Gorman

Like Seinfeld, a Nirvana reference earns an automatic like.

Thoughts on In Your House 3 I loved the idea of the Tripleheader match with the WWF, IC and tag belts all on the line. However, the WWF decided to jump through a million hoops to allow Diesel and Shawn to win the belts but get stripped of them the next night on Raw, because Owen wasn't the official tag team champion during the match. They never really explained why Owen was late for the match. It would seem like serious transportation problems or a car accident would be the only things that would keep Owen from a chance at the WWF title that he had craved since his feud with Bret. Waylon Mercy's loss to Savio Vega was surprising. He had a great character and was so big that you'd think he would be fast-tracked into a WWF title shot against Diesel. Bob Backlund introduced Dean Douglas, but that pairing didn't stay together. Douglas then introduced his opponent, Razor Ramon. I'm surprised that no heel has adopted the "introduce and insult your opponent" gimmick. Jean-Pierre Lafitte did a great job keeping up with Bret Hart, as those two had a very fun match. Lafitte showed up wearing Bret's jacket, which probably would have drawn more heat if they had saved it for the next month's In Your House in Winnipeg. I love how well Davey Boy Smith transitioned to being a heel with his mat-based attack on Bigelow. Then he came back later in the night for the main event and could have beaten Diesel with the powerslam if Shawn hadn't made the save. Add his waving the Japanese flag to get heel heat, and there is your MVP of the show.

Thoughts on SummerSlam 95 I was in Pittsburgh for this show, and I really liked it even though the show doesn't get much love. I loved Hakushi vs. 1-2-3 Kid, Skip vs. Horowitz, and of course, the ladder match. However, watching it again, I liked it even better because the Undertaker-Kama casket match and the Bret-Yankem match were much better than I remembered them. Both matches went 16 minutes, and I'm giving credit to Undertaker and Bret by letting them share the MVP award. Hunter Hearst Helmsley had a "HHH" crest logo projected into the ring long before he was known by those initials. I remember staring at the arena ceiling in disbelief when Horowitz won again. I thought for sure that Skip would get his win back. Vince mentioned casually on commentary that Horowitz would earn a full-time contract if he won. I'm surprised this wasn't a bigger plot point. The ladder match was much more brutal than the first, even though Razor and Shawn were babyfaces. The WWF gave the spotlight to several new stars by keeping Bulldog, Bundy, Sid, Tatanka, Owen and Yokozuna on the bench for one of the biggest shows of the year. Lex Luger did a weird run-in during the main event. Diesel attacked Luger, thinking Luger was about to pull a Bulldog and attack him. Luger didn't retaliate against Diesel but instead started beating on Sir Mo to prove he was a good guy. This was supposed to start a feud between Luger and King Mabel, but that went out the window when Luger showed up on Nitro.

Then his career ends. The fans realize that he can't wrestle anymore, and they stop clamoring for him to return.

Here's a reality-based angle that WWE can do with Daniel Bryan. He comes out and complains that although the doctors have cleared him, WWE won't let him wrestle. Bryan says he is the rightful WWE and Intercontinental champion because he never lost either title in the ring. The Authority explains that they gave him the ball twice and he dropped it twice, not because he's not a good wrestler, but he just can't stay healthy. As a compromise, they let him wrestle matches with 5-minute time limits against guys like Heath Slater and Bo Dallas. This gives the fans their Daniel Bryan fix and leads to an IC title match at WM 32 against Kevin Owens, who tries to take Bryan out with an injury to protect his prized title -- just to provide for his family. If Bryan can prove that he can stay healthy by wrestling a non-crippling style, then WWE can consider putting him in the World title picture in the following year, with his injury status always looming as a potential problem. I will let WWE have this idea for free, as long as they give me a shot to announce in NXT.

