Mike Reviews WWF In Your House 17: Ground Zero

Happy In Your House Friday Everyone!

Ground Zero is a name that I think had a slightly less severe connotation in 1997 than it would post 2001 seeing as Ground Zero was the name most associated with the area effected by the 9/11 attacks. In 1997 though it was just a goofy name for another WWF pay per view

Ground Zero was the first full-length In Your House Event, as the shows had previously been only 2 hours long. However, WCW were doing 12 full-length pay per views a month by this stage so the WWF had to follow suit

We’ve got Shawn Michaels Vs The Undertaker, with Taker looking to batter Shawn for what happened back at SummerSlam. We’ve also got evil Canadian Bret Hart taking on the flag waving Pro USA Patriot. If both of those bouts are good then the show itself should hopefully have some value. Let’s see if Ground Zero can deliver

You can view the full card for Ground Zero below;

WWF In Your House 17: Ground Zero Card

Ground Zero is emanating from the Louisville Gardens in Louisville, Kentucky on the 7th of September 1997

Calling the action are Vince McMahon Jr, Jim Ross and Jerry Lawler

We get the opening video package, detailing Shawn Michael’s Heel turn after blasting Undertaker with a chair, once accidentally and twice definitely on purpose

We see clips from Raw, where Brian Pillman claimed that Dustin Rhodes’ daughter, Dakota, was Pillman’s love child, which Dustin did NOT take well obviously

Opening Match
Indecent Proposal
“Loose Cannon” Brian Pillman Vs “The Bizarre” Goldust w/ Marlena

Goldust got a win over Pillman back at SummerSlam, meaning that Pillman had to wear a dress for a month. Pillman wanted a rematch here and said he would leave Goldust and Marlena alone should he lose by leaving the WWF forever, but if Pillman wins he gets Marlena for a month. Exploitative as this storyline was, it certainly has captured the imagination of the live crowd at Ground Zero, as they cheer wildly whenever Goldust hammers away on Pillman here, with Pillman selling and begging off like a good cowardly Heel. Pillman was far past his physical prime at this stage due to as serious car crash in 1996, so he can’t really do much on offence other than punches, chops and standard Heel tactics like biting, choking, eye gouges etc.

Pillman does manage to take a couple of big bumps though, including getting dropped crotch first onto the top rope and getting suplexed out onto the ramp. Goldust tries going after Pillman’s surgically repaired ankle at one stage, but the crowd doesn’t respond that loudly, possibly not getting what Goldust was going for? Pillman keeps drawing good Heel heat here, although there are some more rebellious fans in the crowd who boo Goldust a bit. Interestingly it sounds like the women are pro-Goldust and the dudes are pro-Pillman, which makes sense seeing as a woman’s liberty is on the line in this one so the women would obviously want Goldust to prevail.

Pillman’s little buddies continue getting walloped when Goldust crotches Pillman on the top rope, and then we get a pretty shocking spot considering just how knackered Pillman was at the time, as Goldust flings Pillman off the second rope onto the metal railings at ringside. Marlena adds a slap out there, which isn’t a DQ, because Attitude Era I guess. Pillman manages to fight off a Superplex and actually tries coming off the top with a Missile Dropkick, but Goldust dodges it and gets the Curtain Call. Ref Earl Hebner took a stray hand to the eye during the move though, meaning there’s no one to count. This allows Pillman to steal Marlena’s purse and clock Goldust with it for three once the referee recovers in around 11 Minutes.

