Featuring a very rare “Sabu in WCW” match!

Welcome back to more Dream Matches! This week, I have some classic WCW stuff, including a bout featuring that very weird cup of coffee SABU of all people had with the company in 1995! I always remember reading about it, but had never seen it.

We start off, however, with a classic Steiner Brothers match shortly before their break-up, as they take on Mortis & Wrath on WCW Saturday Night! Then it’s Sabu vs. Harry Dean Baker on WCW Prime (a show I don’t remember existing)… followed by the SUPER SHOCKMASTER, who was a brief attempt at saving the “Shockmaster” gimmick by repackaging Fred Ottman as a nasty heel. It did not work.

Following that, it’s the battle of the failed 1991 WWF gimmicks as The Dragon (Ricky Steamboat) battles Col. Mustafa (the Iron Sheik)! And finally it’s a late-stage WCW bout as my Sean O’Haire watching continues, with him & Chuck Palumbo taking on Lance Storm & Mike Awesome!

THE STEINER BROTHERS (Rick & Scott, w/ Ted DiBiase) vs. MORTIS & WRATH (w/ James Vandenberg):
(WCW Saturday Night, Nov. 1st 1997)
* A potentially good match, but on Saturday Night it’s always iffy if you’re gonna see any kind of effort. A solid two minutes is just the heels’ walk to the ring (keep in mind the aisle is like 30 feet long). It’s a weird era for the Steiners, as Scott is INCREDIBLY juiced to his Big Poppa Pump levels, but still has long black hair… but an evil parallel universe goatee and a shiny black singlet.

“Mom, can we see Ric Flair?”
“We have Ric Flair at home.”

Welcome back to more Dream Matches! Today, we’ve got a wild mish-mash of WWF stuff, as we get the weird time when Buddy Landel was a regular WWF guy until an ice patch, not his own demons, caught up with him! And Buddy gets a shot against the WWF Champion, Bret Hart!

Then it’s the true debut of “Team Extreme”, as Matt Hardy takes on Essa Rios (w/ Lita), and Essa’s had enough of his manager! Then we have Marty Jannetty vs. The Repo Man as Marty gets ready to face Shawn Michaels at the Royal Rumble! There’s also an interesting jobber match, as the Steiner Brothers take on Al Green and a very young Mike Awesome! Vincent vs. Damian on WCW Saturday Night, as they continue to give VINCENT of all people a mini-push on that show!  Then it’s one of those throwaway Nitro spotfest matches, as Psychosis, La Parka & El Dandy take on future Dragon Gate guys CIMA Nobunaga, Tokyo Magnum & Judo Suwa!

WWF WORLD HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE:
BRET “HITMAN” HART vs. BUDDY LANDEL:
(WWF Mania, Jan. 15th 1996)
* Yes, it’s the hilariously short time BUDDY LANDEL was in the WWF- an ill-timed injury slipping on ice ended this, what could have been his most lucrative run ever. Though he jobbed to Ahmed Johnson in like 45 seconds on PPV, so I don’t think they had high hopes for him. His “Ric Flair Wannabe” gimmick was in full effect, with fancy robes and he even used Flair’s WWF entrance music! This is actually taped before Buddy’s injury and aired after it- he was only in one-off WWF matches after this.

The Battle Royal: in an era of jobber vs. jobber matches making up almost all TV wrestling, this iwas the only way to get to see a TON of big stars in one place!

It’s another Dream Matches column! This time I find a Battle Royal from 1992 with a very unexpected victor! A 40-man battle royal with an incredible SEVENTEEN jobbers getting paydays, and extended runs by guys like Kato and a beyond-done Texas Tornado! Read on!

I also find some disparate stuff- Crush vs. Damian Demento from a 1992 WWF Mania, as I find an incredible smorgasbord of horrible low-grade matches on that program! Essa Rios vs. Jeff Hardy from 2000, as the Hardyz push REALLY starts to get in gear and “Team Extreme” is ready to form! WCW midcard glory as Glacier faces Lash Leroux! Then it’s a request, as we see a very young MIKE AWESOME in late ’80s WCW, as he faces the “Z-Man” Tom Zenk! And finally, some throwaway lucha stuff as Juventud Guerrera & Super Calo face Silver King & El Dandy in a match that ends in a REAL mess of miscommunication!

