Mike Reviews Shows Considered To Be Stinkers – iGW Rodman Down Under

Happy Stinky Saturday Everyone!

Today we’re going to look at another show with a bad reputation, as we give the floor to iGW and their disastrous pay per view event from 2000 featuring Dennis Rodman. iGW stands for i-Generation Wrestling, a company who operated out of Australia and thought that they could crack the wrestling market by running shows that contained a combination of star wrestlers from the 80’s and 90’s combined with the unmistakable star power of Dennis Rodman.

I joke, but I remember seeing a report of this show here in the UK due to the involvement of Rodman, although I think it was on Channel 5, which was in distant fifth place in levels of importance when it came to the five main terrestrial channels over here in the UK at the time. According to Cage Match; Rodman Down Under somehow managed to draw 10,000 people to an arena in Sydney, which is either incorrect or a testament to how starved for live wrestling the Aussies were at the time.

Rodman Down Under also scored a pitiful 2 out of 10 over on Cage Match, and Scott Keith famously hated the show at the time as well. So…….I’m not entirely optimistic here, but maybe iGW’s Rodman show won’t be as bad as it sounds? Right? RIGHT?!?!

You can view the card for Rodman Down Under by clicking the link below; and you can also look at more Stinker reviews by checking the archives.

https://www.cagematch.net/?id=1&nr=22056&page=3

Rodman Down Under is emanating from Sydney, Australia on the 30th of July 2000 (PPV aired on 9th of November 2000)

Calling the action are Vince Mancini and Ted Dibiase

The opening video package shows Dennis Rodman continuously attacking Curt Hennig in order to set up their match for later on.

The commentary team hypes up the Main Event, and explain that it’s No DQ and Falls Count Anywhere when they meet later on. Remember that for later…

Curt Hennig joins us for some promo time in the ring. I’m not sure why there’s this much pre-amble for a one shot pay per view event. Get the show going guys, we don’t need ALL of this backstory for Curt Hennig to wrestle Dennis Rodman. Hennig doesn’t think that Rodman will have the guts to show up tonight, and he even drops an S Bomb at one stage, so you know he’s serious! Rodman does eventually join us, as I can’t work out if the generic music everyone is using is actually what they had on the night or if it was dubbed in at a later date. Rodman cuts a generic Heel promo, which leads to Hennig getting the crowd to chant that Rodman does the opposite of blowing. That was a pretty straightforward segment that wasn’t horrible, but I’m not sure we needed it on the pay per view.

We get clips from a press conference, where The Public Enemy attacked The Road Warriors from behind in order to set up the next match.

Opening Match
Double Tables Match for the iGW Tag Team Titles
Champs: The Public Enemy (Flyboy Rocco Rock and Johnny Grunge) Vs The Road Warriors (Hawk and Animal)

First team to put both members of the opposing team through a table wins the match. I don’t think you could call this a Dream Match or anything, but they hadn’t been in a televised match together since 1996 and they’d never really had a full on feud either, so booking them against one another isn’t the worst idea. I think the stipulation will help here, as wild brawl was the best you were going to get out of these two teams in the year 2000. That press conference attack has established TPE as the Heels, with even Dibiase casting some shade about them on commentary for being violent street brawlers and not technical wrestlers. iGW has at least been smart enough to put TPE in one of the two characters they do well, the first being violent hoodlums and the second being comedy hardcore guys.

TPE cuts a generic Heel promo before the match, just to make sure that the fans keep booing them I guess. Again, this wasn’t a terrible promo, but I’m not sure it was really needed. There’s been quite a bit of filler here thus far. That could possibly be because they don’t think the wrestling will hold up on it’s own so they’ve got to dress the show up with other stuff in order to keep things going. The production during the entrance of The Road Warriors is pretty good for a smaller company like this, with The Roadies getting some nice pyrotechnics. I’m thinking they’re dubbing in generic music for The Road Warriors here as the crowd reactions don’t appear to be matching what the live crowd is actually doing, which is usually a telltale sign that the audio has been dubbed. Why not just give them generic rights free music for them to enter to on the show itself if you knew it was being filmed? At least then you get to keep the crowd reactions.

For some reason we’re doing tag rules here, which I never understood in table matches because it’s not like those matches have DQ’s. Just make it a Tornado brawl like The Dudleyz Vs Hardyz match from Royal Rumble 2000, which is probably still the best version of that gimmick. Dibiase makes some disparaging comments about Grunge’s weight during this, but it’s not like either LOD member looks like they did in their prime here, with both of them sporting notable guts, although you can tell that they still lift a bit based on their arms and the fact they can throw TPE around with relative ease in the early going. TPE eventually manages to drag Animal to the floor, where he eats a chair shot and also gets flung into the metal railings at ringside. Hawk doesn’t come over to help, even though his partner is getting battered and there technically aren’t any rules in this match.

