RIP Vince

Vince McMahon vs. Ric Flair WWF Royal Rumble 1/20/02

ER: With the news of Vince McMahon and the McMahon Family's swift and sudden death, I thought it would be a good time to write about Vince's best match. While I do remember this era, it's mostly stuff I haven't watched since it originally aired, so you'll have to forgive me that I didn't recall Vince - at his absolute MOST juiced - in a street fight feud with Ric Flair over the ownership of WWF. Flair bought Shane and Stephanie's stock? Sure, who wouldn't trust Ric Flair to provide capital in a transfer of stocks. Doesn't seem so bad in retrospect. It also really feels like leaving good money on the table for Flair to return to WWF for the first time in 10 years, his first appearance since the last ever episode of WCW, as a man who now owns HALF of Vince McMahon's company, bought out right from underneath him...and then two months into this they're already at "Street Fight". Flair's first match in WWF in a decade, is in a feud with the oldest man in the company, STARTING that feud with a Street Fight. Imagine the two of them instead in the Rumble Match itself. You have two 50-50 owners of the company, who are ALSO both former Royal Rumble winners. 

Had the 2002 Rumble match featured Vince McMahon and Ric Flair chasing after each other and not focusing on any other soul in the Royal Rumble, Undertaker and Austin eliminating everyone but getting a real kick out of seeing McMahon and Flair Andy Capp their way through the middle of it all, it could have been better than 1992. Just picture the looks Austin would be capable of giving as he considers whether he wants to eliminate McMahon himself, or let Flair hit him with a 10th chop in the corner. Neither of them had to win, you just could have had them chaotically interrupt the middle of it, and then have them drag each other to elimination. There's enough action going on around them that they would get to peak their interactions in between easily hidden rest breaks, when the attention goes back to Austin or Undertaker. We got robbed of several months of odd couple interaction before a big payoff with two genuine weirdos, because we just go right into a Street Fight challenge from Flair. It takes a bit of luster off your No Holds Barred match six months later when you start with a No Holds Barred match. 

But it turns out nothing actually matters because we got something better than all of that. This was a match that managed to play exactly how you would have expected it to play out, while also exceeding every possible expectation. Flair takes the first bump of the match bouncing across the ring as if Vince was Andre the Giant and, well, Vince *is* pumped full of an ungodly amount of horse testosterone and *does* look like a physical freak. More importantly, he hits Flair so hard with a shoulderblock that it looked like he was using Flair to jam his shoulder back into the socket. Some of their strikes look okay, others look way better than they should. Vince throws a kick to the stomach the way you would throw a kick to the balls, but it's actually a good stomach kick. Vince throws a way better chop than you'd think a partially trained man in his mid 50s should be able to throw, and when he sells several stiff Flair chops by crossing his arms across his chest and running in place on his tip toes, he looked like the world's most jacked John Tatum. 2002 Vince was all about making his offense look as real as possible by doing it real as possible. Vince hits a lariat so fucking hard, that it's like he was cosplaying as JBL vs. Guy Who JBL is Pretending Looked at Him in the Shower. 

The weapons stuff isn't as interesting as the actual stiff ring work, but the sign and chair shots are thrown with bad intentions and they make a nice vehicle for getting Flair bloodied. And once Flair is bloodied, that's when we get Vince throwing full Terry Funk right hands as hard as he can at Flair's forehead, AS Flair is leaning against the barricade. Vince McMahon is throwing full force punches maybe two feet away from some fan's head. That's a pro wrestling visual right there and if I was the owner of the company I would have those punches still in the Raw intro 20 years later. After getting his head punched right next to fans, Flair takes a painfully real bump into the ring steps right in front of his children, then gets body slammed in front of them the way Stan Hansen would bodyslam Rusher Kimura. And then, something unexpectedly amazing happens. 

Vince McMahon is a guy who is famous for being so far in the bubble that he is at minimum a decade behind popular trends, while also being forward thinking enough to build the biggest wrestling company in history. Here, Vince shows how ahead of the trends he can be, when - in 2002 - he takes a selfie with a bloodied Flair, stealing Reed's gigantic camera to take the selfie. This was a camera with all the accessories, like he was a ringside photographer, and this man leaned in for a selfie with a hemorrhaging Ric. Next level Vinsanity. 

