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Episode 13: Starrcade '95
35 Plays6 years ago
It's WCW vs. NJPW for the World Cup of Wrestling as WCW runs another Starrcade that has nothing to do with anything! Luger and Sting also face a fressssssh Ric Flair to determine who will fight Randy Savage for the title...but will Sting and Luger's friendship survive the battle? And will Bobby Heenan's sanity survive the night with Dusty Rhodes joining the commentary team? For all this and more, let's go to the ring! I'm a possum!
Music by Michael Gary Brewer at https://www.instantmusicnow.com/
Logo by Gina Trujillo at http://resuki.com/
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Transcript
School Picture Day Allergies
00:00:00
Speaker
it's always when my sinuses start acting up okay they know they always it's like school picture day that would always happen always be my worst allergy days i'd be sneezing up a storm yeah go and get my picture big red nose from from all the sneezing and all it's like oh how does it always know
Podcast Introduction
00:00:46
Speaker
Hello everyone, and welcome to Let's Go to the Ring, where we take a look at the good old days, and not so good old days, of World Championship Wrestling, series by series. I'm your host, Bob Moore, and I'm here with Pro Podcasting Illustrated's 2019 Podcaster of the Year, Alec Bridget. It's an honor to be nominated. And Pro Podcasting Illustrated's 2019 Most Popular Podcaster of the Year, Matrix Mullins. I'm only popular because all my friends are made from Play-Doh.
00:01:19
Speaker
I would explain a lot. They smell great. I feel like I've gotten a real insight into something that I'm not sure I would have preferred to get an insight into, frankly.
Starrcade 95 and Cultural Stereotypes
00:01:38
Speaker
Tonight we're taking a look at Starrcade 95, the World Cup of Wrestling.
00:01:46
Speaker
A word before we begin on a couple of points. First, this stargade rather frequently turns to Japanese stereotypes in both commentary and angles. It can be uncomfortable or even offensive. I'm gonna call out one pre-match segment in particular when we get to it, but just bear in mind there's a lot of jokes and moments on this show that just aren't really well thought out in this stargade.
00:02:11
Speaker
And it's a reminder that wrestling sometimes plays to some pretty bad tropes. Another example of the they're different so boo them mentality. It's impossible to escape on this one. Please do keep that in mind if you're making the choice about whether to watch this or not. This is a very big negative about this Starrcade.
00:02:31
Speaker
won't get into the whole thing. There's a whole sort of debate going on right now with a lot of stuff. Friends being the one that's sort of the focal point for all this. This whole thing of people rediscovering things of 20, 25 years and going, oh yeah, I forgot about that. And then it's like whether or not you should be allowed to be bothered by it. Even if you lived through it like we did, I'm like, I feel like I should be allowed to. I saw it both times, but apparently some people think I'm not supposed to remember how things are back then. So I don't know.
00:03:00
Speaker
with Netflix and the access to legacy or older shows, sometimes while you're watching a show that you had fond memories of, it won't ruin the show for you, but you definitely won't appreciate it like you did just because you're like, oh, no, why'd I laugh at that? Or maybe I just, I know that's the character or the archetype they're playing, but I don't know, it doesn't really fit with how I feel about things now. Yeah.
Chris Benoit: Wrestling and Reality
00:03:28
Speaker
And our second note,
00:03:31
Speaker
This is our first show of many to feature Chris Benoit. Now Benoit is going to be featured on WCW shows from 1995 until 2000 when he and several others left for the WWE. He will also show up on a few shows in 1992 and 1993 in other series.
00:03:53
Speaker
In 2007, Chris Benoit murdered his third child, Daniel, and his wife, Nancy Benoit, formerly Nancy Sullivan, who portrayed woman in WCW and was married to Kevin Sullivan from 1985 through 1997. Chris Benoit then committed suicide.
00:04:15
Speaker
There will be uncomfortable moments during Benoit's appearances, most notably a storyline running from 1996 to 1997, in which Nancy is involved in a feud between Chris Benoit and Kevin Sullivan. We are still going to discuss those moments, but let me be clear.
00:04:35
Speaker
Our opinions about that storyline regard only the television storyline itself and should not be taken as judgment or opinions of the actual people involved. Similarly, our discussions regarding Chris Benoit overall reflect only his performances as a character in WCW, not Chris Benoit as a person. Our sympathies are with those affected by the 2007 tragedy and no disrespect is intended from our discussions.
00:05:02
Speaker
I mean, yeah, it's a weird thing for me because, so I started watching wrestling in 2000, really restart watching wrestling. And so I discovered him when he started WWE, like right after he leaves these shows, basically.
00:05:16
Speaker
up and through till it happened. So, yeah, it hit me pretty badly. I'm still not really sure how I feel about the whole thing. I have a lot of mixed emotions about it and how I can reconcile the person and the performer. I try to separate it, but yeah, most people that never really fully separates art from the artist.
00:05:34
Speaker
And it's especially hard in wrestling where, you know, he's Chris Benoit, but he's playing the character Chris Benoit. It's maybe even a little easier with like a Hulk Hogan where there's at least a name difference between the actual person and the character where you can say he's playing the role.
00:05:49
Speaker
but then why I think for me it's particularly hard. I just hope to get across that we don't want to give offense with anything that we've said and I hope that we don't and if we do I hope that we can find a way to make amends.
Starrcade 1995 Event Details
00:06:08
Speaker
Starrcade 1995 was held on December 27th, 1995 at the Nashville Municipal Auditorium in Nashville, Tennessee, in front of 8,200 fans, 6,018 fans paid. It received about 95,000 pay-per-view buys, which, you might note, is a big drop from last year's 140,000. That is.
00:06:35
Speaker
In fact, if we exclude Starrcade 87, the first pay-per-view edition when the WWF played hardball, the 1995 has the lowest pay-per-view by total yet. Before the show opened, the crowd saw two dark matches. Those were Diamond Dallas Page versus Dave Sullivan. Dodged a bullet there. At least we won't have 600 of those matches on pay-per-view. Oh, gosh. That's like two.
00:07:05
Speaker
The other one was the American males, Marcus Alexander Bagwell and Scotty Riggs versus the Blue Bloods, Lord Steven Regal and Earl Robert Eaton. After the show, just for completion's sake, there's another dark match, that being Kintsuke Sasaki versus the one-man gang for Sasaki's WCW United States Heavyweight Championship.
00:07:30
Speaker
Now on most of our shows, we focus on the storylines match by match, but in this case, the majority of this show focuses on the World Cup of Wrestling, a competition between WCW and New Japan Pro Wrestling. So Al, why don't you give us the storyline set up for that?
WCW vs. New Japan Storyline
00:07:49
Speaker
This is the first year that Nitro exists as a viable option to get storylines, which is nice. The problem is that they still have like six shows.
00:07:59
Speaker
And the rest of them are not on the network. So, simple WCW Saturday night is only up through early 1993, so that's no help. Uh, they have a thing called WW Pro Wrestling, which seems a bit redundant in the name if you think about it. Yeah, a little bit.
00:08:15
Speaker
And like two other shows, I believe. I might be overexciting that bit, but... So, watching Nitro Street through, I'm thinking I'm getting all the story, but then I'm really not. One show, Bishout Promise is a debut news about Starrcade on the next episode, and then they just announce what the show is. I'm like, oh, so here's A and there's C, but where is B? How'd you get from where's the show gonna be to? It's this.
00:08:43
Speaker
It basically revolves around a weird sort of story that Bobby Heenan is demoted to Saturday at night for a while. And he started making a deal with Sonny Ono, who's a manager slash businessman slash six other other things, because in wrestling you never have one job. And Heenan convinces them that he has something to sell them, which is the show itself. That would be Saturday night.
00:09:12
Speaker
which even in this point, I'm not sure how much that's really worth, but you can have 25 is like the worst year domestically, like ticket sales wise for wrestling in quite a while. So you're like buying the least viable product of a company at like the least viable time for a said company. But I guess they wind him and dined him and gave him all these gifts that he alludes to a nitro. But almost none of this happens on the actual show that should be telling you what's going to happen.
00:09:41
Speaker
Don't undersell WSCW Saturday Night, though. It is the mothership. Oh, okay. As Dusty Rhodes calls it all the time for, I think, the next year after this. I love Dusty Rhodes.
00:09:56
Speaker
To be fair, he's on that show, which is probably why it's- Exactly, yeah. It's the most important show. But so it basically comes down to he tried to sell his show to Sonny Ono, which he claimed to own and didn't. So I guess to make recompense, they decided to have 80% of their biggest show of the year as them fighting New Japan for a suddenly existing World Cup of Wrestling.
00:10:22
Speaker
So we get a bunch of matches because we don't really need story, I guess, for our midcard. So now we have all these people on the show. A lot of them are like basically a one-off appearance as far as Hyperview goes. For little to no reason. Excluding the fact that, as I said, wrestling is down in 1975. It's kind of easy to see why it's maybe not the biggest buy rate because they're not selling you on. Here's these big matches of stories you got to see. Oh yeah, we're doing this instead. Yeah.
00:10:53
Speaker
As bad as the Butcher storyline was with Hogan, at least it was a long-winning story that culminated in terrible fashion, mind you, at the show, where this is, now this is going on instead. Have fun. What's this? Wouldn't have been better. We might've mentioned this if they actually had some of the matches in Japan. Yeah.
00:11:12
Speaker
They could have done the Starrcade, what, 85, 86, I think it was, where they did the two arenas. Yeah. That would have actually been kind of interesting to do a two arenas thing, but internationally. You could record one early, so if you had to have someone in the main event, you know, like elimination or something, you know, they could be at the other place on time. Explain that to seeing them like jumped on the bullet train to get back from Tokyo to Nashville. Yeah, yeah. There's one straight trip, like second hour. Trans-Pacific maglev.
00:11:42
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. Exactly.
Opening Package Critique
00:11:44
Speaker
He just rides a Scorpal Hawk there, passes way of travel. Well, they do have electrical tail segments, so I could see that. Oh, okay, yeah. I'm learning more about the Scorpal Hawk mythology this episode, too. Well, the life cycle is very unique. They start out as a polyp and grow inside electric eels, and then they become acclimated to electrical fields, and then, you know, something eats that, and there you go.
00:12:10
Speaker
I'm trying to picture that in Sir David Attenborough's voice. Just really get the nature feel of that. As countries across the world compete for global dominance,
00:12:22
Speaker
World Championship Wrestling has accepted the challenge from New Japan Pro Wrestling in a best-of-seven battle for the World Cup of Professional Wrestling! Canadian Crippler Crispin Wah meets High Flying Jushin Thunder Liger, Carrero against Otani, World TV champ Johnny B. Bad against Masasaito the Torture Master, we'll see Kanamoto against Wright, the total package Lex Luger faces Masachogo, World champ Savage against Tenzin, and Sting faces U.S. champ Suzuki.
00:12:51
Speaker
in an epic contest of global remortions at Star Game 1995. That music is amazing. Isn't it? It's like a Thundercats Mega Man crossover. Yes. I was thinking Street Fighter, but I can see. Yeah, I can see both of those two. Oh, my gosh. Yeah. That's Thunder Liger that made me think of the cats. There you go. There you go. He was an anime character. Yes, he was.
00:13:20
Speaker
An opening video package oddly starts out suggesting that countries around the world are fighting for dominance, showing several national flags, before admitting that Starrcade is really just about WCW versus New Japan Pro Wrestling. Neither of which is a country, by the way. During the opening video package, they misspell Tenzon, using an S in place of the Z. 30 seconds into the show. Good start, guys. It's a quarter, you gotta check that box. I guess so. They're close on the keyboard. Yeah, I guess so.
00:13:50
Speaker
Tony Schiavone welcomes us to the show once his microphone starts working alongside Bobby the Brain Henan and Dusty Rhodes. Baby. It's required me say his name. It is. Okay. Rhodes is interestingly wearing what looks kind of like a tux jacket, but over a black shirt with blue jeans and a black cowboy hat. Somehow it kind of actually still works as an outfit.
00:14:18
Speaker
Yeah, it's like when you watch local news and they're convinced they're never going to be standing up. So they just wear whatever scenes they feel like over their really like fancy outfit. And then they have to stand up and they realize, oh, you can see that. Yeah.
00:14:30
Speaker
Dusty says we're going to see Clubberin and Heine Kicken. He builds up the participation of good friends Sting and Lex Luger as competitors in a triangle match, and Tony says that it'll be one of them or the also participating Ric Flair facing Randy Savage for the world title at the end of the night.
00:14:49
Speaker
Heenan says there couldn't be a better place than Nashville for Dusty, and I thought he was kind of going to turn that into a jab at Dusty, but he actually just compliments Dusty on his boots and hat and Dusty smiles at him, so I guess he can sometimes be nice.
Benoit vs. Liger Match Overview
00:15:04
Speaker
Heenan says Savage has a bad arm and bad back, and he's predicting Ric Flair will be the new World Heavyweight Champion.
00:15:12
Speaker
could be a new world champion and someone will walk home with a World Cup of Wrestling. Let's go to the ring as we kick off Starrcade, the 1995 edition. So our first match is Chris Benoit versus Jushin Thunder Liger, accompanied by Sonny Ono. The referee for this match is Randy Eller. Benoit at the time, in the early 90s, originally wrestled in Japan as Wild Pegasus.
00:15:38
Speaker
There's gotta be a great name. There's gotta be up there in the ring names we'll have. That's pretty awesome. So in 1991 he has a match against Jushin the Liger. He has a Lutest de Apuestas match where that's mask versus mask. And not really spoiler, Jushin Liger did not lose his mask because he's wearing one of the show and has been wearing it for 20 odd years after that.
00:16:03
Speaker
So, he actually unmasks Ben-Wan in Japan. So he goes from being a masked wrestler to being the one we know him as. Okay. I was not actually aware that Ben-Wan was a masked wrestler as Wild Pegasus. I actually would not either. The other thing of note is that in 1994, 1995, they both competed in the Super J Cup.
00:16:21
Speaker
which is basically a big tournament they have between the junior heavyweights in Japan. However, due to the tournament format, it wasn't around Robin, so they never actually meet in any of the shows. Oh, okay. Two years in a row in this big tournament, they never actually fight each other. Interesting. Yeah, they get really close a couple of times. Okay. But they never actually do it. Oh, and Benoit won the 1994 one. Oh, okay.
00:16:45
Speaker
This match starts the World Cup of Wrestling. This is a best of seven series. The first team, WCW or New Japan, to win four matches wins the trophy. We get these really strange match cards at the beginning of each match. Rather than just displaying on the screen, WCW has gotten all fancy and they have the picture of the two wrestlers just kind of lazily drift down the screen like a falling sheet of paper. It looks strange.
00:17:11
Speaker
It continues all night and really never looks that good. Someone was clearly inspired by screen savers. They're like, ooh, I have an idea. Remember those clocks and floating windows things? Yeah. Let's use that. That's like one of those cases where someone was like, ooh, I learned how to do a special effect and never questioned if they actually should. See, also Max Magician. Yes.
00:17:37
Speaker
Except for that one scene where the knights just disappear without any special effects. And they really should have done a special effect there. I like the one where the little kid is turned into a mouse and it's thrown and he says wee before he dies. Thought he's like flying through the air. I forgot that part. Yeah. If I can help, my last word will be wee, so. Yeah, no. I'm hoping for yippee. Maybe he was proclaiming his love for Nintendo.
00:18:06
Speaker
Sadly, Benoit does not come out with the awesome four horseman theme despite being a member of the faction at this time. I was really bummed about that. That's one of my favorite wrestling themes. Yeah, it's weird that in both cases, we should get it. We don't. Yeah. Oh, sorry. Is it a coincidence that someone who is Pegasus becomes a horseman? Oh, there you go. There you go. It's like his wings were clipped. Yeah, the mask was his wings, and now he's a horse. Yeah. There you go. We'll tie him together. Yep. Synergy.
00:18:37
Speaker
Leiger has an amazing cape this year. Red, gold, and silver. It looks awesome. Dusty calls Sunny Ono, Sunny Bono. Hienan corrects him. Hienan predicts that New Japan will walk away with the World Cup, and Tony says that Hienan has sold out. Hienan denies it. He lists off a bunch of expensive goods, Alexis, TVs, watches, pearls, diamonds, and the like, but says they didn't give him all of it. He earned some.
00:19:07
Speaker
the strongest defense. We're starting the tournament for the World Cup and we have not seen it yet. Yes, that is true. Just keep track of how long it is till we actually get to see the cup that we're fighting for. Yeah.
Match Analysis: Benoit vs. Liger
00:19:20
Speaker
We get a quiet USA chant as we start for Chris Benoit, who's from Canada. Yeah.
00:19:28
Speaker
At least later, they changed it from him being from Canada to residing in, like, Georgia, I believe. Yeah. So that you can excuse it then if you just don't know who he is, but yeah. But not on this show. Oh, no. No pun intended.
00:19:42
Speaker
Liger uses speed and agility to keep ahead of Benoit and hits rapid arm drags and a dropkick to send Benoit rolling out of the ring, then follows with a flipping suntan. The announcers, in a theme for the night, vary between talking about the World Cup as the USA vs Japan, or WCW vs New Japan. Back in, Benoit overpowers Liger, but Liger comes back with a Hurricane Rana and a flipping axe kick that actually earned him a pause from the crowd.
00:20:12
Speaker
Benoit gets a tilt-a-whirl backbreaker to win the crowd's love back, but Leger again counters everything else he tries and Benoit rolls out. Leger starts to dive, but Benoit dodges, so Leger bounces off the ropes and back into the ring. Dusty says he did a little tipsy toe, and he was teetering on totter, and Hienan is incredulous.
00:20:36
Speaker
Liger holds the ropes for Benoit, but Benoit walks around to get in elsewhere. Benoit takes over with a great snap suplex and a huge backdrop and the lion tamer hold. I'm not sure if it's actually called that yet or if that's a Jericho thing. Shouldn't it be the Liger tamer? Yeah, that would make sense, yeah. Dusty says that Benoit has Liger's back strapped and his liver quiver in.
00:21:01
Speaker
and he didn't ask Tony what that meant. I'm not here as a translator brain, Tony yells. Benoit cuts off Leger's comebacks with hard strikes. Great German suplex, but Leger gets a cool elevated bow and arrow and turns that into a dragon sleeper hold that looks like it really hurt. Yeah, it's a good yoga pose as well. Really like wrenches back on him, yeah. I'm very visual all of a sudden trying to portray that old, sorry. It's a nice arc to his back there, I'm sure it felt great.
00:21:30
Speaker
They trade hard-hitting counters, and Liger tries going up top, but Benoit springs up and snaps Superplex's Liger down. Really fast Superplex there. It gets two.
00:21:41
Speaker
Liger dodges Benoit's swan dive headbutt and gets an impressive powerbomb, counting along with the ref. Which makes it a little weird when he protests getting a 2 count a moment later. You know exactly what count he was on, Liger. To be fair, to be fair, to paint use of the metric system so that does create discrepancy. No. Worth a try.
00:22:00
Speaker
Benoit gets back in control with rolling German suplexes and a powerbomb, and hits his swan dive headbutt. But suddenly, Kevin Sullivan and Jimmy Hart, in an amazing Kevin Sullivan-themed jacket, come to ringside. Sullivan yells at Benoit, and Benoit gets distracted, so Liger hits a somewhat sloppy Frankensteiner for the three count and the win, putting New Japan up one to zero.
00:22:25
Speaker
Well, Jimmy Hart's lifetime dedication to Hulk Hogan sure lasted long, huh? Yeah. Like a month. Yeah. A question about his jacket in this case. So, Sullivan did not have a match, a dark match for the show. No. So, Sullivan comes out wearing his gear and his cloak, which I assume he just wears all the time. I mean, he has Kevin Sullivan. Yeah. It's rumored he's a direct, you know. I've heard that. Yeah. I've explained so much.
00:22:52
Speaker
But Jimmy Hart was not managing him for a match. And he wears this theme jacket for his wrestlers he's managing when he's out with them. But so he was just backstage, I guess because he's hanging out with Sullivan, he has to wear Sullivan's jacket. Can he say go when he wear it together? Yeah. Well, yeah. I mean, like they're going to get coffee. He's got to make sure they know he manages him by wearing his jacket. Well, I'm sitting next to you wearing an Alec Bridget jacket right now.
00:23:15
Speaker
Well yeah, but I insist on that. Yeah, see, so Kevin Sullivan probably insists. He is a crazy man, so I mean, I would wear a jacket with his face on it too. It's in the contract. Yeah. The uniform. There you go. It's a work uniform. That's what it is. Okay. I'm just saying, I think this unplanned arrival might be less unplanned than they do. Yeah. Thoughts on this one?
00:23:39
Speaker
I'll get to the good stuff first, because you kind of know what my obvious butt to the scenario is going to be, but we'll get to there eventually. So I really like this match as far as the action up to the end.
00:23:52
Speaker
If you don't know Japanese wrestling, they're really all about strong style, strong strikes, strong holds. Like you see it with the sort of torque he puts on that bone arrow in the back bend. Cause they super train your neck in Japan. You like sit for like an hour straight with like a full bridge on your neck. I mean, I'm not doing that at the exact time, but basically they really focus on that. That's like the core of your routine is be able to bridge and balance on your neck like that.
