SirSmUgly

Show #167 – 23 November 1998 “The one where Bret Hart and Dean Malenko are a drawback and not a benefit, strangely enough” Tony S. welcomes us to the only live weekly wrestling show on television while the Nitro Girls dance, and I think, oh yeah, of course RAW is still taping every other show. The “butts in seats” incident happens because Mankind’s title win was taped. RAW is getting roughly five million people to watch their show each week at this point in late 1998; they really should have cut out the “every other show is taped” schedule at this point. Tony S. has some hot news and updates for us: Kevin Nash won the WW3 Battle Royal. Hulk Hogan will act like a jackass on Leno’s Tonight Show later this week. Just another week in 1998! Mike Enos opens the show against Lex Luger. There’s not much to say about this match. If you know anything about Lex Luger TV matches, you know what this was like. The Wolfpac is very over, though, so the crowd is pretty hot for it. Enos also drills a sweet piledriver for two. You know, there have been better openers, but there have been worse. It was perfectly acceptable wrestling. Luger actually went up top twice, so that’s kinda new, but otherwise, you can probably guess who wins and with what move. (It’s Luger with the Torture Rack just in case you couldn’t guess.) Goldberg trades weak barbs with Konnan and Nash in the parking lot. Goldberg sounds like a doofus. The Nitro opening occurs here, followed by Gene Okerlund standing on the ramp, shilling the company and preparing to talk to new WCW Cruiserweight Champion Billy Kidman. Just when I thought that Juvi and Kidman were out of ideas in the ring, they put on a hell of a match at WW3. Kidman is bad at mic work and is sort of putting me to sleep, but he calls Rey Misterio Jr. out and offers Misterio a title shot tonight. They shake hands and split, but Eddy Guerrero comes out here – DAMMIT – and I guess he has a contract to keep Rey in the lWo or something? How and why would there be contracts to sign with individual stables? The nWo is presented as a different organization, not just another stable. What the fuck? This is dumb, and it gets dumber when Eddy gives Rey a double XL lWo shirt and makes him wear it. Bisch and Sully have driven me to the point that I’m disappointed when Eddy Guerrero shows up on my television. That is, to put it mildly, a fireable offense. Norman Smiley should get a push. See, there are two Norman Smiley signs in the front row! Smiley grabs one which declares him to be a favorite of the fan holding it. Smiley’s not winning tonight, but I have reasonably high expectations for his six-minute TV match tonight because he’s facing Chris Benoit. Smiley wins a go behind, snap mares Benoit, and kicks him in the spine, which pisses Benoit off; Benoit gets up and slaps the guy. Smiley wins a knuckle lock, tosses Benoit, and hits a BIG WIGGLE. Benoit is not appreciative of the lascivious dancing, to say the least. He beats down Smiley and snot rockets him. These fellas are slapping each other like they actually don’t like one another. Smiley’s heeling tonight, which means that he’s doing a lot of dancing and posing, which means that he’s giving a guy like Benoit way too much time to recover. After one dance, Smiley gets his Irish whip reversed, and Benoit catches him after he slams into the corner and hits the triple Germans, followed by a flying headbutt and a Crippler Crossface in short order. Honestly, this wasn’t long enough for me. I wanted more. There’s some Nitro Party stuff and stills of WW3, and I only really snap back when the AHWOOOO hits and Nash, Luger, and Konnan come to the ring. Everyone plays Catchphrase Roulette. Well, not Luger. Luger doesn’t have any over catchphrases. Nash talks about the perseverance of the Wolfpac, which is short-handed and missing Savage and Sting, and acknowledges a weak Goldberg chant. You know, Nash might be more over than Goldberg tonight, though they’re in Michigan, which explains that. Nash plans to be the one in how-many-ever-wins-WCW-says-Goldberg-has-now and one. Nash leaves the ring and walks backstage, where Gene Okerlund catches up to him and asks about his relationship with Scott Hall. Nash basically doesn’t trust Hall, but as he explains this lack of trust, Goldberg walks by, tosses another weak barb, and sounds like a man who is going to get rolled on the mic by Kevin Nash over the next month. Tokyo Magnum should have a theme he can groove to, not “generic East Asian track #34,” dammit. Magnum faces Kanyon in what should be at least a fun little TV match. Or uh, he would be facing Kanyon if Kanyon came out here when his music played. We go backstage where Raven is pouting and doesn’t wanna go out there, Kanyon can’t make him! Kanyon is not supportive of Raven’s inability to get past his mommy issues. Yeah, Raven’s trauma dumping all over you Kanyon, tell him to get a therapist or get fucked. Kanyon is so troubled by Raven’s behavior and refusal to join him in the ring that he can’t even get excited to ask everyone WHO BETTA THAN HIM? He’s so troubled, in fact, that Magnum gets the jump on him and gets two on a schoolboy. Kanyon hits a second-rope side Russian (!) to reverse a series of Magnum corner punches and peppers Magnum with strikes after Magnum kicks out of a pinfall attempt. However, Magnum keeps sneaking flash pinfall attempts in there; Kanyon is clearly rattled and realizes that he needs to get a win and get out of dodge before he’s on the wrong end of an upset, so he blocks a hip toss attempt and drills a Flatliner ASAP. Yeah, that was a fun little thing. There’s a Nitro Girls dance. Larry Z. asks Tony S., “Can you do that with your thing?” in response to something that Tygress does (and which gets a sizable pop). I’ll leave what Tygress did to get that pop and to get Larry Z. to ask the question up to mystery and your imagination, you fucking sicko. It’s a Glacier appearance. There was a time that I thought that I was interested in Glacier appearances, but actually what I was really interested in was James Vandenberg, Mortis, and Wrath appearances. Glacier’s going to lay down for Bobby Duncum Jr., probably, in this mid-off between two guys who I don’t give a fuck about. Well, Glacier trying to inspire Norman Smiley, I’ll give a fuck about, but that's not for a couple of years. They do some decent-enough work, have a little ringside brawl per the style of the time, and Duncum is never really in much danger. Glacier is always a step behind. Ew, there’s a terrible punch and soft DDT from Duncum that gets two, but should have gotten zero because it was complete ass. Duncum wins shortly after with a front Russian leg sweep. Gene Okerlund introduces the Giant to the ring for an interview. It’s nice that they remembered how much Kevin Nash and the Giant hate each other in storyline; Okerlund asks the Giant about Nash spearheading the gang attempt that dumped him from the ring in the previous night’s battle royale. The Giant cuts an, uh, suboptimal promo in which he challenges Goldberg for the World title (again) so that he can take it into Starrcade to fight Nash. The Giant says “damn” and “balls” and has to stop himself from saying “chickenshit.” It’s edgy in a very WCW way, I suppose. The Giant should have jobbed to Goldberg months ago, but I guess since he’s shoot vocal about heading to New York at this point in his run, they’re finally going to do what they should have done months ago. Saturn faces Silver King next. Saturn grabs a mic before the match and threatens/challenges Ernest Miller. Saturn will get something good out of Miller, who needs reps with good wrestlers badly. Then, as Saturn promised Silver King before he challenged Miller, Saturn beats up Silver King. I think Silver King is a sneaky good JttS in this era of WCW, actually. This is a pretty entertaining semi-competitive squash. Saturn’s quite over as a mid-card ass kicker. Before Saturn can finish off Silver King, Ernest Miller and Sonny Onoo come onto the ramp to taunt Saturn. Miller: “I’m big, bad, and I’m beautiful!” Guy in crowd: AND YOU SUCK. Miller and Onoo kept talking, did what some might charitably call a comedy routine, and left, but that didn’t keep Saturn from going back to beating up Silver King and landing a DVD for the win. Miller refused the challenge, by the way. There are some more PPV stills to hype up that Goldberg/Giant match for later tonight. Rey Misterio Jr. comes to the ring next for his Cruiserweight Championship match against Billy Kidman. Rey hits a Bronco Buster, which seems like a heel move, actually, but then again, it’s the ‘90s and anything goes for babyface behavior. Rey and Kidman spill outside on a Misterio Frankensteiner; they have a flippy cruiserweight version of a ringside brawl. Well, that’s different! Seriously, it’s an interesting variation on the typical punch/kick/whip into the stairs stuff that you see in almost every match from this time period (especially in the WWF). Back in the ring, Kidman struggles to keep control. Rey hits a sick dropkick on Kidman’s knee and follows up with a second-rope Rocker Dropper for two. Rey whips Kidman to the corner, but ends up getting crossbodied for two. Again, Kidman’s control doesn’t last long as he whiffs on a crossbody, lands at ringside, and gets seated senton splashed in the bargain. Misterio tries to follow up with a springboard rana back in the ring to end it, but Kidman lands a desperation counter dropkick that gets two. Kidman goes to a seated abdominal stretch, which makes a lot of sense in kayfabe because Rey was easily outmaneuvering him when they were standing or in the air. And again, when Kidman lets off and gets to standing, he gets booted on a corner charge, though he rips off a counter powerslam on a charging Rey for two. After another counter-filled change in the corner, Rey tries a moonsault that Kidman catches, but Rey bails out before he can get slammed or piledriver and lands, um, some kind of facebuster from an odd position. Mike T. and Larry Z. are impressed. This match continues to go back and forth; Rey lands a facebuster after being popped up into the air for a sitout slam. Rey tries to go to the air but gets caught in the corner; he works out of the jam and lands a sunset flip powerbomb for another two count. You know what, this match is laid out really well. Everything feels logical. Kidman lands his signature springboard bulldog and goes up for an SSP, but Misterio cuts him off and lands a superplex. Rey tries anther springboard rana, but Kidman catches him and completes the sitout slam this time. Eddy Guerrero creeps down to the ring, but Kidman dropkicks him off the apron and splashes him. The ref is drawn by that and doesn’t notice the lWo’s newest member, Juventud Guerrera, sneaking into the ring from the other side and sending a message to Rey by landing a Juvi Driver. Kidman is finished with Eddy and turns his attention back to Rey, sees him still down in perfect position for an SSP, and lands it for three. Very good match even with the end-of-match gaga. Gene Okerlund is standing in the ring with waste of space Eric Bischoff. Bisch is here to continue this shitty Bisch/Flair feud. Bisch promises to end their feud with a confrontation tonight; then, he reiterates that he’s the boss and that the beatdown that Scott Hall caught from nWo Hollywood at last night’s PPV is proof of that. Ric Flair enters the ring to respond. Flair can be entertaining on the mic in his sleep, so obviously this is perfectly acceptable stuff even with that black hole of entertainment Bischoff across from him. Bisch is like ACKNOWLEDGE ME (as the leader of this company) and Flair burns him by saying that he’ll acknowledge that even a man as great as Ted Turner makes a mistake every once in a while. It was a really good burn. Bischoff says that he refuses to add Barry Windham to the payroll since he runs the place, and then Windham comes out here. Is this the most obvious set-up ever? We all know what’s going to happen. There’s no need for Okerlund to lampshade it by saying something about the Horsemen running together forever. Anyway, Bisch slaps Flair; Flair punches the crap out of Bischoff. Windham, in a shocker, jumps Flair and beats the crap out of him. A few crowd members chant BULLSHIT while Bicsh and Windham commence with a beatdown. Yeah, I know, you