WINNER: BRIAN PILLMAN
RATING: **3/4

Thoughts: Just a standard punch and kick match for the most part due to Pillman’s litany of physical issues, but it had great crowd heat and both wrestlers were putting the effort in, so it ended up being a decent opener. Pillman took some frankly insane bumps here considering he could barely even move, and it added to the match

Pillman grabs Marlena and heads for the hills. The eventual payoff was I believe going to be Marlena switching Heel following her month with Pillman, but then Brian Pillman died and they just had Goldust go Heel instead and then had him shack up with Luna Vachon. Lawler reveals that Marlena’s purse had a brick in it, which is why it was enough for the finish

Match Two
Special Light Heavyweight Contest
“Too Sexy” Brian Christopher Vs Scott Putski

This was the WWF having a go at doing their own version of WCW’s Cruiserweight division, although it didn’t really work because WCW’s division was all about smaller guys who worked an exciting style that made them feel different, whilst the WWF Light Heavyweights just wrestled like the bigger wrestlers but were just a bit smaller. There’s an added layer here of this being a match between sons of famous wrestlers, with Christopher being the son of Jerry Lawler whilst Putski is the son of Ivan Putski. Jerry Lawler of course denies that Christopher is his son, because he doesn’t want people to know that he’s old enough to have a son. Christopher actually seems to be the more popular of the two here, possibly because he wrestled for quite a while in the USWA and that promotion was known locally in Louisville? They have an okay match here, nothing amazing but a solid enough back and forth match. Again, it mostly looks like two smaller heavyweights going at it, but it’s fine for an undercard match. Sadly they have to end it abruptly, as Christopher dives out onto Putski and Putski hurts his leg, leading to Christopher getting the count out win after about 5 Minutes.

WINNER: BRIAN CHRISTOPHER
RATING: N/A

Thoughts: I can’t rate it due to how the match couldn’t be completed, but it wasn’t bad up to that point. It wasn’t even remotely on par with what the Eddy Guerrero’s, Rey Mysterio Jr’s, Juventud Guerrera’s, Psicosis’ and Ultimo Dragon’s were doing over in WCW though, and was a warning sign that the WWF wasn’t really sure what it was doing with this division

Jerry Lawler mocks Putski on he mic following the match, as I think there was supposed to be a Heel beatdown there but then they called it off when they realised that Putski was legitimately hurt

Sunny lets us know that Brian Pillman called the Superstar Line whilst driving away with Marlena, but we’ll have to call in to hear it. That extends to Canada and the UK as well. Lucky us…

We see some footage from the GANG WARZ!!!

Match Three
Gang Warz
Faarooq (Nation of Domination) Vs Savio Vega (Los Boricuas) Vs Crush (Disciples of Apocalypse)

The GANG WARZ was the WWF’s attempt at doing faction warfare. We’ve got the leaders going at it here, with Farooq the leader of the militant African American faction, Savio the leader of the Puerto Rican street thugs and Crush the leader of the big angry bikers. Not seen here are The Truth Commission, who were apartheid South Africans. This is probably because their leader was an actor from South Africa that Bret Hart met, so he wouldn’t be able to wrestle in a match like this at Ground Zero. Crush is definitely the babyface as far as the crowd are concerned, and that’s reflected in the match itself, with Faarooq and Vega doubling up on Crush in the early stages, forcing Crush to fight against them both.

The crowd doesn’t really care whenever it’s Farooq or Savio fighting with one another, but they do react whenever Crush is on offence against one or both of Faarooq and Savio. They do at least work a lot of the match will all three wrestlers in there, which avoids too much of the usual 3 way trope where two wrestlers essentially just work a singles match whilst the other one rolls to the outside of the ring for a breather. As a match it’s not especially exciting, as I don’t think the storyline itself is that over, so the crowd isn’t that interested and the wrestling is mostly just the three guys punching and kicking one another. Things do start falling apart a bit in the last quarter though, with Savio botching a neck breaker on Faarooq at one stage and the crowd starting to tire of the match the longer it goes on for.

There is almost a rather inventive finish, as Faarooq and Crush decide to work together and try to pin Savio at the same time following a double suplex, but Mike Chioda won’t count it. Why exactly? It’s not like there’s a title on the line here or anything. Count it and declare them both winners. Anyway, we of course get the classic WWF/E Triple Threat finish, where one wrestler steals it right at the death, as Crush gives Faarooq the Heart Punch but then turns around into a spin kick from Savio for the three count in around 12 Minutes.

