Monday Night Wars - The Comprehensive Recap
06-27-2016
, 10:48 AM
07-01-2016
, 04:12 PM
December 30, 1996
NITRO
Knoxville, TN
No search bubbles on the Network? That's going to be annoying. Unless that means it's a two-hour Chris Benoit ironman match, in which case I could probably warm up to it.
The show cold-opens on the arrival of a couple of black limos, and the nWo emerging from them. They're all acting like Hogan beat Piper last night. The Giant seems to be about to take exception with something Hogan says, but Hogan calms it down and just repeats, "You dropped the ball, but it's okay." Giant says fine, he dropped the ball, but then brings up his WW3 win and says that he wants a shot at the World Title. Hogan says that the shot that Giant won creates a bye for the group. Giant isn't happy that Hogan doesn't want to give him a shot. Finally Ted DiBiase tells the camera to get out of there as the show finally goes to opening graphics.
Tony Schiavone and Larry Zbyszko give their opening talk and show some stills from last night's Lex Luger vs. Giant match before sending it out to the ring.
The Amazing French Canadians (w/ Col. Parker) vs. Public Enemy: Opening the show on a ****ing Public Enemy match is no way to make someone want to keep watching. Match starts quickly with the Canadians attacking PE as they first try to enter the ring. PE regroups, fights their way back in, and then clears the ring before long. Canadians are going to take a walk when PE chases them down and beats them repeatedly with flagpoles. The referee doesn't mind. They set Jacques Rougeau on a table outside, the trademark Rocco Rock flip ends up putting both of Public Enemy through the table when Jacques moves.
Canadians capitalize by double-teaming Rocco, Carl Ouellet hits the cannonball off the top, 1-2-3.
Result: Amazing French Canadians via pinfall
Ultimo Dragon (w/ Sonny Onoo) vs. Jushin Thunder Liger: Of his nine belts, Ultimo only wears the WCW Cruiserweight Title out. In keeping with the theme of the thread, I can't tell whether this is a title match or not. Liger throws an early backdrop, Dragon lands on his feet. We get a couple of collisions in the middle of the ring, but neither man goes down. Liger finally puts Ultimo down and then locks in an upside-down surfboard. Lets it go and then executes a handspring back elbow. Two-count, running somersault splash by Liger, another two-count. Jushin continues relentlessly, snapping Dragon off with a powerbomb. Dragon escapes a tilt-a-whirl attempt and then executes a tilt-a-whirl backbreaker of his own. Liger tries to take a break, but Ultimo follows him out with a suicide dive.
The new Cruiserweight Champ follows by slamming his opponent into the guardrail. Rolls Liger inside, front bodyslam to set him up, but Liger gets a boot up when Ultimo jumps off the top. Liger with a delayed brainbuster. Showboats on the count and only gets two. Jushin executes on a superplex from a full standing position atop the ropes. Still only two. Dragon catches Liger heading up the ropes, follows and hits a spinning hurracanrana.
Dragon is quick to capitalize with a tiger suplex into a bridging pinfall attempt, and we have a winner. I was going to say that it appears that he busted his mouth open at the end, but that might just be mist. Decent match, but nothing special considering the combatants.
Result: Ultimo Dragon via pinfall
We're scheduled next for a strap match between Konnan and Big Bubba, but when Bubba's music hits (this seems to be the first appearance of the crappy alternate jobber-specific nWo music), he never appears. Eventually Mr. Wallstreet comes out and delivers the message that Bubba couldn't make it tonight, but that he isn't afraid of Konnan or that strap, and they would fight soon. Then Konnan acts like a complete moron and celebrates by just turning his back so that Wallstreet can jump him.
Wallstreet attaches himself to the strap, so I guess he's subbing in and we're doing a match.
Strap Match - Konnan (w/ Jimmy Hart) vs. Mr. Wallstreet: Wallstreet has the early advantage after the ambush, but it doesn't get him far, as Konnan regains the advantage. Wallstreet fights back, choking Konnan with the strap, and then they engage in the inevitable sequence where Wallstreet drags Konnan around, touching the turnbuckles himself but allowing Konnan to do likewise. He eventually knocks Konnan into the 4th corner to end it, pretending that he didn't realize what was going on, and even acting like he thought he won, even though Konnan had to jerk them both back in order to tag up at a prior corner and even though Wallstreet hadn't actually touched the fourth corner yet when the bell rang. Let's go to the tape and see whether or not Wallstreet was believably unaware that Konnan was tagging the corners:
Whatever.
Result: Konnan via the usual strap match cliché ending
Enter Hulk Hogan and Eric Bischoff for the next segment. They're all smiles and pretending they won last night.
It's a generic taunting promo, except for the part where Hogan actually lost cleanly last night. The announcers of course express their disbelief about the whole thing. They say that they'll show footage later of Piper beating Hogan.
Hugh Morrus vs. Kensuke Sasaki (w/ Sonny Onoo): Lots of punch-kick and not much else early. Sasaki breaks the monotony with a suplex. He follows with some chops that Hugh Morrus no-sells. Who is Bill ****ing Demott to ever no-sell anything except for maybe a 2015 sensitivity training course? In any case, Hugh Morrus is on offense now, locking in a reverse chinlock before executing a corner whip and following up to avalanche Sasaki. At this point Eric Bischoff shows up at the booth, snatches away a videotape they have of Starrcade last night, and says, "You're not showing anything." I realize it was an earlier time, but WCW was pretty ridiculous about pretending that only one recording ever existed of any PPV show…they did the same after the original WW3 when Hogan wanted to prove that he got screwed. Schiavone reassures the audience that they do have stills to prove their point.
Sasaki goes for a flying elbow off the ropes, but misses. Morrus hits the No Laughing Matter moonsault, is going to get the three-count, Sonny Onoo is fairly late to his spot and the referee just has to awkwardly slow-count and then stop after two while buying time to allow Onoo to arrive and hit Morrus with the Japanese flag. At that point it becomes a DQ.
Result: Hugh Morrus via DQ
Morrus grabs and tries to attack Onoo after the bell, but Onoo just sheds his jacket and slips away.
Here are the stills. It appears that Piper did, indeed, win.
Harlem Heat (w/ Sister Sherri) vs. The Faces of Fear: Stevie Ray vs. Meng to start, and I can barely keep my eyes trained on the screen until one of the workers tags in. There's the tag to Barbarian after a clothesline by Meng, and a blind tag by Booker T a moment later. Axe kick and then a Harlem side kick by Booker that gets a quick two-count. Barbarian catches Booker heading up top, sets up and connects on a belly-to-belly superplex. Meng tags in and continues control for the Faces of Fear, landing a two-count after a backbreaker. He drops his head too early and gets kicked in the face, allowing Booker to tag out and avoid a full heat segment.
Here's Col. Parker. He comes out and whips Sherri on the ass with…whatever he's carrying. She tackles Parker, the chaos distracts referee Mark Curtis, Jacques Rougeau appears on the apron out of nowhere and throws a handful of some sort of black dust(?) in Stevie Ray's face, Meng with a mafia kick and a cover, but the table gets turned on this finish as Booker flies off the top to hit Meng, rolling his brother on top for the pinfall. Short, worthless match.
Result: Harlem Heat via pinfall
Here's Diamond Dallas Page for an interview with Mean Gene at the top of the aisle. Gene asks DDP what he's going to do about what the nWo did to him last night. Page says, "Don't worry about it." When pressed, he says, "Am I crying? I'm not crying about it. I'm a fixer. I'm gonna fix things." Gene continues to thunder away at DDP with questions, but Dallas just keeps it cryptic and brief in reply. The promo is left open-ended. This is a simple tactic that is blatantly underused in modern wrestling. Guy gives you his mood, but doesn't say much. Next week he might say a bit more. While I know the general direction of DDP's character over time, I have zero memory of the specifics of how it all went down, and this segment was effective in keeping me interested. A slow burn isn't a bad thing, it's…a good thing.
