[RESULTS/OPINION] WCW Monday Nitro/WWF RAW is WAR (05/19/97) [Slobberknocker Central Monday Night Recap: #79] (05/19/97) WCW Monday Nitro: Live/Taped: Live. Time: One Hour. Location: Asheville, North Carolina. Hosted By: Tony Schiavone, Bobby "The Brain" Heenan and Mike Tenay. - Quick WCW Slamboree 1997 Results (05/18/97): * Steven Regal defeated Ultimo Dragon to become the new WCW World Television Champion. Ultimo and his manager Sonny Onoo teased spliting up following the match. * Madusa defeated Luna Vachon with a Germen Suplex. * The New World Order came out and Randy "Macho Man" Savage taunted Diamond Dallas Page. Page, at ringside, threw some insults in return. Savage and Page got into a fight and a brawl ensued, with the NWO beating on Page. Page broke a crutch over Eric Bischoff's head. The Giant came out to save Page. * Rey Mysterio, Jr. defeated Yuji Yasuraoka. Yasuraoka is from the WAR promotion in Japan. * Glacier defeated Mortis via disqulification when Wrath interfered. The match lasted less than two minutes. Mortis, Wrath and their manager James Vandenberg beat on Glacier after the match until a "bald, black man" ran in through the crowd and saved him. Sonny Onoo, on the RealAudio broadcast of the PPV, identified him as martial artist/kickboxer Earnest Miller. * Dean Malenko defeated Jeff Jarrett with the Texas Cloverleaf. * Meng beat Chris Benoit in a "Death Match". Benoit "passed out" from a nerve hold applied by Meng and the referee stopped the match. * The Steiner Brothers defeated Hugh Morrus and Konnan. Morrus and Konnan broke up after the match. * Steve "Mongo" McMichael beat Reggie White with the help of Jeff Jarrett and a Haliburton briefcase. Gilbert Brown, linebacker from the Green Bay Packers, prevented McMichael from walking out early in the match. Match lasted over fifteen minutes. * Ric Flair, "Rowdy" Roddy Piper and Kevin Greene defeated Kevin Nash, Scott Hall and Syxx. Referee Randy Anderson was knocked out by Roddy Piper and was replaced by Nick Patrick. Flair put Scott Hall in the Figure Four leglock. Hall "passed out" and referee Nick Patrick counted Hall's shoulders down. - We get a quick look at Flair, Piper and Greene celebrating in the ring following their victory over the NWO. Intro then runs. - Ric Flair comes out for an interview with Mean Gene Okerlund. (Gee ... his lips are moving, but he's not saying anything new). He says that he can now put the stuff of the recent past behind him. Cue the NWO music and Syxx comes out. Syxx says Flair's team didn't win because the wrong referee was in the ring. He then says that he dominated Flair, and if he wants to throw down tonight, they can. Flair replies by calling Syxx a "fly in the ointment", and tonight he'll kick Syxx's "flyweight ass!" The two then get into a running scuffle, trading slaps near the announcer's desk. Flair chases him to the back. - STEVEN REGAL vs. PRINCE IAUKEA Regal dropped the "Lord" monniker, indicating he was going back to his more "common" roots. Whatever island Iaukea is from must be part of the USA, because that's what the crowd was chanting. Regal squashes him in just under three minutes. The crowd was solidly behind Iaukea. - They show some clips of Glacier being beaten up by Mortis and Wrath, as well as the rescue by Earnest Miller. - MASAHIRO CHONO vs. SQUIRE DAVID TAYLOR Mike Tenay comes out to join the announcing crew, and he announces that the June 30th Nitro will take place at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, and will feature the WCW debut of a "major star". (Mr. Perfect ... Scott "Raven" Levy ... place your bets now). Chono squashes him in about three minutes, though Taylor gets in a good deal of offense. Chono finishes him off with an STF (Stepover Toehold Facelock) which is essentially the same finisher Regal used ("The Regal Stretch") in the previous match. What's with all the submission holds lately? UFC fever? - Mean Gene interviews Sonny Onoo. Onoo as much as confirms that he's parted ways with the Ultimo Dragon. He gets into a verbal argument with Chono, telling him that he will get revenge for Chono's leaving him last year. He tells Chono that he will be bringing in Chono's "worst nightmare" to face him next week. My immediate guess was that it'll be the Great Muta, since he and Chono are huge enemies in Japan. (This is also the consensus opinion of the news and rumor websites out there. It's been said that Bischoff has wanted to bring Muta in, and next week's return by Nitro