WINNER: SAVIO VEGA
RATING: *1/2

Thoughts: I’ve always felt that the booking here was basically them recognising that Los Boricuas were by far the weakest group of the three so they decided to give Savio the win just to throw those guys a bone, when Faarooq or Crush winning would have made more sense because their groups actually had some steam on them. Honestly, Crush winning was probably the right call because he was the guy in the match that the crowd actually liked, but Faarooq winning could have worked too. As a match it was probably about 3-5 minutes too long, as a shorter run time would have made it snappier with and probably more enjoyable. It wasn’t a total disaster, but it wasn’t really approaching “good” either

We get a commercial for an upcoming Stone Cold VHS

The US Boxing Team is in the house

Match Four
Mexican Mini Madness
El Torito Vs Max Mini

The WWF decided to book the Mexican Mini’s for a bit in 1997 and 1998. The division never really got any serious focus and was presented more as a comedy break, but some of the matches could be enjoyable now and then. Max gets a decent reception actually, showing that plans to make him the focus of the division were not without merit. Torito is considerably bigger than Max, so we get a Mini-David Vs Mini-Goliath battle, and it’s quite good fun, especially when Max busts out high flying luchador moves such as a flying head scissors and a dive to the floor. Max’s high flying actually gets a good reception from the crowd, and Torito draws actual Heel heat at times when he bullies Max around.

There’s a bit where Max works a wristlock that doesn’t really work, as it goes against the Small Vs Big theme of the contest, but it leads to a spot where Max bites referee Jack Doan on the bum because Doan keeps missing Torito doing it to Max, which does at least get a laugh from the crowd. Max then heads outside of the ring and sits on Lawler’s lap, which the crowd gets a kick out of as well. We get back to Big Vs Small spots following that diversion, with Torita bullying Max around again whilst Max sells and uses his speed for hope spots, and that works just fine. Torito absolutely DESTROYS Max with a Lariat at one stage, with Max taking a fantastic bump from it. Max eventually makes a comeback with some arm drags and gets an Asai Moonsault to the outside onto Torito in a nice looking spot. Max actually heads all the way to the top with a rana at one stage, which is very impressive, and a Sunset Flip ends it soon after at roughly the 9 Minute mark.

WINNER: MAX MINI
RATING: **1/2

Thoughts: This was a decent outing when they were telling the Big Vs Small story, although the additional stuff surrounding it didn’t work as well for me. Still though, this showed that these two were very capable of wrestling just as well as bigger wrestlers

We get a video package showing Owen Hart dropping Stone Cold Steve Austin on his head with a Steiner Screwdriver. Austin is not cleared to wrestle, so Commissioner Slaughter is going to have to strip Austin of his half of the WWF Tag Team Titles

Jim Ross and Commissioner Slaughter are in the ring for the Tag Title vacation ceremony. Dude Love heads down to the ring first, saying that he doesn’t want to defend the belts if he can’t team with Stone Cold, so he hands his belt over to Slaughter. Stone Cold Steve Austin then joins us so that he can hand over his belt, although he chews Slaughter out first as the crowd goes wild for it. Austin eventually drops the belt at Slaughter’s feet, and then he chews out Jim Ross as well before firing off a Stone Cold Stunner to Ross, adding another string to his rebellious bow in the process. Austin would of course end up getting retconned into being Good Ol’ JR’s bestie, but at this point Ross was just another guy in a suit that Austin didn’t like. This was a great segment, as Austin gave up a belt due to injury but his promo and the Stunner to Ross meant he left the whole thing even more over than when he went in. Vince McMahon was soon to be on the Stunner list as well, at which point Austin became the coolest and most rebellious character in wrestling

