Loss Posted July 3, 2012 Report Share Posted July 3, 2012 The Shawn TV from '96 worth checking out is: * vs 1-2-3 Kid (3/4/96 RAW) * vs Leif Cassidy (3/25/96 RAW) * vs Hunter Hearst Helmsley (5/13/96 RAW) * vs Marty Jannetty (7/1/96 RAW) * vs Owen Hart (8/12/96 RAW) * vs Steve Austin (10/14/96 RAW) Every match has some positives. Some are really good, and some are just okay. The Owen match is my personal favorite, with the Jannetty match after that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted July 3, 2012 Report Share Posted July 3, 2012 I'll try to run through them in the next couple of days. Thanks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frankensteiner Posted July 3, 2012 Report Share Posted July 3, 2012 Honestly, we lose a lot in 93 relative to 92 as there are less CV tapings and I think we got more out of random PTW matches then we do out of Raw matches. It's one reason why my interest petered out a bit in going through WWF TV. Just as we lost a lot from 91 to 92 in losing MSG, and a lot in 91 and 90 to 89 in losing some of the other arenas. It should be noted that handhelds of house shows really exploded around this time ('93-'96). I don't know how you feel about watching handhelds, but that could certainly fill the gap of losing broadcast house shows. On my last check I counted roughly 28 shows available from 1993 alone, which comes close to equaling a full year of MSG/Spectrum/NESN shows in the late 80's. I also would like to ask what you meant by getting more from PTW matches than RAW matches. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gregor Posted July 3, 2012 Report Share Posted July 3, 2012 Bulldog match at Beware of Dog was disappointing. I know, I was there live Still think people should watch it, particularly if it's part of the alleged "career year" of Shawn.I agree; I just thought I should clarify that not even Shawn's biggest fans talk about that match as something worth watching. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted July 3, 2012 Report Share Posted July 3, 2012 I've only seen the January 93 Boston WWF House show fan cam as of yet in my 93 watching, and it's well enough done. It's still not the same as something that's professionally done, and I'd rather have Mooney/Lord Alfred than no commentary at all. Still, you can obviously get a lot out of that, too. I'm sure I'll get to more as I keep going (give or take some derailing). If there are really that many, then yes, it's a gap filler. As for Raw vs PTW, at least for the first 3 months of 93, the matches feel shorter and certainly more distracted. There's also an hour less and more extra curricular activity. You'd never see a match interrupted for Kamala chasing Kimchee through the stands on Primetime, for instance. Watched Shawn vs 123 Kid. Liked it. Obviously, by this point Shawn is running the Hogan formula with more elaborate finishes. He gave Waltman a ton, actually making him look like the better wrestler in the opening exchange and again later on, with Michaels' first two comebacks only due to Kid's grandstanding. There's a hint of Malenko vs Crusierweights in Shawn's offense as he kicks out both a press slam and power slam. I actually think he gave Waltman a bit too much without a good storyline reason for it especially as he was on his way to the Main Event at Mania. That said, as action goes, Michaels' might have been best at his opening segments. This one was fun but it was very weird to me that Michaels was on the losing end of the exchange until the grandstanding. Definitely not following the Tito formula, which is okay, but slightly less okay on the road to wrestlemania. Also, Vince's voice was really raspy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dylan Waco Posted July 4, 2012 Author Report Share Posted July 4, 2012 One difference between the handhelds is that they can be from anywhere, not just bigger shows in bigger markets. This will tell us who busts their ass night to night, but if Shawn looks like shit on them (and I have no clue whether he would or not) that doesn't really mean anything to those who argue that he is an all time great because he was on on the big shows when it mattered. I would note that there is a ton of good house show footage available online and the last several house shows I have gone to have include several good matches and a couple that I would have no problem calling great. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted July 4, 2012 Report Share Posted July 4, 2012 I do a weekly "wwe house show, this week" youtube search, but nothing's jumped out recently, I don't think. I don't know if they're cutting down on what's allowed or what. Watched the Al Snow match. Another really exciting opening segment, but Snow almost Killed Michaels twice, first with that rydeen bomb and then with that rocket launcher power bomb what the hell was that? But Michaels kept his cool and even ate a superplex shortly thereafter. I thought the comeback was a little smarter in how it was executed here, with the top rope clothesline after Snow went to the well for a second superplex a little more believable, but Snow really destroyed Shawn with his offense so it felt a little less believable. Granted, then Shawn did one of the best