Connor McGrath
WWF Monday Night RAW
June 26th,1995
Live from Danville, Pennsylvania
Announcers: Vince McMahon and Shawn Michaels
Show starts with Vince McMahon narrating highlights of the 1995 King of the Ring pay per view that took place the night before. Interestingly, the Kiss My Foot match between Bret Hart and Jerry Lawler is the only match talked about in the opening video. Not the actual KOTR tournament or the main event of the show. Although as goofy as it was, the Kiss My Foot match was better than the tourney or main event…
We’re live from an undisclosed location in Danville, Pennsylvania! I assume it’s the high school gym. Vince McMahon says that Lawler won’t make it tonight because he was humiliated last night so instead our old friend, Shawn Michaels is coming out to be the color commentator for the night. HBK is wearing a see through, mesh t-shirt with black jeans because 1995!
The Smoking Gunns Vs Jason Arndt & The Black Phantom
Smoking Gunns come out for the opener against the future Joey Abs and Gangrel. McMahon talk about The Gunns beef with Men on a Mission. Interesting that they were still trying to sell that storyline after Mabel won King of the Ring. HBK gives Mabel some props and congrats him on winning the tourney. Michaels says it was even more impressive to find out that Mo could read. HBRacist. Gunns win with the Sidewinder.
Now we go to earlier today when Jerry Lawler visited his dentist Issac Yankem DDS. Ah, an inauspicious debut for a guy who would go onto a nineteen year (and counting) run in WWE. Lawler can’t get the taste of feet out of his mouth! He might have terminal halitosis! The King and Dr. Issac Yankem are gonna make sure Bret pays! Lawler says Dr. Issac Yankem does not practice painless dentistry.
Vince and Shawn Michaels hype the Kiss My Foot match some more (actual main event of the show hasn’t been mentioned once and the tournament only mentioned once in passing) and throw it to an ad for the Encore Plus replay of KOTR ’95 tomorrow night.
We finally get some clips of the main event ten minutes into the show. It’s as if WWF immediately realized what a lame duck main event that Diesel & Bam Bam Bigelow Vs Sid & Tatanka was…
Vince hypes tonight’s Jeff Jarrett Vs Savio Vega main event with clips of Savio’s debut at In Your House I (now available on Coliseum Video)
Here come the Bodydonnas. Sunny calls out the fat and stupid fans before Vince throws it to Barry Didinsky in Bret Hart shades and t-shirt with an awkward, mulleted teenage member of the WWF Universe wearing official King of the Ring ’95 swag.
Skip (with Sunny) Vs Scott Taylor
Speaking of mullets, it’s young Scott Taylor who is taking on Skip. Skip has some impressive moves for this era. Him and the future Scotty 2 Hotty have an energetic squash match. Skip does a dive off the top rope then finishes Scotty with a Top Rope Frankensteiner.
Vince McMahon throws it to some Hitting for The Heartland celebrity softball game to benefit the victims of the Oklahoma City Bombing. Herschel Walker was there so were Troy Aikman and Tony Danza. Big Daddy Cool talks about lending a helping hand to those in need while Go West’s “King of Wishful Thinking” plays in the background. I’ll tell you who the real King of Wishful Thinking was… the guy who thought Diesel would draw as World Champ. HAH! Oh, hey, I guess Natrone Means was at this charity softball game too. 1995!
Todd Pettingell delivers the final King of the Ring report from the halls of the Philadelphia Spectrum. Again, the Kiss My Foot match is the most hyped match of the show. Todd says Gorilla Monsoon will host the Encore Plus Replay of the show. Pettingell wonders what the Gorilla has to say. I bet a half hour into the show Gorilla will be yelling “WILL YOU STOP IT!?” Todd announces that Diesel Vs Sid has already been signed for In Your House II and it will be a Lumberjack Match. Somehow, I doubt that one is as good as Ambrose Vs Rollins at SummerSlam.
Savio Vega gets hype for his Intercontinental Title shot by cutting promos in Spanish *and* English. Will this multilingual superstar be the next IC Champ? We’ll find out later tonight.
Man Mountain Rock Vs Phil Apollo
HBK yells about the kids these days and their crazy rock n roll. Him and Razor probably took a dump in Man Mountain Rock’s gym bag after the show. Shawn Michaels makes some Apollo 13 jokes about Phil. Shawn Michaels jokes about Bob Backlund going out for drinks with Ted Kennedy. Watching these early RAWs, I kind of forgot how awkwardly Vince tried to shoo horn in political commentary… Man Mountain Rock wins with the Whammy Bar.
King Mabel (with Sir Mo) Vs Kenny Kendall
King Mabel’s entrance is hilarious in retrospect with the closeups of the jobbers carrying his throne’s pained facial expressions. King Mabel screaming “I’M A KING!” in his Kool Aid man voice is also funny. In retrospect, I think King Mabel could have been salvageable if they had him stay in the midcard and tag teams for some time instead of immediately hotshotting him into the main event when he wasn’t ready. Mabel wins with a belly to belly suplex.
We get another look at Waylon Mercy, the ’95 WWF wrestler who most seems like Bray Wyatt (much more so than Bray Wyatt’s actual dad).
Vince and Shawn Michaels talk some more about Diesel Vs Sid II at In Your House II before we get footage of the WWF Hall of Fame Induction ceremony on Saturday. Interesting to see Undertaker dressed in formal biker wear five years before BikerTaker was a thing. Highlight of this is Bill Murray showing up live via satellite to cut a promo on his Ed Wood co-star George “The Animal” Steele. Ceremony closed with Ivan Putski singing Bobby Vinton’s “My Melody of Love” horribly. The Hall of Fame Ceremony in ’95 seemed a lot more eclectic than it is now…
WWF Intercontinental Title Match: Jeff Jarrett (with The Roadie) (c) Vs Savio Vega
Vince announces that next week, we’ll finally get the World Premiere of Jeff Jarrett’s first music video, “With My Baby Tonight” Vince and Shawn talk about how this is Savio Vega’s fifth match in twenty four hours while Double J is fresh as a daisy. Savio clears Roadie and Double J out of the ring. Roadie & Double J have a war of words with HBK. Hmmm. Vince and Shawn talk about how ugly Roadie’s dreads are. Savio isn’t really selling the fact that this is his fifth match in twenty four hours too much. At one point, he hits a Rock Bottom. We get our biggest pop of the night as HBK finally leaves ringside to get some of Double J and The Roadie. Somehow, HBK pummeling Double J doesn’t get a DQ but Roadie interfering does. Show ends with a pier six brawl with Shawn Michaels and Savio taking down the Intercontinental Champ and his faithful sidekick.
Show closes with Shawn Michaels dancing shirtless on the announce booth while Vince marks out (maybe Bret was right about those two…) and hypes next week’s show. Double J comes back out and calls out Michaels but the show cuts out before we hear what he has to say.
Next Week on RAW: Bam Bam Bigelow continues his quest for revenge against The Million Dollar Corporation by trying to take out #1 WWF World Title Contender SID. in our main event! Plus the in-ring debut of Waylon Mercy and the world premiere of the music video for Jeff Jarrett’s hit single “With My Baby Tonight”