Michael Hayes is interviewing Owen Hart and British Bulldog backstage. Owen is in full snivelling Heel mode, demanding that Stone Cold should be suspended and suddenly pretending to be Jim Ross’ good friend. Owen was hilarious there, what a fantastic Heel

Match Five
Fatal Four Way Elimination Bout for the vacant WWF Tag Team Titles
Owen Hart and British Bullodg Vs The Godwinns (Henry and Phineas) Vs The Head Bangers (Mosh and Thrasher) Vs The Road Warriors (Hawk and Animal)

The Godwinns and Roadies had a side-issue here based around The Roadies breaking Henry’s neck. Annoyingly, rather than just letting all 8 wrestlers going at it in a wild brawl, we instead can only have two wrestlers in the ring at any one time, with anyone being able to tag in. Owen and Bulldog kind of let the other three teams fight one another in the early going, which makes sense for their Heel characters but it means we don’t get to see the two best wrestlers in the match actually wrestling. Owen and Bulldog do eventually get tagged in, with Owen taking a really nice Military Press Slam from Henry at one stage. Owen took that like the consummate pro he was. Eventually it looks like it’s DOOMsday Device time for Phineas, but Henry breaks it up and brings his bucket into the ring. Henry gets disarmed and The Roadies use the bucket to destroy both Godwinns to get themselves DQ’ed in a super lame elimination.

Elimination #1
The Road Warriors are disqualified

The Godwinns work a bit of heat on Thrasher, but Thrasher manages to catch Phineas with a Sunset Flip OUTTA NOWHERE and that leads to The Godwinns being eliminated.

Elimination #2
The Godwinns by The Head Bangers (1) – Thrasher Sunset Flip to Phineas

Owen and Bulldog quickly pounce on Thrasher following the pin though, giving us another heat segment. Thrasher sells that well and the Heel team look good on offence, with the crowd chanting “USA” to try and fire up The Bangers’ to make a comeback. Bulldog and Thrasher end up colliding somehow in a messy way, but they’re smart enough to both sell it and make it the double down, with it leading to Mosh getting the hot tag and running wild. Owen ends up accidentally clocking Bulldog, but Bulldog recovers in time in order to prevent a Head Bangers double team. Bulldog and Thrasher brawl on the floor, distracting referee Tim White, which leads to Stone Cold running down and giving Owen a Stunner so that Mosh can get the three count for the belts and a big pop.

Elimination #3
Owen Hart and British Bulldog by The Head Bangers (2) – pin following Stone Cold Steve Austin interference

Total Match Time: Around 17 Minutes

WINNERS AND NEW CHAMPIONS: THE HEAD BANGERS
MOST ELIMINATIONS: THE HEAD BANGERS (2)
RATING: **

Thoughts: Match was kind of meh for the most part, but the crowd went NUTS for the finish and it was really well done. It was nice to see The Head Bangers get into WWF history books as well, as they were a reasonably effective team during this time when a lot of the regular tag teams in the WWF were kind of mince, which is why the belts were held by “super” teams like Owen/Bulldog, Austin/Shawn and Austin/Foley for so much of the year because they were the only teams who could be credible as Champions

Jim Ross has an icepack on his neck backstage. I hope he got permission from his designated locker room leader before using that

We get a video package to try and hype up Del “The Patriot” Wilkes. We actually get some footage from All Japan Pro Wrestling, which might be the only time that Mitsuharu Misawa appeared on a WWF/E broadcast

Sunny interviews The Patriot (or should that be the La-Li-Lu-Le-Lo?) and he gives a good fired up promo. Hey, at least they were making some kind of an effort to make Patriot seem like more than just a lame duck challenger of the month here at Ground Zero

Michael Cole interviews Bret Hart, who correctly points out that he’s the WORLD Wrestling Federation Champion, not the American Wrestling Federation, so it doesn’t matter if American’s hate him because he represents the whole World. Heck yeah you do Bret! Bret adds that he’s going to hurt Patriot tonight in order to hurt America. Well that’s just mean

