Andrew Lutzke
September 18th 1995
We’ll kick’er off with RAW this week, the last round of pre-tapes for the month before we get a live Raw next week after the Tripleheader IYH PPV this Sunday.
Razor Ramon vs. The Kid
Razor has kicked Raw off both weeks that the WWF have gone head to head with Nitro, perhaps Vince had evidence he was a true ratings draw? Kid jumps Razor before Ramon can even make it in the ring. That only serves to piss Razor off and he tosses the Kid around with raw power. Kid is dominated until Razor errors and ends up being tossed to the floor. Kid gets a sleeper and keeps it locked on for the duration of a commercial, which is either kayfabe-exposing or evidence that the Kid can’t properly lock in a hold. A ref bump leads to Dean Douglas running in and giving Razor a splash from the top rope. The Kid s-l-o-w-l-y crawls on top of Razor and somehow that’s enough to pin Razor. Fun match between the Kliq buddies.
Dean Douglas gives another goofy school grades based promo and rips on both Kid and Razor. That outfit…ugh.
We see clips from Superstars of Henry O. Godwin slopping Ted Dibiase again. HOG is set to battle Sid, Kama, King Kong Bundy and Tatanka. Oh god! I won’t need Unisom if I have to cover those matches in the next few weeks.
Tatanka & Kama vs Savio Vega & Bob Holly… by TSteck160
Savio Vega and Bob Holly vs. Tatanka and Kama
Savio’s push is somewhat bizarre in retrospect. . He doesn’t have a good body, his promos as a face were energetic broken English, his moveset was nothing to write home about, his past in Puerto Rico as TNT had no bearing on his WWF persona and yet from 1995 till 98, he was always in that upper mid-card position where he was booked strongly but always ended up losing – generally in dull matches. Chalk it up to the lack of roster depth that plagued this WWF era.
I really dug Kama’s “Supreme Fighting Machine” gimmick when I was a teen watching this. It’s a shame he never developed a proper MMA moveset to utilize the potential his character offered.
Tatanka’s heel turn sure seemed to kill his character dead. Feuding for six months with the equally dead in the water Lex Luger probably had something to do with that.
Bob Holly has the WWF logo on his outfit in several places, which is a sure sign of a geek. They should have let his inner asshole out a long time before 1999.
This match is just a basic tag formula of face in peril w/ a partner who keeps running in and accidentally distracting the ref so the heels can gang up on the other poor schmuck. The workers involved here don’t have any sort of interesting moves so this plods around for 6 minutes or so before Holly has a flying crossbody reversed into a pin by Kama. Savio has a PPV match in six days with Waylon Mercy and this did nothing to build to it.
Lawler makes a joke about Jeffery Dahmer’s mom eating her son’s brain.
Jean Pierre Lafitte vs. Brian Walsh
Pierre is wearing Bret Hart’s jacket that he stole. We see clips of JPL also robbing a kid of Bret’s sunglasses. Poor Bret has dealt with dementia (Bob Backlund), focal hyperhidrosis (Jerry Lawler’s feet), plaque (Yankem) and now kleptomania. What an exciting series of feuds for our conquering hero.
This match must’ve thrilled the masses who had now been sitting for around 4 hours at this taping. Bret calls in and rips on the Pirate gimmick to my amusement. Hart tries to give the feud some meat on the bone by playing up the disrespect he feels when his glasses are taken from the adoring fans that Bret was trying to connect to. JPL gave the jobber some offense and showed off some of his own expansive offense. I look forward to what he and Bret can do at the PPV since both guys can obviously work.
While Eric Bischoff was giving away RAW results on Nitro, Vince wasn’t hiding the fact that he was airing pre-taped matches, as we get clips of the next match as a teaser to stick around.
Men on a Mission vs. Owen Hart and Yokozuna
The ring crew has reinforced the ring for the fatties. Poor Owen has to try and do the work for the other 3 guys in the ring. Vince ejaculates on commentary because “LOOK AT THE SIZE OF MAYYY-BULLL!!” Sir Mo thanks Owen for carrying this match by stealing from his arsenal & attempts a spin heel kick as we enter into the theater of the absurd. The fatties finally throw down and Mabel gets the best of it. Owen’s quickly back in since Yoko is a 600 pound paper weight after 2 minutes of moving. Yoko gets back in and dumps Mabel and a quick double team move ends Mo’s night as the crowd cheers for Yoko and Owen. This whole match seemed counter intuitive for building to the PPV and even Vince was ripping on Owen and Yoko for getting beat up so much right before facing Shawn and Diesel. This built up Yoko vs. Mabel for the PPV following the Tripleheader and would have probably been better served going down a week later to preserve Yoko and Owen for the Dudes with Attitudes – unless showing their vulnerability was the point all along?
