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Pro Wrestling

RDT Reviews WWE Royal Rumble 2012

RoyalRumble2012

WWE Royal Rumble 2012
January 29, 2012
St. Louis, MO
Reviewed on April 19, 2014

Background: The Summer of Punk is in full gear…but sadly it already lost some of it’s luster (really, once HHH pinned Punk at Night of Champions the angle was never the same). While based off the guys holding all the belts (your champs after TLC 2011: Punk, Bryan, Ryder, Rhodes, Bourne, Kingston), we all knew The Rock was coming back soon and John Cena would be in the Mania main and HHH and Undertaker would be back. A lot of change that ultimately didn’t matter and the WWE didn’t really feel all that different until Wrestlemania XXX (and we need to wait and see how that turns out). The Summer of Punk kicked off the Reality Era…but some storylines remained old and dated. I was all for Kane coming back with the mask and all, but it already turned out to be rather comical. The result of the John Cena-Kane feud was the exact opposite of The Rock vs. Mankind in early 1999.

Anyway, the Royal Rumble is one of the most fun events in the WWE calendar year, but last year WWE took a misstep with the 40 man match. This year though the roster is WAY too thin for something like that to work, so back to 30 we are.

We are in a period where change was clashing up against the old guard. Let’s see how the Rumble works through that.

The Card

World Heavyweight Championship: Triple Threat Steel Cage
Daniel Bryan© vs. Big Show vs. Mark Henry

Story: Henry and Show had feuded over the title in 2011. After Show finally won it at TLC 11, Bryan cashed in for the belt. This made Bryan a heel. Bryan hasn’t established “YES!” yet and was a legit heel here.

Note: Mark Henry was reportedly injured here. Apparently he was getting pissed a Vince for making him wrestle. I call bs on that. I mean he was injured. But I’m sure the Rumble and Mania payoffs were just fine for him.

Big Show was an energetic face here, and it actually worked for him for a while.

Daniel Bryan chants. I guess he was getting cheered afterall.

Smart booking early on with Bryan trying to be sneaky and escape whenever possible.

Henry yelling at a ref to close that door was epic.

Tornado DDT on Show from Bryan!

Daniel Bryan wins in 9:08. Weird finish. Show Kos Henry, but Bryan breaks up the pin. Bryan runs up the cage but Big Show is on his tail. This ends up with Bryan hanging from Big Show’s arm…then finally dropping to the floor. I guess they were going with the Bryan is a fluke champion angle…which is ridiculously lame. Right guy went over, but the match and finish sucked. A lot of people thought the finish was a botch.

We get some career review of Cena. How can anyone care? I mean we know he’s John Cena, WWE legend/icon already. Whatever.

Eight Diva Tag Team Match
Natayla, The Bellas, Beth Phoenix vs. Eve, Tamina, Alicia Fox, Kelly Kelly

Matching attires for the heels!

Eve was actually a pretty good wrestler.

Hey Kelly, how about when you do a flying headscissors you don’t let go of the scissors before the bump?

Kelly with the standard fly into everyone else on the floor spot.

Team Phoenix wins when Beth pins Kelly. Actually a good finish where Beth hard tags one of the Bellas, tells her to get out of the ring and Glam Slams Kelly. Anyway, nothing special here, I guess it wasn’t horrible or anything. Certainly not good though.

Big Johnny wheels Zack Ryder into his office or something, and Ryder’s back isn’t broken anymore. Kane had chokeslammed him through the stage on RAW. This whole feud was awful…but could have worked had Ryder actually pinned Kane at the end. Big Johnny was being nice just because his job was in jeopardy and HHH was gonna fire him the next night…which didn’t happen cause of Undertaker.

Kane vs. John Cena

Huge boos for Cena. Good thing that video earlier worked.

Five minutes and a chinlock. Woo.

Totally forgot about the Claw! Awful idea for a finisher.