Co-Main
WWF Title
Champ: Bret “Hitman” Hart Vs The Patriot

Patriot seemed a bit out of place during the Attitude Era, but the WWF had a faction of anti-Americans in the form of The Hart Foundation, so Patriot was brought in to try and oppose them and even got a pin-fall win over Bret on television in order to put him in title contention. Bret is actually very aggressive here, making it a fight straight away, which plays into Bret’s pre-match promo that he wants to hurt Patriot in order to hurt the American fans, meaning he’s not here to do technical wrestling but to beat Patriot up. Patriot by comparison does use wrestling, and it actually helps him get the better of Bret at certain points, such as when he delivers a series of arm drags and then works Bret’s left arm over with a series of holds. I really like that actually, as Bret is clearly a better technician than Patriot, but he’s allowed his anger to get the better of him and now he’s being out wrestled by a lesser wrestler because of it.

Bret continues to favour fighting over wrestling, as he starts trying to kick Patriot’s leg out from under his leg, with Patriot selling it well and Bret doing a great job of working up the crowd with Heel mannerisms. Bret of course busts out the ring post Figure Four at one stage, which he always did when he was especially angry as a Heel, and Patriot continues to sell all of this fantastically. British Bulldog decides to head down to watch the match, which doesn’t really make sense seeing as Bret has things under control here. I guess Bulldog just wanted to get a good view of Patriot getting his bum kicked? As I type that though, Patriot starts making a comeback, with one flaw being that he isn’t really selling the leg that much and he really should be limping for the rest of the match following all the work Bret did on the appendage. Bulldog tries climbing onto the apron, but Patriot runs Bret into Bulldog and gets a roll-up for two in a good near fall.

Vader heads down to brawl with Bulldog, and also clocks Bret in the process, but referee Mike Chioda decides to let the match keep going, which is inherently unfair to Bret but I guess plays into the idea that he felt everyone was against him. Patriot gets a big boot at one stage, but sadly elects not to deliver a leg drop and instead heads up top for The Patriot Missile which gets two in another really good near fall. That’s twice now that Bret Hart has managed to make the crowd at Ground Zero think that no-hope challenger of the month Del Wilkes might actually be capable of winning the WWF Title. Patriot gets another near fall when he delivers his Uncle Slam full nelson slam move, but Bret gets his foot on the rope at two after the referee was delayed in making the count due to taking a stray shot, which protects the move at least. Patriot makes the mistake of trying to beat Bret Hart with The Sharpshooter though, and as Earl Hebner isn’t the referee tonight, Bret counters the hold into a Sharpshooter of his own and the referee stops the contest after around 19 minutes.

WINNER AND STILL CHAMPION: BRET HART
RATING: ***3/4

Thoughts: This was Bret Hart doing the Ric Flair/Harley Race/Kenta Kobashi trick of taking a challenger no one really expects to win and having a great match with them until the fans bought into the idea of the weak challenger winning. And because Bret won clean in the end, it didn’t do him any damage to give Patriot so much along the way

Sadly they undo some of the good work done in the match itself by having Bret beatdown Patriot following the match, which makes Patriot look like a weak chump after he just gave Bret a real challenge. It would be fine if Patriot was eventually going to rally and win the Title at Badd Blood or Survivor Series, but Patriot did another job to Bret at Badd Blood and that was it, so this beatdown served no purpose other than to make Patriot look weak

We get a video package for the next match, highlighting the history between Undertaker and Shawn Michaels

Shawn Michaels is his usual cocky self, saying that he’s too jacked up to Rest In Peace for The Undertaker up next at Ground Zero

Main Event
Ground Zero Grudge Match
“The Heartbreak Kid” Shawn Michaels Vs The Undertaker

