Slobberknocker Central Monday Night Recap #149 September 21st, 1998 WCW Monday Nitro: Live/Taped: Live. Length: Three Hours. Location: Boston, Massachusetts. HOUR ONE Hosted By: Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay and Larry Zbyszko. - Scott Hall, drunk as a skunk (which is also a good animal of comparison for his acting skills) bumps into security chief Doug Dellinger backstage. Hall tells Dellinger that someone wrecked his (Hall's) car, and that he should go check on it. Dellinger tells Hall that maybe he should go get a cup of coffee. Hold it ... Should I commend WCW for only inferring drunken driving, not actually showing it?! Is the fact that he wrecked his car while drunk supposed to be funny? And why doesn't someone call the police? I know if I was drunk and I crashed a car, I'm going to get into serious trouble for it. Even if we assume that it couldn't be proven, because nobody saw him do it, there should still be an investigation of some kind (by the police, as well as insurance adjusters). (I think we've entered some new, shaky territory here ... but I'll reserve further comment until I finish with the matter at hand.) The announcers report that Ric Flair is in the building. The previously seen Scott Hall will be teaming up with Stevie Ray to face Lex Luger and Kevin Nash in tonight's main event. - The ring fills with smoke (well ... steam, actually). Once it clears the Disciple can be seen lying unconscious on the canvas. "Hollywood" Hogan and others from the NWO come out, but the smoke reappears and, when it again clears, the Disciple (Renegade?) again vanishes. The spotlight then appears to show the Warrior high up in the rafters with the Disciple slumped next to him. The Warrior tells Hogan that he plans on taking away everything that is of value to him. Hold it ... The Warrior kidnapped the Disciple last week, right? They're in another state this week, right? Doesn't that make what the Warrior has done a federal crime? I'm really just joking here, but if we accept what WCW is telling us, shouldn't the Warrior be a fugitive wanted by the FBI? I was under the impression that the transportation of a kidnapping victim across state lines was a federal offense. One of the funny things about this whole storyline (not "ha-ha" funny but stupid funny) is the problems it created for the taped version of Thunder last week. Apparently WCW had taped a match between the Disciple and one of the Armstrong brothers that was supposed to air on the show. They then had the Warrior "kidnap" the Disciple last Monday. Since that directly lead into their plans for this week, they then could NOT show the pretaped match on Thunder (because he was presumably still locked up somewhere in the Warrior's cave. (As bad as all this is, though, it gets even worse. Read on.) - FIT FINLAY vs. BARRY DARSOW Darsow is letting his hair grow back, so he now looks a bit less like two certain bald wrestlers we all know. Finlay wins with the Tombstone Piledriver. They replay, via Squish-o-vision (tm), some of Flair's return. - WRATH vs. NICK DINSMORE Dinsmore is a jobber from Music City Wrestling. Wrath wins with the Meltdown. More Flair footage is shown. - RICK STEINER vs. RICK FULLER Steiner gets the pin after a bulldog off the top. Rick has a few words for his brother Scott after the match. The "scary laughter" puts in another appearance at the end of this segment. - "Hollywood" Hogan and the NWO come back out to the ring. Hogan throws down a challenge for the Warrior. The Warrior appears through the entrance arch, telling him to follow him if he want to go at it. Hogan follows, but the Warrior vanishes. Hogan makes his way through the back, ending up at an open dressing room door. Inside a large OWN logo is on the wall, emitting smoke (from something that looks like a long string of black incense). Hogan passes through this room into a small bathroom, where he finds the Disciple laid out on the floor. Suddenly someone beside the cameraman shoots a fire extinguisher into the room (oh, brother). The camera tilts up, so that we can't see anything. When the "smoke" clears the Disciple has yet again disappeared. It's bad enough that this all has the terrible plot of your usual Hulk Hogan movie, but do the special effects also have to be as bad? - RAVEN/KANYON vs. LOS VILLANOS Raven is still upset that his Flock left him, and takes the time to tell us all. (Why doesn't he just hypnotize them all again? Didn't he have some kind of "strange power" over all of them? Why can't he use that power to get them back?) This match ends after a few seconds when Kanyon and Raven nail one of the Villano's with a Stunner/Powerbomb combo. Raven then hovers over him, as