Animal actually sells reasonably well during the heat, with TPE keeping it mostly basic with their offence, so it’s serviceable action, with Animal even busting out a Sunset Flip at one point, even though such an act is pointless in a tables match. I wonder why they even bothered making this a tables match actually, as it’s not like they’ve really used the gimmick. They could have easily just done a normal tag match, seeing as that what they’ve essentially worked here anyway. Hawk eventually gets the hot tag and runs wild on both members of TPE, getting Rude Awakenings to both of the Champs. We look to be finally getting the wild brawl that this should have been all along, as Rocco Rock gets a TOPE CON HILO to put Hawk through a table to eliminate him.

Rocco Rock introduces a chair to proceedings following that, as the commentary team put him over for carrying the team. Was Grunge on the outs with the promotion at the time whilst Rocco was remaining on the roster? I ask because the commentary team has been burying Grunge from the opening bell whilst being nicer about Rocco, which makes me think that iGW was mad at Grunge for something and the commentary team was briefed to target Grunge whilst handling the call. TPE look to fling Animal through a table in the corner, but he ends up Spearing BOTH of TPE through the table, and that counts as both of them being eliminated, meaning that The Road Warriors are our new Champs!

WINNERS AND NEW CHAMPIONS: THE ROAD WARRIORS
RATING: *3/4

Thoughts: This wasn’t awful, but it took way too long for them to get to the metaphorical firework’s factory. The bit where they were brawling was fine, and if we’d got 6-8 minutes of that then this would have probably ended up being a serviceable opener. As it was, we had to sit through them doing a normal tag match for a bit, which made no sense as there are no rules in a tables match. Why both teams were patiently waiting for tags instead of just going at it when there were no rules to enforce them to remain on the apron is beyond me. Still, when you consider how washed everyone in this match was, this could have been a lot worse

The i-Generettes dance for us. They are basically the iGW version of the Nitro Girls. The music they dance to has way to much percussion in it, to the point that it becomes really obnoxious. The ladies themselves do nothing wrong, although I don’t think this is really adding much to the broadcast.

Match Two
Hardcore Rules
The Barbarian Vs Brute Force

Brute Force is a new gimmick for Ed Leslie, who will likely be better known to most of you as Brutus Beefcake. Crazed barber was a shockingly effective mid-card gimmick for Leslie, and he had a decent run in the WWF with it, but once he left that company, and could no longer use that character, he struggled to find something that worked as well as that one did. Barbarian had stints in both the WWF and WCW, where he mostly spent his time in tag teams with other bruisers like Fatu and Meng. This seems like kind of a random match, but letting these two clobber one another with weapons should hopefully provide some interest to a match that otherwise might be a bit dull.

Brute Force does his best New Jack impression by bringing a trolley full of weapons down to the ring with him, although I doubt we’ll get to see a balcony dive in this one. The crowd seems pretty flat for this, and they don’t seem to know who they are supposed to cheer for, with neither one of the wrestlers really playing a clear Heel or Face in the early going. Once the action starts, it becomes basically every hardcore match from the late 90’s/early 00’s, with both wrestlers taking it in turns to hit one another with the assorted weaponry, such as metal bins and whatnot, without much in the way of transitions or storytelling in the match itself.

It’s kind of boring in all honesty, and the flat crowd reactions don’t help in that regard. Usually hardcore matches like this are an easy way to get a crowd to react, but it’s not really working here. It feels at times like this is just two guys punching and going through the motions until they’re allowed to call things a day and pick up their pay packet. The fight eventually heads to the floor, where Brute Force tries to choke Barbarian with a bin on the entrance ramp, but Barbarian no sells it and fights back. Back in the ring, Barbarian can barely muscle Brute Force up for a suplex. I can’t work out if that was due to Brute Force sandbagging Barbarian, Barbarian not being strong enough to do the move anymore, or a combination of the two.

Brute Force manages to catch Barbarian with a Stunner, DDT and Piledriver, but none of those moves can keep Barbarian down. Hey, at least we finally saw something approaching wrestling! Brute Force tries coming off the second rope with a metal bin lid shot, but Barbarian catches him with a kick on the way down and that’s enough for three. That finish was weaker than a watered down pint of Skol.

WINNER: THE BARBARIAN
RATING: 1/2*

Thoughts: Yeah, this was pretty bad, with neither wrestler seemingly knowing how to put a match like this together, and the crowd not really caring about what action we got. It was mostly just them trading weapon shots and the match meandered until it was time to end things

We get more of the i-Generettes, dancing to a track that sounds like it could be in the menu screen of a WipEout game.