We see a replay of things getting tense between Hulk Hogan and The Giant earlier, and then a replay of Hogan and Bischoff denying the real result of last night's main event. Back at the table, Tony Schiavone announces that he's just gotten word that Rowdy Roddy Piper is here tonight.
Glacier vs. Disco Inferno: Been quite a while since we've seen Disco. I liked him enough that I was disappointed to see that he was just showing up to be fed to Glacier. At the opening bell, Disco picks up a mic and tells Glacier that he's been perfecting his new leg hold for the past two weeks, so he recommends that Glacier just leave so that people can watch the Disco Inferno dance. He proceeds, "What are you, stupid? You must be dumber than Peyton Manning!" Well that's a time capsule; a wrestler trolling Manning's college fans before Manning had ever made it to the pros. Glacier attacks Disco - the way it set up, I figured the action would last about 10 seconds, but they do have a bit of back-and-forth.
Glacier's kick-heavy offense is just dreadful. He's about go for the Cryonic Kick, Disco pulls the ref in the way and gets Glacier distracted for long enough to turn him inside out with a running clothesline. He tells the camera he's going to go for the leg hold that he has perfected, but he goes for it and can't figure out how to actually apply it. Disco hits a swinging neckbreaker instead, but turns his back and celebrates instead of following…eventually he turns around into a Cryonic Kick to finish this. The crowd has been fine all night, but they were dead as a doornail for this.
Result: Glacier via pinfall
We get a stills recap of Chris Benoit vs. Jeff Jarrett from last night.
Chris Benoit (w/ Woman) vs. Chris Jericho: These guys get right into the action, with Jericho connecting on a spinning back kick that knocks Benoit to the apron, a springboard dropkick that knocks him to the floor, then a missile dropkick from the top rope to the floor. Upon Benoit's return inside, Jericho keeps up the offense until Benoit catches him and counters into a stun gun. Hard knees and a rug slam by Benoit, who screams at him on the mat. Front slam by Benoit gets two. He tries to go for a powerbomb, Jericho with a nifty escape, ducks a clothesline, backslide gets a near-fall. Benoit straight back up with a hard knife-edge chop that gets two. Vicious chops back and forth, Jericho ducks, schoolboy gets two. Action here is fast and furious.
Benoit sidesteps Jericho and pulls him face-first into the second turnbuckle. Corner mount, several punches by Benoit, Jericho lifts him out into an atomic drop, superkick, but Benoit dodges the following quebrada. Jericho punches back, staggering Benoit, cross-body off the top connects, but the following knee misses. Benoit capitalizes by setting him up and connecting on a back superplex. 1, 2…3? Holy ****, a superplex that wasn't anyone's finisher actually just won a match. I approve. I would have liked this match to get more time, but they worked at a nonstop Savage-Steamboat tempo with the minutes they got.
Result: Chris Benoit via pinfall
Ric Flair, Mongo McMichael, and Debra are waiting at the top of the aisle and celebrating next to Mean Gene directly after the match. Woman and Debra share an icy stare when Woman and Benoit join the party. Debra goes full phony and tells Woman how much she's missed her. Woman breaks in and tells Debra and Mongo to keep their mouths shut, says they don't have a vote because they haven't been here long enough. Flair plays peacemaker, stepping into the middle, and…now out comes Jeff Jarrett. Nothing could kill my interest in this segment more quickly than his boring ass. Jarrett brings up Arn Anderson dropping him on his head last night. Woman interjects and asks where Arn is tonight. Flair: "You're asking me where Double A is on New Year's Eve Eve? He's down at the Hyatt with a Miller Lite in his hand so cold it would freeze the hand off an Eskimo." Wat. He dances up and down the aisle with Woman for a second. Flair is just being funny to try to defuse the situation.
Everyone else is yucking it up, but Benoit no-sells and remains serious, saying, "Jarrett, you proved yourself last night. You can be anything BUT a Horseman." With that, he and Woman walk off. Debra says that Woman is just grumpy because of the weight she's gaining over the holiday season. She adds, "Steve, it's a good thing I got between you and Chris, because you were gonna kill that little boy." I'm appreciating her heel work a little more here. Flair goes back to trying to stir up a party as the segment closes out.
Octagoncito & Mascarita Sagrada vs. Jerito Estrada & Piratita Morgan: Pretty sure this midget match was a one-time thing on Nitro unless they returned during the dying years. You might remember Mascarita Sagrada as Max Mini from his later WWF years. Estrada charges Octagoncito before the bell, Octagoncito sidesteps, and we're off. Octagoncito reverses a corner whip, backdrops Estrada, Morgan and Sagrada in illegally, Sagrada and Octagoncito both sunset flip their opponents at the same time, but both just get two. Heenan: "It's like a riot at the day care center." Morgan comes up empty on a corner charge and spills all the way through the middle rope to the floor. Forget what I said about "illegally"; they seem to just be operating under the liberal lucha tag rules where wrestlers can trade out without a tag and the new one in just becomes legal. Sagrada with a flying headscissor. Weak dropkick misses. Estrada backdrops Sagrada in the corner, Sagrada does an extended head stand and then kicks back down into a headscissor takeover.
Both guys trade out. Octagoncito throws a couple of hip-tosses, but Estrada puts him down with a punch. Sagrada back in, jumps up into a victory roll, 1-2-3.
Result: Octagoncito & Mascarita Sagrada via pinfall
Dean Malenko vs. Rey Mysterio Jr.: What the…back from commercial break with an immediate opening bell, and you don't expect the two guys who both got jobber entrances to be Malenko and Mysterio. Rey with a leglock, Malenko escapes and counters into an STF. Snapmare by Dean into a chinlock. Rey counters Dean's next move into an armdrag that carries Malenko out, then Rey jumps through the middle rope to execute a hurracanrana on the floor. Back inside, Malenko reasserts his size advantage, tripping Rey into a grounded headlock. He transitions into an attempted standing surfboard, but Rey doesn't quite let him lock it in, and instead counters into another armdrag followed by a front facelock.
Dean sets Rey up on the ropes and then just clubs him with a forearm. Whips Rey off the ropes and throws him up high to come crashing down to the mat. Fireman's carry into a gutbuster. Slow cover, two-count. Snap suplex, then a half-crab. Really wrenches at this hold, almost looks like a Lion Tamer.
Dean relinquishes the hold and leaves an opening for Rey to kick him in the gut, scale the ropes, and launch off them with a dropkick. The dropkick seems to hurt Rey as well, and Dean goes back on offense. Butterfly suplex gets two. Backbreaker by Dean, and he holds onto it to stress Rey's lower back. Goes for a tilt-a-whirl move, Rey falls on top and gets a two-count. Dean with a corner smash, then a whip to another corner…Rey takes the patented Hart chest-first corner bump. Rey starts the comeback, charges Dean, Dean picks him up and throws him overhead, Rey can't quite stick a top-rope landing, and instead he gets crotched on the top rope. Malenko climbs up after him, tries a back superplex, Rey counters and falls on top, but gets hurt on the landing as well. Both slow to get up, Rey with a hip-toss, jumps on Malenko's shoulders, tries for a hurracanrana, gets truly planted by a hard powerbomb that I thought was game over, but Rey kicks out on 2.5.
Malenko picks him up overhead, Rey counters into a victory roll, also a semi-believable near-fall. Sunset flip a moment later by Rey gets another two. Dean gets up and levels him with a clothesline. Crowd is a bit (unfairly) dead for this as well. Dean tries to climb the ropes, but Rey catches him with a jumping leg lariat halfway up and knocks him to the floor. Rey to the top, ****ing seated sentan to the floor. Awesome.
