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WEEK 23 (June 7 to June 12, 1999) Death of WCW angles of the week : Female contortionnist in a bag throwing sewage over Savage's head/Savage's ladies hitting on Nash to have him enter the limo and get squashed by a hummer. (Nitro) I won't even go into details. These are infamous, and this is just embarrassingly bad. Russo was all over this product way before he was even hired. And of course it leads to the immortal question : who drove the hummer. My guess is Rikishi Stupid promo of the week : Roddy Piper (Nitro) Yeah, *that* Piper promo when he made fun and light of the younger workers in the back complaining about not getting opportunities. Sure, because that wasn't a real issue with the company. Remember Piper is supposed to be a babyface. And who does he want to carry the ball, after making fun of him in the most absurd and stupid way imaginable (asking a WCW bred worker if he ever worked in Madison Square Garden... dumb) ? Buff Bagwell, who's been exposed at this point as a terrible babyface (awful over pandering promos) and a rather poor worker (blame either the injury, lazyness or the fact Buff was roided as all). And he puts him in a PPV match with Disco Inferno, who had also complained that the young generation didn't get any opportunities. Of course, Buff already beat Disco clean the previous week on Nitro. Kill me. Swerve match of the week : Ric Flair & Chris Benoit vs DDP & Bam Bam Bigelow (Nitro). Flair convinces Benoit to work their differences out and gives themselves a title shot. Good little match, Bam Bam is much better in that setting. Of course Flair ends up betraying Benoit when he was going for the hot tag, which led to Arn first proposing himself as Benoit's partner, to the delight of the crowd, until Saturn came out, got the tag and "won" the titles. But it was a Dusty finish, since Saturn really wasn't officially in the match. Which led to : Shitty title change of the week : Perry Saturn vs Kanyon (Thunder). Yeah. You read it right. Kanyon is technically able to defend the tag titles since the Triad uses the Freebirds rules. Why not. What I hate though, is that it's a single match which turns into a tag match 4 minutes before ending, when DDP then Benoit jump in the ring. And it actually is a tag title match, with the belt changing hands. I just hate when this kind of shit happens. The tag division was the most fun part of the product, but in a week they managed to shit over it with a Dusty finish and a completely illogical and anti-climatic title change, three days before the PPV, in a match that was a single match for the 3/4 of its duration. Kill me. Stupid match and announcing performance of the week : La Parka & Silver King vs Damian & Ciclope (Nitro). "A Mexican, falls count anywhere, hardocre match ! Ah ah ah ah !" Yeah, *that* match, with Bobby and Tony just making fun of the entire deal while thse guys were killing each others in the ring. That being said, I blame the workers too for going all out for nothing and just doing stupid shit to no reactions. This is just a gigantic mess. Match of the week : Juventud Guerrera vs Psychosis (Saturday Night). At this point we've seen a hundreds of these, but in such a terrible week it was refreshing nonetheless. When Juvy works against Rey, he's a rudo, when he works against Psychosis, he's a technico. Go figure. Spot of the week : Sting doing the Stinger Splash in the corner on Mona first, then Madusa (Nitro). These girls are aces. ALthough the idiotic WCW crew had to zoom in right when Sting asked Debbie if she was allright and she was visibly nodding yes as an answer. Spot of the week 2 : Mona doing a missile dropkick on Brian Adams (Thunder). Yep, those girls were aces. And it's a good thing, because Savage really looks like he doesn't want to do much of anything in the ring sadly. That was one hell of a horrible week. The Rap vs Country angle is keeping on developping, with a decent Rey Jr. vs Bobby Duncum match on Nitro, and we still get that bizarre First Family vs Kidman & Hak affair going on too. The main event and upper mid-card scene is cluttered with horrible angles and Rick Steiner being pushed while his brother was injured (I think). I'll have to take a break after Bash at the Beach, if I don't want to destroy all my brain cells and will to watch this.... stuff.