00:24:20
Speaker
I actually watch Japanese matches, like how are they getting up for that move because they have the most invulnerable necks in the world, basically. That sort of informs how matches like this are, where they are hitting each other really hard, they're definitely slamming each other around. Aside from certain things where they cooperate, like the ending spot,
00:24:40
Speaker
It's kind of the thing like with Anderson, you could see someone watch it and think, Oh, this seems real. Cause they're really thrown into the round. They cover the little gaps that you have to do cooperate pretty well. So it definitely creates the illusion really well. So in the obvious, but of course is the finish. Because for some reason we have to have interference in this match and we have to have it done not in the best executed way. You don't want clearly could go for a pin.
00:25:07
Speaker
And so worst case scenario, Sullivan runs and attacks him and he went by a DQ. Right. Because he just hit the headbutt. There's no reason to do anything but that. And it really would be a better insult to the guy if he's running to get you to pin the guy right in front of him and go, yeah, look
Eddie Guerrero on World Cup of Wrestling
00:25:22
Speaker
what I'm doing. And as we know, Kevin Sullivan, if you're pinning a guy, will very nicely just kind of teeter on the top rope until you're done pinning and then jump into the ring. Yes, exactly. He really should have taken that into account.
00:25:35
Speaker
The way they did the hurricane water was a little weird, because I know he can do those moves better. And I'm asking them to think they should have had him take a power bomb and get pinned. Because you can move into that really easily. You can jump at Liger and you grab him and counter him.
00:25:51
Speaker
They went the way it did. There are certain things they can use it, helping the realism, because it's not like we see of nowadays when people take his or her piranhas, you can tell they're just doing a front flip. There's like no connection with the leg. It's just like, it looks neat, but you know, it's all cooperative. So I wanted to use it for that, but it really is just kind of an awkwardly timed and positioned version of the move. I know they could do better.
00:26:16
Speaker
I think for me, it's just that that's literally the only move in the match that looks like that. No, everything else is so smooth that that makes that stand out as looking awkward, where if other moves in the match had felt like they were fighting for the move, no, I would have been more willing to say that that looks fine, because I can see where you're saying where it kind of makes them look like you fought for it. But it's just like for the entire rest of the match, it hasn't been like that. Oh, yeah. No, I agree with that one. No, I can see at that point. Yeah.
00:26:46
Speaker
Yeah. That's what I was wondering. If you'd on a backslide, for instance, when people fight for that, that actually does look like part of the move. But yeah, it's a shame that that's sort of Mars ending up otherwise really good match for me. Okay.
00:26:59
Speaker
It's a good first match in that it is not slow. It is not boring. It looks pretty fluid. In fact, at some points, I think Liger like jumps down if when he was supposed to fall, I don't know if you can actually go faster, but it looks like he's throwing himself into even those falls. They're doing it at like 1.5 G or something.
00:27:21
Speaker
The jump, what's it called? The headbutt? The skybutt? The swan dive headbutt. Okay, whatever. It's a dumb move. I'm going to jump and just plank in air and hopefully hit my face on something. Yeah. I laughed every single time we did it. It's one of those things that it only seems to hurt him when he misses, which makes absolutely no sense to me still. Yeah, either way, you're contacting something with your head.
00:27:47
Speaker
And honestly, my biggest problem with the match is about 15 or 20 seconds before it's over. I know who's going to win, you know, with the interference. So when he came over and started pointing his finger, I was like, Oh, okay. Well, script. Yeah. It's very rare for that to get turned around after one of those. So kind of does give it away. Unless you're like the main character, then you can see that they were setting something up and then you, you still triumph. That's the only thing that seems to be a reversal for that.
00:28:17
Speaker
Yeah. I agree with you guys. This was a very nice opener. Had a quick pace, good, crisp, hard-hitting moves by both men. I really liked that, actually, despite the crowd's reactions, Benoit still kind of worked heel and Liger kind of worked face. It felt like they were keeping to their characters still. Yeah. And just accepting that the crowd was gonna react differently for this show. So, like, it's Benoit that gets shaken up and rolls out repeatedly, and Liger's the one that keeps pressing the attack.
00:28:47
Speaker
Benoit had some really, really great power moves, and Liger had some really excellent acrobatics, and both pulled out some very cool submission holds in the middle. The ending, like you said, works a bit against it. It's clearly to protect Benoit's reputation as a very new member of the Four Horsemen at this point, but I really would have preferred a clean finish, but still a very hot opener that showed off both men's abilities very well.
00:29:13
Speaker
It's 95% of a really good match. And unfortunately the other 5% is at the end. Yeah. Despite the ending on it. I'm struggling to think of an opening match that we've seen that was better. Oh yeah. No. That that's, if not the best opening match that we've seen, it's right up there. It's gotta be for sure. Yeah. Change ending. Get rid of one flying headbutt and it's perfect. Yeah. I can see that.
00:29:40
Speaker
As you mentioned, Benoit's feud. So at this point, it's all in the other because there's a feud between the dungeon and the horsemen. Right. Stuff happened with Brian Pillman in a few months that changed his direction with a bunch of stuff following the horsemen, which then turned that feud into something else, the personal feud they have going on there. Right. We go back to Jean, who is with Eddie Guerrero.
00:30:07
Speaker
Thank you very much, Tony Schiavone. There's a big buzz back in the locker room. What you've just seen here, Eddie Guerrero, does not set well with you. No, it doesn't set well at all. Kevin had no reason to be there. He had no business. No, he didn't. That was Chris Benoit's match. He should have stayed out of it. All right, let's talk about what's going to be taking place here. The World Cup of Wrestling. The best four out of seven right now. WCW is down 0-1 to New Japan. In a moment or two, you're going to be going up against Notadi. Size up your match if you would, Eddie.
00:30:37
Speaker
Well, first of all, Eugene, what I want to do is I just want to tell you what an honor it is to be here representing WCW in the World Cup of Professional Wrestling. I mean, to be selected one of the seven out of all the wrestlers out there. I mean, that's a great honor. I'm just happy to be here.
00:30:55
Speaker
and perhaps the most prestigious international event ever of this magnitude. Yes, sir, it is, and I'm just proud to be here. And one thing I'd like to say, you know, talking about Ohtani, he is a tremendous athlete, and what I had to do to prepare to be here is I had to be at the top of my game, and that's what I did. I went out, I put the hours in the gym, I put the hours in the ring just to be able to give my best today, because that's what I'm going to do. I'm representing you, the WCW fan, and I'm not going to let you down. I'm going to go out there, give it my best like I always do, and hopefully come out a winner.
00:31:24
Speaker
By the way, I saw Eddie Guerrero back here doing some push-ups, doing some squats, getting ready for his big match with Otani. It is part of the World Cup. It is part of Starrcade 95 from Nashville, Tennessee. Right now, let's get back up to the ring.
00:31:40
Speaker
So before we talk about the interview, we should mention just as Eddie starts talking about the honor of representing WCW in this interview, somebody opens the door in the background and starts to enter before clearly spotting the camera and just backing right out really quickly. I was sad. I watched it a few times to see if I could identify who it was, but it was just too like caught in shadows still to identify it.
00:32:04
Speaker
Just like, do you guys not mark the doors to prevent that? I don't know. It seems like that was entirely avoidable. Based on the last match, I assumed that was probably Kevin Sullivan. He just goes anywhere he feels like. I don't know, it looks too tall to be Kevin Sullivan, though. Seems like a taller guy. So it looks like Kevin Sullivan, but taller? That does narrow it down a bit. Oh, gal, no. No, if it was Dave Sullivan, he would have tripped going through the door. No, that'd be the shock master.
00:32:33
Speaker
No, he would trip going through the wall. That's true. Oh, yeah.
00:32:38
Speaker
Guerrero feels a little flustered at first, but ends up pretty much fine. Perfectly acceptable promo, but pretty basic babyface, I'm gonna try my best kind of promo. It's always something I appreciate though when a wrestler takes time to promote his opponent too, and it's nice that Guerrero highlighted the importance of the event and his match by building up just how much he's worked to be ready for it. So this was fine to me, but nothing particularly special.
00:33:05
Speaker
Guerrero will become a pretty great promo guy, but right now he's just kind of generic babyface. He does have a really nice sparkly white and red jacket though.
00:33:14
Speaker
And to be fair to him as well, you know, a year ago from that point, he's wrestling almost entirely in Mexico, where the focus on character and like promos is like completely different there. It's much more about you're this guy wearing a mask, wearing this outfit, wrestling your match. If you cut promos, that's good. Your goal is not to be a character who performs, your goal is to be a performer. And if you have a character, that's great.
00:33:38
Speaker
So given he's going through transition to that, I give him a little pass. Yeah, and it's not like they're giving him a ton of story to work with tonight or anything either. Right. No, that was a good promo. The thing that stood out to me though is actually towards the end he's like realizing that it's a big event. He's like, Stargate! Screams it into the thing. I was thinking that too, yeah, it's like a sudden ramp up. It's like he's reading off a teleprompter that's the only thing that's bold and underlined.
00:34:04
Speaker
The other possibility is that Eric Bischoff, who we don't see, is behind him with a cattle prod and snaps him away to Starcase. Starcase!
00:34:16
Speaker
Yeah. And it would. But maybe just at the end, it's just like the only part of you rehearsed. There you go. It's like he's confident. He does seem to like get a lot smoother as the promo goes on where at first he's kind of stumbling a little bit. I think Gene kind of does help by jumping in saying the no business line and that kind of like gets him focused on it and helps him get past that point.
00:34:40
Speaker
It's definitely a more subtle version of the actor giving the other person this line. Yes. Then you get sometimes where like, don't you mean you're really concerned? Oh yes, I'm really concerned. What he said. Yeah. So our second match is Alex Wright versus Koji Kanamoto with Sunny Ono.
Alex Wright vs. Koji Kanemoto Analysis
00:35:03
Speaker
The referee for this match is Nick Patrick.
00:35:06
Speaker
I do have to note that it's not mentioned at all in the show, but fairly recently, before the show, Kanamoto won the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship, which had previously been held by Juice Not A Liger. And this is supposed to be, at least according to Japan, an official title of defense for this belt.
00:35:27
Speaker
which is the first time it ever happened, by the way. So of course, WWE equally does not comment on history being made. The first time the belt was defended? No, in the United States. Oh, okay. So that's the first time that the belt was defended in the United States? Yeah, like at all. Oh, okay. The next time there's a big title match involving it is about four years from now, which involves Liger, which is good, but involving the head by a bottle of tequila, which is not good.
00:35:55
Speaker
So no matter how you feel about this match, it's not involved with that. Okay. I won't give much context. You can look that up yourself. It's really bad.
00:36:04
Speaker
Kanamoto comes down to the ring in a pretty cool looking black and white G with a silver belt. It felt like just the right mix of serious and flashy to me. He also, it must be noted, has very wonderful fluffy hair, which somehow remains wonderful fluffy hair all the way through the match and afterwards. It like never gets the pressed down sweaty look or anything. I have no idea what he uses, but it's a good product.
00:36:32
Speaker
Yeah, given it, yeah. I don't know, man. I just noticed that. No, no, I got that note as well. Whatever happens with Brock Lesnar, how much he sweats like gallons just walking to the ring. The opposite for kind of moto. Yeah, yeah.
00:36:53
Speaker
As he comes to the ring also, we get a terrifying shot of a guy dressed like Hulk Hogan in the crowd who is screaming at the camera. It's very frightening. Yeah, he didn't realize that Hogan was storyline suspended two weeks before the show because I guess he didn't feel like being on it. Yeah. But I'll get more into that later. Alex Wright still has his techno-dancing music, but while he still does the backflip off the top, he doesn't dance today. Sorry, John.
00:37:22
Speaker
I was actually quite disappointed. I bet. Because that was a highlight for you last show. I mean, it's entertainment. And admittedly, last show didn't have that many highlights. They didn't make a shirt explaining how Alex Rice dance does work. Oh, yeah. You can Google it. It's pretty amazing. If I ever find it, I will get it. Yeah, yeah, definitely. It's very informative. I did like his black leather jacket this time. It had the pretty cool logo on the back, I thought. Oh, yeah.
00:37:51
Speaker
They trade hammer locks and arm locks in the Crowd Chance USA for Alex Wright from Germany. Geez. Two for two so far. The right stuff. Dusty randomly talks about hanging out at a club, tripping the light Fandango.
00:38:14
Speaker
and Tony compliments his dancing. Kanamoto gets a cool spinning leg takedown and works the leg, but eats Enzigiri. Wright works Kanamoto's arm, but Kanamoto reverses and Wright cartwheels free and hits a fast series of throws, finishing in a head scissors and a drop kick. Tony and Hienan both nicely note that Wright starts out both moves the same way, so his opponent doesn't know which is coming, which is a nice touch.
00:38:42
Speaker
Kanamoto slumps on the ropes, but doesn't seem to like his location, so he just kind of gets up and moves elsewhere and slumps again. Right crossbodies both of them out. I guess you don't get DQ'd for going over the top rope on that because you also went out? Yeah. So it balances out, I guess. You're being DQ'd while getting your DQ credit by being thrown over the top rope. Okay. So it's null. Yeah, so it's a DQ null. Okay. Yeah.
00:39:12
Speaker
There's a rule book for this, we've discussed it. Yeah, we need to write that rule book at some point.
00:39:19
Speaker
Wright keeps Kanamoto out with a baseball slide and dives out onto him. Back in, Wright goes for a sleeper, but Kanamoto backs him into the corner and takes over with strikes, leading to a really nice spinning wheel kick. Kanamoto hits strikes and a drop kick in the corner, and puts Wright on the apron, and then they just kind of hold on for a bit. Dusty wonders if Kanamoto is trying to uncle Wright, and Tony asks if Hienan knows what that means. Hienan says it's the opposite of anting.
00:39:49
Speaker
Oh, man. Kanamoto finally dropkicks Wright off the apron and dives on Wright. Wright gets the better of an outside brawl, but back inside, Kanamoto gets a tiger suplex for one and a moonsault, but lets Wright up. It costs him as Wright counters a whip into a German suplex for two and gets a jumping leg lariat and back elbow. Yeah, yells Wright, attempting to have a personality. Oh, come on, guys.
00:40:19
Speaker
I was mimicking the reaction he gets for doing that. Oh, okay. Yeah. I was just going to say, you didn't have to say you could have said suplex. That's more in line with the theme of what this show is. Yeah. Nevermind.
00:40:34
Speaker
Kanamoto counters a top rope drop kick with his own drop kick, though both mostly miss. Patrick counts to seven and they're up, trading quick moves, including a Muda-esque spin kick by Kanamoto, and a drop kick by Wright that sends Kanamoto, as Dusty calls it, butt over teakettle. Yes. I don't want to know what the teakettle in his house looked like at this point.
00:41:00
Speaker
A right superplex gets two, but Kanamoto counters a whip and catches right trying to slip up and over, dropping right jaw first on the turnbuckle. Kanamoto hits a double-leg takedown and flips over to hold right down for the three-count and the win, putting New Japan up 2-0. Amusingly during the replays, Hinen miscalls Kanamoto's moonsault as a somersault and Dusty tries to correct him but calls it a flip.
00:41:25
Speaker
Neither of you guys know what that's actually called, do you? No. Thoughts on this one? It's a match made up of, I thought, really good strikes. They had the timing and sort of the snap of those really well. It's obviously a little different from the more visceral ones you get in the Liger, that one match. So it's a little, honestly prettier, but definitely quicker, like flashier moves in general, I would say.
00:41:52
Speaker
But at the same time, it's nice that they don't sort of ignore the fundamentals of it. It's not like a bunch of kicks, but then they have to do holds because their holds and wrestling are really good as well. They flow really nicely. I guess my real problem with the match is.
00:42:06
Speaker
Before the ending sequence, they kind of lose the flow of it a bit. By the end, it's, you know, Kanamoto slams him, tries to move and misses. I'll try to spawn so that you grab him, slam him, and try to top rope move, which also misses. And then the finish is, it's well done. It's just kind of a weird anti-climax of a thing. After all these strikes and counters, it's just,
00:42:30
Speaker
set him down and just float over and pin him. I felt exactly the same way on the finish. It's like you did big move, big move, big move, big move. Oh, it can't quite take him down and then wait, that's it? Yeah. It's a perfectly fine execution on it, but just with all the build, I was expecting something really big at the end and it just like, oh, that's that's underwhelming. Right.
00:42:55
Speaker
I thought it was a good match, again, two energetic matches that had a lot of technical skill, a lot of high flying. Alex actually kind of reminds me of, like, a Dust Wonder Boat, like a, you know, Steamboat-esque, you know, Dust Wonder Boat, and I'm gonna try to sell it.
00:43:14
Speaker
Koji really does a good job of selling. Even some of the stuff that Wright does, you know, Koji just fling himself back, you know, like there's one kick. It looks like Alex is going quick, but he just touches him and Koji just flies from the...
00:43:28
Speaker
the ring and into the barrier that kind of made me take notice of him. Good physical prowess and athleticism from both. I'm kind of glad that Koji won, just not necessarily the way he did.
00:43:44
Speaker
Yeah, what's your feeling on the ending? Did that kind of catch you the same way as us or was it? I wasn't expecting that to be the end. And at least it was different than anything else in that match. It wasn't like, you know, they had tried one move three times and either, you know, succeeded all three or failed and finally landed it. I honestly thought the end of the match was going to be when they both met each other mid-air. I thought they were going to end the match there and, you know, have one of the other
00:44:12
Speaker
recover quickly and roll them up, but it just went on for three minutes after that. Yeah.
00:44:19
Speaker
From my perspective, this was a good match, albeit one that got a little bit sloppy at times. They seemed to have a few miscommunications here and there, a few spots where you could tell that they were working something out or clearly moving into position for one another. They just didn't hide the cooperation as well as in most matches, but both men had some very nice moves, and they largely kept up a very fast pace. They built nicely on their spots, too. In particular, rights float over in the corner, works the first time, and gets countered the second.
00:44:49
Speaker
And the series of top rope dropkick attempts before Wright finally manages to land one solidly is kind of nice too. If only he was as skilled at judging the possibility of top rope dropkicks as the Z-Man, huh? He knows when it's possible and it's not possible, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He would have saved himself some pain there. Kanamoto has some very good character work and some great expressions, which helps make up for Wright largely not having much character or expression himself. I liked it, but it could have used more polish, I guess is how I'd put it.
00:45:18
Speaker
There was that nice spot, sort of joking when I say this, where he has kind of mototang on the ropes and he's, I guess, supposed to do like a shoulder block to the stomach. They kind of just leans up with his shoulder. So gentle. Yeah. Yeah. It's like he's leaning in to sort of rub his shoulder on his belly and he's like, Oh, right. I mean, uh, sort of block second time. And that's in fact, he's gauging the distance. Yeah. Yeah. There you go. Yeah.
00:45:44
Speaker
I'm just picturing what I was talking about. It's like when those cats, they put their head up against you. It's like a term of endearment and plotting. Yes. Mostly the latter, yes. Yeah. Depending what company you work at, the big show of the year is different times.
00:46:04
Speaker
Theoretically, it's Darkade, although this show makes you think otherwise. For WWE, obviously WWE, or half of the time, it's WrestleMania, which is in March, April, this time period. The biggest one, for the most part, for New Japan, is Wrestle Kingdom. At that match, Kojokanamoto had to defend his IWGP Junior Heavy Championship against June Thunder Liger, which he lost. And yes, that was in January.
00:46:34
Speaker
So the street continues even across the pond in Japan.
00:46:42
Speaker
He seems like, unfortunately, the next several months, he's still on shows, but he's on pre-shows where he has some dark matches. At least for now, his sort of high point mid-card phase has kind of passed, or another over him, or what, but... I know he shows up on Nitros a lot over the course of 96. But his pay-per-view appearance has dropped noticeably after the show, up until they start to rebrand him a couple times. It's a little bit of a shame, because he's a good worker. Yeah, absolutely.
00:47:12
Speaker
We go to the announcers, and Tony breaks down the current status and notes that to win, WCW now has to win four of the remaining five matches.
Sonny Ono Promo Critique
00:47:22
Speaker
Dusty says that WCW has to regroup, and Hienen holds up a present that he got from Sonny Ono. That's a little display of the Japanese and US flags. Again, the first two wrestlers for WCW were a Canadian and a German. This is not the USA versus Japan. This is WCW versus New Japan.
00:47:43
Speaker
Hienan says WCW knows that they're in trouble, and Tony throws to Gene Okerlund, who is with Sunny Ono.
00:48:00
Speaker
two to nothing here for the world cup of wrestling by the way ladies and gentlemen this past week an extraordinary amount of money detest along green was offered to a superstar mark madden will have complete details on that story tonight during his exclusive hotline report you have the madman a call from the pittsburgh post-gazette
00:48:20
Speaker
at 1-900-909-9900 for all of the inside stories and for what's happening behind the scenes here at Starrcade, call the hotline right now. Take a look at that big grin on your face. Sonny Odo, come on in. It's too zip right now. You obviously are delighted. Pretty soon it'll be five zip.
00:48:42
Speaker
Well, it won't get to five zip. If it gets to four zip, we're going to close down shop. Close down shop, and maybe we buy WCCW. Then maybe we buy Iowa. Wait a minute. Buy WCCW. WCCW is not for sale. Iowa, that might be another story. I don't know a whole lot about the state. This is America. Everything's for sale. You Japanese people would know that, yes. You noticed. As you didn't know, nobody knew. But we have friends in Dungeons of Doom. As you saw in the first match,
00:49:12
Speaker
Was somebody paid off? No, no. Wait a minute. Now, was somebody paid off? You just say, oh, no, no, no, no, my name. Hey, don't work with me. Please give me a break. Right now. Let's get back to Eric. I beg your pardon, Tony. You are confusing me a little bit. Oh, my goodness. Gene Okerlund is in a quandary right now. Yes. Everyone has a price. Don't they bring? They've got some else's catchphrase, Tony. Yeah, but it is a good line.