Match Three
Special Women’s Attraction
Brandi Wine w/ Sugar Daddy Vs Sweet Destiny w/ Aussie Joe

I don’t really know who any of these people are. Wine was trained by Tim Blaze and mostly wrestled in the USA, whilst Destiny was trained by Johnny Rodz. I’m not sure either of these women were the cream of the crop of the women’s wrestling scene, but at least iGW is bothering to put a women’s match on I guess. Sugar Daddy is probably the biggest star of everyone involved here, as he is a former WWF Tag Champ as Typhoon, although I didn’t recognise him at first as he looks more like The Big Boss Man if he dressed up as Coach John Tolos from when he was managing Mr. Perfect. Joe is apparently a boxer, and he went 15 rounds with Muhammed Ali, which is some achievement.

Aussie Joe is wearing a referee shirt here for some reason, even though he’s there just to keep an eye on Sugar Daddy. Dibiase is all excited about this potentially becoming a cat fight, although they work it as a wrestling match in the early going. Wine is actually doing a good job playing to the crowd here, and plays the role of an annoying Heel quite well. Destiny wastes time during the shine by looking to the crowd for approval though, and that allows Wine to cut Destiny off and work some heat. Wine focuses on general Heel tactics during the heat, such as hair pulls and choking. We of course get the hairmare, as this has been a total Moolah match thus far. That poisonous bint set North American wrestling back years by making women’s matches all about hair pulling and chicanery instead of actual wrestling.

The crowd pretty much dies once the heat segment begins, even though Destiny does a solid enough job selling everything. It’s another dull match really, even though both of the wrestlers are putting in the effort. Wine gives Destiny an utterly horrible powerbomb out on the floor at one stage, which is so bad that I’d be amazed if it’s never found it’s way into Maffew’s hands. Some of Destiny’s rope running is pretty awful, as she doesn’t so much hit the ropes as she does barely brush against them. Suger Daddy ends up tripping Destiny when it looks like she might fight back, which leads to Aussie Joe challenging Sugar Daddy to some fisticuffs. That goes about as well for Sugar Daddy as you’d expect, with him taking the best bump in the entire match for a Joe punch. It’s the most the crowd has cared about the match too.

You’d think that would be the cue for the finish seeing as we’ve hit the peak of the match, but the two women continue wrestling for a bit longer, as the momentum just grinds to a halt. Destiny gets an okay German Suplex and an iffy Snap Suplex, but she takes too long on the top rope and gets thrown off Flair style by Wine. However, Wine also takes too long on top, and that leads to Destiny getting a terrifying looking Superplex for three. It looked like Wine nearly got spiked on that, with the move more resembling a DDT in it’s final form.

WINNER: SWEET DESTINY
RATING: *

Thoughts: Another match that wasn’t very good, although they were trying at least. It certainly wasn’t a lazy effort, but the match went on for too long and I just can’t get into this hair pulling shenanigans based 70’s styled women’s wrestling. Thank goodness the standard has improved significantly in the modern age

We get more i-Generettes. Okay guys, we get it, they’re hot and they dance. Do we really need them to come out and dance after EVERY match on this card?

Match Four
iGW Australasian Title
Champ: The Native American Tatanka Vs The One Man Gang

This is another bout where it’s hardly a Dream Match, but it’s not a match we’ve ever really seen before due to them never sharing a locker room in a major promotion before. That’s not to say that the match will be GOOD of course, but at least I get the thought process behind presenting it. There’s a “Where is Akeem?” sign in the crowd, which is possibly the highlight of the evening thus far. OMG cuts a pre-match promo, where he riles up the crowd and does a decent job to be fair, even if it is a bit cheesy when he’s yelling at the crowd to shut their “pie-holes” and whatnot. The wacky techno disco entrance music they have for Tatanka doesn’t suit him at all, but it is pretty funny.

Some of OMG’s selling in this one is a little goofy, but they do a good job of working in a babyface shine for Tatanka, as he survives the initial Gang attacks and then fires off some chops. Gang does his best Larry Z impression by yelling at the crowd and stalling outside the ring, but Tatanka is smart enough not to follow his bigger more brawling based opponent at first. Hey, a babyface that isn’t a total doofus, what are the odds! The fans are pelting OMG with plastic bottles, as I’m starting to think that The Gang should have been the lead Heel here and not Dennis Rodman. It’s nice to see that the crowd cares about this one at least, and the action hasn’t been terrible either. Gang is a serviceable big man Heel and Tatanka is serviceable traditional fiery babyface, so they have a thoroughly competent match going on here.