Double Countout in 10:56. Do I even need to explain why this finish is horrible? Kane beats the hell out of Cena in the back, then finds Ryder. Tombstone to Ryder. Eve cries. Cena’s back. Chokeslam to Cena. Kane standing tall at the end was actually nice, but otherwise, horrible all around.

Really bad start to this PPV. Thank goodness it is the Rumble, so the Rumble can save it.

Now a Rock video. Yay?

Brodus Clay vs. Drew McIntyre

Clay had just debuted as the Funkasauras. I liked it at first, but this got old by Mania.

Clay pins McIntyre in 1:05. What the Funk for the win. Nice waste of PPV time.

WWE Championship
CM Punk© vs. Dolph Ziggler

Story: Really Punk vs. Big Johnny. Laurinaitis was intending to screw Punk at the Rumble until he was informed he might be fired as GM of Raw. He was the ref for this, but decided to become a side ref instead.

Ziggler had been a hot heel as it was though.

Laurinaitis forces Vickie Guerrero to the back.

Damn Cole saying Johnny was a better worker than Booker T. Using the word worker was what was surprising there.

Punk with some great mockery of Ziggler.

Ziggler actually trips Punk on the top rope and Punk takes a back bump. That was a little nuts to be honest.

Fameasser countered into a spinning powerbomb! Nice by Punk! Hell nice by both.

Punk beats Ziggler three different ways, but Laurinaitis misses it for legit ways (well the 3rd one was questionable). Punk calls Johnny “clownshoes”, which is awesome.

GTS into a Fameasser! Crazy false finish that the fans bought hook, line, sinker.

CM Punk retains by pin in 14:33. GTS for the win. Ref and Big Johnny make the count. Great match, absolutely saved this show so far. Furthered the storytelling. For anyone who thought it buried Ziggler…look at the rest of Ziggler’s 2012. He looked great.

Royal Rumble

Most people’s favorite match of the year. Money favorite this year is on Chris Jericho, who just returned all cryptically with the end of the world stuff.

There was a gimmick for this Rumble…ANYONE can enter. Remember that.

#1 is The Miz. I think he lost a match to end up here.

Miz promo. Gonna prove everyone wrong tonight. I would have marked. We are literally at the Miz’s last great days here.

#2 is Alex Riley. Hard to believe this was a main event duo at this point last year. Sorry, but Alex Riley sucks.

Riley is gone. Whatever.

#3 is R-Truth! Just getting the Miz’s rivals out of the way I see.

#4 is Cody Rhodes!

#5 is Justin Gabriel.

#6 is Primo!

R-Truth is gone!

#7 is Mick Foley! Finally time for some fun.

Foley’s knee is shot, that run wasn’t pretty. Huge Foley chant!

Foley gets rid of Primo.

#8 is Alberto Del Rio. Wait…a broken down car comes. It’s Ricardo! Amazing!

Ricardo goes after Cody!

Foley and Ricardo send Gabriel out.

Ricardo does all the ADR mannerisms. Good stuff.

#9 is Santino! Even more nuttyness.

Some weird rolling from Ricardo and Santino. What? Santino sends Ricardo out.

Cobra vs. Socko!

#10 is Epico. Yay?

Foley with his 3rd elimination! Bye Epico.

Miz and Cody break up the Cobra vs. Socko war.

Santino and Foley are out thanks to Rhodes.

#11 is Kofi Kingston. Got a Riddler theme going here.

#12 is Jerry Lawler! Really fun so far.

Cody quickly dumps Lawler out. Gotta like Rhodes getting rid of all the fun entrants.

#13 is Ezekiel Jackson.

#14 is Jinder Mahal. Must mean Khali is soon.

#15 is The Great Khali. There goes Mahal. Jackson is gone too from Khali.

#16 is Hunico.

#17 is Booker T! Cole is upset!

Kofi with an awesome spot of handstanding on the floor and avoiding elimination. This started a trend.

#18 is Ziggler.

#19 is Hacksaw Jim Duggan! Crowd is HOT for Hacksaw!

Duggan, Khali and Booker are all gone.

