2 weeks Ago By RobertLeightyJr
-We roll along with 1995 WCW as we are full steam ahead to Starrcade. Let’s get to it! -Announce Team: Eric Bischoff, Bobby Heenan, and Mongo -America West Arena, Phoenix, AZ -Eric welcomes us to the show and announces the Main Event is Randy Savage defending his World Title against Lex Luger. Man, they ran a lot of Luger/Savage matches.
-Eric also lets us know that Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair, and The Giant are all on probation. WCW World Tag Team Titles: Harlem Heat (w/ Sister Sherri) (c) vs. The American Males -Riggs starts with Stevie Ray and that goes badly for Riggs as he gets beat down in the corner.
Whip to the opposite corner. He misses a punch though and Riggs hits a series of dropkicks for two. They mention The Males upset Harlem Heat weeks back.
Booker T in and he misses a side kick. Riggs tags to Bagwell who sling shots in with a shoulder. Double elbows to Stevie who charges.
Double backdrop as Booker goes flying. Booker misses a charge in the corner which lets Bagwelll get a roll-up for two. Colonel Parker is watching from the aisle as the love angle with Sherri continues.
Riggs with another dropkick, but goes shoulder first into the post as he misses a charge. Stevie Ray back in and hits a World’s Strongest Slam. Parker hands Sherri a gift and we can’t see as her back is blocking the view.
Whatever it is, she likes it and they kiss. Booker misses an elbow in the ring, but is up first and hits the side kick for two. We see Sherri and Parker leaving together as she has a new ring on her finger.
Booker has noticed she is gone and starts yelling for her but you can’t grieve forever and returns to the match. Booker fires off knees to the ribs and hits another spinning kick. The crowd is clearly behind Harlem Heat, so Booker starts yelling at a fan in the crowd to make sure that changes.
Actually the fan is NBA player, AC Green. I was curious why they were focused on one fan so much. Can you imagine if WCW ever put NBA players in the ring? Probably crazy talk! Oh, Riggs finally makes the hot tag and Bagwell runs wild.
Eric notes that Bagwell has hit the gym hard and put on some upper body weight. I guess you can say he is a little more buff now. Fisherman’s suplex on Stevie, but Booker makes the save.
The ref puts Riggs out and Bagwell gets planted by Stevie. Booker off the top with the Harlem Hangover to a big pop and Booker gets the pin at 7:48. Winners and Still WCW World Tag Team Champions: Harlem Heat via pin at 7:48 -Heat barely broke a sweat here as they dominated Riggs and withstood a Bagwell rally before getting the win.
Just a solid Title defense over a lower tier team at this point. The crowd made this more enjoyable. **1/4 -Gene is in the aisle with Sting and Lex Luger.
These two will be in a Triangle Match at Starrcade (with Ric Flair) and the winner gets Savage later in the night. That would kind of tip off who is walking out with the World Title tonight, but they have stated if Luger wins tonight, Savage goes into the Triangle Match. Sting lets us know Lex is his best friend, but he will be coming at him the same way he will be coming at Ric Flair.
Luger is cool with that and says the same thing goes for him. Sting vs. Kurasawa -No Parker with Kurasawa as he is off with Sherri.
This crowd really likes Sting. Standing dropkick from Sting and a clothesline sends Kurasaw over the top to the floor. Sting follows and Kurasawa turns things around out there.
He hits a kick back in the ring and goes to work on the arm. He wraps the arm around the top rope and drops forearms on it. Sting fights out of the corner and starts running Kurasawa from one corner to the other.
Stinger Splash and Scorpion Deathlock finish at 2:37. Winner: Sting via submission at 2:37 -Sting has a #1 contender match at Starrcade so him winning was no surprise. Doing so in such a short and dominant fashion was kind of a surprise as they were pushing Kurasawa, but that seems over now.
* -This week on Saturday Night: Pillman and Benoit in action, Hugh Morrus has a match, and Big Bubba vs. Eddie Guerrero Scott Norton vs. The Giant(w/ Jimmy Hart and Kevin Sullivan) -nWo EXPLODES! Lockup which seems weird for these two.
Eric announces that next week Hogan and Sting will team to face Flair and Anderson. Giant throws Norton around the ring like a child. He gets a slam and growls at the crowd.
Clubbing forearm to the back followed by a kick. Clothesline misses and Norton carries The Giant around and hits an atomic drop. Cool! That got a good reaction from the crowd.
Norton starts throwing punches and running Giant into the top buckle. Eric tells us they will run long if needed for the Main Event. Is this the first over run for Nitro? Norton comes off the top, but gets caught and chokeslam finishes at 2:45.
Winner: The Giant via pin at 2:45 -This went as it should have. Giant dominates, Norton gets a brief flurry and eats a chokeslam to end things. *1/2 -Gene brings out Ric Flair, who has Charles Barkley with him.
WCW loved their NBA players which makes sense as the NBA and TNT went hand in hand. I was not a Barkley fan as a kid as I was all Jordan, but Barkley has been awesome in his TV role since he retired. Flair is drunk as he calls Barkley the best basketball player alive.
