[RESULTS/OPINION] WWF Monday Night RAW/WCW Monday Nitro (2/24) WWF Monday Night RAW: Live. 2 Hours. Hosted by Vince McMahon and Jerry "The King" Lawler. - THE GODWINNS vs. THE NEW BLACKJACKS Lawler starts right off the bat badmouthing the Extreme Championship Wrestling grapplers who will appear in matches throughout the show. Barry Windham has lost a lot of weight, while Justin "Hawk" Bradshaw is nearly unrecognizable with his short black hair. The Godwinns dominate the opening minutes of the match. Things then settle into the standard tag team fare with both teams alternating on offense. The end comes about five minutes as Windham is being held by Phineas. Bradshaw charges off the ropes and clotheslines Phineas as Windham ducks. "Blackjack" Windham covers for the pin and gets the three count. Phineas' leg had been on the bottom rope, but Windham pulled it off before the ref could spot it. This brings out a second ref who tries to explain what happened. The Godwinns are obviously upset, and they slop the original ref. Now that's extreme! Sorry ... call me a cynic, but this was not the way to start this show. There are few things in the WWF that the "hardcore" fans dislike more than the Godwinns. UFC fighter Ken Shamrock is shown in the audience. Lawler claims to be a close friend. Also, McMahon mentions very early on that the WWF has a "major surprise" in store for tonight. - They show a promo for the "Sugar" Ray Leonard/Hector "Macho" Camacho bout. What's the deal here? Is McMahon promoting this thing? - Vince sets the stage for the first of the ECW matches. The camera cuts to the ring where the ECW tag team champs, the Eliminators, have cornered a ring boy. They pull him to the center of the ring and hit him with "Total Elimination." (Dual leg sweeps: one done from the front to the upper body, the other from behind clipping the legs. An awesome move when done just right. This was close). Paul E. Dangerously enters the ring and over the mic tells Jerry Lawler that ECW has arrived to answer his challenge. The crowd chants "ECW" and Lawler calls them morons. - BIG STEVIE COOL (w/ The Blue World Order) vs. LITTLE GUIDO The BWO charges in through the crowd: Big Stevie Cool, The Blue Guy, Hollywood, and 7-11. In case you haven't guessed, they look and act just like the NWO (except that their t-shirts are blue). The Blue Meanie does a Scott Hall/Razor Ramon accent. Stevie is Kevin Nash. Someone I don't recognize plays a belt like a guitar (a la Hogan) and anothey guy I don't recognize (7-11) has a camcorder and runs around like Syxx. (What can I say, I haven't seen any ECW for a year). Lawler calls it another "ECW rip-off." Paul E. (joining the commentary) asks what exactly are they ripping off? McMahon points out that the BWO has nothing to do with the NWO clothing line. About a minute into the match Raven comes out and stares Stevie down. Paul E. identifies him as the "David Koresh of wrestling." I take it these two guys split up? (It's hard to follow an entire fed from 'net recaps). Little Guido takes advantage of the distraction to take control of the match, driving Stevie Richards to the floor with a dropkick. McMahon accidentally calls him "Stevie Ray." Paul E. says McMahon is pretty good, and if this WWF thing doesn't work out, ECW can give him a job. Raven gives Stevie the crucifix sign, while Guido throws him back in the ring. They then cut split-screen to comments from Goldust. He says he's the premiere in the WWF, and everyone else is just "b-movies." Paul E. says of Goldust: "... homosexual, heterosexual, bisexual, if Marlena comes along with the package, I'd go home with him too!" Big Stevie Cool plants Little Guido with a Jacknife, then nails him with a Superkick. Paul E. asks if that's not extreme, to which Lawler replies he's seen Shawn Michaels do it to about a thousand guys. It's freaky how much Stevie Richards looks like Shawn Michaels. McMahon again points out that the BWO bears no relation to the NWO clothing line. Paul E. says the difference between Big Stevie and Shawn Michaels is that Stevie "hasn't lost his smile." - Sunny with comments about her armwrestling match with Marlena-up next! - The Honky Tonk Man comes out to serve as announcer and referee. Sunny comes out first and does a Rick Rude inspired robe removal. Sunny is very over with the ECW crowd. Tonight she's attired in a bikini top and shorts sixteen sizes too small. Marlena comes out in a one-piece golden swim style suit over black tights. Her ribs are taped underneath. Sunny mentions the attack on her last week and offers Marlena the option to forfeit. Marlena says "we're all glad to see that Sunny stopped working 42nd... " Honky Explains the rules (emphasizing "tight" and "firm" and "grip"). "Get up on this table Sunny!" They lock up, but Sunny