#20 is Michael Cole!

#21 is Kharama! Huge surprise!

Lawler and Booker pull Cole out.

Muscle Buster to Ziggler!

Kharama gets rid of Hunico…but Ziggler takes her out.

#22 is Sheamus. Time for the serious portion of the Rumble.

Good bye Kofi.

#23 is Road Dogg! Hard to believe he’d have a tag title run in his future still.

#24 is Jey Uso. Did not care about the Usos at this point.

#25 is Jack Swagger.

#26 is Wade Barrett.

#27 is David Otunga.

#28 is the hometown Randy Orton. Huge pop.

There goes an Uso and Barrett. Poor Barrett.

#29 is Chris Jericho! No one knows who #30 is.

Otunga is gone.

#30 is Big Show. Huge groans from the crowd. Very disappointing #30.

Swagger is gone.

Show just dumps Rhodes and Miz. Horrible.

Show, Sheamus, Orton and Jericho.

Orton gets rid of Show, Jericho gets rid of Orton. Best possible scenario there.

Sheamus wins the Rumble in 54:55. They have a great match for five minutes before Sheamus Brogue Kicks Jericho off the apron for the win. Fans were 70-30 for Jericho here…but Sheamus got a good pop for the win, probably because it was pretty damn surprising he’d win when Jericho was the smart money. There are two trains of thought for this Rumble: Not good because of the thin roster and amount of silliness, or really fun with a good finish. And I am with the latter. I’ll take fun and a good finish as long as there was no ridiculous stupidity involved. I do think what holds it back from being a top tier Rumble is the first argument, but this is very good, no doubt about it.

So….

First half of the show blew. Absolutely blew. It was D quality. But then Punk and Ziggler had what had to be an A world title match, and the Rumble was a solid B+.

Historically Sheamus would win the title…but how he did it killed him. It also made Bryan. And Punk-Johnny continues. We also say Ziggler shine again in a PPV title match. So some historical significance, even if not a lot.

Tough to call. Can’t be in the As obviously, too much crap. B+ is even pushing it due to the lack of history and again, the first half was crap. So…

Final Grade: B

Pro Wrestling

RDT Reviews WWE Summerslam ’10

SummerSlam_(2010)

WWE Summerslam 2010
August 15, 2010
Los Angeles, CA
Reviewed on June 22, 2014

2010 was an interesting time for WWE as they had shockingly tried something new: The Nexus. The Nexus were a string of rookies from the newly formed NXT that came in and just began destroying everything NWO style, and it was very fresh and interesting. And after some Triple H, John Cena, Batista and Randy Orton title reigns, WWE needed interesting.

Also of note was that one of those rookies, Daniel Bryan, was released new the beginning of the angle when he choked out Justin Roberts with his tie. We were still too close to the Chris Benoit tragedy for anything like that to happen…although maybe it was a worked shoot the whole time? (I mean, HHH and HBK had used Crossfaces in the past).

In theory, Summerslam should have made some stars within the Nexus. Did it do that? Let’s find out.

The Card

Intercontinental Championship
Dolph Ziggler© vs. Kofi Kingston

I’m not sure about the story here, but I know Dolph and Kofi wrestled each other a billion times (not an estimate) from 2009 through 2012, so I doubt this has a serious story attached to it.

Kofi misses a pretty awesome looking suicide dive. What a start.

I haven’t noticed since Kofi has been stale for years, but there is a difference between 2010 Kofi and 2014 Kofi. 2010 Kofi was better.

Draw in 7:05. Nexus comes in and beats the crap out of both. I guess I’d rather them not do that in a title match, but it serves a good purpose I guess. We do get a Barrett promo out of it, and Barrett owned on the mic then too. Good match for 7 minutes.

Team WWE needs a 7th teammate. Jericho and Edge try to convince The Miz to join the team. Miz isn’t sure Nexus should be his priority though.

Diva’s Championship
Alicia Fox© vs. Melina

Is this the famous Fox vs. Melina match?!

