[1994-04-17-WCW-Spring Stampede] Rick Rude vs Sting

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

Last few minutes, which are really heated and laid out well, but wow, is it obvious everyone (Sting, Rude, the ref, Vader, Race) is waiting for their cue every step of the way. These really look like people working together.

[Kevin Ridge]

Got all weird there with Rude just looking around when trying to apply the Rude Awakening. Chair shot was a bit delayed too. Vader is just chilling out hanging ringside after originally doing a run in.

[Exposer]

The crowd is really into this show which is awesome. This is the ending of the International Heavyweight Title match. It's not bad but it does seem pretty choreographed. Decent stuff here.

[soup23]

The action was pretty bad but the pop Sting gets when he wins may be his mos satisfying championship win and I would say is only rivaled by the Great American Bash 1990 pop.

[El-P]

When Rude showed up in 1991, it lit a fire under Sting and really helped him to get his level of work to the next level, and it's about that time that I began to enjoy Sting on a regular basis.

1994, Rude is so done here, and Sting actually reverted to do his no-selling bayface act that he wasn't doing that much in big matches. It's decent at best, and only look better than it is thanks to the great heat. The big gold belt being basically an undercard championship (nobody would think Rude was the Man at that time), all goes toward a unification so that Flair can get back the big gold belt and ditch this useless fake world championship. Cool pop for Sting but not really a good match nor a decisive moment. The promise of a renewed feud with vader is obviously the highlight.

[Cross Face Chicken Wing]

It was tough going from the brutal chair and shovel shots in the Nastys/Foley/Payne match to the weak-ass chair shot delivered by Harley Race to Rude. The fans ate it up, though.

[PeteF3]

I love this crowd! Can't say the same for this finish, which goes completely off the rails with Harley and Vader seemingly each waiting for the other to do something, and Rude having to badly stall. Just awful execution and I'm not sure who was at fault. Bockwinkel looks totally ineffective at ringside while all this chaos is going on around him in a supposed title match. Also telling: as soon as Randy Anderson gets creamed, EVERYONE turns and looks to the entrance way, well before Harley and Vader appear. That's been a problem for WCW for a few years now and it's only fixing to get worse.

[cactus]

The crowd finally come alive for The Stinger. Sting no-sells a tad here, but he's charismatic enough to pull it off. Rude bumps his ass off for Sting and there's plenty of moments here that would fit right at home on that Rick Rude Getting Atomic Dropped Twitter account. Shenanigans ensue when the referee gets taken, with Vader and Race getting involved. It was quite overbooked, but I found it entertaining. 

★★★