Back in the ring, Vince has startlingly good form on his ankle locks, drops knees on Flair's ankle, and punches Flair back to the mat any time he sits up. Flair has not wrestled a match in almost a year at this point and he is getting punched in the face multiple times by his new boss. Wrestling is unexplainable to anyone who doesn't have some kind of mental disorder. McMahon takes so much of the match that you wonder if Flair is going to come back at all, or just win by total banana peel, but Flair's late comeback is great. He punches Vince in the balls and takes a ton of chops on the floor, and back to back it's easy to notice one problem with Vince's excellent crybaby John Tatum selling of Flair's chops: It really leaves him nowhere to go creatively when he actually does get hit in the balls. Vince went so big on the chops, but only sells the low blow by rolling to the floor holding his groin. The low blow would have been the time for a Vince bug-eyed gulp, a bit of a Sabado Gigante look right into the camera. Modern WWE matches are nothing but reaction shots, and we needed a big Vince reaction shot here. It's possible his selling was appropriate and he doesn't feel the same kind of pain in his chemically shriveled testicles that you or I would feel. It also turns out we don't need the ball selling, because Flair smacks Vince in the head with a TV monitor and Vince takes one of his greatest all time bumps, flying backward over the announce table ass over crown, legs in the air as he dropped. Flair beats his ass around ringside, gets his daughter to take a picture of the two bloodied old dogs, throws a great mule kick at Vince's crotch, and brains him with the steel pipe that lead to Vince's downfall, and does an applause worthy Flair strut before sinking in the figure 4. This was better than the best possible Flair/Vince match, the perfect clash of old man ego and carny showmanship. It's too bad both men are dead. 

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On Brand Segunda Caida: Vince McMahon

Vince McMahon/Steve Austin vs. The Rock/D-Lo Brown WWF Raw 5/11/98

ER: This was only the second time Vince put himself in a match on Raw, here as Austin's surprise partner. That means Vince was going to stay on the apron the entire time while Austin fought the Nation by himself for nearly 10 minutes. There was no chance Vince was going to do any exchanges with the Rock or D-Lo, although it would have been hilarious in retrospect if D-Lo Brown was the guy tasked with working Vince through exchanges in maybe his first ever match. Peak babyface Austin can do a match like this in his sleep and make it look good, and the crowd stays into every single movement he does the entire match. Vince is limited to a real wrestling strength of his: smirking on the apron like a guy who has it all figured out, every time Austin starts getting outgunned. 

Vince comes in to distract the ref and prevent an Austin tag, wearing his stupid bodybuilding pants while directing Patterson and Brisco. They're smart and don't have any long extended heat segment on Austin, so he always feels like a guy flying back into frame once you think the fight has been broken up. He cuts D-Lo off with an unexpected Thesz press, throws Rock to the floor, conks Patterson and Brisco's heads together, hits Rock with a mean clothesline on the metal ramp (with Rock bumping it on his shoulders like a lunatic), and Austin fighting against the odds was always a very entertaining role for him to shine within. The match ending bedlam was great, with Austin hitting D-Lo with a stunner, Vince coming into the ring and finally getting physically involved by pasting Austin with a stiff arm lariat. Patterson and Brisco try to hold Austin for McMahon but he fights them off (Brisco takes this great flipping bump after Austin punches him away), and suddenly Dustin Rhodes of all people comes out to fight the Nation with DX coming in close behind as we fade out. I remember watching this show with my friends in high school and all of us lost it during the main. All we wanted was Austin kicking ass and handing out stunners. 

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WWECW Workrate Report 5/8/07

So I did not have SyFy when ECW originally started. I didn't get it until a like mid 2009 so really didn't start watching it until it was towards the end. So realistically I've probably only seen 20% of the actual WWECW run, all of it from the end when guys like Christian and Finlay were working it. I'm not familiar with any of the stuff from the first year (or second or third year), don't know if there are any hidden gems or recommended matches, don't know any story lines, nothing. All this stuff is new to me so I'm hoping something fun jumps out. And again, all this stuff is new to me so if I say anything that sounds like I don't know what I'm talking about, it's because I don't know what I'm talking about.

1. CM Punk vs. Marcus Cor Von

This is all so bizarro universe to me, as I was obviously watching WWE during this same time period, but here's Monty Brown coming out to theme music I've never heard while Joey Styles talks about him.   Cor Von seemed massive in TNA and here seems about 15 pounds larger than Punk, maybe. Still Cor Von (gosh this is a stupid name) works over Punk's back nicely by posting him  and tossing him with a sweet overhead belly-to-belly. Punk transitions to control by dodging a Cor Von charge, and instantly Cor Von is selling as much damage as Punk so that's odd. Punk is still selling his ribs in between doing offense, which includes an awful springboard clothesline. I don't remember digging early WWE babyface punk at all, and this is reminding me why. Styles is selling Punk's "broken" ribs in that really fucking obnoxious way that Styles sells things. But holy shit Cor Von hits the Pounce and THAT move still looks great as Punk flings himself into the ropes neck first (with his neck hitting the bottom rope in a nasty way). For a 10 minute match this wasn't very good.

