It is being rumored that some old names will pop up on the live edition of TNA iMPACT! set for Monday, January 4. Sean Waltman, Scott Hall, Rob Van Dam and Ric Flair’s names are being tossed around.  (Emphasis on the word “old”)

Can’t wait.

My memories of Hall, and Flair are of them being old and fat.

Waltman… He was having sex with that he/she called Chyna.  Shudder.

Van Dam… Last seen on TV promoting marijana usage.  Positive image for the new TNA, Eh Hulk (“I wish I had killed my wife like OJ did”) Hogan…

And what about that female wrestler Roxxi who came back to TNA after being off wrestling somewhere else.  Got a big promo, then proceeded to break her leg the following week.  Sad.  This is how the promotion operates.  In WWE they would use her injury to get someone else over.  Here… Nope.

So Jan 4th, I’ll be watching… RAW.  Maybe switch over to see the old fogies ewvery now and then.  RAW has really sucked lately and I hate the lack of wrestling and short matches, but TNA makes me angry that they want to copy WWE.  They should copy ROH or the old ECW.

Since Justin and Scott have only reached 2003 in their reviews and any extra work added on them to watch the next forty matches would be difficult and just too much at this time of year (especially when they have their own awesome sports/wrestling/TV forum), I’ll be doing solo shots of the final three years of this ten part column. I want to thank Justin and Scott for ALL their hard work and dedication when they were just merely doing me a favor. Let me assure you, those two guys are good people.

Alright, enough of the man love. As I mentioned in the 2005 column, this is my 500th post here at the blog. The interesting part about that is this post is actually a repost of a column I did after covering all the 2006 PPVs for TheHistoryofWWE.com. Anyways, it’s really hard to believe I’ve spent this much time on a blog, but here we are two and a half years later. I hope you all enjoy this!

Let’s get to the year that was 2006.

The Best of 2006: The Matches

This is WWE only, so you won’t see any TNA or ROH here. Except for a few matches, the workrate in WWE had tended to decline throughout 2006, but don’t let that fool you into thinking that this was just another year of mediocre wrestling. We’ve got some good ones on here! For me to consider a match to be a MOTYC, it has to be overwhelmed with three things: 1) workrate 2) great booking, and 3) a huge level of suspense. I got to believe what’s going on in that ring is for real! While most other publications or internet columnists like to cut the ballot date off at the end of November, I go from 1/1 to 12/31. Another rule that only makes sense is that I have to have seen the match. I’ve seen every PPV and SNME this year and a whole lot of weekly stuff. I haven’t seen every episode of all three brands in 2006, but when I hear people talking (or see, if it’s on the net), then I’ll find it somewhere and watch it. Enough chit-chat though, let’s start up the countdown!

Wait, first off, we have some awesome “honorable mentions”.

- WWE Champion John Cena vs. Triple H vs. Edge – Triple Threat Match (Backlash 04.30.06) ***¾

- World Champion Kurt Angle vs. Shawn Michaels – non-title match (Raw 01.16.06) ***¾

- Kurt Angle vs. Randy Orton – (ECW: One Night Stand II 06.11.06) ***¾

- Rob Van Dam vs. Hardcore Holly – (ECW on Sci-Fi 09.26.06) ***¾

- Edge, Randy Orton & Lita vs. John Cena, Carlito & Trish Stratus – (Raw 09.04.06) ***¾

Now to the countdown! Anything you see from here on will be **** or better.

10. After what seemed like forever since we had actually been surprised on PPV, they spring this baby on us. Every one involved worked their butts off regardless of the brand-extension gaps. You had no idea who was going to win this up until the very end and it left you hoping for more from all four teams involved. I can’t say that it saved the whole show, but it sure made for a great match. It also reminds us why we should definitely leave the wrestling to the pros. Isn’t that right, Joey? Here it is, the #10 WWE match of 2006.

- WWE Tag Team Champions Paul London & Brian Kendrick vs. William Regal & Dave Taylor vs. MNM vs. The Hardys – Four-Way Ladder Match (Armageddon – 12.17.06)

JBL puts the Hardys over as ladder match veterans. The faces dump the heels to start so that they can trade blows and keep the match between themselves. Kendrick takes a hiptoss from Matt while Jeff takes a rana from London. Jeff fights back with a sitout jawbreaker and goes over and attacks Kendrick to set up the double-wheelbarrow bomb. MNM takes the Hardys out to the floor to brawl while Regal and Taylor do the same in the ring with the Hooligans. Ouch! Half-nelson throw from Regal to London, then to Kendrick! Meanwhile, the Hardys don’t want MNM bringing the ladders to the ring, so they attack and do it themselves! Regal and Taylor have tossed out the champs and want to keep the Hardys from putting the ladders in the ring. They try and stop MNM from bringing them in as well, but that allows Matt to sneak in and nail them with a ladder. Now everyone is back in the ring. Taylor receives Poetry in Motion from the Hardys, which sets up a SNAPSHOT from MNM! Regal takes a double-superkick to the face from the Hooligans. Regal and Taylor get dumped, as does MNM. Kendrick gets whipped into a ladder by the Hardys, and he has no choice but to take a breather. London catches Matt with an enziguri, but Jeff nails him with a front dropkick to the face. Jeff sets up a ladder to go for the belts, but London surprises Matt with an inverted atomic drop and dropkicks Jeff off the ladder! Now London tries to head up the ladder. Kendrick intercepts Jeff’s attempt at bringing London down, and then London jumps off the ladder as he sees Nitro coming up behind him with a springboard attempt from the apron into him with something. The ladder falls over and that could’ve REALLY gone wrong had Nitro landed on one of the legs. The man is LUCKY! Mercury takes the ladder and starts jabbing everyone he sees and sets up the ladder again. Mercury starts climbing, but the faces swarm and bring the ladder to the edge of the ring. They tilt it over and send Mercury off the ladder out on top of Nitro outside the ring! Matt hits a pescado on Taylor and sends Regal face-first into the ringpost. Kendrick tries to climb up, but Matt stops him and brings him down face-first to the mat. Man, Matt Hardy is EVERYWHERE! Matt sets up the ladder in a corner and the Hardys double-whip Kendrick into it. London receives the same, except they try for Poetry in Motion. London avoids it and Jeff hits his face on the TOP of the ladder! OUCH! Cole ~ “It truly looks like Armageddon out here!” Really, Michael? The Hooligans beat down Matt for a bit. London tries to head up the ladder again, but he gets pulled down and clotheslined by Matt. Kendrick tries to shoot up the ladder and grab the belts, but Matt is there to yank him down by his tights. Matt sets up the ladder and makes a ramp out of it using the second rope. He wants to suplex London on it, but London blocks and hammers Matt down on the ladder. London lifts up the end of the ladder to put Matt at a 180-degree angle so that Kendrick can come off the top and deliver the DOUBLE-STOMP to Matt Hardy! Since the Hardys are incapacitated, MNM come back in to destroy the Hooligans. They give London a double-gutbuster and then set up the ladders to create a see-saw effect. Matt gets beat up some more and then is set up on the turnbuckle for a double-superplex on the ladders, but Jeff comes back in for the save. Matt and MNM are back on the mat while Jeff is up top! Matt gives MNM a DOUBLE-NOGGIN KNOCKER while Jeff leaps down on the ladder so that it comes up and hits MNM in the face! Mercury gets the worse of it as he rolls out to the floor with his face GUSHING OUT BLOOD! Yeah, his face is shattered. That was really sick, folks. Poor Joey. He goes away for six months and then he comes back and a few weeks later, his face gets broken. I blame Teddy. Matt and Kendrick fight on the ladder until Regal and Taylor hop in to save. Taylor slams Kendrick on and off a ladder set up in the corner and then Regal gives London a half-nelson suplex on that same ladder. Regal starts to climb the ladder to retrieve the belts, but then he finds out he’s afraid of heights! He comes down and tells Taylor to climb. He does, but Kendrick stops him half-way up. Regal gets pissed and throws Kendrick out to the floor. By the way, Mercury has been taken to the hospital. The Hardys return to the ring to stop the Englishmen. While Jeff is getting another ladder set up out on the floor, Matt is giving Regal and Taylor both TWIST OF FATES! Jeff climbs up the ladder for a possible SWANTON BOMB on Regal and Taylor, but then Nitro runs in out of nowhere and dropkicks the ladder through the ropes to send Jeff crashing throat-first on the top rope! Oh that was NOT smart, Jeff. Nitro nails Regal and Taylor with a ladder and then delivers the Shawn Michaels Special by climbing the turnbuckle and smashing the ladder into Regal. Nitro tries for the belts. Kendrick attempts to stop him while London climbs up on the apron to deliver a springboard dropkick to take him off the ladder. Crowd applauds the Hooligans, and it’s about time too. Matt meets Kendrick up on the ladder and hiptosses him down to the mat. London pounds on Matt and tries to grab the belts, but then Matt backdrops London to the mat as the ladder falls over. Jeff tries to retrieve the belts, but its set up too far from the belts so you know a spot is coming. Nitro starts the climb and gets nailed with a SUNSET FLIP POWERBOMB off the ladder from Jeff. Jeff looked like he could’ve blown out his knee on that one. Matt stupidly sets up two ladders beside each other and starts to climb with one foot on each ladder. Regal and Taylor pull the ladder out from under him like anybody with any common sense would. Matt gets right back up, but gets double-teamed and booted in the face by Regal. Regal and Taylor give the ladder climb another try and set up two ladders beside each other, but Kendrick is there to meet Regal up top. Taylor pulls Kendrick down and clotheslines him, but then gets dumped to the floor by London. Regal is still up on the ladder! Kendrick gets back to his feet and climbs the other ladder and tries for SLICED BREAD #2 to Regal off the ladder, but they’re too close to the ropes for the move so they another spot is ruined. London gets back in the ring and climbs the ladder. Matt meets him there, but gets knocked off the ladder. With Nitro and Taylor both clawing at his heels, London is still able to grab the belts and win the match. (20:13) Regardless of some contrived and blown spots, it was a great match that just might solidify the tag champs run as more than just killing time. I still hope Regal and Taylor get a good long title match soon because that would still be a great match. But wow, poor Joey. ****

9. What’s most saddening about this match is its most memorable moment; Vince McMahon’s bloody face being shoved up Big Show’s butt. No, I’m not British. Why do you ask? Terrible image aside, this match had awesome drama and Big Show really added a lot to the whole affair. Of course, DX came out the winners at the end and we can say goodbye the DX/McMahons feud for the time being at least. It’s a match that was able to mix brutality and fun together at the same time, which is really hard to pull off.

- Shane McMahon, Big Show & Vince McMahon vs. Shawn Michaels & Triple H – Hell In A Cell (Unforgiven – 09.17.06)

JR does a great job of putting over how CRAZY this “Satan’s Playground” is noting that dozens of bones have been broken and thousands of stitches have been given out. H and Michaels dish out stereo kicks to the Big Show’s big show to put him down for a moment so they can beat down the McMahons. The Canadians start chanting “You screwed Bret” within the first twenty seconds. DX dump the McMahons and go back after Big Show who is back up to his feet. They give him another running field goal kick to the balls to once again keep him down. Next up, the McMahons eat the steel and get busted open as a result. Where is Big Show? Oh, he’s STILL down in the ring. Triple H pulls out a screwdriver and begins to twist it into Vince’s forehead! Triple H brings Vince back in the ring and Shawn goes up top for the elbow drop, but Show comes alive and catches Shawn coming off the top and slams him. Boy that was dumb. Triple H tries a whip, but Show stands his ground and flips H out of the ring: Harley Race-style. Show goes out for Triple H, but then gets double-teamed by DX and tossed into the steps to keep him incapacitated. Back in the ring, Shawn pairs up with Shane and Triple H pairs up with Vince with DX in control. Show comes back in again to end DX’s momentum. He levels H with headbutts while Shawn gets sent out via clothesline by Shane. The McMahons get a few licks in on H while cheering Show on at the same time. Show delivers the CHOKESLAM to H and then goes out to punish Shawn. He picks him up and gives Shawn a release powerbomb face-first into the cage and blades. Meanwhile, the McMahons are toying around with the Game. Show ~ “Hey, watch this!” He proceeds to toss Shawn into the cage like a lawn dart. Shane stomps H down in the corner to set up for the trashcan assisted COAST-TO-COAST! ALRIGHT! He connects! What’s great about that spot is that H’s ear was supposedly injured Monday night. They remembered to capitalize on the injury to make the spot more than just a spot. I like it when they do that. I got to mention that he’s bleeding from the ear. Shawn gets tossed back in the ring for some triple-teaming. Shane takes H out to the floor and sets up the steel steps and then catapults H into the cage wall to bust open his forehead. In the ring, Show delivers the pump splash out of the corner onto Shawn. Just as promised earlier, Vince goes for the cover for 1, 2, NO! He picks Shawn up off the mat. He hands Shawn to Show for the COBRA-CLUTCH BACKBREAKER! He continues the hold on the mat for a bit and then lifts him up for the inverted leg drop bulldog. Vince covers again, but picks Shawn up again at two. Triple H comes back with his body COVERED in blood and tosses Show. He hits the facebuster on Vince and tries for the PEDIGREE, but Shane pulls him off his dad and lifts him into a torture rack. Huh? He twists H around into what appeared to be a spinning rack neckbreaker or an inverted TKO, but JR calls it a counter into a neckbreaker. I’m not sure what happened there, but both men are down. Shawn gets back up and sends Shane out with an enziguri. Vince clotheslines Shawn down to stop his momentum as the Big Show walks over to take care of Shawn. Vince pulls down his pants to reintroduce Shawn to the “Kiss My WHAT?” club, but Triple H is there to prevent that from happening. Show nails him and sets Shawn up for a splash off the ropes, but Shawn pulls Vince in the way and he gets splashed instead. Big Show ~ “Yikes!” A distracted Big Show gets tripped up and posted by DX. Back in, Shawn nails Shane with the flying forearm and the kip-up. An HBK atomic drop into a Triple H spinebuster to Shane! Shawn goes up for the flying elbow while H brings a chair into the ring and Pillmanizes Shane’s neck! Shawn connects with the elbow drop! Shane is bleeding inside! Shawn tunes up the band for SWEET CHIN MUSIC, but Show is there to yank him out and throw him into the cage. Show hotshots H and brings the steps in the ring because he’s ANGRY! Vince is still down by the way and Shane is done. Show goes to ram H with the steps, but since they are covering his face, he can’t see Triple H running at him to nail him in the gut with a steel chair. Haha, he jiggles like Jell-O! A chair shot to the head on the steps KO’s Show. Wait, no it doesn’t, but the SWEET CHIN MUSIC will! He falls on the ropes, which becomes important in a minute. The last McMahon standing is Vince, and he looks FURIOUS. H gets rid of the steps as the crowd starts to boo! It’s a standoff between Vince and DX. They yank Show’s tights down past his rear end! Vince drops to his knees and gets his face stuck in between the cheeks. Show falls out to the floor to readjust himself, and I think I saw a wee-wee! Shawn hits the SWEET CHIN MUSIC while H grabs a sledgehammer and BREAKS it over the back of Vince’s skull for the academic three-count. (25:04) Wow, great match to hopefully end the feud. It told a great story and adding Big Show to the mix was the best thing for it, as it did wonders for the match. I couldn’t imagine it being good without him. ****

8. This is the match that gave Sabu a future in the new ECW. The crowd was extremely hot for the whole thing and it ended in an insane moment without a real winner. You can’t deny that it was awesome seeing these two nearly kill each other. Sounds sick, I know, but that’s ECW.

- World Heavyweight Champion Rey Mysterio vs. Sabu – “Extreme Rules” match (ECW: One Night Stand II – 06.11.06)

Mysterio comes out with his old-school tights like he wore before he lost the mask in WCW. Rey has ECW stitched on the back of his mask, but the crowd interprets it as “sucking up” so they boo Rey. Joey calls Rey’s reaction mixed, but Tazz begs to differ. Both men have chairs in hand as the bell sounds. They lay the chairs down and actually begin to wrestle! They go through a nice little sequence and then come to a stand-off. They play patty cake with the chairs which goes nowhere. Sabu hits Air Sabu, but then takes a drop-toe hold into a chair. Rey follows up with a chair-assisted hurracanrana out from the corner. Sabu avoids a 619 and then heaves a chair into Rey’s face which sends him rolling out to the floor! Sabu pulls out a table and makes it into a scaffold between the ring and guardrail. He lays Rey on the table and then goes for a springboard dive from inside the ring, but Rey rolls off the table. Sabu changes his direction, but still misses Rey and lands chest-first on the railing. Back in, Rey hits a beautiful moonsault press for two! Rey tries for a sunset flip from the apron, but Sabu kicks him in the head and sets Rey up for a guillotine legdrop while laid out on the middle rope. Sabu covers, 1, 2, NO! Sabu puts Rey in a camel clutch to draw some “Sheik” chants from the crowd, so Sabu releases the hold and points to the sky. Sabu goes to the floor and pulls out another table before re-entering and delivering an Arabian Facebuster for a near-fall. Sabu goes back out and sets up the table vertically to the ring. Rey dropkicks Sabu on the apron and landing on the table. LA SILLA to Sabu THROUGH the table! Back in, Rey hits a springboard guillotine leg drop to the back of Sabu’s head. Cover, 1, 2, NO! Sabu comes back with a springboard leg lariat. Sabu hits the TRIPLE JUMP MOONSAULT for 1, 2, NO! Rey avoids the ATOMIC ARABIAN FACEBUSTER and then sets Sabu in a chair for LA SILLA. Rey goes for it, but then Sabu rolls out of the way to crotch Rey REAL good! Sabu heaves the chair at Rey again for a nice sonic boom to send Rey to the floor! Sabu puts Rey on that table made into a scaffold and then delivers a SPRINGBOARD DDT THROUGH THE TABLE ON THE FLOOR on Rey Mysterio!!! Neither man can continue so they call for a bell leaving this match a no-contest. (9:08) The crowd boos the heck out of that finish, but that just made the moment all the more insane. Sabu pretty much jackknifed himself. That was a pretty cool spot fest if I do say so myself. Should this match be classified as having a bad finish just because there was no real end result? I don’t think so because to me, that’s what makes something hardcore; two guys who cross the line of being able to continue to fight. Sabu wasn’t going to win the title and since he had had 75% of the offense in the match, it wouldn’t have made sense for Rey to go over here. ****

7. What has helped Ric Flair maintain a wrestling career after thirty years is that he didn’t wrestle in crazy gimmick matches. He was a wrestler’s wrestler; meaning he kept it on the mat as much as possible unless he was being slammed off the top turnbuckle. You also have Edge, who holds a fairly decent win/loss record when it comes to ladder matches and was undefeated in TLC matches at this point. You wouldn’t think someone like Ric Flair could put on an awesome TLC match at the age of 56, but it was as though he had waited his whole career to compete in one of these dangerous matches.

- WWE Champion Edge (w/Lita) vs. Ric Flair – TLC V Match (Raw – 01.16.06)

This was the best Raw of 2006, wrestling-wise. Edge had been making fun of Flair for weeks after he was charged (in REAL life!) with assault and battery in late-November. They wrestled at New Year’s Revolution, which Flair won by DQ after Edge hit Flair in the face with his “Money-in-the-Bank” briefcase. That same night, as we all know, Edge cashed in the briefcase and pinned Cena to win the WWE title. This could all come back to bite him in the butt now that he has Flair to contend with in a TLC match. Many overlook this match saying that Flair is out of his element, but that’s definitely not the case (no pun intended). By the way, this is LIVE from Raleigh, NC. Flair country, if you WILL. Flair hits some chops early, but Edge stops that with a knee and grabs a ladder and a chair from the outside. Edge jabs Flair with the ladder and then sandwiches him in between the rungs! Flair is trapped, so Edge picks up the chair and smashes it into the ladder. Flair finally gets free and rolls out to the floor. Edge follows him out and gets chopped out over the security wall. They brawl in the crowd for a bit, but then Flair takes a backdrop back out to ringside. Edge gives Flair a suplex on the floor and sets up a table and puts a chair on it. Lita hands him another chair for a CONCHAIRTO on the table, but Flair counters by grabbing Edge’s balls! Flair takes Edge off the announce table and drops him chest-first on the security wall. Lita takes this opportunity to jump on Flair’s back and choke him down, but Flair flips her off of him. Flair goes back after Edge, but then gets nailed with a steel chair to bust him open! Edge sets him on the table and Lita holds him down while Edge sets up a ladder in the ring. Remember, Flair is on a table over by the announce table! Edge starts to climb and once he gets to the top, he SPLASHES Flair through the table! CRAZY! Flair’s daughter Ashley is at ringside pleading with him to get up as we go to commercial! We’re back and a bloody Flair is vertical in the ring while Edge is still stumbling out on the floor. Edge gets back in and takes a low blow for it. Flair sandwiches Edge in between the rungs this time and proceeds to smash a chair on the ladder. I love how Flair is using Edge’s own tactics against him, knowing that he’s never been in a ladder match before. Flair pulls Edge free from the ladders and cleans his clock with a chairshot! Flair places the ladder on Edge and bashes the ladder with the chair some more and then makes the first attempt at retrieving the belt. Once he sees Edge is still moving, he gets down and moves the ladder to a corner. Flair chops Edge down and heads up the ladder, but Edge meets him at the top for a SUPERPLEX OFF THE LADDER! INSANE! Edge starts to climb the ladder, but now Flair is standing again. Edge decides to deliver a missile dropkick, but Flair avoids it. Nevertheless, we see a Flair Flop. WOOOO! Edge gets up first and knocks Flair out to ringside with a chairshot. Edge goes up the ladder for his belt, but Flair gets back in and pushes the ladder back to send Edge crashing through a table out on the floor! The crowd is going nuts, begging Flair to capitalize on this moment. Flair climbs the ladder and touches the belt, but Lita sneaks in and brings Flair down. She knocks Flair down and mounts him to punch on him, but Flair pushes Lita off and puts her in the FIGURE-FOUR! He lets go after about ten seconds and Edge is still out! Flair slowly starts the climb again. Edge is now up and at the ladder, but Edge climbs and punches Flair down to retain his belt. (16:38) Post-match, Edge SPEARS Flair down and goes for another CONCHAIRTO, but John Cena runs down for the save. Interestingly enough, Edge would be dethroned during his second title reign in a TLC match against John Cena himself, which we’ll get to later in the countdown. ****

6. We’ve got two guys who are given 20-minutes and who just so happen to RULE. What else do you need?

- Chris Benoit vs. Finlay – (Judgment Day 05.21.06)

This grudge match is a result of Finlay pulling some shenanigans on Benoit to continue in the KotR tournament. It’s all for naught considering Lashley beat Finlay to advance the finals. But in any event, both these guys just love to fight. I mean, Finlay says it at the beginning of his entrance music. “Benoit” chants start up before these guys even lock up with each other. They collar-and-elbow tie up their way out to the floor with INTENSITY! Back in, Benoit goes nose-to-nose with Finlay to bait in the quickest double-leg takedown I’ve ever seen to try for a SHARPSHOOTER. Finlay trips him up before Benoit can lock in the hold. Benoit goes to the mat with a headlock, but a quick rollup by Finlay causes him to break the hold. Finlay complains to the ref that Benoit jabbed him in the eye to slow things down and to get a quick shot in on Benoit. Genius! Finlay takes Benoit back to the mat with a reverse chinlock for a bit, but then wakes Benoit up with a slap to the face. Benoit returns the favor, only 1000x harder! Benoit stiffs Finlay to the other side of the ring and drops him with a textbook backbreaker. Benoit takes Finlay to the mat and tries to maneuver him around for the Crippler Crossface, but instead cradles him over for a near-fall with Finlay’s feet on the ropes. Benoit beats on Finlay in the corner, but then takes a thumb to the eye. Short-arm clothesline sets up a near-fall. Finlay puts Benoit in a hold that is so sick, I don’t even know WHAT to call it where he forces his foot behind Benoit’s head and pulls on both his arms. Let’s call it the IRISH TORTURE DEVICE! Benoit actually powers out of this insane hold, but goes right into a bow-tie chokehold. Benoit fights out and ducks a clothesline to hit the HAT TRICK of Germans. Benoit goes up top for the SWANDIVE HEADBUTT, but Finlay rolls out of the way. Benoit delivers a dragon screw leg whip and tries for the SHARPSHOOTER once more, but Finlay kicks him away. Finlay goes out to bring a chair into the ring, but Benoit baseball-slides the chair into Finlay. Benoit rolls Finlay in and nails the SWANDIVE HEADBUTT! He covers for 1, 2, NO! Finlay reverses a whip for Benoit to run chest-first in the corner, and then follows up with a clothesline from behind for two. Finlay works on the neck for a bit, but then hits a big running butt splash to Benoit’s lower abdomen for two. Finlay locks on a hammerlock/dragon sleeper submission hold! I don’t know why no one has ever thought of that before! Benoit bridges out, but Finlay drops him again with a European uppercut to the back of the head. Finlay just kills Benoit with the forearm shots. Benoit fights back with the same, but then Finlay starts to tear on Benoit’s shoulders. Benoit flips out a slam and puts Finlay down with a German suplex! He hits another suplex! Benoit tries for a third, but Finlay elbows out. Finlay repeatedly headbutts Benoit, but then takes an enziguri that sends him stumbling out of the ring. Benoit follows him out and ducks a swing of the shillelagh to give Finlay a German suplex on the floor! Benoit gets back in the ring at the count of six, Finlay in at eight. Benoit delivers a snap suplex in from the apron and holds on through the Three Amigos of Eddie Guerrero. Benoit takes too much time pounding his chest like Eddie, so Finlay shoves Benoit off the apron into the security wall. Back in, Finlay drives Benoit shoulder-first into the steel ringpost. He brings Benoit to the center of the ring and out of nowhere; Benoit takes Finlay down to the mat to lock in the CRIPPLER CROSSFACE! Once Benoit clasps his hands, Finlay taps immediately! (21:10) If guys like Benoit and Finlay can’t deliver, WWE might as well stop what they’re doing. Keep the memories you have and leave it at that. The match they had that set this one up was really great, but this was just better. Possibly the reason could just be due to the commercial break in the middle of it. You might be able to say that the finish was too quick, but it completely defines what the Crossface is meant to do. It’s meant to be unexpected and quickly executed. No one saw it coming, especially not Finlay. ****

5. A perfect definition of “good friends, better enemies.” These two put on a non-stop hardcore clinic, ending with a very memorable finish that few men could ever top. To say that Mick Foley is included this far down on a Match of the Year countdown in 2006 is a testament to just how great he still can be to the business.