Thoughts on In Your House 2 The Roadie beat the 1-2-3 Kid with a botched piledriver off the second rope, but still it was a piledriver off the second rope. Then he casually went back to his "regular job" of being Jeff Jarrett's roadie. I'm surprised we didn't see more of that after matches: Duke Droese riding away on a garbage truck or TL Hopper trudging off to the bathroom to plunge a toilet. Add Roadie's dancing, bragging on the WWF Hotline, and positioning to feud with Jarrett, and he's your MVP. Sir Mo is wearing a crown and royal robe just like King Mabel. I guess everyone forgot that knights don't wear crowns. Being Mabel's Mini-Me makes him look like Sleazy, Queasy & Cheesy. The fans were more into Henry Godwinn as a heel than they were into Bam Bam Bigelow as a babyface, so that experiment failed quickly. Jeff Jarrett's musical performance was a rare occasion when a heel is set up to be humiliated, but then it just doesn't happen. Vince and some of the fans had to admit that he did a pretty good job. It was obvious that Jarrett was lip-synching, but the idea was that it was Jarrett's own voice. After Jarrett lost the IC title to Michaels, Dok Hendrix cut a babbling promo about how Jarrett and Roadie got into a fight after the match. They were both in the building, and this was a pro wrestling show, so why didn't we actually see them fight? Triple H made his WWF pay-per-view debut as one of the lumberjacks in the Diesel-Sid main event, joining such luminaries as Jean-Pierre LaFitte, Man Mountain Rock, Rad Radford and Techno Team 2000.

Thoughts on King of the Ring 95 This may not be the worst-booked show in WWE history, but it's certainly near the top when it comes to not giving the fans what they want. We could have had the first Shawn-Undertaker singles match in the semifinals. We also could have had Shawn vs. 1-2-3 Kid in the finals. Instead, we got FOUR Savio Vega matches and no championships on the line at all. We were only introduced to the Savio Vega character one month earlier, and Vince was literally pushing him as a Rocky Balboa story, even showing the statue outside the arena. Think about it: would you have ordered a pay-per-view a few months earlier with four Kwang matches? Bob Holly had some good fired-up babyface moves, but his race-car driver gimmick would have been more at home in WCW. Shawn Michaels was not happy after wrestling for 15 minutes and drawing with Kama. This was one show that he did not "stop." Undertaker's loss to Mabel was good evidence that he was no longer invincible without the urn. Vince mentioned it on commentary, but it could have been a much bigger deal that Taker would have to deal with being somewhat "mortal." Mabel gets the MVP award, simply because he wrestled twice and went almost 20 minutes total. He and Mo also made a good transition into heel-dom, as Mo was drawing out the coronation speech and getting good heat from the crowd. I totally forgot about Bam Bam Bigelow's flame-throwin' babyface fire suit. I'm sure Ricky Steamboat, watching at home, said, "Yeah, that'll get over."

Thoughts on In Your House Bret Hart is the MVP of this show, carrying it with multiple matches as he has done in the past. I love how he faked an injury at the end of the Hakushi match in order to get Lawler to drop his guard. Of course, Lawler did a great job of trying to get his match with Bret going to capitalize on the "injury." Poor Aldo Montoya was unable to save Razor Ramon from a double-team attack by Jeff Jarrett and The Roadie, but some guy out of the crowd handled the job with no problem (the debuting Savio Vega). Mabel squished Adam Bomb in under two minutes. Despite Adam's impressive look and kid-friendly gimmick, he didn't get very far as a heel or a babyface. I don't get why Jerry Lawler had a woman in her 20s posing as his mother on Mother's Day. A disqualification in the Diesel-Sid main event welcomed us to the monthly-PPV era. Don't expect everything to be wrapped up...tune in next month!

Thoughts on WrestleMania XI Lex Luger and Davey Boy Smith got some momentum from their win over Jacob & Eli Blu, but in typical Luger fashion, it wasn't enough to eventually result in a title reign. I used to announce for a group called the Allied Powers Wrestling Federation, which was named after this team and was supposed to feature them on occasion. I don't think that ever happened. Later, the group changed its named to APWF 2000 and kept that name after 2000 had ended, which I'm sure some luchadors would appreciate. King Kong Bundy is an also-ran when people discuss Undertaker's streak, but he does have some serious WrestleMania credentials: setting the quickest-pin record at WM 1, main eventing WM 2, and squashing poor Little Beaver at WM 3. The fans reacted to everything Yokozuna did, simply based on his size, even though he had been around for 2 1/2 years. It was like an arena full of Art Donovans. Sid's screaming backstage promo startled Jenny McCarthy, who then started laughing at Sid's over-the-top intensity. Like Bret Hart's SummerSlam cage match, the psychology of his I Quit match against Bob Backlund was all wrong. Since Piper has been through the wars, including with Bret at WM 8, he should have only stuck the mic in the wrestlers' faces when they were really on the verge of quitting. Of course, Piper never met a mic he didn't like. Some people say Shawn Michaels tried to steal Diesel's spotlight, but anyone trying to make this show better gets my approval. Bam Bam Bigelow is the MVP of the show. He put over a non-wrestler in the main event of the biggest show and carried him to a passable match. He even got into it with Salt & Pepa on the way to the ring. Even in defeat, this was the peak of Bam Bam's career.