steps away when Honky says "go." She does it again, doing a few push-ups to warm up. (The crowd chants "thank you!") The third time Marlena pulls away and Honky threatens to disqualify her. They finally start and Honky roots for Sunny. Predictably, just as Marlena gets the upper hand, Sunny throws powder in her eyes. Then Savio Vega enters the ring and backs Marlena inter the corner as the Nation of Domination surrounds the ring. This brings out Goldust and we have... - SAVIO VEGA (w/ the NOD and Sunny) vs. GOLDUST Sunny is loosely allied to the NOD through her connection to Faarooq. McMahon and Lawler are joined by Miguel Perez, hairy mid-carder recently from WCW. Perez says his fellow Puerto Ricans are ashamed of Savio for joining the Nation. We've seen much better from both guys. This match was pretty dull. Savio controlled the vast majority of the action. The big spot of the match comes when Savio sets Goldust on the top turnbuckle for a suplex. Goldust holds on, hits a pair of headbutts, then plants a kiss on Savio's lips. He then jumps off and Savio raises a boot, but Goldust lands on his feet and catches the boot. He then goes into the ropes to hit an elbow or something similar, but Crush grabs Goldust's boot. Goldust drops to the floor and nails Crush (the crowd standing in expectation of some good ringside brawling, which they didn't get). Goldust then goes back in and is met with a Savio spinning heel kick. Goldust recovers and gets a few blows in. Crush then runs in and he and Savio beat on Goldust as the ref calls for the bell. This brings in Miguel Prez. Savio dumps him quickly out of the ring. Miguel then cimbs to the top and lands a sweet dropkick on Savio. there's a lot of shouting, pointing, and Savio grabs a chair, but nothing else happens. - McMahon hypes next week's show, which will have taped footage from Germany featuring the crowning of the new WWF European Champion. - They show clips of Lawler interviewing Tiny Tim several years ago. Lawler then interviews Ken Shamrock. Lawler claims to be an old friend who showed Ken all his submission holds. Shamrock (looking embarrasingly lost behind the mic) calls Lawler a liar. This was painful to watch. Paul E. comes out and says the non-ECW portions of the show have sucked. - TAZ (w/ Team Taz) vs. MIKEY WHIPWRECK Lawler says the ECW guys have been on their best behavior, and asks Paul E. why they don't set someone on fire or beat them up with a barbedwire baseball bat? Paul E. says they're saving that for the PPV. Lawler then tries to joke how small either Mikey or Taz is, to which Paul E. responds what a joke this is coming from a guy as small as Lawler who was on top of his territory for "seventy-six years." Taz is an excellent wrestler, but only gets to show a little of that here. Whipwreck offers almost no resistance (isn't he injured?) They do another split-screen and this time we get comments from Faarooq, who talks about his upcoming match with the Undertaker. Back to the action and Sabu has put in an appearance, leaping off the top of the RAW entryway onto members of Taz's entourage. (The camera almost missed the spot). Sabu gets to ringside and grabs Bill Alphonso (Taz's "manager"). Taz belly-to-belly suplexes Mikey over the rope onto Sabu (or at least tries to, but blows it and barely gets Mickey over). Taz's entourage then drags Sabu off and Mikey is tossed back into the ring, where he is ganked by a head-and-arm Tazplex and finished off by the Katihajime ("Tazmission"). McMahon accidentally calls Mikey "Mickey." Paul E. tells him "you need to look at the tapes Bruce Pritchard leaves on your desk." - The Headbangers come out and it's time for the huge surprise... - THE LEGION OF DOOM, THE ROAD WARRIORS vs. THE HEADBANGERS The crowd pops bigtime, letting forth a major roar. As old and decrepid as the LOD may be, the fans still love 'em! McMahon calls them both the Road Warriors and the Legion of Doom and they come out to their previous WWF music. ("What a rush!") A loud and clear "Nitro sucks!" chant breaks out. The match kicks off and we see a whole lot of stomping, licking, and punching. The best part (and funniest as far as I'm concerned, is right at the beginning when one of the Headbangers goes into his peptic fit of dancing. Animal walks up and kicks him in the gut, stopping him). An even louder and clearer "Bischoff sucks!" chant breaks out. The match goes on and on, spilling in and out of the ring. The Headbangers get to make a good showing of themselves, avoiding the almost expected squash. It eventually degenerates into a halfhearted brawl on the floor and the Headbangers lose by countout. One of them is tossed back in and the LOD nail him with their clothesline off the top, which gets a big response from the crowd. - The song "Tell Me A Lie," which