- Edge (w/Lita) vs. Mick Foley – Hardcore Match (WrestleMania 22 04.02.06)

Edge has a baseball bat and you can just guess what he wants to do with it. Foley knocks it away from him and sends Edge down with a faceslam. Joey Styles is “losing his WrestleMania virginity” as he puts it by calling this match. He mentions that Foley is wearing the black flannel showing that he’s gone into a dark place preparing for this match. Foley sets up Edge in the TREEEE OF WOEEE position and follows up with an elbow drop to the face. Edge comes back with a knockdown to Foley. Edge tells Lita to throw in some toys for him to beat Foley with. A cookie sheet is destroyed by Foley’s head! Edge follows up by dropkicking a road sign in Foley’s face! Edge sets up for the spear and he gets it! Edge is obviously more hurt by it as Foley stands up and shows everyone that he has barbed-wire wrapped around his abdomen! Foley yanks out some wire-cutters from his shoe and takes that off of him. CRAZY! Edge’s arm is “busted open”. Foley takes his barbed wire and then starts whipping Edge with it! While Edge gets wrapped up in the ropes, Mick goes to the floor and pulls out his barbed-wire wrapped baseball bat better known as Barbie! Lita comes in and leaps on Mick’s back to try and save Edge, so Mick runs at Edge who is still in the ropes for a CACTUS CLOTHESLINE! That was AWESOME! Mick covers for two! Swinging neckbreaker on the floor gets two. Foley charges Edge with his head up against the steel steps, but Edge jumps up and tosses Foley awkwardly into the steps! Poor Mick. Edge beats on Foley some more before tossing him knees first into the steps again! Edge sets up a table out on the floor and puts Foley on it. Edge goes up top, but Foley simply slides off of the table. Edge comes down and goes after Mick by slamming his head into the steel rampway! That gets two. Back in, Lita hands Edge a bottle of lighter fluid and then Edge squirts it all over Mick! Lawler can’t believe Edge is going to light Foley on fire! Foley comes back with a quick pull-up piledriver for two. Lita saves Edge from a ONE-MAN CONCHAIRTO by getting in the ring, but then Foley turns around into a DDT on a cookie sheet for two. Edge brings Barbie into play and harms Foley with it REAL good. He even bulldogs Foley on it for two. Edge goes back to the floor and pulls out a SACK OF TACKS and pours them all in the ring! Foley counters with a back suplex on the tacks! Edge is all like OWWWW so Foley pulls out MR. SOCKO, and then wraps him up with barbed wire! MANDIBLE CLAW for Edge AND Lita! Lita’s lip is supposedly busted open. Foley grabs Barbie and nails Edge with it a couple times. Both men are busted open pretty bad. Foley goes out onto the apron and pours lighter fluid on that table that was set up on the floor. Lita comes by with Barbie and whacks Foley in the balls with it! HAHAHA! She sets the table on fire as Edge comes THROUGH the ropes and spears Foley THROUGH THE FLAMING TABLE! Joey ~ “OH MY GOD!” That’ll do it as Edge gets the three-count. (14:38) A flaming table and a barbed-wire wrapped Mr. Socko. THAT’s hardcore, folks! Edge does a great mutilated sell-job on his way to the back. ****

4. It seemed like this was a match where WWE wanted Randy Orton to get in there and learn something. Possibly the most underrated WWE match of 2006, for reasons I don’t understand. I enjoyed the heck out of this match.

- Chris Benoit vs. Randy Orton – No Holds Barred, Falls Count Anywhere (Smackdown – 01.27.06)

Orton took Booker’s place due to an injury in order to finish his best-of-seven series with Benoit over the US Title. Orton is promised a favor in return, but I’m not sure that it ever paid off. After the Rumble, Orton went right into a feud with Rey Mysterio leading up to WrestleMania. Nice chain wrestling to start. Benoit comes out of a waistlock and goes to an overhead wristlock. Orton comes out of that into a side headlock. Benoit shoves him off into the ropes and takes a shoulderblock. He tries several times to do a German Suplex, but Orton blocks every attempt and slips through the ropes and out to the floor because he FEARS the move. Good psychology. Orton’s all, “I don’t think so, dude,” as we go to commercial. We come back to see Orton taking Benoit down with a headlock. Benoit tries to get out of that and surprise Orton with the CROSSFACE, but Orton gets away. Benoit works the arm with a standing armbar, but Orton rolls out of it and gets knocked down with some chops for two. Orton fights back and sends Benoit out to the floor with forearm shots. They fight on the announce table until Orton backs Benoit kidneys-first into the apron. Orton covers out on the floor for 1-2-NO! Back in, Orton covers again using the ropes for leverage for two. Nothing the ref can do about it either. Orton goes to the rigorous chinlock. Benoit fights out with an armdrag and gets caught with a HIGH dropkick. They go back out to the floor and Orton finds a trashcan lid and nails Benoit in the back with it. Now Orton grabs a trash can, but Benoit gives him a drop toe hold on it to buy himself some time. Benoit slams Orton’s face into the steps and chops him up against the ringpost. They go back over to the announce table for Benoit to slam Orton’s face on it and send him flying in Cole and Tazz’s seats! Orton fights back with a BLINDING rake to the eyes. Benoit takes a hotshot on the announce table for 1-2-NO! Back in, Orton delivers some knee drops and goes to the crazy chinlock again. Orton releases to stomp him and then goes out and brings a chair into the ring. Benoit ducks a wild swing with the chair and goes for the SHARPSHOOTER! Orton fights it, but Benoit holds on until he gets kicked away. Orton channels the spirit of NIKOLAI VOLKOFF and drops a big communist-like knee drop for 1-2-NO! Orton applies a sleeper/body scissors. Benoit breaks free of the body scissors. He remains in a front headlock, but fights out with a release Northern Lights suplex. They go out on the floor and brawl up the aisle way, but Benoit sends Orton back into the ring with chops. Benoit delivers a pair of knockdowns and then a running elbow drop for 1-2-NO! Benoit hits the Three Amigos and goes a superplex for the big exclamation point. Will he get it? Yes he does! Both men down at the seven-count, but then out of nowhere Benoit jumps on Orton to slap on the CRIPPLER CROSSFACE. Orton fights it off long enough to stand up and fall out to the floor along with Benoit. Orton grabs the trash can on the other side of the ring and walks over and hits Benoit in the head with it. Commercial time! We come back and Orton has Benoit in the ring and down on the mat in the tenacious chinlock. Benoit fights out of it with chops, but then Orton catches Benoit in a Stretch Backbreaker. Back out to the floor, Orton pulls up the protective mat to expose the concrete floor and tries to give Benoit a PILEDRIVER! That move is illegal in the WWE, even Cole says it is! I love how Orton takes advantage of the rules there to get the job done. Naturally, Benoit has to backdrop out of the piledriver. He grabs a steel chair and goes to KILL Orton with it, but Orton moves out of the way just in time for the chair to smash against the concrete. Benoit chases Orton back into the ring with the chair, but Orton kicks it away. Orton swings at Benoit, but he ducks and gets his Hat Trick of Germans! Benoit signals for the Swandive Headbutt and heads up top, but Orton brings up the trashcan lid to block and lets Benoit hit it face first. Hahaha, Orton is SMILING! Cole calls Orton a coward, which seems unjustified to me. That was smart. Orton slithers around waiting for Benoit to get up and take an RKO on the trashcan lid. Benoit blocks it and shoves Orton off into the ropes, and then NAILS Orton in the face with the lid, making Orton easy pickings for the CRIPPLER CROSSFACE and the win! (26:06) Just an all-around awesome match with tons of great psychology. ****

3. A classic match followed by a classic rematch. It’s amazing how they can create the same amazing atmosphere twice by doing two completely different matches. Sure, some spots were the same, but the ones that were different are what make this match so special. Up until the finish, you knew Undertaker meant what he said at No Way Out by telling Kurt Angle that he had his number.

- World Champion Kurt Angle vs. The Undertaker – (Smackdown – 03.03.06)

This is the rematch from No Way Out due to the controversial finish. I still don’t know how the WWE can call that finish controversial, but who cares! We get another great match! Crowd goes into the dueling chants to start as Angle tries to avoid being stuck in the corner with Taker. Angle ducks Taker’s shots and turns things around on Taker in the corner. Taker comes out and brings Angle into the corner by his throat and delivers some body shots. Taker chases the ref out of the ring and charges into a boot off a whip in the corner. Angle catches Taker in an armdrag and goes into an armbar. Taker escapes and applies a Fujiwara armbar of his own. Taker lifts Angle up in a knucklelock lift and heads over to the corner to wrench on Angle’s arm some more. Taker decides to go OLD SKOOL, but Angle brings him down with a forearm. Angle stomps Taker down in the corner, but Taker goes back to the arm to regain control. Taker looks like he wants to try for OLD SKOOL again, but Angle drills him with a forearm before he can start the climb. Angle delivers the ten-count corner punch, but Taker lifts him up for the LAST RIDE to counter after seven. Angle tries to block it, so Taker drops him on the top rope instead. Angle gets booted off the apron into the security wall as we go to break. We come back to see Taker setting up the announce table, but Angle stops him and slams Taker’s head into the steel steps, but then he turns around and drops Angle with a clothesline. Taker places Angle on the apron and gives him the guillotine leg drop across the neck instead of delivering it on the chest. Angle WRITHES in pain as he falls to the floor. Taker brings Angle back in to avoid a countout and covers for 1-2-NO! I love how Taker created the opportunity to move from working on the arm to the neck. Taker grinds and hammers on Angle’s neck and shoulders, but then Angle reverses a whip and hits a powerslam out of nowhere! Cover, 1-2-NO! Angle applies a chinlock, but releases the hold when Taker starts pushing on Angle’s face causing more torque on the neck. Angle delivers a suplex for two, and then moves to a body scissors for a few near-falls. Taker stands up out of it, leaving Angle open for right hands. Angle baits Taker in the corner and avoids a running big boot to create an opportunity to weaken Taker’s leg for the anklelock. Angle tries to knock Taker off the apron, but he runs into a back elbow to slow things down. Taker heads up top, but Angle meets him there only to get knocked back down. Angle comes back with rights and delivers a top-rope superplex for 1-2-NO! Commercial break #2! After the break, we see Angle punishing Taker with another chinlock. Taker punches out, but then gets clotheslined out to the floor by Angle. He lands on his feet and pulls Angle out to the floor with him. That proves to a BIG mistake, as Angle reverses a whip sending Taker knees-first into the steel steps! Back in, Angle covers for 1-2-NO! Taker wins a slugfest and follows Angle into the corner with a clothesline! Make it two clotheslines! Taker follows up with the snake-eyes, but Angle ducks the big boot and hits a German Suplex! OH YEAH! Angle wants the ANGLE SLAM, but will he get it? NO! Big boot by Taker! Cover, 1-2-NO! Taker wants a CHOKESLAM, but Angle decides that the ANKLELOCK might be that much cooler! Taker kicks Angle away and goes for the TOMBSTONE out of nowhere! Angle reverses, but so does Taker! Angle escapes, ducks a clothesline and hits the ANGLE SLAM! Cover, 1-2-NO!!! The crowd collectively has a heart attack at this point. Angle pulls down the straps, makes up some new cuss words, and slaps on the ANKLELOCK again! Taker rolls through it and catches Angle in a CHOKESLAM! Taker staggers around, so Angle takes advantage and surprises EVERYONE with another ANKLELOCK! Taker turns around and pulls Angle into the Triangle Choke! Angle starts to fade away, but then rolls over Taker into a pinning predicament just like at No Way Out, but Taker slips out after one. The choke is still applied as Taker rolls onto his back. Will Angle tap out?! Angle’s arm drops once, twice, but not three times as he reaches the bottom rope. Taker sets Angle up for a leg drop, but Angle avoids it and hooks on the ANKLELOCK for the FOURTH time in this match! Taker actually kicks Angle off again, slips out of an ANGLE SLAM, and applies a Dragon Sleeper! Angle pounds his way out of it and drops Taker with a DDT for 1-2-NO! Angle goes for it all with a picture-perfect MOONSAULT, but there’s no water in the pool! ZOMBIE SIT-UP! Taker hits the TOMBSTONE and just as he covers Angle, Mark Henry and Daivari hop in the ring and begin their attack for the DQ. (28:42) Crowd is pissed off at the ending, and I can’t say I blame them. How are you going to give us a near 30-minute classic and end it on a DQ? Henry kicks Taker out to the floor and splashes him through the announce table to get their WrestleMania feud-a-roasting. This was equally as good, if not better than their No Way Out match by showcasing some different moves than what was done before. It was nearing ****¾ territory in my eyes up until that utterly terrible finish, and I have no choice but to subtract a ½* away from it. However, horrible finish aside, it’s still the best free TV match of the year. ****¼

2. Okay, so before, I gave this the nod for match of the year, but then I popped in No Way Out one day and my mind was changed. I loved how the Cena/Edge feud came to this; Edge being topped in his own specialty match. What better way to dethrone the champ?

- WWE Champion Edge vs. John Cena – TLC Match (Unforgiven 09.17.06)

If Edge wins, Cena signs a three-year deal with Smackdown. If Cena wins, he becomes the three-time WWE Champion alongside Mick Foley and Brock Lesnar. In case you didn’t know, this is also Edge’s hometown so the crowd is very pro-Edge. Also, JR goofs up again by saying Edge (and Edge has said as well) has never lost in a TLC match. I vaguely remember a TLC match on Smackdown five years ago that Edge and Christian lost which included Benoit, Jericho, the Hardys and the Dudleys. Actually, I remember it VERY well. Why does everyone seem to forget about that match? We start off with Cena working a headlock while breaking the hold and getting in three shoulderblocks. Cena runs the ropes and Edge catches Cena with a slap to the face. Cena takes him down and pounds away, but then he ducks low off a whip and takes a swinging neckbreaker from Edge. They go to the floor where Edge tries to Cena’s head off with a steel chair, but he misses and Cena takes him back into the ring for the Protoplex. Edge avoids a charge and then delivers the Edgecution. Edge goes out and brings two chairs into the ring and then sets up facing each other. Edge tries to suplex Cena on the chairs, but he counters and tries for the suplex. Edge flips out and drops Cena with an inverted DDT on the chairs! Edge brings one of the shorter ladders into the ring and goes for the belt, but Cena gets back up and shoves the ladder over. Edge lands on his feet and charges at Cena with a clothesline. While Cena is draped across the middle ropes, Edge goes out to the floor and slams a ladder in his face. Edge follows up and comes off the security wall and missile dropkicks the ladder into Cena! Edge gets back in and tries to ram Cena with the ladder, but he moves and hits the corner. Cena comes back with rights and then hiptosses Edge onto the propped up ladder in the corner. Cena sees there’s two tables set up beside one another and grabs Edge so he can FU him through the tables, but Edge grabs the ropes and lands on the apron. Cena wins a slugfest and comes off the ropes, but gets nailed with a forearm. Edge goes up top and gets crotched to disable him long enough for Cena to bring a table into the ring. He sets it up in the ring and then tries to superplex Edge through it. Edge is able to hammer his way out for a sunset flip powerbomb, but Cena puts the brakes on the hold for our first real botched spot of the match. The crowd is a little disappointed to say the least. They improvise with Edge giving Cena a powerslam through the table. “Cena sucks!” chant go up as the ref gets the table out of the ring. Cena is out on the floor, so Edge runs up the ladder that’s still propped up in the corner and dives out onto Cena! Edge tosses Cena back in and brings two chairs in the ring with him. He levels Cena on the mat with a chair shot and then sets up for the one-man Conchairto, but Cena trips Edge up once he goes for the fatal swing. Cena hits the Throwback (running flip neckbreaker) on the chair! He then picks up the ladder and sandwiches Edge in between the ladder and applies the STFU! JR tries to convince us that Cena is a TOUGH SONUVAGUN for doing what he just did. Cena releases the hold and then rams the ladder into Edge’s face. He lifts the ladder up onto his shoulders and FU’s the ladder on Edge! Sure, why not. Cena sets the ladder up in the corner and then delivers a Protobomb to set up the Five Knuckle Shuffle from the ladder! Lawler ~ “I love a good fist drop, JR.” Cena goes out to the floor and brings another table into the ring, but then turns around in a WONDERFUL chairshot. I mean, that baby was nice. Cena is OUT. Haha, Edge starts to get cocky and bobbles his head as the crowd cheers! Edge sets Cena on a table and then goes out and brings another table into the ring, which he sets up on TOP of the table Cena is laid out on! Edge goes up top, but then Cena gets up and knocks Edge out onto the security wall. Cena goes out to the floor and pulls out one of those 16-foot ladders which will make it harder to climb, but a lot easier to grab the belt. I can’t let you forget about the ladder that was set up in the corner about five minutes ago because Edge is climbing it as we speak. He comes off of it and spears Cena off the big ladder to save his title! Not a perfect spear, but it worked. Edge begins to climb the big ladder, but then realizes Cena is up and dives out on top of him. Cena catches him and lifts Edge up into the FU position. He gets too close to the ladder, allowing Edge to climb off of Cena and onto the ladder. Cena stops him and powerbombs Edge into the smaller standing ladder. Yikes, that could’ve been disastrous. Edge falls out to the floor to rest, but Cena follows him out and has a steel chair in hand. Edge rises and Cena connects with a very, very weak chairshot. Cena rolls back in the ring and seems to be disappointed in himself. Cena begins to climb the 16-foot ladder to regain his title, but Lita comes down and turns the ladder over to send Cena through a table out on the floor ala Matt Hardy at SummerSlam 2000. The only difference was the table was horizontal instead of vertical like at SummerSlam. I’m proud of you, John. Edge finally starts to get up to his feet on the other side of the ring. Edge crawls in the ring and sets the ladder up underneath the belt as somehow Cena is back in the ring. Lita grabs a chair in the ring and nails Cena in the back with it, causing him to fall into the ladder and send Edge crashing through a table on the entrance ramp. OUCH! That looked like it hurt worse than Cena’s bump. Lita gets an FU to put her out of the match. The top table from the double-stack in the ring fell down because of the ring bounce from the FU, so Cena sets it back up because it’s very vital to the finish. Cena sets the ladder back up and begins to climb, and Edge has unbelievably made it back into the ring. He starts to climb the opposite side of the ladder to try and knock the challenger off, but Cena lifts him up on his shoulders for the FU off the ladder and through the double-stack of tables! The finish is academic as Cena easily grabs the belt to regain his championship! (25:29) That was one AMAZING match and possibly my favorite WWE TLC match. With a few minor obvious botches, it wasn’t perfect so I can’t give it the full five stars. ****¼

And now, to no one’s surprise, the #1 WWE match of 2006!

1. Absolutely tremendous match from bell-to-bell. It legitimized Kurt Angle’s title reign and proved that Undertaker could still go with someone talented. It’s no doubt the all-around best match WWE could muster up in 2006. After a couple more viewings, I boosted the rating up another ½*.

- World Heavyweight Champion Kurt Angle vs. Undertaker – (No Way Out 02.19.06)

Taker goes right after Angle, but Angle is able to dodge, dip, duck, dive, and dodge him to start. Angle pisses off Taker by shoving him in the back, so Taker goes crazy on him. Angle rolls out of the ring to avoid ALL of that. Back in, Taker works over Angle’s arm and shoulder for a good while. Taker goes for Old School, but Angle nails him in the face to put a stop to it. Taker counters a whip out of the corner into an arm whip. He goes for Old School again and this time it works. Taker hits the Snake Eyes, but Angle ducks the big boot and catches Taker for a German suplex. Angle punishes Taker in the corner with stomps and shoulder blocks. Taker counters a whip into the far side corner and follows in with a running knee to the face. Taker charges again, but Angle ducks out of the way. Taker gets knocked off the apron onto the barricade. Angle sends Taker face-first into the steel steps, but then Angle is caught coming off the apron and then driven spine-first into the ringpost. Taker sets Angle on the apron and delivers a legdrop across the throat. Back in, Taker goes for a chokeslam but Angle kicks him away. Now Angle goes after Taker’s left knee. He posts his knee a couple times and then applies the ringpost figure-four. Back in, Angle stomps away on Taker’s knee and then goes all Ric Flair on Taker by splashing his knee against the ropes. Taker tosses Angle to the floor out of desperation. Taker sets Angle up on the apron again for another legdrop, but Angle counters it with an ANKLELOCK out on the floor! Angle goes in to break the count and then comes back out to apply the hold once again. Back in, Angle applies a legbar but Taker kicks out of it. Angle comes back with a double-leg takedown, but Taker counters that with a TRIANGLE CHOKE! Angle makes the ropes. Angle rolls out to the floor to try and rejuvenate himself. Taker goes out after him and attacks him out on the floor. He even tosses him into Tony Chimel! That guy has had a rough night! Tazz ~ “Better Chimel than us.” Weren’t you a wrestler once? Geez. Taker sets up the Cole/Tazz announce table, but Angle catches Taker and drives him through the SAT with an ANGLESLAM! Angle cusses ref Nick Patrick out for trying to count out the Undertaker. Angle rocks your face off. He goes back out to the floor and pounds on Taker, but then gets whipped into the steel steps. Back in, Taker goes up top possibly for his flying clothesline, but Angle pops up and tries a superplex. Angle gets knocked back down to the mat, but then he comes back up and delivers a SUPER BELLY-TO-BELLY THROW. Angle covers for two. Angle comes off the ropes, but runs into a boot for two. Taker goes for the chokeslam, but Angle rolls through into the ANKLELOCK! Taker pulls Angle into the TRIANGLE CHOKE! Angle counters THAT into another ANKLELOCK! Taker rolls Angle off of him and then gives Angle a CHOKESLAM! That gets a near-fall! Now it’s time for the LAST RIDE! Or is it? Angle rolls out of that into another ANKLELOCK! Taker kicks him off again, but swings his way into an ANGLESLAM! Angle covers, but it only gets two. Angle can’t believe it! He pulls down the straps so he can finally get serious! They trade blows. Angle comes off the ropes and Taker catches him for the TOMBSTONE! Angle reverses it into a Tombstone of his own. Taker reverses it again but Angle rolls down into the ANKLELOCK! Angle grapevines the leg! OH SNAP! Taker rolls over so that he’s able to kick Angle repeatedly in the face to get him off of him. Both men back up, Angle delivers ANOTHER ANGLESLAM! Angle tries a rollup of sorts, but Taker pulls him in the TRIANGLE CHOKE again! Kurt looks like he’s going to pass out! The arm falls twice but on the third time, Angle flips over into a pinning predicament with Taker’s shoulders down on the mat for the three-count! ANGLE RETAINS! (29:48) Tazz tries to say that since Taker was the aggressor that his shoulders shouldn’t have been counted. Well, if they want to say that it was a controversial finish for the REMATCH on Smackdown, then that’s cool with me! Taker is another guy that can have great matches with great competitors, and Angle is capable of having a great match with just about anybody. Add these two together and you’ve got an excellent match. I would say that this was definitely Taker’s best non-gimmicked match since 1997; bar none. I would also go as far as to say that this is Angle’s greatest successful PPV title defense outside of Angle/Benoit at the Rumble 2003. ****½

EDIT: After reading that, chances are — either you think my writing has gotten better or its gotten a lot less creative. All the same, I hope you enjoyed that.

