KB Reviews WCW Nitro — page 7

Rants

Monday Nitro – October 20, 1997

By Scott Keith on 6th March 2013

Monday Nitro #109

Date: October 13, 1997

Location: Ice Palace,
Tampa, Florida

Attendance: 12,000

Commentators: Mike
Tenay, Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan, Larry Zbyszko

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

It’s one of the last
shows before Halloween Havoc and WCW has been on fire lately. The
main match tonight is a tag title defense with the Outsiders fighting
a team to be announced. If they don’t defend the belts, they’ll be
stripped of the titles. Not that it took forever to get them to
defend the stupid things or anything like that though. Let’s get to
it.

Here are Hogan (sans
belt), Bischoff and Savage to open the show. Bischoff plugs Hogan’s
new movie Assault on Devil’s Island and takes jabs at Raw for not
being live. Yeah Eric I wouldn’t compare my show to 1997 Raw. Oh
and Savage is in a neckbrace because of the Diamond Cutter last week.
Hogan wants Piper to give him his belt back (Piper took it when he
was running from Hogan and Bischoff last week) and that’s about it.

We see the Diamond
Cutter on Savage from last week.

The announcers say
there are four title matches this week. Is it sweeps week or
something?

Cruiserweight Title:
Eddie Guerrero vs. Psychosis

Eddie is defending and
there’s no Sonny Onoo with Psychosis for no apparent reason.
Psychosis misses a charge into the corner to start, allowing Eddie to
hit a fast suplex for two. Apparently Disco vs. Jackie at the PPV is
non-title due to the athletic commission. Why is that match even
happening? Has that ever been answered? Psychosis shrugs it off and
hits a quick leg lariat and a baseball slide to send Eddie to the
floor.

We get the spot of the
match as Psychosis hits a big old senton backsplash to the floor,
possibly injuring his back in the process though. Back in and the
guillotine legdrop misses Eddie but Psychosis grabs a quick rollup
for two anyway. Psychosis goes for the arm which is kind of rare to
see in a lucha match. Once that goes nowhere Eddie takes over, only
to walk into a backbreaker. The masked one goes up but is quickly
crotched, superplexed and Frog Splashed for the pin to retain the
title.

Rating: C.
This didn’t work that well but the injury might have had something to
do with it. Eddie was gearing up for the showdown with Rey which
needs to be announced already. This kept him looking strong though
and that’s what a champion needs going into a big PPV title defense.
Not a good match here but the big senton got the fans going at least.

Eddie teases ripping
off the mask but walks away.

It’s time for the
second of Tenay’s videos on lucha libre. Today he’s talking about
masks and how important they are to culture of lucha libre. We see
the making of masks and hear from Rey Mysterio Jr. and Senior (Rey’s
uncle) who says how important the masks are in identity. We hear
from Dr. Lechuga (I know some Spanish and either that’s a fake name
or we’re hearing from Dr. Lettuce.) about the history of masks and
the various cultures that form them. Psychosis talks about how
important his mask is.

Rey worries about
losing his mask, but that shouldn’t be a problem. Only a completely
stupid company would stop making masks that popular which were
guaranteed money makers. Silver King says why cover up my pretty
face? La Parka says he wears a mask to scare people. We get clips
from When Worlds Collide with Eddie getting his hair cut and hear
about Luchas De Apuestas. For a two minute segment, this was
AWESOME. I love these segments and there’s some really interesting
stuff in there.

Here’s Piper who looks
a bit different in the face this week. Makeup maybe? Piper is here
to talk about Bischoff and makes it clear that he is the boss, not
Bischoff. What happened to Savage last week was justice, not an
unfair attack. Also Hogan doesn’t deserve to carry the belt (which
is nowhere in sight) so for now it’s gone. Piper says the same thing
he said last week about the Outsiders having to defend or be stripped
and that’s it.

We recap Jarrett/Debra
vs. Mongo.

Steve Regal vs.
Steve McMichael

Mongo grabs a quick
headlock and runs Regal over with a shoulder block. I do love it
when heels like Regal are shocked when a much bigger and stronger guy
runs them over. That’s always amusing. Off to a wristlock which is
more Regal’s speed and he takes it down to the mat for some control.
Mongo again powers out of it and tosses Regal around like something
that is large and easy to throw around. Regal comes back with an
uppercut and some stomping but Mongo pops up again. Now Mongo looks
confused so he hits a few elbows and finishes Regal with the
tombstone. That was a really awkward looking ending.

Rating: D.
It continues to amaze me that Mongo somehow kept getting worse in the
ring. He’s in there with one of the best technicians of all time and
can’t get a watchable match? Regal is more than capable of walking
him through this but I guess Mongo is even beyond Regal’s help. That
says a lot.

Gene is with Debra and
asks about rumors that Jarrett is gone. Apparently he is indeed gone
(SWEET!) but she has a surprise for Mongo at Halloween Havoc. Mongo
calls her a snake. No that would be her future husband, who would
also be named Steve.

Yuji Nagata vs.
Chris Jericho

The quest for Nagata to
be useful or interesting continues. Sonny is here with Nagata but
wasn’t with Psychosis. Apparently it’s Dragon vs. Nagata at the PPV.
I know that would sway me into buying it. Jericho immediately goes
for the arm with whatever hold he can put on it. When that doesn’t
work, he goes with the easiest idea there is: kick him in the face.
Now back to Nagata’s arm but Nagata hits a fast superplex to take
over. A snapmare puts Jericho down and there’s a HARD kick to the
Canadian’s back.

Now Nagata works on the
arm but runs into a boot in the corner and gets caught by a middle
rope missile dropkick. In something I’ve never seen, at least not
from Jericho, he grabs Nagata in a half nelson and gives him a giant
swing. That gets two and Nagata knocks him to the apron and then
into the barricade. Out to the floor and Nagata goes into the post.
They head back in but Jericho has to beat up Sonny. As they actually
get back in, Sonny trips Jericho on the top and the Nagata Lock
(standing figure four) gets the submission.

Rating: C.
I get that Nagata is skilled and means a lot in Japan, but man alive
he is dull in America. He’s just a guy in trunks using wrestling
holds. Jericho at least plays to the crowd and has a ton of charisma
which can get him through a match. I know Nagata is talented and
such, but anything being different about him would be an improvement.
He’s just so dull it’s almost unreal.

Raven is in a nursery
next to a crib. He talks about how his earliest memories are of
feeling of abandonment and sadness. Raven says that our futures are
determined in these moments and we’re all creatures of this nature.

Bill Goldberg vs.
Scotty Riggs

Goldberg has his
signature music now. We get a shot of Saturn and Raven in the crowd
along with a third person. I don’t recognize him but there’s a
chance it’s Sick Boy. Richards is gone as well, I believe back to
ECW. Goldberg shrugs him off and Riggs gets in a few right hands.
The spear (more like a tackle here) takes Riggs down and Goldberg
pounds away.

Riggs gets up some
boots in the corner but gets slammed out of the corner a few seconds
later. Scotty comes back with some dropkicks including one that
sends Goldberg over the top. Apparently Judo Gene LeBell wants to
train Goldberg. Bill will have none of this selling stuff and
LAUNCHES Riggs into the barricade to take over again. Back in and
the Jackhammer ends this. This would be #4 as Goldberg won on
Saturday Night as well.

The Nitro Girls waste
some time.

Here are Hall and Syxx
for the Survey. The fans actually side with WCW on this one which is
a rarity around this time. Hall complains about having to face both
Luger and Zbyszko but it’s the only way WCW can have a chance.
Apparently Nash is out with an injury and the Steiners want a title
match tonight. That’s cool because Syxx will take Nash’s place. As
Hall is talking, a fan hits him in the face with a piece of trash.
It nailed him square in the jaw.

Tag Titles: Steiner
Brothers vs. Scott Hall/Syxx

For the sake of
clarity, only Scott Steiner will be referred to as Scott and Scott
Hall will only be referred to as Hall. Hall is quickly sent to the
floor and the Steiners stand tall. We start with Scott vs. Syxx and
there’s a wheelbarrow slam for Syxx to give the Steiners control.
Off to Rick vs. Hall with Steiner pounding away, only to get caught
by a clothesline to give the NWO control. Rick will have none of
that though and hits a middle rope clothesline. Steiner goes up
again but a cross body (huh?) is caught in a fallaway slam by Hall.

Rick won’t sell it
though and knocks Syxx off the apron, only to be decked by Hall
again. Hall pounds on him in the corner but Rick comes back with a
Steiner Line. Hot tag brings in Scott and house is cleaned. The
Steiner DDT off the top gets two on Syxx as Hall pulls the referee to
the floor. Larry Z comes down to scare Hall back to the ring and
there’s the Steiner Bulldog to Hall. The Steiners get a double cover
and Larry counts the pin for the titles. You know, because being a
guest referee in 13 days counts as being a referee here.

Rating: C-.
The match was short but the fans were very hot for it. This had been
built up for months upon months but then when they get to the payoff,
we don’t even get Hall and Nash to do the job. You know, because of
that “knee injury” Nash had. Isn’t it amazing how he’s hurt
every time that he has to do a job? I’m sure we’ll hear more about
the refereeing issue.

Tony says they have an
injury update on Savage: “Who cares?” The heartlessness is
pretty sad. And yes I know it’s a fake injury.

The Nitro Girls dance a
bit.

Dean Malenko vs. Rey
Mysterio Jr.

Apparently the decision
in the tag match stands because Larry is an assigned official.
Assigned at a PPV but what difference does that make? Also Eric
can’t reverse the decision. Rey gives his mask to a baby at ringside
but the baby gives it back to him. It’s fast paced stuff to start
with Dean taking it to the mat to slow Rey down. Back up and Rey
goes from a test of strength into a sunset flip for two. Dean
catapults him to the apron but Mysterio pops right back in.

Back in and Rey
counters a variety of holds by Dean by flying through the air, only
to be caught by a leg lariat for two. A quick victory roll gets two
for Rey but a headscissors is countered into a side slam for no
cover. Off to a figure four necklock by Dean for a few seconds
before he powerbombs Rey halfway back to Mexico for two. Rey comes
back and pounds away in the corner but Dean launches him into the
corner.

Mysterio lands on the
top rope and hits a flip attack to take Dean down again. A sunset
flip gets two on Malenko and the West Coast Pop looks to finish. At
two though Eddie runs in and rips Rey’s mask off, causing him to
break the hold. Malenko backflips up into the Texas Cloverleaf and
Rey taps immediately to hide his face.

Rating: B.
This was one of the better matches I’ve ever seen them have and one
of the best cruiserweight matches they’ve ever had on Nitro. They
barely ever stopped moving other than a quick rest hold by Dean.
Other than that it was five minutes of nonstop action with an ending
that advanced the story and kept Rey looking strong at the same time.
Great match here and actually worth checking out for how fast and
agile Rey was in his time.

DDP is at the Power
Plant and talks about how he hasn’t changed like Hogan and Savage
have. Oh and Piper is awesome too. This was just to hype up Savage
vs. Page.

Here’s Piper with more
to say. The tag title change stands because Larry was officially
made a referee last week so the pin counted. HAIL THE STEINERS!
This brings out Savage and Bischoff with Eric talking about Savage’s
injury. He wants to know if this is how Piper is going to run things
and wants Hogan’s title back. Piper says come in and get it (the
title is nowhere in sight) but here’s the NWO. Sting comes out as
well and holds off the NWO before blasting Piper. At least they
didn’t show a closeup of him to show it was clearly a fake. It’s
Hogan and Piper gets beaten up.

Video on Hennig vs.
Flair.

Scott Norton vs. Ray
Traylor

Please be quick.
Norton has Vincent and Bagwell with him here because that’s what NWO
members do. Traylor starts with uppercuts and hits a quick backdrop
but stops to go after Bagwell. Back in and Norton pounds away on
Traylor with clubbing forearms to the back. A slam puts Norton down
and we cut to the crowd. Kidman, now with eye shadow, sits in the
crowd next to Raven and Saturn.

Back to the match and
Buff chokes away a bit while Norton argues with the referee. Norton
pounds away very, very slowly. Traylor comes back with an uppercut
and puts Norton in 619 position for a sliding uppercut. Vincent gets
decked too but during the distraction Buff throws Norton the
spraypaint can and Traylor is knocked out for the pin.

Rating: F+.
After Rey vs. Dean, this was hard to sit through. Then again Norton
vs. Traylor would be hard to sit through after watching a dancing
bear act. Traylor going to war against the NWO was a nice idea but
having him job to Scott Norton doesn’t help anyone. Norton is just a
power goon and having him lose would do nothing but help Traylor.
But that might mean WCW fans have something else to cheer for and we
can’t have that.

TV Title: Disco
Inferno vs. Alex Wright

Wright jumps him to
start and both guys still have their jackets on. Disco is defending
in case you haven’t read anything from around this time. Wright
pounds him down against the ropes and hits a good dropkick to send
the champion down. Another dropkick puts Disco down and Alex finally
takes his own jacket off. Alex whips Inferno with said jacket for
good measure but gets punched in the face for his efforts. The
offense is short lived though as Wright comes back and stomps away
even more. Mostly just kicking and punching so far.

We stop for a quick
dance break and Disco gets draped over the apron and pounded even
more. Almost all Alex so far. Out on the floor and Wright stomps on
his hand for good measure. Wouldn’t the leg be better as it would
get rid of the dancing abilities? Back in and Disco tries a fast
backslide but gets taken down by a clothesline. A small package gets
two more for the champion and here’s Jackie. Disco yells at her and
gets rolled up, only to reverse into one of own for the pin to
retain.

Rating: D+.
Nothing to see here but it’s definitely better than Disco vs. Jackie
would wind up being. I’m still not entirely sure what the story is
with those two but I’m guessing it’s more of Jackie’s “I’m a woman
but I can wrestle men. Yeah I suck but I’M LOUD AND THAT MEANS I AM
AN INTERESTING PERSON!” Match was nothing.

US Title: Diamond
Dallas Page vs. Curt Hennig

Page fires off his
shoulder blocks into Hennig’s shoulder to send Curt (the champion)
out to the floor. Back in and DDP grabs a headlock but Curt runs
away from a Diamond Cutter attempt. The champ gets on the apron and
Page spits in his face to send him back to the floor. Back in and
it’s back to the headlock as Hennig can’t get anything to work early
on. Hennig tries to run the ropes but gets caught in a Russian
legsweep for two. The champ finally gets something going by getting
in a shot to Page’s likely injured ribs.

A dropkick puts Page
down and we hit the chinlock. Hennig puts his feet on the ropes like
any good heel would do. Page fights up but gets caught in a sleeper,
only to come out with a jawbreaker. There’s the Pancake to Hennig
but Curt comes back with a jawbreaker of his own. Cue Flair but
security holds him back. Page rolls up Hennig for three as Flair
runs in. The three count goes down but I’m guessing Flair was late
as the referee says no pin. I’m guessing Hennig wins by DQ but the
ending was botched.

Rating: C.
The match was ok but the ending was a big blow to it. The problem
here was that the three count clearly hit before Flair touched either
guy so there’s no real reason for a DQ, especially after Hall pulled
a referee from the ring earlier and it wasn’t even a DQ. These two
should work well together and did most of the time, but it never hit
the level that it could have.

Post match Piper makes
the referee give Page the belt. Anderson (referee) isn’t sure and
here’s Hogan to try to get at Piper. The NWO runs in and it’s 7-2.
Even more guys come in and the good guys are in trouble. Savage,
with a neck injury, is able to drop the big elbow on Page. There’s a
legdrop and another elbow as Page is in trouble. Piper gets an elbow
as well but here’s Sting at the top of a row of stands.

But wait here he comes
from another side of the arena. No wait he’s over there. Wait he’s
in the ring and coming through the crowd. We’re on our fifth Sting
but most of them are getting beaten up. Here comes another one
through the crowd and a seventh one joins him. The sixth one gets in
and is stomped down.

Now they’re coming
through the entrance. Now three more come out. I’ve lost count at
this point. All of them are getting beaten down….until Bagwell
hits one for no effect. The Death Drop lays Bagwell out and the NWO
runs. Piper has the world title belt from somewhere and swings it
over his head to end the show.

Overall Rating: B.
This is the third great show in a row with an AWESOME ending segment.
How often do you see a show with four title matches in two hours?
There are a lot of PPVs that don’t do that and we got it for free
here tonight. Sting was coming for Hogan and they might as well have
been printing the money in their basement. I would say there was no
way to screw this up, but you know the rest I’m sure. Another very
good show here.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and check out my website at kbwrestlingreviews.com

Rants

Monday Nitro – September 8, 1997

By Scott Keith on 31st January 2013

Monday Nitro #104

Date: September 8, 1997

Location: Wisconsin
Center Arena, Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Attendance: 8,596

Commentators: Mike
Tenay, Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan, Larry Zbyszko

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

It’s the go home show
for Fall Brawl which I don’t think we have much of a confirmed card
for. It’s pretty clear that Luger, Page, Hall and Savage will be in
WarGames but other than that we don’t have much confirmed. This
week’s show has to be better than last week’s or at least less dull.
Hopefully this won’t be a bunch of whining from the announcers for
two hours again. Let’s get to it.

We open with the Nitro
Girls dancing in the ring with Tony running down the card for
tonight.

Tony tells us that
Flair is on Team WCW along with Luger and Page for WarGames. He
starts to talk about the Horsemen parody last week but gets cut off
by Eric Bischoff. Eric says run the tape but after a few moments,
the tape cuts off and we see the Horsemen at the desk instead. Mongo
(booed because he used to be a Bear (and a Packer) and we’re in
Packer country) wants to fight right now and the Horsemen march to
the ring.

They want the NWO right
now so of course no one comes out. Hennig says that since he’s the
enforcer of the Horsemen, it’s his job to get revenge. Flair says
that last year was the first time that he was embarrassed to be a pro
wrestler. Oh just wait Slick Ric. Just wait. Flair says that he’s
not leaving until he gets his hands on Bagwell, Syxx, Konnan and
Nash.

Post break the Horsemen
are being escorted out of the ring.

Rey Mysterio Jr. vs.
Eddie Guerrero

During the entrances,
Tony says that the new commissioner might be named tonight. Eddie
grabs Rey’s arm to start but gets tossed around to break the hold.
Guerrero comes back with a tilt-a-whirl backbreaker before cranking
on the arm some more before we go to break. Back with Eddie cranking
on the arm some more until Rey breaks out and pounds on Eddie, only
to get slammed back down.

Guerrero slides to the
floor for no apparent reason, allowing Rey to dive down onto him to
take over. Tony of course talks about the NWO and basically ignore
the match while Tenay tries to keep the focus in place. Back in and
a moonsault press gets two on Eddie but Guerrero catches a top rope
cross body in a slam for two of his own. A BIG powerbomb takes Rey
down again for two more, as does a butterfly powerbomb. Eddie busts
out the Gory Special, but Rey rolls off his back to escape. Rey
escapes powerbomb attempt #2 and heads to the apron, hitting West
Coast Pop out of nowhere for the win.

Rating: B-.
These two are guys that you always expect a good match out of. They
would have a masterpiece at Halloween Havoc and while this is nowhere
near that one, it’s still a solid back and forth match and a good
choice for an opener. Also, can anyone take a powerbomb as well as
Rey Mysterio? He sells them really well.

DDP says he wants
respect and thinks both he and Luger have earned said respect.
Tonight it’s Luger vs. Page so Team WCW can get along on Sunday.
Luger says ok but don’t hold anything back.

Hugh Morrus vs.
Disco Inferno

This is fallout from
last week. Hugh pounds him down to start with clotheslines and
headbutts, followed by a good looking spinwheel kick. The future
Tough Enough trainer misses a corner splash though and crashes out to
the floor for a bit. Back in and Disco slaps him because Disco isn’t
that bright. Cue Alex Wright for some dancing as Morrus loads up No
Laughing Matter (moonsault). Wright slides in the belt, but Disco
puts it face down on his chest to injure himself. Like I said, he’s
not that bright. Morrus gets the pin over the idiot.

Wright and Disco argue
post match.

The NWO makes fun of
the Horsemen again and apparently it’s Konnan/Bagwell vs. two
Horsemen tonight.

Cruiserweight Title:
Brad Armstrong vs. Chris Jericho

Before the match here’s
Eddie to say that last week he should have gotten a shot. He asks
Brad to step aside here but Brad basically ignores him and jumps the
champ to start things off. Apparently the winner of this has to
defend against Guerrero on Sunday anyway. Dang Eddie is greedy isn’t
he? And didn’t he lose earlier tonight anyway?

Jericho blocks a monkey
flip to send Brad to the floor, followed by a suicide dive from the
champ. Back in and Jericho charges into a boot followed by a tornado
DDT from Armstrong for two. Jericho comes back with a standing
Lionsault for two followed by the missile dropkick to send Armstrong
to the floor. Not that it matters as Eddie runs in for the DQ.

Rating: C+.
These two were working well together with some solid back and forth
stuff. Unfortunately it didn’t get to go anywhere because Armstrong
was there to fill in a spot, but he could fill in a spot quite well.
With Mysterio back and Eddie going after the title, the
Cruiserweights are about to come back with a vengeance. Good stuff
here and I wouldn’t mind seeing more from these two.

Hour #2 begins and it’s
time to dance.

We recap Hogan beating
up JJ from last week, which brings out Bischoff and Hogan. Eric
introduces him as the champion of the universe before handing the mic
to Hogan. Hollywood says everyone is here to see the NWO. Yeah
that’s pretty much true. Flair isn’t the man apparently. I don’t
remember him saying that lately but ok then. Hollywood says no one
is going to touch Bischoff again. He’s kind of all over the place
here. The Horsemen are going down tonight apparently. Finally,
Hogan says he’ll put the title on the line RIGHT NOW against Sting.

Hogan poses…..AND
HERE’S STING! He falls REALLY fast and hits the barricade….and
it’s a mannequin. This causes Tony to have to act concerned and he
makes Stephanie McMahon look Oscar worthy. Hogan freaks out and says
that’s not what is supposed to happen and a stretcher comes out. The
NWO picks Sting up and puts him limp body in the ring as Tony gets
what’s going on. Hogan drops a pair of legs and Bischoff, now in a
referee’s shirt, counts the pin.

Lee Marshall does his
schtick.

Faces of Fear vs.
Steiner Brothers

Scott starts and
immediately walks into a powerslam from Barbarian. That’s not
something you see that often. A double tag brings in Rick to face
Meng and the Steiners clear the ring for their signature running
around the ring pose. Of all teams that face the Steiners, the Faces
of Fear actually are the ones smart enough to rush the Steiners when
they’re posing and get the advantage.

We wind up with Meng
vs. Rick with Meng hitting the dropkick which always impressed Jesse
Ventura. Off to Barbarian for another powerslam for two as Rick is
in trouble. Back to Meng who gets caught in a sunset flip of all
things. That goes nowhere so it’s back to the Barbarian for a double
headbutt from the monsters. Off to a chinlock by the Tongan which
doesn’t last long as Rick fights up and hits a Steiner Line. The
third slam of the match by Barbarian looks to set up the diving
headbutt but Rick dodges.

The hot tag brings in
Scott who cleans house until everything breaks down. Barbarian gets
caught in a belly to belly superplex from Scott but Meng puts Rick in
the Tongan Death Grip. Cue Harlem Heat along with Mortis/Wrath for
the double DQ. Heenan: “Why do the NWO guys never fight each other
like this?” Oh don’t worry Bobby. They will, and in different
color shirts!

Rating: C+.
The Faces of Fear were on a mini roll at this point and would have a
surprisingly good match with Mortis and Wrath on Sunday. The
Steiners would continue to spin their wheels against Harlem Heat
while they waited to be able to win the titles they should have won
about five times already. Another decent little match here.

Scott Hall vs. Super
Calo

Hall wants Calo to take
his glasses off, even though I believe they’re painted onto his face.
Calo gets a shot in on Hall in the corner and that’s about the
extent of his offense. Hall sends him to the floor before going back
inside and cranking away on both arms. The fallaway slam from the
middle rope sets up the Outsider’s Edge to end this squash.

Post match Big Bubba
comes in to face off with Hall and lay him out with a spinebuster.
Vincent comes out and takes a Boss Man Slam before Hogan himself
comes out. Boss Man stares him down but poses in the corner,
allowing Hall to hit the Outsider’s Edge and lay him down. Total
time for Traylor to stand tall: about 83 seconds. Hogan calls him
the Big Loss Man.

Dean Malenko vs.
Psychosis

Apparently the winner
of Malenko vs. Jarrett on Sunday gets a shot at the US Title at
Halloween Havoc. They head to the mat quickly and why would you ever
do that against Dean Malenko? Psychosis breaks a headscissors and
gets up, only to get caught in a standing armbar. Psychosis tries a
leg lock but Dean is in the ropes before it can be on full. A
dropkick puts the masked dude on the floor and as they come back in,
a fan tries to come in. Referee Mark Curtis, who might weigh 110lbs
soaking wet, KNEES HIM IN THE HEAD and chokes him down until security
takes him out.

After that’s settled
down, Psychosis kicks Dean to the floor where Sonny Onoo can get in a
few shots. Psychosis has to save Sonny from getting killed and we
head inside again. Scratch that as we go right back to the floor
where Psychosis hits a good looking suicide dive. That and a victory
roll get two for Psychosis back inside but Dean takes him down with a
leg lariat. Psychosis slams him down and loads up the guillotine
legdrop but it only gets two. Sonny argues with the referee, which
winds up meaning nothing as Dean counters a rana attempt into the
Cloverleaf for the tap out.

Rating: C.
Not bad again here as Dean can barely do anything wrong in 1997.
Sonny Onoo as a manager was about as worthless as you could get as a
manager around this time as he just kind of stood around and yelled
at people while throwing kicks that didn’t do much damage. Also it’s
interesting to see the cruiserweights being pushed more and more
lately. It isn’t likely to last but it’s cool while it lasts.

Jarrett comes out and
wants to fight right now but immediately runs away.

WE get the reveal of
the new commissioner and it’s Roddy Piper. He says this is like
putting John Belushi in charge of the frat house. Well Bluto became
a Senator (and President if you got the anniversary edition) so that
might not be a bad idea. Piper says he used to be President of the
WWF so tonight he’s going to do three things. First of all he
guarantees Sting vs. Hogan by the end of the year (BIG pop). Then he
says he’s facing Hogan at Halloween Havoc in a cage (not as big of a
pop). Finally he’s putting the Horsemen in WarGames (moderate pop).
Not a terrible start I guess.

Ric Flair/Curt
Hennig vs. Buff Bagwell/Konnan

The Horsemen clear the
ring to start before we get down to Bagwell vs. Flair. Flair chops
away to start but gets clotheslined and backdropped down. I’ll give
Flair this: he never had an issue with making any kid look good. Off
to Konnan for some choking before it’s back to Buff. Nice to see the
Cuban contingent contributing so much here.

A dropkick puts Flair
down again and it’s off to the corner for a Flair Flip. Naturally he
runs the apron to go up top, but surprisingly enough he isn’t slammed
down. Instead Buff crotches and superplexes him down for no cover.
Buff poses as even Konnan is yelling at him to do something. A top
rope elbow misses and it’s hot tag to Hennig who cleans house. The
NWO is sent to the floor and Bagwell sneaks back in to take out
Hennig’s knee.

Konnan drops Curt on
the steps before getting tagged back in to work on the knee. A kick
to the face misses though and it’s another hot tag to Flair to face
Buff. Tony of course is going nuts about how THIS is how you work
together. Flair fires off chops but walks into a powerslam because
Heaven help us if WCW gets to look strong over Buff freaking Bagwell.
Hennig jumps Buff and Flair locks on the Figure Four but Konnan
makes a fast save. A quick PerfectPlex on Konnan gets the win
despite neither guy being legal.

Rating: C.
Basic tag match here to set up WarGames a bit more which is fine.
Hennig looked good and Bagwell continued to look goofy as he always
did. Flair wasn’t exactly furious here like he said he would be
earlier, which makes the match seem like it doesn’t mean all that
much. Still though, not bad.

Lex Luger vs.
Diamond Dallas Page

Luger shoves him down
to start as Tony says let them go at it. This coming from the same
“STOP FIGHTING AND WORK TOGETHER” guy. Lex cranks on the arm and
grabs a headlock before running Page over with a clothesline. Cue
the NWO as Page throws Luger to the floor. Page didn’t seem to know
the NWO was there.

Luger gets beaten up
and thrown back in as now DDP sees the NWO. A neckbreaker gets two
on Lex and there’s the Pancake for two more. Lex comes back with a
belly to back suplex and his string of clotheslines. The third one
misses though and Lex falls to the floor. Page follows and brawls
with the NWO for the DQ.