WEEK 22 (May 31 to June 5, 1999) Match of the week : Konnan & Rey Mysterio Jr. vs Curt Hennig & Bobby Duncum Jr. (Nitro). It says a lot when the match of the week involves Konnan and Bobby Duncum. This is a nice tag match with Rey playing face-in-peril, and we're at the beginning of the whole Rap is Crap angle. Earlier on Curt sang a country song (and got booed out of the building), but no Rap is Crap song yet. Return of the week : Eddie Guerrero (Nitro). Back from the horrific car accident. He shows up and gets to tell his story. Babyface mode. He announces the first match and leaves. He can't come back soon enough. Godawful angle of the week : Randy Savage beats up a fake Kevin Nash in drag. Kevin Nash retaliate by empting a sceptic tank on Savage's limo while he and the girls are inside (Nitro). No comment. This is straight out of what Russo is doing on the other channel. This is shit. Forget the cool angle Savage had with Rey that led nowhere, the Savage vs Nash feud is officialy in the tank. The septic tank, indeed. Godwaful main event of the week : Sting vs Rick Steiner in a cage with Tank Abbott as the referee (Nitro). Angle sucks. Match sucks. There's a swerve at the end, as Abbott allies himself with Rick Steiner whom he confronted on Thunder. There's no reason why Rick Steiner, who's got the TV belt, should be feuding with Sting in main events. The whole Tank Abbott is just a waste of time. They should have got Jim Neidhart for the job. Title change of the week : DDP & Bam Bam Bigelow vs Perry Saturn (Nitro). So, DDP and Bam Bam attacked Raven at the beginning of the show and put him out. They also attacked, or so it seems, Kanyon, so Saturn defends the titles by himself, and does a good job. Kanyon jobs up for the hot tag, wearing a hospital wrist band, but get KOed by a simple punch from DDP, who wins for his team. That was pretty well done, and a nice change from the usual "partner turns on partner" deal we see all the time. Of course we can see it coming from a mile away, but the execution was nice, and the detail of the hospital wristband was a nice touch. Ruined match of the week : Hak vs Kidman (Nitro). Starts out well and looks like it will build into one of the most interesting Hak match, so of course we have to have Hugh Morrus to attack Kidman, and then Brian Knobbs to attack Hak. What a waste. Brawl of the week : Fit Finlay vs Brian Knobbs (Saturday Night). One of the best solo Knobbs match I've seen. Take a wild guess why that is ? Short brawl, but it suits Knobbs "style", and Finlay does wonder kicking his ass and selling for his awkward stuff. Line of the week : "The commercials are better then the matches." Bobby Heenan on Nitro. It's getting really tough to watch to be honest. Except the premise of the Rap is Crap angle and the tag team situation, nothing is remotely interesting or fun anymore. The Savage vs Nash feud has turned into awful stuff. The TV belt is dead because Rick Steiner is working a program with Sting instead of defending it on the undercard like he should. The US belt is not defended either. Goldie is nowhere to be seen. The cruiserweight belt is not defended either since Rey is feuding with heavyweights. Ric Flair pushing David could be fun if David was at least at the Erik Watts 92 level of work, but he's far removed from this, so it's not watchable. Flair himself had a decent match with Benoit on Thunder, but it's a match that underlined how much he wasn't able to work well with the younger guys at this point. He bumps slow and like an old guy, and against a dynamo like Benoit it shows. No wonder Jericho left, and Raven would follow in a few months.

That didn't bother me for several reasons. One is that she really wasn't injured, it was a set-up and used the crutches to attack Piper. Second is that Francine was using crutches with high heels depsite being legit injured in ECW, so... But yeah, only in pro-wrestling. It was obvious by this point that they had no idea how to fill the first hour or the three hours Nitros anymore. I'm amazed they didn't cut back as soon as the Fall season.

Glad people are enjoying it. WEEK 21 (May 24 to 29, 1999) Owen Hart had died on Sunday. Turn of the week : Chris Benoit & Dean Malenko (Nitro). No idea if this has anything to do with Owen dying and thus the impossibility to have Benoit as a heel anymore. Anyway, this comes a bit from nowhere, as earlier on in the show, we see Benoit & Dean complaining to Arn that they don't get title shots and opportunity despite what Flair had promised them, and that you have to be 45 to get somewhere in this company. Ok, I get the feeling, Bischoff was trying to push the notion that the glass ceiling will become a storyline here, and that it's time to push younger guys. But really, Chris & Dean complaining about not getting shots despite being the anchor of the tag-team division for months now is a bit odd. They basically bitch because Flair gave DDP & Bam Bam the next title shot at the PPV. Ok. So later in the evening, Flair, DDP & Bigelow were supposed to face Piper and two guys he selected. The Horsemen show up, Flair thinks they are coming to support him, but they align with Piper. Malenko is not even dressed to work, and we don't know if he's got an injury or something. Anyway, this also seals the history of the 4 Horsemen once and for all I belive, as this split marks the last ending of the stable. Roddy, Benoit & DDP were wearing black armbands to honor the memory of Owen. Match of the week : DDP vs Chris Benoit (Thunder). Benoit is a face but doesn't get a big time reaction like he did as a heel. Too soon I guess. Well worked match, I'd probably say it's better than the matches they had in 98. It's obvious DDP's stint as a world champion hasn't changed his status very much in the long haul, as he works with Benoit like they are equals, which is good. No finish, Bam Bam then Flair come up to attack Benoit. Honorable mention of the week : Rey Mysterio Jr. vs Lash LeRoux (Saturday Night) : LeRoux is one of those young cruiserweight who can do some impressive spots but who lacks a lot in term of basics. Sadly, it will become the norm. Good little match considering his level of greeness, Mysterio works like a chief around him. You can feel the cruiserweight title has lost a lot of luster in 1999 though. Which leads me to : Retarded angle of the week : Hugh Morrus interrupting a Cruiserweight Battle Royal (Nitro). Yeah, because Cruiserweights are boring midgets, and we need to have a JTTS like Morrus kill a bunch of them and challenge Rey Mysterio Jr. Nash really killed the division dead in its tracks way before Russo. The last time the division had an hot angle was in late 98 with the LWo. The Kidman reign was treated as an afterthought, they Rey won the belt was all the focus was on the tag belts which he had to defend to. And now this. Video of the week : Eric Bischoff recap video (Nitro). They did a pretty damn good job of recaping the entire Eric Bischoff character arc since he got power in 1993, including his rise to success with Nitro and the way he betrayed his own company by joigning the nWo. The only criticism I have is that we still don't know for sure what the deal is with who is actively in power. But the piece is well done. Hot stuff of the week : Madusa. And she was kicking ass too, attacking Kevin Nash and confronting Piper. Pretty awesome S&M vinyl outfit. Promo of the week : Curt Hennig doesn't like that rap crap and wants some good "country rythm & blues" instead. (Nitro) This is gonna get good really quick. Really not much in terms of good wrestling this week, and the Savage vs Nash feud doesn't advance a lot. Savage attacked Nash and painted his face with lipstick again. The issue I have with Savage is that it's very obvious he's dropped a lot as an in-ring worker. His match on Thunder with Buff really exposed him as someone who doesn't want to do much anymore, probably because of his injured knee he doesn't do any top rope jumps anymore (and when he does his big elbow he protects his knee by landing with all his weight on his opponent, which broke the ribs of Charles Robinson) and basically looks slow and plodding. As much as I enjoy his character and new look, I haven't seen anything good from him from the few I've seen him work. We get more Sting & Luger aligning against the Steiners, including a stupid monster truck spot. We also get Tank Abott on Thunder talking down to WCW wrestlers, which leads to heel Rick Steiner confronting him. Pretty weak-ass week.