It’s all snowy here in North Carolina and when there’s anything white on the ground, our entire world shuts down, which means I’ve got nowhere to go. Having said that, my ten picks from 2007 are due. Look for it to be up sometime Sunday!

• Triple H (w/Ric Flair) vs. Randy Orton vs. Chris Jericho vs. Edge vs. Batista vs. Chris Benoit – Elimination Chamber (New Years Revolution 2005)
  

Matt: LIVE FROM PUERTO RICO! Shawn Michaels is *your* special guest referee and the World title is completely up for grabs thanks to a HHH-Edge-Benoit triple threat match back in December that had a double-pin finish. Easily the best match this PPV ever generated in the three years of its existence. It was bloody, brutal, and quite dramatic. Benoit and Jericho started the match for the first five minutes and tore the house down. Triple H and Edge would be the first two men to escape their chambers. Somebody has to nearly kill themselves by coming off one of the chambers, so the inevitable happens as Benoit comes off the top of a chamber with the Swandive Headbutt to Triple H. It’s always a beautiful thing. We saw some awesome three-man spots as Benoit stopped a Pedigree on Jericho by throwing Triple H away with a German suplex. Also, there’s a neat exchange between Triple H, Benoit, and Orton. Benoit releases a nasty looking Crossface on Orton to put Triple H in the Sharpshooter since he’s just standing there taunting Orton. With Benoit’s head exposed, you can see the RKO coming a mile away. The moment finally comes when HBK gets involved. Orton ducks a spear from Edge, which causes Shawn to take the blow. Orton gets a spear anyway, but HBK is too hurt to make the count. Edge gets in Shawn’s face – SWEET CHIN MUSIC – followed by a Lionsault from Jericho and there goes Edge’s chances at winning the World title, which he was clinically obsessed about doing at the time. That sets up their match for the Royal Rumble. Triple H gets stuck in a Crippler Crossface-Walls of Jericho spot and everybody thinks he’s going to submit when Batista’s time to enter the match comes up and he makes the save for his mentor. I was becoming more of a Batista during the period after NYR when Batista started to mess with Triple H. Before that, he was just a big enforcer guy for the Evolution stable. Here is where he gets awesome. He throws Jericho into a cameraman and then SPINEBUSTERS Jericho on top of Benoit! WHO DOES THAT. That gets rid of Benoit. A Demon Bomb later to Jericho gets rid of him as well. That leaves HHH & Batista vs. Orton. Not good. As Orton continues to kickout of Triple H’s offense, he gets a little mad and lets Batista go for the Demon Bomb. Nobody kicks out of that. Instead, Orton low blows out and drops Batista with the RKO! Cover, 1-2-3! Batista is GONE! Umm, why didn’t Triple H make the save? He starts to and then he sits back down in the corner! Oh man. As the cage door opens up to get Batista out, Ric Flair hops into the match to distract HBK while Batista nails Orton with a clothesline. That sets up an easy Pedigree as HHH wins his tenth world championship (five WWE, five world). Afterwards, Batista puts HHH up on his shoulders to celebrate. You expect Batista to drop back, but it never happens. On an otherwise awful PPV, this match is worth taking a look at if you’re a fan of this era on Raw.

Justin: When Triple H lost his title in the triple threat match on Raw, many people thought a changing of the guard was in the air. Bischoff vacated the belt and put it up for grabs in the Chamber. Up until this point, this was definitely the best Chamber match in the history of the gimmick. All six men were in a good groove here and they all had good chemistry with each other. Despite still being a heel here, Batista was really gaining a strong fan following and had eclipsed his former partner Randy Orton as a crowd favorite. All six men worked hard and as badly as everyone wanted Hunter to lose here, he really was the best option to pass the torch to Batista. The subtle move by Hunter to feign being to worn out to save Batista was awesome too. Great match to kick off a really good year for in ring action.

• Edge vs. Chris Benoit vs. Chris Jericho vs. Kane vs. Christian (w/Tyson Tomko) vs. Shelton Benjamin – ‘Money in the Bank’ Ladder Match (WrestleMania 21)
  

Matt: The mother of all ‘Money in the Bank’ ladder matches. The chances we saw taken in TLC matches in years past came back with this one. This was all kinds of cool as we saw a very brief reunion between Edge and Christian, Shelton Benjamin WALKING UP A TILTED LADDER to clothesline Jericho, Benoit’s pain-stricken Swandive Headbutt. Much like Rhyno helped E&C win at TLC II at WrestleMania X-7, “The Problem Solver” Tyson Tomko nearly helped Christian win it all before Kane gave Tyson the big boot to the floor and turned the ladder over to send Christian falling on top of Tomko. Unlike your usual popcorn spotfest, this one had some storytelling as well. As Benoit made that final ascent up the ladder with his hurt shoulder, Edge comes out of nowhere and BLASTS Benoit’s shoulder with a chair. Down goes Benoit. Up goes Edge as he retrieves the ‘Money in the Bank’ briefcase to one day getting a random title shot whenever he wants.

Justin: This is the match that established the legend of MITB. Take six or eight hard working midcarders and toss them into a wild environment full of weapons and let them battle for a title shot. I think the prize really added to this match as well as the idea of a title shot that is good for one year was a shrewd one. These guys destroyed each other and really set the bar for the ensuing versions of the match. The breakout star here was clearly Shelton Benjamin, who wowed the crowd with his athleticism and risky offense. Edge picked up a big win to help keep his heel turn churning ahead and Chris Benoit put on an exhibition in legendary selling. Great stuff and a big contender for the match of the night.

• Kurt Angle vs. Shawn Michaels – (WrestleMania 21)
  

Matt: I haven’t watched UT-HBK from WrestleMania 25 since I saw it live, but it’s these two matches that in my opinion HAVE to be the best standard one-on-one matches from WWE in this decade. I’ve done a review for this already on the Kurt Angle mixtape, so here you go!

Michaels eliminated Angle at the Royal Rumble and from there a rivalry was started to the point both guys have come to WrestleMania to see who the best wrestler of the decade is. This match is also labeled as an inter-promotional match, but all that really means is Raw vs. Smackdown. Both guys get into a wrestling stance to start and then Shawn shocks Angle with a slap! Charlie Murphy says, YOU DON’T SLAP A MAN! Angle explodes on HBK and rides him down to the mat. From there, Shawn does what Angle didn’t expect him to do – wrestle. HBK grabs hold of a headlock and doesn’t let go. Once Angle finds the ropes, Shawn applies a short-arm scissors down on the mat. Angle tries to lift and slam HBK out of it, but Shawn counters that into a sunset flip for two. Backslide gets another two. Back to the headlock. They brawl into the corner and as the “biased” Smackdown ref pulls HBK out, Angle blasts him from behind with a clothesline and grabs the ANKLELOCK out of nowhere. Shawn quickly rolls Angle off him and they take each other to the floor. Shawn sets up the Smackdown table for something big. They brawl on the floor until Angle ducks a blow and picks Shawn up for the ANGLE SLAM! Instead of dropping him on the floor, Angle backs Shawn kidneys-first into the ringpost! Back in, Angle hits a snap suplex for a pair of twos. Now he grabs a body scissors. HBK battles out, but gets caught with an overhead belly to belly suplex off the Ray Stevens corner bump. Angle places a knee in Shawn’s kidneys and pulls back on the neck. HBK escapes and during an exchange, slaps Angle again which gets him clotheslined hard to the mat. Shawn shoves off a belly-to-belly superplex, but misses the Flying Elbow. DOWN COME THE STRAPS! Michaels armdrags out of the ANGLE SLAM and takes Angle to the floor. He dives on top of Angle – driving his knee right into Angle’s face! Shawn avoids the German Suplex Off The Apron That Never Happens and knocks Angle onto the Smackdown table for the Springboard Splash, but the table doesn’t break! Back inside, Angle is bleeding PROFUSELY from the mouth. Shawn connects with the Flying Forearm and KIPS UP to continue his comeback. Flying Elbow hits this time as he sets up for SWEET CHIN MUSIC! Oh, Angle counters into the ANKLELOCK! Shawn makes the ropes and counters another ANGLE SLAM, but Angle rolls through into more of the ANKLELOCK! Shawn counters into a victory roll, but stands up into the ANGLE SLAM! Cover, 1-2-NO! Now Angle goes for it all with the Flying Moonsault and completely misses. Shawn slowly heads up top and gets caught with the SUPER ANGLE SLAM! Cover, 1-2-NO!! OH MY GOSH. Angle is REALLY frustrated right now. He grabs Shawn by the hair and SCREAMS at him to tap out, so Shawn shoves him back and delivers a desperate SWEET CHIN MUSIC! Slow cover gets two! Shawn was knocked so loopy by that Super Angle Slam, that it takes him forever to even get to his feet. Angle ceases the moment and easily takes Shawn down into the ANKLELOCK! HBK does one INCREDIBLE job selling the pain of the hold, but once Angle grapevines the leg Shawn has no choice but to tap out. (26:58) Such an incredible performance from both men. You have to think that Shawn and Taker may have looked back to this match when they got together at WM 25 in the way that there were several moments when the match could have been over, but it went another 10-15 minutes and continued to build and build up to a fantastic and dramatic ending. Without a doubt, one of the top three matches of the decade. *****

Justin: And the other contender was this showdown of legends. Since Michaels returned, this was one of those dream matches everyone was waiting for. When they set it up at the Rumble, everybody knew we were in for a treat. They delivered the classic everyone anticipated and in a pretty surprising result, Angle picked up the clean win on Mr. WrestleMania. The only gripe some pundits had was that Michaels lasted a bit too long in the Anklelock, but it wasn’t enough to punish the match on a whole. This was just a great match with a big time classic feel.

• Shawn Michaels vs. Shelton Benjamin – Gold Rush Tournament Match (Raw, 5/2/05)
  

Matt: It’s an easy match to love. You have wrestlers that can fly and you have wrestlers who can go on the mat, but rarely ever do you have a sweet combination of the two. These two could do both and excelled tremendously against one another to make for one awesome match which stood out above all the other matches in this Gold Rush tournament to find a #1 contender to Batista’s world heavyweight title. Even though he already had the ‘Money in the Bank’ briefcase which guaranteed a title shot whenever he wanted, he still ended up losing to the Animal. But back to the match, it’s fantastic with Shelton nearly getting the win on Shawn on several different occasions but everyone remembers it for the amazing springboard into SWEET CHIN MUSIC to give Shawn the victory over the man with the longest IC title reign of the decade. That’s either a compliment to Shelton Benjamin or an utter travesty done to the title because I can’t for the life of me honestly remember him doing anything with the belt. I’ll let you decide.

Justin: This match was part of the Gold Rush tournament as Eric Bischoff was trying to determine a number one contender to Batista’s World Title. Shelton had really come into his own as a wrestler since breaking out a year earlier and when Michaels made his entrance, the fans in the arena started to buzz. These two went balls to wall and delivered a tremendous TV match. Of course, the highlight was the insane SCM that Benjamin ate as he springboards off the top rope and into the ring. Shelton continued to help his stock soar but Michaels was able to narrowly steal this win.

• WWE Champion John Cena vs. JBL – “I Quit” Match (Judgment Day 2005)
  

Matt: If you thought John Cena’s successful WWE title match at WrestleMania was a tad lame, this match MORE than made up for it. Also if you had wanted to see JBL get destroyed for his entire 280-day reign because I know a lot of folks did, this is your match. I can’t think of too many bad ‘I quit’ matches in WWE. I’ve always liked them whether it was Magnum TA and Tully Blanchard or Ric Flair and Terry Funk or even the Rock and Mankind. This was not nearly as iconic, but they definitely tried. First of all, Cena makes his entrance on a SEMI TRUCK! Awesome. Well into the match, JBL makes a man out of the “Doctor of Thuganomics” (which if any dude nicknamed himself that in real life, they should lose all credibility for trying to be a tough guy) gives Cena the same scary chairshot he gave Eddie Guerrero the previous year at Judgment Day. He bleeds, but thankfully not quite as bad as Eddie did. I mean, really. Nobody should be doing that. Cena makes his SUPERMAN comeback that has been DONE over the years of his numerous and lengthy title reigns. They brawl over to the stage where Cena throws JBL through TV screens and through the car windows of JBL’s own limo. JBL gets in his licks too – violently hanging Cena from power cords and everything. Kind of an anticlimactic finish as JBL gives up before Cena whacks him with the smokestack from the semi truck he drove in on, but whatever. Cena nails him after he gives up anyway with the smokestack through a glass panel.

Justin: After a meteoric rise to the top, John Cena was still looking for that epic classic to cement his position. His WM Championship win was a bit anticlimactic as he easily dispatched of the long term champion JBL. JBL got his rematch here and they delivered the match that many expected at Mania. These two beat on each with ferocity and a bevy of weapons. The blood was flowing and the crowd was pumped as Cena was able to take out JBL once again to continue his title reign. This was a match Cena needed, but it would also end up being his final big time match with the fans completely behind him as a top level face, so in a way it is a pretty historic bout as well.

• Masato Tanaka vs. Mike Awesome – (ECW One Night Stand 2005)
  

Matt: These two had a great rivalry going in ‘98 –’99 in the original ECW and now they meet again. Basically a tribute to their past crazy VIOLENT matches they had at Heatwave ‘98 and the two classic matches they had on TNN in late 1999. We saw an Awesome Bomb off the apron through a table and an Awesome Bomb from inside the ring out to the floor through a table. Just insanity. Tanaka took more super hard chairshots in one match than anybody should ever receive in a lifetime. But he wasn’t completely out done. He gave Awesome a run for his money with a tornado DDT on a couple chairs and a super DDT through a table! If you loved ECW for the hardcore wrestling, this is as close as WWE would allow anymore in this show-stealing match.

Justin: On the most unlikely show of the year, two forgotten stars of days gone by came to NYC to put on a violent reminder of what made ECW so memorable. Nobody ever could have dreamed that ECW would make a return like this and who would have expected Tanaka and Awesome to deliver a classic ECW war. These two went all out, probably auditioning for a job, and just laid waste to each other with sick weapon shots. Awesome put the dagger in Tanaka with a nasty powerbomb to a table on the floor and then put a cherry on top with a big dive out on top of him. Unfortunately, he messed up his knee, which may have cost him a contract. Regardless, it was a hell of a performance that added to the legend of this show.

• Shawn Michaels vs. Kurt Angle – (Vengeance 2005)
  

Matt: The WrestleMania rematch nobody minded seeing again. Of course it doesn’t hold a candle to the drama of the first match, Shawn and Angle bust their rumps in match #2 of their three match series in 2005. We saw some nods to the original match by HBK avoiding an Angle Slam into the ringpost, but he still had to settle for a German suplex on the SAT. From there, Angle continued to destroy Shawn on the mat for the next 15 minutes. Just incredible stuff. Shawn made his signature comeback, but Angle cut off the Sweet Chin Music and terrorized HBK with the Anklelock. The whole match was centered around Angle’s desire to make Shawn tap one more time just like he did at WrestleMania 21. Of course Shawn held out all the way to the end. HBK finally nailed Angle with Sweet Chin Music, but it wasn’t enough to put Angle away. Once Angle came off the top (which isn’t his domain anyway), he leaped right down into Sweet Chin Music for real to give HBK his win back. Great match and it definitely deserves to be on this list, but the original match is most certainly the greatest of all three. Angle and Shawn would meet one more time on Raw’s return show to the USA Network in a 30 minute ironman match that went to a draw. Check that match out on the Best of Raw DVD!

Justin: The WM rematch was heavily hyped and heavily anticipated. The two stars delivered once again, equaling their Mania effort, with Michaels picking up the win this time around. Once of the best spots of the match was when Angle powerbombs Michaels into the turnbuckles. This year was loaded with great matches and these two produced two of them.

• World Heavyweight Champion Batista vs. Triple H – Hell in a Cell (Vengeance 2005)
  

Matt: The breakdown of Evolution ends here at the Hell in a Cell. Some people love their other two matches, but I believe their best match is right here at Vengeance. After years of overrated and mediocre Hell in a Cell matches, we finally get one that is AWESOME. Batista busts Triple H open early, but then Triple H pulls out a chair wrapped in barbed-wire that both guys get a chance to play with. Yeah, that gets pretty gruesome. Naturally, Batista gets busted open as well. HHH finds a sledgehammer, but even that won’t put Batista down for the three count. Triple H saves himself from the same fate with a chain-wrapped fist to the face! That still doesn’t put Batista away. Batista makes his comeback and sends the bottom half of the ringside stairs into the ring. Triple H gets his head bounced off that a bunch, but he counters a Demon Bomb with a low blow and a Pedigree. Still can’t get the win. He wants to one-up his game a bit with a Pedigree on the steps, but Batista counters with a SPINEBUSTER on the steps instead. Why not. One Demon Bomb later and Batista defeats Triple H for the THIRD time on PPV in nearly three months. Now that’s putting somebody over, I don’t know what is. Certainly another brutal affair that cemented Batista as the next big star in WWE. He’ll become plagued with injuries over the next several years, so it’s just sad that he couldn’t really ever top this match.

Justin: One of the top stories of 2005 was the rise of Batista. Triple H did his best to make him a star, already having put him over twice cleanly. He was given one final rematch inside the Cell on a loaded Vengeance card. You knew Hunter could bring the goods in a gimmick match, but the jury was still out on Batista. Well, those questions were answered when these two gave us a brutal slugfest. There were no crazy insane spots, just a lot of weapons, violence and hatred. By the end of this battle, Batista was legitimized as a major star and Hunter was headed to the sidelines for a much needed break. This is definitely one of the best Cell matches in the history of the gimmick.

• Matt Hardy vs. Edge – Cage Match (Unforgiven 2005)
  

Matt: If you were a fan in 2005, you know all about the Matt Hardy-Edge soap opera. In real life, Edge cheated on his wife with Matt’s girlfriend Lita and now the couple decided to become public with their relationship. Of course this was after Matt was released from WWE. Big mistake. After everyone protested, Matt makes an appearance on Raw three months after his release and acted like a total nut job saying that his fans could see him in Ring of Honor. While this was all true since Matt made several appearances in ROH, this appearance blurred the lines between a work and a shoot in a way that fans hadn’t seen since the early days of the nWo in WCW. So Vince resigns Matt just in time for a match with Edge at SummerSlam. Everyone hoped for a shoot fight considering the hatred Matt should be feeling for Edge, but when they started whipping each other into the ropes, the match lost all its appeal. Now we get a cage match. This was a year of brutality and these two about killed each other. Edge busted out some crazy offense on Matt like a powerbomb into the cage wall while Hardy just busts Edge and grinds on the cut like a mental patient. He gets a little revenge on Lita with the Twist of Fate and then drops the craziest moment of the match – a FLYING LEGDROP FROM THE TOP OF THE CAGE! That gave Matt the win. It’s just a shame looking back that this was the best that he ever got working in singles matches. Check this one out on the Hardy Boyz DVD!

Justin: To me, this may be one of the most underrated matches of the year, and maybe even the decade. Everyone knows the back story for this. Hardy made his return but was knocked silly by Edge at SummerSlam. He was looking for revenge here and he got it with a hard fought win inside a cage. The spot of the match was Hardy’s crazy legdrop from the top of the cage. This was another hate filled battle in a year full of them. Hardy gets a much needed win in a classic encounter.

• WWE Intercontinental Champion Ric Flair vs. Triple H – Cage Match (Taboo Tuesday 2005)
  

Matt: Another match I’ve already done a review for, so I’ll just repost that instead. From the History of the IC Championship DVD.

Joey Styles and Jerry Lawler are on commentary. Time for Triple H to put Old Yeller down. Big standoff to start with both men exchanging some rather mean words! Being the master of mind games, Flair backs H into the corner for a chop and then walks away. Flair continues with the chops until HHH nails Flair with a High Knee. Flair chops back some more, but runs into a AA Spinebuster. Triple H is hesitant at first, but then starts beating the crap out of Flair and sends him into the cage to bust him open. Another throw into the cage sets up the Knee Drop out of the corner. H then takes Flair to the cage wall and starts to grind his face right before he splashes Flair up against the steel. This time H lowers the knee pad and Knee Drops Flair out of disrespect. Triple H sends Flair into the cage one more time and then starts to climb out. Flair is not going to die that easily though and meets H at the top and chops him down. They trade blows until they wind up crotching each other on the top rope. H climbs back up and finds a chain in the corner of the cage. With Flair down on the mat, H wraps the chain around his fist to come down on Flair, but Ric gets his foot up to block. H still has the chain wrapped around his knuckles as Flair chops him and sets him up for the FIGURE-FOUR with a shin breaker, but H gives him a chain punch to the face. Cover, 1-2-NO! Triple H drops a fist again with the chain on Flair before ref Mickey Jay takes it away from him. HHH destroys Flair by beating him down in the corner and then hits another Knee Drop before mocking Flair with the FIGURE-FOUR. Flair makes DEATH THREATS to Triple H when he’s in the hold! Triple H cranks on it but Flair will not die. Flair eventually flips Triple H the bird and turns the hold over into the ropes. H drags Flair to the middle of the ring to reapply the Figure Four, but Flair kicks him off into the steel. Now Triple H is busted wide open. When he sees blood, Flair gets a second wind and works the cut on the cage and with his fingers! Stalling suplex by Flair sets up the Rolling Knee Drop. Flair gives him another one. More chops from Flair leads to a chop block to do some damage on the knee. FIGURE-FOUR is applied by Flair this time. Triple H avoids submitting by throwing the ref into Flair to break up the hold. Flair stays in control with a knee drop to H’s knee and then starts to climb out. H comes after him, but gets raked in the eyes and takes a flying single sledge to the head. Cover, 1-2-NO! From there, Flair low blows Triple H to allow Joey Styles a justifiable reason to say “balls” on PPV. Triple H grabs hold of Flair to keep him from crawling out the door. He brings a chair in with him. H gets the chair away from Flair and goes to whack him, but Flair grabs the testicular claw! Flair gives him a chop while he’s there too! He ducks low off a whip though to set up a PEDIGREE, but Flair backdrops H over onto the chair. Flair proceeds to give Triple H THREE chairshots and then walks out the cage to retain his title and his dignity. (23:46) A very good albeit methodical brawl. ***¾

Justin: Upon his return from his HITC loss, Hunter promptly turned on his mentor Ric Flair and put an ungodly beating on him on Raw. Flair challenged the Game here. Flair’s IC title was on the line as well. The teacher and the student spent nearly 17 minutes brutalizing each other until Flair was able to sneak out a win. After years of dominance and complaints, Hunter spent all of 2005 jobbing to help quell his detractors a bit. Flair showed that he could still deliver a vicious psychologically driven war with this one. They would put on another vicious battle at Survivor Series, making this one of the best feuds of the second half of the year.

Well that does it for another year! Next up, my picks for the ten best WWE matches of 2006 will be my 500^th post for the Powerdriver Review! It’s funny because it’s actually a repost of a post that of the top ten matches of 2006 that I chose and worked on for TheHistoryofWWE back at the end of 2006. So come on back for that one, ya’ll.

After Sheamus’ stunning victory for the WWE Championship this past Sunday, I thought it might be fun to take a look at some of the other fastest ascents to the top of the mountain in WWE history. Although many are protesting that Sheamus has won the title too soon, it may come as a surprise to find out that his is not the shortest run to the title in history. Here I present the list of those men that I believe to be the top eleven quickest world champions in WWE history, although one or two of them, as you will see, are somewhat arguable. I am here counting the number of days it took each of these men, starting from their television debut, to win the championship. I’ll count down in reverse order.