00:49:41
Speaker
just does a very nice smooth. Everyone has a price and then looks really quickly over it, don't they, Brain? Yeah, as for the promo itself, Ono's character plays up the broken English here, which I don't know. I recognize this is a little bit hypocritical from things I've said previously, but I felt more okay with it when it was the fake Russians doing it.
00:50:06
Speaker
rather than a real Japanese guy? Right. There's less of a racial angle to it then, I guess. There's a few kind of funny moments in this promo, including Jean accidentally calling Tony Eric, but it's largely just kind of uncomfortable to watch to me.
00:50:22
Speaker
What does Iowa come into play? I was looking for things about that, actually. I'm glad you asked. So I tried to find out if buying Iowa was a reference to something, and I'm not sure, but the closest I could find was there was a late 1995 story from the New York Times about the Iowa straw poll.
00:50:42
Speaker
where participation did not require Iowa residency, but a $25 ticket. So campaigns were bringing in people from out of town and paying for them to attend the straw poll to improve their ranking. So I guess someone might have referred to that as buying Iowa at some point, but I didn't find something with that specific language. Are you applying that money is affecting politics in some way? No, not. Okay, good. I was like, there's no way that's possible. But it happened. It was like, I think,
00:51:11
Speaker
I don't know, late 1995, that story was, so it would have been fresh in people's minds. I liked how he kept on giving all the names for money. That was weird. I was really hoping to be like, big cheddar bread, the whole sandwich. Yeah, just keep it going. Go for as long as you can, yeah.
00:51:30
Speaker
There's definitely a bit of a stork irony that he takes super great offense to the idea that someone would buy WCW. Like that could possibly happen. Yes, true. Meanwhile, Japan, a sovereign country buying one of a stage is like, well, maybe. Yeah. That's way more plausible than someone buying WCW. Well, WCW is more established than this Iowa place. Yeah.
00:51:55
Speaker
Dusty says WCW is down two points and needs to catch up. And he says it's time to bring out their cannons. Tony throws to the third match with, quote, one of the big cannons, Lex Luger. So our third match is Lex Luger with the mouth of the South, Jimmy Hart, versus Masahiro Chono with Sonny Ono.
Lex Luger vs. Masahiro Chono Breakdown
00:52:18
Speaker
Referee for this match is Randy Eller.
00:52:22
Speaker
on one of the New Japan Super Shows, which in Japan was called Starrcade, as a fun side note. We technically have more Starrcade after the final official Starrcade, should we eventually cover them, which I think we will. And one of those is Lex Luger defending the title against Chono. But other than that, there's not really a lot of interaction between them. Chono has an awesome looking sleeveless coat, very 1990s comic book vigilante.
00:52:49
Speaker
Mm-hmm all sorts of character for his look that he didn't have last time we saw him. Yeah Yeah, definitely got more of a like I said more of a character to in this time We he is also still we're told the master of the STF. However, I Think there's a some some young man named Eric Watts who really wants to battle over that. Yeah. Yeah Luger sadly mitched it Wow, really Bobby, okay
00:53:14
Speaker
keep it. I've been watching Baywatching recently, sorry. Mitch is on my mind. Luger sadly missed out on the lyrical theme songs, but the generic rock tune that he's got is kind of annoyingly catchy all the same. Jimmy Hart is out with him and he's wearing an amazing Lex Luger jacket now. Luger gives us a peck jiggle as he comes to the ring.
00:53:36
Speaker
Tony says that both men once held the, quote, gigantic gold belt Randy Savage now holds. I guess the big gold belt got an upgrade in Tony's mind.
00:53:47
Speaker
But to the best of my knowledge, that's wrong. When Luger won the WCW title, it was while Flair had left the company with the big old belt. And when Flair sent it back, it became the NWA title that was separate from Luger's WCW title. And Luger didn't return to the company until recently, so he missed the whole NWA championship and WCW international championship thing. Well, I don't know if missed is the right word for it. Dodged. That's probably better, yeah.
00:54:14
Speaker
So a bit of a nitpick, as I'm sure what Tony actually meant was that both were former world champions, which is cool. But hey, if I wasn't going to nitpick, right, why have a review show? Right. I will say I have the lovely picture of Chono holding the big gold belt. So I know he did. Yeah. Yeah. He he had it while it was the NWA title. Correct. Luger dominates with strength and sells his own strikes louder than Chono. I've missed you, Luger.
00:54:41
Speaker
Chono comes back with flying forearms and a high sidekick called the Yakuza Kick, which Tony localizes as Mafia Kick. Luger rolls out to recover. Back in, Luger starts off strong, but Chono reverses a suplex and beats Luger up as the crowd chants USA. And for the first time, they're chanting it for a wrestler from the United States. He in fact got a big bus that lets you know he was from the United States. He was your hero. Hero. Yes.
00:55:11
Speaker
Chono uses chokes and tries an eye gouge, but Heart alerts Eller. Chono cuts off a Luger comeback with a Sleeper Hold into a reverse DDT and grabs the STF as Henan predicts that it'll be 3-0, but Dusty says the Hold isn't on quite right and Luger gets the ropes for a break. See, now I bet Eric Watts would've hooked it in just right. Chono fails to block a punch, but Luger stops anyway.
00:55:39
Speaker
Chono and Luger trade blows, and Luger sells everybody's. He's giving. Yeah. Particularly loud Luger sell on a Chono atomic drop. Weirdly, Chono gets to the apron, but then just gets right back in for the Yakuza or slash Mafia kick, as Dusty is utterly perplexed by the move's name. Luger counters a Chono top rope move with a back elbow, and Dusty exclaims, he hit him with the Sicilian elbow!
00:56:10
Speaker
Somewhat unceremoniously, Luger gets the torture rack, and Chono gives up. WCW gets a point, and the score is now 2-1, with New Japan still in the lead. Thoughts on this one? So, in-ring wise, it's not quite as strong as the previous two, I would say. It's one of those ones where they don't do a whole lot of really interesting stuff in the ring.
00:56:31
Speaker
That said, the matches were defined by two things. One of which is they're clearly set up characters. Unlike, as I mentioned, last time we saw Chono, he was a generic wrestler guy who was really good, don't get me wrong, but I just felt nothing for his character when I saw him. I really struggled with that match we had with him and Muda. As blasphemous as that sounds, I just got very little out of that match. I still feel like I should have liked that match more than I did, but same way.
00:57:01
Speaker
Few years later, now he's back as a clearly defined character in Look, and Luger has fully accepted his sort of over-the-top Lex Luger character selling and all. Literally the exact same match played out with two different wrestlers, it wouldn't be the same. Literally every move and copy-pasted it would not be the same without them. Luger's selling is gloriously over-the-top. Yes.
00:57:26
Speaker
My point for me is when he's getting kicked and sells super loud and then kicks back and responds and sells the exact same way at the exact same value. Yeah, it makes literally the same sound when he's getting hit and hitting someone else in sequence. It's awesome.
00:57:49
Speaker
The liberal selling thing is like he was ribbed for like a decade and someone told him everyone sells like that and somehow we didn't figure out after I assume hundreds of matches but no one else did that but him. He's like okay maybe this time they'll do it and then they did and he's like that's weird but I'll keep trying this until it works. So I'm the only guy that knows how to sell in the company yeah. Yeah exactly. Whoa.
00:58:13
Speaker
As you mentioned, though, the one bit with the punches is definitely a little awkward because he couldn't actually stop the punch. Yeah. The other part is, as you enter that, so Chono clearly goes to the outside. It's like he's going to climb the rope and jump at Luger. But then I guess realizing the wrong position for the way the match is supposed to end. So he kicks him and runs to the other side of the ring, where now he's facing
00:58:38
Speaker
lugar's back which is important difference so you can hit the back elbow yeah be countered so i guess he couldn't be countered by a forward punter and elbow i don't know it had to work he's surprised by the elbow and then put the butcher rack i guess
00:58:52
Speaker
It was a good elbow. It was a good elbow, yeah. It's just setting it up is a little bit awkward, but the actual spot itself looks awesome. Right. It's an awkward way to get to what they get, but plus like Luger actually wins with the torture rack on pay-per-view on Starrcade, finally breaking the streak of him either not winning or winning some other way.
00:59:14
Speaker
I do have a theory about Luger selling though. Yeah. I think that Luger saw an opportunity for voice acting and wanted to get himself in the royalty free area and he's trying to compete with like the Wilhelm scream. Oh, there you go. He just tries a different variation until he gets the right one. Okay. And the one you hear twice is like the most current version.
00:59:41
Speaker
I think he's trying to try out for fighting game sound effects. He records it, and then he goes to where they're making the new Street Fighter. He's like, no, no, this is what it should sound like if someone's taking a sonic boom. He's like, whoa!
00:59:57
Speaker
Thoughts on the match itself? It was pretty formulaic. You know, I don't know Jono as well as either of you, but I did enjoy watching him. There wasn't anything out of, other than the finish, that wasn't out of the ordinary or unique from Luger.
01:00:16
Speaker
I do like that he has some charisma, and I know that it's not a bear hug, but I'm kind of over the crouch shot stuff to set up, you know, especially if it lasts forever. I think the Nature Boy ruined that for me. But it wasn't bad. Again, I still was looking back at the first two matches and comparing it to this one.
01:00:41
Speaker
I'm going to say you can tell by the crowd reaction because once he hits the elbow and clearly is going to do the torture rack, the crowd is like super pops. Yeah. Oh yeah. In contrast to like a minute before where they're, they're into it, but it's not the same. Yeah. And it's the first Sicilian elbow I've ever seen and it's done perfectly. Yeah.
01:01:03
Speaker
I'm pretty much with you guys on it. There wasn't a lot to this one, but it was still pretty entertaining. Part of that is the Luger selling, of course. I've really missed that. Oh, yeah. But both wrestlers did get opportunities to do something cool. Chono's kicks looked really good and Luger's power was quite impressive. Like you guys, the back elbows spot was a nice idea for a counter. And yeah, like you were saying, Al, it's great to finally see the torture rack actually win a match for Luger. Yes.
01:01:32
Speaker
That said, it just feels like this isn't a complete match design. It has the big moments, but nothing that really ties them together. There's not much of a story to the match, just some fun spots. It doesn't really build up to its finish in any way. It just kind of decides to end. It entertained me, but it didn't involve me. If that distinction makes any sense. It's good to see USA making a comeback. Slash WCW.
01:02:02
Speaker
Lexigu has an interesting couple of months ahead of me to follow up. He will win a tag title with Sting and hold the TV title as well. Although to note, he's not holding them both at the same time, which would be pretty cool. And he wins the TV title of the house show, it's trying to be bad, and holds it for an entire day.
01:02:19
Speaker
and then loses it back. I think it's part of their weird thing they try a lot later, where they just randomly have big matches and talent changes at house shows, just to see if people were paying attention and try and draw the tenants up, especially. Hey, anything can happen, Adam. Yes. Yeah. I do have a fun note for Chono, though. Chono, at this point in time, is a bad guy, as you can tell by his attire. He's teamed up with Masa Saito, the guy we'll see the next match. Their name is Team Wolf.
01:02:49
Speaker
That's awesome. Yeah, I like that name. I think he's locked in MVP just from that. Yeah, that earned him some points. Yeah, I figured he liked that. We go backstage to Gene Okerlund, who is with Sting.
Sting's Rivalries and Friendships
01:03:06
Speaker
Tony, it's beginning to look a little bit like, well, the 27th of December, 1995, here at Starrcade. It's New Japan Pro Wrestling 2, WCW 1, and Sting. That's got to be good news for your team. You got it. It's two to one, and we are coming on strong. Johnny B. Bad is in the ring next, right? That's absolutely right. I want to talk about your matches. Well, he's going to even a score. That's all I wanted to say. Go ahead. Ask me.
01:03:29
Speaker
Okay, Kensuke Suzuki, a couple of months ago, in Japan on foreign soil, defeated you for the United States title, a title that he holds right now. Now, that title will not be up for grabs tonight. However, you've got them one-on-one, perhaps a measure of revenge here. That was a bad day a couple of months ago in Japan. You had to bring that up, didn't you? The U.S. title is not up for grabs tonight, but guess what? Pride is what is up for grabs. And Sonny, what's that guy's name?
01:03:57
Speaker
No! Oh, no! Is Wright talking about buying WCW? Over the Stinger's dead body, my friend! All right. You got another thing coming. Triangle match yourself, Lex Luger, victorious just moments ago, and the Nature Boy, Ric Flair. The three of you, of course, have been stalwarts here at World Championship Wrestling for the last three or four years. Maybe a little bit longer than that. You know what you're up against. Size this one up. You know what the stakes are.
01:04:22
Speaker
Well, I've sized it up before and I know you're probably gonna ask me your favorite question. What's that deal with Luger? Yeah, I know. We'll get to that in a minute. We got this triangle thing going on. It's gonna be interesting. All I gotta say is, Luger and I are friends, okay? Macho and I are trying to work things out too. Last week you could see it got a little bit edgy, didn't it?
01:04:43
Speaker
And I wanted to get that way again. Luger, my best friend. I love you, pal. But you say you got to do what you got to do. Well, guess what? The Stinger's got to do what he's got to do also. And the Nature Boy, you know the way I feel about you. I'll never, ever, ever forget what you did to me much. I want you so bad I can taste you.
01:05:05
Speaker
Okay, it is thick enough. You can cut it with the knife right now. I'm talking about the electricity in the air as we get back to the launch bin in the ring. Yeah. Ladies and gentlemen, with New Japan... He's like a proto John Cena. Yeah. Yeah. He needs therapy. He's got these relationship issues he used to work them out. Yeah.
01:05:31
Speaker
It's funny, you meant to say that because John Cena originally was the prototype. Oh, yeah. So he's a proto prototype. Oh, yeah. There you go. All right.
01:05:39
Speaker
The unusual Sting promo here is a bit more confrontational with Gene than normal, but he has his usual big personality and makes good use of it to build up the kind of complex angles that have been happening around him. They make good use of Sting's prior loss to Sasaki to build up their, at this point, still potential match. And they highlight Sting's friendship with Luger, who is just about enemies with Savage at this point.
01:06:06
Speaker
Well, he literally fought him. He tried to win the title off him like two weeks for the show. Right. But I mean, it's gone beyond just competition. Yeah. To actually like Lucas kind of playing between face and heel. I mean, well, he tried to break Savage's arm at one point. Yeah. Like a month ago. So yeah. Yeah. I say it's gotten pretty bad. Yeah.
01:06:25
Speaker
So where Sting has been still close to Hogan and Savage. So it's an interesting angle that they've got going on there. Sting also effectively builds up his rivalry with Savage and his, of course, long-standing feud with Ric Flair. So he really did a lot to focus on the elements of the triangle match and world title storyline tonight.
01:06:45
Speaker
They pack in quite a lot here, but I think it works well overall. And I like that Sting took a moment to build up Johnny Be Bad, too. It really takes a moment to make sure that they get that in, which I appreciated. Yeah. There's a lot of long-running debate after these getting more character versions of Sting as to which is the best version of Sting. You know, server Sting, the one we'll get next year, is it sort of the hybrid Sting? Is it definitely not Joker Sting and TNA? We all agree it's not that one.
01:07:13
Speaker
at this point i kind of like sarcastic sting he's he's pretty good at sarcasm really growing on me yeah we are the as a side note mention that they did refer to luger sting and flair as the stalwarts of wcw over the last years
01:07:29
Speaker
Yes, but Luger not for the past few years. Yeah, Luger literally just returned in October. And Flair actually not for a couple of the past few years because he was gone for 91 and 92. He retired. Yeah, and then retired for last year's show effectively, so yeah. So yeah, Sting, yeah, sure, totally. The other ones, maybe not so much. Nah, not so much, yeah.
01:07:53
Speaker
Tony throws to the next match and says that Sting's comments were interesting. Tony wonders if Sting may turn his back on his fans tonight with his do-what-he-has-to-do comments. Dusty says that Sting is ready to go and not afraid of consequences, but don't question his integrity. Our next match is Johnny B. Bad with Kimberly the Diamond Doll versus Masa Saito with Sonny Ono.
01:08:23
Speaker
The referee for this match is Nick Patrick. Bad is accompanied by Kimberly, the Diamond Doll, so named because she was previously the valet to Diamond Dallas Page. Bad wears a sparkly black and silver cape that reads, Have a Bad Day, and Kimberly is wearing black and silver too. We get a quick shot of a fan in the crowd that's holding up a Johnny B. Bad action figure.
01:08:46
Speaker
Well and next to a actual like poster of him. Yes, there's a weird contrast. Yeah, if it looks like and here's him as a tiny doll It's comparison purposes, I guess yeah scale accuracy Kimberly and bad each take a blaster and fire confetti to the crowd but WCW only focuses on Kimberly and mrs. Bads would have made a Would have been a good rare or
01:09:16
Speaker
I don't know where I am sometimes tonight. Oh my gosh. Would have been a rare good moment for one of your sudden wide shots, WCW. That poor guy is still strapped to the ceiling filming downward. He's not using him. 75 feet in the air. Let me down at least. I'm going to have the ground crew. Oh, the dude that fell over. Yeah, have him do it.
01:09:39
Speaker
Actually, I kind of wish they had a guy on the ringside where they're fighting towards, like holding upward and see if he gets confetti on the lens. That'd be a great effect to see it fall and kind of hard the frame for second. Yeah. Bobby Heenan gets in a pretty good line here that people are now calling DDP diamond, dull, less page. Massa Sieto has a very serious sports star kind of look, which is kind of a good contrast to bad. It's a very flashy versus very serious.
01:10:09
Speaker
If you look at Saito's jacket, his name, it's written as M. and his name is spelled out in the back, like this little thing. It has an H at the end of it. Oh. And I've never seen it written or spelled that way in a time. Interesting. I think there is a Japanese thing where you put H at the end of some name, but we don't always use it. I've seen a couple of versions of that, but... Yeah, I mean, obviously it's the names are written with an entirely different character set. Right. You know, it's how they transition that to our character set.
01:10:38
Speaker
But I've seen a couple other instances where someone's name ends with an O and I've seen it with and without an H. Interesting. So here's the segment that I mentioned as we began. Yeah. Sunny Ono comes into the ring and takes a microphone and proclaims that Kimberly should be home cooking or doing dishes. And she takes Umbridge, telling him off.
01:11:00
Speaker
This is a horrible stereotype and it's poorly acted besides. Not to mention that it makes zero sense for Sonny Ono as a character. The suggestion here is that he has a real problem with women being in the wrestling ring and he thinks it's only a place for men.
01:11:18
Speaker
At the previous month's show, World War III 1995, Sunny Ono managed women wrestlers Bull Nakano and Akira Hokuto in a tag team match. Ono would continue to manage Nakano and Hokuto, along with Malia Hasaka,
01:11:34
Speaker
through 1996 and I believe into 1997. In the 90s, by my understanding, there was a real boom in women's pro wrestling in Japan with multiple promotions springing up to join other long-running promotions entirely dedicated to it. In fact, in 2002, when all Japan women's pro wrestling had to close its doors due in part to losing performers to those new promotions, it was at the time the longest running pro wrestling promotion in Japan at 37 years.
01:12:03
Speaker
Considering that WCW could barely be bothered to have a women's division for most of its run, it's a real laugh to have them supposedly defending female performers here. Oh, and by the way, speaking of WCW's women's division, Medusa literally showed up on Nitro less than a month ago to chuck the WWF women's title in a trash can and proclaim that WCW wasn't just where the big boys play, but now it was where the big girls play.
01:12:28
Speaker
This pay-per-view would have been a great chance to maybe have a match between, you know, Medusa and Nakano or Hokuto, for instance. That easily could have been a part of the WCW vs. New Japan storyline. Oh, and by the way, Kimberly calls Ono Hop Sing, referencing a character from Bonanza who was Chinese. Bad idea all around, this bit was actively insulting and should never have been part of the show.
01:12:53
Speaker
So
Saito vs. Bad: Match Drama
01:12:54
Speaker
Akira Hakuto is at this point, and as of recording now, married to Kenzuki Sasaki, who is part of the tournament and also met with Sanyono. Yeah, this was not a great moment on the show. All right, onto the match.
01:13:12
Speaker
Saito is just too strong for Bad starting out, brushing off his holds and taking him down with ease. Leading to the most intense headlock I think I've ever seen, as it looked like Saito was trying to twist Bad's head off. Bad fights to his feet, but Saito pulls the hair to take him down, and wins a resulting brawl. Saito continues dominating, and when Patrick warns him about choking, Ono takes the opportunity to choke Bad with his Japanese flag.
01:13:38
Speaker
Sayito gets two counts off of a big back suplex, a clothesline, and a Russian leg sweep before Bad finally comes back with punches, a knee lift, and a top rope double axe handle into his beautiful top rope sunset flip for two. Sayito bows to Bad, but Bad kicks him. I'm not sure if it was supposed to come off this way, but it felt like Sayito was showing respect for Bad's effort, and Bad totally disrespected him for it.
01:14:03
Speaker
Bad knocks Saito down again and gets a suplex, but only gets like half a count. Things seem to get a bit confused as Bad keeps looking behind him and Kimberly shouts something. Ono finally gets on the apron, so Bad runs over and grabs him, but Saito hits him from behind. Ono takes Bad over the top rope, and Patrick dequeues Saito, tying the World Cup score 2-2.
