RIP Virgil: A Weekend With Vincent

For the last 2+ years I've spent every day writing a book painstakingly reviewing every single match that took place in 1997 WCW. One of many guys making this project worth continuing has been Vincent's work as the nWo's Enforcer, the man stationed to the front lines who doesn't actually realized he's the weakest link of the coolest gang. It's a great role made greater by everything that Vincent brings to it. Here are two classic nWo Vincent performances from a summer weekend of 1997 WCW TV. These are the first two WCW reviews I've posted publicly on Segunda Caida since starting the book, and it feels Correct that my first full preview of what my WCW book will be like is to honor Vincent. A Real Character. 

Each match is under 2 minutes and showcase Vincent's incredible charm. His ability to act cool without realizing he's not. I don't think anyone actually did it better. 

DDP vs. Vincent WCW Saturday Night 8/9/97

The story goes that Charles Wright was the guy in line to get Vincent's eventual spot in the nWo, but seeing the perfect way Vincent embodies his Lowest on the nWo Totem Pole Role, I really can't visualize what The Godfather's place would have been. Vincent's role was an important one. A wrestling stable of a certain size needs a clear weak gazelle, a man there to take bumps that the higher ups won't take and stare up at lights the higher ups will never see. Without Vincent, the nWo might be more formidable, but I'm not sure how it would work. Would Wright and Norton have teamed instead of Norton and Bagwell, and would Bagwell have in turn wound up as the nWo Vincent? I'm not sure if that's better, because Buff really thrives in Vicious & Delicious in ways that I don't think Kama The Extreme Fighting Machine would have. Vincent is too damn good at being exactly what he should be in the nWo and to the nWo that the other ways just don't make sense. Adding one guy to the bottom makes the whole group better. 

Who else in the nWo would have been pinned by DDP on a Saturday Night, taking 30 seconds of a 90 second match to even lock up, reacting visually to the boos of the crowd and even flinching at DDP's BANG? Vincent spends the match making a beeline for the ropes any time DDP locked in a slight advantage (which was every time contact was made), sticking his body through the ropes to make the ref back DDP up, DDP kicking him in the ass while Vincent's torso is halfway out of the ring and those tight Guess jeans are framing his perfect set inside the ring. When Vincent finally steps to DDP he walks right into an elbow smash and jabs, a big kick to the stomach. His knees are turned to a fine powder with DDP's pancake piledriver, a move I'm surprised more guys didn't just refuse to take. Vincent takes the Diamondcutter like he was writing a manual for 2009 Christian. Heaven needed a champion, and the nWo needed a Vincent. 

The Giant vs. Vincent WCW Pro 8/10/97

This is incredible. This is the moment. And I fully understand why the cameras cut away from this moment, but whomever chose to  do what, it was incredible. Upon entering the ring Vincent attempts to "roll" in over the top. He doesn't attempt to enter the ring like Solar with any kind of beautiful arc, but more like a guy skinning the cat into the ring. Rolling over the top, casually. Smoothly. Except Vincent, upon holding the top rope and rolling in, clearly gets hung up between the middle and top ropes, and so the camera cuts away for several seconds. When they cut back Vincent is only just getting himself untangled from the ropes. This man rolled into the ring and got hung up in the ropes like they were made of fly paper, then stood up and walked to the center of the ring like a man who didn't just loudly shit his pants while stepping into a room where all eyes were on him, casually removing his sunglasses with the biggest smile on his face. 

I hold firm to my belief that Vincent knows exactly what character he is playing, knows his exact role on the entire roster hierarchy, and perfectly understands that he is the man who needs to act untouchably cool while also stepping on any possible rake in sight. For all we know, the camera cut was only unfortunate timing, and Vincent was actually intentionally lying across the middle rope, in the same way Jeff Jarrett lies across the ropes in the corner to taunt his opponent. But I choose to believe that Vincent was hung up in those ropes like he was caught in a tuna net, and that he 100% knew exactly what he was doing, and fully understood his role as a guy who thinks he's cool and has no actual idea that he is not, but would also do whatever it took to maintain his status as the least cool guy in the Cool Guy stable. 

Getting stuck in the ropes was only the beginning of Vincent's brilliant Zero Offense performance, as the cool guy getting into the ring in the least cool way possible then tries his damndest to stay physically away from The Giant. He avoids contact as long as possible and is scared the entire time he's in the ring, and it's all perfect. He at first acts like he's merely circling behind Mark Curtis while circling the Giant with good intentions, but then he Hey Buddy claps Curtis on the back the way a stranger would when he was about to force a man into doing an unexpected illegal favor. A man passes you on the street and gives you a head not and a shoulder clap, suddenly you find yourself as a human shield. As Vincent fully hides behind Mark Curtis in the corner, Curtis - a human shield who was in no real danger - looked like he had no idea Vincent would be holding him as a shield for so long, and looked to actually be trying to wriggle away so Vincent could take his medicine. And Vincent is that, a child trying to not take medicine. 

He takes comic flat back bumps when he gets thrown to his back and headbutted, gets kicked in the ass when stumbling away, dragged back into the ring as he was trying to frantically army crawl the floor on his stomach. His crossbody is caught, and Giant's backbreaker is among his most backbreaking, even though his insistence on keeping his hands balled into fists while clutching Vincent -  instead of gripping Vincent's back and balls with full increased pituitarily outstretched hands - shows he is a Giant who feels shame and is no wild giant at all. He has the restraint of modern man's guilt showing through those balled fists, and it is a tell that all of Universal Studios can read. Were they to meet an actual Forest Giant, they all know that beast would have no problem gripping them squarely by the ass and genitals for any reason, and now they all know The Giant is no beast, but simply a large man who has been sadly touched by mankind's insistence on feeling shame. Imagine The Giant asking someone which ear is "the gay ear". Sad. 

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Found Footage Friday: Second Annual Ilio DiPaolo Memorial Show/97 WCW House Show

Second Annual Ilio DiPaolo Memorial Show - WCW - 6/7/97

MD: This starts with Tony Parisi doing the national anthem for both Canada and the States, a pretty classy DiPaolo video with a ton of footage, and then switches from gallant to goofus for a martial artist (Gary Castanza) tribute video that really needs to be seen. Later on, they did a presentation on Buffalo boxing champs and brought out Carmen Basilio. The Legends presentation was nice, with guys like Ladd and Waldo Von Erich and Kurt Von Hess coming out and Thesz speaking. They did a presentation with Jim Kelly to set up the Savage match (more on that later). 

ER: The Ilio DiPaolo tribute video really was great, with an actual shocking amount of DiPaolo footage against at least a dozen different opponents. WWE owns more footage than any company in history and none of their video packages come close to using this many unique matches per package. Perhaps even more shocking, is how much footage they had for martial artist Gary Castanza's tribute package. I'm not sure my family has a photograph of me later than my high school graduation photo, but WCW is somehow in possession of hours upon hours of Gary Castanza footage to cull from. We're lucky they had that access, as Castanza is one of my all time favorite breeds of martial artist: A man who looks like Randy Marsh who also invented his "own style of fighting". You should watch him fight, but you will not be surprised that much of his "own style of fighting" involved standing in one place and throwing guys who grab him in a very specific way, like a Steven Seagal aikido expo. From the plentiful footage of this man's life, it appears like he fleeced a ton of police departments into paying for his self defense training programs, and I will always get behind a guy who got paid money to make cops look like idiots. Oh, and definitely watch 12:47 of the video to see Castanza screaming in full close-up while wearing some kind of bite suit helmet. After a warm and somber video tribute to this local community hero, Brian Knobbs brings Castanza's widow and three young children in the ring while yelling "MAKE SOME NOISE" into the mic directly next to their faces. 

Greg Valentine/Dory Funk Jr. vs. Tony Parisi/Gino Brito

MD: This had the local newspeople announcing and seconding and was very much the legends match on the card. And then Valentine and Funk skipped the shine entirely and went right to heat, the jerks! It wasn't idle stuff either as they were getting it on Parisi and Valentine kept rushing over to elbow Brito in the skull to stop tags and draw off the ref. Valentine/Dory teamed a bit in 83 and they were a well-oiled machine here, really complementing one another. Valentine, of course, wasn't afraid to bump and stooge around the ring when it was comeback time either. After a spirited, but brief, comeback ending with a Brito figure-four on the Hammer, they went into a second round of heat, building to Parisi having enough and rushing in and a DQ-drawing blatant ref bump. The fans didn't love the non-finish but at least old-timer babyfaces got their hands raised. For guys who were very much inactive, Brito and Parisi more or less held up their own. I was expecting more matwork and feeling out, not a trip straight to heatseeking, but it all worked out for the best. And hey, post match newsman second for the heels, Art Wander went after the babyface second with way more fire than you'd expect, and was revealed to be nWo.

ER: This match did not have any right being as entertaining as it was, as 3/4 of the wrestlers were 55 years old and two of those men had not been worked in a wrestling ring for a decade. Tony Parisi showing out was an especially nice surprise, and after seeing him here I'm bummed we didn't get him working any northeast 90s indies. This was all about Valentine and Funk being assholes and throwing nothing but elbows and jaw rattling uppercuts, cutting off the ring and making blind tags. Parisi was a really great babyface here, and the crowd was insanely loud for he and Brito. This was a huge show with a listed attendance of 13,000, held in the arena where the Buffalo Sabers play. This show drew a larger crowd than nine (!) of their 1997 PPVs. From the sound of the crowd, it certainly feels like that 13,000 figure is correct. Heel Valentine and Dory were so entertaining, and Parisi was really great at getting more and more fired up until he was throwing punches with the energy of a babyface half his age. There were so many satisfying beats in this, with some totally unexpected surprises, like Dory hitting a fucking brainbuster on Gino Brito, bringing him into the ring from the apron. 

Valentine really cracked the ref to draw the DQ, and the ref had this great backward leap into a flat back bump landing. Then we got a post-match with local newscasters that was insane! Art Wander was a Buffalo sports radio personality who was definitely older than any of the match participants, and he went after another sportscaster like a fucking psycho. He tore the guys' cool ass jacket and they scrapped and got thrown to the mat in a way that...honestly looked like what an actual fight between two men in their mid 50s/early 60s would actually look like. If two of the weird older guys at your office got in an unexpected fight over something stupid, it would look exactly like this, which means this ruled. You can still find Angelfire pages that list Jim Neidhart as a onetime member of DX just for getting tricked by them on one episode of Raw, and I think that means Art Wander should be listed as an official nWo member. Also, the page has both of them represented by South Park caricatures. 