Rey rolls Dean back in. Goes for a springboard hurracanrana, Dean catches him and counters into a Boston crab. Rey bridges out into a pin, counter by Dean into his own, re-counter, and they finally separate before either can score a fall. Rey tries to jump out from the corner into a headscissor, Malenko counters nicely into a side salto. Malenko tries to follow with possibly a figure-four, but Rey boots him off. Mysterio with a hurracanrana off the top, and as this connects the bell rings. They hadn't foreshadowed a time limit draw at all during this match, but that's what we've got. Mysterio pleads for five more minutes, but doesn't get it. I think this result is fine. Both were coming off Starrcade losses, so neither was in a great position to take a loss, and Schiavone does a good job here to put over the way that this match just showed how even this rivalry is. Pretty great match in spite of the non-ending. A little weird to have Dean have time limit draws on consecutive Nitros, but whatever.
Result: Time Limit Draw
Lex Luger vs. Greg Valentine: Valentine lays in some early offense on Lex, and even gets a bit more in after Lex retakes the advantage, but obviously he's here to do the honors. He attempts to suplex Luger in from the apron to the ring, Luger escapes behind and slaps on the Torture Rack, and referee Mark Curtis cues the bell.
Result: Lex Luger via submission
After commercial, we hear the sound of bagpipes, and Roddy Piper emerges in the entryway. Piper gets on the mic and, after celebrating last night's win a bit, says that was his last fight. Cue the nWo music, enter Hogan and Bischoff. Hogan calls Piper a liar and demands that Piper admit that Hogan "dogged him" last night. Hogan continues and says that the only reason he took it easy on Piper last night and "didn't end it for good" was because Piper's son begged him to "take it easy on Pops." Piper gets all offended by this and says, "Then let's do it one more time!" He sheds his jacket, his belt, his t-shirt, and…here are Kevin Nash, Scott Hall, and Syxx for the beatdown. As they stomp away, Giant makes his way down slowly as well. Scott Norton joins the beatdown, and the nWo drops Piper along Norton's bent knee. Giant hangs out for the beatdown and watches, but doesn't really participate.
Hogan again cracks Piper's bad hip with a chair. The nWo asks The Giant to do something. Giant steps in, sets up a chokeslam, then releases the choke and sets Piper down. Paramedics are on the scene and seize the opportunity to isolate Piper and try to treat him. Incidentally, here's Nick Patrick openly wearing an nWo shirt for the first time. The Giant stands separated from the rest of the group. Hogan picks up a mic and asks Giant what his deal is. He again tells him he dropped the ball. He mentions last night, then says something muffled about "again tonight with Piper," finally saying, "That's three strikes!" as he slaps Giant across the face. Giant grabs Hogan in a chokehold and screams at the rest of the nWo to get out of the ring.
Instead of chokeslamming Hogan, Giant screams at Hogan to agree to give him a title match. Hogan apologizes and begs off and agrees to give him the title match, as he bails out of the ring and whimpers, "I didn't know it meant that much to you." Once Hogan is safely out of the ring, he yells, "Get him!" Marcus Bagwell, Vincent, and fake Sting try to attack first, and Giant fends them all off. Finally the heavy hitters step in and overwhelm the big man, at least managing to subdue him and hold him in place while Hulk hits him with the World Title belt. IIRC it's customary for Giant to now sell that blow for the next 20 minutes. The group strips Giant of his nWo shirt and then holds him up again for Hogan to take another free shot.
The nWo stands tall in the ring. Bet you didn't see that ending coming. We get a quick cut to outside the arena, where an ambulance is hauling Roddy Piper off as the credits roll.
Overall: Really good episode. So much strong ringwork on this show from the cruiserweights. Aside from the annoyance of the nWo standing tall as always, the main event segment was pretty effective. Liked this a lot overall.
RAW
Albany, NY
We open on a graphic that builds the animosity between Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels. Tonight they'll face off in a head-to-head interview segment.
Bret: "This is the opportunity that I've been waiting for to tell you face to face, 'boy toy,' exactly what I think of you and everything you do."
HBK: "Hitman, you can make all the excuses you want. But tonight, we're gonna find out what the 'role model' has to say when he comes face to face with the World Wrestling Federation's favorite degenerate." I don't know that I ever really thought about the fact that DX almost certainly doesn't exist if it wasn't for Bret Hart being a moralizing stick in the mud IRL (and I say that while still very much being a fan of Bret's).
After the credits, we open in the ring with Faarooq, surrounded by the Nation. He's joined by his tag team partner for the evening, Steve Austin.
Steve Austin & Faarooq (w/ Clarence Mason & PG-13) vs. Jesse James & Savio Vega: "Double J" is singing his way to the ring slowly when Steve Austin has had enough and ambushes him in the aisle. Savio Vega races out to his partner's aid and fights Austin off. He slams Austin into the steel steps, rolls him inside, and we're only now officially under way as the opening bell finally rings. Vega tries to continue on offense, but drops his head and allows Austin to kick him in the face. Stone Cold with a stun gun a moment later, an elbow, a clothesline, and the heels are in control as Faarooq tags in. Faarooq with a spinebuster, gets two. Savio halts his momentum by raising his boot on a corner charge, then he follows with a spinning wheel kick. Savio gets a two-count out of that, and shows no real interest in tagging out. That's a mistake, as he falls back behind in the match, with Austin coming in and doing the mudhole stomp in the corner.
Surprise small package by Vega gets two, Austin up quickly with a hard clothesline. Savio finally makes his first tag of the match after kicking his way free of Austin. In comes Jesse James with a series of punches, a jumping forearm, and a bulldog. Austin slugs him and tags Faarooq. Faarooq has his trouble as well though, as James gets a series of rights in before telegraphing the **** out of a charge at the ropes, allowing Faarooq to easily drop down and send the country singer sprawling out of the ring. With James outside, Faarooq occupies the referee, and Austin drops down to the floor to clip James's leg.
I was beginning to think that this whole match was pretty weak, and a waste of a use of Austin, but out comes Bret Hart in street clothes. He takes exception to that cheap shot by Austin on James, and is screaming at Austin. Vince speculates that James might not be able to continue, and that if he can't, Bret might want to take his place. With that question open, the show goes to commercial.
Once back from break, yes, Bret has been added to the match as Savio Vega's partner, and has taken his place on the apron in jeans.
Savio is face in peril, with the heels taking turns working him over and keeping from tagging out. He eventually takes advantage of Faarooq's arrogance though…as Faarooq stands over him and plays to the crowd, Savio stands all the way up, picking Faarooq up on his shoulders, and executing a nice electric chair drop. Finally makes the hot tag to Bret. Bret hammers away at Faarooq, Austin enters and gets cleared out, Bret executes the Russian legsweep and elbow off the ropes on Faarooq. As he goes for the Sharpshooter, Crush runs in and attacks, with the others in the Nation following soon after.
Result: Bret Hart & Savio Vega via DQ
The heels have the numbers here, and they beat both Bret and Savio down. Eventually Ahmed Johnson comes out wielding a 2x4, and that clears the ring. Ahmed picks up a mic and starts another "you going down" chant. The faces hold the ring. This whole thing, match and post-match, was nothing great.
Hunter Hearst-Helmsley vs. Flash Funk: This is non-title, as established in a quick pre-match interview by HHH where he talks about the Royal Rumble and vows again to show Marlena what a "real man" is. Goldust shows up in the crowd before the match starts. Hunter is distracted by him, and Funk capitalizes by attacking from behind. Corner whip and a backdrop. Spinning wheel kick, then a standing moonsault by Funk that gets him a two-count. H reverses a corner whip, Funk springs up to the second turnbuckle and jumps back into a cross-body, but Helmsley ducks it and causes Flash to come up empty. Offense time for Hunter, as he dumps Funk through the middle ropes. As he tries to bring Flash back inside, Flash throws a shoulderblock, then jumps over the ropes behind HHH, rolling him up, bridging, and getting a two-count.
