Starrcade 1997
Date: December 28, 1997
Location: MCI Center, Washington, D.C.
Attendance: 17,500
Commentators: Eric Bischoff, Dusty Rhodes, Mike Tenay

 

Tonight is WCW’s night. After a year and a half of being dominated by the NWO, tonight is the night that WCW stands up and says this is our company and you’re not taking us over. WCW has its warrior in Sting and there is no way that Hogan can stop him. Hogan has been running scared of Sting for months and tonight he’s out of places to hide. This is WCW’s night. Let’s get to it.

 

The opening video is rather awesome with Sting standing in the shadows as rain falls. He jumps off a wall and lands on a picture of Hogan. Sting picks up the bat and walks off, all while pictures of Hogan are superimposed over the screen. That’s a great visual.

 

There will be a drawing on who gets to be the referee for the main event.

 

Several WCW wrestlers are in the crowd, including Harlem Heat and the TV Champion Disco Inferno.

 

Apparently Kevin Nash isn’t here tonight. This was another big problem with the NWO: they didn’t like to lose. The original plan for Nash was to face the Giant and lose. Nash, not wanting to be pinned on PPV, decided to screw the fans out of one of the biggest matches on the show and not appear. He eventually appeared in the match at the next PPV where he was allowed to win.

 

In other words, he acted unprofessionally and screwed over the people and got his way anyway. These are the kind of things that would catch up to them in the long run. Officially Nash claimed that he had chest pains, but he’s had a tendency to have those many times over the years when he was about to lose a major match. Also considering his story has changed multiple times over the years, something tells me he wasn’t being honest. Imagine that coming from a wrestler.

 

Cruiserweight Title: Eddie Guerrero vs. Dean Malenko

 

This is the culmination of a rather awesome three way feud between Malenko, Guerrero and Rey Mysterio which led to some excellent matches between the three of them. Eddie is defending here. They head to the mat to start where Eddie is good but Dean is great. Malenko takes over on the champion and fires off some right hands to the head to send Eddie back. A leg lariat gets two for Malenko and they trade control of a German suplex until Dean counters a rana into a HARD powerbomb for two.

 

Another powerbomb gets two for Dean and a snap powerslam gets the same. Eddie begs for mercy and runs to the floor for a breather. Back in and Guerrero hits a chop block on Dean’s knee to give the champion control. Dean knees his way out of a suplex and drops Guerrero stomach first over the top rope to slow him down again. A clothesline gets another two count on Eddie and it’s off to a chinlock. Make that a headscissors as the match slows down a lot.

 

Back up and Eddie backs off again before kissing Dean’s feet and begging for mercy. Dean wins a test of strength by taking Eddie’s hands to the mat so he can stomp on them. A dropkick to the face puts Guerrero down again before Dean counters a tornado DDT and drops Guerrero face first on the top turnbuckle for two. Eddie gets suplexed out to the apron but lands on his feet, allowing him to snap Dean’s neck on the ropes. The champion takes over with a slingshot ax handle onto Dean’s leg to put Malenko in trouble.

 

Guerrero wraps Dean’s knee around the post and dropkicks the steps into said knee in a nice show of aggression. Back in again and Guerrero cranks on the leg for a bit before hitting a bit powerbomb for two. Dean counters a hurricanrana attempt into a nice wheelbarrow suplex for two. A backbreaker puts Eddie down again but it hurts Dean’s knee in the process. Eddie takes him up top but gets shoved off the top as he tries a rana. Dean tries the Texas Cloverleaf (submission hold) but Eddie kicks the knee out to escape. Guerrero hits a missile dropkick into the knee to set up a Frog Splash to retain the title.

 

Rating: C+. Decent opener here but way below what you would expect from these two. The matches leading up to this one had been excellent but this came off as somewhat flat. It’s certainly not a bad match or anything, but given the expectations from the buildup, this was pretty disappointing.

 

Here’s Scott Hall with something to say. As is his custom, Hall asks the fans if they’re here to see the NWO or WCW. In this case it’s WCW but Hall would rather talk about the main event. He actually has a reason to as he gets a title shot at the winner at Uncensored. As for Nash, he isn’t here tonight so Giant is the winner. Giant comes out and says that he’s a patient man and one day Nash will be back. Hall goes after Giant but gets laid out with Kevin Nash’s powerbomb. Why they didn’t just have Hall replace Nash in a match here is beyond me.

 

Scott Norton/Vincent/Konnan vs. Ray Traylor/Steiner Brothers

 

The Steiners and Traylor had been going to war with the NWO for months so these three are just a random grouping of members for them to fight. There’s no Konnan in sight during the entrances so we’re going to start with a handicap match. Norton is a big strong guy who used to be world armwrestling champion. Vincent used to work for the WWF as Ted DiBiase’s bodyguard. The Steiners’ manager tonight? Ted DiBiase.

 

Since there’s no Konnan, here’s former world champion Randy Savage to take his place. Savage nearly gets in a fight with the WCW wrestlers in the audience on the way to the ring. For the sake of clarity in this match, Scott will only be used in reference to Scott Steiner. Savage starts with Scott with Randy being shoved back into the corner. A shoulder block puts Savage down but Norton hits Scott in the back to let Savage take over. Off to Vincent who is there to distract the referee while Savage chokes Scott.

 

Norton comes in for a power vs. power match with Scott, followed by a backbreaker to work on Scott’s back. Savage adds a double ax to the spine, only to have Scott come back with a double underhook powerbomb and a gorilla press slam. Everything breaks down and the NWO is cleared out. Back in and it’s Rick vs. Norton now which is a battle of the tough guys. Rick hits a quick suplex and a Steiner Line followed by a powerslam for two. Traylor, a former member of the NWO, comes in to pound away on Norton as well.

 

Vincent comes back in and walks into a spinebuster and a belly to back drop. Back to Scott for that wicked spinning belly to belly for no cover. Traylor comes in again as we have the rare heel in peril sequence. Rick puts on a chinlock while rubbing Vincent’s head for no apparent reason. Traylor comes back in but misses a splash, allowing for the tag off to Norton. After a big clothesline, it’s back to Vincent instead of Savage for no apparent reason.

 

To the shock of no one, Vincent is no match for Traylor and it’s hot tag to Rick. He cleans house and the Steiners hit their top rope DDT on Vincent, only to have Norton make the save. Scott hits the Frankensteiner off the top but this time Savage makes the save. Now it’s Savage in danger of being caught in the top rope Frankensteiner but Norton shoves Scott off the top, allowing Randy to drop the big elbow for the pin.

 

Rating: D+. Not a bad match or anything here, but why in the world would have have the NWO D team and Savage win this match? The Steiners are the world tag team champions and they’re losing in the second match on the biggest show of the year? This night is supposed to be all about WCW, not about the NWO winning a meaningless match that they don’t need.

 

Nick Patrick is officially announced as the referee for the main event. The problem with this is that Patrick is a former member of the NWO with a very sketchy record. Keep in mind that we’re wasting time on the biggest show of the year for this. Also, I wonder what the announcers are going to spend the next hour and a half talking about.

 

Bill Goldberg vs. Steve McMichael

 

Steve “Mongo” McMichael is a former Horseman and NFL player, but he’s absolutely terrible in the ring. Goldberg is still undefeated at this point and would become a much bigger deal after this show is over. This is happening because Goldberg stole McMichael’s Super Bowl ring and they’ve attacked each other a few times since. The brawl is on in the aisle to start but Mongo’s offense isn’t having much effect. Goldberg literally picks him up and carries Mongo into the ring like a rag doll.

 

Goldberg picks up a table at ringside as the bell rings and the actual match begins. Mongo suplexes him down for two but a big shoulder tackle takes Steve down for two. We head to the floor where the table is leaning against the post. They fight around the ring with Mongo taking over before heading back inside, only to have Goldberg punch Mongo as Steve dives off the top. Goldberg hooks a quick leg lock and is toying with Mongo at this point.

 

The spear (the setup for Goldberg’s finisher) hits for two and Goldberg loads up the table on the floor. He tries to slam Mongo over the top and through the table but the referee breaks it up. A dropkick of all things puts Mongo down and out to the floor and we have to be getting close to done. Mongo gets back up onto the apron, only to be punched through the table. Back in and the Jackhammer (suplex but instead Goldberg turns it over into a powerslam) ends Mongo.

 

Rating: D. This was terrible but Goldberg’s day was coming. It was clear that Mongo just wasn’t any good as a wrestler and thankfully in 1998 he would be pushed WAY down the card and rarely ever have a big match again. The match itself was slow and plodding, but Goldberg would be pushed to the moon very quickly after this.

 

Raven vs. Chris Benoit

 

Raven, a loner who has a collection of misfits called his Flock, comes out for his match against Chris Benoit but says he won’t wrestle tonight. Instead his top man Saturn does, which has been a recurring theme for Raven. To be fair to him and WCW though, Raven had a legit appendicitis and wasn’t medically cleared to wrestle. On the other hand, WCW knew this in advance and didn’t bother to announce that Raven couldn’t wrestle, thereby ripping off the fans with something they easily could have fixed. Anyway Benoit is a very tough wrestler with an excellent amateur skill set. Saturn can do a bit of everything.

 

Before the match, Benoit talks about seeing things for what they are in an attempt to speak like Raven. This doesn’t go well at all, but once they had their match it would be a classic. Apparently this is under Raven’s Rules, meaning anything goes. Saturn tries to jump Benoit but gets chopped down for his efforts. More chops hit Saturn’s chest in the corner and a jawbreaker gets Benoit out of a sleeper attempt. Benoit stomps away in the corner and invites Raven to get in the ring. Saturn catches Benoit’s arm during a chop attempt and hits a quick suplex to take over.

 

Chris comes right back with a dropkick to the knee but has to knock Raven to the floor instead of go after Saturn. Benoit whips Saturn into the barricade but Raven’s men Kidman and Sick Boy interfere to give Saturn control. Back in and Saturn puts on a chinlock before hitting a moonsault, only to injure himself in the process. A few knees to Benoit’s ribs put him down again but Benoit’s foot is in the ropes. Off to reverse chinlock by Saturn to stay on the ribs but he lets it go for no apparent reason.

 

A kind of brainbuster gets two on Benoit and it’s off to another chinlock. Benoit fights up and hooks a sunset flip for two before clotheslining Saturn down. Both guys are dazed now but it’s Benoit taking over as they get back up. Saturn grabs a quick falcon arrow (sitout slam) to put Benoit down, only to have Chris knock him off the top rope and to the floor.

 

Benoit takes it to the floor and puts on his Crippler Crossface (arm trap hold with a facelock) but the Flock makes the save. Benoit fights them and throws Saturn back in for the flying headbutt, only to have the Flock come in again. They’re quickly dispatched, but Raven himself comes in with the DDT to lay Benoit out. Saturn puts on his Rings of Saturn double armbar but Benoit is out cold, ending the match.

 

Rating: C+. This was getting good at the end but the decision here makes little sense. Benoit had been running through the Flock, so why have him lose to Saturn right before he’s supposed to face Raven? Benoit can’t beat the second in command so we’re supposed to want to see him fight the boss? That doesn’t make sense.

 

By the way: this is an eight match card and the heels are now 4/4.

 

Buff Bagwell vs. Lex Luger

 

Buff is of course Marcus Bagwell and now part of the NWO. This is I think the fourth match between these two in about a month with Bagwell cheating to win before. Bagwell of course stalls before the match begins because that’s what people with little talent do to draw heat. They lock up and go into the corner with no one being able to get an advantage. Buff starts pounding away in the corner but Lex comes back with right hands of his own. A press slam puts Bagwell down and a clothesline puts him on the floor.

 

Bagwell is ticked off and wants Vincent out here to help him. Apparently the power of a worthless man obsessed with his own career like Vincent is enough to inspire Bagwell as he pounds away on Lex. It doesn’t last long though as Luger pounds him down onto the floor and sends him into the barricade before nailing Vincent. The distraction lets Bagwell get in more of his array of right hands and forearms before stomping away in the corner. Bagwell pounds on Luger’s back and says hi to his mom Judy (future World Tag Team Champion. Please, don’t ask).

 

Luger gets in a back elbow but can’t follow up at all. Then again he took some forearms to the back so how good could be be right now? Bagwell puts on a chinlock for a bit before clotheslining Luger down for two. Back to the chinlock as this match is already going long. Luger tries to come back but a knee to the ribs puts him right back down. Now it’s a sleeper because this match hasn’t had enough rest holds. Lex finally fights up and suplexes him down so let’s lay around even more.

 

Luger pounds away and hits some clotheslines and atomic drops. Now Luger has to beat up Vincent before suplexing Bagwell down. Vincent is thrown off the top and clotheslined to the floor and Luger stomps away in the corner. The referee calls him off, allowing Bagwell to hit him in the back and into the referee. Luger puts Buff in the Torture Rack but there’s no referee to see Randy Savage make the save. Savage gets racked but here’s Scott Norton to hit Luger in the head with a chain and put Bagwell on top for the pin.

 

Rating: D. In case you’re keeping track, we’re about an hour and forty minutes into this show and the heels are still undefeated. I’m assuming the idea here was to make Bagwell look like he can beat a big name, but having him need three other guys and a weapon to do so isn’t going to accomplish that goal. This was really boring too and could have had five minutes cut out from it.

 

US Title: Curt Hennig vs. Diamond Dallas Page

 

Hennig is defending and had been feuding with Flair for months, but Flair is hurt so Page is subbing for him. Curt is also NWO of course. Apparently Page stole the physical belt last night on Saturday Night….and then gave it back before the match tonight. That sounds like an idea they had and then dropped. Page has bad ribs which he had for months on end. Hennig gets elbowed in the face a lot and knocked out to the floor for a breather.

 

Back in and Hennig wisely goes after the bad ribs before putting on a chinlock. Thankfully it doesn’t last long as Page counters into the much more interesting headlock. Curt fights up and is put right back into the hold as the match continues to go slowly. Back up and they head to the floor where Hennig snaps Page’s throat across the top rope to take over. Page also goes ribs first into the steps as Hennig is thinking with his attack here. They go back into the ring where Curt pounds on the ribs even more.

 

Page tries to fight back but charges into a boot in the corner and a clothesline takes him down. Off to a chinlock which must be left over from the Bagwell match. The fans start chanting boring as this hold drags on for over a minute. Page finally fights up and hits a jawbreaker to escape before punching Hennig out to the floor. A dive over the top puts Hennig down again and Page throws him into the crowd to continue the beating.

 

They head back inside where Hennig gets to do his reverse crotch against the post spot. The Diamond Cutter is blocked by a grab of the ropes though and Hennig gets two. A rollup gets two for Page but Hennig clotheslines him down for two. Hennig loads up his Hennigplex but Page counters into a Diamond Cutter. He totally botched the move though and it looks like an armbar. They both get back up and Page hits the Diamond Cutter out of nowhere for the US Title and the first win by a good guy of the night.

 

Rating: C-. This wasn’t great and the botched ending hurt it a bit. Still though, it’s nice to see the fans have something to cheer for, even though it took them nearly two hours to get there. To say the Diamond Cutter was a popular move is the understatement of the year, as the fans went nuts when he hit it. This was a pretty dull match until the Cutter hit.

 

Bret Hart comes out to be guest referee. There’s no pyro, there’s no big entrance, there’s nothing but generic music and Bret casually walking to the ring. The theory is that he’s in the NWO but that’s never been confirmed yet.

 

Eric Bischoff vs. Larry Zbyszko

 

This should have been Hall vs. Larry, as those two had been talking trash to each other for months. However, Larry only gets Hall if he beats Eric here tonight. If Eric wins, the NWO controls Nitro. Larry is in good shape here considering he’s 46 and hasn’t wrestled regularly in about five years. Bret checks them for weapons and we’re ready to go. Bischoff has the body of a 15 year old girl. He is however a black belt in karate so you can expect a lot of striking.

 

Bischoff hits a quick shot to Larry’s head and immediately celebrates. More strikes follow and Eric heads out to the floor for consultation with Hall. Back in and Larry hits some shots of his own and Eric is scared. Larry goes after him again and Eric hits a spin kick to the side of the head that knocks Larry down. That’s enough for Zbyszko and he charges at Eric and takes him down to the mat. Bret admonishes him for pulling Eric’s hair, so Larry puts on a sleeper and a headscissors, both of which are broken up for being chokes.

 

Off to a standing figure four but Eric quickly makes a rope. The damage is done though and Larry goes after the leg. Makes sense against a karate guy. Bret keeps Larry away from Eric and the announcers PANIC. Imagine that: a referee following the rules. Eric is sent into the steps and takes a brief walk around the ring. Back in and Bret blocks a right hand from Larry, allowing Eric to get in a kick to the head. Bischoff fires more kicks with Larry on the ropes, although Bret is fine with them.

 

Eric is starting to kick himself out though as the kicks are getting weaker and weaker each time. Now he fires rights and lefts in the corner as Larry is just covering up. Eric can barely move now and Larry shakes everything off. A suplex puts Bischoff down and Larry ties him in the Tree of Woe. Hall pulls something out of his pocket and loads it into Eric’s shoe, WITH BRET LOOKING RIGHT AT THEM. I mean, he knows what’s going on so why not LOOK THE OTHER WAY???

 

Anyway, Eric kicks him in the head with the loaded foot and the piece of metal goes flying. Bret isn’t supposed to see it, despite watching it fly through the air. Eric celebrates, so Bret hits both Bischoff and Hall before putting Hall in the Sharpshooter, which is Bret’s version of the Scorpion Deathlock. Larry chokes Eric for a bit and is declared the winner, presumably by DQ.

 

Rating: F. This was in the second to last spot on the biggest show of the year and featured the boss of the company who has no skill whatsoever in the ring. Larry did fine all things considered, but to waste this spot on this match and to waste BRET HART’s in ring debut on this match is absolutely ridiculous in every sense of the word.

 

And yet, it’s only going to get worse.

 

Before we get to the main event, I need to set the stage a bit more. This match is 18 months in the making at minimum. Hogan has been the biggest villain in the company the entire time and has been behind a ton of attacks, crooked endings, and every other possible evil thing you can do as a wrestler. He has basically held the world title hostage for the entire time and has gone completely against WCW. Tonight should be his punishment for those crimes. This match should be Hogan being taken to the gallows and executed for everything he’s done for the last year and a half.

 

WCW World Title: Sting vs. Hollywood Hogan

 

So how does Hogan come out after running scared of Sting for a year and a half? He struts to the ring, playing the belt like a guitar. He looks like he’s about to face Sick Boy instead of Sting for the world title. Hogan should have had people literally dragging him to the ring as he was trying everything he could to get out of the match. Have him offering money to the security, have him trying to run, have him doing ANYTHING but walking out with that big grin on his face.

 

After a year of repelling from the rafters, coming through the crowd, and at one point ziplining to the ring Sting…..calmly walks out. Oh wait there’s some lightning and a voiceover that we’ve heard before so it’s cool right? They stare each other down and as the bell rings, Hogan shoves him away. Sting slaps him so Hogan walks around the ring and is loudly booed as you would expect. Sting is pushed to the corner but comes out with a right hand and it’s pretty much all downhill from there.

 

We’re about two minutes into the match now and that’s literally all that’s happened. Hogan kicks him in the ribs and a single right hand sends Sting flying across the ring. Sting is pounded in the corner as Hogan gives a shout out to his son, Nasty Nick. A shot to the throat has Sting in trouble as the crowd is stunned. There’s a slam but Hogan misses three straight elbows. A dropkick puts Hogan on the floor and Sting just stands there looking down at Hollywood.

 

Back in and the fans are chanting boring. Hogan grabs a headlock before running Sting over like he’s not even there. Two more dropkicks send Hogan to the floor and again just stands there. Back inside again and Sting puts on a headlock to take Hogan down. We’re six minutes into this and the entire sequence of action has been punches, headlocks, a shoulder block and dropkicks. Goldberg and McMichael went less than six minutes and had a full match while Hogan and Sting have fit about a minute’s worth of action in the same amount of time.

 

Hogan shoves him off and lays Sting out with a clothesline. As in Sting is down on the mat for about 10 seconds off a clothesline. A suplex puts Sting down but he’s on his feet before Hogan is. That’s more like it. He does the crotch chop sign to Hogan and pounds Hogan into the corner….so Hogan calmly rakes the eyes to take over again. Hogan is toying with Sting so far and he does even more toying by throwing Sting to the floor. Sting is thrown into the timekeeper’s area and Hogan hits him in the neck with Sting’s trademark baseball bat.

 

Sting is choked with a t-shirt up against the railing, but he comes back by whipping Hogan into the barricade. As usual though, Sting misses the Stinger Splash into the steel and Hogan takes over seconds later. Sting is crotched on the barricade and dropped with a single right hand. I’ve seen Hogan have more trouble dropping jobbers. Back in and Hogan hits an atomic drop before choking away. We’re over ten minutes into this now and Hogan hasn’t been in significant trouble at all.

 

And now, it’s going to get even worse.

 

Hogan hits the big boot and the legdrop for the pin in a little over eleven minutes. Now, the announcers start talking about a fast count, but the count was about as fast as you would expect it to be, albeit maybe a hair faster. It’s far from what you would call a fast count when you’re talking about a crooked referee though. I’ve heard stories over the years about Hogan actually paying the referee to count at a normal speed to count properly instead of doing it fast, and if that’s the case then he did a decent job at it. The count was close enough that you could buy it either way, but it looked good enough.

