight with all kinds of stuff happening. It’s fascinating to look at these guys at this point and imaging what they would become. Orton is probably the least likely as he had nothing going for him at all. He would injure his shoulder and become a cocky heel and that was all he needed. Anyway, great show and really interesting stuff.

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I had to get to these eventually I guess. This is widely considered one of the worst series of shows ever and the stage was set for that with the first one. The only good things about the first two are Torrie looking hot on the posters. I don’t think they ever had any idea what they were doing with these shows and the name certainly doesn’t live up to the WCW incarnation. Let’s just plow through these and get them over with.

Great American Bash 2004
Date: June 27, 2004
Location: Norfolk Scope, Norfolk, Virginia
Attendance: 6,500
Commentators: Michael Cole, Tazz

I had to get to do this one eventually. This won worst show of the year according to Meltzer and I can’t disagree with him at all. It’s a double main event with JBL in the world title match and the Undertaker vs. the Dudleys. If the Dudleys win, Paul Bearer is buried in concrete. I’m going to pause to let the idiocy of that sink in for a minute. Let’s get to it.

The opening video has a patriotic theme to it, showing JBL being all awesome. He claims to be a real American while Eddie is a disgrace. Angle also hates Cena so he’s sending him into a fatal fourway. And there’s the stupid Taker vs. Dudleys thing.

Torrie welcomes us to the show. This is Smackdown only.

US Title: John Cena vs. Rene Dupree vs. Booker T vs. Rob Van Dam

This is elimination rules and Cena is champion coming in. Cena fires up the crowd a bit and that’s a LOUD chant for him. He makes gay jokes about Angle in his pre-match rap. Also RVD likes marijuana, Booker used to be GI Bro and Rene Dupree wants to be Cena. This is also a Navy town so Rene is gay right? Booker and RVD go at it as do John and Rene to start us off. This is under tornado rules.

Rob and Booker fight to the floor. I think Rene is the only heel here but I’m not sure on Booker. Off to Rene vs. RVD. Booker is chilling on the floor to avoid getting beaten up which is really smart strategy. Yeah Booker is officially a heel in this. He turned on RVD a few weeks back. See? Cole can be useful at times. Rene hooks a chinlock on RVD to waste some time. Rob fights back and hits a split legged moonsault for two.

Rolling Thunder gets the same. Cena does something for the first time in about four minutes, picking up Rene on the floor, only to get flipped onto by RVD. Cena vs. Rob in the ring now and they exchange near falls. RVD slides to the floor and tells Booker to get in. They get in an argument so RVD throws Booker in for a beating. Cena slides to the floor and throws Rene in to replace him. Cena and RVD are just kind of chilling on the floor.

Dupree hits a powerslam and does the French Tickler (don’t ask) but walks into a Booker spinebuster. Five Star hits Rene but there’s no cover. Cena goes up and gets kicked off by RVD. Five Star hits Booker this time but Cena rolls in and cradles Van Dam for the first elimination. Booker and Dupree team up on Cena with Booker hitting the side kick for two. Rene got the cover and Booker isn’t thrilled with that.

Cena takes advantage of their argument to beat them both up. The fans aren’t exactly thrilled by this match either. Throwback to Booker and Cena pumps it up. FU (noticeably different than the modern version) puts down Dupree. Booker hits an axe kick on Cena and eliminates Rene. So it’s down to one on one now. Side slam gets two and what appeared to be a fast count. Off to a chinlock to kill some time.

The announcers talk about a mini feud Cena has had with Taker. Today, that’s a Wrestlemania dream match. Here, it’s a two week filler feud. Booker chops away in the corner and gets the Jack Brisco spinning sunset flip out of the corner for two. Axe kick misses though and the FU keeps the title on Cena.

Rating: C-. Not bad here, but the problem was in the match structure. With it being elimination rules, it actually made things easier on Cena. Like you saw with Booker and Dupree, you can pretty much just chill on the floor for two eliminations and then get it down to a one on one match. Then again, Cena pinned RVD first anyway so he would have won either way, which again begs the question of why it wasn’t just one fall. That would be because they needed to fill an extra seven minutes.

Cena walks through the back and hits on Jackie Gayda. He leaves and Angle rolls up to yell at Charlie Haas, who is with Jackie. Charlie defends himself and gets thrown into a match with Luther Reigns tonight.

Sable is in a hot tub and says the Divas will be hosting the show tonight. She’ll be interviewing herself. Sable faces Torrie tonight and says she’s hotter than Torrie. Ok then.

Charlie Haas vs. Luther Reigns

Good thing Charlie just happened to be in gear and right by the entrance isn’t it? Power vs. speed here to start but Charlie is in over his head here. Reigns hammers away and is very slow. I mean REALLY slow. A kick puts Haas down as we hear about how Angle can never wrestle again. Angle says he’s loving this. Luther works on the back for a bit but Charlie “hits” (you can see the space between the feet and Luther) a pair of dropkicks. He gets sent to the floor and it’s time for a chinlock.