01:14:27
Speaker
The bell rings and the announcer starts to speak, but cuts off as Saito stalks towards Kimberly. Bad comes back in and grabs Saito and lands punches and a couple dropkicks to send him fleeing outside. Saito leans on the apron, and Bad vaults over the top rope and outside, and virtually entirely misses him, splatting on the safety mats.
01:14:49
Speaker
He's like one move away from having a good closing to this sequence. But he started to do his flashy finishing a bad day. I think it's called, I think it's called the bad day. Yeah. Yeah. Which is a really nice looking flip. But yeah, the guy is basically in front of where he lands and he's hopped over a guy really beautifully, but does nothing. So you do kind of sells it anyway and bad chases ono off before going back in to pose and root for the upcoming WCW wrestlers.
01:15:17
Speaker
Thoughts on this one? I'm not a huge fan of this one. I will say I elected better the second time I watched it. I was really underwhelmed the first time. I can see strong points for it. As you mentioned, Saito at this point has, he doesn't have a lot of in-ring flashiness to him. He's a big burly guy who can grab you hard and can't be knocked down, but that's about all he has at this point.
01:15:41
Speaker
Bad Thankfully
Saito's Limitations and Bad's Style
01:15:42
Speaker
has a lot of personality and flash to what little moves he's allowed to do. I'll give them much credit. It's kind of interesting clash of styles because sort of a flashy striker and a no frills guy. But it was one where if Saito was at a different point in his career, like it was with Saito five years ago and bad his current state might've been more dynamic back and forth contest where at this point Saito just can't do a lot. He's 53 at the point of the show, which credit to credit to do. I mean, I can't do this now. Hmm.
01:16:12
Speaker
It's not a great finish. It's kind of annoying that bad gets to win, but only by DQ. Yeah. It could be really good, but it's, it's okay for what little it is. I actually do like their styles. You know, there's a certain rawness to it. They're not looking to be flashy. They're just trying to power through that move. Nothing looks super clean, but that's, that's okay because, uh, there's not like a oversell. It looks like there's actually some power behind, uh, some of the strikes.
01:16:43
Speaker
You know, I do see that flip over the ropes over and over and over to my head. Yeah. But you know, they could have like saved it. Like you said earlier, you wish he didn't win by a DQ earlier. We've already seen a over the ropes non DQ earlier. Yes. I guess we're making up for that here.
01:17:03
Speaker
Yeah.
Match Critique and Tropes
01:17:04
Speaker
He could have easily just threw him back in the thing and actually was like, looked at the ref and said, look, I'm a pin them and pinned them, you know, like, and got like a legit, you know, I could see bad doing that or doing a couple moves and then pin them. Yeah. But I guess it didn't, it wasn't really necessary. And I don't know why they, it's a common thing where like someone that goes after the girl or the, the. Yeah.
01:17:30
Speaker
I guess it is a try to build up one character, not the other. I don't know. I mean, at least that's cut off very quickly in this one, but I wasn't a fan of that coming up either. As for the match.
01:17:44
Speaker
I rather liked, actually, what we got of it. Both hit some nice strikes and some suplexes, like you were talking about, Jon. And Saedo really, really wrenched on his holds, which I appreciated. Like, none of his holds looked like he was using them to rest at all. Like, he's always working on them, which I appreciated a lot. Bad sunset flip off the top rope looked great once again.
01:18:08
Speaker
But this is so short. I looked at the match time and it's listed as five minutes and 52 seconds. Yeah. I feel like these guys have more than five minutes and 52 seconds in them. I think BadBad did for sure. Yeah. Honestly, for my part, I think Saito did too. But I would have liked to see what more they could do with, say, just double the time. Not like a super long match, but a little longer than this.
01:18:33
Speaker
As it is, I feel like this barely gets going and the ending is clearly mistimed. I think Ono was supposed to be up on the apron earlier, so it just doesn't end up working quite that well. Give this, say, five more minutes and time the ending right, and I think the match would actually probably be quite good, but it just doesn't get the time to fulfill its potential, really.
01:18:53
Speaker
I understand where you're coming from where he does look back like two times really quickly for Ono and seeing it again, especially with that in mind, it is a giveaway that he's waiting for him to be there. But I will say at least Ono had interfered before. So it's not like Ono was never like didn't do anything, suddenly he's staring over there where he's at for no reason. Yeah.
01:19:13
Speaker
true I'll give you that but also there's that really odd break of the pinball too where he literally gets like half a count yeah and so what I'm thinking was probably supposed to happen is he was supposed to go for the pin oh no was at that point supposed to jump up thereby the ref would get up and go over and look at oh no that would cause bad to get up so bad thinking that that's happened
01:19:37
Speaker
and goes ahead and gets off, but for no reason. Oh, you know, I will absolutely not say that it goes 100% smoothly. I just think, if you don't think about what it's probably supposed to be, just look after what it is. It's him sort of acting nervous before he's about to presumably do a big move to Saito. And then on the second or third, you know, quick glance, he sees the guy and then it goes right to the finish. It's not a smooth way it works, but
01:20:06
Speaker
I don't know, I'm not super bothered by that. It's still a DQ finish in a match, I don't like it, but it's an okay version of it, if anything. I can't defend the DQ on this one. Yeah. I will say, just slightly on Sayido, Sayido is one of the few people who has a move named after him.
Wrestling Career Transitions
01:20:27
Speaker
There's literally a Sayido suplex. Yes. So you can't take that away from him, nothing else. No, no.
01:20:33
Speaker
It's good to see Johnny be bad. Uh, even though I don't really care for the name, um, kicking butt. So it's bad.
01:20:45
Speaker
Saido would wrestle practically for WCW up until about nay. His last match in WCW, I think, might be ever, might have a random appearance one off later, is itching enough for Tim and Chono, so Team Wolf. Oh, you did? On, um, that was gonna be Saturday night, not Nitro for some reason. Against Harlem Heat, so it's kind of a mixed bag of quality there. Oh, that'd be interesting. Now, Bands is a different story. So, as I mentioned, he briefly loses his title to Luger, but he gets it right back.
01:21:14
Speaker
However, he then wrestles a match in March where he quickly drops the title again. And that proves to be his last match because there was some sort of contract issue with WCW. So he loses his title on, they get Saturday night again, of all places. Shouldn't be their high profile show when Nitro exists, but they blow off a lot of stuff there. And that's his last match for WCW.
01:21:41
Speaker
He will briefly come back on one nitro, like be shown in the audience to tease a match, apparently, but never actually comes along. He's gone to WWF to be the wild man, Mark Marrow. Or the wild man, Mark Marrow, as they initially introduced him. Correct. Mark Marrow and Alo. Yep. Number of Jon would be bad, fortunately, in Starrcade Run, Jon. Yep. Oh, well. Was it Badwall Lasted? Yes.
Cultural Sensitivity in Presentation
01:22:11
Speaker
I like the begrudging response to that. Yeah. Yes. That was earned, I understand. You know what, I am really glad they didn't do any crazy stereotypes with green powder or any of the... True, yeah, we don't get the mist or anything. Yeah, you don't get any of that. That is true, I'm kind of surprised that that stuff doesn't show up tonight.
01:22:38
Speaker
We go back to the announcers, and Hienan says that he's pretty sure New Japan can still win it. Dusty and Tony criticize him for cheering for New Japan. Dusty says he needs to go get his rope, which, um, I'm not touching that with a 10-foot pole.
01:22:53
Speaker
Hienan insists that he's not cheering for New Japan and gives some really good, innocent faces as Tony moves on to talking up Super Brawl. We get video clips and the Super Brawl logo, but nothing too exciting. Except that the upcoming Super Brawl show is in Florida. And in fact, it actually took place at the Bayfront Arena in St. Petersburg. Go us. Yeah. Tony throws to Jean, who is backstage with Lex Luger and Jimmy Hart.
Lex Luger's WCW Ambitions
01:23:20
Speaker
Thank you very much Tony Schiavone with me. Of course the total package, Lex Luger still to come, the triangle match, Jimmy Hart. Before we talk about that, let's talk about what's going on here. We've got a little 2-2 situation with WCW against New Japan Pro Wrestling. You seem to be happy. What's the deal with Kevin Sullivan?
01:23:36
Speaker
Well, you know, I guess you're talking about what happened when Chris Benoit was out there and Kevin kind of interfered in the match and cost him to lose. I guess it cost America to lose. Let me tell you something. Kevin Sutterman's got a short fuse. Hey, how do you know that? What do you mean, how do I know that? Let me tell you something, Gene. 10,000 comedians out of work and you're trying to be one. He's got a short fuse. Dungeon of doom. Let me tell you something, Four Horseman. You're going to be in a lot of trouble, baby.
01:23:58
Speaker
All right, Lex Luger, let's talk about the triangle match. Sting, your good friend, that ain't your boy, Rick Flair, and of course an opportunity for one of you to meet the Macho Man Randy Savage for the WCW World Heavyweight title. That's what this great sport, that's what World Championship Wrestling is all about. The moment of truth has arrived, year in and year out. You look at the top names of professional wrestling here in WCW, you look at Sting, you look at Flair,
01:24:25
Speaker
Look at Luger, the total package, their names are synonymous with superiority at being the very best at what they do. Well after one prize, and that's the WCW World Heavyweight title that the Macho Man is wearing around his waist. And everybody in World Championship Wrestling, everybody out there knows that I own you Macho Man. You are a pathetic one arm champion. I've said it before, I'm telling you right now, I am coming right at you because I've had you in the rack Macho Man many, many times.
01:24:54
Speaker
I've had your arm. I would have tore it right out of the socket if it wasn't for my good friend Sting. And now, macho man, every time I face you, I beat you. That's on your mind. But first things first, the triangle has Jimmy. I gotta go this one alone, baby. You know 10 years of friendship with Sting and I, it's me walking an aisle just this one time by myself.
01:25:14
Speaker
Well, what do you mean all alone? Are you saying Jimmy Hart's not going to be in your corner? Just this one time, Jimmy. It's cool. We've talked this over, Mean Jean. But just remember one thing, Lex. I'm here for a long time. Not a good time, baby. And Jimmy Hart's always met as champions because that's what keeps you around, baby. So I'm just saying, please bring me back the goal. That's all I'm asking.
01:25:33
Speaker
Got a list of cliches here in my pocket, Jimmy Hart, if you want to use them. Yes, Lex. We're cool, Jimmy. You know that. I know that. That's what's important. I don't care about anybody else out there. There's one time that I walked it all alone because I had to have unfinished business with a nature boy and sting best friends or whatever we have. We're going at it. If it's you and me,
01:25:53
Speaker
You're the best man when I've said it before. We are going after the macho man. The total package is going to reign supreme. Counting down to the Triangle match tonight here at Star Kate. Short fuse, huh Jimmy? Let's get back to the ring. I gotta ask, why does Gene not think that Hart should know that Sullivan has a short temper? I mean, Hart's clearly been working with the Dungeon of Doom. He comes out wearing a Kevin Sullivan face jacket.
01:26:20
Speaker
It's like he seems clearly familiar with him, and that seems like something that would be pretty evident if you spent roughly five seconds with Kevin Sullivan. This has probably been a promo for World War III. Sullivan talks about how he's only ever had one man during his career, and that is to be heard. Oh. Which, as far as I could tell, is actually true. Yeah, probably. For once, the wrestling claim is accurate. Surprised me, too.
01:26:43
Speaker
The Luger part of things I actually thought was pretty great. Luger effectively builds up the match and his opponents while making clear that he thinks he's the best of them. He's got the bad guy arrogance and he's willing to associate with Jimmy Hart, who's clearly something of a dishonorable person. Something that's happened last year, quickly. But he cares enough about his friend Sting that he's willing to disassociate with Hart when facing his friend.
01:27:07
Speaker
So there's a different attitude to the promo whenever he mentions Sting, I think. There's much more respect that I get in Luger's tone there. Yeah, I can see that. Especially compared to when he talks about the macho man Randy Savage and is just totally, I can beat you easily. I totally win over you every time. So some pretty complex character work here from Luger and I think he pulls it off actually pretty well. He stumbles a little bit on lines here and there, but he's got a pretty complicated promo to work through and he does a good job with it. Yeah.
Hypothetical Managerial Scenarios
01:27:38
Speaker
Some reason I have this weird thought, which is, what if you're in an alternate reality where, for whatever reason, Demi Hart can't go to WCW with Hogan, but they need somebody to be his manager.
01:27:51
Speaker
mouthpiece, character. And they picked the next best thing in their minds, just due to name similarity. And he's managed by Jimmy Valiant. Oh my gosh. A terrible reality, but an interesting one. Jimmy Valiant wearing flashy jacket to the megaphone. Do not threaten me with Jimmy Valiant coming back.
01:28:11
Speaker
I thought you were going to go into like a dusty manager. Now see that I could get behind. No, it's me. I'm just picturing Jimmy vowing a dress like Jimmy Hart now. I don't know why. No. No one would see that less than I do. But I just had that weird thought. One person wants to see that less than you do. It's me.
01:28:33
Speaker
I don't know. I think it's the lack of sleep, but now Luger more and more reminds me of Dar, the Beastmaster, and I think that he should be doing these things with two ferrets and talking about they're going to seek out the Danger Boy. Jimmy Hart kind of is like a ferret. Yeah. He could have the ferret wrapped around his bicep that he has the string that people do. Oh, there you go. Beef flexing in there, like smiling over his arm. Yeah, there you go. I know I'm a little too far on this one, but you can see it. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guerrero vs. Otani Match Setup
01:29:05
Speaker
Our next match is Eddie Guerrero versus Shinjiro Otani with Sonny Ono. The referee for this match is Randy Eller. Otani looks kind of bemused as he walks down the ramp, and Tony builds up his amateur wrestling history. Dusty builds up Guerrero as pound for pound, the best wrestler in the world. Incidentally, he's earlier mentioned on the show that Bobby Heenan is pound for pound, the best wrestling announcer, which was an odd statement.
01:29:34
Speaker
Tony sells this as a clash of each organization's new generation, and he mentions that the two have actually feuded before in Japan. I love Guerrero's jacket. Not quite as much as most Sting jackets, but it's a good one. Sparkling red and white, big and bold. Very nice. That jacket gets a lot of FaceTime. We'll discuss it after. It does look a little bit odd that the jacket is white and red, and his outfit is black and red though.
01:30:00
Speaker
Yeah, he usually at this point has two main outfits, since sadly he stopped wearing his great America pants he used to wear from AAA. It's amazing. But yeah, so he has two versions of the outfit and that jacket goes with the one he's not wearing, unfortunately. Yeah. I guess he didn't have a black and red jacket as cool as that, so he didn't wear it. With this match determining who's going to be up three to two, Dusty calls it a pivotable situation.
01:30:29
Speaker
The ability to pivot, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I guess so. Makes sense. The match itself can pivot. That's what that means. Eddie gets an Eddie chant rather than a USA chant. He does. Already got a really good crowd connection here. Tony talks about Otani coming to wrestling shows dressed as Jushin Liger to get noticed by promoters. So all those kids that do that as well, it's been their plan the whole time. Well, yeah, probably. Yeah. It's signed so many people that worked every time.
01:31:00
Speaker
Fast action as they trade locks and holds both standing and on the mat. Otani pulls at Guerrero's mouth, twists his nose, and pulls his hair to keep control. Guerrero holds his own but finally gets angry, stomping hard on Otani's face, then spinning on top of it. Otani comes back with a neat elevated leg lock and they trade holds and acrobatic moves, including a leaping monkey flip by Otani, before Guerrero head scissors him and Otani rolls out in frustration.
01:31:30
Speaker
Back in, Guerrero keeps control and hits a diving flip from the apron to the ring, and Henan points out Guerrero has great acceleration on his moves. I agree, there's a sense of quick motion how he does his dives in particular. Makes him look faster and more powerful.
01:31:47
Speaker
Guerrero gets a Boston crab into a single leg, but Itani gets the ropes. Guerrero switches to strength and gets two counts off a huge power bomb and an amazing brain buster. Big clothesline to Itani, and Dusty says that, rang his belly, then clarifies he meant bell, not another word for stomach.
01:32:13
Speaker
Atani dodges a corner clothesline, and hits a magnificent springboard dropkick. Absolutely beautiful. Guerrero rolls out, and Atani follows with an equally beautiful springboard splash. Back in, Atani keeps control, but Hienan, via cheering, and Dusty, note that he doesn't take the chances that he gets to go for the pin.
Commentator Humor
01:32:34
Speaker
Line of the night here, I think. Hienan asks Dusty, if he's Guerrero, what is he thinking right now?
01:32:41
Speaker
Dusty Quick As A Whip says, I'm thinking I lost a lot of weight, brother. Tony collapses into helpless laughter, as did I. Yeah, I really wish they would do the back and forth cuts of the announcers. Oh, yeah, I would have loved to see their faces on that. I bet Tony was doubled over. Yeah.
01:33:02
Speaker
Guerrero and Atani trade suplexes for two each, and Atani hits an awesome springboard spinning wheel kick, but pauses to taunt the crowd before going up top, and Guerrero gets a top rope Hurricanrana for two and a crucifix powerbomb for two and three quarters. Atani gets a leg lock. Guerrero makes the ropes, but Atani holds on until four and a half.
01:33:25
Speaker
Hinan says Atani might not understand the count, but then kind of saves it by saying that the ref should give Atani a grace period. Like, a count of 30 or 35. Yeah. I think the exaggeration kind of brings it back around. Right. And I'd be more bothered by that if the story wasn't that he's clearly in favor of New Japan. Yeah, yeah. It's clear that he's trying to turn that into a way that he's blatantly wants them to get the advantage. Yeah. It walks that line pretty well.
01:33:54
Speaker
They spill outside, and Guerrero hits a very safe slam on the concrete, then his own twisting springboard splash. Back on the apron, Guerrero tries to suplex Itani out, but Itani counters with his own into the ring. So wouldn't Guerrero have gotten DQ'd if he succeeded at that? I mean, he's suplexing him from inside of the ring out. Maybe if he had also fallen on the floor, that would count and it'd be okay? Yeah, maybe, I don't know.
01:34:21
Speaker
Another beautiful springboard dropkick from Itani to the back of Guerrero's head. Ow. Yeah, there's no way I'd take that. Itani, by the way, appears to have busted his nose and lips somewhere. I'm not sure when that happened, actually. I think it's from the dive. I think it might be, yeah.
01:34:37
Speaker
Atani tries a full Nelson, but Guerrero counters with a Frankensteiner. But Atani rolls through for two, only for Guerrero to roll it back over for two, only for Atani to roll it over again for a three count and the win. Wow, what a finish. That put New Japan up three to two. One more win and they take the World Cup.
01:34:59
Speaker
Otani smugly poses for the crowd, as Guerrero despairs in the corner. Heaton says they've got to take their hat off to Otani for that win, and Tony reluctantly agrees. Thoughts on that match?
Guerrero vs. Otani Match Perspectives
01:35:10
Speaker
So it's an interesting one for me for a lot of reasons. I start watching wrestling. Lady Guerrero is like at his peak as far as notoriety in America. He's come to, yeah, you know, all this stuff happens.
01:35:22
Speaker
So I know him very well. I watched him from 2000 up until unfortunately he died. Atani I have never seen before.
01:35:32
Speaker
at all, like in any show. My knowledge of New Japan is separate from my viewership of New Japan. I know more of them by reading than actually watching. So I see a Tani walk out, other than his weird sort of top gun jacket. He has like this blank expression, it cannot read whatsoever. Between that and the fact that he's wearing black boots, black knee pads, and plain black trunks,
01:36:01
Speaker
which is normally what Young Lion, the people that are training in New Japan wear because they haven't earned their character yet. That's the way to explain anyways. I just assumed he'd be really boring. Not so he wouldn't be a reformer, but just like he'd have no character. He'd be a clinical wrestling guy with nothing. Thankfully he really proved me wrong. This nice bit where he's heelish, like the nose grabbing stuff, trying to crowd.
01:36:28
Speaker
We just really enjoy playing to this audience really surprised me Mm-hmm. Obviously it's any grow match with the fairly equal opponent. So it's no question. It's everything has worked beautifully There's really not like a moment that stands out as
01:36:43
Speaker
being really awkward or like a mistiming thing we've had in previous matches where they'd be really good, but maybe this one thing. It's hard to really nitpick this match quality wise. So there's a point where Eddie gets a two count and the ref, I remember funny cause I'm watching this as you the first time. I'm telling you that the ref is slow on that one, which is immediately parroted by I believe Tony, right? I think Tony says it at one point. Yeah. That might've been a slow count. Yeah.
01:37:13
Speaker
Flash forward the end of the match where that last three count feels a little fast to me. So that's not absolutely another fault. They worked the match perfectly. But there's that little bit where I kind of wish there'd been some sort of story where like the ref gives a known look to Oh no, or he smiled or something, trying to make it like he fast counted when he needed to and slow counted when it looked really worrisome.
01:37:37
Speaker
I think in reality it's just he knows that first one is not the three count and he's worried about actually hitting three, and then we notice the finish he's just really excited and does it fast. So the fact that I'm nitpicking the ref count in a match should tell you something. Yeah, and to be fair to him on that final one especially, he's got to do
01:37:56
Speaker
counts rapidly in a row for multiple bidding things. So I accept that it's hard to maintain your pace, especially in that situation. But there's a noticeable spike between the second to last count and the last count. Oh, yeah, absolutely. And which was a story to that. What a match.