Dean Malenko vs. Alex Wright

MD: Eric can speak much better than I can about 97 WCW and Dean in specific. That said, they really did adapt to the crowd for this match. Wright trashed the town on the mic to begin and it was for the US title so there were some stakes, but they crowd just didn't go up for the early matwork. It was good too with Wright using cartwheels to position himself. The second Dean started to lay in some shots and throw a suplex, they came alive, and they loved booing Wright's dancing and loved it more when he ate a dropkick over the top as comeuppance for it. They shifted to a formula where Wright would cheat to stay on top, throw uppercuts and stomps to keep the crowd simmering, and then Dean would come back by beating him around the ring until he cheated to get back heat. There was a pretty good near-fall laden finishing stretch with the crowd hating Wright's cut-offs and going nuts for the Texas Cloverleaf. I'm not sure if this one was because they had more freedom to adapt as it was a house show and not a PPV or what, but they did a good job of it here.

ER: The two Ilio DiPaolo shows he worked were literally the only times Alex Wright worked Buffalo, and it's to our benefit as he immediately recognizes that he is going to be booed as a Eurotrash heel and fully plays up that archetype. This was very soon after Wright started acting more overtly heel on television, so this is his big house show breakout with the new character. Because of the defined face/heel dynamic, and because Wright works a lot of this getting heat on Malenko, it is a much better match than they would have had on actual WCW TV or PPV. It lengthens sequences that would have been outright eliminated on TV, like every part of Wright working the mat, allowing for that extended Wright heel control that there wouldn't have been enough time for. WCW was not a house show company at this point, and we don't have anywhere close to as many WCW house show fancams as we do WWF, so I loved this look at them working to a crowd rather than working to an Orlando theme park studio. Malenko's best matches during this era are when he is the active underdog, fighting to comeback against a larger opponent. Wright was often presented on TV as a cruiserweight and here he more correctly works as a big tall guy who can keep a little guy down. 

Malenko had a really nice corner clothesline and hard vertical suplex, but instead of getting the long and pointless Malenko chinlock, Wright quickly broke that chinlock with a jawbreaker and took over. Wright worked uppercuts, leaping kicks, hard ground and pound, axe handles, all good control while the fans hated him. Malenko really benefits from working as fast underdog, as he's good at timing and good at quick execution, so his brief comebacks (like when he dodged a Wright charge and hit a cool quick crossbody off the top) work really well. The finish was sudden but worked nicely within the context of the match, as Malenko again dodged a Wright charge at the last minute, sending Wright neck first into the top rope on a missed crossbody, allowing the quick Cloverleaf application. This would not have been the match we'd have otherwise gotten from them in 1997, and I wish we had more looks at what could have been happening on WCW midcards. 

 

Public Enemy vs. The Steiner Brothers

MD: We have several Steiners vs. PE matches but they all tend to go around 6 minutes. This got at least double that and they used the extra time for pure, glorious house show BS. They jawwed on the house mic, insulted the Bills, insulted the crowd, and then Rocco refused to lock up with Scott. He stalled his way right into Rick's fist on the apron, then got upset and tried to leave until they threatened to fine them $1000 if they didn't make the ten count. Unsurprisingly, the fans loved the mad scramble back to the ring and Rocco had so much heat that someone was shining a laser pointer at him. That's pure 1997 heat right there.

They made good use of the back half of their time, with Grunge really throwing himself into all of the Steiners' shots, Scott returning the favor for Public Enemy, Rick cleaning house on a hot tag with the suplexes and Steinerlines you'd expect, Rocco and Scott setting up the finish with a great bit of chair choking to keep them out of the way, and said finish being Grunge own-goaling himself through the table. Scott's frustrating by this point (and probably far earlier) as he has all of the tools and the size and the look to go with them, is perfectly willing to sell and hit hard, and has a real affection for Rick, but just refuses to connect with the crowd. That animosity for them that he channeled so well as Big Poppa Pump a year later, made him a tough babyface to get behind here. Rick would be mimicking a chicken and driving Rock nuts and Scott barely wanted to revel in things with the crowd when they were loving the ten count. Really good stooging performance by Grunge and especially Rock here. All the stuff you probably only got on house shows.

ER: There were a lot of Steiners/Public Enemy tags but never ever one like this. As I say a lot, WCW was NOT a house show fed at this point. They were a TV product, and they had a LOT of TV. This tribute show was nearly halfway through 1997, and WCW had only run 23 house shows. For comparison sake, WWF had already run 56 house shows, but they also only had 3 hours of TV a week. Anyway, as I said, even though we got a ton of Steiners/PE TV matches, I've never seen one like this, with Public Enemy playing overt crowd-antagonizing heels with the Steiners almost as after thoughts. If you somehow saw this match, and had never seen either team before, there's no doubt you would leave thinking that Public Enemy were the big stars and the Steiners were more of a generic meathead team. 1997 Steiners just do not have the same appeal as they had even a couple years (maybe even one year?) prior. Scott just looked tired. He had no energy, barely engaged the crowd, and often stood on the apron leaning on the ropes listlessly waiting for his hot tag. And really, in this match, that's all he needed to do. 

Public Enemy were perfect at stalling, hitting all the beats, sprinting back to the ring to get one hand under the ropes to break a count (after being threatened with a $1,000 fine). Rocco got up on the guardrail to get down in people's faces, and threw stiff shots at Scott until getting caught in a press slam and thrown into Grunge. Any time PE would take a single piece of offense, they'd roll to the floor to stall more. Grunge gets upended by Rick's high powerslam, rolls to the floor selling his back while Rocco called for time outs and got on the railing again. I loved Grunge taking over by blindsiding Scott with a lariat from the apron, turning the match briefly into a PE brawl, with Rock choking Scott on the floor with a chair. Grunge went through his own tables a lot, and this was a great version of that spot, as you're watching him set up his table and know that he's taking too long, and the crowd gets excited when they see him taking too long, and of course crashes right through it into a loss. Heel Public Enemy could have been a real great use of them in WCW, but I also understand their value in dancing with Orlando grandmas. They were a fun babyface team, but after seeing them here it really feels like we missed out on a potentially great WCW heel run. 

Randy Savage vs. Diamond Dallas Page

MD: Savage and his dad interrupted the Jim Kelly presentation and the back and forth was just a bit too long as Kelly obviously was stretching outside of his skillset. Still, due to both the angle and the sheer star power, Page was super over and Savage had tons of heat. They worked something of a sprint, with Savage explosive in his cutoffs and cheapshots and Page putting it all out there including a dive. Finish had a ref bump and Kelly knocking Savage off the top to set up the diamond cutter, with him going into business for himself with a couple of elbow drops that the ref had to ignore. Jim Kelly was not a top-tier celebrity interloper but they worked around him well enough and the crowd was happy anyway. 

ER: Missy Hyatt called Jim Kelly an absolutely clueless lover, and he appears to be equally clueless at doing wrestling angles. Unlike his encounter with Missy, this went much longer than a few seconds. When Kelly and Macho Man were shoving each other, it didn't even look like Kelly had been involved in any kind of physical altercation in his life. This man has no sort of physical charisma. You wouldn't have even guessed he was an athlete, let alone a Hall of Fame quarterback. He looks and moves much more like David Flair appearing on Nitro before he started to train. The "elbowdrop" Kelly hit on Savage after the match-ending Diamondcutter was one of the least athletic things I've seen, and I had to watch it a couple of times just to make sure that it was supposed to be an elbowdrop and not just him slipping and falling on Savage. A slip and fall probably would have looked better and made better impact. 

But the match between Savage and DDP kicked plenty of ass. DDP and Savage had great chemistry, both knew how to bump really well for each other, and DDP's aggression played well into Savage's stooging, like when DDP flew out of the ring with a pescado when Savage rolled to the floor to stall. Every Savage punch was treated like a big moment due to DDP's selling, the way he staggered with split legs after a standing blow or the way Savage blocked a sunset flip with one pointed shot. I thought DDP's offense looked really great as taken by Savage, like that awesome high lift atomic drop or the pancake piledriver, but I wish we could have seen a couple more beats of action before Kelly shoved Savage off the top. Every camera missed the Diamondcutter, but somehow captured two different angles of Jim Kelly falling on Savage with far worse form that Art Wander had earlier. They hilariously cut to one of the Bills linemen at ringside immediately after Kelly's "elbowdrop" and he was making this perfect "yeah I don't know about that, man..." face. That elbowdrop was worse than every single interception that man threw during his near complete quest to lose every single Super Bowl of the 1990s. 

Chris Benoit vs. Meng

MD: If not for FFF I don't really see Benoit anymore. They have to come to me. That said, I wasn't as against seeing this one as I might have been five years ago. I wouldn't have sought it out, but I didn't avoid it. And it was ok. This crowd was very much into guys hitting each other hard and when they did that, the match worked for me. That was the first half or so (which instilled some broader issues with everything overall maybe). Benoit would charge forth and really put himself into his kicks and chops and punches. Meng would absorb. Benoit would make a mistake, like slamming Meng's head into the turnbuckle or go for one too many chops. Meng would take back over until Benoit was able to miss a move. Eventually things built to Meng pile driving Benoit on the floor and then leaning on him with chokes and what not. It was fine but I don't think the fans were along for the ride. They wanted more of the early stuff and not heat and comeback. Benoit would get a hope spot or two but again, it wasn't scrapping. The finish had a German and a dive, but when Benoit went for his second dive, Meng caught him with the Tongan Death Grip, Benoit in the ring, Meng on the apron. He got counted out, a finish that satisfied no one and didn't accomplish anything that an agent might hope it would on paper. If they cut out the middle and end and just had them throw themselves at one another for another five minutes until the thing got thrown out, I have a feeling this particular audience would have been all the happier.

ER: I've been writing ALL about 1997 WCW for an upcoming book project, and Chris Benoit is someone (maybe the literal only one) that I am getting tired of writing about. Before starting that project I was like Matt, not actively seeking out Benoit and only writing about him if he was part of a show or match that I was only writing about for other, not-Benoit guys. But writing about 1997 WCW means that I'll be writing about 60-80 Benoit matches and well, that was my choice.