Yikes, Melina comes out dressed like a cross of Pocohahantas and a Las Vegas showgirl.

I never got Melina as a face. And until very recently I didn’t understand how Alicia Fox had a job.

Michael Cole calls Melina one of the all time greats. Yeah I’m sure.

There’s some leg psychology here. That’s always fun.

Melina wins the title in 5:22. Melina hits that cutter facebuster for the win. You know, it really wasn’t that bad. It was a Melina squash basically. Alicia Fox’s offense looked horrible but she was barely on offense so it didn’t matter. Melina’s scream is the worst though. Melina cries because she won the title in her hometown or something. Here come the Co-WWE Women Champs Laycool! Laycool owned has heels here. This led to the unification match at some PPV in the future. They take out Melina.

The Big Show vs. CM Punk, Luke Gallows and Joseph Mercury

Ugh. No wonder Punk wanted to leave in a year.

Punk was the main event of Summerslam 2009 and is now regulated to the joke handicap match.

The story here began when Punk lost his hair to Rey. Then he got involved with Big Show, who unmasked Punk and revealed his bald head.

Ha, Punk comes out with a “I broke Big Show’s hand” t-shirt (which the S.E.S. did in an angle). Punk is always great.

Big Show owns Mercury and Gallows. On the Show-Punk face off, there are huge CM Punk chants. Way to be a top face Show.

Big Show wins when he pins Mercury and Gallows in 6:45. Show chokeslams Mercury on Gallows for the win. Punk was pretty good and you can tell Mercury was wrestling to keep his job, but I mean, this is pretty much a waste on a Summerslam card. I forgot if this actually led to a Big Show vs. Punk match.

Kane cuts a promo with a casket. He runs into WWE Champ Sheamus. A little bit about Kane here. The whole Undertaker in a vegetative state angle was pretty fucking stupid. And then it got worse when Kane blamed Rey Mysterio of all people of going it. Like I’m supposed to remotely believe that Rey Mysterio took out the Undertaker. We all knew it was gonna be Kane.

Sheamus tells Kane to stay out of his way. Was Kane in his way in the first place?

Miz joins the team after pointing how they begged him.

WWE Championship
Sheamus© vs. Randy Orton

We actually did this match at the Royal Rumble in the whole Legacy implosion. In this case, Sheamus won the title at Fatal Four Way on a kinda fluke.

There’s definitely improvement from the Sheamus who was in the World Title match at the Rumble and this Sheamus…but this match is still pretty boring.

Sheamus counters a RKO late and Michael Cole blows the call. Nice.

To be fair this match has picked up towards the end. I think Orton just turned face a few months prior…and the crowd is super hot for him.

Orton wins by DQ in 18:55. Sheamus brings a chair in. When the ref tries to take the chair from him, Sheamus sends the ref out for the DQ. Awful finish. Sheamus doesn’t even get a chair shot in as Orton RKOs him on the table. So not only did Sheamus not beat Orton, he got beaten down by him. No wonder no one cared about him until he won the Rumble 16 months later. Horrible horrible ending. This is Summerslam?

World Heavyweight Championship
Kane© vs. Rey Mysterio

Somewhere smack in the middle of this strange Kane-Undertaker vegetative state angle was Kane winning MITB and the World Title from Rey, and blaming Rey for taking out Undertaker. Did anyone buy Rey being the man to take out Undertaker? Anyone?

Kane and Rey had some mask feud not that long ago either. These two have never had good chemistry in the ring.

A lot of early bearhugs.

Rey’s in the casket! He fights out though.

Kane retains by pin in 13:32. Chokeslam for the win. Match was pretty bad. Kane just isn’t the guy for Rey to have good matches with. There was a good spot at the end where Kane put his feet up too early to counter the West Coast Pop Splash…but Rey seemed to improvise and counter that instead of looking like an idiot.