No, Kama melted down the urn after WrestleMania XI.

Thoughts on Royal Rumble 95 The Roadie put Jeff Jarrett over the top as a wrestler who should be taken seriously. Not only did Roadie help Jarrett win the IC title, but they attacked Diesel later in the night to set up Double J for shots at the WWF title. It's amazing how having a lackey makes you seem like a bigger deal. Call it The Raven Effect. Bret Hart and Diesel had another strong WWF title match. However, it didn't make sense for Shawn Michaels to attack Diesel after the jackknife powerbomb. His action should have saved Diesel's title by disqualification, but the match kept going. Bret was great during the Rumble getting his retribution against Owen and Backlund, setting them up for easy eliminations. He added life to a Rumble with a lackluster field, laden with mid-90s gimmick guys (Kwang, Duke Droese, Mantaur) and tag team guys who had no chance to win (Bushwhackers, Heavenly Bodies, New Headshrinkers, Well Dunn). Speaking of tag teams, The 1-2-3 Kid and Bob Holly seem to have only won the titles to kick off Bigelow's angle with Lawrence Taylor, with LT laughing at Bam Bam losing to the Kid. It wouldn't have been such a laughing matter for Bigelow to lose to one of the Smoking Gunns, who won the belts from Holly and Kid one night later. Of course, Shawn Michaels is the MVP based on his wire-to-wire victory in the Rumble. Not only did he pull off the spectacular "one-foot-on-the floor" ending, but he was also pressed overhead five times (Bulldog twice, Luger, Sionne and Crush) but never dumped to the floor.

Thoughts on Survivor Series 94 Razor Ramon became the first wrestler to face a 1-on-5 deficit and come out victorious. It helped that the entire opposing team (Shawn, Diesel, Owen, Anvil, Jarrett) was counted out while arguing on the floor. Diesel turned in another dominant performance to set up his face turn and WWF title win later in the week. The Lawler-Doink midget match was the rare comedy match that was actually funny. My favorite spot was when Jerry Lawler got on Sleazy's shoulders to chicken fight Dink, only to crash down when Sleazy couldn't carry his weight. Mabel was trying to groove to the ring to Lex Luger's USA music, but it didn't quite work. Poor Oscar came out last, without rapping, and he wasn't even near Mabel. It was interesting to have King Kong Bundy and Bam Bam Bigelow on the same team since they were opponents in the first Survivor Series main event in 1987. Undertaker's win over Yokozuna was a satisfying conclusion to their year-long story. Chuck Norris got his big spot in, and Jeff Jarrett sold it big. Bob Backlund is the MVP for reinventing himself as a crazy old man and outwrestling the champ without cheating or even throwing a punch. Even though Owen Hart duped his mom into throwing in the towel, Bob had the cross-face chickenwing on for five minutes, and Bret wasn't getting out. Bret got the chicken wing procured on him when he turned to Owen to call him a son of a bitch. Not only did he lose the match, but he also accidentally called himself an SOB and insulted his mother at ringside. No wonder she cost him the title!

Thoughts on SummerSlam 94 Surprised to see Captain Lou take a punch at his age in the opener (Headshrinkers vs. Bigelow & IRS). Afa got a nice pop for his retaliation. Walter Payton didn't do much in Razor Ramon's corner, but Razor won anyway as the Shawn-Diesel breakup began. I loved Tatanka's heel turn on Lex Luger. I don't think we've seen that before or since, where a babyface accuses a fellow babyface of joining a heel stable, only to join that heel stable himself. Too bad it led to a lot of bad matches. Mabel's singles push seemed to be going nowhere, as he followed up his loss at King of the Ring to IRS with another loss here to Jeff Jarrett. Nobody could have guessed that one year later, he would be King of the Ring and headlining SummerSlam in a WWF title match. As much as I loved the Bret-Owen match at WM X, I really didn't like their cage match. There were way too many cage escape attempts, and they started way too early. The psychology should have been, "This is my brother, I know how tough he is and what a great wrestler he is. I have to beat him half to death before I can even think of trying to get out of this cage." Also, I don't see why Diana Hart Smith had to take the bump over the railing with Davey Boy Smith. Did that lead to anything? Undertaker vs. Undertaker fell flat for two reasons. The fake Undertaker never established himself as a serious threat, and he never did anything to the real Undertaker except imitate him. Once the bell rang, the result was a foregone conclusion. Ted DiBiase gets the MVP award for his involvement throughout the show: starting with IRS and Bigelow, then establishing Tatanka as a heel before trying his best with a fake Undertaker.