Helmsley is up quickly with a kick to the gut, and a quick follow with a neckbreaker. Two-count. Jerry Lawler devotes a bunch of commentary to Goldust not being a "real man," causing Vince McMahon to stand up for him and say, "He has guts enough to be different. He has guts enough to be anybody he wants to be." Well that's not very Vince-like. Suplex by HHH. Flash ducks a clothesline and hits a cross-body that gets another two-count, but again Hunter is quick to get up and attack right after escaping a pin attempt. He slaps on a camel clutch as Raw goes to break.
Back from commercial, Funk hip-tosses his way out of a hold, but a follow-up splash attempt lands on HHH's knees. Knee-drop by the blueblood gets two. Delayed suplex. Fistdrop off the ropes for another two. Unfortunately this match is slow and boring when you might hope for better. Back suplex by Funk. Jerry Lawler stands up from the announce table and starts talking on a live arena mic. He starts yelling at Goldust and calling him a freak as the match continues. Goldust sheds his robe and heads toward the ring as Funk connects on a top-rope moonsault. Referee Mike Chioda is a bit slow to be in position, as he was tending to the Lawler/Goldust matter, and his count only gets to two.
Lawler continues to distract from the match, and as Mike Chioda is distracted again, HHH wallops Funk with his title belt and scores the cheap pin.
Result: HHH via pinfall
Funk gets his heat back after the match by laying out Hunter and hitting a 450 splash. He never made it at all in the WWF, but you can see that they were still taking measures to protect him here.
We see an ad for Shotgun Saturday Night, debuting this coming Saturday. All I remember from that entire series is Marlena flashing the crowd during the first episode.
Jim Ross is in the ring to moderate our Bret Hart/Shawn Michaels confrontation. After bringing both men out, Ross mentions that Bret will take on Vader next week. Shawn says that he'll be ringside during that match, and that he "won't dare interfere." Ross offers for Shawn to start first in this exchange, and Shawn mockingly defers to "the best there is, the best there was, and the best there ever will be," and says sarcastically that he isn't worthy of going first. "Let the almighty one go first." Bret starts in, calling Michaels disrespectful. He says that Shawn pretends to respect Jose Lothario, but obviously doesn't take an example from him. He notes that Lothario stood up and apologized when he cost Shawn the WWF Title at Survivor Series, but Shawn has never shown any contrition about costing Bret the title at December IYH.
Bret continues: "Last year at WrestleMania, when I was screwed out of the World Wrestling Federation Championship belt, you promised that you would carry that belt with the same pride and the same class that I did. And Shawn Michaels, you never came close." Bret's mic keeps cutting out, which is hurting this segment. It cuts off half his next sentence, but he criticizes Michaels for posing for Playgirl. "You know, I don't even think girls buy that magazine." Ross slips him another microphone that hopefully works. Bret says that Michaels has degraded the WWF Title. Says that only 14-year-old females would like him. "You call yourself a man's man? I don't think so. Whose man are you?" These wouldn't be the last veiled homophobic swipes he would take at Shawn over the course of the next year. Bret rages on about what Shawn has done to the title. Says that sooner or later, they're going to meet in the ring, whether there's a title on the line or not. "All the dancing in the world will not save you, and I will kick your ass."
Vince comments that Bret didn't show a lot of class there. Time for Shawn to talk. "Let's start with the role model stuff. Because Hitman, I've seen you on the road, and bro, you ain't no role model." Yeah, that's a shoot; Bret was open about that in his book. Shawn says, "That's fact #1, and I've got a long way to go." And here to interrupt the proceedings is Sid. Dammit, this was NOT the moment for an interruption.
Sid says, "I've played the game with you <points to Shawn> and I've played the game with you <points to Bret>, and I've beaten you both. You're talking about my title, and I want some real competition!" Lights go down, gong…lights come back up, and The Undertaker marches toward the ring without music. As he approaches, Vader emerges from the back and attacks Taker from behind.
Taker puts Vader down, then turns around to have a staredown with Sid. Vader picks himself up and attacks Taker again…Taker stalks Vader back up the aisle. As Bret starts to head out of the ring, Shawn cheap-shots him, then jumps over the ropes to the outside to attack Sid. Officials are out to break Shawn and Sid up. This was a good way to build up a number of people as viable in the WWF Title mix, even though I wish we could have gotten more Bret vs. Shawn stuff.
The Honky Tonk Man and Hunter Hearst-Helmsley are out to join Vince on commentary for the last match.
Jerry Lawler vs. Goldust: This match is joined in progress after a late commercial. Lawler drops a fist off the ropes, but he kept his strap up so it's not that effective. Running clothesline by Goldust. Helmsley gets up out of his announce position and goes to accost Marlena. He suddenly picks her up over his shoulder and starts to walk off with her against her struggle. Marc Mero stops him halfway up the aisle. Goldust sees what's going on and pursues Hunter, Hunter tosses Marlena to Mero, then sidesteps Goldust, and there's a big collision among Goldust, Marlena, and Mero.
Marlena is laid out, and Goldust and HHH keep fighting. The bell rings for an apparent countout win by Lawler. Helmsley leaves everyone in his wake and exits stage left. Camera focuses on a pained Marlena as the show goes off the air.
Overall: The Bret/Shawn segment was pretty strong and gave at least some sort of takeaway from this show. Not really a fan of the HHH/Goldust/Lawler stuff, though it was reasonably well-done. It was an okay episode.
---
Ratings for 12/30/96: Nitro 3.6, Raw 1.6
Ratings Running Score: Nitro 44-17-2
Better Show: Nitro with relative ease this week. They really emptied the clip in terms of sending a lot of their best workers out there to put on a show.
Better Show Running Score: Nitro 49-14
Match of the Night: Rey Mysterio Jr. vs. Dean Malenko
NITRO
Knoxville, TN
No search bubbles on the Network? That's going to be annoying. Unless that means it's a two-hour Chris Benoit ironman match, in which case I could probably warm up to it.
The show cold-opens on the arrival of a couple of black limos, and the nWo emerging from them. They're all acting like Hogan beat Piper last night. The Giant seems to be about to take exception with something Hogan says, but Hogan calms it down and just repeats, "You dropped the ball, but it's okay." Giant says fine, he dropped the ball, but then brings up his WW3 win and says that he wants a shot at the World Title. Hogan says that the shot that Giant won creates a bye for the group. Giant isn't happy that Hogan doesn't want to give him a shot. Finally Ted DiBiase tells the camera to get out of there as the show finally goes to opening graphics.
Tony Schiavone and Larry Zbyszko give their opening talk and show some stills from last night's Lex Luger vs. Giant match before sending it out to the ring.
The Amazing French Canadians (w/ Col. Parker) vs. Public Enemy: Opening the show on a ****ing Public Enemy match is no way to make someone want to keep watching. Match starts quickly with the Canadians attacking PE as they first try to enter the ring. PE regroups, fights their way back in, and then clears the ring before long. Canadians are going to take a walk when PE chases them down and beats them repeatedly with flagpoles. The referee doesn't mind. They set Jacques Rougeau on a table outside, the trademark Rocco Rock flip ends up putting both of Public Enemy through the table when Jacques moves.
Canadians capitalize by double-teaming Rocco, Carl Ouellet hits the cannonball off the top, 1-2-3.
Result: Amazing French Canadians via pinfall
Ultimo Dragon (w/ Sonny Onoo) vs. Jushin Thunder Liger: Of his nine belts, Ultimo only wears the WCW Cruiserweight Title out. In keeping with the theme of the thread, I can't tell whether this is a title match or not. Liger throws an early backdrop, Dragon lands on his feet. We get a couple of collisions in the middle of the ring, but neither man goes down. Liger finally puts Ultimo down and then locks in an upside-down surfboard. Lets it go and then executes a handspring back elbow. Two-count, running somersault splash by Liger, another two-count. Jushin continues relentlessly, snapping Dragon off with a powerbomb. Dragon escapes a tilt-a-whirl attempt and then executes a tilt-a-whirl backbreaker of his own. Liger tries to take a break, but Ultimo follows him out with a suicide dive.