Both teams headlining the PPV close out RAW with promos.
This show was fairly solid but the PPV build was certainly lacking. I will be reviewing the Tripleheader this Thursday. Now onto Nitro and the Fall Brawl aftermath:
WCW Nitro
The arena looks awfully small. We open with an ambulance pulling up and Kevin Sullivan and The Giant climb out in order to send out a warning to Hulk Hogan that Fall Brawl won’t be his last trip inside an ambulance.
American Males vs. Lord Steven Regal and Earl Robert Eaton
We never get going as Harlem Heat jump the Blue Bloods and take their spot in the match. Heat want to defend their titles NOW. The Males are channeling the Fabulous Ones with tonight’s white suspender outfits. Heat take most of the match before Col. Parker wanders out and starts making out with Sherri. That distracts Booker T and Marcus Bagwell reverses a suplex into a pinfall for the upset title win. Ugh for more Stevie Ray wrestling…
Mean Gene with Ric Flair for a promo. Flair is perturbed that Arn Anderson had Brian Pillman help him last night instead of settling he and Arn’s differences one on one. Flair promises to injure Pillman tonight and then find Double A.
This Sunday at 6:05 Craig Pittman vs. Cobra (THE HORROR!), Lord Steven Regal vs. Sting and Dusty Rhodes will talk!
Paul Orndorff vs. Johnny B. Badd
Paul now has awesome operatic music to go along with his new and improved gimmick. (Now he holds a mirror…) This theme sounds like the type of thing that would get over with the internet wrestling community nowadays.
Orndorff starts aggressively to show off his new confidence. Sadly the long term injuries Paul worked through would end his career shortly after this reboot. We’ll get to that angle in a few weeks. Scotty Riggs would be given this same gimmick a few years later and the commentators openly mocked him for stealing it on commentary. Paul uses the mirror to avoid a Badd attack from his rear. Badd reverses out of a piledriver – tries one of his own and is rolled up for the pin. Way to capitalize on Badd’s momentum from last night WCW! Your roster is pretty damn deep and you have to job Badd here? Ugh!
We get clips of Randy Savage lifting weights on the set of Baywatch. Kevin Sullivan attacks him and chokes him with the bar. RIC FLAIR (??!?!) saves Macho Man and calls Sullivan “The Devil” several times.
Savage comes out and is aghast that Flair would help him. Savage plans to destroy the Taskmaster himself if Hogan is hurt. Savage bitches at Hogan for convincing him to trust Luger last night. Savage thinks Luger, Jimmy Hart and Sting have all joined the Dungeon of Doom. Luger storms out and accuses Macho of being jealous and thinks that Savage wants the World title that Hogan holds. Savage agrees that he plans on being WCW champs someday. Savage wants Lex NOW but Luger just smirks. Good segment.
Al Bundy wants me to use 1-800- Collect. The joy of original commercials on old VHS tapes! Then a Showgirls trailer that makes me feel dirty just watching it…
We get a replay from last night of The Giant running over Hogan’s Harley and Hogan pounding on the side of his monster truck as the Giant laughs like a cartoonish villain in a B movie.
Ric Flair vs. Brian Pillman
A pissed off Flair chops the pee out of Pillman. Pillman cheats several times and Bischoff hasn’t figured out that Pillman has turned heel yet. They plug the WCW Hotline by announcing a WCW star has left (Vader). Somewhat odd to promote such a thing when your marketing is based around all the big names being under the WCW banner. Pillman and Flair are going back and forth and watching a motivated Pillman is certainly fun. The men collide and Flair gets up first and locks in the figure four and earns a submission! Whoa! Didn’t see a clean finish coming here, much less a submission loss by Pillman.
Flair promises to kick Arn’s ass again and runs to the locker room.
I have to give the nod to RAW this week. Neither show was a blow away but Nitro felt disjointed and had far worse booking moves.