 

On top of that, the far bigger problem with the fast count theory is that it doesn’t hold up when you look at the aftermath. The idea behind a fast count is that the guy would have been able to kick out had it been at normal speed. Sting NEVER MOVED. He doesn’t push off, he doesn’t sit up after the count, he doesn’t kick his legs. Sting is still laying on the mat a good ten seconds after the three count. Even with the fast count, Sting looks like he’s out cold so the count doesn’t even make a difference.

 

On top of THAT, Bret Hart is seen walking in front of the camera as Hogan is going down for the cover. Not a few seconds after the cover, not as Hogan is celebrating, but as Hogan is getting on top of Sting. That would mean that he came into the arena probably before Hogan even hit the big boot. Why was he out there? He’s there early enough to grab the timekeeper’s hand before he can strike the bell, which makes even less sense.

 

Back to the “action” as Bret grabs the mic and mumbles that “he’s not going to let it happen again.” He complains about the count being fast and decks Nick Patrick (who has the most amazing overblown fall ever, throwing his arms in the air and falling over like a tree). Hogan tries to leave (as Sting is just now getting up) but Bret throws him back in the ring.

 

Bret calls for the bell, Sting goes NUTS and hits a quick Stinger Splash. He tries for another but Hogan holds the ropes, pretty much stopping Sting’s momentum cold. The NWO runs in but Sting fights them off and hits another splash on Hogan. The Scorpion Deathlock goes on and Hogan gives up, allowing Bret to call for the bell and give Sting the title.

 

WCW comes out to celebrate, Sting shouts something in what sounds like Spanish (the last word was mamacita. A quick Google search says Sting said something like “revenge is sweet baby”) into the camera, end of show.

 

Rating: W. As in where in the world do I even start. First and foremost, the match absolutely sucked in case you couldn’t tell. Hogan was destroying Sting for over ten minutes and then pinned him clean(ish) in the middle of the ring. It’s completely against everything that the match was supposed to be and was horribly boring on top of that. This made Sting look like a complete joke and did little for anyone else besides Hogan.

 

Now for the second ending, which has even more holes in it. First and foremost, there’s one huge problem with what Bret did: what if you didn’t watch WWF? Simple question: what if you had no idea that this was a reference to what happened at Survivor Series a few weeks ago because you don’t watch that company’s programming? What was Bret not allowing to happen again? Granted you can only be confused by that if you understood what Bret said, which was mumbled pretty badly.

 

Second, Bret was hired as guest referee for one match, but he now has the authority to referee any match he wants all night long. The fans live weren’t told that, so they either had to put it together in about a minute and a half, or they were completely oblivious to what was going on. The whole idea was a stretch to put it mildly and it was made even worse by how badly it was executed.

 

Finally…..just why? I mean, aside from Hogan, who could have possibly thought this was a good idea? The answer I’ve heard from either Hogan or Bischoff in one of their books is that Sting had some substance abuse issues and was in no condition to be champion at this point. The problem with that theory is that Sting just wrestled a coherent enough match. He was pretty much a shell of his former self, but he was able to throw dropkicks, punches, the Stinger Splash and the Scorpion Deathlock. That’s really all he needed in this match, but apparently he wasn’t capable of doing those things, at least according to Hogan or Bischoff.

 

All in all, this match is the biggest disaster that I can ever remember for a major match. It was booked completely backwards, it did nothing that it was supposed to do, the ending was screwed up, and the fans were likely confused by at least one thing at the time. Sting may indeed have had a drug problem at the time, but if he’s even remotely capable of wrestling a passable match (which he clearly was), you give the fans this moment and worry about the rest later. It’s been over 15 years since this happened and I’m still amazed by how badly they screwed this up.

 

Overall Rating: F. That’s the only way to describe this show: a failure. WCW completely failed at what they were trying to do here and the show is a disaster. The best match is just slightly above average and that’s likely being generous. No good guy wins until nearly two hours into the show and the main reason to watch the show (which A LOT of people did) was completely fouled up.

 

This is everything that you can possibly do wrong on a major show rolled into one and multiplied several times over. There’s nothing truly good here and the aftershocks of this show crippled WCW for good. This was supposed to be the night that WCW was supposed to come back from everything that had gone wrong for them and take back their company. At the end of the day, they got back the US Title and that’s it. They already had Nitro and yeah they got back the world title. For now. That’s the other reason this show is so awful: at the end of the day, none of this mattered.

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Monday Nitro #119
Date: December 22, 1997
Location: Macon Coliseum, Macon, Georgia
Attendance: 7,615
Commentators: Larry Zbyszko, Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay, Bobby Heenan

Amazingly enough, we’re actually at the go home show for Starrcade. This is yet another three hour show which would become the norm soon after this. The wrestling on this episode means nothing at all, due to a certain segment at the end of the first hour which overshadows everything else we would see in the ring on this show. Let’s get to it.

We open with a paid announcement from the NWO. Actually it’s just Bischoff, who talks for several minutes about what he’s going to do to Larry at Starrcade. In short, he’s going to humiliate Zbyszko and take Nitro as a result. Well he certainly did humiliate Larry but not for the reasons Eric is talking about here.

Fit Finlay vs. Eddie Guerrero

Apparently this is the arena where Hall jumped the guard rail over a year and a half ago. The fans are all over Eddie to start as he begs for mercy. Guerrero pops up and kicks at Finlay’s knee to take him down. A slingshot hilo onto the leg has Finlay in big trouble early on. Actually scratch that as Finlay pops back up and pounds on Eddie without so much as a shake of the leg. Finlay drops Eddie throat first on the top rope before hitting a hard kick to the back for no cover.

Eddie is catapulted into the ropes so he can crash down onto Finlay’s knees before the Irishman pounds away with forearms in the corner. A hard clothesline puts Eddie down and Finlay rams Guerrero’s face into the side of the ring a few times. Back in and a hard boot to Eddie’s face puts him down but Eddie goes back to the knee which suddenly hurts again. A dropkick to the knee puts Finlay down again but goes up top, only to be caught and superplexed back down. Finlay loads up the tombstone but Eddie bails to the floor…and walks out for the countout.

Rating: C. Surprising lack of selling from Finlay aside, this wasn’t a bad match at all. The ending makes sense in a way as Eddie has a title defense on Sunday and wouldn’t want to waste his energy before then. Finlay was an interesting character as he would disappear for months on end before returning and getting a pretty big match like this out of nowhere.

Steve McMichael vs. Meng

Please….make it short. This is as a result of the match that didn’t happen last week. Mongo wins an early slugout and hits a corner clothesline. The slugout was so interesting the first time so let’s do it again a few seconds later. Meng tries a charge into the corner but eats a boot. However since he’s a savage and obeying ethnic stereotypes, it has no effect. A powerslam gets two on Mongo and a piledriver gets the same.

Meng goes up top for a splash but picks McMichael up at two. Dude, I watched you for like fifteen years and THIS is what I get in return? Mongo bails to the floor and finds the dreaded wooden chair. As usual it gets destroyed over Meng’s head (not a DQ for no apparent reason) to no effect (also as usual), so Mongo instead tombstones him for the pin.

Rating: D. In a weird way, Mongo is fascinating to watch. He had been around for a year and a half at this point and is somehow getting worse over time. That’s really quite amazing given the talent he’s been in there against. I know Meng isn’t exactly Lou Thesz, but he’s a veteran who can get someone through a basic match. Mongo looked completely lost here though and it’s painful to sit through anymore.

Page talks about being ready for the title match with Hennig, where the champion will feel the bang.

La Parka/Silver King/Psychosis vs. Hector Garza/Rey Mysterio Jr./Juventud Guerrera

The four man version worked so well last week that we get the traditional six man version this week. This is under lucha libre rules again, meaning if you go to the floor it’s the same as a tag. La Parka is in the alternate white attire tonight which really stands out in the ring. Garza and Silver King get us going and they immediately bust out the flips with almost no contact being made at all. Garza hits a spinning wristlock off the top to take King down but it’s off to Juvy for a big springboard missile dropkick.

Psychosis comes in and pounds Guerrera down as the match slows way down. He wants Rey Mysterio but instead we get Raven’s Flock arriving. Juvy speeds things up with a headscissors and an attempted reverse rana, only to land on the back of his head in a scary looking semi-botch. Psychosis misses a charge and hits the post shoulder first, allowing Guerrera to make the hot tag to Rey. Mysterio takes Psychosis out to the floor and sends La Parka into Silver King. La Parka comes back but missses a backsplash as everyone starts going up.

Rey cross bodies Silver King to the floor and La Parka dropkicks Psychosis to the floor for some reason. Juvy uses Garza as a springboard for Air Juvy to take Psychosis out again and there’s a suicide dive by La Parka to take out Juvy and break the chair he was sitting in. Why he was sitting in a chair I’m not sure but it doesn’t matter as Garza hits the corkscrew plancha to take out Psychosis and La Parka. Back in the ring and Rey puts Silver King on top for a reverse rana followed by the yet to be named West Coast Pop for the pin.

Rating: B. It’s hard not to love these things as there’s no need for a story of any kind of psychology to them. They’re quick and exciting with six interchangeable guys going out there and doing all kinds of insane spots. WCW never tried to make these matches anything more than that and it would have been stupid to try. Fun stuff here, as always.

Mysterio seemed to hurt his left knee on the reverse rana and is holding it post match.

Chris Benoit vs. Hammer

Benoit’s run through the Flock continues but there’s no Raven again. Chris asks the rest of the Flock to get in the ring because Hammer is going to need all the help he can get. A quick dropkick to Hammer’s knee takes him down and Benoit chops away in the corner. Hammer is kicked to the floor and Benoit takes him down with a dive through the ropes. Benoit goes over and smacks Saturn in the head, allowing Hammer to take over with some sledges to the back. Hammer knocks him back to the floor but gets whipped into the apron. Benoit gets a chair and here comes the Flock for the DQ.

Rating: D+. This didn’t have time to go anywhere but again this was about storytelling rather than the match. They’ve done a great job at setting up Benoit vs. Raven when it finally would happen, which for some reason wasn’t at Starrcade. Either way, this feud is making Benoit look like a star.

Post match Benoit is put in the Rings of Saturn again.

It’s time for the start of the infamous segment. Rude, Bagwell, Konnan and Vincent take over the announce table and run off the announcers. Bagwell then goes over to the cameramen and make them say they’re NWO and put on the shirts. The rest of the crew is made to put on the shirts too, including the guys in the back. Various WCW signs are taken down as Konnan goes into the production truck and makes everyone put on a shirt.

The big metal WCW letters on either side of the entrance are taken down, as is the WCW sign over the entrance. By the way, there is no resistance to this by any security or WCW wrestlers. To be fair though, I’d be terrified by a guy who can’t wrestle anymore, a career jobber, a low level tag team and Konnan. The commentary booth now has a sign that says NWO Monday Nitro. The fans are rapidly getting restless and it’s easy to see why. We’re at seven minutes of this already and now they’re heading to the ring.

Buff runs off the ring announcer and makes the WCW banners in the rafters NWO banners. We take a break and come back with the letters NWO spray painted on the mat. Rude demands and receives some lame fireworks as the NWO all stops to look at the NWO signs. A fairly big NWO sign is lowered from the ceiling as this has been going on nearly fifteen minutes now.

There’s an actual NWO Monday Nitro intro video and the graphic in the corner says NWO Monday Nitro. Good thing they had those graphics ready and loaded into the truck on a moment’s notice like that.

Here’s Bischoff on his motorcycle to FINALLY do something more than have the fans sit around and watch people do construction work. He brings out the entire NWO as this segment somehow keeps going. Even Nash and Hogan are here this week so you know it’s a big deal. Eric says tonight is Hogan’s night so he’s going to get some Christmas gifts.

First of all, Bischoff dedicates the show to Hogan and literally bows down to him. His first gift: NWO leaflets falling from the ceiling. Now he gets a motorcycle. Then he gets a second motorcycle. Then he gets a LONG open top limousine with built in hot tub and his own set of Nitro Girls. Bischoff promises even MORE gifts for him later because this hasn’t gone on long enough yet.

In total, all this stuff took about half an hour. Literally, it was half an hour of construction work and Hogan receiving gifts. No stories, no action, no matches, nothing. The viewers left in droves for this segment, to the point where Raw actually won the second hour because they were having ANYTHING but this going on.

JJ Dillon tells Rick Steiner he doesn’t have to go out there but Rick wants to.

The NWO sign is actually a big cube sitting in front of the entrance.

Rick Steiner vs. Scott Norton

Bischoff, Nash and Rude have taken over commentary. Rick hits a quick Steiner Line but gets caught by a shoulder block to put him down. They quickly go to the floor with Steiner being rammed into the post and pounded down with CLUBBING, yes CLUBBING I SAY forearms to the back. Back in and they trade clotheslines with Steiner taking over and dropping an elbow. Rick puts him on top for a belly to belly superplex but they TOTALLY screw it up with Rick basically just falling down and Norton landing on top of him. Before they can screw anything else up, Konnan runs in for the DQ.

Rating: D. I’m not sure whose fault that botch was but when a Steiner is having trouble with a suplex, it’s time to throw in the towel on the match. Norton continues to be a guy that WCW protects like no other and I’m still not sure why. I know he’s a bigger deal in Japan, but Jericho beat Chono on Nitro and I’m sure Chono is a bigger deal than Norton. Anyway, terrible match.

Post match Scott Steiner and Ray Traylor run out for the save, setting up a six man on Sunday.

Nash thinks Giant is going to retire and become a Nitro Girl instead of facing him on Sunday.

US Title: Disco Inferno vs. Curt Hennig

Disco is challenging here but he’s TV Champion. Hogan’s limo and motorcycles are still in the aisle. The name graphics are now vertical on the side of the screen instead of horizontal on the bottom like they usually are. Curt runs him over a few times to start before hitting a pair of dropkicks to send Disco out to the floor. Hennig pounds away on the floor before throwing Disco back in to continue the beating. Disco fires off some right hands but charges into a boot in the corner. Hennig knees him in the head and rakes Disco’s eye and toys with him a bit more until the Hennigplex ends the torture.

Rating: D. Was there ANY need for this to be the TV Champion? Brad Armstrong wasn’t available tonight? Disco has been on a roll lately but instead of letting him continue that and make the TV Champion look good, we have to see Hennig pick him apart because Hennig is part of the NWO and therefore awesome.

Heenan comes out to being hour #3 by begging to be allowed back on the commentary booth. He sucks up to Nash and Bischoff and is allowed back in before Bischoff gets a headache.

Harlem Heat vs. Scotty Riggs/Lodi

Heenan is offering to buy Rude dinner to prevent pain and agony. They stand around for a long time to start until it’s Booker vs. Riggs. Mike Tenay joins in on commentary again to give us Bobby, Mike and Rick. Booker easily takes down Riggs and they trade wristlocks. Scotty takes him down with a dropkick to give the Flock its only advantage of the match, but Booker spin kicks him down with ease. Off to Stevie Ray who misses an elbow and it’s off to Lodi for the first time ever.

Ray immediately clotheslines him down as the punishment continues. A backbreaker keeps Lodi down and it’s off to Booker for the ax kick. The Heat hit a double suplex for two before Stevie chokes with his knee. A bicycle kick gets two on Lodi as the Heat are barely breaking a sweat here. Stevie hits what would become known as the AA as Riggs walks out on his partner. The Big Apple Blast (Hart Attack with a side kick from Booker instead of a clothesline) ends this massacre.

Rating: D. Unless you’re a big fan of Harlem Heat, there’s no need to see this match. It felt like they were intentionally filling in time with nothing special at all. Harlem Heat didn’t even have a match on the upcoming PPV yet they get a ten minute segment here to destroy a pair of jobbers? That doesn’t do much for me.

Buff Bagwell vs. Chris Jericho

Jericho immediately backdrops Bagwell to the apron and hits the springboard dropkick to knock Bagwell to the outside. A kick to the head has Buff in trouble but he manages to take down Jericho as the Canadian comes back in. Jericho is knocked to the floor and we take an early break. Back with Bagwell taking over after a brief slugout so he can choke away a bit more. Jericho charges into a boot in the corner and it’s time for the chinlock.

The announcers of course suck up to Bagwell because we have to make sure that every NWO guy on the team looks as amazing as they can. Jericho fights up and dropkicks Bagwell a few times before getting a near fall off a powerslam. Bagwell pounds him down again and goes up top, only to miss an elbow. Jericho tries a rana (I think) but they just collide and Jericho comes straight down instead of doing anything to Bagwell. After a double underhook backbreaker, Jericho looks for a superplex, only to be shoved down and hit with the Blockbuster for the pin.

Rating: D. ANOTHER lame match tonight with notable botches on moves that shouldn’t be that hard to pull off. Also another match here with a guy with nothing to do on Sunday and a guy in a match no one cares about on Sunday, but hey he’s in the NWO so we must be interested in him right?

Bagwell knocks out the referee for fun.

Here’s the NWO again because we need to give Hogan more presents. Bischoff gives him a ring (make your own jokes) shaped like the WCW Title and various posters to commemorate major moments in his career. That’s another six minutes I’ll never get back.

Lex Luger vs. Randy Savage

Savage comes in like a crazy man (perfect for the role) and gets beaten down as a result. A hard clothesline in the corner has Luger in control but he charges into Savage’s boot to put him down. Savage pounds away and chokes a lot before sending Luger to the floor. Luger goes face first into the steps but blocks a shot into the barricade.

Lex throws him into the crowd for a quick beating before we head back inside, where the referee is bumped by Luger’s steel forearm. Savage hides behind Liz as Luger makes his big comeback and of course here’s the NWO, led by Bagwell, for the big beatdown. The big elbow ends Luger in a worthless match.

Rating: D+. I’m trying to like some of these matches but they’re not making it easy on me. Luger and Savage fought on and over for years and the matches were only good once in awhile. The best I can make of this is they wanted Bagwell to cost Luger a match here to give Luger a reason to want to beat him on Sunday, again working on the assumption that anyone cares about Buff Bagwell.

Here are Hogan and Bischoff YET AGAIN to finally close things out. Hogan talks about how many people he’s beaten over the years and how Sting is going to be stung, but there’s another gift for Hollywood. Eric says this isn’t from him and here’s Bret Hart in the limo. Hogan opens the box to reveal….a Hogan head. Sting shows up on top of the NWO sign at the entrance and ziplines down to the ring to end the show.

Overall Rating: D-. I’ve seen a lot of dull go home shows before, but this one was absolutely horrible. This show barely promoted Starrcade at all and was all about the NWO taking over Nitro. I’ve read rumors before that the NWO was originally going to get Nitro but this show was such a ratings disaster that the plans were changed to WCW keeping it. That’s how big of a flop this show was, but I guess since so many people had already been sold on Starrcade that it didn’t make much of a difference.

Here’s Starrcade if you’re interested:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/02/03/starrcade-1997-the-death-of-wcw/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up my book on the History of the WWE Championship from Amazon for just $5 at:

 

 

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Thunder
Date: April 12, 2000
Location: World Arena, Colorado Springs, Colorado
Attendance: 3,118
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay, Bobby Heenan, Mark Madden

This is another show that I rarely talk about due to the high levels of suck which surround it. This was WCW’s second show and this is from a time period where the company was all but dead. This is the go home show for Spring Stampede, meaning that every title in WCW is vacant. Russo’s BRILLIANT idea was to completely restart WCW, meaning all title reigns were cut off two days before this on Nitro with tournaments being held on Sunday at Spring Stampede. Yeah the whole show is nothing but three tournaments and a Hardcore Title match, but first we’ve got to get through the show to set that up. Let’s get to it.

The opening video is about Russo returning and uniting with Bischoff before vacating all titles. Apparently there was a mini-tournament on Nitro with the winner getting to face Jarrett for the vacated title. Bischoff screwed Hogan over for the sake of Billy Kidman and Russo beat up Flair as well. Apparently Mike Awesome has debuted as well and beat up Kevin Nash. We also got a reveal of Bischoff as the Hummer Driver, which was a payoff to an angle from about ten months ago. I’ve just sat through this recap and I have no idea what happened on Nitro.

Bischoff and Russo arrived earlier today.

David Arquette is here.

Here’s the New Blood Order to open things up. The actual name is the New Blood but pretty much everyone saw them as the latest NWO knockoff. They formed on Nitro two days before this so the roster is still kind of up in the air. It’s Bischoff and Russo with some young talent and that’s about it. Bischoff immediately screws up and says that last night all the titles were vacated (Thunder was taped on Tuesdays to air on Wednesday). Eric talks about Hogan getting hit by a car and being in the hospital as a result. Kidman brags about pinning Hogan and crushing him with the Hummer.

Russo says this town sucks because it isn’t New York. Last night Flair and the people learned that Russo is Batman (he hit Flair with a bat) and that New Yorkers respect no one. When everything is done, Flair will belong to him. Shane Douglas talks about calling out Flair for seven years and says he’s going to Franchise Flair. There’s going to be a chain of Ric Flairs around the country?

