[1992-10-03-WCW-Saturday Night] Steve Williams & Terry Gordy vs Barry Windham & Dustin Rhodes

[Loss]

Taped on 9/21/92.    Terry Gordy & Steve Williams defend the NWA/WCW Unified Tag Team titles.    Talk about it here.

[Loss]

Great match! Barry and Dustin have been involved three of the four best U.S. tags of the year -- this, SuperBrawl II and the Rude/Austin match at the GAB. This goes about 25 minutes on free TV and would have been aided by Doc and Gordy heeling it up more than they did, as the Center Stage crowd is pretty quiet. But aside from that, this is extremely well-worked. I love the arm work on Doc and Gordy in the beginning, along with the out of nowhere lariats from everyone at different times depending on what's happening in the match. Doc and Gordy are reliable of course, but this is really a great performance from the babyfaces more than anything, and the swan song for the MVC in WCW. Deserves a full walk-through sometime and would be in the top handful of matches to ever air on a Saturday evening on TBS. Post-match, they start laying the groundwork for Windham to turn heel, as Barry is holding all the gold and Jim Ross is giving Dustin all the credit for the win. I love that they made a huge deal of the title change.

[Tim Evans]

Besides what Loss said, Arn Anderson was real good with Jim Ross putting the match over. Kinda sad that this was it for Doc and Gordy in WCW.

[shoe]

This was a pretty strong match. I dug how Arn compared the MVC to the Andersons. The MVC could have benefited from having Ole as their manager compared to his roll as trouble shooting ref. These guys told a basic story, like Loss said we could have gotten a little more heeling from the heels. The faces were pretty awesome with their offense, and selling. Great interview post match and a great beginning to the Dustin/Windham story.

[El-P]

One of the strongest TV match of the year, as the TV becomes much better at this point. Barry Windham really is the standout in the match I though, great on selling babyface in peril, smooth offense as always. Terry Gordy was so good at this point, it's depressing to think in a few months his brain would go bye-bye. Doc & Gordy really were a failed experiment as far as the WCW audience goes, they really didn't get a chance to get over because of overpush and lack of promo skills, but they were a great tag team. I still don't know where does the MVC name comes from, as they were never called Miracle Violence Connection in WCW, and I don't remember them having any name in Japan either (although I would guess it was a japanese nickname, it sounds like it anyway).

[PeteF3]

Interesting contrast to the previous 6-man. That was very shticky and broad but made by a red-hot crowd. This is very gritty and hard-hitting but Doc & Gordy are not over in the slightest. Now, they do eventually win the crowd over so that they're into things by the end of it, and the finish is very good and really comes off as a monumental upset. And babyface locker rooms emptying to celebrate title wins are always awesome. This was well-done but I wasn't as high on this as everyone else. Dustin got the winning move, Windham got the pin, and Windham takes all four belts and takes credit for his superplex getting the win. The seeds are sown.

[WingedEagle]

I'd never seen this before and expected an above average WCWSN main event. Wrong. This was awesome, probably the best US tag match of the year. Just as good as the match was Anderson on commentary. He was calm, intelligent and put over everyone in the match. A voice like that makes the product seem like a big deal. Gordy would bump well here, but this was the babyface show as Windham & Rhodes were firing on all cylinders. Fast, crisp offense, almost working like a heavyweight RNR during their extended shine. Windham then plays face in peril for a while and excels at that, eating a ton of power offense. Terrific false finish on Rhodes after a Gordy piledriver, and again after a double running tackle. Great, great match. I don't know how I forgot about Windham & Rhodes being this much fun.

 

****1/4

[Zenjo]

It's amazing that they used to have such lengthy bouts on TV. This would've lasted the best part of half an hour including the break. A gruelling battle for sure. Not always the most thrilling as it got bogged down at times. The workrate did remain high however and both teams were effective units. There weren't any weak links. I dug the upset finish and subsequent celebrations.

[PhilTLL]

Fantastic match that is not generally in the WCW "canon." I really love the structure tying into the story: the full TV segment-length shine is more of a face control because you can't push around the MVC. Doc, bless his heart, goes into total telegraph/doin' too much mode at the finish, but no matter.

