The SmarK Rant for WCW Monday Nitro – 11.03.97

The SmarK Rant for WCW Monday Nitro – 11.03.97

Originally written 08.04.25

Time for my favorite promotion at the moment: ANYONE BUT WWE.

Live from Philly, drawing 15,000 while the WWF is basically going down the drain and seemingly on the verge of collapse.

HOUR #1! THE HOUR THAT CONVINCED JOHN CENA TO TURN HEEL!

Your hosts are Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay & Larry Zbyszko. Sadly no Dick Graham here in the Spectrum.

Meanwhile, we get footage from “Assault on Devil’s Island” and then cut to a press conference, where Hulk calls the reporters “idiots” and accuses Sting of being a coward who won’t show up to sign the contract for Starrcade. But then Sting does show up. Man the world could use a Sting right now to rappel from the rafters and take out some people in the real world.

Dean Malenko & Eddie Guerrero v. Rey Mysterio & Steven Regal

This seems kind of insane to just throw out as an opener on TV. Regal is looking rather rotund at this point, but standing next to Rey will do that. Dean and Rey trade acrobatics to start and Dean tags in an annoyed Eddie. Regal hits him with a butterfly suplex and Eddie flips out of it and lands on his feet, but Regal faceplants him. Eddie goes to the knee to put Regal down, but it’s back to Rey and he sends Eddie across the ring with a monkey flip and snaps off the rana for two. Malenko tries a powerbomb and Rey counters with a headscissors over the top rope, but then Rey collides with Regal and Eddie hits Rey with the powerbomb. Eddie goes up to finish, but Dean tags himself in and puts Rey in the cloverleaf for the submission at 3:53. Pretty disappointing. **

Squire Dave Taylor v. Fit Finlay

Finlay hasn’t quite cut his hair off yet and they trade takedowns while Raven wanders down through the crowd with his new crew, thus distracting the Philly crowd. They trade forearms and Taylor takes Fit down with a nice standing headscissors and then presses him for a slam. Fit puts him down with a shoulderblock and finishes with a tombstone at 3:00. It certainly took a while for Fit’s push to stick. *1/2

Meanwhile, Eric Bischoff cuts into Tony’s hype of World War III and claims that Hogan has challenged Sting numerous times over the past year, with no answer from Sting. Also “Assault on Devil’s Island” was a huge success and will be going to series, despite attempts by Vince McMahon to sabotage it with his “Best of Survivor Series” show.

Psicosis v. Yuji Nagata

Nagata quickly beats Psi down with kicks in the corner, but he comes back with a springboard dropkick and sends Nagata to the floor. Psi follows with a cannonball to the floor and legdrop off the apron and back in for two. Psi tries a top rope rana, but Yuji blocks it and puts him down with kicks, and then goes to a camel clutch and powerbombs him. Psicosis escapes a german suplex, but Sonny Onoo kicks him from the apron behind the ref’s back, and Yuji finishes with the Nagata-lock at 3:54. Nagata was just kind of there at this point.

Meanwhile, Raven takes us back to his school days and all the pain he experienced there, dropping a “Theresa Hayes” reference.

World TV title: Disco Inferno v. Perry Saturn

I thought it was weird at the time that WCW was only interested in Saturn and not Kronus, but in retrospect that was the play to make. Saturn leaves his spot at ringside instead of doing an entrance, drawing an immediate pop from the Philly crowd for obvious reasons. Saturn with a suplex and he runs Disco into the corner and hits him with a belly to belly suplex before taking him down for SMALL JOINT MANIPULATION. Tenay notes that Saturn has previous tag team experience with “other Eastern based independent promotions” but this is his singles debut with WCW. Saturn works the arm and takes Disco down with a top wristlock and really cranks on Disco’s arm before putting him down with a clothesline. Snap suplex and he takes Disco down again with a Fujiwara armbar and then a hammerlock northern lights suplex, but Disco makes a comeback and clotheslines Saturn down for two. But then Saturn cuts him off again with a german suplex and then a tiger suplex, and he finishes with the Rings of Saturn to win the TV title in his debut at 6:40. A very interesting match with Saturn dismantling Disco’s arm over and over and winning clean. **

Meanwhile, Ric Flair joins Mean Gene and cuts his usual promo about Curt Hennig, WOO, BY GOD, WOO.

HOUR #2! THE HOUR THAT LENT PAUL HEYMAN MONEY TO MAKE PAYROLL THAT WEEK!

Scott Hall joins us, wearing half of the WCW tag team titles despite not being half of the WCW tag team champions. This would be the new belt design that stuck around until the end. Hall does his survey and offers some threats to Larry Z, and then calls out Chris Jericho.

