[1996-05-19-WCW-Slamboree] Battlebowl Battle Royal

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

Not sure what the logic was in doing an all midcarder battle royal as the main event of the show, unless none of the top guys wanted to put over DDP. Weird show, but DDP wins the title shot against The Giant at the Great American Bash. Zero heat for all of this, but good for WCW sticking with the DDP push, actually having a plan to make a star over the long term and not abandoning it because results don't come immediately. Rarity.

[Tim Evans]

Couldn't they have found someone better to put DDP over besides the Barbarian? Man that was one dead crowd.

[El-P]

JTTS battle royal for a bogus title. Gotta love how Sullivan talks about it in the 96 Timeline : "How went the discussions about that ?" "There was no discussion. -This is what you're going to do-". But really, DDP would get over by himself not because of this match but because his cool finisher would eventually caught up + the nWo recruiting angle which made him a star.

[PeteF3]

This was such an absurd PPV, with the most contrived "Lethal Lottery" in history with literally every match involving enemies teaming or tag partners against each other. The result is a #1 contenders' final 4 consisting of DDP, the Barbarian, Johnny Grunge, and Ice Train. Unbelievable. Oh, and pinfalls count, because why not? DDP and Barb work hard to put on as good of a match as possible under the circumstances, before DDP puts him away with the Diamond Cutter. We didn't know what was to come with Diamond Dallas, but at the time this was a total out of nowhere, WTF result.

[soup23]

The jobbers being in at the end resulted in the bad crowd heat. DDP does win signifying his first run to the top that has been chronicled excellently in these sets.

 

I wonder how good the Sting vs. Giant main event was as I have liked the way giant has been presented lately.

[BruiserBrody]

And Bischoff wanted Muta to put DDP over at the next PPV before New Japan stepped in...

[BruiserBrody]

The jobbers being in at the end resulted in the bad crowd heat. DDP does win signifying his first run to the top that has been chronicled excellently in these sets.

 

I wonder how good the Sting vs. Giant main event was as I have liked the way giant has been presented lately.

Total Nitro match right down to a fuck finish.

[tim]

Dead crowd. DDP and Barbarian work a decent end of the match. Feels like a real out of nowhere push for DDP, interested to watch it develop.

[dawho5]

Is this the genesis of the hard-working, never say die DDP with an uber finisher in the Diamond Cutter?  If so, totally worth a ridiculous set-up tournament and dead crowd.  There have to be easier ways though.