01:38:14
Speaker
No, no, it was amazing. I don't know if you saw it. It was awesome. I may have seen it, yes. Oh, good. No, I was really surprised by both of them. I am somewhat familiar with Eddie Guerrero, but I haven't seen him at this stage in his career.
01:38:30
Speaker
There's some very quick movements by both sides and I really did like Hitani's healist nature. He was doing a good job of being arrogant and playing it up. Whatever the springboard vertebral dislocator or whatever you want to call it.
01:38:48
Speaker
was pretty amazing. Yeah. And I didn't think there would be any part of the match that would be better than that because I do like the posing at the end. And, you know, he's like clearly giving Eddie some time to recover, catch his breath because it's kind of hard to sell that sort of thing. Some of it's probably real. Oh, yeah.
01:39:08
Speaker
the last, I know it was only like five seconds, but it felt like 30 because it seemed like everything slowed down for me. I was like, oh man, you've encountered that, encountered that, encountered that. I just seen the complexity of those moves. It was all quick. It was all smooth. It was unexpected. And I really, really liked the match because of that.
01:39:31
Speaker
Yeah, I feel like the ending to this one is what they were going for with the Alex Wright one. It's a shock ending, but because of the ability involved. But with the Alex Wright one, it doesn't come off quite like that. It just comes off as a little bit of a downbeat after all the really big moves. Where with this one, they managed to do the shock ending as a big spot.
01:39:53
Speaker
Right, because in that match, Kanamoto doesn't counter a move and pin him. It's a fairly standard move, then rolls over and pin him. Yeah, with this, it's like, oh my gosh, counter, counter, counter. Oh, it really literally comes out of nowhere in this amazing fashion. Mm-hmm, sure. And I do like how the final position looks like our time is just hanging out. He's just like, whatever, just like sitting up.
01:40:18
Speaker
Like, oh, we're done with this. But it was amazing. I became a fan of both of them. Yeah. Yeah. Like you guys, I think this was brilliant. Guerrero and Atani were both at the top of their game here, combined some exceptional mat wrestling with hard hitting power moves and some amazing high flying acrobatics to put together a terrific spectacle. Those springboard moves in particular, I loved. Those were incredible.
01:40:45
Speaker
Atani in particular honestly just seems so confident every time he jumps up on the on the rope to go for a springboard. It's like there's no doubt, there's no shakiness, there's no needing to get his aim in or at something like that. It just it's nice smooth motion that looks perfectly springboard. It's just great. Guevara's power always surprises me. He's a very agile guy but he can just
01:41:13
Speaker
whip a guy up for a power bomb or a brain buster and just a heartbeat. Very hot match, fast paced, some great intensity. And Atani in particular, as you guys were pointing out, was really good about interacting with the crowd. He made that part of the match storyline sometimes because he like wants to show them up so badly that he'll pause and taunt them or something and make a mistake that gives Guerrero time to recover. So I really appreciated that about him.
01:41:40
Speaker
I like that he looks so unassuming and like not like intimidating in any way and then he just does crazy stuff. It's a study in contrast that he looks like this generic or not intimidating wrestler and then what he can pull off is incredible. Yeah. Yeah. The ending is picture perfect and had me on the edge of my seat really smoothly done in an impressive spot to end a match that felt hard fought from beginning to end.
01:42:10
Speaker
The thing with Eddie Guerrero, very early on in the match, this happens in most of his matches, the shoulder strap, and I want to say the left side moves around, so his one nipple is exposed.
01:42:23
Speaker
It's a weird thing to notice, but it stays that way for the entire match. I was thinking of that. What's that one movie that we watched? The Ator of the Fighting Eagle, I think, where he has that chestplate thing that never stays positioned properly. I would gladly watch this match again, but I will constantly notice that no matter how much I try to focus on anything else. I can't help it.
01:42:47
Speaker
In March, WCW would finally go, you know, we should have a cruiserweight division.
Cruiserweight Division Origins
01:42:53
Speaker
We have all these people around. We've got Pillman, we've got Benwah, Malenko. Let's finally do that. So they decided to hold a tournament. The finale, which takes place in, of course, New Japan for the WCW Cruiserweight Championship. Does that make sense?
01:43:10
Speaker
and is won by Otani, who in fact beats Chris Benoit in the finals. Which sounds like a really good match. I'm gonna say that now. As for Eddie, he would compete at the best of Super Junior's tournament. That tournament seems really stacked with people. Just the people I know, so it's not counting Japanese wrestlers I'm familiar with. It has Demolinko, Jushin Liger, Chris Benoit,
01:43:35
Speaker
Jingeru Itani and Kanemoto. Wow. It's a lot in one tournament. Okay. You have no excuse to cover that, but I kind of want to see. Yeah.
Randy Savage's Intense Promo
01:43:45
Speaker
We go backstage and Minji Nokorland intros WCW World Heavyweight Champion, the Macho Man Randy Savage, who is wearing a jacket and hat of every possible color.
01:43:57
Speaker
all right let's now go to mean she don't come in at new japan leads to lead to do yes that's what i was going to say again gentlemen i repeat new japan three w c w two macho man randy savage it's all going to be up to you if it gets beyond you that it's going to be up to staying here at star k ninety five for the world cup of wrestling and one of the most extraordinary international events i have ever been part of randy savage you've got a lot to think about tens on
01:44:24
Speaker
perhaps on the international competition and then after that the triangle match forget about the triangle match one thing at a time the pressure's on me and then hopefully the pressure's on Sting to infinity and beyond three to two are back
01:44:39
Speaker
You know what? I like being the underdog. I've been the underdog all my life. But that's okay. That's cool. And the Stinger, he's cool too. And you know what? I gotta admit something. Lex Luger, he put that guy in the torture wreck. You know, it's a team type situation. And then it reverses itself to infinity and beyond.
01:44:59
Speaker
Breaking on through to the other side. I like that! I got chills up and down my spine. I'm wrapped into the moment. This is a moment in time, and I'm gonna take advantage of it. Ten's on! You can't understand what I'm saying. But... I'm coming to getcha, yeah! I just got off the telephone just moments ago with the suspended Hulk Hogan. What did he say? He wanted to know what frame of mind you were in.
01:45:27
Speaker
Tell him I'm in the zone. He knows what the zone's all about. That's what makes us different. That's what makes Sting different. That's what makes Lex Luger different. In different years. That it's three to two. And I'm going in there to even the score. Sting ah!
01:45:45
Speaker
there for the USA red white and blue yeah I'm out of here I can't see another word thank you very much the macho man Randy Savage is going into his matchup with Pennson as uh new Japan leads three to two right now let's get you back up to the ring oh my gosh yeah
01:46:11
Speaker
Good promo overall, I think. Macho focuses us nicely on the contrast between the team storyline of the World Cup and the open competition between some of the same people for the triangle and world title matches. It's a neat contrast, and I'm glad it got such a highlight here. I love how mobile Savage is during his promos, too. He's just constantly moving around. Gene has to follow him with the microphone.
01:46:35
Speaker
You can definitely tell what year it is from his repeated To Infinity and Beyond lines. Toy Story came out in November 1995. I don't know about you guys, but I got a great mental image of Savage watching that in the theater with full Macho Man get up and carrying the big gold belt, which would have been great. I was hoping he would, like, say Sting's got a friend in me or something like that. Oh, that would have been great.
01:47:00
Speaker
And he was talking about the dog. I thought he was going to talk about Slinky Dog. It just never happened. Who in the scenario is Slinky Dog? Is that Luger? I guess. Yeah, maybe. I don't know. We have time for a full who's and who in Toy Story as WSW. Is the announcer Potato Head? Oh, me and Gene. Oh, yeah. Yeah, that works.
Savage's Personal Anecdotes
01:47:29
Speaker
And Macho is another person who doesn't realize that this is WCW versus New Japan, not the USA versus Japan. But, you know, the show just can't keep that straight anyway. It's amazing for as good a promo as Savage is. It's a shame he can't control the volume of his voice. It's a real medical condition that does the people have. Thank you, Will Ferrell. Peaks and valleys, peaks and valleys. Yeah. Like that dude from the guy from Harlem.
01:47:58
Speaker
Yes, very much so. It was delightful, enjoyable. I'd never expected him to say it to infinity and beyond, let alone twice. Would have been even better if Sting was back with him and that kept pointing at him yelling that you are a toy. Would that have helped? No. You are a toy, Randy Savage.
01:48:21
Speaker
No, I do like the interaction when he talks about other people that are out there, but it's all about Randy and it needs to be a Randy, so it's good. Yeah. I know that he had some voice and modulation issues, but... It affects dozens of people every year. It's true.
01:48:42
Speaker
Um, but I don't know. He has a certain cadence to the way he says thing or like rhythm. That's probably a better word. Oh yeah. I just enjoy them. My dad was a kid, grew up in Downers Grove, Illinois. It's the suburb just outside of Chicago. So if you're Downers Grove, you say you're from Chicago, it's that close. Thank you as a kid. He played Little League.
01:49:05
Speaker
on his team was a young boy named Randy and a young boy named Lanny, whose father, a big sweaty hairy man wearing like sweatpants and clearly wearing a wrestling singlet, having just probably come from a match, would be seated in the audience. See, my dad, in fact, did play Lilly baseball with Randy Savage. That's awesome. Which is amazing. That's cool.
01:49:28
Speaker
Angelo Pafo is just sitting next to the crowd of, you know, what we would now call soccer moms, basically. My dad didn't know who Angelo Pafo was at the time, because he was not much from wrestling, he's a kid at that point. But he remembers seeing that person there. Probably at the time thinking, who is this weird person that's in the audience all the time? And then later making an action, oh, that's Angelo Pafo, because his sons are on team I'm playing. Oh my gosh. Yeah. That's kind of awesome, man. Yeah.
01:49:58
Speaker
Very cool. I need to see if he has any pictures from then. I hope he does. I haven't actually asked him on that. That would be great. If I can find them, I will definitely share them. Yeah. I love that. John, did you notice anything in the background during the few interviews? Oh, so you didn't notice that he grows a jacket hanging nicely on a rack behind Sting and Luger?
01:50:24
Speaker
No. And oh no? I didn't pay attention to that. Yeah, yeah. If you go back and watch it, it is in frame, center frame in the background. It's hanging on its hook. Like, it's hanging, just waiting back there.
01:50:36
Speaker
Which means 40 Guerrero was told he got to do an interview, so he put his jacket on, and then didn't need it for like, what, three more matches? Yeah. So he just left it back there, and at some point, before his match, he ran back, grabbed it, put it on, so it's gone by the next promo. Yeah. But it's just hanging out in the background, just going, hey, I'm back here. Yes.
01:50:58
Speaker
That's a sparkly red and white jacket. Yes. Good placement. Yeah. I would have liked it if one of the other wrestlers had tried it on when Sting just goes over and is like, oh, that's a sparkly jacket. That must be mine. They all wore the jacket during the promo. That would have been a good move. Yeah. So our next match is Randy Savage versus Hiroyoshi Tenzan with Sunny Ono.
01:51:27
Speaker
Referee for this match is Nick Patrick. Tenzan has a pretty cool entrance outfit with a red robe and some cool horned headgear. It looks pretty intimidating. Interestingly, his robe has his actual name, Yamamoto, rather than his wrestling name, Tenzan. Savage is extremely colorful.
Tenzan vs. Savage Match Highlights
01:51:51
Speaker
His entrance theme is a rock version of Pomp and Circumstance, one of my least favorite pieces to play in high school band. We had to play that for an eternity at every graduation ceremony, and the trombone part is so incredibly boring. Would have been better if someone was playing electric guitar with you, at least you go into that. Honestly, yes.
01:52:12
Speaker
They finally fixed their problem for you. I used to bop it and I get dirty looks from the conductor. Yeah. You had to do something to make that part entertaining, right? I mean, it's just... Thank you. Repeat that for about an hour and you've got the experience of playing trombone for pomp and circumstance.
01:52:41
Speaker
The crowd goes wild for Savage. Savage takes off his coat to reveal a bandaged left arm. Henan says that the damage Tenzon inflicts on Savage here could make it more likely that Savage will lose the title later tonight.
01:52:56
Speaker
Aside from a couple initial pushes on lockups, Savage gets no offense for the early portion of the match, taking a beating from Tenzon with big hard strikes, headbutts, and clotheslines, and a bit perplexingly, eye breaks. Savage finally gets a kick and some punches, but Tenzon shrugs them off and headbutts him down, then grabs a nerve hold.
01:53:17
Speaker
Savage twists Tenzon's nose, but Tenzon hits a spinning wheel kick and goes back to the beatdown. Savage rolls out, and Tenzon kicks his a** on the floor too, and runs him into the ring post and barricade. Consistency! Yeah.
01:53:32
Speaker
Back in, Tenzon gets an elevated fireman's carry, then a falling headbutt from the top rope. Tenzon tries a moonsault, but Savage finally dodges and clotheslines Tenzon through the ropes to the apron. They fight over a suplex, and Savage gets Tenzon up, but drops him gut first on the top rope. I'm not clear on if that was a botch, but it looked painful.
01:53:54
Speaker
Savage goes up top and lands the big elbow drop with his good arm for the three count and the win to tie it up 3-3, leaving the fate of the World Cup to Sting vs. Kintsuki Sasaki.
01:54:06
Speaker
Thoughts on this match?
World Cup Presentation Critique
01:54:08
Speaker
Okay, so before I get to the match, I have to point out one big issue I have with WCW as far as the whole World Cup thing goes. So first off, they don't show the World Cup at the beginning of the tournament. It's not just sitting in the entryway. People don't walk by and point at it. How they could have put it next to the announce table and shown it. This is for all intents and purposes, could be the final match of this tournament. And the cup is nowhere to be seen.
01:54:36
Speaker
Right. The spray paint's still drying. So there's two plausible explanations. One is that WCW is so sure Renny Savage, their world champion, will win. They're not going to bother bringing the cup out because this is locked up. We don't need to have that because there's no reason to do a ceremony.
01:54:58
Speaker
The other option is, of course, that they know when you sign up to win because this is pre-planned, and so we don't need to have the cup out there. So they're kind of giving things away when I'm the cup out there for me. A little bit. And putting Sting at the end. Yes. Putting that kind of big thing aside, I like to match a lot for what it is. It's a fairly short match, which basically is let's see what Tenzan can do.
01:55:25
Speaker
All his moves look nice. There's a nice crispness and sharpness to his strikes and his moves. He's not gonna ever be somebody who can swap out for Otani with the gracefulness of his moves or just how seamless his wrestling is.
01:55:41
Speaker
but what he does is look intimidating with that hair. He has a nice, lovely mullet with some blonde and, it's a little red-eyed, some other color in there as well. Yeah, yeah, a little bit, yeah. His other color, like, highlighting his Tennessee waterfall.
01:55:57
Speaker
I just really like his look. It's probably also the fact that, as I mentioned, a couple of shows back with Vader, one of the big rites of passage in Japan is going to Ribera Steakhouse, which it is still today, by the way. So I see Guy wearing those super bright shorts, which seem to be an inverse of the, say, by the bell shorts, the Boston War, by the way. And I see the big Ribera horns on that.
01:56:23
Speaker
Now I also see him come out wearing horns, so I know that's not why it's there, but I cannot make an action. Yeah. It definitely is a very one-sided match for the most part.
01:56:33
Speaker
The finish is a little wonky. I think the idea is that Randy Savage is supposed to suplex him in, and that's a position for the elbow drop. Yeah. And to Savage's craft, as you mentioned, Savage makes sure to come down with his good elbow and not his bad elbow. Yes, yes, that's nice. Which is a mix of kayfabe and probably his elbow-ism actually hurt to a certain degree, so it's smart for the story and smart for himself.
01:56:56
Speaker
So they tried to sell a commentary that his injured arm gives out and he makes the best of it by dropping him on the ropes. Tenzin gamely rolls into position the other way. Savage never really has a problem with the distance on his jump, so he makes it work fine. It's just a rare case where I think it's definitely a botch, but the way it plays out is covered well by commentary. But the commentary is good at covering it up and the two wrestlers are professional enough that they recover really fast.
01:57:25
Speaker
But yeah, it's definitely a bit lopsided as far as the flow of the match. Sawa touches two big moves and then wits a win. There is a brief that they mention how good Tenzin Moonsault is, and it is nice. And they say he may have the best moonsault in all of New Japan, which feels like a weird dig at Muda, who is not on this show. Yeah, yeah. Very famous for his moonsault.
01:57:53
Speaker
And currently the IWGP world champion by the way. And kind of a dig out. Wasn't it Kanamoto that this was really open the night? Yeah. I do think this was a little better, but yes. So I agree in that regard. Oh man. What happened to the Randy Savage that did that promo?
01:58:12
Speaker
He wore himself out. I've never seen that man get kicked around so bad. Land air and sea or whatever, you know, any part of the map, Tenzin was showing them how to get there, you know, forcefully. Yes, pretty much.
01:58:25
Speaker
I think it builds Randy up for finish and kind of sets the groundwork for him being hurt and everything. It was just fun to watch Tenzin masterfully just push him around. And Randy's doing his best pinata impression with that fringe. I'm just waiting for him to burst open and a bunch of confetti comes out. Well, you know if he's a pinata what comes out. Slim Jims. Well, yes, obviously. I mean, that's all that comes out. Snap into it.
01:58:55
Speaker
Tenzin looked so defeated at the very end and surprised and so was I. Not that I was expecting Savage to lose, given the way they set up everything. It was such a big, big leap. Yeah. At the end. Because he went from being like this unstoppable force to, I'm too tired to lift my leg.
01:59:17
Speaker
The elbow was just that effective. Yeah. He didn't even land the elbow. He like ribs flashed him. I mean, obviously that's kind of, I think how you're supposed to perform a move like that. If you actually hit the elbow on someone's chest at high velocity from coming from the top rope.
01:59:33
Speaker
you would probably kill them, but they normally do a better job of picking the camera angle. Where this one, yes, you get a clear shot of Savage clearly going completely over Tenzon and landing with his elbow on the opposite side of his body. So it's his ribs that land on Tenzon, really. If they filmed it from the side or something instead, you wouldn't have caught it.
01:59:55
Speaker
I wouldn't even have caught it if they didn't do it in slow motion at the very end. And especially if you're attending and you're 30 feet away, it's okay, you landed on. Yeah, you won't notice there. So, yeah. But it was a good match.
Tenzan vs. Savage Match Analysis
02:00:11
Speaker
I don't know what happened to the energy. Randy, you know, he never recovered from his promo until the very end.
02:00:18
Speaker
I can't call this a good match on my part. Why not? It's interesting, but the one-sidedness just really, really got to me with this one. Tenzan just beats the heck out of Savage for almost the entire match. And yeah, his strikes do look vicious, but for me it got monotonous really fast.
02:00:40
Speaker
the ending just feels so out of nowhere too it's just savage suddenly hits like three moves one of which is a botch and wins i mean it's it's a botch that they cover but it's a botch with impact at least yeah but it gets three moves and that just wins
02:00:56
Speaker
and Tenzan's supposed to be this hard guy that is really tough and brutal and everything. It doesn't even bother me that Savage suddenly wins with the elbow drop. It more bothers me that Savage manages to, on just two additional moves, stun Tenzan enough that he can get the elbow drop.
02:01:16
Speaker
where I was thinking we were maybe in for a Sting Vader kind of situation where it's like Savage starts to come back, you know, after tiring 10's on out by getting punched in the face repeatedly. Could be a rope and dope strategy, yeah. But it doesn't feel like that. You don't get to that point with it.
02:01:33
Speaker
So I just, I didn't, did not really like this one. Tenzan does have a really nice moonsault like we were discussing. His spinning wheel kick is also quite nice. Surprise, yeah. Savage's top rope elbow is of course wonderful, just really beautiful. There just wasn't a lot to this to me and it felt kind of disappointing. I did appreciate that it was something different.
02:01:56
Speaker
But it was so one-sided that it felt like it just kind of should have ended with Tenzon winning, but they can't have him win because then you don't get a Sting match, and that would be horrible. So... So it was no pomp and all circumstance? Yeah, pretty much. There was a New Japan show, I believe it's around March, where there's a rematch between the two, so maybe you'll watch that and see if that strikes your fancy a little more.
02:02:21
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, it may be a factor of injuries or time constraints or things like that, so I'd be interested in seeing another attempt. We cut back to the announcers, and Tony tries to build up the upcoming Sting match, as Hienan appears to not be paying attention. Tony taps him on the shoulder, and Hienan goes into a full-on slapstick comedy routine, dropping his notes, knocking over his chair, trying to gather things up in a huge mess, and knocking his own headset off.
02:02:51
Speaker
Yeah, he goes full vaudeville. Yeah. Tony and Dusty flat out lose it and break down laughing. And Tony just kind of manages to fight off the laughter long enough to throw to Gene. Gene is clearly having a good laugh as well as they cut to him, but he gets himself under control and shills the hotline. 1-900-909-9900. Gene says the score is three all and brings in short-haired Ric Flair in a pink Ric Flair's gold gym shirt.
02:03:21
Speaker
Gotta plug that gym.
02:03:23
Speaker
The score is three all. This international competition for the World Cup of Wrestling is everything we have anticipated. The Nature Boy Ric Flair has slyly been sitting back and watching all of this. Ric Flair, come on in.