Luther can’t even do a chinlock right, as the hands are about four inches from Haas’ face. Press slam gets two. The fans are really not all that interested. Luther uses all of his skill to gauge their reaction and puts on a half crab. Angle says they’re running out of time and Charlie hits a suplex for probably his only big offense of the match. German suplex gets two. Charlie’s shoulder goes into the post and a Roll of the Dice (Cross Rhodes) ends this.

Rating: F. Even Jackie’s hotness couldn’t save this. The fans DID NOT care at all here, mainly because the match was thrown together in the back about 2 minutes before it started. Reigns was really bad in the ring and Haas was a total jobber here despite having talent. I have no idea what the point here was, but I think it might be exhibit A as to why not to have brand exclusive PPVs.

JBL says he’ll win the title tonight. It’s a Texas Bullrope match tonight, which means the four corners kind. Oh joy. He says tonight is his vindication and he’s awesome.

Cruiserweight Title: Chavo Guerrero vs. Rey Mysterio

Match #89 of about 384. Rey is champion and Chavo won a battle royal on Thursday to set this up. They speed things up to start and Rey grabs a pair of rollups for two. Chavo works on the arm so Rey spins around a lot and kicks Chavo’s arm to escape. As they just did a few seconds ago, they fly around a lot and work on the arm. Chavo dropkicks Rey as he’s on the apron to send him to the floor and possibly injure his knee.

The knee goes around the post and Rey is in trouble. Back in the ring Chavo hooks a one legged Liontamer. Rey kicks out of it and hits the bulldog (DDT according to Cole) to break it up. Chavo works the knee even more, kicking it so hard that Rey spins around in a circle. Off to a hold formerly called the Brock Lock to further damage the leg. Chavo charges into a boot and Rey gets in some offense. It’s so nice to see an actual story being told in a match after the previous horrible display.

Rey gets tied in the Tree of Woe but Chavo misses his charge, going arm first into the post. Rey fires off a seated senton to the floor and both guys are down. They fight to the apron and Chavo teases a superplex back to the floor. They both stand on the top and wind up hitting kind of a double facejam to the mat. Rey counters a slingshot into a dropkick and the knee is rapidly getting better. Russian Legsweep gets two.

Seated senton gets two so Rey pounds away on him. He charges into a Gory Bomb for two though as Chavo takes over again. Chavo works on the knee even more but an enziguri sets up the 619. Rey’s knee can barely work so he can’t hit the West Coast Pop. Off to the one legged Liontamer again and then a half crab. Rey slaps the mat as he’s crawling but that isn’t a tap in this case. He finally makes a rope and the crowd is WAY into this now. Chavo loads up another Gory Bomb but Rey rolls through into a sunset flip for the surprise pin to retain.

Rating: B. Good match here and a NICE breath of air on this show. It’s not really surprising to see these two have a good match though so it’s hardly a classic, but it’s always cool to see Rey vs. a Guerrero for twenty minutes. The psychology was here too and it made for a good match. It’s a shame Rey was nowhere near his best at this point though.

Torrie is in the hot tub with various Cruiserweights who say they would have won had they been in there. Torrie stands up in her flag bikini and leaves. Funaki: “God bless America.”

Kenzo Suzuki vs. Billy Gunn

Suzuki is a Japanese guy who wants revenge for Japan because of what America did to it in World War II. I kid you not. This is a rematch from Smackdown where Hiroko, Kenzo’s chick, threw salt in Billy’s eyes to save Kenzo. Somehow, Gunn’s music (his most famous one) is catchy. Kenzo’s tights are brown/orange. He’s one of those guys that is a martial arts expert, which means he hits a chop and then poses.

Neckbreaker gets two for Gunn. This is a very dull match in case you can’t tell. The Claw STO puts Billy down but he drops a knee instead of covering. Off to a nerve hold, which would be a little more effective if he would, like, squeeze his hand or something. After what seems like an eternity, Billy gets a rollup for two. Suplex gets two for Suzuki.

Off to ANOTHER chinlock kind of move and the fans are loudly booing now. They slug it out and Billy hits a Stinger Splash to set up the Fameasser but Kenzo stands up. Shining Wizard gets two but he walks into a tilt-a-whirl slam for two. A low blow slows Billy down and Kenzo gets a pin after that knee to the back out of a reverse DDT position that Christian does. It didn’t even look good. HORRIBLE finish.

Rating: F. Remember when I said the other match was exhibit A? This might have just trumped it. I mean this was TERRIBLE. Who in the world thought these two deserved eight minutes on a PPV? Kenzo was awful and everyone knew it, so they put him with Rene Dupree and gave them the tag titles. Don’t you get the logical progression of events there? Terrible match and Gunn would be gone soon.

Heyman is with the tied up Paul Bearer and tells him that he will in fact bury him in concrete tonight. Yes, this is really one of the main event angles for this show. Heyman almost seems turned on by this.

I forgot to mention: there’s a huge cement truck next to the entrance of the arena, just to further the idiocy of the event.