But I did really like this match and I appreciated how Meng worked it much more than I appreciated Benoit's contributions. Meng is the most feared man in the last 30 years of pro wrestling, at least to me, because the thought of losing my nose - let alone from a person biting my nose off my face! -  is one of my biggest nightmares. Maybe my biggest. My nose is easily my best facial feature. It ties my entire face together. If I lost this beauty I have no idea how I would go about my life. I've grown too accustomed to the way I look and cherish the few plus features I've been blessed with. It's too late for me to rebuild my confidence from scratch and confront life with a massive physical deformity. I handled several years of high school acne, but I can't go through that stage again. As I do not actively seek out fights with huge Tongans, I should be safe, but just knowing there are people out there who could conceivably bite off a nose has haunted me. 

However, this Meng who bites noses clean off faces is not a Meng that shows up in the ring very often. With all the stories you've heard about Meng, you'd expect more existence of savage in-ring beatdowns, and those matches just don't really exist. He gets his nose biting kicks outside the ring, sunshine. But this match is more of a glimpse of what that Meng would look like, and it's great. He throws two chops to Benoit that would end the day of a normal man, and works a lot of this like a real freight train. His big arm swinging strikes all looked great, and he would punctuate strike exchanges with a big smashing headbutt. He also threw transition moves like bodyslams with real big move energy. Benoit's big strength is that he has no problem weathering the kind of beating this Meng could throw at him, and I liked how he fought back by timing boots to stop charges, and that suicide dive he built to was huge. Meng's Piledriver on the floor was the kind of mean badass shit he rarely did on WCW TV, another glimpse into an alternate WCW that this show has given us. I didn't mind the Tongan death grip cool down sections, even though this would have made a better 7 minute all out war that just ended with a DQ or count out, if it was going to end in a count out anyway. The cool down kind of built to a finish that wasn't going to be happening, so why not just lay waste to each other and go out in an explosion? 

Dean Malenko vs. Rey Mysterio Jr. 

MD: This was supposed to be Rey vs. Juvi and Juster came out saying Juvi wasn't there but they still wanted to give the crowd WCW's best high-flyer and he had an open challenge. Dean came out to put the title up. In front of this crowd, I don't think Juvi would have done the trick either. You probably needed Fuerza. Dean did an admirable job hitting his wrestling-someone-smaller-than-him offense and getting Rey everywhere that he needed to be to hit his stuff, most spectacular being the press up to the top from what felt like the middle of the ring so he could hit a twisting body press. He caught all the dives too. Even though Dean was de facto bully and the crowd oohed and ahhed at Rey's hope spots and comeback, Dean and Wright had managed to get the crowd behind him earlier and he was all the more admirable for putting the title on the line with no notice in his second match of the night. Rey wasn't exactly drawing the usual amount of sympathy, even when he was writhing on the outside. Still, you can't fault the action, especially considering Dean was doing double duty. Another finish (a double pin) that the fans hated. There's very little reason for these sorts of finishes on a house show. I'm not saying they could have made Dean in Buffalo by having him cleanly staving off Rey's challenge, but it might have helped for future appearances without hurting Rey in the least. 

ER: I think this era of Malenko and Rey were a good match for each other, while also being capable of playing into each other's worst traits. Juvy was supposed to be in Malenko's spot, and even though we got a lot of Juvy/Rey TV matches from this time I would have really liked to see a house show Juvy/Rey. Despite what promoter Gary Juster proclaimed about Rey before the match, I think Juvy was easily the craziest and even most inventive high flyer WCW had on their roster. Rey is a legend and deserves every piece of praise he gets, but 1997 Juventud was on some whacked out shit. You watch months of Juvy matches, and you see how many different pieces of offense he was coming up with every time out. Rey had certain spots he always hit and tended to hit them the same way; Juvy had a higher error rate but also tried out a ton of new material. There are comics who can work their classics, and then there are guys who go out there constantly working new bits and throwing twists on old material. Rey could surprise with the greats, but when he was in with a Technically Good Base like Malenko, you were almost surely going to get the exact same match Rey and Malenko often had with each other. There's less Wild Card factor when they wrestle each other. Juvy - in the best of times and worst of times - truly embodied Wild Card Spirit. This also made me think about Juvy vs. Malenko, which is a match that barely happened, despite both guys working constantly on TV at the same place for 3 years while having exactly these style of matches with everyone else. 

Rey/Malenko matches always have several incredible looking moments, and also seem to be paced exactly the same: They go go go for a couple minutes, then they go into long stretches of Dean just holding Rey on the mat until Rey gets up and runs fast for 20 seconds, and then Dean holds onto him for another minute, and it keeps going like that until eventually one of the times Rey stands up leads to a disappointing finish. Dean is a strong base for Rey, and knows how to set up spots that end with spectacular Rey showcases, but also there's a completely detached artlessness to a lot of it. You'll get one of the most insane and perfectly executed spots - like Rey getting whipped up onto the turnbuckles and flying back with a corkscrew moonsault that Dean runs directly into - but then it's followed up with Dean looking downright bored waiting for 5 o'clock to hit while holding onto a rear naked choke. Whenever Malenko is wrestling anyone smaller than he, there never seems to be any kind of sense that he's using these holds to advance the match. It almost always seems like he's only using these holds so that both can catch their breath for the next stunt. Resting is somewhat essential when you're moving like they do, but it doesn't have to feel so blatant. Malenko in control often makes it feel like there is no sense of an actual match or any kind of fight, but much more two circus performers that are catching their breath before their next trapeze stunt. 

Rey doesn't help that feeling, either. He goes along with all of it, as whenever he's pulled to the mat he is always immediately unmoving and practically comatose, tongue literally hanging out the side of his mouth like he's a vegetable, until it's time for him to "fight" to his feet (in quotations as it's usually just him standing up while Dean loosely acknowledges his headlock) and then sprinting and jumping for another 20 seconds. Rey was just not very engaging in holds yet, which I think is the main reason that they weren't drawing any sympathy from this specific crowd. It feels like too obvious an exhibition, when Rey simply flips a switch to go from innovative flyer to a bedridden grandmother too weak to reach for her pain pills. Rey got so much better at drawing sympathy in holds the older he got, and he's been one of the best sympathetic salesmen for ages now. 

The pacing for this pairing will just always be lifeless holds interspersed with some of the coolest movement you've seen, and I don't think it would take much to tweak that formula into a more fully formed match. Rey's rope flip seated senton to the floor looked amazing, and the springboard version into the ring looked just as great, and Malenko catches each of them like a real pro...but watching Malenko matches at this stage of my life means that I'm always going to wish that Malenko could have acted like a small human man actually landed ass first on his chest, instead of just viewing every single move as an opportunity to start a series of seesaw 2 counts. The moves all look spectacular, but they sure would mean a lot more if every single one of them didn't lead to Malenko just turning them into his own pinfall sequence. 

Lex Luger/Giant vs. Scott Hall/Kevin Nash

MD: Fun house show Hall performance here. At one point he was stooging around after three inverted atomic drops by Luger and you can see Nash breaking on the apron. Giant was on the apron for the entirety of the match until the hot tag as Luger worked the shine on Hall and Nash took over on Lex from there. You could do a lot worse than having a massive bellowing presence in the corner slamming the turnbuckle and cheering Lex on. Nash, to his credit, took a big bump over the top off of a Giant dropkick after the hot tag. Lex flew around a bit when he was knocking Hall about, but then didn't go down on the power slam towards the end, which was a little weird. Finish was Luger (the illegal man) racking Hall (the illegal man) while Giant stopped Nash from using the belt and used it himself to draw a DQ that also looked like Luger and Giant might have won the belts. There was a lot of trash in the ring at the end and the funny image of Hall and Nash laid out as the Fugees played over the loudspeaker. They probably ran this exact match a bunch in this era.

ER: This was a big house show match in 1997, and it's a good match with big star power. But I also think it's a repeat example of how Giant/Luger didn't ever quite fully click as a team, and yet another example of what incredible chemistry Hall and Nash had. This was a great Hall performance, and a great Nash performance, and watching them felt like they could have been placed in any era of US wrestling history and stood out as the most popular, charismatic team. The Outsiders bumped for a significant portion of this and yet felt like huge stars the entire time. Hall stooged around for Luger and took several inverted atomic drops, never going full Rick Rude, but always knowing exactly what he was doing. As much as I enjoyed their stooging, I thought the best parts were Nash going after Luger and then bumping big down the stretch for both Luger and Giant. Nash throws his big knee lifts, back elbows, and big boots, while Hall runs distraction from the apron (including getting forearmed off by Luger into a big bump on the floor) to allow Nash to remain in control.

Giant's strength is a role reversal, as he's better at taking a beating and building to a Luger tag, than he is standing on the apron waiting for his hot tag. The weakest part of his apron work is that the more verbal he gets, the more ridiculous he sounds. There's just something dopey about the biggest man in the arena yelling "Come on Lex, you're #1!" You're a fucking GIANT, dude, just yell a bunch of words that aren't. You don't even need to form sentences, just fucking shout. Maybe Andre could have pulled off yelling "You got this, pal!" at Haku or Baba (in fact he definitely could have, he's the greatest), but The Giant cannot. 

Kevin Nash somehow got summed up (by people who hate wrestling) as a lazy worker who always took the night off, and the more House Show Nash shows up from this era the more ridiculous that summation looks. Nash is also a giant, and the way he bumps in this match is yet another example of how he was one of the best bumping big men of his time. There's one gigantic bump, when Giant finally makes the hot tag and is running clotheslines through the Outsiders, and he throws a dropkick that sends Nash flying over the top to the floor. Nash takes a Berzerker level bump to the floor, and he's one of the few guys from the 90s who was actually bigger than John Nord! But it's not only his big bumps to the floor (which he almost always used in big matches, and in different ways), it's the way he goes down like a light for that belt shot, or the way he takes big man bumps without slowing down the offense feed. The man was a really great bumper who somehow got the reputation of someone who barely moved in the ring. 

