El-P

All time great to me. At his peak (88 or so), better than Flair. Could play any role and be great at it, fiery young babyface, vulnerable injured babyface, heel tag-team worker Horseman, face veteran tag-team leader carrying young Dustin, technical veteran heel against Scorp, brawler lone wolf heel against Pillman, had ton of great looking offense (he's one of the most graceful wrestler ever), could sell his ass off, beg like a chickenshit, make great fiery babyface comebacks, the guy could do litteraly everything and look great doing it. During WCW stint from 91 to 93 he was the best worker in the promotion overall, and that was after he passed his physical prime. I'd watch fat Barry Windham rather than tons of guys in their prime. All time great. He he hadn't blown his knee in 1993, who knows how many great matches he would have had still. Awesome awesome worker.

Ah, the famous junkyard vignette. Arn adn Barry look so bad-ass in this one it's not even funny. The last time the Horsemen look like the freaking Horsemen, really.

To me more than showing that Flair had slipped, this match totally exposed Scott Steiner for what he was, a spot machine absolutely not ready for a single push.

That's the big issue with shoot tapes, as the guys doing the interveiws don't to the least bit of research it seems, even the guy from KC. They just to hear stories and the hell with facts. I mean, when Nash says that the best fight he ever saw was Vader vs Orndorff when it happens a good 6 months before he even was in WCW, it's not that hard to point out that fact. Larry is fantastically full of shit, and the talking point about Backlund not drawing shit and being paranoid is ridiculous at this point.

It was also what made WCW so fun to watch though. You could watch Saturday Night and get a mini-feud between Chris Adams and Glacier over the superkick, a Bobby Blaze vs Barry Horowitz match, and Greg Valentine vs Pat Tanaka. Ridiculously random and fun.

I am so gonna use the "meaningless depth" idea.

A few quick thoughts as I am finished with SMW. Overall I'm glad I watched it as the product had been really fun at times. My main criticism of the promotion would be the lack of competitive matches on TC after a point (especially the last year), as the old-school format can get a bit frustrating after a while, always building to non televised shows. I didn't get to see a lot of big shows in full, as I had some handhelds that I just dind't bother to watch (I don't watch handhelds anymore at this point, don't have the patience to unless the footage is really quality), so that plays into it too, but still. It's an incredible promotion in term of promos, the number of legit great promos is just ridiculous. Cornette's booking strong point is an effort on details and overall trying to make sense. The weak point is an overreliance on gimmick and stipulation matches. I understand he was booking a regional territory with a limited amount of workers and turn-over of talent, and you have to give the audience something special to keep them interested, but still it really felt exagerated after a while. Also, as much as I enjoyed Bob Armstrong's promos, the feud between him and Cornette overstayed its welcome after the great Wargames match, and it really was hard to keep things interesting. Third criticism of his booking was the way he overbooked himslef. I love Corny, but by 1995 you ended up with three different Cornette's promo on the same TV shows sometime. It wasn't fresh anymore. Cornette as a booker had its strong points, but he doesn't strike me as a particulary great creative booker. He had trouble keeping his lead babyfaces strong too. As a performer, Cornette's stock rised quite a bit with me, he surprised me as a pure worker in the ring, being quite adept, more than I thought he would. And as much as I knew he was great on the mic, some of his best mic work here is absolutely killer. Guys whose stock has risen a lot are Tracey Smothers, Dirty White Boy and Ricky Morton. White Boy in particular, who I wasn't overly familiar with except a few tag matches from the 80's and the awful WWF stint. Terrific brawler, terrific promo, great heel, superb face. Smothers I already liked a lot, but his best work is just right there. Being the babyface anchor to a regional promotion was the right spot for him, super worker who could do workrate matches, bloody brawl, gimmick matches (the ladder match with Candido is arguably better than the Shawn matches from the same era). Improved quite a bit on promos, sometime cutting really strong ones, other time being a bit shaky, but overall quite good. Ricky Morton was just amazing to watch as he carried angles after angles on his back, cutting excellent promos whatever the situation, and still being really strong in the ring. For someone who was passed his prime and supposedly "dated", he showed me that he was still a great performer up to 1995, at least anyway. I never knew he was such a great angle guy. The Gangstas didn't do much for me. New Jack did cut some great awkward promos, but th whole Gangsta angle just didn't work for me and was conterproductive. As far as work goes, they were just blah. New Jack could do a little bit of stuff in the ring, while Mustafa was useless, and even the Rock'n Roll coudn't carry them to really good matches. Nope. Thumbs down. Al Snow was better here than anywhere else, and the rest of his career seems even more a waste now. Candido was as fun as ever, his stock didn't rise with me as he was already a big favourite of mine. Watching Tammy improve week to week was very cool. Boo Bradley was as useless here as in ECW. Paul Orndorff was the best wrestler of the company in 1992, really enjoyed his work and was surprised by how hard the guy was still pushing himslef and others. Buddy Landell came in too late, but was an amazing promo man especially as a babyface. Loved Bob Armstrong promos at first, but in the ring he didn't bring anything to the table, so after a while I was tired of having him being basically the number one babyface in the company. The best even Commissioner character though, before it became a cliché. Ron Wright was awesome in his role of devious hypocrite old man piece of trash begging for pity. Loved the whole Ron Wright in a wheel-chair period. The Armstrong boys, especially Scott, didn't impress me that much, to the point I now think the talking point of them being underrated and underused is false. They were decent to good, but that's it. The Heavenly Bodies were clearly the heel anchor to the company, and to me the peak ended with their first departure (which is maybe the best moment in SMW history). I enjoyed the first version more than I thought I would, as I'm not a big Stan Lane fan, but Del Rey brought the team to another level. Truly the last old-school tag team that came into the game, misused in WWF, and their work in SMW was very satisfying, although I must admit they are not close to what the MX were. And they had a terrific music theme to boot. Oh, and I enjoyed Tim Horner a lot. Unironically. What else ?.... I dunno. I'm feeling quite burned out at this point, so I'll let it rest. To me the promotion peaked in 1993 and first half of 1994. It was funny to see how ECW followed the footsteps of SMW in a way, with guys like Brian Lee, Candido, the Gangstas, Tracey Smothers, Boo Bradley, Lance Storm, Al Snow would progressively transfer from one promotion to another (with sometime a transitionnal and usually failed WWF stint between the two). Anyway, it was fun. Must see there are the works of Smothers, DWB, Ricky Morton, Heavenly Bodies and Candido & Tammy, and moreso promo-wise Cornette/Wright/Bullet Bob/Landell. I need a break.