Rating: D+.
This was storyline advancement rather than a match. Page and Luger’s
issues are pretty much done now as they threw up their hands and said
forget about it. Well why bother having a conclusion to a storyline
when you can just stop working on it at all? They would face
Hall/Savage again on Sunday.

Page and Luger beat up
the NWO as the Giant comes down to help. WCW stands tall to end the
show.

Overall Rating: B-.
For a go home show, this was a pretty solid edition with a lot of at
least decent matches. The main issue here is that the Horsemen
didn’t close the show despite being the Team WCW for Sunday’s
WarGames. Still though, good stuff here overall with some solid
cruiserweight stuff. I don’t know what’s gotten into WCW lately with
them but it’s working well.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @Kbreviews and check out my website at kbwrestlingreviews.com

Rants

Monday Nitro – September 1, 1997

By Scott Keith on 23rd January 2013

Monday Nitro #103

Date: September 1, 1997

Location: Pensacola
Civic Center, Pensacola, Florida

Commentators: Mike
Tenay, Tony Schivaone, Bobby Heenan, Larry Zbyszko

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

We’re two weeks from
Fall Brawl which has barely been touched on so far. The show wound
up being pretty lame if I remember right but that goes without saying
for a lot of these WCW PPVs. The main event tonight is a rematch
from Clash of the Champions with Hall/Savage vs. Luger/Page. Let’s
get to it.

This is the two year
anniversary. Ok then.

We open with a video
package on the career of Arn Anderson. That’s very cool and he still
doesn’t get the recognition he deserves.

We also recap Hennig
getting Arn’s spot on the team last week.

Eddie Guerrero/Jeff
Jarrett vs. Steve McMichael/Chris Benoit

Like a true man from
Memphis, Jarrett stalls on the floor before we get going. Benoit and
Guerrero start things off and it’s a feeling out process.
Considering how often they’ve fought, you wouldn’t think they would
need to feel each other out. Eddie pounds him into the corner and
does that spinning boot onto Benoit’s eyes move of his. Jarrett
comes in and gets chopped down as we take a break.

Back with Guerrero
doing pushups to annoy Benoit. So he’s Scott Steiner now? Jeff
comes in again for a dropkick onto Chris before it’s back to Eddie.
Chris gets a fast two off a rollup but gets caught by Jarrett in the
running crotch attack while in 619 position. Benoit chops Jeff down
and Mongo adds a clothesline to a BIG pop. Eddie comes back in with
a clothesline to Benoit but Mongo breaks up the Frog Splash.

The Canadian hits a
fast superplex to put both guys down and the hot tag brings in Mongo
to clean house on both heels. Everything breaks down and Eddie trips
Benoit up, allowing Jarrett to chop block McMichael. Jeff puts on
the Figure Four and Eddie goes up for the Frog Splash, only to have
Dean Malenko come in, shove Eddie off the top, and frog splash Jeff
to break up the hold. Mongo gets the easy pin.

Rating: C+.
Basic tag match here which went fine. I don’t know why it took so
long for Dean to get involved with the Horsemen as he’s pretty close
to a natural fit for them. Jarrett wasn’t long for WCW as he would
have his last televised match in the company in the first week of
October. Pretty decent opener here though and it advanced the story,
even though I’m not sure they knew what that story was anymore.

Luger congratulates Arn
on his career. I’d expect a lot of these testimonial kind of things
tonight.

Here are Hall, Savage
and Liz to the announce desk. Hall steals the mic from Larry and
says Happy Labor Day. He talks about doing it for the little man and
says the NWO is the real draw instead of WCW. Come on dude don’t rub
it in that much. Hall brags about the NWO’s disrespect of authority
to Larry who doesn’t have a great comeback. Savage challenges Page
and Luger to a rematch that was already talked about earlier and
that’s about it.

Silver King vs.
Mortis

Mortis pounds away to
start but King flips over him ala Daniel Bryan and kicks Mortis’ face
off. Well his mask off but you get the idea. A mini springboard
kick to Mortis’ gets another two as you may be noticing a pattern
emerging here. Vandenberg finally realizes Mortis is losing to
freaking Silver King and trips him up to let Mortis take over.

A guillotine legdrop
gets two for the masked (Mortis if you’re not clear on that) dude
before hooking an abdominal stretch for a few moments. King hits a
quick backdrop and a paid of dropkicks to send Mortis outside for a
plancha to take him down again. Back in they go and King’s run ends
via a Russian legsweep. The Flatliner (middle rope Samoan Drop) gets
the pin in an abrupt ending.

Rating: C-.
This wasn’t bad but at the end of the day how interested can you get
in Silver King vs. Mortis? That’s one of the things you did get on
Nitro: matches between guys you would never think to put together
that wound up being decent. They have these guys under contract, so
why not throw them out there for five minutes and see what they can
do?

Vandenberg wants the
Faces of Fear to come out here, only to have his boys cleaned out by
the monsters.

Time for some dancing
chicks.

We recap Bischoff
getting beaten up by Sting last week.

Yuji Nagata vs. Dean
Malenko

Bah it’s Nagata. I
never cared for this guy and he never was anything interesting in
WCW. They fight for control to start until Dean takes him down to
the mat and cranks on the arm a bit. Both guys try for the others’
leg with Yuji settling for the ankle. Dean is all like “oh you did
not just try a mat hold on me” and puts on a freaky leg lock that
only lasts a few seconds until Yuji gets a rope. Dean hits his leg
lariat for one and we hit the chinlock.

Nagata fights up
quickly and counters a whip into the corner with a boot to the face.
We get the dragon screw leg whip which is getting more and more
common in WCW at this point. They fight for the submissions on the
mat again with Dean trying for a cross armbreaker that doesn’t last
long due to those pesky ropes. Dean suplexes Nagata down for two and
Nagata gets the same off a backdrop. Cue Jarrett for revenge from
earlier (shouldn’t this be Eddie?). Debra distracts the referee,
allowing Jeff to nail Malenko to give Nagata the win.

Rating: C+.
This was one of the more entertaining matches I’ve ever seen from
Nagata, although that may have been due to Malenko being able to do
no wrong in 1997. The match was very technical, which shows another
strength of Nitro: this is the third match of the night and we’ve had
a tag match, a high flying match and a technical match. That gives a
lot of fan bases something to care about and that’s a great idea.

The Girls dance some
more.

La Parka vs. Ultimo
Dragon

This is part of Sonny
Onoo’s war with the Ultimo Dragon. La Parka pounds away to start and
chops Dragon down. Ultimo is fine with that though, coming back with
a nip up and an armdrag before sending Parka through the ropes and
out to the floor. We head to the floor where Dragon’s handspring
elbow misses La Parka but hits the barricade. Dragon tries to suplex
Onoo on the floor but gets taken out by a nice suicide dive.

The fans chant for
Dragon to mess with la Parka’s mind so he puts Ultimo in the Tree of
Woe. A hard kick to Dragon’s chest keeps him down but he fires (see
what I did there?) off a clothesline for one and it’s time for some
martial arts. La Parka gets two off a powerslam but Dragon escapes a
backdrop and fires off the kicks. A bridging fallaway slam (not a
move you often see) gets two for Dragon so Sonny distracts the
referee. Parka gets a chair but walks into kind of a Van Daminator
from Dragon for the pin.

Rating: C.
Not bad here although the ending was kind of stupid. The referee
sees a chair laying next to the guys, La Parka is out cold, and
presumably he would have heard the chair cracking off La Parka’s
head, and he’s perfectly ok with that? Eh that’s one of the things
you have to deal with in wrestling I guess. Dragon’s feud with Sonny
would eventually move onto Nagata as Sonny’s enforcer I believe.

Sonny fires off a kick
to Dragon and gets slammed as a result. Dragon puts him in the
Dragon Sleeper but has to run from La Parka’s chair.

Buff Bagwell vs.
Glacier

Now here’s an
interesting match. I didn’t say good mind you but it’s definitely
not a pairing I would have put together. Buff of course is obnoxious
and makes fun of Glacier’s karate stuff. Ok to be fair it’s Glacier
so it’s hard not to make fun of him. They trade armdrags and Buff
pulls his eyes back like an Asian person. Ok then. Glacier can’t
get in a shot as Buff is ducking around like a boxer. I don’t think
a boxer often leapfrogs people but you get the idea.

Buff makes fun of
Glacier some more and gets kicked in the head, ribs and chest for his
efforts so far. After Bagwell chills (man I’m nailing these unfunny
puns tonight) on the floor for a bit he comes back in to get kicked a
few more times before Glacier hits a legsweep to take him down. A
few shots by Buff slow Glacier down but Vincent actually doing
something by tripping Glacier up puts him on the mat. Glacier, ever
the schmuck, yells at Vincent instead of focusing on Buff and gets
clotheslined in the back of the head for his troubles.

A back elbow to the
face gets two for Buff and it’s time to pose. To be fair, Buff is
really only good for a Blockbuster and posing so you can’t fault him
for going to one of his pair of moves. I don’t think he had the
Blockbuster yet anyway. Bagwell charges into a boot in the corner
before Glacier unleashes the PALM STRIKES.

A hard kick to Bagwell
face drops him but Glacier goes up and misses what I think was
supposed to be a splash. Vincent gets kicked in the face as does
Bagwell, but Glacier takes him to the top for no apparent reason.
Vincent finally does his job again and holds Buff’s foot, sending
Glacier to the mat. Blockbuster hits and we’re done.

Rating: D+.
Not the best pairing in the world here but they gave me some decent
joke material so I’ll forgive it. Either way, Glacier was clearly
outliving his limited usefulness at this point while Buff continues
to be at the top of the NWO C list. The fact that such a thing
exists says a lot about where the team has gone in 13 months.

Larry Z thanks Arn for
his career. They were world tag team champions back in the early
90s.

Piper is back at
Halloween Havoc.

Lizmark Jr. vs.
Villano IV

I’m sure their dads
fought at some point. They pound on each other to start but Lizmark
dropkicks him to the floor and hits a big over the top dive. Tenay
talks about Lizmark and his dad being cliff divers from Acapulco. I
don’t know if all this stuff he says is true or not, but man alive
does it make matches more interesting. Back in and Villano takes him
down with a clothesline and hits a backsplash as Raven is in the
audience.

A DDT puts Lizmark down
and Villano drops a knee only to get taken down by a spinwheel kick
for two. A standing rana gets two more for Lizmark and the seem to
mess something up in the corner as Lizmark tries a running dropkick
but Villano puts his feet up. Lizmark sends him to the outside and
hits a big dive to the floor, only to see Villano IV change with
Villano V. Not that it matters as Lizmark hits a standing Lionsault
for the pin out of almos nowhere.

Rating: C+.
Is this Cruiserweight night or something? This is the third match
with a luchador in it out of six matches we’ve had so far. This was
entertaining stuff though as Lizmark is a pretty good diver (from
Acapulco. Thanks Mike!). The Villanos were fine for a lower card
heel gimmick and the match worked pretty well despite how short it
was.

Luger says he and Page
can get along and asks Page to come out and bury the hatchet. Page
is nowhere to be seen so Luger shrugs.

Remember earlier when
the Nitro Girls danced? They do that again here, until Disco Inferno
comes out to join them. Alex Wright comes out for his match and a
dance off breaks out with Inferno.

TV Title: Hugh
Morrus vs. Alex Wright

Wright tries to use
some speed stuff to avoid Morrus before punching his way out of the
corner like a jerk. Hugh charges right back at him and pounds the
champion (Wright in case that was missing) in the corner. Wright
bails to the floor for a bit before coming back to run a bit more.
He gets Morrus to chase him and when your name is Hugh Morrus, it’s
pretty clear you’re not that bright. Alex gets in some shots to take
Hugh down and works on the knee, wrapping it around the post in the
process.

Morrus goes to the
floor and hits a clothesline from one leg but gets taken right back
down inside. Wright stays on the leg but goes up and gets slammed
down. Hugh’s leg is suddenly fine enough to run back and forth to
splash Wright in the corners, although he does limp a bit after each
one. Disco is at ringside again as Hugh slams Wright down. Disco is
pulled in and beaten up but walks into a spinwheel kick for the pin
(with feet on the ropes) to retain the title.

Rating: C-.
This was going well until Wright got slammed off the top. I get that
Morrus is a power guy, but the lack of selling was stupid. Selling
does not mean doing all of your moves and then limping a bit.
Selling means you CAN’T DO THE MOVES PROPERLY because of your injury.
The match didn’t work at that point, and it didn’t do either guy any
favors.

Raven is still here.

Heenan spends most of
the ten seconds he has to thank Arn for his career complaining that
he only has ten seconds.

Video on Sting.

Damien vs. Stevie
Richards

As Damien comes to the
ring, Raven grabs him for a DDT on the concrete. He throws Damien in
to Stevie who didn’t notice what Raven did. Stevie of course
performs CPR until Raven smacks him upside the head, making Richards
cover him for the pin.

Here’s Gene for an
interview with Big Bubba of all people. Bubba says he’s tired of
wearing different costumes and his name is Ray Traylor. He got
beaten up when he was in the NWO but they never came to check on him.
Bischoff sent him a letter throwing him out of the group and that’s
it. Now, he wants to take the NWO out. Makes as much sense as any
other reason.

Prince Iaukea vs.
Ray Traylor

Traylor pounds on him
to start (GOOD MAN!) and sends him to the outside after no selling a
dropkick. Ray sits on a sunset flip attempt and hits a big boot to
send the Prince’s head back to whatever island he’s a prince of.
Prince manages to block a powerbomb but walks into the Boss Man Slam
to end the squash.

JJ thanks Arn for being
awesome.

Gene calls out the
Horsemen but instead he gets the NWO. It’s time for a parody! Syxx
is Flair and Konnan is Mongo. Syxx has a big fake nose and a bad
blonde wig while saying WOO a lot. He calls Flair down to the ring
as Tony thinks he’ll be sick. I think the same thing every time you
call a show Schiavone. Bagwell is playing Hennig here. Flair talks
to Hennig about joining the Horsemen (WOO!). Bagwell keeps chewing
the gum and says spot a lot. Flair brings out Anderson (as played by
Kevin Nash) who has a bald wig, a neck brace and a cooler. Oh and
he’s fat.

Anderson makes fun of
himself for being fat and says he feels like he’s in labor here on
Labor Day. He talks about how he has average size, speed, quickness,
looks, intelligence and carpentry skills but he parlayed that into a
wrestling career. Then he hurt his neck and lost the strength in his
beer opening hand. A few weeks later he went to a bar and a fat
broad slapped him on the back and it woke him up. He looked at the
longneck he was drinking from and it was like sand going through an
hourglass…..and so are the days of our lives.

Anderson makes fun of
himself for being a drunk who would give as much as he could every
night he was in the ring. Now he wants the fans to remember him as
he is now, not as he was. This brings him to Hennig. All he has
left to offer Curt is a spot. Not a liver spot or a dog named Spot,
but his spot. Hennig agrees and that’s that. Tony acts like we just
saw the Kennedy assassination or something.

This segment apparently
was controversial and offended the Horsemen badly. At the end of the
day….the NWO are heels. What do you expect them to do? Write
Anderson a card and get him a plaque? Yeah the Horsemen probably
should have been allowed to run in or something, but this really
isn’t as big of a deal as I’ve heard it made out to be.

Given how ridiculous
some of Flair’s promos were back in the day and how ridiculous Flair
would get, I find it hard to feel bad about this. You can’t be a
group on top for so long and not expect to be made fun of once in
awhile. If you don’t like it I can totally understand that, but to
nearly quit over it as I’ve heard Flair and Anderson wanted to do is
a bit much.

Cruiserweight Title:
Chavo Guerrero Jr. vs. Chris Jericho

Eddie comes out before
the match to yell at Chavo (who is challenging). He says he’s failed
to make Chavo a man, causing Chavo to yell a bit. This draws out
Scotty Riggs, Damien, Prince Iaukea and Kidman for no apparent
reason. A brawl breaks out and here comes the Villanos. Dragon and
Wright are out now. They all get in the ring and throw each other
out like a battle royal until only Jericho is left. Eddie blasts him
with the belt and hits a frog splash and that’s it.

Giant thanks Anderson.

Here are Hogan and
Bischoff to respond to Sting. We still have the main event to go
even though this show has felt like it’s been on for nine hours or so
now. Eric says that Hogan has driven Sting to the rafters and Hulk
suggests Sting get into dry cleaning because he won’t be in the ring
anytime soon. Hogan says he wants Sting and calls him down to the
ring (and calls him a jabroni in the process). Instead Hulk calls
out JJ Dillon and demands that JJ produce Sting. Since there’s no
Sting, Hogan beats up JJ instead. Tony walks off set, instantly
making this segment better. Dillon gets the spraypaint. Tony is
already back.

Randy Savage/Scott
Hall vs. Lex Luger/Diamond Dallas Page

Tony of course whines
about how hard is job is and dear goodness are we supposed to care?
JJ has been treated like a goon since he got here so why are we
supposed to be all depressed about this? Luger and Page are in
different corners due to not trusting each other until it’s Page vs.
Hall to start. They slug it out in the corner with DDP taking over.
Off to Savage and you know Page is cool with that.

We take our second
break in about five minutes (first was during the NWO’s entrance) and
come back to see Hall holding Page in an armbar. Apparently Page
hasn’t even tried to tag in Luger yet. Savage takes Page down before
it’s back to Scott for the fallaway slam. We hit the chinlock from
Savage followed by a double ax from the top for two.

The announcers are
sounding like they all just saw their puppies drowned. Page finally
hits a discus lariat to drop Hall but Savage distracts the referee
from seeing the hot tag. Luger comes in anyway to beat on the NWO
with atomic drops all around. Lex accidentally decks Page with the
forearm but Racks Savage anyway. There was no tag though so Hall
makes the legal pin on Page.

Rating: C-.
Just angle advancement for WarGames here but DANG was that commentary
annoying. “WE NEED TO WORK TOGETHER!” Yes Tony, we know this
because you’ve been saying it FOR THIRTEEN FREAKING MONTHS ALREADY!
LEARN A NEW TRICK YOU STUPID PARROT HEADED MAN! The match told a
decent story but at this point it’s really hard to care as I just
want this show to end.

Luger is frustrated
with Page to end the show.

Overall Rating: D.
I’m glad I’m laying down as I watch this or I would have collapsed a
few times during the show. SWEET GOODNESS did this feel long. It’s
one of those episodes that just keeps going with almost nothing being
done at all. This show had ten matches and two LONG talking
segments, which is too much for a two hour program. The announcers
are reaching the levels of annoying that they’re famous for, as it’s
constantly “we’re doomed!” and “please pull together WCW!”
Yes, we get it: the NWO is dominating right now. TELL US SOMETHING
NEW! Really bad show this week.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

Rants

Monday Nitro – August 25, 1997

By Scott Keith on 16th January 2013

Monday
Nitro #102

Date: August 25, 1997

Location: Carolina
Coliseum, Columbia, South Carolina

Attendance: 8,048

Commentators: Mike
Tenay, Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan, Larry Zbyszko

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

We’re past the Clash
and the main change is that we have Sting vs. Hogan on the verge of
being announced. Other than that we’re getting ready for Fall Brawl
which is in like three weeks I think. The main event tonight is
Savage vs. Luger as they renew an old rivalry. Other than that I
wouldn’t expect anything big tonight. Let’s get to it.

We open with a recap of
the vulture stuff from Clash which is over the top but fits well for
Sting at this point.

Here’s Gene in the ring
to recap JJ’s offers to Sting. He calls out “Earic” Bischoff to
address the possibility of Sting vs. Hogan. Bischoff says ultimatums
can come back to bite you, which means the WCW ship has to sail
without Sting. JJ is on the phone (seriously? They couldn’t get JJ
Dillon to a show?) and says that Eric is jumping to conclusions.

Apparently WCW was
flooded with letters from fans so Hogan vs. Sting will happen. Eric
FREAKS and says it won’t happen because Hogan is too busy, but if the
match happened, Hogan would destroy him. Cue Sting who puts Eric on
his knees and puts a Hogan shirt down his throat. Sting smiles for
the first time in a year.

Raven jabbers a bit.

The Nitro Girls dance.

Ernest
Miller/Glacier vs. La Parka/Psychosis

Glacier vs. La Parka to
start with Ice Man kicking him in the face. I’m as shocked as you
are I assure you. Psychosis trips up Glacier but gets caught by a
spin kick from La Parka in a bit of heel miscommunication. A
powerslam puts La Parka down and Psychosis screws up again by hitting
his partner by mistake. They’re even now I guess. Miller comes in
and gets caught in some EVIL double teaming on the floor while being
stretched over the railing. Back in and the masked guys screw up
AGAIN with La Parka kicking Psychosis in the head. Everything breaks
down and La Parka hits Glacier with a wooden chair for the upset pin.

Rating: D+.
What in the world was the point of this? Go show that Glacier and
Miller aren’t a good team? I think we established that about the day
they started teaming together. Other than that, it’s nice to see a
new team who has done well before getting a win, even though they
look like the Three Stooges at the same time. Nothing to see here,
as usual.

Silver King and Ultimo
Dragon come in as the brawl continues post match. Dragon gets beaten
down, leading to this.

Silver King vs.
Ultimo Dragon

Dragon is in trouble
from the beating by all three other luchadores before we get going
here. He says he’s ready to go and it’s on. King already misses a
charge but a following kick in the corner connects with Dragon to
take him down. A top rope legdrop and moonsault get two for King and
we hit the chinlock. Silver misses a top rope elbow but takes
Dragon’s head off with a clothesline.

King chokes away a bit
but jumps into a dropkick as Dragon makes his comeback. He pounds
away on King in the corner and adds a Muta Handspring Elbow. A kind
of rana is botched by Dragon and both guys are down. They try it
again and Dragon gets much higher this time and hits the rana
perfectly for two. King goes up and after bumping the cameraman
twice, gets caught in the super rana and the Dragon Sleeper for the
tap out.

Rating: C-.
Not much here but at least they’re trying to give these guys a story.
What that story is I’m not sure but at least they’re trying somehow.
Other than that though, the botch on the rana wasn’t great and it
really slowed the match down. Silver King is a much bigger deal in
Mexico, but in WCW he never amounted to anything.

Here are Savage and
Hall for a chat. Hall says you can’t have a party without the NWO
and they’re the reason why everyone is here and watching on TV at
home. Apparently DDP has joined the NWO even though Savage voted no.
As for Luger, the slump will continue tonight when he takes the Big
Elbow. Gene asks Page to come out and asks if the Diamond Cutter to
Luger on Thursday was intentional or not. Page calls the question
stupid and says he and Luger will settle their differences like men.
Just advancing stories here.

Chris Benoit vs.
Jeff Jarrett

Benoit drills him three
times in a row to start and ducks the enziguri attempt from Jeff.
Jarret heads to the floor and is immediately caught by a baseball
slide, so he hides behind Debra like a coward. Back in and Jarrett
misses a charge in the corner but manages to avoid the Swan Dive.
Jeff goes up top but Benoit pops up for a superplex, but Jarrett
hooks Benoit’s legs once they hit the mat for a fast pin. Short but
intense as you would imagine from a Benoit match.

The Nitro Girls dance
some more.

Mortis/Wrath vs.
Faces of Fear

Apparently this is a
rematch from Saturday Night where the Faces of Fear lost. Wrath and
Barbarian start things off with neither guy being able to keep an
advantage. Vandenberg grabs Barbarian’s leg and Wrath kicks him down
for two but Barbie pops right back up. A top rope lariat gets two
more for Wrath but he misses a middle rope elbow. Off to Meng for a
double middle rope headbutt for two more. Everything breaks down so
let’s talk about WarGames.

There’s no Jimmy Hart
out here with the Fear dudes for some reason. Things calm down a bit
and Wrath charges into a Meng boot in the corner. Back to Barbarian
who gets caught by a cross body of all things. Not hot tag brings in
Mortis to fire off kicks but Meng goes into MONSTER MODE….which
lasts about four seconds before Mortis kicks him down for two.
Everything breaks down again and Mortis jumps into the Tongan
Deathgrip to end this.

Rating: C.
I’ll give them this: they’re giving these lower level guys some
programs which while not great do in fact exist. So many people
today have nothing of note to do and just wait for a story to come
along. This isn’t much of a story for these guys but it’s something
to do and a chance for them to show their skills a bit. That’s kind
of nice to see and the matches aren’t horrible or anything.

Wrath and Meng fight
some more post match.

BUY THIS STUFF!

Hour #2 begins.

Here are the Horsemen
with something to say. Flair wants to know RIGHT NOW if Hennig is
with them or against them. Curt comes out but he says he’s still not
ready to give Flair an answer at this point. However, Flair was
expecting this so here’s Arn Anderson to give a final sales pitch.
Anderson talks about how he’s never been the biggest, the strongest,
or the best at anything, but he’s parlayed that into a wrestling
career. Then a few months ago he had to have neck surgery which left
his left hand (he’s a southpaw) too weak to hold a glass or button a
button.

Then a few days ago at
the gym, he dropped a water bottle and saw the water falling out of
it like the sand in the hourglass of his career. Therefore, he’d
rather walk away than endanger the careers of men he respects. Every
time he got in the ring, he gave you everything he had and that’s how
he wants to be remembered. However he has one more challenge and
that’s to Curt Hennig. He asks Hennig to be the new Enforcer of the
Horsemen, which is Anderson’s spot on the team. Hennig says it would
be a privilege and shakes Arn’s hand to join the team.

US Title: Steve
McMichael vs. Eddie Guerrero

Mongo (the champion)
gets jumped from behind to start with Eddie going after the knee. A
snapmare puts the champ on the mat and Eddie stomps away before
hitting a DDT out of the corner for two. A headscissors gets the
same as Mongo is in trouble. Steve comes back with some basic power
stuff including a slam and another slam and then a SPINNING slam. A
charge misses in the corner and Eddie goes up, only to jump into a
Tombstone for the pin to retain. Nothing to see here.

Here’s Rey to update us
on his knee injury. He shouldn’t have wrestled at Road Wild which
brings out Konnan to run his mouth. Trash is spoken but Giant comes
out to scare Konnan off.

Bischoff comes out and
runs off Heenan and Tenay, saying he and Tony are doing commentary
for the rest of the show. Ok then.

Cruiserweight Title:
Yuji Nagata vs. Chris Jericho

I never got the appeal
of Nagata. I know he’s a big deal in Japan but his WCW stuff bored
me to death. Technical stuff to start with Jericho being sent into
the ropes where he misses a spinwheel kick. Yuji takes it to the mat
and fires off a HARD kick to Jericho. You know, because he’s
Japanese and Japanese wrestlers kick a lot. Jericho comes back with
a dropkick and slam to set up a springboard splash for two. We hit a
chinlock for a bit before Nagata is put in the Tree of Woe for some
kicks.

We take a break and
come back with Jericho getting dropped stomach first onto the ropes.
We head to the floor where Jericho comes back with a cross body and
it’s back inside. Yuji punches Jericho coming off the top to break
up an ax handle shot. Jericho shrugs that off, hits the Lionsault,
the WCW-rare double powerbomb and hooks the Liontamer for the tap out
to retain.

Rating: D+.
This didn’t work for the most part for me. Nagata is another guy who
is just there with no real character or anything resembling one aside
from “he’s a big deal in Japan.” Therefore, it’s hard to care
about him and it’s hard to buy him as a legit threat to Jericho’s
title. Not bad but nothing interesting at all here.

Harlem Heat wants to be
#1 contenders but they have to get past the Steiners apparently. Ray
talks about not having to go up north (to WWF) or to Japan because
they’re the big tag team of WCW. The Steiners come out to say they
deserve another title shot because of how the previous match ended.
Vicious and Delicious come out to brag and a fight breaks out.

More dancing.

TV Title: Alex
Wright vs. Dean Malenko

Alex is defending.
Dean messes with him by using amateur stuff on him to start before
taking him to the mat for two. The champ heads to the floor and
comes back in with a strategy of punch Dean in the face over and
over. Sometimes it’s the simplest ideas that work best I suppose.
There’s an elbow drop but the champion stops to dance instead of
covering.

There’s a backbreaker
and Wright bends Dean over his knee for a little while. Wright’s
piledriver attempt is blocked into a backdrop. Malenko loads up a
superplex but gets shoved down. Instead Dean settles for a dropkick
but Wright goes to the eyes to break up the Cloverleaf attempt. A
pair of suplexes take Dean down but Dean counters into another
Cloverleaf attempt, drawing Dean and Eddie out for the DQ.