11: Bob Backlund. Later to become known for antics so wild and crazy that many fans remain unsure just what is a work and what isn’t, when he made his debut on February the 8^th1977, Bob Backlund was the classic all-American babyface. An accomplished amateur wrestler (he was an NCAA Division II Champion), Backlund had become known for a clean, technical wrestling style and had already found a fair amount of success, and championship belts, in various other territories. Backlund was the perfect foil for the rule-breaking champion “Superstar” Billy Graham. It was not much more than a year later, just 377 days after his debut, that Backlund defeated Graham to begin his reign as the 7^th WWWF Champion. And what a reign it was! Glossing over a couple of dubious decisions that are not recognized by the WWE, Backlund was champ for almost six years and faced practically everybody who was anybody in the business at the time, including a string of “Champion vs Champion” matches that pitted him against NWA Champions Harley Race and Ric Flair, and AWA Champion Nick Bockwinkel. He even found time to team with Pedro Morales and win the tag team championships! Finally, The Iron Sheik was victorious where so many had failed, defeating Backlund with his notorious Camel Clutch when Backlund’s manager, Arnold Skaaland, threw in the towel. Backlund would famously return to the company and capture a shocking second championship from Bret Hart eleven years later.

10: The Undertaker. Debuting at the 1990 Survivor Series, The Undertaker took just 370 days, barely over one calendar year, to capture the biggest prize in the company. Now, over nineteen years since his debut, it is difficult to remember the wrestling landscape without the Deadman but back then, this character was a major gamble. Although the World Wrestling Federation was the home of larger than life, outlandish characters, The Undertaker, with his supernatural trappings, represented a leap into the unknown even for them. Add to that the fact that Mark Calaway was yet to really step into main-event level wrestling and the nature of the gamble becomes clear. Of course, the gimmick was actually insanely popular right from the word go, to the extent that Pat Patterson recalled that he was actually surprised that it took as long as it did for The Undertaker to reach the top! Making all of this more impressive was the fact ‘Taker won the title from Hulk Hogan himself, something few people could boast. Sure, it was a crooked win, and Hogan took the title back six days later but the fact remained: hardly a year into his wrestling career, The Undertaker had defeated the Immortal one and reached the top of the mountain.

9: Kurt Angle. If ever a wrestler had seemed destined to be WWE Champion it had to be Kurt Angle. After he won his Olympic Gold Medal in the 1996 Atlanta games, Angle found himself pursued by the WWE. However, at that point he wanted to try other career options and, when he contacted them again a couple of years later, he found that interest had cooled somewhat. Once they got him in developmental, however, that all changed! From the moment he made his debut at the 1999 Survivor Series it was clear that Angle had it all. His sense of entitlement, due to his amateur credentials, his infuriating smugness and his winning streak made him hated heel almost instantly and, as time wore on, and Angle resorted to ever more desperate means to preserve his unbeaten run, he became ever more hated. It was at No Mercy 2000, just 343 days into his WWE career, that Angle won the Championship from The Rock, ironically, the man who had handed Angle his very first pinfall loss. Once at the top, Angle never looked back. That first title reign saw successful defences against The Undertaker and Triple H, but the high point of it had to be the six man Hell in a Cell match at Armageddon, where Angle successfully held off the challenges of Rikishi, Triple H, The Undertaker, The Rock and Stone Cold Steve Austin. It really doesn’t get any bigger or better than that. Although Angle dropped the title back to The Rock at No Way Out 2001, just about four months after winning it, it hardly mattered. Kurt Angle had established himself as one of the top pro wrestlers in the business, which is what he has remained ever since.

8: The Big Show. Paul Wight came to the WWE in 1999 already a former world champion with victories over Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair, thanks to his days in WCW, so it is hardly surprising that he found himself champ before the year was out, after a mere 273 days. Subbing in for the run-over Stone Cold Steve Austin in a triple threat match against Triple H and The Rock, Show could hardly have asked for a better way to become champion. However, his title reign would be somewhat anticlimactic. His only pay per view title defence came against The Big Boss Man at Armageddon the next month, in one of WWE’s more tasteless storylines. However, this match actually took place on the lower card, as the main event went to Triple H and Vince McMahon’s street fight. Show also made successful defences against The British Bulldog, Kane and Triple H, before Triple H finally got the job done on the first Raw of 2000. Still, a genuinely gigantic man, Big Show is the very definition of “over without the belt” and will remain a big star as long as he wants to be.

7: Kane. Kane’s meteoric rise to the top is somewhat arguable due to the fact that his debut was not actually his debut. Glenn Jacobs had actually signed with the WWE in 1995 and had competed as Jerry Lawler’s psychotic dentist Isaac Yankem and the fake Diesel in two very forgettable gimmicks. However, the character Kane, although teased for some time beforehand, did not make his televised debut until Badd Blood, on October the 5^th 1997. Just 247 days later, at King of the Ring 1998, Kane was WWE Champion. Kane’s rapid ascent to the top was perhaps unsurprising given that, unlike most wrestlers, Kane was brought in as a main-event wrestler from the word go. His gimmick, as The Undertaker’s brother, meant that he was starting at the top. Kane, of course, would famously hold his championship for only one day, losing it back to Steve Austin the next night on Raw in what was regarded as one of the classic matches in Raw history. However, although Kane may not have reached such dizzy heights again, he has remained a serious player in the WWE. Although it is beginning to seem unlikely now, another title reign is not yet out of the question for the Big Red Monster.

6: Goldberg. Bill Goldberg differs from most of the men mentioned so far on this list because, when he reached the WWE in 2003, he was already an established main-event wrestler and former World Champion from his WCW days. Indeed, although he took only 174 days to take the World Heavyweight Championship from Triple H at Unforgiven, most critics argued that, if anything the WWE had waited too long to push him to the top! One can also argue that Goldberg does not belong on this list because he never won the WWE Championship; personally, I think it’s clear that the WWE themselves regard the two titles as largely interchangeable, and therefore I see it as a rather pedantic point. Regardless of that, Goldberg’s run as champ in WWE was largely regarded as a disappointment. Whether one blames him for not adapting to the WWE style, or them for not booking him correctly, this title run did not even come close to matching his WCW achievements. It was barely three months later, at Armageddon when Triple H reclaimed his belt. By Wrestlemania 20, it was known that Goldberg was leaving the WWE. The man who had once been one of the biggest draws in the wrestling business left it, to a general response of apathy.

5: Sheamus. Well, we all know this story, don’t we? Sheamus’ victory over John Cena at TLC came just 166 days after the Irishman made his WWE television debut on ECW. Sheamus’ elevation in itself was not a surprise, but its speed has been, largely because he has only been booked with mid-card talent until, suddenly, he finds himself number one contender and champion all in the space of a fortnight. Where this will lead, we cannot say. I myself have been a fan of Sheamus’ for years, so I have every confidence that he will go on to be a long-term player in the company. However, nothing is guaranteed in this business.

4: Brock Lesnar. Brock Lesnar burst onto the scene on the Raw immediately following Wrestlemania 18 and was booked as an unstoppable force from the get go. By the time he defeated The Rock for the championship at Summerslam 2002, he had only been appearing on TV for 160 days! In that time he had accumulated a number of victories, most notably over Hulk Hogan, who he had supposedly retired. Lesnar’s first title reign was memorable for several reasons. Firstly, it saw the beginning of the Raw and Smackdown separate championships system that has persisted to this day. Secondly, because Lesnar turned babyface simply by being so brutal and destructive that people began to like and respect him for it. When, at Survivor Series, he lost the title to The Big Show, his awesome feats of strength displayed in suplexing and throwing the giant around, before finally lifting him to his shoulders for the F5, something which, at that point, had not been done before, meant that he was firmly established as a crowd favourite. Sadly, Lesnar’s heart was not in the business, otherwise who knows what he might have achieved?

3: Yokozuna. Yokozuna’s 144 day sprint to the top represents the fastest journey from TV debut to WWE champion of anybody who was not already established as a main-event star when they joined the company. Making his first televised appearance on October the 31^st, his rise was even more astonishing than that of Sheamus and Lesnar, as Yokozuna won the Royal Rumble less than three months into his WWE career! Playing the typically anti-American foreign heel, Yokozuna was billed as a Japanese sumo wrestler when he was, in fact, Samoan wrestler Rodney Anoa’i, nephew of Wild Samoans Afa and Sika and cousin of Rikishi. However, if one thinks that Kane’s title reign, at one day, was brief, Yokozuna’s was real blink and you’ll miss it stuff! At Wrestlemania 9, Yokozuna, as Royal Rumble winner, took on then-champion Bret Hart, and defeated him after Mr Fuji, managing Yokozuna, threw salt in the face of Hart. The evil duo had little time to celebrate, however, as Hulk Hogan came storming to the ring. A challenge was made and answered, a match quickly set up and, before you knew it, Hulk Hogan was champion for the 5^th time! It wasn’t all bad for Yokozuna, however. He would remain a top villain for some time, regaining the title at King of the Ring and holding it for an impressive 280 days. A memorable run with Owen Hart as tag champions also came. Sadly, however, Yokozuna’s weight just kept increasing. WWE could not use him anymore he proved unable to drop the excess weight. He passed away, aged just 34, in October 2000.

2: Ric Flair. The Nature Boy Ric Flair entered the WWE in 1991 calling himself the “real world’s champion” and it wasn’t long before he could call himself WWE Champion – just 132 days, in fact. Flair, of course, was already a legendary figure and multiple time NWA Champion, so it was merely a matter of when, not if, he won the title. Nevertheless, his title reign was remarkable for a couple of reasons. Firstly, Flair won the title as a result of winning the Royal Rumble match itself, the only time that this has ever happened. Secondly, Flair won the match from number three, going nearly an hour, which, at the time, was a record-setting performance. Flair did not hold the title for an especially long time, losing it to Randy Savage at Wrestlemania. He would regain the title once before returning to WCW.

1: Hulk Hogan. No surprise to find the Hulkster’s name at the top of a wrestling list. This one, however, is somewhat disputable. Hogan made his second televised debut for the WWE on December the 27^th 1983 and won the championship from The Iron Sheik a mere 27 days later! However, Hogan had wrestled in the WWE before, in 1979, for around a year, albeit as a heel managed by Freddie Blassie, rather than the babyface who won the title in 1984. Even adding all that time together, however, Hogan’s rise was rapid. In the meantime, he had been a big star both in New Japan and the AWA. Indeed, legend has it that, so distraught was he to lose Hogan to Vince McMahon, Verne Gagne offered The Iron Sheik a considerable sum of money to legitimately break Hogan’s leg in their title match. Whether this is true or not is another matter entirely. Whatever the case, this was the title reign that started it all: Hulkamania, Wrestlemania, Rock ‘n’ Wrestling and so on. Hogan would hold the title for over four years on this occasion and, even when he finally lost it, he did so only be way of a screwy finish and a vacated title. I should also point out that The Iron Sheik also won the title in short order, just weeks after debuting in 1983. However, like Hogan, Sheik had worked for WWE back in 1979. Unlike Hogan, he had been using the same character and gimmick back then, which is why I excluded him from this list.

WCW Monday Nitro
December 23, 1996
Macon, GA
Civic Center

The current WCW champs were as follows:
WCW World Champion: Hollywood Hogan (8/10/1996)
WCW U.S. Champion: Vacant (11/25/1996)
WCW World Tag Team Champions: The Outsiders (10/27/1996)
WCW World Television Champion: Lord Steven Regal (8/20/1996)
WCW World Cruiserweight Champion: Dean Malenko (10/27/1996)

HOUR NUMBER ONE! Your hosts are Tony Schiavone & Larry Zbyszko.

• Chris Benoit (w/Woman) vs. Eddie Guerrero – WCW U.S. Title Tournament Quarterfinals

Why isn’t this the finals instead? Because DDP and Eddie Guerrero are still feuding after four months because of that one time he took his Battlebowl ring? Nothing has happened since then though? Come on. You were going to give Eddie the belt anyways. Oh well – at least we get to see this match again. Even though these two have fought like at least once every month since the beginning of Nitro. Why am I complaining? At least it’s not a Hacksaw-Wallstreet rematch because it could have been. It really could.

DDP joins us for commentary since he’s got the winner of this match at Starrcade. These two get ROUGH with one another to start with chops a plenty. Kevin Sullivan cuts a creepy promo on the split screen threatening Benoit. Eddie controls with a headlock as we take a commercial break. When we return, Benoit launches Guerrero into a hotshot. Back suplex gets two. A delayed cover off Benoit’s NASTY signature snap powerbomb that should be illegal in 48 states gets a nearfall. Benoit connects with more chops, but Eddie comes back with a tilt-a-whirl backbreaker. Benoit stops the Frog Splash with a superplex. Man this crowd is HOT. Benoit hangs Eddie out to dry and goes for a back superplex. The ref gets up on the ropes to talk Benoit down, but he gets shoved away which allows Eddie enough time to regroup and push Benoit to the mat for a funky FROG SPLASH! Cover, 1-2-3! (10:34 shown) Guerrero advances to the finals. Hard fought match for both guys. They REALLY had the crowd in the palm of their hands for the entire match. ***¼

Gene Okerlund brings out the rest of the Four Horsemen. AA tells Benoit that he took the beating from Kevin Sullivan last week because that’s what Horsemen do for each other, but then asks why Woman isn’t here for the Horsemen this week. Debra runs her mouth off again like somebody cares about her opinion until Benoit literally tells her and I quote, “Talk to the hand because the man don’t understand.’ Oh man, she better take a step back. Mongo defends his lady and starts pointing fingers at Benoit until Ric Flair steps in to remind everybody that’s its Christmastime and we just need to party ALL NIGHT LONG! WOOO! He goes on to ask who can blame Woman for leaving the devil after ten years for a weekend with Benoit. Somehow Flair seems to think that the Four Horsemen are still alive and well.

Really Naitch? Let’s have a quick sidebar, buddy. Ric, you can’t even wrestle right now because of your messed up shoulder. Arn is just about done with his career because of his broken down neck. Benoit just lost to Eddie Guerrero for a chance at the US strap and nobody likes him in the Horsemen right now because he keeps causing trouble messing around with Woman while Arn’s taking beatings in his place and Mongo doesn’t like him because he’s talking down to his wife. And then you have Mongo there who I haven’t seen wrestle in months. The Four Horsemen are dead, my man. Give it up, there’s nothing left.

Alright back to the show. Hollywood Hogan and his nWotourage head to the ring. It’s another week of Hogan talking about how Roddy Piper is SOOO scared of him because he won’t confront him when he’s in the building. He continues to say how he’s a bigger star than Piper ever will be, men who wear skirts are dumb, and that Piper’s a big huge coward. Give them what they want, Hulkster. It’s posin’ time!

WCW Saturday Night! Watch it IF YOU WEEL! 6:05PM eastern! TBS! It’s the Year in Review show including the incursion of the new World order. Also, you’ll see the lead up to Piper/Hogan on Sunday night at Starrcade! Don’t miss out! It’s the MUTHASHIP! PAY WINDAHS, CLUBBERIN, AND PLUNDAH, BABY!

We take this opportunity to watch the trailer for Roddy Piper’s new film entitled Marked Man. As with most of Piper’s films, it looks worthy of a MST3K viewing.

• Lex Luger vs. Tombstone

Tombstone is 911 from ECW. No reason to sign him away from that fed other than just because they could. He was only here in WCW for about four months before heading to JAPW with the rest of the ECW throwaways. And no, this isn’t ECW so 911 doesn’t just chokeslam Luger for the pin. Instead, Luger takes a few slams and a few clotheslines before making his comeback and hoisting Tombstone up in the TORTURE RACK for the quick submission. (3:38) Right as he lets go of Tombstone, the Giant shows up for a beating. Luger actually gets him up in the TORTURE RACK right as Scott Hall and Kevin Nash make the save. ½*

Flashback to Last Week: The real Sting beat up the nWo Sting and this week didn’t beat up the Steiner brothers. But later on in the night when there was this huge free for all in the ring, WCW guys started firing away on Sting. All he did was defend himself before quietly leaving the ring. You don’t want my help? FINE.

• Rey Mysterio Jr. vs. Mr. JL

Does JL only work heel against Rey Mysterio? After they trade some armdrags, Rey ducks a pescado and hits a flying headscissors off the apron. Back in, a bit of perfect irony comes as Mysterio knees JL when he sticks his head through the ropes – a spot where Jerry Lynn himself would give you a jumping legdrop with no set up – and delivers a springboard legdrop for two. JL blocks a rana with a powerbomb, but Rey flips out of another powerbomb and nails JL with a quebrada. Rey runs into a tilt-a-whirl backbreaker, but connects with another flying headscissors to send JL to the floor for an awesome suicide dive! Back in again, JL avoids the Springboard Hurracanrana and faceplants Mysterio for La Magistral that gets two. JL heads up top, but Rey crotches him for an awesome SPRINGBOARD DRAGONSTEINER for the 1-2-3! (6:02) These two did much better with a shorter amount of TV time. As Rey Mysterio always seemed to do back then, he certainly knows how to deliver a fantastic finish. **¾

In a rare moment, Rey Mysterio heads over to the announce position to slap Tony and Larry Z with some knowledge. STING WAS JUST DEFENDING HIMSELF. When somebody throws a punch at you, you duck and then stand up straight and swing back. Larry just thinks Rey is dreaming – like he’s on some Mexican skunk weed or something like ALL the youth of the ’90s were. Replay that Bonnie Tyler video!

HOUR NUMBER TWO! Your hosts are Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan, and Mike Tenay.

Flashback to Earlier Tonight: Hogan talks junk about Piper.

• Glacier vs. Sgt. Buddy Lee Parker

Oh man. More Glacier? Give this guy something to do! Sgt. Buddy Lee Parker is no longer part of the police force – he’s a Gomer Pyle now. Perhaps a Sgt. Carter instead? Anyways, kicks are everywhere. Tenay makes the first CRYONIC KICK call. The first one whiffs, but the second one NAILS Parker for the win. (2:29) Glacier is a force, says Bobby Heenan. ¼*

• The Amazing French Canadians (w/Col. Robert Parker) vs. Public Enemy

The Public Enemy interrupt the AFC’s ‘O Canada’ performance by blinding them with their toboggans. The shenanigans continue as they try to put Rougeau through a table, but Oulette distracts and the AFC hit Grunge with La Bombe de Rougeau followed by the Boston crab-flying legdrop combo. Rocco Rock tries to break up the QUEBECER CRASH off the table up in the corner, but the table breaks. Once the Public Enemy take what’s left of the table and run the AFC down with it, the ref calls for the bell. (3:23) I do like the AFC, but this was hardly even a match. Oulette gets Public Enemy’s version of the Quebecer Crash on a broken down table before he’s pulled out by Rougeau and Parker to celebrate how they are #1. WHAT. ¼*

Flashback to last week when Big Bubba turned on the Dungeon of Doom and joined up with the new World order.

• Konnan (w/Jimmy Hart) vs. Big Bubba

Here’s Bubba’s first Nitro match as a member of the new World order. Speaking of firsts, this is the first time we’ve seen Nick Patrick as a referee since World War 3. No neck brace, no ski mask – he’s just wearing some creepy earrings. Bubba controls to start until he goes out after Jimmy Hart, which gets him hit with a suicide dive by Konnan. He follows up with a ride into the steps, followed by a dropkick. Back in, Konnan complains to Nick Patrick about a slow count while Bubba’s on the floor. Bubba tries to attack, but Konnan fights him off. Nick Patrick talks to Jimmy Hart for no reason while Bubba chokes Konnan and tosses him over the top to the floor. After some more choking, Jimmy gets on the apron to complain and winds up barely poking Nick Patrick in the nose to send Jimmy to the back. Nevertheless, Konnan tosses Bubba over the top rope to the floor for the DQ. (5:36) I don’t even know what to say here. It’s like now that Raw is on from 8-9pm, they don’t even have to try. ¼*

On the Road with Lee Marshall: He’s in Knoxville, Tennessee! While Starrcade is sold out, the following Nitro in Knoxville still has tickets available! He drops the weekly weasel joke and Bobby one-ups him with an actual insult.

• WCW World Television Champion Lord Steven Regal vs. Dean Malenko

While you would never know it by our ‘informative’ commentators, it appears the TV belt is on the line since it gets shown to Malenko. Only Tenay is able to pay attention to this match and mentions the TV title being on the line about minute into the match. The point being that if Malenko wins the TV strap, he’ll have a chance at holding TEN titles at once if he were to capture the J-Crown at Starrcade against Ultimo Dragon. This should be a good grappling match if nothing else. Regal tries to dislocate Malenko’s elbow to start. Malenko kips up and when he tries a monkey flip, Regal cartwheels away and drills Dean with an enziguri. Sonny Oono comes out of the tunnel to snap some pictures of the match. From here, Regal keeps Malenko grounded with a headlock. The crowd is silent through this whole match as Tony and Bobby hype Starrcade. Malenko mounts a comeback out of an ab stretch, but Regal stops that with a full nelson. Malenko rolls out of a Boston crab and nearly gets the Texas Cloverleaf turned over when Regal finds the ropes. Butterfly suplex by Regal, release German suplex by Malenko. Brainbuster by Malenko brings us to the ten-minute time limit draw about 34 seconds early. (9:26) The crowd is just sitting with their arms crossed. While I enjoyed it, surely they won’t do this again. **½

• Rick Steiner (w/Scott Steiner) vs. Jeff Jarrett

So the two guys who talked the most crap about Sting square off against each other. Rick does his maniacal laugh during the whole match as he hits Jarrett with a Steinerline and slams him into the corner. Overhead suplex brings out the clearly fake and obvious nWo Sting. Of course Tony is convinced it’s the real Sting. Steiner saves Jarrett from a Scorpion Deathdrop with a Steinerline and Jarrett jumps on top of Sting for the 1-2-3. (2:24) WHAT. ½*

IT’S MAIN EVENT INTERVIEW TIME: Since we haven’t seen Hollywood Hogan for an hour, let’s bring him out! Once again, Hogan calls out Roddy Piper. The bagpipes hit, but it’s Eric Bischoff dressed like a Scottish stereotype with a Hulkster t-shirt on pretending to be Piper. He ‘admits’ Hogan is the true icon and the unrivaled god of wrestling. He lays down for Hogan as Nick Patrick comes out for the three-count. While Bischoff is worshipping Hogan, more bagpipes play as the REAL Roddy Piper heads down to get into a fisticuffs exchange with Hogan. The crowd is going nuts until the new World order runs down to make the fight 12-on-1 while Sting watches on from the rafters. WCW security comes out WAYYY too late and that’s where we leave off six days before Starrcade. Because I mean you know nothing important is going to happen on WCW Saturday Night.

Here’s the final card for Starrcade on December 29!

- MAIN EVENT: WCW World Heavyweight Champion Hollywood Hogan vs. Roddy Piper
- Lex Luger vs. The Giant
- Diamond Dallas Page vs. Eddie Guerrero (WCW US Title Tournament Finals)
- WCW World Tag Team Champions The Outsiders vs. The Faces of Fear
- Chris Benoit vs. Jeff Jarrett
- Rey Mysterio Jr. vs. Jushin “Thunder” Liger
- Akira Hokuto vs. Madusa (WCW Womens Title Tournament Finals)
- WCW World Cruiserweight Champion Dean Malenko vs. J-Crown Champion Ultimo Dragon

There is perhaps no family so intimately connected with wrestling as the Anoa’i. Their family tree reads like a who’s who of pro wrestling and it is with sadness and sympathy that the thoughts of the wrestling world are turned to them, after the tragic passing of Eki “Eddie” Fatu, known to millions of wrestling fans as Umaga, on Friday. Aged just 36, Fatu appears to have suffered a heart attack at home, followed by a second in hospital.

 If anyone can be said to have been destined for a career in wrestling, it would have been Eddie Fatu. His uncles, Afa and Sika Anoa’i, attained great success as the tag team The Wild Samoans in the 70s and 80s. They considered High Chief Peter Maivia to be their uncle, thus connecting them to Rocky Johnson and his son, The Rock. Eddie’s older brothers, Sam and Solofa Jr found fame as The Tonga Kid and Rikishi respectively, while his cousin Rodney became a WWE Champion in the mid-nineties as Yokozuna. His cousins Reno and Matt are also successful professional wrestlers, not to mention the fact that WWE Hall of Famer Jimmy “Superfly” Snuka is also related to the family by marriage.

