[1992-03-28-WCW-Pro] Arn Anderson vs Ricky Steamboat

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

A whole lotta awesome. High-energy, action packed 10-minute TV match with a super-heated run-in from Rude. Steamboat karate chops him directly on the throat then chokes him out. Paul E. takes some bumps. Fun!

[Tim Evans]

Great match. Loved Steamboat's selling of the spinebuster and Arn just does the little things so great. Steamboat chokes Rude with a belt during the post match brawl.

[shoe]

This is just a great t.v bout. Arn and Steamboat work so well together. They both have great psychology. It's amazing that the Clash in 91 was the 1st time they worked each other. The Rude run in was great.

[Eduardo]

This was incredible. Amazing what they did within a 10 minute time frame. Everything flowed together from beginning to end. After the spinebuster, Steamboat looks like he's crippled or like Nate Quarry after getting knocked out by Rich Franklin. Two awesome professionals working perfectly together. That crowd was so hot for everything.

 

Steamboat looks like the man when the match and post-match angle is over.

[Kevin Ridge]

I wasn't completing buying good guy Steamboat resorting to using an eye gouge so early in match. Otherwise good match. Steamboat gets really fired up when Heyman and Rude interfere. Ricky is pissed off.

[MikeCampbell]

Here's a great example where everything just clicks. Steamboat and Anderson mesh together perfectly, it's an easy angle of Anderson being Rude's policeman, and you've got the hot angle with Rude at the end.

[WingedEagle]

Anderson is as methodical as ever, and these two work a great match with sound transitions, selling and comebacks, all in about 10 minutes. Paul E had to wait a bit too long for the spot where he took a bump, but you had two all time greats doing their thing here and that spot wasn't about to bring it down. Rude is in to interfere but Steamboat turns the tables and hangs him over the ropes. WCW continues putting out awesome TV in 1992.

 

***1/2

[RCS1988]

I like how Rude sells the throat shot.

[PeteF3]

Good match with an even better post-match. Steamboat takes out both Arn and Paul E. and Rude tries to whack him with a chair. Nick Patrick prevents that but Rude chokes out Steamboat with his karate belt. Rude is about to deliver a Rude Awakening with the belt, which would have been an awesome spot, but Steamboat flips out of it and pays Rude back by choking and HANGING(!) him. That's Steamboat at his nastiest. Huge reactions for all of this, as Steamboat manages to fight off all 3 guys by himself. Rude/Steamboat is going to make a dark horse run for Feud of the Year contention, at least as far as the Big Two go.

[Superstar Sleeze]

Arn Anderson (w/ Paul E Dangerously) vs Ricky Steamboat - WCW Pro 3/28/92

Steamboat has answered all his criticisms from me in this feud. Steamboat is one of the greatest championship match workers, but sometimes leaves something to be desired in a blood feud. In the Dangerous Alliance angle, he has been red hot and taking it to the Alliance members with unwonted aggression. When AA jumps him at the outset with his robe still on, The Dragon fires back with kicks, chops and even eye gouges. Even when Anderson starts to connect with punches and a backbreaker, Steamboat is still coming at him. This is a perfect time for a chinlock as Anderson needs to slow the match down, catch his breath and sap Steamboat's energy. When Steamboat comes back off those rope with that high-energy attack and Anderson catches him in midsection is such high-quality wrestling. Steamboat is looking to keep it uptempo and at every turn Anderson is looking to slow it down. The spinebuster is another excellent sudden cutoff that keeps the match in Anderson's favor. Unfortunately for Anderson, he knocks his back into Steamboat, which is a great trademark Anderson spot. When he comes off the rope for double axehandle and he is caught in the midsection and flips over. I have to give them credit with how seamless this looked. So many times, the heel will stop short or it looks like he could never hit a move, but here it looked like Anderson would have hit the move if not for Steamboat connecting. The finish and post-match with Steamboat actually getting his hands on Paul E. and hanging Rude really surprised me. Paul E. does not strike me as someone to get physical (I know that changed with Punk and he took a mighty good asskicking) and I just thought it never happened on WCW TV. It was look to see Steamboat get in some licks on the loudmouth yuppie. Then hanging Rude after all Rude had done to him just shows how deep under his skin Rude had gotten to the Steamer for that to happen. Steamboat and Anderson should have a gotten a chance to have a classic on PPV, but still this was quite good. Each played their roles fantastically and worked at an excellent clip. The post-match really but over the new asskicker Steamboat in a real crowd-pleasing way. ***1/2

[xlynwoodx]

It's so funny to me that at one time, Paul Heyman and Arn Anderson were aligned.

