[RESULTS/OPINION] WCW Monday Nitro/WWF Monday Night RAW (7/8)

 - Quick Bash at the Beach recap:

   WCW Main Event Pre-PPV Show:

   * Tony Schiavone announced that Eric Bischoff was missing.
   * The Steiner Brothers beat Harlem heat by disqualification. Sister
     Sherri returned as the Heat's manager (along with Col. Parker.) The
     Heat retain the World Tag Team Titles.
   * "Hardwork" Bobby Walker beat Billy Kidman via a Headbutt off the top
     rope.
   * The Rock n' Roll Express beat Fire & Ice. Fire & Ice teased a break-up.
   * Eddy Guerrero beat Lord Steven Regal.

   WCW Bash At The Beach PPV:

   * Rey Misterio Jr. beat Psicosis. This was from most accounts an
     excellent match.
   * John Tenta beat Big Bubba Rogers. Tenta knocked out Bubba with a sack
     of silver dollars (which had been suspended from a pole.)
   * Diamond Dallas Page beat Hacksaw Jim Duggan in a Taped Fist Match via
     the Diamond Cutter.
   * The Nasty Boys beat The Public Enemy in a Double Dog Collar Match.
   * Dean Malenko beat Disco Inferno with a Texas Cloverleaf. Malenko
     retains the Cruiserweight Title.
   * Steve McMichael beat Joe Gomez via a Tombstone Piledriver.
   * Ric Flair beat Konnan. Flair wins the United States Title. Woman
     interfered in the match (knocking out Konnan with her shoe.)
   * The Giant/Kevin Sullivan beat Arn Anderson/Chris Benoit. The Giant
     Chokeslammed Anderson for the win.
   * Kevin Nash/Scott Hall vs. Sting/Randy Savage/Lex Luger:
     The third "Invader" was revealed to be Hulk Hogan. Luger was knocked
     out early making it a two-on-two match. Hogan came out well after
     the match started, tore off his t-shirt, then attacked Randy Savage,
     nailing three Leg Drops. He threw the referee out of the ring, then
     covered Savage for the "pin" as Scott Hall made the count. Hogan then
     did an interview while the fans threw trash into the ring. Hogan says
     he, Nash and Hall are the "New World Order" of wrestling. He berates
     the fans for the cold reception they gave his arrival in WCW, and the
     lack of support since then. PPV ends with Tony Schiavone saying "Hulk
     Hogan... you can go to Hell!"

WCW Monday Nitro: Live.

HOUR ONE: Hosted by Tony Schiavone & Larry Zbyszko.

 - Bash at the Beach recap. Tony promises more details on Hulk Hogan's
   turn. In fact they spend the whole show doing this. They only barely
   delivered.

 - REY MISTERIO JR. vs. DEAN MALENKO
   Match started out at a moderate pace, alternating between quick maneuvers
   and slower mat wrestling. It eventually cranked up a gear as Misterio
   did his usual high flying. Match went outside briefly as Misterio tried
   a springboard Moonsault but missed about 98% of it, slamming to the
   concrete. He sold it for about ten seconds, then the match moved back
   into the ring. Malenko took over, nailing a procession of moves off the
   top rope. He then pulled Misterio up during a pin attempt. As you might
   guess, this backfired when Misterio reversed a tilt-a-whirl pick-up
   (possibly for a piledriver or slam) into a Frankensteiner. Misterio ties
   up the legs and covers for the pin, winning the Cruiserweight Title.
   Excellent match. Crowd was pretty well into the match (except for a batch
   of senior citizens in the front row - some wheelchair bound - who never
   reacted whatsoever.)

 - Mean Gene interviews the Nasty Boys and the Steiner Brothers. Rick
   Steiner spent most of it standing in the backround, mugging like a goon.
   Incredibly funny if you just watched Rick and ignored the rest. Winner of
   these two teams' match later in the show recieve a title shot against the
   Harlem Heat at the next PPV, "Hog Wild" on August 10th from Sturgis,
   South Dakota.

