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[1993-07-03-WCW-Saturday Night] Ric Flair & Arn Anderson & Paul Roma vs Hollywood Blonds & Barry Windham


Loss

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  • 2 months later...

This is a waaaaaay better match than the Clash -- way more focused with both Flair and Arn acting as faces in peril. The Flair/Windham stuff is really good, which just makes the Beach Blast match all the more disappointing. Windham is the star of his match if only because he has so much great offense and he was really comfortable in his role, so maybe rather than the Clash, this is his real last hurrah. Roma I think is in the match one time for a very brief spell. They were obviously trying to hide him.

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  • 1 year later...

Finally a long, exciting match on TV. Man, Barry was great. Blowing his knee really ended his awesome run of nearly three years of constant post-prime excellence. It's funny how they just don't involve Roma at all. Poor guy. Flair alreally had turned into Tenryu at this point, which really at 44 I'm totally fine with (although Tenryu at the same age was way way better than Flair). Bye bye great Barry Windham, it has been awesome.

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  • 1 year later...

Roma is the newest member of Horsemen and they immediately hide him in match. Was for the best though. Flair versus Windham was great. Both guys looked good. They had solid portions of match time against each other too. Looked like was going to an excellent singles match for them. Pretty darn good 3 on 2 match as they come.

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  • 3 weeks later...

According to thehistoryofwwe.com this match was taped on 6/9/93, so a week or so before the Clash.

I know Things Were Different Then but I think it's kind of crazy that Flair's in-ring return was on a taped program before his "actual" live return.

 

Anyway, there was nothing spectacular here but this was a good, solid, hard-hitting workmanlike match. Roma was pretty useless but the other five were very good, and Flair is certainly re-energized after his hiatus. Flair gets a hot tag with about 60 seconds of TV time left and goes nuts on the whole heel team, then figure-fours Barry as the other Horsemen cut off the Blonds in a cool All-Japan 6-man moment. Windham heaves Nick Patrick to the floor to draw a DQ, kind of a clever bullshit finish when it looked like they were going to the draw.

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  • 1 year later...
  • 1 year later...

Horsemen ( Ric Flair, Arn Anderson & Paul Roma) vs Barry Windham & Hollywood Blonds - WCW Saturday Night 7/3/93

 

Did Paul Roma do anything besides a side headlock? Jeez, if you are going to make him a Horsemen you might as well try to make the best of it rather than be embarrassed by it.

 

Flair was the total MVP of this for me. He is so underrated as a babyface by himself and by most everyone else. He is so damn fiery. I love shit like throwing a random wicked chop at Austin when he is in trouble in the wrong corner. He is great at selling and his babyface comeback is so compelling. His stuff with Pillman at the beginning was just a taste of their old TV battle. Him and Windham going toe-to-toe but now with Flair as the face & Windham as the heel was cool. Windham throws Flair into the railing and that suplex back into the ring and then floatover was a thing of beauty. Flair is able to tag to Arn to minimal reaction. They are in Louisiana apparently. Is that why the reaction to Flair's first match back a little muted? Very strange. Anderson nails Austin with a spinebuster but a fracas breaks out and Austin clubs him in the back of the head with a clothesline. Flair is a monster on the apron during the Anderson heat segment. I love him running over yanking Pillman down and blasting him with a chop or how excited he gets on the apron during an Anderson hope spot. Flair gets the hot tag and this crowd be damned. He supplying 1 Megawatt of electricity out there just hitting anything that moves. He applies the figure-4 to Windham, but Barry throws the ref out and that triggers the DQ. Besides Flair's energy and Windham's smoothness, I thought there was noting too remarkable just a strong TV six-man tag. ***1/2

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  • 2 months later...

This was made good by Flair; his segments with Windham and Pillman were among the best I've seen this year, regardless of promotion. His chops had extra zip, and Pillman certainly responded in kind. What a return, and you can tell that he's back where he's always wanted to be.

 

Kevin called this a three-on-two, and he was right. The question is why. Did they just want to give Flair as much as possible in his return match, or were they really trying to deemphasize Roma? If it was the latter, why even bring him in, as we've all asked so many times? Is he their designated side headlock specialist? The man's got a World tag team title match In two weeks (by the time this aired, at any rate). Why not show off a little teamwork between him and Arn? As it is, especially considering the finish of the tag match at the Clash, if I'm a paying customer I'm looking for Flair to work twice. It's almost false advertising to even call Arn and Roma a team at this point, let alone a World title contending one.

 

To see Barry here, you'd never know he was two weeks away from a knee injury that would end this incredible run. He's been a tremendous old-school heel NWA World champion, and I wonder what would have happened if he'd been able to keep the belt, or at least contend for it, a while longer.

 

The Blonds are back to a wrestling base instead of just relying on schtick, which is when they're at their best. Austin's in a little less than I would like, but this match was as much, if not more, about Flair and Barry, as it was about the Blonds and Arn/Roma, so someone had to be the short man, as it were. It's just a shame that the match at Beach Blast is going to be their last major bout, at least on this set.

 

I liked Jesse talking about how he and the Blonds were going to all the major Hollywood parties, and his complaining about Flair and Arn using thumbs to the eyes was a genuine laugh-out-loud moment. Unfortunately, Tony didn't convert the easy slam-dunk by reminding Jesse that that was, by his own admission, his own favorite move in the ring.

 

They're still hit-and-miss a bit too often for a top announcing team; when Tony feels like engaging in the Bod's verbal hijinks or when a match is important enough for Jesse to be serious, they're terrific. When Tony's in "Shut up and let me call this" mode, or when there's nothing happening in the ring for Jesse to sink his teeth into, they're below average, though they're still better than almost any pairing the WWF can trot out by now. I liked their back-and-forth over whether their respective favorite teams would have gotten the win if not for their partners making the save; it reminded me of an exchange Vince and Jesse might have had on SNME ​before they got bored with each other.

 

I didn't exactly like the DQ finish, but I understood why they did it. A draw wouldn't have done much for anyone, but Barry couldn't submit to the figure four two whole weeks before Beach Blast. Fluke pins in non-sanctioned bouts are one thing, but a clean submission win so close to a pay-per-view main event kills said main event stone dead.

 

They were still trying to push Dusty-Assassin as a viable feud? Please tell me that they didn't end up in the ring, even in a tag match. Dusty might have still been able to go a little, but when was the last time Hamilton wrestled? I don't recall any major runs for him while I was following wrestling in real time (I first really got interested in the summer of '86).

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  • GSR changed the title to [1993-07-03-WCW-Saturday Night] Ric Flair & Arn Anderson & Paul Roma vs Hollywood Blonds & Barry Windham

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