just want to see the good guys win for once. Wait, fellas, at least here come the Horsemen for the save, and—oops, no, they’re jumped by a bunch of B-Teamers and beaten up. This got heat, and I think some of it was good, but some of it seems tired, like it’s of the “can our guys just get a win already?” variety. The desk is shocked that the bad guys won again for a bit, but soon enough, Konnan comes to the ring to hit the ol’ catchphrase roulette. His opponent tonight is Booker T. A black fan in the crowd wearing a homemade Jericho Personal Security shirt holds up a REUNITE HARLEM HEAT sign. WCW and disappointing black fans by breaking up their favorite black tag teams – name a more iconic duo. But seriously, though, this Booker babyface push is going well, though I’m not sure anyone wants to boo Konnan tonight. Booker overpowers Konnan early and wins a shoulderblock. Konnan hits a rolling clothesline at half speed, so Booker slows it down with a knuckle lock and then lands a back elbow for two. This match is not going to be good because Booker works better with explosive athletes and not very slow wrestlers with awkward offense. We’re not getting a charming uniquity out of this one. Konnan lands a back kick and a sitout facebuster, but he doesn’t even try for a Tequila Sunrise and Booker goes back on offense, landing an axe kick and Spinaroonie-ing up to see his brother Stevie Ray on the apron. Stevie hits Konnan with the slapjack, drawing a DQ win for Konnan. Stevie and Booker have a short repartee in which Booker wants Stevie to go about his business and leave him alone, but as we all know, Stevie is not going to do that. After that beatdown of the Horsemen, Bischoff declared that while the Horsemen were kicked out of the building, Malenko was an exception because Malenko would be facing the Hitman later in the show. Bret comes down to the ring to talk to Gene Okerlund right now. The Hitman claims that he was screwed by a cheap DDP victory at WW3, and also he hates the fans. Even doing this sort of boilerplate heel stuff while half-engaged, this guy is pretty entertaining. Is this the match where Malenko injures Bret trying to lift him onto the buckles? Bret promises to come after Page and the United States title again at some point before leaving. It's hour number three, and that means that it’s time for Kevin Nash to end Wrath’s recent undefeated streak. Yeah, Wrath lost to Glacier and Ernest Miller, so I don’t think Nash beating him is all that amazing or all that much of a momentum killer. Plus, as much as I like Wrath, he is absolutely not Goldberg. Maybe it’s just me. I do think that Nash got onto the booking committee and went mad with power, though. I enjoy Nash a lot as a performer, but there’s zero sense in having him book a show that he is also performing on. It seems like anyone should be able to guess that Nash would immediately book himself on top. In truth, Nash is way over, and it's fine that he’s on top, but still, you don’t want to give Nash himself the leeway to book himself on top. It’s improper. Wrath makes a rude gesture toward Nash. Nash crotch chops in response. The crowd cheers. Wrath wins a bunch of strikes to start and is able to reverse Nash’s momentum with a snap kick and a dropkick that sends Nash to the floor. Nash reconsiders his strategy, then re-enters the ring. Nash’s reconsidered strategy: Throw a bunch of knees and maybe a soupbone or two. Wrath squirms out of the back of a slam attempt and hits a back suplex, then a diving clothesline from the top for a 2.7, maybe a 2.8. As close to a 2.9 as you can get when your timing is nearly perfect. Wrath gets two more off a series of elbowdrops. He hits some punches in the corner and tries to whip Nash, but he follows Nash into the corner and eats a boot, then a side slam. Wrath runs the ropes and again turns the tide with a diving shoulderblock, but he just can’t out strike Nash, who wins a counter lariat and a big boot before pulling down the straps and landing a Jackknife for three. Gonna be honest, that is not the worst way to end Wrath’s little winning streak. I think there was chatter about how selfish this was at the time, but that was a competitive match and Nash sells that Wrath was a challenge after he wins. It was solid. Maybe I’m too forgiving because I like Nash, though. Gene Okerlund is in the ring yet again, this time to interview Chris Jericho. Jericho comes out here looking like he’s starring in Eraserhead. That hairdo is positively Lynchian. The black dude wearing the homemade JPS shirt has replaced his sign requesting a Harlem Heat reunion with one declaring that he's wearing a WARDROBE BY RALFUS [sic]. Okerlund mumbles on the hot mic, “I can’t say anything” in reference to Jericho’s hair, and it makes me laugh. Dear reader, I cannot express enough to you how over Jericho is. The number of Jericho (and Ralphus) signs is wild. Jericho as a cowardly heel World Champion with Ralphus and an actual huge bodyguard to watch his back would have been amazing. That’s a huge missed opportunity on WCW’s part. Jericho chastises the fans for not cheering enough for him lately, can’t properly pronounce Bobby Duncum Jr.’s last name, calls Stu Hart a “crazy old wizard,” and says that even though he hates cowboys, he could easily “rustle up some vittles.” This is the rare situation in which everyone tried to do comedy, including the fans, and it worked. Duncan Duncum comes out here with a hogtied Ralphus and dumps him in the aisle; Jericho freaks out. There’s a commercial break. When we come back, Jericho is still trying to untie Ralphus in the aisle, but Scott Hall comes out to the nWo Hollywood music, so Jericho decides that discretion is the better part of valor and leaves Ralphus in the aisle. Unfortunately, the commentary desk also tries to be funny, what with all the fake laughter and bad jokes, and they fail. Oh well, getting that much genuine funny from WCW in the first place was good enough. Hall requests that the truck cut the theme music and then gets in the ring and declares that he is giving his final survey. He knows that everyone wants to see the nWo. As for nWo Hollywood, he says that it's bogus that he's been kicked out of the nWo since he started it “by himself," and that he has no problem running by himself. As for the nWo Wolfpac, he says that he doesn’t have anything to prove to Kevin Nash; he only has something to prove to himself. He declares that the next thing he will prove to himself is that he kicks ass at the pro grapz by beating Alex Wright. Wright comes out, runs down the stupid Americans in the crowd (bad move because this gets the mutants to hit a U-S-A chant while he’s in control), and gets in the ring. Also, he dances, but you probably guessed that. Even though Hall’s break with nWo Hollywood is total nonsense that got ginned up out of nowhere, people want to cheer him and the idea of Hall as a tweener bully is enticing. Of course, Hall is going to be in no condition to perform so much that he gets sent home pretty soon, so that never would have come to fruition, but the idea is certainly something that I wouldn’t mind seeing. Hall and Wright have a solid TV match. Hall survives a decent patch of Wright control, punches his way out of trouble, and lands a fallaway slam and a Razor’s Edge for the win. Dean Malenko’s selling that Horace the Younger leg attack from earlier tonight as he comes to the ring to face Bret Hart. Tony S. tells Bobby H. “stifle yourself.” Then he calls Mike T. a meathead. No, wait, only the first of those things happened. Bret goes right at the injured leg and works the knee. If you like a choke-and-kick offense, the Hitman’s got you covered. Malenko fights back with forearms and punches. They do a shitty cradle spot, but at least the commentators can say that Malenko’s lack of leg strength explains the shitty cradle he tried. The Hitman rolls outside and catches his breath. There’s a break. We come back to the Hitman begging off and Malenko hitting punches in the corner. Malenko lands a short clothesline and a vertical suplex, but sells that it put too much pressure on his knee to get Bret up and over. The delayed cover gets two. Malenko hits another cradle right into the ropes. This match sorta stinks. Bret’s really been on autopilot. I mean, the good thing about it is that even on autopilot, his shit is crisp. The bad thing about it is that he’s only as entertaining as his opponent, and sometimes even his opponent isn’t enough to get things all fired up. Page tried, but they didn’t have a notable match of their two recent bouts. We get a standing ten count after the Hitman misses an elbow. Malenko’s up first and gets a sleeper. Bret eventually counters with a back suplex, but it’s not much of a counter because Malenko hangs onto the sleeper. It’s a visually muddy spot, and the crowd responds by asking/requesting/harassing some lady in the audience to share a quick viewing of her boobs with the crowd. There’s a tiny pop at some point that makes me think she did it, but really quickly. Don't give in to the social pressure, sis. Anyway, did you know that this match sorta stinks? It goes on for what feels like forever. It’s just on and on with chokes and guys kicking each other’s knees and shit. And yeah, Malenko injures Bret’s groin by trying to hang him up on the top rope and failing miserably. A few dudes in the crowd chant BO-RING while Bret lays around on the floor holding said injured groin. Hey fellas who read this, I think that Dean Malenko kinda sucks. He was useful in establishing the Cruiserweight division as a base for the high flyers, but I don’t think we need this guy to get a bigger push as part of the Horsemen. He hasn't been a positive on television since the Jericho feud, in my humble opinion. This match is STILL GOING. Bret gets to the ropes on a Texas Cloverleaf, and then they fight over a chair outside, and after that, Malenko hits a missile dropkick back in the ring for two. Finally, Bret clips Malenko’s leg as Malenko tries to leapfrog him, bashes Malenko’s knee against a post, and then hits a bulldog onto the chair that got brought in from outside. The Hitman prepares to Pillmanize Malenko, and Diamond Dallas Page runs out of the crowd. Page eats a chair shot, but dodges another one and tries to hit a Diamond Cutter that the Hitman blocks. Page just punches the guy out of the ring in response. This was the worst possible match that involves the Hitman, Dean Malenko, and DDP that you could possibly imagine. Wait, I spoke too soon; Page gets on the mic and calls the Hitman “Bret ‘HitSCUM’ Hart.” OK, now it's the worst possible match involving those three, and also, shut the fuck up, Page. Page refuses to shut up and calls Bret a wuss. This didn't sorta stink; it completely sucked and I hated it. Page challenges Bret to a match next week on Nitro. I’m downgrading my expectations for that match from “decent” to “barely adequate” considering that the already disinterested Hitman also now has a shoot groin injury. Goldberg comes out here to bring some life back to this show by steamrolling the Giant (on jobber entrance because we’re on overrun/Giant’s recently been to Connecticut to visit Vinnie Mac so fuck 'im). Goldberg kicks out of a chokeslam, eats a couple of chops for dinner, and then murders the dude with a spear and a Jackhammer in a couple minutes, and the high of that demolition (and that Jackhammer, which was a complete visual spectacle) is immediately brought back to a mediocre low by WCW insisting that Bam Bam Bigelow is a legitimate threat to Goldberg in 1998. I like Bammer, but no, this is not 1988, and it’s not the spot for him. There’s a huge pull-apart at the end, but that’s not going to make me want to see Goldberg/Bam Bam in 1998. Kevin Nash comes out to face off with Goldberg after security carts Bam Bam away, which is actually a hot pull-apart. This show had some missteps, and Bret/Malenko was a new low in Bret’s WCW run, but most of it was pretty enjoyable. As usual, if you can ignore all the shitty angles and below-average mic work from most of the guys on this show, you can derive some fun out of the faux fisties. Say what you will about late-stage WCW, but they’ve still got a lot of diverse and interesting in-ring talent at this point. Uh, except for Bret and Malenko, somehow. 2.75 out of 5 Stinger Splashes.