Sable vs. Torrie Wilson

So they’re fighting over who should be the spokesperson for this PPV. Torrie said she should be, so Sable said she looked fat. You know it’s on after that. To the shock of no one, neither of them can do anything other than look good in shorts. Sable kicks a lot and they mess up a sunset flip. The fans are already booing. All Sable so far here. Time for a chinlock by Sable as this is dying quickly. The fans are mostly silent at this point.

Torrie hits one of the worst suplexes I’ve ever seen. Cole says there are Torrie chants but I don’t hear them. Then again Cole thinks some odd things at times. They collide and both girls are down, drawing even more booing. Sable plays possum and rolls Torrie up for the pin. They couldn’t even do THAT right, as Sable rolled over her and Torrie’s right side was completely off the mat.

Rating: F. If I need to explain this one, you’re not paying enough attention.

Taker is in the back and he starts walking to the ring. His match isn’t next but I guess he needs to get a running start.

Dawn Marie is also looking hot in a flag bikini and talks to Rene Dupree who says he got cheated. He’s going to protest Cena’s title reign. He hits on Dawn and offers to show her his French Tickler. He starts dancing and the FBI shows up. Shoe jokes are made. Hint to WWE production guys: just show us Dawn.

Mordecai vs. Bob Holly

Mordecai is a religious character who wound up in PPV matches with Scotty 2 Hotty and Bob Holly. This would be his last appearance despite implying he was going to come after Eddie next. You might remember him as Kevin Thorn in ECW. Cole just flat out says this isn’t going to be pretty. Holly ties him in the ropes and pounds away to start. This crowd is SILENT. For once, I can’t blame them. This is Hardcore Holly in a singles match after watching a horrible Divas match and Billy Gunn in a match.

Off to a chinlock as this match dies even further. Taz makes fun of the way Mordecai talks and basically makes the whole character sound like an idiot. I mean more than the character itself already did. Holly fights back with a hot shot but they collide, I think by accident, when Mordecai bounces off the ropes. Holly hits a bunch of clotheslines, including one off the top for two. A kind of sloppy looking reverse DDT gets two as well. Mordecai grabs a sitout spinebuster for two. Alabama Slam is countered into the Razor’s Edge for the pin.

Rating: D-. Why in the world was this on PPV? I don’t think anyone else really knew the answer to that either. Either way it’s not like it mattered as after this Mordecai was sent back down to OVW, which to be fair he probably belonged there anyway. The gimmick didn’t help him, but he just wasn’t ready for the main shows yet.

We recap Eddie vs. JBL. They had a WAR at Judgment Day with both guys just gushing blood. Tonight it’s a bullrope match, because we need to have the match be as boring as possible. It’s the kind where you have to touch all four corners. JBL says Eddie got disqualified intentionally at Judgment Day, so here Eddie can’t run or hide.

Smackdown World title: Eddie Guerrero vs. John Bradshaw Layfield

Yes, the concrete match is going last. This is no DQ, unless you intentionally unhook yourself. There’s a bell on the rope of course, because we’re wrestlers so we all want to be cowboys! Eddie goes for the leg and chokes him out a bit with the rope. That bell is getting really annoying really fast. They have these stupid lights on the corners because just counting the number of corners for each guy is too much for Nick Patrick.

Both guys get two corners but they get their momentum broken up. The rope goes around Eddie’s neck and there’s a bell shot to put him down. Bradshaw puts him in the Tree of Woe and chokes him upside down as Eddie is in trouble. Here comes the Spanish Announce Table but Eddie blocks a powerbomb through it. Cowbell to the head puts JBL down and it’s Eddie in control.

JBL sends him over the table again but Eddie CRACKS Bradshaw over the head with a chair. Oh yeah he’s busted too. That’s enough for Eddie to get three corners but JBL breaks it up enough for the fourth to not count. Patrick says the momentum is broken, meaning the streak is broken. Eddie gets three corners again and again JBL grabs the rope. After a JBL DDT, Eddie crotches him with the rope and gets three buckles but the streak is broken.

Three Amigos hit and Eddie adds a frog splash for good measure. In a REALLY smart move, JBL rolls to the floor to stop the fourth corner from being touched. Smart because Eddie can’t drag him from the floor like he could in the ring. They go to the top and JBL hits him with the bell. He wraps the rope around Eddie’s neck and throws him onto the announce table which doesn’t break. Cole says it’s like rock or concrete. These jokes write themselves at times.

A powerbomb puts Eddie through the table and both guys are down again. Somehow that only gets three corners back in the ring. JBL gets three corners again but takes a cowbell low to stop things again. Since this is a four corners bullrope match, we get the only ending that ever happens in these things: they both get three and the good guy dives to touch the fourth one just in time.

Rating: B. Pretty solid brawl here but at the same time these matches get really repetitive after awhile. It becomes wrestler A gets a few corners, then wrestler B gets a few corners, then we reset things. The brawling in between that was pretty solid stuff though so I can’t really complain here. At the end of the day though, this gave us JBL as world champion. Here’s why.

Angle comes out and shows us the replay, which shows that when Eddie dove at JBL, it knocked JBL into the buckle first, which means he’s champion. This would go on until Wrestle-freaking-Mania.