Garber, actually. He was a pretty good relief pitcher for the Braves.

Actually, it might be WWF champion Mr. Bob Backlund, after he regained the belt from Bret at Survivor Series 94.

Thoughts on King of the Ring 94 IRS challenges Owen Hart for the Malaprop of the Year award by telling Razor Ramon, "You're nothing but a fool's gold wearing, tax fool, tax cheat idiot!" Jeff Jarrett gave the 1-2-3 Kid three piledrivers after Kid beat him, so it was amazing that Kid was able to come out for his semifinal match against Owen Hart. The piledriver was obviously not treated like a death move, as it showed up several times on these 1994 PPVs. Lawler couldn't even beat Piper with it. Jim Neidhart had a fascinating night. First he supports Bret and saves the WWF title by interfering after Bret takes Diesel's jackknife powerbomb. Then he leaves Bret to the wolves. Later, Neidhart attacks Razor Ramon and helps Owen become King of the Ring. Detective Randy Savage figures out that Neidhart was only at ringside to keep Bret from losing the title so Owen could be the one to win it from Bret. Speaking of announcers, Art Donovan is the best worst announcer in WWE history. He had absolutely no idea who anyone was or what was happening. Oscar was in a white suit, so Donovan said "I thought he was the guy who took people to the hospital." But at the same time, he made the wrestlers look great by putting over how big and tough they were. He said Owen Hart and Tatanka were like "linebackers" and marveled at everything Yokozuna did. Anytime Donovan was impressed, it carried weight because he is in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Owen Hart is the MVP for carrying the show with multiple matches, just like Bret, and Owen rebranded himself nicely with his "King of Harts" coronation speech. Jerry Lawler and Roddy Piper showed that you don't have to kill yourself with crazy moves to put on an entertaining main event. They put in the hard work with their mouths in the weeks before the match, so they were able to have a solid bout despite the sloppy finish. Best of all, Gorilla Monsoon plugged the "New WWF Generation" for the battle between the 44-year-old Lawler and the 40-year-old Piper. The "distraction finish" should be named after Crush, who lost yet another match because his "real enemy" (Lex Luger in this case) was yelling at him from the aisle. I thought this would change when he turned heel, but Crush continued to have the attention span of a toddler.

Thoughts on WrestleMania X Owen Hart vs. Bret Hart is my favorite match of all time. It's an amazing technical match, and the little brother wins cleanly. When you're a little brother, you lose to your big brother 95 percent of the time in every imaginable game and sport. But every once in a while, the sun shines on the little brother. Owen beating Bret reminded me of the rare occasions when I would actually beat my big brother at tennis. Man, that felt good. When Randy Savage tied up Crush and prevented him from beating the 10 count in the Texas death match, I can imagine young John Cena saying, "Great idea!" I like how Lelani Kai walked into Madison Square Garden expecting to pick up the title she dropped nine years earlier. She did well in her short match against Alundra Blayze. Men on a Mission vs. Quebecers was a surprisingly good match. The Quebecers had a lot of double-teams that involved propelling one partner at the opponent (slams, backdrops, and the Tower finisher). Mr. Perfect screwing over Lex Luger in the WWF title match made sense. Luger cheated to beat Perfect at WM 9 and knocked him out with the steel forearm, so the chickens came home to roost for Lex at the worst possible time. Owen and Bret were strong candidates for MVP honors, and even Yokozuna deserves an honorable mention for defending his title twice while carrying so much weight. However, Shawn Michaels wins the MVP for his performance against Razor Ramon. Shawn's insane bumps and innovative moves put the ladder match on the map, and it's still a big part of wrestling 21 years later. So now that I've watched every WWF pay-per-view from Wrestlemania 1 through 10, let's check the MVP leaderboard: Bret Hart --------------5 ------WM 8, SummerSlam 92, Survivor Series 92, KOTR 93, Rumble 94 Randy Savage -------4 -------Wrestling Classic, WM 3, WM 4, WM 7 Shawn Michaels -----3 -------Survivor Series 92 and 93, WM X Ultimate Warrior -----3 -------SummerSlam 88, Survivor Series 89, WM 6 Bobby Heenan -------3------- Big Event, WM 5, Rumble 92 Ric Flair ----------------2-------Tuesday in Texas, Rumble 92

Apron spots are cool because it's the hardest part of the ring! That shows the fans that you are working really hard and willing to sacrifice your body for...well no fucking reason actually.... Agreed! Big Bully Busick and Cousin Luke once threw me out of the ring when I was (for some reason) a referee, and I cracked my head on the edge of the ring apron.