Scott Hall v. Chris Jericho

Hall beats on Jericho’s arm and takes him down, but Jericho kicks out of it to put him down. But then Hall hits the fallaway slam and goes for the Edge, at which point Jericho rolls him up for the pin at 2:45. And then Hall immediately kicks his ass and destroys him, hitting the Edge after the match and leaving him laying while Hall brushes it off because he’s the BIG STAR and Jericho is a jabroni. Hopefully Jericho didn’t bother to make a spot on his trophy wall for the torch being passed here. So this brings Larry down to the ring with a contract, calling Hall a COWARD for not signing. Hall continues to ignore him as he was completely insufferable for a long time at this point.

Meanwhile, Mike Tenay presents a cool rundown of some lucha libre moves, with names and footage.

Lucha Libre Battle Royale:

We’ve notably got the Nitro debut of EL DANDY here, and they joke that Ciclope is “still dressed for Halloween” in an inside joke. So it’s Ciclope, Juventud, El Dandy, Silver King, Villano IV, Villano V, Damien 666 and Lizmark. Not really much a battle royale roster. And it proves to just be a setup for the Giant to come out and chokeslam everyone and do a promo.

Alex Wright v. Ric Flair

This was the very weird period with Debra managing Alex and Goldberg in a plot to get revenge on Mongo, which I keep blanking out of my brain. They trade chops and Flair backdrops him and sends him to the floor with another chop. Back in the ring, Flair keeps countering everything with chops, but Wright hits him with a leg lariat and puts the boots to him. Wright tries to throw chops and Flair shows him how it’s done, so Wright stomps him down in the corner and stops to dance. So Flair just unloads on him with more chops, but Wright drops elbows for two and puts Ric down with a back suplex for two. They fight on the floor and Wright comes back in the ring and sends Flair to the floor again with a Flair Flip, but he misses a dive and lands on his face. Back in the ring, Flair crotches him on the top rope and hits a delayed suplex, so delayed they should call it Vince McMahon dropping dead, and Flair finishes with the figure-four at 7:37. Flair gave the kid a TON of offense and made him look really good. WCW didn’t care of course. ***

Steve McMichael v. Ray Traylor

Traylor works the arm, but Mongo hits him with a clothesline to put him on the floor. Meanwhile the announcers have a hilarious conversation about how someone unexpected could win the World War III battle royale and get a shot at the World title! LOL yeah right. Did they forget which company they work for? Back in the ring, Boss Bubba works the leg and they collide for a double down, but that Bill Goldberg guy comes down to distract Mongo with the Super Bowl ring stolen from Mongo. And Traylor finishes with the Bubba Slam or Traylor Hitch or whatever you want to call it at 4:50. DUD

I gotta say, for a sold out Philly show with a rabid crowd, the day after Bret Hart gave notice to the WWF no less, this episode has been a complete drag. They should have had their foot on the throat of the WWF at this point and they’re throwing this junk on TV to fill time.

Diamond Dallas Page joins us to put over the lie that Halloween Havoc 97 has “the biggest PPV audience for wrestling for all time”, which isn’t even remotely true but whatever. To clarify, it DID do a huge buyrate with 300,000 buys, one of the biggest in WCW’s history, but not anywhere near WWF’s biggest shows.

WCW World tag team title, Philly Street Fight: The Steiner Brothers v. Public Enemy

Steiners chase them to the floor and Rick powerslams Grunge in the ring while Rocco slugs it out with Scott on the floor. Rocco goes up and Scott crotches him and they fight on the floor again as we do a split screen coverage that’s really hard to follow. Like why not at least fill more than 20% of the screen with the two feeds? Rocco jumps off the WCW logo onto Scott and they fight out there, while Rick and Grunge do some submission wrestling in the ring from what I can tell. Back to the floor and two tables are magically stacked, and Grunge dives through them, nearly killing Rick Steiner while Ted Dibiase desperately pulls him out of the way, and Scott pins Grunge at 5:30 to retain. Just a complete mess. DUD

Last year, at World War III, the Giant wins the title shot, leaves the nWo to cash it in, and never wins the title. Which is why no one ever cared about that stipulation.

WCW US title: Curt Hennig v. Lex Luger

Lex works a headlock and goes AAAAAAAAAAAGH in triumph, but Hennig puts the boots to him and he goes AWWOOOOOOOOOOOHH in pain as we take a rare mid-match break. Back with Hennig arguing with some doofus at ringside before necking Lex on the top rope and putting the boots to him to take over. Hennig chokes him out, looking about as bored and unmotivated as he really was. I think he really did want to stay with the WWF but the money from Bischoff was too much to pass up. Curt chokes him out in the corner and necks him on the top rope again, but Lex runs him into the corner and Hennig takes a signature bump while Lex makes the comeback. Lex with atomic drops and clotheslines, but they all tumble over the top when Lex tries the Rack. This brings out Flair to attack Hennig for the DQ at 7:17 of a very lacklustre match. ½*. And Flair brawls with Hennig to the back to end a very lacklustre show.

A surprising TV title change is really the only highlight here, as WCW definitely did not keep their foot on the gas at the end of 1997 and it ended up costing them, eventually.