Shawn cost Undertaker the WWF Title back at SummerSlam by trying to brain Bret Hart with a chair but catching Taker instead, so Undertaker is very mad and looking for revenge here. Despite being a Heel, the women in the crowd still love Shawn. In a funny moment, Shawn’s pyro doesn’t go off during his entrance, leading to Shawn getting all snippy about it in his usual manner. Taker quickly shows how mad he is by clocking referee Mike Chioda and then flinging Chioda over the top rope onto Shawn at ringside before chasing Shawn up the stage and giving Shawn an hellacious beating, with Shawn of course taking plenty of huge bumps in order to make Taker look as dangerous as possible. Shawn not only gets Press Slammed onto the entrance area but he’s also sent tumbling down the entrance way all the way back down to ringside. It’s fantastic stuff from both competitors, with Shawn selling desperation and panic perfectly whilst Taker nails it as a vengeful Phenom looking for payback for what happened back at SummerSlam. Shawn continues getting razzled in the ring as well, which leads to Earl Hebner being brought down to the ring by Commissioner Slaughter so that we can try having an actual match here.

Shawn uses the distraction of Hebner coming down to chop block Taker and try to work a bit of heat, but Taker mostly shrugs that off and continues to destroy Shawn, with the crowd being into all of it, either because they’re dudes cheering Taker on or women screaming in terror that the object of their desires is getting battered by a big scary tattooed Deadman. Shawn eventually decides that he’s going to need to use a chair, but Taker easily disarms him. However, Hebner stops Taker from using the chair instead, which leads to Shawn knocking Taker into Hebner in order to bump the referee. Shawn heads up with two Flying Elbow Drops, but Taker presses Shawn off at two and that leads to Shawn landing on Hebner to bump the referee AGAIN. This allows Rick Rude to head down to ringside and pass Shawn some brass knuckles before calmly walking off in classic “suit wearing Rick Rude NGAF” behaviour. Replacement referee Jack Doan only gets two for Shawn following the knuckles shot, which leads to Shawn cleaning Doan’s clock so that Triple H and Chyna can head down and beat up Taker.

Taker eventually decides that he’s had enough of the three Heels waling on him and catches the Sweet Chin Music before taking the brass knuckles from Shawn and clattering both Shawn and Tri with them, which gets him a two count from Hebner, who did his special “this is definitely the finish” slow count in order to make the kick out even more of a surprise in a nice subversion of the fan’s expectations. Hebner eats a Choke Slam following that, which leads to referee Tim White running down and just throwing the match out after about 16 minutes, and after all we’ve seen in this one and the fact that three referees got creamed in the process, you have to say that the decision is fair enough. It of course leads to White getting beaten up as well, as Tri sparks him out with a big punch.

NO CONTEST
RATING: ****

Thoughts: Lame not to get a finish, but it was setting up Hell in a Cell, so it made sense. The match itself was a fantastic wild brawl, with Shawn being a great bumping Heel and Taker being a great vengeful angry babyface. Shawn, HHH, Chyna and Rude all working together was the beginnings of Degeneration X being formed, although they weren’t named as such yet

The locker room empties trying to calm things down, but Taker runs past them all and dives out onto a gaggle of Heels who have come out to rescue Shawn from his imminent DOOM. I guess we’ll need a match next time where no one can interfere and the chaos can be confined to one place. Maybe a cage type situation?

In Conclusion:

Most of the undercard for Ground Zero was just “there” but the last two matches were both great and the Main Event set up ANOTHER awesome match between Shawn and Taker at Badd Blood, so Ground Zero certainly isn’t a show without merit. You only really need to watch the last two matches, but if you do then you’ll likely have a good time

It is interesting seeing how Bret Hart was somewhat marginalised following SummerSlam though, as he’s in the Co-Main for both Ground Zero and Badd Blood whilst Shawn and Taker have the Main Event program. Granted, Shawn and Taker’s issue had more heat and was delivering better matches, but it was odd that the company seemingly wilfully ensured that the WWF Champion had a less interesting feud than the two other Main Event guys

Ground Zero comes mildly recommended