This was a weird dynamic as the crowd obviously loved Phoenix Sun hero, Barkley, but were booing Flair. WCW World Heavyweight Championship: “Macho Man” Randy Savage (c) vs. Lex Luger (w/ Jimmy Hart) -The bell sounds while Luger is still on the floor, so Savage goes out to chase.
Nothing doing though as they both get in the ring and Luger stalls. Savage still has his arm wrapped even though we were told at World War 3 that he wasn’t injured. Savage is done with this stalling nonsense and gets a choke in the corner.
Whip reverse and Luger misses a charge, but puts on the brakes and runs Savage down with a clothesline. Luger comes off the apron, but Savage catches him with a shot to the gut on the way down. Bischoff fires off a shot against the WWF just because.
Back in the ring Savage gets backed into the corner. Luger tries to run Savage into the corner, but he blocks and hits a running elbow for a two count. Suplex is blocked and then Luger powers Savage over with his own suplex.
Elbow drop misses as Savage rolls out of the way. Savage goes after Luger’s arm as I assume he wants payback. We take a commercial break at 4:09.
-Starrcade commercial! USA vs. Japan! NJPW vs. WCW! -45 seconds of Peacock commercials! -Back at 5:28 with Savage trying to break Luger’s arm on the security railing.
I am digging the story of Savage being out for blood and going after the arm. They head back in the ring and Savage hooks an armbar. Heenan: “the sport’s world looks up to Ric Flair.
” We had no idea how much at this time. Can I get two claps and a Ric Flair? Savage continues to work the arm as he transitions to a hammerlock. Heenan notes Flair has an advantage at Starrcade as he isn’t part of Team USA in the series of matches against New Japan.
To the floor again and Savage comes off the apron, but Luger moves and Savage crashes into the railing. Back in the ring Luger goes after Savage’s eyes and Macho takes a wild swing and nearly decks the ref. Clothesline from Luger as he continues to sell the other arm.
He even covers while selling the arm and it gets a two count. Luger drops a series of elbows for another two count. Luger hits a knee-lift as Eric goes asks if we want to watch wrestling or watch people talk about wrestling.
Just wait! Savage and Luger collide to leave both men down. Savage is up first and goes for a pin which gets two. Luger tosses Savage back to the floor, but Savage pulls him out under the ropes.
They brawl out there and Luger gets sent into the railing. Back in the ring Savage hits a clothesline out of the corner. We see that Hart exposed the buckle in corner, but it backfires as Savage runs Luger into it.
He heads up top and hits The Flying Elbow. We have no ref so Hart goes after Jimmy Hart. Here’s Ric Flair and he decks Savage with a foreign object.
Hart puts Luger on top as we see Flair strutting up the aisle. Here’s Hulk Hogan and he chases Flair back to the ring. Hogan stops the ref’s count and we have a DQ at 15:18.
Winner: Lex Luger via DQ at 15:18 -Solid match between two pros. This was one of the better matches they had and would have been better without the crap ending. ***1/4 -Hogan runs Hart and Luger into each other.
Here’s Sting to try to keep the peace and he pushes Luger out of the way and gets decked by Hogan. That was clearly an accident but I don’t think Hogan cares. They get in each other’s face as the crowd is going crazy right now.
-Peacock commercials! -Back with Gene in the ring with Hogan, Savage, and Sting. For the millionth time, Sting tells Hogan he is on his side. He says Luger is his best friend, and he stands by him even if he isn’t a fan of the Jimmy Hart thing.
He brings up Hogan backing Savage even though he doesn’t always trust him. Hogan and Savage remind Sting that Savage was right about Luger from day one. Sting things they didn’t give Luger a chance.
Hogan tells Sting he is his friend and they will take care of Flair and Anderson next week. Sting tells Hogan he will do everything in his power to keep Luger away from Savage and Hogan. -Eric and crew wrap things up while also hyping up next week’s show.
They were very good at making the following week sound even more important than the show you just watched. No wonder they started blowing RAW out of the water. -Thanks for reading! The 7.
0 The final score: review Good The 411 The Main Event is enough to make it a good show. Now while the match was good, it didn't help Savage's first reign as Champion as they didn't let the man beat too many people once he became champion. I didn't check but it may be the longest match in Nitro history to this point.
The Tag Title Match was necessary as it let Harlem Heat get their win back and continued the Sherri/Parker stuff that certainly has a charm about it. In between two short matches, but the crowd was good. The build to Starrcade started to heat up with this show and we know the Main Event (kind of) now.
Weird though as based off these shows you would think Hogan as a big part of Starrcade, but nope. As I say weekly, this is an easy hour of wrestling to watch. legend 0 - 0.
9 Torture 1 - 1.9 Extremely Horrendous 2 - 2.9 Very Bad 3 - 3.
9 Bad 4 - 4.9 Poor 5 - 5.9 Not So Good 6 - 6.
9 Average 7 - 7.9 Good 8 - 8.9 Very Good 9 - 9.
9 Amazing 10 Virtually Perfect.