The new Cruiserweight Champ follows by slamming his opponent into the guardrail. Rolls Liger inside, front bodyslam to set him up, but Liger gets a boot up when Ultimo jumps off the top. Liger with a delayed brainbuster. Showboats on the count and only gets two. Jushin executes on a superplex from a full standing position atop the ropes. Still only two. Dragon catches Liger heading up the ropes, follows and hits a spinning hurracanrana.
Dragon is quick to capitalize with a tiger suplex into a bridging pinfall attempt, and we have a winner. I was going to say that it appears that he busted his mouth open at the end, but that might just be mist. Decent match, but nothing special considering the combatants.
Result: Ultimo Dragon via pinfall
We're scheduled next for a strap match between Konnan and Big Bubba, but when Bubba's music hits (this seems to be the first appearance of the crappy alternate jobber-specific nWo music), he never appears. Eventually Mr. Wallstreet comes out and delivers the message that Bubba couldn't make it tonight, but that he isn't afraid of Konnan or that strap, and they would fight soon. Then Konnan acts like a complete moron and celebrates by just turning his back so that Wallstreet can jump him.
Wallstreet attaches himself to the strap, so I guess he's subbing in and we're doing a match.
Strap Match - Konnan (w/ Jimmy Hart) vs. Mr. Wallstreet: Wallstreet has the early advantage after the ambush, but it doesn't get him far, as Konnan regains the advantage. Wallstreet fights back, choking Konnan with the strap, and then they engage in the inevitable sequence where Wallstreet drags Konnan around, touching the turnbuckles himself but allowing Konnan to do likewise. He eventually knocks Konnan into the 4th corner to end it, pretending that he didn't realize what was going on, and even acting like he thought he won, even though Konnan had to jerk them both back in order to tag up at a prior corner and even though Wallstreet hadn't actually touched the fourth corner yet when the bell rang. Let's go to the tape and see whether or not Wallstreet was believably unaware that Konnan was tagging the corners:
Whatever.
Result: Konnan via the usual strap match cliché ending
Enter Hulk Hogan and Eric Bischoff for the next segment. They're all smiles and pretending they won last night.
It's a generic taunting promo, except for the part where Hogan actually lost cleanly last night. The announcers of course express their disbelief about the whole thing. They say that they'll show footage later of Piper beating Hogan.
Hugh Morrus vs. Kensuke Sasaki (w/ Sonny Onoo): Lots of punch-kick and not much else early. Sasaki breaks the monotony with a suplex. He follows with some chops that Hugh Morrus no-sells. Who is Bill ****ing Demott to ever no-sell anything except for maybe a 2015 sensitivity training course? In any case, Hugh Morrus is on offense now, locking in a reverse chinlock before executing a corner whip and following up to avalanche Sasaki. At this point Eric Bischoff shows up at the booth, snatches away a videotape they have of Starrcade last night, and says, "You're not showing anything." I realize it was an earlier time, but WCW was pretty ridiculous about pretending that only one recording ever existed of any PPV show…they did the same after the original WW3 when Hogan wanted to prove that he got screwed. Schiavone reassures the audience that they do have stills to prove their point.
Sasaki goes for a flying elbow off the ropes, but misses. Morrus hits the No Laughing Matter moonsault, is going to get the three-count, Sonny Onoo is fairly late to his spot and the referee just has to awkwardly slow-count and then stop after two while buying time to allow Onoo to arrive and hit Morrus with the Japanese flag. At that point it becomes a DQ.
Result: Hugh Morrus via DQ
Morrus grabs and tries to attack Onoo after the bell, but Onoo just sheds his jacket and slips away.
Here are the stills. It appears that Piper did, indeed, win.
Harlem Heat (w/ Sister Sherri) vs. The Faces of Fear: Stevie Ray vs. Meng to start, and I can barely keep my eyes trained on the screen until one of the workers tags in. There's the tag to Barbarian after a clothesline by Meng, and a blind tag by Booker T a moment later. Axe kick and then a Harlem side kick by Booker that gets a quick two-count. Barbarian catches Booker heading up top, sets up and connects on a belly-to-belly superplex. Meng tags in and continues control for the Faces of Fear, landing a two-count after a backbreaker. He drops his head too early and gets kicked in the face, allowing Booker to tag out and avoid a full heat segment.
Here's Col. Parker. He comes out and whips Sherri on the ass with…whatever he's carrying. She tackles Parker, the chaos distracts referee Mark Curtis, Jacques Rougeau appears on the apron out of nowhere and throws a handful of some sort of black dust(?) in Stevie Ray's face, Meng with a mafia kick and a cover, but the table gets turned on this finish as Booker flies off the top to hit Meng, rolling his brother on top for the pinfall. Short, worthless match.
Result: Harlem Heat via pinfall
Here's Diamond Dallas Page for an interview with Mean Gene at the top of the aisle. Gene asks DDP what he's going to do about what the nWo did to him last night. Page says, "Don't worry about it." When pressed, he says, "Am I crying? I'm not crying about it. I'm a fixer. I'm gonna fix things." Gene continues to thunder away at DDP with questions, but Dallas just keeps it cryptic and brief in reply. The promo is left open-ended. This is a simple tactic that is blatantly underused in modern wrestling. Guy gives you his mood, but doesn't say much. Next week he might say a bit more. While I know the general direction of DDP's character over time, I have zero memory of the specifics of how it all went down, and this segment was effective in keeping me interested. A slow burn isn't a bad thing, it's…a good thing.
We see a replay of things getting tense between Hulk Hogan and The Giant earlier, and then a replay of Hogan and Bischoff denying the real result of last night's main event. Back at the table, Tony Schiavone announces that he's just gotten word that Rowdy Roddy Piper is here tonight.
Glacier vs. Disco Inferno: Been quite a while since we've seen Disco. I liked him enough that I was disappointed to see that he was just showing up to be fed to Glacier. At the opening bell, Disco picks up a mic and tells Glacier that he's been perfecting his new leg hold for the past two weeks, so he recommends that Glacier just leave so that people can watch the Disco Inferno dance. He proceeds, "What are you, stupid? You must be dumber than Peyton Manning!" Well that's a time capsule; a wrestler trolling Manning's college fans before Manning had ever made it to the pros. Glacier attacks Disco - the way it set up, I figured the action would last about 10 seconds, but they do have a bit of back-and-forth.
Glacier's kick-heavy offense is just dreadful. He's about go for the Cryonic Kick, Disco pulls the ref in the way and gets Glacier distracted for long enough to turn him inside out with a running clothesline. He tells the camera he's going to go for the leg hold that he has perfected, but he goes for it and can't figure out how to actually apply it. Disco hits a swinging neckbreaker instead, but turns his back and celebrates instead of following…eventually he turns around into a Cryonic Kick to finish this. The crowd has been fine all night, but they were dead as a doornail for this.
Result: Glacier via pinfall
We get a stills recap of Chris Benoit vs. Jeff Jarrett from last night.
Chris Benoit (w/ Woman) vs. Chris Jericho: These guys get right into the action, with Jericho connecting on a spinning back kick that knocks Benoit to the apron, a springboard dropkick that knocks him to the floor, then a missile dropkick from the top rope to the floor. Upon Benoit's return inside, Jericho keeps up the offense until Benoit catches him and counters into a stun gun. Hard knees and a rug slam by Benoit, who screams at him on the mat. Front slam by Benoit gets two. He tries to go for a powerbomb, Jericho with a nifty escape, ducks a clothesline, backslide gets a near-fall. Benoit straight back up with a hard knife-edge chop that gets two. Vicious chops back and forth, Jericho ducks, schoolboy gets two. Action here is fast and furious.