reared it's head back in 1995 when Shawn Michaels was put out before, is played with more recent footage. Hanky time, gang. (Or sandwich break). - D-VON DUDLEY (w/ ???) vs. TOMMY DREAMER (w/ Beulah) I've no idea who that was with D-Von. Another one of the Dudley's? This was my first look at D-Von and I wasn't impressed. (Other than Buh Buh Ray, none of the Dudley angle has made any sense to me or amused me all that much). This was the match that was probably the most representative of ECW. Dreamer starts off by hitting D-Von with a reverse Atomic Drop, then a low blow kick. D-Von whips Dreamer into the corner and comes out hitting a running bulldog. Lawler and Paul E. start to argue. Dreamer tosses D-Von to the floor and follows. A fan hands him a frying pan and Dreamer uses it. (McMahon calls it the ring bell). Dreamer then gets a cane and hits him with it. He throws D-Von into the ring steps. McMahon starts to get a bit squeamish, expressing his hope that things calm down a bit. Lawler says this is what ECW is all about, while Paul E. says it'll just get more extreme. Dreamer places the upper half of the ring steps onto the apron, enters the ring, charges, and slides, driving the steps into D-Von's head. Dreamer then hangs the steps between the second and third ropes in a corner. He whips D-Von into them, but D-Von reverses it and Dreamer hits the steps. The Lawler/Dangerously argument gets worse. Lawler has been playing critic's advocate all night to the point of annoyance. Paul E. is hyping his PPV. McMahon acts the role of moderator, being much fairer to ECW than I'd ever have expected. D-Von hits Dreamer with a chair, then legdrops it across his face. McMahon tries to get his two cohorts to pay attention to the action in the ring. D-Von lays Dreamer across the chair and tries a splash off the top, but Dreamer moves. Tommy picks him up and piledrives him. Dreamer then gets a chair from Beulah. D-Von's manager (or whatever) grabs Tommy's leg and holds him in the corner. D-Von hits the chair, knocking it against Tommy's head. The guy on the floor then grabs Beulah. Tommy gets a chair, but D-Von has Beulah in the ring. Beulah kicks backwards, groin shotting D-Von. Tommy then hits him with the chair and finishes him off by DDT'ing him onto it. Referee John Finnegan (or is that Jim Molinoux) makes a quick three count. The entire finish was a bit hard to make out because yet again they went split-screen, this time with comments from the Undertaker, re: his match with Faarooq. In charges Buh Buh Ray Dudley. He and D-Von work over Dreamer until the Sandman makes his way to the ring through the crowd. Sandman stops on the apron, brandishes his Singapore cain, chugs some beer, then smashes the beer can against his forhead. Buh Buh and D-Von tilt him into the ring. Sandman is whipped into the corner. Buh Buh charges him with a chair, but Sandman moves and Buh Buh hits himself against the chair in the corner. Sandman recovers the chair and hits both Dudleys, the shot to D-Von being perhaps the stiffest ever on RAW. The Dudleys exit as Sandman and Dreamer pose. Sandman's head is busted open (most likely from the beer can). Paul E., tired of Lawler's taunts, thanks McMahon for the opportunity to be on RAW, takes off his jacket and charges Lawler. McMahon holds Dangerously back. This brings the ECW wrestlers into the pile as they pull McMahon off Paul E. and prevent Lawler from getting any closer. Lawler jumps up on the table and a huge fist swinging melee breaks out as they go to commercial. - McMahon, oddly level-headed, hypes next week's show. He then blames Lawler for causing the fracas. Lawler again challenges the ECW wrestlers to come on RAW, and puts forth a challenge to Paul E. himself. they then show a highlights package of the Bret Hart/Steve Austin/Sycho Sid/ Undertaker World Title situation. - Todd Pettengill interviews Ken Shamrock and things go much smoother this time. Shamrock introduces his wife and father. He then makes some WrestleMania predictions. They are interrupted by the arrival of the Nation of Domination. Faarooq comes over to Shamrock, feigning ignorance of the UFC, calling it "cat fighting," and saying the WWF is where "cats go to be tigers!" Faarooq challenges Shamrock to a fight. Shamrock, gettimng animated and sounding like a wrestler, says if Vince "wants to put something on the line" he'll fight Faarooq. We're left to guess as to whether this may actually come about, or if it was just something to get a rise out of the crowd. - THE UNDERTAKER vs. FAAROOQ (w/ The Nation of Domination) I won't kid you here: this match sucked. Nothing happened. It dragged on way too long and ended with an NOD run-in causing the DQ win for the Undertaker. The Nation has the better of him until the Road Warriors can come in