Big Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo vibes.

Gonna be honest, if I didn't enjoy the art of people who didn't like my skin color, I'd enjoy like zero art. Especially of the pro wrestling variety. If you don't get over some of that stuff and just enjoy the work, you'll drive yourself crazy and never enjoy anything.

Everyone wanted a 2v2 or 3v3 game and got a wet fart. Having Red Earth characters in the game is cool, but not re-drawing the Darkstalkers sprites is very uncool. Look at Leo standing next to Morrigan or Hauser standing next to Jedah. Absurd. Fuck that game.

Horace was an okay midcard worker, and I don't think being over pushed as an nWo B-Teamer deserves this sort of vitriol.

Bischoff being a cold-hearted bastard is no surprise, the way he talks about some of the talent on 83 Weeks. The irony is that the guy derides Ed Leslie for being a barnacle clinging to the S.S. Hulk Hogan, but doing that himself is essentially what accounts for a massive chunk of Bischoff's career post-WCW, so... Anyway, if you're not a big enough name that Bisch wants to ride bikes with you and forge a future business partnership with you, you might as well be invisible to that guy.

That tweet is the funniest thing Hogan's ever written or said. Classic.

Survivor Series ’98: Deadly Game notes: We’ve made it to the final show in the WWF’s Big Five PPVs of 1998 IN REVIEWWWWWWW series I've been working on. This Survivor Series isn’t a team tournament; rather, we have fourteen wrestlers trying to SURVIVE a SERIES of singles matches en route to the WWF Championship. See what I did there? This is one of my favorite PPVs of all time and the shining jewel in Vince Russo’s career as a creative talent, by the way, for whatever credit Russo should get for his input into this show. Right now, I have the Big Five of 1998 in this order in terms of quality: SummerSlam > Royal Rumble > WrestleMania > King of the Ring. Survivor Series won’t do any worse than second, but I suppose that SummerSlam was so good that there’s a chance it could replace Survivor Series at the top. A small chance, but a chance! The Undertaker and Kane get byes in this tournament, which is fine by me as that means one fewer Kane match to watch. Mr. McMahon is in a wheelchair and selling an ankle injury. Either he’s being indicted by the feds and needs to drum up sympathy, or Stone Cold Steve Austin beat the shit out of him recently. McMahon introduces his apparent protégé Mankind. Mankind stumbles out here in a tux and holding the Hardcore Championship. What a visual! Mankind hugs Vince, and Vince’s face screams disgust in a way that is hilarious. Mankind is facing a mystery opponent in this first round of the tournament, and as Vince takes out his note cards to introduce said opponent, the crowd chants HBK HBK HBK. Hahaha, you sweet summer children. McMahon gives a stirring ring introduction for a person who is “currently the coach of the Pasadena Chargers, the man, the myth” Duane Gill. Gill is thrilled by his Titantron, which is just clips of him getting his ass kicked. His pyro goes off. It terrifies him. This is so dumb in the best way possible. The crowd boos because they feel ripped off, but it works because they realize how dumb they are for thinking that Vince was going to give Mankind an opponent the caliber of Shawn Michaels. Mankind wins it with a half-nelson and a rollup in about thirty seconds and moves on to the quarters. The poor bastard shaved his face to make Vince happier, by the way. We see video of Jacqueline clobbering Sable in the head on Sunday Night Heat followed by Sable only semi-woodenly telling Kevin Kelly that Jacqueline pissed her off and that she will take Jacqueline’s Women’s Championship from her tonight. She flings an ice pack and storms out of the interview. Jeff Jarrett (w/Debra) faces Al Snow for a chance to meet Mankind in the quarterfinal of this tournament. Debra dresses down Tim White in advance, just in case. Then after Jarrett calms her down, she dresses down Howard Finkel instead. Man, Debra’s in ace form tonight. Snow stalks Debra, what with being a creepy dude and all, and then Snow hits Jarrett when Jarrett chases him down. Snow lands a senton off the stairs and a springboard guillotine before the bell even rings. This is a perfectly cromulent match. Snow whiffs on a top-rope guillotine legdrop and they trade flash pinfall attempts and counters for two counts. After Snow and Jarrett clash heads, Debra tries to give Head to Jarrett as a weapon. This draws Tim White over, and that allows Al Snow to grab Jarrett’s guitar. Snow swings the guitar at Jarrett but whiffs; Jarrett hits Snow in the back of the head with Head, but he doesn’t catch him entirely. Jarrett points the guitar out to White, who clears it from the ring. Jarrett tries to use White being distracted by the guitar to pop Snow another one with Head, but Snow boots Jarrett in the mush, picks Head up after Jarrett drops the poor disembodied mannequin piece, and clobbers Jarrett with it for three. Next up, the plot thickens. So, we’ve come into this show with the Rock seeming to have completed a face turn and Vince reluctantly backing Mankind as his corporate champion. Mankind has already been afforded a career jobber as his first opponent of the night, so the fix appears to be in, even considering how little Vince actually likes Mankind. Or can stand the sight of Mankind, for that matter. Now, we get the Big Boss Man heading to the ring to face Stone Cold Steve Austin, the latter of whom is of course McMahon’s biggest enemy. Get Austin out of the tournament, that’s the first thing McMahon cares about. Getting Rocky out of the tournament is ostensibly the second thing. Boss Man meets Austin in the aisle, throwing fists, and Austin wins that punch-up and kicks the hell out of the guy. This show is pretty Bowdlerized. The phrase “Piss[ed] off” is bleeped, for one, and for two, they blur Austin throwing up the middle fingers as he drops an elbow. It’s the Attitude Era, they do way worse than minor impolite words and middle fingers, come on now. Boss Man takes over with a low blow and picks right up where he left off in his failed crusade against the nWo earlier in the year. That is to say, he hits some shitty offense that ends up being broadly ineffective against his much more resilient opponent. Vinnie Mac and his stooges watch the match backstage on the split screen and are excited about this, um, Boss Man headlock that I’m sure is going to stop Steve Austin in his tracks. Austin makes a comeback and Boss Man has had quite enough of that shit, thank you very much, and grabs his truncheon so that he can beat the crap out of Austin with it. Austin wins the match and moves to the quarters, but he doesn’t look like much of a winner after that beatdown. Aw, Lawler just said the same thing right after I typed it; how unoriginal am I? Michael Cole interviews Vince backstage and asks whether or not Vince is worried about Austin advancing in the tournament. Vince is not worried at this point considering that whole “Boss Man beat the shit out of Austin with a nightstick” dealie that just happened. X-Pac – our current European Champion, might I add – comes to the ring for a shot at facing Stone Cold Steve Austin in the quarters. Now, Vince can control a whole lot of stuff in his company from a kayfabe standpoint, but he can’t control everything. There are just too many variables to consider. For example, he failed to consider the variable that is X-Pac and A REALLLLL MAN’S MANNNNNN Stephen (that’s how they spell it on the chyron!) Regal being so heated over whether or not an American should be able to hold the European championship that they spill out to ringside, lose all track of the ref’s count, and get counted out together. This result sends Steve Austin into the semifinals, which is great for the fans in the crowd and awful for Vinnie Mac and his mooks. Meanwhile, Stephen Regal/X-Pac would have worked better as Steven Regal/Syxx because WWF crowds don’t get excited for holds at this point. Even X-Pac and badly drugged-up Regal working a nothing match on PPV gives a glimmer of something that would be really good over fifteen minutes with a more definitive finish, and I wonder if they ever got that chance. Regal does a lot of neck work that X-Pac has to fight up from so that he can explode, and it’s solid stuff, but all the fans care about is a Bronco Buster. Waltman had a great cumulative showing on the three of the Big Five PPVs he showed up on, by the way. This was the least of his matches on those shows, and I still enjoyed it and wanted to see a longer rematch of this one. Anyway, Mr. McMahon demands that Commissioner Slaughter run out there and start a five minute overtime for the match after the count out, but X-Pac is like FUCK YOU REF, MY NECK HURTS and then Regal runs down the aisle and to the back to chase him anyway, so that overtime doesn’t end up happening/it results in another double count out anyway. McMahon yells AUSTIN GETS A BYE?!, but he’s got more tricks up the sleeve of his well-cut suit, don’t you worry. Ken Shamrock is now the Intercontinental Champion. At some point between SummerSlam and now, Triple H injured a knee and either lost or relinquished the title. Also at some point between SummerSlam and now, Goldust had kayfabe/also shoot (???) issues with Terri, though we don’t get much of that story now. Ross points out that Shamrock has won a major wrestling tournament already this year in the King of the Ring, but that was only two matches in one night, not four like tonight. So, these fellas go at about fifty miles an hour, and it’s great. Do you want to see big guys hit lariats and roundhouse kicks at pace? If you do, you’ll enjoy this bit of fun wrestling. Well, there’s a chinlock in here because Goldust’s conditioning isn’t that good, but still. I mean hell, Goldust reverses a vertical suplex attempt and hits one of his own, and Shamrock is first up, and that feels about right w/r/t conditioning. Shamrock hits a leaping Frankensteiner from the second rope, a belly-to-belly, and locks on an ankle lock for the victory in short order after Goldust tries to traumatize his testes. Now, Mr. McMahon’s got some machinations going on in the background if this event. He’s secretly cut a deal with the Rock to become his corporate champ, but he’s got to hide that deal from everyone else until the time is right to properly pull it off. Solution: Book the Rock against Triple H, and then when HHH doesn’t show up because he’s injured, just send the Big Boss Man out there to slip on a banana peel! The crowd in St. Louis tonight sucks, they’re just awful, but DO YOU SMELL WHAT THE ROCK IS COOKIN’ gets a big pop. As does ARE YOU READY?, but uh, bad news for y’all, it’s just Patterson and Brisco walking out and crotch chopping everyone. Brisco gets a mic and tells us that MISTER MACK-MAHAONNN decrees that Brisco should heavily fine Triple H for a no-show before Patterson grabs the mic and introduces the Boss Man as Trips’s replacement. Jim Ross has a very good night on commentary, and it picks up around now, with his despairing, “But the Big Boss Man’s already been eliminated!” So, Boss Man runs in and immediately gets small packaged for three. The crowd and Jim Ross both get a kick out of that, and IMO, this PPV is so good because the misdirection in the booking works exceptionally. I remember seeing this show the first time around and then after the finish of the show, remembering how this match went down and suddenly, retroactively registering that it was a fix because unlike normally, the WWF’s creative team didn’t feel the need to point it out at the end of the show in some sort of flashback video made just for the end of the PPV. Aw shit, here comes the Undertaker. Wait, let me finish before you ask me why I'm bummed out. Here comes the Undertaker to wrestle Kane in the first quarterfinal match of the show. Apparently, the Brothers of Destruction both got byes because of some bullshit controversy surrounding the world title and their claim to it. Whatever, man, whatever. So, the Undertaker has turned heel and joined up with Paul Bearer again since we last saw the guy. I felt then, and feel now, that while Satanic Undertaker was an amazing iteration of this character, his matches and angles basically all sucked. If we could meld Satanic Undertaker’s character with Biker ‘Taker’s matches, that’d be cool. Alas, we’re going to watch Satanic Undertaker wrestle Kane. This match is the low point of the night, IMO, but I guess it’s an okay-enough plodding brawl. One of the big shockers for me on rewatch is how generally good the work is on these 1998 WWF PPVs. The prevailing narrative is that WCW had a much better undercard than the WWF in terms of work, and that’s just a complete falsity. The WWF’s undercard workers can go as much as WCW’s undercard. The big difference is that the WWF’s main event matches tend to be better. I might complain about Steve Austin and the Undertaker not having much chemistry, but it’s far better than watching Hogan, Warrior, or Piper in 1998. Sting is still pilled up enough that he’s inconsistent in his match quality. Savage has lost three or four steps by the time he destroys the rest of his mobility with a knee injury. The Hitman left the WWF and got jerked around in his booking before being turned heel for no reason, so his work is less than ideal because you can just tell the guy doesn't have the fire for his WCW run. Goldberg is still learning. Nash is inconsistent. The Giant's been de-pushed. In 1998, Diamond Dallas Page is the best main event worker in the company by a significant amount. I enjoy DDP a lot, but he is not the guy you want as your best main event worker. Anyway, honestly, this is fine. The Undertaker tries really hard and his control segment is active, specifically because he does the little things like work a legbar by laying in soupbones so that Kane can’t fight out of it. Eventually, we get a double-goozle. Kane wins that exchange with a chokeslam, but Paul Bearer distracts Kane, and the Undertaker sits up and grabs Kane in a Tombstone for three. Kane punches the ref in frustration on his way out of the ring. Mankind continues what he thinks is his night-long coronation as WWF World Champion by shuffling to the ring to face Al Snow. Someone stole Mr. Socko and planted the guy around Head’s temple, which is sure to piss off Mankind and drive him on to victory when he realizes it. Mick’s out here still wrestling in that tux because that’s his idea of being classy. What makes this work so well is that poor Mick is trying his best to be what Mr. McMahon wants him to be, but it’s just not who he is, man, I feel bad for him. He should love himself more. Snow swings a chair and doesn’t get DQ’d even though he connects with Mankind. Did Mr. McMahon give Jimmy Korderas his directions or not? No, I guess McMahon didn’t feel that he needed to because on the split-screen, he reveals that he's the one who had Mr. Socko kidnapped and plantedon Head. In fact, Snow grabs Head and swings for the fences; Mankind ducks it, drops Snow with an atomic drop, and then sees Head wearing his precious Socko. Mankind retrieves Socko and attacks Head with strikes – yes, that is exactly what happened – and this allows Snow to get the jump on Mankind. Snow gets maybe a 2.5 off a Sky High, but he shoots Mankind into the ropes shortly after, ducks down, and gets double-arm DDT’d. Mankind pops Mr. Socko on his arm and then pops the Mandible Claw on Al Snow for the win. That sets up a Mankind/Stone Cold semifinal clash. The Rock and Ken Shamrock face off on their fourth of the Big Five WWF PPVs this year. This match will be the least of those matches, but at this point, they’ve worked one another that they’ll do something entertaining through sheer experience. Do you think it burned Ken Shamrock up in kayfabe that after all that bullshit trying to get the IC title off the Rock, and then finally getting that title, the Rock just up and won the World title - and beat him to do it? If I were him, I’d be kayfabe perpetually AHHHH IN THE ZONE if things shook out that way. Shamrock and the Rock work this match at a quick pace. Shamrock gets two on a floatover vertical suplex, then hits a couple Irish whips before the Rock explodes out of the corner with a lariat. They end up outside, where they toss each other into stuff at ringside. Shamrock gets the best of that exchange and, back in the ring, stomps the Rock’s fingers and lands a leg lariat and a side Russian leg sweep for two. Shamrock locks on a chinlock and the Big Boss Man saunters back out. Boss Man brings his truncheon, which he eventually seems to toss toward Ken Shamrock. But darn it, wouldn’t you know it, his aim is juuuuuust off and actually he hits the Rock square in the hands with the dang thing. Before that, the Rock has to survive an ankle lock in the center of the ring, showing a lot of babyface fire by getting to the ropes. I mean, theoretically, he showed babyface fire, assuming he were actually a babyface. So, after that, the Rock makes a comeback, and the crowd creams their collective jeans for the People’s Elbow, which only gets 2.9. The Rock tries to hook a Rock Bottom next, but Shamrock reverses it into a belly-to-belly, which is when the Boss Man decides to intervene and help the Rock out a little bit. You know what? I lied. This was not the least of their matches on these shows. This was clearly better than the KotR match. I’ll put the Rock/Shamrock Big Five of ’98 Quadrilogy in this order, from best to not best: Royal Rumble > WM > Survivor Series > KotR. Paul Bearer cuts a quickie promo on the Rock after the match. It’s delightfully goofy. Sable heads to the ring to face Jacqueline (w/Marc Mero) for the WWF Women’s Championship. Mero helped Jacqueline win the gold a couple months back by giving Jacqueline some leverage when Sable tried to suplex her. Shane McMahon is your ref for this match. I always forget that he did some reffing as a part of a false “feuding with dad” angle. This match is nonsense. Sable is consistently booked like Goldberg, and tonight is no difference. She hits a TKO on Jacqueline thirty seconds in; Mero pulls her away from the cover from his spot at ringside, so she rolls under the ropes and then boots and powerbombs Mero. Are you kidding me? Eventually, she has to do some cursory (terrible) selling. Sable is actually a quite good athlete, but boy, does she come off as an unsympathetic character. There is zero reason to be invested in her success. Jacqueline tries a tornado DDT after a couple minutes of choke-focused offense, but Sable tosses her to the mat and then lands a Sable Bomb for the three and the gold. So based on the transitive property, how long would it take Sable to mow down Disco Inferno in a singles match, do you think? Mankind makes his third showing of the night to face off with Stone Cold Steve Austin for a shot at the finals. He’s relatively fresh, considering that his first match took about thirty seconds and his second match featured the completely hapless Al Snow as his opponent. Stone Cold has only wrestled once, but that nightstick beating has him selling a left arm injury…but only until he gets in the ring, as he immediately unloads on Mankind with both arms. Stone Cold goes to town on Mankind while Mr. McMahon is wheeled out by his toadies. I don’t have a lot of desire to watch the other seven WWF PPVs from 1998, but Austin’s ’98 in the main event has been somewhat underwhelming. The Over the Edge match against Foley is a masterpiece of main event overbooking, and the match against Michaels at WrestleMania is very good, but I’m not sure the guy has much else to hang his hat on when it comes to PPV. This match against Mankind is fine. Austin takes a backdrop in the aisle. It’s not like he’s not trying in these matches. They have a requisite ringside brawl, and then Mankind locks on what could be the worst chinlock/neck vise I’ve ever seen in my life for a minute before Austin works out of it. He'd damned well better work out of that loose-looking vise. The match does pick up after this, but I think part of the issue is that everyone’s attention is halfway on Mr. McMahon sitting there, directing his goons. What’s he going to do? After Mankind charges Austin with a chair and Austin kicks it into his face, it looks like Stone Cold is ascendant. Alas, he misses a splash against the ropes and gets double-arm DDT’d onto the chair by Mankind, but only for a 2.9. Mankind goes for a stump piledriver onto the chair, but Austin gets piledriven about as often as Kidman gets powerbombed at this point. Austin reverses it and hits a Stone Cold Stunner for one, two, thr—oops, what McMahon is going to do is attack the ref. OK, time for some gaga. Mankind is coming out of his tux pants, but he perseveres and sinks in a Mandible Claw. So, having Shane McMahon come out here to ref the previous match was genius, as it lulled everyone into a false sense of security, because he runs down to replace Tim White as Austin escapes the Mandible Claw with a Stone Cold Stunner. Shane counts the one, two thr—oops, Shane stops the count and hits Austin with the double birds. Austin is totally flustered at this point. He’s so flustered, in fact, that he quickly gets an Irish whip reversed and eats a Mankind clothesline. That disorients him enough that Gerry Brisco has time to hop in the ring and hit an incredibly weak chair shot that puts Austin down for a three count that Shane is there to make. If you are wondering why I hold a PPV in such high esteem when the match quality is probably the lowest of any of the other Big Five shows from this year, this is why. The gaga isn't just gaga, but it's well-designed gaga that is so essential to the story they’re telling. It’s a show where the big bad’s master plan gets pulled off perfectly. That they had Shane on TV as a ref and in fact had him show up to ref the previous match so that it wasn’t suspicious when he ran out to relieve Tim White is just perfection. There’s also the stuff where Vinnie Mac was feuding with Shane as a false front before this show. Then consider all the Boss Man “failures” in vanquishing the Rock that were retrospectively by design; those are just as good. This tournament is a booking masterpiece, I tell you. Anyway, Vince and company escape the scene of the conspiracy against Austin post-haste. Austin carjacks a dude in the back and takes off after Vince’s limo once the match is over. The Undertaker heads to the ring to await the Rock’s arrival. The Rock opens up with punches, but misses a lariat and gets his ass kicked. You might be shocked to hear this, but there’s a ringside brawl part in this match. There are also punches. A lot of punches. So many punches. Paul Bearer hits the Rock with his shoe behind the ref’s back. The Big Boss Man saunters back out to make sure that the Rock doesn’t have any slip-ups. The Rock punches Undertaker in the dick, slams him, and goes for a People’s Elbow. Boss Man has to sell that the Rock is his enemy, so he grabs the Rock’s foot on the rope run, but he also distracts the Undertaker, too, and besides, Kane has already been enlisted to get the Undertaker disqualified in revenge for the loss earlier tonight. In fact, here comes Kane to chokeslam the Rock, which gets 'Taker disqualified and ushers Rocky into the finals to face Mankind. The Undertaker takes a moment, has it dawn on him what Kane’s just done to his chance to become champion, and then – and you won’t believe this – punches Kane a lot. They fight back through the crowd. Michael Cole interviews Mankind backstage. Mankind wears an ugly jacket and says IF YOU SMELL WHAT THE SOCK IS COOKIN' while holding up Mr. Socko. This fucking guy. The New Age Outlaws come to the ring to defend the WWF Tag Team Championships in a triple threat tag match against the Headbangers and D’Lo Brown & Mark Henry. A whole damned row of the crowd holds up a giant banner with Road Dogg’s entire pre-match spiel on it. That’s kind of impressive. A woman in the crowd offers to trade oral sexual favors with everyone in DX on her sign. That’s less impressive, but okay. Billy Gunn spots the giant banner and gets a huge kick out of it. Apparently, there’s an ongoing angle where Mark Henry is suing Chyna for sexual harassment. THIS FUCKING COMPANY. Also, the edit of this show is so weird. We just cut from Henry and D’Lo coming to the ring to Gunn and D’Lo locking up. Anyway, it’s a triple threat tag match, so by its very nature, it's sub-optimal. This is the worst match type, non-physical gimmick division. This match in particular is an imminently watchable version of a bad match type. Part of the reason is that all three teams have a man in at the same time, which at least makes some logical sense (no team can get locked out of winning the belt) and keeps the action going. The biggest in-match pop is for Billy Gunn yelling GODDAMMIT, YOU SUCK at the ref, if you want an idea of what really lands in this whole deal. But I mean, this is the best possible version of this type of match and everyone works really hard, which makes it watchable. They also manage to have Road Dogg work as FIP who gets pinballed between the attacks of the other two teams before he can finally manage a tag to Billy Gunn. Actually, the logic of this match is surprisingly sound for the match type. They did the best they could with it, and I think that while this wasn’t a great match, it was as good as could be expected considering the limitations around it. Oh yeah, the New Age Outlaws retained the gold after Billy Gunn drilled Mosh with a piledriver and snuck a three count while his opponents were distracted with fighting one another. Jim Ross laments Mankind’s lack of a sense of self and his naïve manipulability as Foley enters the ring one final time to face the Rock for the WWF World Championship. Ross says the following in a sad tone that genuinely touches my soul: “Poor old Mick[…] he’s still wearing that damned bow tie. Bless his deranged heart. His brains have been scrambled by so many chair shots, you gotta wonder if he’s even aware of what’s goin’ on.” That is about as poignant as a wrestling commentator will ever get, folks. It’s pretty exciting that we’re getting a first-time world champ for sure, actually! I think that also imprinted itself on my memory as to why I was so high on this show. We cut from the Rock coming down the aisle to see Mr. McMahon in the back. He’s returned to the arena, and he tells the Big Boss Man that he and his stooges will see to the main event personally, heh heh heh. Ross one-ups WCW’s QVC deal by promoting a WWF/HSN deal. Meanwhile, the Rock and Mankind stand around in the ring for awhile. This is the most lukewarm of openings to a match. Everyone is tired, I think. Hell, the folks in Kiel have apparently been exhausted since they got here. There’s a weak ringside brawl. I remember this match picking up toward the end, but right now, I’m watching Mankind sink in a chinlock and wondering when the finish is going to happen. Thankfully, during said chinlock, Vince and Shane walk back out to ringside. Jim Ross: “Well, there’s Big John Wayne and Little John Wayne, and by God, we swagger when we walk just because we can.” Ross might be the MVP of this show, I have to say. He’s commentated with the palpable frustration of a man watching the owner of the company he works for slide into total despotism. The match itself goes out of the ring and back in the ring and out of the ring again. Mankind grabs a chair and uses it, then breaks the count. Uh, okay. The crowd finally wakes up when the Rock uses that same chair to hit the steps that Mankind is carrying toward him to use as a weapon, as well as for his follow-up chair shot. It only gets two, though. I find it odd in kayfabe that Vince didn’t make Earl Hebner, the ref for this match, yell RING THA BELL after Mankind used the chair in the first place. Maybe they should have avoided weapon shots in this match to avoid logical errors, but that’s a nitpick considering the overall high-quality booking of this tournament. Mankind even drops a Cactus Elbow out here, just doing whatever he can think of to make this match entertaining. It’s acceptable, but again, Mr. McMahon is out here and pretty much everyone wants to see what he’s going to do. Finally, we go into the finishing run. The Rock hits a People’s Elbow, but it only gets two. Mankind fights back with a double-arm DDT and then pulls out the ever-present Mr. Socko. Mankind sinks in a sock-assisted Mandible Claw, but the Rock’s hand only drops twice, and he fights back up and breaks the hold with a Rock Bottom. A delayed cover only gets two, but the Rock jumps right up, raises the People’s Eyebrow, and locks on a perfectly acceptable Sharpshooter that sparks Mr. McMahon to call for the bell. The slowpokes in the crowd are initially excited, but then it sinks in, especially when Rocky, Shane, and Vince have a big group hug. And that’s the last time we need to ever book a Montreal Screwjob finish ever again! Vince grabs a mic and says that he didn’t screw the people tonight because the people screwed the people. Poor confused Mankind; Vince calls him “gullible” as he stands there confusedly. Shane grabs the mic and says he’s just like his dad, so maybe the Feds should seize his phones, check his texts, and see if he's running a sex trafficking organization. Mankind is extremely confused by the end of this match and asks “dad” what’s happening, so Vince answers by having the Rock bean Mick in the head with the belt and hit the poor bastard with another Rock Bottom. But unlike WCW, which would have just ended the show on a heel victory, Stone Cold shows back up to the arena to confront the Rock and ends up hitting the new champ with a Stone Cold Stunner before tossing the Rock out of the ring. See, that’s how you give the fans hope, WCW booking committee! Austin hands a Stunner out to Mankind and middle fingers out to everybody while his music plays to end the show. OK, this was a fun show, but that’s mostly down to the booking of the tournament. It was far better than its WCW counterpart, World War 3, but that’s obvious. What’s less obvious is how to order the WWF’s Big Five PPVs of 1998. I have them like so: SummerSlam = Survivor Series > Royal Rumble > WrestleMania > King of the Ring If KotR is the worst show of the bunch, you know this company was hitting on most cylinders creatively in 1998.