Ric Flair's Triangle Match Promo
02:03:38
Speaker
Happy New Year to you as 11 time, former WCW World Heavyweight champ. This crowd out there in Nashville, in the arena, is hanging from the Raptors in anticipation of the final match at the international competition, then out of the triangle match. Great conception.
02:03:53
Speaker
Japan versus the USA. Our first at WCW brought it to this world of professional wrestling. But tonight, let's face it, we're talking about the most coveted trophy in all sports. The one and only World Heavyweight Championship belt. And tonight, as the nation wants styles, woo! And profiles. Sting, you and Luger have to remember,
02:04:21
Speaker
to be the man. Think about it like this. You've got to beat the man. You both will have wrestled.
02:04:32
Speaker
The nature boy will be fresh. He'll be invigorated and he will know beyond the shadow of an out that are right here at Nashville with the bright lights, Dolly Parton to my left. Some very lovely lady to my right. I will win the world's heavyweight championship styling and profiler.
02:05:02
Speaker
Thank you Nature Boy Ric Flair ladies and gentlemen still to come the triangle match the Nature Boy Sting and Lex Luger the winner of that one will be taking on the Macho Man ready Savage for the WCW World Heavyweight title 3-3 as we go to the ring
02:05:22
Speaker
I love him just repeatedly wooing as Dean tries to throw to the next match. It really reminds me of the bit from Futurama, where Bender becomes a human. He dies from the over excess of like a week of binge drinking, eating, and everything. He's like literally a giant round ball of a person. And they realize that he died before the big party. Like, but you said woo. I don't know, that's air escaping from his fat. And as they're rolling him out, you hear woo as he's going by.
02:05:51
Speaker
All I could think of when he does that now. Whoo! Short but good promo from Flair, who effectively talks up the triangle match and the advantage that he has. Luger and Sting fought in the World Cup, or Sting will fight in the foot World Cup now, but Flair hasn't. So in the triangle match, he'll be fresh, where they'll have to deal with injuries. Yeah, fresh.
02:06:15
Speaker
Well, they'll have to deal with injuries and expended energy. Nice angle, and he sets it up well here. And I think it's our first stylin' and profilin' and our first actually audible to be the man you've gotta beat the man. TM. Yeah. Flair did say that at Starrcade 89, but it was drowned out mostly by the end credits music. Yes.
02:06:37
Speaker
He should have brought up the war, the gym war, because obviously we know Luger and Singham co-own one. Main Event Fitness, I think it's called. Main Event Fitness in Atlanta, GA. Hotlanta. Classic Flare XS in a nice, tiny package. Yep. That was just very short, but very packed. Yes.
02:07:02
Speaker
It's like you only have a little soda left in the can, but it's Joe Cola. Yeah, it was short, short ish and sweet. I did find it funny that he didn't know who was going to be saying to his side. He's like, yeah.
02:07:17
Speaker
Whoever else. Yeah, it's like he clearly has the start of a thought there. Like, ah, I can say Dolly Parton for this side, that he starts it clearly thinking, I'll think of another lady's name by the time I reach the second sentence and just doesn't. She's like, whatever. And Jean for his part doesn't go, oh, you mean like so and so. No, he had no one there. He's like, nope, you're on your own, buddy.
02:07:42
Speaker
He looks weird with his haircut, too. It always looks a little weird to me with his short hair. I definitely prefer the long hair Ric Flair look. It's funny, too, because the part of that whole thing of him leaving was Jim Hurd wanted him to cut his hair, pick out of a character, and yada yada. He's now back at WSW after all that folded with short hair. Yes. Maybe as a slap in the face, Jim Hurd. Yeah. He went through a crisis and shaved his head, and that's what grew back. There you go.
02:08:13
Speaker
Our next match and the final match of the World Cup of Wrestling is Sting versus Kintsuki Sasaki with Sunny Ono.
Sting vs. Sasaki: World Cup Decider
02:08:23
Speaker
Referee for this match is Randy Eller.
02:08:26
Speaker
Ono shows off Kintsuki Sasaki's US heavyweight title, which he won from Sting. Sasaki has a truly badass leather jacket with flame patterns. The sleeve bears the words, The God of Fire. And on the back, there's an intimidating figure with blue skin bearing a sword and surrounded by flames. I tried to see, there's a word underneath it, but I couldn't get a really good clear shot of the whole thing to try and look up what the figure's supposed to be. Anyway, it's an amazing jacket.
02:08:57
Speaker
we get a shot of the World Cup now sitting in the middle of the entrance ramp. Yeah, as you pointed out earlier, Al, it's really odd that it wasn't their last match, too, since they're clearly putting it out there now to highlight that, oh, this could be the last, well, this is the last match, but the previous match could have been the last match of the competition if Savage had lost. Yes.
02:09:18
Speaker
At least unlike the ring they gave this thing, we know it exists at the time of winning. That's true. At least they are handing out the World Cup this year rather than next Starrcade. Slight improvement.
02:09:30
Speaker
Sin comes out with a US flag and a super glittery pink and green yellow jacket and black, orange, and yellow face paint. Again, we're kind of mixing messages here. I think he either should have left the flag out to keep it WCW only, or just gone whole hog with it and worn red, white, and blue jacket and face paint. Which he's done before. Yeah. Everyone else is kind of calling this USA versus Japan, so he might as well have jumped on the bandwagon.
02:09:55
Speaker
I could have an F flag where it's W to W and then the American flag. That would have gone over like a lead balloon. I mean, they would have tried it. Yeah. It's also kind of weird to me that his face paint and jacket don't match. They don't always, but he's normally a little bit better at color coordination and they kind of clash in this case.
02:10:18
Speaker
Sasaki gets the better of an initial brawl, but Sting fights back and hits an early stinger splash. Sasaki counters a second try into a one-handed bulldog, the crowd chants for Sting, and Sasaki mocks Sting with his own, kind of sad, attempt at a stinger call. Yeah, I think it's supposed to be in front of the crowd which really just kind of cry for help when they don't... Yeah. Did it sound like the mouse, John? Oh, no. No?
02:10:47
Speaker
Not quite squeaky enough. She sounds more like a lamb now. It's weird when she's really distressed. She sounds like a lamb. Oh, it's not, it's not awe inspiring. It's, it's kinda sad. You just want to help.
02:11:05
Speaker
Sasaki lands clotheslines, but Sting dodges one and hits his high leaping dropkick and clothesline to take Sasaki out of the ring. He didn't insist that his constant cheerleading for Sasaki is just that he's a broadcast journalist with an objective viewpoint. His objective is that he wants to do Japan to win. Yeah, there you go. That's our objective. Sasaki floats over a suplex back in and hits a mighty power slam and brain buster. He poses for the crowd, but they boo. So he goes up on the ropes and tries again and gets booed even more.
02:11:36
Speaker
The crowd chants for Sting, then for the USA as Sasaki uses locks and strikes, and then applies the Scorpion Deathlock to Sting. Sting struggles, but finally powers out of the hold to big cheers. Sasaki gets a leg takedown, but a second attempt earns him an Enzigiri from Sting, but Sasaki recovers faster. Sasaki tries a running slam, but Sting slips free and hits a clothesline, kick, and one-handed bulldog, then gets the Scorpion Deathlock.
02:12:06
Speaker
Sasaki drags himself towards the ropes, but Sting pulls him back to the middle of the ring and sits down, and Sasaki gives up to give Sting the win and WCW the World Cup at a final score of 4-3. WCW's other competitors come running out, all but Macho and Benoit wearing shirts with the US and Japanese flags on them. Macho wears his own Macho Man shirt, and Benoit wears an awesome Four Horseman shirt that I would love to own. I keep looking. Yeah.
02:12:35
Speaker
A chant of USA goes up. Seriously, nobody gets that WCW is not Team USA, do they? It has world in its name, people. Yeah. Thoughts on this match?
02:12:50
Speaker
I'm a little mixed on this match overall. One of the ones where the strong points are pretty high is just I have other aspects to think about. So Sting is in classic form here. He's got his energy, he's got his great drop kick. Like he's jump is like higher than the top rope, right? Yes, he clears the top rope easily from a standing jump. Yeah, it's amazing.
02:13:13
Speaker
Sasaki does have nice bits of character where he just sort of mocking the crowd, but like during the actual wrestling, he doesn't have that. It's crazy like he was told he got getting out of the crowd. So he does that, but it's clearly separate from his wrestling. There's a little disconnect from me there. It's not like a Tommy where it's mixed in with his performance. It's sort of like he's wrestling and then I was like, oh, right. I'm like, guys, it's done well, but it feels separate to me.
02:13:44
Speaker
The problem for me is that the match is kind of short. Yeah. The whole part where Suzuki gets him over the shoulders and Timothy's going to start a next sequence for the fight out of the corner. But instead he changes his mind, I guess, and tries to do the stampede move out of the corner, but then gets counter to the finish. It feels like they cut a few mint out of the match and it just goes right from that point to the end.
02:14:11
Speaker
Sting always has a good performance. It's nice to see him get pushed around too. Not like Randy Savage was pushed around, but some of those clotheslines were just ridiculous. Especially they do like three or four in a row and Sting just immediately pops back up and then drop kicks.
02:14:32
Speaker
You can definitely see during this match where the tide's turning. There's not like any ambiguity. You know, it's not like they just get a lucky move. No, it's like always sets a three or four things as they battle back and forth. It makes it interesting. I didn't like the ring outs, kind of slowed up the action, you know, but overall a decent match.
02:14:55
Speaker
Yeah, for me, fun match, but like you were saying, Al, very short. I think they make the best of it, but they don't get enough time to really tell a complete story.
Broadcast Editing Decisions
02:15:05
Speaker
That said, they do a good job of working in what they can. I like that Sasaki used Sting's own moves against him. It's not just the Scorpion Death Love, but he actually also uses the one-handed Bulldog in almost exactly the same way Sting does, which was nice. And of course he mocks the Stinger Call, though he could have done a better job with that.
02:15:23
Speaker
I like the commentary when they use the Death Locker on them. It's like if anyone knows how to get out, it's going to be Sting. Right, exactly. They do a good job of setting that up. For as short a match as this is, they do a really good job of getting across the story they're trying to tell. The match felt pretty heated, and I got a sense of the history between the two. Suzuki gets across a feeling of confidence. He's beaten Sting before, and he can do it again.
02:15:47
Speaker
Sting feels like he's taking this very seriously. He's aware that he has to prove he can really beat Sasaki after a previous failure. So he tries to put Sasaki away really fast, starting with the Stinger Splash, but that makes him make mistakes. But even though he's on defense of a lot of the match, it never feels one-sided like the Savage match did. It just feels like this is a good storyline idea.
02:16:10
Speaker
that doesn't get quite fully developed because they have to cram everything into the little window of time they have rather than getting to let things play out fully. It was still fun, but I'd like to see this storyline done with more time.
02:16:25
Speaker
You okay with it ending as a submission? Oh yeah, I loved that ending actually. I loved Sting. Dragging them to the center. They really fight for it. That's again a point where this match really got across the storyline they were going for of Sting as the master of the Scorpion Deathlock where Sasaki is trying to do it but isn't as good at it.
02:16:49
Speaker
with Sting's able to power out of Sasaki's, and Sasaki tries a different counter because he can't manage to power out, but Sting is wise to that, pulls him back from it, and locks it in even harder. It really looked definitive, so I liked that.
02:17:06
Speaker
So as you mentioned briefly at the beginning, there was a dark match after this show featuring Kazuki Sasaki. Yes. From my understanding, Sasaki, in the lead up to this show, made it pretty clear to WCW that he was not interested in wrestling on, say, Nitro and other shows being a regular champion defending the US title. He wanted to do it in Japan and it's less interested in their shows. They were not happy with that, but they found a workaround.
02:17:33
Speaker
Matt, after this, is infinite against the one-man gang. The woman gang gets the pinned fall and the ref counts it, but then the ref is told that the foot is on the rope, whereas the foot is outside to some degree, so the match is then restarted and Suzuki beat the woman gang, so that's why he's defending his title and leaves.
02:17:54
Speaker
WWE then decides when they want to air this match that that ending part where the match is reversed and restarted didn't happen. It's just chopped off.
WCW's World Cup Victory
02:18:05
Speaker
So now Womengang has successfully defeated Suzuki and is the US champion from this point going forward. They control the edit and they control reality. All right. They are controlling transmission. They control the horizontal and the vertical. Correct.
02:18:26
Speaker
All right, gentlemen, I thank you very much. This has got to be truly one of the most historic evenings I can recall in the ranks of professional wrestling here in Nashville, Tennessee. Tonight, in front of this capacity crowd, the chant of USA, USA.
02:18:44
Speaker
And WCW, as WCW wins four to three, the World Cup of Wrestling. Ladies and gentlemen, let's hear it for these men. Sting, Chris Benoit, the total package. Lex Luger, Alex Wright, Johnny B. Bad, and Eddie Guerrero. Gentlemen, I want you to take this cup, and tonight, somewhere in this great city, we can sip champagne and be proud
02:19:11
Speaker
World Championship wrestling and this great sport fill her up gentlemen fill her up staying I've got to tell you this crowd electrified and you certainly excited them in this final match of the international competition You've still got some work to do. I sure do, but I just got one thing to say USA
02:19:37
Speaker
Ladies and gentlemen, I want to say I hope this becomes a tradition at Starrcade because certainly this is one of the most prestigious international events like the Ryder Cup in golf, like the Stanley Cup in hockey, like the World Series itself. Truly, this is a memorable moment for these seven men. Tony, Bobby Heenan, and the American Dream Dusty Rose, you can really appreciate this. Gentlemen, let's get back to you.
02:20:02
Speaker
Benoit and Wright are right there, Sting. Come on. Oddly, Gene congratulates the WCW wrestlers and lists off the WCW competitors, but he misses listing Macho Man because he's just kind of suddenly not there anymore. It's disappeared at some point and it never's all what he left.
02:20:24
Speaker
I didn't even notice Randy was gone either. I only noticed it because Gene doesn't say his name. And I was like, wait, he didn't say Randy Savage. And then I looked and I'm like, oh, Randy Savage is not in the ring. Where did he go? So, yeah, that was odd. Oh, that was a type of a smoke where he was once standing. Yeah.
02:20:44
Speaker
this plays of the historic angle a bit much, and despite Jean's hopes, yeah, they're not making this a tradition. But still, it was kinda cool to see everybody out to celebrate, and Luger and Sting holding the trophy together as an nod to the friendship storyline.
02:20:58
Speaker
It's definitely a bad idea to bet against winning tournaments on Starrcade. Yes. Because, let's see, he won the Iron Man Singles tournament, correct? He won the King of Cable tournament, which also got him a cup, by the way. He won first battle bowl, and now he won this. Yeah. Yeah, he's four for five then. Yeah. Because he missed the second battle bowl he didn't win, but otherwise he's good.
02:21:26
Speaker
Yeah, and to be fair, in a show where you can win two trophies, winning one of them is still good. Yeah, that's still good. Yeah. I'd say it's a watch. We win one of the two trophies in one night. Yeah. Yeah. The cup is very elaborate. Yes.
02:21:45
Speaker
It's very large. I give them that. It's not like that. I guess they were going for like the Stanley Cup kind of thing. Yeah, yeah, definitely. But when they're announcing it, it makes it sound like something more like soccer. Yeah, yeah. The announcers talk up the win. Tony and Dusty are happy, while Hienan looks depressed. Hienan says he's gonna have to give the Lexus back.
02:22:25
Speaker
Three of the top superstars in the history of WCW will vie for the chance at facing WCW World Champion, Macho Man Randy Savage.
Triangle Match Rules and Confusion
02:22:35
Speaker
Tony throws to a video package on the upcoming Triangle match.
02:22:35
Speaker
The Macho Man won the title in World War III when he was the last man left in the ring. Or was he? The replay footage error could not show the final verdict. However, Savage is the champion. The contenders, Lex Luger.
02:22:51
Speaker
He returned to WCW in September and made his intentions clear. I'm here for one reason and one reason only to take that belt.
02:23:02
Speaker
Luger claims he is the uncrowned world champion with previous victories over Savage, as well as many bizarre incidents with his manager, Jimmy Hart. The other, Sting, who has kept his friendship with Luger intact throughout Luger's bizarre actions over the past few months in WCW. However, many have been wondering about Sting.
02:23:22
Speaker
As one of WCW's most popular athletes, he has been involved in many bizarre incidents as well, causing many, including Hulk Hogan, to question his allegiance. I just want to know what's the deal with Luger, and you know what time you're on.
02:23:38
Speaker
However, none can question Sting's purpose. He wants to regain a title he has held in the past, regardless of friendships. Finally, there is the Nature Boy, Ric Flair, a man with a definite advantage. Luger and Sting will wrestle earlier in the night during the World Cup of Wrestling competition.
02:23:57
Speaker
Flare merely has to wait until the end of the night. He will be fresh. He will be ready. A coin toss will decide which two men will begin the triangle match. A man can tag out at any time. However, the man who scores the pinfall will go on to meet Savage.
02:24:15
Speaker
Will Luger turn on Sting just as he has everyone else in WCW? Will Sting's hatred of Flair consume him and cause him to be eliminated? Or will Flair's experience and readiness pay off? The fate of WCW's elite hangs in the balance and an anxious world champion awaits the conclusion of one of the most anticipated matches in WCW history.
02:24:44
Speaker
I like how they inverted or changed the triangles around. So it is not the triforce or inverted triforce or any sort of real pyramid. Yeah. Well, I mean, I understand if they rotated all the way around and then they did the triangle like this, but at the top they kept it one way and then put the points down on the bottom too. It was weird. You think you could rely on WSW to have nothing else know what a pyramid looks like?
02:25:13
Speaker
Alas, no. No. We're happy to work for that matter, given how treasonous this is. I thought this did a pretty good job, though, of covering the people involved in the world title angle, and the honestly fairly complex story that's been going on around them. There's a lot of ridiculous Dungeon of Doom stuff going on in WCW right now, but the Sting and Luger angle and how it affects Sting's alliance with Hogan and Savage is actually pretty interesting, and Sting and Luger perform it well.
02:25:42
Speaker
It's neat to see Sting in a situation where he's torn between friendship and his usual solid good guy role. And it feels like it adds some depth to his character, while not breaking away from the Sting that we know and love. It's interesting how Hogan's still mentioning here, even though they rode this whole show around, squeezing him just out of the way. But you still have to hear him at least once in there. I mean, it's an important part of the Sting and Luger stuff, still.
02:26:10
Speaker
at least explains what happens in the triangle match better than a lot of the other matches. Yeah. It's a match with some unusual rules, so it's good to actually have a little bit of coverage of that before the match begins.
02:26:25
Speaker
It's unusual even in the context of what a triangle match previously was in WCW. Yeah. The last time there was there was a ball of Sting, Big Bubba, and Vader. I think that's the last one before this. Where it was just an elimination match. So two people wrestled and then whoever was left wrestled the next guy. Can the third interrupt the pin?
02:26:45
Speaker
No, in that one it was actually two people straight wrestled a normal match and then whichever one won that one the next guy would then come down the ramp. Where in this one it's all three guys out there and there's tag rules. Apparently. Yes. And not elimination which would make it more interesting. Yes. I mean it makes sense like if you're tired you can tag out but then you can't have you have no possibility of winning and you have no guarantee that anyone's gonna tag you in. Yeah.
02:27:15
Speaker
So the rules of the triangle match, here's what I've gathered from the video package and from the match itself. It's a three-way match, but only two men are in the ring at a time. The third man stays on the apron and can be tagged in by either competitor to switch off. One pinfall or submission wins the match, but I think if someone is disqualified or counted out, that person's eliminated and the remaining competitors can still keep fighting.
02:27:42
Speaker
It's a pretty confusing match design and I much prefer three-way matches where everyone's in the ring at once. It's less confusing to explain and there's interesting double-team spots that can happen then too. Our next match is Sting versus Lex Luger versus Ric Flair in a triangle match to determine the number one contender for Randy Savage's WCW World Heavyweight Championship. The
Triangle Match Dynamics
02:28:08
Speaker
referee for this match is Nick Patrick.
02:28:11
Speaker
Luger, as promised earlier, comes to the ring without Jimmy Hart. He gets some nice pyro as he flexes. Flair is out second in a gold and sparkly robe. Flair spots the guy in the crowd dressed as Hulk Hogan and points and yells at him for a moment. Sting is out third, Sans' jacket, and Henan builds up that if he wins the triangle match, he's gonna end up having to fight three matches in a row. That's an interesting point, isn't it?
02:28:40
Speaker
Sting's position in the World Cup meant that if one side reached four points early, he'd have gone into the Triangle match fresh. But, since it went down to the wire and required all seven matches, Sting had to wrestle right before the Triangle match, which is right before the World Title match. In contrast, Luger had the third match in the World Cup, so no matter how things went, he'd have to have that match. But because of its placement, he's had time to rest.
02:29:06
Speaker
And Flair of course didn't have to wrestle at all before this. So there's three different conditions. Kind of thought that was a cool contrast over the course of the night. Either Sting or Luger, I couldn't tell which, knocks Flair down before we've even started. And Flair goes after Sting when his back is turned.
02:29:27
Speaker
There's an odd bit as Tony says they'll have a coin toss with three coins and whoever's coin comes up different from the others will start on the outside. But we don't see the coin toss. And Patrick just orders Luke or outside, motioning like it was the result of a coin toss. But I definitely didn't see a coin toss. Did either of you? No, I didn't either. No, I had to toss my own. What'd it come up? Side. I mean edge. I thought I knew ML. I know.