 - HUGH MORRUS/BIG BUBBA (w/ Jimmy Hart) vs. The Bluebloods (w/ Jeeves)
   Ugh! Each man is in the ring once for about a minute, then John Tenta
   comes out and starts brawling with Bubba. Bluebloods double suplex Morrus
   and get the pin.

 - EDDY GUERRERO vs. PSICOSIS
   Psicosis was dressed like a Ninja Turtle or something. (Maybe a VR
   Trooper?) Anyway, this was another pretty good match. Several of the
   moves from the first match showed up here as well. Psicosis (who was
   recieving the majority of the announcers hype) looked to be winning,
   but Guerrero eventually turns the tide and nails the Frog Splash for
   the pin.

 - Mean Gene interviews the Dungeon of Doom. Jimmy Hart is speechless over
   the actions of Hogan (like he should talk anyway.) Sullivan bemoans the
   fact that Hogan took away his opportunity to destroy Hulkamania - that
   Hogan had destroyed it himself. The Giant seems annoyed at the two and
   says WCW has no problem as long as he's wearing the Championship belt.
   (Mental note: Expect Hogan to win the title soon.) Hart mentions that
   Okerlund may soon be out of a job, which unnerves him for the rest of
   the evening.

 - NASTY BOYS vs. THE STEINER BROTHERS
   Poor effort from both teams in this, another match that meant nothing.
   Okay, so the winners get a title shot. Big deal. Sister Sheri and Col.
   Parker come out. (Man, did Sherri's ass get big.) Sherri distracts the
   ref while Parker whacks Jerry Saggs with his cane. Steiners get the win.
   (In other words, the Heat consider the Steiners - arguably the best tag
   team in North America - as LESS of a threat than those fat slobs, the
   Nasty Boys? Mean Gene interviews the Nasties. Saggs has come to the
   conclusion that WCW doesn't mean a damn thing to them because of this,
   their recent endless "Street Fight" and "Dog Collar" matches against the
   Public Enemy, and their inability to get a fair title shot against Sting
   and Luger when they had the straps. Knobbs says that what Hogan did -
   while he and Saggs don't condone it - wasn't all that bad. "This 'New
   World Order' seems to do what they want... just like the Nasties used
   to!" The battle lines are drawn, let the defections begin! Yeehaw!

HOUR TWO: Hosted by Eric Bischoff and Bobby "The Brain" Heenan.

 - RIC FLAIR (w/ you know) vs. JIM POWERS
   I tell you, S.D. Jones, Tiger Chung Lee and "Iron" Mike Sharpe are 
   missing out on easy money here! Who'd Powers have to blow to get a U.S.
   Title shot? Flair quickly Figure Four's Powers for the win. He, Mongo
   McMichael and Arn Anderson do an interview with the girls after the
   match. Arn is fairly intense, telling Okerlund the even though the
   Horsemen never claimed to be role models, Hogan did, and that what he
   said at Bash at the Beach was disgusting. Mongo them gurgled some of
   his usual nonsense ("oh yeah baby... the Horsemen are what it's all
   about... .") Flair alluded to his sexual prowess and told The Giant that
   there's a new champ it town.

 - Bischoff and Heenan talked about BatB, showing a still photo of Lex
   Luger getting carted off on a ambulance stretcher. Biscoff says he was
   missing at the Bash because of "high level WCW meetings."

 - CHRIS BENOIT vs. SGT. CRAIG PITTMAN (w/ Teddy Long)
   Benoit roughs up Pittman for a bit, then Long "throws in the towel" for
   Pittman. You see, Benoit had applied a rather nasty front facelock and,
   well... you KNOW there's no getting out of one of those! Pittman is
   understandably upset.