Kane is gonna stuff Rey in the casket now…and when Kane opens it it’s empty, leading to an audible groan from the crowd. Rey tries to fight it, but Kane chokeslams him again. Rey even gets Tombstoned this time. Kane opens the casket again…and it’s THE UNDERTAKER! Huge reaction! He looks pretty damn old here though (he somehow aged like 10 years from the Mania match with Shawn). Taker turns to Rey and asks him why he did it before beating the crap out of the obvious culprit, Kane. Shockingly, Kane gets the upper hand and lays out Taker (and Taker put him over on three straight PPVs). Good pop, even for the obvious here. This would lead to Taker’s last long non-Mania program.

Elimination Match
Nexus vs. Team WWE

Miz shows up, but Cena says they already have a partner…Daniel Bryan! Big pop for Bryan.

So it’s Otunga, Sheffield, Tarver, Barrett, Gabriel, Young and Slater vs. Cena, Edge, Jericho, Morrison, Bryan, Bret Hart and R-Truth.

Note: this is Bret Hart’s last PPV match, and interestingly wrestled his last WWE PPV main event after HBK did. Even as late as December 2009, what were the odds of that? 10,000 to 1?
Bret Hart actually looks pretty good here. It’s a shame he couldn’t get hit in the head, he probably could have had a solid run otherwise.

Bryan makes Darren Young submit in a minute. I guess that continues the tradition of a submission wrestler taking out the exotic haired black guy in 45 seconds at Summerslam with a Crossface (reference to Benoit vs. Orlando Jordan…and that reference could have went further).

Lawler calls Bryan Bryan Danielson on air. Ha.

Morrison eliminates Tarver with Sharship Pain at the 4 minute mark. 7-5 WWE advantage.

Sheffield is the first Nexus guy in this match to look like a threat as he kicks the crap out of Morrison.

Gabriel cheap shots Morrison and Sheffield takes him out with a clothesline to take him out. Sheffield then takes out R-Truth with another clothesline and suddenly it’s tied. I’ll complain about Truth being in this later.

Michael Cole says that if Bret could lead team WWE to victory it would be his greatest Summerslam moment of his career. Screw that winning the WWF title from Undertaker in 1997 or having one of the greatest matches ever at Summerslam ’92.

Bret locks Slater in the Sharpshooter, and Barrett tosses a chair in. Bret smacks Sheffield with the chair for the DQ…then blames Barrett for bringing it in. I can’t think of a time that didn’t work. Anyway, Bret’s gone in the only way he could be.

Edge spears Sheffield and we are down to 4 vs. 4. Cena, Bryan, Jericho and Edge vs. Gabriel, Otunga, Barrett and Slater.

Otunga taps to a botched Walls.

Jericho accidentally runs into Cena, and then gets hit with a rear naked choke drop by Slater and Slater eliminates him.

Edge and Cena argue, then Slater shoved Edge into Cena and rolls him up to take him out! Nexus with the 3-2 lead!

Bryan owns everyone and makes Slater tap (amazingly, Bryan’s moveset is exactly the same three years later). Miz comes back and takes Bryan out with the briefcase. Barrett pins Bryan.

Cena vs. Barrett and Gabriel.

DDT on the concrete! Cena’s out cold! CAN HE COME BACK?! Even Lawler and Cole thinks its hopeless.

Team WWE wins when Cena makes Barrett submit in 35:18. Gabriel misses the 450, and Cena pins him. Barrett then just runs into the STF and that’s that. Very disappointing and a lot worse than I remember it. This match buried Nexus as any kind of threat. The only people they beat legit were Morrison and Truth. Bret got DQed. Jericho ran into Cena and got fluke pinned. Edge argued with Cena and got fluke pinned. Miz attacked Bryan. Cena of course OVERCAME the odds. Ugh. No idea how Barrett dragged this to December.

The debate of how significant this match was is Daniel Bryan’s comeback. I think it’s a good moment and it gave Bryan a good push out of the gate…but once he won the US title WWE did nothing with him for a good 10 months. He did wrestle a bunch of pre-PPV matches (Wrestlemania, Over the Limit, surely there is more) so there is that. So this all turned out to be meaningless.