Bischoff talks about Sunday being all new champions and how everything is going to change. As for tonight, Jarrett has the night off because we want the playing field to be level for Sunday. His opponent on Sunday, DDP, has the night off as well. However, we will get DDP’s wife Kimberly in the ring against veteran Madusa. This brings out Page with a shirt saying “whatever”, which sums up my attitude about most of these issues.

Page doesn’t have a problem with Bischoff having a problem with Page, but leave Kimberly out of it. DDP wants to fight Bischoff tonight but Eric would rather see what outfit Kimberly wears tonight. Page comes to beat up Bischoff but gets jumped by Bam Bam Bigelow. Cue the old guys (the Millionaires’ Club) for the first big brawl of the show.

We hear about how the other titles will be decided: Tag Titles in a tournament, US Title in a tournament, six way elimination for the Cruiserweight Title, and a singles match for the Hardcore Title. Now who said WCW in 2000 was a mess? That sounds totally coherent.

Chris Candido/Juventud Guerrera/The Artist vs. Lash LeRoux/Crowbar/Shannon Moore

These are the six men in the Cruiserweight Title match on Sunday. The Artist is somewhat more famous as Prince Iaukea. Artist gets beaten down to start before getting things going with Shannon. Things almost break down until we get Lash vs. Candido. Someone throws in a beach ball and here’s David Flair to dance with Artist’s chick Paisley (Booker T’s real life wife Sharmell). Juvy pounds on Shannon as the match continues to be all over the place.

Moore hits a Fameasser to put Guerrera down and it’s off to Crowbar. A quick northern lights suplex gets two for Crowbar but a headscissors sends him out to the floor. Crowbar and Flair get in a fight on the floor but Candido dives on both of them to take them out. Artist and Candido start fighting on the floor so Lash dives on everyone. Juvy sends Moore to the apron before diving onto everyone not named Shannon.

Moore hits a BIG Asai Moonsault onto all five guys as everyone is down. Shane Helms, Moore’s partner, interferes but here’s Daffney, Crowbar’s chick, to take Shane down with a hurricanrana. Back inside and Juvy hits the Juvy Driver (scoop piledriver) on Crowbar but Candido and Artist hit a double DDT on Crowbar for two. Candido adds a top rope headbutt for one on Crowbar before Artist hits his jumping middle rope DDT on Candido (his own partner) to let Crowbar hit a front suplex for the pin on Chris.

Rating: C+. Well it wasn’t boring. It wasn’t really a tag match and I completely lost track of who was on what team more than once, but it wasn’t boring. To be fair though that’s the entire idea here and the point of the match was to set up the big match on Sunday where it’s going to be every man for himself. A pair of triple threats would have been the better idea here but it was all over the place and not boring, so at least there’s that.

DDP says he’s going to rip Jarrett’s head off on Sunday. He wants Bigelow tonight.

Russo and Bischoff make Sid vs. Harlem Heat 2000 for later.

Sting was at the Ready to Rumble premiere.

Curt Hennig jumps Shawn Stasiak in the dressing room in retaliation for an attack on Monday.

Sid vs. Harlem Heat 2000

That would be Big T (Ahmed Johnson), Kash (4×4 from the No Limit Soldiers who you probably don’t remember) and Stevie Ray. This is No DQ and if Sid loses, he’s not in the US Title Tournament. Sid clears the ring to start but can’t chokeslam the lawyer manager J. Biggs. T and Ray get back in and beat Sid down but T is so fat that he can barely do anything right at all. A splash gets two for Kash but New Blood member Booker (he had lost the rights to the letter T to Harlem Heat. Yeah, seriously) makes the save and lets Sid powerbomb Stevie for the pin. This was barely a match.

Immediately after the bell, The Wall (he used to hang out with Berlyn. Again, yeah seriously) cracks Sid with a chair.

Bischoff and Russo are mad at Booker for betraying them.

Sid is still down in the ring so here’s Bischoff to disqualify Sid…..in a No DQ match. In other words, Sid is out of the tournament.

Bischoff yells at Booker in the back in front of the New Blood members.

Shane Douglas vs. Total Package

Luger (Total Package. This was the best thing they could come up with to “develop” his character. He’s the same exact guy) and Flair are partners and Douglas hates Flair so here’s a match to set up the obvious tournament final on Sunday. Luger pounds away to start and apparently tonight it’s Bigelow vs. Page.

Shane makes a comeback and hits his belly to belly suplex, which would win world titles in ECW but here it’s a way for him to go up top and get slammed down. We head to the floor so Luger can clothesline him down and Luger takes over. Since this is a three minute match on the secondary show, there’s the ref bump, the low blow by Shane and the run-in by Flair. He hits Douglas low too and the Rack ends Shane.

Rating: D. Again, three and a half minutes long on the Wednesday B-show and we had a ref bump, two low blows and a run-in. I think by this point it’s clear what’s wrong with Russo’s booking. You know, aside from Lex Luger being an upper midcard guy in April of 2000 instead of like, retired.

Jimmy Hart can’t get Eric Bischoff’s attention.

Later tonight, if Luger interferes in Bagwell vs. Flair, there will be suspensions. In other words, we need a special ruling to prevent interference because it’s that common anymore.

We get an update on Hogan who was in a limo and then crushed by a Bischoff-driven Hummer on Monday (culmination of a LONG storyline with about a ten month break in between to the point that no one remembered the stupid thing anymore). Hogan is out for two weeks.

Here’s Jimmy Hart to the ring who wants some answers from Bischoff about why he did that to Hogan on Nitro. Hart talks about being the liaison between Hogan and Bischoff over the years but gets interrupted by Billy Kidman and Bischoff. Kidman sprints to the ring and beats up Hart, as this is part of the Flea Market feud.

Basically Hogan said Kidman couldn’t be champion of a flea market so Kidman went after him. This is the feud that people point to when they say Hogan gave young guys rubs. The problem is Kidman never beat Hogan clean and Hogan made him look like a jobber the entire way through. Kidman spray paints Hart’s back to make the NWO rip-offs all the more clear.

Page tells Kimberly she’s not going to the ring. Kimberly says yes she is.

Scott Steiner vs. Booker vs. Vampiro vs. Billy Kidman vs. The Wall vs. The Cat

This is a Colorado Collision match and these are the six guys in the US Title tournament so far. Two guys start and one minute later someone else comes in. Elimination rules apply and last man standing wins. Booker and Wall start things off with the far more famous one pounding away. Wall immediately shoves him into the corner for some choking but Booker comes back with a slam and the ax kick for no cover as Wall pops up. Cat (Ernest Miller) comes out early and superkicks Booker to the floor.

Wall chokeslams Booker through his table (it was his prop) and since both guys are counted out, it’s time for Cat to dance. Actually he talks a lot and gets Scott Steiner instead. Steiner gets in some hard shots but Miller hits a GREAT superkick to take Steiner’s head off. That looked awesome. Kidman is fifth along with Torrie but he’s content to let Steiner beat up Miller for awhile instead. Steiner goes to pose so Kidman runs in to pin Miller and get us down to two. Vampiro is in last as Steiner pins Kidman with a belly to belly. Before there’s any contact, Sting comes in and lays out Vampiro so the Steiner Recliner can get the win.

Rating: D. Again, in a six man gauntlet match, we managed to have a run-in. Steiner barely even broke a sweat here and would run through the tournament like a roided up freak destroying a bunch of guys way beneath him and Sting in an overbooked tournament. Nothing to this match again as everyone lost in like 90 seconds.

Team Package (yes really. It’s Flair/Luger/Liz) freak out with Flair saying he’ll beat up Russo.

Madusa vs. Kimberly Page

Kimberly looks GREAT here in barely there leather shorts and a bright green top. I’m sure there’s nothing to the fact that she’s in DX colors and dressed exactly like DX member Tori. Madusa is basically Chyna so she destroys Kimberly for a bit until DDP comes in for the save and the DQ.

Terry Funk/Norman Smiley vs. Hugh Morrus/Meng vs. Brian Knobbs/Fit Finlay

This is a hardcore triple threat tag match and the winners fight for the Hardcore Title on Sunday. Tony tries to talk us into buying Spring Stampede instead of Backlash which is so pitiful it’s cute. Meng and Knobbs fight into the crowd before the bell and good luck in trying to keep track of this mess. Morrus knocks Smiley into the crowd and Norman screams a lot. They head to the stage and Morrus sets up a table but let’s go back to Punk vs. Finlay in the ring.

Morrus misses a dive off the stage through the table as we see Meng and Knobbs fighting in the back. Meng has a drink thrown on him and there’s a trashcan on top of it. Tony: “TO THE CONDIMENTS!” Meng makes his comeback….and stops to spear a cardboard cutout of Goldberg. He then breaks it over Knobbs’ head as they go outside. Knobbs charges at a railing and goes flying over, with Tony saying it could be a thirty foot drop. Now they’re stealing ideas from Halloween Havoc 1995. Let that sink in a bit.

We cut back and forth between the two brawls and Norman hides inside a big cat head that hockey players skate out of to start a game. Morrus charges and crotches himself on a tusk as we cut to Finlay DDTing Funk on the exposed concrete. Finlay puts up a table in the corner instead of covering, meaning of course Funk sends him through said table.

A piledriver on the piece of table puts Finlay down and here’s the run-in by Dustin Rhodes to beat up Funk. There are some Shattered Dreams for Funk and a chair shot for good measure. Rhodes pounds on Funk before heading to the floor…..so Smiley can run in and pin his own partner for the win and the title match.

Rating: D. Between the apparent death of Brian Knobbs, a Goldberg cardboard cutout used as a weapon, condiments, crotching Hugh Morrus on a cat tusk and that ending, what more do you expect me to think of this match? Not to mention we’re now 6/6 on matches having interference tonight with three more to go.

Eric and Vince give Los Villanos a pep talk for their handicap match against Sting. Apparently Sting has to beat all of them as opposed to Sid only needing one pin.

Sting vs. Los Villanos

The Villanos are III, IV and V and remember Sting has to beat them all. They all jump Sting to start but Sting Hulks Up and fights them all off like they’re uh…Los Villanos. Sting hits a double Death Drop to eliminate let’s say III and IV and we get a ref bump. Sting beats up V but takes a low blow on a leapfrog. V hits a low blow of his own and goes to get a guitar. Sting gets cracked in the head and V unmasks to reveal Jeff Jarrett. Page runs in for a Diamond Cutter to give Sting the pin and make us 7/7 for run-ins tonight. Too short to rate but it was an angle disguised as a match.

Jeff Jarrett threatens to knock Gene’s liver spots off if he doesn’t shut up. He’s coming for Arquette and Page tonight.

Buff Bagwell vs. Ric Flair

Flair is in street clothes for no apparent reason. According to Tony it’s because he’s fighting the New Blood instead of wrestling. Buff takes over to start and hits a quick backdrop followed by some clotheslines to take Ric down. There are some knees to Flair’s arm as this is one sided so far. Yes Flair getting beaten down in a Bischoff booked company. Flair comes back with an elbow and some punches in the corner before they head to the floor where Russo in a Sting costume (stealing from 1997) blasts Flair with a bat for the DQ. Another match too short to rate and another run-in.

Douglas and Luger run in post match with the New Blood guys standing tall.

Bam Bam Bigelow vs. Diamond Dallas Page

Bigelow takes him into the corner to pound away but Page comes back with shots to the head of his own. A discus lariat gets two for Page but Bam Bam comes back with a Samoan drop for two. We hit a camel clutch and Page slaps the mat but it doesn’t count here. Bigelow drops a headbutt on the bad back of Page for two.

Page fights out of a powerbomb for two of his own and a neckbreaker gets the same. The Cutter is countered into the third ref bump of the night but Bigelow misses the top rope headbutt. Now the Cutter hits but Bischoff runs in to count two before straightening his head. Jarrett cracks Page with a guitar as the match is thrown out.

Rating: D. NINE FOR NINE BABY! The match was once again a means to an end here so we could have Page and Jarrett brawl to end the show. By brawl of course I mean a weapon shot and a beatdown but that’s interesting TV under Russo’s watch. Nothing to see here though, much like the rest of the show tonight.

David Arquette tries to make the save but gets beaten down with a Stroke. He would be world champion in two weeks. Now Kanyon runs in to beat up Jarrett but Bischoff lays HIM out with a chair. The New Blood runs in and spray paint everyone to end the show.

Overall Rating: D. This show is VERY interesting to say the least. For one thing, how in the world can you manage to book three ref bumps and NINE RUN-INS IN ONE SHOW??? That takes either an amazing talent or complete insanity. On top of that, this was all to set up a bunch of new champions at Spring Stampede, and over half of those titles would change hands in less than a month. Oh and Kimberly would join the New Blood on Sunday because…..well why not. Anyway, this show is a great lesson in Russo booking as he managed to fit ALL THIS into 90 minutes, and somehow it would only get worse.

Here’s Spring Stampede if you’re interested:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2013/03/03/spring-stampede-2000-if-you-like-tournaments-find-this-show-immediately/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up my new book on the History of the WWE Championship from Amazon for just $5 at:

Uncensored 1996
Date: March 24, 1996
Location: Tupelo Coliseum, Tupelo, Mississippi
Attendance: 9,000
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan, Dusty Rhodes

When I was a kid, this show looked completely awesome. I mean, Sting and Booker T vs. the Road Warriors in a street fight? Hogan and Savage against ten guys in a cage match? All of the matches with no rules? How could this not be good??? Well, this show has since been considered one of the worst of all time. After reading this raping of my childhood, I had to take another look at it to see if that’s the case or not.

The main theory here is that these matches aren’t sanctioned by WCW and therefore are more or less anything goes. That turns out to be bogus though as it’s really just a gimmick match PPV. Your main feud here is Hogan and Savage vs. the world.

There’s an alliance between the Horsemen and the Dungeon of Doom called the Alliance to End Hulkamania. Yeah, starting to see why wrestling was dying a painful death at this point? This was the top storyline. More on that later though, because we have an apparently awful show to watch.

Also, this is one week before Wrestlemania 12 where Shawn would win the title, just to give you a little perspective on what was going on with the competition.

The cage match is called the Doomsday Cage Match, so the opening video is about Doomsday. This is so ridiculously over the top that it’s hilarious. This reminds me of when they had Cena and Orton against the “roster” about a year and a half ago. They’re just throwing everyone they can into one match to feed them to Hogan and Savage.

This is going to be so bad it’s great. Tony says there isn’t a seat to be found in Tupelo. No, I’m pretty sure I see about 5000 tarped off up there. There are three in the announcer’s booth since they’re all standing. Oh and Bessie Mae Scroggins is only having two people for dinner tonight so there’s a chair free at her kitchen table.

The cage is just standing there next to the run way instead of you know, at the ring where people can see it. It’s very dark so you can see where this is going. Dusty says there’s a feel of danger. I have no idea what that means so Dusty is at the top of his HHH tonight. He says that Hogan needs to survive here to carry on into the 90s. You know, the decade that’s over 50% over already. I missed Dusty’s awfulness. We get a match to shut him up though.

US Title: Konnan vs. Eddie Guerrero

Eddie is the challenger here. He’s just gotten out of jobber status and this is his first big time title match. Konnan is still in his Mexican champion mode here and is rocking neon pink and blue on his jacket. Somehow it works though. You know before he came here and was a completely racist and insane bigot, he was actually a very entertaining wrestler.

Dusty calls Eddie his homey from El Paso. I wonder if they exchange bicycles. They start with a technical sequence which is the best thing they likely can do. Both guys are really good wrestlers so that’s always a good thing. This is right around the time where WCW with the cruiserweights was about to explode with Eddie being one of those leading the charge.

They point out the large amount of people that are here from other countries, which is kind of cool I think. WCW had a tendency to overpush that though and it hurt things. Konnan uses a heel hook as Dusty says he’s trying to uncle him. I should note the crowd is quite dead here. Now since Eddie was smart, he noticed this and more or less said screw this and just went insane on it.

Apparently the winner of this fights Mr. JL (Jerry Lynn) tomorrow on Nitro. I have no idea why, but whatever. This homey nonsense needs to freaking stop Dusty. It’s not funny and it’s just annoying. As for the match, it’s going ok I guess. The speeding up has really woken up the crowd. They’re desperately in need of a Mike Tenay here though to tell them what the heck is going on.

They have these weird spurts of awesome stuff and then they go into boring stuff 101. After some more time spent just making the audience go back and forth from being half asleep to freaking out, we get a weird ending. Eddie goes for a leapfrog or a hurricanrana or something like that and I think Konnan stops early. Either way, Eddie’s balls land on Konnan’s head and as he’s screaming, Eddie is covered and pinned.

Naturally he’s ticked off. Let’s look at this from a Kayfabe perspective. Eddie is the one that jumped on Konnan right? Why should he be ticked that he landed wrong? From a legit perspective, it’s an accident and no reason at all to be a jerk about it. If it were me, I’d think it’s because Vickie is the one that’s going to massage them back to health. Anyway, that’s how it ends which kind of sucks from either perspective.

Rating: B-. This was so back and forth all match that it wasn’t funny. The fans could tell also as you could see them waking up and then just dying at various intervals of the match. WCW was on the verge of the big time here and I think this match had a lot to do with it. I think they were starting to see that high flying stuff could really work well if they did it right and once they figured that out, it was all cruise control.

Gene is with Dick Slater and Colonel Parker. This was a buildup for Parker against Medusa later on tonight. The thing here is simple: Medusa is a decent wrestler and he’s a chauvinist that wants her in the kitchen. He says he’s doing this for all the men in the world. Parker was always pretty overrated as a manger and about as generic of a stereotype as you were ever going to find. Oh yeah and then there’s Slater who is even more generic.

Belfast Bruiser vs. Steven Regal

For you that aren’t familiar with these two, it’s William Regal vs. Finlay. This was some feud that they said was allegedly about something that happened in Europe but they never actually said what that was, which tells me it never happened. Regal has a butler with him named Jeeves. Make your own jokes. Finlay pops Regal with his jacket. Well ok then.

This is a freaking FIGHT. These guys are hammering on each other in a way that I’ve hardly ever seen before. It’s rather cool looking actually. Dusty drops the term stomp a mudhole in someone. That’s something new. This is just freaking brutal in there. We get a Pedro Morales reference who is apparently part of the Spanish announce team.

Since when did they have a Spanish announce team?? I don’t remember that at all. Dusty is a flat out idiot. He says that one of the Spanish announcers can get the truth out of Konnan because he speaks the Espanol. Not only that but he says that of the 32,000 people in the town are all here. Wow this man is impressive. He can’t wrestle, he can’t talk, but he’s a legend.

Apparently this is the WCW PPV debut in Australia. That just isn’t fair and I apologize to them. This is one of the most brutal matches I can ever remember. I mean there’s nothing special about it but they’re just hitting each other especially hard but they’re doing stuff like the forearm to the face on pins. That’s just painful looking. More or less it’s a street fight where you can get disqualified though.

They announce that tomorrow it’s Finlay vs. Savage. I like that, as they advertise the matches like that. Also, that’s what they need to do more of today in WWE: having main event guys fight midcarders. It worked back then and it would work today. Dusty continues to amaze me by saying Ireland and England aren’t close to each other at all. The crowd is completely dead by the way.

They hit the floor for about the third time and run to the Doomsday cage. After a solid shot into that still doesn’t draw a DQ, the freaking Blue Bloods run in for the actual DQ, despite having a lower combined IQ than the cage. I know this was a short review, but this was nearly a twenty minute fight. Yes fight, not match.

Rating: C-. This is a very hard one to describe. This had to be at least 75% shoot though, as there’s no way they could hammer on each other that well and have it be fake completely. They hammered on each other in probably the hardest hitting match I’ve ever seen. The problem is, the fans were just completely bored with it. Think of the Nastys vs. Sullivan and Cactus from Spring Stampede 94, but add ten minutes to it and less weapons. See how that could be a problem?

This is a very odd show so far. The crowd simply doesn’t care about much at all, and between that and Dusty’s complete insanity at commentary, I’m not sure what to think yet. Let’s keep at it though.

Gene is with the Giant and Jimmy Hart who say they’ll take care of Loch Ness. Giant threatens to smoke Loch Ness like bacon. That joke writes itself. Apparently the winner of this gets a world title shot against Flair tomorrow night.

Colonel Parker vs. Madusa

The story here is about as complicated as you can think of. Sherri had gotten hit on the head and decided she was in love with Parker. They kissed at Fall Brawl so he decided he wanted to marry her. They had the wedding and for reasons that were never explained, Madusa jumped out of a trailer and broke it up.

That leads to this, which is man vs. woman, yet I’ve never heard of another woman named Colonel Robert Parker before. That’s clearly the less masculine of the two here though. Before this starts though, Heenan and Tony get into this STUPID argument with insults that aren’t funny and wouldn’t be funny in 6th grade. After some brief predictions, we get to the match.

Bobby is clad in leather for some odd reason. He suggests buying off Madusa here with credit cards and flowers. Oh thank goodness for Bobby Heenan. We get a WWF reference as this is just a bit after she dropped the women’s title in the garbage which inadvertently led to Montreal. Parker is just stupid looking here, wearing a white suit.