 Eddie first came to national prominence in 2002 as one half of the tag team Three Minute Warning, under the name Jamal. His cousin Matt, wrestling under the name Rosey, was his tag partner and the pair initially acted as enforcers for then Raw General Manager Eric Bischoff. When verbally berating someone, Bischoff would frequently work the words “three minutes” into his speech, at which point he would interrupt himself, saying “did I just hear myself say three minutes”, at which point Rosey and Jamal would emerge to give the hapless individual a severe beating. Frequently, this beating would conclude with Jamal delivering a splash from the top rope which, given his 350lb frame, was a highly impressive move visually.

 After just under a year, Eddie was released from his contract. At the time, rumours circulated on websites such as Slash Wrestling had it that the team were frequently working very “stiff”, which is to say that they were not protecting their opponents well enough. According to the same rumours, Eddie’s attitude and commitment to the business were not all they should have been. Regardless of the truth of these rumours, Eddie stayed in wrestling and soon turned up in TNA, teaming with fellow Samoan Sonny Siaki. However, this team did not last long before Eddie had moved on again, this time to All Japan Pro Wrestling.

 Eddie spent over a year in Japan, mostly wrestling in tag teams and began to gain a reputation as a good “big man”. By the end of 2005, WWE had re-signed him and, in April 2006, he returned to Raw, now repackaged as Umaga and accompanied by a manager, Armando Alejandro Estrada. Many fans and observers initially took shots at the WWE, seeing this new gimmick as a shot at/rip off of TNA’s Samoa Joe. In point of fact, Umaga was a gimmick that harked back to the earlier days of WWE and was far more old-school than the image Samoa Joe presented. Moreover, sneering comments about the new gimmick quickly vanished as it became apparent that Umaga was getting over and getting over fast with the vast majority of fans. WWE presented Umaga as an unstoppable, almost uncontrollable savage and fans, myself included, ate it up. The initial criticisms soon gave way to praise, with many internet wrestling writers commenting on how much Eddie’s stint in Japan had improved him as a wrestler.

 Umaga worked a series of feuds with Ric Flair, D-Generation X and Kane, before taking on the ultimate opponent, John Cena, the WWE Champion. At New Year’s Revolution 2007, Cena handed Umaga his first pinfall loss. Nevertheless, Umaga had looked strong in defeat. He had dominated most of the match, only for Cena to surprise him with a roll-up pin. The match was not terribly well received but a re-match was inevitable. When it was signed for The Royal Rumble, it was announced that the match would be a Last Man Standing match. Umaga’s manager, Estrada, taunted Cena, saying that there was no way Cena could get Umaga to stay down for a count of ten. This match was truly outstanding and will surely be remembered as the high point of Eddie Fatu’s career. Cena won when he choked Umaga out with a loosened ring rope but the real story of the match was that the reputations of both men had been greatly enhanced.

 From there, however, it seemed to me that Umaga’s career began to lose focus. For whatever reason, just as he seemed poised to take the next step to the top tier of the business, it didn’t quite happen. His role at Wrestlemania remained a high-profile one as he acted as Vince McMahon’s champion in the McMahon/Trump feud. The association with the McMahons did not work for me, as it led to Umaga’s separation from Estrada. The two had worked extremely well together and, I think, should have stayed together.

 Even so, Umaga stayed with the WWE until June of this year and, while he may not have quite been at the top of the card, he was always involved in high profile spots and there is nothing to say that he might not have gone still further. His final feud in the WWE was on Smackdown with CM Punk. However, on the 8th of June, Fatu was released from the company, reportedly after refusing to go into rehab. Since then, Eddie Fatu wrestled on Hulk Hogan’s recent tour of Australia, working with the former Mr Kennedy, Ken Anderson. The tour only finished on November the 28th. No one could have imagined that, less than a week later, Eddie Fatu would have passed away.

 In mourning Eddie Fatu, we as wrestling fans mourn the loss of an athletic and highly skilled big wrestler who achieved considerable success and had the ability to achieve even more, had he been spared. Nevertheless, we must not forget that the real loss lies not with us, the wrestling fans, but with his family and loved ones, most of all, his wife and children. All we can really do for them is make sure they know that he did make a difference. We will miss him.

 Sadly, I must also address something else while on a subject that is, frankly, painful enough already. Hardly had the news of Fatu’s passing been announced before certain people were commenting, in the most heartless terms imaginable, on Fatu’s Wellness Policy violations. Not only is this utterly insensitive – do these people not imagine that his children might go online to see what people thought of their father? – it is rampant speculation. We do not know, what, if any, role in his death Fatu’s earlier Wellness issues played so any such speculation is premature. Moreover, what does it matter? The death of a 36 year-old man is a tragedy, regardless of what role his own actions played in it. I won’t name any names, because I don’t wish to give any of these heartless creatures publicity, but some of the things I have read make me ashamed to think that anyone might think I have something in common with these people, since we are all wrestling fans.

“No pity, no sorrow” wrote one particularly foul individual who should be thoroughly ashamed of himself. Have these people never done anything to jeopardise their own health? Got roaring drunk one night, for example. Would they want their own death to be greeted in so insensitive a manner? I understand that people wish to prevent similar tragedies by pointing out the mistakes made by the dead so that the living will not repeat them but, if there are any lessons to be drawn from this affair, they can surely be drawn in more kindly and sympathetic manner. Anway, enough of that. The bottom line is this: Eddie Fatu has died. As a fan, I will miss him. As a human being, my condolences go to his family.

Today’s Thursday Thirteen will be a lost of the 13 things I hate about TNA Wrestling.  Some require some explanation, but some are pretty self-explanatory… Really.

Here is my list.

13. Mike Tenay

12. Don West

11. Shark Boy

10. The shape of the ring

9.  Vince Russo and his stupid plot lines / or lack thereof

8.  The name TNA.  TNA stands for Tits ‘n’ Ass.

7.  The old washed up wrestlers who can only fight 6 times a year.  Kevin Nash, Sting, now Hogan and Flair… I don’t want to see these fogies… Seriously.  Only in reruns when they were still near their prime, like 20 years ago. 

6.  I’ll never forgive TNA / WCCW / WCW / NWA for making Jason Hervey the World Heavyweight champion.  All respect was lost at this point.  You think about Ric Flair owning that title for so many years and his epic battles with Ricky Steamboat, Harley Race, Lex Lugar, Sting… and then there is Jason Hervey. 

5. Trying to be the WWE.  You’re not, so stop trying and find your own identity.  The beginning of the show with the fireworks works for RAW, not TNA.

4.  Does every TNA wrestler need a gesture that they must face the camera and do it many times in the match? 

3.  The entrances of wrestlers.  Either sound sucks in the arena or the announcer talks too low, but it’s terrible.

2. The moves.  TNA has perfected the use of amazing moves which guys kick out of with regularity, thereby requiring them to perform even more dangerous moves to get themselves over.  Like that back-flip piledriver move… No one should ever kick out of that… But they do.  In WWE for example, a chokeslam does a guy in.  In TNA you need to kill them or run them over with a car in order to get a 2-count.  Back to basics, boys!  It’ll save your wrestlers too.  Ask Kevin Nash / Diesel who used to beat guys in WWE with a boot to the face and a powerbomb.

1.  Too hard to follow.  One week Kurt Angle is a good guy and the main eventer, then 2 weeks later he’s a bad guy and fighting against the newest reclamation project TNA picks up because they used to be in the WWE.  I think every week Russo and his boys think of another face turn or a new plot line.  What ever happened to taking a new wrestler coming in, like Bobby Lashley and having him earn his way to a title shot… Get more bang for your buck.  These guys come in - Booker T, Kurt Angle, etc. and they get title shots right away.  I don;t think there is anyone in TNA who can plot out a strategy for the wrestlers longer than a month (or the next PPV).  I could do this better!  Seriously!

WCW Monday Nitro
December 16, 1996
Pensacola, FL
Civic Center

The current WCW champs were as follows:
WCW World Champion: Hollywood Hogan (8/10/1996)
WCW U.S. Champion: Vacant (11/25/1996)
WCW World Tag Team Champions: The Outsiders (10/27/1996)
WCW World Television Champion: Lord Steven Regal (8/20/1996)
WCW World Cruiserweight Champion: Dean Malenko (10/27/1996)

HOUR NUMBER ONE! Your hosts are Tony Schiavone & Larry Zbyszko.

Bischoff and DiBiase come out and take over the broadcast right in the middle of Tony’s first sentence. Larry Z tries to put up a fight, but he’s retired. He plays golf every day. Get out of here, Larry.

Flashback to Last Week: Eric Bischoff confronts Roddy Piper, but the part where he gets knocked out naturally isn’t shown.

• WCW World Television Champion Lord Steven Regal vs. Psychosis
  

This crowd is either really against Regal, really into Psychosis, or just really hot – I can’t decide. Bischoff reminds everybody that the WCW locker room has until Christmas to convert their contracts over to the nWo or else they will become targeted. Early on, Regal tries to break Psychosis’s arm and we go to commercials. AND WE’RE BACK! Spinning heel kick and a Koppou Kick sends Regal to the floor for a plancha! Back in, a flying sunset flip gets 1-2-NO! Top rope hurracanrana gets 1-2-NO! Whoa – GUILLOTINE LEG DROP connects. Delayed cover gets a nearfall. Regal drops Psychosis with a German suplex to buy himself some time. He keeps Psychosis grounded with a full nelson. Butterfly suplex gets two. Psychosis shoves off the Butterfly Superplex and hits a HUGE flying splash for 1-2-NO! Psychosis gets a bunch of nearfalls off cradles, but then takes a faceplant to set up the REGAL STRETCH to give him the submission victory. (10:37 shown) Nice to see Psychosis being able to hang with the TV champ. That crowd really wanted to see a title change. Good little TV match with loads of heat-filled action. ***

Flashback to Three Weeks Ago: Sting cost Rick Steiner a match with Big Bubba when he gave Rick the Scorpion Deathdrop.

• Big Bubba vs. Chavo Guerrero Jr.

Chavo beats Bubba to the floor, but his pescado gets caught for a slam. Back inside, Bubba misses a splash. Chavo punches Bubba down while he’s up on his shoulders. Flying Butthole and a somersault senton gets two. But Chavo can’t keep Bubba down forever. He runs into a BUBBA SLAM for the 1-2-3. (2:53) Rule #1 to booking a cruiserweight division: Don’t use them to job to big guys. That’s what fat ugly wrestlers with mullets are for. ¾*

Gene Okerlund grabs Masahiro Chono and Sonny Oono for an interview before they go to the ring. Gene asks Oono why Chono hasn’t renewed his contract with New Japan yet. Oono’s been negotiating and stuff. He shows off his New Japan t-shirt, so Chono tries to one-up him by wearing an nWo t-shirt! The new World order has just gone international! Oono is freaking out in Japanese. Chono responds in more Japanese gibberish (THIS IS AMERICA! SPEAK AMERICAN!) and then tries to rip Oono’s t-shirt off. Boy, those Japanese shirts are not cheaply made. Bischoff and DiBiase are laughing it up in approval.

• Masahiro Chono (w/Sonny Oono) vs. Chris Jericho

Since Jericho’s like TOTALLY all about WCW, you’d think he’d be attacking at the bell. Jericho spinning back kicks Chono in the head, so he retaliates with the MAFIA KICK. Chono beats Jericho around the ring for a while. Jericho tries to stop him with a superplex, but can’t capitalize on a cover. Meanwhile, Bischoff makes a remark about how Antonio Inoki (the New Japan owner) has to be in shock much like Vince McMahon back when Luger showed up at the first Nitro. He even mentions that he WATCHED the PPV last night. Wow, so you admit on live TV that you bought a WWF PPV? DiBiase wisely keeps his mouth shut. Chono ducks a Flying Spinning Heel Kick, but Jericho comes down on his lower back! Moving on, Jericho gets his foot trapped in the ropes and as he’s hanging over the side of the apron, Chono kicks the crap out of him until ref Mark Curtis calls for the bell. (5:50) So Jericho wins via DQ. Not a good return for Chono, but I’m sure they’ll be sending this tape primarily for the finish to New Japan where it matters as the nWo Japan starts here. Over the next several years, the group would feature other New Japan heavyweight stars such as Chono’s tag team partner Hiroyoshi Tenzan, Great Muta, Satoshi Kojima, and Hiro Saito. *½

WCW Saturday Night! Watch it IF YOU WEEL! 6:05PM eastern! TBS! WCW world tag champs The Outsiders will be involved in a 3-on-2 handicap match! Jeff Jarrett, Diamond Dallas Page, Scott Norton, Lex Luger, Eddie Guerrero, M. Wallstreet, and many others will be featured on the show! Don’t miss out! It’s the MUTHASHIP! PAY WINDAHS, CLUBBERIN, AND PLUNDAH, BABY!

Flashback to Last Week: Ric Flair gives Roddy Piper the support of the Four Horsemen, but Piper wants to do this on his own. Now they show Bischoff making fun of Piper for being a gimp and then getting knocked out. Of course it didn’t even hurt. He could have gotten up and beaten Piper down, but he felt bad for him. You know, with the bad hip and all. Kevin Greene hops in the ring to help out, but then we go off the air.

Gene Okerlund brings out Ric Flair, Arn Anderson, Steve & Debra McMichael. Flair’s got his Gators pullover on. Long before Tim Tebow was the man, there was Danny Wuerffel. Tonight, AA says he’s going to mend Sullivan’s broken heart with a broken body. Awesome. Flair doesn’t blame Benoit for wanting a piece of Woman. Of course, Debra has to run her mouth off. Mongo gets us back on track and encourages Arn to take Sullivan down Horsemen-style. Flair wraps this interview up with a frog in his throat. It had to happen eventually.

Anybody else find this camera shot extremely creepy?

• WCW World Cruiserweight Champion Dean Malenko vs. Dave Sammartino

A ripped David Sammartino makes his WCW debut here. Dang, he’s like 100 pounds lighter than he was at the first WrestleMania. No real story here. They tussle on the mat for a while until Malenko hooks the arms (CATTLE MUTILATION?) and rolls the shoulders for the seemingly surprising three-count. (2:56) Crowd isn’t pleased with the match, but hey Dean wins again! ¾*

I mean, look at the difference.

HOUR NUMBER TWO! Your hosts are Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan, and Mike Tenay. When the threesome come out, Heenan gets a huge “weasel” chant and he gives them a nice angered response. Bobby just won’t let that go, will he.

Flashback to Earlier Tonight: Masahiro Chono becomes the newest member of the new World order.

• Ice Train (w/Teddy Long) vs. Jerry Flynn

For someone so “accomplished and disciplined in martial arts”, in his Nitro debut Jerry Flynn looks like he just got out of bed with a hangover and didn’t even bother to shower before this match. Ice Train runs Flynn over a bunch until he comes back with kicks. Train HULKS UP and catches one of Flynn’s kicks to clamp on an anklelock. WHOA. That gets the win. (3:25) Tenay says Ice Train picked up that submission hold during his matches with Scott Norton. Yeah right. ¾*

Syxx interrupts Ice Train’s celebration to introduce the WCW world tag champs, Scott Hall and Kevin Nash for an interview. They come out to say things like “too sweet”. They hype Starrcade and then make a challenge to their opponents at the PPV – the Faces of Fear – and since they’re in the building, they want to hook it up tonight.

They air an LSD-induced promo for Sting.

• Rey Mysterio Jr. vs. Bobby Eaton

Bobby shuts Rey down for a minute with a right hand. Billy Robinson backbreaker gets two. Rey slides out and avoids a lunge off the apron as Bobby eats the guardrail to set up a suicide dive by Rey. Back inside, Rey spin kicks Eaton down for a springboard dropkick, which sets up a split-legged moonsault for two. Once again, Eaton shuts Rey down this time with a clothesline. Flying Knee Drop to Rey gets 1-2-NO! Next up, Rey catches Eaton up top and brings him down with a hurracanrana for the 1-2-3. (4:59) Rule #2 to booking a cruiserweight division: Don’t use heavyweights to job to them. That’s what other cruiserweights are for. **

On the Road with Lee Marshall: He’s calling from next week’s location for Nitro – Macon, GA. GET YOUR TICKETS! Marshall thinks a bunch of fictional fifties musical characters will be there. Heenan tells him to stay off the moonshine.

Another video of Chris Benoit and Woman in Europe is shown. Those two are so in LOOOOOOVE!

• Arn Anderson vs. Kevin Sullivan (w/Jimmy Hart)

Looks like Arn is fighting Benoit’s battles now. Sullivan meets Arn on the floor where a chair nearly takes Sullivan apart up against the ringpost. They brawl into the crowd for a bit with Arn in control. AA knocks the ref back by accident and when he gets his eyes poked, Arn turns away and DDTs the ref! Whoops. Sullivan hits the DOUBLE STOMP and then ties Arn up in the Tree of Woe, but he blocks the charge with a shot to the balls. DDT to Sullivan? Nope. Hugh Morrus comes in for the save and he takes the DDT instead. Konnan attacks and gets thrown out. Now Jimmy Hart gets grabbed for a DDT, but Sullivan saves with a wooden chair. Jimmy wakes up the ref, who counts the 1-2-3. (3:51) Some cool chaotic moments there. Then again, maybe I’m just an Arn Anderson mark. It’s definitely the loudest the crowd has become since the opener. Mongo runs in for the wayyyy too late save. *½

• Rick Steiner (w/Scott Steiner) vs. Sting

Of course, no match. Sting starts to come down from the rafters, but then another gum-chewing Sting comes out from another part of the arena. AND THE ANNOUNCERS THINK HE’S THE REAL STING. It’s the nWo Sting, guys. He pulls the ropes down for the real Sting while the Steiners get the bats. When they turn their backs, Sting hits the nWo Sting with the SCORPION DEATHDROP. Now it clicks and Tony finally realizes who the real Sting is. Rick tosses Sting the bat and he heads back through the crowd. Oh, Sting is definitely WCW now!

The World Champ Hollywood Hogan, Ted DiBiase, The Giant, Vincent, and Elizabeth all head to the ring. Once again, Hogan gets the ‘Hollywood’ spotlight and talks down Roddy Piper. He tells Vincent to go find Piper, but he’s not here bro. When Vincent returns, Hogan says Piper ran out the back door when he heard Hogan was looking for him. Since he can’t beat up Piper tonight for his nWo-ites, he decides to pose instead.

• WCW World Tag Team Champions The Outsiders vs. The Faces of Fear (w/Jimmy Hart)

Again, no match. They brawl until Big Bubba comes out to help the Faces of Fear – or DOES HE? He starts punching Meng and gives him the BUBBA SLAM! Konnan, Hugh Morrus, and Kevin Sullivan run down to beat up Bubba, but the Outsiders help fight them off. The locker room clears out as it’s just a huge brawl. When Ice Train heads down, Scott Norton cuts him off with a DDT on the floor! He’s nWo out too! Sting heads to the ring and tries to stop everybody from fighting. When he backs Arn away, AA takes a shot at him. Sting ducks and knocks Arn away. Mongo goes to defend Arn, but he gets nailed. Rey Mysterio jumps on Sting’s back, but gets flipped off. Enough of this. He tries to help, but WCW tries to hurt him. Sting leaves back through the crowd again as we fade to black.

Some matches have already been announced for Starrcade on December 29!

- MAIN EVENT: WCW World Heavyweight Champion Hollywood Hogan vs. Roddy Piper
- Lex Luger vs. The Giant
- WCW World Tag Team Champions The Outsiders vs. The Faces of Fear
- WCW World Cruiserweight Champion Dean Malenko vs. J-Crown Champion Ultimo Dragon

Randy Orton, Triple H, Ric Flair and Batista are the Evolution!

 This is a republish from Bleacher Report. Enjoy!

This was one of the best, if not the best group in the WWE history. It was all the WWE could ask for. It was called Evolution. The reasoning behind the name is unknown, but I have a pretty good idea why it was called what it was called. Evolution had a great veteran talent in Ric Flair, a great talent of the present in Triple H, and it also had two great young talents in Dave Batista and Randy Orton. Young and old, see something? If not, that’s alright.

Evolution was a group that made Raw unbearable for anyone that would dare challenge them. At a point, they had control of all of Raw’s belts with Triple H holding the World Heavyweight Championship, Randy Orton holding the Intercontinental Championship, and Batista and Flair holding the World Tag Team Championships. They were truly a force to be reckoned with.

This group was first started at Unforgiven when Triple H defended his World Title against Rob Van Dam. During the match, Flair came down, taking a sledgehammer from Triple H. At first Flair was teasing Triple H, but in the end he struck Rob Van Dam with it, allowing Triple H to retain the title. That day Flair became Triple H’s manager.

The next to join the group was one Dave Batista. When Batista came over to Raw from SmackDown, he took Flair as a manager, which was kinda his ticket into the group. When Triple H’s feud with Scott Steiner started Flair, Batista, and another in the name of Randy Orton were all there to help Triple H. The group officially became a stable on February 3, 2003 and it took the name of Evolution.

Many dared to challenge Evolution, but practically all left bruised. After Randy Orton was injured in Febuary of 2003, he returned as a masked man who attacked HBK and Kevin Nash. This was when Triple H faced them in a Two-on-One Handicap match. He then took off the mask and returned to the group. Batista returned on October 20.

Challengers to Evolution included: Goldberg, HBK, Rob Van Dam, and others. Here are some of the attempts to bring down Evolution:

• At Bad Blood, Evolution showed their dominance and defeated their enemies. Flair defeated Shawn Michaels after Orton hit Michaels with a chair. Later that night Triple H destroyed Kevin Nash in the Hell In A Cell to retain his title.

• At Unforgiven, Evolution had a mixed night. Randy Orton, who was the developing a Legend Killer, really backed the new gimmick up as he defeated Shawn Michaels. Evolution’s success would not continue when Triple H defended his World Title against Bill Goldberg. Despite outside interference from the rest of Evolution, Triple H lost his World Title to Goldberg.

With Triple H mad at Goldberg he offered a $100,000 reward to anyone who could take out Goldberg. A returning Batista would be the man to claim the reward as he destroyed Goldberg and re-joined Evolution. This plan failed because at Survivor Series Goldberg still managed to retain, despite Evolution getting involved again.

Evolution hit the big-time success during the period of 2003-2004. The height of this was when they won all of the titles on Raw, not including Women’s Title. Flair and Batista took the Tag Team titles from The Dudleys, Orton defeated Rob Van Dam to reclaim the Intercontinental Championship for Evolution, and Triple H finally got the better of Goldberg as he regained the title.

Flair and Batista would retain the titles against the Dudleys at Royal Rumble. Flair and Batista would then lose the titles to Rob Van Dam and Booker T, but then would regain them. This pattern continued for a short period of time.

At Wrestlemania 20 Triple H lost the World Heavyweight Championship to Chris Benoit in a Triple Threat match featuring Chris Benoit, himself, and Shawn Michaels. The rest of Evolution was successful, though, as they defeated The Rock and Mick Foley in a Three-on-Two Handicap match.  

At Backlash Orton was successful when he defeated Mick Foley in a Hardcore Match. That same night Ric Flair and Triple H would both lose their individual contests, with Flair losing to Shelton Benjamin and Triple H losing a Wrestlemania rematch, despite him not being involved in the losing effort. HBK tapped out. Later on in the year Chris Benoit and Edge would also capture the tag team titles from Flair and Batista.

2004 would be known as the year the collapse of Evolution would begin. Randy Orton would be first to leave the group.

At Vengeance Orton would lose his Intercontinental Championship to Edge. It would not matter, though, as Orton won a 20-Man Battle Royal on Monday Night Raw to later on meet Chris Benoit at Summerslam. At Summerslam, history was made as Randy Orton captured the World Heavyweight Championship. That night he became the youngest world champion.

It would not be all good for Orton, though. August 16 marked the day that Randy Orton officially left Evolution. As he was celebrating Evolution showed up and they joined him in the celebration. Orton was mislead though, when Batista hoisted Orton onto his shoulders. Triple H would make a thumbs up for Orton only to turn it into a huge thumbs down as Batista dropped him from his shoulders and they would all beat the life out of him. 

That would start a Triple H-Randy Orton feud, the same feud that WWE fans are sick of today. Orton was successful against the Game until Unforgiven. At Unforgiven Triple H would re-capture the World Heavyweight Championship with help from Evolution. Orton did continue feuding with Evolution though.

On December 6 the World Title officially became vacant as there was a match between Edge, Triple H, and Benoit for it. It ended in a double-pin as Edge had Benoit pinned and Benoit had Edge tapping out. So the title would be defended in an Elimination Chamber at New Year’s Revolution.

