5-Star Match Reviews: Sting’s Squadron vs. The Dangerous Alliance – WarGames XXIV – WCW WrestleWar 1992

Full disclosure to get things started here: I had never watched a WarGames match prior to this. Not the originals and not the new ones in NXT or AEW. The originals took place before I got into wrestling and from the summary clips I’ve gathered from the resurrected ones in the 2010s to today the newer ones are basically timed spotfests inside two enclosed rings instead of one. That being said there’s this almost universal admiration for WarGames as a stipulation and this one in particular stands above the rest. I’ve read in other places that this match is something akin to a canonical or critical piece of American wrestling history which is enough to convince me to check it out and see how it holds up in 2025.

Now, my having never seen this match before actually helps because I can go into this blind and not know all that much about what’s going on. Thus it falls on the commentators to explain this match to viewers like me. And lo and behold do Jesse Ventura and Jim Ross to an OUTSTANDING job of setting the scene and summarizing key points to viewers both new and existing.

The Story

Sting had been involved in a brutal and personal feud with The Dangerous Alliance for months, going as far back as Starrcade ’91, with the Alliance going after Sting because he was considered “the franchise” of WCW. The Alliance wanted to destroy the WCW that Sting represented and thus put together a crew of some of the most capable villains they could fine: Arn Anderson, Larry Zbyszko, Bobby Eaton, Steve Austin and their biggest star Rick Rude.

Meanwhile Sting gathered a crew of allies that had been likewise drawn into feuds with the Alliance, including Barry Windham, Ricky “the Dragon” Steamboat, the relatively inexperienced Dustin Rhodes, and Nikita Koloff. That last one was especially important because there was a concern that Koloff wasn’t as loyal to Sting as the others, which left people wondering if Koloff would betray his friend Sting and join the Alliance.

The Match

This took place on May 17, 1992.

We get an early shot of the Dangerous Alliance in a football huddle with Paul E Dangerously-Heyman laying out the plan and revealing that Steve Austin will enter first for his side while Barry Windham enters for the Squadron. The bell rings and the match starts with a punch exchange that Windham wins. Windham avoids being sent into the steel and then the guys exchange basic moves as JR explains the stipulation and how no falls can take place until everyone is inside. A coin toss will determine whose side will enter next which will ultimately affect the pacing of the match going forward. We get some more brawling as Windham avoids a dropkick and flapjacks Austin to the mat. Windham launches Austin into the cage wall and now Austin’s bleeding as the final minute of the first periods begins. Windham continues to target Austin’s open wound when the coin toss takes place. It’s tails which means Rick Rude enters on behalf of the Dangerous Alliance.

Windham fights Rude off as much as he can but it’s not long before Austin recovers enough to make this a two-on-one situation. Aided diving clothesline on Windham. Then the two minutes run out and Ricky Steamboat comes in next. Huge babyface shine for Steamboat as the crowd and commentators collectively lose their minds. Austin tries cutting him off but Steamboat’s still fresh and easily dodges and lands a headscissor into mounted punches on Rude. Next is Arn Anderson for the DA and he makes a beeline for his former partner Barry Windham. He spikes Windham with a DDT and plants Steamboat with a spinebuster. He and Rude lock in a double crab on Steamboat. Nice, something new. Windham breaks it up and then the action descends into chaos among these five men.

The sixth man is Dustin Rhodes. Rhodes shines as he takes out Austin and Anderson as Steamboat locks in a crab on Rude. The spots get bigger and bigger as Rhodes lands an electric chair on Austin and Windham traps Anderson between the rings while Steamboat traps Rude in a Figure-4. Next comes Larry Zbyszko who immediately gets jumped by Rhodes. The attention shifts to the DA’s valet Madusa who climbs the cage and drops Paul E’s giant-ass 1980s cellphone down into the rings. Now the Dangerous Alliance have a weapon and Arn Anderson’s happy to use it.

More chaos as random people get thrown into the cage wall. And then in comes Sting. He runs in and makes quick work of both Anderson and Rude, press slamming the latter into the cage ceiling several times in the process. He and Steamboat do a wishbone spot on Rude, stretching his legs apart between the rings. The last man in for the Dangerous Alliance is Bobby Eaton who runs in and knocks several people down. Rhodes is bleeding pretty heavily too now. Then the last man in is Nikita Koloff and he enters with plenty of speculation surrounding him. Will he remain loyal to his teammates or will he turn? In comes Koloff. Now the Match Beyond Begins.