WEEK 20 (May 17 to 22, 1999) Match of the week : Raven & Perry Saturn vs Chris Benoit & Dean Malenko (Nitro). Really good tag team match once again. This has been the best stuff in WCW since the beginning of the year, and I might say it's the best stuff in US wrestling that year thus far. The whole Tajiri vs Crazy feud in ECW was cool but a bit samey after a while. The tag team division in WCW was more varied with Windham/Hennig, Rey/Kidman, Raven/Saturn and the anchor team of the Horsemen. I'm loving this. Funniest match of the week : Ric Flair & Charles Robinson vs Randy Savage & Madusa (Nitro). Good mixed match part 2. Robinson keeps on ruling as Little Naich, and it's even more striking to see him tag with Flair. What's cool about this match is that there are no sexual innuendos whatsoever, which is refreshing and surprising. Madusa kicks Robinson's ass, and she even gets Flair to sell for her, which I guess must have been a real kick. They fumbled the back bodydrop spot a bit (yeah, Flair took a backbody drop from Madusa !), but all in all it was extremely fun. Savage does look older and slower than he ever has before in term of his in ring work. Being roided up like hell surely didn't help. Keep in mind that Savage is a babyface at this point of the show. Nonsensical turn of the week : Randy Savage. (Nitro) Because we need a heel to feud with Nash on top, and really there are no one else at this point but Flair and DDP. Savage came in as a hot babyface for the last month or so, and right after a super hot match against Flair he's basically turning heel again by requesting a match with Nash from Piper and Bischoff. Who are not in power. I'll get back to this in a moment. Anyway, Savage is so good that he has no problem turning himself heel, but still... Shooty-shooty nonsensical promo of the week : Eric Bischoff apologizing for all his screw ups and promising to do a better job in the future. (Nitro) So, Bischoff basically said he interfered in matches despite having no official authority, while at the same time acting like he's been the boss of WCW since 1993 and still is today and in the future. Even Schiavone has no idea what to say following this shit in term of who's supposed to be in power. When you add the fact that Piper says that he's the President of WCW later on, this is a gigantic mess. During the week we'll learn that Flair indeed still is the President, while Bischoff I guess is the "shoot boss". Just a clusterfuck. Hardcore match of the week : Hak vs Fit Finlay (Nitro). Less "hit each others back and forth with stuff" and more wrestling and actual brawling with a dynamic. Anyone surprised ? Of course Brian Knobbs has to ruin this by showing up and busting stuff on their heads, because we need Knobbs on TV, he's ratings, he's over, he's reliable and a positive contribution to the product. Surprisingly decent match of the week : Curt Hennig vs Konnan (Nitro). Hey, Curt Hennig is really having a resurgence in 1999, there's no way he should have that decent of a match with Konnan. At the end Savage interferes to screw up with Konnan, because he's a friend of Kevin Nash again... Wait, what ? They made up after the whole Mysterio debacle ? Anyway, fun little match that took me by surprise. Hot angle of the week : Randy Savage tries to recruit Rey Mysterio into Team Madness (Thunder). As you see, Savage is all over the TV, which I won't complain about unless it's in terrible angles. This isn't one of them. Savage puts over Rey because he defeated Nash earlier in the year, so he wants him in the team. Savage is pretty great as he's got a way to put him over while being slightly condescending. The reaction of the audience is puzzling, as they boo and cheer without any logical reasons : they cheer heel Savage when he tries to recruit face Rey, then boo Rey when he first declines. Anyway, Rey would rather not, so Savage and the girls beat him up (from behind). Total dick move from Savage, who's using the girls to his advantage. Kidman runs in for the save, he gets clocked by Madusa, who is seriously bad ass at this point. Then finally Konan runs in and gets beat up too. Cool stuff as it made sense, got great heat for Savage, showcased the girls as being tough and bitchy, also showcased Savage as being a psycho backstaber. Of course it could have led to really cool stuff with Savage and Rey in a well booked company. That would have been awesome. But this little moment of TV was excellent as it was, on its own merits. Random match of the week : Jerry Flynn vs Juventud Guerrera (Saturday Night). Oddly, Flynn is working heel and Juvy babyface, despite ususally working the opposite way. But hey, I love both guys and it's cool to see Juvy gets a win over a big guy. They do screw up a spot, but they mostly work a very nice match. Other angle they ran this week : Ric Flair pushing his son by having guys like Buddy Lee Parker and Barry Horowitz take a dive for him. It could be fun, but David is so awful that I don't care. Savage has been excellent both as a face and turning heel, no matter how abrupt it's been, but the whole Nash feud begins with Savage humiliating Nash with lipsticks all over his face, which isn't exactly compelling. Plus Nash is having a feud on the Jay Leno show with Bret Hart, which will be cut short the following week for obvious reasons. Lex Luger returned to help Sting against the Steiners, but it seems very fishy to me... Goldberg was nowhere to be seen, which is nice, way to use your biggest potential star... Bam Bam is aligning himself with DDP, although they didn't mentionned the Jersey connection yet.