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WCW Starrcade 12/29/96

1. Ultimo Dragon vs. Dean Malenko

ER: It's a bold move to start your Nashville PPV with a AAA minis dark tag and a 20 minute cruiserweight match. This is the first 12 minutes of a strong cruiserweight match, with a lot of mid 90s juniors matwork to start, and quick exchanges that don't really go anywhere but give us something to build off. They build to some quick rope running exchanges and some snap suplexes, and it plays like a very crisp New Japan juniors match. The Nashville crowd isn't really on board with it until Ultimo starts working a little more than just de facto heel. He had been the automatic heel by virtue of being Japanese in Nashville, but they wake up a bit when Dragon starts landing nice looking kicks to the grounded Malenko's ribs and a little toe kick to Malenko's temple. Once Ultimo is actually working with mild disrespect the crowd picks up on it immediately. It peaks with a great spot where Dragon feints a dive with Malenko on the floor, landing on his feet in ring with a quebrada and turns that into a flat footed tope with emphasis on making it look like a flying headbutt. Dragon even started selling like a heel, taking a couple of nasty Malenko back suplexes on his shoulders and acting like a heel getting punished. 

It's a match that is building to something strong, but Malenko makes the decision to throw some ice on things by grabbing a kneebar for a couple long minutes, really getting things silent in the arena. It threw off their vibe as Ultimo HAD been working as a luchador working as southern heel, and then in a couple minutes Malenko started working heel legwork while Ultimo valiantly kept having to struggle to the ropes and work a knee injury. It went instinctively against the fans' instincts to cheer the legwork the way it was being worked, as Ultimo was clearly face in these exchanges. A couple of awkward cross ups when they came out the other side of the legwork only extended the weird vibes. Malenko hits a body press with Ultimo leaning in the ropes, but Dragon stays put on his feet while Malenko tumbles to the floor, with Ultimo feebly rolling out after. Crowd is getting silent by the second and suddenly snaps awake in unison when Malenko looks like he has the match suddenly won after a nasty tombstone. The entire Nashville Municipal Auditorium thought they were seeing a Malenko win. With the crowd now suddenly heavily invested in a Malenko win, it really added to the closing stretch. I think they went with a couple too many nearfalls and the Onoo interference to break up Malenko's center of the ring cloverleaf weakened things, but there were some good nearfalls that the fans bit at. A Malenko release sitout Tiger suplex got a huge reaction, he plants Dragon with a disgusting brainbuster for another, and there was a great match-winning go behind waistlock battle that ended with a fantastic Tiger suplex for Dragon. This was the kind of PPV opener that a lot of WCW fans came to expect, with a lot of big moves and nearfalls. There were some stretches that didn't work and felt out of place, and they didn't really explore the stories they set up, but a lot of the action looked really good.

2. Akira Hokuto vs. Madusa

ER: This was not the match the crowd wanted to see. The crowd was far less familiar with Hokuto than they were with Ultimo Dragon, but even a Japanese competitor against a white woman wearing a sequined stars and stripes aerobics thong couldn't inspire them to get involved. Hokuto works holds with a short match they probably would have had a better chance going straight to fireworks. By the time they build to some big German suplexes and a couple hard missile dropkicks I was expecting them to react but it was still real light. The best reactions came from two pieces of Sonny Onoo interference, yanking Madusa's ankle from ringside to allow Hokuto to take over, and coming in later with to smack Madusa in the back of the head with a full American flag on a pole. This was laid out pretty heavily for Hokuto, never really feeling like Madusa was going to win, and Madusa's big moments on offense came off flat when a tornado DDT didn't really get pulled off. Hokuto wins with a nasty northern lights bomb, and it come off like an easier victory than the crowd was expecting. This was not the show to have Akira Hokuto win the inaugural WCW Women's Title Tournament, and an omen for how the Women's division would eventually wind up in the coming months. 

Roddy Piper does an interview with Mean Gene, and well, Piper's interviews in 1996 were really bad. He had taken coked up 1986 Hot Rod promos and now it felt more like a man performing comedic impressions of Cocaine Rod. He makes weird references to Strangler Lewis and Sky Low Low, says that he and Hogan ("can I call him Hogan?") are the only two icons, makes a joke about Roseanne Barr that barely felt like a reference (let alone a joke), and hops out on one leg when asked about his hip injury. This was like a hopped up Roger Rabbit promo that made the heavily promoted "Match of the Century" feel like it was about to be a tremendous disaster. 

3. Jushin Liger vs. Rey Misterio Jr. 

ER: This match was a major deal among tape traders, a first time (and last time, it turns out) singles match between two of the very best. So, of course this match starts with an enthusiastic USA chant, which Misterio happily accepts as his, and that's just fine. It also becomes apparent pretty early into this match that this crowd is tired of seeing a Japanese wrestler against a WCW regular. The commentary has some real wild tone shifts too, as Tenay starts the match talking about Liger's brain tumor surgery, and within minutes we take a weird sidetrack. Dusty ends up going on for far too long about Liger "looking heavier" than the last time he saw him, and none of the four man announce crew picks him up. He keeps trying to get anyone else to chime in, repeatedly asking whether or not he's crazy for thinking Liger is heavier. The crowd pays about as much attention to the match as commentary does, but it is surprising that people don't react louder for the beating that Misterio takes. Liger is very punishing, hitting an in-ring powerbomb about as hard as you can powerbomb someone, hits a crazy vertical suplex to the floor (and Rey really splats on that floor), then hits a powerbomb ON THE FLOOR! The actual wrestling in the match is great, it's nothing but offense, but it doesn't draw the crowd in like it should. They occasionally get them to notice, but they don't keep them hooked. 

Liger is super dominant here, brushing aside a missile dropkick and locking in a stretching surfboard, a release German suplex that folds Rey, a kappo kick in the corner, a dragon screw that would snap the surgically repaired knee of 2021 Rey Mysterio, and a really sunk in half crab. Rey had some comebacks, some flash to counter Liger's dominance, but Liger keeps effectively cutting him off. When Rey goes on a big tear with a headscissors and beautiful Asai moonsault, I foolishly thought that all of Rey's offense got backloaded into the match. But Liger immediately blocks a top rope Frankensteiner by hopping down to the mat, nails a kappo kick, and then drills Rey's head into the mat with a definitive Liger Bomb for the win. So far this PPV has had three Japanese wrestlers win the first three matches, and it is clearly not what anyone in attendance expected or wanted. This match was as good as could be expected with no fan involvement, and a suitably entertaining Dream Match with Liger really assaulting Rey and Misterio flying and splatting in cool Misterio ways. But, this also seemed like a match where Rey was to be the OBVIOUS winner, and even the finish looked like he kicked out before 3, which didn't help the reaction. Liger wasn't around in any way in 1997 WCW, so letting him destroy Misterio like this on WCW's biggest PPV of the year was a really strange decision. 

4. Chris Benoit vs. Jeff Jarrett

ER: This was kind of a peculiar match, as it was billed as No DQ but was not worked in any way as a No DQ match. The match didn't need the stip to work, as we find out that they really only made this No DQ to allow for a rush of outside interference right at the end. The match started like a strong Benoit/Jarrett match, both working some nice mat exchanges and Jarrett getting lit up by chops, but there's a weird tone as both men are clearly working as heels. Benoit rubs Jarrett's face in the mat and grinds his boot into the back of Jarrett's head after getting the best of a mat exchange, and later when Jarrett does the same he runs up the length of Benoit's back and then struts around the ring. Jarrett is the Nashville boy but isn't rallying the crowd behind him, and every single thing Benoit does is delivered as a heel. So the crowd doesn't get into this match the way they could have. They both work the match with a lot of aggression, and the pace feels really good, even if Benoit has a lot of strikes that show noticeable light. Benoit's stomps in the corner all whiff by 6" or more, and it's odd that the guy known for working stiff appears to be pulling his shots so much. Woman interferes from the floor, except her and Benoit continue to act like they don't realize the match is No DQ, as she sneaks in her interference behind Brian Hildebrand's back, and later on Benoit does the whole feet on the ropes bit with Hildebrand just missing his cheating each time. 

This is a match where Benoit could have just choked Jarrett with a chair, so holding a grounded headlock with his feet on the ropes behind the ref's back made zero sense. At a certain point Benoit didn't even have his arm wrapped around Jarrett's neck, looking more like he was just pinning him across the shoulders. Jarrett's comeback doesn't get a reaction, since he didn't decide to show the fans of Nashville that he was their guy, but he looked good. I liked his clothesline and super high belly to back suplex, but that's when everything goes to hell. Woman gets on the apron, Arn comes out, Hugh Morrus and Konnan attack Woman, she kicks Morrus in the balls while Konnan holds her in a snug headlock, Kevin Sullivan breaks a wooden chair over Benoit, Arn DDTs Jarrett, and somehow through it all Jarrett just gets rolled back inside and pins Benoit. So we had a No DQ match where it seemed like neither guy realized that was the case, all the DQ worthy events were caused by guys that came out at the very end of the match, and even after the match the crowd had no clue which one of them to cheer for. This felt like nobody knew what role they were actually playing and the match fell apart because of it. 

Arn Anderson and Jeff Jarrett blow off Mean Gene's interview requests after the match, but Steve and Debra McMichael have no problems repping the Horsemen on the mic. McMichael says Benoit is getting too distracted by Woman, and Debra says that Woman is looking rode hard and put up wet (to which Gene covers the microphone) and then calls her plump. I really wish we had been given a Woman reaction to being called "plump" by Debra McMichaels' perfectly slurred judgmental Alabama Christian voice. 

The Outsiders vs. The Faces of Fear

ER: This was heading towards being a truly great big man tag match, but a slow third act that dropped all the big man clubbering left us with a kind of unsatisfying finish. These guys all have great chemistry and have no problem hitting hard, and the match forgoes a lot of structure and instead mostly just exists as four tough guys hitting each other hard. You don't really need to cut off the ring with guys this large, as it's incredibly satisfying to have them constantly cutting each other off, able to turn any tide at any time with a hard clothesline or harder headbutt. It's hard not to get excited for a tag match made up wholly of big guys hitting each other hard, and commentary gets into it as much as the crowd does. The action is steady and nobody remains in control long. Nash really punishes Barbarian in the corner with kneelifts and heavy back elbows, hits a lariat to the side of Barbarian's neck when Nick Patrick steps in. Meng and Nash come off like superstars, with Meng having no trouble standing up to either Outsider and Nash getting roars whenever he gets into the ring. 