The match is pretty back and forth in the first half, with Tatanka able to fight back whenever it looks like OMG is going to cut the Champ off and work some heat. We even get an Aloha-Gang at one stage, but the resulting Sunset Flip does not succeed in getting Tatanka the three count. They are working quite hard here in all honesty, with both of the wrestlers getting worn out by their efforts. Tatanka eventually misses an elbow drop, and that leads to Gang working some heat, including the dreaded Nerve Pinch, a move I really don’t like, especially when it’s done by big guys. It just looks lazy and it makes no sense that a big dude like Gang would use that when he could clamp in a chin lock or a Camel Clutch in order to make his opponent carry his weight.

Tatanka manages to dodge a Splash in the corner and makes a bit of a comeback, but Gang manages to fire back with a big leg drop, although he misses whatever the follow-up attack is (we didn’t get to see it as the camera cut away to crowd reaction shots). Tatanka keeps fighting, and Gang takes some decent bumps for the Champ here. The ref ends up getting accidentally squished in the corner, which leads to OMG trying to come off the top with something. Gang takes too long though and gets thrown back into the ring by Tatanka, which is followed by Tatanka coming off the top with a chop for the visual pin fall. The referee starts waking up, just as Gang clobbers Tatanka with a International Object for three. I bet it felt like rain on his wedding day.

WINNER AND NEW CHAMPION: ONE MAN GANG
RATING: **1/2

Thoughts: This was a decent match. Both of the wrestlers worked hard and the crowd was into it, with the wrestling itself being basic but to an okay standard. It’s not going to challenge the MOTY ballot, but it was “perfectly cromulent” as Scott Keith might say

In the shock of all shocks, the i-Generettes dance. Again. Hopefully for the last time tonight.

Main Event
Australian Outback Rules for the iGW World Title
Champ: “Mr. Spiffy” Curt Hennig Vs “Rodzilla” Dennis Rodman

Hennig is the babyface Champ here defending the honour of didgeridoos the world over against the heinous action movie star wannabe that is Rodzilla. In reality, Hennig was probably the only guy on the roster that they trusted to actually get anything out of Rodman, seeing as Rodman had probably wrestled less than five proper matches up to this point in his career. Hennig would normally make more sense as a cocky Heel, but I think the folks at iGW correctly assumed that nobody would want to cheer for Rodman, so they’ve booked Hennig as the bad ass babyface here.

Rodman clobbers Hennig with the title belt to start, leading to Hennig doing a blade job. So we’re straight into shortcut territory then, which makes sense I guess. Rodman’s punches aren’t utterly terrible at least. Hennig eventually fights back with assorted weaponry, as I start to think that this one would benefit from having music playing in the background. Hennig actually does a decent job holding this together, with Rodman only having to deliver and receive basic offence. Rodman does seem rather ungainly in there though, especially when he takes bumps, as he kind of just flails around and it isn’t very smooth.

Rodman ends up attacking the referee, and that leads to a DQ?! WTF?!?! They’ve spent the entire match hitting each other with weapons but attacking the ref leads to a DQ? What a positively awful ending to, what had been up to that point, a reasonable bout. Please make that make sense for me gang, because I’m at a loss.

WINNER BY DQ AND STILL CHAMPION: CURT HENNIG
RATING: *

Thoughts: That was an okayish New Jack styled brawl for the most part, but the finish was not only lame, but also didn’t make any sense, and flushed away any goodwill I might have had

The fight continues following the match, with Stone Cold Steve Hennig beating up everyone who comes close. The live crowd are of course disgusted by the finish and throw trash at everyone and everything.

Hennig gets medical assistance backstage and says he proved he was the better man. Well, considering Rodman is a self professed worm, that’s not a huge achievement.

Is It Really A Stinker?

Had the Main Event delivered, I might have said no, but the terrible finish dragged it down and took the show all the way to Stinkertown. Obviously you do have to grade shows like this on a curve due to them lacking the budget and talent of those of major promotions, and normally that would be enough of a mitigating factor for me to ease off a bit.

However, iGW could have just put on a straightforward 5 match card with the veterans they had and kept the nonsense to a minimum. Had they done so, it wouldn’t have been the most exciting event ever, but I could have cut them some slack and excused the shows weaker aspects to some degree as at least they wouldn’t have done anything overly aggravating. But when you stuff the show with filler segments and then give the Main Event THAT finish, I’m going to laser focus on everything, because now you’re actively wasting my time.

Final Rating – Stinker

(Scores based on a scale of Stinker/Stinky/Odourless/Pleasant/Fragrant)