 

Oddly enough, Doc and Gordy gave the Steiners their clean job back on Worldwide the week before, making them explicit #1 contenders...for no reason at all, in the end. Such strangeness surrounded the Steiners' way out.

[garretta]

I'm kind of in the middle here. The work was high quality, of course, but there was no electricity here, and Doc and Bamm Bamm are the reason why, although it's not really their fault.

 

Watts made one mistake with these two: he assumed that because they got over with very little to no verbal skills in Japan (mostly because of the language barrier), they could do the same here in the U.S. He was wrong; even though Barry and Dustin got the hell beaten of them here, very few in the audience cared. That's because there was no reason for the fans to dislike Doc and Bamm Bamm. They're big and they're tough, but we have no idea what motivates them, what's in their hearts. Even if they're just supposed to kick butt because that's their job, we don't know that because we weren't told.

 

You've got Michael Hayes on your roster doing practically nothing; make him the MVC's American spokesman and have him do what he used to do when Bamm Bamm was a Freebird, which is put him and Doc over as five hundred and eighty pounds of rompin', stompin' graveyard destruction direct from the Land of the Rising Sun. Have him cut promos on Dustin and Barry, Arn and Bobby, and all the other teams in WCW. Make these two dislikable so that the fans can get behind the American teams (particularly Dustin and Barry) and root for them to send Doc and Gordy back to Japan in bodybags. You can even have him join in a six-man occasionally if you like, provided he can move a little better than he did the last time we saw him.

 

As it was, no one really got behind the challengers, so what we had was a televised exhibition, only with the belts on the line. I could have stood for a little less endless pounding on Barry in particular; without crowd involvement, long face-in-peril sequences are excruciating. This was very reminiscent of the tag from Halloween Havoc with Austin taking Bamm Bamm's place; I'm guessing that this was the MVC's default match structure, and I say I'm guessing because it's not as readily apparent in their Japanese matches.

 

Arn was a treat to listen to on commentary; he delved into strategy, put across the effects of various holds and maneuvers, and generally walked a straight line, staying almost completely impartial, although he admitted early on that he'd have loved for himself and Bobby Eaton to be in Dustin and Barry's shoes. The one time he showed his heel bias was when Dustin came in to make a save for Barry. JR called it brilliant, and Arn rightly pointed out that if he'd done it for Bobby, JR would have called it illegal and condemned him for it.

 

It was nice to hear the Horsemen acknowledged by name; the deal to bring Flair home must have already been in the works. I also liked Arn putting Barry over so much as a tag team partner, and he had some kind words for Dustin too.

 

The finish was patently illegal, of course, but we weren't supposed to notice that, I guess. JR did go a bit overboard saying that it was Dustin's bulldog that won the belts for himself and Barry, as if Barry's supeprplex that Doc had to save Bamm Bamm from had nothing to do with it. Of course, Barry was a jerk for continuing to hold all four belts himself as if they were his property alone. In other words, the seeds of Barry's heel turn have been effectively planted.

 

Line of the Night goes to Arn, after Bamm Bamm blasts Dustin with a lariat: "You can pick up his head right out here (by the broadcast table)."

 

I guess the NWA belts weren't around for too much longer after this, because I don't recall hearing that Austin and Pillman were booked as the Unified World champions, although I'm guessing that Douglas and Steamboat were, at least at first.

[ohtani's jacket]

#320

 

I've been meaning to revisit Williams & Gordy's WCW run for a while now. I remember liking it during the Smarkschoice poll but there's been a lot of water under the bridge since then. This was every bit as good as I remembered. As far as a match with four big men go, I thought it was much better than Doc & Gordy's match with Jumbo and Taue from the same year. A bit long maybe, especially since it's a match I've seen before, but I couldn't pick too many faults with it. Arn wasn't entirely comfortable on commentary for a guy with his promo ability, but he did a good job of fleshing out the psychology and providing insight into basic tag match strategy. Williams and Gordy's run is strangely unpopular among fans despite the fact there's no changing it now. You'd think people would have melllowed with age, but it's still largely viewed as a mistake by Watts. Give me a great TV match over retrospective booking any day of the week.