World War 3 ’98 notes: Here we are, at the final WW3 PPV and creeping ever closer to 1999. I have no expectations for this show, so it has a very low bar to clear for me. We open with a shot of a limo. Goldberg is in it. Mike T. points out that Hulk Hogan isn’t here, which is great news! It means we get a two-month vacation from him before he shows back up to be the champ again. I’ll take two months of Hogan-free television where I can get it, even with the caveat. Gene Okerlund, while shilling the hotline, picks a smaller guy to win the battle royal tonight. NOPE. Glacier opens the show and jobs to Wrath. Tony S. reminds everyone that these fellas have been off-and-on feuding for a couple years, now. The Detroit crowd is hyped for some wrestling action, as Detroit crowds tend to be. Detroit crowds are underrated, IMO. They do have quite the wrestling history to draw from what with the Sheik running the area for years and all. Anyway, Wrath mostly walks through Glacier’s offense en route to a Meltdown for three. It was just fine, especially because they did a bit of crowd brawling that the crowd loved. Glacier’s offense is terrible, though. Everything he does looks weak. The Hitman talks about all the guys he tried to cripple in a pre-tape promo. Last night while I made dinner, I listened to Eric Bischoff on the ol’ 83 Weeks pretending that the Hitman has no charisma to cover for the fact that Bisch booked the guy into the ground like the creative failure that Bischoff has consistently proven to be. The Hitman cuts a solid heel promo and flashes some charisma even though he’s not interested in being a heel, like it’s so fucking obvious. Stevie Ray and Konnan fill time on this show. At least Konnan is way over, so the crowd is into him doing whatever the heck he wants to. You can guess the quality of this match, probably. I mean, it’s not heinous or anything, but it’s not even close to approaching something good. Stevie dumps Konnan to ringside so Vincent can get involved and so Heenan can note that Vincent’s storing Stevie’s slapjack in his back pocket. This feels like a Chekhov’s Gun; in fact, after a somnambulant Stevie Ray control segment, Vincent tries to swat Konnan with the slapjack, but hits Stevie instead. However, instead of getting a pinfall off Vincent’s fuckup, Konnan gets disqualified for pushing the ref away while punching a halfway-out Stevie. This is dumb. Booker comes down to try and back Konnan off, then attempts to talk a positive sense of self into Stevie. Alas, Stevie did not win the TV title of his own accord and thus has not had the true revelatory experience of having worked to attain and keep something through the values of hard work and fair play, so Stevie chooses to stick with the nWo and tells his brother to stick it, basically. Ernest Miller and Sonny Onoo (w/corner man who is holding a bucket that almost surely seems like another Chekhov’s Gun, but isn't) are next to the ring to face Kaz Hayashi and Saturn. I can’t wait until they put Kaz in the Jung Dragons and also Leia Meow shows up. Forgive me for talking about how lovely Ms. Meow is, but in middle and high school, I think it was near unanimous amongst me and my friends that Tommy Dreamer walking around with both Beulah McGillicuddy and Kimona Wanalaya was highly improbable even considering the improbability of many pro wrestling angles. Both women seemed entirely unattainable in general, looks-wise, but also especially unattainable for Tommy fucking Dreamer. Anyway, there’s a match, and it’s not good. This is a waste of Saturn, who should be holding the United States Championship that two guys who are too elevated for it, DDP and Bret Hart, are fighting over later tonight. I know, I know, I repeat myself, but you see, each review is new to me and half the time, I’ve forgotten what I said earlier. Saturn spends a lot of time as FIP while Sonny Onoo refuses to tag in because he doesn’t want to get his ass kicked. Miller, who is tired of doing all the work, finally tags the guy in. Onoo tries to land a stomp and tag back out, but Miller refuses, so Onoo throws a kick that gets reversed into an STF. This series of spots is fine, I guess, but I just do not care about Onoo finally getting his comeuppance. There are a couple of sloppy spots in here, including a weird one that is meant to be Miller breaking up a Kaz offensive move on Onoo, but even the desk can’t tell what the fuck that spot was supposed to be. Because of the nature of this match, in which a) the heels need to be in control for the eventual babyface comeback, and b) it’s clear that Onoo is not a threat, that means that Miller basically dominates two guys for large portions of this match. Um, no. I like Ernest Miller as the commish, but no. Then, get this – GET THIS – Miller hits a Feliner on Saturn behind the ref’s back and Onoo falls onto Saturn for three. FUCK OFF, WCW. Absolute bullshit. Moppy is better than this shit, fuck it, it’s no wonder Saturn left as soon as possible. Backstage, Lee Marshall makes fun of Chris Jericho getting hogtied on Thunder, but Jericho brushes off the news of said hogtying as WCW propaganda and also cuts a promo at double his normal speaking speed that’s pretty good. They’re not really going to take the gold off Jericho and put it on Bobby Duncum Jr., are they? ARE THEY?! Billy Kidman faces Juvi Guerrera in a rematch for the WCW Cruiserweight Championship. Gene Okerlund rushes up and stops Juvi on his way to the ring; he points out that Juvi has an lWo shirt on backwards, and Juvi flips it around and shows the logo to the crowd. What a boring and shitty way to turn Juvi heel after all that teasing. Rey comes down to gripe about Eddy not letting him get the chance at the Cruiserweight title and then there’s a bunch of stupid-ass lWo horseshit. Eddy asks Rey about Rey’s kids, and you know, I am pretty sure that Eddy knows all about Rey’s kids and their questionable parentage, heh heh heh. But yeah, this lWo garbage is so bad, it defies belief. Juvi eventually makes it to the ring to have yet another match against Kidman. These fellas really did have quite the rivalry. I’m just hoping that this match is on the better end of their encounters, which I’d classify their match on the Nitro before this show as being. I do think they’re better as a pairing with Juvi as the babyface and Kidman as the heel. Speaking of things that I think, I think that one of the neatest things about this match is that both guys really put some sting into their chops and strikes. Kidman puts a surprising amount of stank on a lariat early in the match. Both guys are putting in work and really laying stuff in, and this match feels quite violent for a match between cruiserweights in general and between these two specifically. Juvi gets a series of two counts in there, including off a brainbuster, before going to a chinlock so that everyone can lay down and rest for a few seconds. They deserve a rest. Juvi cuts off a couple of Kidman comeback attempts and continues his run of controlling the match in and out of the ring. Juvi sells a guillotine legdrop and its effects on his tailbone in there, which delays his cover enough to only get two. You gotta have Psicosis’s tailbone of titanium to hit that move and not flinch. Juvi also tries a double springboard missile dropkick from one ring to the other and barely clears it enough to land a dropkick in Kidman’s abdomen. Juvi is a good athlete, no doubt, but he’s not Rey-level as an athlete. Misterio’s sense of balance is legendary. Kidman makes a comeback and, rather than trying his own double-springboard move, simply headscissors Juvi into another ring and does a crossbody from one ring’s ropes into the other ring. Good idea because Kidman’s not half the athlete that Juvi is. They have a few creative spots going from ring to ring and a nice 2.9 spot where Juvi rope-walks from one ring to the other to hit a top-rope Frankensteiner. There’s another lovely spot where Juvi tries a Juvi Driver, gets reversed into gourdbuster position, and then flips out of that and back into a Juvi Driver, which he squarely lands the second attempt around. Juvi spends a lot of time recovering from that last exchange, and Kidman dodges his 450 attempt. Juvi lands on his feet and counters and tries a rana that Kidman can’t reverse into a powerbomb for 2.9. Juvi gets up angry that it wasn’t three and petulantly slaps Charles Robinson in the face. I am shocked at how heated this match has been and am re-thinking my assertion that these matches are better with Kidman as the heel. Kidman makes one more comeback, lands a wheelbarrow slam, and goes up for an SSP to a huge pop. Juvi gets up, blocks it, and goes up for a top-rope rana. Rey Misterio Jr. sneaks out, holds Kidman’s jeans so that Juvi lands on his head when he tries for the rana, and then watches as Kidman completes an SSP for the win. The lWo comes out and gets in Rey’s face as Eddy backs them off. Eddy then yells at Rey YOU’RE EITHER IN OR YOU’RE OUT, GIMME YOUR ANSWER. Uh, Eddy, I think he’s only in because you made him be in. Rey, in no surprise to anyone who’s been watching these shows, tosses away his lWo shirt and runs away from the pursuing pack. The lWo stuff was stupid – why would Eddy work so hard to force Rey into the group, for literal weeks of TV time mind you, and then just let him leave? – but that barely tarnishes what was the best match Juvi and Kidman have had against one another yet. This is well worth watching if you’d like to see a heated-feeling cruiser match; it feels like exactly the kind of match that people think of when they remember the WCW Cruiserweight division in a vaguely fond sort of way. After some recap of Hall and Nash getting in a perpetual tizzy with one another for the last few months, we get a match (Editor’s note: No, we don’t) between Scott Steiner (w/Buff Bagwell and annoying nWo ref) and Rick Steiner. Buff poses with a BUFF I WANT TO TOUCH YOUR STUFF sign. Of course Buff poses with a BUFF I WANT TO TOUCH YOUR STUFF sign. I’m shocked that Buff doesn’t do this every week because the ladies in the crowd generally are thirsty as fuck for the guy, and probably a few dudes are, too. Before we can get a match going, Rick Steiner gets beaten down by the nWo in the back before the match. The Giant drags Ricky to the ring after said beatdown. So, wait, Ricky signed a match between himself and Scott and agreed to Scott providing the ref? What the fuck? This is legitimately the worst feud of the Nitro era and is absolutely on the list of the worst feuds in pro wrestling history. This is not hyperbole on my part. What a dumb fucking interminable feud. There’s no logic, there are barely any stakes, and I am long past desire to see THE STEINER BROTHERS EXPLODE after all the consistent teasing of said explosion without it happening. This whole feud has been one giant edging session, with the downside that any release that might happen will be weak and disappointing. They try to give this thing some juice by having Goldberg run out here to save Rick, and the crowd pops huge because, duh, Goldberg. Now, Bisch would almost certainly argue that what we just saw was a good idea because, hey, it generated a pop. And there are some cool spots once Goldberg gets to the ring – Scotty putting a middle finger in Goldberg’s face and yelling FUCK YOU, Goldberg destroying everyone and launching the nWo ref from one ring to the next – but what is this in aid of? Goldberg is once again not defending his world title on the show, and it’s not like this is the start of a WCW resistance team angle that bonds Goldberg with Ricky Steiner and, say, DDP to finally destroy the nWo once and for all. It’s just a spot to pop a crowd in the midst of a