for the save. McMahon finally mentions that Jim Ross is gone this week because Ross' father recently passed away. As a huge Jim Ross fan, my condolences go out to him. Perhaps most interestingly during the match, as McMahon and Lawler are arguing over who's fault it was the ECW guys showed up, McMahon muses as to what would happen if some of the WWF stars and ECW stars were to square off. "Anything can happen in the World Wrestling Federation." - Next week's main event: Action from Germany. Comments: A real mixed bag. I'd honestly call it borderline terrible wrestling this week. Everything else, however, exceded most people's expectations. ECW was given quite a bit of exposure, but they were able to only hint at what they are usually capable of. It was fun to watch, and quite memorable, but I'd agree with most any fair criticism that anyone out there levelled against it. A strong showing by Nitro should have been able to beat them out this week. Let's see, shall we? ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - Quick SuperBrawl VII (2/23) Recap: * Syxx defeated Dean Malenko to win the Cruiserweight Title. Eddie Guerrero tried to prevent Syxx from using the title belt as a foreign object, but his interference backfired and cost Malenko the match. * Konnan/La Parka/Villano IV defeated Super Calo/Ciclope/Juventud Guerrera. * Prince Iaukea defeated Rey Mysterio, Jr. Lord Steven Regal interfered on Iaukea's behalf. * Eddie Guerrero defeated Chris Jericho to retain the U.S. Title. * Diamond Dallas Page defeated Buff Bagwell. * The Public Enemy defeated the Faces of Fear and Harlem Heat in the Triangle Match. * Jeff Jarrett defeated Steve "Mongo" McMichael with the help of Mongo's wife, Debra. Jarrett is now a Horseman. * Chris Benoit defeated Kevin Sullivan. Benoit, Sullivan, and Jacquelyn were all injured and taken to the hospital. * The Giant & Lex Luger defeated The Outsiders. Luger came out to offset interference by Syxx. Luger entered the match and put Kevin Nash in the Torture Rack, causing him to submit. The Giant and Luger are the new World Tag Team Champions. * "Hollywood" Hulk Hogan defeated "Rowdy" Roddy Piper. Randy "Macho Man" Savage came out and helped Hogan. Piper had Hogan beat with a sleeperhold, but Savage put Hogan's feet under the ropes, causing the match to continue. Savage then gave Hogan a foreign object to use in the win. Savage helped Hogan beat on Piper after the match. WCW Monday Nitro: Live. HOUR ONE: Hosted by Tony Schiavone & Larry Zbyszko. - PUBLIC ENEMY vs. STEVE MCMICHAEL/JEFF JARRETT (w/ Debra McMichael) What the hell, Rocco Rock is bald?! A total joke of a match. The Horsemen have things well in hand when Debra hands Mongo the briefcase. Mongo climbs into the ring and whacks Jarrett with it. Rocco rolls Jarrett up for the pin. At least they continued the P.E.'s token push. "Mean" Gene Okerlund enters the ring and interviews the Horsemen. Arn Anderson and Ric Flair come out. Mongo says he hit Jarrett to show that he was the boss, like one brother setting straight another unruly brother. Flair stresses how teamwork is a necessity, and Arn (who can always be counted on for the best, most concise interviews) points out that with the rise of the Dungeon of Doom, the New World Order, and even Luger and the Giant aligning, that the Horsemen need to be strong. Flair and Arn are injured. Benoit is in the hospital. McMichael and Jarrett are the only two healthy Horsemen left. The two grudgingly shake hands. - "HACKSAW" JIM DUGGAN vs. GALAXY Tony hypes Galaxy as a top Mexican star. Duggan proceeds to dismantle him in a laugher of a match, which Duggan wins with his usual taped fist (even though the ref sees him doing it). Duggan then gives "Mean" Gene a surprisingly coherent interview, essentially warning Hogan and Savage to watch out. - HUGH MORRUS vs. "DESPERADO" JOE GOMEZ Stop the insanity! Morrus wins easily with the moonsault. I've got to tell you, watching this and RAW head-to-head, I doubt if I watched more than two minutes of Nitro. Hello, something happen please! - Photos from the Sullivan/Benoit match at SuperBrawl. - LA PARKA vs. ICE TRAIN (w/ Teddy Long) I hate la Parka, and Ice Train does me a faver by beating him in just a few minutes. It briefly spills out of the ring, then back in where Ice Train finishes him off with a thoroughly unimpressive splash. - They run a promo for the March 10th Nitro. It will be part of a special "Spring Break-out" in Florida. I guess the Nitro will be on the beach. - CHRIS JERICHO/EDDIE GUERRERO vs. FACES OF FEAR Finally a watchable match. Sort of. I can't remember what happened in it. All I remember is that Guerrero is up on the ropes and Dean Malenko runs in and pushes him off. The Barbarian covers him for the pin. I can't say this is the worst 1st hour of