02:29:56
Speaker
Sting and Flair start, and Flair struts and gives a woo. Sting responds with a stinger call to cheers. Tony brings up the Starrcade 84 Flair vs Dusty match that was for a million dollars. Dusty says he'd had the money spent before the match, so maybe that explains why he was so angry at Joe Frazier. I think we all shared that rage to be fair.
02:30:22
Speaker
Sting dominates with power and goes right to the scorpion deathlock, but Flare gets the ropes before he can lock it in. Flare rolls out to recover.
02:30:32
Speaker
Back in, Flare focuses on Sting's arm with hammer locks, strikes, and snaps across the ropes and wears Sting down. But after a chop in the corner, Flare struts, but Sting recovers and walks along behind Flare, then does his own strut when Flare turns around before hurling Flare half across the ring. Great spot. Love how sarcastic Sting is again with the strut. He's just making a great face the entire time. I loved it. He's happy. Yeah.
02:31:02
Speaker
Sting with a drop kick and press drop and he hits corner punches, stopping to bite Flair. What is with that lately? Flair rolls out and tries using the barricades, but Sting just fires right back and Tony says that Sting's got a rush of adrenaline and Flair can't hurt him. Dusty asks if he said Russian adrenaline. I love dusty roads.
02:31:30
Speaker
Back in, Flair begs for mercy, but Sting hurls him across the ring. Flair dodges a drop kick and drops the knee. And he's back in control, methodically taking Sting apart and taunting him beckoning to Luger. Heenan asks if Sting might be playing possum. And Dusty has apparently never heard that expression in his life, asking how you would play possum. Do you go up in a tree and yell, I'm a possum, I'm a possum.
02:31:59
Speaker
He's heard all the other sayings. Oh my gosh.
02:32:06
Speaker
Never mind if that was accurate, Hunter would be, hey, wait, that possum could talk! Yeah, get it! Looker takes Flair's bait and tries to charge in, and Patrick goes to usher him out, so Flair chucks Sting over the top rope to the poorly positioned ring steps and beats him up outside. Back in, a knee drop earns Flair five two counts, and a one count.
02:32:30
Speaker
He gets six pin attempts off of one move. Sting recovers, pelting Flare with strikes and building to a superplex. For one, as Luger lunges into the ring and Sting jumps to his feet to confront him. We get a stare down and Luger backs away to the apron, but Flare attacks Sting from behind, but knocks him near Luger, who tags in.
02:32:56
Speaker
Luger flexes and roars at Flair, who begs for his life and tries to flee. Luger carries him back. Flair hits a cheap shot and briefly stuns Luger, but tries to shoulder block him and just bounces off. Twice.
02:33:11
Speaker
Luger overpowers Flare and gets a Flare flop, but Flare pokes Luger's eye and viciously strikes his knee. Flare rolls out and goes to grab a chair while Patrick is looking, so Patrick looks over at Sting for no reason, so Sting tries to get in so Patrick has a reason to be distracted. Not the best Nick Patrick moment. Yeah, yeah.
02:33:32
Speaker
Flair nails Luger in the knee with the chair, then builds to and gets the figure four using the ropes. Sting tries to tell Patrick, but Flair acts innocent. Flair gets several two counts, but slaps Luger, who fires up and rolls him over. Flair breaks the hold. Luger comes back with a suplex for two, and a top rope moved by Flair goes as usual.
02:33:55
Speaker
Luger no-cells chops and a shoulder block, and Flare backs off, and tags Sting. The crowd gets really excited. Luger and Sting shake hands, and the crowd actually boos at that, wanting to see the fight.
02:34:12
Speaker
We get clean breaks in the corner to start, and Luger is the first to land a strike, even running Sting into the turnbuckles. They get more aggressive with harder punches and clotheslines, and Flare tries to sneak in a cheap shot, but Sting is wise to him. Sting knees Luger in the face, and Luger responds with a screaming clothesline to knock him flying, then drops Sting on the top rope and steps on his throat.
02:34:36
Speaker
The announcers do a really great job highlighting the escalation and violence between the friends and how Luger in particular is bending the rules.
02:34:45
Speaker
Both counter jumping moves. Luger drops Vicious Elbows but only gets two, and Sting slugs Luger down for the Scorpion Deathlock, but Luger grabs the ropes. Patrick tells Sting to break, and Luger takes advantage of Sting's distraction to slug Sting and the little Stingers. Reflexes, Heenan says. Yeah, yeah. That wasn't the all the time.
02:35:10
Speaker
Luger gets overeager, and Sting rolls him up and Sunset flips him for two counts, then counters a suplex into his own snap suplex. Tony nicely points out that they've been avoiding Flair's Corner so he can't tag in, and indeed Sting clearly intentionally whips Luger away from Flair's Corner a moment later.
02:35:30
Speaker
Stinger Splash, but Luger dodges a second and gets the torture rack, but accidentally hits Patrick with Sting's boot. Patrick visibly shields himself early. He's very smart. He wasn't smart enough. Yeah. Flare charges and hits Luger's knee to send him out, then chucks Sting over the top rope. Flare nicely wakes up Patrick, who starts counting. Sting gets up, but Luger grabs his arm, and both are counted out to give Flare the win.
02:36:00
Speaker
Sting checks on Luger, who's still holding his knee. Sting looks irritated, but Luger says something to him still in pain. Sting asks why Luger grabbed his arm. Jimmy Hart runs out and confronts Flair, getting in his face. Ref Randy Anderson comes out to check on things, and Hart talks to Flair, starting to look less like he's confronting him and more like he's arranging some kind of partnership.
02:36:24
Speaker
Thoughts on this match? Covering the obvious stuff right away, the rules are confusing. Yes. The fact that you can tag out, which means you can't win the match, in theory, anyways, is odd, to say the least. Strategy. Yeah. Strategery. Stratego. I don't have a third one, sorry. I win.
02:36:53
Speaker
I thought that game works. I have no place to go. Anyways, the other thing is the match is kinda too long. Maybe it's because it's basically three matches sort of squished together. Believe me, my show notes agree. We've gotten a Sting Flare match on, what, at least two Star Cades? Different years to close the show out. Yeah. So it's not like this is a new match.
02:37:23
Speaker
We definitely had two Luger Flair matches. One wasn't made event obviously, it was during the multi-tournament show, and one was actually made event. So that match isn't exactly fresh either. If they had made this an actual threat match and played with the rules that way,
02:37:41
Speaker
I would have this constantly more out of it because you got to play it up Sting and Luger teaming up. But then as usual, one goes for a pin in that part. You can even play the D of that. At that point, Luger might team with Flair against Sting and he has really, you have betrayal.
02:37:57
Speaker
All this sounds really interesting, and we described the sort of inner workings of the match, about how these two were fighting against each other and players taking advantage. It sounds interesting, it's just the match is, what, 28 minutes long? It's a very lengthy match, yeah. So yeah, it's too long for this point in the show and just for what it is, because it's just three matches put together.
02:38:21
Speaker
And obviously, I take a little issue with the way the finish works, given that the whole point is you have to tag in because you're not tagged and you can't win the match. So, of course, Flayer makes sure to somehow win while not tagging the match at all. Just a giant screw you to the rules, apparently. Yeah.
02:38:40
Speaker
I actually have to say I kind of like the concept of the ending. I think it's outside the box, literally. Yeah, yeah, I mean it is, but there's some execution problems like Patrick bumping rather poorly for it and all, but I actually like it as an indication of Flair as the ultimate wily wrestling villain that
02:39:01
Speaker
This is a match where the announcers all night are telling you the problem with tagging out in this match is you can't possibly win outside the ring. And then Flair, the ultimate wily wrestling villain, finds a way to win outside the ring. I get that it's a weird thing, but I think it didn't bother me because the match itself was such a weird concept to begin with that I think, for me, that ending actually worked quite well.
02:39:30
Speaker
I like that it also, from a storyline perspective, really did a good job of adding further intrigue to the Sting and Luger stuff. Sting losing specifically because Luger grabbed his arm. But you're not sure, wait, did Luger grab his arm to stop him from winning? Or as he's lying there grabbing his knee afterwards, is it because
02:40:11
Speaker
The way it ultimately plays out for me is not as interesting as it should be. It's going back to where Flair is intending to be the Black Scorpion. In theory, the idea that Flair becomes a different character to wrestle Sting and his outfit and all this nonsense with the magic is interesting, but the match itself is just not that interesting to me, unfortunately. It's kind of the same thing where describing the idea is like, oh, it's interesting, but then you watch it, I guess.
02:40:21
Speaker
he's hurt and he just instinctively reached out to a friend.
02:40:37
Speaker
It didn't sell them as much as it should have. I get that it's supposed to be a cheap finish, intentionally so, to make you bad flare. If the match was paced differently, and then that happened, I'd accept that, but as a combination of things, I don't like it as much.
02:40:54
Speaker
Yeah, I'm gonna agree with you both that it was a long match, but I think that it might have something to do with Flare being fresh, and I'm sure he would have negotiated to have some screen time. True. He loves long matches, that's for sure.
02:41:09
Speaker
And that and when Luger and Sting, you know, it's been hyped up to this point, they want to make sure that they don't diminish that portion of the match. Even if it is Flair versus Sting and Flair versus Luger, those are the other matches. But the one that they're really hyped for is Luger and Sting. So they probably extended that due to the crowd. And I think on a certain level, to your point there, they probably
02:41:35
Speaker
extend the earlier segments a little bit too to make you wait for that. Because they know when these two get tagged in against each other, that's our most interesting situation right there. So we want to make sure that we build to that effectively. Maybe they overdo it, but I understand what you're saying. I think they were doing for sure.
02:41:56
Speaker
And I do think that Luger pulling Sting at the very end could be any number of things. It could be helping himself try to get up and get back in the ring with him. It could be, oh, I got knocked out and I don't know what count it was going on. Yeah. It could be, he really just didn't want Sting to win because, you know, they had just been fighting. Mm-hmm.
02:42:16
Speaker
If it can't be me, it might as well be Flair, you know? As a cliffhanger or kind of thing, it's like, oh, Sting's gonna get back in. Is Sting and Luger gonna get back in? Yeah. Could have been a nice cliffhanger. Yeah, I do praise them for the inventiveness, if you want to call it that, of using it. I was not disappointed in this sort of DQ finish like I was in others.
02:42:41
Speaker
It feels very story-driven in this case, where in some other ones it's more of a, let's expressly put something in that just cuts off the storyline and you go... Because we won another match, yeah. Yeah, where this one feels very much like, no, that actually is moving this to a new stage in the story.
02:43:02
Speaker
And it also, like, if people are rooting at this point for Sting and Luger, because they're excited about the match, they can lose in a way where they can still preserve their friendship maybe later on. Or at least they're really ****ed up flair for moving forward. Yeah, true. And they can team up again. Well, as long as this builds to a big climactic match between Sting and Luger, they'll all be worth it. Oh, yeah.
02:43:29
Speaker
Actually, I really liked this. I thought it was a good match. It is a little confusing. The rules are strange.
02:43:38
Speaker
but I think the three of them make the rules work really well. As Tony points out in the match, actually, nobody should actually want to tag out, so there's actually only two tags. Luger tags in himself off of staying against Sting's will, and Flair tags out to Sting almost out of spite because he's absolutely frustrated trying to get anywhere fighting Luger and wants to send the friends against each other.
02:44:01
Speaker
I particularly liked how Sting and Luger avoided even getting to Flare's corner. Nice bit of storytelling there. Flare plays a great heal against both opponents, and all the taunting made sense. He's got a psychological weapon against both of them since they're friends, so he gets them to make stupid mistakes out of a concern for each other.
02:44:20
Speaker
But there's a good sense of underlying tension, too, with Sting and Luger each wanting to win the match themselves. And there's a good payoff for that, with them finally fighting and escalating in violence against each other, until Luger is even choking his good friend. Yeah, and as I said, I really like the ending in concept and mostly in execution. The only thing that feels a little weird is the kind of happenstance Luger just accidentally knocking Patrick down.
02:44:47
Speaker
What was Flair's plan if that didn't happen? I guess is the question that bothers me on it. It feels like we should have seen that the horsemen were ready or something like that. They could have made it better or at least heightened it a little bit more if Flair was moving around the ring to try to get those tags. Yeah, yeah. And they just had to keep on trying to move away from corners.
02:45:08
Speaker
He's narrowly avoiding things, so it seems like he's still interacting. The only thing that may take away from their match, because everyone's going to be drawing attention to Flair, but if they hadn't done the knockout thing, that's what I would see him doing.
02:45:24
Speaker
I mean, listen to the video package again and explain the rules. They never address countout or DQ. Right, yeah. Which is a problem. I had to extrapolate just from what happened in the match on the theoretical rules that I went over on that part. Like default two people are DQ'd, there's one that's not disqualified, therefore... Therefore he wins, yeah. Right.
02:45:44
Speaker
Overall, despite the kind of strange rules and the odd ending, I liked this one, and I appreciated the nods in the match in announcing the vast history between these characters. There's lots of terrific character work, and I had a lot of fun watching it despite its length.
02:46:01
Speaker
For my memory, we've had three very long semi-made event matches with Sting on Star Cades. We had the one, but two shows back with him and Hawk against Nasty Boys. And then we had the match for him and Dusty against the Road Warriors. Of those three, this is the best one. Take that for what you will, I suppose.
02:46:23
Speaker
One other theory that Flair would do to try to get back in is like if he went behind the ref and like, you know, pretended either Sting or Fluger was nearby and he clapped his own hands. Yeah. And it's like, hey, let me in. That could have happened, Joe.
02:46:39
Speaker
Heels love that move and faces never try it. But in this case, it would actually make sense where normally it makes no sense when you do it because they're close enough to tag anyway. But in this case, someone would be close enough to tag but didn't want to so he could fake a tag. Yeah, that would have been an interesting part. Yeah. Yeah.
02:46:58
Speaker
And they could even make it comedic. After he does that, Luger gets eventually shoved out by the ref. Flair's like getting ready to do the sting and Sting just starts doing stuff. Flair just runs around the thing and then tags Luger back in. That would be the kind of jerk move that he would go for. Yeah.
02:47:21
Speaker
We go back to the announcers who discussed the upcoming title match.
Savage vs. Flair Title Match
02:47:25
Speaker
Hienan says that Savage with his injuries has to be shaking in fear. Hienan says Flair has won the title 11 times and now is going to be the 12th. Tony throws back to the original Starrcade and Flair's second title win and then to the title match tonight as Hienan gives us a good woo!
02:47:48
Speaker
So our final match is Randy Savage versus Ric Flair for Randy Savage's WCW World Heavyweight Championship. The referee for this match is Randy Anderson, reffing his only match of the show. Oh, yeah. Yeah. This is from Randy Eller the rest of the night, Randy Eller and Nick Patrick. That's true.
02:48:10
Speaker
Savage comes out with a new green Macho Man shirt and bandana instead of his jacket and hat from earlier. I don't like those as well. Savage grabs the microphone from Michael Buffer to give us an, ooh yeah! That was pretty good, yeah. Buffer does the ring announcements, and Jimmy Hart appears to be managing Ric Flair now.
02:48:30
Speaker
Buffer says that Savage won the title at the greatest battle royale ever held, World War III. Well, it was certainly the most complicated. Look forward to World War III. Oh yeah. That sounded like a threat. It does, yeah, right. Look forward to World War III.
02:48:52
Speaker
We get a sign in the crowd that says, snap flare like a Slim Jim. Nice. And then what, eat him? Yeah, I guess so. Also, I guess that person wasn't too confident in Sting or Luger. Yeah, he seemed prepared for that. Or they just made multiple signs, I guess. Yeah. That sign would explain all the biting. Yeah, yeah.
02:49:13
Speaker
Savage quickly gets a backslide for two. His bandana slips off and he tears his shirt and throws it at Flair. DQ, match over. Just kidding. Alright. Thoughts? That was short. Technically, it's a foreign object. There's a weird exception for if you're wearing though, it's often interesting rules. Not with a boot.
02:49:36
Speaker
Well, you take it off and then you actually- But he took it off and used it. See? I got you. You did bring him into the ring legally. Yeah, but same thing with the boot. What if he's doing a kick and then it flew off his foot? That's a good question. I don't know.
02:49:53
Speaker
Savage with early control with a flurry of punches as we see Mr. Wonderful, Paul Orndorff, standing on the ramp wearing a neck brace. The horseman pile drove him on the cement floor not so long ago. Flair tries for a quick figure four, but Savage kicks him away. Savage counters a cheap shot with more punches and throws Flair to the corner, and Flair flips out over the turnbuckle to the apron to the floor. I love that spot, but actually I just thought, shouldn't that be a DQ?
02:50:22
Speaker
I mean, he didn't over the top rope to the floor.
02:50:26
Speaker
There is a break there, so I think that's the exception. I guess so. If you land on the apron first, it doesn't count, I guess. Because at that point, you're knocking them from the apron to the floor. True. Yeah. That's really fine. Oh, I thought no DQs for the first five minutes. There you go. Security Chief Doug Dillinger makes Orndorff leave, and Flare counters a Savage top rope axe handle to the floor with a gut punch, then uses the barricade and post against Savage's bad arm.
02:50:53
Speaker
Back in, Flair twists and strikes Savage's bad arm. Savage punches free with his good arm, but Flair gets a sleeper hold. Savage ducks to make him fall towards the ropes, but Flair catches himself. Savage gets a couple two counts off of a huge punch, and rapidly hits a back body drop and several close lines for more pin attempts. Jimmy Hart distracts Anderson, as Flair counters another top rope double axe handle.
02:51:17
Speaker
Hart throws Flair his megaphone behind Anderson's back, but Savage steals it and, very gently, hits Flair with it. Flair is bleeding. Macho hits the big elbow, but Hart is still arguing with Anderson. Horseman Brian Pillman and Chris Benoit run out, but Savage throws Pillman into Benoit. Anderson spots Pillman and holds him down, but the other Anderson, Arn, runs in and hits Savage with the loaded punch.
02:51:44
Speaker
Randy Anderson turns around to see Flair pinning Savage, and that gets the three count to give Flair the win and the title. A horrifically bloody Ric Flair celebrates with the Horseman and Jimmy Hart, who is still, by the way, wearing a Luger jacket. I mean, I guess he wouldn't have had time to get a Flair jacket design, but it feels a little weird that he kept that on. Pillman charmingly spits on a camera lens.
02:52:08
Speaker
Pillman whips Savage with the big gold belt, as Flair gets a towel to wipe off some of the blood. Arne stomps Savage and Pillman flashes the Horseman sign in Savage's face. Flair and the Horseman leave a battered Savage unconscious in the ring, and Randy Anderson checks on him. Tony accidentally says, The Macho Man is your winner! Whoops. Tony tells us that with Flair's medical condition at the moment, there will not be an interview, as he needs to get his wounds treated.
02:52:40
Speaker
thoughts on this one? Put yourself in the mindset of our poor referee. Yeah. He's being held and yelled at by a guy for like, it feels like five minutes. Yeah, it takes a while. You know, the match is like six minutes long. So he turned around, not only is Randy Savage, who was last seen upright and fighting unconscious, Rick Flair, who was perfectly clean or covered in blood,
02:53:04
Speaker
You kind of wonder what the hell happened while his back was turned. Oh my gosh, Jason Voorhees visited the arena. I like this match to a certain degree. I like that it does a lot of action, sort of condense into a small window of time. If only they had a way they got to cut time at some point earlier to make more time for this match, but you know.
02:53:26
Speaker
I have no choices there. There's a lot of good action there. I like that all the big spots are attached upon. There's definitely a match in fast forward. My problem is, like I said in my notes, just as it gets going, we get loads of interference, a blade job, and a screw refinish. So not only are they condensing what should be a 15, 20 minute match into what, how long is the match? I thought it was 10 to 15 minutes, wasn't it? Eight minutes and 41 seconds. Okay. People are tired. They need to go home.
02:53:56
Speaker
So they condense, which should be a 15-20 minute match into about eight minutes, and it feels like there's too much going on. Because we have super long ref distraction. We have two different people coming out together, but at different points of the ring. So we can do the middle of the cool spot of throwing Pillman at Benoit. Yeah. But then Anderson has been weighing at the back behind a curtain for a third person to interfere in this match.
02:54:25
Speaker
I get that they had to risk refinished to protect Savage, because at this point he is obviously a big star for them, and then I get they want to sort of culminate how cheap Flare has been. But yeah, I feel like they could have cut 10 minutes from the previous match and added to this, had a lengthy match to build off this more. They had plenty of ideas to fill out a match. They just truncated it so much to make it fit in the time that they had. It's good, but it could have been really good.
02:54:53
Speaker
Well, apparently I thought it was longer. I was in denial that, you know, we had the manager distracting the ref for like 80% of the match. I figured it was... I feel like it, yeah.
02:55:06
Speaker
But I have to give it to Randy Punching Savage. It looked like a boxing match and some of those those cells or I don't know if they were cells. Some of it looked really good. Yeah, he had some good punches and he was flattened. Yeah, it was great. I enjoyed that. It's the first time I've ever seen and again, I know we talk about blading, but it looked like
02:55:27
Speaker
Randy was the one that bladed Flair rather than him doing it himself. I noticed that when he went over to him after knocking him down, he was over and he looked like he was doing something like, like, you know, wrenching his head or whatever. But I think that's when the, you don't see any blood on his head until Randy walks all the way away and like does a jump. By that point, Flair, his hair is red. Interesting.