mismanagement of Goldberg’s title reign and this overlong Steiner Brothers feud. It’s pointless. It’s empty calories. It’s a weak orgasm that dissipates quickly as feelings of dread and self-hatred because you’ve achieved said orgasm with someone you barely even know or like flood in to replace it. Sorry to be graphic, but I mentioned edging before and felt that I had to carry out the metaphor to a gross and disappointing ending, much as WCW carries out most of its long-term angles. Next up: Scott Hall (w/the Giant and B-Teamers) vs. Kevin Nash. Wait, here comes Eric Bischoff before Nash can make his way out. Bischoff does his own survey, which says that Scott Hall is gonna catch a beatdown. Nash runs down and makes the save, and the Outsiders clear the ring. Now, if I didn’t know any better, I’d be kind of excited that Hall was going to join the Wolfpac and help destroy nWo Hollywood. I’d be as excited as this Detroit crowd, which is loudly chanting OUT-SI-DERS. Hall throws up the Wolfpac sign, but he gets no daps. Nash just walks away. What if WCW simply gave the fans what they want? What if? What if, indeed? Take note: The last two matches on this PPV were extended angles rather than matches. Bobby Duncum Jr. comes to the ring for another shot at Chris Jericho’s Television Championship. A fan touches Jericho in the aisle, so Jericho points him out and Ralphus waves him off. These two are hilarious together. There are a whole heck of a lot of Jericho signs and Monday Night Jericho t-shirts in the crowd, I’ll note. I’m glad I watched this because in 1998 and 1999 especially, Jericho was on fire as a performer and incredibly over. He was super-over when he showed up in the WWF and looked like he belonged on the same stage as the Rock immediately, in fact. It’s good to revisit this period because the guy has been complete ass for so much of his career now that it’s easy to forget that he really was that dude at one point. This matchup is so fascinating at its start that the desk ruminates on Hulk Hogan missing the chance to win the WW3 battle royale. There is some uninspired mat wrestling to start, so I guess I don’t entirely blame them. The match goes outside, where Jericho turns it around and lands a diving clothesline off the guardrail. Hey, that’s a nice spot! Then he works what is like the third chinlock spot between them in the first four-ish minutes of this match. That’s not so nice. Anyway, this match is a piece of evidence in the argument that Jericho isn’t good enough to carry a bum to an entertaining match, but in Jericho’s defense, he’s still under thirty himself at this point. These fellas lay around in chinlocks and facelocks and headlocks that are not really worked at all and are totally boring as fuck for a lot of this thing. Tony S. says that Jericho has used loopholes and obscure rules to hold onto the TV title. Is it too pedantic to note that Jericho did that to hold onto the Cruiserweight title, not the TV title? Fuck it, I’mma go full pedant. Anyway, this match goes on for longer than is necessary; Ralphus tries to get involved and distracts Duncum, which gives Jericho a chance to grab his belt and waffle Duncum in the back of the head. That gets three, as Billy Silverman somehow didn’t feel the strap of the belt hit him in the head at the same time that Jericho hit Duncum. Silverman is kayfabe the worst ref in the history of the industry. Huh, the battle royal is next? So we’re doing Hitman/DDP as the main event? And not, you know, a Goldberg title def—no, never mind, I give up. OK, let’s do this one more time: Disciple is here and Tony S. mentions that Disciple’s in the Warrior’s camp. I’m shocked that they’re still mentioning the Warrior on television. Wrath is in this thing, another sign (of many) that they’re not really taking his winning streak seriously. Honestly, it’s fine that Nash beats him in the next week to get himself over as a streak killer. Juvi sells being worn down from his earlier match; Kidman sure strolls out here looking reasonably fresh, though. I think I’m becoming a semi-irrational Kidman hater. It’s a Renegade sighting! Much more importantly, it’s a Tokyo Magnum sighting! The British Bulldog’s name is one of the names that pops up on the screen, but alas, he is gravely injured, so we are left with Sgt. Buddy Lee Parker as his substitute. Hall hides behind Mickey Jay in the corner of one ring as soon as the bell rings. Nash starts dumping dudes early and scores five quick eliminations in the first minute over in ring number three. We get from sixty men to forty-eight men almost immediately, in fact. Van Hammer helps eliminate Mike Enos in ring three, which leaves him in there with Nash by himself…for about thirty more seconds, as Nash big boots Hammer out and then chills out by himself as he waits for the other rings to empty enough that he must join them. They legit eliminated 25 guys in two minutes! That makes this whole sixty-man exercise feels somewhat pointless. Kanyon keeps trying moves from the top or second rope, and it eventually bites him in the ass when Kidman backdrops him over and out while sitting on the second rope. Booker and Stevie think about teaming up, but decide against it. After relaxing in the first ring for a bit, the Giant makes his move and starts trying to dump guys. This sparks the rest of the ring to jump the Giant. Good idea, but it’s a plan that fails miserably. I thought that Chavo got dumped by the Giant already, but he’s running around in the first ring again. Rey gets eliminated, which gets us down to twenty guys left, and everyone goes into the center ring to finish up the match. Saturn and Ernest Miller fight each other on the floor and, I guess, eliminate themselves before they can even enter the center ring. Like everyone under 6’2 immediately gets tossed except Benoit and Malenko. We’re down to thirteen men; the crowd pops for Nash and the Giant renewing their rivalry. They separate, but when they hook it up again, it gets another big pop. Hall comes over to help Nash dump the Giant, which the crowd wants to happen. It doesn’t happen. When we get down to our final ten members, Bam Bam Bigelow comes through the crowd, jumps in the ring, and gets beaten up and dumped. Goldberg runs down and sprints like a half-mile around the configuration of rings to hunt Bam Bam and fight him. Scott Steiner and Wrath are eliminated while this pull-apart happens. Booker T. is the only unaffiliated WCW wrestler in the final eight. He’s launched almost exactly when we get down to eight people. The last seven people in this sucker include Scott Hall, the Giant, Konnan, Lex Luger, Kevin Nash, Chris Benoit, and Dean Malenko. Konnan eliminates himself diving at someone. Nash calms everyone who isn’t the Giant down and directs them to all jump the Giant. Poor Giant. Nobody kayfabe likes this guy at all outside of Kevin Sullivan and Jimmy Hart. The Giant fights it, but he can’t hold five guys off forever and gets dumped. This crowd LOVED it. This crowd loved anything involving the Giant during this match, honestly. Nash and Luger chill out while the Horsemen go at Scott Hall. Hall fights back and the Wolfpac members jump Benoit and dump him while Hall tosses Malenko. Hall, Nash, and Luger are your final three. Nash and Luger agree that it’s every man for himself at this point, which is cool, but the crowd is bummed about Nash and Luger fighting one another, I think. You can hear them quiet down considerably. Why wouldn’t Nash and Luger team up to dump Hall and thus ensure a Wolfpac vic—no, no, I’m not going to ask the obvious question. Kevin Nash, remembering his experience in the 1996 Royal Rumble when Shawn Michaels waited until Nash was distracted by fighting Kama to eliminate him, waits for Luger to get distracted by fighting Scott Hall and then big boots the whole mass of humanity over the top rope to win what was a pretty shitty battle royal when the Giant wasn’t involved in a cool spot! The crowd applauds appreciatively when Nash and Luger show love to one another. Nash, walking off, “Looks like I’m next.” Actually, based on this finish, it looks like you’re a key member of the booking team. No, but seriously, I think Nash is more than over enough to win this and even to be champ, though of course, not in the way that the latter happened. Michael Buffer is here to introduce the Diamond Dallas Page/Bret Hart main event. Bret’s music has the saddest excuse for a stand-in opening guitar riff. It’s like someone heard “Hart Attack” and said, How can we do that opening riff, but incredibly shitty? DDP comes down to an ersatz version of ersatz “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” as usual. Something happened to the sound mixing while they replaced Page's theme because you can’t hear this crowd cheering at all, and I can see them doing so. Page attacks Bret outside the ring to start and tosses him into everything imaginable. Hart eventually takes over when things get back in the ring, which is where your technical masters and such tend to dominate. I don’t know, this is definitely better than the Sting match, but it’s doing nothing for me. I can’t blame anyone, maybe? It’s just not what I want to see. Hart does a decent heel beatdown and Page fires up and scores flash pins or big moves that get two counts before Bret re-takes control. Page comes back, hits a discus clothesline, gets two on a pancake, and whiffs on a lariat before eating one from the Hitman. See, that’s pretty much the match. After this spot, the Hitman loads his fist, but Page lands a forearm and Charles Robinson picks up the fallen knucks and pockets them for a later spot. Then, DDP does what is the single-worst Sharpshooter that I’ve ever seen in my life. My goodness, it was a vile Sharpshooter. The desk says it’s a good Sharpshooter because of course they do, but I am not being hyperbolic when I say that it was one of the worst executions of a move that I've ever seen done in a wrestling ring. Bret easily gets to the ropes, punts Page in the penis, and attacks Page’s injured knee. There’s a lot of Hart attacking Page’s knee. Finally, Hart locks on a Figure Four in the center of the ring, and that’s only broken when the ref catches Hart using the ropes for leverage. There’s some more legwork, but eventually Page kicks Hart out of the ring with his good leg and goes to work for awhile out there. Then, Page tries the ringpost Figure Four and, oh boy, well, um, it’s executed better than his Sharpshooter was! I’ll say that. Page is the champ, and the Hitman needs to beat him to get the belt, so DDP figures "why not," gets a chair and goes to whack the Hitman with it in full view of Charles Robinson. Robinson, who is an idiot, grabs the chair instead of just letting Page get some revenge and get disqualified. Then we get Hart crashing into them both, Robinson getting knocked out, Hart getting his knucks back from the fallen ref, the nWo ref running down and distracting Page, Hart hitting Page with the knucks, and finally Hart locking on the Sharpshooter while the nWo ref calls for the bell. The nWo ref gives Hart the belt, and Hart celebrates while Mickey Jay runs down and calls the whole deal off on account of the nWo ref isn’t a sanctioned ref. Page stumbles to his feet, hooks the Hitman from behind, and lands a Diamond Cutter for three in an overbooked mess of an ending. The match before it was mediocre, too. Who did this finish serve, really? It's just a guess, but I think my re-watch of Survivor Series ’98 will reveal that it was a much better PPV than its WCW counterpart of the same month and year! As for the final World War 3 PPV, it’s a one-match show. Catch Kidman/Juvi on YouTube and pretend the rest of the show didn’t happen.