Meng's chops look like something that Hall and Nash legitimately hate taking, and you get some cool bigger spots like a Hall second rope bulldog on Meng, a great missed middle rope elbowdrop from Barbarian, Meng fighting to get Hall up for a piledriver before finally spiking him, and not long after that a big Barbarian powerbomb on Hall. The match also has a bunch of cool clotheslines and lariats from everyone, like Hall running the length of the apron to nail Barbarian in the corner, or Hall whipping Barbarian into a Nash apron lariat and then hitting one of the hardest possible diving lariats as Barbarian is reeling. Everyone in the match is showing stiff shots from the apron whenever an opponent gets anywhere near, and I love tag team fights like that. Things do take a bit too much of a cool down when Barbarian locks in a LONG nerve hold on Hall that the match didn't really need. 

The only formula the match had settled into by then was four guys kicking ass, with Hall and Barbarian each being briefly separated from their partners. But this late in the match you don't need a long nervehold to build to a Nash hot tag, as the crowd was hot every time Nash had been in and the hold went on so long that the hot tag was literally Nash's quietest part of the match. The hold cooled things down too much and took the energy away, and then for whatever reason Barbarian didn't make his own hot tag out when Nash made his big tag in. Hall and Barbarian had clearly been building a long sequence that was supposed to build to Meng and Nash absolutely wailing on each other, and instead Barbarian just stays in the ring. It's a bit anticlimactic as Nash tags in and Hall immediately drags Meng to the floor, and Nash fairly easily beats Barbarian with a jackknife. The match deserved a finish that was a bit more thought out than that, but the bulk of this was hard hitting heavyweight wrestling that I loved. 

Hogan cuts a truly unhinged promo backstage with Dibiase and Vincent laughing along with him. If you show this promo back to back with Piper's promo earlier you get 10 minutes of what feels like it is going to be the craziest match you've ever seen. He keeps building towards a big ending but keeps getting derailed, until he's just shouting out the names of celebrities and calling Piper a woman. This kind of manic old man insanity is making this match come off far more exciting than I've been lead to believe.

Diamond Dallas Page vs. Eddie Guerrero

ER: This was the finals of the WCW US Title tournament, a very fun match that is perhaps too long, but finishes strong. It's always best when a match goes out on a high note, and the finishing stretch makes this worth seeing. This is cool because Page fights Eddie as an equal and makes it work, going toe to toe with both throwing elbows and chops as heavyweights (even though Eddie is much smaller than DDP here). DDP is great at doing fast armdrag and leapfrog exchanges, and both know how to salvage minor miscommunications by taking big bumps. DDP takes an awesome backwards bump through the ropes off a dropkick, both good at working a back and forth match without it ever feeling like they're just trading moves. It's really hard hitting, with Eddie getting harder than expected impact an avalanche, pescado, and big back suplex. Page has a bunch of cool offense - a couple of unique gutbusters, nice right arm clothesline immediately following a missed left arm one, and a nasty kneeling piledriver - so it's a little disappointing when he locks in a too long abdominal stretch. 

The match had kind of been babyface/babyface and DDP wasn't working heel enough to build to a big Eddie comeback. But things really do come alive for the push to the finish, when DDP starts really throwing himself back into offense. He hits a hard shoulderblock in the corner and then misses another into the turnbuckles just as hard. Eddie sweeps DDP's legs and DDP takes it on the back of his head like Psychosis, Eddie lifts him in the air with a European uppercut (that makes Dusty lose his mind),and then drops DDP with a brainbuster. We get a crazy run of bigger and bigger spots, like Eddie catching DDP in an atomic drop off the top rope, and DDP hitting a bananas spinning powerbomb. There were several great nearfalls off of Eddie backslides (set up nicely by DDP's missed spinning clothesline or Diamondcutter attempts). The finish itself is a bit of a stretch, as the ref had to be distracted for far too long so that Scott Hall had time to run in and hit DDP with an Outsider's Edge (for turning down the nWo's invite), and then Eddie hits the frog splash for the title. This match could have gone 12 instead of 15, as trimming out the bullshit would have easily made this the tightest and best match on the card. As is it was strong, and the peaks lift it higher than its valleys lower it. 

The Giant vs. Lex Luger

ER: This was great, the best Giant singles match and performance so far (easily), and an excellent Luger performance that completely rewards the loud crowd. The Nashville crowd were cheering louder for Luger before the first lock-up, than any other babyface so far this PPV (Nash got the loudest cheers, but that's just because people are going to cheer the coolest guy in any room). Giant had a year of ring work at this point and was improving, but having a guy like Luger in there to guide the match really elevated this. Luger knew exactly what to do and the fans were behind him doing just that. I loved Luger's lock-up to start, getting a low base, taking big super ball bumps when Giant would throw him away. Every time Luger got thrown off, he would come back in with left and right elbows, and then began measuring Giant with right hands. Luger would rear back and throw one big right, send the Giant rocking and wobbling in the corner, then throw another. It was a great way to start the match and they used the ring incredibly well to make this feel like a big fight. Luger would get bumped to the opposite corner, and the camera would pull back and show the distance between the men, making Luger look like even more of a walking tall babyface every time he would stomp back across the ring to punch Giant. Both were good at selling the early fatigue, and I liked how Giant shut things down by just charging out of the corner with a straight arm clothesline to the chest. 

I thought Giant looked good in control, and Luger looked great bumping for him. They worked a long control section and the Giant has a lot of ideas on how to fill time, and Luger's selling keeps the crowd interested. The Giant gets insane air on an elbowdrop, throws a stiff kick to Luger's ribs (that Luger bumps through the ropes to the floor) and brings him back in with a big delayed vertical suplex. The Luger comeback teases are good, like a quick bodyslam attempt that ends with the Giant flattening him and then hitting another elbowdrop. We're over a year into the Giant, and he's still trying weird  things and I love it. He weirdly does the Shawn Michaels "draped over the corner ropes" spot after missing an avalanche, struggling to get his legs into position but even getting turned over by kicks the way Michaels would. I don't think I've ever seen a 400 lb. guy do that spot - probably because it looked pretty stupid - but I am all for wrestlers taking a risk of looking stupid. Even better, is how Giant sets up Luger's comeback by missing a running dropkick in the ropes when Luger moves out of the way. Giant really just ran and threw a dropkick into the ropes like he was a luchador, top foot nearly getting tangled on the top rope and sending him to the mat head first. Giant was lucky the landing was better than it could have been, but a giant doing crazy spots is impossible to hate. 

Luger starts punching the reeling Giant and really knows how to milk the reaction, the crowd getting louder and louder whenever it looked like Giant might fall over, and when Giant is reeling back far enough Luger gets the loudest reaction of the night by taking Giant down with a Rude Awakening style neckbreaker. It's a great nearfall, fans literally jumping up and down in their seats after seeing a neckbreaker. It's beautiful. Luger gets pressed onto Mark Curtis during the kickout, and this allows all the bullshit to start, and I loved all the bullshit. Luger finally has the advantage over Giant, but with no ref we get Nick Patrick finally showing up (with Syxx), and I love it when Nick Patrick shows up. I'm someone who is sick to death of rudo lucha refs, and yet I love Nick Patrick's stooging and idiocy. Luger bodyslams Giant and gets him up in the Rack (an awesome feat) and Patrick actually kicks Luger in the back of the knee! Patrick gets thrown across the ring and Luger Racks the Giant again, this time eating a spinkick from Syxx and unceremoniously dropping Giant again. To add to the great bullshit, Sting comes through the crowd, a man who looks like Jimmy Del Ray but with the flat out craziest eyes actually bumps faces with him before being pulled away by security, man looking like he actually wanted to fight or assassinate Sting. There's a great moment where Sting gets in the ring and shoves his bat into Patrick's chest, throws Patrick again to get him out of there, and Patrick punches a still ailing Mark Curtis in the face on his way out! 

The bullshit leads to a really great finish with some great theater, when Sting whispers separately to both Luger and Giant and leaves his bat in the middle of the ring. Commentary was strong this entire match, putting over and questioning everyone's motivations and getting fired up for Luger and Giant, making it really feel like a clash of the titans. They nail all of the visuals, with Luger reaching the bat but Giant getting there right after and standing on it. The crowd really seemed frozen in excitement waiting to see what was about to happen, and finally Luger just punches Giant in the balls and then beats him in the legs and body with that baseball bat. Mark Curtis dramatically drags himself over and counts the pin, and the fans rightly lost their minds for all of this. Luger cannot be denied. 

Hollywood Hogan vs. Roddy Piper

ER: Commentary calls this the biggest match of our lifetimes, and Michael Buffer manages to top that by calling it the Match of the Century. It's ridiculous, sure, and got mocked by smart fans at the time, but over 9,000 people in Nashville all bought into it to some extent. Buffer's intro is one of his best, genuinely adding to the match hype. Hogan looks like he's having a blast as a heel, with his broad MJF-esque "I'M a HEEL" shtick playing out like Hogan had been dying to do house show heel routines for a decade. It's a really great Hogan performance and it really felt like both men were playing up to their current abilities. Piper moves older than his actual age (and it's crazy that Hogan and Piper were only 43 and 42 here, respectively) and so Hogan really carries this by having a super active performance. Piper was limited but spirited, and he's good enough to make that work, but Hogan was the one working to make this big. Hogan stalls and stooges and tries to avoid Piper, slaps him on breaks and bails to the floor each time. Piper is mostly limited to punches and clotheslines and can't move quick, so Hogan avoiding him works and it makes it better when Piper finally tees off. Piper used a few different eye pokes and I love how Hogan sold each one. 

Piper is not going to be above fighting dirty and the crowd was fully behind Piper fighting dirty to combat Hogan's dirty fighting, and Piper moves stiffly enough that he draws a lot of sympathy, and he's able to pull off the performance of an old dog dragged back to another fight. Things get great when Piper gets knocked to the floor, tumbling hard, but fights back against Hogan and Dibiase. Piper gets his belt and whips Hogan around ringside like in a great LA Park match. All the belt shots looked really nasty, Piper not holding back and Hogan leaning into all of them. The whole match was an escalation of dirty fighting, and it peaked when Hogan started kicking at Piper's long visible hip surgery scar, even locking in an abdominal stretch while hammering on that scar. They don't quite know how to transition into the finishing stretch but there are some big moments, like Piper pulling off a vertical suplex while Schiavone wondered if his legs would hold, and a big missed Hogan legdrop. Schiavone was great at covering for things while keeping the excitement live, and his excitement really added to the chaotic ending. 