He's okay when he's in with great workers like Eddie, Rey or Juvy. Good babyface in that he's able to get sympathy, and he's got a few good spots and a will to take death bumps outside in big matches. Odly, the infamous "you can't powerbomb Kidman" spot hasn't bothered me nearly as much as I thought it would. What has, however, is that awful short powerbomb spot. Looks really bad to me, with the opponent obviously jumping while Kidman basically looks like he's barely doing anything expect placing his hands under his opponent's armpits. Kidman was good in his own little spot, he got over allright and was sympathetic. Not a guy with a lot of upward mobility nor the ability to have good matches on his own though. It always bothered me that guys like Kaz Hayashi or Silver King were basically JTTS despite being a hundred time more talented. It's not like foreigners like Ultimo didn't get over the previous years despite not speaking any English.

You know what I think about the Hotta Queedom match. And it was a one of a kind experiment that doesn't reflect Asuka's style. And slower pace comes from Bison Kimura. Lioness was a go-go-go worker at heart. She was interested in doing a lot of spots, not in selling.

I'm so far removed from my joshi watching days that I couldn't point to references at this time. I enjoyed Lioness in Jd' and NEO facing fat Kyoko or still slim Jaguar, doing garbage inspired brawls/all action go-go-go matches. But Lioness had this issue with selling that made her annoying after a while. When she came to ARSION she really derailed what was left of the old-style (which wasn't much) and buried everyone to put herself over. That was my big issue with her. Very selfish worker. She could go but would only give to her "peers", she never did shit to elevate the great Bloody or Yuko Kosugi in Jd'. Her brawling matches always looked the same after a while, and the lack of selling was just tiresome. I enjoyed her a lot, then less so, then less so, then was annoyed. In her prime she just wasn't nearly as good as Chiggy, basically for the same reasons. Not even close to Aja Kong or Dynamite Kansai as a worker to me. Way too selfish. Against the right opponent she could have very fun match if you enjoy go-go-go style, which has fell out of favour these days. The Kyoko feud in the laste 90's is the best stuff she did post-Crush Gals, and I give credit more to fat Kyoko for bumping like crazy and killing herself, which made Lioness look a lot more dangerous and bad-ass than she really was. In a way she was a bit like Mike Awesome during this time, she needed a huge-ass bumper would could also give her back some stiff shit (although Awesome wasn't a selfish worker, but they had the same limitations).

Yes and no. Made no sense whatsoever. He's "in power" as a shoot, but not in storylines, but still interfered, yet had no offical right to, therefore Flair is still the president, but Bischoff is the actual "shoot" boss of WCW. It's coming up. This is brain-frying.

You're the exception to the rule. I have crossed path with very few. I remember Miko Kubota who was a huge joshi fan back in the late 90's. A girl named Tina also dating back from the Spider Twist board I think....

Hum... I'm watching WCW's Highway to Hell, and it is not a matter of marketing. The product was going to the shitter and people just stopped watching because they got fucked over and over again and were sick of the same old shit. Then Russo made wrestling irrelevant and the core WCW fans were true wrestling fans so they left never to return again. WWF's product was shit in 1999, but you had AUstin and Rock (and Mr. McMahon) who were so ridiculously over that it didn't matter. They were over and fresh. WCW's product was neither. WCW's bad product killed the company, there's no arguing about that one. WWF's product was shit in 1999, but it was also new hot shit that got over by being good (on top at least) in 97 and early 98. And then when Russo left, the product got better and better, and the company peaked with a good product again.

This is what struck me the most when watching WCW 92. As much as the matches were fun because they were so many quality workers involved, the booking was just unspectacular as all hell. They threw good workers together and let them had matches. They was never any big angles with dramatical follow ups nor big storylines inside the matches. There were barely any great promos from Heyman to build the feuds. Really, it was all about random matches between members of the Alliance and WCW, without much thought put into it. Lot of fun to watch on TV, but without much depth at all. With good booking it could have been amazing. In the end it was just good matches.