to 8:00 PM Eastern is a good time to do it). - James J. Dillon announces that Nick Patrick has been reinstated as a WCW referee, on a probationary basis. Just like that, nine months of angles are wiped out. - MICHAEL WALLSTREET vs. SCOTTY RIGGS Wallstreet, though "technically" still a part of WCW, considers himself a member of the NWO. He comes to the ring wearing a WCW t-shirt with a circle and slash overlaying it. Nothing match here. Wallstreet tries to cheat by pulling out an "international object", but Patrick stops him. Riggs then hits a Sunset Flip off the top. Wallstreet holds on to the ropes, but Patrick knocks him loose and Riggs gets the pin. The whole point of this was to show that Patrick has truly turned his back on the NWO. Match went maaaaaaybeeeeee two minutes. - Mean Gene brings out Mark Martin and Flair. Martin had been expected to be named as WCW's new race car driver. Instead, his sole purpose of being here is to hype a contest being put on by Valvoline. Valvoline is giving a racing car away to one lucky contest winner. To sign up, go anywhere Valvoline is sold. That's it. This had nothing whatsoever to do with WCW. WCW isn't even a sponsor of the contest. Flair was just there to keep the crowd from going completely dead. - Lee Marshall phones in from Nashville, Tennessee. Is it just me, or is WCW running shows in only about half a dozen cities now? Sure seems that way. - The Horsemen's music starts, then is stopped so that they can show a clip of Savage and Page getting into it at the PPV. They show Bischoff getting whacked with the cane. The Horsemen music starts up again for the next match. - JEFF JARRETT/STEVE MCMICHAEL (w/ Debra) vs. THE STEINER BROTHERS The Steiners have the match well in hand for most of it's total three minutes. Kevin Greene then comes out and knocks out McMichael with the Haliburton briefcase. Rick covers for the pin. Look for a future Greene/ McMichael match. As they go to break the screen graphic reminds us that Nitro returns to it's old time slot and length next week. Following the break they show Green and McMichael being held apart in the lockerroom. It's announceed that Greene will be removed from the building. - RIC FLAIR vs. SYXX No real match to speak of. Syxx jumps Flair. Flair immediately turns it around. Less than a minute after the start, Hall and Nash run in. The three beat on him. As payback for doing the job the night before, they get to absolutely destroy him. Hall gives him the "Razor's Edge". Nash Jacknifes him. Nash then gets on the mic and says Piper is next. Piper was not in the building tonight, and the other Horsemen had been removed from the building following the brawl with Greene in the lockerroom, so there was no one to come to Flair's aid. - Eric Bischoff comes out to say that he wants to talk to Sting, but he and the NWO can't find him. Bischoff is under the impression that Sting isn't in the building. He calls Sting a coward. He says Sting isn't worthy of a match with "Hollywood" Hulk Hogan. Bischoff says that if Sting were there, he'd slap the paint off his face. Borrowing another trick from the Undertaker, Sting pops up through the mat in a corner of the ring. He grabs Bischoff and gives him a reverse neckbreaker like last week. He starts to pick him up for another, but the show goes off the air. - Next week's main event: Chono vs. his "Worst Nightmare". Comments: This was, in my opinion, the worst of the four NBA playoff shows. Absolutely no wrestling of note. No memorable or noteworthy interviews. Flair's first match back on TV was a joke, and yet another hyped main event that didn't takke place. The end of the show was the same as last week's. (And why not? The rating they got last week was huge, earning a better mark than RAW usually used to get in what was considered for Nitro a miserable timeslot). They didn't even try. Flair, the Steiners, and the NWO were the only major stars on hand for the show. As a post-PPV show, they only recapped half the matches. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- WWF RAW is WAR: Live/Taped: Live. Time: Two Hours+. Location: Mobile, Alabama. HOUR ONE Hosted By: Jim Ross and Jerry "The King" Lawler. - Clips from last week, including footage of what happened after the show went off the air. Shawn Michaels Superkicked Bret ot of his wheelchair, was attacked by the rest of the Hart Foundation, and was saved from being thrown off the stage by "Stone Cold" Steve Austin. The threat of injury looked real enough, as the British Bulldog had Michaels press slammed over his head and could have thrown him fifteen to twenty feet to the concrete below (if you count total distance, not just the height of the stage). - Steve Austin comes out for an interview with Jim Ross. Austin wants to make it clear that he didn't come out to save Michaels, but to take a "cheap shot" at the Hart Foundation. Michaels comes out and says that was the same thing he did a few weeks ago when he saved Austin. The two get in each others' faces, leading to a pull-apart brawl. Austin said he'd kick Shawn's teeth in, while Shawn, the master of the Superkick, says he could "Stun" Austin, and "that's the bottom line, because I said so!" Owen Hart then comes on the big screen and laughs at the two for not being able to team up against a common enemy, calling them "typical Americans". He says if the two can get their act together, he and the Bulldog will put the World Tag Team Titles up in a match next week. Austin and Michaels accept the challenge, but each refuses to tag with the other. Shawn says he'll find his own partner. Austin says he just needs someone to stand on the apron while he does all the work. Another brawl breaks out. The two are eventually parted and both men go off in search of a partner of their own choosing for the match next week. Wild stuff, with the best yet to come. - Vader, they announce, has a broken nose courtesy of Ken Shamrock. Because of this, he has been pulled from the King of the Ring Tournament. (I believe the actual reason is because he has to go back to Kuwait soon for a hearing regarding his incident there, which will cause him to miss the PPV). A replacement has been named: Hunter Hearst Helmsley! It seems Hunter was given improper pre-match instruction by the referee last week, in that the ref told him that he must win by pinfall or submission. This lead Hunter to believe that interference by Chyna would either not disqualify him, or that disqualification would not eliminate him from the tourney. Suuuuuuuuuuure! WWF official Jerry Brisco says this was done to avoid litigation on Helmsley's part. Uh-huh. They show a clip from Vader's match showing where Vader's nose may have been broken (and as far as I know, the injury is legitimate). - CRUSH (w/ the Nation of Domination) vs. HUNTER HEARST HELMLSEY (w/ Chyna) Chyna comes to the ring in an outfit much too sexy for her physique. Since I absolutely hate Helmsley, I'm going to blow through this match by saying Crush dominated all the way through. Chyna then distracts the ref as Savio Vega tries to interfere. Crush holds HHH up for a kick from Savio, but Helmlsey ducks and Crush gets nailed in the face. Helmsley covers for the pin as Chyna holds Savio back from running in to stop the count. Crush and Savio then get in a shoving match, but Faarooq comes out to break it up. - OWEN HART (w/ the Hart Foundation) vs. BOB HOLLY They run comments from local fans regarding Bob Holly, a native of Mobile. Jerry Lawler then runs a clip of an interview with a pair of redneck mutants from the area. The crowd, predictably, is solidly behind Holly. This is a non-title match. The match starts with a series of leapfrogs, then Holly nailing a Frankensteiner. He whips Owen into the ropes and hits a move that the camera doesn't really pick up because it was busy showing the Bulldog and Neidhart watching from the stage. Holly lays in some shots in the corner, then catches the groggy Owen with a clothesline. Owen then assumes control with a spinning heel kick. Owen goes to work on Holly, laying in a stomp, a backbreaker, and a fist off the turnbuckles. A headlock follows. Holly breaks free, but Owen dumps him over the top rope to the floor. Holly comes back into the ring with a Sunset Flip, but Owen kicks out of the pin attempt. Owen then starts to apply the Sharpshooter, but Holly rolls Owen up into the small package and gets an upset, surprise pin. The audience erupts, and Holly makes his escape through the crowd as the Bulldog and Neidhart run in. Holly has pinned yet another Intercontinental Champion. The video signal then conks out as they recap comments from the Undertaker last week. We still get a muffled audio. A "technical difficulties" advisory scrolls across the bottom of the screen. They then run episode two of Sunny's Super Soaker extravaganza, but we don't have to see it because of the video problem. Yay! (We can still hear it, though). - Shawn is in the back and has found his partner: Ken