BATTLE ROYAL:
(Bret Hart, The British Bulldog, Sgt. Slaughter, Rick “The Model” Martel, “Million Dollar Man” Ted DiBiase, I.R.S., The Nasty Boys, “El Matador” Tito Santana, “Texas Tornado” Kerry Von Erich, Virgil, High Energy, Skinner, The Beverly Brothers, The Berzerker, Kato, Jim Powers, Barry Horowitz, Jumping Jim Brunzell, Duane Gill, Joe Milano, Rick Johnson, John/Tom Star, J.K. Goodman, Chico Martinez, Bob Bradley, Bruce Mitchell, Bob Knight, Terry Davis, Joe McMullen, Al Tucker, Barry Hardy, Nick Danger, Scott Palontonio?)
(WWF Prime Time, July 6th 1992)
* Okay, so while Scott Keith HATES Battle Royals, I LOVE them. I mean, in an era where your weekly main event was like Bam Bam Bigelow vs. Koko B. Ware, seeing THIRTY GUYS in one match? That was incredible! Plus it was fun to see guys go out almost in the exact order of importance. This one’s a real mish-mash of the most “1992” acts possible, including Kato as a singles act, the Beverlies, High Energy & Skinner. I don’t recognize most of the seventeen (!) jobbers, but there’s a pudgy short guy in a red singlet who is AMAZINGLY bad-looking, and Johnson is some huge, ripped dude. Bruce & Bob look like a tag team in matching black tights & white boots. LOL some asshole fan on the right is grabbing all the babyfaces by the arm and not letting go, resulting in a bunch of dudes (Virgil, Kerry) spinning around, probably giving him an earful.

Hello You!

To say the past month or so of these reviews has been a tumultuous time for ECW would perhaps be somewhat of an understatement, with a costly leg injury to Rob Van Dam causing him to have to vacate his ECW TV Title and essentially blow the Main Event scene to pieces.

With the TV Title now vacated, we will crown a new Champion tonight in a 4 man tournament, as Super Crazy takes on Little Guido and Rhino has a long awaited singles battle with The Sandman. Sadly the Quarter Finals all got crammed in to one episode of Hardcore TV (The last one I did in fact) so the matches have all been chopped to pieces to fit the allotted time. Hopefully the matches tonight at least get some time to breathe.

ECW World Champ Mike Awesome doesn’t even have a Title defence tonight, as he will instead be defending one half of his newly won Tag Team Titles with Raven against two teams in a Three Way Dance. As a result, there isn’t really a clear marquee Main Event for this show, which combined with the general way the card has been thrown together means that I am probably less hyped for this show than any I have covered since starting these reviews last year.

I actually do own the DVD version of this show from Laser Light Digital, but I couldn’t find it so I’m going to be stuck with the WWE Network version, which means there’ll be music dubbing galore. Oh well, let’s just hope some of the dubbed music is good eh?

Anyway, that’s enough of wittering from me, let’s watch some chuffing wrestling!

Hello You!

I wrote this up about a year ago as I didn’t plan I’d ever get this far in these ECW reviews. I’ve gone in and tightened some stuff up and added any additional bits I felt were necessary.

ECW made a big fuss in the build-up about how this was the first pay per view event of the new millennium, but it won’t mean much if the show itself isn’t any good.

Hello You!

So here we are again with another ECW pay per view event of 1999. It’s been a tad hit and miss for ECW on pay per view this year, with Anarchy Rulz being good whilst Heat Wave and Hardcore Heaven were kind of just there and Living Dangerously was pretty bad. Hopefully tonight ECW can knock this one out of the park, especially as this show is supposed to be the biggest one they do all year.

I actually bought the live American pay per view version of this show years back from the dearly departed Extreme Central UK store in Manchester, which was a fantastic place to buy ECW/CZW/ROH tapes without having to faff about with arranging things online. The picture is a bit fuzzy but I get the real entrance music at least, so I’m counting it as a win.

Monday Nitro #288
Date: March 26, 2001
Location: Boardwalk Beach Resort, Panama City, Florida
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Scott Hudson

I can’t believe I actually typed that. After over five and a half years, we’ve actually arrived at the final episode of Monday Nitro. Tonight is the Night of Champions show with every title being defended. Other than that there’s been an open call to all former WCW World Champions to show up and bring their gear. That could be interesting or a big disappointment and I’ll let you guess which I’m expecting. Let’s get to it.

Thunder
Date: March 21, 2001
Location: O’Connell Center, Gainesville, Florida
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay

We’ve arrived at the final shows. We’ll start off the final episode of the corporate mandate that was Thunder, which has somehow gotten even less important over the years. The big story coming out of Monday is Ric Flair’s face being pressed onto the back of a donkey and the upcoming Night of Champions on Monday. Let’s get to it.

Monday Nitro #280
Date: March 5, 2001
Location: Bi-Lo Center, Greenville, South Carolina
Commentators: Tony Schaivone, Scott Hudson

After last week, it’s really hard to say what we should expect here as Nitro worked very well but Thunder was every bit the show you would have expected it to be. I’m liking Scott Steiner vs. Diamond Dallas Page but the rest of the show is so all over the scale that it’s hard to guess what you’ll get. Let’s get to it.

Thunder
Date: February 28, 2001
Location: Lakefront Arena, New Orleans, Louisiana
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay

I know it’s a bit late to matter but WCW is on a roll at this point. The matches are entertaining, the stories make sense and you can tell the story they’re going with. Diamond Dallas Page is the best option as a challenger for Steiner’s title and Booker T. is clearly the next major threat to the champ. Let’s get to it.