Thunder Interlude – show number forty-one – 19 November 1998 "The WCW Gang stumbles into the final WW3 PPV riding a bunch of shitty angles” Larry Z. has been corralled into Thunder commentary duty in place of Bobby Heenan…I think that’s a clear upgrade at this point…God help us all, Larry Z. is an upgrade on Bobby Heenan at the desk… The final World War 3 pay-per-view will happen after this show…Nitro has stabilized into mediocrity after an all-time awful run from about Road Wild '98 up through Halloween Havoc '98…Don’t get me wrong, stuff like Hogan “running” for POTUS and the lWo absolutely stinks…This ‘”Bret Hart takes people out” angle that we now review through the magic of video sucks, but maybe Bret/DDP will be good…Then again, Bret/Sting was ass cheeks at Havoc, so I can’t even be sure about getting a quality match from the Hitman at this point… Norman Smiley opens the night against Booker T….I kind of enjoy that Booker’s arc over the past year was that winning his first singles title gave him a sense of accomplishment and pride that caused hidden aspects of his character to come out…And rather than it being that he was a babyface who devolved in his outlook and behavior and became jealous and greedy of his gold as it often happens (*coughDDPcough*), it was that he was a heel who developed a sense of character as he found a new belief in himself as an individual and willingly took responsibility on himself to be an exemplary champion…That is such a natural way to turn someone face…We’ve probably all known someone who was out of control, but then had to suddenly become a parent or guardian or take care of something else important in their lives, and it was like they flipped a switch inside themselves and became responsible and thoughtful… Anyway, Smiley pretends to be a babyface with an opening handshake and then heels it up…Booker makes a comeback eventually…Book misses an elbow and Spinaroonies up while Smiley dances, thinking Book was still down…That was a spot tailor made for me…Book wins it with a 110th Street Slam… It's only now that the Thunder intro plays… I was remiss earlier…I should have mentioned the absolute hell of this Steiners/Bagwells feud…Except for Judy making me laugh a couple times, it’s been only slightly less bad than the rest of this decades-long feud…At least, it feels like it's been a decade…I will repeat, if even Judy cuts a heel turn on Rick Steiner at the PPV, that will bring this whole dumbass angle back around and make me enjoy it for once…I mean, drawing out the punchline of a joke in which Rick Steiner continually gets suckered in and then attacked by a false friend over almost a year isn’t worth all the bad angles and segments…But at least I’ll get a bit of joy out of it…If it just happens that Judy helps Rick and they somehow win at the PPV, what the hell was even the point?... Disco Inferno had a whole character arc in 1997 that was pretty incredible…In 1998, he’s just jobber fodder for nWo members…Scott Hall (w/B-Teamers) beats up Disco in yet another televised match between them…I do love that Hall messing up Disco’s hair is what causes Disco to get super-aggressive and start kicking Hall’s ass…Hall finally reverses an Irish whip, hits a corner clothesline, and coasts the rest of the way to an eventual Razor’s Edge for three… Chris Jericho hits the ramp for an interview with Tony S….Jericho’s got to defend his TV title against Bobby Duncum Jr. at WW3 in a couple days…I’m not sure why we’re doing this big Duncum push…Jericho doesn’t like cowboys because Stu Hart made him one on his indy debut, haha…Duncum comes out here and hogties Jericho to mostly silence…Jericho screams for Tony S. to help him out…Tony’s like Sorry son, I don’t really do knots or ropes, good luck on Sunday though…HAHAHAHA… Kaz Hayashi has been walking around all day in the back with a Japanese-to-English dictionary and trying to get a tag partner for a WW3 match against Ernest Miller and Sonny Onoo…Kaz tries to pitch Scott Hall, who only recognizes when Kaz enunciates the name “Miller” and responds that he’s trying to avoid drinking before the matches…This was the wrestling equivalent of a dad joke, requisite with me rolling my eyes and chuckling with embarrassment at the punchline… Video of Bobby Duncum Jr. getting a totally unwarranted push upon his debut… Rey Misterio looks bummed about repping the lWo…Understandably, because this further dilution of the nWo branding and overall shitty angle absolutely sucks…Misterio’s going to try and coax something good out of Billy Kidman…Kidman is very over, and I’m still baffled about how that happened…Kidman gets a mic and, oh no, they let him talk…Kidman lectures Misterio on joining an organization that Rey doesn’t even want to be in…Eddy grabs the mic before Rey can respond and does his whole heel deal…Then Rey talks…Rey’s not in WWE yet, so he stinks at it…There’s a whole thing where Rey apparently isn’t getting a shot for the Cruiserweight title at Juvi unless he beats Kidman, Eddy steals Rey’s spot in the match, and the rest of the lWo bullies Rey out of the ring…This was bad television… There’s a commercial break, and after it, Eddy’s going to try and coax something good out of Billy Kidman…Mike T. and Larry Z. are both confused about why Eddy chose to substitute for Rey…You dopes…Tony S. figures out why (Eddy wants a Cruiserweight Championship shot for himself), but doesn’t point out that Rey won a number one contendership match over the current champion last Thunder, so the crackheads on the WCW Championship Committee should just give Rey the title shot as a matter of course…I mean, obviously Tony S. doesn’t say this, he’s trying to sell an angle and doesn’t want to expose how stupid it is…These are the little cracks in logic that I think bookers and executive producers think only the superfans care about, but they undermine the story of an angle for the regular viewers, too… Anyway, this is a short, back-and-forth match…Kidman ranas out of a pop-up powerbomb for a little wrinkle to the "can't be powerbombed" routine…Kidman scores two on a superplex shortly after…Then, Eddy tries a regular powerbomb just a bit later and Kidman hits a facebuster out of it…Stop trying to powerbomb Kidman, geez…Kidman goes up for an SSP, but sees Rey and Spyder at ringside arguing for some reason and dives onto them instead…Ah, that’s good dumb babyfacin’ from Kidman, who is even dumber when he goes over to confront Spyder on the apron…Rey tries to pull Spyder down, but Eddy runs Kidman into Spyder from behind and rolls Kidman up with his feet on the ropes for three, and presumably, a shot at Juvi Guerrera’s Cruiserweight title…It was mostly an angle with a couple of hot near-falls… We get a recap of the end of the Juvi/Kidman match from Nitro…Then, what the fuck, Tony S. says that Kidman gets a rematch against Juvi at WW3…So what the fuck was the point of Eddy subbing for Rey then?...I’m pretty sure that Rey was talking about getting a shot at WW3 before Eddy replaced him…You know what, I’m not going to think about this too deeply because neither Bisch nor Sully did… More video recapping…The Hall/Nash feud sucked, and we unfortunately must now relive it…Oh great, there’ll be a rematch at WW3… Scott Putski looks like a complete jackass, per usual…IWGP Champion Scott Norton (w/B-Teamers again) comes down for a quick serving of squash…Wait, I guess Vincent is his opponent?...No, Vincent and Putski just have a tiny match before Norton attacks Putski from behind and then the bell rings…Should this not be a DQ or no contest?...No, nevermind, I’m not going to think about this too deeply yada yada…Norton lands a powerbomb after about a minute for the win… Video recap of Hogan being so personally hurt about Jesse Ventura winning political office that he wastes time doing a stupid skit with a crappy Monica Lewinsky impersonator…Oh, also Hall and Bischoff are mad at each other for some random reason…The nWo is still around almost a year after it should have died, but there was a way to keep it around and have Goldberg + the Wolfpac finish it off that would have made keeping it around worthwhile…What they’re doing here with random nWo breakup teases (yet again!) was not the wave, though… Kaz tries to communicate with the WCW locker room some more…Disco hears the word "partner" and says he’ll only be a dancing partner with a buxom lass…Saturn walks in and corrects Disco about what Kaz needs a partner for because apparently he’s actually paying attention to what’s going on in this dumbshit company…Saturn considers being Kaz’s partner… Ernest Miller (w/Sonny Onoo) grabs a mic and does some mediocre heeling in the ring…Sonny Onoo takes the mic and also does some mediocre heeling…Onoo says that he had to scrounge up a tomato can from Japan to face Miller in a warm-up match for the Sunday bout…The desk is like This guy is white, he can’t be a karate champ in Japan…I mean, he’s obviously not a karate champ from Japan, but the word gaijin exists for a reason, fellas…Kaz runs out and gets beaten up again until Saturn makes the save…Saturn’s ceiling is as a babyface who wins against everyone at his level and below and gatekeeps the heels who will ascend to the main event…Neither getting involved in this feud nor the weird Konnan stuff really serves cementing him in that role… Chavo Guerrero Jr. (w/Pepe) faces Alex Wright…Wright insults the crowd on the mic before the match…He threatens to leave if the rubes in this Indiana crowd don’t give him respect…They don’t give him respect, but he sticks around…It's easy to forget how big Alex Wright, but then you see him collar-and-elbowed with Chavo and remember it again…The size difference is striking…Wright’s a lanky guy (well, at least at this point), so it’s easy to underestimate his size from a visual standpoint…The match is a solid affair with Wright utilizing his size advantage and Chavo using speed, agility, and flash pins to counter…Chavo Jr. makes a final comeback after blocking Wright’s reverse neckbreaker, but Wright blocks a vertical suplex attempt and flips Chavo over into a bridged pin for three…Wright drills Chavo with a clothesline post-match and attacks Pepe as the cherry on top…That was pretty good stuff… Kanyon tries to engender the support of the crowd…He fails…Hahaha, after the crowd responds to Kanyon’s usual question with EVERYBODY, he freaks out and yells NO, NO, YOUR MAMA…There wasn’t even a Your Mama joke in there, he just yelled YOUR MAMA…That was genuinely funny…Prince Iaukea comes out, Kanyon attacks him in the aisle, and they end up back in the ring and (unsurprisingly) have a fun TV match…Kanyon hits a Northern Lights facebuster, I guess is what you’d call it?...That should be a finishing move, not a random move that gets a two count…Kanyon hits a lot of unique-looking facebusters in general, and he hits a couple of them here as well…Iaukea comes back, but Kanyon pulls an Alex Wright from a few minutes ago, blocks a vertical suplex attempt, and drops down into a Flatliner for three…A few dopes in the crowd were chanting BORING…No the fuck that wasn’t, it was a perfectly pleasant competitive TV match… Saturn is out immediately after that match to face Wrath…I assume Saturn loses this one through interference…This is a decent competitive TV match…Wrath really pushes his size advantage…He lands a backbreaker and pummels Saturn in the corner…The pummeling just wakes Saturn up, so Wrath has to go back to power moves with a back suplex…Wrath gets 2.9 off a diving clothesline…Wrath misses a corner splash and gets overhead suplexed for two…Here come Onoo and Miller to spoil a solid TV bout…Saturn gets two off a top-rope splash…Onoo distracts the ref so that the Cat can land a superkick…Wrath follows with a Meltdown for three… We review Bam Bam Bigelow’s arrival to WCW… Konnan faces Bret Hart in Thunder’s main event…Konnan hits his pre-match big move, the Catchphrase Roulette…This is a five-minute number that starts with Konnan jumping on the Hitman and bashing him around ringside…It ends with Stevie Ray hitting Konnan with a slapjack behind the ref’s back and the Hitman winning with a Sharpshooter, followed by the Hitman attempting to Pillmanize Konnan after the match, but DDP making the save before that could happen…*yawn*… This Thunder had some solid matches, but it also reminded me that every ongoing angle in this company stinks…It’s close, but ultimately, I came away from this show feeling more negative than positive about it…OWW…

