The SmarK Rant for WWF Monday Night Raw – 01.06.97

(Apparently I’ve already got these done until, like, February of 97, so we’ll keep going through the perfectly fine 2007 rants to save me a lot of time and give more time to write Observer Flashbacks!)

– Man, time flies, as we’re now into 97 and rapidly approaching the point where these shows are gonna be like 5 hours long. (That’s 5/7 of a Wrestlemania!)

WWF Monday Night RAW!

– Taped from Albany, I guess.

Owen Hart v. Mankind

Another oddball heel v. heel match. Owen quickly takes him down into the Sharpshooter, but Mankind makes the ropes. He fires back with the running knee in the corner and chokes him out on the ropes, but Owen elbows out of there and starts on the arm. Mankind slickly takes him down and tries for the mandible claw, but Owen bites his fingers to break. And steps on the hand. Cactus clothesline puts them on the floor, and it’s a Slammy v. Chair duel, which is won by the Slammy, much to my surprise. Owen drops him on the railing and hits him with the tag belt, and they head back in, where Owen takes over. Owen pounds on the midsection and hits him with a leg lariat, then goes to an abdominal stretch. Mankind hiptosses out and they brawl to the floor again, where Owen takes a drink tray to the head, and we take a break. Back with Mankind getting a neckbreaker, but Owen reverses another attempt into a DDT. He comes off the top, but lands in a mandible claw, then counters with the enzuigiri. Blind charge misses and Owen hits the post, and Mankind follows with a piledriver to finish.

(Mankind d. Owen Hart, piledriver — pin, 7:01, ***) Good brawl from these two, and the clean finish is always appreciated.

Meanwhile, Shawn Michaels and the Lothario family have words for Sid. Thankfully, Jose Lothario would disappear from Shawn`s life after this.

Let us take you back to the debut of Shotgun Saturday Night, which was a brilliant concept in its original form before it turned into another B-show. (SUCH a flop, though. Dave’s second hand review: “The show was apparently like watching a poorly-lit minor league promotional cross between Incredibly Strange Wrestling and “Grunt: The Wrestling movie” but with bigger name stars.”)

Doug Furnas & Phil LaFon v. The Insiders

Diesel pounds on LaFon to start and blocks a sunset flip with a choke, but LaFon evades their attempts to double-team him in the corner. Ramon comes in and gets a blockbuster slam, but LaFon comes back with chops and a corner clothesline, into a crucifix for two. Snap suplex and Furnas comes in and headlocks him on the mat, but Ramon slugs him down to escape. Ramon goes to a standing armbar, but Furnas powers out of it and follows with an overhead belly to belly, but walks into an elbow from Diesel on the apron. Diesel clotheslines him and pounds away in the corner, and Ramon comes in with a pumphandle slam as we take a break. Back with Furnas escaping a submission move, but Diesel cuts off the tag with a sideslam for two. The heels pound away in the corner and Diesel chokes Furnas out on the ropes and follows with the running choke, and clotheslines him down. Legdrop misses, but Diesel keeps cutting off the tag. Corner clothesline misses and Furnas dropkicks him from behind, and finally it’s the hot tag to LaFon. He tries a butterfly suplex on Diesel and goes with a sunset flip instead when that doesn`t work, and that gets two. Off the top, but Diesel gets the foot up to block and brings Ramon back in. LaFon catches him with a northern lights suplex and tags Furnas, but Ramon was playing possum and hits a lariat. Razor’s Edge is blocked by Furnas, and he gets a rana for two. They get rid of Diesel and a Hart Attack clothesline into a rollup finishes.

(Furnas & LaFon d. Diesel & Ramon, LaFon rollup — pin Ramon, 9:03, ***1/4) Too much offense from the heels, but Furnas and LaFon did a good job of hiding their weaknesses and carried them to a very good match. I think Bogner & Jacobs could have been a fine team had they been allowed to grow out of the stupid imitations they had to do, as Bogner showed flashes of innovative power wrestling when he wasn’t busy doing his Scott Hall impression.

Sid still has nothing new to say. And they wondered why Royal Rumble 97 flopped? (Buyrate was terrible, but the attendance was huge at least.)

Bret Hart v. Vader

Lockup in the corner to start and Vader throws hands on him while Shawn Michaels makes snarky comments on commentary. They brawl outside and Vader meets the stairs, and Bret drops an elbow off them, while Shawn asks the question on everyone’s mind: Who is “They” in “The Man They Call Vader”? Vince clarifies that it’s the fans. WWF ALERT: A cameraman at ringside has the dreaded logo on his back, with no blurring. Back into the ring, Bret takes him down with an armbar and works on that, while Shawn brings the funny. Vince: “He really needs a victory here.” Shawn: “Of course he does. It’s not like you come in the match going ‘I could really use a LOSS here.'” Vader clobbers Bret down to take over, and comes off the second rope with a clothesline as we take a break. Back with another one of those in case we forgot as Bret bumps all over the ring. Rather nasty flying splash gets two. Shawn notes that Bret is going around whining about how he was screwed out of the title against Shawn. Just wait, Shawn, just wait. Vader tries another splash and hits knee, and Bret makes the comeback. Legsweep and Bret slams him while Shawn points out that Bret uses the same moves all the time. Middle rope elbow gets two. Teardrop suplex gets two. He lifted that one from Shawn! Vader goes for a slam and both guys tumble out, and they brawl to the aisle, but Sid steals the cameraman while Steve Austin sneaks out and it’s KICK WHAM STUNNER for Bret on the floor. Back in, Vader finishes with the pump splash.

(Vader d. Bret Hart, splash — pin, 8:00, **3/4) Needed more time to really crack the upper level of main event style RAW matches for 1997, but Bret was bringing the power moves and Vader was up for taking them, so it worked.

Meanwhile, we discover why Sid wanted a cameraman — he powerbombs Jose Lothario’s son through a table in the dressing room to make a point to Shawn. Was that actually his son or just some local worker, I wonder? (Pretty sure it was an indy worker.)

The Verdict: Pretty clear win for RAW, I think, as everything was focused on the Hart-Austin-Shawn-Sid love triangle and Nitro continued to zig and zag with only the occasional good match in the midcard to prop it up. Plus three matches on RAW and they’re all really good beats the parade of squashes on Nitro.