Madusa was more or less the only American women’s wrestler worth a thing that anyone could stand the sight of for a good many years, but Sable was on the rise and it would be a few years before this indy chick named Amy Dumas came up. Trish was probably in high school at this time. Madusa is supposed to be sexy I think, but she’s just not as she’s more masculine than Parker.

Naturally she’s a black belt also as all women wrestlers apparently are. After the bell we get a lock up. We’ll move on with the match in just a moment, but first, this pearl of insight from Dusty: “HE LOCKED UP WITH HER! HE LOCKED UP WITH HER! WHAT THE HECK??? HE LOCKED UP WITH HER! SOMEBODY GET MY MEDICINE!” This is going to be a really long night. What in the heck am I watching???

The fans are about as one sided as you could possibly believe. After an Airplane Spin that brought on some of the highest pitched screams that I can ever remember, she reverses into a sunset flip for a HUGE pop. I mean that was loud. She slams him and Dusty needs new pants I think. Not due to an issue or anything, but the 12 cheeseburgers he’s had during this match made him go up a size.

Heenan continues to crack me up by saying the closest thing he’s ever seen to this is one night when Gene got home late and his old lady backdropped him. Would anyone else be far more interested in a reality show of Gene and Bobby wandering around to various places and having stupid misadventures? Dick Slater, who was somehow married to Madusa at the time keeps him from running. Screw you Slater.

Madusa actually wasn’t that bad in the ring. They’re in Trish territory. Sadly that’s the only thing about her that’s in Trish’s territory. She gets her signature German suplex, and actually gets a decent one all things considered, but Slater hooks her foot and Parker falls on her for the pin. That was…yeah.

Rating: D. That’s because she looked ok and to be fair, she was asked to do a lot out there and while it sucked beyond belief, she worked very hard so I’ll give her points for that. This made less than zero sense though and I have no idea what this was supposed to be other than a really bad comedy bit. It lasted about 4 minutes though, and that’s too long. My head is starting to throb from this show.

Lee Marshall says there’s no question why this is called Uncensored. Really? I’m not sure I know what that is. Apparently the tag team division is hot, so let’s talk to the Road Warriors. The idea tonight is that Luger and Sting are the tag champions and the Warriors want their shot. Luger however is in the main event so we have Booker T in as Sting’s partner.

It’s a standard Road Warriors’ interview, although Hawk does get in a line about the medulla oblongata at least a year before Waterboy came out. However, the part that makes this absolutely great is that behind them is a chalk board. On this chalk board, IS THE HEEL BATTLE PLAN FOR THE MAIN EVENT. Literally, just behind them is a drawing of the triple cage and the places where the heels are supposed to be, including a list of strategy and tips for the heels.

Again, let’s look at this from two ways. First of all, let’s say it’s supposed to be kayfabe and written by a member of the heel team. First of all, how in the world is Lee Marshall getting an interview with the LOD in that locker room? Two, wouldn’t you think that they would have hid it better? Three, they use the same symbol for Hogan and Savage in their key.

Looking at it from a legit perspective, as in it’s there from a production meeting or something, FIRE THE PRODUCER OF THE SEGMENT! My goodness they let the plan for the main event be seen. How stupid can they be? Either way, this is just dumb on so many levels and looks completely stupid.

Diamond Dallas Page vs. Booty Man

Oh where do I even start here. Ok, Booty Man is Brutus Beefcake first of all, who is freshly face again, having been a heel in the Dungeon of Doom, only to be thrown into this match with the explanation that he was sent in by Hogan as a spy and was really a good guy all along. That….actually could work.

I mean think about it: is that really such an insane plot idea? I certainly wouldn’t think so. I mean it’s certainly not great or fleshed out or anything, but considering it was likely thrown together at the last minute it’s fine by me. Now, you might be wondering why we’re even having to talk about Brutus here. Well, this was supposed to be Johnny B. Badd fighting DDP for the 12th time in a week or something like that, as they had been feuding forever.

Why were they feuding? Well, DDP was this poor guy that got some money together and went to play Bingo with Kimberly. He bought her ticket and she won $12 million dollars at a freaking Bingo game. I want to play in that game! Anyway, they went to court over it and the judge gave it to her. The thing was, he had already spent a ton of it, and Johnny was the only guy that would defend her. The TV Title got involved in there too but it wasn’t important.

Anyway, this is money vs. career so there we are. Badd had jumped ship about two weeks before this to WWF as Marc Mero and debuted 7 days after this. So with no one at all to go to, they turned Brutus into the Booty Man of all things and we have this. Think about that story for a bit: that’s pretty much the main midcard feud: a feud over a game of Bingo, and people wonder why this company sucked so much at this time. DDP is allegedly penniless here, but he has enough to get tights and boots.

He’s doing some almost biker gimmick or something here too. Oh and Kimberly is called the Booty Girl now. Page looks like garbage here. Brutus is wearing the same tights he wore as the Barber but now he’s wearing a headband and has a REALLY bad song. They bury Badd before the match, saying he decided he just couldn’t compete in WCW anymore. Ouch.

It’s a shame he had about 5 times as big of a career in WWF than he ever would have in WCW where he would have been swallowed by the NWO in six months and gone to WWF for half the money later on. Yep, his life sucked. Sadly, we haven’t even started the match at this point. We start with Page hiding and smoking a cigar as Brutus is apparently a Hulkamaniac.

The way his tights are cut Brutus looks like he’s wearing a really big thong. They haven’t actually made contact yet. HE LOCKED UP WITH HIM! HE LOCKED UP WITH HIM!!! After that, we waste some more time. We’ve been going for almost three minutes before they actually do any real wrestling. We get a great line of after the money came in, the Diamond Doll (Kimberly) got built up with Page. Think about that for a minute and you’ll get it.

Anyway, they finally get going here and in a funny bit, Heenan starts talking about the angle and Dusty talks over him. Bobby starts getting upset and complaining, saying that he won’t talk anymore and it’s now the Tony and Dusty Show. BOBBY, PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF THINGS GOOD AND MADE OF PORK TALK TO US!!! DON’T DO THIS TO US!

Thankfully he’s back a few seconds later. Dusty actually says Brutus is a skilled mat wrestler. Yep, that’s what he said. Anyone want to place a bet on him topping that one later on? As Dallas is on the floor, Kimberly comes out looking like a roller disco cheerleading French maid. Trust me, you would describe her the same way. This is just horrible.

It’s more or less a dance recital with some arm work in there. That was the absolute worst mistiming thing I’ve EVER seen. DDP reverses an Irish Whip and then I have zero clue what they were planning as Page lays down on his back and Brutus bent forward after running like he was going to back drop Page. I really don’t know what that was supposed to be but even the announcers can’t hide the fact that it was horrible looking.

I mean TONY FREAKING SCHIAVONE says “Oh what was that?” in a very sarcastic tone. They try to say it was a botched arm drag but that doesn’t work. OH! They repeated the spot (dingbats) and it was supposed to be Brutus goes for a cross body and Page ducks. The problem was that the first time I think Brutus was thinking shoulder block or something.

It was so obviously a repeat of the spot and it just looked awful. You can tell that Page, who likes to map stuff out, has no clue what to do here. He liked to have his whole matches scripted beforehand, something Randy Savage was notorious for in his best days, but this was thrown together so there we are. Also, this is nowhere NEAR the DDP that you’re used to.

Kimberly wants Brutus to be her boyfriend. That’s her exact line. Is she wanting to participate in a drug intervention or something? In another jab at Badd, they say that Page signed to fight bad and the announcers unanimously agree Page would have won. They say a heel would beat a face, which sums everything up. Heenan says if she’s looking for a boyfriend to put an ad in the paper. Bobby says that in that outfit the only person she could get is a fellow acrobat.

Page kisses Kimberly, leading to a high knee for the pin. Brutus “keeps” Kimberly due to the stipulation. WCW: a slave trader’s paradise! Brutus kisses her. I’d recommend about a week in a dentist’s office along with a high dose of antibiotics. She’s the Booty Girl now. I’m out of jokes here so post amongst yourselves. Page would of course be back and somehow wrestle THREE MATCHES at the next PPV. Good to see they’re keeping their promises.

Rating: D. This went WAY too long. To be fair, Kimberly looked pretty good so it gets points for that. It also launched DDP’s career as he became this guy that despite being fired still was filmed by WCW cameras and shown on WCW TV. He would get some mystery benefactor that was never revealed due to the NWO. He would return and become the character we all know and at least like, launching him into the stratosphere in WCW.

Gene is with Jimmy Hart and Luger. Jimmy says that tonight is the last night he’s going to be with Luger. Why is this the case? We’re never told. Luger looks stunned as well, which makes even less sense because the explanation Jimmy gives is he’s a man of his word. Jimmy starts to cry and leaves, and for some reason we get a random bell in the arena.

Luger says that tonight he has to watch his friend and partner defend the titles without him in a Chicago Street Fight, and he’s the one from Chicago. The odd part here is that Jimmy leaves him, but Luger would turn full face (he was a tweener at this point) later on in the night.

Now having Jimmy leave here keeps him from having to do that later on, but why not turn face and then dump Jimmy? That would at least make sense and strengthen his face turn, but they went with this instead. It’s illogical, it makes no sense, and it came out of nowhere and is expected to make sense. IT’S WCW!

Giant vs. Loch Ness

Apparently Loch Ness was supposed to be in the cage and this was supposed to not happen I guess, but Luger was pulled from the street fight and put into the cage, so Loch Ness is given a #1 contender’s match. He weighs 699lbs and he is coming out to what would become Rey Mysterio’s music.

This is Giant (Big Show) at about 420 and scary looking. He’s still huge and strong but he’s skinny here. This is the big man that was supposed to be the best big man ever and at this point, that really wouldn’t have been too much of a stretch. Loch Ness is actually bigger than Yokozuna ever was, so take that for what it’s worth.

Naturally they beat the heck out of each other with just big pounding shots, until Giant goes to the other corner and throws himself at Loch Ness but misses, sending Giant up over the top rope and corner and crashing to the floor. The camera is in the corner though so it doesn’t look as cool as it sounds, but still it’s amazing that a guy that size can throw stuff like that and make it look pretty decent.

In a flat out scary move, Giant hits what we would call Sweet Chin Music on Loch Ness, who was billed as 6’11. He nailed it too. A Hogan leg drop ends it and Jimmy Hart celebrates like he’s a new father. Giant screams into the camera that the leg drop was for Hogan. That made zero sense. He also says he’s coming for the WCW Title a month later (for the life of me I thought he won it the next night), which he would win with relative ease and hold all summer.

Rating: C-. This is for the Giant doing some freaky stuff out there, like hitting the kick. That was impressive. Loch Ness would be gone I think after this match and then he died about two months later. This was a 3 minute “war”, so there we are.

Lee Marshall has a great mustache for the ages. Sting and Booker more or less say they don’t want to do this but they respect each other. We’re still in front of the board with the plans on it. Sting talks like a guy from the streets, and actually pulls it off very well. Sting and Booker have so much charisma it’s flat out terrifying.

Chicago Street Fight; Road Warriors vs. Booker T/Sting

Now say it with me: a Chicago street fight is happening in MISSISSIPPI. The idea here is that if Booker and Sting win here, Harlem Heat gets a title shot. I think the belts are on the line here but it’s never made clear, at least not so far. This is Booker’s dry run for a singles push, which obviously went well as he won his first TV Title a year and a half later. Yeah the NWO REALLY threw a lot of stuff off.

Naturally it’s a brawl to start and they’re already on the floor. We go split screen here which is a good idea. Granted then they have just two separate shots of the same thing and I continue to wonder how they stayed in business as long as they did. Tony must be drunk because he makes a good point, saying that these kinds of matches should have two referees.

Aside from pointing out the stupidity of the higher ups with them allowing such an idiotic move, that’s very accurate. Sting and Animal trade low blows on the post because that’s very normal. We switch back to the split screen, now complete with a graphic reminding us that this is the Chicago Street Fight. In yet another great moment from Bobby, he says that instead of covering someone that’s down, you go through his pockets and look for cash, jewelry, watches, etc. I love Heenan.

The wrestlers can apparently get away with murder, but they can get disqualified. I love wrestling. It’s Booker and Animal in the ring and Sting and Hawk, who is also an animal but whatever, with Sting in the aisle. Hawk can throw a freaking dropkick when he has to. That was impressive. Sting gets a chair and hits some absolutely laughably bad shots with it.

However, they’re divine ones compared to the ones that Animal hits the faces with. How weird is it that the Road Warriors are the heels in a match? Those shots were just awful though. I think I’ve seen Rey throw harder ones. Hawk no sells a piledriver. Really? How do you not sell a freaking piledriver? You’re dropped on your head for goodness’ sake. The stupid stuff continues as we have a chinlock in a street fight. Oh yeah work that chin!

Heenan says that Animal or Hawk need to get with their partner and say something to them. The thing he says takes him 11 seconds to say. It’s not really funny, but there’s something that’s just great about that. They hit the stands for about a second and we have the second instance tonight of the chairs being in big rows for no apparent reason. Why do they insist on using two camera for the same shot? I love wrestling at times, but this makes my head hurt.

Apparently this is non title, so therefore Sting can’t lose his title and can only get hurt, the Road Warriors have nothing to gain, and Booker can get a title shot. Why are the three not named Booker here? Sting and Hawk are in the ring and Booker and Animal are near the cage. They set for the Doomsday Device but Booker makes the save by crocthing Animal (who usually doesn’t go up top).

This prompts Dusty to say E.T. phone home. I gave up on trying to figure this out a long time ago. Sting hits the fifth low blow in 15 minutes. I wish they would make a reference to Sting and Dusty teaming up to fight the Road Warriors at Starrcade 87. Just as I say that, Bobby asks Dusty what he would do if he were Sting’s partner in this case.

I wish he would have said that he was and left it at that but no go. The spinaroonie is known as the whirly bird here. I’d love to see Sting against RVD in a jumping contest. It would be a very interesting challenge. Apparently the fans are standing everywhere. They must be about an average of 4ft tall because they look like they’re sitting to me, but then again I’m no professional announcer.

Booker hits low blow #6. Tony, continuing his brilliant career as an announcer, points out that they haven’t done anything incredibly extreme and this has really just been as basic as possible. Thanks for pointing out that this isn’t as great as it was built up to be and giving us no reason to believe the hype on future PPVs.

I think I’ve finally started figuring out the problem that I have with this commentary team: I don’t know what they’re saying and it just passes through my head as being fine. Bobby and Dusty are talking about glomming someone. What the heck does that mean?

I guess it means double teaming, but it could mean sharing a turkey sandwich and a white wine for all I know. I will give them this: they’ve managed to keep going with the singles and team fighting. That’s hard to do but they’re pulling it off here. Off a top rope powerslam, Bobby says Sting landed on his shoulder like Apollo 13.

THAT DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE!!! What in the world is that supposed to mean? It’s like just random gibberish that sounds good. What the heck does Apollo freaking 13 have to do with this match and how in the world does it relate to a guy landing on his shoulder? Animal follows it up with even more weak chair shots. Uh oh, a weak clothesline hits the post.

The weapons shots here just flat out suck. Hawk just somehow managed to hit Sting with the side of the chair facing Hawk when he swung it. That’s hard to do. Sting then leaves his partner alone to go get some plunder (which I figured out means weapons). He comes back with….brooms. Yep, he’s got brooms.

Even Tony sounds annoyed with this match as we’re well past 20 minutes here which is mainly just stupid stuff where they look tired. Now instead of hitting Hawk with the wooden handle of the broom, he hits him with the straw. Yep, that’s what he did. Animal apparently noggered Booker. There’s a new language being formed here. Bobby makes a vacuum reference for no apparent reason.

They trash Luger some more as it occurs to me that Dusty has fought him at Starrcade as well. Hey WCW: GET NEW TALENT! Booker apparently walks out with Animal following him so we hit the split screen again. Animal and Booker fight in the back even more with Luger there. Animal accidentally hits Luger and knocks him into some trash, which ticks him off of course.

With a Viking like yell he runs at Animal and takes him out. Stevie Ray, Booker’s partner, shows up and along with Jimmy Hart they beat the heck out of Animal and tie him to a post. In the ring, Hawk is beating the crap out of Sting which is odd to see indeed.

Sting goes into his insane offense that works better than anything else. Booker is back now as it’s all faces here. Stevie runs out to hit another crap chair shot to end this. Right after the pin we cut to Animal who is screaming about nothing in particular other than having his teeth kicked in, being taped to a pole and being handcuffed. I love wrestling!

Rating: D+. This is just hard to grade. The main problem is simple: this went thirty minutes. You could cut at least 15 of that out and this is a B- or so. There’s just way too many dead spots though where it’s just random punches and kicking that get very boring.

The street fight aspect of this was awful with only a few chair shots and the broom being in there to do anything at all. Also, it’s not even for the titles. Put Booker in there as a substitute partner. That would have at least given us something close to a reason to care. The brawling was ok, but that’s overshadowed by the pure dullness of about 15 minutes of this.

We recap the feud with Hogan and Savage against the Alliance. More or less what happened was simple: the Alliance challenged Hogan to a 4-1 cage match, but WCW wised up and realized Hogan carrying a match like that could expose him too much, so they threw Savage in there too.

Now, how did the Alliance put out this challenge? Was it by beating down Hogan? Was it by destroying something he held dear and valuable? Was it by making threats to his family and home? Nope to all three. They sent him a telegram. Let me repeat that. The feud and match were set by a group sending Hogan a telegram. That’s so freaking stupid I can’t even make fun of it. I truly can’t.

They sent him a telegram. I can’t get over that. Something else I notice: there hasn’t been a single mention of Randy Savage all show. It’s been nothing but Hogan. The team is known as the Alliance to End Hulkamania. In the build up from the announcers there’s no mention of Savage. What in the world is wrong with these people? Why am I trying to figure that out?

Doomsday Cage Match: Hogan/SAVAGE vs. Alliance to End Hulkamania

The Alliance is Ric Flair, Arn Anderson, Meng, Barbarian, Lex Luger, Taskmaster (Kevin Sullivan), Z-Gangsta (Zeus from the late 80s) and Ultimate Solution (big fat strong guy that never did anything other of note in wrestling. He did play Bane in Batman and Robin though in case anyone is interested.) Now you might be wondering how this is going to work.

Well until about 3 minutes before the bell rings, so was everyone else. Literally, they didn’t know what they were going to do until the day of the show. That’s your brilliant wrestling company at work. The idea would be this. You have a ring with three cages on top of it. In other words, there’s a ring with a cage over it that’s very tall and has a top of in. The top of that cage is the floor of a second cage. That cage has six sides, all made of cage.

There’s ANOTHER of those on top. The match starts up at the top for no apparent reason. The idea is that it’s more or less a gauntlet match. There’s two guys on top, four in the middle cage and two in the bottom cage and Hogan and Savage have to win in all three cages. Yep, that’s it.

In a match that’s supposed to be all about violence and called a Doomsday match, we have a freaking gauntlet with regular pins and submissions. Let’s get to this. Michael Buffer is in the ring doing introductions for this as I have a feeling that this is going to take a LONG time.

He asks if they’re ready. He asks it again. I wonder if they’re going to break it down after the match. The cage I mean. Oh Brian Pillman is supposed to be in this but he’s left for ECW at this time where he would be for all of a day or so and then on to WWF. Flair comes out sans belt or any acknowledgement that he’s champion so you can see where the priorities are.

Oh we also have to wait for them to all climb up the steps to get to their cages too. Barbarian has been banned from wrestling in most countries in the world too. You learn something new every day. Zeus (I refuse to refer to him as Z-Gangsta more than I have to) and Ultimate Solution aren’t here yet. His original name was Final Solution. I’ll give you two guesses as to how that went.

So we’re starting with Anderson and Flair at the top so we’re starting with the Mega Powers vs. Anderson and Flair. Tell me, what’s wrong with that as a main event? I’d like that FAR better. Luger left WWF for this. That’s just sad. They finally just give up and call Hogan a superhero. Naturally the camera follows him up the stairs as my fear of heights is kicking in.

Dusty says the fans have been waiting for days in and around this building. Just go with it. Once they finally reach the top we start immediately and also immediately we see the massive problem: the fans can’t see a freaking thing. They’re about thirty feet from the ground (which of course hits as high as 65 so far according to Brain) and the lighting is awful.

Also, this is before the days of the Titantron. If they had that, this would be ok. No actually it wouldn’t be but it would have been better. The people watching the PPV from home have a hard time seeing this so imagine what it’s like for the fans there. They’re dead quiet too after the opening maybe 10 seconds because reality has set in. Oh Arn is wearing a full black body suit for no apparent reason.

Heenan says what I think might have been hidden jabs at WCW by saying “What a great thing for television!” and “Only here in WCW!” Those are either fed to him or shots at the brilliant minds who came up with this. Actually no. They’re not worthy of sarcastic praise. They’re freaking idiots. I mean seriously, WHAT ARE THEY THINKING???

If you’re going to do a cage match, fine. If you’re going to do a big cage match, fine. If you’re going to do a gauntlet cage match, that’s fine too. Actually that’s kind of an interesting concept. However, DO IT WHERE THE PEOPLE CAN SEE IT. My goodness how hard of a concept is that? What’s the most important aspect of any show? How about being able to see it?