Rating: C-.
This was just waiting around until we got to the ending. The matches
tonight haven’t had much to them at all other than setting up stuff
for the future. That’s ok for a bit but when that’s all that happens
on the show it gets old. Dean needs Jarrett to go to the WWF already
so he and Eddie can just do their thing without being dragged down.

Lex Luger vs. Randy
Savage

Savage, an old Memphis
man, stalls before we get going. Luger punches him into the ropes
and gets pulled away by the referee, resulting in Savage getting in a
punch to take over. Randy seems to be keeping things simple tonight
with punches and a clothesline as we head to the floor. More basic
attacking by Savage as he starts focusing on the ribs by sending
Luger into the barricade.

Luger tries crawling
around but gets kicked in the head. You can’t say Savage didn’t live
up to his name. A double ax off the apron puts Luger down again,
preventing him from getting back into the ring. Savage finally
throws him back in and drops the top rope ax on him for two. A
sleeper on Luger is quickly countered into a belly to back suplex and
both guys are down.

Luger gets up first and
starts his comeback with his complete assortment of non-Rack moves
(punch, clothesline, atomic drop, forearm) before calling for the
Rack. Hall of course runs in and rams the guys together by mistake.
Page comes out and checks on Luger, resulting in Lex Racking him to
end the show.

Rating: D+.
This was again just there for the ending to play off the idea of
Luger and Page having issues. Based on that, I’ll set the over/under
for pleas for WCW to come together at 4 for the first hour of next
week’s show alone. Savage and Luger fought forever in WCW so it’s
kind of nice to see them rekindle that a bit here.

Overall Rating: D.
This show just wasn’t very good. It was almost all angle
advancement, but at the same time there weren’t any good matches to
back it up. We’re heading into WarGames now and nothing is really
set in stone yet. We can see most of the card though, and that’s the
most important part. Anderson’s retirement speech is worth checking
out, if nothing else to keep in mind for the parody that would
follow.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and check out my website at kbwrestlingreviews.com

Rants

Monday Nitro – August 18, 1997

By Scott Keith on 9th January 2013

Monday
Nitro #101

Date: August 18, 1997

Location:
Birmingham-Jefferson Civic Center, Birmingham, Alabama

Commentators: Tony
Schiavone, Mike Tenay, Bobby Heenan, Larry Zbyszko

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

We’re about a month
away from Fall Brawl and the final traditional WarGames match with
WCW vs. the NWO. On top of that, we’ve got Sting vs. Hogan looming
which would be huge financially, but not so great critically. I’m
talking about the future so much because there isn’t much to talk
about in the next few weeks other than the final Clash of the
Champions a few days after this. Let’s get to it.

Raven reads us a poem
about ugly people to start things off.

Harlem Heat vs.
Vicious and Delicious

Buff and Ray start
things off with Buff running his mouth of course. A hiptoss shuts
him up for a bit but he comes back with a hiptoss of his own and some
posing. Ray still tries to shut him up, this time with a slam and a
tag off to his brother. Norton comes in as well to pound down
Booker, only to get kicked in the face a few times. Back to Ray who
gets grabbed by Buff to give the NWO a quick advantage. A few elbows
are dropped before one from the top by Buff misses. Everything
breaks down after the hot tag to Ray and Vincent comes in for the
fast DQ.

Rating: D+.
Nothing to see here as the Heat were out of the NWO’s league here and
Vincent continues to be nothing of note. The match was short too but
given that this is Nitro, I almost have to take the shorter ones just
to have something to rate. The Heat weren’t long for WCW though as
it would soon be Booker getting the big singles push.

Booker clears the ring
anyway.

Barbarian vs. Mortis

This feud isn’t exactly
lighting the world on fire but it’s nice to see a story getting to
run its course. During Mortis’ entrance, we hear about Jericho
winning the Cruiserweight Title on Saturday Night. Mortis kicks away
to start and pounds Barbarian down into the corner. Barbie misses a
charge into the post and Mortis hits a Fameasser off the middle rope
for two. The guy not in a mask comes back with a powerslam and
pounds Mortis down in the corner. Mortis goes up again but dives
into a powerslam for another two count. The Kick of Fear ends Mortis
a few seconds later. Wow Barbarian gets a clean win on Nitro.
That’s different.

Post match Wrath comes
in to take Barbarian out but Meng puts him in the Tongan Death Grip
to knock Wrath out.

Here’s the NWO for
their weekly chat. Bischoff is looking forward to the party on
Thursday because Larry Z and Giant can’t come near him. Apparently
Giant was arrested last week. Eric wants his own show for the NWO
and says he’ll see us Thursday. Just hyping the Clash here.

Flair and Hennig have
their weekly promo: “You’re a Horseman!” “No I’m not, but
we’ll win our tag match against the NWO anyway.” More Clash
hyping.

Stevie Richards vs.
Scotty Riggs

Richards charges to the
ring like a maniac. Riggs grabs the wrist to start before nearly
botching a monkey flip. A dropkick puts Richards on the floor but he
rams Scotty’s shoulder into the post to take over. Back in and a
sitout spinebuster gets two for Stevie but Scotty comes back with
some clotheslines. Richards loses his half shirt and gets caught in
a side slam for two. Raven jumps the railing as Stevie hits the
Stevie Kick for the pin.

Rating: D.
I guess this was to set up future stuff but that didn’t make this any
easier to get through. Riggs is just not that good and Richards is a
comedy character which doesn’t make for an interesting or good match
at all. Not much to see here but that would be the case for a lot of
Nitro matches.

Raven lays out Richards
with the Even Flow.

Eddie, Debra and
Jarrett make fun of the fans and tell Wright that he has to win the
TV Title if he wants to hang out with them.

The NWO says this
Thursday is going to be their birthday.

Chris Benoit/Steve
McMichael vs. Jeff Jarrett/Eddie Guerrero

Benoit and Guerrero
start things off with Chris taking over with a gorgeous suplex to
send Eddie crawling to Jeff. Jarrett won’t come in to face Mongo who
he faces for the US Title on Thursday. Mongo goes after Eddie
instead but Jeff sneaks in with a dropkick to the back of McMichael’s
knee. The heels start working over said knee with some Horsemen
style tactics. A Benoit distraction lets Mongo hit a three point
stance charge to take out Guerrero and make a hot tag. Everything
breaks down and Eddie has to break up the Crossface on Jeff. Mongo
blasts Jeff with the US Title to give Benoit the pin.

Rating: C+.
Short but very hot match here. I was hoping for more selling from
Mongo of the knee, but they didn’t work on it that long so it’s not
terrible I guess. As usual, the less Jeff Jarrett is involved in a
Jeff Jarrett match, the more exciting that match becomes. He would
be gone in about two months thank goodness.

We recap Sting’s
segment with JJ last week.

The Outsiders say
they’re ready for Page and Luger tonight. I believe that was the
main event of the Clash as well.

Ric Flair vs. Syxx

Road Wild rematch.
They have a pose off to start until Flair is backdropped and sent
into the corner. It’s a Flair match. Did you expect things to start
well for him? He chops Syxx down and takes over with a headlock
followed by another after an escape. Flair pounds on the head and
clotheslines Syxx down before going after the knee. Syxx comes back
with an enziguri to set up the Bronco Buster, drawing huge heat from
the southern crowd.

Some chops don’t get
Flair that far as Syxx punches him right back down. A guillotine
legdrop gets two and there’s the Flair Flip out to the floor. Back
in and a second Bronco Buster misses and you can almost feel the
crowd laughing as Syxx crotches himself. They punch each other down
and it’s Flair up to backdrop Syxx down again. There’s the knee to
the head and it’s time to go to school. That also means it’s time
for Vincent, Bagwell and Norton to run in for the DQ.

Rating: C.
These two fought each other quite a bit and we got some decent
matches out of them most of the time. The respect angle was fine,
especially when you have a punk like Waltman and a pretty big jerk in
Flair out there talking about it. Not much to see here but it was
designed to set up the Clash again, which is fine.

Hennig makes the save
post match.

JJ and Nick Patrick are
with Gene and Dillon says that Nick did nothing wrong at the PPV.
Patrick questions Randy Anderson’s officiating, drawing him out for
the always fascinating referee argument.

TV Title: Ultimo
Dragon vs. La Parka

Dragon is defending of
course. Things start fast with Parka getting flipped over and
backdropped. Dragon does his headstand in the corner and fires away
with the kicks to take the challenger down again. A dropkick sends
La Parka to the floor and there’s a big dive by the champion to take
him out again.

Sonny Onoo (La Parka’s
manager apparently) kicks Dragon down and Parka sends Dragon into the
steps. A powerbomb gets two for Parka so he puts Dragon in the Tree
of Woe for a kick to the chest. Now let’s stand around for a bit!
Dragon comes back, hits the super rana, Sonny’s interference fails,
and the Dragon Sleeper retains the belt.

Rating: D+.
Just a quick title match here with no doubt as to who was going to
win. Dragon was pretty good at what he did but as usual, the lack of
mic skills held him down. If we can’t connect with these characters,
the matches have to be amazing for them to get over. Dragon was
good, but not that good. He would lose the title soon enough anyway.

Curt Hennig vs. The
Giant

Hennig slaps him in the
face for some reason and is tossed into the corner accordingly. An
attempted whip out of the corner fails completely for Hennig so Curt
bails to the floor. Giant hits some of those LOUD chops to Curt’s
chest and suplexes him down. He calls for the chokeslam and here’s
Eric to say that Giant is violating the restraining order. Doug
Dillinger (WCW security) won’t do anything about it so Giant goes
after Eric, losing via countout in the process. Short and basically
a squash until the ending.

Dillinger still won’t
do anything so Larry Z comes out to corner Eric. Bischoff runs into
the crowd and escapes as cops hold Giant back.

We recap the Sting
segment from last week again.

JJ is in the ring with
another offer for Sting which I’m sure will work this time.
Apparently he doesn’t have a new contract for Sting tonight. Stupid
me, thinking the rolled up paper in his hand that has been a contract
the last two weeks is a contract again here. JJ says he needs
answers from Sting soon or they may have to go their separate ways.
Geez even the WCW on screen bosses are stupid. Sting has until the
Clash to tell JJ what he wants.

Here’s Sting in the
crowd and the fans go nuts. The fans chant Hogan and Sting points at
them again. Even TONY FREAKING SCHIAVONE is saying how obvious this
is. Sting takes a sign out of the crowd that says Hulk vs. Sting.
And JJ STILL doesn’t get it. Apparently HOLDING UP A SIGN THAT SAYS
THE MATCH ON IT isn’t telling him what Sting wants.

The NWO is having a
birthday party on Thursday.

Tag Titles:
Outsiders vs. Diamond Dallas Page/Lex Luger

The announcers point
out that the Steiners are being passed over AGAIN here. I’m sure
another #1 contenders match is coming up soon too. Hall and Luger
start things off as we go past ten o’clock which was a different
thing back then. Luger slaps Hall in the face and shoves him into
the corner to get things going. He beats on both Outsiders in the
NWO corner and Hall tags Nash.

The big man wants Page
so they both stand in opposite corners for a bit. The high powered
offense begins from Nash until Page takes him down with a swinging
neckbreaker for two. Page fires off his shoulder blocks but Nash
clotheslines him right back down. DDP escapes Snake Eyes and gets
two off a Russian legsweep. Back to Hall for a clothesline and the
fallaway slam for two.

Off to the abdominal
stretch for a bit until Page hip tosses out of it. Nash breaks up
the tag attempt to Luger and it’s time for corner elbows. The
Outsiders change without a tag and the referee yells at them. Hall
makes an overblown tag and now Snake Eyes hits for no cover. They
change again sans tag and Anderson is fine with it now.

Off to a sleeper by
Hall and Page is in trouble. His arm drops twice before Page comes
back with a belly to back suplex to put both guys down. Nash breaks
up the tag AGAIN and clotheslines Page down. Page busts out a
headscissors of all things and finally tags in Luger. Not that it
matters as the NWO runs in about five seconds later for the DQ.

Rating: B-.
I was digging this until the obvious ending. We knew the titles
weren’t changing hands here and the NWO would run in, but it was cool
to see WCW guys hanging in there this long. They played the formula
here and as usual, it worked as well as anything else was going to.
Good stuff.

Flair and the Giant run
in and a brawl ends the show.

Overall Rating: B-.
Pretty good show here as they set up the Clash quite well. There’s
some stuff on there I’d like to see (including a main event of
Page/Luger vs. Hall/Savage which I listed wrong earlier). The Sting
stuff would really come to a new level on Thursday which it’s needed
to do for months now. Solid episode here as WCW is kind of on a
roll.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and check out my website at kbwrestlingreviews.com

Rants

Monday Nitro – August 4, 1997

By Scott Keith on 26th December 2012

Monday Nitro #99

Date: August 4, 1997

Location: Palace of
Auburn Hills, Detroit, Michigan

Commentators: Tony
Schiavone, Mike Tenay, Larry Zbyszko, Bobby Heenan

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

This is an interesting
episode as I’ve seen says this is the 100th episode, but
I’ve counted each one I’ve done and can only come up with 99. I
haven’t missed any shows and there are only 99 counting this one so
far. Two weeks in 1996 had no show at all so maybe they’re counting
one of those to get to 100. Either way, the main event tonight is
Luger vs. Hogan for the title, five days before their PPV title
match. That clearly won’t go anywhere. Let’s get to it.

Oh and this is a three
hour show.

Buffer welcomes us to
this special show. This whole 99 or 100 thing is going to bother me
but the best I can figure out is that WCW is just lying.

After the Nitro Girls
dance a bit, here are Hogan and Bischoff with something to say.
Hogan runs down Luger and says that he’s going to have “500,000 of
his friends” watching on Saturday. It was about 1% of that but
what difference does it match? Anyway, Hogan doesn’t like having to
defend tonight, but Luger is going to pay for the mistake tonight.
Hogan says something about defending against Scott Hall instead but
it didn’t make much sense.

Curt Hennig vs.
Mortis

Feeling out process to
start until Hennig takes Mortis down with a knee lift. Curt goes
after Vandenberg though and the masked dude takes over. Mortis
misses an elbow and there’s the Hennig neck snap. Mortis comes back
with a spinwheel kick for two but Hennig goes after the knee.
PerfectPlex ends this pretty quick.

Rating: C-.
I don’t like matches like this one as it’s hard to rate due to how
fast it was. A lot of it was them walking around, but it was so
short that it was still decent. This is what WCW’s massive roster
helps with: they have have a guy like Mortis lose, but he can go and
beat up other people and get his spot back. Also since there’s no
shame to losing to Hennig, everything is ok for him. Why WWE doesn’t
use their roster like this is beyond me.

Video on Sting not
talking for the last year or so.

Dean Malenko/Jeff
Jarrett vs. Hector Guerrero/Chavo Guerrero

Malenko and Chavo start
things off and we hit the mat very quickly. That doesn’t last long
so they run the ropes a bit until Dean gets taken down by a pair of
dropkicks. Hector comes in to face Jeff and we have a strut vs.
dance battle. A headscissors puts Jarrett down and frustrates him so
he pounds away a bit. Hector makes a brief comeback but stops to jaw
with Dean, letting Jeff take over again.

There’s the running
crotch attack to a 619’d Hector (I’m still looking for a better name
for that) before it’s back to Malenko. Make that back to Jeff again
and Hector gets two off a backslide. Chavo breaks up the Figure Four
and Dean is rolled up for two. Hector won’t tag and is caught in an
electric chair. Dean hooks the Cloverleaf and we’re done.

Rating: C.
The idea here was that Hector wouldn’t tag, presumably due to
stubbornness, but it doesn’t make Jeff any more interesting. The guy
is just flat out not interesting no matter how you try to push or
package him. Malenko was fine but he needs to get away from this
stupid tag team thing.

Raven still won’t talk
so here’s Stevie Richards instead. Richards has a contract for Raven
but there’s a snag. He’s been in Atlanta renegotiating for Raven and
everything seems to be cool now. Raven looks at the contract, spits
at Richards and decks him. He pulls back to punch Richards again,
but Stevie blocks it and says no more.

Giant vs. Joey
Maggs/Lenny Lane/Scott D’Amore

Chokeslam, chokeslam,
chokeslam, about 90 seconds, interview time.

Savage pops up on the
stage and says bring it before running from a fast walking Giant.

We recap the roll Lex
Luger is on. Basically it’s a Luger highlight video.

High Voltage vs.
Public Enemy

Kaos vs. Grunge to
start and Johnny wants to dance. A swinging neckbreaker puts Kaos
down as does a clothesline before it’s off to Rocco. Rage interferes
but Kaos takes the time to pose instead of following up. Larry:
“HE’S WASTING TIME!” Remember, this is LARRY ZBYSZKO complaining
about stalling. High Voltage is coming off as the heel team here and
it doesn’t suit them that well.

Rage comes in and
pounds away on Rocco a bit more but jumps off the top into Rocco’s
boot. My goodness how I hate that spot. Grunge comes in and beats
up both guys as everything breaks down. The Public Enemy loads up
the table but Rage moves, sending Rocco crashing through the wood.
Not that it matters as Rage runs into Kaos and is rolled up by Grunge
for the pin.

Rating: D+.
As lame as the match was, there was an actual story being told out
there. The idea was that High Voltage didn’t have the experience to
hang with the Public Enemy and the veterans used that to their
advantage. This is probably the last match I would have expected
something like that from but points to these guys for putting it in
there.

Alex Wright cuts in on
the Nitro Girls dancing. The Girls leave and Alex talks some trash
about Jericho, who he faces on Saturday.

Scotty Riggs vs.
Alex Wright

Non-title here. Wright
sends Scotty to the floor almost immediately and hits a double ax off
the apron. A suplex on the floor keeps Riggs down but he sends
Wright into the barricade to get himself a breather. Back in and
Alex takes over again before dancing a bit. They both hit cross
bodies with Scotty falling on top for two. They head up top and Alex
headbutts him down before hitting a missile dropkick for the pin.

Rating: D+.
Just a squash here to set up the title match at Road Wild. Wright
using the dropkick was a nice touch as that’s one of Jericho’s
finishing moves. Not much of a match here, but then again Riggs
wasn’t much of a wrestler. At least he stopped using the American
Males theme.

Hour #2 starts.

Here’s Luger to talk to
Gene. Lex says that he was only focused on Saturday but now his
focus has shifted to tonight. It’s his defining moment and tonight,
he’s going to make history. Standard promo here but it did exactly
what it needed to do. It’s such a simple science but no one can pull
it off anymore.

Chris Benoit vs.
Syxx

Syxx starts with that
headlock of his but Benoit quickly elbows him down. A spinwheel kick
puts Benoit down but Chris immediately legdraps Syxx out to the
floor. There’s a suicide dive to take the NWO dude out. Back in and
Benoit goes up, only to get caught in the Tree of Woe. Syxx hits a
Bronco Buster to an upside down Benoit in a move I’ve never seen
before. A top rope flipping legdrop misses Benoit though and Chris
suplexes him down for two. Benoit loads up a belly to back superplex
but here’s Jarrett to attack Benoit for the DQ.

Rating: C+.
This was a nice fast paced match that had to be brought down by a
stupid ending. This was done to further the tag match on Sunday
which at least had a purpose. Not much to see here but Benoit was
fast paced as usual and Syxx continues to be much better against
smaller guys. Not bad at all here.

More dancing.

Booker T vs. Vincent

Nothing match as Booker
beats up Vincent and side kicks him for the pin in maybe 45 seconds.

DDP talks about his
match with Flair tonight, saying that while he and Flair have common
enemies, Flair has his respect, but he has Flair’s number. I like
that line.

Wrath vs. Barbarian

Now here’s an odd
match. Barbarian knocks him back into the corner but gets
clotheslined down for two. Wrath takes him down but can’t hit the
Death Penalty (two arm Rock Bottom) as we head to the floor.
Barbarian sends him into various metal objects before we head back
inside. Back in and Barbarian goes up but jumps into the Death
Penalty for the pin. Too short to rate but it wasn’t very good.

Meng comes out to stare
down Wrath. Wrath bails.

The hometown Steiners
come out and introduce Ted DiBiase as their surprise new manager.
DiBiase was one of the original members of the NWO so this is a big
deal. He starts off by saying that he’s seen the error of his ways
before almost saying the World Wrestling Federation tag titles were
on the line on Saturday. Cue the Outsiders to laugh this off and say
that DiBiase is a dead man.

More dancing.

Lee Marshall does his
thing.

Konnan vs. Psychosis

Konnan pounds him down
to start before nearly clotheslining a horn off. A low dropkick hits
the masked man and Konnan sends him to the apron. Psychosis comes
back in with a top rope spinwheel kick for two. That’s about the
extent of his offense as Konnan hits the 187 and Tequila Sunrise for
the fast tap.

Rey, still on crutches,
comes out to confront Konnan post match. Konnan kicks the crutches
away but Rey is faking it and breaks a crutch over Konnan’s back.

Glacier/Ernest
Miller vs. Damien/Silver King

King and Glacier get us
going and the kicking begins. Glacier cranks on the arm a bit but
King kicks out of it pretty quickly. Damien trips up Glacier but the
ice enthusiast kicks Silver down anyway. Off to Miller but the
luchadores pound him down pretty quickly. Miller comes back with a
bunch of kicks and here’s Glacier again. A backdrop gets two on
Damien but Glacier is double teamed a bit. Uninterested tag brings
in Miller who uses his karate stuff, finishing Damien with a spinning
kick off the top.

Rating: D.
At the end of the day, Miller was so unbelievably boring in this role
and it took a long time to get him to a level where anyone cared
about him. Silver King and Damien actually got a win or two so they
were only somewhat jobbers to the stars. Not much to see here
though.

Here’s Bischoff with
something to say. He’s here to complain about the attack by the
Giant from last week and calls out JJ Dillon. The alleged boss of
WCW comes out and Eric yells a lot, threatening legal actions against
the Giant and violence against Larry Z. If there was a point to this
getting six minutes of TV time, I have no idea what it was.

Hour #3 begins and the
Nitro Girls dance on the announce table.

Diamond Dallas Page
vs. Ric Flair

Hennig comes out and
shakes Flair’s hand to mess with Page’s mind. Page runs Flair down
and slaps him in the face to tick him off. Hennig went to the back
already so this is one on one. Page pounds away in the corner and
Ric is in trouble early. Flair comes back with a poke to the eye but
Page counters a backdrop attempt into a sweet sitout powerbomb for no
cover. Hennig comes back out and we take a break.

Back with Flair in
control and Page down in the corner. Page comes back with right
hands and slams Flair off the top, but a Hennig distraction lets
Flair get in a shot to the knee. There’s the knee drop and Flair is
in Nature Boy mode. A quick Figure Four is broken up because Page is
in the ropes.

Flair pounds away even
more and tries to suplex Page over the top and out to the floor. DDP
counters of course and puts Ric in the Figure Four instead. Flair
pokes the referee in the eye, allowing Curt to come in. Page cradles
him to slow him down, but it lets Flair escape the hold. There’s a
Flair Flip in the corner and Ric goes up, only to dive into a
clothesline. Page calls for the Cutter but Hennig comes in for the
DQ.

Rating: C+.
This was fine but they more or less had a big sign saying RUN-IN
COMING. That’s fine though as you can’t have these guys losing five
days before a PPV match. I mean, this is WCW, not some crazy company
like WWE that has guys in prominent matches getting pinned on go home
shows.

Page clears the ring
post match.

Hector Garza/Lizmark
Jr. vs. Villanos

This would be IV and V
for you Villano enthusiasts. Garza and IV start things off and
things speed up quickly. Hector moonsaults out of the corner and
clotheslines IV down before hitting a superkick. Off to Lizmark for
a dropkick but V comes in and ducks the same move. Some armdrags put
V down but the Villanos double team Lizmark to take over. Back to
Garza who gets caught in a double gutbuster.

We head to the floor
where Garza is dropkicked into the barricade. That gets boring so
it’s back inside where everything breaks down. Garza dives on I
think IV before Lizmark and V go to the floor. IV is backdropped to
the floor so Garza can hit the big corkscrew plancha. Back in and
Lizmark dropkicks IV a few times, but the referee gets distracted and
the switch from the brothers is enough for Lizmark to get rolled up
for the pin.

Rating: C.
This was fine but it was nothing more than a bridge between the big
stuff later on in the show. Garza had the making of a big star and
was getting over pretty well in the earlier days of TNA before
getting busted for steroid possession. The other three guys never
amounted to anything in the States.

Here’s JJ to offer
Sting a contract. Basically “we’re sorry we thought you were lying
because we were too stupid to use common sense and tell that it
wasn’t you the whole time. Maybe we should hit Turner up for vision
insurance. Anyway, wanna fight Curt Hennig?” Sting lowers from
the rafters and rips up the contract. See, this is something that
actually deserved the six and a half minutes it got.

WCW World Title: Lex
Luger vs. Hollywood Hogan

Dang man how long has
it been since Hogan wrestled on Nitro? They trade hammerlocks to
start and Hulk heads to the ropes. More feeling out until Hogan
pounds away in the corner to take over. The fans are WAY into this
here. Hogan keeps beating on him and drops a bunch of elbows. A
clothesline in the corner has Lex in trouble and Hulk chokes away.
Luger comes back and rams the champ into the buckle a few times to
get himself a breather. Hollywood takes his head off with another
clothesline and we take a break.

Back with Hogan still
in control and hitting a suplex for two. A belly to back suplex puts
Luger down again and a big right hand gets two. The big boot and
legdrop hit for two and the pop is really weak for some reason.
Another legdrop misses and it’s comeback time. Luger decks the
Outsiders and Savage as they try to run in. The forearm takes Hogan
down and there’s the Torture Rack to give us a new world champion.

Rating: B.
The match itself was as by the book as you could get, but that’s
exactly what it should have been. The rating is almost entirely for
the moment, which is WAY better here than I remember it being.
Hindsight would say it was obviously only going to last until the
PPV, but still man this worked really well. I’m actually surprised
at how much I liked this.

The locker room empties
out for the celebration. The fans go NUTS too. Everyone goes to the
back and we see Giant and Luger polishing the belt to get the NWO
paint off as champagne is flowing everywhere.

Hogan loses his mind in
the other locker room.

Overall Rating: B.
This was supposed to be a special show, and I don’t often get to say
this about WCW, but they absolutely nailed it. The wrestling here is
ok at best, but they did a good job of setting up the PPV, they had a
good start to the new part of the Sting angle, and the ending is
actually excellent. I know it doesn’t mean anything in the long run,
but at the time this was a cool moment. Good show here which almost
shocks me.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

Rants

Monday Nitro – July 7, 1997

By Scott Keith on 28th November 2012

Monday
Nitro #95

Date: July 7, 1997

Location: Mid-South
Coliseum, Memphis, Tennessee

Attendance: 7,799

Commentators: Mike
Tenay, Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan, Larry Zbyszko

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

We’re finally back to
this series with the go home show for Bash at the Beach which is the
final show before we get to something a little more interesting than
celebrities in the main event. Tonight we have a pretty famous
moment which is a cool building block for a feud. I won’t spoil it
for those of you unfamiliar with it so let’s get to it.

We open with a recap of
Sting cleaning house last week to end the show, as Hennig and Raven
came to ringside as well.

Opening sequence.

Gene is here with
Hennig to open things up. The fans boo Hennig for some reason. He
says he’ll be at Bash at the Beach and will be active in some
capacity, but he won’t say if he’s Page’s mystery partner or not.
Hennig declares himself a free agent and here’s Flair with some
blonde. Flair is all fired up and says Hennig is here to join the
Horsemen. Curt says he didn’t say he’s joining, although he seems
intrigued by the offer.

Harlem Heat vs.
Public Enemy

Booker and Grunge start
but all four guys get in the ring for a staring contest before any
contact is made. Booker pounds Johnny down in the corner and
clotheslines him down for two. It’s off to Rock who has a bit better
luck as he pounds away on Booker’s arm. That’s about the extent of
his luck though as Ray comes in and pounds away in the corner.

The Heat keep control
and a side slam by Booker gets two. An elbow misses Rock and the tag
brings in Grunge. Everything breaks down and here’s Vincent of the
NWO for no apparent reason. Sherri points him out to Booker which
breaks up a Heat double team move. Booker goes after Vincent and
Sherri accidentally pushes Rock into Stevie, giving Grunge a pin. It
was about as messy as it sounds.

Rating: D.
This was four minutes of punching and kicking before we got to the
ending where things got more complicated than they needed to.
Apparently Vincent had interfered in a Harlem Heat match on Saturday
Night as well, so there’s some kind of a story there which is better
than some random attack I guess. The match sucked though.