I'm inviting you to join my wrestling-themed Def Poetry Jam circle. If you accept, there will be two of us in the group.

I thought Barca/PSG was the right game to watch, and it's been wild, but it's got nothing on Dortmund and Atletico trading the aggregate lead back and forth.

Has anyone read Paul Boesch's book Hey Boy, Where'd You Get Them Ears? It's an astronomical price on the internet, but it also seems like it's worth reading. I'd love to hear Boesch's viewpoints about breaking away from Dallas and his relationship with Bill Watts before Watts sold Mid-South without telling him. If anyone has the book and has read it, would it be too much to ask if there's anything interesting or notable that Boesch writes about either of these things?

You'd need a champ willing to float between two shows to have that, and that guy would probably be overexposed quickly in the bargain showing up twice a week on two three-hour shows. I think two world champs for two shows is fine. Boxing has disputed world champs sanctioned by different federations, so a global wrestling company having two wrestling shows each sanctioning its own champ seems reasonable to me.

I just started my World Class re-watch again after re-reading a huge chunk of Gary Hart's book a couple weeks back, and I am consistently tempted to turn on some Mid-Atlantic or re-watch some Mid-South instead. As someone who doesn't jibe with either the Von Erich boys or the Freebirds, I'm wondering if maybe the Eric Embry era of Dallas wrestling is going to remain my favorite.