The Giant comes out and lifts Piper for a chokeslam, but a fan also charges the ring and grabs Hogan's legs, so the Giant has to keep Piper in the air while security roughs up the fan. It throws off the timing but still plays huge when Piper bites Giant in the face and dumps him to the floor, then somehow beats Hogan with a sleeper, with Randy Anderson delivering a great shocked face when Hogan's arm drops a third time. I was really into this match and thought it was far better than most thought at the time. The moment was hurt by being non-title. I'm not actually sure they ever said it was non-title, they just never announced it was FOR the title and didn't talk about it during the match, like they were intentionally avoiding it. Dusty even calls Piper the champ after the win, with some immediate awkward silence as Dusty clearly gets corrected off-mic. 

This was not the great workrate PPV that it has the reputation for being, a rep that it mostly got by having two long singles matches early in the card between cruiserweight legends. This was still a good in-ring show, but not to the level it has been written about being. The two cruiserweight matches have flaws that weren't as glaring in 1996, but even though they aren't the MOTYC that people wanted them to be in 1996 doesn't mean they aren't still entertaining as hell. The Hogan/Piper match doesn't deserve the bile that it got at the time as I thought it was an excellent Hogan performance, working around a guy who hadn't wrestled an actual match in 10 months. It was a top to bottom mix of styles and matches, and that gives a show a high floor. 

Best Matches:

1. Lex Luger vs. The Giant

2. Outsiders vs. Faces of Fear

3. DDP vs. Eddie Guerrero

4. Jushin Liger vs. Rey Misterio Jr. 

Weakest Matches:

1. Akira Hokuto vs. Madusa

2. Chris Benoit vs. Jeff Jarrett

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WCW World War 3 11/24/96

From beautiful (?) Norfolk, Virginia, in front of over 10,000 wrestling fans looking at three large gleaming wrestling rings set up like the Tri-Force, comes the only PPV appearances of Roadblock and Tony Rumble. Who wouldn't want to watch this!? I've never seen it. Let's ride.

1. Rey Misterio Jr. vs. The Ultimate Dragon

ER: This was wild. Ultimo (I'm going to call him Ultimo, but used their weird Ultimate spelling above since they had it in their graphic) took like 85% of this match and won the thing about as definitively as someone could win a match. I guess I had forgotten that Rey became a big star, but they were still pushing Ultimo as a clearly bigger star. Dragon broke out every single piece of offense he knew and it all looked great. This whole thing is just a straight run of bigger and bigger moves. His leg kick combos looked crisp and looked really good for a guy who prides himself on not working stiff. His bodyslams looked Finlay stiff, so that was an awesome surprise. Soon he was building up to big backbreakers, a great tombstone piledriver, a piledriver on the floor, a powerbomb, a RUNNING powerbomb, vicious brainbuster...I mean it was a crazy one-sided beating and Misterio is really great at taking a one sided beating. The crowd gets almost uncomfortable watching Dragon just wreck Rey over and over.

Heenan: "Misterio has landed on the back of his head at least 15 times in this match!"

He's not wrong. Rey finally makes a little run by getting a boot up in the corner, but he overshoots an ambitious two rope split legged moonsault. Even Dusty has to point out on commentary that Misterio got like none of it. Rey has a couple nice rana roll ups, but it just makes more want to see more of Ultimo's awesome video game offense. And boy do I ever get my wish. Rey goes for a huge springboard rana, but Ultimo catches it, bounces him off the top rope, and then absolutely PLANTS Rey with a sitout powerbomb. It finishes the match, and looked like something that should have DEFINITELY finished the match.

2. Nick Patrick vs. Chris Jericho

ER: Goddamn this match rules. This makes me so pissed that we didn't get a run of Nick Patrick as a worker during this era WCW. He's like a god tier Danny McBride character in this match, just a magnificent stooge who genuinely looked like a better worker here than half of the active roster (and WCW had an impressive as hell roster). This match is brilliant. Jericho has one arm tied behind his back, and they work a fantastic match not only based around Jericho with one good arm, but Patrick doing mean offense to a guy with one arm while also convincingly taking a beating from that same man. Both guys' offense looks really good in this, Jericho pulling out a really impressive performance with use of only one arm, breaking out with a cool kick combo, a big leaping shoulderblock, actually some pretty impressive stuff with your body balance thrown off. But Nick Patrick is a real marvel here. He works like a great Memphis worker, throwing nice submarine angle uppercut right hands and fast excellently worked left jabs. He has as many doofus stooge faces as John Tatum, and any wrestler who tips the Tatum Scales for me is going to immediately be a guy who I champion. Patrick is not only a great bumper, he's able to take great bumps while conveying a guy who isn't someone who should be taking bumps.

I remember seeing an interview with Martin Landau about his wonderful performance in Ed Wood, where he talked about how seriously he took the role of Bela Lugosi; how he thought Lugosi was a true legend who he wanted to honor, so much that he thought out each aspect of the character in detailed fashion. And he talked about the crazy method depths he went to properly capture Bela, down to the fact that he didn't just want to do an accurate Romanian accent, he wanted to do an accent of a Romanian man who was insecure about his accent negatively affecting his career. Nick Patrick seems to understand his role in this match as well as Landau knew what tone to use to play Lugosi. Nick Patrick brawled like Windham and stooged like Tatum, and that's something I'm going to be impressed as hell by. Patrick uses the setting really well, brawling to the floor, hitting a cool ring post bump into a ring post joining two rings, setting up a spot where Jericho missed a punch and decked the ring post (Jericho played into all these transition spots GREAT), Patrick found cool ways to take this match into a couple rings and show off to several sides of the arena. That's an AMAZING skill. Patrick throws a ton of great punches throughout, great quick jabs, and then to show you how much of a rebel badass he is Nick Patrick does the Curt Hennig rolling neck snap! Patrick even takes a back drop bump, with Jericho setting it up impressively for a guy with one arm. This match was an absolute blast, I can't believe it isn't some kind of cult favorite. It's really great. Patrick is a legend and there's no sign that he'd even worked a match in the prior decade, and then he turns in this incredible performance?? I would have this super high on a 1996 MOTY List, as ridiculous as that sounds. Not just a superior gimmick match, but a superior pro wrestling match.

3. Giant vs. Jeff Jarrett

ER: This was pretty great, a cool bout derailed by a Crow Sting appearance that should have pissed off Jarrett and Giant. This match felt like a cool Coliseum Video hidden gem, like a cool Doink vs. Giant Gonzalez match that you've never heard anyone talk about. Giant was really quick and had different movement than when he was older and slower, so it was cool to see him throw a hard lariat with a lot more lunge. Jarrett bumped nice for him but also made sure his own shots looked good, and I like seeing the kind of shots in David/Goliath matches where the smaller guy jumps up for corner 10 count punches but gets shoved off, bumping backwards, and these two do a great version of that. Sting comes out and walks around the rafters, and Jarrett and Giant have to continue showing interest while literally the entire crowd is now watching Sting. But these two are good soldiers and this is a fun professional well worked match. Giant takes a big bump to the floor, and misses a big elbow drop off the middle buckle. He hits a hard bodyslam and this whole show can do no wrong.

We got a really great Hogan/Piper contract signing, genuinely up there with the great contract signings of all time, and I'm someone who really likes a good contract signing. The whole nWo is out there surrounding Piper, Hogan, Nash, Hall, Bischoff, Giant, all closing in as Piper talks tall. Hogan is really mean on the mic, some of his best mic work I've heard from this era. He keeps needling Piper about his hip, makes Piper lift up his kilt to show his hip surgery scar, says "I normally don't beat up cripples, but I can't wait to beat up a gimp!" Holy shit, that's pretty cruel. Piper getting jumped and doing his best to fight back while going down was great, and him staggering back to his feet before the nWo had completely left was a strong visual. I'd never really heard about this segment (and wasn't watching wrestling when this originally aired) but this should be talked about as one of the best examples of building interest in a match with a hot contract signing. I really want to watch Starrcade 96 right now.

4. Amazing French Canadians vs. Harlem Heat

ER: Guess what, this also ruled. This felt like an ECW house show tag, 4 big guys hitting hard and bumping hard, building to some awesome highspots. Rougeau was a great bumper in tags like this, really made Harlem Heat look like stars. Booker misses a high sidekick and catches the top rope, and the Canadians take control and the match keeps getting more fun. We build to this insane spot where the Canadians stack up a table across the ring corner, then put the RING STEPS on top of that table, and then already-insane-in-1996 PCO climbs to the top buckle and to the top of the ring steps, and MISSES the biggest cannonball ever attempted. This would have actually murdered Stevie Ray if he didn't get out of the way. I watched his ROH match from Mania weekend the day before I watched this and in that he gets powerbombed from the ring down to the floor - nobody catching him, just literally a powerbomb to the floor - and miss a cannonball from the top to the ring apron. This guy really is genuinely crazy, it's been happening for at least 23 years and at a certain point it can't be a work. PCO is nuts. Booker throws a ton of cherries on this delicious sundae with a vicious Harlem Hangover, that leg whipping perfectly and safely across PCO's jaw. Great 10 minute banger, best PPV ever so far.

We get a brief brawl between Col. Parker and Sherri Martel as part of the tag match stipulation, and it's freaking great. Sherri jumps him and the fans get way into it. Parker takes a huge bump over the top to the floor and Dusty is losing his shit the entire time, going absolutely bonkers. Sherri hits a couple flying clotheslines and a big crossbody off the top and the entire crowd is standing when she hits that crossbody. This is the perfect way to do a manager brawl, and I even wish we got a longer version of it.