Nitro ever, but it was possibly the least eventful. HOUR TWO: Hosted by Tony Schiavone, Bobby "The Brain" Heenan and Mike Tenay. - They recap the first match of the night. - REY MYSTERIO, JR. vs. JUVENTUD GUERRERA A string of spectacular moves with no sense of flow, much less any attempt to convey a story. A spot-fest. I give them a lot of credit for doing the moves, I just hate it when they unload them in such a cold, sterile manner. "I do a high spot, you do a high spot." Mysterio wins with his springboard huracanrana into a rollup, which he's using much too often nowdays. - Lee Marshall calls in from Atlanta, GA. - PRINCE IAUKEA vs. PAT TANAKA Iaukea wins. Don't ask me how. - DEAN MALENKO vs. ULTIMO DRAGON (w/ Sonny Onoo) This was probably the match of the night, but again it didn't do anything to stick in my mind, except for the waning moments. The satellite signal went out for several seconds, which was an annoyance more than anything else. Malenko then starts to lose it. He chokes the dragon. When Onoo jumps up on the apron, Malenko nails him. He then goes back to choking the Dragon, eventually getting disqualified by the ref. Malenko then gives a fiery interview about respect. - DIAMOND DALLAS PAGE vs. SQUIRE DAVID TAYLOR This was met with howls of laughter by my Monday Night group. "Doesn't Nitro WANT us to watch?" my brother laughed. Hall and Nash come to ringside. Page wins with what I'll admit was an impressive variation of the Diamond Cutter. Thoroughly distracted by the Outsiders, Page doesn't see Randy Savage come in from behind him. Savage pops him. Then as he, Hall and Nash stand over him, a fan runs in. Savage and Hall try a few shots at the fan while Nash pushes him out of the ring. He disappears off camera and security can be seen scrambling after him. Savage then pulls out the black spraypaint and paints some squiggly lines on Page's back. I think it was Gaelic. After the commercial break, "Hollywood" Hogan, Eric Bischoff, Ted DiBiase and Miss Elizabeth come out and join Hall, Nash and Savage. Guess what? Savage, contrary to all logic and reason, has joined the NWO to get Liz back. Yee-ah. Liz, who has spent the last six months looking disgusted as everything the NWO has done, was all smiles. - LEX LUGER/THE GIANT vs. HARLEM HEAT (w/ Sister Sherri) No match. As the entire world expected, Bischoff comes out and strips the Giant and Luger of the belts, returning them to Hall and Nash. The Giant gives his over unwillingly, but Luger happily hands his over so long as Bischoff will agree to put all the belts up in a match at Uncensored. Bischoff agrees. Then Sting shows up and joins the NWO. Well, actually he enters the ring, lets Hogan hug him, then stands alongside the NWO as they celebrate. - Next week's main event: None announced. Comments: My God, they didn't even try this week. Even though it was a post- PPV Nitro they didn't even bother to give all the results. They only showed a handfull of still photos. As bad as this Nitro was, the real topic this week has to be what a downer SuperBrawl was. I myself didn't see it. My impression from the newsgroup is that most reviews were negative, with some middle-of-the-road reaction and a few positive reviews. Benoit/Sullivan seems to be the consensus pick as the best match, with a few giving the nod to the six-man match. I'll admit right off that I got almost completely skunked in my predictions. That's fine with me, since they were merely predictions, not what I was hoping would happen. (My own hopes about what should happen in WCW these days involve snipers and loud explosions). I do think however that a lot of my predictions were based on simple logic, and Bischoff seems to have taken the obvious, what made sense, what the fans would like to see, what the wrestlers would like to do, and threw it all out the window in favor of surprises for nothing other than the sake of being surprises. Having Luger turn heel made sense: having him wrestle in a match he was told he could not wrestle in made none (and Bischoff actually had the gall to pull a Dusty finish and screw over the paying fans for a second PPV in a row). The Savage turn defies all attempts at logic. The "Elizabeth" explanation on Nitro, as far as I'm concerned, doesn't cut it. Do I really have to bring up the past history between Hogan and Savage? Are we really supposed to believe that Savage would join a man he absolutely hates, several others that he has dislike for, all in an effort to get back a woman that has not only divorced him, but turned on him a year ago and cost him the title? And let's not forget Sting. Did the two of them actually spend a month up in the rafters and Sting never had an idea that Savage planned to join the NWO? I also don't buy this idea of them trying to take out the NWO from