Thank you. WEEK 19 (May 10 to 15, 1999) Match of the week : Kanyon vs Silver King (Saturday Night) Kanyon works really well with the luchadors, as he can take their offense and bump well for them despite his size. He also gives Silver King more than I thought he would, which is neat. Cool little match. Honorable mention of the week : Fit Finlay vs Kendall Windham (Saturday Night) Short but sweet, I like Kendall as a second rate Barry, and Fit is one of the best worker in the company, sadly they do nothing with him (and no, I'm not asking for a program with Brian Knobbs). Not fancy, but stiff. Line of the week "The nWo Black & WHite is the most cohesive group in all of wrestling, and it also got the most depth." Mike Tenay on Saturday Night. Stevie Ray, Brian Adams, Horace, Vincent, Scott Norton. Can we talk about meaningless depth here ? Nitro & Thunder were preampted this week because of some sports event. NBA playoff maybe. Fear not, WCW tv is back full force next time around for four glorious weeks of build to the Great American Bash, and the beginning of the Summer of Hell 1999.

I can't speak for him / her (lol, yeah right "her"), but I think the idea is that if you look at films for example, it's frequently the case that poor films -- which even the people going to see them don't think are very good -- do very well. And, of course, the inverse. The same is true across most forms of entertainment. To the extent where the relationship between "the product" and its popularity almost seems random. To the extent where films that almost no one likes (or admits to liking) make all-time boxoffice lists. I don't know if the "50 Shades of Grey" craze has hit the US or not, but I've literally never heard a single good word said about that book by anyone. Not in life, or on TV. But it's a smash bestseller. A "product" that virtually everyone shits on, a product that is by all accounts putrid. And yet it's a smash. Why is wrestling different from that? Agreed. We're getting into tricky territory when talking about quality and the success of a wrestling product. Hell, of any "cultural" product. Would anyone argue that 1999 WWF was a great wrestling product and that's why they were so successful ? WWF in 1999 was nearly unwatchable to me, to the point of driving me away. The booking was awful. The wrestling was awful. But the product was hot. WWF fans loved Sable, her platic tits and her godawful delivery. WWF audience in 1999 didn't give a shit about *wrestling* and only wanted to chant along with catchphrases and show their sign on TV. The product delivered that in spades. The product was hot. But was the product *good* ? There was this movie in France a few years ago, "Bienvenue chez les Ch'ti", which beat nearly every box office records in the country, including the biggest grossing comedy of all-time dating back from the 60's "La Grande Vadrouille." It nearly beat "Titanic" ! It was a cultural phenomenon, nobody could escape it. There were people that supposedly didn't go to the movies in more than 20 years suddenly going to see that one. And why ? It was a decent popualr comedy, nothing shameful but nothing to brag about either. There are reasons why this huge success happened, we can analyze them after the fact, as it wasn't even a huge marketing campaign that made the movie this awesome grossing machine. It just happened. Same thing happened again with "Intouchable" two years ago, attaining the third place in biggest box-office success ever for a French movie. Again, decent comedy at best, nothing special. Yet it became like this amazing phenomenon. The "product" was nothing exceptionnal, hell some would argue it wasn't very good at all. Yet it clicked like no one's business. I heard one interesting remark about Steve Austin. Dutch Mantell said in an interview, talking about the all-time great talkers, said that Austin had to "cheat" a little bit. Don't get me wrong, Dutch gives full credit for Austin and his talent but he also points out that Austin had the luck to be the very first one to say "I'm going to kick your *ass*" on national TV on a wrestling show. And since he was the first one, it set him apart big time. Of course it totally fit his character, more than it would have with anyone else, but still, I thought this was an interesting remark. I always thought that guys like the Road Warriors having to say "I'm gonna kick you butt" did feel a bit goofy and cartoonish. Austin said *ass* first. Set him apart. Just a side remark.

That's what I figured. But hey, people who followed WCW got fucked a lot too. I love Big Poppa Pump so... But yeah, Bagwell was really not the same coming back from injury. And he was way too buffed. Yeah, the announcing helped, oldy enough. And that final bump. Seriously... Yep. Just perfect. Which is a very odd thing to say about WCW in 1999.