 - ARN ANDERSON vs. STING
   This was an Old Style match (read: boring.) Headlocks, armbars, all that
   stuff that would be okay if there were any psychology involved or if we
   the fans didn't know that Hall and Nash would be showing up any minute.
   Eventually they do and as we've seen for the last seven weeks nothing
   happens. Randy Savage joins the group at ringside. Arn joins him and
   Sting in the finger pointing and trash talk, then grabs Sting to try a
   quick pin. Sting blocks a DDT attempt by holding onto the ropes, then
   applies the Scorpion Deathlock for the win. Mean Gene interviews Sting
   and Savage post match and they say pretty much what every wrestler ever
   has said in past babyface turning heel situations.

 - Mean Gene interviews Nash and Hall - The Outsiders. They, along with
   Hogan comprise the New World Order of Wrestling. Cute. Makes no sense
   whatsoever, but it's cute nonetheless. Nash offers Mean Gene a job,
   which he declines. Nash says Hogan will appear next week.

 - Biscoff and Heenan comment on Hogan's betrayal as they show still pics
   from BatB. Hall is wearing a Razor Ramon outfit with dripping blood
   instead of razor blades. Nash is wearing a red and black Diesel outfit
   that says "Outsiders." They show luger being carried out, Hogan tearing
   off his shirt, Hogan dropping the leg three times, and he, Hall and
   Nash posing as the ring fills with debris. We waited two hours for this?

 - Next week's main event: Do they ever say? Hogan will be there though.

Comments: So Hogan was the 3rd man? I can admit I'm shocked. I think it's
a great angle for WCW. I also think it makes no sense and doesn't change
much my opinion of WCW. Why does Hogan, the most popular man (to the most
people in the widest age range) turn heel? Why does he align himself with
two men who've called him "The Immortal Huckster," two men who've called
his TV show "Blunder in Paradise," two men whose entire WWF careers revolved
around the notion that they are the "New Generation" while Hogan was the
"Old Generation," why? Why... because WCW needed a surprise. They looked
around and saw that most of the signifigant free agents out there wouldn't
have fit the bill. Mabel? Who down south would recognize him? He would have
been a nobody. Bret Hart apparently said no, no matter how much money they
offered. They really had no option but to turn someone.

Luger would have been the obvious choice, but probably didn't in the end
simply for that same reason: Too obvious. Savage would have worked as well.
Sting's turning seemed an impossibility, but then so did Hogan's. So WCW
went for the maximum shock value. They looked at how well WCW has done in
his absence and must have thought "we can live without him, so turning him
can't hurt us." (Which I pretty much agree with.) A heel Hogan doesn't hurt
WCW, but will it help? A bit if r.s.p-w is an indicator. Never in my life
have I seen so many ridiculous posts such as "Hogan Rules" and "Hulk is
the man" and "Hulkamania will live forever!" Get real people - he's still
the same balding, slow, flabbly, egotistic buffoon that has done his best to
drag wrestling down with him for the last several years. He's not a better
wrestler now that he's evil. His interviews won't be any better. The booking
is unlikely to make any more sense than it ever has with him involved. But
it does show one thing: Maybe he doesn't have the power that he used to.

And that's really the question, isn't it? How much of this is his idea and
how much of it is WCW's? Will Hogan job to the WCW elite and quietly bow out
of the business, or will he "come to his senses" in a few months and redeem
himself? Was all this the price for his getting his hands on the World Title
"just one more time?" Only time will tell, and while I too will watch, I do
not do so with unbridled optimism. Perhaps something interesting will come
of this. Perhaps not. But no one can doubt that this is the most signifigant
angle in the last 15 years of wrestling and I give credit to WCW for having
the nuts to try it.

I end this line of thought with some interesting comments from Vince McMahon
in an interview he did on Newsportalk several months ago. The interviewer
asked him if Hulk Hogan could play a heel. McMahon's response? "I suppose
so... that's about all there's left for him."

That aside, this was an pretty good Nitro, with the first hour being much
better than the second. Again they teased and teased but never delivered
at the end.


WWF Monday Night RAW: Taped 6/24.