We recap the main event. Heyman started managing the Dudley Boys and convinced them to kidnap Paul Bearer and steal the urn. The idea is that Taker is lost without Bearer, because those years and world titles without him never counted. Taker followed Heyman for awhile because Heyman had the urn.

Dudley Boys vs. Undertaker

They’re really vague about the stipulations here. All they say is that Taker has to “do the right thing” or Bearer gets buried. There’s a cement truck with a trough going into a case made of glass. Heyman is at the switch and if Taker does something wrong, Bearer gets buried alive in cement. This was a main event in 2004 on a $35 PPV. Let that sink in for a minute. Oh and the Dudleys are Smackdown tag champions.

Now we get the really stupid part of this. Heyman gives us a “preview” by putting in some cement then turning it off. If it can be stopped, WHY DOES TAKER NOT GO LAY HEYMAN OUT AND TURN THE THING OFF??? Bubba yells that the right thing is for Taker to lay down. In case you’re missing the point, the idea here is that if Taker doesn’t lay down, Paul Bearer will be killed.

Taker lays down but grabs them by the throat. Heyman says that’s not the right thing and the Dudleys take over. They fight to the floor and Taker is in control. He loads up Old School and Heyman says Bad Dog and loads in a lot more cement. The Dudleys take over and this is so dumb. Taker beats them down and goes after Heyman but the Dudleys make the save. Bearer keeps saying that Taker will….the cement is lower than before. Did I mention that this wasn’t live and a lot of the concrete stuff was taped earlier? The ending of the match leaked online earlier in the day.

Bubba stops the cement, saying they can take him out on their own. The fans are loudly booing now. They beat on Taker using very basic stuff like suplexes and elbows. Out to the floor and Bubba basically lays the piece of the announce table on Taker for two. And then it’s a sleeper. Are you kidding me? Thankfully they are as Taker suplexes out of it. He beats up D-Von and it becomes a big brawl. This place is SILENT too. Old School hits but D-Von hits Taker low. Taker sits up and Heyman holds up the urn. And then a tombstone ends D-Von.

Rating: F. Ok come on now. Where’s my real main event? Where’s the match that I really paid this much money to see? I mean it couldn’t be this, because this was a boring 15 minute match with Heyman constantly teasing that he’ll murder Bearer. I mean…ok I’ll drop it now. The match SUCKED and the concept is further fetched than wrestling should be allowed to go.

Heyman goes to pull the lever again but Taker sends a bolt of lightning to stop him. Then he pulls the level himself to kill off Paul Bearer for about five years. The idea was without his conscience he could be more violent or whatever.

Overall Rating: R. As in returned like a bad steak at a restaurant.  Oh just no. I mean NO. This isn’t acceptable. Let’s see: attempted murder, actual murder, Bob Holly, Billy Gunn, Charlie Haas, and JBL, who at the time was a midcard guy for about ten years, is the new WWE Champion. This was AWFUL and while there are some ok matches, some of the things here simply are not acceptable whatsoever. Horrible show, and somehow it might get worse next year.

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Monday Night Raw
Date: October 15, 2001
Location: Corel Center, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
Commentators: Jim Ross, Paul Heyman

This was a special request from someone so here it is. To set the stage a bit, this is during the latter part of the Invasion/Alliance angle and Austin is the top dog in the whole thing because when you think Austin, you think of his time in WCW and ECW right? The Alliance was doomed from the start, if nothing else due to their name. It sounds like something you have as an indy company instead of the company that’s going to fight Vince. I wonder if it was a backhanded jab at the NWA. Let’s get to it.

We open with a video of Shane talking to Austin about the triple threat main event on Sunday (No Mercy) and Austin is told that there are two Alliance guys in it so they have a 2/3 chance. Austin isn’t happy with the idea of RVD winning the title. RVD was as popular as beer in a frat house at this point, so they went with Angle instead. You know, because that was the smart idea right?

The main event is Austin/??? vs. Angle/???.

Here’s Foley who has a new book and is commissioner again. Mick asks why he’d come back to a place where he keeps getting yelled at and fired. His response: he doesn’t care. He didn’t come back for Vince, he didn’t come back to plug a new book (“Like this one: Mick Foley’s Halloween Hijinx, which just happens to be available at bookstores now.”), but rather for the fans. He made the triple threat for the fans and we have a cheap pop.

Cue Trish who is returning apparently. She talks about how Foley needs some Stratusfaction and hypes a lingerie match at No Mercy. Trish: “You know who looks great in lingerie Mick?” Foley: “Pat Patterson?” She takes her robe off and is in a one piece. I’m not one to complain, but is there a point to this? Foley offers to put her in a cage at his house where his kids can poke her with sticks. And that’s it. That’s the whole segment. Trish isn’t even in the match Sunday. Why did this happen?

In the back Austin is having a meeting with the Alliance. He says he’s cool with RVD reaching for the star because that’s what he said to do. As for the mystery partner tonight, he’s going to put it up to a vote. Austin has Debra hand out paper and pencils. Well at least he’s organized. He hints that he doesn’t want it to be RVD. Booker basically says he knows he’ll (as in Booker) will win.