Shamrock. Ken says he's honored, and can handle the British Bulldog so long as Shawn takes care of Owen Hart. - Ross apologizes for the video difficulties, then sets up a taped interview with Mankind, which is similar in vein to the recent ones with Goldust. This one may be better: [ROSS] "'Deranged' ... that's the word most often used to describe Mankind. The path of carnage he has carved through the World Wrestling Federation has made Mankind one of the most feared and hated Superstars in the WWF. What makes a man love pain so much that he willingly mutilates his own body? Over the next few weeks, I'm going to take you on a different kind of odyssey ... a twenty-six year journey of a young boy named 'Mick Foley' ... boyhood dreams turned to a living hell!" (Clips of Mankind are shown, then old photos of him as a child, teenager, then just starting out as Cactus Jack). [ROSS] "What do you think the biggest misconceptions are that the WWF fans have as it relates to Mankind?" [MANKIND] "That I'm a ... bad person. Jimmy, there's plenty of good reasons to hate me ... I just don't want people to hate me for untruths and partial truths and rumors. You see I-when I was a kid I played 'cowboys and indians'. Now who were the good guys-the cowboys coming over the hill to rape ... pillage innocent women and children. I was always the indian Jimmy, I always stood for the underdog. If that makes me a bad person- for standing up for what I believe in-then I guess you've got me dead to rights. I'm a bad man!" (Infamous clip of Cactus Jack jumping of the roof of his house onto a mattress in his yard, followed by more childhood photos). [ROSS] "Mick Foley wasn't like other boys. He embraced physical pain as friend and companion." [MANKIND] "I was eight years old ... at Minasaki (sp?) Elementary School ... playing a game of 'Kill the Guy with the Ball'-which may even be an olympic sport these days. And in chasing one of the other students I, uh, I made a leap for his legs and the back of his foot kicked me in the lip. And I didn't know what happened-I knew it hurt, Jimmy, I knew it hurt bad, but all of a sudden people started to look at me in a different way, like there was something wrong with me. I looked down at my Chicago Bears-back in the days when they were two and twelve-in the waning days of Dick Butkus-my Chocago Bears white sweatshirt suddenly turned red. And children were running from me ... scared ... I was bleeding ... I was in pain ... a-and I was loving it! Because I felt like I'd finally found something in my life that I could do better than everybody else: handle pain! Someone said 'ah, that's just vampire blood!' and then saw the open wound from which the blood was flowing. I've still got that shirt, Jimmy, and I remember thinking 'wouldn't it be nice if I could do something in my life where I could do this all the time?' Get that attention every night. Stockbrokers can't do it ... teachers can't do it ... the President of the United States can't bleed for a living ... but pro wrestlers can! It's the first time that I realized that I had a calling in my life, and I followed it right down the line!" (Clips of classic wrestling stars as Mankind mentions them). "That's all my brother and I wanted to do. We watched them all: Chief Jay Strongbow, Bruno Sammartino, the Valiant Brothers-that's what we wanted to be. Then I broke his nose by backdropping him into his bedroom wall and mom said 'no more wrestling!' But she didn't say no more dreaming." (Clip of teenage Foley wrestling in his backyard). [ROSS] "Mick Foley continued to pursue his dream, but he paid a heavy price. The emotional scars of a strange childhood are still evident). [MANKIND] "You know I wanna tell my son ... when he gets to be fifteen ... not to be the guy who eats strange things. I never exactly brought it upon myself. Other people and their 'cliques'-for lack of a better word, they would gang up on me because I was different-because I acted different- looked different. They were throwing worms at me, Jimmy. Little wiggly worms they were throwing at me. Bending down in athletic class doing my hurdler's stretch and there was a bombardment of worms being thrown at me. So what do you do to retaliate, d'you throw the worm back?! At seven or eight people? It's not the fact that they were hurting me, they were wounding my pride! They were looking at me like I was garbage. So I picked up the largest specimen, Jimmy, and I SUCKED IT DOWN! To show them their attempts to