Post match Harlem Heat
yells at Sherri. Gene accidentally calls Vincent Virgil here.
Booker says Sherri needs to get her act together or she’s gone.
Sherri quits instead.

Joe Gomez vs. Konnan

Raven is in the front
row again. Konnan hammers away to start but Gomez comes back with
his usual jobber offense. Tenay talks about Raven being ECW Champion
without saying ECW. Konnan cranks away on the head and arm for
awhile and hits the rolling clothesline for two. The Tequila Sunrise
(kneeling arm trap half crab) ends Gomez pretty quickly.

Rating: D.
Just a squash here and Gomez continues to be one of those guys that
is always around but never really did anything. Konnan would be
continuing his heel turn (I think?) in the next few months before
finally joining the NWO just like almost every other heel on the
roster would do.

Hector
Garza/Juventud Guerrera vs. Villano IV/Villano V

Garza and I think #4
start things off here with Garza flying all over the place. The
Villanos are a bit bigger so they’re better as targets than guys
flying through the air. Off to Juvy who speeds things up even more
and hits a rana to send IV into the corner for the tag to V. Garza
comes back in and gets caught in something like a Demolition
Decapitation from the Villanos.

V drops a leg and it’s
back to IV for a clothesline. A powerslam gets two for IV but a
double elbow misses. The non-brothers double team a bit and
everything breaks down. We get a move we would call Poetry in Motion
to both Villanos but IV catches Juvy in mid aid and slams him down
for two.

Garza launches Juvy
into a double dropkick and a sunset flip gets one for Guerrera. A
double gutbuster slows Juvy down but Garza hits a backbreaker and
moonsault for two. This is very fast paced stuff. Heel
miscommunication sends the Villanos to the floor and there’s the
Corkscrew Plancha from Garza to take out IV. Juvy Driver and 450 get
the pin on V back in the ring.

Rating: C+.
Take four luchadores, give them five minutes, cover your ears so the
fans don’t hurt your ears with the cheering. This is one of those
ideas that just works and didn’t need a lot of work. These guys were
all very talented and could impress the crowd by going out there and
doing what they had been doing in Mexico for years. Standard lucha
tag match here and it was fun stuff.

Liz, Macho and Hall
invade the announce desk but Larry Z won’t leave. They say they’re
going to take Page and whoever the mystery partner is very lightly
because they’re just too good. Just a quick promo to hype the tag
match Sunday here. Hall throws his shirt at Larry and Zbyszko wants
to fight. Nothing comes of it of course.

We get a video on Giant
and Luger teaming up on Sunday. They’re not sure if they can trust
each other but they’re going to.

Vicious and
Delicious vs. Eddie Guerrero/Chavo Guerrero

It’s Bagwell and Norton
as the as the NWO B tag team. Before the match, a limo is seen
arriving in the back. We take a break and come back to see Chavo vs.
Buff starting things off. Buff is looking pretty roided up here and
pounds away to start. Apparently Syxx and Nash aren’t here, which
Tony thinks is some kind of genius master plan. Yes, the master plan
is to have LESS forces here while they’re in a war. Keep that up
Tony. We need thinking like that.

Off to Norton and Eddie
makes a blind tag to missile dropkick him. Scott will have none of
this falling down thing and suplexes both Guerreros down. Eddie
doesn’t seem to want to stay in despite being tagged so Bagwell slaps
him into reality. Things speed up and Bagwell gets dropkicked down,
only to come back with a hotshot to put Eddie down. Back to Norton
who throws Eddie around by the throat. Larry: “He picked him up
like a baby.” What kind of person picks up babies by the throat
and throws them into a corner? Instead of commentating Larry needs
to be filling out police reports for child abuse.

Eddie does that fast
crawl on his knees across the ring to tag in Chavo so he can get
beaten up for awhile. Bagwell jumps into a boot and Eddie doesn’t
seem interested in tagging back in. Now he walks away as Norton
suplexes Chavo down for two. A quick rollup gets two on Bagwell but
he walks into a wicked powerslam from Norton. Eddie yells at Chavo
to get up from the stage as Norton picks Chavo up from a cover.
Norton powerbombs Chavo down and holds him up for a Blockbuster which
gets the pin.

Rating: C-.
This was a more entertaining match which was helped because I like
the Blockbuster a lot. Other than that, this was more about an angle
instead of the match, which was really just a long squash. Vicious
and Delicious never went anywhere but they were fine for matches like
this one. More weak stuff on the show so far.

Hour #2 starts but
Larry wants to watch the next match instead of letting Heenan sit
down. Scratch that as we’re going to have a four man booth for
awhile.

La Parka vs. Randy
Savage

We get a video of La
Parka’s chair usage of the last month. They trade armdrags to start
and Heenan’s headset doesn’t work. A small package gets two for La
Parka so Savage clotheslines him down. Hell walks to the announcers
desk as Savage slams La Parka and loads up the elbow. La Parka gets
his feet up, hits a Diamond Cutter on Savage and pins him. The mask
comes off and it’s Diamond Dallas Page, drawing a BIG pop from the
crowd.

Rating: C.
The match sucked, but this is one of those moments that people always
remember from Nitro. Page vs. Savage was one of those feuds where
they kept them apart long enough between the matches that you wanted
to see them fight when you got the chance. This is called building a
feud and unfortunately it’s a lost art today.

Ernest
Miller/Glacier vs. Silver King/Psychosis

Well it’s not Wrath and
Mortis at least. The bell rings and Glacier causes some
lucha-miscommunication, but we cut to the back to see the Guerreros
in a fight. Glacier and Psychosis are starting things off but before
anything happens it’s off to Miller for, wait for it, wait for
it…..KICKING! King launches Psychosis at Miller but Psychosis’
kick only grazes him. Everything breaks down and we get a lot of
kicking. There’s a leg lock to Psychosis by Miller but Silver King
breaks it up. Psychosis kicks Miller down but a second one is
countered into a powerbomb….and here are Mortis and Wrath for the
fast DQ.

All three teams brawl
for awhile.

Lee Marshall does his
thing. In case you’re not familiar with him after I reference him
week after week, congratulations: you’re now almost exactly like most
old school wrestling fans. Marshall was a really bad commentator on
the D level TV shows and that’s about it.

Here’s Flair with that
blonde again. Flair brings out Piper, his opponent on Sunday.
Actually, it’s just a mannequin. Oh I don’t see this ending well.
Flair says Piper isn’t the icon and the blonde (with the thickest
country accent I’ve heard in years) asks why he’s called Hot Rod.
The real Piper comes up behind Flair as Flair goes on a big rant
about Piper.

They head to the ring
and Flair gets his clothes ripped off, revealing green boxers. The
Horsemen come out for the save but Piper beats them all up. The
Horsemen finally get him down and Benoit hits the longest Swan Dive
I’ve ever seen. Someone comes in for a save as we go to a break.
Even the announcers couldn’t tell who he was.

Post break, of course
we don’t mention who the other guy was.

Raven still has nothing
to say but Stevie Richards comes in to speak for Bird Boy. He calls
himself Dancing Stevie Richards and tells Tenay to go “ask one of
the Mexicans what their favorite movie is.” Richards asks Raven
some questions but again gets no answers. Tenay gets shoved away.

Chris Benoit/Steve
McMichael vs. Steiners

Apparently it was Jeff
Jarrett in the ring. Good enough I guess. Steve and Scott start
things off with Steiner immediately taking it to the mat. Mongo
comes back with a powerslam but walks into a spinning belly to belly
for two. Off to Rick vs. Benoit with Benoit going off on Steiner in
the corner. Rick comes back with a release overhead belly to belly
for two and grabs him on the mat.

Mongo comes in again
and punches Rick a bit as the match slows down. Rick shoves him into
the corner so Scott can beat on McMichael on the floor a bit. Savage
is in the back beating up Nick Patrick and hurting his shoulder.
What would a main event be without a cutaway to something in the
back? Scott gorilla presses Benoit and puts him in an STF. Rick
gets the tag and puts Benoit in an STF of his own.

Benoit comes back with
a dragon screw legwhip and it’s off to McMichael. Scott comes in and
belly to belly superplexes Mongo down for two. Rick gets the hot (?)
tag to clean house and everything breaks down. Jeff Jarrett runs out
and beats up Mongo as Sullivan comes out with a chair to crack over
Benoit’s head. Rick sees what happened and steals the pin anyway.

Rating: C-.
This was more along the lines of a way to build up Mongo and Benoit’s
singles matches on Sunday. The match was kind of a mess but it was a
very physical mess which made things more interesting. When the
Steiners started throwing people around it was always entertaining,
as was Benoit suplexing everyone all over the place. Not a terrible
match but it was messy.

Here are Hogan and
Bischoff to close the show. Bischoff talks about seeing Luger on
Regis and Kathy Lee this morning and how after Sunday, no one is
going to want to see him again. This is a really basic interview
until Luger and Giant chase them off to end the show. The NWO comes
in and Luger puts Bischoff in the Rack with Giant running
interference.

Overall Rating: D.
Over than the Savage and Page stuff, this was a pretty dull show.
The matches weren’t any good and while the PPV was built up, it’s
still nothing that I have any interest in watching. Thankfully after
this we would move towards matches that were for more than bragging
rights and honor. This show on its own doesn’t do anything that well
though, other than the Page stuff which is really memorable.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and check out my website at kbwrestlingreviews.com

Rants

Monday Nitro – June 23, 1997

By Scott Keith on 17th November 2012

Monday
Nitro #93

Date: June 23, 1997

Location: Macon
Coliseum, Macon, Georgia

Commentators: Mike
Tenay, Bobby Heenan, Tony Schiavone, Larry Zbyszko

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

We’re getting closer to
Bash at the Beach but more importantly we’re getting closer to next
week which is being hyped as a major Nitro, with the debut of a major
name. There would be another major name there actually but not as
big as the other one. Tonight we’re likely going to build towards
the PPV but I wouldn’t expect Hogan or Rodman to be here. Let’s get
to it.

We open with a recap
from the end of last week’s show with Luger and Giant getting beaten
down by the NWO.

Opening sequence.

By the way, before the
show started, a local guy debuted (I believe) in a dark match. His
name: Goldberg.

Here are Page and
Kimberly (looking GOOD) to open the show. Page says he has a
surprise partner for the PPV and tonight it’s Page vs. Hall, as set
up by Kimberly somehow.

Public Enemy vs. La
Parka/Damien

Grunge and Parka start
things off as Tony talks about the rest of the show because this
isn’t an important match. That’s not sarcasm. This match is about
as pure filler as you can ask for. La Parka takes him into the
corner but Grunge takes him down. Off to Damien as all four are in
the ring already. Off to Rock vs. Damien with the luchadors taking
over for a bit. Not hot tag brings in Grunge and it’s table time.
Rock dives through Damien through the table which isn’t a DQ somehow.
La Parka blasts Grunge with a chair and steals the pin. Short and
nothing of note, but it’s nice to see a fresh team getting a win like
this.

Here’s Eddie Guerrero
who asks for Chavo to come out to clear the air over an issue they’re
apparently having. Eddie claims Chavo offered to go to the ring last
week to face Malenko. Chavo isn’t sure if that’s true but Eddie has
talked to JJ and Chavo is getting Eddie’s shot at Syxx tonight.
Chavo isn’t sure what’s going on but he says ok.

Alex Wright vs.
Chris Jericho

This is a rematch from
two weeks ago. Wright jumps Jericho as he gets in the ring and
things start fast. Jericho comes back with a spinwheel kick to send
Wright to the floor. Alex starts to take a walk but comes back to
kick Jericho in the ribs a few times. Chris takes him to the mat to
take over and works on an armbar. A springboard shoulder block puts
Wright on the floor but Jericho dives into a dropkick to shift
momentum again. Wright stops to dance but Jericho hits a Lionsault
Press for two. Jericho catches him coming out of the corner and the
Liontamer (called a Boston Crab here) gets the submission.

Rating: C.
Not bad here as Jericho continues to evolve into the modern day
version of himself. Wright’s heel turn has more flounder in it than
a river in Minnesota and it just isn’t working at all. Thankfully
they made the right pick with who to push of these two as Jericho
would become a legend and Wright would become a Nazi character.

The announcers talk
about the PPV main event and the NWO interfering in the tag match at
the previous PPV.

Steiner Brothers vs.
Harlem Heat

ANOTHER #1 contender
match because seventy four of them weren’t enough. Vincent
interfered at the PPV so the Heat’s victory didn’t count. Booker and
Scot get things going and we stall to start. Eventually Scott gets
double teamed and kicked in the face to give the Heat control. Then
again Scott Steiner isn’t one to sell so he gorilla presses Booker
and launches him across the ring.

Off to Rick and the
fans start barking. Stevie beats on him and kicks Rick in the head
to take over. When all else fails, kick the guy in the head. Rick
comes back with a belly to back and barks some more. Off to Scott
vs. Booker again with the future Freakzilla taking over via a belly
to belly. A double tag brings in Stevie and Rick with Stevie
powerslamming Rick down for two.

Off to a chinlock for a
bit followed by Booker missing an elbow but Spinarooning up. Rick
powerslams him down and it’s off to Scott who cleans house. Stevie
breaks up the top rope bulldog and Sherri is knocked into Booker on
the floor. A BAD looking top rope bulldog (Stevie’s head hit Rick’s
leg) gets the pin for Rick.

Rating: D-.
This was a MESS. They were all over the place and weren’t even in
the same library, let alone on the same page. The ending looked
horrible and the whole thing just never clicked. It didn’t help that
the Outsiders wouldn’t defend the belts again for months, making this
match, say it with me, TOTALLY POINTLESS.

The NWO D team
(Bagwell, Norton and Vincent) say the Steiners aren’t the #1
contenders. Buff says he has the real arms instead of Scott Steiner.
Buff and Norton are now named Vicious and Delicious. The Steiners
get in their faces and chase them off. The Steiners want the
Outsiders.

Video on Ernest Miller.
The guy still wouldn’t be interesting for about three years, and
even then it was nothing special.

Hector Garza vs.
Villano IV

Talk about your random
matches. Villano takes over quickly with a Cutter that looks more
like an RKO. He launches Garza to the floor and hits a suicide dive
to take Garza down again. Garza comes back once they get inside and
Tenay goes into one of his interesting stories about Garza’s father
being a regional star in Mexico. How did he go from this to hitting
on women thirty five years his junior in TNA? Villano hits a
shoulder breaker but misses a moonsault. They head to the floor with
Garza hitting a backbreaker followed by his trademark corkscrew
plancha. Back inside and a standing moonsault pins Villano.

Rating: C-.
There were some good dives here but the match had zero heat. There’s
no reason to care about either of these guys and big flips and dives
mean nothing when you can see Mysterio and Dragon do the same things.
The match was a fine way to kill seven minutes, but the match didn’t
mean anything at all.

Here are Luger and
Giant for a chat. They don’t like Hogan and Rodman all that much
apparently. They won’t quit and they’ll win at the PPV. This takes
five minutes to get through.

Cruiserweight Title:
Chavo Guerrero Jr. vs. Syxx

Hall is with the champ
here. Chavo puts Syxx on the floor but misses a cross body off the
top to give the champ control. The Bronco Buster hits and it’s off
to a chinlock. Syxx hits a Michinoku Driver and some of those fast
legdrops of his. A charge into the corner misses Chavo though and
both guys are down. Chavo wins a quick slugout and gets a rollup for
two. Eddie comes out to watch as Syxx is knocked to the floor. A
BIG top rope dive takes Syxx out but Hall decks Chavo behind the
referee’s back. The Outsider’s Edge sets up the Buzz Kill for the
submission. Eddie has his arms folded on the stage.

Rating: C+.
When you give Waltman a small guy like Chavo to fight, you get a much
better match out of him. This wasn’t a masterpiece or anything but
it was entertaining stuff. Syxx would actually lose the title before
the next episode of Nitro at a house show (called Saturday Nitro) to
a certain Lionheart.

Konnan vs. Steve
McMichael

Jarrett is on official
Horsemen probation apparently. Mongo shoves Konnan down to start so
Konnan wants to get in a three point stance. One of these guys would
wind up in the College Football Hall of Fame so guess how well this
goes for Konnan. Back in after Mongo shoves him to the floor, Konnan
pounds away in the corner. We hit a neck crank but Hugh Morrus comes
out to distract Konnan, allowing Mongo to hit the Tombstone for the
quick pin. Nothing to see here.

We get a video on
Benoit’s path to get another match with Sullivan, because somehow
Sullivan, who I don’t think beat Benoit once in their feud, has the
pull to be able to not have a match he doesn’t want. Benoit had to
beat both Faces of Fear and did just that, then he had to beat Meng
again in the same kind of match. Now he gets a career match against
Sullivan at the Bash which will FINALLY end this feud.

Here’s Piper for a
chat. He rants about Batman and Mr. Freeze for some reason before
saying he thinks Flair might have abandoned him last week. He talks
about Flair dating two women so when he falls asleep they can talk to
each other. Here’s Flair to try to say something that makes sense.
When Ric Flair is the one who makes sense, you know you’re in
trouble. Flair comes out and tells Piper to calm down and Piper
references Dante’s Peak, a volcano movie. Mongo and Benoit come out
with Debra, who runs her mouth and is immediately booed.

Mongo makes fun of the
kilt and is the only person that makes any sense here. He says lay
off Flair but Piper wants to fight. Benoit tells Piper he’s been
around way too long and accuses him of having osteoporosis. Piper
beats up the Horsemen. Mongo hits him with the briefcase and Benoit
puts on the Crossface. We get a Horsemen stomp until security breaks
it up. I have no idea who I’m supposed to cheer for or why they’re
fighting in the first place.

Glacier/Ernest
Miller vs. High Voltage

This is Miller’s debut.
Rage and Kaos jump the karate guys from behind and are immediately
kicked to the floor. Glacier and Kaos start things off but Rage
comes in with a springboard bulldog. High Voltage hits a double
gorilla press but Glacier comes back with strikes. Mortis, Wrath and
Vandenberg are watching from the stage. Miller comes in and kicks a
lot before hitting something like Trouble in Paradise from the top
rope for the pin. Standard debut match.

Wrath and Mortis stare
some more.

Hogan and Rodman talk
some trash and it’s an NWO commercial.

Diamond Dallas Page
vs. Scott Hall

Savage and Liz come out
just after Hall. We actually hear about Page managing Hall back in
the day. They don’t mention it being in WCW but they do at least
mention it. Hall takes him down to start and works on the arm but
Page comes back with his shoulders to the shoulder. Hall goes to
Page’s bad ribs to take over again. Page hits an atomic drop but
gets backdropped to the floor, which isn’t a DQ because of whatever
reason they’re going with this week.

Savage sends Page into
the barricade and Hall chops away. DDP gets sent into the steps as
it’s all Hall at the moment. Page hits some right hands but gets
slammed down into the mat to stop the comeback. Page’s discus lariat
takes Hall down but DDP can’t follow up. He calls for the Cutter but
here’s Savage for the DQ.

Rating: C-.
Standard Nitro main event here as the match was mostly kicking and
punching before they were setting up a finish and the DQ ending. The
important thing here is that Page looked comfortable in there against
a big name, instead of looking like he was in over his head. The
Savage feud did an excellent job of elevating him to this level which
you hardly ever see anymore.

Savage and Hall beat
down Page. Savage goes up for the elbow but Sting is in the crowd
with the bat. He stares down Savage who is on the top rope, but
thankfully Savage drops the elbow on Page anyway. It took a minute
for him to do it but thankfully the NWO didn’t make Savage that
stupid. Sting chases Hall and Savage off to end the show.

Overall Rating: C-.
The problem with WCW at this point is really becoming clear now:
other than the main event and one or two other things, there aren’t
any stories going on here. The main feud is a tag match which we
don’t know the fourth participant of until we got to the PPV. The
second biggest feud I guess is Piper vs. Flair which makes no sense
at all. After that…..the tag title #1 contender feud which is
going on and on and would result in another #1 contenders match at
the PPV with another team replacing the Heat?

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and check out my website at kbwrestlingreviews.com

Rants

Monday Nitro – June 2, 1997

By Scott Keith on 24th October 2012

Monday Nitro #90
Date: June 2, 1997
Location: Hara Arena, Dayton, Ohio
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Tony Schiavone, Larry Zbyszko, Bobby Heenan

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

It’s
hard to believe we’re almost halfway through 1997. I’m digging this
idea of doing four shows at once as you get through the storylines a lot
faster which is good when the stories are really dull, as they have
been lately. Sting and Hogan is clearly being set up as a huge match
somewhere in the future, which is the start of probably the biggest
angle in the history of the company. Hopefully we get more of that
tonight. Let’s get to it.

Hall
and Syxx are in the ring to open the show. Hall says that the fans have
been asking for more of the NWO because they’re the reason everyone is
watching. They say they won at Slamboree and that Flair is recuperating
in the La Brea tar pits. Hall calls out Flair for a fight but we get JJ
Dillon instead. JJ says Flair is on his way here and tonight it’s Flair
vs. Hall. Hall says no but if he doesn’t do it, then the Outsiders are
stripped of the belts.

Opening sequence.

Alex Wright vs. Glacier

Wright
wisely jumps Glacier during his elaborate entrance and takes over
early. A spinwheel kick takes Glacier down and Wright pounds away in the
corner. He stops to dance though and Glacier gets in some kicks,
including the Cryonic Kick for the fast pin.

Post
match here’s James Vanderberg for a distraction along with Mortis and
Wrath who are spotted before they come in. The beatdown begins but
Wright wants to get some revenge. That bell ringing over and over again
is really annoying. Mortis aims a kick at Glacier but kicks Wright
instead. Glacier fights both monsters off.

Buff Bagwell vs. Joe Gomez

Bagwell
pounds him down and grabs the rope to avoid a Gomez dropkick. Bagwell
talks to the camera for awhile before walking into a bad dropkick by
Gomez. Joe throws some bad punches in the corner but gets dropped into
the buckle and thrown out to the floor. Scott Norton, Buff’s partner,
gets in some shots and sends Gomez back in for the Blockbuster and the
pin by Buff.

Rating: D.
Gomez was never in another match on Nitro and that’s a good thing. The
guy just wasn’t that good and it’s pretty clear to see why he never
amounted to anything. Bagwell wasn’t much better, although the
Blockbuster has always been a favorite move of mine. Just a squash here
but it was pretty bad looking while it lasted.

Mike Tenay gives us a quick profile on Ernest Miller.

We get a clip of Roddy Piper’s latest movie.

Hugh Morrus vs. Prince Iaukea

Konnan
jumps Morrus on his way to the ring. Morrus pounds him down but he’s a
bit shaken. They mess up a spot where Iaukea is supposed to slide
between Morrus’ legs so Morrus swings his leg out wide, but Iaukea runs
around instead and runs into Morrus’ leg. Thankfully Iaukea rolls him up
a second later for the pin. This seems to be an injury angle for
Morrus.

Here’s
JJ to talk about the main event but more importantly that we need #1
contenders to the tag titles after the PPV. He thinks it’s the Steiners,
who are barely on Nitro anymore. This draws out Sherri and Harlem Heat
who disagree with this ruling. JJ says if the Steiners win tonight, they
get the next shot after Flair and Piper. Sherri says that’ll get a
reaction.

We
recap Page vs. Savage with the focus on Page. He talks about losing his
first 79 matches and working his way up to become what he is now. He
kept getting better and developed the Diamond Cutter, which he used to
beat Savage in their first match. I want to see these guys fight again
which is a good sign.

Masahiro Chono/Great Muta vs. Steiner Brothers

Five
or six years earlier, this is a candidate for match of the year before
the bell even rings. Scott and Muta start with Muta firing off a very
quick kick to send Scott ducking back into the corner. Scott armdrags
him down and it’s a stalemate. A suplex sends Muta flying so Muta goes
to the strikes. Muta takes him down and we’re told that Flair has
arrived. Scott butterfly powerbombs and gorilla press slams Muta down,
sending him out to the floor.

Rick
comes in and Muta bails right back to the floor to hide. Rick stomps on
an NWO shirt and it’s off to Chono. The two of them have a test of
strength but Rick suplexes him down instead of seeing who wins. A
Steiner Line sends Chono to the outside and Muta wants nothing to do
with Rick either. Back in and Chono gets powerslammed down as Scott
takes out Muta. All Steiners so far.

Chono
gets back in against Scott and the Japanese guys finally get in some
shots to the back to take over. Scott gets the tag to Rick and the NWO
guys are taken down almost immediately. The Steiners were in trouble for
about 30 seconds. Chono hits the Mafia Kick on Scott and there’s a
handspring elbow to Muta. Chono accidentally Mafia Kicks Muta and the
Steiners load up the double bulldog on Muta. Harlem Heat runs in and
knocks out Rick with a chair, giving Muta the easy pin.

Rating: C-.
This was fast paced, but it came off almost like a squash. That doesn’t
exactly make the NWO guys seem to be any kind of a threat as the
Steiners were in trouble for about a minute out of a nearly ten minute
match. The ending was obvious given what Sherri said earlier, but it
makes sense all things considered.

Post
match Harlem Heat says they’re the #1 contenders now but JJ says the
match is under review. What is there to review exactly? Harlem Heat
interfered and the Steiners lost because of it. It’s not that
complicated, but this is WCW where you need a meeting to determine what
color the sky is.

It’s
hour #2 and after the recap, here’s Ric Flair for a chat. Flair rants
as you would expect him to and a lot of it is censored.

US Title: Dean Malenko vs. Mr. Wallstreet

Feeling
out process to start with neither guy being able to get any real
control. A rollup by Dean is blocked and Nick Patrick yells at
Wallstreet for holding the ropes. Patrick yells about using the hair and
the match slows down again. Wallstreet sends Dean to the floor as
things continue to not get started. Back in and Dean grabs a hammerlock
which is quickly broken. Off to a chinlock by the challenger
(Wallstreet) followed by an abdominal stretch. Sweet goodness Wallstreet
is dull.

Dean’s
leg lariat gets two as does a suplex. The Cloverleaf is broken up by a
rake to the eyes but Wallstreet misses a charge and goes flying over the
top and out to the floor. Jeff Jarrett comes in out of nowhere and
trips Malenko for two. Wallstreet doesn’t pay attention and gets caught
in the Cloverleaf to retain the title for Dean. Patrick was between
Wallstreet and the ropes so we have another wrinkle in the Patrick might
be crooked story.

Rating: D.
I love Malenko but my goodness Wallstreet is dull. I mean the guy does
NOTHING but jobber level offense. The other problem is that since he’s
taken on his current gimmick, the Wallstreet name doesn’t mean anything.
This was about Jarrett though which makes the match a little more
forgivable.

Jarrett
wants a rematch with Malenko and says he’ll get it next week on Nitro.
Dean accepts and here’s Mongo. Mongo wants to know why Jarrett came out
here without him and won’t let Debra leave with Jeff. Mongo rants about
Kevin Greene and the people boo Mongo out of the building. Why didn’t
WCW get that no one was interested in this football stuff?

Damien/Ciclope vs. Harlem Heat

Stevie
and Ciclope start things off with the big man stomping Ciclope down
into the corner. A slam puts Ciclope down and it’s off to Booker for a
hook kick. Damien comes in and some Hardy Boys style double teaming
sends Booker to the floor. Booker knees Damien down and it’s back to Ray
as the Heat weren’t in trouble long. Booker sends Damien to the floor
and stomps away on him against the barricade as this breaks down. Here
are the Steiners with a chair to lay out Booker, allowing Damien to hit a
top rope splash for the upset pin.

Rating: D+.
This match was the same thing we’ve had all night: a dull match that
was waiting for the angle advancement that ended it. Damien and Ciclope
wouldn’t go anywhere of course but it’s nice to see some newcomers get a
win, even if it’s tainted like this. Obviously this set up Steiners vs.
Heat and there’s nothing wrong with that. The match was dull though.

Lee Marshall does his thing.

Barbarian vs. Chris Benoit

Apparently
Benoit has to run the Dungeon gauntlet to get another match with
Sullivan. Benoit takes it straight to the corner and stomps Barbarian
down, which is something you almost never see. Barbarian breaks the
German attempt so Benoit settles for a release northern lights suplex.
Jimmy Hart distracts Benoit and Barbie gets in a shot to take over.
There’s a piledriver for two on Benoit and Barbarian is frustrated
already. Barbarian be clubberin in the corner followed by his always
cool release belly to belly superplex. Barbarian loads up something off
the top but gets shoved down. Swan Dive and Crossface end this.

