What the World Was Watching: WWF Wrestling Challenge – January 2, 1994

Jim Ross and Gorilla Monsoon are the commentary team, taped from Springfield, Massachusetts. This was the last episode of a taping that drew 4,000 fans to Springfield, Massachusetts on November 30.

Tatanka pins Tony DeVito after a flying chop at 2:48:

Tatanka was one of the WWF’s strongest midcard acts in 1993, appearing in more matches than any other wrestler. Arriving in 1992, he was prominently featured as a Native American athlete. Tatanka won a feud with Intercontinental Champion Shawn Michaels, beating the champion in a non-title match and six-man tag team match, but he failed to win the Intercontinental Championship at WrestleMania IX. Instead of being given more title matches, Tatanka was put in a long feud with Bam Bam Bigelow that never had a singles blowoff, although Tatanka teamed with the Smoking Gunns to beat Bigelow and the Headshrinkers at SummerSlam. A big part of Tatanka’s gimmick was a long televised unbeaten streak which got up to 84 matches until it was ended by Ludvig Borga in October. That loss resulted in a kayfabed injury that kept Tatanka out of Survivor Series and he began 1994 seeking revenge against Borga.

DeVito was a David Schultz trainee that was entering his fourth year in the wrestling business. He had been doing WWF squash matches since 1992 and appeared in 15 matches in 1993. He was often paired with Mike Bell in losing efforts to the Smoking Gunns, Money Incorporated, and the Steiner Brothers. DeVito would achieve his greatest fame in Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW) later in the decade as a member of Da Baldies.

Monsoon decides to put over some of DeVito’s amateur wrestling abilities so that Tatanka beating him looks better. DeVito shows off some of that ability by taking Tatanka to the mat with a fireman’s carry. However, Tatanka goes on the warpath after getting taken to the buckle and wins with a flying chop.

The Headshrinkers (1-0) beat John Crystal & Russ Greenberg when Fatu pins Crystal after the splash off the top rope at 2:45:

Greenberg was trained by former WWF enhancement talent Mario Mancini. The WWF thought of giving him a full-time position by putting him throughout multiple tryouts in 1992 but Greenberg was never deemed satisfactory enough to warrant a gimmick. Greenberg appeared in 11 matches in 1993, often losing against heels like Adam Bomb, Crush, Mr. Hughes, Razor Ramon, Shawn Michaels, Yokozuna, the Headshrinkers, the Quebecers, and Well Dunn.

Some of the action is sloppy as the enhancement talents miss their cue to shine as a team following an initial Headshrinker attack. The Headshrinkers dish out more punishment than their opponents can handle and Crystal takes the big moves at the end to lose.

Bret Hart warns fans not to drive and drive.

Doink the Clown (w/Dink) pins Duane Gill after the flying butt splash at 1:56:

The Doink gimmick went through a radical overhaul in 1993. Started by Matt Borne as an evil clown along the lines of Stephen King’s It, the character got over with longtime fans. Doink destroyed Crush in a feud to start 1993 and had good television matches – albeit losses – against Marty Jannetty, Mr. Perfect, and Randy Savage. After being called upon by Jerry Lawler to battle Bret Hart at SummerSlam and losing, Doink started to showcase babyface tendencies by pranking heels and that produced simultaneous feuds with Lawler and Bam Bam Bigelow. Unfortunately, Borne’s drug use backstage caused the WWF to suspend and then terminate his contract by the fall. Unwilling to scrap the character, the WWF gave it to Ray Apollo, an independent wrestler who was a veteran of New Japan Pro Wrestling and a friend of Bigelow’s. The WWF also took away any edge from the Doink character, pairing Doink with a little person named Dink, who was a carbon copy of Doink in miniature form. Dink was Tiger Jackson, who had wrestled in little person matches on house shows against Little Louie. The new Doink did not wrestle at Survivor Series against Bigelow’s team, opting to send Men on a Mission and the Bushwhackers in as the Four Doinks. The Doinks swept Bigelow’s team in a comedy match and the feud between Bigelow and his “main squeeze” Luna Vachon and Doink continued in 1994.

Gill developed a reputation as a trusted and reliable enhancement talent act like his tag team partner Barry Hardy. He started working WWF squash matches in 1991 and appeared 19 names under his own name in 1993. He and Hardy also worked under masks as the Executioners for several matches. Fans in the Attitude Era would develop a new respect for Gill when he would be recast as Gillberg, a parody of then-WCW Champion Bill Goldberg.

The pattern for new Doink matches was that Doink would work a few holds as Dink engaged the crowd on the ring apron and sometimes interfered by hitting wrestlers. Referees ignored conventional rules that seconds/managers should not be on the ring apron and never seemed to mind this. The crowd, possibly burned out by the taping, does not care about what Doink or Dink do. The clown wins after avoiding a Gill blind charge and hitting a flying butt splash.