Well, thanks. Not sure I'm getting the *exact* meaning of "very adventurous girlfriend" though (you know English isn't my native language. I have an idea but doesn't want to offend...). PPV 5 : Slamboree 1999 aka, what a mess. Match of the night : Chris Benoit & Dean Malenko vs Raven & Perry Saturn vs Rey Mysterio Jr. & Kidman. What a shock. And it's also the opener, which is nice because you need a hot opener on a PPV, but having your two best workers and a very over character jerking the curtain tells you everything you need to know. It's three-way style, so you get three guys at the same time. The storyline revolves around the Horsemen dominating both teams, which fit the build. A bit messy at times because of the setting, but it's action packed with quite a bit of great stuff workwise. Arn Anderson gets to do his spinebuster but either Malenko or Saturn blows the setup a bit, which was too bad. The finish sees Kanyon interferes to help Raven & Saturn win the belt. Which makes sense, he was Raven's friend last time we saw him. But no one remarks that he's wearing a DDP shirt. Hum... Best match on the show, good ending, makes sense. It can only go downhill from here. Stupidest match of the night : Brian Knobbs vs Bam Bam Bigelow. And it does. They hit each others with plunders, with variable intensity (meaning Knobbs hits like a madman). It's not good, but it's perversely entertaining, as Knobbs eventually takes really stupid bumps. He also let go of a chair which flies at very high speed only to hit the guardrail, but seriously a few inches higher and it would have killed three kids in the first row. Knobbs was such a dangerous and inept worker, it amazes me that anyone would even want to book him or work with him, especially in this kind of match. Anyway, it goes to the outside since it's "falls count anywhere" (well, at least it makes the PPV version a bit special), and they eventually go to the souvenir stand, where Knobbs takes a suicide dive onto Bam Bam who slid of the table to the floor while Knobbs was in the air. Knobbs barely touched anyone but the concrete. Idiot. Heatless match of the night : Booker T vs Rick Steiner. And I mean *heatless*. Rick got some sympathy barks at the beginning, but man did the audience didn't give a shit. The match was okay while Rick was throwing Booker around, but quickly got boring and bad. Booker's attempt at getting heat his usual way (those annoying shouts) only got him negative heat. Yep, they shit on Booker too, despite Rick working already like a heel. Scott helps him to win, Rick pretends he didn't ask for it. Booker loses the TV title, I can't say I'll regret this really poor and useless reign. Funniest match of the night : Charles Robinson vs Gorgeous George. Robinson is really funny as Little Naich, doing all the maneurism, bumps and spots of Flair. Hell, he outworked 70% the roster that night in term of performance. George did what she had to do well, hell, they worked some chain wrestling that was smoother than anything Booker T ever did (or that Sting and Goldie would do later). Got a rough shot with Robinson bodyslamming Mona to the floor (as George was not gonna take serious bump, so someone had to to give Robinson some heat, that was well done). BTW, I like Molly a lot, but what was Miss Madness all about anyway ? Madusa I understand, she was hired to train George. And BTW, Madusa looked awesome. Damn those legs ! And she could throw some mean kick too, high heels and all. Asya (yes, because now she got that stupid name), serves no purpose to me however, so having Madusa kick her in the back of the head was cool. Anyway, this is comedy, this is fun, this ends like it should. I laughed out loud at Robinson. This is great. Efficient short sprint of the night : Buff Bagwell vs Scott Steiner. Say what you want about Bagwell, he was over. And since Scott is the best heel they have, this got heat. Scott beats up Buff a little, Buff got to do a comeback only for Rick to betray him (jeeeez, seriously Buff, everyone saw that coming miles away). Rick and Scott are back together, as heels. Rick is done with the headgear. I can live with Rick as a big bully. Way better than it should match of the night : Ric Flair vs Roddy Piper. Okay, so yes, it is better than it should. It should be unwatchable, like everything Piper has been involved with in the past two years. It's not. It's fun for two old guys chopping the hell out of each others. I guess this kind of match happening in 2011 or so would have people jump up and down about Flair being the best wrestler this year. But it's just two old guys chopping each others, and Flair bumping around for Piper. So it's fun for what it is. But, here comes Nash's booking. Flair cheats to win. Ok. Eric Bischoff shows up, insults Flair which gets a pop (how time changes, in a matter of a few months only) and declares that Piper is the winner. Wait WHAT ?? WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS ?? Where does it says that Bischoff has any power left whatsoever, didn't Flair won control of the company for good after defeating Hogan ? Duh ! Makes no sense. Shit. Way worse than it should match of the night : Sting vs Goldberg. Not good. Sloppy, bad timing, blown spots. Sting works like a cretin, going for the previously injured knee for a whole minute and a half before throwing punches and going into a headlock. They really don't click at all and it shows how good DDP is for having such exciting matches with these two. It doesn't matter, the big match between the two franchises ends up in a schmooz when Bret Hart shows up, beats up Goldie, then the Steiner brothers attack both Sting and Goldie. Blah. Second best match of the show : Kevin Nash vs DDP. Kevin Nash is an atrocious booker, but I enjoy his work. Worked well with Rey, Flair, Goldie and now DDP. This is excatly what it should be in term of main event. DDP is the best main event guy they have, and it's sad they didn't keep him on top longer. Nothing fancy, but they have a good dynamic, and I'd be remiss if I failed to mention how nicely Nash bumps for his opponents. The bad part is the booking : Macho Man saves DDP from a loss, which isn't a surprise at this point BUT : Eric Bischoff comes into the ring and RESTARTS THE MATCH ! Wait a fucking minute, how the hell can he do that ? Couldn't it at least be Piper who supposedly won control of the company ? I hate this kind of shit. Anyway, so the match restarts, and Nash books himself onto the top spot. Good match, but bad booking all around. This whole Bischoff thing doesn't make a bit of sense. I didn't talk about Stevie Ray vs Konnan. Because I don't want to. Please. MVP : Charles Robinson. And Madusa's legs.

