[1992-01-12-WWF-Wrestling Challenge] Barber Shop: The Rockers

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

And there you have it. Pretty famous segment and a great angle that launched Shawn's career, and Jannetty never reached his potential as a singles star. Shawn must have been dying to do this for a long time, because he was already a natural heel.

[Resident Evil]

People who hadn't watched wrestling in over 10 yrs after this angle took place will mention this angle to me when wrestling is brought up. This had a strong impact on a lot of people. One of the all time best WWF angles.

[glea diddy]

One of the best wwf angles of the 90s and something that resonates with an entire generation of fans who grew up on it. This was a helluva jump start to Shawns single push and the only thing missing was a true feud with Jannetty. Though we can probably blame that on his personal problems unfortunately.

[Tim Evans]

Pretty hardcore angle for 92. Michaels was just great here and it's a shame a real feud never happened.

[MJH]

A great, memorable angle. It's a shame their December house show run isn't featured on the set, and even more of a shame they had to wait until then to deliver worthy matches.

[Loss]

It is represented. We couldn't include them all, so we chose the handheld with the best VQ.

[MJH]

I stand corrected. The ones I recall liking the most were December and that's the only month's listings I checked.

[stunning_grover]

This was taped on 1991-12-03 in San Antonio, TX and aired on the 1992-01-12 episode of WWF Challenge. It’s the famous Barber Shop segment where Shawn Michaels turned heel on Marty Jannetty. Classic stuff!

[shoe]

What can you say about this classic angle. What a way to jump start Shawn's heel run. Shawn really has great heel mannerisms.

[Eduardo]

I don't think it was mentioned here yet, but Shawn Michaels tearing the WWF Magazine (that features The Rockers) in half is such a great pro wrestling visual. Awesome angle. I want to show this to my older brother when I see him again, he'll dig this so much.

[jdw]

Pretty hardcore angle for 92. Michaels was just great here and it's a shame a real feud never happened.

I think they ended up having a LOT of matches against each other in a feud. Raw matches with the title changes. Quite a few house show matches, many with the same format: false start match early on the card with them then having to come out later for a full match.

 

Example lifted from a set:

 

Barber Shop w/the Rockers (Wrestling Challenge – 1/12/92)

Shawn Michaels vs. Steve May (Superstars – 10/31/92)

Marty Jannetty vs. Papa Shango Finish (Dayton, OH – 11/24/92, Grudge Matches)

Shawn Michaels vs. Marty Jannetty (Providence, RI – 11/27/92)

Shawn Michaels vs. Marty Jannetty (Indianapolis, IN – 11/29/92)

Shawn Michaels vs. Marty Jannetty (San Francisco, CA – 12/11/92)

Shawn Michaels vs. Marty Jannetty (Hartford, CT – 12/26/92)

Shawn Michaels vs. Marty Jannetty (Philadelphia, PA – 1/8/93)

Royal Rumble Update (RAW – 1/11/93)

Shawn Michaels vs. Marty Jannetty (Reno, NV – 1/23/93)

Shawn Michaels vs. Marty Jannetty (Royal Rumble – 1/24/93)

Shawn Michaels Interview (RAW – 5/17/93)

Shawn Michaels vs. Marty Jannetty (RAW – 5/17/93)

Update: Shawn Michaels Wins Intercontinental Title (Superstars – 6/12/93)

Shawn Michaels vs. Marty Jannetty (RAW – 7/19/93)

Shawn Michaels/Diesel vs. Marty Jannetty/Razor Ramon (Plattsburgh, NY – 7/26/93, Inside the WWF)

Shawn/Diesel/Bam Bam vs. Jannetty/Mr. Perfect/Tatanka (MSG – 8/13/93)

Shawn Michaels vs. Marty Jannetty - Cage Match (White Plains, NY – 8/17/93, Bloopers, Bleeps, & Bodyslams)

Shawn/Diesel/Bam Bam vs. Jannetty/Mr. Perfect/Tatanka (San Francisco, CA – 8/20/93)

 

 

There were a lot of handhelds, but also quite a few things on TV, PPV and CHV. It was just a little stop & star due to Marty's dope issues. But it did pretty much have a start, a middle of quite a few house show matches, the title changes, and a cage blow off. The handhelds on a set like the above might be overkill because most of them were probably repetative.