Benoit sidesteps Jericho and pulls him face-first into the second turnbuckle. Corner mount, several punches by Benoit, Jericho lifts him out into an atomic drop, superkick, but Benoit dodges the following quebrada. Jericho punches back, staggering Benoit, cross-body off the top connects, but the following knee misses. Benoit capitalizes by setting him up and connecting on a back superplex. 1, 2…3? Holy ****, a superplex that wasn't anyone's finisher actually just won a match. I approve. I would have liked this match to get more time, but they worked at a nonstop Savage-Steamboat tempo with the minutes they got.
Result: Chris Benoit via pinfall
Ric Flair, Mongo McMichael, and Debra are waiting at the top of the aisle and celebrating next to Mean Gene directly after the match. Woman and Debra share an icy stare when Woman and Benoit join the party. Debra goes full phony and tells Woman how much she's missed her. Woman breaks in and tells Debra and Mongo to keep their mouths shut, says they don't have a vote because they haven't been here long enough. Flair plays peacemaker, stepping into the middle, and…now out comes Jeff Jarrett. Nothing could kill my interest in this segment more quickly than his boring ass. Jarrett brings up Arn Anderson dropping him on his head last night. Woman interjects and asks where Arn is tonight. Flair: "You're asking me where Double A is on New Year's Eve Eve? He's down at the Hyatt with a Miller Lite in his hand so cold it would freeze the hand off an Eskimo." Wat. He dances up and down the aisle with Woman for a second. Flair is just being funny to try to defuse the situation.
Everyone else is yucking it up, but Benoit no-sells and remains serious, saying, "Jarrett, you proved yourself last night. You can be anything BUT a Horseman." With that, he and Woman walk off. Debra says that Woman is just grumpy because of the weight she's gaining over the holiday season. She adds, "Steve, it's a good thing I got between you and Chris, because you were gonna kill that little boy." I'm appreciating her heel work a little more here. Flair goes back to trying to stir up a party as the segment closes out.
Octagoncito & Mascarita Sagrada vs. Jerito Estrada & Piratita Morgan: Pretty sure this midget match was a one-time thing on Nitro unless they returned during the dying years. You might remember Mascarita Sagrada as Max Mini from his later WWF years. Estrada charges Octagoncito before the bell, Octagoncito sidesteps, and we're off. Octagoncito reverses a corner whip, backdrops Estrada, Morgan and Sagrada in illegally, Sagrada and Octagoncito both sunset flip their opponents at the same time, but both just get two. Heenan: "It's like a riot at the day care center." Morgan comes up empty on a corner charge and spills all the way through the middle rope to the floor. Forget what I said about "illegally"; they seem to just be operating under the liberal lucha tag rules where wrestlers can trade out without a tag and the new one in just becomes legal. Sagrada with a flying headscissor. Weak dropkick misses. Estrada backdrops Sagrada in the corner, Sagrada does an extended head stand and then kicks back down into a headscissor takeover.
Both guys trade out. Octagoncito throws a couple of hip-tosses, but Estrada puts him down with a punch. Sagrada back in, jumps up into a victory roll, 1-2-3.
Result: Octagoncito & Mascarita Sagrada via pinfall
Dean Malenko vs. Rey Mysterio Jr.: What the…back from commercial break with an immediate opening bell, and you don't expect the two guys who both got jobber entrances to be Malenko and Mysterio. Rey with a leglock, Malenko escapes and counters into an STF. Snapmare by Dean into a chinlock. Rey counters Dean's next move into an armdrag that carries Malenko out, then Rey jumps through the middle rope to execute a hurracanrana on the floor. Back inside, Malenko reasserts his size advantage, tripping Rey into a grounded headlock. He transitions into an attempted standing surfboard, but Rey doesn't quite let him lock it in, and instead counters into another armdrag followed by a front facelock.
Dean sets Rey up on the ropes and then just clubs him with a forearm. Whips Rey off the ropes and throws him up high to come crashing down to the mat. Fireman's carry into a gutbuster. Slow cover, two-count. Snap suplex, then a half-crab. Really wrenches at this hold, almost looks like a Lion Tamer.
Dean relinquishes the hold and leaves an opening for Rey to kick him in the gut, scale the ropes, and launch off them with a dropkick. The dropkick seems to hurt Rey as well, and Dean goes back on offense. Butterfly suplex gets two. Backbreaker by Dean, and he holds onto it to stress Rey's lower back. Goes for a tilt-a-whirl move, Rey falls on top and gets a two-count. Dean with a corner smash, then a whip to another corner…Rey takes the patented Hart chest-first corner bump. Rey starts the comeback, charges Dean, Dean picks him up and throws him overhead, Rey can't quite stick a top-rope landing, and instead he gets crotched on the top rope. Malenko climbs up after him, tries a back superplex, Rey counters and falls on top, but gets hurt on the landing as well. Both slow to get up, Rey with a hip-toss, jumps on Malenko's shoulders, tries for a hurracanrana, gets truly planted by a hard powerbomb that I thought was game over, but Rey kicks out on 2.5.
Malenko picks him up overhead, Rey counters into a victory roll, also a semi-believable near-fall. Sunset flip a moment later by Rey gets another two. Dean gets up and levels him with a clothesline. Crowd is a bit (unfairly) dead for this as well. Dean tries to climb the ropes, but Rey catches him with a jumping leg lariat halfway up and knocks him to the floor. Rey to the top, ****ing seated sentan to the floor. Awesome.
Rey rolls Dean back in. Goes for a springboard hurracanrana, Dean catches him and counters into a Boston crab. Rey bridges out into a pin, counter by Dean into his own, re-counter, and they finally separate before either can score a fall. Rey tries to jump out from the corner into a headscissor, Malenko counters nicely into a side salto. Malenko tries to follow with possibly a figure-four, but Rey boots him off. Mysterio with a hurracanrana off the top, and as this connects the bell rings. They hadn't foreshadowed a time limit draw at all during this match, but that's what we've got. Mysterio pleads for five more minutes, but doesn't get it. I think this result is fine. Both were coming off Starrcade losses, so neither was in a great position to take a loss, and Schiavone does a good job here to put over the way that this match just showed how even this rivalry is. Pretty great match in spite of the non-ending. A little weird to have Dean have time limit draws on consecutive Nitros, but whatever.
Result: Time Limit Draw
Lex Luger vs. Greg Valentine: Valentine lays in some early offense on Lex, and even gets a bit more in after Lex retakes the advantage, but obviously he's here to do the honors. He attempts to suplex Luger in from the apron to the ring, Luger escapes behind and slaps on the Torture Rack, and referee Mark Curtis cues the bell.
Result: Lex Luger via submission
After commercial, we hear the sound of bagpipes, and Roddy Piper emerges in the entryway. Piper gets on the mic and, after celebrating last night's win a bit, says that was his last fight. Cue the nWo music, enter Hogan and Bischoff. Hogan calls Piper a liar and demands that Piper admit that Hogan "dogged him" last night. Hogan continues and says that the only reason he took it easy on Piper last night and "didn't end it for good" was because Piper's son begged him to "take it easy on Pops." Piper gets all offended by this and says, "Then let's do it one more time!" He sheds his jacket, his belt, his t-shirt, and…here are Kevin Nash, Scott Hall, and Syxx for the beatdown. As they stomp away, Giant makes his way down slowly as well. Scott Norton joins the beatdown, and the nWo drops Piper along Norton's bent knee. Giant hangs out for the beatdown and watches, but doesn't really participate.
Hogan again cracks Piper's bad hip with a chair. The nWo asks The Giant to do something. Giant steps in, sets up a chokeslam, then releases the choke and sets Piper down. Paramedics are on the scene and seize the opportunity to isolate Piper and try to treat him. Incidentally, here's Nick Patrick openly wearing an nWo shirt for the first time. The Giant stands separated from the rest of the group. Hogan picks up a mic and asks Giant what his deal is. He again tells him he dropped the ball. He mentions last night, then says something muffled about "again tonight with Piper," finally saying, "That's three strikes!" as he slaps Giant across the face. Giant grabs Hogan in a chokehold and screams at the rest of the nWo to get out of the ring.