Rating: C.
It wasn’t as good as their match from a few months ago, but this is a
pairing that still works. Barbarian is an interesting case as he has a
pretty standard gimmick but the guy was continuously employed in a major
company for the better part of fifteen years. For a guy like Barbarian,
that’s very impressive.

Benoit says he wants Sullivan now but Hart says Benoit has to beat Meng in a death match at the Bash.

Scott Hall vs. Ric Flair

Flair
goes insane to start and takes Hall down with chops and shots to the
knee. Syxx tries to interfere but Flair takes both guys out with ease.
Hall slugs Flair but Flair chops him into the corner with ease. Flair is
sent into the corner for the Flair Flip but Flair dives off the apron
onto Syxx in a kind of Thess Press. Hall gets in a shot to the back and
takes over by stomping away in the corner.

Syxx
comes in for a Bronco Buster which somehow the referee doesn’t notice.
The fallaway slam hits for two and the fans want Sting. There’s an
abdominal stretch and Syxx does the required arm pull for extra
leverage. Hall pounds Flair down and puts on the sleeper, only to be
countered into a knee crusher. Hall clotheslines Flair down to break up
the Figure Four attempt and they’re both down. Flair chops away and it’s
time to strut. Syxx gets knocked off the apron and then crotched.
There’s a low blow to Hall and Flair is rolling. Flair loads up the
Figure Four but has to fight off Syxx AGAIN. A belt shot to Flair
finally gets the DQ.

Rating: C+.
At the end of the day, Flair is one of the guys you know is going to
have at least a decent match. It’s a rare thing to see one of the higher
ups in the NWO have a big time match and putting him with Flair meant
this was going to be good. Also it plays into the tag title match at the
PPV, making this one of the few matches tonight that actually meant
something and the only one that was good on top of that.

Post
match Flair gets double teamed and I guess the Horsemen are off hunting
elk or something. Mongo and Jarrett FINALLY come out for the save.
Mongo takes either a tag belt or the Cruiserweight belt with him as they
leave for some reason.

Here’s
Savage for the final segment of the show. He brings Gene out with him
by force and looks extra angry/crazy here. Gene talks about DDP and how
Savage is underrating him, so Savage snaps. Gene says someone has to
bring Savage back to earth and Savage gets in his face, drawing out JJ.
JJ threatens Savage with some undefined punishment before saying he’s
lost respect for Savage.

Dillon
says he expects better from Savage than from the rest of the NWO. JJ
talks about how in the old days, Savage would have stood up to Page like
a man. Now Savage is hiding in the crowd and isn’t being a man. Savage
decks JJ and security plus Bischoff come out to pull Savage off.
Bischoff talks Savage down in the corner but the fans chant DDP, which
sends Savage over the edge again. Bischoff says JJ brought this on
himself to end the show.

Overall Rating: D+.
This show wasn’t that interesting overall. Savage vs. Page has me
wanting to watch their match all over again even though I just saw it a
few months ago. Flair’s stuff was good too, but other than that there’s
nothing of interest here. The other matches were all setting up later
stuff and most of them were either bad or too short to be anything.
Great American Bash is coming off like a much better show than Slamboree
so these Nitros have been a lot easier to get through, but other than
the top stuff, most of the matches aren’t doing much for me yet.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

Rants

Monday Nitro – May 26, 1997

By Scott Keith on 17th October 2012

Monday Nitro #89
Date: May 26, 1997
Location: Nashville Municipal Auditorium, Nashville, Tennessee
Attendance: 6,484
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Bobby Heenan, Tony Schiavone, Larry Zbyzsko

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

We’re
back to the regular two hours again and that might be something good in
this case. Also Hogan is here tonight which always helps make the shows
feel bigger than they do without him. We’re coming up on the Great
American Bash in three weeks and odds are we’ll get the main event
announced tonight. Let’s get to it.

Here
are Hogan and Bischoff to open the show. Hogan’s beard appears to be
infecting his head and is growing at an alarming rate. This is the one
year anniversary of Hall jumping the guard rail. Bischoff says he’s
checked under the ring and there’s not Sting this week. Hogan talks
about partying in the Bahamas with Nick and Brooke, which are names that
don’t mean anything at this point. Hogan runs down Sting and Eric says
that Sting is just afraid of Hulk. Hogan says he’s going to be looking
around and if he finds anyone in Sting makeup, he’s going to take them
out.

Hector Garza/Juventud Guerrera/Super Calo vs. Ciclope/Damien/La Parka

This
is under Mexican rules, which means if you go to the floor, another
member of your team can come in just like a tag. La Parka and Juvy get
us going with Juvy taking over with a quick spin kick to the face. Juvy
goes up but his cross body is caught and La Parka struts over to the
corner and sets Juvy up top. Juvy comes back with a big top rope rana to
send Parka to the floor.

Off
to Ciclope as Larry complains about the Mexican rules because “we’re
not in Mexico.” Sometimes common sense is the best approach. Calo comes
in to replace Parka and hits a headscissors to send Parka to the floor.
Calo hits a HUGE suicide dive to send both guys into the crowd, giving
us Damien vs. Garza. Garza is basically here for one move: a corkscrew
plancha to the floor. The idea is that he’s going to hit it but you
don’t know when or how many people he’ll take out.

Everything
breaks down and it’s almost impossible to tell who is legal as four
people came in at the same time when Garza and Damien went to the floor.
It appears to be Calo vs. Damien now with Calo in control, only to take
his eyes off Damien and get jumped. Off to Garza who speeds things up
but gets sent to the floor.

Everyone
goes to the floor and it’s time to fire off the dives. Garza hits his
big corkscrew plancha, prompting Larry to ask if Garza thinks he’s
Captain Planet. Turner property or not, that’s the best Larry can come
up with? Damien tries a seated senton back inside but Garza catches him
in a powerbomb and hits a standing moonsault for the pin.

Rating: B.
This is pretty much the textbook definition for a lucha libre spotfest
and there’s nothing wrong with that. Other than Juvy, none of these guys
have stood out but they know how to fire off all kinds of flips and
dives. While not a great match from a technical standpoint or anything
like that, it was fun and the dives were great. That’s what you want to
do with an opener too. Good stuff here.

Alex Wright vs. Psychosis

This
is Wright’s first match after his heel turn last week. Wright flips
around to escape a wristlock but Psychosis does the exact same thing. A
jumping kick to the face gives Wright control again and he pounds away
in the corner. Psychosis comes back with a moonsault press for two
followed by a top rope spin kick to the back of Wright’s head for one.
Wright bails to the floor and dances a bit, only for Psychosis to bust
out a mostly missed moonsault to take both guys out.

Back in and the
guillotine legdrop pins Wright.

Rating: D+.
This was pretty messy. Also why in the world would you have Wright lose
completely clean after a heel turn last week? The announcers are
pushing this as a huge upset and to be fair it probably is. The match
had almost no flow or story to it at all and the big spots didn’t hit.
Not terrible but really messy.

Sonny
Onoo still has a surprise for Chono tonight but won’t say who it is.
Sonny tries to sign Psychosis as he leaves and Psychosis is interested.
As Sonny gloats, Madusa comes out and wants a Women’s Title shot. She
says she’ll do anything for it and immediately regrets saying it. Sonny
says she’ll get the shot at the Bash but if she loses, her career is
over. She agrees and that’s it.

We get a quick look at Ernest Miller and his martial arts background.

Wrath vs. Mark Starr

Total
squash with Wrath throwing Starr all over the place, including out to
the floor so Mortis can get in some shots. Wrath does look awesome and
has a great name, but this feud went on so long that it killed whatever
he had going. A top rope clothesline kills Starr and a bicycle kick sets
up the double arm Rock Bottom to end the massacre. Apparently that move
is called the Death Penalty.

Konnan vs. Villano IV

They’re
going really light on the promos tonight. Hugh Morrus talks about how
he doesn’t like Konnan anymore, which I think happened at Slamboree.
Konnan and Villano shake hands before Konnan hits him in the ribs to
start. Konnan pounds him into the corner and fires off a dropkick. He
shouts VIVA MEXICO which apparently fires up Villano.

After
a brief comeback, Villano shouts VIVA MEXICO as well. Not that it
really matters as Konnan hits an Alabama Slam out of the corner to stop
the momentum dead. Here’s Morrus but security stops him in the aisle.
The 187 (fisherman’s DDT) kills Villano dead and Tequila Sunrise (half
crab with armbar) gets the win for Konnan.

Rating: C-.
Just a squash here as Konnan was a guy who had a decent place in the
midcard. The next step for him of course: put him in the NWO where he
got lost in the shuffle. He was a Mexican wrestler who could actually
wrestle a style different from the dozen or so other luchadores they had
which gave him something to offer. Then it went nowhere because the NWO
didn’t have enough lackeys.

Konnan runs down the Dungeon and Sullivan post match.

Masahiro Chono vs. ???

Sonny
comes out to introduce the surprise: The Great Muta. Chono is NWO. We
get a LONG stall at the beginning of the match, during which Larry
announces that the Japanese are in fact a different race. No contact in
the first minute. Or in the second minute. Muta puts on a VERY weak
headlock. So weak that Chono just ducks out of it and Muta doesn’t move
his arms. Sonny freaks out on Muta, Muta sprays mist in his eyes, and
Muta joins the NWO. Well no one had joined in a few months so I guess we
needed someone else to inflate the ranks.

Hour #2 starts.

Savage
talks about his feud with Page. Apparently he wants a rematch at the
Bash, which may or may not already be set. The idea is that Savage was
embarrassed by a guy in his first main event match at Spring Stampede
and it’s driving him crazier than he already is.

Here
are Page and Kimberly with a rebuttal. The match is already signed
apparently. Page has the crutch that was broken over his back by Hogan.
He talks about how he’s under Savage’s skin and how he owes Hogan a
Diamond Cutter. Page owes Savage even more though and he’ll get that at
the Bash. Kimberly says she’s keeping the pieces of the crutch as a
memento. She also has some of the hair that Savage pulled out of her
head. Page says you don’t mess with family or his wife, and Savage
messed with both. See, this is how you build up a match. I want to see
these two fight now.

Barbarian vs. Jim Powers

Powers
fires off some basic offense to start but can’t take Barbarian down. A
clothesline takes Powers’ head off and Barbarian sends him out to the
floor for some more beating. Back in and they chop it out with Barbie
taking over. Powers gets in some boots but he doesn’t jump far enough
coming off the middle rope so Barbarian can catch him in a powerslam. A
big boot ends Powers.

Rating: D.
Powers is FINALLY done after this, not appearing on Nitro for over a
year after this. Why we needed to have Barbarian get a squash win on
Nitro is kind of head scratching but it was something different than
they’ve had in the rest of the show. Meng has been doing some singles
stuff around this time so maybe that’s why.

Benoit
comes out post match and wants Sullivan back soon. Hart says Barbarian
is ready for Benoit right now so Benoit takes his jacket off and gets in
the ring. Hart says next week.

The Giant vs. Jerry Flynn/Johnny Swinger/Rick Fuller

The
jobbers have to tag here so what are you expecting to happen? Swinger
starts and can’t do anything. Flynn can’t do anything so it’s off to
Fuller who is by far the biggest guy on the team. After Fuller gets
beaten up, all three come in with Flynn and Fuller getting belly to back
suplexed at the same time. There’s a chokeslam to Swinger, there’s one
for Fuller, and there’s one for Flynn. Giant pins all Swinger and Flynn
at the same time.

Luger
and Giant are in the ring and we hear about an open contract issued by
Hogan and Rodman for the PPV Luger talks about being an NBA fan and
watching Rodman. At Uncensored, Rodman came into the WCW world and Luger
would like to invite them back. Luger issues the challenge for the PPV
and Giant says they’re ready. I’m missing something because that match
wound up happening at Bash at the Beach. Maybe that’s what they meant or
maybe it was changed.

Lee Marshall does his road report jazz.

Here’s
Syxx to talk about Flair. He shows us a video from last week of him and
the Outsiders beating up Flair before bringing the Outsiders out. Hall
and Nash have the newer design of the tag titles which I’ve always liked
better. They make fun of Piper and say Piper couldn’t make Hogan sleep
unless they showed him Piper’s latest movie. To the shock of everyone,
Hall and Nash offer to defend the titles. The opponents aren’t the
shock. It’s that they’re actually defending the belts. They want Piper
and Flair so they can retire them once and for all.

Jeff Jarrett/Steve McMichael vs. Harlem Heat

Before
the match we get a quick recap of Kevin Greene running in last week.
Booker and Jeff start things off but it’s off to Mongo before anything
happens. Mongo runs him over but Booker won’t tag out. Booker escapes a
belly to back suplex but gets punched in the face and clotheslined down.
Off to Jarrett as Greene is on commentary now. Stevie comes in and
pounds on Jarrett in the corner before slamming him down. We cut to the
commentators so we can see that Greene is in fact wearing a football
jacket.

Off
to Booker vs. Mongo again with the Horsemen taking over. Booker misses a
charge into the corner but Stevie blasts Mongo in the back of the head
to put him down. Stevie uses the power stuff to take over on McMichael
before it’s back to Booker for a chinlock. Harlem Heat double teams to
draw in Jarrett which allows for even more double teaming.

Stevie puts on another chinlock so we cut to the announcers again. Mongo
comes out of nowhere with a powerslam to Booker and it’s hot (?) tag to
Jarrett. Jeff fires off dropkicks to take over and everything breaks
down. Mongo realizes Greene is with the announcers and walks off for a
brawl. Jeff puts Booker in the Figure Four but Stevie breaks it up and a
Hart Attack with Booker hitting a side kick instead of a clothesline
gets the pin for the Heat.

Rating: D+.
This was long and not interesting. The problem is there’s no reason for
these guys to be fighting and the main story of the match was about the
football players fighting, which I don’t think anyone was interested in
seeing. Just like last week: these matches have almost no meaning
because the Outsiders never defend the belts, so these guys are all
fighting for nothing.

Jarrett says that might be the last straw.

Here
are Hogan and Bischoff to end the show. Hogan says the title is on the
line right now if Sting wants to face him for it. Bischoff says
unfortunately Sting isn’t here tonight. They turn their backs to the
camera and Sting pops up through the mat. And of course it’s the fake
one and the announcers are fooled.

The
NWO Sting stays on his knees in front of Hogan and nods when asked if
he’s half the man Hogan is. He bows down to Hogan and the real Sting
repels into the ring. There’s a Death Drop for Bischoff and Hogan falls
over the bowing fake Sting. The real one beats up the fake one and here
come the troops. Sting flies into the rafters again to end the show.

Overall Rating: C.
This started off hot but slowed way down afterwards. Having Hogan
around helped a lot and you can see that they’re building to Sting vs.
Hogan eventually. I don’t think anyone expected it to take another seven
months, but it was worth it in theory. As for the rest of the show, it
wasn’t bad but as always, the show is better when the bigger names are
in play.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

Rants

Monday Nitro – May 19, 1997

By Scott Keith on 10th October 2012

Monday Nitro #88
Date: May 19, 1997
Location: Ashville Civic Center, Ashville, North Carolina
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan, Larry Zbyszko

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

We’re
FINALLY past Slamboree and we have four weeks before the Great American
Bash where the world title still won’t be on the line. At least that
show will have a big time grudge match in the main event but we’ll get
to that later on. Anyway tonight is likely going to establish the PPV
main event and deal with the fallout from last night. Let’s get to it.

We
open with a recap of the ending of the show last night with the old
guys winning and Tony declaring it the BIGGEST MOMENT EVER in WCW.

Here’s
Flair to open the show. Flair says that last night he erased everything
the NWO has done with the help of Piper and Greene. This draws out Syxx
who says that the wrong guy got pinned last night and that he doesn’t
like the idea of Flair saying he can beat Syxx. Syxx says he can beat
Flair and challenges Flair to a match tonight. Flair says he doesn’t
know if he can beat Hall and Nash but he knows he can beat Syxx so it’s
on.

TV Title: Prince Iaukea vs. Steven Regal

Regal
pounds the punk kid down to start and hammers him in the corner. A
sunset flip gets two for Iaukea and the fans are on fire tonight. Iaukea
crucifixes him down for another two but Regal counters a headscissors
by slamming him down face first onto the mat. Regal kicks him in the
head and suplexes him before the Regal Stretch ends this. Seeing Prince
Iaukea get beaten up makes me smile.

We get some clips from last night with Mortis and Wrath beating up Glacier until Ernest Miller debuted made the save.

Masahiro Chono vs. Dave Taylor

Chono
is NWO. Tenay talks about a major name debuting on June 30 on Nitro. I
won’t say who but if what I can find is correct, two major names would
debut that night. Taylor controls early with some European uppercuts but
walks into an atomic drop. Chono knocks him to the floor but back in
the ring a piledriver is broken up by Taylor. Not that it matters as
Taylor charges into a boot and the STF ends this quick. The STF is
Chono’s signature hold if you’re not familiar with him.

Sonny Onoo says Chono has a debt to pay with New Japan and Onoo has someone coming in next week but won’t say who.

JJ Dillon reinstates Nick Patrick.

Scotty Riggs vs. Michael Wallstreet

Wallstreet
isn’t allowed to be in the NWO but he’s anti-WCW. Riggs speeds things
up to start and hits his decent dropkick, only to have Wallstreet take
him down soon thereafter. Wallstreet hooks a chinlock as the fans look
at something in the crowd. A small package gets two for Riggs and
Wallstreet tries to pull something out of his pocket. Nick Patrick stops
him and Riggs gets a sunset flip for the pin. Another short match, but
did we REALLY need to see Scotty Riggs vs. Michael Wallstreet when we
had an hour for the show? I get that it’s for Nick Patrick, but do we
need to focus on him either? Really?

Speaking
of wasting time, here’s NASCAR driver Mark Martin to talk about a
sweepstakes to win a racecar. The car being brought in is probably what
the fans were looking at in the Riggs match. Flair comes out with Martin
to try to make this look like it’s important.

Time for the road report to waste some more time. This includes Lee Marshall singing some Elvis.

We
get a video from last night with Page holding off Savage and the NWO
with a crutch.The Giant eventually made the save when Page got in
trouble.

Jeff Jarrett/Steve McMichael vs. Steiner Brothers

Jarrett
and Scott start things off with Jeff being sent into the corner
quickly. Jeff comes back with a neckbreaker to take over but a suplex is
no sold. Scott gorilla presses Jeff down and hits a kind of Angle Slam
off the top for two. Off to Rick vs. Mongo and it’s a slugfest of
course. Mongo takes out Rick’s knee but gets caught by a suplex and what
was supposed to be the middle rope bulldog but wound up being like a
cravate-dog if that makes sense. Everything breaks down and Kevin Greene
runs in with a briefcase shot to Mongo’s back, giving Rick the easy
pin.

Rating: C-.
Apparently they thought last night’s match with White vs. Mongo was so
great that we MUST do another battle of the football players. I mean,
having Mongo as a ring general is a can’t miss idea right? The match was
barely long enough to rate but it’s the longest match of the night so
far. The problem with these tag matches is there’s nothing to fight for
because the Outsiders weren’t going to defend the titles, so why bother
having the other teams fight?

We get a video from during the break where Mongo and Greene got in a fight backstage.

Ric Flair vs. Syxx

Syxx
jumps Flair as he comes in but a charge into the corner misses. Flair
fires away with punches and chops and here are the Outsiders for the DQ.
The match wasn’t even a minute long.

Flair
gets destroyed because the Horsemen were escorted from the building due
to the Mongo vs. Greene fight. Nash says it’s about putting the old
guys out of business. Syxx has flowers for some reason.

Here’s
Bischoff for the closing segment. He says that last week he wanted to
talk to Sting but he was nowhere to be found. The NWO called him and
looked for him and even sent a private detective agency after him. Sting
isn’t in the rafters or the locker room tonight because he’s a coward.
Sting will never get a match with Hogan because it would mean bad things
for the Scorpion enthusiast. Bischoff says if Sting were here, he’d
slap the paint off his face. Sting pops up through the ring and lays out
Bischoff to end the show.

Overall Rating: D+.
This definitely wasn’t a good show but it was miles better than the
previous week’s. I know they only have an hour at this point, but does
WCW know that? At times I’m really not sure given some of the stuff they
put out there. This show felt like it had some energy to it this week
which has been lacking for awhile. Maybe it’s because they’re coming off
a PPV or maybe it’s because the build to Slamboree was incredibly long,
but this felt much fresher and it made the show go by a lot faster.
They’re back to the full two hours next week.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and check out my website at kbwrestlingreviews.com

Rants

Monday Nitro – May 12, 1997

By Scott Keith on 3rd October 2012

Monday Nitro #87
Date: May 12, 1997
Location: 1st Mariner Center, Baltimore, Arena
Attendance: 8,058
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan, Larry Zbyszko

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

I
think this is another of those hour long shows due to the NBA Playoffs
which is a good idea lately. Slamboree is this Sunday and THANK GOODNESS
FOR THAT. The shows have been so insanely boring lately that they need
something to be completely changed. 1997 wasn’t kind to the company but
everyone remembers it as being awesome for some reason. Hopefully
there’s more Sting and Hogan here tonight as without them, these shows
suck. Let’s get to it.

Michael Buffer of all people opens the show.

Here
are Savage and Liz with the Macho Man on his own feet instead of
crutches. He talks about Page jumping him last week and firing him up.
Savage wants a fight tonight and that’s it. He talked for 25 seconds
max. That’s kind of refreshing.

Apparently
Sting wants to conduct a one on one interview with Bischoff. The source
of this news: Bischoff. Naturally the announcers accept this with no
questions.

TV Title: Juventud Guerrera vs. Ultimo Dragon

Dragon
is defending and Regal talks about how he can outwrestle anyone and
will take the title on Sunday. Guerrera starts with a springboard cross
body for two followed by a headscissors to send the champ to the floor.
Back in and Dragon fires off some kicks followed by an over the shoulder
backbreaker for two. Juvy kicks him in the face for two and hits a
northern lights fisherman’s suplex for two.

A
rana is countered by a Dragon powerbomb and things slow down. Juvy
rolls through a rana into a sunset flip for two before escaping a dragon
and tiger suplex. They both go up top, resulting in Dragon hitting a
superplex to put both guys down. Juvy gets pulled to the floor by Sonny
Onoo and Dragon jumps on Guerrera from behind, saving Sonny in the
process. Onoo kicks Juvy in the back and back inside, the super rana
sets up the Dragon Sleeper to retain the title.

Rating: C.
Not bad here but they kept starting and stopping. Juvy is a good choice
for an opening act though as he can fly all over the place and do it
almost as well as anyone else. That being said, he had no chance at
winning the title, but for the most part that’s ok. Sometimes it’s fine
to throw out an entertaining match even if the ending isn’t in doubt.

Here
are Piper/Flair/Greene to talk about Sunday. Please let this be short.
Greene says that everyone pays taxes, everyone dies, and on Sunday he’s
going to hurt the NWO. Flair says they’ll be there on Sunday. Piper says
he’s isn’t Dorthy from the Wizard of Oz. The NWO shows up and makes fun
of the guys in the ring. On Sunday, it’s no DQ and no countout.

Dean Malenko vs. Steve McMichael

Dean
takes him to the mat almost immediately but Mongo shoves him down
almost just as fast. Malenko goes after the knee but Mongo escapes a
Cloverleaf attempt. The leg lariat gets two for Dean but a Jarrett
distraction lets Mongo clip Dean from behind. Mongo powerslams Dean but
the referee went down during the slam.

Here’s
Reggie White but Jarrett distracts him too, allowing Mongo to get in a
shot. White hits a clothesline and splash on Mongo (Bobby says it’s not
fair as Mongo has already been in there five or ten minutes. It hasn’t
even been three yet) giving Dean the pin. This was a mess and it set up
Reggie White vs. Mongo on Sunday so if it could be rated, the grade
would be very low.

Reggie says he’s fighting for Wisconsin on Sunday.

Lee Marshall does his thing. Remind me again why this guy was getting a paycheck?

Scotty Riggs vs. Wrath

Even
Scotty Riggs gets pyro. Man how much money did they have to burn at
this point? Before the match, James Vandenberg names his monster as
Wrath. As for the match, picture any squash between a small pretty boy
and a monster that lasts about 40 seconds. That’s the match you get
here. Wrath wins it with his double arm Rock Bottom.

Here’s Glacier post match. He doesn’t do anything but he does in fact show up.

Konnan/Hugh Morrus vs. Alex Wright/Ice Train

Clearly a main event in any arena in the country. Tonight, it’s the main event in the 1st
Mariner Arena. The Dungeon team jumps Train to start with no avail at
all. Train and Morrus officially start us off with Ice Train hitting a
powerslam to take over. Off to Wright who is booed out of the building.
Wright won’t tag out and it lets Morrus take over. A clothesline puts
Train down and Wright bails to the floor. Train fights back but Wright
claims a knee injury and walks away. The Dungeon double teams Ice Train
until the Tequila Sunrise gets the submission.

Rating: D.
This was all about the heel turn and not about the match at all. This
didn’t lead to a match between Ice Train and Wright, at least not on
Nitro. This would be Train’s last match on Nitro that I can find for
over three years. Nothing to see here as it was an angle instead of a
match, but at least the angle seemed to be what was needed given the
crowd hating Wright when he came into the match.

We recap the beatdown on DDP by the NWO last week.

We cut to the back where Piper is down and injured. To the best of my knowledge this wasn’t mentioned at all on Sunday.

Here’s
Bischoff for the big interview with Sting. Bischoff stalls a lot and
we’re rapidly running out of airtime. To the shock of absolutely no one
with a functioning brain, it’s the NWO Sting. The fans say they want
Sting. Bischoff says a bunch of things that run Sting down while
praising Hogan and Sting nods in agreement with everything. The real
Sting comes out and beats up the fake one. Bischoff runs to end the
show.

Overall Rating: D-.
The only thing keeping this from being a total failure is that it was
half the length of a usual show. There was NOTHING on this show of value
at all and it was pretty clear that no one was interested in what they
were doing out there. Slamboree would wind up being the textbook
definition of a throwaway show and even though the main event wound up
being decent, it didn’t mean anything at all past Sunday night. This
show however was horrible and thankfully we’re moving towards something
new now.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and check out my website at kbwrestlingreviews.com

Rants

Monday Nitro – April 21, 1997

By Scott Keith on 12th September 2012

Monday
Nitro #84

Date: April 21, 1997

Location: Saginaw Civic
Center, Saginaw, Michigan

Commentators: Mike
Tenay, Bobby Heenan, Larry Zbyszko, Tony Schiavone

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

We continue the
marathon of shows between Spring Stampede and Slamboree and the big
story tonight is the decision regarding the future of Eric Bischoff.
Other than that, there isn’t much here as we’re heading towards
Slamboree with a meaningless six man tag team main event. Nothing on
the card looks like anything of note at all. Let’s get to it.

James J. Dillon arrives
to open the show. He doesn’t really mean anything other than being a
legend at this point.

Hogan is FINALLY out of
the intro sequence.

US Title: Yuji
Nagata vs. Dean Malenko

I think this is
Nagata’s company debut so he doesn’t mean much yet. Dean takes him
down to the mat and puts on a headlock. Yuji counters into a
headscissors, followed by an enziguri and a chinlock. Reggie White
is here again so let’s put the camera on him for about ten seconds.
Dean hits a jawbreaker to escape the hold and suplexes Nagata down
for two. We hit chinlock #3 in the third minute of the match, this
one with Dean in control.

Nagata escapes and puts
on a modified STF but after letting it go, Yuji walks into a leg
lariat for two. Nagata tries some kicks but gets caught in a dragon
screw leg whip. The injury doesn’t last long as Yuji superkicks Dean
down and hits an overhead belly to belly for two. Nagata misses
another kick and Dean drops an elbow on the leg before throwing on
the Cloverleaf to retain.

Rating: C.
When they weren’t using the chinlocks this was a pretty fun match.
Dean was on fire in 1997 and there was almost no one he couldn’t have
a good match with. Nagata would come back later in the year and have
an incredibly dull feud with Ultimo Dragon. I understand that these
guys are Japanese legends and are incredibly talented, but it takes a
lot more than a resume in another country and a six minute match on
Nitro to get people to care about you, and most of the guys from
other countries never got the chance to prove otherwise.

Glacier vs. Ciclope

Glacier’s entrance
takes longer than the match as he kicks Ciclope in the head and pins
him in about thirty seconds.

Post match Glacier does
more of his posing stuff until Wrath (not yet named) comes out. The
distraction lets Mortis come in and jump Glacier from behind. Mortis
steals Glacier’s helmet which is like 700 years old or something.
They try to injure Glacier’s eye as this goes on WAY too long. When
the fans spent the entire match chanting GLACIER SUCKS, giving this
whole beatdown nearly four minutes was a bad idea.