Maybe so. I don't know when I'm gonna rewatch that match back, as I'm taking a break from WCW. I stop my watch as the Nitro era begins, for several reasons. One is that I'm feeling the burn out. Second is that these are the years I already know the most (although not the B shows so much), and I don't want to dwelve back into this right now. Maybe at some point I'll do a comparative watch of WCW and WWF from the debut of the Nitro era up to the end of 1997 which is the end of WCW's peak and basically the start of the Attitude era which I intent of never revisiting. I'm just taking a break now and maybe my next "project" with WCW will be to go through the Death of WCW, beginning with the Fingerpoke of Doom until the end. That is, if I have the courage to.

Yep, excellent promo by Flair. This was really good stuff, and felt fresh and exciting. It's just too bad the match hasn't lived up to the hype.

This is excellent, and the most compelling feud of all year. Arn promises the fight of the decade, which it should have been.

There are some peculiar characters in that sauna....

Looking at his body of work, I would agree. I like his heel personnality better like I said, but the very good to great matches he piled up as a babyface, in various roles like you said, speak for themselves.

I really don't want to see Vader teaming with Hogan, so it's not something I miss. Vader should have pissed off Paul Orndorff before the strap match and go on his merry way before all that shit.

Yes, this is exactly how Rick comes off after a while. I'm not sure when the change happens, but at some point the Steiner become really unberably egotistical, probably because they knew they could beat the shit out of people for real. Unless they got guys like Doom, the Shrinkers, Doc/Gordy who are real bad ass and who know their shit (well, Butch Reed did at least). The Road Warriors cames off like monsters. The Steiners came off like dicks.

I thought Pillman's babyface act was always a little bit too rooted in the traditionnal exciting-jumping around 80's babyface, and that with the crummy look (bad hairstyle, shitty tights, either too small in eearly 90's or too hair-metal in 95) kinda prevented me from totally getting connected to Pillman as a face. It come across in his promos, which always felt a bit forced to me. That being said, on a pure work level, he was an excellent babyface. But the whole package always had something wrong to me. It seems like his personnality was more suited for being a heel, but then again, his promos both as a Holywood Blond or the Loose Cannon kinda semed a bit forced too. I guess Pillman had that overdrive and desire in him that made him, I dunno, a bit too self-conscious. I'd say a heel, I really loved his team with Windham and the Blondes. But he's a guy who certainly could play both role efficiently in the ring. He should have recieved a big push as a babyface as early as 1990 though, after the series with Luger in 89. It's a shame that WCW never saw what they had in him, for so long.

I hate that shit. It seems like ever since Michaels mouthed "I'm sorry, I love you", WWE started having this obsession with heavy verbalizing in some of their big matches. I guess it ties into the whole "self concious epic" stuff. My exact feeling too.

Going through WCW TV from 89 to 95, Pillman is a guy whose stock has went up with me, and I didn't expect it. I never realized before that he had been so good for so long despite being fucked over and fucked over again by the booking. It's amazing how this guy just didn't snap or throw the towel much earlier in his career. As far as comparing him with Austin, it's a tricky question for me, obviously during that whole period he's the much better worker, and he has some great stuff. He was never put in Austin's spot to have big main events, so it's a different realm. But yeah, maybe Pillman would be above Austin at this point with me too. I'd have to revisit Austin's WWF stuff, which is something I dont intent to do at this point. But having Pillman ahead of Austin doesn't strike me as outrageous at this point, not at all. Pillman was consistently one hell of a worker from 89 to 95.

That would probably be the reason for me not thinking about him. Epic peak, but a bit too short for me to compete against the guys I mentionned.

Good match, but yeah, it made them look weak. And THAT feud would end up being very disapointing with THAT match.

Shit, that's exactly what it looks like !

Yeah, Kevin Nash is a rather funny guy, but he's not as funny as he thinks he is. Laughs too much out of his own jokes, which aren't always funny. But he's a smart guy. Completely full of shit though.

This is really fitting as the last match of the last SMW TV show, with the Heavenly Bodies, DWB and Tracey Smothers in the ring. Of course you have the wrong R'n'R and the wrong Armstrong really in term of significance, but it's a very good match. End of the line for me, as I don't have the last two shows. I mostly had a lot of fun with SMW, although the last year's TV was really a drag at points. It took me forever before I watched that product, but I'm glad I did. I'll miss that Edgar Winter Band tune.

I had no idea Miss Jackie and her huge... eyes worked in SMW until she showed up two weeks earlier.

That's a match I would have liked to see, Tracey's promo was pretty intense.

Awful stuff. Come on Cornette, you're better than this.