Instead of chokeslamming Hogan, Giant screams at Hogan to agree to give him a title match. Hogan apologizes and begs off and agrees to give him the title match, as he bails out of the ring and whimpers, "I didn't know it meant that much to you." Once Hogan is safely out of the ring, he yells, "Get him!" Marcus Bagwell, Vincent, and fake Sting try to attack first, and Giant fends them all off. Finally the heavy hitters step in and overwhelm the big man, at least managing to subdue him and hold him in place while Hulk hits him with the World Title belt. IIRC it's customary for Giant to now sell that blow for the next 20 minutes. The group strips Giant of his nWo shirt and then holds him up again for Hogan to take another free shot.
The nWo stands tall in the ring. Bet you didn't see that ending coming. We get a quick cut to outside the arena, where an ambulance is hauling Roddy Piper off as the credits roll.
Overall: Really good episode. So much strong ringwork on this show from the cruiserweights. Aside from the annoyance of the nWo standing tall as always, the main event segment was pretty effective. Liked this a lot overall.
RAW
Albany, NY
We open on a graphic that builds the animosity between Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels. Tonight they'll face off in a head-to-head interview segment.
Bret: "This is the opportunity that I've been waiting for to tell you face to face, 'boy toy,' exactly what I think of you and everything you do."
HBK: "Hitman, you can make all the excuses you want. But tonight, we're gonna find out what the 'role model' has to say when he comes face to face with the World Wrestling Federation's favorite degenerate." I don't know that I ever really thought about the fact that DX almost certainly doesn't exist if it wasn't for Bret Hart being a moralizing stick in the mud IRL (and I say that while still very much being a fan of Bret's).
After the credits, we open in the ring with Faarooq, surrounded by the Nation. He's joined by his tag team partner for the evening, Steve Austin.
Steve Austin & Faarooq (w/ Clarence Mason & PG-13) vs. Jesse James & Savio Vega: "Double J" is singing his way to the ring slowly when Steve Austin has had enough and ambushes him in the aisle. Savio Vega races out to his partner's aid and fights Austin off. He slams Austin into the steel steps, rolls him inside, and we're only now officially under way as the opening bell finally rings. Vega tries to continue on offense, but drops his head and allows Austin to kick him in the face. Stone Cold with a stun gun a moment later, an elbow, a clothesline, and the heels are in control as Faarooq tags in. Faarooq with a spinebuster, gets two. Savio halts his momentum by raising his boot on a corner charge, then he follows with a spinning wheel kick. Savio gets a two-count out of that, and shows no real interest in tagging out. That's a mistake, as he falls back behind in the match, with Austin coming in and doing the mudhole stomp in the corner.
Surprise small package by Vega gets two, Austin up quickly with a hard clothesline. Savio finally makes his first tag of the match after kicking his way free of Austin. In comes Jesse James with a series of punches, a jumping forearm, and a bulldog. Austin slugs him and tags Faarooq. Faarooq has his trouble as well though, as James gets a series of rights in before telegraphing the **** out of a charge at the ropes, allowing Faarooq to easily drop down and send the country singer sprawling out of the ring. With James outside, Faarooq occupies the referee, and Austin drops down to the floor to clip James's leg.
I was beginning to think that this whole match was pretty weak, and a waste of a use of Austin, but out comes Bret Hart in street clothes. He takes exception to that cheap shot by Austin on James, and is screaming at Austin. Vince speculates that James might not be able to continue, and that if he can't, Bret might want to take his place. With that question open, the show goes to commercial.
Once back from break, yes, Bret has been added to the match as Savio Vega's partner, and has taken his place on the apron in jeans.
Savio is face in peril, with the heels taking turns working him over and keeping from tagging out. He eventually takes advantage of Faarooq's arrogance though…as Faarooq stands over him and plays to the crowd, Savio stands all the way up, picking Faarooq up on his shoulders, and executing a nice electric chair drop. Finally makes the hot tag to Bret. Bret hammers away at Faarooq, Austin enters and gets cleared out, Bret executes the Russian legsweep and elbow off the ropes on Faarooq. As he goes for the Sharpshooter, Crush runs in and attacks, with the others in the Nation following soon after.
Result: Bret Hart & Savio Vega via DQ
The heels have the numbers here, and they beat both Bret and Savio down. Eventually Ahmed Johnson comes out wielding a 2x4, and that clears the ring. Ahmed picks up a mic and starts another "you going down" chant. The faces hold the ring. This whole thing, match and post-match, was nothing great.
Hunter Hearst-Helmsley vs. Flash Funk: This is non-title, as established in a quick pre-match interview by HHH where he talks about the Royal Rumble and vows again to show Marlena what a "real man" is. Goldust shows up in the crowd before the match starts. Hunter is distracted by him, and Funk capitalizes by attacking from behind. Corner whip and a backdrop. Spinning wheel kick, then a standing moonsault by Funk that gets him a two-count. H reverses a corner whip, Funk springs up to the second turnbuckle and jumps back into a cross-body, but Helmsley ducks it and causes Flash to come up empty. Offense time for Hunter, as he dumps Funk through the middle ropes. As he tries to bring Flash back inside, Flash throws a shoulderblock, then jumps over the ropes behind HHH, rolling him up, bridging, and getting a two-count.
Helmsley is up quickly with a kick to the gut, and a quick follow with a neckbreaker. Two-count. Jerry Lawler devotes a bunch of commentary to Goldust not being a "real man," causing Vince McMahon to stand up for him and say, "He has guts enough to be different. He has guts enough to be anybody he wants to be." Well that's not very Vince-like. Suplex by HHH. Flash ducks a clothesline and hits a cross-body that gets another two-count, but again Hunter is quick to get up and attack right after escaping a pin attempt. He slaps on a camel clutch as Raw goes to break.
Back from commercial, Funk hip-tosses his way out of a hold, but a follow-up splash attempt lands on HHH's knees. Knee-drop by the blueblood gets two. Delayed suplex. Fistdrop off the ropes for another two. Unfortunately this match is slow and boring when you might hope for better. Back suplex by Funk. Jerry Lawler stands up from the announce table and starts talking on a live arena mic. He starts yelling at Goldust and calling him a freak as the match continues. Goldust sheds his robe and heads toward the ring as Funk connects on a top-rope moonsault. Referee Mike Chioda is a bit slow to be in position, as he was tending to the Lawler/Goldust matter, and his count only gets to two.
Lawler continues to distract from the match, and as Mike Chioda is distracted again, HHH wallops Funk with his title belt and scores the cheap pin.
Result: HHH via pinfall
Funk gets his heat back after the match by laying out Hunter and hitting a 450 splash. He never made it at all in the WWF, but you can see that they were still taking measures to protect him here.
We see an ad for Shotgun Saturday Night, debuting this coming Saturday. All I remember from that entire series is Marlena flashing the crowd during the first episode.
Jim Ross is in the ring to moderate our Bret Hart/Shawn Michaels confrontation. After bringing both men out, Ross mentions that Bret will take on Vader next week. Shawn says that he'll be ringside during that match, and that he "won't dare interfere." Ross offers for Shawn to start first in this exchange, and Shawn mockingly defers to "the best there is, the best there was, and the best there ever will be," and says sarcastically that he isn't worthy of going first. "Let the almighty one go first." Bret starts in, calling Michaels disrespectful. He says that Shawn pretends to respect Jose Lothario, but obviously doesn't take an example from him. He notes that Lothario stood up and apologized when he cost Shawn the WWF Title at Survivor Series, but Shawn has never shown any contrition about costing Bret the title at December IYH.