The fans here might be able to make out someone next to one side of the cage but other than that, nothing. And don’t even bother staying if you sit across the arena and don’t have binoculars because you’re screwed. Sting and Booker won the main event already. I can’t get over how ridiculous this is. Seriously who thought this was a good idea?

Oh and there’s a referee up there too even though it’s Uncensored and therefore unsanctioned. There’s also a massive pole in the middle in case Hogan wants to shoot a Brooke Hogan video up there. They go to a wide shot to just further show how stupid this is. We can hear the wrestlers talking which is usually covered up by the crowd.

Maybe they can see as there’s a pop for Hogan ripping the shirt off. Heenan says this is better than the World Series or the Super Bowl. Yes it does Bobby, yes it does. Hey we’ve hit 70 feet in the air! Heenan redeems himself a bit with the line of all a manager can do here is hope they have a client in the morning. We get a random reference to some woman named Becky in Denver. Ok then.

Tony sums up the match perfectly: the fans wanted to know what the Doomsday Cage was so they’re finding out here. Well thanks for that Tony. In other words, we’re going to throw out a cool sounding name and say Hogan is in it against a bunch of guys that we’re only going to vaguely mention and say to find out, pay up. Once you hook them, you don’t have to do jack.

They did the same thing with the Elimination Chamber in 2002, but the difference was that match wasn’t bad. It certainly wasn’t great but I’ve seen far worse matches. Exhibit A is being reviewed at the moment. In the ultra violent match, we get double figure fours.

Heenan’s comedy is all that’s holding the pieces of this in place. Notice I didn’t say together but just in place as they would likely want to run away and join a witness protection program or something. Zeus and Solution didn’t wrestle again after this. They were the smart ones I guess.

Dusty says if you have a chain length fence (who doesn’t?) just go lay on it to see what this is like. Bobby: Then call your neighbor over and slap the figure four on him! Then put the figure eight on your Doberman! Bobby Heenan, I love you very much. You need massive amounts of therapy and medication, but I love you.

Flair drops something from one cage to the other which is never explained or mentioned again. My guess would be the will of Flair’s career since it’s dead at this point. Hogan and Savage throw powder, which is likely the remains of the cocaine they needed to agree to this.

They go through a trapdoor to get to the next cage, and Anderson and Flair are eliminated. WOW. Ok so wait. All they had to do was get through a door? They didn’t have to pin someone or get a tap out but just go through a door? Ladies and gentlemen, I’m done. I’m going to stop trying to make sense of this match and that’s all there is to it.

This just doesn’t make sense at all but for some reason they insist that it does. Bobby says Boris Karloff would love this. Not really but ok. Hogan has a chain and beats on Sullivan with it. They’re down about 12 feet now so the crowd is a bit more into it. It’s the Faces of Fear (Meng and Barbarian) on Savage and Luger and Sullivan on Hogan.

This room has a door in the middle of it so it’s like two small cages. Actually there’s a reason for it though which will come up in a minute. After being beaten on by two grown men and a steel chain, Hogan is fine and manages to get the chain away to lock the door (which didn’t have a lock before but whatever) and trap Meng and Barbarian inside.

A shot of the cage from the floor makes this look a lot better as in essence they’re fighting on top of a regular cage. That’s not bad I guess. Anderson and Flair drop to the second cage and are trapped as well. Where’s my wah wah music when I need it? Heenan says it’s a maze with no way in or out.

Yep other than the doors they came in through, the doors they leave through or the path that the referee points them through to get to the end. Speaking of doors they go out of one and fight on the stairs which is kind of scary when you think about it as there’s no wall to save them there.

Sullivan is actually over halfway out as Heenan says that he’ll be spam if he hits. I’ll infract him if he does. I don’t want any spam in my reviews. Savage and Luger are still in the cage by the way. According to Brain everyone is on their feet. They have to be to see this I suppose. They’re more or less quiet by the way.

Luger gets loose and we’re out on the floor. Yep, they got out of the cage and while the rules stated earlier in the match said that Hogan and Savage just needed to get down to win, they apparently are going to keep going. Hey, we’re having a Doomsday Cage Match, so let’s fight in the ring!

Yep, they’re fighting in the ring. Luger and Savage are fighting by the cage with Hogan and Sullivan in the ring. The four guys in the upper cage break out and head down the cage. Now this could be cool: Hogan and Savage 6-2 in the arena. Well ok I can go with that as at least its easier to see.

It’s more or less the same thing as the previous match but…that’s….why are the other four just leaving? They just walked back to the dressing room. Anderson and Flair are supposed to, but the Faces of Fear are still in this legally, but who cares about that? That would MAKE SENSE! Hogan is beating on Luger in the ring while Savage is having boards thrown at him.

Apparently the Faces of Fear have been eliminated. Oh ok I think I’ve got it now: the rules are as follows. Hogan and Savage had to go to the top of the cage where they had to either pin or get a submission from Flair and Anderson but they were allowed to have an alternate way of winning because Hogan made a large donation to the Save the Wombat Foundation.

Next up they had to get pins or submissions on some combination of the Faces of Fear, Sullivan or Luger, but they were able to lock the Faces of Fear into a cage and therefore receive a Federal credit for preventing an international assault and battery charge since both men are international ambassadors sent by the King of Tonga to study wrestling (that’s actually not made up if you can believe that. That’s legit true).

Now at the beginning the rules stated that they simply had to get to the floor to win, however there was a clause stating that if there was a high percentage (17 or greater) of time spent on discussing the social habits of Bulgarian monks in the 15th century by the four in the second cage during the battle in the first cage, then simply getting to the floor wouldn’t be classified as a win.

In that case a pin in the other ring would work. However, that won’t work either because Lex Luger’s lawyers feel that the population of fire ants in this match were misrepresented so therefore a simple pin in the ring won’t work either, and the final two members of the Alliance to End Hulkamania, which has founded new chapters in Laos, Manhattan and the North Pole, fighting off the evils of Hulk-Chi-Min, Hulk Maritoni and Hulk-a-Claus, must be equally represented in this match, which must end via pinfall in the original ring.

HOWEVER, it will be allowed for former members of the Alliance to reenter the match under the Columbus Act which also founded Ohio in 1776, but also said that wrestlers were unlawfully evicted from the match via an international treaty can be allowed to return. ANYWAY, now that we’re back to the match, let’s continue here but I need to make sure this remains logical. It’s very important to keep that going here.

They’re all at the ring now and we have more bad chair shots. I love how the graphic under the split screen says Doomsday Cage Match despite a significant lack of cage. Here’s Ultimate Solution and Zeus. According to the clause listed above, we head back to the original cage for the showdown. Yep, it’s Hogan and Savage in a no tag tag-team match against two big strong guys. How do they come up with these things? Sullivan is lurking around as I feel he needs to register. I’m sure there’s something in this match for him too. There must be a tournament somewhere.

As if this wasn’t riveting enough, we hit a bear hug. Hey now, it’s time for the rematch of the match that didn’t happen seven years ago in another company that we’re not going to mention but imply that everyone knows anyway because that’s how we roll.

Ultimate Solution (hereafter known as porkchop for no other reason than I have the Doug song in my head) picks up Savage and has him in position for a slam, prompting Dusty to wonder what he’s going to do with him. Heenan says that he picked Savage up like a 100lb infant. Tony says there’s no winning or losing but only surviving. Yeah I’d agree.

Whose career can survive this match? Here’s Arn and Flair again as apparently their plan to eliminate Hulkamania is just to stomp them and punch them and slam them a lot. Yep, that’s the epic plan. Tony is holding out hope despite a few seconds before saying it’s hopeless.

I love that top level journalism there Tony! Keep it up and one day you might be able to get a better job like selling meat from a truck in Minneapolis! They actually argue over how many people are in there against Hogan and Savage. To get off of that we point out that this started with a telegram. Somehow that’s an improvement.

Naturally they ask if Hulkamania can survive instead of Hogan and Savage. It amazes me that he got so little respect over the years. He was nuts, but man could he wrestle. In one of the best unintentionally funny moments I can ever remember, the powder that Hogan and Savage have spills out and within 5 seconds Brutus is there to help them. That’s just greatness.

Also they’re almost face down in it. Could this get any funnier? Now the interesting part is what Brutus does for them. He brings them weapons to even the odds, instead of actually sticking around to help fight like a friend would. Nope he brought them something to help them fight off the forces of evil. What does he bring? Does he bring brass knuckles?

Maybe a club? Perhaps a couple of chairs? Nope. He brings frying pans. Brutus Beefcake brings a pair of frying pans to help save his friends. Where in the world do I start? Let’s see: how about WHY DID HE HAVE FRYING PANS??? Was he making bacon in the back or something? Does he tend to carry cookware around with him? Did the barber shop fall through? I guess he couldn’t repair the window after Shawn broke it so he became a chef.

Somehow, that is the most logical thing I’ve said all night. There’s five minutes left so let’s get through this if we can. Luger comes back in with a glove that they imply is loaded. He sets to hit Savage but Macho ducks (that sounds like an upgrade to Duck Hunter) and Luger stops, but then starts again to hit Flair and turn face I guess.

Hogan and Savage turn to leave but Savage runs back in and pins Flair while everyone else kind of stands around and lets it happen. WOW. So did they forget the whole pin thing too I suppose? Heenan is ticked off and leaves and we’re finally done.

Rating: -F. This is below an F. We’ve gone so low that we’ve went past Z (which stands for Zeus not Z-Gangsta blastit) and we’ve reached negative letters. That’s how insane this was. I mean it made no sense, the rules I laid out might as well have been the real ones because nothing stayed the same as it was in the beginning, you couldn’t see a thing if you were in the audience, the match was exactly the same thing that it had always been with Hogan surviving, and the plan was just to beat them up a lot? Take note fans: never, I mean never, send a telegram in your life. You can see what it can lead to.

Overall Rating: D-. You know, for some reason I like it. I have no idea why, but somehow I like this show. I think it’s the whole crazy aspect of it. It’s so completely ridiculous that it’s actually fun. The earlier stuff isn’t great and is incredibly boring, but the rest of the show is just such insanity and stupidity that I’d only recommend watching it while completely and utterly stoned or drunk or hopefully a combination of both.

If that’s the case, this is the greatest match of all time. This actually prompted Hogan’s heel turn as he was more or less booed out of the building the next time. Hulkamania was completely gone here as the whole idea of him being able to pull this off was just too much even for the hardcore Hulkamaniac to take.

Something had to be done, and while it turned wrestling upside down and more or less screwed up a ton of pushes and plans, Hogan was saved so all was right with the world. As for a recommendation, note that this is a terrible show and should only be watched if you’re interested in the complete insanity of it. It’s the absolute worst main event I’ve ever seen. I have however heard of something called the Extreme Elimination Chamber. That could be worth looking into.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

Halloween Havoc 1998
Date: October 25, 1998
Location: MGM Grand Garden Arena, Las Vegas, Nevada
Attendance: 10,663
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan, Mike Tenay

This is a rather famous show for all the wrong reasons. If 1997 was the bullet that took down WCW (which it was), this was the infection that got into the wound and caused them to die. There are so many things wrong with this show I’m really not sure where to start. Ok I am but that sounds good. There’s a double main event tonight with Hogan vs. Warrior II and DDP vs. Goldberg. I’m pretty sure you know why this was a disaster for the company, but I’ll go into details for that at the end. Let’s get to it.

The opening video is of course all about Hogan! Well did you expect something else? It’s the whole Gregorian Chant thing with images of Hogan and Warrior. Oh and there’s the world champion and there’s his challenger.

I always did like the massive pumpkin set for this series. That was kind of cool. This crowd is LOUD! I’m actually having trouble understanding Tony’s opening stuff. This is the second version of the tape that I’ve tried to watch and both had the same issues so it’s not just this version. Bobby puts on a mask while Tony is talking to Tenay so the reaction is really funny.

The Nitro Girls dance. You know, not on Nitro. Keep that in mind. They point out that this is their PPV debut, making it kind of stupid. The music on this show is WAY too loud as it’s drowning out the commentary. Apparently there have been three matches added, one for a title and one where the winner gets a title shot later in the night. Uh, ok then.

We really open the show with an interview with Rick Steiner. Really that’s the best guy you had to open things up here? It’s Rick vs. Scott tonight and Rick sees him as just another opponent. Cue Buff Bagwell, a friend of Scott’s that Rick injured on Nitro, legitimately injuring his neck. Bagwell says he’s sick of Scott and wants to be in Rick’s corner tonight. Yeah they’re not giving away the ending to that match at all. Apparently Buff needs permission from JJ Dillon to do that.

TV Title: Raven vs. Chris Jericho

Jericho with the title here. Raven’s music is WAY too up tempo for him. Again with the loud music as I can only hear little bits of what Tony is saying. Something about a losing streak? Raven has been acting differently recently, even tapping out at one point. Jericho is a cocky heel here, meaning he’s hilarious. Raven says his losing streak isn’t his fault and what about me, what about Raven, what about me. He wasn’t informed about this match and he doesn’t feel like wrestling. So he was given a title match and he’s mad about it?

Jericho says he doesn’t want to be here either but all the Jericoholics came here to see him (is he a heel here?) because Jericho equals buyrates, people in the seats and rock and roll. I’m really not sure what Jericho is here. Yeah he’s a face. Jericho calls him a loser and here’s Raven, starting the match about 13 and a half minutes into the show. Jericho whips him with the jacket and avoids a clothesline to take over.

Raven hits a Cactus Clothesline and we’re on the floor. Crowd is HOT. Raven sets up the steps and throws Jericho on them in a front face suplex. Jericho may have hurt his shoulder and/or knee. Oh and the Flock is gone by this point. They keep mentioning it so maybe it’s important? Jericho gets a hot shot to reverse things and a springboard dropkick to send Raven back to the floor.

His advantage is short lived though as Jericho gets sent into the railing and both men are down. Raven tries to set up the steps but is whipped into the railing instead. Raven’s shirt that he ties around his waist comes off so he chokes away with it. There’s a sleeper by the bird man but Jericho is out very soon. Jericho unhooks the buckle and the referee is just fine with it.

Jericho charges at Raven but gets powerbombed for his efforts. He catapults the Canadian into the buckle and Jericho is stunned. Clothesline gets two. Jericho misses a spinkick and in the fastest I’ve ever seen Raven move he immediately grabs Chris and gets a spinning belly to belly for two. They are MOVING out there. German suplex is rolled through by Jericho but he can’t get the Liontamer.

Ok scratch that yes he can but Raven grabs the rope for the break. Raven is wrestling with his eye piercing in. That is so dangerous it’s not even funny. Raven counters a whip in and gets the DDT out of nowhere for two. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that kicked out of. They speed it up again but Jericho hits Raven low and gets a German for two. Kanyon comes out of nowhere and jumps up on the apron so Jericho sends Raven into him. Liontamer ends it seconds later.

Rating: B+. Where in the world did this come from??? This was a great match and easily the fastest pace I’ve ever seen Raven go at. The crowd was into it the whole way and the false finish on the DDT was great. I was really liking this although it would have helped a bit to not have Kanyon there so randomly. Either way, great stuff indeed. Jericho jumping up and down in celebration is hilarious.

Here come Bischoff and Hogan to talk. Keep in mind that we’ve had the girls dancing and now two promos. We’re about 22 minutes into the show at this point so keep that in mind. Hogan is in an NWO Nitro shirt. Bischoff says Hogan represents family values. Uh ok? Hogan says that all his fans love him and all that jazz. He talks about beating up his nephew Horace (real nephew, real awful) for not being ready to be a disciple or something. We see the beating and Hogan says he went a bit too far. Bischoff is just there to hold the mic. Oh and he’s going to beat up Warrior. Total waste of five minutes.

Meng vs. Wrath

Yeah see what I mean about pointless stuff? Wrath was getting something resembling a push around this time and would ultimately be beaten by Rick Steiner the next month in a TV Title match that ended anything he had going because he was starting to get a pop. We head to the floor quickly and Wrath gets a front flip onto Meng from the apron. Nice one too. Back in and after some clotheslines he can’t hit the Meltdown (pumphandle slam).

Meng goes on offense and this is turning into a weak TV match. I’m very surprised Meng had a job at this point. What in the world was he going to add to any company here? Either way he’s doing nothing special here at all. Meng does his basic evil Samoan (Tongan in this case) offense and we get a nerve hold. Wrath hits a Rock Bottom to counter for two and then the Meltdown hits to end it. Sweet goodness this was dull.

Rating: D. Dang that three minute rule. I hate it so much during matches such as this one. This was bad of course and never once got even the slightest big interesting. This wasn’t put on the VHS release and I think you’ll get why later on. Again, note that they wasted another five minutes on this joke of a match.

Disco Inferno vs. Juventud Guerrera

Winner gets Kidman later tonight for the Cruiserweight Title. Juvy has no mask at this point. Disco goes after Juvy to start as the cameraman looks like he’s having issues standing up. They speed things up and Guerrera gets a LOUD chop. Headscissors takes Disco down and I think they botch a Famerasser but it might have been ok. Ah there it is.

Another loud chop in the corner and a monkey flip sends Disco out to the floor. Headscissors takes Disco down but the hair acts as a shield. Back in and Disco gets an atomic drop and a clothesline but dances instead of covering because he’s not incredibly intelligent. Middle rope elbow gets two and we hit the chinlock. Heenan suggests that Disco needs a manager in a random comment.

Juvy gets a stunner on the rope to take over again. He sets for a springboard but Disco hits the floor to hide. Juvy is like get back here you scoundrel and hits a pescado. Back in and Guerrera keeps out moving him. Juvy Driver is reversed into a reverse suplex which is reversed into a hot shot and swinging neckbreaker for Disco for two. Disco blocks a sunset flip and does a Macarena. Why can’t I escape that thing???

Disco busts out a giant swing and falls onto Guerrera’s balls in a Sting spot. Vertical suplex results in more dancing. Disco goes up but gets crotched and there’s a top rope rana for no cover. Instead he goes up again and a spinwheel kick gets two. Juvy does Rey’s sitout bulldog for two. Victory roll is blocked and Disco gets a SWEET jumping Piledriver with Juvy just stopping dead for the pin.

Rating: B-. Far better match than you would expect here. Disco was actually underrated as his gimmick overshadowed what he could do in the ring. This was a fun match and even though I’m not really a fan of Guerrera he looked quite good here too. One of Disco’s better matches actually.

Here’s another 75 seconds wasted as the Nitro Girls dance again. They look good but is this the best way to use PPV time?

After that here we have another four and a half minutes wasted with Scott Steiner to say that tonight is a night off for him. He insults Steiner and Bagwell but instead of Rick vs. Scott, it’s Rick/Bagwell vs. Scott/Giant. Giant and Scott Hall are tag champions but Hall is injured. Well of course this is fine. A thrown together team is getting a title shot at the non champions. JJ Dillon comes out and says ok, but if they lose the titles then it’s Rick vs. Scott. You know, THE ADVERTISED MATCH. How can this company continue to be this stupid?

Alex Wright vs. Fit Finlay

Another match not on the home video. Finlay meant nothing by this point and Wright meant about the same, so let’s give them five minutes of PPV time! Oh ok they had a match on Thunder and this is the rematch. Don’t both to tell us who won or why they’re fighting or anything like that guys. Let’s talk about Warrior vs. Hogan instead!

Back and forth match that isn’t half bad actually, but that doesn’t mean it belongs on this show and taking up PPV time. We have the Nitro Girls to look at if we want to waste time. Wright controls to start, Finlay beats him down, more talk of Hogan vs. Warrior, Wright gets a random neckbreaker to get the win. Again, why in the world was this on PPV? It’s eating up time and is a good reason for the ending of the show.

Rating: C. Not a bad match but dang man, what’s the point? That’s the issue I have with this show: there is so much pointless crap on here that it’s killing the show. We’ve had two good matches so far but then we have these random TV matches that aren’t anything special at all and could have been given to wrestlers that matter. Such a waste of time.

Saturn vs. Lodi

Is this someone’s idea of a joke? Saturn had freed the Flock and Lodi is mad about it so there you are. Lodi being billed as from anywhere other than Las Vegas is kind of funny I guess. Anyway this is another nothing match as Saturn was in the midcard at this point and getting some traction so he beats on Lodi for awhile to reaffirm his manliness. Total squash and the Death Valley Driver ends it. No rating, but keep in mind that Lodi is on PPV and Benoit or Malenko aren’t. Let that sink in for a bit. Not on the video either.

The announcers talk about the main events and the tag titles. This is idiotic.

Oh look: another minute wasted on the Nitro Girls. No Benoit or Maleno or Eddie, but a third performance by these chicks.

Cruiserweight Title: Billy Kidman vs. Disco Inferno

The bell rings 8 times to start the match which is a bit more than you’re used to. Kidman uses speed to take over to start and gets a great dropkick. He was awesome back in the day and really was the best in the division for a long time. Disco was the kind of wrestler that was a Cruiserweight in name only as he wrestled like a heavyweight. He keeps using the hair so Kidman keeps nipping up.

Kidman finally gets ticked off and stomps the heck out of Disco to take over a bit. Disco takes him to the mat and uses his rare power advantage to take over on the champion. He makes fun of Kidman being young which doesn’t make a ton of sense. We hit the floor and Kidman gets a bulldog onto the concrete to put both guys down. Back in a top rope splash misses and Disco gets two off of the crash.