[Victator]

And there you have it. Pretty famous segment and a great angle that launched Shawn's career, and Jannetty never reached his potential as a singles star. Shawn must have been dying to do this for a long time, because he was already a natural heel.

Have you seen the Midnight Rockers Memphis run? Shawn was already a great heel in 88. Such a complete dickhead in promos.

[BackToBionic]

I don't think this is the first thing I saw but it is the first thing I can remember watching. Glad it resonates with so many other people.

[Kevin Ridge]

Obviously a great segment with how the split was done. Michaels tearing up the WWF magazine and throwing the Jannetty sided picture on the ground and hold up his own image was a great touch. My favorite part though is when they show the replay of the glass breaking from behind the window. Nice slow motion view where screen pauses with Jannetty going through it.

[MikeCampbell]

I remember this like it was yesterday. Shawn is such an arrogant jerk the whole time, and Heenan is in his glory "He tried to jump through the window!" And the Shawn Michaels we know and love (and sometimes love to hate) has arrived.

[Zenjo]

2 decades later this remains one of the all time great angles. You'll never see the tag team break up done better than this.

[WingedEagle]

Between this and the Rumble, January 1992 was a pretty historic and classic month. Incredible angle, facials and a fresh new delivery from Michaels, who shined on the mic right away in a way he never did as a face. Love tearing up the magazine to close.

[PeteF3]

Maybe the biggest thing ever to happen on Wrestling Challenge. I try not to get too worked up over Flair constantly wearing his robe, but the Rockers of all people get to wear street clothes here?? This is an excellent segment on almost all levels, with Shawn starting as a disingenuous babyface ("As the captain of this team...") and building to yet another dark, intense payoff. Heenan is spectacular, too.

[garretta]

I've seen this before, but not in the context of the rest of late 91/early 92 WWF. From the minute Shawn addressed their host as "Beefcake", you could tell that the heel turn was coming, but it still delivered in a shocking way that remains so even after all the weapons stuff we saw during the Attitude Era. I seemed to remember Shawn kicking Marty through the window, but throwing him through it bodily seems so much more violent. Kudos to Marty for the grisly blade job as well, and I'm surprised it didn't have an red X attached like Savage's did after the cobra bite. Shawn ripping the magazine and only holding up his half to the camera drives the point home one last time.

 

The only thing that might have made this a bit better is if there was just a bit more mystery as to who was turning. Marty's actions, particularly in the Flair clip, could be interpreted as heel-like just as much as Shawn's. The problem was, Marty wasn't nearly the talker Shawn turned out to be; he talked too fast and tended to use clichés. Then again, so did Shawn until this very interview. The Rockers were just as good a talking tag team as most of their type were, which is to say not very. Even Ricky Morton, who was above average, was pretty much canceled out by the marblemouth who was Robert Gibson.

 

Gino and Heenan did an excellent job not telegraphing the whole business either before or during, which only added to the surprise. Bobby was on fire after, claiming that Marty jumped through the window trying to escape and that he knew Shawn was going to turn all along, when not thirty seconds before he was saying stuff like, "They need each other" and "They're no good without each other". He continues to impress me as a color man as well as a comedian, and I wonder why WCW was so stupid as to let him slide downhill once he went there. Thank heaven we have two more years of first-rate Heenan to go through before the decline begins.

 

I wonder why this was done on Challenge instead of Superstars. I'm thinking that Vince wanted blood to seal the breakup, so he had it done on Challenge so Beefcake''s window could be used. Also, the cobra bite and subsequent blade job had only happened about six weeks before on Superstars, so maybe Vince thought it was best not to use blood on that show again quite so soon.

[soup23]

A great segment that I have memorized after seeing it so many times over the years. The drive through the window is what really makes this stand out. Shawn had to have that vicious edge to him to be taken seriously.

[dawho5]

Shawn was showing heel mannerisms pretty much from the get-go. Seems like he was a natural heel all along. The slow-mo recap from the opposite angle was cool, if not a little business exposing. They just happened to have a camera back there I guess. Waiting for that one week somebody was going through. Why oh why couldn't it have been Brutus? But in his favor he did stay out of the way for most of this and I think that adds to the segment a lot.