hurt my pride would not be successful. I thought, Jimmy, that I'd shown them. But then, sure enough, the story became exaggerated, as everything in life does, and it no longer became 'well Mickey Foley ate one worm because some kids were picking on him', it became 'Mickey Foley eats a plate full of worms every day!' Do you think I got many dates after that, Jimmy?" [ROSS] "Probably not." [MANKIND] "Do you think girls wanted to kiss a boy that had worms on his breath? I'm a GOOD kisser ... but I never got the chance to show it! What am I gonna do, practice on myself, Jimmy? I never had the chance to show the world that I could love and be loved, because they ruled me out because I had a strange appetite for strange things. I'm not gonna say I didn't accept money to eat other strange things, but the fact is the damage had been done and I went through my entire high school without date number one! You don't think that scarred my soul, then maybe you're not looking deep enough!" [ROSS] "Next week we'll look deep into Mankind's scarred soul. He'll share his unfulfilled boyhood dream of becoming 'Dude Love', a wrestler not unlike Shawn Michaels. Also, Mick Foley's disturbing psychological evolution, including his years as 'Cactus Jack'." (Clips of Foley wrestling at what looks to be a beach party, a gimmicked magazine cover with Foley's picture on it saying "What do women really think of the DUDE?" and a shot of Cactus Jack with a barbed-wire baseball bat in Japan-either in the IWA or FMW). [MANKIND] "I was a 'Deathmatch Champion' and I had the ability to make people sick!" (Continued next week). This was just great. Certainly there was more than just a touch of parody compared to the Goldust interview, but the acknowledgement of his past as Cactus Jack, as well as an opportunity to speak at length, has been what Cactus fans have been waiting for. - Leif Cassidy waits in the ring for his opponent. Jerry Lawler takes the opportunity to complain about ECW. He claims that Paul Heyman has initiated legal proceeding which prevent Rob Van Dam from being on the show this week. They show clips of high points from Van Dam's debut last week. Ross promises to keep us updated on the Van Dam situation. This constituted the ECW portion of this week's show-no doubt a disappointment to those unaware that Van Dam and Sabu are in Japan until early June, and expected one or the other to appear tonight. - LEIF CASSIDY vs. SCOTT TAYLOR Taylor, a long time jobber, has come to the WWF to compete in the upcoming Light Heavyweight division. Cassidy nails him at ringside with a plancha, splashing him before he can get in the ring. Cassidy lays in a few shots, the tosses him in. He pounds on him some more, but Taylor turns around the momentum, sending Cassidy to the floor. Taylor, standing on the apron, kicks at Cassidy, then thoroughly botches an Asai Moonsault. He gets no spring, and comes off sideways instead of doing a flip, then lands on Cassidy. (Part of it may have been Cassidy's fault, as he looked to be too close to Taylor, forcing him to try and adjust, botching the move instead). He tosses Cassidy back in and hits a much better crossbody off the top turnbuckle. Ross mentions the Mankind interview, saying that it was a "terrifying situation" as it ended, teasing some kind of unusual developement for part two next week. Taylor is dominating Cassidy, looking far from great. Cassidy turns things around with a clothesline. He whips Taylor into a corner and follows. Taylor leaps up, hoping to land behind Cassidy. Leif catches him and whips him to the mat, powerbombing him like you'd throw down a sack of dog food. Cassidy lifts him into a suplex, then drops him face-first into a powerbomb. Leif taunts him (and works the crowd) by yelling "I bet that hurt!" and signals for another. He hoists Taylor up again, but Taylor drops his legs, hooks Cassidy's leg, and cradles him into a small package, getting a three count! Cassidy immediately pops up and chases the ref out of the ring. He again goes over to Jim Ross and grabs him, yelling "I can't take this anymore!" Ross advises him to seek help. - They cut to the back where Steve Austin is knocking on someone's dressing room door. The occupant yells "Just a minute!" and Austin opens the door, revealing it to be Sable's dressing room (her name now visible on the door). Sable is half nekkid, 'cept for an Austin 3:16 t-shirt hurriedly clutched over her front. "Hey, I thought you said 'come in', honey?" He asks if