The APA are with Jackie and Nidia in the back. Nidia recently won Tough Enough and they want her to come with them to the ring tonight as a reward. They get to their office and Hurricane/Mighty Molly have attached their Hurricycle to the door. They drive away and destroy it, ticking off the APA.

Big Show vs. Dudley Boys

I know this is saying a lot, but Stacy was never hotter than when she was with the Dudleys. The Dudleys beat up Spike and Show is here for revenge for some reason. The double teaming doesn’t work so the Dudleys run, but Big Show chases them down (which sums up the Dudleys’ conditioning) and we go back to the ring. They beat him down and hit What’s Up but can’t suplex him. Show destroys them and chokeslams D-Von but he wants a table. He sets up a powerbomb but Stacy gets on the apron and starts shaking it so Bubba can hit Show with a title for the weak pin.

Rating: D-. The only reason this doesn’t fail is Stacy is go freaking stunning in this era. The match was junk and I have no idea what the point was to have this match. There’s some post match stuff and it’s kind of a reason, but was this really the best they could come up with? Bad match, hot woman.

Tajiri runs out for the save and Bubba goes through the table.

Austin gets the final vote and is ready to come count them, but he throws one away (presumably a vote for RVD) and leaves.

Quick video showing Regal, now in the Alliance, being fired as Commissioner of the WWF.

Here’s the Alliance for the vote reveal. Stephanie and her awesome implants makes fun of her mom and hands the mic to Shane, who announces Regal as the Alliance Commissioner. Regal says he’s proud to be here and that’s it. Oh never mind. He says this is the rising force in sports entertainment and praises Austin.

Austin says it’s time for the vote and everyone chants RVD. RVD gets there late for no apparent reason. Austin reads through the votes (which have names on them) and Booker seems to be running away with it. RVD only gets one vote so Austin just ends this and says it’s Booker as his partner. Booker says he’ll prove his worth.

RVD isn’t happy so Austin yells at him, saying he only got one vote. Taz isn’t happy for some reason but he’s only kind of glaring and doesn’t say anything. Austin asks RVD if he thinks he deserves to be in the ring with Austin. RVD deserves to be a champion, so he gets a WCW Title shot against Rock later tonight. The idea is he’d be out of the triple threat if he wins. Regal officially makes the match.

Hurricane/Lance Storm/Mighty Molly vs. APA/Jacqueline

Hurricane is getting more and more popular at this point. The APA charges in to start and the beating begins. Faarooq and Storm start but Molly tags herself in. She hits Faarooq in the back and it’s off to Jackie. Jackie beats her up a bit and hits a bulldog for two. Hurricane comes in but so does Bradshaw who cleans house. Hurricane puts on the cape but jumps into a fallaway slam. The Clothesline ends it. This was a squash.

The booking for that makes no sense either as Hurricane and Storm had a WCW Tag Title shot on Sunday while the APA was in a dark match. There’s a good example of stupid and not thinking in booking. It’s booking for the TV show, not the PPV.

Kidman thinks something is up with the votes, because everyone listed voted for RVD. Tazz comes in and says shut up or he’ll tell Austin. Tazz vs. Kidman later.

Angle isn’t sure who his partner is going to be. Taker walks up and says he’s going to be the partner. Angle is cool with that.

Jericho says he wants to fight Rock at No Mercy. He and Rock are feuding so he makes fun of Rock’s signature stuff a bit. Cue Rock, who towers over Jericho. Rock says stay out of the match with RVD.

WCW World Title: The Rock vs. Rob Van Dam

Jericho is on commentary. Rock hits the release belly to belly to start and we head to the floor. Rock avoids the spinning leg drop from the apron and both guys get rammed into the table. Van Dam gets a spin kick and a leg drop for two. Jericho isn’t all that impressed with Rocky. Van Dam works on the ribs which Jericho calls smart. You know, because his finisher hits the ribs. That’s a little thing called analysis, but we don’t have time for that. WE HAVE TWITTER LINES TO RECITE!!!

Split legged moonsault misses and both guys are down. Rock gets up first and hits a DDT for two. I like RVD standing on his head for all intents and purposes when he gets dropped on his head. Rock Bottom is blocked but Rock hits a spinebuster to put both guys down. Van Dam sweeps the leg but Rolling Thunder is countered. They go to the floor and Rock hits him against the announce table. Rob goes for a chair and uses the distraction to let Rhyno run in for a Gore. Rock is dead so RVD goes up for the Splash and Jericho shoves him off for the DQ.

Rating: C+. Pretty basic match until the ending. This could have been a good match but with just eight minutes there’s only so much they can do. You can argue whether or not the ending makes sense but it’s close enough I guess. Still though, this was fine considering it was thrown onto the show (because we can’t market it right?) and RVD doesn’t get the title yet.

Jericho doesn’t save Rock from the beatdown because that’s what Rock wanted right?

Stephanie yells at Rhyno about how Jericho just messed everything up. Stephanie, just look hot. Don’t talk. You can’t do it.