if something has gone wrong. The ref instantly calls for the bell. They kill a few minutes by having medical personnel come out and check him. The fans, other than "ooh-ing" every time the move is replayed on the big screen, gets bored and starts to chant Larry Zbyszko's name once they show him on the screen. The Villano is eventually able to walk out of the ring with help from his partner, getting the obligatory "football applause" from the crowd. (The shame here is that had this injury been real, which it may well have been, no one would have believed it because of what WCW has done recently with Buff Bagwell.) And why is it these medical guys never show up when one of the NWO has been laid out by the Warrior's mystic gas? The Disciple lay in that ring for upwards of a minute or two and not one WCW trainer in site! - Disco Inferno, in a segment taped earlier in the day, is shown working out in an effort to "make weight" so that he can get a shot at the Cruiserweight Title. It seems he was a few pounds overweight. HOUR TWO Hosted By: Schiavone, Tenay and Zbyszko. - Alex Wright, now without a regular tag team partner, comes out and trashes the American crowd. This leads to a challenge to Diamond Dallas Page, and ... - DIAMOND DALLAS PAGE vs. ALEX WRIGHT DDP with the Diamond Cutter. I have no idea what the point was of all this, other than to lead into a "Mean" Gene interview with DDP. DDP talks about his upcoming title shot against Goldberg. Looks like they're taking a "mutual respect" course here between the two, which is fine with me. - Ernest Miller clip in Squish-o-vision (tm). - LENNY LANE vs. ERNEST "THE CAT" MILLER Miller gives his usual pre-match warning to Lane, informing him of his deadly status as a "three time world karate champion". Lane actually accepts the offer to walk out, but Miller stops him long enough to shake his hand ... then plant a kick to his throat. This total squash is stretched out over a few minutes because ... Out comes Scott Hall. Hall, drunk and barely sure where he is, makes the spooky finger wiggle at Miller. He's about to interfere in the match when Dusty Rhodes pulls him down from the ring apron. Rhodes tells Hall he's throwing his career away unless he shapes up. Hall is, of course, unimpressed with Dusty's advice. Rhodes tows Hall back to the backstage area. Miller gets the pin. Disco Inferno, still in the back working out, is relieved to learn he's dropped enough ounces to make the Cruiserweight requirement. - Chris Jericho clips, shown in Squish-o-vision (tm), from Fall Brawl and last week's "Backstage Blast" DirecTV PPV offering. Jericho-holics the world over are distressed upon realizing this is all they'll get of him this week (not counting a "Monday Night Jericho" t-shirt ad coming up). - SATURN vs. JERRY FLYNN The first of a number of matches tonight which will last several minutes. A long match isn't necessarily a good match, though, as we see with this one. Saturn splashes Flynn through a table at ringside, then puts him away with the Death Valley Driver. Quick clip of Scott Hall and Kevin Nash from last week. - Buff Bagwell and Scott Steiner come out. Steiner, after trashing the local crowd in the usual manner, says he was sent out by Hogan to ask Bret Hart where he stands with the NWO. Hart comes out, and is immediately jumped by the two. Sting runs out to make the save. As Bagwell and Steiner are leaving Scott is jumped by Rick Steiner. This segment almost draws the largest crowd reaction of the night. - Boxer Vinny Pazienza is shown in the crowd, providing a good spot to hype TNT's new boxing show, which debuts this week. At least this time TNT had the decency to wait until a show was canceled on USA before copying it. (Heh ... that's gonna get me some nasty E-Mails.) - DISCO INFERNO vs. KIDMAN Disco, worn out from his afternoon of exercise, looks ripe for the loss here. Instead he and Kidman put on a lengthy battle, consisting mostly of 1) move, 2) pin attempt, 3) kick-out, 4) repeat. Disco seems to be close to getting the win on more than one occasion, but always screws it up by playing to the crowd. Kidman eventually gets the pin following his Seven Year Itch finisher. A good match, but more annoying than suspenseful for the way it's dragged out. I'm not even gonna guess whether or not this is supposed to be a push for Disco. His failure to capitalize when necessary makes Kidman look lucky to even get the win, which would seem to be counterproductive to his push. (Still, it's a better match than most others we get on Monday nights, I'll give it that.) HOUR THREE Hosted By: Schiavone, Tenay and Bobby "The Brain" Heenan. - Just after the commercial break in the above match, (and don't