Here’s my problem with the idea of the match as well. The commentators were selling it as the most important match in WWE history and all of that. So why then is R-Truth on the team? Shouldn’t Randy Orton or I don’t know, the WWE Champion Sheamus be on it instead. To an extent that thinking applies to Morrison and even Bret Hart.

This PPV is full of bullshit finishes and is pretty forgettable. All Summerslam 2010 got was the further development of The Miz as a main event star. Most of Nexus became nothing significant from their run in Nexus. Even Barrett…practically a sure thing, got lost in the shuffle with the Corre later. For a match with a lot of young guys the lack of historical significance is surprising.

I guess you can also say its Bret Hart’s last WWE PPV match, but no one remembers it for that.

Nexus should have been so much better. There was so much potential here.

Forgettable and overall too many weak finishes. Could have been worse but there was decent wrestling scattered around this show.

Final Grade: C

Pro Wrestling

RDT Reviews WCW Fall Brawl ’98

fallbrawl98

WCW Fall Brawl ‘98
September 13, 1998
Winston-Salem, MA
Reviewed on November 13, 2014

What the hell is going on?

Ten months ago it was supposed to be over. WCW had gotten Bret Hart. WCW had the super hot Sting vs. Hogan feud. WCW had the NWO. Even the raw rookie Goldberg somehow became one of the biggest stars in pro wrestling.

And WCW…is losing?

This is the equivalent of an all-star team in sports without thought of making a “team”. It’s hard to find a top guy in WCW booked correctly except for Diamond Dallas Page at this point. Hogan? Stale. Nash? Acting half his age trying to be the “cool” heel or face or whatever (although he’d get mega over by the end of the year). Sting? Buried in Washington D.C. last December and replaced by some guy in red face paint. Don’t even get me started on Goldberg. All the momentum in the world and somehow Goldberg still plays second fiddle to Hogan. In fact, Goldberg hadn’t even wrestled a last match main event since his title win in July.

Of course there’s Bret Hart too. One of the biggest wastes in wrestling history was Bret Hart in WCW.

Most recently WCW signed The Warrior as well. He went right after Hogan and…

And well let’s get right to it. Fall Brawl means WAR GAMES! The Warrior in War Games! Who knows what will happen?!

The Card

Opening video reminds us that Team Hollywood in War Games is Hollywood Hogan, Stevie Ray and Bret Hart. One of those is not like the other.

“WE WANT FLAIR!” Well, wait a night.

Tony Schiavone talks about the new rules for War Games. Three teams! It can end before all nine men get into the ring (um…what? Why would that happen from an entertainment standpoint?). Also winner gets a World Title shot at Halloween Havoc. So much for the team aspect eh?

Ernest Miller being held by security. Fuck if I know the storyline there.

Gene Okerlund talks about the rest of the card. Why? We already sold the PPV, no?

It’s Chris Jericho! Jericho is one of the best parts of WCW 1998. He’s calling out Goldberg and says Goldberg accepted a match against Jericho tonight! Title vs. title!

Alex Wight and Disco Inferno vs. The British Bulldog and Jim Neidhart

I like how we get separate entrances for Wright and Inferno. Double the dancing!

USA chant to Alex Wright. The British Bulldog was in the ring opposing him.

A whole lot of nothing to start this thing…other than Anvil dancing.

Bulldog can still land on his feet after being monkey flipped from the corner. Impressive.

Bulldog screws up a stun gun. It’s amazing how different the Bulldog and Neidhart are in terms of giving a shit here. In WWF 1997, the Bulldog and Neidhart showed great intensity. Here? Meh.

“WE WANT FLAIR!” Yeah no one cares about this boring match.

Neidhart misses a slingshot shoulder block. I don’t think he was supposed to miss.

Bulldog actually screws up picking Disco up for the Running Powerslam. Sad.