5. Psychosis vs. Dean Malenko

ER: Goddamn this PPV absolutely smokes. This is a tough match with both guys staying tight and grounded, relying on some nice strikes and building to a couple big bumps, working a lot of more BattlArts style submission sections. The crowd is silent as hell which is a shame, they've been so hot for everything else and maybe they were already burned out? The PPV has been nothing but great matches and great promos. It's such a fun match to be quiet during, and they seem like a crowd who would be into their thing. Psychosis does his rope flip bump but lands on his feet instead of head, and turns it into a cool spinkick comeback; it's like he used that bump the same way you see a rebound lariat and it was cool. Psychosis does make up for the missing "crazy bump" quota and take a nutso leap to nothing off the top, catching his face on the guardrail. It's one of those dangerous Psychosis bumps where you can't tell if he botched something, or if he's an all timer and missed that ugly on purpose (I think it was the latter). Dusty excitedly says "We in the midst of it" and it sounds cool and he's absolutely right. This whole thing had a cool WCW BattlArts vibe, cool subs and matwork with some flashy quick armdrag variations and some nice strikes, something that I might not have known how to process when this originally aired. Maybe that's why the crowd was so quiet. I seem to remember the general opinion being that these two were a disappointing "mainstay" cruiserweight match-up in WCW, but maybe that was just a stupid guy's opinion that got amplified too loud? Because this match ruled.

6. The Outsiders vs. Faces of Fear vs. The Nasty Boys

ER: Shit this PPV really does feel like the total embodiment of Where the Big Boys Play. This PPV has had a ton of big dudes running into each other. This match is filled with a cool mixture of stiff motherfucker and sneaky motherfucker, and that's a combination you don't often get from a big time professional wrestling company. This is more like a three way race on Scooby's Laff-A-Lympics, and Laff-A-Lympics as Wrestling is something I want right this very second. FoF and Nasty Boys especially kick the shit out of each other, mean knees to the face, chops to the neck, full force collisions; at one point Meng clotheslines Knobbs so hard that you wonder why you ever watch anything that isn't pro wrestling. Outsiders do an amusing job of staying out of this while the other two teams beat bruises into each other, clapping from the apron at the men performing for them. BUT then they get tagged in and Hall is throwing a nice right hand one moment, but then being choked and thrown violently into the corner by Barbarian. This is a legendary big boys battle and nobody is talking about it! I've heard absolutely no opinions on this show and it's fucking incredible. Barbarian slams into Hall with an avalanche that is not so much an avalanche as it is just Barbarian running full speed into Hall. We get an incredible moment of various guys leaping at and attacking guys on the apron, the whole thing feels messy and violent in the best ways. I think every guy in this match misses an elbow drop that they don't actually expect to me a missed elbow drop. Like there is honestly a match-long prank war to see who can make someone miss an elbow more painfully. There are multiple piledrivers, Jimmy Hart is wearing his Misfits jacket with fucking skulls on the shoulders, this whole thing rules. It's a long match, too, over 15 minutes, and it completely rules. I am so in the bag for this show. My god.

7. WORLD WAR 3!!!

ER: These things were terrible, right? I have a very large TV, and when they cut to three separate screens you officially can barely see a thing. I would wager most 1996 viewers were watching this, somehow, on a TV at least half the size of my 2019 TV. This is a 60 person nude beach fuckfest filmed by a guy hiding a half mile away in the bushes. It's the kind of thing that would actually be better if it was just fullscreen and they just switched cameras a ton. It's a damn shame really, you hate to see it, because you can't see it. Because from every minuscule camera shot this whole match REALLLY looked like it ruled. First, it's freaking weird. The entrance might be the best part as 60 different WCW guys just walk out single file and the order is almost completely unplanned, just an endless parade of guys that you mostly know. The whole thing had great energy, you just couldn't see 90% of it at any given time. 

We start with Benoit jumping Sullivan on the floor and brawling through the crowd (with Konnan and Ray Traylor?), Tony Rumble is not only in this match for reasons that wouldn't make any sense to me or anybody, but he's also the first eliminated and Dusty yells out on commentary "Tony Rumble IS GONE!" From there we get flashes of brilliance when we can actually see any of what's going on. Villano IV punches the hell out of Jarrett, Parka punches people, a ton of eliminations look fantastic (Dave Taylor flies wildly off an Alex Wright dropkick, Road Block - in his only PPV appearance - eats a huge clothesline, we get a spot where 8 different guys do running corner attacks on Ron Studd and then DOGPILE him in the ring!), and the final 10 is a fantastic collection of the nWo vs. DDP, Regal, Luger, and Rey. It's so damn good. 

Once they get back to fullscreen and run through all the nWo vs. WCW, it really shows how hot of a battle royal this appeared to be. Regal tricks DDP into charging him and DDP flies to the floor, it takes Hall, Nash, and Syxx to eliminate Regal and he fights the whole way, and while the Giant win was exciting it really should have been Luger. The EASY MVP of the match was Regal. Every single time he popped into camera he looked like a megastar, and he was by far the greatest part of that final 8. Regal was an incredible fighting babyface here, and he stood out more than anybody throughout the entire match; from lacing into Riggs early on to walking tall right up to his elimination, this is an underrated great Regal performance.

ER: Wow, what a PPV. This is honestly one of the best PPVs I've ever watched. This needs to be discussed more. I need to do a podcast where I have a new guest on and we just watch and talk about World War 3 1996. New week, new guest, same PPV.

World War 3 and Me.

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My Favorite Wrestling: WCW Worldwide 6/30/96

Dave Taylor/Bobby Eaton vs. Fire & Ice

ER: This is fun for what we got, but man I really wanted to see an actual full tag match between these two. Just like the Faces of Fear vs. Duggan/Pittman match from the previous episode, the potential was high as there were 4 tough guys who didn’t mind hitting hard or getting hit hard. And there were plenty of guys getting hit hard in this match, it was just a very quick 4 minutes. Taylor and Train do a nice shoulderblock exchange, and Taylor wrecks him with a few uppercuts, high dropkick to the chest, and a nasty forearm smash across the chest. I love Dave Taylor. A C&A Dave Taylor will need to be done in the future. I have a feeling he won’t really have many classic singles matches, but he is never less than enjoyable in a tag or multiman. So the match is going great, but sadly Eaton gets kind of steamrolled. He tags in, throws a couple nice punch variations to a held-by-Taylor Ice Train, then goes for an ill-advised top rope elbow. Once he misses that Fire & Ice just takes over. Norton didn’t seem in the mood to sell anything, Eaton takes a big crooked backdrop, eats Norton’s crippling shoulderbreaker and a big splash from Train, and on the floor Regal advises Taylor to not even attempt to break up the pin. So what we got was real fun, but could have been all time great had it gotten 10 minutes and actually let Eaton shine a bit.

Kurosawa vs. Alex Wright

ER: This had some miscommunication, and the layout left a lot to be desired, but I was impressed by how expressive Kurosawa was. Wright had a bunch of potential but often disappointed. He hit a couple athletically pretty but light landing dropkicks, and a couple European uppercuts that seem a lot weaker when we're merely 10 minutes removed from Dave Taylor. But Nakanishi took Wright's offense in a fun stooge style, really cartoon-y but atmosphere appropriate. Nakanishi has light arm strikes but really heavy legs, so he hit a couple of so so forearms but then aimed to kick a hole in Wright's chest and threw some big stomps. He also committed to a big missed elbow off the top. So there was some heart in the match, but it didn't go to a very interesting place. Nakanishi did some offense for awhile, then Wright came back with a spinning heel kick and German suplex. And, how crazy is it that Nakanishi is basically still working a full schedule?

ER: Macho Man does a promo with Mean Gene to build up the upcoming WCW Theatre at MSG show, and threatens guest referee Bruno Sammartino . Still can't believe they don't use a graphic of Bruno to build this up. 

Rough & Ready vs. Cobra/Bill Payne

ER: Bill Payne was around for a shockingly long time, was a guy big enough to actually get an entrance now and then, but also never win a match. He looks like Super Crazy mixed with Julio Fantastico. Rough and Ready were truly the cruelest gift, an awesome pairing that only got paired 20 times, with half of those not making television. I love the combo of 1996 combo of mid 40s Dick Slater and Pussy Wagon Mike Enos (The Mauler??). Bill Payne eats a full landing vertical suplex from Enos on the spinning stage, painful spill, and I'm now a Bill Payne fan. He also eats a badass fallaway slam off the middle ropes from Enos. Enos is really muscling this guy around and it's awesome. Slater kicks Payne in the gut with a flat out great stomach kick, and Enos hits one of the biggest high rotation power slam you've seen. You need to cherish the Rough & Ready that you come across in the wild. It is nature's endorphins.

The Gambler vs. Booty Man

ER: Gambler has his sick as hell red trunks with all four playing card suits on the back. Gambler is such a great stooge, and a real pro, the kind of guy I really appreciate. I'd rather watch all of the Gambler matches than the best Kenny Omega matches. Gambler is the Chris Elliott of wrestling. A little thicker, but an understanding of physical reaction, a fun but punchable face, and an undeserved smug cockiness. Booty doesn't bring much of interest other than Kimberly Page. Gambler brings nice clubbing arms, solid stomps, big falls, and leans into Booty's high knee. High Knee. Say it.

Kensuke Sasaki vs. The Giant

ER: Surprised they would put Sasaki in with the Giant, as I didn't think Sasaki was there to lose one minute matches. He throws hard chops and hard leg kicks, and Giant's big chokeslam is super impressive, as he lifts him with one arm, then lifts him higher before dropping to his knees with the slam. I wanted more, obviously.

Hugh Morrus vs. Lex Luger

ER: Luger is a god on these 1996 shows, and he has truly gotten the worst of what WCW has to offer. Who else is having to make chicken salad out of a main event opposite Hugh Morris or Konnan? Luger knows how to craft matches out of these lugs beyond lugs, working this one like a great Hogan match. Morrus gets a couple of big slams to start and they slow play them, with Morrus hamming it up and Luger selling them with a "You think that's a knife" face. Luger let's him think he's at a disadvantage, then just explodes on Morrus with a bunch of nice forearms and shows off a bodyslam of his own and hits a nice powerslam on a big guy. Luger really does work the best version of the Hogan match you're used to, because he's not working with the same level of insecurity. He's cool with his spot on the pecking order, happy with the amount of money he's made, not scared of guys like Hugh Morrus. He knows he can sell for Morrus and naturally look like a star, so it makes a Hogan-style match more like a Nice John Cena match without toddler shorts and goofy faces. Morrus gets to merely miss the No Laughing Matter instead of having Luger take it, then just kick out and go for win. Missing the moonsault that leads to a Luger comeback is a much more organic way of moving the match along, and Morrus also gets to eyerake his way out of a Torture Rack. A Hogan match with him missing a legdrop would make it more interesting, give it some more depth. Morrus didn't look great here, but it didn't matter, because we had Lex Luger running things in 1996.