We hit the chinlock for a bit. Disco gets a flapjack and dances, completely killing him momentum. He’s really wasting time, yelling after almost every single move he hits. BK Bomb (Sky High) gets two but Kidman can’t really capitalize. He runs into an elbow but gets a powerslam for two. Piledriver is reversed but hits the second time. Disco rolls the wrong way though so it only gets two.

The reaction of Disco freaking out is kind of funny. In a NICE counter, Kidman tries to run up the corner and get a bulldog but Disco twists around and turns it into a suplex. Gordbuster gets two. He tries another Piledriver but does a Macarena first. Kidman counters into a facecrusher and the Shooting Star Press ends this.

Rating: C. This was really just a long TV match. There isn’t much going on here at all that was anything special. Kidman was way out of Disco’s league here, meaning Kidman was way better. He should have been elevated up from the Cruiserweights but this was WCW so that was downright sacrilegious. Again, why did the first match for Disco need to be here? It’s another waste of time.

Speaking of wasting time, let’s spend five minutes on Konnan’s music video. This marks at least 15 minutes, not counting Disco vs. Juvi or the other matches, that EASILY could have been cut but weren’t.

Tag Titles: The Giant/Scott Steiner vs. Buff Bagwell/Rick Steiner

Bagwell is in street clothes. If the NWO loses the titles then Scott has to face Rick. Oh and the NWO has NWO rules, which means Freebird Rules. I forgot to mention: around this time the movie Bride of Chucky was coming out and Chucky appeared on Nitro and cut a promo about Scott Steiner. Yeah it was really dumb but they mention it here.

Giant is in a t-shirt for some reason. He chops away at Rick who he started with if you didn’t get that. Off to Scott and the fans react to this matchup. ARE YOU LISTENING WCW? Steiner gets a running kick to a seated Rick and pounds away. Rick gets sent to the floor where Giant beats him up even more. Bagwell shoves Giant away and then runs. Keep that in mind.

Rick finally gets an atomic drop which means nothing on the steroid ridden balls of Scott. Rick beats him down with ease in the corner but gets caught in an atomic drop. He no sells it and tags Bagwell. Naturally Bagwell turns on him, joining up with the NWO for the 99^th time. For some reason he runs to the back and it’s a handicap match. Naturally the eternally idiotic announcers are SHOCKED, yes SHOCKED I say!

The equally stupid fans chant for Goldberg. Yes he’s going to come out here when he has a world title match later on tonight. Scott beats on Rick for a good while as the announcers won’t shut up about Bagwell. Giant literally jumps up and down on Rick’s ribs. FREAKING OW MAN! Scott beats him down and Giant keeps picking him up. Now we’re talking about Judy Bagwell. Does this company just not get it?

Anyway, Rick fights back but gets caught by a low blow which is all cool according to the referee I guess. The announcers point out that this is the FOURTH time that has happened in this one match. Dudes, stop trying to validate your lack of logic and continuity. It’s wasting our time. Scott tags Giant who goes up top and accidentally hits a missile dropkick to Scott. Since Scott is officially dead now, Rick goes up, hits a bulldog on Giant and wins the freaking tag titles by himself. The next night he got to pick a new partner and picked Kenny Kaos of High Voltage. You’re not alone: no one else remembers him either.

Rating: C-. This was pretty average, but the Bagwell turn brings it down. I have no idea what the point of this was at the end of this, but it didn’t work. First off, you’re saying that Rick can not only beat Scott, but can beat a former two time world champion on his own after being betrayed and attacked by a third man? This was very odd indeed and I wasn’t really that sure what they were shooting for.

While the crowd is popping huge for Rick winning, Scott tries to bail. Rick chases him down and I guess this is a match.

Rick Steiner vs. Scott Steiner

This is more of a fight than a match of course. Rick hammers away for a good while but Scott gets the fourth low blow of this segment to take over again. There’s a suplex for Rick to shift the momentum again. Belly to belly gets two. And then Bill Clinton jumps the railing, drills a security dude, gets a slapjack from Stevie Ray who is here for no apparent reason, DRILLS the referee with it, and of course it’s Buff Bagwell.

Uh…point to the Clinton mask? Was it supposed to fool Rick? He wouldn’t notice the PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES beating up security guards? The bell rang as soon as the mask came off as you can’t DQ the president I guess. Buff picks up the referee’s hand but can’t get a 3. Rick fights them both off, gets a suplex on Scott, a second referee comes out and counts the three and it’s a bell. Where do I even begin? No rating, but just read what I said again and figure out what you think I’d give it.

We recap Hall vs. Nash, which is happening because they have to do it at some point I guess. Hall has been drinking and I cannot explain my hatred for this angle. In short, Hall would be “drunk” on camera, throw up on camera, be passed out in his house, stumble everywhere and all that jazz. It’s far worse than it sounds because he had real life issues for a long time and still does to this day. Hey! Let’s make an angle about it!

Kevin Nash vs. Scott Hall

Hall has a drink with him of course here. Hall drills him as they start it off and Nash is sent to the floor seconds in. Hall hits him in the head with the mic as they’re REALLY lenient on the DQs tonight aren’t they? Nash is down in the aisle after having whatever was in the cup thrown in his eyes, apparently alcohol. Hall, still in his vest, is in the ring. He grabs the mic and tells Nash to just leave now.

You don’t tick off a Super Shredder though and Nash gets back in. All Hall still though as this has been total domination so far. Discus Punch puts Nash down again and Hall is staggering. Slam puts Nash down and it’s time for the Outsider Edge. Hall goes for punches in the corner but gets shoved away. Nash doesn’t seem like he’s trying to fight back.

Nash keeps saying bring it on and yeah he’s not fighting back at all. And never mind yes he is as he whips Hall in a few times and gets a side slam for no cover as both guys are down. Hall has had about 99% of his offense come from punches. Jackknife attempt but Hall runs away. Nash finally rips his shirt off. We’re almost halfway in and this has been like a really long intro.

They lock up and Nash wins a battle of strength pretty easily. Hall does his slapping the back of the head bit and Nash just shrugs him off. Nash hammers on Hall’s back and is dominating here. The referee asks Hall if he wants to continue and Hall can barely say yes. Nash throws a bunch of knees in the corner and the picture frame elbow.

Off to another corner and more knees with Nash saying “have another drink baby”. Hall collapses and has nothing left. Long sequence of Nash hitting him and Hall’s shots having no effect at all. Big boot sets up the Jackknife (not the Jackhammer like Tony says) and Nash says one more. Instead of covering, Nash just walks away and gets counted out to let Hall win. We wasted almost 15 minutes for that ending? Blast it WCW do you even know what you’re trying to do?

Rating: D+. They were going for the big epic encounter here but when a match is 85% punches it’s a little hard to get into it. There was nothing in terms of competition as Hall dominated the first half and then Nash dominated the second half. Again I’m not sure what the point of the ending was but it didn’t particularly work. Pretty lame match and ending as I don’t think they wanted to fight each other.

Since they haven’t done so in nearly an hour, the Nitro Girls dance to bad techno music while in various colors of wigs. This is another minute of nothing but time wasting. There wasn’t a guy that could have cut a promo here? That’s what gets on my nerves about these segments: they could be used for ANYTHING else. You could even use them for bad comedy and they would be better.

We recap Bret vs. Sting which was built as a battle of leg locks. Bret is a heel here but neither guy means much of anything as for a year the spotlight has been on Hogan and/or Goldberg. Sting’s career was killed so badly by Hogan in the spring that he hasn’t even begun to recover and wouldn’t for years. We also knew that Bret was going to be wasted in WCW by this point and he did too. Rather sad to see indeed.

US Title: Sting vs. Bret Hart

Bret has the title here and Sting is in the Wolfpac. Sting has a goatee here and is supposed to be SERIOUS. Sting won’t let Bret in the ring as he still has the bat so we enter into a LONG stall session by the Canadian. I mean we’re at two minutes of just standing around and waiting at this point. There’s the third time Bret hits the floor and Sting gets mad and goes after him. They had a big brawl on Nitro that I vaguely remember which also contributed to this.

Sting hammers away with rather generic and basic offense for a bit. Here comes Bret with cheating tactics. And now we talk about Hogan to fill the quota for every match. Bret gets a DDT for two. Bret gets an atomic drop and a clothesline to take Sting down. I love that quick leg that Bret tends to drop. Bunch of basic stuff from the Canadian here including a bulldog.

Sting steals a small package for two out of nowhere. Bret tries a middle rope dropkick (???) and jumps into the Scorpion but there’s a rope for the break. Sting on offense now and Bret tries a leapfrog but hurts his knee. Well of course he does. Naturally he’s faking and Bret gets a foreign object. Sting knocks it out with a clothesline and picks it up himself. The referee stops him and there’s low blow #28 tonight to give Bret the momentum back.

Five Moves of Doom gives Bret even more momentum and then he throws Sting to the floor. Sting accidentally takes down the referee and Bret drops a leg on Billy Silverman. Here’s Sting’s comeback but like the eternal idiot that he is he stops to check on the referee and gets drilled. Superplex by Sting and Bret’s legs land on Silverman’s likely breaking them in half.

Stinger Splash to Bret but he hits the post to knock himself silly. Bret nails him with the bat and Sting is dead. I mean he nails him a lot. Oh dang it’s this match. I remember this now. Bret gets about 10 shots with the bat including one off the middle rope. Sting is completely out so Bret wakes up the referee who hasn’t moved in three minutes but a hand on his shoulder and he pops up. Bret puts on the Sharpshooter and Sting is out cold.

Rating: C-. Totally weak match here that never got out of second gear. The ending sucked too with the referee bump taking forever and never doing anything at all. This was idiotic and more nonsense to keep one guy over the age of 37 from jobbing clean. That would be a real issue in WCW and would haunt them until the end of their run. Not a horrible match but considering who was in there, this was awful.

Sting goes out on a stretcher and wouldn’t be seen in over four months. This would mean he didn’t wrestle for 14 months, came back for ten, then left for another four. Way to earn those millions baby! This is five more minutes that we’re wasting here.

Recap of Hogan vs. Warrior. It’s the rematch of the century and there was a bunch of stupid beyond belief supernatural stuff going on in there too that no one cared about in the slightest because it was really stupid. Hogan’s Disciple (Brutus Beefcake in gimmick #84872B) was turned to Warrior’s side through some kind of mystical smoke. Hogan beat up his nephew Horace on Monday so expect a run-in and SHOCKING swerve.

Hulk Hogan vs. Warrior

Yes just Warrior, not Ultimate or anything like that. It should be noted that the Nitro ratings had gone up with Warrior around so this was definitely something that there was an interest in. We see Horace being blasted with the chair again on Nitro. Could you make it any clearer? Hogan stalls a lot, saying he’s going to kill him and murder him and all that jazz.

Warrior Sucks chant starts up. Hogan gets knocked down by a big punch and hides in the corner. Something tells me this isn’t quite going to be Toronto in 90. Hogan hammers him down and gets a wristlock. Warrior takes over and Hogan hits the floor. You know it’s weird that they hate each other this much since Hogan seemed pretty happy with Warrior after the end of their previous match.

Test of strength time as they recreate probably their most famous spot and one of the most famous of all time. Oh never mind actually. I guess that move is too complex so we’ll use more punches. Ah there it is. Hogan wins to start and keeps doing so. The fans chant boring. Tenay says this is the battle for the city of Las Vegas. I’m not sure if that’s stupid or just typical WCW. They’re one in the same I guess.

Criss cross and Hogan wins with a slam. Hogan is by far and away more popular in this. One of the worst clotheslines I’ve ever seen puts Hogan on the floor. There’s a Hogan Sucks chant as no one is sure what to go with in here. They fight on the floor which means a lot of walking around. Tenay calls it a fine wrestling match that turned into a fight. Uh…he’s the Professor right?

Back in and we get one of the most contrived referee bumps I’ve ever seen as Patrick wasn’t in the right spot for Hogan to run into so Hogan had to switch directions to hit him. Hogan calls out the troops and here’s The Giant. Big boot misses and down goes Hogan. Stevie Ray and Vincent go down. Hogan gets a belly to back for two as the referee is mostly back up.

They’re trying to recreate a lot of the spots in their first match but the problem is most of the spots they’re redoing aren’t that well known in the first place. There was a ref bump in that match and Warrior got a suplex but there was no referee. See what I mean? Workout belt is used in its usual fashion by baldie.

Here’s a weird sequence as Hogan tries an elbow but Warrior rolls out of the way. Hogan tries another elbow and Warrior rolls away again. I’m sure you’ve all seen that before right? Well then Warrior rolls back at Hogan and hits him in the knee. It looks completely unplanned and awful as a result. Then again it’s Warrior so what do you expect? Big splash misses afterwards and control goes back to Hogan.

One punch from Warrior puts Hogan down. Belt for Warrior now and he hammers away. It’s not a foreign object because it’s part of Hogan’s attire. I stopped trying to figure out WCW rules years ago so I just go with it at this point. If they’re not changing the over the top rule they’re changing this rule so it’s whatever really.

And now it’s time for the infamous spot of the match. It’s the spot that makes this the worst match anyone has seen since….well since the last WCW PPV. Hogan goes to the corner while Warrior is being yelled at about using the belt. Hulk pulls out a bag which has flash paper and a lighter in it. The idea was supposed to be Hogan threw a fireball at Warrior and blinded him with Warrior eventually making a comeback blind.

To give you an idea of how stupid this was, Hogan himself said it was a bad idea and he came up with it. When have you EVER heard Hogan say he had a bad idea? Anyway, Hogan uses the lighter and throws the flash paper at Warrior. The problem is that the lighter didn’t connect with the paper before he threw it, so he threw a piece of paper at Warrior. He tries again but doesn’t throw the paper in time so the paper burns up in his hand instead of going at Warrior’s face. Let the panicking begin!

Naturally they have no clue what to do now and it’s clear they’re both nervous as they might actually have to improvise and think while moving. For people of their limited intellect, this might not be the easiest thing in the world to do. Warrior hits him and goes up, and doesn’t hit a double axe. Instead it’s more like a one handed punch that completely missed Hogan’s head but Hogan went down from it anyway.

He does it again and Hogan is busted from…something. Low blow by Hogan sets up the leg drop but he doesn’t cover. Here’s Horace Hogan with a chair. OH just get to the swerve already. Warrior Warriors Up and hits a bunch of clotheslines. Bischoff comes down and distracts the referee allowing Horace to blast Warrior with the chair to end it. Hogan says Horace passed the test. Yeah whatever. Horace puts lighter fluid on Warrior and security has to stop Hogan from lighting him on fire. I give up. This was more or less the last time Warrior was seen.

Rating: F. This is one of those matches that the best explanation as to why it sucks is to say “did you watch the match?” Neither guy was capable of putting on a decent match to save their lives at this point so they gave them fifteen minutes on PPV. The ending was bad, the big spot of the match was bad, the whole thing was bad. I don’t know who besides Hogan thought this was a good idea, but they need to be shot otherwise. This was an atrocious match and definitely one of the biggest bombs I’ve ever seen.

With no transition at all, it’s world title time.

WCW World Title: Goldberg vs. Diamond Dallas Page

DDP won this by winning WarGames. I’ve always wondered: if Goldberg is such a tough guy, why does he need so many bodyguards? No big match intros and we’re off in a hurry. They lock up and Page is sent flying with relative ease. Long feeling out process to start here. Page gets an armdrag and we head to the floor almost immediately. No one really has an advantage so far.

Goldberg takes him to the mat so Page tries a leg sweep. Goldberg is like uh yeah I’m awesome and does a standing backflip to avoid it. Cross armbreaker by Goldberg is blocked and Page tries to work on the arm. Goldberg shoves off the Diamond Cutter and it’s Goldberg in charge early on. This is looking good so far, and that’s our show everyone! See you tomorrow on Nitro!

So in case you’ve never heard of this, this is what I’ve been referring to the time the entire show for. In short, the PPV ran long and a lot of people lost the PPV feed in the early going of the main event. In other words, they didn’t get to see the ending of the match they paid to see. Needless to say, this did not go well in the slightest. WCW was threatened with more lawsuits than they knew what to do with, so they did the only thing they could: air the full match the next night on Nitro.

This was a bad idea too, as it ticked off the fans that bought the show to see the main event. I mean it’s not like they were cutting off Saturn vs. Lodi here. This was one of the two reasons people bought this show. The fans were mad because why should the people that didn’t pay to see the show get to see this match? You know, hence the term PAY PER VIEW? They weren’t paying yet they were getting to see the match that the people that did in fact pay didn’t get to see. That didn’t fly at all.

The PPV company was mad too because they agreed to show this on the grounds that WCW would air a complete show. Also, by airing the main attraction for free on Monday, why should anyone want to pay the full price to see the main event when they can see it for free the night before? The whole thing was a disaster and the worst part was it easily could have been avoided.

Bearing in mind that some of the main event was seen before the feed went out, let’s take a look at some numbers here. These are all approximated and rounded off for the sake of match and I’m rounding down in every case, meaning that even if something was up to say 11 minutes and 59 seconds, I’m calling it 11 minutes. The main event ran about 11 minutes bell to bell. Let’s go way high and say it took 20 minutes counting intros (closer to seventeen but we’ll say twenty).

In other words WCW needed to cut off 20 minutes to fit in the entire show. Let’s see what we could have cut off. To begin with, the Nitro Girls. They had four dance routines at a minute each. Then we have Konnan’s music video, running about five minutes. We’re almost halfway there now. There was the interview with Hogan saying he would destroy Warrior, eating up four minutes. Buff offered to be in the corner of Rick which ate up four minutes, and then there was also the Sting stretcher deal which was five minutes.

There are your 20 minutes right there. We’re also leaving on all of the matches, including the classics such as Lodi vs. Saturn, Wright vs. Finlay and Meng vs. Wrath which combined for about 13 minutes of ring time, not counting the intros and exits. Also there was the joke of the Steiners match, as well as the fact that the tag title match was added on as a bonus. This was completely ridiculous and there were so many ways to fix it that it’s unreal. And now, back to the match.

We get some very nice chain wrestling as Page tries for the arm again but Page is sent to the floor through pure power. Back in and Page gets a neckbreaker and Russian leg sweep for two. Front chancery but Goldberg hits a spinning neckbreaker of his own to take over again. Cross armbreaker goes on again but another rope is grabbed. Page counters a tilt-a-whirl with a headscissors of all things.

Bret-Killer kick sends Page into the corner. Goldberg charges but Page gets out of the way and the champion hits the post! Goldberg’s arm is hurt and Page has a chance. Clothesline off the middle rope gets two and a jumping DDT stops the momentum Goldberg starts up. He wants the Diamond Cutter but Goldberg spears the crap out of him.

His arm is hurt though so he can’t cover or follow up. Also quick point here: when Goldberg uses the spear, he runs through the guy. When Edge hits it, it’s a shoulder block to the ribs. Edge stops going forward when he hits it more often than not. Goldberg is like a hard takedown and looks much more impressive because of it. Take notes Edge.

Goldberg tries the Jackhammer but can’t get Page up because of the arm. SELLING PEOPLE! Oh how I love it. Take note: there’s a major difference between shaking an injured body part and then doing your move and not being able to do your move because of an injury. The first looks silly while the second makes us believe you’re in pain. Diamond Cutter hits and the place erupts. They erupt even harder on the kickout. Like an idiot, Page tries a vertical suplex which is reversed into the Jackhammer and Goldberg is 155-0.

Rating: B. See what happens when you let two guys that are both popular and can work well when given time? You get a *gasp* good match! Goldberg had to wrestle a different style here and it came off as far more interesting and impressive than his usual power stuff. Page played the roll of the challenger that had a puncher’s chance very well. This was probably the best match Goldberg ever had and one of the best Page ever had. Good stuff and a nice breath of fresh air to end this show.

Goldberg and Page do the respect thing to end the show.

OverallRating: D+. This was a hard one to grade as it’s certainly not unwatchable. It’s a show where the good parts are good and the bad parts are very bad. Unfortunately there is a lot more bad than good. The opener is good and the main event is good and there’s some other ok stuff mixed in, but like I said in the time aspect there is WAY too much stupid stuff thrown in. It doesn’t help that Hogan and Warrior is one of the biggest bombs of all time either.

This is a perfect microcosm of the problem in WCW. The young guys go out there and have a good start to the show. Then the old guys, the “draws” if you will, come out and have to use three low blows a match plus weapons and ref bumps because they’re such paint by numbers guys anymore that they can’t go out and put on an entertaining match. Look at the main event: there is not one shortcut in it and you get a good match.

That’s one of the main reasons why people got irritated with WCW: the tools and pieces were all there at their fingertips, but instead of having main events like DDP vs. Goldberg they decided we’d rather see stuff like Warrior vs. Hogan, which had an interest to it but the quality wasn’t there. It’s fine for a quickie, but you need some meat eventually. Hogan couldn’t offer that, and the company never realized it. And then they died and no one seemed to care after the levels they reached at the end because of it, but that’s another story. Anyway, not a horrible show, but the bad outweighs the good as usual.