This was an exciting event as it had not only Orton and Triple H, but also Dave Batista. What happened in this match started to change Batista’s views on Triple H. Orton hit and RKO on Dave and covered him for the pin. Triple H was indeed close enough to break up the count, but didn’t. This made what Randy Orton said earlier in the night true.

The Next Pay Per View on the schedule was Royal Rumble. This would be another step to help Batista exit Evolution. That night Triple H retained the World Heavyweight Championship, but that was not the biggest accomplishment for Evolution that night. That same night Dave Batista came in at 28 in the Royal Rumble and won, eliminating John Cena in the final moments.

Despite Triple H’s attempts to have Dave challenge for the WWE Championship, Batista chose to face the leader of Evolution, The Game himself, at Wrestlemania 21. Triple H and Batista feuded until the time of Wrestlemania and at Wrestlemania both men brought it in a terrific contest for the World Title. Despite interference from Ric Flair, Batista defeated a bloody Triple H to win his first World Heavyweight Championship.

This feud would continue as it had epic encounters including one at Vengeance that no one could believe. Evolution was still somewhat together after that. Triple H would take a break as Ric Flair captured the Intercontinental Championship. Flair and Triple H would team against Carlito and Chris Masters, which is where Evolution would officially be ended as the last two members ended their alliance, with Triple H attacking Flair with a sledgehammer. 

Evolution was finally no more!

Evolution would reunite once more for a Three- on-Three Tag match. The match was Batista, Ric Flair, and Triple H Vs. Rated RKO—Randy Orton and Edge—with Umaga. This match would be won by Evolution.

Judging The Group

In my opinion, Evolution was an amazing group. Even when it was breaking down, with Orton and Batista exiting, it was epic. This group had amazing storylines, and to see them would be an instant classic. Out of five, I will give this group 4 and one-half.

WCW Monday Nitro
December 9, 1996
Charlotte, NC
Independence Arena

The current WCW champs were as follows:
WCW World Champion: Hollywood Hogan (8/10/1996)
WCW U.S. Champion: Vacant (11/25/1996)
WCW World Tag Team Champions: The Outsiders (10/27/1996)
WCW World Television Champion: Lord Steven Regal (8/20/1996)
WCW World Cruiserweight Champion: Dean Malenko (10/27/1996)

HOUR NUMBER ONE! Your hosts are Tony Schiavone & Larry Zbyszko.

Right out of the shoot, we hear bagpipes as Roddy Piper makes his way to the ring. Take that, RAW! Piper names some local landmarks that he used to frequent back in the day. The crowd loves it. He mentions that at Starrcade against Hogan will be his last fight. Yeah right. Naturally, Charlotte KNOWS Hogan sucks. Piper continues on and tells us something that nobody could have ever known – his boxing match with Mr. T was a work! WHO KNEW! He calls out a guy holding up a ‘This is nWo country’ sign and makes the assumption that because there’s no chicks in the nWo vignettes and they’re all wearing leather that they might be playing for a different team than Piper. He’s just saying. Okay enough funny business, the inevitable happens as Piper calls out Hogan to get this fight going right now. No Hogan, so Piper leaves. He’ll be back.

• M. Wallstreet vs. Mike Enos

Schiavone talks Carolina Panthers football before Ted DiBiase comes out for a distraction. He appears to offer Enos a contract when Wallstreet decks him from behind for the STOCK MARKET CRASH to pick up the win. (1:36) So DiBiase hands Wallstreet a contract and walks away. Wallstreet seems pretty happy about it too. MONEY INC IS BACK, BAYBEE! ¼*

Flashback to Saturday Night: Schiavone shows a video to Kevin Sullivan of Chris Benoit and Woman enjoying some wine together at an undisclosed area. To say Sullivan is distraught is an understatement.

• Hugh Morrus vs. Renegade (w/Joe Gomez)

Morrus knocks Renegade around to start. Renegade powers out of a bearhug (?) and powerslams Morrus for two. Handspring Elbow connects, but Morrus blocks a bulldog with a back suplex to set up the NO LAUGHING MATTER for the win. (3:01) He goes for another moonsault, but Gomez pulls his boy out. ½*

Here comes Kevin Sullivan wearing a Four Horsemen shirt with an X taped over the logo. He power walks over to Schiavone and blesses him out for airing something that affects his personal life without his consent. Didn’t they just do this same thing with Bischoff and Savage?

We take a special video look at the recent actions of Sting set to Bonnie Tyler’s “Holding Out for a Hero”. Yes, a song from the Footloose movie soundtrack makes it to WCW television. Did they think this wasn’t going to make me laugh? Oh man, I hope we see a Sullivan-Woman video set to “Total Eclipse of the Heart” soon!

Gene Okerlund brings out Kevin Greene to get Charlotte all excited. Even though everyone else has, he still hasn’t forgot about what Mongo did at the Great American Bash. Also, he wants to punch Hogan in the face if he gets the chance. What a wild man.

• WCW World Cruiserweight Champion Dean Malenko vs. Jimmy Graffiti

A feeling out process leads to a commercial break. We return to see Sonny Oono taking pictures from ringside. That gets Malenko all distracted as Graffiti takes over. They trade some suplexes as Malenko dropkicks Graffiti to the floor. Graffiti avoids the baseball slide and nails Malenko with a clothesline before dropping him on the guardrail. Back inside, Malenko crotches Graffiti up top for a superplex. Back up, Graffiti puts on the brakes when he sees a leapfrog and superkicks Malenko down for two. Powerbomb and a slow jackknife cover gets two. Malenko bridges out into a powerbomb of his own for 1-2-NO! Awesome. Graffiti catches Malenko charging at him for a hotshot, but Malenko counters a suplex into a small package for the 1-2-3. (7:04 shown) Great little match, but they didn’t quite pull out on the stops in a TV match sense like they did last time around. **¼

Gene Okerlund gets a word from Sonny Oono, who is no Herb Ritts in Gene’s eyes. He calls Oono’s accent phony. Oono says that with an accent, he can get and do whatever he wants in America. It’s such a wonderful country!

WCW Saturday Night! Watch it IF YOU WEEL! 6:05PM eastern! TBS! WCW TV Champ Lord Steven Regal defends the belt against Hugh Morrus! Jim Duggan, Renegade & Joe Gomez, Jeff Jarrett, Diamond Dallas Page, Ice Train, Dean Malenko, and many others are featured on the show! Don’t miss out! It’s the MUTHASHIP! PAY WINDAHS, CLUBBERIN, AND PLUNDAH, BABY!

We see some clips from the triangle match from World War 3.

• The Faces of Fear (w/Jimmy Hart) vs. The Nasty Boys

This is somewhat notable as it’s the final match ever on Nitro for the Nasty Boys as a team. It’s a clubberin’ affair to say the least. Where’s Dusty at when you need him? The tag champs Hall and Nash watch on from the tunnel. The finish comes as Jimmy Hart goes to smash his megaphone on Knobbs as he comes off the top ropes, but Knobbs moves and Barbarian gets wiped out. Knobbs throws Jimmy out on top of Meng on the outside. Barbarian whacks Knobbs with the megaphone anyway as the ref makes the three count. (5:20) What was the point of this? To prove that the Faces of Fear deserve the tag titles shot? I don’t know. ½*

Gene Okerlund brings out Ric Flair. He praises and calls for Roddy Piper to come down. They embrace and just enjoy each other’s sentiments about how crazy they used to be. Flair goes to ask Charlotte what they think of Hogan? He sucks. Yep. Hogan SUCKS. Anyways, Flair says that Piper’s got his support because he wants to see Piper kick Hogan’s butt. WOO! Piper says he appreciates the help, but he’s got to do this by himself.

HOUR NUMBER TWO! Your hosts are Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan, and Mike Tenay.

Flashback to Earlier Tonight: Piper calls out Hogan.

• Chris Jericho vs. Bobby Eaton

Early on, Eaton hits the Flying Knee Drop for two. Jericho comes back with the spinning heel kick and a Lionsault for two. Eaton catches Jericho up top and brings him down with an electric chair drop. The ALABAMA JAM misses, but a missile dropkick from Jericho gives him the win. (2:33) Man I can’t wait for Jericho to have a personality. ½*

Recap of the recent stuff that has happened between Sting and the Steiners.

That leads to Gene Okerlund talking with the Steiners themselves. Scott says that you don’t hand my brother a bat in a fight because he’s crazy! BAT FIGHT! It’s anyone’s game. BAT FIGHT! A test of wills. BAT FIGHT! Who’s going to win? BAT FIGHT! You never know who. Yeah… bat fight.

Now we get a video montage of Lex Luger racking people.

• Arn Anderson (w/Steve & Debra McMichael) vs. Sgt. Craig Pittman

Pittman grew a mustache. Now you KNOW he’s serious. On the split screen, Sullivan blames Arn Anderson for letting Benoit mess with his Woman. Next week, they will hook it up. Pittman goes after the arm until AA says something to Mongo as we go to break. When that’s over, we see Pittman getting his knee posted. Arn goes up top, which is always a mistake. Pittman slams him down and hooks on the CODE RED! Arn makes the ropes and we got to the floor where Debra starts talking to the ref. Meanwhile, Mongo jabs the Haliburton briefcase into Pittman’s ribs. Back inside with Pittman doubled over, Arn drops him with the DDT! See ya. (2:57 shown) Again, AA is just phoning it in during the last month or so of his in-ring career. Who can blame him with opponents like this? ½*

Gene Okerlund meets with Arn, Mongo, and Debra for another pow-wow about what to do with Woman. Debra meanders on about how she thinks she’s the most powerful member of the Horsemen. Will somebody please punch her in the mouth? Benoit – come home (from a WCW tour in Germany). Woman – Arn’s got a bone to pick with you.

On the Road with Lee Marshall: He’s living it up in GORGEOUS Pensacola, Florida, where Nitro will be held next week. Somehow that guy always manages to find those non-existent Nitro parties.

• Diamond Dallas Page vs. Jeff Jarrett – First Round WCW U.S. Title Tournament Match

Since Luger and AA went to a double countout, the winner of this match goes to the finals at Starrcade on a bye to face the winner of Eddie Guerrero vs. Chris Benoit. That match goes down in two weeks! Sometimes it’s funny what becomes the main event in a promotion years down the road. Feeling out and strutting occurs as we go to break. AND WE’RE BACK! Page hits a back suplex and a tilt-a-whirl sideslam for two. Jarrett comes back with an enziguri and nails DDP with a swinging neckbreaker to regain control. Bossman straddle connects. Jarrett delivers a slingshot suplex and follows up with the Memphis flying fist drop. Page fires back, but telegraphs a backdrop and takes a faceslam. Page fights out of a sleeper and drills Jarrett with the discus clothesline. Flying lariat gets 1-2-NO! Page misses a charge and falls to the floor. Meanwhile, Scott Hall and Kevin Nash head out to distract the ref and Jeff Jarrett as Hall gives him the OUTSIDERS EDGE off the middle rope. Once Hall and Nash clear out, DDP slides back into the ring and lays on top of Jarrett for the 1-2-3. (9:44 shown) An odd match as Tony and Bobby are pushing DDP as a low down scum heel, but Jarrett controls the majority of the match to set up the comeback, but then again they were prepping Page for his face turn by now anyways. Still felt a little odd though. Gene Okerlund meets DDP in the ring and asks him to explain what happened. He compares the nWo to a chick who won’t stop calling – he just wants to be left alone. **¼

• Rick Steiner (w/Scott Steiner) vs. Scott Norton

No match. During Steiner’s entrance music, Roddy Piper storms the ring and demands Hogan come out now. He takes a seat in the ring waiting on Hogan. Instead, Hogan’s ‘messenger boy’ Eric Bischoff heads to the ring. Bischoff tells Piper that he tried to save him from himself, but now there’s nothing he can do. See ya in Nashville, gimp. Well that pisses Piper off a little bit. Piper decks Bischoff and holds him down with his foot until Hall, Nash, DiBiase, and the Giant head to the ring. Kevin Greene jumps in the ring for the assist. Everybody throws up the Wolfpac sign and as Nash starts to jump Piper, WE RUN OUT OF TIME!

Some matches have already been announced for Starrcade on December 29!

- MAIN EVENT: WCW World Heavyweight Champion Hollywood Hogan vs. Roddy Piper
- Lex Luger vs. The Giant
- WCW World Tag Team Champions The Outsiders vs. The Faces of Fear
- WCW World Cruiserweight Champion Dean Malenko vs. J-Crown Champion Ultimo Dragon

Batista: I Walk Alone DVD
Released: October 20, 2009
The Matches

Disc two:

OVW Heavyweight Title: The Machine (w/Queen Victoria) vs. Leviathan (Batista)

Machine works over the shoulder, but throws dust in the face of the referee. Leviathan hits a choke-slam, but the ref, from the back, is late in getting there. Revolution runs down. Leviathan recuperates and goes for the Demon-bomb, but Victoria gets in the ring in and hits a low-blow. The ref was late in, so it is a two. Leviathan then hits the spear for the win in 7:53.

Thoughts: This was a decent showing from Batista. The match was a bit straight forward at times, but was okay for what it was. I love Cornette’s commentating; if ROH was smart they would put him on the announce team. He really has an ability of knowing how to make the wrestlers look good. **

Kane vs. Batista

This was the first PPV match Batista had Kane starts it up, and  clotheslines him over, In the ring, Batista spears Kane and then hits a powerslam for 2. Batista hits a botchbomb and nearly breaks Kane’s neck. Kane hits a flying clothesline. Then, Batista gives Kane a spine-buster, but it only gets two. Kane tosses Flair in, allowing Batista to sneak up, boot Kane in the gut, and hit the Batista bomb to win in 6:38.

Thoughts: This is as bad as you expect. The fans were really getting angry at Batista, because how green he was; Kane was no better, either, and looked very sloppy. In a nut-shell, this was a complete utter mess. If I saw this match live, I would have thought Batista would have became World Heavy Weight unemployed, rather than Champion. DUD

Batista (w/Ric Flair) vs. Shawn Michaels

Batista catches up with Shawn’s speed, while HBK tried to use it to his advantage. Batista then waits for get up and nails him with a clothesline. Shawn goes for his comeback; then hits a flying forearm and does his kick up thing, but Batista grabs him for the double choke-slam. Shawn fights out of the move and hits the top rope elbow. Shawn goes for Sweet Chin Music, but Batista catches him and delivers a spine-buster. Batista calls for the Batista Bomb, but Shawn slips out of it and hits SCM for the win at 12:21.

Thoughts: No HBK match is bad, but this is as bad as one could get. Batista looked misplaced for the whole match. His timing and pacing were awful. He just did moves for the sake of doing them, with no meaning behind him. Terrible match wrestled by Batista. *¾

World Tag Team Titles: Table Match: Batista & Ric Flair vs. The Dudley Boyz

The Dudleyz attack them.  Batista misses a punch and hurts his own shoulder. Bubba gets a table and slides it into Batista. The Dudleys set up the table and snatch Flair. They’re about to suplex him through it, but Batista throws the table. The table gets set up in the corner. Flair chops Bubba. Bubba comes back with the Elbow. Batista chokes D-Von with his foot. D-Von hits Flair with an airborne clothesline. Batista hits Bubba with a charge. Flair goes up, but Bubba slams him off. Coach comes in, and saves Flair from going through the table. Batista hits a Batistabomb through the table at 4:20.

Thoughts: Short, sloppy, and botched. The only structure in the match was because of Flair. Bad match. ½*

Disc Three:

Royal Rumble (01/30/05).

Batista is #28, and comes in and eliminates off the bat. Jericho jumps at Batista, but Batista catches him and tosses him over. Christian is #29 and he goes after Cena. Rey hits Kane with the 619. Cena tosses Kane over with the Fireman’s carry. Ric Flair is #30. Batista spinebusters Coach and Flair eliminates him. Flair throws Christian into a Batista spinebuster. Flair and Batista team up to throw that guy who won in 2004. Flair tries to be the dirtiest player in the game, but Batista catches him, but Flair denies it. Edge hits a spear on Dave. Edge goes for a spear on Rey, but Rey counters. Edge tosses Rey to the apron and Edge spears him to the floor. Cena tosses Edge out. Cena picks Batista up in the FU, but can’t get him over the top rope. Batista counters into the Batista bomb. Cena holds on. They fall over the top, landing at the same time. Each brand ref thinks their wrestler won. Vince McMahon restarts the match. Batista blocks the FU and then hits the spinebuster on Cena.Batista throws Cena over the top, and is heading to Wrestlemania.

Thoughts: Not the best Rumbles, but easily up there. I liked everything up to the end. I found it very rushed, and asinine. They should have just made it seem like it was an epic showdown of two evenly match contenders, rather than the ridiculous ending (which caused Vince to tear both his quads.). This was the start of the Batista era. ***½

World Heavyweight Title: Triple H (w/Ric Flair) vs. Batista (04/03/05).

A stiff tie-up; no one gets the advantage. They do it again, and Batista pushes him backwards. Triple H tries a shoulder-block but runs into Batista. HHH goes for it again, and Batista knocks him down. HHH goes for the Pedigree, but Batista shoves him and then press slams him. Batista gives him a backdrop. Triple H ducks a clothesline and delivers a knee that sends Dave to the floor. Hunter hits Batista with an elbow as Batista trying to get back in the ring. Later on, H goes for a Pedigree, but Batista backdrops HHH. Batista catches HHH with a sideslam for only a two. Batista catches up with HHH and slams his face into the ringsteps. In the ring, Batista starts pounding on HHH. Batista delivers clothesline. Flair distracts Batista while Hunter attempts to hit him with a chair, but the Ref blocks it. Flair runs into a spinebuster with the title in his hand. Hunter nails Batista with the title behind the ref for only a two. Hunter charges but its right into a spinebuster. Batista goes for the Dave Bomb, but Hunter counters and hits a low blow. HHH goes for the Pedigree, but Batista powers out and drops him with a Misawa’s finisher. Batista hits the Dave Bomb and gets the pinfall.

Thoughts: Very boring in the start, but picked up slowly throughout the match. They tried adding drama by using the bag-of-tricks booking, but it just felt substandard for a WM main event match. Batista was very charismatic in this match, which helped hide his flaws. Better days for Batista still to come. ** ½

World Title, Hell in the Cell: Batista vs. Triple H (w/Ric Flair — 06/26/05)

Batista was mega over at this point. In the ring, Batista clotheslines him and whips HHH to the cell wall. Hunter counters the whip and sends Batista into the ringsteps. Batista attempts to get back in the ring, but HHH knocks him down. HHH gets a chain and hits Batista in the mid-section. HHH chokes Batista. Batista snaps and counters it. Batista starts hitting HHH with the chain with great vengeance and furious anger. Batista goes for the Dave Bomb, but Hunter counters with a backdrop. Hunter nails Batista with his friend, but it only gets two. He attempts again, but this time Batista goes low on HHH. Batista picks up the sledgehammer and charges, but clever HHH finds the chain and drills Batista before Batista hits him. Batista throws Hunter over the top.  In the ring, Batista throws HHH into the ring steps he set up Batista goes for the Dave Bomb, but HHH goes low and then hits the Pedigree, but only gets a two. HHH goes for another one, but this time on the steps. Batista counters the move, and hits a spinebuster. Batista goes for a Dave bomb, but HHH grabs the Sledgehammer on the way up. HHH goes to hit him, but runs out of time as Batista hits the Batista bomb and gets the three.

Thoughts: Started off very similar to their WM match because of it being methodically paced, but rapidly enhanced as the match went on. The finish gave HHH an “out” but also made it seem like he deserved a rematch clause. In my opinion, Hell in the Cell is supposed to end the feud by giving one of the wrestlers a clean victory to conclude the feud. Despite its flaws, it still was a very good match with good amounts of realism and hostility. Nice work.  ***½

World Heavyweight Title: No Holds Barred: Batista vs. John Bradshaw Layfield (08/21/05)

JBL meets Batista and they start brawling. JBL grabs the chair, but Batista spears him through the crowd blockade. JBL recovers and comes back with a clothesline and starts pounding him with the belt. Batista takes the belt away from him and drills JBL with it. JBL blocks a charge and hits the lariat for a two count. JBL brings the ringsteps into the match and goes for a powerbomb on them, but Batista backdrops him and gives him the Batista Bomb. He picks JBL up and gives him a powerbomb on the steps for the pinfall.

Thoughts: Much better than there Great American Bash match. WWE obviously knew that they needed to keep this one short and sweet in order for it to be watch-able. While it only lasted 9 minutes and was short they did tell a good enough story of Batista getting his revenge on JBL. Not as bad as you would think. **

World Heavyweight Title: Batista vs. Eddie Guerrero (No Mercy – 10/09/05).

Eddie takes Batista down, but Batista pops up and powers him. Eddie throws the chair down, but Batista grabs him and yells at him. Eddie whiplashes Dave’s throat on the top rope and hits the frogsplash for only a two. Later on, Eddie rolls through the Dave Bomb, but Batista blocks his sunset flip and pulls him up by the neck. Batista hits his vintage spinebuster, but only gets two. Batista tries an elbowdrop, but the ultimate opportunist gets his knees up. Eddie goes for the traditional frogsplash, but Batista gets out of the way. Eddie runs into the spinebuster, which gets the pin.

Thoughts: The more experience Eddie Gurrero helped carry Batista throughout the match Even though this wasn’t the high-flying/athletic side of Eddie, he told a believable story that served the purpose of the story behind this match.

The problems with the match were that; it was way too slow at times and never really picked up at any stages of the match; Batista was becoming very stale and all his matches virtually felt the same; and the finish was very anticlimactic because of Batista not having to use a finishing move to defeat Eddie and beating him with his “set up” move. Sadly, this was Eddie’s last “big” match. **½

World Heavyweight Title: King Booker (w/Queen Sharmell) vs. Batista (11/26/06)

Batista attacks Booker T before he takes his robe off (real babyface). Batista goes for the Dave bomb early, but Booker rolls to the floor.. Batista counters a neck-snap on the ropes and delivers one of his one. Booker then works on Dave’s ribs. Batista comes back with a Jackhammer; then a Bossman slam for a two count. They brawl some more. Batista boots Booker to the floor and nails a flying shoulderblock (that Cole never saw before) for two. Booker hits him with a Bookend, but it only gets a two count. Batista counters the Scissors Kick and hits the Dave Bomb, but Booker T gets his right hand on the bottom rope. Sharmell slides the title belt to Booker and gets on the apron. Booker T goes to hit Dave with the belt, but misses. Dave kicks Booker in the gut and steals the title from Booker. Wham! Batista hits Booker T with the title and gets enough for the pin.

Thoughts: Meh. These two wrestling styles never clicked together. This had some poor timing and a couple slightly blown spots. Everything just felt like it was delayed. The finish came weird to me, also. A babyface such as Batista (a big man face) shouldn’t have to cheat against someone as Booker T. Maybe it happened that way because Batista was scared to get messed up by Booker T, again. Bad match. *

World Heavyweight Title: Batista vs. King Booker (w/Queen Sharmell) vs. Fit Finlay (12/01/06).

Big Dave beats on both the heels. Back from commercial, Booker is firmly in control of Batista. Finlay pulls Batista to the apron and boots him right in the head. Finlay slowly takes apart Dave. Batista sets him on top and delivers a muscle buster. Batista and Booker slug it out as Hornswoggle runs through the ring to distract the ref. Finlay uses the disruption to slip in and destroy Batista’s knee with the shillelagh for only two. Booker charges right into the spinebuster. Batista goes for a Dave Bomb on Finlay, but he counters by drilling the bad knee. Dave no sells the knee, and then hits the Big David Bomb on Finlay for the three.

Thoughts: Finlay added some well missing structure in the previous Booker-Batista matches. The match itself was a typical WWE style heels vs. face match. Heel dominates most of the match and attempts to get some heat; then the face does there comeback and overcomes the odds (usually by no selling the offense from the heel, which would make most of the match filler). Thanks for Finlay, though, this was a decent TV match. **1/2

World Heavyweight Title: Batista vs. The Undertaker (04/01/07).

This match had bad news written all over it. Batista was dogging most of his matches up to this point, and people didn’t think Undertaker would have been able to carry Dave to a decent WM match. Batista goes for a Dave Bomb, but Taker smashes him into the turnbuckle. Batista hits a belly-to-belly suplex on Taker. Batista is smashing Taker’s head in with the punches on top of the turnbuckle, but Taker counters to the Last Ride for a two. Taker goes for another Last Ride, but Batista counters and hits a spear. Batista goes for the Dave bomb and hits hit, but only get another two count. Dave is pissed. Batista goes for another Lametista bomb, but Taker shoves him into the turnbuckle, and then hits the tombstone piledriver for the win.