she's up to being his partner against the Hart Foundation. She indicates that in her current position, she's not up for anything. Austin says "forget it!" and leaves. Sable asks him to close the door behind him. He closes it, then whips it open again, hoping to catch a peek. "Did you say something?" "I said 'close the door'!" Austin then says something that gets censored. (Nice to see "Stone Cold" is just as much a pervert as most of the rest of us). - Bret Hart has just arrived in the building. He is flanked by his Hart Foundation. His "surprise" announcement will kick off hour two. The show, like last week, actually ends at this point, only to start anew for the second hour. (I believe there's a reason for this, which I'll discuss below). HOUR TWO Hosted By: Vince McMahon, Jim Ross and Jerry "The King" Lawler. - They replay the highlights package that they showed at the start of hour one. - Bret comes out to announce his "surprise", which is a little confusing because I thought we all knew what that was last week. Hart, like last week, challenges Shawn Michaels to a match at King of the Ring. Bret says a "real hero" will be making his return at KOTR. "That hero ... is ME!" That is the surprise. There is a stipulation, however. Bret says that if he doesn't beat Shawn within ten minutes, he will never wrestle in American again. Shawn appears on the jumbo screen and says he'll take the match if Bret agrees to one more stipulation: all four other members of the Hart Foundation each be handcuffed to a ring post. Bret agrees (much to the consternation of the rest of the Hart Foundation). - Goldust comes out and introduces his two "Marlenas": his wife Terri and his daughter Dakota. They try and do some kind of bit on the mic, but Dakota won't cooperate. She instead wanders around the ring with the mic. Jim Ross says "Just like her granddad-always hogging the mic." This was pretty bad. W.C. Fields was right. - GOLDUST vs. ROCKABILLY (w/ the Honky Tonk Man) An slightly amusing and short match, but I'll cut right to the finish: Rockabilly is tied up in the ropes. Honky comes in to hit Goldust with his guitar, but Goldust kicks him the gut, gets the guitar, and smashes it over his head. The ref sees this and DQ's Goldust, giving the win to Rockabilly. A WCW finish if I ever saw one. - Jim Ross hypes the hotline, promising details on the whereabouts of Sycho Sid, constituting the "where is Sid?" portion of the show. - Ahmed Johnson delivers comments from the lockerroom. He says that as much as he disagrees with the philosophy of Faarooq, he agrees with him in that the WWF is racist-that politics have prevented a black man from being WWF World Champion. Jim Ross has the unenviable task of making the assertion that up til now, no black man has been able to get the job done, that's all. Poor Jim, stuck playing "White Devil's Advocate". - The camera gives us a good look at a pretty crude poster featuring a "Stone Cold" skull headed figure urinating on a Hart heart. They then cut to the back where Austin has found his partner. Austin blocks the camera's view as he tells this person that all he has to do is stand on the apron. "I'm scared!" "Of course you're scared, because you're a piece of trash!" Austin moves and it's Harvey Whippleman! Suddenly the Brooklyn Brawler steps into view. "Steve! I'll be your partner!" Austin grabs him and slams him into the chain link interview set. He grabs Whippleman and makes him agree to be his partner. They then play the Sunny Super Soaker segment because of the video problems from earlier. Boo! This week she squirts Jim Cornette. Next week it'll be the Honky Tonk Man. - McMahon announces that they are running a bit long, so a Godwinn's match has been dropped. (*Vince is God! Vince is God! Vince is God!*) - FAAROOQ (w/ the Nation of Domination) vs. ROCKY MAIVIA Faarooq squashes the rapidly plummeting former Intercontinental Champion. He finishes him off with the Dominator. Crush and Savio then jump in the ring and start to stomp on Rocky, but Faarooq waves them off. They cut to the back where the hart Foundation is busy stomping a mudhole into Bob Holly, in retaliation for his upset win over Owen Hart earlier in the night. - The Undertaker comes out for an interview. McMahon asks about the secret which Paul Bearer knows, having pledged to keep it a secret at the Undertaker's parents' gravesite. The Undertaker skirts around the issue by talking about Faarooq. McMahon again asks about the secret. "This ... is