Bret continues: "Last year at WrestleMania, when I was screwed out of the World Wrestling Federation Championship belt, you promised that you would carry that belt with the same pride and the same class that I did. And Shawn Michaels, you never came close." Bret's mic keeps cutting out, which is hurting this segment. It cuts off half his next sentence, but he criticizes Michaels for posing for Playgirl. "You know, I don't even think girls buy that magazine." Ross slips him another microphone that hopefully works. Bret says that Michaels has degraded the WWF Title. Says that only 14-year-old females would like him. "You call yourself a man's man? I don't think so. Whose man are you?" These wouldn't be the last veiled homophobic swipes he would take at Shawn over the course of the next year. Bret rages on about what Shawn has done to the title. Says that sooner or later, they're going to meet in the ring, whether there's a title on the line or not. "All the dancing in the world will not save you, and I will kick your ass."
Vince comments that Bret didn't show a lot of class there. Time for Shawn to talk. "Let's start with the role model stuff. Because Hitman, I've seen you on the road, and bro, you ain't no role model." Yeah, that's a shoot; Bret was open about that in his book. Shawn says, "That's fact #1, and I've got a long way to go." And here to interrupt the proceedings is Sid. Dammit, this was NOT the moment for an interruption.
Sid says, "I've played the game with you <points to Shawn> and I've played the game with you <points to Bret>, and I've beaten you both. You're talking about my title, and I want some real competition!" Lights go down, gong…lights come back up, and The Undertaker marches toward the ring without music. As he approaches, Vader emerges from the back and attacks Taker from behind.
Taker puts Vader down, then turns around to have a staredown with Sid. Vader picks himself up and attacks Taker again…Taker stalks Vader back up the aisle. As Bret starts to head out of the ring, Shawn cheap-shots him, then jumps over the ropes to the outside to attack Sid. Officials are out to break Shawn and Sid up. This was a good way to build up a number of people as viable in the WWF Title mix, even though I wish we could have gotten more Bret vs. Shawn stuff.
The Honky Tonk Man and Hunter Hearst-Helmsley are out to join Vince on commentary for the last match.
Jerry Lawler vs. Goldust: This match is joined in progress after a late commercial. Lawler drops a fist off the ropes, but he kept his strap up so it's not that effective. Running clothesline by Goldust. Helmsley gets up out of his announce position and goes to accost Marlena. He suddenly picks her up over his shoulder and starts to walk off with her against her struggle. Marc Mero stops him halfway up the aisle. Goldust sees what's going on and pursues Hunter, Hunter tosses Marlena to Mero, then sidesteps Goldust, and there's a big collision among Goldust, Marlena, and Mero.
Marlena is laid out, and Goldust and HHH keep fighting. The bell rings for an apparent countout win by Lawler. Helmsley leaves everyone in his wake and exits stage left. Camera focuses on a pained Marlena as the show goes off the air.
Overall: The Bret/Shawn segment was pretty strong and gave at least some sort of takeaway from this show. Not really a fan of the HHH/Goldust/Lawler stuff, though it was reasonably well-done. It was an okay episode.
---
Ratings for 12/30/96: Nitro 3.6, Raw 1.6
Ratings Running Score: Nitro 44-17-2
Better Show: Nitro with relative ease this week. They really emptied the clip in terms of sending a lot of their best workers out there to put on a show.
Better Show Running Score: Nitro 49-14
Match of the Night: Rey Mysterio Jr. vs. Dean Malenko
07-01-2016
, 04:17 PM
DECEMBER 1996 IN REVIEW
Arrivals: Well…none in either company that I can tell. This section is just for guys who actually mattered, not guys who barely appeared on Raw or Nitro along the way.
Match of the Month: Ultimo Dragon vs. Dean Malenko, Starrcade
PPV of the Month: Starrcade
Ratings: Ratings remained a never-ending pool of darkness for the WWF.
Quality: After a November where WWF appeared to clearly pull ahead as the better company from a quality standpoint, they got defeated pretty thoroughly this month, as I give 4 of 5 Monday nights to WCW as well as the nod just now for better PPV (which was not close). I'm still expecting WWF to entertain me more in January '97, but I at least have to pump the brakes slightly on the notion that they had significantly surpassed WCW from a quality standpoint.
Gif of the Month:
Runner-Up:
Arrivals: Well…none in either company that I can tell. This section is just for guys who actually mattered, not guys who barely appeared on Raw or Nitro along the way.
Match of the Month: Ultimo Dragon vs. Dean Malenko, Starrcade
PPV of the Month: Starrcade
Ratings: Ratings remained a never-ending pool of darkness for the WWF.
Quality: After a November where WWF appeared to clearly pull ahead as the better company from a quality standpoint, they got defeated pretty thoroughly this month, as I give 4 of 5 Monday nights to WCW as well as the nod just now for better PPV (which was not close). I'm still expecting WWF to entertain me more in January '97, but I at least have to pump the brakes slightly on the notion that they had significantly surpassed WCW from a quality standpoint.
Gif of the Month:
Runner-Up:
07-01-2016
, 04:20 PM
1996 IN REVIEW
Match of the Year: Bret Hart vs. Steve Austin, Survivor Series '96
PPV of the Year: Great American Bash '96
Worker of the Year: Shawn Michaels
Angle of the Year: Objectively you have to give it to the nWo, as it absolutely turned the business on its ear. Even from just a personal preference standpoint, I would give it to the initial nWo invasion, spanning from Scott Hall's first appearance through Hogan's heel turn.
Feud of the Year: For all the great things you can say about the nWo angle, nWo vs. WCW was no great feud, so it's out. The best on WCW's end might be Chris Benoit vs. Kevin Sullivan, but I think this is a WWF award this year. From a peak standpoint I would be tempted to give this to Bret Hart vs. Steve Austin, but that really hasn't been going for very long yet. I think I'm going to give this to Mankind vs. The Undertaker. Produced a number of great matches, elevated Mick Foley as a star, elevated Undertaker as a worker, ran a long time and didn't feel like it too badly overstayed its welcome.
Heel Turn of the Year: Hulk Hogan by a landslide
Debut of the Year: Scott Hall by a landslide
Promo of the Year: Austin 3:16
Gif of the Year:
Runner-Up:
Match of the Year: Bret Hart vs. Steve Austin, Survivor Series '96
PPV of the Year: Great American Bash '96
Worker of the Year: Shawn Michaels
Angle of the Year: Objectively you have to give it to the nWo, as it absolutely turned the business on its ear. Even from just a personal preference standpoint, I would give it to the initial nWo invasion, spanning from Scott Hall's first appearance through Hogan's heel turn.
Feud of the Year: For all the great things you can say about the nWo angle, nWo vs. WCW was no great feud, so it's out. The best on WCW's end might be Chris Benoit vs. Kevin Sullivan, but I think this is a WWF award this year. From a peak standpoint I would be tempted to give this to Bret Hart vs. Steve Austin, but that really hasn't been going for very long yet. I think I'm going to give this to Mankind vs. The Undertaker. Produced a number of great matches, elevated Mick Foley as a star, elevated Undertaker as a worker, ran a long time and didn't feel like it too badly overstayed its welcome.
Heel Turn of the Year: Hulk Hogan by a landslide
Debut of the Year: Scott Hall by a landslide
Promo of the Year: Austin 3:16
Gif of the Year:
Runner-Up:
07-02-2016
, 12:14 AM
Quote:
Opening the show on a ****ing Public Enemy match is no way to make someone want to keep watching.
'ed PE fwiw.
Quote:
If the general sense was that they would do a 1.5-year build to Starrcade '97, then they were probably going at a decent pace here in terms of building heat and then showing the first cracks in the foundation with this Giant stuff at Starrcade '96.
Didn't read the winner or description of Rey/Dean because I'm going to go off and watch that later tonight.
Great write-up and fantastic yearly overview.