We get Raw highlights all dealing with the Edge/Mr. Kennedy feud which is about as much eyeball poison as a person should be able to handle. If I asked you to name a shittier sounding match off the top of your head, I don't know if you'd be able to.

2. The Sandman vs. Snitsky

Gene Snitsky was a guy who was bad at pro wrestling, but some people enjoyed him because he was "so bad he was good", even though "so bad it's good" isn't actually a thing. What was really annoying about all that, is a few of us who enjoyed Mark Henry around this time got lumped into the same crowd of people ironically liking Snitsky, as if we were only liking him to be kewl or something. At least 95% of those assholes know how awesome Mark Henry is now. For all I know Snitsky may have died a couple years ago. I do remember that when he moved to ECW he changed his look, which meant shaving his thinning/receding roidz 'do (and his eyebrows) and purposely making his teeth yellow and jagged. I may only remember one Snitsky match I thought was good (I think I liked a TV match against Matt Hardy) but I gotta give him credit for fully committing to a look. The dude looks gross. Oh, and this match goes 1 minute as Snitsky hits a couple clubbing blows and then whiffs on a big boot and Sandman gets zero offense. So I assume a few original ECW guys were signed to 1 year deals and this was like the end of that 1 year and they just gave not one shit about them anymore?

Extreme Expose are dancing in the ring. I have never witnessed EE but it seems to be perfectly fine in a Nitro Girls type of way. The only thing I remember about them was Meltzer always harping on how bad Kelly Kelly looked compared to the other two (I assume Layla and the other one have more dance training). The crowd - to my surprise - doesn't completely shit on this, which is probably due more to them not overstaying their welcome. I'll take 2 minutes of foxy ladies dancing to "Toxic" over 15 minutes of Abraham Washington.

3. Brian Major vs. Elijah Burke

Well, I have zero memory of Zach Ryder and Curt Hawkins wrestling as "Brett and Brian Major", even though they apparently had a bunch of matches on Smackdown. How is it that I can remember all the Manu matches but not these guys? The first time I remember seeing them was when they were Edge lackeys. I assumed they had never appeared on TV before that. Huh. This was a good short match as Burke stiffed Major up and Major flopped well and leaned into things. I really liked Burke's knees and he had some great kicks to the stomach. Major misses big on a crossbody and then the match ends on a weak note because instead of using his awesome Elijah Express running double knees, he ends it with what is apparently called the Elijah Experience, which is basically The Stroke. So he just grabs the back of Major's head, and throws him to the mat, but it really looks like Major flinging himself face first into the mat. Wah wah.

4. Vince MacMahon, Shane MacMahon and Umaga vs. Rob Van Dam

That is great. So apparently Vince put the title on himself and proclaims himself Mr. Extreme. His strut coming out for this match is epic as he has full on Vince legs, and big swinging arms, occasionally throwing in a pimp limp. He's also wearing his all black gear and doo rag. Shane really is just the best pudgy backyarder. It seems like a miracle he doesn't blow any sequences. When you think back to how horrific David Flair was then Shane practically comes off like prime Misawa. He and RVD actually work really well together and it's satisfying seeing reckless RVD kicks catch Shane in the chin and forehead. Shane throws a couple nice elbow drops, RVD takes a big bump to the floor when Umaga pulls the rope down, and I'm digging this way more than I should be. Vince is great as a Jimmy Hart/Bobby Heenan "forced to compete" guy, except he chose to compete so has an extra layer of hubris running parallel to his chickenshit routine. He's fun running in and trying to pin RVD after Umaga beats him up, scrambling back to the apron while making Vince faces and Don Knotts mannerisms. We get a hot fake finishing sequence with Shane doing a big bump over the top to the floor, and RVD countering Umaga offense in cool ways. The MacMahons cheat to transition back to offense, and Shane actually hits a superplex! Once Umaga hits the big splash off the top and Samoan Spike, Vince freaks out wanting the "hot" tag and then struts around with the belt after the match. I couldn't really say it was a good match, but it was plenty fun for 10 minutes and peaked nicely.


WWECW MASTER LIST

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