Bulldog and Neidhart win when Bulldog pinned Disco in 11:03. Bulldog eventually gets the Running Powerslam for the win. Bad boring match. This match is also infamous for the Bulldog injuring his back on the Warrior’s trap door.

Not the typical WCW opening match goodness sadly.

Scott Steiner has a doctor’s note! No Steiner vs. Steiner tonight.

No wait! JJ Dillion calls him on his bs! The match is on!

Title vs. Title
Chris Jericho vs. Goldberg

JPS! Ralphus and the Jerichoholic NINJA!

Jericho is just absolutely brilliant here.

And it’s a midget Goldberg!

Chris Jericho vs. Mini-Goldberg

Mini-Goldberg gets a spear in! You know HHH stole this idea a year later on Smackdownm using Gillberg.

Chris Jericho wins by submission in 1:15. Liontamer! Jericho is brilliant.

Norman Smiley vs. Ernest Miller

Angle here? Smiley asked Miller what his problem was after Miller attacked The Armstrong Brothers. That’s it.

Miller pins Smiley in 5:07. Top rope feliner I think was the finish…but Smiley didn’t go all the way down. Smiley hits a 2nd for the win. A whole lot of nothing for five minutes. Not a good sign when the best part of the first 45 minutes of the show is a Jericho joke match.

Rick Steiner vs. Scott Steiner

Angle began when Scott turned on Rick back in February at Superbrawl. Buff Bagwell’s serious injury was used as an angle between them as well, where Bagwell faked being friends. Scott did all he can to avoid fighting Rick, but Dillion said it has to happen at Fall Brawl. So here we are.

Crowd is very into this.

Really good brawl to start! Crowd is really into Rick Steiner. I’m starting to think they should have pushed Rick big as a face here. Too bad though as…

No Contest in 5:30. Bagwell tried to attack, but Rick Steiner slams him into the 2nd turnbuckle. Bagwell goes limp. The announcers treat it as a shoot. It takes about 10 minutes to get Bagwell into the ambulance…and then Scott and Bagwell attack Rick! It was a ruse! A great brawl turned into a bullshit angle. Ah well.

WCW Cruiserweight Championship
Juventud Guerrera© vs. Silver King

Silver King? Really?

Sunset flip botch! Woo!

Inverted top rope frankensteiner is pretty cool. Shocked it only got 2.

Juventud Guerrera retains in 8:36 by pin. Weak Juvi Driver, then the 450 for the win. Decent. Pretty low on the standard WCW Cruiserweight Title match quality tier. I don’t think anyone saw Silver King winning either. Best match of the night by default.

Drunk Scott Hall and Konnan have a confronation.

Raven’s Rules: If Raven wins, the Flock disbands, if Saturn wins, he becomes Raven’s slave. Kanyon is handcuffed to the ringpost.
Raven vs. Saturn

I enjoyed this match two months ago, so I am all for it again.

Back at Bash at the Beach, Saturn had broken free from the Flock. Now Saturn is trying to save the others from Raven. I don’t remember how Kanyon ended up officially in the Flock to be fair.

This one has more wrestling than the last…but Saturn picks it up with a tope!

One of the big shocks: The Flock comes to help Raven finish off Saturn…but Kidman takes out Raven with a missile dropkick!

That’s followed by a great false finish with the DVD!

Kanyon breaks free, Flatlines Saturn, the locks himself back up. I laughed.

Saturn kills Lodi with a DVD through the table on the floor!

A lot of great false finishes. Saturn survivies an Evenflow!

Saturn frees the Flock at 14:04. DVD wins it! Great second half of the match. I still prefer their July encounter though. Kidman would become a star instantly, winning the Cruiserweight Title the next night. Somehow, despite the big reactions for Saturn here…he would be getting pinned by Sonny Oono two months later. Whatever. Still a solid match.

Curt Hennig vs. Dean Malenko

For some reason these two had a cage match on Nitro. Doing things backwards…aren’t we.