02:55:54
Speaker
I could see that being a possibility because Flair had the earlier match. They might have been nervous about it staying through two different matches or something. I don't know. Yeah, I'm almost certain that he did the blading and he was messing with his head to get it to start. It is very possible. It's rare that you blade someone else. But it is done. Yeah, it's just done, yeah.
02:56:14
Speaker
That's what I noticed, and I was like, oh, I know what he's doing. Yeah. But it's weird after so many years of Starkades where the mat was red. It was like a bloodbath. It's like a forensic murder scene. 85, I think it is. Every match. Every match is a bloodbath. Yeah, including the one that actually should be a bloodbath.
02:56:37
Speaker
I'm not a fan of it or anything, but it's interesting to see it come back in certain circumstances. Yeah, definitely. The question for me, I think, on that, is it necessary?
02:56:48
Speaker
because Flair blades, or is bladed, what, 30 seconds before the match is over? Yeah, true. It feels really arbitrary. The only at Possbox Nation is that he doesn't really does not want to talk to anybody after the match. He's like, you know, this is worth it. I'm going to come my forehead. I can go to the back and I'll talk to anybody. Yeah, yeah. You want to be asked why it's only eight minutes. Yeah.
02:57:11
Speaker
Didn't want Gene to ask him who the other lady that was supposed to be on his arm was gonna be. Still hasn't thought of another lady. All I was gonna say is it's worth the watch again to see Savage, you know, I guess Blade. That shouldn't be what stood out in the match to me. That shouldn't be the definitive highlight of the match. Then there's just a couple of those punches, man. Yeah, there's one in particular that he really gets a good wind up and just decks him.
02:57:42
Speaker
I thought this was a pretty fun match, if very much in a particular flair pattern. Macho starts off hot, flair takes control and works the body part, in this case the arm. Macho comes back and we go to a finish. It's kind of flair 101, but it's a pattern that he uses because it generally works. There's some nice concepts here.
02:58:01
Speaker
I like Flair stopping himself from falling on the ropes when Macho escapes the sleeper, and Hart's throw of the megaphone to Flair was nice and smooth. Flair's arm work was good and makes sense in the story. If his opponent has a big bandaged limb, of course Rick Flair is going to go after it. Flair does seem to take extra care on some of his moves, some of the wrist locks and such. He moves a little slower than normal to avoid wrenching on the arm too much. I believe Savage's arm actually is hurt.
02:58:29
Speaker
So Flair seems to move a little slower on his wrist locks and such to avoid hurting Savage, but simultaneously, nicely, actually makes it look like he's taking his time to really lock the holds in hard. Yeah. So it does a nice cover there. The ending. The ending is way, way over the top. And there's no way that I can believe that the ref didn't notice all the craziness going on, especially since he actually holds Pillman down himself.
02:58:57
Speaker
If we were talking, you know, Heart distracts Brandy, and Arne runs in, punches Savage once, and gets out, that's fine. But this is three different guys charging in to try different attacks in rapid succession, and one literally falls right by the ref. Well, by the way, he's actively struggling with Flair's Kinda Sword of Manager, which in and of itself could have been a DQ for Heart trying to shove past him to clearly interfere.
02:59:21
Speaker
This went way past suspension of disbelief. I don't mind Flair winning the title by underhanded means. He's Flair. That's what he does. Yeah. But this really should have been toned down a tad.
Starrcade 95 Show Reflections
02:59:32
Speaker
The match is perfectly fine and very entertaining, with Macho and Flair being two outsized personalities that did their best to get the audience into it, but the ending is just way too much.
02:59:54
Speaker
10 minutes or so. They could have had, you know, Pillman and Ben went to another fear and that go nowhere. And then Matt resumes. And then Arn Anderson, that part happens. Yeah, I could see that. I could split that up a little. Distribute it a little. Yeah. Yeah. It's like a, maybe a casserole of what was left in the refrigerator. This goes in, this goes in, this goes in, this goes in. Anything left out? No. It's all going in there and you're going to enjoy it. Yeah, definitely. How do you feel about Arn Anderson? I love Arn Anderson. Okay.
03:00:10
Speaker
It's just like, what do you think, like you said earlier, what do you think's going on behind you really? It's like thud, thud, crash, boom, punch.
03:00:25
Speaker
This is a kind of weird period of time where they sort of start hotshotting the title around a lot. Yeah. It really starts basically in the post-World War at the Brie time because we were coming off a pretty long Hogan title run. Coming off of this match, Sadwood would get a rematch on Nitro when the title back. And yes, that match is in January. Yeah. Because of course it is, which would lead to them wrestling again in February on pay-per-view. Okay.
03:00:52
Speaker
This thing is not ending. Back to the announcers, and Henan is all smiles.
03:01:03
Speaker
Hienan says, Flair did what he said he would do. He's world champ for the twelfth time. Someone flings something over the announcer's heads, and Tony looks at it bemusedly, as Dusty recaps Flair's night. Tony congratulates WCW on its win in the World Cup, and Flair on his world title win. He questions how Sting and Luger's friendship will develop, and notes that Hogan is going to make his return on Nitro.
03:01:29
Speaker
Hienan says he'll party with Flair and the Horsemen tonight and gives woos while Tony closes up the show, and Starrcade 95 is done. Overall thoughts on Starrcade 95? So it's definitely a tale of two different, very different segments. With the exception of referencing story, the first seven matches on a, what, nine-match show
03:01:54
Speaker
are pretty unrelated to everything. They're all playing most of our good matches, but you don't get a feeling of everything is building to one moment. Even on bad WWE shows, as we'll get to plenty of those later, the reference, the world title match or whatever the big story line of that show is, they're out. So you always feel like it's going towards something. But other than sort of fading references to, oh, Luger wrestled already, you know, Sting's gonna wrestle.
03:02:22
Speaker
It's kind of its own universe. This whole like two thirds of the show is. Yeah. And then suddenly you have basically 40 minutes that counting intros and recaps of here's all the important stuff. Now that we're done with everything else. And it's really balanced because again, two thirds of it of that segment is now all one match, which is basically three matches. And then the final match is not even the longest match in the show.
03:02:52
Speaker
It's all about getting to the title match, and the title match is shorter than Alex Wright's match. Yeah. And then it's like, huh, that doesn't feel like that put together right. Yeah, but it's Alex Wright. You want to keep him around. Yeah. Clearly.
03:03:09
Speaker
I had a couple of intern observations that would mean the same thing. So first off, all the Japanese wrestlers that win, they don't actually hit a finisher or get a submission hold. They always win by some sort of roll up and pin.
03:03:24
Speaker
Yeah. They never get a definitive win of this person is definitely better than him. You can maybe argue the Otani one because that's counter wrestling. I would argue with the Otani one. But it's part of a sequence. It is. So it's not like he counters up a pin and goes in like a brain buster and gets the win. Right. That doesn't take away from them. Their victory is just less impactful than they think it would be.
03:03:47
Speaker
And the other thing is that there's a real divide in a number of ways between, at this point, the mid-card wrestlers and the top-tier wrestlers. The top-tier wrestlers, all wrestling matches that are less than seven minutes long, and when the other signature moves. The mid-card guys, the three that lose,
03:04:09
Speaker
don't think they make it look bad in a silly way, but they don't, the way the matches book to me, they don't get their big shining moment. Like Luger, countering, and he gets big moves, dinging the hold, and it's out in the elbow. The only one that sort of breaks it, in fact, down to be bad, wins his match, because you have to have a fourth win. But he wins by DQ. Correct. Yeah. That's interesting. We'll get worse in later shows where they really differentiate the mid card and it's like, you know, the glass ceiling they talk about. Yeah.
03:04:37
Speaker
But there's a feeling on the show that the mid-card guys come out and wrestle longer matches. Their matches are 10, 11 minutes, 12 minutes long. But these matches don't have to be bad, which is shorter for a number of reasons. So they get to try and impress people, but they don't get to potentially get the payoff of standing a victory and looking good. Whereas the top guys get to work less and get to win and get big cheers. And Zensada would make you want to be a top guy. That's good.
03:05:05
Speaker
But instead, it feels like you can't get anywhere as a mid-card guy or a lower-card guy. It's kind of sad. I think the only thing that kind of argues against that point, though, is that all three of the top guys that you referenced have other matches later in the night. So I think there's maybe shorter or less because
03:05:24
Speaker
their top guys and just want to have time to show off on this show and more because, you know, Sting and Luger are going to both be in the triangle match, which is, as we've noted, quite long and physically demanding. And then Savage is going to have his world title match, which maybe doesn't go as long. I think if you combine Savage's two matches together, it's only a little longer than the Otani-Guro match. But Sting and Luger, I think, both have pretty lengthy performances tonight, so
03:05:52
Speaker
Oh, and I don't mean that in any way to disparage them for working less, but the way the show was booked. It is interesting looking at it from the tournament perspective itself. Right, that's not my point of view on that, yeah. They get to win in big ways, whereas the Medicare guys, you don't get to win or get to win in ways that don't really elevate them at all. Do you think it would have been better if they had saved the last cup match, or the tiebreaker or whatever, for after the triangle?
03:06:19
Speaker
Hmm, that'd be interesting. Flare would get to rest, or whoever won the triangle would get to rest potentially, and then they would do the last match. But you might have someone still wrestling two matches in a row. Yeah, that's an interesting thought. I don't know how that would affect the dynamics of the storyline.
03:06:39
Speaker
One thing I would have done with the tournament is nothing Bob would have suggested necessarily, but I would have had Sting and Luger there because they are the two of the four biggest people in the company. The cannons. I would have put them in a tag match. You guys are trying to add tag matches? I'm going to add one. What's going on? There's zero on this show. There's one. It's triangle match.
03:07:05
Speaker
Ideally what I would have done if I was a full control of this theoretical situation One thing I wouldn't have had Hogan not in the show It feels weird that he just literally takes vacation on their biggest show of the year Yeah, everyone has sort of a lazy way of he's just too aggressive.
Critique on Representation
03:07:20
Speaker
He was in the crowd. Yeah Besides Hogan is one of the thing that's really missing to make this a true like competition between New Japan and WCW, which is that
03:07:33
Speaker
W.J.W.'s world champion is wrestling in the tournament. New Japan is not. Great Muda is the world champion at this point in time, and he is not wrestling on this show. We're appearing in any way. And we all would have loved to see Great Muda again, I'm sure. It feels like kind of unintentionally insulting that New Japan doesn't send their world champion, their best guy, to this tournament that's supposed to be super important, apparently. Yeah, yeah. Don't hate me.
03:08:00
Speaker
I enjoyed the first segment of the show more than I liked the end. New Japan being there was just a nice change up from previous years. It showed cooperation. You got to see how many new faces, you know, it was great. I wish they kept that direction.
03:08:21
Speaker
Not necessarily in Starrcade, but... Yeah, I wouldn't end in a Starrcade like this, but it would have been good to have another show for sure. Yeah, yeah. And that may have been the intent, but I really enjoyed it. You know, I was looking for Muda, you know, although I didn't know that he was champion or anything like that. Even the commentary was a little bit better during that.
03:08:40
Speaker
I'm not counting all the stereotype and all that crap. There's a lot of good sides to it as well. That's what I meant. I was a little drained after the triangle match. The second half, even though it isn't the whole half, the second third, or whatever you want to call it, the last portion, the triangle match was drawn out. We have seen other matches on Starrcade that were, in my opinion, even though they might have been shorter, it felt more drawn out than that match.
03:09:10
Speaker
Yeah. That tag match with Sting and Hawk for reference. Yeah. That felt longer. Yeah. Mr. T versus Kevin Sullivan felt like the longest three minutes in creation at times. I like how it stood out from other Starkades. And I enjoy that. And Randy Savage. Awesome. Yeah. Were you glad that he wrestled on this show as opposed to merely showing up? Yes. Yes.
03:09:40
Speaker
No, I totally see where you're coming from on that. The early portion of the show feels totally different than any other Starrcade that we've seen thus far. There's performances that we've never gotten and a whole slew of performers that I've only seen on this show. There's something obviously like Liger that we've seen previously, but there's a bunch of the
03:10:05
Speaker
Performers in those matches are like only people that we've seen on the show and I'd like to see them again. It's kind of moto Motani and Tenzin. Yeah, so three of the seven, right? Mm-hmm. So three of the seven are people that we've never seen before and that I liked Yeah, exactly is only in one one person in right? Yeah
03:10:29
Speaker
And I also liked that the first two matches, they were lengthy and they were fast. They weren't, they're energetic. They built on each other. The third one tapered off a little bit, but it had still had something unique to offer. I guess when you go up and wait class, things slow down. A little bit. Yeah. Usually. No, that's just like for safety. It was a great start. And I think that left a stronger impression on me than the finish. Yeah, I can see that definitely.
03:10:59
Speaker
Yeah, this was a very entertaining show. It's strange, there's next to no storyline content that affects anything outside this Starrcade until we hit the triangle match and world title match. But despite that, this was an easy show to get into and a really fun watch. The match content is just terrific for much of the night, and even some matches that don't quite hold up are actually still good fun.
03:11:23
Speaker
Some don't quite reach their potential or don't get quite enough time, but most are really great, and I came out of watching this with a few new performers I'd really like to look up so I can see more of their work. High quality performances, low story content, it's like the exact opposite of Starrcade 94.
03:11:42
Speaker
The World Cup storyline, even if the announcers and wrestlers do constantly call it the USA vs Japan rather than WCW vs New Japan, is nicely done. I mean, I think all of us knew it was going for all seven matches. Yeah. But they do a good job getting there, and there's quite a lot of tension over that, with the scoring going back and forth.
03:12:02
Speaker
Aside from maybe Savage's match, which has to end in his win for Sting's match to happen, I never felt like I knew from the start how any one match was going to go. I liked that the WCW wrestlers encouraged each other and called out each other's matches throughout the night. There was a real team atmosphere, and that provided a really nice contrast to the Triangle match storyline that pitted Sting and Luger against each other after they fought on the same side through the World Cup.
03:12:29
Speaker
The Sting and Luger friendship angle was used very well here, with both doing a good job of setting up how they're sticking together despite people's criticisms, celebrating together after the World Cup win, showing concern for each other as each face flare, and finally struggling to maintain their friendship as they competed directly.
03:12:46
Speaker
The show leaves them in a really interesting place, with Luger having actively caused Sting's loss, but in a way that suggests that he was looking for sympathy from a friend, not actually trying to hurt Sting's chances. It's a strong story that works well and I liked seeing it highlighted.
03:13:04
Speaker
I talked about this at the start, so I won't dwell on it, but there's way too much use of stereotypes about Japanese people on this show, both in terms of commentary and in the show's general plotline. Most notably, the bit between Sunny Ono and the Diamond Doll, which is just downright offensive. The stereotype comments and storyline elements were a big problem for the show and just keep coming up, though more often in the early matches. I just can't ignore them, though. They're a black mark on an otherwise good show.
03:13:32
Speaker
Other than that, the announced team was a highlight of the show. Dusty, Tony, and Henan play off each other well and alternate between really good discussions that make useful insights about the matches and wrestlers and utterly hilarious bickering. Dusty and his wonderful dusty-isms, and Henan's increasingly perplexed reactions to them, had me in stitches, and Tony plays a very good straight man caught between the two.
03:13:57
Speaker
There's moments where he just breaks down laughing and those were great. It's clear the three had a good time working together here. And when you're listening to three guys having fun talking about something, it's hard not to have fun yourself. Hopefully. Again, I can't just let the jokes about stereotypes slide, unfortunately, and those are a black mark on their performance. But there is enough fun content there to still make a net positive for the announced team, I think.
03:14:26
Speaker
Otherwise, this was a really easy watch with two good storylines, one self-contained, and a lot of great matches. I think I can recommend this one, but just be warned that there are some pretty uncomfortable moments in the mix. I agree with what you said. I just wish they could have done more to bridge the two sections. It's good for in-ring action, but there's definitely a disconnect in the way it was put together.
03:14:53
Speaker
But if you want, you can watch it for what it is. It's a bunch of really interesting matches, but as a, it's not a fully cohesive unit, I would say. Hashtag need more Buddha. There you go. There was plenty of aerobatics, but you know, Hey, why not? There's no mist. Oh, sure. So then we, that's one thing we absolutely missed. No pun intended. Well, it's time to do match of the night and MVP. Al, you want to go first?
03:15:23
Speaker
Okay, sure. So there's a bunch of strong matches on the show. For me, I had to basically put down the matches that had a full beginning, middle, and end, and had the time to actually deliver. So unfortunately that excludes stuff like the Sting, Saki match, and the Savage, Tenzen match, and even the Luger, Tono match.
03:15:48
Speaker
And so it really had come down to me to one match that really stood out, has a flawless story, has worked really well, has the right amount of time to actually get things to happen. And that would be Shinjiro Itani versus Eddie Guerrero. Kind of, yeah, I figured we were going there. Yeah.
03:16:05
Speaker
And on that note, my MVP, based on the match itself and the fact that he had a pre-match promo, which helped all the people, he got to actually really first build up the fact that tournament is supposed to be important, even if I don't necessarily believe it. He seems sincere about it being important to win and important that he's part of it. And also the fact that after his loss,
03:16:30
Speaker
you can visibly tell that he's upset. He makes sure to be at the back of the frame, this building is set at himself for losing. So MVP is Eddie Guerrero. Okay.
03:16:42
Speaker
All right, John. No, Eddie did amazing. I think this is the first Star K we see him in, right? Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And I, you know, I enjoyed him there and they did have a good storyline or at least, you know, a snippet of one. Honestly, it's one of the better matches of the night, but I cannot tell you how happy I was to see Jushin Liger again. Fair enough.
03:17:07
Speaker
And so I'm probably going to choose that from my favorite match because unlike a large percentage of Star Cades, there's always a slow start. And we didn't have that this time.
03:17:18
Speaker
with Liger, he hardly ever wins that I'm aware of, so. And it's in the States anyways, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So it was nice to see that there was a strong start and they hadn't ramped up the whole offensive train. That's true, yeah. You know, so. They hadn't had time yet, yeah. Yeah. So as it is an initial impression that stuck with me throughout the entire, at least the first seven matches, that would be my favorite match. Okay. And my MVP,
03:17:48
Speaker
is going to be Dusty. Because, again, with those seven matches, or all the matches, his quirkiness and interplay and everything, this is the first time I'm announcing, and I loved every second of it. I'm like, why isn't he an announcer at the shows? I knew you were going to love Dusty Rhodes announcing. Oh, yeah. He's not an announcer in the shows that he's in. He should be announcing his own match as he's fighting.
03:18:14
Speaker
like last arcade, Al picked the announcer because the show was just horrid. But this is still a great show, but it would not have been... I wouldn't have made so many pauses and reflected on what was actually happening in the ring if I didn't have to wade through all the craziness going out of him. It lightened my mood. It was still a commentary that
03:18:43
Speaker
made me think about what was going on. It made the entire show better. All right. And one more thing before I forget about it. Sorry. This is not important. I'm sorry I interrupted you. Go ahead. Possums are North America's only marsupial. Okay. Maybe Dusty would have understood the reference if they said playing marsupial. Yeah.
03:19:10
Speaker
My match of the night, I'm going to agree with you, Al. It is Eddie Guerrero vs. Shinjiro Otani by A Country Mile. It was absolutely brilliant, two performers at their very best putting on a terrific show of technical ability, strength, and agility. I already very much enjoyed watching Guerrero, but this match made me really want to track down more from Otani, who impressed me greatly.
03:19:34
Speaker
There are other very good matches on this card. In fact, most of the card is very good, but some jaw-dropping moves in this match combined with a solid work for the duration and a terrific edge of your seat ending made it pretty easily my match of the night. For my MVP, I'm gonna give it to Luger. Hi. Alright. Maybe I'm just glad to see him back, but he had a good night.
03:20:00
Speaker
He had a fun match against Chono, did a good job building up the angle with Sting, compliments to Sting on that too of course, did great work on the apron and in the ring in the triangle match, and really brought the intensity to the portion of the match where he faced Sting. Sting is an important part of all that too and is excellent, but Luger really showed how his drive to win was getting between him and his friend and letting his dark side emerge even against Sting. So I thought he did a great job with some complex character work and that earns him my MVP.
03:20:35
Speaker
And that wraps up our review of Starrcade 95. If you've enjoyed listening to us tonight, you can search for us on Twitter or Facebook as Let's Go to the Ring. Follow us for episode announcements and other show details, and share your own thoughts about the Starrcades as we go through. And please, if you've enjoyed this show, give us a nice review on iTunes and share the show through your favorite social media platforms to help others discover us.
03:21:00
Speaker
Many thanks to OSW Review for attendance and pay-per-view figures, and to Gina Trujillo for our logo. Join us next time for Starcade 96, not your typical warm, fuzzy holiday special. Like any of the other Starcades have been? Yeah. That is the official tagline, by the way. Oh, okay. I was going to say, is that actually it? Yes, it is.
03:21:25
Speaker
I mean, I watched the St. Claus Congress of Martians and he didn't cut his forehead open during the final battle with the Martians. So that does stand out a little bit. This is Bob Moore for Alec Pridgen and John Mullins signing off. Good night, everybody. Happy wrestling. Get some rest.
03:21:56
Speaker
Actually, I'm gonna fill my water before I start that up. It won't teeter-totter. Yeah. So I walked the light fandango to the kitchen. Just hope Bobby doesn't slip and go butt over teacup. Yeah. Doo-doo-doo. Doo-doo-doo-doo-doo. Doo-doo-doo. Dusty.