 

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

Monday Nitro
Date: July 24, 2000
Location: CSU Convocation Center, Cleveland, Ohio
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Scott Hudson, Mark Madden

This is another request that was made so long ago that I don’t remember the reason behind it at all. We’re just after Bash at the Beach 2000 and Booker T is the new world champion. We’re on the way to New Blood Rising which was another Russo mess of a PPV. Tonight we have Booker vs. Goldberg in a match I vaguely remember. Let’s get to it.

There’s a cage over the ring.

Here’s US Champion Lance Storm to open the show. He asks for us to rise for the Canadian national anthem as Mark Madden can’t shut up. After the anthem, Storm says Americans need a hero. It’s not his fault that all great wrestling champions come from Canada. He has Mike Awesome at New Blood Rising so right now he wants a warmup match. Cue the Hardcore Champion Big Vito, who wants this to be title for title.

US Title/Hardcore Title: Big Vito vs. Lance Storm

Storm jumps him to start but gets slammed down as well as clotheslined. Vito pounds him into the corner but Storm comes back with a leg lariat to take over. That gets him nowhere as Vito pounds him into the corner and pulls out some weapons. A traffic cone is knocked into Storm’s testicles and it’s table time.

Vito takes too long though and Storm superplexes him down. An O’Connor Roll gets two for Storm as does a small package. Vito snaps off an overhead belly to belly suplex but the top rope elbow only gets two. An Impaler puts Storm down for another two and they trade superkicks. Storm throws on the Mapleleaf (half crab) and wins the Hardcore Title.

Rating: D+. This was part of the Storm super push where he won three titles in three weeks and just barely lost the world title match in the fourth week. Vito was a journeyman who did about the same thing no matter where he went. This was decent enough, but I’m not sure why you would open a show with it.

Booker T is coming to the ring.

Buy New Blood Rising! PLEASE!

Here’s Booker for a chat. He thanks the fans for their support because without them, there is no Booker T. Booker talks about Jarrett whining about how he lost the title to Booker at the PPV and the champ doesn’t really seem to care. He says he’ll retain at the PPV and that’s about it. Scratch that as here’s Goldberg (repeat x5).

Goldberg says that Booker guaranteed a title defense every week, so tonight he wants one. Booker says cool but here’s Cat who I think has some authority at this point to break up the staredown. Cat says the fans pick the opponent (since when?) and they can vote on WCW.com from a list of ten options. Goldberg chokes Cat out but Booker makes the save to give us another staredown.

Back from a break and the announcers talk about what we just saw.

Billy Kidman jumps in on commentary and says he has a sex tape of him and Torrie tonight. Oh dear.

David Flair/Ms. Hancock vs. Lieutenant Loco/Major Gunns

Hancock is Stacy Keibler and Loco is Chavo Guerrero, the latter of whom holds the Cruiserweight Title. This is due to Gunns trying to give mouth to mouth to David, Hancock’s man. They’re having a Rip Off The Camouflage match at the PPV. Flair wrestles in a dress shirt and pants while Hancock wrestles in a short dress. The guys start things off as Madden asks about the tape.

The girls come in without tags and it’s a chase on the floor. Flair gets pounded down into the corner and Stacy accidentally rams her head into David’s crotch. That doesn’t seem to hurt but Stacy misses a cross body and hits David by mistake. Gunns rolls her up for the pin. This is one of those comedy matches without the comedy.

Gunns tries to give mouth to mouth to Chavo, who was knocked down by something we missed. Stacy rips off Gunns’ top instead to reveal a camo bikini top. Chavo gets back up and helps beat David up to clear the ring. What was the point of this at all?

Jeff Jarrett wants a title match, so Cat gives him a handicap tag title match against Kronik. Ok then.

Pamela Paulshock, a big set of fake breasts with a blonde attached, talks to some guy in black who doesn’t say much. Apparently that was supposed to be Sting and it sounds like him. He says the mask comes off tonight.

Goldberg says he’ll win the poll and if he doesn’t, he’ll kill someone.

We go to Kronik’s locker room and Brian Clark is out cold.

Tag Titles: Jeff Jarrett vs. Brian Adams

I think this is a tag title match. Jarrett jumps Adams as he comes in but a clothesline misses and Adams hits his tilt-a-whirl backbreaker for two. Back up and Jarrett whips Adams in but ducks his head like a schmuck, letting Adams hit a piledriver for another two. They head to the floor and Adams (more famous as Crush in the WWF) tries to ram Jeff into the post but Jeff escapes and sends Adams in instead.

In a move that makes me pine for Memphis, Jarrett piledrives Adams on the floor. Back in Memphis, that would be a months long angle. Here it’s good for a two count in the ring. A middle rope punch (MEMPHIS AGAIN) hits Adams but as Jeff goes up again, he gets caught in a bearhug. For no apparent reason, Adams lets him go and tries a sidewalk slam, only to get caught in a DDT from Jeff for two. Jarrett sends him into the corner but jumps into a cobra clutch slam. Adams hits a legdrop for two (Madden: “THAT MOVE NEVER WINS!”) and it looks like we’re getting to the end here.

Jarrett grabs the guitar and hits a shot to the throat when the referee isn’t looking. That only gets two and Adams is mad. He uses the power game for a gutbuster but a middle rope knee misses Jeff entirely. Clark finally comes out and hits Jeff with the guitar, followed by the Meltdown (pumphandle slam). It’s table time as Kronik wants High Times (double chokeslam) but the referee breaks it up. That’s cool with Kronik as they give him the chokeslam instead. The match ends with Jarrett running away.

Rating: D+. Not bad here but the ending was pretty stupid. WCW had a bad habit (WWF did as well to be fair) around this time of just letting the matches end with no real resolution, even in the form of a DQ or something. Why Johnson wanted to help Jarrett wasn’t really mentioned but maybe it was just because it was the right thing to do. Not bad here but nothing great.

Vampiro says he’ll take care of Great Muta for Cat. Why does cat need Muta taken care of you ask? I don’t know either. I was hoping you did.

Shane Douglas complains about Kidman’s sex tape.

Sting is leading in the fan voting poll.

Vampiro vs. Great Muta

This is a rematch from the US Title Tournament last week. Vampiro has the Insane Clown Posse with him for the sake of getting my blood pressure up. Cat (Ernest Miller) is guest referee for no apparent reason. Before any contact is made, Vampiro hits Cat and it’s a SWERVE!!! Cat fights off Vampiro but Muta kicks him down. This would be the start of a stable called the Dark Carnival. No match for the most part.

Never mind as Miller gets up and beats everyone down. Great way to debut a stable there.

Booker doesn’t care who he’s facing.

WCW World Title: Booker T vs. ???

It’s Sting. Apparently the mask is a bunch of bandages from Vampiro burning him. That makes more sense and it only took an hour to tell us that. Sting comes out but Goldberg jumps him. Hehe screw the fans. Goldberg superkicks Sting and Sting has to be taken out on a stretcher. Booker gets in anyway…and is immediately decapitated by a clothesline and a powerslam. Booker heads to the floor and gets in a shot or two, only to be sent into the steps to put him back down again. The champ is busted open so Goldberg gives him an FU and hooks a cross armbreaker.

Booker gets the rope and the hold is broken….but Stevie Ray (Booker’s brother and former tag partner) comes out and throws in the towel. Ernest Miller comes out and declares Goldberg the winner……but he’s not the champion because Booker didn’t quit. He made the rope and didn’t tap, so why is the match over? This didn’t even make it to three minutes, but hey, the world champ looks like a joke now so the point is made.

After a break, Booker wants the match to start again.

Buff Bagwell vs. Kanyon

Kanyon is doing the DDP imitation here….or at least he would if he was here. Judy Bagwell is here with her boy and she yells at Kanyon for being a coward. Buff declares himself the winner and it’s time to dance. A cameraman puts the camera down and beats up Buff, only to have Judy make the save. Buff takes the Kanyon Cutter and Kanyon chases Judy to the back, shoves her in a car and leaves.

Buff gives chase after a break.

Kidman still has a sex tape.

Shane Douglas vs. Mike Awesome

Shane says he’s winning fast so he and Torrie can get out of the town. Mike Awesome is now the Fat Chick Thriller, further proving that WCW had no idea what they were doing a lot of the time. Awesome shoves him away a few times before ramming Shane into all three buckles and then the mat to cap off the series of ten shots. Shane gets clotheslined to the floor and Awesome follows him out with a dive. How scary is it that he could do stuff like that with such ease?

Torrie tries to interfere but is kicked away. The distraction works though as Shane hot shots Awesome on the top rope to take over. A reverse Hennig Neck Snap keeps Awesome down and it’s off to a chinlock. Awesome taps but it doesn’t count for some reason, likely because you don’t tap to a chinlock. Awesome slams Shane off the top and starts his comeback.

A splash gets two and an Alabama Slam looks to set up the Awesome Splash but Torrie interferes again. Douglas gets in his signature chain shots to the ribs but the sex tape pops up on the screen. You can’t see anything of course but Awesome hits Shane in the head with a barbell that came from somewhere for the pin.

Rating: C-. We had two interferences, a chain, a barbell and a sex tape in this five and a half minute match. The tape went nowhere as it’s just the two of them in bed kissing and that’s about it. Kidman would feud with Shane for awhile in a feud that did nothing for no one and was more proof that Kidman feuding with Hogan did nothing for him. Decent match I guess but WAY overbooked.

Billy pops up on the stage with some underwear. Lance Storm tries to jump Awesome but gets Awesome Bombed.

Post break, Douglas beats up the guy that played the tape.

Kidman comes back out and says that he’s made a ton of copies of the tape, including one for Madden, drawing a hilarious response from the fat man. Some guys are shown in the back watching the tape and Douglas yells some more in the production truck.

Filthy Animals vs. Misfits in Action vs. Perfect Event vs. Natural Born Thrillers

The teams are Rey Mysterio/Juventud Guerrera, Hugh Morrus/Lash Leroux (Captain Rection and Corporal Cajun, which I won’t be calling them), Shawn Stasiak/Chuck Palumbo and Sean O’Haire/Mark Jindrak respectfully. This is in the Caged Heat cage, which is WCW’s name for Hell in a Cell. It’s escape only and the last team in the cage is out of the four way title match at New Blood Rising. Palumbo immediately goes for the door but gets caught and beaten down just as fast. Konnan is on commentary here.

This is more like a battle royal than a cage match to start, as everyone is beating on everyone at once. O’Haire hits the first big spot of the match, firing off the Seanton (Swanton) Bomb on Morrus. There are no covers in this as it’s escape only remember. The fighting continues as we see Rey and Juvi hiding in the corner of the cage. That’s pretty smart when you think about it.

Palumbo hits a jumping back elbow on Morrus and in the chaos, the Thrillers both walk out and advance to the PPV. Rey goes up for a cross body onto Stasiak but Stasiak catches him in mid air. That’s more power than he usually shows. Juvy dropkicks Rey onto Stasiak, sending Shawn to the floor, where he and Palumbo make their escape. We’re down to the Filthy Animals vs. the Misfits.

Morrus loads up the No Laughing Matter moonsault but Juvy makes the save. The Bronco Buster keeps Morrus down….and then things stop making sense as the Perfect Event lock the cage. No explanation is given for this but I guess it makes sense in Russo’s mind. Mark Madden pulls out some bolt cutters for Konnan who doesn’t use them immediately. The match basically stops as Disco Inferno of the Animals goes up top and opens a door on top of the cage.

Back in the ring the Animals set up a ladder because this match isn’t overbooked enough yet. They beat down the Misfits so they can climb the ladder and dive on them again. You know, because going through the opening in the roof would make too much sense. Everyone is down after the dive and for a second we actually get a breather. Morrus is up first and climbs the ladder to escape, only to be stomped on by Disco who is still on top of the cage.

Rey climbs up and it’s Juvi vs. Lash, the latter of which has done next to nothing in this match. Konnan finally cuts the lock off the door as Morrus fights off Rey and Disco (Rey is a heel here, if that gives you any idea how stupid this company was) as the other two walk out the door. So now there’s no one in the cage but the match continues. Tony: “We’re completely lost.”

There’s a table set up on the floor and Morrus teases diving off the top through Juvi through said table, but Rey stops him from killing himself. Juvy gets up and stands the table against the cage before sending Lash through it. Morrus and Rey go back through the roof and down into the ring again because….well why not? It doesn’t last long though as Morrus counters a rana into a powerbomb to escape and…..win I guess?

Rating: W. As in WHAT? Where in the world do I begin? First of all, why would you have a big match like this to qualify for another match? Second, why would you have a match like this to eliminate someone? Third, why didn’t the match end when everyone was out of the cage? Fourth, if they could go through the door only, WHY WOULD THEY GO ON THE FREAKING ROOF?

Fifth, why would this match be on Nitro instead of on the PPV? Sixth, why did it take Konnan so long to open the door? Seventh, why did Madden have bolt cutters? Eighth, why were the first two teams in this in the first place? Ninth, who thought Rey as a heel was a good idea? Finally, WHAT DID I JUST WATCH???

Stevie Ray goes up to Goldberg in the back and yells at him, so Goldie throws him through a glass window.

WCW World Title: Booker T vs. Goldberg

Booker jumps him in the aisle but Goldberg knocks him right back down. As they head into the ring, Booker hits the ax kick and Goldberg is in trouble. Never mind as he clotheslines Booker down and into a 360. A powerslam puts Booker down and Goldberg pounds on the cut from earlier. Jeff Jarrett comes out for no reason and hits Goldberg with a chair as this is anything goes. SINCE FREAKING WHEN??? That makes Goldie mad so here’s the Cat to kick Goldberg in the face. That gets him nowhere either so Booker kicks him down for a second and the Book End (Rock Bottom) retains the title in less than three minutes.

Goldberg immediately pops up and spears Booker down and hits a Jackhammer to stand tall to end the show.

Ok before we get to the overall rating, let’s think about this main event for a second. In total, the world champion has been in the ring about six minutes tonight and has been destroyed twice in that span. Goldberg looks like a monster that can’t be hurt and Booker looks like a joke. It took an ax kick, a chair shot, a kick to the face, another kick to the face and a Rock Bottom to put Goldberg down for about five seconds before he destroyed Booker again to end the show.

Not to mention this all happened after the fans were told they could vote and then had their pick knocked out, making it completely meaningless. This would also be the sensible match after the even bigger mess that the cage match on free TV was. They were out of business how soon after this?

Overall Rating: D-. WOW. Between the matches having no endings, the ones that do ending screwy, the debuting faction looking stupid, the debacle that was the world title stuff and the INSANE cage match among all of the other stuff I’m forgetting, it’s no wonder why this company went out of business so soon. Booker would manage five world title reigns in less than a year, and it’s no wonder given how much they seemed to care about him as champion. Why was this show requested anyway? It didn’t seem to be anything special and it was certainly bad.

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Uncensored 1995
Date: March 19, 1995
Location: Tupelo Coliseum, Tupelo, Mississippi
Attendance: 5,782
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan

So here we are at what managed to win back to back worst show of the year awards from Meltzer: Uncensored. The idea is WCW has washed their hands of the show which is stupid for reasons I’ve gone into already in other rants. Anyway, this is really just a continuation of the last show and not a lot has really changed. The main event is still Hogan vs. Vader and other than that there’s not a lot to talk about on this one. This show does however feature perhaps the dumbest idea in wrestling history that resulted in Goldust, so let’s get to it.

Again, Nitro doesn’t exist yet so this isn’t your traditional show.

Opening video is just about how everything is different now and there are no rules. It’s your standard thing. Apparently we are packed to the rafters here. There aren’t even 6,000 people there so that’s a stretch if there ever has been one. Heenan dates the show by saying Jordan just came back to the NBA and Tyson is about to get out of prison. Oh this is the debut of the Renegade. Oh dear it’s THAT show.

Blacktop Bully vs. Dustin Rhodes

For some reason WCW thought this was a good idea. See if you can figure this out: they’re in the back of a truck driving around Atlanta. The winner is the first person to get to the end of the truck and pull a horn. Both guys bladed which was illegal at the time and were fired for it. There are bales of hay in the back of it also. Yep, WCW isn’t a hick company AT ALL. Oh hey let’s get a police escort and a helicopter too.

This must have been SO fun for the people in the arena. I mean my goodness: SOMEONE GOT PAID FOR THIS!!! The problem here is that no one can actually stand up at all as they’re IN A MOVING TRUCK! Two idiots have to actually sit in the cab and watch this. Seriously, WHO CAME UP WITH THIS IDEA??? Yep there goes the sunlight. Oh I forgot to mention: this has been edited to heck and back so the light changes about every 5 seconds.

Hey, let’s run a stop sign on film and show a shot of the truck driver for no apparent reason. They aren’t even really fighting. It’s them wandering from one end of the truck to another and hitting the other guy with a bale of hay. And all of a sudden Dustin is 8 feet away from where he was a second ago. Not to mention they had to rent the truck. The camera work here is crap as we can’t let anyone see blood. Nothing dumb about this AT ALL.

They actually call this a match. I’m stunned. Hey something good happens for once: the camera in the helicopter breaks up. Someone up there likes me. Oh hey, let’s sit on the side of a moving truck and hang off the side while a guy punches me. Nothing bad can happen from this. This has been going on over 8 minutes and they might have interacted for 50 seconds total. Other than that it’s stumbling around and trying to grab the stupid horn.

It’s also gotten lighter so apparently this has gone on all night. It certainly feels like it. They’re up on the beam together and Dustin gets knocked off, allowing the Bully to pull the horn and win I guess. In the arena fireworks go off. This is a BAD idea already isn’t it?

Rating: H. As in HOLY GOODNESS WHAT IN THE WORLD WERE THEY FREAKING SMOKING TO COME UP WITH THIS????? Do I even need to make fun of this? Dustin took off and put on his shirt twice, yet you never saw him do it once. See what I’m working with here?

We go to the Stud Stable, which is Colonel Parker, Meng and the TV Champion Arn Anderson who for no apparent reason is wearing what would become the Cruiserweight Title. Apparently he has a boxer vs. wrestler match with Johnny B. Badd. Meng is having a martial arts match with Duggan. This could be a REALLY long night.

We recap Meng vs. Duggan. Short version: Duggan ran into Parker and Meng beat him up. This is set to Rey Mysterio’s music for no apparent reason.

Jim Duggan vs. Meng

Ok so even more non wrestling. Good to know. The fans, having sat around over twenty minutes at this point watching a single small screen, are shockingly dead. Duggan is all taped up as this show is giving me a migraine. Sonny Onoo, not yet a stereotyped Japanese tourist that would sue WCW over it, is the guest referee. Duggan is in street clothes. You can win by pin or knockout apparently.

On a random note that is far more interesting, this was one of Austin’s last match with the company before heading to ECW. It was a dark match that I didn’t mention already. There’s no point to it at all. I’m just bored. Another dark match was Stars N Stripes vs. Bunkhouse Buck and Dick Slater. Can I watch that match instead? They point out that Duggan knows nothing about martial arts. My head hurts.

We’ve been walking around for three minutes now waiting on Duggan to bow. Meng kicks him once and then poses. Duggan’s punching doesn’t work so he takes his boot off to beat Meng with it, which also does nothing at all. The match goes like this: Meng hits him, Duggan walks around, Meng knocks him down, Duggan gets up, Duggan can’t hurt Meng, repeat.

We’re at the third nerve hold of the match. The guy is allegedly a killing machine so let’s have him rub Duggan’s neck instead. Heenan says Duggan has held a lot of titles. Name two. Duggan does the ten punches in the corner, and all of them go into the shoulder. That’s brilliant isn’t it? Meng no sells the Three Point Clothesline. HE GOT UP FROM A CLOTHESLINE! HOW FREAKING TOUGH IS HE??? A kick to the head ends it.

Rating: F-. And that’s being generous. This was a regular match with a guest referee, period. Seriously, whose idea was this show anyway? I freaking don’t get it. This is the closest thing to a match we’ve had and that’s not saying anything at all.

We recap Anderson vs. Johnny B. Badd. Anderson stole the TV Title from him and then cheated (you expected something else) to keep the title. Finally on Saturday Night, Badd interfered in a match Anderson had with Alex Wright. Now you have to remember something around this time: Badd’s character was gay without actually saying he was gay.

This is the character that says he was so pretty he should have been a little girl. So on Saturday Night ha literally sauntered out (think of the run that Sunny used to do) in powder blue tights (WAY too small) and boxing gloves to knock Anderson out. Since you know, THAT HURTS SO MUCH MORE THAN A FIST.

Badd says that tonight is a disadvantage to him. He has a boxing trainer that I refuse to believe is a real human being.

We get a clip of Anderson in the middle of nowhere in a Jeep or something talking. These kinds of promos are the things I based Night Vision on for the three people that got that reference. Anderson looks like a bad teacher from a stereotypical high school.

Arn Anderson vs. Johnny B. Badd

This is billed as boxer vs. wrestler. We have rounds here so this is closer to an MMA fight in a weird screwed up way. In other words, 40 minutes into the show and we still haven’t had an actual wrestling match. The rounds are three minutes with a minute between each. You can win by pinfall, submission or knockout. Oh this is going to be bad isn’t it? This is dumb already as it’s just Badd punching him and making Arn look stupid.