“WE WANT FLAIR!” At least it makes sense, since Hennig turned on the Horsemen at this event in the same building last year.

This is a fun little match where Malenko beats the crap out of Hennig’s leg. I like it in terms of building up Malenko’s aggressiveness.

Malenko wins by DQ in 7:38. Malenko nails Hennig with the Hennig-Plex…but Rick Rude runs in to cause the DQ. Arn Anderson looks to make the save, but gets taken out. No Flair. He would come tomorrow. Still, not bad. The last three matches have at least taken this show past F potential.

Konnan vs. Scott Hall

The drunk Scott Hall angle. Horrible.

He actually gets a drink while applying an abdominal stretch.

Hall has it won, but wants another drink. Konnan kicks the drink out of Hall’s hand (and it hits a fan, nice) and hits a facebuster.

Konnan makes Scott Hall submit in 12:03. Tequila Sunrise for the win. Horrible. It’s still hard to believe something like that was on TV, much less Pay-Per-View.

#1 Contender War Games
Team Hollywood (Hollywood Hogan, Bret Hart, Stevie Ray) vs. Team Wolfpac (Lex Luger, Kevin Nash, Sting) vs. Team WCW (Roddy Piper, Diamond Dallas Page and The Warrior)

DDP is #1. Bret Hart #2. The team psychology is already non-existant.

Stevie Ray is next! Well…it was a good five minutes between Bret and Page I guess.

So 0 Wolfpac, 2 Hollywood and 1 WCW. Yeah that makes sense.

Here comes Sting! Crowd comes alive!

Sting kicks Stevie Ray’s ass, and leaps from one ring to the other with a flying clothesline!

Piper’s in, looking like a nut. It’s all punches and kicks though.

Here comes Lex Luger! There really isn’t a whole lot happening between each segment.

Kevin Nash next! Big reaction. Hogan and Warrior left.

Hogan’s out early! So much for rules!

Hogan slapjacks everyone but Stevie Ray.

For some reason, Hogan doesn’t go to pin anyone.

We’re just waiting for the Warrior here.

As soon as the pin attempt happens there’s SMOKE EVERYWHERE!

WARRIOR’S IN THE RING! Hogan nails him from behind!

More smoke….it’s a fake Warrior? Whatever, here comes THE WARRIOR!

A few punches and Hogan goes through the door of the cage to escape. Hogan locks himself out of the cage (well, Warrior goes for the door and it slightly opens…and Warrior avoids the door. Nice). Warrior gets all angry, kicks the top part of the cage to get out, blows his quad and then gets some more punches in. Even though it’s a match and both are participants, security breaks them up. Imagine if that happen at Bad Blood ’97.

Now that the angle is over, Stevie Ray accidentally hits (I think it missed and Bret knew it) Bret Hart with a slapjack, and a Diamond Cutter to Stevie Ray!

Diamond Dallas Page wins in 20:06 when he pinned Steve Ray. Bret tries to make the save but fails as Page pins Stevie Ray for the Title shot. Absolutely horrible. The worst War Games in the history of the match. It’s not even close really. One of…if not THE worst major PPV main event in professional wrestling history. Your match was a 5 minute solid Bret-Page match, entrances and punches (except for Sting, who did some good stuff). Kevin Nash’s entire night was a few forearms before getting hit with the slapjack and taking two legdrops. The Hogan-Warrior angle was an embarrassment. Page getting the win at the end was pure afterthought.

Here’s another thing about this PPV.

No Rey Mysterio Jr. or Eddie Guerrero (but Silver King!)
No Chris Benoit.
No….Goldberg. No fucking Goldberg.

At the end of Hennig-Malenko we were in D range. The show overall was a whole lot of nothing. The only real positive I saw storyline wise was Saturn vs. Raven.

Well drunk Scott Hall didn’t help. The show basically rested on the main event. Considering it’s possibly the worst main event in professional wrestling history, that should tell you all you need to know.

WCW somehow still hung in there ratings wise…although not for long.

Final Grade: F