Thoughts: Just a tad overrated, but still very good. It was really surprising where this match got put on the card, because of all the build it had. Plenty of sources and dirtsheets were hearing rumors of Batista breaking the streak, and sadly I believe that the card placement ruined the unpredictability. Batista seemed very motivated for once in his career and it finally seemed like he cared about something other than a paycheck. What people predicted to be one of the worst WM main events all time, turned into a very good midcard match. ***½

World Heavyweight Title, Steel Cage: Edge vs. Batista (06/03/07).

Edge tries to dash out early. Batista drags him back in. Edge hits the edge-o-matic. Batista delivers a superplex, but instead of trying to escape, he goes up and dives off the top rope. Batista gets fired after Edge beat on him. Batista goes for the Dave bomb, but Edge grabs the cage and tries to escape. Edge hits a low blow. Batista goes the other way and tries to escape, but Edge drops to the floor and wins.

Thoughts: The psychology was present in the match. Batista played the all mighty face who does everything by the book, while Edge was the complete opposite. I do like proper characterization in my matches, but there characters, in the match, really restricted them from doing what they are capable of. **¼

World Heavyweight Title, Undertaker vs. Batista (10/03/2007)

There was a ref scandal before the match. The ref nominations for the match were: Jbl, Foley, and AUSTIN. While JBL was the only person who was on the show before this, everyone still voted for Austin.  What they should have done was to make JBL pull a George Bush and some how “change” the voting. Instead, they just had Austin be the ref and let him beat up Foley and JBL. Batista hits him with punches on the top, but Undertaker counters into the last ride for only 2 .Batista gets up and hits the spinebuster. Batista is puzzled and sells it well. Batisa hits the Batista bomb, but only gets another two. Batista is now furious. Undertaker staggers himself back up. Batista hits another Batista bomb and gets the three count.

Thoughts: They went all out in this match. Very good wrestling match, with both workers not holding back. I do believe JBL would have made a better ref than Austin, because JBL would have added in some heat and drama into it. Batista, as a shocker, gets the clean win over the Deadman. Great match from the big guys. ***¾

Triple H, Batista & Ric Flair vs. Randy Orton, Edge & Umaga (12/10/07).

This was the 15 anniversary show of Raw. On the show, Evolution was supposed to have a reunion. Everyone joined the reunion except Randy Orton (since he was the only heel). Orton then names another stable he was apart of and that is Rated-RKO. Edge comes out, and so does Umaga for no reason, and then they have a match. They do some basic tag stuff. Batista gets a hot tag from Flair, but Umaga  hits the ref and causes the DQ. Rated-RKO runs away. Evolution beats up Umaga just for the sake.

Thoughts: Nothing to rate. Everything in this segment/match was pointless. I don’t even know why this is on the DVD. Batista wasn’t even the main center of attention in any of this. N/R

John Cena vs. Batista (08/17/08).

They are dead even in the feeling out process. Crowd is either booing Cena or Batista(because there “cool).Batista gets a figure-four leglock and the woo chants occur. Cena goes for a FU but Batista elbows out and then Cena in the STFU. Batista makes it to the ropes. Cena goes for the FU, but Batista gets out and applies a weird looking choke. He lets go and then hits the spear but only gets two Cena counters a powerslam and hits the FU and sells the injuries by making a delayed cover. They dish out some blows. Cena wins and comes off for a top rope leg drop, but Batista catches him in the air and hits the Dave Bomb, but only get a two! Batista can’t believe it. Batista hits another Batista bomb and ends the match.

Thoughts: They added in the epic feeling they were looking for by using good power moves, counters, and near-falls. I would give this a great rating, if it wasn’t for the center of the match. The center had bunch of filler. It felt like they ran out of ideas and moves to do. Still a good match. *** ¼

Batista vs. Randy Orton (w/Manu & Cody Rhodes — 12/14/08).
Orton controls most of the match with his sluggish offense. Batista and gives him a DDT. Batista counters the RKO to an unprettier for two. Batista nails him in the corner for punches, and when Randy tries to counter, he accidentally finds himself getting Powerbombed.

Thoughts: Orton’s heat on Batista was so slow and went no where fast. The only thing that could have saved it was, either, good selling or a good comeback, but neither took place because Batista did his average comeback to win the match. Nothing was really that bad from a wrestling standpoint. No botches or anything, but how hard is it to botch when the match is slower than Nick Dinsmore’s character? *3/4

Going Home: This DVD takes through Dave’s life as a punk kid growing up-raised by a single mother, then becoming a bodybuilder and “saving his life” Then, getting into the wresting business from his debuting name: Leviathan; then all the way to becoming one of the most talked about wrestlers today.

This DVD isn’t just about Batista. The DVD also has a good moral behind it, and that is never to give up at what you believe in.  DON’T STOP BELIEVING!

The only match I could say that belongs on there was his Last Man Standing match with Undertaker, but every other important or good match of Batista’s is on there. I actually enjoyed most of the matches on here. Batista is one of those wrestlers who can be on his game sometimes, and completely stink  up the place another night.  On this DVD, you will mostly see Batista on his game; therefor, I recommend this DVD.

Thumbs up for “I walk alone”

LA POSTA. Il meglio dello spam e delle assurdità postali scovate sbirciando nelle caselle di posta elettronica globali e non solo. Di fatto ogni giorno la nostra casella riceve centinaia di mail, dal contenuto profetico e premurose nei confronti delle nostre persone e soprattutto “dimensioni professionali”… risponderemo anche a loro.
Quesiti e risposte di cuore, moda,  bellezza, economia domestica, galateo , vita in casa… d’altri.
La rubrica dedicata con il cuore ai lettori di AgainstAllBlogs, ma anche no.

Inauguriamo la posta dei lettori (ma non-commentatori) di AAB rispondendo in prima persona al tipo di pubblico che non ci leggerà MAI, nemmeno quando sarà intento ad installare software per il parental control per i propri figli.
Peccato, perchè QUESTE sono le risposte giuste ai loro problemi.

(Domande tratte dalla rubrica “LA POSTA” del magazine “AMICA” n . 05 Maggio 2009)

—

MODA

Mi chiamo Gabriella, ho 34 Anni e vivo a Lodi (Milano).  Ogni anno l’azienda per la quale lavoro si occupa della presentazione di un importante pubblicazione di moda. Il mio principale mi ha appena comunicato che sarò io a rappresentare l’azienda. Di solito tutti quelli che vi partecipano si vestono in modo abbastanza eccentrico. Che cosa mi consigliate di mettermi per la serata???

AAB:  www.cosplaymagic.com

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ECONOMIA DOMESTICA

Mi chiamo Daria, ho 28 anni e vivo a L’Aquila. Il nostro vecchio televisore purtroppo si è spento definitivamente, scatenando una gran discussione familiare sul tipo di tv da comperare. Qualcuno la vorrebbe ancor a tubo catodico, qualcun altro a pannelli Lcd e qualcun altro ancora al plasma. Ognuno sostiene che la tecnologia indicata ha vita piu’ lunga rispetto alle altre. Chi ha ragione?

AAB: VIVI A L’AQUILA E IL PROBLEMA E’ IL TELEVISORE ROTTO?

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SESSO

Sono Tiziana, ho 38 anni e abito a Brindisi. Lui ha cercato di farmi tingere i capelli di biondo, poi ha messo sul cuscino una parrucca bionda, prima di fare l’amore. Che intenzioni avrà?

AAB: Regalarti una parure di farfalle e candidarti presso una lista “La Puglia Prima di Tutto“

againstallblogs

This was made by a reader of mine. It’s pretty awesome. There are some good ones on the side too.

- The 11/21 Melbourne house show was taped for television in Australia. The event will be in a few weeks in prime time on One HD.

- The show was also taped for DVD release, presumably in both Australia as well as the North American market.

- In addition to the Hulkamania tour, Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair, The Nasty Boys, Jimmy Hart and Brutus Beefcake were also in Australia to film a pilot for a Hogan/Flair reality show for North America.

- The only merchandise sold at the shows was for Hogan.

- The former Jethro Holiday/Trevor Murdoch recently opened T Murdoch’s Bar & Grill in Eldon, MO. credit: Wrestling Globe Newsletter

Friday was one of the busiest days in Brand Elevation history.  It was a day of major events including my radio interview with United States Olympic Gold Medalist and swimmer Cullen Jones, Oprah’s announcement that she is ending her show after twenty-five years, and seeing Bruce Springsteen live at the First Mariner Arena for his first concert in Baltimore since 1973.

Alright, only two of these things really impacted me. Cullen was a great guest on Elevation Radio and The Boss absolutely tore the fucking house down in Baltimore.

In the penultimate show of the 2009 tour the Boss broke out amazing versions of My Love Will Not Let You Down, Long Walk Home, The E Street Shuffle, Wrecking Ball, For You (solo on the piano), Baltimore favorite Hungry Heart, Ramrod, Rosie, and so much more.

The musical pinnacle of the night was the band’s rendition of every song on Born to Run, as it was played on the album. Powerhouse versions of Backstreets and Thunder Road were particularly memorable.

Besides the music, the Boss just does amazing things with his body for a 60-year-old. Wait, that sounded kind of gay didn’t it? Well, I don’t care. When I’m 60, I just hope to be able to walk from my kitchen to the living room so I can watch Monday Night Raw once a week. Nevermind doing shit like crowd surfing, playing 31 songs in three and a half hours without letting the energy waiver at all, jumping around and dancing like a mad man, and leading 13,000 people in unison like its a religious experience. Honestly, Springsteen has so much energy, he could walk from his house in New Jersey to every venue around the country. It would save jet costs. Although, carrying The Big Man would probably get a little tiresome after a while.

The Boss tries not to get groped while crowd surfing though Baltimore's finest.

Speaking of the Big Man, Clarence and the rest of the band were absolutely on fire. Despite all of knee and back injuries Clarence was on his feet the entire night and just nailed every single one of his saxophone solos. Nils Lofgren and Max Weinberg also had amazing shows. Nils was spinning like a mad man all night on lead guitar, and Max was able to bring the power for every single song. It wasn’t just simple Ringo Starr-keep the beat stuff. Practically every song from American Land to Badlands called for big drum solos. Little Steven Van Zandt and the rest of the band also looked really good too.

The E Street Band cuts down on costs by forcing the entire band to share one microphone.

Probably the only being at the show who didn’t have a great time was The Baltimore Arena. That old girl needed to be torn down in 1985. The sound system was on its last legs by the end of the night and left me a parting gift of buzzing in my ear for the next 48 hours. The arena is just really old-looking and a big dump, however it did provide a nice retro classic rock atmosphere for the show. Next week I’ll get to complete the second part of my Arena double-header, when the WWE comes to Baltimore for a live taping of Raw. If that show is 1/15th as entertaining as Springsteen, I’ll be happy. Due to the fact Mini Me is hosting the show, my hopes are not out of this world. Sheamus becoming the new number one contender to Cena may be a giant rib on the American wrestling fan.

Anyway, back to the Boss. I think you’ll enjoy this video of he and Stevie going nuts on Ramrod.

Now at 60 years old, Bruce Springsteen is a physical specimen with the energy of a 16 year old. HULK HOGAN IS NOT THE SAME WAY. I just thought I’d pass along this fucking clip of Hogan and Ric Flair’s “match” from the first show of the Hulkamania Tour of Has Beens in Australia, or whatever the hell it’s called. Hogan and Nature Boy must really need the money.  Hogan looks less spry than Stephen Hawking at this point. Naitch’ still moves OK, but its a shame that his retirement ceremony from Mania 24 is forever tarnished because he decided to job to Hulk Hogan 4 or times in Australia to pay off his ex-wives. WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

I also wanted to take this opportunity to be a shameless Billy Mays-esque whore for my latest adventure on Elevation Radio. Before getting down with the Boss on Friday night, there was business to be had Friday afternoon when I interviewed American gold medal winning swimmer Cullen Jones. Cullen was really neat to talk to, and offered some fascinating insights into how he originally got into swimming, the experience of swimming in Beijing for the Olympics, America’s rivalry with France, being a teammate to Michael Phelps, his feelings on representing the African-American community and so much more. It was a nice, tidy quick, show and very interesting.

Cullen Jones (left) celebrates winning the gold medal. The greatest moment of his career, besides appearing on Elevation Radio.

I also discussed the fallout from UFC 105, correctly predicted the outcome of the main event at UFC 106, and offered my uninvited take on the 32 teams who made it to the World Cup. SJX will enjoy that portion of the show. I make some amazingly uneducated generalizations about teams I have never seen before. Quite impressive. So, click this link to hear that plus the interview with Cullen. http://www.blogtalkradio.com/elevationradio/2009/11/20/elevation-radio-with-cullen-jones

Finally, this weekend brings about the 1 year anniversary of The Outsiders Edge. My great thanks to: SJX for being there at the beginning and for continuing to be a great ear for all my rants about the WWE and other things , all the global correspondents, Scott Hall and Kevin Nash for inventing our name, all the guests who have appeared on the radio show, chest tattoos for bringing so many google searches to the site, along with naked  LPGA golfers, Michelle Yeoh, Jean Calude Van Damme’s Bloodsport, world soccer daily, erin andrews video peep pictures, david carradine, and all of the other search terms that bring so many people to this website every day, The Wrestle Rock Rumble video, weird celebrity deaths, Sammy the Samoyed, and to all the readers like you.

We made it to year and will keep on ticking to better and bigger things in 2010!

I stood stone-like at midnight suspended in my masquerade
I combed my hair till it was just right and commanded the night brigade
I was open to pain and crossed by the rain and I walked on a crooked crutch
I strolled all alone through a fallout zone and came out with my soul untouched
I hid in the clouded wrath of the crowd but when they said “Sit down” I stood up.
Ooh-ooh growin’ up

The flag of piracy flew from my mast, my sails were set wing to wing
I had a jukebox graduate for first mate, she couldn’t sail but she sure could sing,
I pushed B-52 and bombed ‘em with the blues with my gear set stubborn on standing
I broke all the rules, strafed my old high school, never once gave thought to landing,
I hid in the clouded wrath of the crowd but when they said “Come down” I threw up
Ooh-ooh growin’ up

I took month-long vacations in the stratosphere and you know it’s really hard to hold your breath.
I swear I lost everything I ever loved or feared, I was the cosmic kid in full costume dress
Well, my feet they finally took root in the earth but I got me a nice little place in the stars
And I swear I found the key to the universe in the engine of an old parked car
I hid in the mother breast of the crowd but when they said “Pull down” I pulled up
Ooh-ooh growin’ up. Ooh-ooh growin’ up

Stylin’ and profilin’ at the Wal-Mart! WOOOOOOO!

Algunas fotos de luchadores encontrados en los pasillos de la conocida tienda Walmart, sugerencia de compañero Dunkler

The Great Khali buscando comprar talento

WTF?

En este video vemos los momentos de arranque de una de las funciones del tour “Hulkmania” en Australia, que parece haber sido un éxito para Hulk Hogan, no solo tuvo grandes entradas (como muestra el video), si no que ha recibido muy buenos comentarios de los asistentes:

• Haha great night dude, How awesome was it when Ric Flair came out. We both were yelling WOOOO WOOOOOOOO WOOOOO!
• Once you have pyro, giant video screens, world class talent, and an arena full of blokes… You’re not low budget.
  No part of this low budget. Low budget is not a synonym for “wrestling produced by someone other than WWE”.
  Great stuff man. Keep it coming, one love to AUSTRALIA.

WCW World War 3
November 24, 1996
Norfolk, VA
The Scope

The current WCW champs were as follows:
WCW World Champion: Hollywood Hogan (8/10/1996)
WCW U.S. Champion: Ric Flair (7/7/1996)
WCW World Tag Team Champions: The Outsiders (10/27/1996)
WCW World Television Champion: Lord Steven Regal (8/20/1996)
WCW World Cruiserweight Champion: Dean Malenko (10/27/1996)

Your hosts are Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan, and Dusty Rhodes.

• J-Crown Champion Ultimo Dragon (w/Sonny Oono) vs. Rey Mysterio

For those unaware, the J-Crown is EIGHT lightweight championships combined from promotions all around the world. The funny part is and possibly the most annoying for the champion is that he’s got to carry around all those eight titles instead of having just one belt to represent all the belts. Needless to say, the J-Crown championship was short-lived and when the WWF came calling for their light heavyweight championship all of a sudden (which was one of the eight championships) in the fall of 1997, the J-Crown status was absolved and all the belts returned to be defended in their particular promotion. Anyways, this is match #2 in the three part series of the Mysterio-Dragon PPV matches. Mysterio won the first match at Hog Wild in Dragon’s debut and now that he’s got a boost of confidence in winning all those belts, maybe he can pick up the win here especially now that Rey has just lost the cruiserweight belt four weeks ago at Halloween Havoc. Alright that’s enough set up talk, let’s get to the match.

After a short feeling out process, they flip around to come to a stalemate. Enough of that, Dragon puts Rey down with his famous kick combo and corners him for some chops. Rey lands on the apron and looks for a springboard, but Dragon stops that with a springboard dropkick to put Rey on the floor. Awesome! Dragon hits a German suplex and then puts Mysterio in a lucha backbreaker rack drop. Rey outlasts a half crab, but then Dragon powerbombs him and lifts him back up for a hotshot! WHAT. Cover, 1-2-NO! Dragon gives Rey the Giant Swing! After so many spins, Dragon ends up making himself dizzy too. Fisherman buster gets two. Brainbuster gets another two. Tombstone piledriver gets a THIRD nearfall in a row! They go to the floor where Dragon drops Rey with ANOTHER tombstone! While Mysterio’s laid out, Dragon gives him a slingshot splash! Back inside, he hits the DRAGONSTEINER for 1-2-NO! RUNNING LIGERBOMB gets 1-2-NO! Mysterio catches Dragon charging in the corner and follows up with a springboard split-legged moonsault for 1-2-NO! Rey flips out to the apron off a whip and springboard dropkicks Dragon to the floor. He continues with the offense and wipes out Dragon with a springboard somersault plancha! Incredible. In the ring, Rey delivers a springboard sunset flip for 1-2-NO! Awesome cartwheel into a spinning hurracanrana gets 1-2-NO! Dragon comes back with a Dragon Suplex right on Rey’s head for 1-2-NO! He tries another Running Ligerbomb, but Rey sunset flips out for 1-2-NO! WHOA. So many convincing nearfalls. Rey calls for the SPRINGBOARD HURRACANRANA which always wins, but this time Dragon catches him in mid-air and bounces him off the rope into a powerbomb for 1-2-3! (13:47) Wow just an absolutely awesome match. I LOVE that finish too. A slingshot powerbomb? Who thinks of this stuff? Just incredible. Easily a MOTYC here. Next month, Dragon wants Malenko and his Cruiserweight belt. At the time, Ultimo Dragon held NINE total championships – that’s one other belt outside of the J-Crown. The cruiserweight belt would make a ridiculous ten championships at once. That’s insanity. But hey, when you’re a champ, you’re a champ all the way. ****½

In the back, DDP avoids Gene’s question about whether or not he’s got anything to do with Eric Bischoff since he’s his next door neighbor and all. You know what Gene, Page does in fact owe his great hair to Head & Shoulders. Don’t be jealous. BANG!

• Chris Jericho (w/Teddy Long) vs. Nick Patrick

For this match, Jericho has to wrestle Patrick with one arm tied behind his back. Nick Patrick comes out looks all sleazy. He wrestles in a sleeveless zebra shirt, black pants, white boots, and one of those soft collars. Jericho shoulderblocks and hiptosses Patrick around to start. He stalls and gets in Teddy Long’s face for a moment. Back inside, he slaps Jericho and then takes a slap to send him flying to the floor. Patrick finally gains an advantage when Jericho misses a clothesline up against the ringpost. Back in again, Patrick punches Jericho around in the corner, but charges into a boot and takes a bunch of turnbuckle smashes. Patrick leads Jericho in and out of the ring to stomp him on his way back inside, but then he gets slammed off the top (WOO!) and eats a superkick for the 1-2-3. (8:02) I know Nick Patrick used to be a wrestler before he hurt himself and became a referee, but he did pretty darn good since that was about fifteen years ago. Tony tells Patrick to go home to daddy. In case you don’t get the inside joke, his daddy is the Assassin who RULED the southern territories as a masked heel back in the day and in 1996, he ran the WCW Power Plant. Actually not that bad to sit through and it’s certainly satisfying to see Patrick get owned if you can forget about referees usually getting merely bumped and knocked out for five minutes. They’re usually so feeble! *½

Gene Okerlund brings out a rehabilitating Ric Flair. While this crowd was already molten hot, Flair comes out to help them become a little hotter. He promises the wrestling public that before it’s all said and done, he will dance all night and dance a little longer, stay all night and stay a little longer. Oh yeah and the new World order will belong to the WCW. WOO! Wait, what?

• The Giant vs. Jeff Jarrett

Giant wears the US belt with him to the ring. Schiavone says that Flair is no longer the champ because of not defending the belt in 30 days. Jarrett spends the whole match trying to knock Giant off his feet. When he fails, Giant takes over and chokes and chops on him. Wait a minute, here comes STING! Meanwhile, Giant misses a pump splash (yep, even back then) and Jarrett takes him off his feet with a flying bodypress for 1-2-NO! As Sting jumps the rail, Giant gets dumped. Jarrett doesn’t notice anything and takes this opportunity to do the Fargo Strut. While the ref is counting on Giant, Sting hops in the ring and gives Jarrett the SCORPION DEATH DROP! Once Sting leaves, Giant waits for Jarrett to stagger up to his feet and delivers the CHOKESLAM for the academic 1-2-3. (6:52) This achieved a couple things. It continues Sting punishing Jarrett for waltzing in here all of a sudden and demanding that he stop being a loser and become the leader for WCW against the nWo. Secondly it allowed Giant to finally chokeslam Jarrett when he said he couldn’t do it. And yeah, that pretty much ends Giant’s feud with the Horsemen. ¾*

It’s time for a contract signing! There’s a table with a plaid cover ready in the ring and Roddy Piper comes out with the contract in hand. Get out here, Hogan. Instead of seeing Hogan, Eric Bischoff comes out wearing an nWo t-shirt, Ted DiBiase, and Vincent. Bischoff says that Hollywood isn’t coming out to sign this because he’s a little busy looking over some scripts and has made Bischoff his power of attorney, so he can sign the contract in his place. First of all, Piper reminds Vincent that he taught him how to fight, so he better back off. Piper handles these three by being able to talk over all them. He doesn’t care about no WCW or nWo. To Piper, nWo means ‘no way out’. And somewhere Vince is thinking that might not be a bad name for a PPV. When Piper gets up in Bischoff’s face, Bischoff reminds him that he can fine Piper for whatever it is he’s about to do. O RLY? How much would it cost him? Piper gets a little off track and then tells Bischoff that this match against Hogan is no-DQ, no countouts – there must be a winner to find out who the real icon is. Piper doesn’t want to look at Bischoff anymore, he calls Hogan out again. And here comes Hollywood along with the rest of the new World order. First of all, Hollywood says he’ll sign the contract, but then he brings up Piper’s hip replacement. Show everybody the scar, Roddy! Hogan proceeds to call Piper a cripple and “Pegged Leg Pete”. Piper finally has enough and slaps Hogan away. Big mistake. The nWo swarms on him while Hogan blasts his scar with a chair and then spray paints the nWo letters across his hip! Before the nWo leaves, Piper gets to his feet and turns the table over to prove a point. He WILL NOT DIE! While the build towards this match is pretty awesome, it’s a shame that it can’t live up to it.