[JKWebb]

#320 - placetobenation.com/countdown-top-500-matches-of-the-90s-350-301/2/

 

I thought first half of this was good, but probably could have been better with some more heel-ish antics from Doc and Gordy. Dustin and Barry delivered here, and I thought they sold really well - sucking the people in, and then delivered on the hot tags. The post-match promo is pretty fun, and I enjoyed Arn on commentary.

[Superstar Sleeze]

Unified World Tag Team Champions Miracle Violence Connection vs Barry Windham & Dustin Rhodes - WCW Saturday Night 10/03/92

 

I remember seeing this before and digging it.

 

Shine: is all Windham & Rhodes. What keeps this for going full heel in peril is Gordy & Williams do a great job making both Rhodes & Windham earn their armdrags and armbars. Gordy kept slugging it out with Dustin only for Dustin to tenaciously rip out another armdrag. Doc would try amateur wrestling takedowns or maneuver Windham or Rhodes into their corner to no avail. I liked how Gordy and Doc missed all their highspots in the early going while Dustin & Windham escalated theirs. Dustin gets the crossbody for two. Double dropkick for two. BW gets a gutwrench for two. It is all pro wrestling 101 but it is refreshing when the offense is being executed well, paced well and the opponents are making them earn it. Right before the second commercial break, BW takes a tumble from the top rope to the floor when he was going for a superplex. Doc suckerpunches him on the floor. Methinks that the face in peril is about to start.

 

Double FIP; is all Miracle Violence Connection. Again I think the pacing and escalation is what makes this match. It is a Double FIP, but they don't blow their big spots on the first FIP which is Windham. Doc gets a shoulder tackle & powerslam. Gordy gets an STF. The rest is the struggle to keep Windham from making the tag. There is a lot of drama in that inherently you don't need nearfalls on top of that. Windham tags Dr. Death really good with a right, but Doc goes to the eyes to prevent the tag. Eventually Windham explodes out of the corner with a lariat. Dustin is a great house of fire! Lariats and dropkicks. He gets hotshotted by Doc. Gordy comes in and finally hits a piledriver on his third try. I love that Gordy had to work for that piledriver. Dustin kicks out. Now Arn is promoting how devastating Gordy's lariat is and Gordy nails it! 1-2-NO! They are ramping up the spots! Dustin hits a back suplex and the playing field has been leveled.

 

Finish Stretch: Windham comes in and is just nailing everything that moves with rights. Doc & Gordy try to double team but he fends of both of them. He will not be denied. Gordy goes up top, but Windham meets him up top and SUPERPLEX! Ref out of position! 1-2-NO! BULLDOG BY DUSTIN ON GORDY! WINDHAM COVERS! 1-2-3! Awesome, clean finish!

 

Pacing, pacing, pacing. Excellent pacing throughout. They were very economical with highspots, but when they landed they meant something. They told a story using positioning and energy/intensity. It all came together in a short, raucous finish. Excellent pro wrestling. ****1/4

[dawho5]

WCW is just so weird.  For a promotion that is about the wrestling more than the sideshow antics and promos, the fans sometimes don't respond to the wrestling unless it's somebody who has already wowed them with the antics/promos.  This was a great match with a structure that should have kept the crowd involved, but somehow it just didn't.  Maybe hotshotting Gordy/Williams into the spotlight had something to do with that?

I wonder if Watts wasn't trying a little too hard to put his stamp on WCW rightnow when he came in and would probably have done better working the stuff he wanted to do in gradually.  As it is I'm surprised he didn't bring in JYD and start pushing him to the moon from day one.  There was an idea in this thread involving Watts using Hayes as a mouthpiece for the MVC, which seemed like it might have worked.  Would even have gotten past Watts' predeliction towards not having Hayes wrestle.  So far for me the Watts era has been mostly bust and I kinda wish they had stuck with the Dangerous Alliance and worked Vader in as the newer big bad instead if this.