I predict they will plug Dean Ambrose into the match and make it to determine the top contender for the IC title.

Heavy D vs. Huey Lewis, with The Gang and The News banned from ringside? It was Heavy D and the Boyz. Unfortunately, this dream match will never come to pass. Heavy D passed away in 2011. If you really want to use the Gang, I'm sure Kool will be happy to do a run-in with them.

Has anyone found results from the Global Force show in Erie, PA on Saturday? Thanks in advance.

Well, they clearly don't enforce this. Exhibit A: Jerrry Lawler They handed this to Lawler and he started doodling on it before changing into his blingy t-shirt. VKM's not completely wrong though. I really don't care what Michael Cole thinks. I don't know why WWE insists on a 3-man booth. It really adds nothing. It's already competitive and confrontational enough with just two guys at the desk but that's the environment they've fostered for years. A three-man booth can work if the announcers have clearly defined roles and they work together. In IWC (Pittsburgh), we had a three-man team of me on play-by-play, Joe Dombrowski as the face color guy and Kingdom James as the heel color guy. We all played our roles and played off each other, and it worked.

Fuck those machines I always go to a person's lane to checkout. I do too. My theory is... "Nobody's paying me to run the checkout aisle."

Thoughts on Royal Rumble 94 Tatanka-Bigelow was a good opener, but it would have been nice to see the original match, Tatanka-Ludvig Borga. Either Tatanka gets revenge on the guy who broke his streak, or Borga stays super-strong and moves into title contention. Owen's heel turn on Bret was just perfect. I loved his subtle comment during the pre-match interview that he would be "leading the way." Bret really wasn't trying to hog the glory; he just saw an opening for the Sharpshooter and tried to win the match. Of course, Owen had his own narrative in his head. Even Owen's classic malaprop after the match "That's why I kicked your leg out of your leg" makes sense because he was so mad at Bret that he couldn't speak correctly. The IC title match was the best IRS match I've seen in a long time. It wasn't bogged down with standstill offense like most of his matches. The false title change was good, as IRS would have been a believable IC champ. Ted DiBiase did a superb job on commentary during the Yoko (and Friends!) vs. Undertaker casket match. First, he mentioned how dangerous Yoko could be because he was "backed into a corner" and forced to face his fear of caskets. Then he heaped praise onto Mr. Fuji for recruiting the heel locker room to beat up the Undertaker, because there are no disqualifications. This match set the precedent for unlimited cheating in no-DQ matches. Bret Hart wins the MVP award of the pay-per-view for his selling his leg throughout the show. When he limped down the aisle to enter the Rumble, that was a heroic moment. Luger was also attacked before the Rumble, but Bret's battle was much more personal.

Thoughts on Survivor Series 93 Razor Ramon buried his former AWA tag team championship partner, Mr. Perfect, by saying he tagged out before the match started. Perfect's replacement was Randy Savage. Of course, one year earlier, Perfect replaced Ultimate Warrior to team with Savage against Ramon and Ric Flair. Shawn Michaels is the MVP of this show. He saved the match against the Hart brothers from falling apart when he stepped in for Jerry Lawler. So he had to adopt Lawler's Knights as his own and quickly throw out a fresh batch of insults at the Harts. Shawn also sold like crazy for all of the Harts, especially for Stu. The Rock & Roll Express vs. The Heavenly Bodies is one of the rare matches that would have gotten a bigger reaction if the crowd were smaller. If that crowd were further south than Boston, that would have helped, too. In the four Doinks match, the fans were chanting, "We Want Doink" because they were expecting the real one (well, the new babyface version) to be wrestling. This match was really bad, as the heels were all unfocused and kept falling prey to silly gags. Doink cut a lousy promo on Bigelow after the match, too. Even though Crush was a heel, he showed the same inability to concentrate on his opponents in the ring as he did when he was a face feuding with evil Doink. Crush got counted out battling Savage on the floor -- even though Crush pulled the same trick on Savage in the opening match.