they ALWAYS put a commercial in the Cruiserweight matches?), Lodi came out and tried to talk Kidman in going with him back to Raven. After the match we got more of the "scary laughter". - Perhaps realizing that Squish-o-vision (tm) is unflattering to him, they show a Flair clip in the classier black-and-white. - KONAN vs. CHAVO GUERRERO, JR. Another long match, and another one which wasn't that good for it's extended length. Pre-match Chavo asks if he can join the Wolfpac. Typical back-and-forth action, with Konan--to his credit--not half-assing it as usual. A commercial break rears its head in the middle. A brief bit involving a chair on the floor adds a spark of life to what is otherwise a dull match. Konan earns the win with the Tequila Sunrise. - They replay, in Squish-o-vision (tm), the argument between Eric Bischoff and Eddie Guerrero from last week. I guess we'll see this replayed every week from now on until Eddie's returns from Japan. - Eric Bischoff and Miss Elizabeth make their way to the ring. Bischoff starts off by saying he put everyone in the seats at the Fleet Center. He brags about the empire he's built, and that he's leaving for Japan to do the same there. He then moves on to Ric Flair, saying that Flair isn't even in the building. He says that just because Flair has a contract doesn't mean he can wrestle in WCW. He mentions Arn Anderson's arm wrestling loss, saying it's for the best that Arn lost because Flair's to old to make a comeback anyway. Eric says he can't stop Flair from coming out and talking, but he can keep him out of the ring. He's interrupted by the sound of horse hooves, as well as the arrival of Flair and the Horsemen. Coming to the ring they're blocked off by Doug Dellinger and his security crew. Flair speaks a few soft words and Doug, after weighing the two different opposing sides, chooses tradition and steps aside for Flair. Flair then takes his turn on the mic and points out Bischoff's lies. Indicating each of the Horsemen in turn (of which Steve McMichael, interestingly enough, draws a round of boo's from the crowd), Flair says they've come out to set the record straight. Flair accuses Bischoff of abusing his power. Bischoff begins taunting him, begging for Flair to hit him. Flair holds off, knowing that would keep him out for good. Flair says the only reason he doesn't hit him is because he doesn't have another two million bucks, "which is the only reason you aren't picking up your teeth right now!" Flair talks about the circumstances surrounding his being fired by Bischoff. A few insults back-and-forth later Flair tells Bischoff that he (Eric) is "sitting on a big contract" because guys like himself, Lex Luger, Sting and Dusty Rhodes made wrestling what it is today. Things then get interesting as the talk moves on to Hulk Hogan, with Bischoff saying that Hogan has meant more to wrestling than Flair has. Things then get a bit ragged as Flair, worked into a frenzy, stops making much sense. Bischoff calls for his mic to be cut off and Flair promises to pick this up at Thunder in Norfolk, Virginia. - THE GIANT/STEVIE RAY vs. KEVIN NASH/LEX LUGER As is the usual with Michael Buffer doing the introductions they take forever. Hall has been declared unfit to wrestle, so the Giant takes his place. Hall shows up anyway at the announcer's desk. The match is hard to watch--not just because of the miserable action going on in the ring, but for the presence of Scott Hall, who in a slurred and broken voice talks about how he thought he was supposed to wrestle Nash tonight, how he's carried Nash for all these years, etc. (Hall sounds so miserable and pathetic that I almost cried out of pity for him.) Hall says he'll show us all how cool Kevin Nash really is, slams down his headset and leaves the booth. Hitting the ring he tosses out the ref over the top rope (much to the delight of Kevin Nash, who as we all know hates to take time away from looking cool by actually wrestling). Hall calls for Nash to tag in, so he does (why--the match is over?) Hall takes a swing at him, but Nash sidesteps it, causing Hall to land flat on his face. Nash then kneels over him and calls for help, only to be hit from behind by the Giant. Luger takes out Stevie Ray, then chases the Giant off with a steel chair. Hall takes another swing at Nash but ends up getting dumped over the top. Nash grabs a mic and says he's lost his best friend because he no longer knows who Hall is. Nash saying he won't fight for free (hell ... when does he fight at all?!), but that he'll fight Nash for money at Halloween Havoc. Hogan and Bischoff then come back out. Once again the Warrior is called out. The Warrior appears in the entryway, followed moments later