inverted atomic drops ever, execution elevating what would have been a pretty silly comeback after what he just ate. Good, story driven finish. Until I really started to watch these things, I didn't realize just how much Shawn used the classic wwf babyface no sell comeback. It feels a little weird in 96 and also a little weird with a guy like Michaels who is heralded as he is. There's also a moment in both comebacks I've seen where Michaels sort of fumbled with his opponent before throwing him across the ring, but that could be flukey. In general, I think this match was more effective at doing what it was supposed to do than the Kid match and was laid out better, but maybe wasn't as exciting. I'll take effective over exciting, but I believed the comeback in the Kid match more. Ok, saw the HHH match too. This had the same sort of opening as Kid, with Shawn getting out wrestled, but it was more meticulous and the announcers came up with storyline reasons for it, which made it work much better. It wasn't the same sort of Michaels' opening flurry as the other matches, but it resonated more and had more meaning. This was the most full match in a few ways, but I think a lot of that was because it received the most time out of the three. Lots of cut offs. Hunter's offense wasn't bad but it got a bit repetitive as it went on. He didn't quite have enough stuff or he couldn't use what he had quite well enough. One thing I do really like about Shawn in 96, from what I've seen before, is how he changed up the comebacks. The kip up is his rope-shaking, hulk-upping, strap dropping moment, but sometimes he does it right after the forearm, sometimes before, sometimes he does the inverted atomic drop before, sometimes after, so at least he switches things up, and it rarely leads directly to the finish either, so that's something. In general, I thought this was the match that made the most sense, that, on paper, had right amount of time in the right places, that had a clever enough opening segment, with Shawn coming unglued and getting pissed, and that was smart with its cutoffs and ultimate comeback. But it was also the most lackluster of the matches, and I do think a lot of that was on Hunter. I still don't regret watching it, mind you, because it was interesting for what, why, and how Shawn did. so to sum up, I thought the Kid match was exciting but structured weird, with a wrong beginning for the context. I thought the Snow match was structured okay and dynamic but was a bit too compressed to be believable, and I thought the HHH was structured pretty well with a better take on the kid beginning but lackluster. I would have rather seen Snow with that time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frankensteiner Posted July 4, 2012 Report Share Posted July 4, 2012 I've only seen the January 93 Boston WWF House show fan cam as of yet in my 93 watching, and it's well enough done. It's still not the same as something that's professionally done, and I'd rather have Mooney/Lord Alfred than no commentary at all. Still, you can obviously get a lot out of that, too. I'm sure I'll get to more as I keep going (give or take some derailing). If there are really that many, then yes, it's a gap filler. As for Raw vs PTW, at least for the first 3 months of 93, the matches feel shorter and certainly more distracted. There's also an hour less and more extra curricular activity. You'd never see a match interrupted for Kamala chasing Kimchee through the stands on Primetime, for instance. Yeah, Raw matches definitely have more of a TV studio feel where they're trying to put over an angle or get over the idea of an "exciting" TV show. Once you get into May I think they're pretty good about providing at least one long-ish feature match every couple weeks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted July 4, 2012 Report Share Posted July 4, 2012 I saw the Marty match. Lots of fun tit for tat stuff. Cornette being out there was a let down since he didn't really play a role. It didn't exactly tell a story outside a broad "Two guys who know each other well" one, but it was worked pretty damn hard with Michaels going over for armdrags with more zing than I might have ever seen, and whipping across the ropes for his leaping forearm with as much speed as I've ever seen anyone in the ring. Good cut offs by Marty. A little less of a miraculous comeback. I thought it protected Marty's fistdrop well, though there was a weird moment when Shawn sat up to avoid the top rope iteration where, once again, he seemed momentarily lost in there. It was an awkward few seconds, for certain. Probably my favorite of the matches I've seen so far as there was just enough of a skeleton of a story in there to make the work worth the effort they were putting into it. Storming through. Saw the Owen match. Geez Owen was good. He had a way of making reversals look like he was actually trying something, like how Michaels floated over early on and it really seemed like Owen was going for some sort of slam instead of it just being part of a planned wrestling exchange. There's backwork that's ultimately meaningless (which is disappointing, since I thought it was going to go somewhere), but the comeback works the best out of all of the matches. While it's pretty much straight to the finish (though never entirely straight which is a testament to Shawn), it comes after Owen mocks the stomping and what not, so it's more of a hubris thing. Good athletic action like all the rest of these matches but I think they're all ultimately missing something. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted July 5, 2012 Report Share Posted July 5, 2012 I've got one more Shawn vs Goldust match (house show) to watch (Thanks Gregor!) but I did watch the 9/6/96 Shawn vs Goldust Raw match and I thought it was actually better than all the other ones I've seen so far. It didn't have the fast action, necessarily, but it was really solid. Goldust was very aggressive in the early going and it was obviously he wanted to win the thing. Dustin's offense was both believable and smart. Exactly what the match called for. Shawn was a bit more active from the bottom; instead of just laying there in a chin lock, he'd kick his feet and what not. You really got the sense that Dustin knew this was for the title, that he had earned the shot, and he wanted to WIN it. I thought for sure the kip up was gong to come after the double clothesline but it didn't, and I would have bought the finish after the elbow-drop as into SCM but they twisted it a bit. I think some of the other matches I've seen so far were flashier, but this was the best. Also, one thing I've noticed that 1996 Shawn is very good at is that when he flubs something (which is about once a match), he's USUALLY pretty good at recovering through sheer athleticism and instincts alone. I know sometimes he doesn't and throws a fit, but I've seen more recoveries than not. and I saw the 8-9-96 house show. I'll say off the bat that the most interesting thing about Shawn in 96 is that he really changes things up. I know I said that before, but here it is again after seeing a few more matches. This didn't look all that much like the other two Goldust matches I saw. Lots of different spots and some unique spots, such as missed kick to the head by Goldust (trying to counter a back body drop set up by Shawn) followed by a missed elbow drop by Shawn. Or the beginning of the match being Goldust reversing a Shawn attempt at a piledriver on the floor. The real meat of the match storywise was Goldust grounding Shawn and hooking in a chinlock. Shawn comes back the first time with the elbows but is cut off with a kneelift to the gut. Comes back the second time in a test of strength sort of way a couple of minutes later, but is powered down, and then the third time actually powers out of the thing and tosses goldust across the ring. It's a solid story if not an entirely compelling one. Goldust's chinlocks are pretty good though Shawn's selling isn't as interesting. The fans pop for each comeback but I think in this case, the blending of a slightly quicker pace and the story being told in the TV match worked better. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gordi Posted July 5, 2012 Report Share Posted July 5, 2012 My problem with Michaels is that it all goes to hell once he does the kip up. Nothing gets remembered, he never sells any of the match that just took place. That just bugs the shit out of me. Hogan and Sting would go back to selling if their comebacks failed. If Hogan missed the leg drop, he usually lost because that was all he had. If you survived the Sting onslaught he went back to selling everything. Hogan getting bloodied and Hulking Up was epic, Sting having enough and no selling was awesome, Michaels kip up was groan inducing most of the time. To me, Michaels as a top level guy will always be summed up in Sid getting massive cheers for giving Jose Lothario a heart attack and then beating Michaels for the title when he was supposed to be the company's ace. This has always bugged me, too. Particularly these days, when guys like KENTA are widely vilified online for being "no-sellers" why does HBK generally get a free pass for his unstoppable superhuman comebacks. In general, I think it's fair to sum up as a guy who was once an excellent tag worker who, once he got his big singles push, simply became too melodramatic in his style and too fond of overwrought match structures. He's always been capable of playing his role in a self-conscious epic-style match, and he really hits the heights from time to time... but he also generally seems to need that big-match structure, that overstated Dramatic Moment and that stunt-type Big Climactic Bump in order to put a really good match together anymore. I tend to rank wrestlers who don't generally need all the bells and whistles above those who can't seem to get it done without them. HBK and HHH, to me, seem to fit into the latter camp pretty neatly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted July 5, 2012 Report Share Posted July 5, 2012 This has always bugged me, too. Particularly these days, when guys like KENTA are widely vilified online for being "no-sellers" why does HBK generally get a free pass for his unstoppable superhuman comebacks. I've seen a bunch of matches where it hasn't happened QUITE like that and a bunch where it did, and it's weird to me. Did people make the Hogan comparisons in 96 at all? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted July 6, 2012 Report Share Posted July 6, 2012 I still have one more Michaels match to watch! And I kind of want to see the Billy Gunn one too. Someone break this stuff off to its own note. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gregor Posted July 6, 2012 Report Share Posted July 6, 2012 I still have one more Michaels match to watch! And I kind of want to see the Billy Gunn one too.Our tastes don't match up anywhere close to perfectly, but I remember the Gunn match as Michaels' worst of the year. Gunn is worse than Helmsley, and Michaels is more interested in Sunny than in the match. The Lawler match is more fun. I know you're mostly doing TV stuff, but the International Incident match seems like the sort of thing you'd be interested in - you get to see which guys are entrusted with certain portions of the match and just how much Sid and Ahmed are allowed to do. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted July 6, 2012 Report Share Posted July 6, 2012 I still have one more Michaels match to watch! And I kind of want to see the Billy Gunn one too.Our tastes don't match up anywhere close to perfectly, but I remember the Gunn match as Michaels' worst of the year. Gunn is worse than Helmsley, and Michaels is more interested in Sunny than in the match. The Lawler match is more fun. I know you're mostly doing TV stuff, but the International Incident match seems like the sort of thing you'd be interested in - you get to see which guys are entrusted with certain portions of the match and just how much Sid and Ahmed are allowed to do. That's exactly why I want to see the Gunn match, btw. Well Not because of Sunny, but because it's not against a guy the quality of the others. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NintendoLogic Posted July 6, 2012 Report Share Posted July 6, 2012 This has always bugged me, too. Particularly these days, when guys like KENTA are widely vilified online for being "no-sellers" why does HBK generally get a free pass for his unstoppable superhuman comebacks. At the risk of starting this discussion again, there's a pretty big difference between having a temporary rush of adrenaline to fuel your comeback and disregarding targeted limb work so you can get all your MOVEZ in. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted July 6, 2012 Report Share Posted July 6, 2012 From what I've seen now of 96 Shawn vs Post-Comeback Shawn, the latter is a much huger issue as a lot of his matches are based around the heel working on his damaged back. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MJH Posted July 6, 2012 Report Share Posted July 6, 2012 People need to get over the Superman Comeback. It's just a part of being a top US Babyface. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frankensteiner Posted July 6, 2012 Report Share Posted July 6, 2012 People need to get over the Superman Comeback. It's just a part of being a top US Babyface. Either that or start knocking other guys doing the same thing. Watch Flair's babyface run in '89 where he just shrugs off all the damage done to him when it's time to go to the finish. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted July 6, 2012 Report Share Posted July 6, 2012 Isn't that "Every Flair Match Ever?" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted July 6, 2012 Report Share Posted July 6, 2012 If you mean No Flair Match Ever, possibly yes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted July 6, 2012 Report Share Posted July 6, 2012 People need to get over the Superman Comeback. It's just a part of being a top US Babyface. Bret Hart, Steve Austin, The Rock, and Rey Misterio? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted July 6, 2012 Report Share Posted July 6, 2012 Anyway, the superman comeback doesn't bother me, and I agree that it's not really a great argument against him. I'd rather focus on his lack of offense and that he didn't seem at all like a tough guy. Someone embellish me and tell me why I'm wrong. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted July 6, 2012 Report Share Posted July 6, 2012 If you mean No Flair Match Ever, possibly yes. Past MAYBE a Steamboat match or two and some of the underdog matches like Koko and Sam Houston, name me a few matches where the first few minutes of a Flair match actually matter? I'm not arguing that they're not entertaining. I think Flair is awesome at making holds interesting, both applying them and taking them, but he just runs through his shit. Are you arguing that he doesn't do that? As for Shawn, I think he actually rarely does a real superman comeback in what I saw in 96. He definitely changed things up. Oh wait, there was that terribly frustrating 95 Bulldog MSG match where he kips up three times. Anyway, later Shawn, when the entirety of matches are built upon backwork.. well, that's a different story. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dylan Waco Posted July 7, 2012 Author Report Share Posted July 7, 2012 At Good Friends Better Enemies his "superhuman comeback" is about as "bad" as it gets from the perspective of blowing off the previous work of the match. Oddly I think it fits the match anyhow and I don't mind it at all Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.