Tony tells us that JJ
Dillon is the new head of the executive committee. This brings out
Nick Patrick to give his reasons as to why he should be let back into
WCW. This isn’t exactly Benoit and Mysterio from last week in the
opening segments.

TV Title: Ultimo
Dragon vs. Bobby Eaton

Eaton pounds him down
to start for a surprising early advantage. Dragon fires off the
kicks though and Bobby has no idea what to do. You would think after
hanging out with Stan Lane for so many years he would be familiar
with martial arts. Sonny offers a quick distraction and Eaton gets
dropkicked to the floor. Onoo kicks Eaton into the barricade and
sends him back inside for the super rana and the Dragon Sleeper to
keep the title in Japan.

Regal says he isn’t
dating Sarah Ferguson and that he’ll get the TV Title back. He
actually would, which makes you wonder what the point was in having
Dragon win it in the first place at all, when Dragon would win it
back a few weeks later.

Meng vs. Chris
Jericho

Meng immediately
clubbers him down and all of the fans look at something in the crowd,
presumably a fight. Jericho and Meng chop it out with the savage
taking over. Chris hits a middle rope dropkick but Meng won’t go
down. Meng hits a belly to back suplex for one and then chokes a
bit. The fans are finally sitting down. Now they look at something
else. Geez what is going on over there?

Jericho hits a
spinwheel kick but Meng won’t go down. An enziguri misses for the
Canadian so he tries a standing Lionsault. Meng literally stands
there while Jericho hits him and slides down Meng’s body. This is
getting embarrassing in a hurry. The Canadian hits a German on the
Tongan for two but a rana attempt is countered into a hot shot.
Tongan Death Grip gets the win for Meng.

Rating: D-.
Oh this was bad and the majority of that seems to be on Meng. He
wouldn’t sell ANYTHING here, as Jericho was hitting all kinds of
kicks but Meng would just stare at him. I’m assuming this was the
beginning of Meng push #84 which would likely wind up going nowhere
at all.

Jimmy Hart says that
was a message to Benoit, who faces Meng at Slamboree. Oh so there
was a point to it. Sullivan and Jackie (about as close to falling
out of a dress as you can be without being censored) come out to talk
about Benoit too. When is the retirement match already? This time
Sullivan rants about his kids and says something about sorority
sisters for his daughter. Meng goes after Sullivan for no apparent
reason but Jackie gets in his way. Meng speaks English and says that
if it wasn’t for her, he would take both of them. WHAT WAS THE POINT
OF THIS STABLE?????

Video on Benoit.

Steiner Brothers vs.
Public Enemy

Before the Steiners
come out we cut to the back where the Steiners are fighting with the
Dungeon of Doom. The Steiners are the hometown boys here and their
dad is here. Rick and Grunge start with Grunge being powerslammed
down almost immediately. Off to Rocco who grabs a headlock but Scott
tags himself in. He picks up Rocco and throws him at Grunge out of a
gorilla press in a scary power display. Back to Rick vs. Grunge
after the Public Enemy bails to the floor for a bit. A double
clothesline puts Rick down but Rocco misses a flip dive off the top.
Not that it matters as Konnan/Morrus run in for the double DQ.

Hour #2 begins so we
get the usual recap.

Here’s JJ for his
introductory speech, which isn’t even good enough to put in the ring.
Tony interrupts him to ask about Nick Patrick. JJ says he’ll
consider the reinstatement. As for Bischoff, he has no authority but
he still has a contract and he can still be around. JJ goes into a
bunch of legal jargon and for some reason Mr. Wallstreet and Big
Bubba are under contract to WCW instead of the NWO. Bischoff comes
out and says bite me. Eric explains how great he is and how he
doesn’t care what anyone else says.

JJ says Eric has made
the center of the wrestling universe WCW instead of Stamford,
Connecticut. Eric says bite me. JJ says this isn’t acceptable but
Bischoff leaves. Since it’s JJ Dillon, he talks about shoes to close
things out (old school fans will get that reference). Absolutely
nothing was accomplished here, but thank goodness they got a
wrestling guy to be the authority figure so that A, people know who
he is and B, he knows how to talk in front of a live audience.

Scotty Riggs vs.
Jeff Jarrett

This is a rematch from
Saturday Night which the world was waiting for. Jarrett lost on
Saturday and beat him up post match so we needed a second match.
Riggs charges in and gets beaten down by Jeff. A swinging
neckbreaker and release gutwrench suplex put Riggs down followed by
the move that would eventually be called The Stroke.

Riggs gets in some
quick offense but Jarrett backdrops him to the floor which isn’t a DQ
because we’re not enforcing that rule right now. Time to look at
Reggie White as Jeff misses an enziguri. Scotty’s top rope cross
body gets two and here’s Mongo with the briefcase. White jumps the
railing to stop him and Mongo runs away. Jeff takes out the knee and
a quick Figure Four gets the submission win.

Rating: D+.
This was barely above a squash and was pretty much here for the White
vs. Mongo stuff. At the end of the day, I’m not sure who cared about
White vs. McMichael but it’s something different than the Horsemen
arguing over Debra which makes it a huge improvement. Well maybe not
huge but it’s better at least.

Cruiserweight Title:
Syxx vs. Rey Mysterio Jr.

Syxx is defending.
Nash is the only NWO backup here so far. Feeling out process to
start with neither guy being able to get an extended advantage. Rey
takes him to the mat with a headlock and Syxx slaps the mat but it
doesn’t count as a tap for no apparent reason. Back up and Rey slaps
him in the face before headscissoring Syxx down. Syxx gets in a kick
and drops that fast leg to take over.

More kicks in the
corner set up the Bronco Buster which isn’t named yet. That would be
Syxx hitting it as Rey hadn’t yet adopted the move. The champ hooks
an abdominal stretch but gets caught holding the ropes. After Rey is
sent to the floor for a second, Syxx misses another Bronco Buster
back inside. A somewhat messed up West Coast pop gets two and a top
rope rana sends the champ to the floor. Nash comes in and kills Rey
with the Jackknife (which the referee somehow didn’t notice),
allowing Syxx to put on the Buzz Kill for the easy win.

Rating: C.
Not bad here but the ending sucked. Seriously, how could the referee
not notice Rey slamming into the mat two feet away from him? Syxx
would hold the title for a few more months while Rey did his thing
for the foreseeable future. Either way, this was fine but the ending
was about what you expected.

Dillon comes out post
match and yells but nothing comes of it. Rey is taken out on a
stretcher.

Video on Luger.

Hogan is in a movie and
we take a look at him on set.

Here’s the NWO again
with something to say. Syxx talks about how Flair and Piper were out
here last week talking about respect. He wants to know what kind of
respect it is to rip off the Nature Boy gimmick from Buddy Rogers.
Nash isn’t worried about Piper because he looked down the road the
old guys paved and saw nothing but potholes.

He goes on a big rant
about backstage politics, talking about how people’s kids were
getting pushed and that was it. Then they went to New York where
everyone was trying to get the business out of the funk the old guys
left it in. Nash talks about how Piper and Flair are going to have
to beat respect out of them because this is their generation now.
Where do I even begin?

First and foremost,
this is 1997. I’m writing this review in the year 2012 and odds are
if you’re reading this, you knew what Nash was talking about. That
being said, you’re probably in the minority of wrestling fans that
got what Nash meant. Now imagine how small a percentage that was
back in 1997. At the end of the day, most wrestling fans either A,
didn’t get what Nash was talking about and/or B, don’t care what he’s
talking about.

This was the period
where the “real” stuff was brought into play more and more and
it’s a big reason why things started to go downhill a few years
later. Most of the fans, especially WCW fans, wanted to see Hogan
get beaten up and the NWO get what was coming to them. The problem
was that was the logic on paper.

Then you get promos
like this one, where the NWO paints themselves to be the young guys
who are being treated badly and make themselves the heroes. It all
got way more confusing than it needed to be, and when you make things
too confusing in something that’s supposed to be fun and mostly
mindless entertainment, your audience is going to stop caring.

As if that’s not
enough, listen to what he was talking about: people that took over
the business and wouldn’t leave anything behind for anyone else.
Nash’s boss in the NWO is HULK FREAKING HOGAN. So not only would
most fans not have gotten what he meant, but the ones that did would
see him as a hypocrite. Then on top of all THAT, this set up a
totally meaningless six man tag which didn’t mean anything and was
never mentioned again after Slamboree.

Diamond Dallas Page
vs. Psychosis

The luchador hits a
dropkick and goes up, only to get pulled into a Diamond Cutter for
the pin in less than a minute.

Savage pops up in the
crowd and implies Kimberly is in love with him but nothing comes of
it.

Here are Flair, Piper
and Greene to close the show. They call out the NWO and Hall finally
returns to stare at them. The B Team gets beaten down to end the
show.

Overall Rating: D-.
What a worthless show. From the Nash promo to the short (longest
topped out at 6:01) and dull matches to JJ Dillon being treated as
less than nothing on his first night as WCW boss, this was absolutely
horrible. Slamboree would wind up being perhaps the most pointless
show in the history of WCW which is saying a lot when you think about
it. Terrible show tonight with absolutely nothing of value.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

Rants

Monday Nitro – April 14, 1997

By Scott Keith on 5th September 2012

Monday
Nitro #83

Date: April 14, 1997

Location: Philadelphia
Spectrum, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Commentators: Tony
Schiavone, Larry Zbyszko, Bobby Heenan, Mike Tenay

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

These are taking longer
than I was hoping and now that I’ve got more time on my hands due to
being done with the PPV reviews, I’ll be doing four of these at a
time instead of two in a row. Also I kind of like these shows more
than some of the WWF shows I’ve been doing so it’s more fun for me
this way. This is another of the ten matches deep cards tonight but
I wouldn’t bet on there being much going on here tonight with the big
names. Let’s get to it.

Oh and by the way:
we’re in Philadelphia the night after ECW’s Barely Legal. I wonder
if we’ll hear a certain chant tonight.

We open with a recap of
Nash and Hogan having their summit last week, as well as Sting
lowering from the rafters to chase off the NWO.

Apparently Luger wants
his earned title shot tonight. This brings the NWO to the announce
desk (no Hogan). Nash says that if Luger wants the shot, he has to
beat Nash tonight.

Chris Benoit vs.
Barbarian

The place erupts for
Benoit. Granted it may be for that awesome Horsemen theme. I could
listen to that all day. Benoit is on fire to start and takes
Barbarian down, hitting a sunset flip and northern lights suplex for
two. Jimmy trips up Benoit on the floor and gets punched in the face
for his efforts. For Benoit’s efforts though, Barbarian kicks him in
the face. Advantage Barbarian.

Back in the ring Benoit
snaps off a German but gets crotched on the top. Barbarian hits a
BIG overhead belly to belly superplex for two. The savage (Barbarian
I mean) misses a swan dive before Benoit hits his own for the pin.
For a two and a half minute match, this was AWESOME.

Post match the Dungeon
comes in and destroys Benoit until the Horsemen make the save.
Benoit says that he’s going to destroy Sullivan before Sullivan
destroys him. This feud has been going on for what, almost a year
now?

US Title: Hector
Guerrero vs. Dean Malenko

Dean gets a huge
reaction of course. Apparently Bischoff is going to get a decision
made on his future next week. They fight over a wristlock to start
followed by some very fast near falls. Dean finally takes him down
with a drop toehold and puts on a chinlock. Hector counters an
abdominal stretch to send Dean to the floor and follows him out with
kind of a standing Vader Bomb onto Dean. Sunset flip back in gets
two for the challenger (Guerrero in case you’re rather slow) but Dean
powerbombs him down and puts on the Cloverleaf for the tap out.
Another short but very fast paced match.

Eddie comes out to save
despite his arm being in a sling.

Juventud Guerrera
vs. Rey Mysterio Jr.

Reggie White is here
and will fight McMichael at some point in the near future. They
fight over a wristlock to start until Juvy hits a spin kick to the
face to take over. Rey counters into a kind of reverse crucifix
backbreaker and the fans start the first loud ECW chant of the night.
Rey headscissors him over the top and out to the floor where both
guys are down.

As Mysterio gets back
in, Juvy powerbombs him off the apron and back to the floor. Back in
and a springboard knee to the back keeps Rey in trouble. It’s time
for the gymnastics portion of the match as neither guy can connect
with anything. Rey hits the West Coast Pop out of nowhere for the
quick pin.

Rating: C-.
Considering who was in here, this was a disappointment. They weren’t
really moving as fast as you would expect them to and there weren’t
any high spots. Still though the match wasn’t bad and Rey is always
worth checking out in 1997. That being said, this was easily the
weakest match of the night so far.

Luna Vachon wants the
Women’s Title.

TV Title: Lane
Carlson vs. Ultimo Dragon

They’re flying through
these matches tonight. I’m assuming the title is on the line here.
Carlson is more famous as Lenny Lane. Feeling out process to start
until Dragon escapes a backdrop and fires off the rapid kicks. A
great looking dropkick takes Lane’s head off for two. Lane comes
back with a bad looking Rocker Dropper for two and a bulldog gets the
same. A clothesline puts Dragon on the floor and Lane hits a flip
dive off the top to crush Dragon. Dragon throws Lane back in and
kicks him through the ropes to take over. Back in and the top rope
superrana sets up the tiger suplex for the pin for Dragon to retain.

Rating: C-.
Another fast paced and surprisingly watchable match. This is what
WCW was great at: taking a named guy and putting him out there with
some no name and letting the no name show off a little bit. Lane
would go on to be the Cruiserweight Champion when the company was
falling apart.

Cruiserweight Title:
Syxx vs. Prince Iaukea

We’re having an extreme
lack of promos tonight. Iaukea speeds things up to start, showing
off more fast paced offense in 30 seconds than he did in seven weeks
as TV Champion. A kick to the face and a mat slam put Syxx down but
he comes back with a spinwheel kick. Syxx is Cruiserweight Champion
here but I don’t think the title is on the line. We put the camera
on Reggie White for about 15 seconds and come back to Syxx holding a
chinlock. We have a Hat Guy sighting as well.

Syxx takes him into the
corner and hits the Bronco buster but something similar to a Swanton
misses. Apparently this is for the title. Iaukea starts a comeback
and hits a springboard clothesline for two before going up. Syxx
crotches him but gets shoved down so Prince can badly mess up a top
rope sunset flip for two. Syxx kicks the Prince down and hooks on
the Buzz Kill (crossface chickenwing) to retain.

Rating: C-.
The good part here is almost all because of Syxx. Iaukea was just so
freaking dull, and when you had guys like Dragon, Mysterio, Guerrera,
Benoit and Malenko around at this point, there was no room for a guy
like Iaukea. As usual with Waltman, I like him WAY more when he’s
against a smaller guy. It’s a shame he killed the Cruiserweight
Title for so long though.

Here are Flair, Piper
and Kevin Greene for a chat. Piper rambles about bald guys being
cowards and something about gorillas in the Congo. He talks about
Bischoff wearing Rodman shirts and implies the NWO is all coming out
of the closet. If he wakes up with a dead horse’s head in his bed,
he’s having a barbecue. Now he goes on a rant about people pouring
asphalt and cutting down trees so they could start Starrcade and
Wrestlemania. I assure you, this promo doesn’t make much more sense
in full context. I think he’s talking about paving the way for the
NWO guys.

Kevin says he did
everything Hogan told him to do as a kid and then Hogan stabbed
everyone in the back. The NWO is a bunch of rookies that are here
just for the money. Greene uses the chopping wood and laying asphalt
thing and it’s about respect apparently. For a celebrity that isn’t
used to being on a live mic, Greene was pretty good here.

Flair talks about being
trained by Verne Gagne in 1973 and walking into St. Louis in 1983 (at
the age of 35. Think about that for a minute. At the time this is
being written, Sheamus is 33. Flair was two years older than that
back in 1983. That’s hard to fathom.) and wrestling Dick the
Bruiser. Then in 1993 he wrestled Savage in the Hoosier Dome (it was
92 but close enough) and in 2003 he’ll still be going. That’s
actually true and he even won a title that year.

High Voltage vs.
Public Enemy

This is a street fight
and it’s in Philadelphia. Not a bad way to start the second hour.
You can barely hear Tony over the reaction for Rock and Grunge.
Public Enemy sets up two tables at ringside before the bell and bring
in trashcan lids to get us going. The chant starts before the bell
even rings. There are about five trashcan lids in the ring and all
of them go upside various people’s heads. I’m not really going to
try to call anything in this as it barely resembles wrestling.

A horrible piledriver
to Rage onto a trashcan doesn’t really do much damage so Public Enemy
brings out a toilet seat instead. Heenan suggests dropping a
dumpster on people from the ceiling. After a brawl on the floor,
Kaos gets in some offense and is promptly booed out of the building.
The fans are literally standing in the crowd. Another piledriver on
the trashcan puts Kaos down and it’s table time. Two are stacked on
top of each other and Rage is crushed with the Quebecers’ Cannonball
move for the pin by Rock.

Rating: C+.
The match here was completely beside the point. This was a way to
fire up the crowd and to put it mildly, it worked very well. The
fans erupted over the Public Enemy because they were ECW legends and
every ECW fan was on cloud nine at this point. The match was
basically a squash and that’s all it should be.

Giant vs. Big Al

Speaking of ECW, Big Al
is more famous as 911. We’re told that Giant let Luger pin him at
the PPV because Giant owed Luger a favor from when Luger was the
first person to welcome Giant back to WCW. That makes sense.
Anyway, chokeslam ends this in like a minute.

Diamond Dallas Page
vs. Konnan

Page works on the arm
to start but Konnan stomps him down in the corner for a bit. Page
rams him into the buckle, shrugs off a poke to the eye, and hits the
Diamond Cutter for the fast pin. Typical Page match from this time
period.

Savage and Liz are in
the crowd with Randy telling Kimberly to stop calling him. Page
charges after Savage but Macho escapes.

Harlem Heat vs. Jeff
Jarrett/Steve McMichael

Jeff and Booker get us
going with Booker running him over a few times. Mongo comes in and
wants to fight the bigger member of the Heat in Stevie Ray. Mongo
powerslams him down for two as we take a break. Back with Jarrett
getting double teamed in the corner and taken down via a double
elbow. Stevie comes in and pounds Jeff down again before tagging out
to Booker for an ax kick. The Heat hit a double suplex for two and
it’s off to a chinlock from Stevie.

Booker comes in to
break up a sunset flip as we hear about some guy named Tiger Woods
winning the Masters. Booker kicks Jarrett down again but a second
kick misses. Jeff tries the Figure Four instead of tagging and
everything breaks down. The briefcase is brought in but Sherri
steals it from Mongo. Sherri tries to hit Mongo with it but the shot
doesn’t seem to do much. The girls fight and the match gets thrown
out. In a likely unintentional spot after the match, Sherri swings
and misses Debra but hits her in the head on the back swing. Good.

Rating: D+.
This incarnation of the Horsemen just were not that good. I get the
idea that they’re supposed to be arguing, but that went on FOREVER
and never went anywhere. How many weeks in a row now have I talked
about the exact same kind of things happening in these matches? Oh
and what was the point of the ending? It doesn’t help anything.

Apparently the Horsemen
win by DQ. Ok then.

Gene talks to Mongo
about his match with White at the PPV. As usual, Mongo cuts a heel
promo despite being in a face faction. Mongo blasts White for a bit
on the mic until White jumps the barricade. Mongo spits in his face
and it’s on.

Kevin Nash vs. Lex
Luger

The reinforcements come
out for the NWO almost immediately. Nash pounds him into the corner
and hits the framed elbow. A charge (yes, a charge from Kevin Nash)
misses Luger but Lex has to stop to knock Syxx down, allowing Nash to
kick Luger’s head off. Side slam gets two and Snake Eyes puts Luger
down again. Nash hits the running hip attack to Luger’s back while
Luger is in 619 position. Luger comes back with the steel forearm
and here’s the NWO for the big beatdown and the DQ.

Rating: D.
This was just a way to build up to the ending with the big NWO run in
and the post match stuff. Nash was doing nothing but basic stuff and
Luger hit about two moves in total. Then again, they only had about
four minutes to work with so it may be unfair to blame the guys in
the match. On the other hand, it’s Kevin Nash in 1997 so we can
safely blame him.

Page tries to make the
save but gets beaten down eventually. Giant comes out but Nash has a
lead pipe. Sting walks down the ramp with three ball bats, giving
one each to Giant, Luger and Page. Sting pulls out one for himself
and the ring is cleared to end the show.

Overall Rating: C+.
As usual, when you let the Cruiserweights do their stuff, the show is
good but when the other guys in there, things start to fall apart.
The crowd helped this show a lot as they were erupting for everything
all night. While it wasn’t a great show because of the lack of
anything really happening, the wrestling was enough to carry it.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and check out my website at kbwrestlingreviews.com

Rants

Monday Nitro – April 7, 1997

By Scott Keith on 29th August 2012

Monday
Nitro #82

Date: April 7, 1997

Location: Von Braun
Center, Huntsville, Alabama

Commentators: Mike
Tenay, Bobby Heenan, Tony Schiavone, Larry Zbyszko

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

Back to Nitro and it’s
the first night after Spring Stampede. Almost nothing has changed as
that was one of the least important shows in recent memory. We’re
now on the way towards Slamboree which will set the bar even lower as
Hogan’s spring/summer vacation continues. Hopefully this is a more
interesting show than last week. Let’s get to it.

Tony and Larry suggest
there’s turmoil in the NWO. This would be the first of about 87
times this was potentially happening. We get a lot of stills from
the main event last night with Nash power bombing Nick Patrick after
the pin was counted for Page.

Konnan/Hugh Morrus
vs. Psychosis/Alex Wright

Wright and Morrus start
us off and the fans seem rowdy tonight. Alex uses the Daniel Bryan
moonsault out of the corner and works on the arm of Morrus. Off to
Psychosis as the announcers talk about having an opening to beat the
NWO now. Konnan comes in illegally but walks into a superkick that
didn’t appear to connect from Psychosis. A better looking top rope
spinwheel kick puts Konnan down and Psychosis takes Morrus down on
the floor as well.

Morrus comes in and
with nothing better to do, we go split screen to show Page arriving
earlier today and looking hurt. A powerslam gets no cover on the
masked man and a middle rope elbow misses for Morrus. Double tag
brings in Wright and Konnan and Alex cleans house. A top rope cross
body gets one on Hugh but Konnan hits him with a neckbreaker and No
Laughing Matter (moonsault) gets the pin on Wright.

Rating: D+.
Not much here but it wasn’t bad. The Dungeon of Doom was about a
year and a half past their expiration date and they would never mean
anything again. For that matter you could say the same for Wright
and Psychosis as well, but they had some moderate success. Not a lot
to say here.

Rey Mysterio Jr. vs.
Steven Regal

No entrances for either
guy but at least we got that nifty set of stills from Madusa vs.
Hokuto. Regal takes over to start and sends Rey out to the floor and
into the barricade. Back inside and we’re told the NWO has arrived.
Naturally we look at this instead of the match. I know they’re a
bigger deal but this gets on my nerves. You could EASILY show this
between the matches and nothing would be any worse. Hogan and
Bischoff talk about problems in the family and it’s only the two of
them plus DiBiase and Vincent.

Back in the ring,
Mysterio sends Regal to the apron but misses a charge. Regal goes up
top but takes too long, allowing Rey to hit a springboard
headscissors for two. West Coast Pop doesn’t connect properly and
only gets two. Regal takes him down and puts on the Regal Stretch
but Rey makes the rope. For some reason during part of that hold
referee Randy Anderson had his hand on the back of Rey’s head. Regal
won’t break the hold and it’s a DQ.

Rating: D+.
Not much to see here again but at least we could see most of the
match instead of having most of the time being spent on the NWO
buying a newspaper or whatever they’re doing this week. Regal was
snapping at this point but I don’t remember anything coming out of
it, which is a shame as he was good at being psycho.

Prince Iaukea comes out
for the save but Regal beats him down and puts him in the Stretch
too. The totally calm look on Regal’s face as he tortures Iaukea and
punches him in the face is borderline chilling.

The rest of the NWO
arrives. Savage is on crutches.

We recap last night’s
bizarre one on one match for the tag titles which was basically Rick
Steiner being squashed by Kevin Nash. This led to Ted DiBiase
getting upset by the amount of punishment Steiner received.

Ice Train vs. Chris
Benoit

Woman is continuing to
look good here so at least the squash won’t be a total loss. Benoit
pounds away to start but walks into a press slam from Train. Benoit
starts chopping away but Ice Train yells at him and clotheslines
Benoit down. Train puts on a chinlock as we go split screen to see
Hogan throwing the belt down and the NWO gets in an argument.

Savage seems to be the
one with the most issues here. Nash walks away and Norton says get
it together. Back in the ring Woman takes Teddy Long down and a
Benoit DDT gets the pin. It was barely long enough to rate in the
first place and since we missed a good piece of it for an NWO
argument I’ll pass on a rating. It was exactly what you would expect
though.

We get a video on the
premiere of Double Team, which is Dennis Rodman’s new movie. This is
shown because the NWO was there, which brings up a question: the NWO
is supposed to be a totally different organization from WCW in
storyline terms right? So why would WCW show this stuff? There’s no
disclaimer saying that the NWO paid for this and Tony intros it, so
why would they show it?

Hector Guerrero vs.
Kevin Sullivan

Hector is a dead ringer
for Eddie and may actually be more talented in the ring than Eddie
was. Sullivan pounds Hector down to start and knocks him to the
floor so Jackie can slam him which is supposed to be impressive for
some reason. Back in the ring and Sullivan keeps up the assault and
then throws him out to Jackie for more of her punches and another
slam. The Tree of Woe and double stomp end this quick, and by that I
mean the guy that got in all the offense so far, as in Sullivan,
wins, in case that was too complicated for you.

Here’s the NWO with
something to say. DiBiase says there are clearly problems here and
we need to fix them now. Hogan says that Nash has a problem with
this and throws the belt down again, saying it means nothing. Nash
says that he has no problem with Rodman as he used to be a ball
player too. But he spent Easter Sunday in a hotel room with Syxx
which was a big problem for some reason.

Hogan says next Easter
they’ll go on an NWO Easter Hunt, but for now he wants to know where
Hall is. Nash says Hall is NWO for life but Hogan wants to fight
right now. Nash talks about Hogan joining Hall and Nash and about
how they’re NWO for life. That apparently buries the hatchet but
Savage is mad. The fans want Sting. Hogan says he doesn’t want to
fight Savage so get it together. Savage says ok but he and Bishoff
are on probation with each other. That settles things apparently.

Hour #2 begins and we
recap the first half of the show.

Gene brings out Flair
for a chat. Flair rants a bit about the NWO and how he’s going to
take them out. Here’s Piper who says he’s out of the asylum and
rants a bit as well. Flair says Kevin Greene wants to join up with
them and I think we’ve got a six man coming. Piper on the NWO: “They
smell like six dead otters in a drainpipe.” Greene comes out and
praises both guys before going insane as well. This would be the
main event of the PPV.

US Title: Dean
Malenko vs. Chris Jericho

This should be awesome.
Things start off fast and Jericho hits a pair of kicks to take
Malenko down. They head to the floor for some more kicks before a
missile dropkick gets two back in the ring. A backslide gets the
same but Jericho ducks his head and gets powerbombed. There’s the
Cloverleaf but Jericho grabs the rope. Dean goes up but gets
superplexed down. This is the first slow down they’ve had so far.
As Jericho gets up, Dean hits a standing version of Orton’s Punt for
the pin.

Rating: B.
For a three minute match, this was AWESOME. Dean going all evil and
kicking Jericho in the face was a good change of pace for him and it
would lead to a decent heel run for him. Jericho was starting to get
pushed and it would turn into a title run in a few months in a big
win over an NWO member.

Public Enemy vs.
High Voltage

High Voltage jumps the
Public Enemy to start but gets slugged down almost immediately. A
double flapjack sets up a double suplex on Rage for no cover. The
fans like the arm waving thing the Public Enemy does. Rock and Kaos
officially get us going before Rock is sent to the floor for a
beating from Rage. Back in and Rock hits a neckbreaker on Kaos for
two. Tag to Grunge who cleans house. They head to the floor and
Kaos is put on the table. The elbow through said table misses while
back in the ring, Rage hits a northern lights suplex for the pin.
Short but energetic again.