Stan Lane conducts an in-ring interview with WWF Champion Yokozuna, Jim Cornette, and Mr. Fuji. Cornette repeats an argument from the previous year about how the WWF is out to get the champion, which is why Yokozuna is booked to face the Undertaker in a casket match at The Royal Rumble. The segment plays up Yokozuna’s fear of caskets as his eyes get big any time the word is mentioned. Cornette reminds fans that the Undertaker is only getting one shot at the title, just like Lex Luger at SummerSlam.

Men on a Mission (w/Oscar) beat Reno Riggins & Chris Duffy when Mabel pins Riggins after a drop toe hold-leg drop to the back of the head combination at 1:40:

Men on a Mission were composed of Mabel and Mo. They wore outlandish neon green, yellow, and purple outfits, which somehow related to their urban roots, reinforced by their manager Oscar doing fan-engaging raps on their way to the ring. The duo were undefeated in 1993, posting a 21-0 record, but that record was heavily padded as the only legitimate team they beat was WWF Tag Team Champions the Quebecers on Wrestling Challenge via count out. They were also not placed in a feud, so they wrestled Well Dunn and the Headshrinkers a lot at house shows the last six months of the year. The WWF had high hopes for Mabel, prominently featuring him. It seemed more likely that Mabel would get a singles push than the team would get into the Tag Team title picture.

Riggins was the last trainee of Memphis legend Tojo Yamamoto, starting his career on the Tennessee independent circuit in 1986. He did some WWF enhancement work in 1988, leaving for a while for enhancement stints in WCW, Global, and Smoky Mountain Wrestling (SMW). He returned in that role for the WWF in 1992. Like Duane Gill and Barry Hardy, Riggins was an often-used talent, appearing in more than 20 matches in 1993. Cast as a heel in some ridiculous trunks, Riggins ate losses against Razor Ramon, Owen Hart, Marty Jannetty, and others.

Duffy was a Killer Kowalski trainee that had been doing WWF enhancement matches since 1986. Like Riggins, the WWF used him more in 1993 than 1992 as Duffy worked ten times. His most notable appearance was on Monday Night RAW on April 12 when he was the opponent for Friar Ferguson in the only match the character had.

As has been the case for many of MOM’s matches, Mo is the weak link so Riggins gets some shots in on him before Mabel makes his presence felt. Although they often used an assisted splash, MOM use a Mo drop toe hold-Mabel leg drop to the back of the head combination to win which works just as well.

Irwin R. Schyster pins Mike Khoury after a back suplex at 1:49:

Longtime veteran Mike Rotunda was having a great run with the Irwin R. Schyster gimmick. Returning to the WWF in 1991, Rotunda was cast as an evil accountant. He started 1993 as Tag Team champions with Ted DiBiase as part of a team called Money Incorporated. They were part of the double main event of WrestleMania IX and beat the Mega-Maniacs of Hulk Hogan and Brutus Beefcake via disqualification. The team then feuded with the Steiner Brothers in the spring and summer, exchanging the Tag Team titles with them on multiple occasions as the WWF attempted to boost house show attendance. The team lost the feud in what would be their last match together, falling in a steel cage bout on the SummerSlam Spectacular cable special. After DiBiase left the company, IRS went into singles and was programmed against Razor Ramon, a feud that grew in importance when Ramon won the Intercontinental Championship in October. Ramon’s team beat IRS’ team at Survivor Series with Ramon pinning IRS during the match and IRS causing Ramon to get counted out later. Their feud continued toward a Royal Rumble showdown as IRS stole Ramon’s gold chains off camera and stashed them in his briefcase.

The camera tries to confirm that IRS has Ramon’s gold chains but IRS refuses to let them look in his briefcase. IRS opts not to win with the Write Off, doing a back suplex afterward for the win.

Shawn Michaels pins Bert Centeo after a flying elbow drop at 1:45:

Michaels’ singles push kept going in 1993, although it did encounter rough spots. He began the year as Intercontinental champion but had a disappointing match with former tag team partner Marty Jannetty at The Royal Rumble. When Jannetty was fired the next day, their feud was terminated and Michaels got plugged into a replacement feud with Tatanka. Michaels lost every televised match against the Native American star, including via count out at WrestleMania IX, but he did not lose his title. He started a feud with Mr. Perfect at that pay-per-view but also spent the spring in a mini-feud with Hacksaw Jim Duggan where, again, he got his butt handed to him but kept the title due to Yokozuna’s interference in a lumberjack match on Monday Night RAW. Jannetty returned in May, causing a surprised Michaels to drop the title, only to regain it a few weeks later with the help of a new, tall bodyguard named Diesel. More disappointing pay-per-view matches followed against Crush at The King of the Ring and Perfect at SummerSlam, although Michaels won both by outside interference. Michaels stock as a good wrestler did not collapse, though, as he put on one of the best matches of the year against Jannetty on a July episode of Monday Night RAW. Following the disappointing SummerSlam match against Perfect Michaels was suspended for elevated testosterone levels for six weeks. That caused him to be stripped of the Intercontinental Championship, which was later won by Razor Ramon. Michaels returned prior to Survivor Series where he was moved into the card as a replacement for Jerry Lawler. Even though Michaels’ team was destroyed, he only lost via count out. And the most important development for his character was that he carried around his Intercontinental title belt, arguing in promos that he never lost the title, did not recognize WWF President Jack Tunney’s authority to take the title from him, and that Ramon was not a legitimate champion. That set up a Ramon-Michaels feud for 1994.

Centeno was a Puerto Rican wrestler that broke into the business in 1985 for International World Class Championship Wrestling in the Northeast United States. After doing enhancement matches for the WWF in 1988 and 1989, he came back to do ten of them in 1993. Four of those were in tag team matches where Centeno had a different partner each time.

The best thing about Michaels’ suspension is that it allowed him to get back into shape as he was developing a gut from heavy eating and drinking on the road. Michaels experimented with different finishers in 1993, transitioning away from the Teardrop Suplex to a superkick to a piledriver. That experimentation continues today as he opts for a flying elbow drop finish after blasting Centeno with a superkick. After winning, Michaels gets on the microphone and hypes himself as the undisputed Intercontinental Champion. There is also an effort to put over his “Heartbreak Kid” nickname.

Tune in next week to see Tatanka, Crush, Ludvig Borga, and the 1-2-3 Kid & Marty Jannetty in action! There will also be an interview with the Undertaker!

The Last Word: This episode offered little beyond the exclusive Yokozuna promo and even that recycled a lot of material from what was said about the Yokozuna-Undertaker Royal Rumble match at the end of 1993. Jim Ross and Gorilla Monsoon do what they can to make the hour interesting but they can only do so much.

As 1994 began the WWF ran a few house shows to kick it off. Here were the results of those shows, courtesy of thehistoryofwwe.com:

Auburn Hills, Michigan – The Palace – January 1, 1994 (3,500): The 1-2-3 Kid beat Bastion Booger…The Steiner Brothers defeated WWF Tag Team Champions the Quebecers via disqualification…Crush beat Randy Savage via count out…Intercontinental Champion Razor Ramon defeated Shawn Michaels via count out…The Headshrinkers beat the Smoking Gunns…Doink the Clown defeated Bam Bam Bigelow…Lex Luger & Tatanka beat Yokozuna & Ludvig Borga.

Allentown, Pennsylvania – Agricultural Hall – January 1, 1994 (2,500; sellout): Men on a Mission defeated the Black Knight & the Red Knight (Barry Horowitz & Steve Lombardi)…Jeff Jarrett beat Marty Jannetty…The Undertaker defeated Adam Bomb (substituting for Diesel) in a casket match…Bob Backlund pinned Mike Sharpe (substituting for Adam Bomb)…Bret Hart defeated Irwin R. Schyster.

London, Ontario, Canada – London Gardens – January 2, 1994: The 1-2-3 Kid defeated Bastion Booger…WWF Tag Team Champions the Quebecers beat the Smoking Gunns…Intercontinental Champion Razor Ramon beat Shawn Michaels…Randy Savage defeated Crush…Lex Luger beat Ludvig Borga in a flag match…WWF Champion Yokozuna defeated Tatanka.

Backstage News*: Some of the house show business is recovering as a December 28 card in Chicago drew a crowd of more than 7,000 fans and a gate of $120,000 for a Bret Hart-Shawn Michaels cage match. Other matches that were hyped on the show were Randy Savage-Crush and Steiners-Quebecers. This is the WWF’s best performance in Chicago since Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair headlined in November 1991 for a $135,000 gate.

-Going head-to-head with Starrcade did not hurt the December 27 Monday Night RAW rating, which pulled a 2.9.

-The WWF is telling fans on television that The Royal Rumble is sold out but there are still lots of tickets available at the Providence Civic Center box office.

*Backstage news is provided courtesy of Dave Meltzer’s Wrestling Observer for January 10.

Up Next: Monday Night RAW for January 3!

And if you would like to read a compiled breakdown of 1990-1992 WWF, 1993 ECW, or of various promotions in 1995, check out my Amazon author page to purchase e-books or paperback copies!