COMPLETE AND ACCURATE WCW B-SIDES

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My Favorite Wrestling: WCW Pro 4/13/96

A request from the wonderful and dependable Cubs Fan, a mere hours before the most exciting baseball game of his last decade is about to commence (I'm pulling for the Cubs, buddy).


1. State Patrol vs. Fire & Ice

This was really fun, and according to Chris Cruise the debut of Fire & Ice!! Historic!! Parker is a guy who won't back down and he jumps Train and immediately stiffs him up. It doesn't last long as Train gives Buddy a massive backdrop and a lariat right into Parker's throat, then Norton tags in and steamrolls him with a shoulderblock. State Patrol get to double team him for a bit, choking him out on the ropes and clubbing him, until Norton does a cool double vertical suplex on them. Finish is Norton hitting his nasty shoulderbreaker on Parker followed up with a huge standing splash from Train. Really fun tag.

2. V.K. Wallstreet vs. Cobra

This was maybe the most offense I've ever seen Cobra get. He throws a nice dropkick, some decent-ish punches, threw a really nice high arc powerslam. A lot of guys threw pretty nice powerslams during this era WCW. But Cobra really was a guy who seemed green for several years. I once saw somebody selling a "Super J" comp tape from their tapelist. I assumed initially that it was some Super J Tourney Comp, but no, it was legitimately a Jeff Farmer comp, just during the time he went by Super J. That is probably the weirdest comp tape I've ever seen.

3. Giant vs. Butch Long & Not THEE Manny Fernandez

Manny Fernandez is announced as Vern Henderson here. I always feel for jobbers when they get their name announced wrong. But an onscreen graphic to boot? Ouch. So Manny and Long didn't actually get any offense here. I'll give you time to collect yourselves. Giant threw a nice corner clothesline, and (recurring theme!) a big powerslam. Cool spot where Manny was trying a single leg on Giant, Long flew in with a crossbody that got caught, Giant did a huge kneelift to Manny and then a fallaway slam on Long. This maybe went 90 seconds.

4. Men at Work vs. Brad & Steve Armstrong

This was awesome. It's a fun example of WCW syndicated hierarchy, as there are still matches that surprise me with who's going over. I didn't see Norton going over One Man Gang, and here it was more of a toss-up. Armstrongs don't win a lot, neither do Men at Work. Armstrongs won this one, but ask yourself if the result wouldn't have been different if it were Scott and Steve instead of Brad and Steve. Steve/Scott seems like a team that could feasibly lose to Men at Work. But man this was good. Starr and Brad had glorious slicked down tightly curled mullets, you got a shit ton of dropkicks (and Brad is a guy with a great dropkick), Kanyon showed off a beautiful piece of underrated pro wrestling by nailing Brad with a big right hand coming out of an arm wringer (think about it, picture a guy doing an arm wringer, twisting up and under, only to be met with a right hand on the other side. You love it.), Steve continues the TREND by hitting a big rotating powerslam on Starr  (seriously, EVERYbody did a powerslam and it's the best), Kanyon predicts indie wrestling 15 years into the future by hitting a urunage onto his own knee, and that early match urunage leads to a great finish where Brad scouts it, reverses it later when Kanyon goes for it and slips right out the back into a dynamite Russian legsweep. This was just wonderful classic tag wrestling.

5. Lex Luger vs. Vern Henderson

Henderson is a fun old roided guy who pops up a couple times of year in WCW. He always tries, attempts offense he probably shouldn't, and takes at least one big bump a match. I always smile when Vern pops up. Luger is a little more controlling here than he was against Ice Train, but he still gives Vern a lot. Vern breaks out a neat little floatover armdrag that you wouldn't expect him to, and as advertised gets tossed to the floor and takes a big back bump without getting slowed down by the ropes. His punches are bad and Zbyszko calls out how awful his hammerlock is. "Luger must just be letting him put that thing on to be kind!" Luger hits a powerslam (THEME!) and runs nicely into Vern's corner boot. But then it's torture rack time. Fun little match. Luger was like Bill Dundee in terms of 1996 WCW studio taping mastery.

6. Barbarian vs. Konnan

Woof. What a waste of Barbarian. Let me be the first person to talk about how awful a wrestler Konnan was. At this point he had been given the US title, yet still clearly had no idea how to take offense. He had no idea how to fall, and many times came off like a totally untrained wrestler. At one point Barbarian hits a lariat and Konnan puts his arms at his side and just tips over. Later he spun around twice before hitting a kick to the stomach. I can't actually figure out a way to type what he did, to properly convey how misguided it looked. Barbarian was in the ropes, Konnan right in front of him, in place, just spun around clockwise - twice - on his feet, and at the end of the second spin just threw his leg out, so it was like a sidekick to the stomach. Barbarian sold it properly, like a confused man who kind of got flicked in the nuts by a good friend. Just holding his stomach and looking up at Konnan, confused. Later Konnan has problems getting up on a powerbomb (didn't seem like he intentionally sandbagged Barb, just looked like he was clueless) so Barb muscled him up and planted him anyway. The finish is Klassic Klueless Konnan, as Barbarian goes for another powerbomb, Konnan is supposed to do a rana, but Konnan instead manages to completely brain himself, just awkwardly dropping right onto his own head and neck. Barb tries gallantly to roll through it, and Konnan ends up sitting on Barbarian's chest holding his own head for the pin. A true champion.


Have you had enough 1996 syndicated WCW, Cubs? Well there's gonna be more! After all, you were my first donor, gotta give the people what they want!


***I'm probably sounding like a skipping record (like my Metal Health LP that awesomely skips during the first chorus of "Cum on Feel the Noize", so it just gets stuck perfectly on Kevin DuBrow yelling "Mooore moooore moooore") at this point but I'm still trying to raise money for my friend and coworker whose home burned down, completely disappearing every single one of her possessions. The donations have slowed but no matter, I still have plenty of neat requests to fulfill and WILL be continuing to fulfill them! I'm matching EVERY contribution and will continue writing above and beyond for those who donate. You donate $1? That's awesome. Whatever you can do, and then you get to make a request. This means SO MUCH to me and you all are making me so happy***

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My Favorite Wrestling: WCW Pro 3/30/96

1. State Patrol vs. Harlem Heat

Awwwww yeah this is what I'm talking about! Harlem Heat have aged pretty horribly in retrospect, but State Patrol are one of the great lost teams of the 90s. Buddy Lee will take and deliver a beating and Harlem Heat will deliver an awkward 1996 beating. Both guys in HH were really sloppy around this time, and while that can derail other matches it kind of added to it here. At one point Stevie Ray gives Buddy Lee an accidental shoot brainbuster. It was supposed to be a suplex that Parker reverses into a crossbody, but Ray just drops him straight down. Ouch. How much of State Patrol's AJPW tours made tape? Also why did they make James Earl Wright's name so close to a famous murderer's name? Was Joe Wilkes Boothe tossed around, too?

2. Giant vs. Southern Posse

Always get stoked for some Southern Posse, or as I assume they were known backstage, "Sonny Trout and the ugly one". I always get unrealistically excited for a Southern Posse match, but I'm not sure if they're actually any good. They both look scuzzy, the announcers never know their names so they always just call each guy "southern posse" ("The Giant with a big slam on southern posse!"), one of them got a HJ at a Molly Hatchett concert*, just something about them I always get excited about. Rachel was stunned at how slim the Giant was.

3. Mark Starr vs. Ric Flair

I miss these kind of syndicated matches, where Flair would show tons of ass and give guys like Mark Starr 70/30, and then cheat to beat fucking Mark Starr. All the fanny-packed women in the crowd get all riled up and it's always an enjoyable 4 minutes. It's also odd thinking that current Mark Starr probably is living better than current Ric Flair from a quality-of-life perspective. Starr is likely at a nearby lake having some beers and doing some wakeboarding as I type this, whereas Flair is a sad, melty mess not being able to cover his tab at Q104's Summerfest.

4. Lifeguard Steve Collins vs. Bunkhouse Buck

I'll level with you, I have never heard of Lifeguard Steve Collins. You know who else hasn't heard of him? Bunkhouse Buck, so he proceeds to kick the shit out of Lifeguard Steve Collins for getting into his ring. Collins is some sort of Baywatch gimmick, wearing real awkward red swim shorts that are loose and pulled up real high. Fuller and Buck cheat like assholes and Buck was a beast here, with great punches and stomps. Great moment when Buck steps aside from a Collins dropkick, then bounces off the ropes and just lambasts with an amazing dropkick. And then, he gets the pin fall after just stomping on Collins' face. Collins was on his back, Buck bounced off the ropes, slowed down and just stomped his face --> pinfall. Then after the match Buck and Parker beat Collins with his red floatation device and choked him some more. It was all I wanted and more.

5. Hugh Morrus vs. Scott Armstrong

These Hugh Morrus squashes just aren't that good. Armstrong is going to be one of the unsung heroes of syndicated WCW. But there's not much to do to make Morrus matches fun. If you would have asked for a 8 word guess on how the match went, it would have been "Armstrong bumps big, Morrus misses moonsault, pins anyway." It would have been right.

6. Robert Eaton/Dave Taylor vs. American Males

Not the ideal opponents, but you can put Eaton and Taylor into the ring with two sacks of leaves and I'd still be entertained by Eaton's punches and Taylor's throws. And those things ruled here. Taylor had a powerslam that might have been one of the most amazing things I've seen in a ring. It was a powerslam that went straight up overhead from a dead lift and ended with a float over. It was downright Karelinesque. I don't think there was anything Riggs could have done to prevent it, either. If he was fighting it with every fiber of his being, he was getting slammed. Also, I'm going to say it: Bobby Eaton knows how to fake punch a man better than almost any other man. You heard it here first.

*probably

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