Public Enemy says
sometimes the table works for you and sometimes it works against you
but it’s all good. Rock challenges High Voltage to a Philadelphia
street fight next week. They say they’ll get extreme next week.

Prince Iaukea is
getting his ribs taped up.

Harlem Heat vs.
Steve McMichael/Jeff Jarrett

And there’s no Mongo.
Booker gets things going in a match that would be for the world title
in about three years. Booker runs him over to start but Jarrett
comes back with some hip tosses. Jarrett goes to the corner but gets
pounded down as the Heat takes over again. Stevie comes in and
catches Jarrett in what we would call the World’s Strongest Slam.
Jeff dropkicks both guys to the floor and things slow down a bit.

Stevie slams him down
again and it’s back to Booker. The numbers game is catching up with
Jeff as Booker side kicks him down for two. Debra has left ringside
as the announcers are trying to figure out if Mongo was here earlier
or not. The ax kick hits but Booker tags out instead of covering.
Jarrett grabs a small package out of nowhere for two and a sunset
flip out of the corner gets the same on Booker. A double suplex puts
Jeff down for two and Debra is back again. Jeff misses a dropkick
and Stevie guillotines him on the top rope.

Even Sherri is getting
in some attacks on Jeff, hitting him in the chest and choking him a
bit. A quick backslide gets two for Jarrett and he avoids the Harlem
Side Kick, crotching Booker in the process. Stevie hits a
brainbuster and here’s Mongo who looks fine. Stevie misses something
off the top and Mongo is on the apron. There’s the tag and Mongo
cleans house. Jarrett is spent so Mongo tags him back in. Mongo
shoves him into the side kick and Booker gets the pin.

Rating: D+.
This was a long angle advancement which is a good thing, but it’s an
angle that wasn’t interesting for the most part. At the end of the
day, they’re fighting about Debra who is just annoying beyond belief.
Mongo wasn’t any good in the ring and Jarrett was awful as a face at
this point. It wouldn’t be until be became a male sexist pig in the
WWF that he really came into his own.

Jarrett and Mongo
bicker post match. Mongo says he wants more pain but never would say
where he was.

TV Title: Ultimo
Dragon vs. Prince Iaukea

Iaukea is injured from
the attack by Regal earlier in the night. He tries to speed things
up to start but a slam fails. Iaukea rolls him up for two and a
backslide gets the same. Dragon uses his first opening and kicks the
Prince in the ribs to take over. Iaukea gets the feet up to take out
a diving Dragon but Dragon kicks him in the ribs a few times and pins
him quickly for the title. This was basically a squash.

Another package of
stills from last night. I’ll give WCW one thing: other than the
title matches which are obvious, they haven’t said who won any of
these matches. That’s one thing that annoys me about WWE doing this:
they’ll tell you to buy the replay but they’ll explain every single
thing that happened. Here at least they’re just showing pictures of
it but no endings.

Giant vs. Scott
Steiner

Main event here, but
Konnan and Hugh Morrus jump Scott on the way to the ring. Giant
makes the save. Scott didn’t wrestle last night either so maybe he
was injured. No match.

Here’s DDP to close the
show. He talks about last night and how no one would have believed
that could have happened a few years ago. Page says he’s an anomaly
and if he had gotten his hands on Savage last night when Savage was
hurting Kimberly, he would have killed the Macho Man. Cue Savage on
crutches but Hogan follows him out and stops him.

Hogan says this one is
on him and the rest of the NWO appears on stage. Hogan rips his
shirt off and here’s Sting on a zip line and repelling from the
ceiling. He stands in the aisle in front of the NWO and holds the
bat out at Hogan. Sting hands Page the bat but pulls out another one
to point at Hogan again. The NWO cowers to end the show.

Overall Rating: B-.
This show worked MUCH better than the previous week’s did and that’s
because the big stars were here. Last week and at Spring Stampede,
no one showed up and it felt like an unimportant show. This show
came off like it mattered and even though the PPV would mean nothing
again, this was a good start on the six week build to Slamboree.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and check out my website at kbwrestlingreviews.com

Rants

Monday Nitro – March 31, 1997

By Scott Keith on 22nd August 2012

Monday
Nitro #81

Date: March 31, 1997

Location: Roanoke Civic
Center, Roanoke, Virginia

Attendance: 8,709

Commentators: Tony
Schiavone, Larry Zbyszko, Mike Tenay, Bobby Heenan

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

Man I haven’t done one
of these in forever. We’re getting close to Spring Stampede, so
close in fact that it’s this Sunday. The main feud at the moment is
Page vs. Savage because Hogan didn’t want to defend the world title
on PPV for about four months. Tonight will likely just be a lot of
build up towards that show, which is going to be very hit or miss.
Let’s get to it.

We open with a recap of
the end of last week with Savage vs. Iaukea. I’m still not sure why
they didn’t just let Savage have the belt so he and Page could fight
over it.

The NWO has arrived
sans Hogan, Bischoff and Hall.

Lex Luger/Giant vs.
Rick Fuller/Roadblock

The graphic says
Luger/Giant are tag champions but that hasn’t been the case for
weeks. Giant and Fuller start things off. Fuller is a big guy who
looks like a taller Rhyno. Roadblock is even bigger but to the point
of being fat. Giant throws Fuller into the corner and clotheslines
him before bringing in Lex. Luger works on the arm but gets poked in
the eye to bring in Roadblock.

A splash in the corner
has Luger in trouble as the fat man is rolling quickly. Lex ducks
another clothesline though and there’s the forearm to the head which
may or may not have steel in it. Luger doesn’t tag Giant when he has
the chance and Roadblock knees him in the ribs. A legdrop gets two
for Roadie and it’s back to Fuller. That goes nowhere so here’s
Roadblock again. A splash misses and here’s Giant. He kicks both
guys down and does it again with a double clothesline. Giant
chokeslams Roadblock as Luger Racks Fuller to end it.

Rating: C.
What the heck was this? You have Roadblock and Rick Fuller in there
and you get a somewhat entertaining match? This was two guys who
were big and fat (somewhat so in Fuller’s case) moving very well and
showing off a bit. The match was a total surprise and took what
should have been a squash and made it entertaining. Fun stuff here
all things considered.

Harlem Heat, as in the
guys in the fourway with Luger and Giant on Sunday, come in and we
have a brawl.

After a break, Harlem
Heat says they want respect. Somehow this takes almost two minutes.

Women’s
Cruiserweight Title Tournament First Round: Meiko Satomura vs. Toshie
Uematsu

Yeah this title
existed. The title would be decided on the Sunday show soon after
this and then would never be mentioned on American TV more than maybe
twice afterwards. It would be retired later this year, probably due
to the fact that putting women in weight classes is a bad idea. I
think Meiko is in red here. If so she takes over to start with a
dropkick and hits a forearm in the corner.

Toshie comes back with
a slam and a Daniel Bryan moonsault out of the corner. That gets
horribly botched so she does it again a bit better. Meiko goes up
but gets armdragged down and a top rope splash gets the win for
Toshie. She would win the title and take it to Japan where it was
completely forgotten.

Psychosis vs.
Villano IV

Time for the random
Cruiserweight match of the week. They trade wristlocks to start and
Psychosis is put on the mat. He tries to spin out of it but Villano
grabs a headlock to counter. I love basic stuff like that. Tenay
shows off his knowledge of wrestling, explaining where the name
Villano comes from (it means Villain and comes from Villano I being
the villain in an El Santo movie). Psychosis headscissors him down
and hits a spinwheel kick to a crotched Villano.

A big corkscrew plancha
to the floor takes Villano down again. Back inside and Psychosis
tries a jumping DDT off the top but gets caught in something like a
side slam for two. We cut to the back where the NWO is talking.
They say they’re going to take care of business. Wallstreet walks
out on them and now it’s back to our match. Villano misses a
moonsault and a superkick sets up the guillotine legdrop for the pin.
We didn’t see enough to rate but what we saw was solid.

Here’s Flair for a
chat. He talks about being in Roanoke and brings out Piper. Piper
says Flair’s ears are growing like Pinnochio. He makes sex jokes
about Flair and Flair thanks Piper for humbling himself enough to
come here. Flair says they’re friends but Piper can never claim to
be the best wrestler alive. There are 100 people today that call
themselves the best but none of them call Piper out. Flair talks
about getting the Nasty Boys out of here in 93 (huh?) and talks about
Piper putting Hogan to sleep twice. Piper says Flair hasn’t been
beaten ever and they agree to take on everyone together. I have no
idea what I just saw.

TV Title: Prince
Iaukea vs. La Parka

La Parka kicks him down
to start and hits a moonsault for two. Prince avoids a charge and La
Parka’s shoulder hits the post. They head outside and the champ
(Iaukea) is sent into the barricade. La Parka puts the Prince in a
chair on the floor and dives through the ropes to take him out.
Prince doesn’t seem that interested in selling so they head back
inside. We get an awkward sequence of running the ropes and Iaukea
superkicks him down.

The champ misses a
cross body off the top though and it’s back to the outside. La Parka
baseball slides the chair into Prince’s head which draws a bell, but
the match keeps going with Parka hitting a big dive to the floor.
Back inside and the fans are booing this out of the building. La
Parka gets the chair and Prince dives into it off a cross body. He
doesn’t sell it AT ALL, covers La Parka, and retains.

Rating: D-.
I have no idea what I just saw in back to back segments. This was
very awkward and from what I can tell, that’s mainly due to Iaukea.
He wouldn’t sell most of La Parka’s stuff and on top of that the
referee looked confused during the ending. These two were on
different planets out there but La Parka’s high spots looked good.

Steven Regal vs.
Chris Jericho

Regal says Iaukea will
be eating through a straw after Sunday. The brilliant fans chant USA
for an Englishman and a Canadian. They go to a wristlock and Regal
does his usual awesome sequence of rolling on his back and kicking
Jericho’s hand away to break it. Jericho knocks him to the apron and
hits the springboard dropkick to put him on the floor. Back in and
the move that would become known as the Lionsault gets two. Regal
tries a cobra clutch but Jericho ducks and superkicks him, followed
by a rollup for a BIG upset.

Regal beats the tar out
of him and hits a top rope butterfly suplex post match. Jericho gets
put in the Regal Stretch and Renegade makes the save. Scratch that
as he charges but pulls back without being touched. Joe Gomez comes
in and breaks it up but gets beaten up by Regal. Billy Kidman comes
in to help but gets headbutted. Lenny Lane gets beaten up as well.

Hour #2 begins and we
get the traditional recap.

Mr. Wallstreet leaves.

Women’s Title:
Debbie Combs vs. Akira Hokuto

Hokuto is defending and
Combs is some old chick with big blonde hair. She turns her back on
Hokuto who kicks her in the back to take over. Hokuto chokes her in
the ropes and Sonny gets in a shot of his own to Debbie. Combs hits
what is supposed to be called a gutwrench suplex for two and a cross
body gets the same. Hokuto doesn’t care and grabs a German suplex
(called a tiger suplex by Tony) and “he” (Tony again) beats her
to retain. This was short.

Madusa says Roanoke
rocks and says she’ll win the title on Sunday. Hokuto beats her down
because no one wants to hear from Madusa.

The announcers talk
about Sting a lot and we get a video on him.

We recap the Horsemen
arguing last week.

Jeff Jarrett/Steve
McMichael vs. Amazing French Canadians

After Bobby makes fun
of the Virginia state song, we’re starting with Oullette vs. Mongo.
Things break down quickly and Mongo cleans house, including
dropkicking Rougeau to the floor. Rougeau vs. Jarrett now and double
teaming takes Jarrett down. Jeff shrugs that off and dropkicks
Oullette, followed by a tag to Mongo. I think it was supposed to be
the hot tag but when the match is a minute long so far I don’t think
you can have a hot tag. Public Enemy runs out and jumps the
Horsemen, but Colonel Parker steals Mongo’s briefcase from Grunge who
stole it last week. Rougeau gets the case and hits Mongo with it for
the fast pin.

Debra complains about
breaking some nails. Oh and the Public Enemy have bad breath and
lice. My goodness what did they do the Horsemen? Mongo accuses
Jarrett of hitting him with the case. If only there was some way to
see the match again and find out what really happened.

Hugh Morrus vs.
Chris Benoit

Woman is looking very
good here. Morrus jumps him to start but Benoit comes back with
chops. A powerslam puts Benoit down but he gets up before Morrus can
try No Laughing Matter. Benoit pulls him off the ropes and hits a
quick German for a pin. This didn’t even last 90 seconds.

Sullivan and Jacqueline
come in and it’s a big brawl. Jackie hits a top rope splash on
Benoit but Woman crotches her. Flair finally comes in for the save
and gets by far and away the biggest ovation of the night. Arn
Anderson gets in Sullivan’s way and they have an awkward staredown
before Sullivan leaves. Benoit says that Sullivan is leaving soon
and Benoit is the new generation.

We get another quick
recap of Page getting beaten down last week.

Diamond Dallas Page
vs. Lance Ringo

Ringo is more famous as
the almost equally forgettable Sick Boy. He brings the Playboy or
Penthouse with Kimberly in it with him, making him more awesome than
any other jobber in a long time. Page beats him up to start but gets
clotheslined on the top rope. Ringo hits a springboard dropkick to
put Page down, but DDP gets up and hits what we would call a TKO but
here it’s a Diamond Cutter for the pin. Squash.

Post match Page talks
about his wife being in Playboy and how proud he is of it. He’s not
proud of what Liz and Savage did to Kimberly at Uncensored though,
and he’s going to snap into Macho Man’s world. Cue Savage and Liz
with Randy asking if Page has any family jewels to go with his
diamonds. How did no one else ever make that joke? Page: “I’ll
make sure to bring the lady, because you’re bringing the tramp
(meaning Liz).” There was great chemistry here and I want to see
them fight now.

High Voltage vs.
Steiner Brothers

Kaos and Scott start
and Scott throws him around with ease. Off to Rick and the barking
begins. Rage sends him to the floor and rams the injured ear into
the post. Kaos hits a slingshot legdrop to the back of Rick’s head
followed by a neckbreaker for two. Rage misses a good looking
springboard Swanton and it’s off to Scott. After some power
displays, the FREAKING STEINER SCREWDRIVER ends Rage. If you’ve
never seen that move before, look it up. It’s one of the most
painful looking moves of all time.

Rating: A+.
It had the Steiner Screwdriver in it, thereby making it awesome.
This was barely long enough to rate and it was a squash for the most
part so that’s all I’ve got.

Syxx and Nash come to
the announce table and say the rest of the NWO A-Team has bailed to
see the premier of Dennis Rodman’s new movie. Nash sounds really mad
here and that ends the show.

Overall Rating: D+.
This wasn’t much at all. While it did a decent enough job of setting
up Spring Stampede, the stuff they were offering on that show isn’t
interesting enough for me to care. As annoying as Hogan can get,
when he’s not around this show gets very dull very fast. This show
wasn’t bad but this is a really boring few months for Nitro and it’s
only going to get worse.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

Rants

Monday Nitro – March 24, 1997

By Scott Keith on 15th August 2012

Monday Nitro #80

Date: March 24, 1997

Location: Duluth
Convention Center, Duluth, Minnesota

Commentators: Mike
Tenay, Bobby Heenan, Tony Schiavone, Larry Zbyszko

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

Another Nitro this week
with another stacked card of eleven matches. There isn’t much
different from last week as Hogan is still afraid of Sting and the
main feud is still Page vs. Savage for the PPV. Flair is still out
with an injury as he would be for the next six weeks or so. There
just isn’t much to talk about at the moment and there won’t be for a
few more months. Let’s get to it.

We open with a recap of
last week’s challenge from Savage to Page.

Opening sequence, which
still has Hogan in the red and yellow as the featured person.

Larry Hennig is here.

US Title: Dean
Malenko vs. Konnan

Dean is defending and
has a big bandage over his left eye. Apparently tonight DiBiase has
ordered WCW to give Savage a TV Title match vs. Prince Iaukea.
Konnan takes him to the mat and grabs a leg hold which Dean escapes
into a standoff. Konna hits him in the back as we hear from Syxx
about Dean Malenko. It’s implied that Eddie and Syxx have something
going on. Konnan powerbombs him down for two. Dean comes back with
a leg lariat but Konnan hooks La Majistral for two. Konnan misses a
“dropkick” off the top so Dean can grab the Cloverleaf to retain.

Rating: D+.
Nothing to see here as the match existed to let Syxx talk. Dean was
awesome at this point and could hang with anyone, which is why his
match with Benoit at Spring Stampede was probably a good idea.
Konnan looked better than usual here but he would join the NWO later
in the year and ruin whatever he had going for him.

Dean thinks Eddie and
Syxx are in cahoots.

We get a clip from
Uncensored of Wrath debuting and attacking Glacier after he beat
Mortis.

Mortis vs. Jerry
Flynn

Dang I thought this was
Jerry Lynn at first. They trade missed kicks until Mortis runs him
over with a shoulder block. Flynn kicks him down but Mortis hits a
reverse mule kick in the corner to take over. Since he’s not that
smart, Mortis poses on the ropes and Flynn kicks him down to take
over. Jerry charges into a superkick though and a spinwheel kick
puts Flynn down again. A middle rope Fameasser gets two but Flynn
powerbombs him out of the corner to take over again. Mortis kicks
him down twice and the Flatliner (Samoan Drop from the middle rope)
gets the pin.

Rating: D.
This is a match where the styles contrasted badly. Martial arts vs.
martial arts isn’t a pairing that is going to work most of the time
and when one of the guys is Jerry Flynn, the match is going to be
pretty bad most of the time. Mortis was a character that was hard to
use properly because he was pretty one dimensional and was only there
to torment Glacier. His offense was pretty good though.

La Parka vs.
Juventud Guerrera

La Parka has a
sombrero, what looks like a skull covered bathrobe and a belt with a
skull larger than his head in the middle. Juvy hits a spin kick to
start but La Parka comes back with his strut. This would be the
start of his more famous personality. Juvy knocks him to the floor
and hits a HUGE dive to the outside to take Parka out. Back in a
springboard missile dropkick gets two but La Parka takes him down
with a clothesline.

A springboard moonsault
completely misses (even Tony says so) but it gets two anyway. A
spinwheel kick puts Juvy down to the floor and a bit dive puts
Guerrera down again. Juvy comes back with a (mostly missed)
springboard flip dive followed by an attempted top rope rana, but
Parka powerbombs him down from the top. La Parka goes up and hits
what we would call the Whisper in the Wind for the pin.

Rating: B-.
When all else fails, let two luchadores go out and show off for the
crowd. These guys were flying all over the place and looked great
doing it. It got the crowd going too which is more than almost
anything did last week. La Parka wasn’t quite known for his high
flying but he did it well enough here. Good stuff.

We get a clip from
Souled Out with the Steiners winning the titles, only to get screwed
out of them the next night. Bischoff was then suspended a few weeks
ago so he can’t return the titles later. The Outsiders ran the
Steiners off the road in a car wreck and then laid out Rick Steiner.
This was a very well built feud, but the problem was the Steiners
never got the big win over the Outsiders, so the payoff was never
there, making the whole thing a letdown to the fans.

The Steiners say
they’re ready for Spring Stampede, in a match that never happened
because Scott Hall no showed the show.

High Voltage vs.
Public Enemy

See how deep the tag
division used to be? Public Enemy cleans the ring out quickly until
we get down to Rocco vs. Rage. High Voltage takes over and it’s off
to Kaos with a double ax off the top. Back to Rage who slams him
down but misses a standing moonsault. Double tag brings in Kaos and
Grunge (what names these teams have) and Public Enemy cleans house.
They hit a springboard version of the Quebecers’ Cannonball but opt
to put Rage on the table instead. A springboard dive puts Rage
through it and here’s Jarrett with the briefcase to the head of
Grunge so Kaos can get the pin.

Rating: D.
This was barely long enough to rate and it was nothing of note. High
Voltage was usually the jobbing team so this was a pretty sizable
upset at the time. The match was there to further the Horsemen vs.
Public Enemy, which was a feud I’m sure dozens of people were dying
to see. The double team flip dives weren’t bad though.

Giant talks about
having to possibly face Lex in the four corners match at the PPV.
For some reason they had a four corners match with Harlem Heat vs.
Luger vs. Giant with the winner getting a title shot which didn’t
wind up coming for about three months. Giant doesn’t want to fight
Lex and Lex says he can feel the balance of power shifting because of
Sting.

Super Calo vs.
Psychosis

Psychosis starts with a
spin kick but Calo fires off kicks to the chest to take over. He
climbs the corner but his spinning cross body winds up being more of
an armdrag. Psychosis crotches him on top and hits a spinwheel kick
to the back of the head. Crucifix gets two for Calo and he dropkicks
Psychosis to the floor. Back in and Psychosis slams him down and
hits the guillotine legdrop for the pin. It’s as out of nowhere as
it sounds.

Rating: D+.
Not much here as the match was sloppy at times and the ending came
out of absolutely nowhere. Calo controlled most of the match until
Psychosis hit one move and then his finisher. This was a far cry
from the other cruiserweight match earlier in the night so it’s not
as easy as it looks.

Hour #2 starts so we
hit the recap button even though there isn’t much to recap.

Chris Benoit vs.
Hugh Morrus

Brawl to start as Tenay
says this is a real life feud with Benoit vs. Sullivan. Morrus hits
a gorilla press on Benoit followed by a running corner splash. We
get what sounds like a MORRUS chant. Benoit comes back with a
release German but Konnan shoves him down when he’s loading up the
Swan Dive. No Laughing Matter gets the quick pin.

Sullivan comes out for
the three way beatdown but Malenko, who isn’t a Horseman yet, comes
out for a failed save. Flair comes out for the real save in his
first physical action in almost six months. Benoit and Malenko stare
each other down.

Faces of Fear vs.
Harlem Heat

This is a rematch from
Saturday Night which was thrown out for something involving Luger and
the Giant. Booker and Barbarian start things off. They get into a
power struggle, won by the Samoan. The Faces of Fear double team
Booker to the floor as the Heat are in trouble early. Back in and
Booker hits a spinning cross body off the top for two. Off to Stevie
who uses his usual array of stomps.

Meng comes in and will
have none of Stevie’s bad offense so he hits him in the face. Back
to Barbarian as Stevie is in trouble. Never mind as a big boot to
the face puts Barbarian down. I know Stevie has never been
considered brilliant but apparently he doesn’t know his Samoan
stereotypes. A middle rope ax kick puts Barbarian down but Meng
comes in for a double headbutt to take over on Booker. Booker tries
a slam but Meng falls on him for tow.

Booker gets taken into
the wrong corner and it’s off to Barbarian for more punishment. Side
salto gets two. Back to Meng for an abdominal stretch but Sherri’s
distraction lets Stevie comes in sans tag, which is just fine
apparently. Booker comes back in almost immediately, being launched
off the top onto Meng for no cover. The side kick gets two on Meng.
Meng hits a sitout powerbomb out of nowhere for two and everything
breaks down. Meng misses a charge in the corner, hitting Sherri in
the process, which allows Booker to grabs a fast rollup for the pin.

Rating: C-.
This is one of those matches where if you cut out about two minutes
of it, the match would be a lot better. It’s also very apparent how
much more talented Booker was than Stevie, as Booker carried the
offense for his team while Stevie did little more than stomp on
either Samoan at any given time. The Faces of Fear were great in the
jobber to the stars tag team role.

Here are the Horsemen,
as in Benoit and Flair, to talk about Anderson being attacked last
week. Benoit thinks it was Sullivan but wants to know why Malenko
made the save earlier. Flair offers Piper the spot on the team
again.

Madusa vs. Malia
Hosaka

This is another of
those random WCW women’s matches. They shove each other to start and
Hosaka puts on a Boston Crab. The fans chant USA as Tony talks about
Glacier for some reason. Off to a chinlock by Hosaka which is pretty
easily countered. She tries a rolling cradle but Madusa stands there
instead of falling down. Madusa grabs the bridging German for the
pin. Too short to rate but this was pretty bad.

Jim Duggan vs.
Renegade

Apparently Renegade was
too rough on Saturday Night against Riggs. This is part of
Renegade’s heel turn which was one of the most questionable decisions
ever. Not that it was a bad idea, but because no one was sure why
someone gave Renegade an angle at all. Wait if he’s a heel now why
is he slapping hands? Duggan beats up an NWO sign with his board.
Duggan is in gold boots here for some reason. He sets to wrap his
fist with tape but throws it to the fans instead.

Feeling out process to
start with Renegade not really acting any differently than he usually
did on these shows. Tony implies that WWF might be trying to steal
Renegade for some reason. If so then they’re picking a bad guy to
steal as Duggan hammers him down and then into the corner to take
over. They try a bulldog out of the corner but Duggan falls down
like a headlock takeover. Off to a chinlock followed by the
cartwheel elbow in the corner. Duggan gets another roll of tape for
the punch to the head for the pin.

Rating: F.
Chris Jericho, Eddie Guerrero, Rey Mysterio, Diamond Dallas Page,
Giant, Luger and I could go on. These are people that didn’t have a
match this week but these two guys got to be on TV with a heel turn
for Renegade in the process. Then they have Duggan beat him? What
in the world was the point of this?

Video on Sting and how
WCW needs him.

Steiner Brothers vs.
Amazing French Canadians

The Canadians do the
national anthem before the match. Scott and Pierre start us off and
Steiner hits a butterfly powerbomb to take over. The Steiners clear
the ring but Scott gets in trouble for a bit. Pierre slams him down
but jumps into the boot of Scott. There’s the tag to Rick and
everything breaks down. The idea is that Rick is still messed up
because of his ear injury from the car wreck. Jacques piledrives
Rick but Colonel Parker misses his flag pole shot. Cannonball hits
Rick but there’s no referee. Parker’s boot is thrown in but Rick
intercepts it and blasts Pierre for the pin.

Rating: D-.
Another horrible match here with no point to it at all. The
Canadians were just not that good and certainly weren’t interesting
at all. Then again it may have been Colonel Parker and his
annoyances that kept me from caring here. Either way the match was
bad with neither team seeming interested at all.

TV Title: Prince
Iaukea vs. Randy Savage

Main event time. The
full NWO comes out because Randy Savage needs support against Prince
freaking Iaukea. Nash shouts to HBK on the way to the ring.
Apparently the title challenge isn’t just a one off thing. The NWO
can challenge for any title anytime forever. Prince hits a shoulder
for two and Savage hits the floor.

Back in and Iaukea hits
a springboard cross body for two. A top rope cross body misses and
Savage clotheslines him on the top rope to take over. Savage drops
the elbow but pulls him up at two. Page runs in for the DQ, because
why would he want to face Savage for the TV Title? To be fair I
guess the idea is that he wanted to hurt Savage no matter what. I
can live with that.

Rating: D.
Unfortunately this was long enough to rate. Iaukea was so freaking
boring and bland that there was almost no way to care about him.
Savage facing him here was such a weird matchup as it was in essence
a squash match for a title, which isn’t something you often see.
This was nothing but a way for Page to run in though.

Page gets destroyed to
end the show.

Overall Rating: D.
This really was a tale of two hours. The first one was good and had
some solid action, but the second hour was just dreadful, with bad
matches that weren’t interesting at all. I mean come on, Prince
Iaukea in the main event of a show? Thankfully there’s only one more
episode before Spring Stampede so we can move on to the next boring
PPV build. This show was a chore to sit through, at least in the
second half.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and check out my website at kbwrestlingreviews.com

Rants

Monday Nitro – March 17, 1996

By Scott Keith on 8th August 2012

Monday Nitro #79
Date: March 17, 1997
Location: Savannah Civic Center, Savannah, Georgia
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay, Larry Zbyszko, Bobby Heenan

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

It’s
the night after Uncensored and the big story is that Sting has declared
his loyalty for WCW by attacking the NWO to close the show last night.
At the same time though it’s not all good for the purple and gold (WCW
for you young people out there) as the NWO won the main event last
night, basically giving them unlimited power in the company. There are
eleven matches tonight so expect some quick finishes. Let’s get to it.

Rey Mysterio vs. Psychosis

Mysterio
takes him to the mat to start and controls from behind. Psychosis takes
him to the mat as we see the Japanese announce table which has Ultimo
Dragon sans mask. Rey tries to do his kickoff out of a test of strength
position but they mistime it horribly. A springboard headscissors sends
Psychosis to the floor and Rey follows it with a rana off the apron.
Back in and Psychosis rams him stomach first into the buckle. Psychosis
misses a charge into the post and Rey hits a flip dive to the floor.
West Coast Pop is HORRIBLY botched as Psychosis’ head is drive into the
mat ala a piledriver for the pin.