by the Disciple. Hogan thinks the Disciple is going to attack the Warrior, but the Disciple instead turns around ... revealing an "OWN" logo on his back. - This Thursday: More Ric Flair. - Next week: Nothing announced. Comments: I guess the Warrior was finally able to give the Disciple that brand of man-on-man loving that Hogan could never give him ... or something. Have I mentioned lately how GAY this whole angle is? By the way ... anyone wanna bet that WCW had him show up in the first hour so he'd pop a nice, unopposed quarter-hour rating? No chance of losing to Val Venis THAT way! No, the Nitro Girls weren't absent. I just don't see any point in mentioning them any longer. Maybe I will if and when they get into a fight, lose their tops ... something like that. It didn't bother me any, but I bet the WCW fans were pissed by no Goldberg this week. I'm assuming he had the night off because Monday was a Jewish holiday. Call it a whim of my own personal tastes, but I liked what Flair did this week much more than what he did last week (which isn't hard since I didn't like that all that much). This was more focused, serving as a far better jump-start to the feud between he and Bischoff. Bischoff, for his part, still has no personality in all this ... beyond "annoying twerp", that is. Bischoff keeps telling us he has all this power, but he never does anything to prove it. You just know that this is all going to lead to a situation whereby he'll undermine his own authority and allow Flair to come back and wrestle: almost assuredly in a match where Flair will have to beat him. Sorry, but something like that isn't even worth waiting for. I guess I'm just going to have to sit back be happy with Flair nailing Bischoff with good zingers--of which he had a few doozies this week--for the next two or three months. Flair showed me here that he can hold up his end of the angle, but if WCW has any ambitions of greatness beyond his involvement, or if they think this is going to outdo the Austin/McMahon feud ... forget it. Bischoff simply hasn't developed an on-screen character anywhere near as good as McMahon's. I will say that a Flair/Bischoff match would be better than an Austin/McMahon match, simply because Bischoff--as awful a wrestler he is--would still look better in the ring that the 50+ year old McMahon. Overall I've got to give this week's show one big "bleah!" Take away Flair and the Kidman match and I bet a whole lot of people would agree with that. My thoughts on the Scott Hall situation are below in the "Bottom Line" section. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- WWF RAW is WAR: Live/Taped: Taped 9/15. Length: Two Hours+. Location: Sacramento, California. WWF RAW Hosted By: Jim Cornette and Shane McMahon. - The Rock makes his way to the ring, where Vince McMahon, Ken Shamrock and Mankind have already gathered. Once there McMahon launches into a lengthy speech, the upshot of which is that Steve Austin and a partner of his choosing will face the team of Kane and the Undertaker (who are standing on the stage, watching McMahon's back). If none of the three wrestlers in the ring volunteer to be Austin's partner, they will get a chance to earn a World Title shot. The only catch is that they will have to compete in a "Triple Threat" match later in the show. Jim Cornette and Shane McMahon are filling in for Jim Ross and Jerry "the King" Lawler, who are off filming "Man on the Moon" with Jim Carrey. Cornette does an okay job throughout the show, though like Roddy Piper his jokes are about fifteen or twenty years out-of-date. Shane McMahon, on the other hand, is just plain annoying. Imagine your average bar patron yelling "Yeah! Awesome, baby!" for two hours and you'll get some idea of his style. - BILLY GUNN (w/ Road Dog & X-Pac) vs. JEFF JARRETT (w/ Southern Justice) Before the match Gunn does Road Dog's "TAGteamCHAMPIONS ... " intro, with the Dawg holding up cue cards so he can get it right. All the hangers-on are then sent to the back. The match itself is solid, with Gunn getting a surprisingly clean pinfall after applying a reverse neckbreaker. Jarrett tried to use his guitar on Gunn, but was stopped by the ref. Distracted, Jarrett was an easy target for Gunn's move. Michael Cole gets brief comments from Vince McMahon in the back regarding Steve Austin and his partner. McMahon says he can't imagine who will volunteer, but that even if no one does, Austin will still have to fight on his own. - Steve Austin comes out and says he doesn't give a rat's ass who volunteers to be his partner tonight. He also has some choice words for the Undertaker and Vince McMahon. - They show a clip from earlier in the afternoon of the Undertaker and Kane