What the World Was Watching: WWF Prime Time Wrestling – January 4, 1993

Vince McMahon, Gorilla Monsoon, and Bobby Heenan host what is the final Prime Time Wrestling broadcast, concluding the show’s eight-year run on USA Network. Monsoon argues that Heenan is responsible for the end of the show and that is why Heenan is not part of next week’s Monday Night RAW telecast.

A clip of the one episode Bobby Heenan Show that aired in 1989 is shown. It has a belly dancer moving on top of a blindfolded Jamison.

Opening Contest: The Headshrinkers (w/Afa) defeat El Matador & Virgil when Fatu pins Virgil after a splash off the top rope at 9:34 shown:

The Headshrinkers arrived in August 1992. Originally billed as the Samoans, they were given former WWF Tag Team champion Afa as a manager. The duo were rebranded as the Headshrinkers for their second match and they were undefeated to this point. Their biggest win came against High Energy in the opening match of the previous year’s Survivor Series. They also played a role in the Natural Disasters losing the WWF Tag Team titles to Money Incorporated and that set up a feud between the two, which abruptly ended at the end of the year when Earthquake and Typhoon were placed back into the singles ranks. Not getting a televised win over the former champions did little for the Headshrinkers but their brutal style helped them stand out among many of the new wrestlers the WWF signed.

El Matador was Tito Santana, a former two-time Intercontinental champion and two-time WWF Tag Team champion. He started 1992 as a repacked matador from Mexico, upgrading from white tights to long green ones. The cosmetic change did not usher in a stronger push, though, as El Matador plummeted down the card after winning a short house show program with Ted DiBiase. He lost the opening match of WrestleMania VIII to Shawn Michaels and failed to beat anyone of note the rest of the year, losing to Papa Shango, Ric Flair, Razor Ramon, and Bam Bam Bigelow. The last two matches were indicative of where the WWF saw El Matador’s position as Ramon and Bigelow soundly defeated him.

Like El Matador, Virgil started 1992 at a good clip. He beat Skinner, Irwin R. Schyster, and the Mountie but his fortunes turned after getting the winning pin in an eight-man tag team match at WrestleMania. Virgil was jobbed to Shawn Michaels as part of Michaels’ push up the midcard; lost a feud with the Repo Man; and was used to elevate rising heels on the roster like Nailz, Ramon, and Yokozuna.

Since El Matador and Virgil had declining fortunes in singles, it made sense to pair them up as a tag team, something they had done off and on since 1991. This match was filmed as part of the Superstars tapings in Green Bay, Wisconsin on December 14. The babyfaces get a long run on offense, although it is devoid of much impact. There are two hot tag sequences. The first is triggered by a failed Samu corner avalanche on Virgil, which hits the ring post, but El Matador ends up in peril himself when Afa trips him during an El Paso del Muerte attempt. The second happens after heel miscommunication during a clothesline spot. Virgil makes the dumb decision during his comeback to give the Headshrinkers a double DDT and double nogging knocker, but his opponents heads are imperious to pain so he is knocked down and finished with the Headshrinkers’ flying splash. A solid match to get over the Headshrinkers against name talent and their strength. Rating: **½

Heenan says that he would bet on Razor Ramon to win the WWF Championship at The Royal Rumble.

Footage of an old Prime Time episode on a Western set where Heenan was “blown up” by dynamite is shown.

Terry Taylor pins Dale Wolfe after a gutwrench powerbomb at 3:14:

Taylor, best known to WWF fans as the Red Rooster, came back under his own name in the fall of 1992. He arrived without much fanfare, receiving no vignettes and wrestling all his matches on Prime Time. Taylor failed to beat a name star, although he did wrestle a strong, competitive match against Randy Savage in December.

The nickname for Taylor in this run is “Terrific” and he has “Terrific Terry” in neon green plastered across the back of his short black tights. While Taylor looks great, the squash meanders until he catches Wolfe with a spinebuster off the ropes. He finishes with a gutwrench powerbomb right after.

Monsoon wonders who is going to be able to eliminate Yokozuna in the Royal Rumble. McMahon says it will take more than one man but Heenan makes a good point that no one is going to work together in the Rumble because everyone is going to looking out for themselves.

An old Prime Time clip of Monsoon and Heenan on a yacht airs.

Intercontinental Championship Match: Shawn Michaels (1-0) defeats Skinner after a superkick at 4:36:

Skinner was Southern star Steve Keirn who had been with the company since 1991. Like Taylor, Skinner was confined for much of 1992 to Prime Time Wrestling where his squashes were used as television filler. When he ventured outside of that orbit he lost badly, losing to Owen Hart in less than 70 seconds at WrestleMania, losing to the Ultimate Warrior in less than two minutes on Superstars, and losing to Tatanka in less than four minutes on Wrestling Challenge. If not for Taylor, one could argue that Skinner was the company’s lowest ranked heel for the year.

This match also took place in Green Bay and it was a rare heel vs. heel match from the era. And in kayfabe one wonders what Skinner did to deserve a title match since his biggest win the last six months was against Jim Powers. The match is one of Skinner’s best in a while because Michaels keeps moving and Skinner relies less on his long choking and chinlock spots. The crowd also becomes partial to the man from the Everglades because they hate Michaels more. Skinner gets a near-fall from a shoulderbreaker but a weakness in his strategy is continually tossing Michaels out of the ring. Michaels wises up to that after a while and slides under Skinner’s legs to re-enter, blasting his opponent with a superkick to retain. Rating: *½

A clip from 1991 of Bret Hart painting a portrait of the Nasty Boys as the Nasties vandalized Titan Towers is shown.

Heenan keeps complaining about not getting to participate on Monday Night RAW.

Another clip from 1991 is shown. This time it shows Andre the Giant forcing Heenan to make wine.

McMahon invites fans to tune in for next week’s Monday Night RAW show. Heenan promises to be there one way or the other. To wrap up the show, Jamison comes by and presents Heenan with a piece of corn, which he calls a “Corny” as an award for Heenan’s service over the years. Heenan rejects the gift and gets sick, running off the set to end the show.

The Last Word: While it was sad to see Prime Time Wrestling end its run, which signified the end of an era of the WWF’s early expansion programming, it was also time. The show had declining ratings for years and attempts to reboot it with different formats like a studio audience and roundtable format had failed. The only time that ratings improved was when the WWF loaded it with feature matches but as the roster shrank and the WWF no longer televised house shows in Boston, Philadelphia, or New York City there was less of an emphasis on that. Switching to a live television show, which was the plan for Monday Night RAW, was a daring move but a needed one as wrestling began to evolve from a house show business to a business dependent on television ratings and pay-per-view buys. The negative was that fans would be treated to one less hour of programming each Monday as RAW would only air for one hour versus Prime Time’s two hours. The WWF was given compensation with a Saturday morning show called WWF Mania but that show was largely a recap of syndicated programming so some segments of the fanbase thought they were losing out. For a final show, this had some decent matches but one wishes there had been more time to air more classic clips for longtime fans.

Up Next: WWF Superstars for January 9!