Thunder
Date: February 14, 2001
Location: Mississippi Coast Coliseum, Biloxi, Mississippi
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay

This show is the equivalent of going to the gas station and buying your significant other transmission fluid for Valentine’s Day. It’s also the final show before SuperBrawl and believe it or not there’s something advertised for this week. Tonight we’ll be seeing Hugh Morrus/Rey Mysterio vs. Chavo Guerrero Jr./The Wall as two feuds are combined into one. Let’s get to it.

Thunder
Date: January 24, 2001
Location: Lawrence Joel Memorial Coliseum, Winston-Salem, North Carolina
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Tony Schiavone

We’re still just living in Ric Flair’s WCW as he and the Elite (the unofficial name at the moment) destroy everything in sight, though to be fair it’s more interesting than the Sid Rules The World stuff we sat through for so long. It’s getting closer to SuperBrawl with Kevin Nash getting the World Title shot against Scott Steiner because we’re just that lucky. Let’s get to it.

Thunder
Date: January 17, 2001
Location: Allen County Coliseum, Fort Wayne, Indiana
Attendance: 4,836
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay

We’re coming off an interesting show Monday where things have changed a bit yet still feel very much the same. In this case Ric Flair is now all evil for reasons that aren’t clear (and will remain that way because this is WCW) and the remaining faces are fighting against the latest NWO. It’s certainly better than what we’ve been having but I don’t see much of a shelf life for this one. Let’s get to it.

Monday Nitro #271
Date: December 18, 2000
Location: Richmond Coliseum, Richmond, Virginia
Attendance: 2,872
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Scott Hudson, Mark Madden

Since even WCW isn’t stupid enough to hold a TV show on Christmas night or New Year’s Day, this is the last Monday Nitro of 2000. It’s also the night after Starrcade and a grand total of nothing happened. Steiner is still World Champion, Goldberg is still undefeated (and still feuding with Lex Luger for whatever reason) and the Insiders are still a thing because of reasons. Let’s get to it.

Thunder
Date: November 22, 2000
Location: Augusta-Richmond County Civic Center, Augusta, Georgia
Attendance: 3,800
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Stevie Ray, Tony Schiavone

It’s the go home show for Mayhem and unfortunately that means we’re not likely to see much tonight. We might get some build towards the Tag Team Title match which was only added on Monday but other than that, this could be a very long night. Not as long as it would have been for the people who had to sit through this and Nitro of course. Let’s get to it.

Monday Nitro #266
Date: November 13, 2000
Location: London Arena, London, England
Attendance: 9,138
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Stevie Ray, Mike Tenay

Well maybe it’s going to get better on the other side of the world. I mean, the Australian shows were an improvement in a way but it should be interesting to see what they do over in England. We’re a few weeks away from Mayhem and it’s fairly clear that Booker T.’s World Title reign is in trouble. Let’s get to it.

Thunder
Date: November 8, 2000
Location: United Center, Chicago, Illinois
Attendance: 7,000
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay, Stevie Ray

Sorry for this being late as I got a bit busy in Dallas over the weekend.  We’re still rolling towards Mayhem and things are starting to get a bit better. The shows still aren’t great but they’re coherent and you can see where they want to go for the most part. I’ll take that over Russo’s insanity as now I kind of want to see where things are going instead of waiting on the next big surprise. Let’s get to it.

Monday Nitro #265
Date: November 6, 2000
Location: United Center, Chicago, Illinois
Attendance: 7,000
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Mark Madden, Scott Hudson

It’s a new month for Nitro and hopefully things stay on the good path that Thunder put WCW on. The big story is Scott Steiner vs. Booker T. for the World Title in a few weeks at Mayhem but unfortunately we have a lot of TV left for them to screw up. We also have a new boss in Ric Flair, who wasn’t even on Thunder. Let’s get to it.

Thunder
Date: November 1, 2000
Location: Bren Events Center, Irvine, California
Commentators: Mike Tenay, Mark Madden, Tony Schiavone

We’re out of October and things are…..well they certainly exist. For a few more months at least. Scott Steiner is still insane and chasing Booker T.’s World Title but more importantly WCW has made it very clear that Mike Awesome, the athletic freak, has no future as a main event player. It’s a good thing they caught that problem before it became serious. Let’s get to it.

Monday Nitro #264
Date: October 30, 2000
Location: Bren Events Center, Irvine, California
Commentators: Mark Madden, Scott Hudson, Tony Schiavone

We’re past Halloween Havoc and as you might expect, WCW managed to screw up what should have been a pretty easy show. Booker T. is still the World Champion after Scott Steiner got disqualified, meaning tonight it’s Booker defending against Mike Awesome in a match I’m sure will happen as advertised. Let’s get to it.