The problem is he would do this all the time in regular matches but doesn’t, and guys get punched all the time and it doesn’t do much at all, yet here Badd is wearing gloves and it’s more effective? This is just stupid. They have random stops like in boxing which is ever stupider. Crowd is DEAD mind you. Anderson has gone down three times this round. It’s been totally one sided. And yep, Anderson jumps him in the rest period and hits his DDT.

Naturally Anderson is in worse shape than Badd is after taking the TV Champion’s finishing move. Since there are no DQs Anderson beats on him some more. Anderson is finally dominating here but using jobber offense for the most part. The stool is used and here’s Badd’s manager to help him which of course fails beyond belief. Third round ends with Anderson beating the heck out of him. And Badd has his glove cut off and the trainer puts a bucket on Arn’s head. A big left hand ends it. I hate this show. I truly do.

Rating: F. Again, why is nonsense like this on a WRESTLING show? We’re 54 minutes into the show and there’s been a thing about blowing the horn of a truck, martial arts and boxing/MMA. What am I watching?

A highlight package of Savage leads to an interview with Savage. He admits he doesn’t know what he’s saying. Holy cocaine Batman!

Randy Savage vs. Avalanche

Earthquake in case you were wondering. Yes, we’re getting a wrestling match, AN HOUR INTO THE SHOW! Something tells me this is going to be very formula based. This is really basic stuff for the most part just like I thought it would be. Avalanche throws a dropkick of all things and to stun me, it’s not half bad. This is about what you would expect: Savage gets beaten up, he makes a quick comeback and it doesn’t work, repeat.

They’ve been fighting ten minutes now and that’s all there is to say about it. Savage jumps from the top to the floor with the double axe to knock him down. And Ric Flair in drag jumps the railing and beats up Avalanche. This ends it BY DISQUALIFICATION, at UNCENSORED, meaning NO RULES. Hogan makes the save.

Rating: D+. Match of the night by about 1000% so far. Know why that is? BECAUSE THIS WAS AN ACTUAL MATCH! There’s nothing at all special here but it’s not terrible I guess. This was a match you didn’t see in WWF so that’s always a perk. Nothing great, but by comparison this was Flair vs. Steamboat.

Harlem Heat have a match with the Nasty Boys and it’s Texas Tornado Rules. Just remember: no RULES tonight. Sherri really was decent on the mic.

We recap Bubba (Boss Man) vs. Sting. Boss Man turned heel because he blamed Sting for him losing a match. Sting, looking very odd for some reason, shouts a lot. I’ll say this: John Cena wishes he had the charisma Sting had. Rip me apart.

Big Bubba Rogers vs. Sting

This is a SUPER CONTEST apparently. Ok then. This should be decent actually. I want Bubba’s hat and Sting drops a leg on it and throws it to the crowd. Apparently being Uncensored allows for Sting to destroy Bubba’s personal property. They badly botch a crotch reversal spot on the post where Sting was supposed to pull his legs in so Bubba went face first into the post but the legs came loose and Bubba had to ram himself.

Sting hurts his leg on a leapfrog so there’s your story of the match. When something works as well as that, why mess with it? We get a rest hold, but at least it makes sense here. Bubba likes to stand around way too much. Sting gets a massive pop for a right hand. He was so over it was scary. We get a Captain Planet reference, making this match awesome. This is more or less Sting has a bad knee, Bubba has generic offense.

Sting hits a splash from the top for two, and I never stop loving those things. That man could JUMP. Sting goes for a slam and Bubba falls on him…for the pin? That came from NOWHERE. Even the guy didn’t expect it as there’s a long gap between the pin and the bell.

Rating: D+. Again boring but again not bad. This wasn’t bad really but it needed a lot more to be worth anything. It’s sad when a boring match is a breath of fresh air. This is already a failure of a show so there we are.

We recap Nasty Boys vs. Harlem Heat. How are the Nastys still on TV today? More or less they just fight each other. There’s not much more than that.

Nasty Boys vs. Harlem Heat

Remember it’s Texas Tornado rules. What does Kerry Von Erich have to do with this? And we have no Harlem Heat. Sherri goes to get them and of course they jump the Nastys from behind. Wait this is non title? Why? Why in the world wouldn’t this be for the belts? Oh I guess it’s the UNCENSORED thing. The no rules thing kind of helps here as it hides a lot of the faults of the Nasty Boys.

One of these faults would be no selling, as Jerry gets kicked in the FACE and just walks away. And here’s Sherri being brought in to make it really intense I guess. We brawl to the concession stand, and any real old school fan gets this instantly. Back in 1975 in this area (mainly Tennessee though), two teams had an EPIC rivalry: the Blonde Bombers (Wayne “Honky Tonk Man” Ferris and Larry “Moondog Spot” Latham) and Jerry Lawler and Bill Dundee (Jerry Lawler and Bill Dundee).

One night in Tupelo there was a controversial decision over the Southern tag titles where the Bombers, the heels, won the belts but the referee might have blown the call. The faces jumped them to end the show, and then later we saw what happened afterwards. These four fought into the concession stands with ketchup and mustard going everywhere. Now I know it sounds stupid and corny, but this was more or less the standard for violence until ECW came along.

I mean they ATTACKED each other and it felt real almost. Go find a copy of it as it’s well worth seeing, if nothing else from a historical perspective. So anyway, this brawl is a reference/homage to that event. Here’s the problem: that was 20 years earlier and I don’t think many people get the point. To them this is just four guys acting like idiots and it’s a comedy match. Sherri actually does look good in the leather.

See, now we’re getting to the other problem: this is boring. And we get a bell without seeing a pin. The Nasty Boys win apparently. Ok then. A replay shows that it was a powerslam from Knobbs with Stevie kicking out at the last second but the three going down anyway, another Tupelo reference.

Rating: F+. This was just bad. I get what they were going for here but it just didn’t work at all. That’s the problem here: this was just boring. It was supposed to
be a reference to a classic angle but the problem is that it came off as a really bad comedy match.

Vader and Flair yell at Hogan. Flair still has eyeliner on.

Hogan says he has an ULTIMATE surprise. Heaven help me.

Vader vs. Hulk Hogan

This is again non-title. Flair and Vader are both in the ring and the RENEGADE comes out. The idea was let’s have a guy dressed up like Warrior that kind of looks like him run around a lot and maybe some people will really think it’s him. The problem is this guy is like 5’8 or so while Warrior was 6’3. He looks like he’s in a Halloween costume or something. I’m pretty sure this is the four corners version but it’s not really made clear.

For about the 1000th time tonight we’re told IT’S UNCENSORED!!! Yep it’s four corners variety. Vader beats up Hogan for the most part until Jimmy Hart runs out. He had been missing all day in a bad storyline, leading to nothing at all. Renegade beats up Flair for the third time tonight. Vader makes another comeback and beats up Hogan, leading to his powerbomb. And of course Hogan is up in seconds.

He hits all four corners after beating up Vader. OR DOES HE??? He gets three and a masked man runs out (second in about 6 months. Have to love this original booking right?) and blasts Renegade before he gets to the fourth. There’s no referee for this whole thing mind you. Vader misses a front flip from the middle rope and lands on the chair. Where are all these wooden chairs coming from?

Vader isn’t hooked to the strap anymore so Hogan beats up Flair to make sure the universe is in order. He hooks up Flair and drags him instead I guess to win the match. If that was the case, why even tie up Flair? The Masked Man is back with a chair.

We cut to the entrance ramp to see Arn Anderson in the Masked Man’s outfit minus the mask tied at his hands and feet more or less hopping towards the ring. The Masked Man in the ring beats up Flair and Vader before revealing himself to be Savage. The trip of steroid freaks celebrate to end this mess.

Rating: G. Hogan, seriously, how big is your ego? I want to know. Let’s see. Flair: greatest world champion of all time arguably. Hogan has him in drag and being crazy, not to mention jobbing to Hogan twice, one of which was when Hogan hadn’t wrestled for a year or so.

Then we have Vader, who was built up for a year or so as the unstoppable heel and he jobs to Hogan twice in three months. Is there a point coming anytime soon? This is why Hogan wound up getting booed so often: he refused to ever lose. Yes he was the biggest star ever, but you have to lose once in awhile man.

Overall Rating: O. As in oh what do you think I’m going to give this show? This is freaking terrible. The thing is though, the idea actually isn’t that bad: a hardcore PPV. The problem is it was about as thrown together as you could ask for. None of the gimmicks made any sense and the regular matches were boring. Also the main event being non title makes it sound weak.

If the title isn’t going to change hands, why should I want to see this show? Nothing is going to change as nothing is up for grabs, so why would I really want to see this? The point of PPVs are to have big time matches that end feuds, and this didn’t do that. Also, I know I complain about Hogan in TNA a lot, but this right here is a prime example of why I do that. Look at this main event and show as a whole.

The Nasty Boys go over Harlem Heat, the world tag champions. Hogan makes Vader and Flair look like fools. Hogan celebrates the win again, and the crowd is dead. This would be the trend for the next year until at Uncensored 96 the Doomsday Cage Match happened and Hogan was so universally hated for it that the company had no other option than to turn him heel, because, you know, he couldn’t just be taken off TV and have Sting and Flair and Savage and Giant put on the TV show right? That’s crazy talk. Ignore this completely as it’s terrible.
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Clash of the Champions 24
Date: August 18, 1993
Location: Ocean Center, Daytona Beach, Florida
Attendance: 8,903
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Jesse Ventura

Since I only have six of these to go in total, I think it’s time for an old fashioned marathon. I’ll knock these out as fast as I can so I’ll finally be done with this series. It’s only taken me a few years so we might as well get it done. This is from late 93 which is about as awful as WCW ever got, if you can possibly fathom that. The main event is Vader vs. Davey Boy for the title. Let’s get to it.

The opening video talks about a Flair For The Gold with the WarG……..OH MY GOODNESS IT’S THIS SHOW!!!!!!!!!!!! Oh we’ve got something VERY special coming up later on. You just wait.

Brian Pillman is injured so Steven (William) Regal is replacing him in the tag title defense.

Tag Titles: Steven Regal/Steve Austin vs. Arn Anderson/Paul Roma

Anderson vs. Austin to start. Arn’s white trunks seem to grow every year. Austin pounds him down as Jesse complains about Regal being part of the blondes now. The Horsemen take over to the audience’s delight. Austin gets launched over the top but it’s momentum or whatever. How does that even work? YOU THREW HIM OVER, so why isn’t it a DQ? They brawl to the floor for a bit and Austin brings Regal back in.

Roma, the biggest excuse ever for a Horsemen, and that includes Mongo, comes in and works on Regal’s arm. He speeds things up but Austin trips Roma (who looks a lot like Ricky Steamboat in the long white tights) to give the champs the advantage. Both guys take turns on Roma as this is going nowhere. Austin goes into the buckle but Roma doesn’t tag because he’s an idiot.

Austin gets him into the corner so Anderson, allegedly the best tag wrestler ever, tries to come in. Roma gets the required rollup but there’s no referee of course. Roma hits Austin’s Stun Gun and both guys are down. Regal breaks up a tag and we get the “face makes a tag but it doesn’t count so the heels change without one and it does count” deal. Roma gets a dropkick and there’s the tag to Anderson. The place ERUPTS too. Everything breaks down and a miscue by Regal’s manager lets Arn grab a rollup for the pin and the titles.

Rating: C-. This was already better than any match on the previous Clash. Austin would go on and start a US Title feud in a few months while the Horsemen faded away. This was during the Disney Tapings era, so the Nasty Boys had already been filmed as champions. The titles would change at Fall Brawl, which is another reason why this was an awful time for the company. They would tape MONTHS worth of shows in advance and that was it. All the mystery was gone and no one gave an effort because of it, which is stupid. Imagine if that had happened to Punk in 2011.

2 Cold Scorpio vs. Bobby Eaton

This should be SWEET. On top of that we get the Midnight Express theme. Scorpio is one of my old favorites and he’s young and awesome at this point. Eaton is heel here I guess. Scorpio gets a nice spinning sunset flip for two but Eaton clotheslines him down. Scorpio runs the corner and hits a top rope cross body and grabs an armbar. A regular cross body misses and Bobby takes over.

Eaton hooks a hammerlock down onto the mat. This hasn’t exactly been the high flying spectacle I was expecting. Even Jesse points out that this isn’t what he expected. Scorpio counters and sets him into a superplex position. Instead of using that though, while standing on the top he jumps up and dropkicks Eaton to the floor and adds a plancha. Cool sequence. Eaton hits a neckbreaker back inside to take over. Top rope elbow (why not the Alabama Jam?) gets two. And never mind as Scorpio takes him down and the 450 (called a 360 by Tony) sends both knees into Eaton’s chest for the pin.

Rating: C. I love Scorpio so I’m not going to complain much about this. Good match I guess but they didn’t really hit a level that I was expecting. To be fair though Eaton was just a jobber to the stars and the match wasn’t bad or anything. Just kind of disappointing I guess. Scorpio would get a two week tag title reign later in the year.

Max Payne vs. Johnny B. Badd

Payne stole the Badd Blaster (a confetti cannon) and shot Badd in the face with it so Badd’s face is burned and he’s wearing a mask. This is mask vs. Norma Jean, which is what Max calls his guitar. Max jumps him and drops an elbow into the boas. Jesse: “Right into the boas Tony!” Johnny fires back with punches but the cross body is ducked. This is power vs. speed.

Payne rips off the mask but Badd is wearing another one. Tony’s total lack of shock kills the surprise. There’s a hammerlock slam which is supposed to set up his Fujiwara Armbar finisher but Badd escapes with a small package. Well he did say he used steroids didn’t he? Payne misses a middle rope splash and Badd steals the pin. Well that was nothing. Too short to rate.

Badd says he’s going to unmask on Saturday Night. He’d look the same.

It’s time for A Flair For The Gold, which is Flair’s talk show. THIS IS IT!!! This has an actual set which looks like a living room. Flair comes in through the door and has Fifi his French maid walk around a bit. He brings out his guests, Sting and the British Bulldog. They’re here to talk about WarGames and the place is WAY into this. Flair was a face at this point and was as popular as he’d been in the 90s.

Sid and Harlem Heat, three of the four opponents for WarGames show up. They want to know who the mystery partner is. Sting says the line of “prepare to be shocked, because our partner is none other than THE SHOCKMASTER!”

And here it is: the absolute dumbest, stupidest, worst and completely lowest point for WCW. An explosion goes off (remember this is LIVE) and a wall bursts open. Shockmaster falls over part of the wall, knocking off his glittery Stormtrooper helmet. He tries as hard as he can to put it back on (after revealing to anyone paying attention that he’s Tugboat/Typhoon from WWF, making him a total failure anyway) and finally gets back on his feet.

The whole segment is a total joke now as the fans don’t know what to make of this. Bulldog and Harlem Heat are dying of laughter and try to hide it but you can here the covered laughter very clearly. Shockmaster finally gets it together and with Ole Anderson providing the voice, he says Sid has ruled the world long enough and asks if Sid wants a piece of him. Now keep in mind the voice: he sounds like a cross between a really bad Power Rangers villain and the Cave of Wonders from Aladdin. On top of that, he says Dusty Rhodes will be on their team in WarGames. It would actually be DUSTIN, not Dusty. And it’s over.

I mean WOW. What people seem to overlook is how bad this was going to be no matter what. Answer this: what exactly is a Shockmaster? It sounds like a static electricity prevention thing you would see in a store labeled As Seen On TV. Second, it’s Fred Ottman under the mask. When did anyone ever see the “Sailing Superstar” and think this guy deserved a huge push? Third, it’s a glitter covered Star Wars helmet. Just add all this up and think about how bad it would have been WITHOUT the famous part. Now add that in and look at what you have. My goodness it’s amazing that they stayed in business.

TV Title: Ricky Steamboat vs. Paul Orndorff

Orndorff is champion. Tony and Jesse crack up laughing about what we just saw. This gets big match intros too. Interesting trivia note: the TV Title is the belt that would become the Cruiserweight Title but with a different nameplate. And there go the lights. It looks like a late 80s show now with most of the crowd being covered in darkness. Feeling out process to start as they fight over a top wristlock. Steamboat bridges out of it and that looked AWESOME.

Steamboat misses a dive and lands on the ramp where Paul takes over. A top rope elbow to the head gets two. A slam gets a bunch of two counts and it’s the second chinlock of the match so far. We hear about Flair vs. Sting for the NWA Title this coming Saturday night which is almost an afterthought here. Steamboat sends him into the buckle and a top rope chop gets two, as does a regular one.

A big chop sends Orndorff to the floor but again it’s not a DQ. Steamboat busts out a huge dive which gets a nice reaction. Ten years later it would have gotten a huge pop. Orndorff tries a bunch of covers and Jesse hands him the TV Title for some reason. He drops it and tries the piledriver but Steamboat reverses and here’s a sweet pinfall reversal sequence. Top rope cross body is rolled through for two. Orndorff tries to slam Steamboat and apparently he never watched Mania III because in the same ending, Steamboat rolls through into a cradle for the pin and the title.

Rating: C. Eh not bad here but slower paced than most would like. It could have been a lot worse though, which is the right idea. Steamboat was in the role of veteran that people really respected and could still pull out a good match when asked to, namely due to pure raw talent. Good match but nothing great. At least it got the title off Orndorff though.

Orndorff piledrives him on the belt on the ramp post match.

Harley Race and the Kongs (two very fat guys in masks who were worthless) say that they’re coming for Flair and Sting.

Sting/Ric Flair vs. Colossal Kongs

Sting clears house on his own, easily slamming both guys like it’s nothing. Race freaks out, shouting about how it’s impossible. It’s a big brawl and Flair goes to the floor with one of them. Sting casually beats one of them up, hits the Stinger Splash and a top rope splash for the pin as Flair beats up Race. Total and complete domination.

Sting and Flair say they’ll renew their feud on Saturday for the title.

Rick Rude/The Equalizer vs. Dustin Rhodes/???

It’s a mystery partner. This feud has gone on for about 5 months now and has yet to get interesting. It’s mainly Rude vs. Rhodes but Rude brought in the Equalizer to equalize things. He’s more famous as Dave Evad Sullivan and is AWFUL. Rhodes’ partner is going to come out in some car that the fans can win. And it’s Road Warrior Animal. Rude panics and yells at him as Hawk comes up from behind. He’s the real partner. Not exactly a point to the switch but whatever.

The fans are fired up and it’s Hawk vs. Rude to start us off. They go to a test of strength which Hawk easily wins. Off to Equalizer who gets dropkicked to the floor almost immediately. Hawk tries his neckbreaker and Equalizer falls down, drawing some laughter from the crowd. Rude comes back in and we hit the chinlock but Hawk counters into an electric chair position for a Doomsday Device with Dustin playing Hawk.

Rude beats Dustin down and swivels at Hawk. Some heel miscommunication allows the tag to Hawk and it doesn’t count for no apparent reason. Hawk launches Rude at Equalizer and everything breaks down. As the referee is putting Rude out, Equalizer goes to slam Dustin. Hawk comes off the top to shoulder block both of them down and Dustin gets the pin.

Rating: D. Pretty boring match here and I really don’t get what Hawk adds to anything here. To be fair though, it’s not like he ever meant anything after about 1991 anyway. Not a terrible match but they needed something more interesting than Dustin vs. Rude. The US Title would FINALLY go to Dustin soon after this.

WCW World Title: Davey Boy Smith vs. Vader

Buffer says the DQ rule is waved, but doesn’t mention that he means if Vader gets disqualified he loses the title. Also note that this is the WCW Title and not the NWA World Title. They would be unified next year thank goodness. Race is Vader’s manager. After a break they get into it on the ramp with Bulldog being clotheslined down. Smith shows off INSANE power with a delayed vertical out there.

We go back into the ring but Smith’s slingshot splash gets knees. They go to the floor quickly and Vader accidentally splashes the railing ala Sting. A slam gets two back inside. Vader slows things down and goes after the knee. Samoan Drop puts Smith down and a moonsault misses. Smith gets a sunset flip for two. A splash onto the back puts Smith down and he’s in trouble.

Time for a chinlock to eat up a few moments. Davey manages to come back and hooks a crucifix, which was one of his finishers but it only gets two here. Vader pounds him down in the corner and goes up again, only to get crotched. Back inside it’s Davey’s turn to pound him down. Vader gets in a boot though and the Vader Bomb gets two. The champ comes off the top but jumps into the powerslam, knocking down the referee in the process. Smith tries another powerslam but Race pulls the leg and Vader falls on top for the pin.

Rating: C-. Decent power match but I wasn’t thrilled with it. Smith’s style wasn’t all that great to mesh with Vader’s. It took someone with more speed or just an all out brawler for that to work, and it really didn’t click here. Still though, this was a decent main event, but the lack of star power really hurt things.

Cactus Jack makes his return with 15 seconds left and takes Vader down. The reaction is there but the time isn’t so we’re done.

Overall Rating: D. Not their best work but you have a classic comedy moment to check out so it’s worth something for that. This era was just awful for the company but brighter days were coming soon. The problem in short was that the stories just weren’t interesting and the two titles were a bad idea at this point. To be fair though, a lot of that can be blamed on the NWA. Not the worst show ever, but other than Shockmaster it’s not worth watching.

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