[1992-10-25-WCW-Halloween Havoc] Sting vs Jake Roberts (Coal Miners Glove)

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

Wild finish, and I liked Sting swinging around the pole, but yeah, no reason to see this whole match. Not sure why they wouldn't gimmick the wheel so they could do a better match.

[Boondocks Kernoodle]

This is from the WON a couple of weeks after Havoc:

 

DM: The wheel was rigged. The reason it wasn't a bloodbath is because those kind of matches aren't allowed anymore. For better or for worse, that's how wrestling is today because of fear of spreading diseases and because of the broadcast standards of the PPV industry. The Coal Miners glove was probably chosen because it hadn't been done before by WCW, and it was one of the few gimmicks that going in management probably felt fans wouldn't have felt ripped off by not having juice.

[FLIK]

Hm, weird

 

After all these years this is the 1st time i've ever heard the story that the wheel actually was rigged. Makes me wonder how the story of it being a legit spin became the excepted truth for so long if that's the case.

[Boondocks Kernoodle]

Probably because it was assumed that nobody would be lame enough to book a Coal Miner's Glove match as a PPV main event.

[flyonthewall2983]

Jake getting bit by the snake was an apt finish for this period of his career. And Sting swinging around the pole was pretty awesome. If there's a gif of that somewhere, I'd love to see it.

[Tim Evans]

I like how when Jake gets bitten by the snake at first, the snake lets go and he has to put it on quickly. So disappointing.

[Matt D]

Coal Miner's Glove matches were so much cooler in 1984 Mid South.

[Strummer]

I'm intrigued to se how a Jake/Sting "Cactus/Sting" like brawl would have been. Jake was not one to take many sick bumps or dangerous spots

[El-P]

What a letdown, as this whole PPV was, really, with all three big main event just not delivering at all. Stupid gimmick, and Jake, as much as he could cut awesome promos, just never was much of a worker after his Mid South stint. After all that talk of ending carreers and hate and perversion, we get people working on each others arms. Okay... Sting swinging around the pole is vintage cool Sting athletic spot, and the snake bite is sick, but the match is so-so at best (which makes it better than Simmons vs Barbie and Rude vs Chono, very sadly).

[Zenjo]

A coal miners glove match might had been more entertaining had they tried to film it down a mineshaft. I'm sure some promotion must have tried a subterranean match at one time in history.

[Kevin Ridge]

The finish was cool with Roberts getting his by his own snake. Him putting the snake to his neck after the first attempt was a bit obvious but still good finish. Wish they went with a better match type and surprised to read the comments above that the wheel was rigged after all. The promos leading up were great. Too bad Jake didn't stick around.

[PeteF3]

The action that we see is actually better than I expected given this match's reputation, but the coal miner's glove certainly wasn't much of a factor. Jake then has to do a recreation of Bela Lugosi fighting the octopus in Ed Wood, forcing a snake that may or may not even be alive to "bite" him.

[WingedEagle]

I forgot how big Jake was. Sting with a nice spot jumping around the pole and climbing for the glove. Cactus brings Jake his snake, but Sting nails him and the snake bites Jake allowing Sting to win. Creepy as hell and Jake bleeds a good deal.

[PhilTLL]

Forgettable, poorly booked finish to a forgettable, poorly booked show. This is the stubborn and tone-deaf side of Watts at its worst. This show left such a bad taste that it's stalled my WCW watch-through progress for weeks now.

[garretta]

I skipped ahead to watch this clip before I see either of Jake's matches from September which made the Yearbook, and boy, am I sorry. Not only was what we saw here awful, but Jake was awful in it. He had no balance (blown kneelift spot), no brains (used his injured arm to hit the DDT, thus leaving him unable to stop Sting from climbing the pole and getting the glove), and no control over his cobra (the obvious). In other words, he was made to look like an absolute fool by Watts.

 

I've heard conflicting stories over why Jake left (some say he was really heavily into drugs again; others, including Jake, say that Watts basically refused to honor the contract Jake had signed, thus leaving him no choice but to quit), but even if none of these other issues had surfaced, how this match was booked would have been enough for me if I'd been Jake. I commented in an earlier thread that I thought the Sting-Jake feud had mileage left on it even after Havoc, but now that I've seen Havoc, I'll gladly admit that I was dead wrong. No amount of good promos from Jake can save that feud now; if I'd been the booker, I'd have turned him face and sent him after Cactus Jack because of the cobra biting him. He could have claimed that Cactus had somehow riled it up so that it would attack him once he took it out of the bag.

 

As for the wheel, if they were that afraid of blood in a match, why did they have Jake bleed so badly when the cobra bit him? Doesn't the postmatch count? More importantly, why not just have a regular wrestling match? The glove meant nothing at all, even if Sting managed to get in one shot with it. Of course, Sting-Jake with no titles on the line isn't really pay-per-view worthy, but they could have solved that problem by finding a compelling, already well-known opponent for Simmons, like, say, Vader.

 

I noticed that we really didn't get too good of a look at Jake bleeding, which again begs the question: If we're not supposed to see it clearly, then why book it in the first place?

 

JR's reaction to the cobra attaching itself to Jake's face was the best thing about this segment. Say what you will about the man at times, but when he's on his game as he was here, few can touch him. The problem is, he isn't on his game often enough anymore.

 

I loved Jesse complaining about rule enforcement in a non-sanctioned match; it proves conclusively that I'm not the only one. JR's rebuttals about the ref enforcing the rules on instinct were pretty weak by comparison, as are most of his retorts to Jesse's relevant points. I also think Jesse did a great job pointing out the various mistakes Jake was making; he's not usually that critical of a heel, so the fact that he was here meant that they booked Jake to look bad (even for a heel), which was a shame.

 

I have limited experience with coal miner's glove matches, but if I recall correctly, the gloves have spikes on the end of the knuckles which can bust people wide open. That means that every match we knew about on the wheel had the potential for blood.