within. If Savage is a "spy," didn't they mess that up by giving the impression that Sting has joined? If it's only Sting that will eventually tell them to "stick it," how then did Savage not figure this out in the time he was with Sting? I've said it in other posts, and I'll mention it one final time: the worst thing you can do to Hogan is make him lose the World Title. Piper had him beat. Why mess that up by initiating some scheme of your own? If they are both planning on betraying the NWO, as I said, what can they do that's worse than making Hogan lose the belt? Anything physical would get them killed. Imagine if the idea was for them to try and physically attack Hogan. There's fifteen other NWO members that would stomp them into the mat, and they'd be marked men afterwards even if they did succeed. I guess what bugs me is this notion that Sting will eventually defeat the NWO and be WCW's savior. My question is just what exactly is Sting's beef against the NWO? The worst thing they did to him was come up with the fake Sting. It was WCW that turned on him. Even that wasn't that big a deal compared to what they've done to Piper (beat on his hip and verbally attacked his family), Flair (injured him), the Giant (kicked him out and beat him up repeatedly), the Steiners (ran their car off the road), Diamond Dallas Page (beat him up), Randy Anderson (fired him) and Lex Luger (made fun of him and stole the tag belt back from him). Even Dean Malenko has a greater incentive to take down the NWO than Sting does. So why is Sting going to be the guy that saves WCW? Because he looks cool in black? Where's that emotional tie to the fans? Can the fans really watch Sting defeat the NWO and say "he's doing that for me"? No way ... he's just doing it for himself. They've now given us the clear impression that Sting has joined the NWO. Let's assume for a second that this is true. Excuse me, but how many months of our time did they waste in drawing out what was just one long NWO heel turn? Five, six months? I think we got the idea the very first time he showed up in black. It's like they hit us over the head with a hammer, then spent the last half year tapping us with it. Bam! Tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-etc. One tap for every week Sting popped up in the crowd. Let's also assume that Savage and Sting joining is legitimate. Doesn't this pretty much doom WCW? Why does WCW even exist if Bischoff has the power to hire and fire whomever he wants, control the titles, etc. All Bischoff has to do is fire the Giant, Flair and Luger and WCW ceases to be any kind of threat whatsoever. As for the rest of the SuperBrawl card, if you ask me it sounds a lot like the average Nitro, especially with the Jarrett/Mongo, Iaukea/Mysterio, the Triangle Match and Mexican six-man tags. Oh yeah ... how many of you out there decided to get it at the last minute when WCW announced that Diamond Dallas Page would be fighting a "new mystery NWO member," only to find out it was "Buff" Bagwell? All the shows over the weekend hyped the fact that the NWO would be getting a new member and that he was the mystery opponent for Page. As it turned out, the NWO did get a new member, just not the one who fought Page. This was pretty low, and coupled with "Mean" Gene's hotline hints, I'm sure there was more than one fan out there who was suckered into thinking it was going to be someone like Shawn Michaels. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Bottom Line: The ratings are in and apparently Nitro won again, but with an ever so slim a margin of about a half a ratings point. Nitro had a two hour average of 2.95, while RAW scored a 2.45. Nitro has seen a steady, slow decline in their average since the start of the year, while RAW is slowly creeping upward. I'm not positive, but I belive this was RAW's highest (or perhaps second highest) rating of the year. The 2.95 for Nitro was (I think) their second lowest rating of the year. WCW can claim that even a weak show gave them the win, but most fans would have tuned in not knowing it would be a weak show. Nitro only really succeeded in the last portion of the show, where fans have come to expect the usual NWO appearance. If there was any swing over in fans, it would have been in the last fifteen minutes as they turned from an insignifigant Undertaker/Faarooq match to see if Bischoff would indeed take the tag belts away again. RAW promised a big show and they delivered. To use a clarification from a week or so back, it was historic and memorable. Was it any good though? Marginally. Nitro promised nothing, and that's exactly what they delivered. Nothing. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- This Week's Winner: RAW ----------------------------------------------------------------------------