• Harlem Heat (w/Sister Sherri) vs. The Amazing French Canadians (w/Col. Robert Parker)

If the Heat win, Sherri gets five minutes with Col. Parker. Hopefully this time she won’t bump her head and fall in love with him. During the Canadian national anthem, Sherri wonders if the AFC think they’re at the MTV music awards. SUH-NAP! Jacques kips up after a shoulderblock and nails Booker with a dropkick, but then eats a Hook Kick. Tag to Stevie Ray for a double clothesline. Jacques catches Stevie Ray with a jumping back elbow, but has to tag in Oulette to put him down with a clothesline. Stevie Ray nails Oulette with a back suplex and Bicycle Kicks him down for two. Oulette gets stuck in the Heat corner for a while. Scissors Kick connects. Booker misses an elbow and SPINAROONIES up into a Jumping Leg Lariat. Jacques pulls the top rope down on Booker to send him flying to the floor. Back in, Jacques slams Oulette on top of Booker and continues the double teams with a double hotshot. Boston crab/flying legdrop on Booker gets two. Stevie Ray gets a hot tag and press slams Rougeau on top of Oulette. It breaks down into a pier-six brawl and the ref gets sandwiched in the corner. Booker misses a Jumping Leg Lariat and gets crotched and falls to the floor. That leaves Stevie Ray alone with the AFC for a SPIKE PILEDRIVER! With the Heat all down and out, Oulette makes a scaffold in the corner with a table and then puts the ring steps on top of the table. He puts another bundle of steps down on the mat to make for a SUPER QUEBECER CRASH! OH MY GOSH! Too bad it completely misses. I mean it took all of a whole minute to set up. Jacques gets kicked to the floor while Booker delivers the HARLEM HANGOVER to Oulette for the 1-2-3. (9:15) Standard formula tag with a silly finish. Kind of cool, but kind of silly too. I mean, really guys? Afterwards, Sherri gets her alone time with Parker and beats him to the back after about a minute or two. About what we expected with that. **

Tony Schiavone is wiping away the TEARS of laughter. Yes, TEARS.

On the WCW Hotline, Gene says he’ll tell you who the latest superstar is that will be coming to WCW! Well whoever he is, I’ll bet he’ll be just perfect for WCW.

• WCW World Cruiserweight Champion Dean Malenko vs. Psychosis

Malenko stretches Psychosis down on the mat to start. During the mat work, somebody apparently is getting kicked out of the building. Who knows. Finally, it picks up a little as Psychosis takes Malenko to the floor, but then he misses a leap to the floor and slams his face on the guardrail. Oww? Back in, Malenko returns to the mat with a headscissors. He changes over to a nasty vertical half crab and then levels Psychosis with a butterfly powerbomb into a TEXAS CLOVERLEAF, but Psychosis is in the ropes. They fight to the floor while Malenko cranks on the knee. Psychosis mounts a comeback with a pumphandle backbreaker and then NAILS Malenko with a corkscrew senton on the floor! WHAT. Back in, Psychosis delivers a GUILLOTINE LEGDROP for 1-2-NO! Malenko avoids a charge, but gets caught up top and takes a rana to the mat for 1-2-NO! Whoa, Psychosis catches Malenko with a rolling Koppou kick. We see a DOUBLE REVERSAL on a tombstone piledriver which Dean wins. Cover, 1-2-NO! Malenko eats a boot off a corner charge, but avoids a leapfrog and gets the rolling clutch into a bridge for the 1-2-3. (14:34) Took too long to get where it was going to be great. However it did include quite a few awesome nearfalls. Certainly not as great as the Dragon-Rey match, but still a very good match. ***½

• WCW World Tag Team Champions The Outsiders vs. The Nasty Boys vs. The Faces of Fear (w/Jimmy Hart)

I do believe this is the final WCW PPV for the Nasty Boys. While Knobbs would wrestle on his own later in WCW, I know this is certainly the end of PPVs for Jerry Sags. Anyways, they clean house on the Outsiders before the Faces of Fear even make it to the ring. Once the Faces of Fear make it to the ring, the Outsiders stand back while the other two teams beat the crap out of each other. As you might expect, there’s a lot of CLUBBERIN’. Knobbs gets cornered in the champs corner for a while. Hall kicks Barbarian in the head a bunch and that wakes him up. The Faces of Fear slug him around until the Nasties take over. Sags hits a PILEDRIVER on Barbarian and gets two. Nash lays out Barbarian with the Side Slam. In comes Hall, the Faces of Fear have some more fun with him. Back over to the Nasties, they concentrate on Barbarian some more. Eventually, Knobbs and Meng decide to stop fighting each other and they tag in both Hall and Nash. They think they are brilliant for making these two fight, but all they have to do is pin each other to regain the tag belts, says Tony. They hype the crowd up into a frenzy making them think they’re going to really fight, but then Nash lays down for Hall and they get a two count off that. Does that remind anybody of a certain Monday night in January of 1999? Just saying. The match breaks down with the Faces of Fear heading to the floor to beat up Sags. Meanwhile, Hall gets Jimmy’s megaphone and blasts Knobbs in the back of the head so Nash can give him the JACKKNIFE POWERBOMB for the 1-2-3. (16:11) I don’t normally like tag team triangle matches because they’re usually just a huge mess, but this felt like a good fight. The Nasties and the Faces of Fear are known for being tough dudes, but the Outsiders proved to be the smartest. In this case, being the smartest won them the match. **¼

• 60-Man Battle Royal – Winner Gets The Next WCW World Title Shot

The participants: Lex Luger, Eddie Guerrero, ‘Boston Bad Boy’ Tony Rumble, Diamond Dallas Page, Kaos, Rage, M. Wallstreet, Marcus Bagwell, Scotty Riggs, Sgt. Craig Pittman, Booker T, Stevie Ray, Big Bubba, Hugh Morrus, Konnan, Ron Studd, Lord Steven Regal, La Parka, Pez Whatley, Steve McMichael, Disco Inferno, Renegade, Joe Gomez, Meng, Barbarian, Bunkhouse Buck, Arn Anderson, Johnny Grunge, Ciclope, Galaxy, Syxx, Scott Hall, Kevin Nash, The Giant, Scott Norton, Ultimo Dragon, Jimmy Graffiti, Mike Enos, Rey Mysterio Jr., Roadblock, Ice Train, Jack Boot, Jim Duggan, Chris Benoit, Juventud Guerrera, Jacques Rougeau, Carl Oulette, Prince Iaukea, Dean Malenko, Jeff Jarrett, Bobby Eaton, Jim Powers, Squire David Taylor, Chris Jericho, Alex Wright, Mark Starr, Mr. JL, Villano IV, Rick Steiner, and Kevin Sullivan. Our commentators for ring one – Mike Tenay and Dusty Rhodes; ring two – Tony Schiavone and Bobby Heenan; ring three – Lee Marshall and Larry Zbyszko.

A black-eyed and bruised Benoit meets Sullivan in the aisleway as he comes to the ring. They had a rematch from the Great American Bash in Baltimore the night before. A Horsemen/Dungeon battle ensues on the floor. Benoit and Sullivan fight into the crowd. Bubba tries to help out, but he gets beaten down the steps. Hard to tell if any eliminations are happening even with the three-way split screen because the commentators are all talking about the Horsemen/Dungeon fight. Somehow Lee Marshall gets swept up into the brawl. HA. Apparently everybody involved in the fight is disqualified from the battle royal. The jobbers and the luchadores slowly get weeded out. That excludes Rey Mysterio Jr. The new World order people are just standing around picking their shots. Giant gets into it with Roadblock and clotheslines him out. In one ring, everybody clotheslines Ron Studd in the corner. Once he’s down, they all dog pile on top of him for some reason. While the Amazing French Canadians have their problems with Duggan after they eliminated, Eddie Guerrero pescados out on top of Regal. Off-camera, it looks like Bagwell eliminated Riggs to further their problems with Wallstreet coming up behind Bagwell to send him to the showers. It’ll all become clear tomorrow on Nitro. In another ring, the nWo pretty much stand back and watch while Rey and Dragon make a little match. I thought Eddie was eliminated when he launched himself out on Regal, but he’s still at ringside beating up DDP. Eventually, everybody congregates into the same ring. Jack Boot, better known as Sgt. Buddy Lee Parker, gets tossed out. I know everybody was DYING to know what happened to him. Luger tries to punch away on the Giant, but he can’t stay there forever with the nWo standing in his way protecting their own. Luger does manage to toss out a different giant in Ron Studd though. Now the midcarders like Rick Steiner and Chris Jericho get sent out. How is Regal still in the match? Finally when there’s nine people left, WCW stops fighting each other momentarily. Luger and Jarrett go after Hall and Nash while Regal, Mysterio, DDP, and Eddie continue beating on one another. I’ve seen everybody left from WCW on the floor at some point during this match. Regal backdrops Eddie out for a crazy bump. Rey charges Giant and gets hoisted up with ONE HAND. He pitches Rey on top of Eddie. That’s just ridiculous. Hall goes to give Jarrett the OUTSIDERS EDGE when Regal makes the save! Nevertheless, Nash clotheslines Jarrett out. DDP charges Regal and misses to crash and burn on the floor. Now that Regal is on fire, Nash and Giant swarms the guy and dumps him out.

We’re down to Syxx, Nash, Hall, and the Giant left to take on Luger. The crowd gets to their feet. Luger goes on the move and starts taking everybody down with clotheslines. All except the Giant. He whips Luger across and misses an avalanche to land himself up on the top turnbuckle. Lex gets Giant up on his shoulders to get rid of him, but Syxx kicks Luger in the gut. Hall kicks Luger for the OUTSIDERS EDGE, but Luger backdrops him out to the floor. Lex presses Syxx and throws him out onto Hall! Luger ducks a clothesline from Nash and then nails him coming back around with a running elbow! With Nash staggered, Luger lifts him up in the TORTURE RACK! As he moves over to the ropes to dump him out, Giant comes over and shoves them both out to win the match. (28:23) This actually turns out for the best because it creates an opportunity to weaken the nWo just a little bit. They were getting a tad too strong. Since Giant is part of the new World order and Hogan’s the champ, to ask for the guaranteed title shot for winning World War 3 would mean absolute treason. And boy, this should get a little interesting in the weeks to come.

Final Thoughts: What a fun PPV. Apart from who won at least from a booking standpoint, I’m not a big fan of the main event. It’s usually just a nasty cluster of a match, but the hot ending was just spectacular. Most people hate the undercard on this show aside from the cruiserweight stuff. I didn’t mind it and found those matches to be enjoyable. World War 3 ‘96 will get an easy thumbs up from me. November 1996 was just a great month for PPVs. For an interesting time in WCW, go and check this out however you can.

Hulk Hogan es declarado vencedor ante su oponente  Ric Flair durante Hulkamania Hulk Hogan’s Tour en el Rod Laver Arena en Melbourne, Australia. (21 de noviembre de 2009)

Resultados rapidos:

1. Nick Dinsmore (a/k/a Eugene) y Pimp Fatha (a/k/a Godfather) vencen Rock of Love.
2. Spartan3000 Matt Cross venció “Outcast” Shannon Moore.
3. The Nasty Boys venció Black Pearl y Vampire Warrior in an Australian Street Fight.
4. Brutus Beefcake venció Heidenreich.
5. Lacey Von Erich gano el bikini contest.
6. Mr. Anderson venció Sean Morley (a/k/a Val Venis).
7. Brian Lawler y Rikishi vencieron Orlando Jordan y Uso Fatu.
8. Hulk Hogan venció Ric Flair.

Brian Knobbs is the only person on earth who makes me look like Kate Moss.

Oh my god, Dusty and Kevin are back again. Brothers and sisters, everybody sing. This week, Dusty and Kevin are singing about Monday Night Raw, and what an abysmal overall show it really was. Did you know there was a PPV this coming Sunday? Well, you wouldn’t be able to tell it from watching Raw! The fearless duo critique the show, examining some of the mistakes that were made along the way. Kevin laments that in spite of all these errors, Raw seems to at least be more on the right track than they have been in the past. Baby steps. In other news, Hulk Hogan was left battered and bloodied, and the Australia thought it was a shoot, brother! Which one is dumb, which one is dumber, and which one is the dumbest? Dusty and Kevin tell you who, so you need to listen!

Stunt Granny Audio #68

Auf der Pressekonferenz von Hulk Hogan schlug Ric Flair auf ihn ein…

Fake or Real?

Beim ersten Blick ist man geschockt, doch dann fragt man sich doch ob er wirklich so zugerichtet worden sein kann. Ist dies möglicherweiße nur eine fragwürdige Promo-Aktion für seinen nächsten Kampf? Am Vergangenen Dienstag traf Hogan jedenfalls auf seinen Gegner Ric Flair, während einer Pressekonferenz in Australien.

Nach einem kurzen Wortaustausch, soll Hogan von seinem Gegenüber in den Schwitzkasten genommen worden sein und Flair fing an heftig auf seinen Kopf einzuschlagen, bis er blutüberströmt am Boden lag. Ein Sprecher von Hulk Hogan besteht darauf, dass es sich um einen echten Kampf handelte, die Welt aber zweifelt an der Echtheit.

Ich persönlich denke das es eine Promo-Aktion ist, irgendwie wirkt das Bild nicht real auf mich. Sollte es sich tatsächlich um eine Prügelei gehandelt haben, wünsche ich Herrn Hogan gute Genesung.

WCW Monday Nitro
November 18, 1996
Florence, SC
Civic Center

The current WCW champs were as follows:
WCW World Champion: Hollywood Hogan (8/10/1996)
WCW U.S. Champion: Ric Flair (7/7/1996)
WCW World Tag Team Champions: The Outsiders (10/27/1996)
WCW World Television Champion: Lord Steven Regal (8/20/1996)
WCW World Cruiserweight Champion: Dean Malenko (10/27/1996)

HOUR NUMBER ONE! Your hosts are Tony Schiavone & Larry Zbyszko.

Before there’s even an intro, we see the aftermath of an Outsiders beatdown with chairs in-hand as they interrupted a Nasties vs. High Voltage vs. Ciclope/Galaxy triangle match that occurred prior to the broadcast. They head over to Tony and Larry Z’s ringside announce table to tell them and everybody watching that the new World order can make you laugh (as they did for Tony Schiavone last week) and they can also be extremely deadly. Nash flicking Tony on the head is pretty hilarious though. WHO’S LAUGHING NOW, FAT BOY? After they leave, Meng and Barbarian are waiting to attack them backstage as they fight out of the building!

After a short break, Larry Z tries to calm Tony down and reminds him that they didn’t hurt him or anything, but he’s got five kids (wow!) and a wife. He doesn’t need to put up with this kind of abuse, so he leaves the broadcast for the rest of the show.

• Juventud Guerrera vs. La Parka
  

Here is La Parka’s WCW debut. Mike Tenay comes out and joins Larry Z for the rest of the first hour. They do some kip-ups from chops to start. La Parka dumps out Juvi for a suicide dive. Back in, Juvi pushes La Parka off the top turnbuckle onto the top rope and then takes him down onto the mat with a springboard headscissors! Cover, 1-2-NO! Quebrada gets another two. Juvi sets up for another springboard, but La Parka dropkicks him in mid-air. Back to the floor, La Parka delivers the Eddie Guerrero stage dive. Back inside, La Parka delivers a powerbomb for two. Juvi escapes a surfboard and drills La Parka with a missile dropkick for two. La Parka misses a corner charge and takes a whole BUNCH of turnbuckle smashes. Another springboard headscissors out of the corner gets two for Juvi. Ugh, Guerrera delivers one ugly looking spinning hurracanrana for two. La Parka misses something off the top and takes a Tornado DDT for two. However, La Parka blocks the Dragonsteiner and nails Juvi with a CORKSCREW SENTON for the 1-2-3. (9:22) Great TV debut for La Parka with loads of neat nearfalls on him, but Juvi just didn’t have the weight advantage over the big luchadore. ***¼

Video package shown to hype Ultimo Dragon as he looks to defend his newly-won J-Crown (short-lived unification of EIGHT lightweight championships from promotions around the world) against Rey Mysterio Jr at World War 3. We see some clips of him vs. the Great Sasuke in the J-Crown tournament final back on August 5.

• WCW World Cruiserweight Champion Dean Malenko vs. J-Crown Champion Ultimo Dragon (w/Sonny Oono)
  

OH SNAP. This should be good. Some nice mat stuff to start. Dragon hits the handspring back elbow, but Malenko immediately whips Dragon across for the corner clothesline. Some awesome counters lead to a nearfall sequence which leads to a Tiger Suplex from Dragon for two. They go to the floor for some guardrail action. Back in, Dragon elbows out of a back superplex, but misses the moonsault. Sonny Oono hops up on the apron once Malenko hooks on the TEXAS CLOVERLEAF. Malenko lets go of Dragon and flips Oono into the ring. Dragon goes to save his manager and takes a backdrop over the top to the floor. Oops, DQ! (4:02) Oh WCW and your inconsistencies over what is a toss over the top rope and what isn’t. Good for what it was and it’s got me looking forward to their match at Starrcade that nobody knows about yet. **½

WCW Saturday Night! Watch it IF YOU WEEL! 6:05PM eastern! TBS! The Faces of Fear takes on Ciclope & Galaxy! TV Champ Lord Steven Regal defends his belt against Dean Malenko! Both the Taskmaster and Chris Jericho will be in action! Arn Anderson faces Bunkhouse Buck! Jeff Jarrett battles Mike Enos! Also, a match from the new World order! Don’t miss out! It’s the MUTHASHIP! PAY WINDAHS, CLUBBERIN, AND PLUNDAH, BABY!

Recap to last week where Sherri took a swing at her former lover Col. Robert Parker.

• Amazing French Canadians (w/Col. Robert Parker) vs. The American Males
  

Parker debuts his new French Foreign Legion look. The American Males clean house to start so they can chant “USA” together. Back in, Jacques shows off a little bit. Riggs and Bagwell collide to cause a little problem. Oulette nails Riggs from the apron into a jumping back elbow from Jacques. In comes Oulette, as Jacques slams him on top of Riggs. Maybe they aren’t as good a gimmick as the Quebecers, but they’re still fun to watch. I’m a fan. Double hotshot to Riggs, but heel miscommunication ensues. HOT TAG TO BAGWELL! He completely owns the AFC with backdrops and dropkicks! DOUBLE NOGGIN KNOCKER! Jacques backflips to avoid another backdrop, but then Riggs knees Jacques into Bagwell and their heads collide. While the ref tries to get Riggs out of the ring, Oulette puts Jacques on top of Bagwell for the 1-2-3. (5:25) Fun little formula match to continue the problems between the American Males. *½

For all you total nerds out there who are always typing away at your computers and using that new fad called the world wide web that nobody uses except complete geeks who live in their parents basement and never even talked to a girl before, check out wcwwrestling.com! It’s cool if you’re a NERD!

• Lex Luger vs. Hugh Morrus
  

Another week, another TORTURE RACK! (4:22) Luger is on a roll! Surely he’s the guy who will win the 60-man battle royal at World War 3! After the match, Sting quietly interrupts Luger’s post-match interview with Gene Okerlund. He points his baseball bat at Luger and then shoves him back into the corner with it. What’s Sting going to do? He turns the bat around, gives it to Luger, and leaves through the crowd. Luger has nothing to say about what just happened. *

HOUR NUMBER TWO! Your hosts are Eric Bischoff, Bobby Heenan, and Mike Tenay.

Flashback to last week’s Saturday Night: Tony Schiavone conducts a meeting between Nick Patrick, his lawyer, Teddy Long, and Chris Jericho. Teddy says something about Jericho being able to beat Nick Patrick with one arm tied behind his back any day of the week. The lawyer guy takes him up on that and we’ve got another match signed for World War 3!

• Chris Jericho vs. Johnny Grunge
  

Seems like an odd match. Nick Patrick comes out to get a closer look at the match. Grunge ends the feeling out process with a back suplex. Jericho lands on his feet after Grunge moves away from a moonsault press, but gets nailed with a clothesline. We go to the floor as Jericho nails Grunge with a springboard dropkick off the apron. Grunge gets desperate and grabs a chair. He hotshots Jericho and sits him down in a chair for a running clothesline. Now Grunge slides in a table and sets Jericho up on it. Is he going to splash himself and the chair on top of Jericho? Nope. Jericho moves and hits a missile dropkick for the 1-2-3. (5:22) How is bringing a table and a chair in the ring not a DQ? Anyways, decent enough for somebody like Johnny Grunge who isn’t known to be a singles worker. ¾*

Hollywood Hogan, Ted DiBiase, Vincent, and Elizabeth all come over to take control of the announce table. Heenan gets the heck out of Dodge. Hogan gets on the mic and demands Bischoff to tell the world that he’s the bigger icon of wrestling than Piper, that he’s scared to death of Hogan, and that he’s a hundred times richer than Roddy Piper. Of course Bischoff says he disagrees but he’ll say whatever Hogan wants. That’s all Hogan wanted to hear.

Over to Gene Okerlund, he’s standing by with Diamond Dallas Page. He says he still refuses to be the eighth pick for the new World order. Hall, Nash, Giant, and Syxx stop by to tell DDP that he doesn’t get it. You don’t get it? He doesn’t get it.

Bobby Heenan and Mike Tenay return to the announce position.

• Jeff Jarrett vs. Bobby Eaton
  

Extremely short. Jarrett struts and we go to the floor for some guardrail stuff. Back in, Jarrett hits the Bossman straddle and gives Eaton a suplex for the FIGURE-FOUR. That gets the win. (2:19) Here comes Ric Flair. Of course he’s got his arm in a sling. Flair says that no matter what Benoit and Mongo may say, Flair gives Jarrett his full endorsement as a member of the Four Horsemen while he’s away. We see Sting watching on from the rafters. WOO! ½*

• Big Bubba (w/Jimmy Hart) vs. Jim Powers
  

During the match, Bischoff explains how he’s still unable to get Roddy Piper to sign for a match against Hogan. Bubba controls much of the match until Powers comes back like a good ’80s babyface. Turnbuckle smashes and the Knee Lift connects, but then he runs into a BUBBA SLAM for the 1-2-3. (3:54) Filler. ½*

• Chris Benoit (w/Woman) vs. Eddie Guerrero
  

This is a return match from the night after Halloween Havoc when both men were so banged up and couldn’t compete at the usual fast-paced high-impact level. Guerrero slows Benoit down early with a tilt-a-whirl backbreaker. Eddie lands on his feet out of a monkey flip, but charges into the CRIPPLER CROSSFACE! Luckily Eddie makes the ropes. Eddie comes back with a Hilo for two. Benoit comes back with a series of suplexes in order to keep Guerrero on the mat. He’s stretching Eddie like he’s back in Stu’s Dungeon! Commercial break. We return to see Eddie taking Benoit down with a headscissors. Benoit hangs Guerrero out to dry and gets a superplex. Delayed cover gets two. Eddie takes Benoit to the floor and Woman gets in the way to temporarily help her man. Back inside, Guerrero delivers a back suplex to set up for the FROG SPLASH, but Eddie rolls through when Benoit moves. Eddie goes for a hurracanrana, but Benoit rolls through that into a sunset flip for the 1-2-3! (9:23 shown) Nice finish. One of the best Nitro matches we’ve seen in MONTHS. ***½

Eric Bischoff is in the ring to tell the crowd that Roddy Piper still has not signed a contract to face Hollywood Hogan, but he’s going to do everything he can to make this- IS THAT BAGPIPES I HEAR? The crowd goes insane as Roddy Piper walks out the tunnel. Bischoff doesn’t look too happy to see him and Piper has got his FIGHTIN’ EYES going. He’s here to tell some truth because he’s never heard more lies in his life than when he was telling them. Piper calls Bischoff a liar and the crowd seems confused, but Bischoff looks 1000% guilty. Did you have a nice flight to Portland? Is the path to his ranch straight or crooked? He grabs Bischoff and calls him a “little piece of poop” as the Giant and the rest of the new World order grab Piper (except for Hogan who comes out when Piper has been stopped). Hogan embraces Bischoff and reminds everybody that Eric runs WCW and now he works for the nWo! Hogan continues to denigrate Piper by calling him a coward and how he was nobody before he fought Hogan. A bunch of policemen come down and have to restrain Piper while the nWo pose and watch Piper while they head to the back. Before we go, Piper says he’ll be at World War 3 with the contract for his match with Hogan in his teeth! No surrender! No retreat! Kiss his butt, Hogan.

AND WE OUT! Finally, a great episode of Nitro.

World War 3 goes down on November 24. Here’s the card as it looks right now.

MAIN EVENT: 60-Man Battle Royal – (Winner gets the next WCW World Title shot)
WCW World Tag Team Champions The Outsiders vs. The Nasty Boys vs. The Faces of Fear
The Giant vs. Jeff Jarrett
WCW Cruiserweight Champion Dean Malenko vs. Psychosis
Harlem Heat vs. The Amazing French Canadians – (If the Heat win, Sherri gets five minutes with Parker)
Chris Jericho vs. Nick Patrick (Jericho has to wrestle with one hand tied behind his back)
J-Crown Champion Ultimo Dragon vs. Rey Mysterio Jr.