Tazz vs. Billy Kidman

Tazz throws him around and they seem to mess something up where Kidman’s face hits the back of Tazz’s head in the corner. They slug it out and Kidman hits a spinning X Factor to end this. It wasn’t even two minutes long and I wouldn’t be surprised if someone was a bit messed up out there.

Rhyno vs. Chris Jericho

Rhyno is US Champion but this is non-title. Rhyno clotheslines him down and pounds Jericho in the corner to start things off. Jericho fights back and hits what we would call the Skull Crushing Finale for two. Spinebuster puts Jericho down for two. That’s a very popular move tonight. Off to a chinlock. I’m sorry about all the play by play but with practically zero backstory here there isn’t much to talk about.

We go WAY old school with Rhyno busting out an airplane spin for two. Rhyno continues to surprise me, missing a middle rope splash. Jericho speeds things up but misses the Lionsault. Belly to belly gets two for the horned one. Jericho hooks the Walls off a rollup but here’s the Alliance for the DQ.

Rating: D. This was nothing worth seeing. The whole point was for the run-in and the post match stuff, which is nothing all that interesting. The interesting thing to see though is that Raven and Mike Awesome ran in for the DQ. If those two, especially Awesome, had been used properly, my goodness what they could have done.

Rock comes out for the save and lays Jericho out with a Rock Bottom, which isn’t really that popular in Canada.

Diamond Dallas Page is at WWF New York and doesn’t like Canada. He’s really positive. It’s pretty clear he’s fishing for ANYTHING he can talk about here.

Edge vs. X-Pac

DIG THAT ROB ZOMBIE INTRO!!! This was right around the time where Edge would hit a groove and was without a doubt the hottest thing on the planet. If he hadn’t gotten hurt, John Cena might have been out of a job. Pac is Light Heavyweight Champions, meaning that every match tonight other than the six man has had a champion in it. That’s RIDICULOUS.

Edge grabs a headlock as Heyman defends Pac from an attack by Ross that doesn’t really exist. On Sunday, Edge has an IC Title match against Christian. It’s also a ladder match. Think that might steal the show a bit? Pac sends Edge over the top and hits a sweet baseball slide to take Edge out. Back in with a chinlock by Waltman. Big spinwheel kick gets two. He loads up the Bronco Buster but it gets countered with a spear, which isn’t quite a finisher yet. Edge-O-Matic gets two. After hitting the post, a flapjack and the Impaler finish Pac.

Rating: C. Pretty decent match here and I can’t emphasize this enough: you can have a coherent match that has a small story in it in less than five minutes. That’s what they did here and it was pretty entertaining. Then again, you had two talented guys in there so it worked out pretty well. Edge would get the title on Sunday.

Post match JR whispers something to Edge. It seems to shake him up and he runs off.

In the back Edge is frantically trying to leave. He runs into Christian and says their mom has been in an accident and they need to get to Toronto. Some Alliance guys try to stop him and Christian turns on Edge, revealing himself to be the newest member of the Alliance. Heyman officially announces Christian as the newest member.

Angle has on a bandana and sunglasses like Taker.

Booker T/Steve Austin vs. Undertaker/Kurt Angle

It’s a brawl to start on the floor until Booker and Angle officially get us going. Off to Taker vs. Austin with Austin hitting the Thesz Press. He hits three ropes for the flipping off elbow and gets caught by the throat. Austin manages to get Booker in and one Texan takes down the taller one with an axe kick. Spinarooni is broken up by a clothesline from Taker and here’s Angle.

To the floor and Kurt tastes some steel. Austin and Booker take turns beating him up and Austin hooks a chinlock. Angle is bleeding a bit under his eye. There’s an ankle lock out of nowhere but Booker breaks it up. There’s a tag to Taker who JUMPS OVER THE TOP ROPE. My mind is blown. There’s goes the referee but Taker can’t chokeslam Booker. Austin is knocked to the floor but Test runs in to break up the Last Ride.

He kicks Kurt down too and Kane comes down to even the odds. Taker and Booker fight into the crowd and Austin hits Angle with a belt for two. Austin hits the second referee but both guys get low blows to put everyone down. RVD runs in and hits a HUGE Five Star to Angle for Austin to get the pin. You know, because we can’t have RVD as the top face the audience wants him to be right?

Rating: C+. It was fine for a main event tag match but it had all of the wonderful overbooking that you grow to expect from the WWF in this period. Not much to see but it advanced three matches for Sunday, which they really needed because this has been a pretty lousy go home show.

Overall Rating: C-. I wasn’t feeling this one at all. It doesn’t make me want to watch No Mercy and I barely got into the flow of things at all. Everything was focused on the main event but without context it’s really all over the place. Today’s product is really good at throwing you into the mix very quickly but making sure things don’t get too heavy. This didn’t do that and the build for the show suffers as a result. Not a bad show, but it doesn’t help to build for No Mercy that well at all.

