Ahmed Johnson turns heel to join NOD. Within a few months, the NOD kicks him out, seemingly making him a face (the worst type of face turn). They return to feuding over the next couple of months. Now he's out on the 11/3/97 Raw doing a promo battle with Steve Austin and threatening to kick his ass, to the predictable boos of the crowd.
I don't exactly sympathize with Ahmed - he was too awful to sympathize with - but this booking would destroy anyone. I have to think this was now near the end of his WWF run.
Had no idea of this about Ahmed. I just assumed that he got fired cause he had so many damn injuries. From Wiki:
Quote:
While still in Texas, Johnson was booked to appear in a segment with The Truth Commission where he was to be beaten and dragged up the entrance ramp.[21] Unbeknownst to WWF management, Johnson's sister - an avid fan of WWF - was battling cancer. Johnson knew his sister watched WWF each week and didn't want her to have the image of her brother being beaten and dragged by the neck while she was gravely ill.
According to Johnson, 15 minutes before he was scheduled for the match which would end in his being attacked, he received a call that his sister was "doing really bad" and that he should come immediately to her hospital in Florida. Johnson then met with Vince McMahon and told him he "had some things to deal with" and immediately left WWF and flew to Florida, where his sister died the following week. Johnson has stated subsequently that he did not tell WWF management the reason for his departure at the time because he "didn't like to burden people with his problems" and didn't want to give the impression that he was "telling them something for sympathy".
Huh. Obviously had no idea either. Guess it wasn't the case that they were just booking to sabotage him on the way out the door, since that story was apparently over four months later.
New Age Outlaws win the first Survivor Series match after Billy completely misses a move and scores the pinfall after it gets sold anyway. They have no entrance music at this point, so there's just an awkward dull crowd heat at the end.
Rick Rude comes out to open the Raw after the Montreal Screwjob, to announce HBK to the ring. I thought he had straight-up raged and walked out after the Screwjob, but now that I think about it more, he had to have been around to tape an episode in a beard so that he could show up live on Nitro without on the same night.
Dragonov vs. Walter for the NXT UK Championship from the 10/29 edition of NXT:UK. This match was something else. Two guys beat the **** out of each other. Dave gave it 5*. Bryan Alvarez said it was "the most violent match with no stips in US history". It's worth the watch and borderline uncomfortable to watch at times.
Monsoon Classic is a pretty great Twitter follow if you're into Golden Era wrestling nostalgia. Account is consistent with the "this date in history" call-backs. Nothing especially great about this tweet, but just a sample of what it sends out:
Wait, Lee Marshall was a ring announcer at Wrestlemania 2? That has always gone right on by me, but he was just in the ring announcing the Adrian Adonis vs. Uncle Elmer match.
So without searching the thread, is the subscription worth it? Considering it since I am finally down to 1 job and have more free time to watch. Just curious what the thoughts are. I'm not real big on current wrestling but loved the 80s and 90s matches and PPVs.
I'm still subscribed, but it's my understanding that there's a free tier where you can access at least some of the back catalog of historical stuff. I can't find it described any more specifically than "select older PPVs." Maybe that's really narrow, maybe it's a fair amount.
May be worth trying that first though and seeing what's available through it. To me, having the whole archive available is worth it, so I haven't really thought about unsubscribing.
I'm still subscribed, but it's my understanding that there's a free tier where you can access at least some of the back catalog of historical stuff. I can't find it described any more specifically than "select older PPVs." Maybe that's really narrow, maybe it's a fair amount.
May be worth trying that first though and seeing what's available through it. To me, having the whole archive available is worth it, so I haven't really thought about unsubscribing.
Looks like they dropped another 10 weeks of 1993 Superstars last month.
I wish I liked 1993 WWF a lot more than I do, but **** it, I’ll keep going. While I do keep wishing they’d backfill this catalog instead of just doing April 1992 and forward, it does look like they have a more robust Primetime Wrestling catalog uploaded than I realized, and that would cover a lot of Superstars.
Biggest gap in weekly WWF TV right now appears to be that the consecutive Primetime eps cut off at the end of 1990, with only a handful of scattered eps between that point and April 1992.
October 6 1997 RAW: Farooq and Austin have a promo confrontation. Farooq: "You think you're tough because you have a bald head? You think you're tough because you have a tattoo on both arms?"
I was baffled not only because Austin doesn't have tattoos on his arms, he only has one on one leg. Had Farooq ever looked at him before?
Last edited by NJPW; 11-21-2020 at 07:48 PM.
Reason: i think i spelled his name wrong. idr