My Favorite Wrestling! WCW Worldwide 4/9/95

1. Alex Wright vs. Mark Starr

Well this was one damn fine 3 minutes of wrestling right here. Crowd is way into Alex Wright and Mark Starr is a guy who is good at adapting to just about any style. It's crazy to think that Wright is just 19 here. When I was 19 I was working on beating Ocarina of Time for the 3rd time (this time I'm gonna find ALL the heart pieces!). Wright leans way into a stiff shoulderblock by Starr and Starr returns the favor by leaning chin first into a dropkick. Starr dishes a couple cool elbow varieties in the corner and dumps Wright with a back suplex and nice neck breaker and suddenly I realize this is the most offense I've ever seen Starr do in WCW. Starr is really good at getting into position for Wright's kicks,  charging out of the corner and swinging low on a missed clothesline and turning around to catch a heel kick to the chin.

Awesome interview segment with Macho Man and Sting goofing around with Mean Gene on a C-show. They're pushing a match against Avalanche/Big Bubba but they just spend the whole time chopping each other and behaving like those old roasts where the Rat Pack would just drunkenly make inside jokes for an hour. Mean Gene calls Macho "gregarious" and Macho yells at him "Don't you ever call me gregarious again!" The whole thing was a riot.

2. Nasty Boys vs. Southern Posse

You know, people give Knobbs a hard time for being reckless and stiff when people don't expect it, but that always seems to overshadow how awful Jerry Saggs can look in the ring sometimes. Still this is 2 minutes and Southern Posse are always game to job and even though I'm not sure they're actually any good I always look forward to seeing them.  Saggs does a nasty pump handle slam, Knobbs throws some reckless punches and elbows that look awesome, and then Saggs finishes the match with the absolute worst top rope elbow drop I have ever seen. It was stunning. He spends all his time doing a Macho Man elbow twirl as he's falling, but then he lands on his feet first and then just drops onto the guy. It was the worst and completely amazing all at once. Bobby and Tony are dying laughing, not even able to finish a "well it's not pretty but it's...effective?" sentence.

3. Avalanche vs. John Crystal

Not much of a match, pretty short, but I love Tenta as obese heel Ricky Jay. Fans were into him too, really booing him but also cheering him when he would do big moves. One segment in the middle saw him do a big elbow drop which heard a collective "Ooooohhh!" from the crowd, followed by big boos as he hammed it up. Then he did a big leg drop to more "Oooooooohhhhhssss!!" from the crowd and then flexed afterwards to get louder boos. Then immediately did an awesome big splash that saw tons of people noticeably jump out of their seats to cheer for, but then instantly got more booing. Just came off as a really great performer.

4. Johnny B. Badd vs. Rip Sawyer

Another short 2 minute match but Badd had really nice matwork to start, doing a nice headlock takeover and floating into a nice armlock before rolling back into a nice headlock. He also had really great punches here and a nice kneelift. Match ended on a great left hand, and really when you end a match on a punch you better make it look good.

5. Steven Regal/Robert Eaton vs. Brad Armstrong/Tim Horner

Pre match vignettes show Eaton getting training on how to be a classy, distinguished gentleman. This was apparently the first time the Blue Bloods teamed up, and it was a total blast as you probably could have guessed. They get about 9-10 minutes and it's all Regal and Eaton cutting off the ring, with Regal working schtick with the ref while Eaton stiffs up Armstrong in the corner. Eaton really brutalized both Horner and Armstrong in this match, throwing stiff elbows and his expectedly great punches. Horner's hot tag is really impressive with Regal and Eaton both flying around for his nice right hands, but Regal eventually catches him with a shot and Eaton hits a perfect Alabama Jam for the win. I don't know if I've ever seen a finer leg drop off the top.