Well, thanks, that is heart-warming. I need love, Kevin Nash is doing bad things to my brain... WEEK 18 (May 03 to 08, 1999) Match of the week : Rey Mysterio Jr. vs Kanyon (Thunder). Kanyon is back ! And he's working a really good match with Rey Mysterio, maybe his best single match thus far. Sadly there is no finish since Rey is under the Horsemen radar, but it's nice to see him work with a heavyweight who can take his cruiser offense like a king. World title match of the week : Ric Flair vs DDP (Nitro). They throw big match around on live TV like crazy. This is in Charlotte, so Flair works like a fiery babyface, which means he'll connect at least one coming off the tope rope. He'll also get thrown, don't worry. 95% of his offense consists of chops. Despite what he says in his (not so good) promos, DDP is not in his prime anymore, and it shows at points, but he's still way ahead of Flair as a worker at this point. I enjoyed this match probably more than I should considering Flair's limitations. He also take bumps like an old guy at points. Savage once again helps DDP to win. Stiffest match of the week : Bam Bam Bigelow vs Hak (Nitro). Nope, Bam Bam isn't shining in those matches, and they basically kill each other with plunders without much creativity. The really bad part is when Brian Knobbs shows up at the end and attacks both guys with ridiculous stiff shots. If there's a guy I dind't need to see on my TV again, that was Knobbs. And he's getting a push. Way to go Nash. C-show feud match of the week : Barbarian vs Jerry Flynn (Saturday Night). Why are these two on Saturday Night having cool little matches while Knobbs and Stevie Ray get PPV spots ? Funniest match of the week : Meng vs David Flair (Nitro) Flair booked his son with Meng, to punish him for betraying him and sending him into a mental hospital. Meng kills David Flair. This is fun. Hey ! Torrie Wilson is still around David ! Wait, wasn't she with him only to get him against his father in an elaborate nWo ploy ? Why is she still with David ? What happened with that whole angle ? Remember Ms Robinson ? No one knows, including Nash apparently. Line of the week : "Arn, book him with Meng ! Book him with Meng !" Yeah, that was legit funny. Random match of the week : The Cat vs Buff Bagwell (Nitro) This is the best match Bagwell had since his comeback. The Cat is ridiculously entertaining to me, and he knows how to get heat for himself while stalling. This is psychology people. Bagwell is mediocre at best now but he sure is over, although his character as a babyface is grating to me. The heat helped, but the work was decent enough and they kept things moving. I enjoyed this more than any Bagwell match in a long while. Flair cut an insane promo on Nitro, building the Gorgeous George vs Charles Robinson feud, with George being choked by the muscular nurse. That sucked, it feels like a rehash of the Chyna character, which would only get more obvious when she'll get a name. They also "built" the Goldberg vs Sting match with them going at it other, why, we don't really know. The crowd is super hot for this, and it's a shame this match is wasted on a secondary spot. This could have been a Starrcade main event with a few months worth of build. Nash vs DDP hasn't been built very well, as all the intrigue and heat is on Macho Man & George vs Robinson and Flair vs Piper. The undercard looks so-so, with Buff vs Scott Steiner and Rick vs Booker T, to downright bad with Bam Bam vs Knobbs (ugh). Most promising match on paper is the tag team championship match, once again.

You really want me to be driven insane. Agreed. And it has gotten noticeably worse since the Flair turn I would say. The storyline arc of Flair getting control of WCW was nice, but Hogan turning tweener then face for absolutely no reason while Flair tunred heel just fucked things up big time on top, and it's been a gigantic mess since then. The way the nWo pretty much pettered out is pretty amazing when you think it was the biggest angle ever in the company and the second biggest of the decade in the US or anywhere for that matter. Kayfabe-wise, it's like the nWo crumbling from within let WCW without an enemy to fight, so Flair just got back to his old ways and got insane with power, and then everyone was in only for themselves, thus a big time mess and total lack of direction and heel/face dynamics. I'm rationalizing the best I can here ! Totally agree. They had no idea how to use him after the initial Goldberg debacle. I think his finest hour in WCW will come with the New Jersey Triad days. Well, I can only hope so at this point. I'm not so sure they were ignored. They got the Horsemen vs Raven/Saturn vs Kidman feud going pretty well, with simple angles every week (basically, the Horsemen fucking up the other two teams, which is exactly what the Horsemen should do). Nothing elaborate, but it was simple and efficient booking and led to good matches. Really, the tag team division has been the only running saving grace of the product thus far. Really took the role of the cruiserweight division from 96 to 98 it seems like. Of course it won't last very long. We still got the Jersey Triads period which was cool from memory, and then... That was Psych. Poor guy, he never went beyond highest JTTS level luchador. It's funny, I seem to remember that Blitzkrieg actually got the belt at one point, but I doubt it will happen now. His stint really seems like it was ridiculously overblown back then (by us I mean), although he had lot of potential. Probably a capoeira practicionner judging from the way he moved. I forgot to mention this was the week Rick Rude died. He got a still picture and a three count before Nitro...