arriving at the arena. Jobbers scatter like roaches. - THE HEAD BANGERS vs. THE ODDITIES (w/ Luna) No match. First everyone dances in the ring, spraying silly string into the air from aerosol cans. Then the Bangers go loco and attack the Oddities, spraying paint in the Giant Silva's eyes, tossing Luna over the top rope, etc. After tearing up Golga's Cartman doll they leave. I guess this counts as a heel turn on the part of the Head Bangers. Yawn. Talking to Michael Cole, the Undertaker tosses a few comments back in Steve Austin's direction. - SABLE vs. JACQUELINE (w/ Marc Mero) This match will crown the new WWF Women's Champion, which is pretty lame if you ask me. Not much of a match, with Sable herself doing next to nothing. Jacqueline fights dirty, while Mero interferes on her behalf. Jackie gets the pin when Sable tries to suplex her in from the ring apron. Mero grabs her boot, so that Jackie falls on top of her. Mero then holds on to the leg so she can't kick out. The mystery woman shown last week is nowhere to be seen, which may mean the shot of her at ringside and subsequent rumors are much ado about nothing. - The Undertaker and Kane hit the ring. Then Austin comes out. Cut to the back, where Vince McMahon, Pat Patterson and Jerry Brisco, all cozily huddled together on a couch watching a TV monitor, all chuckle over the fact that Austin has come out alone. The DeGeneration X theme music then kicks in, and out comes ... WWF WAR ZONE Hosted By: Jim Cornette and Shane McMahon. - THE UNDERTAKER/KANE vs. "STONE COLD" STEVE AUSTIN/"BAD ASS" BILLY GUNN "What the hell is this?!" exclaims McMahon. Patterson and Brisco have no answers. A good match, though a bit predictable given the wrestlers involved. Gunn, having already wrestled once before tonight, is primed to do the job in this one, which he does by way of an Undertaker chokeslam. Afterwards Austin nails both Brothers of Doom with a steel chair. - THE DISCIPLES OF APOCALYPSE (w/ Paul Ellering) vs. SOUTHERN JUSTICE Barely a match, as Jeff Jarrett runs out and nails Ellering with his guitar. The action just halts, with no decision of any kind being rendered. In the back Vince McMahon says Billy Gunn's volunteering to be Austin's partner has angered the Undertaker and Kane, and that he would not be responsible for whatever they do, if anything, for the rest of the evening. - The second Steven Regal "A Real Man's Man" vignette. In this one he's shown shaving with a straight razor out in the woods, with only a broken mirror to see his reflection in. If I didn't know any better I'd guess his new gimmick is that he's really gay, and all this false manly bravado is really just a cover-up. - SGT. SLAUGHTER vs. AL SNOW A "Boot Camp Match", which pretty much means falls count anywhere and anything goes. Not a great match, but much better than I expected. Slaughter stomps, whips him with his belt, that sort of thing. Snow monkey flips him into the turnbuckles and takes over with the strap. Spilling to the floor Snow misses a shot with a steel chair. Slaughter gets the chair and waffles Snow in the head. Snow rallies back and nails Slaughter in the gut with the chair. Setting him up against the ring barrier he does a running springboard buttsplash off the chair (a la Sabu). He then does a moonsault off the barrier. Back in the ring he tries another moonsault while holding the chair, but Slaughter moves. Slaughter then tries the Cobra Clutch, but Snow escapes by going into the corner. Sarge applies the Clutch again, but Snow, having grabbed the Head while in the corner, nails Sarge in the nards. Slaughter comes back with his boot, but Snow comes up with it. Tossing that aside in favor of the Head, Snow nails Slaughter in the noggin and covers for the pin. Per the stipulations of the match, Snow is now "officially" back in the WWF. As Snow is celebrating his win he's attacked from behind by Patterson and Brisco. 2 Cold Scorpio comes out to make the save. I should mention that Snow now has rocking, techno-pop entrance music, with a voiceover by Snow asking "what does everybody want?", at which point the crowd is supposed to yell out "Head!" Going to the break Val Venis, who is stretched out on a couch somewhere backstage, tells us his newest movie is yet to come. - Michael Cole gets comments from the Rock, who has little flattering to say about his opponents in tonight's "Triple Threat" main event. - VAL VENIS vs. OWEN HART Dustin Runnels is at ringside for color commentary. During the match Cornette and McMahon keep asking him how he can just sit there and take what Venis has done to him. Sure enough, Dustin finally snaps and attacks Venis, ending the match in a DQ. Val manages to tie Dustin up in