 

Nick Patrick looks like a referee out of Miami Vice. He also pulls off one of the clumsiest ref bumps you will ever see as he knocks himself out by yanking a chair out of Rick Rude's hands and falling backwards into the turnbuckle, never to be seen again.

 

Steamboat is great at a lot of things but sometimes his offense just looks so wacky.

 

TONS of heat at the end as Steamboat fights off Anderson and Rude. Good match, no finish but exciting ending. Huge downer that this is followed by a clip of Eric Bischoff.

[garretta]

If you've read my "review" of Steamboat/Rude from SuperBrawl, you'll know that I believe that the finish wiped out every single bit of good connected with the bout. I wasn't too high on Steamboat/DA as a feud afterward, and although I pretty much knew that this match would be good considering who was involved, and I'd already seen a brief clip of Steamboat hanging Rude at the end of this, I still wasn't prepared to be impressed.

 

Well, I was wrong. This was great from beginning to end. Sure, the postmatch stuff makes the bout itself ultimately meaningless, but Steamer and Arn work like the US title's on the line by proxy, bringing everything they've got into the short time they're given. Steamboat raises his level of aggression perfectly to match Arn's, and both men hit just about every spot you'd expect. Then Heyman tries to interfere, and Steamer goes absolutely berserk. He doesn't just grab Paul by the collar and yell in his face until Rude can come down to make the save, but hits a picture-perfect reverse atomic drop which is sold better by Paul (a manager who seldom takes bumps) than by half the wrestlers on the roster.

 

That's the cue for Rude to come down, and we get a tease of a Rude Awakening with Steamer's own gi belt. That doesn't happen; what happens is that Steamer nails Rude in the throat with a chop, then remembers what Don Muraco did to him seven years before and hangs Rude with the belt (actually, I think it's called a sash), almost choking him out. My description doesn't do this bit justice, as the crowd and JR lose their collective minds at the idea of someone actually getting sustained payback on the DA without help.

 

I've never seen Steamboat this vicious, not even after Savage tried to murder him. Vince always tried to paint him as on too high of a plane to be so violent, almost Zen-like. Here, he's just a good ol' boy from Charlotte who's looking to kick some ass, and I loved it to death. Of course, Rude will have an answer, but for now the playing field is level, as Arn's mission to take Steamer out has completely backfired.

 

JR was on point, especially when talking about the accumulated damage Steamer's neck might have sustained from all the Rude Awakenings he's taken over the past few months. The concept of accumulated damage isn't often talked about in a feud; usually a wrestler suffers an injury, then recovers from it, and while the prospect of further injury is teased, the person who caused the original injury is either prevented by the victim from attacking it again or forgets about it in favor of simply beating the hell out of the victim. If Steamboat had sold the neck a little, even in passing, the point would have been even clearer.

 

How often do you see a referee successfully take a chair away from an interfering heel? Too bad Patrick had to knock himself out with it a few seconds later.

[Tim Cooke]

Is this available online?

[zep81]

Is this available online?

 

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1yyxfd_arn-anderson-vs-ricky-steamboat-wcw-pro-03-28-1992_sport

 

Uploaded it a while ago.

[dawho5]

A lot has been said about how good this match was.  And I can't help but agree!  Such a seamless match worked with great intensity all the way through.  I was pumped as soon as I saw who would be wrestling in the match and I got more than I bargained for.  Steamer taking out Rude and choking him was such a great way to get payback.  I was surprised the Turner people allowed that on TV.