Here’s No Mercy if you’re interested:

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Monday Night Raw
Date: May 25, 1998
Location: UTC Arena, Chattanooga, Tennessee
Attendance: 6,500
Commentators: Michael Cole, Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler

It’s FINALLY the go home show for Over the Edge so I think you know what the focus of tonight is going to be. Expect a lot of Nation vs. DX and a lot of Austin vs. McMahon/Love. The match at the PPV is a classic so I hope the show leading up to it can be as good. This isn’t a live show which means very little for the sake of this but I need to fill in more space. Let’s get to it.

Here are Vince, the Stooges, and cops to open the show. We recap last week with the Stooges and Vince (dressed in a costume) beat down Austin to let Foley get the real beating in. However that’s going to pale in comparison to what happens on Sunday. He says that he got away with assault last Monday. Vince runs down the stipulations of the match and what everyone is going to be doing. Cue Austin and the eruption that comes with him.

Austin curses a lot and tells the cops that he heard an admission of assault so cuff him. Somehow it actually works and Vince is taken away by the cops. The Stooges try to keep it from happening and Austin says that looks like obstruction of justice. That gets the Stooges cuffed as well and I can’t help but think that Patterson is a little aroused by this. Austin pulls out a beer and pours it over Vince as he’s taken away.

Legion of Doom vs. Disciples of Apocolypse

It’s a six man here with the debut of Droz. His name is Puke here but screw that. He gets beaten down by Chainz on the floor. Well so much for that. Animal vs. let’s say Skull starts us off. Off to Droz who hits a clothesline and then gets beaten down again. He can throw a decent dropkick though. That’s enough for him I guess as he goes out quickly. Still better than Garrett Bischoff.

Hawk (who still doesn’t look right with hair) is beaten down in the corner after being in control for about 4 seconds. Well to be fair he was supposed to be drunk or high so it’s kind of excusable. Chainz and Hawk collide which lets Chainz get two. Can we have Hawk shoot up in the ring? It would be more entertaining than this. Off to Droz and everything breaks down. Droz hits a three point clothesline and a Batista Bomb on Chainz for the pin.

Rating: D. This feud was so boring and thankfully I think it ended very soon after this. I don’t think it was so much about the feud being over as much as Vince falling asleep from it. There’s no chemistry at all and the Warriors are just old here. Droz didn’t help things and his pill pusher character never went anywhere. Granted that could be because he was crippled.

Vince and the Stooges are led away in handcuffs. Austin talks more trash to them.

Dan Severn vs. Owen Hart

We get a video of Owen turning on Shamrock before this starts. Gee, I wonder what the ending of this is going to be. Severn is the NWA World Champion and that belt on Raw is still a bizarre sight to see. He takes Owen down very quickly and tries a cross armbreaker but Owen manages to avoid it. Severn chokes away and Owen starts throwing punches. The crowd really doesn’t care here. And then Owen kicks him low for….not a DQ? They go to the mat for a bit and Severn gets an armbar to draw in the Nation for the DQ.

Rating: D. This was nothing, partially because Severn really wasn’t an interesting wrestler at all. And people wonder why ROH gets eye rolls when they bring him in as a big deal. The match was just for the postmatch beatdown, but I really don’t get the point of this for the most part. It was pretty worthless for the most part though.

The Nation destroys Severn but they can’t quite Pillmanize his leg due to referee interference.

Austin was on Celebrity Deathmatch last week and will be again this week.

Vince is still in the squad car.

Edge is still coming.

Here’s the Jackyl who has with him Hank the Angry Drunken Dwarf and Crackhead Bob from the Howard Stern Show. Hank had recently been voted the World’s Most Beautiful Person by People Matazine’s website so he curses about that a lot. Bob yells a lot. This is stupid if you couldn’t tell. Jackyl says we’re not done yet and brings out Luna, Golga (Earthquake) and Giant Silva.

Golga vs. Thrasher

If you don’t know what’s coming here, you’re beyond my help. Bob sits in on commentary while the dominance commences. Total squash of course that takes longer than it should. It ended with a powerslam if you’re interested. Silva beats up Most for fun. The referee too.

Vince is still in the car as Austin talks trash to him.

Vader vs. Jeff Jarrett

Austin has agreed to let Vince and company go if certain conditions are met. No word on what those are yet. Vader pounds Jarrett down and hits a splash but there’s no referee due to Tennessee Lee. Then he does it again. Jarrett goes after the knee as Vader goes after Lee. The fans cheer for Vader but they don’t know what they want to see right Vince? Jarrett works over the knee until Vader runs over him. I’ve always liked that. Vader hits a middle rope splash but Kane runs in for the DQ.

Rating: D+. Better than the opener as the fans were into it, but still pretty dull. Jarrett was so freaking boring as the country singer guy and it was no exception here. He wuldn’t change characters until like July and it couldn’t have come soon enough. Vader still had it but they were already burying him, saying he wasn’t in top shape on commentary. The second run-in finish of the night isn’t helping things either.

Kane destroys Vader post match.

Vince is out of the car. Austin makes him apologize but Vince calls him the former champion. That’s not good enough so Vince has to do it again. Austin says Vince is a good kid and they all get unhancuffed.