Rating: C-.
I haven’t seen Rey botch this much stuff in years. The ending was
almost scary as Psychosis just stopped moving when his head got driven
into the mat like that. The match wasn’t horrible but with two
noticeable botches in three and a half minutes, how good can you
consider a match?

Arn
Anderson says Sting came home last night, but that’s not what he’s here
to talk about. He was injured at Halloween Havoc and has to have neck
surgery. Arn talks about how his grandmother stayed alive long enough to
see him become a mature adult. Last night he saw his family, the
Horsemen, mature. He also saw Sullivan’s son recently and it looks like
the Sullivan family has broken up completely. Anderson says he’ll be
back, but he never would be, at least not in the ring.

We recap last night with Savage and Liz attacking Kimberly and Page. They spray painted Kimberly when page was down.

Maxx vs. Diamond Dallas Page

Maxx
is a muscle guy who is part of the Dungeon of Doom. There’s a slight
chance that he’s the same guy that played Maxx Muscle, who was Page’s
bodyguard back in 1995. This is a squash, with Page hitting a top rope
splash of all things. He escapes a full nelson and hits the Cutter for
the quick pin in maybe a minute and a half.

Page
says he’s hunting for Savage and Liz. We’re also told possibly for the
first time that Page and Kimberly are married in real life. Savage is a
dead man walking. Page starts to leave but Savage and Liz are in the
crowd. Savage says he’s the icon and Page is the wrestler with no name.
Talk of a non-sanctioned match is mentioned but Savage says it’ll be
later. Page charges into the crowd but Savage gets away.

Hugh Morrus/Konnan vs. Renegade/Joe Gomez

Before
the match here are Bischoff and the Outsiders to take over the announce
desk. Actually scratch that as they just have an announcement: they’ll
be getting in the ring tonight but no opponents are mentioned.
Apparently them getting to challenge for any title they want according
to the stipulations from the main event last night now means the
champions get to pick when they wrestle ever.

Back
to the match which starts with Morrus jumping Gomez and working over
his knee. Konnan comes in quickly and kicks at said knee. The Dungeon
trades off a few times but the offense doesn’t improve at all. The
announcers talk about Spring Stampede a bit as not much is going on
during the match. A clothesline puts Gomez down and Konnan comes back in
for a half crab. After about three minutes of leg work Gomez finally
tags in Renegade. He cleans house for about fifteen seconds and then
tags back out when Gomez can’t even stand. It takes about ten seconds to
hit No Laughing Matter for the pin on Joe.

Rating: D.
This was a dull match and it seems like they were trying to set up a
feud between Renegade and Gomez for who knows what reason. The match was
boring as it was about four minutes of leg work followed by the angle
to end the show. Gomez stayed around for a long time and never did
anything at all.

US Title: Dean Malenko vs. Scotty Riggs

Malenko
won the title last night. Riggs lost a strap match to Bagwell last
night so he gets a title match tonight. Makes perfect sense right?
Scotty hits a quick dropkick to start but it only gets two. Dean will
have none of that and sends Riggs to the floor and into the barricade.
Back in and we get a pinfall reversal sequence for some two counts.
Riggs makes a quick comeback with his jobber level offense before he
gets caught in a hot shot. Dean grabs a rolling cradle for the pin to
retain fast.

Lex Luger/The Giant vs. The Knuckles

That
would be Knuckles Nelson and T. Rantula. I don’t know about you, but
I’m smelling an upset here. Giant and Rantula start us off and the man
who would be Peter Parker is thrown back into his own corner quickly.
Nelson comes in and this is squash territory already. Giant works him
over in the corner for awhile until Rantula comes in to help. That goes
nowhere either and it’s a chokeslam for Nelson. Luger walks in without a
tag and powerslams Rantula as Giant pins Nelson. Luger Racks Rantula
post match. Total squash.

Luger
and Giant talk about Sting coming back last night. We get some clips
from the show with Sting destroying the NWO as Giant talks about seeing
the light at the end of the tunnel. Luger says it made him believe in
Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy and the Easter Bunny. These guys do know
they lost the main event right?

We get some stills from last night with Mortis vs. Glacier. Wrath debuted post match to beat down Glacier.

Bobby Eaton vs. Ultimo Dragon

Dragon
stalls on the floor to start so Eaton punches him in the face. And
never mind as Dragon puts him on top and hits a rana for the pin. This
wasn’t even a minute and a half.

Here’s
the NWO in full force. Hogan and Bischoff brag about winning last night
and talk about being able to challenge for any title. That would be the
TV and US Titles, unless you want to count the Women’s belt if that
exists yet. Savage says he’ll face Page at some point. Nash says the
Outsiders will face the Steiners at Spring Stampede. That would wind up
being Rick vs. Nash for the titles. During this announcement, Hall takes
a beer to the head. In PERFECT response, he wipes his hair as he is
known to do.

Call the NWO hotline!

Hour #2 begins and it seems a lot later than usual. We do the usual recap.

Alex Wright/Mark Starr vs. Jeff Jarrett/Steve McMichael

Jarrett
and Wright start things off with Alex firing off some dropkicks.
Jarrett takes him down and Mongo drops an elbow on the back of Wright’s
head to take over. There’s a side slam and it’s back to Jarrett. Tony
calls that a solid tag. How can a tag exactly be solid? Everything
breaks down with Starr diving over Mongo which is called a chop block.
Figure Four ends Starr quick.

Public
Enemy comes out and beats up the Horsemen post match. The Horsemen
fight them off and then go to talk to Gene. Apparently these teams are
going to be fighting at the PPV. Debra screeches a bit and Jarrett says
he’s walking the walk now. Mongo dares the people to boo Debra, again
not seeming to know if he’s a face or a heel.

Lee Marshall does his schtick.

Scott Norton vs. Chavo Guerrero Jr.

Norton
runs him over and Chavo bails to the floor. Back in and Chavo goes
after the knee but Norton won’t go down. Two more shots to it and he
still won’t go down. A missile dropkick won’t put Norton down and a
sunset flip doesn’t either. Norton powerbombs him to death to end this.
Norton wouldn’t sell a thing here.

Hogan and Rodman talk about nothing of note.

Chris Benoit vs. Billy Kidman

This doesn’t even last a minute with the Crossface ending it. That hadn’t been his finisher long at all at this point.

Benoit
and Woman have something to say but Flair comes out before they can
start. Benoit talks about Sullivan of course and Flair blames Piper for
the loss last night. Ric isn’t worried about Arn because he’s tough. As
for Piper, he can come be a Horseman and take Arn’s spot. That’s quite
the offer.

Steiner Brothers vs. Harlem Heat

Scott
and Booker get us going with Booker hitting a fast side kick. He walks
into a gorilla press slam though and it’s off to Rick. Stevie comes in
to stomp away and adds in some punches for good measure. They trade
powerslams as it’s time to talk about Sting. Booker comes in and side
slams Rick down but it’s off to Scott who cleans house. Everything
breaks down and it’s the NWO in for the DQ.

Rating: D+.
The match was just filler until the NWO got there for no apparent
reason. I guess it was to beat down the tag teams like the black and
white used to do but it didn’t quite work as well. These teams seem a
level or two beneath the NWO, but at the same time the NWO has beaten up
everyone so many times that it doesn’t mean much when they beat up the
main event guys anymore.

Luger
and Giant come out for the save and clear the ring. Sting drops from
the ceiling to end the show. He stands with WCW and that’s it. Hogan is
terrified.

Overall Rating: D+.
WCW hit a MAJOR funk over the summer, as the world title wouldn’t be
defended on PPV from March until August, making most of the PPV main
events totally worthless. Spring Stampede would be Savage vs. Page, the
next month would be a six man tag and the third would be Rodman/Hogan
vs. Luger/Giant. There were no major matches to build to so there was
little going on in the way of television. This was a good example of
that, as aside from Page and Savage getting set up, almost nothing
happened here. That would be the case for the next few months.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and check out my website at kbwrestlingreviews.com

Rants

Monday Nitro – February 24, 1997

By Scott Keith on 18th July 2012

Monday Nitro #76

Date: February 24, 1997

Location: ARCO Arena,
Sacramento, California

Commentators: Tony
Schiavone, Mike Tenay, Larry Zbyzsko, Bobby Heenan

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

It’s after SuperBrawl
now and we’re on the way to Uncensored, which had a very unique and
what I thought was a very entertaining main event. That’s in three
weeks though so for now we’ll stay on this show. Piper lost last
night after Savage became the newest member of the NWO. Yeah I’m as
shocked as you are. Other than that not a lot happened other than
Luger and Giant beginning what I’m sure will be a LONG tag title
reign. Let’s get to it.

Public Enemy vs.
Jeff Jarrett/Steve McMichael

Jarrett beat Mongo last
night to become an official Horseman. Rock is now bald and starts
with Mongo. That goes absolutely nowhere so a double tag brings in
the other guys. Grunge puts him down with a swinging neckbreaker and
Rock comes back in to work on the shoulder. Rock misses a charge in
the corner and Jarrett stomps away on him. Off to Mongo for nothing
and Jeff comes back in. Jeff leapfrogs him and Mongo takes out
Rock’s legs twice in a row. Rock tries a leapfrog but gets
powerbombed down. Here’s the briefcase but he hits Jarrett again,
allowing Rock to get the pin.

Rating: D+.
This feud just wouldn’t end no matter how long it kept going for. At
the end of the day though, Jarrett and Debra weren’t interesting at
all but they kept forcing those two and Mongo down our throats all
summer. Jarrett FINALLY went back to the WWF and Mongo stopped
getting TV time to end it, but that’s months away.

Cue the Horsemen to the
ring to yell at Mongo. Anderson rips him apart and Flair is mad.
Flair says we need to be a team. Anderson says that everyone is
getting stronger while we’re getting weaker. Jarrett and Mongo are
the only two healthy Horsemen so Anderson makes them shake hands.

Jim Duggan vs.
Galaxy

Galaxy is somewhat more
famous as Damien. Tony says this will be a classic. We need to have
a chat about what that means. Galaxy is just tiny compared to
Duggan. Duggan throws him around and backdrops him with ease. Out
to the floor and the fans are into Jim here. Duggan beats up Galaxy
on the floor and no sells Galaxy’s limited offense in the ring.
Three Point Clothesline and the taped fist get the pin. Nothing but
a squash.

Post match Duggan
challenges Hogan.

Hugh Morrus vs. Joe
Gomez

Gomez takes him into
the corner to start and breaks clean. Morrus takes him into the
corner and pounds on him. See who had the better career and figure
out what the smart move to make is. Gomez tries to speed things up
and grabs an armbar which defeats the purpose of speeding things up.
A dropkick puts Morrus down and it’s back to the armbar. Morrus
catches a leapfrog into kind of a spinebuster to set up No Laughing
Matter for the pin. This was nothing again.

We get some stills of
last night’s Sullivan vs. Benoit match. It was another wild brawl.
I don’t remember Woman looking good like this at all from this era.

Ice Train vs. La
Parka

We get an inset
interview from Teddy Long to Jackie of all people. La Parka starts
with rapid fire kicks but Train runs him down and hiptosses him for
two. Train keeps running him over but La Parka hits an enziguri to
take over. Top rope spinwheel kick gets two. World’s Strongest Slam
gives Train the advantage again and a corner splash has La Parka
flattened. The masked man comes back again with a spinwheel kick (he
likes that one) and Train is knocked to the floor. A big corkscrew
plancha takes him out and they head back inside. Train hits a HUGE
clothesline and a splash for the pin.

Rating: D+.
I liked Ice Train but this didn’t work all that well for me. I seem
to remember these two having a match a few weeks ago that was better
than this. Not much to this but the power vs. speed idea is
something that it’s hard to screw up. Given who was in this, it was
what you would call a pleasant surprise.

Chris Jericho/Eddie
Guerrero vs. Faces of Fear

Jericho and Guerrero
faced each other last night for Eddie’s US Title with the champion
retaining. Barbarian and Jericho get things going. Eddie comes in
with a cross body but his cover is easily shrugged off. Off to Meng
who shrugs off all of Eddie’s offense and headbutts him down. BIG
(not HUGE) powerbomb plants Eddie but he comes back with a
headscissors which allows the tag.

The small guys double
team Meng but it doesn’t get them very far. A backsplash gets two
but Meng kills Jericho with a belly to back. Barbarian hits a
superplex to the Canadian but Jericho manages a rollup for two. Meng
will have none of that though as the Faces (of Fear) hit their
backdrop into the powerbomb spot which is always cool.

There’s the double
headbutt but Eddie makes the save. Jericho finally avoids an elbow
drop and it’s off to Eddie. Everything breaks down and it’s time to
fly. Jericho loads up a Lionsault but Barbarian stops him from
trying (he would have missed by a mile anyway). Dean Malenko comes
out and shoves Eddie off the top, right into Meng’s boot for the pin.

Rating: C+.
This was pretty good here but you again had power vs. speed with the
speed team being a very good combination. Based on that alone you’re
going to have a good match. Malenko lost the title last night
because of Eddie so so there’s your explanation for the interference.
Fun match.

Time for hour #2.
There’s not much to recap so we’ll talk about the PPV a bit. Oh ok
we can talk about the Horsemen from earlier.

Juventud Guerrera
vs. Rey Mysterio

Juvy doesn’t mean much
yet. Rey tries a kind of backbreaker but Juvy counters into a DDT
and a springboard spinwheel kick to take Rey down. Off to a knee
lock but Rey kicks him in the face to escape. They grab a test of
strength grip and we get a nice gymnastics routine. Rey tries a
moonsault press but Juvy ducks underneath and hits one of his own for
two. Off to a chinlock which doesn’t last long. There’s a SWEET
springboard into a sunset bomb by Guerrera. Out to the floor goes
Rey and Juvy hits a sweet suicide dive. Juvy’s rana is countered
into a powerbomb and the West Coast Pop gets the pin.

Rating: C+.
These two are usually gold together but this was bronze at best.
Still though they were the best at this point for the high flying and
the flips and stuff like that. Also there was a great bit of
commentary in this right before Rey went up for the finish. Tony:
“He’s going to try something from the top too.” Heenan: “Thank
you Sherlock!”

Lee Marshall is in
Atlanta.

TV Title: Pat Tanaka
vs. Prince Iaukea

Tanaka comes out to
what would become Goldberg’s theme. Slow feeling out process to
start as the Prince is very apprehensive. Iaukea tries a kick to the
ribs but gets caught in a dragon screw legwhip. Prince comes back
with another kick and it’s time to stand around. He takes Tanaka
down, hits a springboard senton backsplash and the top rope cross
body retains. Bad match.

Dean Malenko vs.
Ultimo Dragon

Dean is all serious to
start and drives Dragon into the corner. They go to the mat and
trade some quick submission holds. That goes to a stalemate so Dean
offers a handshake and pulls Dragon into a clothesline. Dragon gets
ticked off and fires off his kick series to take over. Dean trips
him up and fires off fists to send Dragon to the floor. Dragon is
whipped into the barricade as Malenko is turning heel as the match
goes on.

Back in for a chinlock
as Malenko is in control. That shifts into a camel clutch but Dragon
reverses into a surfboard. This is the seated version with the
chinlock instead of the full bridge. Now it’s the Indian Deathlock
with the bridge. This is getting fun. Sunset flip gets two for
Malenko. Tiger bomb gets two for the same. Dragon sends him to the
apron and tries the same springboard dropkick that Jericho uses but
it TOTALLY misses.

Dean is knocked to the
floor anyway but Dragon hits a big dive to take Dean out to make up
for the miss. Back in Dragon hits a springboard rana for two but
Dean rolls through for two. La Majistral gets two for Dragon. Dean
snaps off a release German and chokes Dragon which is completely
against his character. Sonny gets on the apron and earns a right
hand. Dean keeps choking and gets disqualified.

Rating: B-.
As always these two have great chemistry together. Dragon was one of
the few people that could keep up with Dean on the mat but had a
different style to him than Eddie or Benoit which made him a more
interesting opponent. This was good and it gave Dean a heel turn
which was a good thing for him here.

Dean says he’s tired of
the lack of respect he’s been getting. He’s coming for Syxx too.

Diamond Dallas Page
vs. Dave Taylor

Taylor is in a pith
helmet, khakis and a vest. Two of those come off to get us to the
match. Taylor starts fast but Page knocks him back. Cue the
Outsiders as Page hits what we would call a TKO to take out Taylor.
No cover though as Page stares down the Outsiders. Savage runs in
through the crowd to set up the main event feud of the summer. The
match just ended. A fan runs in which goes badly for him. Page gets
spraypainted and takes the elbow. Savage officially gets his NWO
shirt.

After a break the NWO
is still in the ring. Hall talks for a bit about nothing in
particular and brings out Hogan. He gives Savage a gift: the now
happy Elizabeth.

Tag Titles: Lex
Luger/The Giant vs. Harlem Heat

And never mind as Eric
comes out and says the titles are going back to the Outsiders because
Luger wasn’t medically cleared. Luger says he’ll do it if all of the
titles were on the line at Uncensored. This stipulation would lasts
all of five minutes because it was forgotten the next week. Luger
talks about getting a team together which means….oh dear it’s THAT
segment next week. Sting comes out with the bat and stares at Luger.
Then he stares at Hogan, who hugs him to no reaction. Announcers:
“HE’S NWO!”

Overall Rating: C+.
See, this is what good wrestling gets you. Nothing really happened
again here but the wrestling was good. That also made the show go by
faster which is always a good thing. The main event would be set up
next week in one of the dumbest segments ever, which would go against
one of the best Raws ever. Then again no one was watching Raw at
this point so it didn’t matter. Better show this week.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews

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Monday Nitro – February 17, 1997

By Scott Keith on 11th July 2012

Monday Nitro #75

Date: February 17, 1997

Location: Florida State
Fairgrounds, Tampa, Florida

Commentators: Tony
Schiavone, Mike Tenay, Larry Zbyzsko, Bobby Heenan

Reviewed by Tommy Hall

This is the go home
show for SuperBrawl which came out of nowhere. This is probably the
beginning of Piper on Alcatraz (don’t ask) and I’m sure more of the
Horsemen being destroyed before our very eyes. Also I’m sure we’ll
get Piper and Hogan talking a lot and expect to hear the words
“biggest match EVER” quite a bit tonight. Let’s get to it.

The two NWO limos
arrive to open the show. They walk in but realize that one of their
members is down. They throw out the cameraman and we couldn’t tell
who it was.

Rey Mysterio vs.
Super Calo

Calo grabs the leg to
take Rey down and puts on a chinlock. Rey comes back and speeds
things up but springboards into a dropkick. Rey gets knocked to the
apron and Calo tries a sunset bomb but Rey counters into a rana.
Calo pops up onto the apron and hits a missile dropkick to the floor.
We’re told that the Steiners are out of the fourway on Sunday
because of a car wreck. Oh we’ll get to that in a minute.

We cut to the back and
Bubba was the NWO member that was hurt and is being loaded into an
ambulance. Back to the ring and Calo drapes the arm over the top
rope. Rey comes back with something like a springboard Whisper in
the Wind for two. Springboard guillotine legdrop gets two. Rey goes
up but gets headscissored down. That goes nowhere as Rey knocks him
down and the West Coast Pop gets the pin.

Rating: C+.
This was a pretty good high flying match and that’s the right idea
for an opener. Rey was in a different league than almost anyone else
on the roster. He was also almost as popular as anyone on the
roster, which is why it took years for him to get away from the
Cruiserweight division. Makes sense right?

Hugh Morrus vs.
Steve McMichael

McMichael runs him over
a few times to start things off and the fans actually seem to like
him. He yells something to Debra and gets run over for his efforts.
Morrus grabs the ankle and works on the leg a bit. He keeps laughing
at Debra which fits him pretty well I guess. He loads up the
moonsault but Debra throws in the briefcase to Mongo. The moonsault
hits the case and Morrus gets pinned as a result.

Rating: D-.
Mongo just wasn’t that good. He was very slowly getting better but
putting him in the Horsemen and then giving him the US Title just
wasn’t a good idea. He would pretty much be the same guy for the
rest of his career and I don’t think anyone really cared. Nothing to
see here though as Debra was almost the focus of the match.

We get a video of a few
weeks ago with Piper and his son getting humiliated by the NWO.

Dean Malenko vs.
Robbie Brookside

Brookside is a somewhat
famous British guy. Dean actually talks before the match, calling
out Syxx on Sunday. The match starts and Tony explains to us about
how Dean’s dad trained Syxx. My goodness an actual story! Dean
takes him down and works on the arm. He tries some holds but
Brookside keeps rolling out of them. Robbie hits a northern lights
suplex for two. They go to the mat for a pinfall reversal sequence
that results in a Dean suplex into a modified Cloverleaf for the
quick tap out. Too short to rate but this was really fast paced.

Syxx comes out and says
that the respect and gratitude he had for Dean’s dad died with Dean’s
old man. He never liked Dean and Dean has been ducking him.

The NWO sneaks up on
the announcers’ desk and talk about the car wreck the Steiners were
in. You can’t pin that on them though and there’s a tape to prove
it. Larry almost gets in a fight with them.

Public Enemy vs.
Amazing French Canadians

Harlem Heat and the
Faces of Fear are in the audience. We get a quick French national
anthem and the brawl begins. The Canadians take over quickly and
send Grunge to the floor where Parker stomps on him a bit. We
officially start with Oullette vs. Grunge and the Canadians keep
control early on. Off to a fast chinlock but Grunge gets up. He
sends Oullette into Jacques but Oullette collides with Grunge. No
tag to Rock but the Canadians miss the Cannonball. There’s the hot
tag and Rock cleans house. Everything breaks down and Oullette is
put through a table and pinned.

Rating: D.
This didn’t work for me at all. The whole ending was horrible
looking as the table spot looked like it was about as planned out as
you could ask for. The rest of the match was nothing of note. For
the life of me I don’t get the appeal of the Canadians as a serious
tag team. They would get back to WWF within a year.

DDP has no idea what
happened to Bubba and doesn’t like being accused of it.

TV Title: Steven
Regal vs. Prince Iaukea

Before the match Regal
says that Rey reminds him of Dopey of the Seven Dwarves. Regal yells
at a lot of fans before we get going. The Prince shoulder blocks him
down and Regal isn’t sure what to do. The champ comes back with a
European Uppercut and a release suplex. A butterfly superplex puts
Iaukea down and Rey comes out to watch. Regal poses at him and the
Prince rolls him up for the pin and the title in probably the biggest
upset in Nitro history. Public Enemy and Teddy Long come out to
celebrate for some reason.

Rating: D.
The match sucked because it was so short. See, four days before this
Raw had a special Thursday episode where their islander/Samoan Rocky
Maivia beat their blueblood HHH for the IC Title in a shocking upset.
Think that’s a coincidence? I know it might be but to me, that’s
too close to be a stroke of luck. Iaukea would SUCK as champion for
almost two months.

Hour #2 begins so we
hit the recap button.

Nick Patrick vs.
Randy Anderson

If Anderson wins, he
gets his job back. Patrick trained to be a wrestler but blew out his
knee so he became a referee instead, meaning he actually has an idea
of what he’s doing. Apparently Anderson has an amateur background.
He even gets fire as he comes to the ring. The regular referee
checks for weapons and hands Anderson a foreign object. On camera of
course so you know it’s going to be called out later. Randy hits him
and wins in about 30 seconds.

Just as you knew would
happen, Eric comes out and says no way. Anderson is still fired. I
think the regular referee is done too.

Lee Marshall is in San
Francisco.

Chris Benoit vs.
Roadblock

Roadblock looks like
Rhyno if he was about 9 inches taller and 200 pounds heavier. George
Steinbrenner is here. Benoit goes right at him but Roadblock uses
his size to take over. Woman slaps him and Roadie goes to the floor
after her, allowing Benoit to hit a GREAT baseball slide. Benoit
goes off on him and throws him back in. A boot to the face puts
Roadblock down and the Swan Dive gets the pin. Basically a Benoit
squash.

Now we get one of the
dumbest moments in the history of professional wrestling. It’s the
video that the Outsiders gave to Tony earlier. It’s from inside a
car with Syxx manning the camera, Hall riding shotgun and Nash
driving. They’re in a small town and see the Steiners at a gas
station. They follow the Steiners’ car and bump into the back of it
a few times before ramming into the side of it, causing it to FLIP
OVER and crash. And remember, the NWO gave this tape to WCW to air
ON NATIONAL TELEVISION.

Even Tony Schiavone
realizes that this is evidence of a criminal act.

Jimmy Hart, Jackie and
Sullivan stop for a chat before their squash. Jimmy talks about how
Jackie and Woman will be tired together on Sunday. Jackie has no
issue hitting Woman. Sullivan thinks it’s perfect timing to have
Jackie return right before this match. That’s a funny comment when
you think about it. He makes more vague statements about leaving the
neighborhood and says on Sunday, we’ll see who has more fire. Jackie
says something and no one cares.

Kevin Sullivan vs.
Doc Dean

Sullivan immediately
runs Dean over and I don’t like Doc’s odds. He sends Dean to the
floor so Jackie can beat him up. Dean grabs a small package out of
nowhere for two. Jackie beats Dean up some more. There’s the Tree
of Woe and the double stomp ends the massacre.

US Title: Konnan vs.
Eddie Guerrero

Power vs. speed to
start and Konnan is sent to the floor. Konnan sends him into the
barricade and takes over with a chinlock and low dropkick for two.
Eddie comes back with a rana but gets launched over Konnan’s head,
sending him face first into the buckle in a sick bump. Back to the
chinlock, followed by a sitout powerbomb for two. There’s chinlock
#4 and Eddie is in trouble. Now Konnan hooks a right armbar. Eddie
comes back and hits a brainbuster and goes up for the Frog Splash.
He shoves Konnan down and hits the Splash but the Faces of Fear run
in for the DQ.

Rating: D+.
Pretty boring match here with neither guy seeming to care much at
all. The hot shot into the buckle looked GREAT but other than that
there was nothing at all of note. When you have four chinlocks in a
six minute match, you know things aren’t going well. Konnan could
get lazy with the best of them.

Jericho, Eddie’s
opponent on Sunday, makes the save.

Here are the Horsemen
for a chat. Flair calls Benoit a love machine. Anderson talks about
how Bischoff is the boss but they’re still the Horsemen. If Randy
Anderson needs $100,000, he’s welcome to it. Mongo continues to be
confused about whether or not he’s a face or heel by making fun of
the Buccaneers. Debra thinks Jackie can’t walk in pumps. Benoit is
ready for Sullivan on Sunday. Somehow this took seven minutes.

The Giant vs. Johnny
Swinger/Top Gun

What in the world are
you expecting here? Both guys are chokeslammed and pinned in less
than a minute.

Giant spraypaints the
words Hall and Nash on the jobbers’ bodies. Luger comes out and has
a doctor’s note but Bischoff comes out to say he’s a week late.
Luger protests but that gets him nowhere.

We go to another insane
moment in wrestling history. Roddy Piper has locked himself in a
cell on Alcatraz (In the words of Road Dogg on Are You Serious:
“Which apparently you can just do”) and is staying there for a
week before the match. He says that he’s been dead inside for years
because of Hogan (who he calls Mr. Spandex in a visual I really
didn’t need). He talks about how Hogan needs the spotlight and how
he (Piper) doesn’t weak a kilt in airports. Piper is going to stay
in his cell for seven days to train for Hogan. To this day, I don’t
think ANYONE knows what the point of this was.

Jeff Jarrett vs.
Chris Jericho

Debra comes out to
watch of course. This is a technical match which shouldn’t surprise
anyone. Jericho uses his mat stuff but gets caught by a top rope
cross body for two. Jericho goes up and Debra begs him not to hurt
Jeff. The distraction makes him miss coming off the top so Jeff
hooks the Figure Four. Mongo hits him with the case and Jericho gets
the pin. Seriously, did ANYONE care about Debra?

Here’s the NWO to close
things out. Hogan is here and Bischoff does the talking. Hogan
brags some but Sting and Savage appear on the stage. Bischoff sucks
up to Hogan some more and Hulk brags about how he put Tampa on the
map. Sting and Savage come to the ring and then turn around and
leave. Hogan says he was going to beat up Piper tonight but Piper
locked himself in a cell so that didn’t work. He poses to end the
show.

Overall Rating: D+.
This show was almost too stupid to be good. Between the Alcatraz
thing and the televised attempted vehicular homicide, this show can
only be so good. On top of that the wrestling was pretty subpar
tonight. I guess we have something interesting in the Bubba attack
which I actually don’t remember the reveal of, so that’s kind of fun
for a change. Pretty weak show here but things would pick up soon.

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