 - Gorilla Monsoon announces that the Ultimate warrior has been indefinitely
   suspended and cannot return until he posts an "insurance bond" What
   malarkey! He will be on tonights show, though. (Gee... )

 - ULTIMATE WARRIOR vs. OWEN HART (w/ Jim Cornette)
   Someone in the audience is holding up a "Jim No-sellWig" sign. Warrior
   huffs and puffs his way to the ring then he and Owen pretend to wrestle
   for several minutes. Warrior wins by DQ when the British Bulldog enters
   the ring. He, Owen, and the late arriving Vader work over the Warrrior,
   Vader delivering a Vaderbomb. I'd say he's gone if it weren't for the
   fact that Jerry Lawler guaranteed us he was. Warrior had to be carried
   out of the ring.

 - SAVIO ("I'm Razor Ramon now!) VEGA vs. JUSTIN HAWK BRADSHAW (w/ Uncle Zeb)
   Punch, kick, slam, Savio wins with a trailing crescent kick. Bradshaw
   then stomps and brands Savio. Brian Pillman appeared VERY briefly by the
   entryway prior to the start of the match. J.J. Dillon chased him off.

 - During the above match Mr. Perfect called in "via cellular phone." They
   lost him during the commercial. Then we go to Shawn Michaels and Ahmed
   Johnson in the WWF studio. Since the Warrior's suspension, they need a
   new six-man tag partner for international Incident. They say they'll
   tell us at the end of the show. They are shown throughout the rest of the
   show dropping hints that he's just called on his cellular phone and that
   he's the "perfect" partner. Get ya lookin' one way, then...

 - Clips of the goings on at WWF events over the weekend (same clips that
   they showed on the Action Zone.)
 
 - BRITISH BULLDOG/VADER (w/ Cornette) vs. THE GODWINS (w/ Hillbilly Jim)
   Punch, kick, slam, Vader and the Bulldog win. They SHOULD have dominated
   this match, but the Godwins were allowed to look way too good. Vader
   punches Henry O. in the back of the head and the Bulldog powerslams him
   for the pin. Jim Cornette sat in for color commentary with Vince and
   Jerry.

 - Cornette rails on about how there's no one available in the WWF to tag
   with Ahmed and Shawn. Shawn says Corny should have folded when he had
   the chance, Ahmed stands aside, and there's Psycho Sid (a surprise to
   anyone who hadn't read the newsgroup over the weekend.) "Twice now Shawn
   has opened the gates of Hell... " Sid says in reference to himself.

 - Next week's main event: Shawn vs. Billy Gunn. Ahmed vs. Bart Gunn.

Comments: Not the worst RAW ever, but barely interesting. So, is the Warrior
gone? He says no in an interview on Prodigy. Nonetheless the WWF is laying
it all out as if he is, or at the very least covering a lengthy absence by
him. That leaves the following three scenarios:

  1. He was fired and either he didn't know it when he did the Bob Ryder
     interview, or the decision and announcement had not been made to him
     until after it.

  2. He quit following what he may have felt was insensitive handling of 
     the recent no-shows (his father had died according to him.) Remember
     when Razor Ramon essentially quit he was "suspended" and jobbed
     in his last few matches. While the match tonight wasn't quite a job,
     it didn't make the Warrior look all that good either.

  3. He's taking time off for the above and also to recover from an
     apparent shoulder injury. The WWF is therefore doing the suspension
     angle to cover his layoff (like they did following the Vader/Monsoon
     attack - and not too dissimilar from the Shawn Michaels collapse.)
     In other words, it's all a work.

I think the third is the likeliest myself. If not, could you imagine what
would happen if WCW snapped him up to feud with the new heel Hogan?