Koloff saves Sting from a beatdown and then shoves him aside to take a bullet for him. Then both Koloff and Sting land counter clotheslines. Big babyface hug. Rude keeps trying to remove one of the turnbuckles but keeps getting cut off. Sting locks Anderson in the Scorpion Deathlock. Rhodes locks Zbyszko in a Figure-4 but he still doesn’t give up. More random holds, dives, slams, and struggles all across both rings. Zbyszko takes over with that one corner and manages to grab a metal turnbuckle bar and turn it into a weapon. Zbyszko swings it at Sting…and hits Eaton instead. Sting knocks Zbyszko away and locks Eaton in an armbar. Eaton surrenders. Sting’s Squadron win WarGames XXIV.

Winners after 23:27: Sting’s Squadron (Sting, Barry Windham, Ricky “The Dragon” Steamboat, “The Natural” Dustin Rhodes, Barry Windham and Nikita Koloff

Review

That was tons of fun. Those 23 minutes just flew by thanks to outstanding pacing and a constant feeling of freshness. While there was lots of token plunder and carnage that sense of violence and randomness that fed into the grudge match nature behind this match. It wasn’t meant to be a MOVEZ match or a display of in-ring creativity of its own sake; it was meant to be a violent brawl without descending into pure hardcore carnage. They struck a delicate balance between making this a brawl while still retaining its overall pro-wrestling wrapping. One could watch this without understanding the weeks or months-long story and still enjoy the match for its action and thanks to story elements added through largely flawless ringside commentary. That makes it a rare gem of a match, especially with so many classics from more recent times requiring either an extended pre-match explanation video or some kind of handbook to explain the story to a new viewer.

What separates this match from later reincarnations and especially the NXT ones is that the sense of chaos and the multiple things happening at once work to the match’s advantage. From the few clips I’ve seen of modern WarGames matches they have a much more structured and rigid format with little happening between key spots. So what you get with modern WarGames is lots of high highs positioned next to long down times and a sense of emptiness in the interim. Here there was this constant state of worry and chaos where something could change at any second. It was as if each wrestler had a game plan in their heads but knew something unplanned could happen at any moment – even if it didn’t – and they had to adapt accordingly. It felt more unscripted and freeform which helped the match progress faster and gave it more of that “real fight” atmosphere. I know some people prefer the more spot-heavy stuff from the modern day but if you ask me the older stuff holds up better. There’s much more to be said about a match that feels satisfying and doesn’t dip at all compared to a match that might to wilder stuff but concentrate said wildness into a fewer spots while the rest contains very little.

And again, special thanks is needed to Jesse Ventura and Jim Ross for explaining key details about individuals and building anticipation for the next entrant. Having spent decades listening a huge gambit of commentary styles, from Michael Cole parrot Vince McMahon and call matches with the enthusiasm of a robot to Mauro Ranallo’s at times overexaggerated excitement and random catchphrases, it was refreshing hearing two commentators take what they were witnessing seriously while ALSO adding their own personalities through banter that didn’t take away from the match. I know there are many of you who visit this site who’ve said you turn commentary off because sometimes it can be annoying; well this match featured none of that and their efforts helped make this into a tremendous watching experience.

When it comes to flaws, I’m really grasping at straws here since there wasn’t anything inherently “wrong” with it. The only nitpicks I could think of are the growing sense of repetition during the middle stages when bodies keep entering and Larry Zbyszko’s entry being overshadowed by Madusa climbing the cage and the weapon she dropped in shifting the focus onto Anderson. But ultimately that didn’t matter since the overall tone and feel of the match – this sense of settling the score in one final bloodbath – remained the same.

Final Rating: *****

I don’t give out 5-Star ratings often. The people who wrote before me have largely been right in that this is a seminal classic in American pro-wrestling history. Yes, it’s far from what wrestling has become and to a modern or present-day viewer it might come across as overly simplistic or repetitive at times. But there was a larger story at play here that put an emphasis on personal beef over showing off or being entertaining. This wasn’t pro-wrestling as a show but pro-wrestling as a fight that just also happened to be fun to watch. The modern landscape has gone too far in the direction of being phoney or overly surreal so matches like this that remind viewers or what wrestling used to be are sorely needed.

I don’t know how some of you keep your old wrestling vids, whether you keep old VHS or DVD collections, or whether you use downloader tools to save videos. But whatever methods you use I recommend keeping this classic alive as long as you can. Personally I never thought I’d live to see the day when WWE would be uploading lost classics to YouTube for free, especially in this age of fanatical IP protection and an obsession with monetizing every piece of media imaginable. So if you haven’t seen this match ever or if you’re feeling nostalgic about wrestling from a bygone (read: better) era you can catch this classic in the link above.

Thanks for reading.