not the time!" "Oh yes it is, Dead Man!" Bearer comes on the jumbo screen. Paul repeats his threat to reveal the secret if the Undertaker does not come back to him. The Undertaker says he needs some time to consider it. Bearer gives him until next Monday. (Wow! What a coincidence!). - "STONE COLD" STEVE AUSTIN vs. JIM "THE ANVIL" NEIDHART Austin comes out with Bret's crutch. Brian Pillman comes to ringside to deliver color commentary. The match only goes a few minutes when Austin, spotting Pillman, goes after him. Neidhart jumps Austin, tossing him back into the ring. A few moments later Pillman enters the ring and busts the crutch across Austin's back, leaving a nasty looking crutch-shaped welt and breaking the skin. Owen and the Bulldog arrive and all four Hart Foundation members stomp on Austin. Bret can be seen watching from the top of the ramp. Shawn runs out with a steel chair, chasing off the Harts and making the save. McMahon then says they've just gotten word from President Gorilla Monsoon, as Jim Ross enters the ring. Ross says President Monsoon has declared that Michaels and Austin MUST team up next week in a Tag Title match against Owen and the Bulldog. Michaels and Austin take turns declaring how neither one of them will be the partner of the other. They get into a nose-to-nose shouting match, shove each other in the chest, and engage in another pull-apart brawl as the show ends. - Next week's main event: Michaels & Austin vs. Owen & the Bulldog. Comments: Hmmm ... my initial reaction to this show was less than whole- heartedly positive during the live airing. I actually thought things got very disappointing from the start of the second hour on. My opinion has improved a bit upon watching the show again, but only slightly. There was a modest improvement in the level of wrestling quality, but still no one stand-out match. I loved the Mankind interview. I can't wait for part two. The stuff with Austin looking for a partner was hilarious, and I wish they'd expanded on that. Unfortunately, they seem to have made all that moot with the revelation at the end of the show, which was a bit annoying. Hopefully Shawn and Steve will still come to the ring with Shamrock and Whippleman in tow. I'm still not buying Faarooq as a top contender. Nor am I all that excited about the prospect of Ahmed possibly joining him. I'm actually interested in where the Leif Cassidy thing is going. Who'd a thunk it?! A Light Heavyweight division is an interesting idea, but they've got to get some guys better than Scott Taylor. Hopefully the Michinoku Pro and AAA rumors are true. Rockabilly wore out his welcome five seconds after he debuted. I'm assuming the Hart/Michaels match at KOTR will only be ten minutes or less because Bret will be less than 100%. I'm assuming Hart will win, with yet another Hart Foundation member debuting being a possibility. However, as many of the websites out there have noted, (and I myself realized as well), there's two PPV's later this year scheduled to take place in Canada, (an In Your House and the Survivor Series). Hart could actually lose, yet still be part of the WWF scene. There's nothing that says he can't be on the show every week-he just couldn't wrestle. He'd then be able to compete at those Canadian PPV's, thus exposing a "loophole" in the stipulation. That would then probably lead to a future match where Bret would win back the rights to wrestke in America. This could go either way. Helmsley getting back on the KOTR card has put a serious damper on my anticipation for it. I'm actually reconsidering my decision to get it-I hate him that much. Overall, I felt that they set up a lot of things last week that they never touched on this week. For example, I was waiting for something new on the ECW front. (But I was NOT expecting Sabu, like many others). Instead we got a brief mention of Van Dam. I understood why it came down that way, but it still left me waiting for something-anything-that didn't happen. No mention of Scott Putski was another example. Just dragging out the Bearer/Undertaker things was another example. They also did nothing to set up the long rumored "Fire Match" between Mankind and the Undertaker for next week, which probably goes to show how silly that rumor was to begin with. I'm betting that the reason the WWF is actually completely ending the first hour of the show, then starting an almost separate show for the second hour, is to set up an eventual move back to one hour, perhaps getting the fans used to seeing the show in distinct, separate chunks. Just a thought. Remember, the WWF NEVER said the expansion to two hours was permanent. In fact, the original assumption was that it was just for the summer. They also never said they would ALWAYS be live from now on. They made these moves to up the ante against Nitro, but they was never confimed as being permanent changes. This should be kept in mind as fall approaches. (In case you hadn't yet heard, RAW will be changing time slots due to the addition of "Walker: Texas Ranger"). ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Bottom Line: The entire night, as a whole, left me feeling a bit flat. Over and over we were told, in actions and words, "wait until next week!" That's fine, if next week's shows are good, but it still made this week's TV viewing a bit annoying. The WWF won the ratings again this week, making it a clean sweep over Nitro during the playoff induced Nitro move. RAW got their highest rating in a year, hitting over a 3.6 for the two hour period. Nitro did a respectable 3.1, showing that the earlier time slot wasn't as terrible as everyone thought. (Numbers courtesy the NFD, SCOOPS, Bob Ryder, to name a few). RAW had a four week average of somewhere around a 3.4, making it one of the most watched cable shows on Monday nights during the sweeps period. Circumstances or not, this is very signifigant to them and their negotiations with the USA Network and advertisers. The NBA playoff game this week killed RAW with a 5.2, indicating that interest in the playoffs build as they go along. Nitro also got a respectable 1.6 for the replay, meaning combined, more people saw Nitro than RAW (as usual). RAW can take comfort in the fact that they drew their highest rating in a year (since a 4.0 featurning an Ultimate Warrior appearance) at the same time as TNT's highest rated Monday night NBA playoff game this season. Next week, no doubt whatsoever, will be an absolutely huge night for wrestling. It's crunch time for the WWF, as they need to show that they can hold on to all those new viewers that they picked up over the last month. Nitro needs to be able to prove they can win them back (or over, assuming not all of the increase for RAW was merely Nitro converts). It could well mark a record night for total number of viewers watching both shows combined, which would be huge for the industry in general. In my opinion, Nitro may have more to lose. Winning the night is the only goal they can really claim. RAW, on the other hand, can claim a minor victory if they manage to stay close. Should they be able to draw above a a 3.0 again, it would show a signifigant jump in their viewership of over a month ago. Their pre-sweeps average was between a 2.4 and a 2.7. On the other hand, Nitro can claim a total victory and superiority over RAW if they not only drop it back below a 3.0, but also go over a 4.0 themselves. I really can't see them doing this, since the only angle or match they set up for next week was Masahiro Chono's. I'd expect a major surprise or developement within the first minute of Nitro, aimed at grabbing the viewers and firmly keeping them there. RAW, if they don't do something to match it, may literally end up conceding the first hour, being forced to use that time to draw the viewers back for the second. Nitro may have an advantage in that they could open huge, coast for the majority of the show, then close strong. WCW has actually done so little lately that they have a lot to draw from for next week. Another Flair/Piper/NWO clash could pay off. Some kind of confrontation between Hogan and Sting could go over big. Same with a DDP/ Randy Savage confrontation. I still think the Great Muta appearing to fight Chono is a strong possibility. RAW, in return, has the Michaels/Austin/Hart Foundation tag match. Don't rule out a title change, which the WWF has never been afraid of in the past to use as a ratings booster. We can also expect the Undertaker/Paul Bearer "secret" to be revealed. Another ECW appearance would be major ammunition. RAW cannot rest on their laurels. They MUST go all out. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- This Week's Winner: RAW. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Slobberknocker Central" and "Monday Night Recap" are copyright 1997 by John Petrie, and all opinions expressed therein are his own, and not those of Internet Access, Inc. Volume One, Number Seventy-Nine of the "Monday Night Recap", May 22, 1997.