Here are Vince and the Stooges after the second hour begins. No commercial though which makes this seem more realistic. Vince looking all messed up is a nice visual. He freaks out on Austin for treating him so badly and insists he DID NOT mean his apology. Austin made a condition that there had to be a WWF guy at the match Sunday to keep Vince in line. Vince is cool with that because no one on the roster can intimidate him. He makes Austin vs. Taker tonight.

DX was at an airport earlier. This is another of their “secret missions”. HHH had a speech but says Raw is too full of hot angles so they have to cut it short. HHH is going to be flying the plane and says it’s a very dangerous mission so he may never see them again. He gets in the wrong plane and that’s it. Ok then.

Al Snow jumps the guardrail and gets in the ring. Then he gets out of the ring and grabs Jerry, demanding his meeting with Vince. Security pulls him off.

Taka Michinoku vs. Dick Togo

Taka is Light Heavyweight Champion but this isn’t a title match because he’s not allowed to defend the title I guess. Also, Togo still has the best name EVER. There’s a spin wheel kick by Taka to send Togo to the floor and there’s his signature dive to the floor. Back in and another dive runs into a dropkick. Taka gets knocked into the railing and there’s a flip dive from the apron. Togo grabs a nerve hold for about a second and then hits a powerslam for two. Taka fights back but his tornado DDT is countered. A standing rana gets the pin for him though.

Rating: C. The match was fine but it was pretty uninteresting. This feud went on for awhile until they pulled the plug on Taka as champion and had him join Kai En Tai, putting the Light Heavyweight Title on this new guy named Christian who had a little bit better career I’d certainly think. Fun match, but it had nothing on what WCW was doing at the time and this division never did.

Post match the other Kai En Tai members come in and beat up Taka.

Back to the airport for more DX hijinks. Apparently HHH has flown off and they have no idea where he went. They all suggest they can fly after him but no one does. Rockabilly is mentioned.

Marc Mero vs. Farrooq

Sable forcibly rips the rope off Mero and he’s not happy about it. Mero starts off fast but gets caught in a powerslam. We go to the floor where Mero hides behind Sable. Mero stomps away again and Sable pops up on the apron. Mero tells her to get down and walks into a clothesline for the pin. This was just for the Sable/Mero stuff.

Mero freaks out on her post match and says that on Sunday, Sable can bring anyone she wants to meet him in a match. If they do, she’s free. If he wins, she’s gone forever. It would wind up being her vs. Mero with Sable losing. She’d be back in a few months.

Video on Pat Patterson and how awesome he is.

HHH is flying around (“I’m in the COCKpit!”) and says he’s flying around Nitro, writing messages in smoke for the WCW fans, such as DX Rules, WCW Sucks! Stupid but I’ve seen worse.

HHH vs. The Rock

This works. Non-title here. Before we get started though, Rock says the fans want to know how he feels about Viagara. However, since he doesn’t need it, he has no comment on it. He’ll also beat Farrooq on Sunday. As for HHH, DX is obsessed with their anatomies. Rock has something hard waiting for him: the Rock Bottom. After a break, here’s HHH and we’re ready to go.

Feeling out process to start and they’re more or less playing chess with each other. They trade headlocks and both guys go to the floor. Chyna interferes but is counteracted by Mark Henry. Back in the Rock takes over. Henry interferes, drawing Chyna up to the apron. The distraction allows a belt shot to HHH but Chyna makes the save and we take a break. Back with the People’s Elbow getting two.

HHH fights back with a clothesline and a crotch chop to Henry. Henry gets on the apron so Chyna pops Rock with a title as well. That was nice. HHH drops the knee (missed by four inches) for two. He stomps away but Rock hits a swinging neckbreaker to get two. Pedigree is countered into a backdrop to the floor. Henry stomps on HHH but Chyna pops him with a chair. HHH saves her and they fight on the floor to a double countout.

Rating: C-. Rock vs. HHH is one of those matches you always have to take a look at. This was nothing special but they would really heat things up over the summer, culminating in one of my all time favorites at Summerslam in their ladder match for the IC Title. The ending had to be that way because they were both champions, but you could see the chemistry out there.

HHH says bring it and Rock leaves. Farrooq pops up behind the future Great One and piledrives him on the stage.

Vince is going to be the guest referee for the main event.

Steve Austin vs. The Undertaker

Before Austin arrives, Taker chokeslams Vince. He loads up the Tombstone but here’s Kane. They slug it out and fight into the crowd. With Vince down here comes Austin. Stunner to both Stooges and he ties Vince up in the ropes. Austin grabs a chair and Vince is panicking. Here’s Dude Love with a chair of his own but Austin is ready for him and smacks his chair into Dude’s into Dude’s head. It’s so refreshing to see smart faces.

Overall Rating: C+. If there’s one thing Raw never did wrong at this point, it was the go home show. This set up the PPV perfectly with I believe everything outside of Jarrett vs. Blackman getting some time and I think we’re all thankful for that. Not much as far as wrestling goes but it’s 1998 so I don’t think anyone is surprised by that. Good stuff though and we got a classic main event out of Austin vs. Foley.

Here’s Over the Edge if you’re interested.

http://forums.wrestlezone.com/showthread.php?p=1111563#post1111563

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