Bottom line: So where does this leave us in the WCW/WWF war, particularly
on Monday nights. WCW is definitely the more interesting of the two right
now. They're winning in the ratings (the extra hour lead in giving Nitro a
tremendous advantage.) But still WCW has a problem appealing to any one
type of fan. The stuff involving Tenta/Big Bubba, as well as any match
involving Jim Duggan, the Dungeon of Doom, etc. are complete wastes of time
(as far as I'm concerned.) The Cruiserweight matches are good, and they seem
to be gaining in general acceptance, but they are still the first matches
on the card and quickly forgotten. The tag team scene is a mess. The Four
Horsemen as a dominant force is promising, but doesn't seem to have a
direction of focus (other than Sullivan, The Giant, and the World Title.)
The U.S. belt is again dropped into a situation where it's more of a
wardrobe accessory than a hotly contested title. The TV title has been
completely forgotten. And so on.

What I don't get about this "Outsiders" scenario is this: Let's assume they
are invaders in the sense that they don't work for WCW. So then why are they
allowed to wrestle? Or even show up? If they were truly unwanted, wouldn't
WCW just file a restraining order against them and have them arrested when
they showed up. Remember when Jake Roberts showed up several years ago to
attack Sting and WCW told him he'd have to get a wrestling license with WCW
or something like that, i.e. sign a contract? If they have, and are on the
payroll, then why are they allowed to do what they've done? Remember Randy
Savage going berserk and his being barred from the arena and appearing on
TV? Is WCW seriously trying to tell us they have no legal or contractual
control over these guys? Come on! And what about Hogan? We know he's on the
payroll - on WCW's official roster - so if WCW were really as disgusted
with him as they say, why not fire him? Then bar him from the arena. My
whole point here is that this entire "Outsiders" scenario is illogical to
the point of being ridiculous. But hey, this is wrestling in general, and
WCW in particular.

And what about the WWF? Well what about them? Not much to say really. Having
now seen the King of the Ring (which was a pretty good PPV almost from top
to bottom, whereas the Great American Bash had maybe one good match, one
big surprise, and Bischoff's stage dive) I feel confident that the WWF can
deliver on their major PPV's. "International Incident" on the other hand
offers little promise. The tag team scene is D.O.A. The Intercontinental
scene looks pretty good, and Shawn Michaels can carry just about anyone to
a good match, but what else? The steam seems to have been let out of a
possible Mr. Perfect return. Vader still isn't dominating as he should be.
Mankind is being wasted and Hunter Hearst Helmsly is almost forgotten.
I don't know what they may have in the way of surprises for the near future
but here's what they would primarily consist of:

 - Face/heel turns. Why bother? None of them would have the same imapact
   as Hogan's.

 - New arrivals. A plumber, for God's sake! Ahmed Johnson is about the only
   new arrival in the last year that's made an impact (with Marc Merro
   doing well, but possibly on the verge of getting the HHH treatment.)

 - 80's stars making a comeback: Who? Rick Rude and his bad back? Mr.
   Perfect and his bag of injuries? Demolition? Get a shovel, 'cuz they'd
   have to do some digging to find them. Maybe they could sign the Road
   Warriors, but who'd care? I hear Barry Windham will work for food.

Let's not forget the WWF excells in the unusual surprise. The Shawn Michaels
collapse being an example. Problem with that is you can't expect stuff like
that and you just have to watch every week to see it. What entices you to
watch every week? Well, beyond the notion that "anything can happen... "
good wrestling and interesting storylines. They haven't done much to set
up anything like that following the King of the Ring (with the possible
exception of the Goldust/Marlena/Sable love triangle - which they almost
seem afraid to talk about.)

The bottom line? The ball's in the WWF's court now. They've been steadily
sinking their free throws, but WCW keeps draining threes, and they have a
sizable lead going into the period break.

By the way... Blood Runs Cold... I run out of patience! Seriously, this
frigging "Mortal Kombat" ninja had better be nine feet tall, glow in the
dark, be accompanied to the ring by seventeen "Hooters" girls, and win
his matches by putting his opponents through six tables. How else can it
live up to the hype? I'll really be pissed if it's Ron Reis, who played
"The Yeti" last year.


This week's winner: Nitro.


JRP