the ropes and taunt him, setting up the debut of his latest movie: "There's Something About Terri". In it Terri, Dustin's wife, says that Val is a "bigger" man than Dustin is. Val then pops out from under the sheets, saying he can't find her little kitty. He goes back down for another look, and back in the arena Val tells Dustin that while he couldn't find the kitty, "her vittles sure were tender!" X-Pac is shown warming up for his match. - X-PAC vs. D-LO BROWN Except for being way too short this was a good match. The finish comes when D-Lo lays X-Pac out and goes up top for the Frog Splash. X-Pac gets back to his feet, though, and catches D-Lo with the split-legged face-slam. 1-2-3 and X-Pac is the new European Champion. - THE ROCK vs. MANKIND vs. KEN SHAMROCK They show a funny interview with Mankind taped during the break. ("It takes a good man to beat Mankind, it just doesn't take him very long!") A really good match until the finish. Each man takes his turn dominating offensively. The Rock sits outside the ring early in the match, then comes in for the longest stretch of offense (with the People's Elbow delivered to Shamrock drawing the usual crowd reaction). Eventually the Undertaker, Kane and Austin all come out. After watching for a few minutes they interfere by pulling Mankind out and beating on him. Maivia and Shamrock continue to fight, with Ken seeming to have the upper hand. he catches Rocky in a huracanrana, followed by a powerslam. The Rock comes back by tossing Shamrock to the floor. The Undertaker and Kane then go after him, then after Maivia in the ring (at which point the match is finally thrown out). The Rock stands his ground and takes a swing at Kane, but is quickly pummeled into mush. As the two brothers are laying in a final bit of clubbering on Mankind, Steve Austin runs out and attacks Vince McMahon. The Undertaker and Kane chase him off, then they help McMahon to the back. - Next week: World Champion vs. #1 Contender. Comments: Far from a stellar show, but one which was nonetheless pretty good most of the way through. Five of the matches (by my count) ranged from okay to pretty good, and of those four had clean finishes (with only the main event being a real letdown). The other matches weren't that good, but in each case they were kept brief. In all a good show that was only really hampered by the poor quality of the commentating. As okay as this show was, though, I thought it did a relatively poor job of hyping the PPV this Sunday. Sure, the main event got the usual build-up to it, but what about the rest of the card? I guess we got to see most everyone who will be in action on the PPV, but nothing on RAW this week really leads up to it directly (with the exception of the Venis/Runnels angle). Here is the PPV card, according to the WWF website: * Steve Austin vs. the Undertaker vs. Kane. "Triple Threat" Title Match. * X-Pac & the New Age Outlaws vs. Jeff Jarrett & Southern Justice. * Hunter Hearst Helmsley vs. Mark Henry. Intercontinental Title Match. * D-Lo Brown vs. Gangrel. * Edge vs. Owen Hart. * Vader vs. Bradshaw. * Val Venis vs. Dustin Runnels. * "Marvelous" Marc Mero vs. Darren Drozdov. Triple H recently underwent knee surgery, and as such probably won't be able to wrestle in his scheduled match against Mark Henry. There are rumors that a Steel Cage Match involving the Rock, Mankind and Ken Shamrock may be added to the card. Further rumors have X-Pac and Jarrett pulling out of the six-man match to do a European Title Match. That would presumably make the New age Outlaws vs. Southern Justice match for the Tag Team Titles. Sunday Night Heat will be live again this week, serving as the countdown show for the PPV. Is anyone else sick of "Triple threat" matches? The WWF usually does them well, but I'm just sick of the whole idea. It's getting so we see them as often as tag team matches. I had a lengthy rant all worked out in my head to put down this week about how the WWF shouldn't bring back the Women's Title. Unfortunately they beat me to the punch by doing it before I could complain. Basically I think it's a bad idea since three wrestling women, (or four, counting Chyna) do not make a "division". Now they have a division, as well as a champion, before they even have a belt to wear. I'm all for the women going at it regularly, I just don't see the need for a title--except now they have a reason to keep fighting, I guess, when otherwise their feuds would have gotten stale. I guess the one upside is that the WWF now has a title that means less than their Light Heavyweight belt. I'm a little leery of the direction the Venis/Runnels angle is taking. In particular Dustin's accusing his wife and Val of committing adultery. With angles like these they can always later say nothing really happened between the two, but comments like that can really come back to haunt them later. Like the whole Scott Hall "alcoholic" angle (see below), accusing someone of being an "adulterer" is something that shouldn't be taken lightly. I probably should have felt the same way about Val's fling with Mrs. Yamaguchi, but in that case I don't think they used such frank accusations, rather they left it to our imaginations to do the work for us. Just splitting hairs, I suppose, but I do nonetheless feel a bit uneasy here, whereas before I didn't. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Bottom Line: WCW's handling of the Scott Hall situation has made me realize I was wrong about how the WWF did it with Hawk. I wouldn't say I approved of what the WWF did, but I did laugh at it (for a few seconds anyway). Now seeing WCW do it makes me realize how wrong it was to do it at all. What WCW is doing may be "worse" than what the WWF did, but I can't actually say the WWF did what they did "better". It was something I'd rather the WWF hadn't done in the first place (which I've noted before), and now I'm really sick of it upon seeing the lengths which WCW seems to be willing to take it. WCW is taking the bold step of showing how ugly alcoholism is, yet up till now the only consequences they've shown of it have been personal embarrassment and social alienation (as was also the case with the WWF and Hawk). Now we've seen WCW escalate that slightly by including an (unseen) act of drunken driving. The scary thing is I've got the feeling that WCW just might try to go even a step further and actually show the violence and tragedy this could all lead to. It would not surprise me if WCW did stage a fake car accident scene, or had Hall "injure" someone in his inebriated condition. I hope to god that they won't, but it certainly wouldn't be inconsistent with what they've done so far. They've already shown that no one can help him, so what will it take for Hall himself to see that he does need help? How long are they going to let this drag on before whatever planned resolution comes about? I hope they aren't seriously considering, in the match between Hall and Nash, adding the stipulation that if Hall loses, he has to go into rehab! I'd really hate to see something as serious as substance abuse and his recovery from such being trivialized to the point where the success of its outcome hinges on the stipulation in a match. If something like that does come about I hope they do something whereby the match is immediately ended, with the ref declaring Nash the winner. We should all be rooting for Hall to get "cleaned up", but I'd hate to think we'd have to root for Nash to kick his ass in the process. I'd also feel a bit better if we knew what Hall's real personal status in all this is. This whole angle has supposedly mirrored his real life to some extent. Hall's on-screen character may be battling some "personal demons", but what about the real man himself? I'm assuming that since he's capable of doing this angle that his personal situation has improved to the point where all this isn't causing him additional pain. It would sicken and sadden me to no end to learn that after these things he says on does on TV, he goes home and says and does the exact same things there. I'm giving WCW a mighty big benefit of the doubt here by assuming that's not the case. I think we've pretty much established that Scott Hall--the character--is in some serious personal trouble. I think it's high time now that this same character either comes to the self realization that he needs help, or some others step in and intervene on his behalf. In a real life situation such as this, "now" wouldn't be soon enough. It'll be really irresponsible of WCW if they drag this out simply to fill another spot on the next PPV card. The WWF already has to deal with the stigma they've now applied to Hawk (once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic). You don't just "cure it" like you would the flu some other malady. I hope both the WWF and WCW remember this when Hawk comes back, and Hall makes whatever turnaround is in the works for him. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- This Week's Winner: RAW. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Slobberknocker Central" and "Monday Night Recap" are copyright 1998 by John Petrie, and all opinions expressed therein are his own, and not those of "Internet Access, Inc". Check the "Slobberknocker Central" main page for info on how to receive the "Recap" free via E-Mail every week. Volume One, Number 149 of the "Monday Night Recap", September 21st, 1998.