WEEK 17 (April 26 to May 01, 1999) I'm not gonna lie, this is getting tougher... I'm kinda get angry behind my screen watching 14 year old pro-wrestling... Match of the week : Sting vs DDP (Nitro) They throw around this main event caliber match at the top of the second hour, facing RAW. They clearly are getting desperate here. And it's gonna get worse. For now though, this is pretty great. Not a great match per say, but clearly one of Sting's best in ages. What makes this so fun is two things : first, the heat is seriously amazing, WCW audience were so into Sting winning the title that they made this match so much better than it probably is. Second, they worked some terrific nearfalls at the end, and it seemed like DDP would lose and Sting would indeed win the title. Until he did. And they it exploded, litteraly. Great Nitro moment, and it showed that Sting still was worthy of a run at the top as the babyface of the company. Yes but.... Retarded match of the week : Sting vs DDP vs Goldberg vs Kevin Nash (Nitro) Yeah. For the title too. Because we need two fucking world title matches on the same show. Before making this match from "the loony bin", Flair also changed the Slamboree main event into Sting vs Goldberg. With two weeks of build. Nice. Anyway, so they throw these four together and it's a bit messy and doesn't attain near the same level of intensity as DDP vs Sting earlier on. And then. Randy Savage, who's a babyface feuding with Flair mind you, attacks Sting, saves DDP and basically gives him the victory, and the title. Yep. Yet another nonsensical heel/face dynamic on top, and Sting was the champ for a whole 90 minutes. Rating jerk-off booking. Retarded title switch of the week 2 : Rey Mysterio Jr. pins Psychosis in 4 minutes to win his title back (Nitro). Yep. After winning an epic 20 minutes 4-way the previous and scoring the upset win, Psych jobs hard in a match that is nothing but a backdrop for another Horsemen attack on Rey. This is so stupid. Godawful vignettes & angle of the week : Flair at the mental hospital gives instructions to Charles Robinson who is the active vice president of the company (Nitro) Yep. Charles Robinson apaprently was the vice-president and as such can overule Piper. The Flair vignettes are embarrassing to watch. Scott Hall making a cameo is the only "funny" moment. That muscular nurse only brings more bad memories. Complete shit. Again, this is as bad as anything Russo was doing in WWF at the time, and it's obvious Nash was copying the hotshotting and stupid vignette style of Russo. Stupid job of the week : Raven doing the job to Steve and Scott Armstrong (Nitro). Why ? Supposedly Saturn had been attacked by the Horsemen earlier on. Still, this has no point and the announcers make it worse by calling it a huge upset, which really doesn't make Raven look like a big deal but rather make the Armstrong look like complete jabroni. They beat up a guy 2 on 1 and it's still a huge upset ? Shit. Get some relief match of the week : Rey Mysterio Jr. vs Kaz Hayashi (Saturday Night). Apart from Hayashi doing his own version ofthe People's Elbow (seriously, WTF ?!!), this was a nice little cruiserweight match which ended the week on a better note. This was hard to get through. So much shit going on. Booker T is now getting some unwanted help from his big brother, thrilling. He's also showing me each and every time that he was pretty much a poor worker at this point. Really got into a total routine with sloppy spots, awkward set-ups and shitty looking shots, always doing the exact same spots with the exact same transitions at the exact same point of the match. I never thought much of Booker, but his stock has dropped a lot thus far in 1999. Ditto Bam Bam who thus far has been way more disapointing than he already was in ECW. The same garbage matches every week with Hak are getting old, and that's coming from a Sandman fan. He's not working with terribly exciting opposition either, Hugh Morrus and now Brian Knobbs... Of course we'll get that thrilling feud between Konnan and nWo Black & White. And Rick Steiner is getting a single push. Meanwhile, Kaz Hayashi, The Cat, Norman Smiley, Fit Finlay among others do nothing of note. And I know it's not gonna get better with the horrible Summer on the horizon... I need some support people....

Two monsters against each other mostly never work anyway. The issue I have with this WM card, is that from where I stand, all three big matches are predictable as hell, with two of them consisting of one guy "getting his win back". And I never cared for Taker's Streak, which makes every damn WM Taker match the epithome of obligatory self-conscious epic with garanteed result anyway. I don't believe for a second that CM Punk can be any threat to Taker anyway. I really have no desire to watch anything involving Triple H, I was bored to tears by him by 2001, so using Lesnar this way really doesn't excite me one bit. And as much as I had fun watching Cena vs Rock last year, this year just doesn't seem that special to me. Any kind of upset in one of these three matches would make my day, but I very highly doubt it.

Plus Colon always had TV, hasn't he ? Onita was promoting without the support of TV for most of his first stint, which makes it even more impressive to me.

Blame Matt. If not for his own little joke, I would have gone straight to the snake picture.

The most embarrasing too. Although we never quite got a guy like Berlusconi at the helm, thank God ! "Italians do it better".

Hey, I almost posted *that* very picture as a way to apologize for subjcting you to the horror of the French MLP. I would have made a tired remark about "I want to be that snake" too. You know how much I love Mary-Louise too...

That's also the recollection I have from this match. I wonder though, as Piper has been rotten in the ring the few times I've seen him in 98 and 99 thus far. We'll see, I have one more week of TV to go (and what a Nitro it was... oh man... you better enjoy the "bizarre turn of the week" stuff... and the "stupid title switches of the week" stuff too...)