WCW's Highway to Hell

[jpchicago23]

Yea his matches against Jericho from late 98 are surprisingly very good

[Loss]

For some reason, the announcers kept hyping Bobby Duncum Jr. as an Internet darling when he debuted. I have no idea why.

[Matt D]

At age 17, I can tell you I was really frustrated by Duncum coming in and feuding with Jericho. I very much had a sense of "Who the hell is this guy and where did he come from and why is there a cowboy?" when there were so many other guys I wanted to see Jericho against.

[Guest Andrews]

For some reason, the announcers kept hyping Bobby Duncum Jr. as an Internet darling when he debuted. I have no idea why.

Must have gone over my head. I didn't realise what the Internet was 'til 1999.

[artDDP]

It's getting really tough to watch to be honest. Except the premise of the Rap is Crap angle and the tag team situation, nothing is remotely interesting or fun anymore. The Savage vs Nash feud has turned into awful stuff. The TV belt is dead because Rick Steiner is working a program with Sting instead of defending it on the undercard like he should. The US belt is not defended either. Goldie is nowhere to be seen. The cruiserweight belt is not defended either since Rey is feuding with heavyweights. Ric Flair pushing David could be fun if David was at least at the Erik Watts 92 level of work, but he's far removed from this, so it's not watchable. Flair himself had a decent match with Benoit on Thunder, but it's a match that underlined how much he wasn't able to work well with the younger guys at this point. He bumps slow and like an old guy, and against a dynamo like Benoit it shows. No wonder Jericho left, and Raven would follow in a few months.

I think you're at the exact point where I completely gave up on WCW and ECW together and my interest in the WWF was fading fast. I think if it wasn't for the WWF's awesome first six months in 2000 I doubt I'd have stayed a wrestling fan.

[Matt D]

Russo is coming

[Strummer]

For some reason, the announcers kept hyping Bobby Duncum Jr. as an Internet darling when he debuted. I have no idea why.

 

Holy crap I remember this! They seemed to group him with the Benoits/Guerreros/Malenkos of the world. IIRC they tried that with Blitzkrieg briefly which of course would make more sense

[Dewar]

WEEK 17 (April 26 to May 01, 1999)

 

I'm not gonna lie, this is getting tougher... I'm kinda get angry behind my screen watching 14 year old pro-wrestling...

 

Match of the week : Sting vs DDP (Nitro) They throw around this main event caliber match at the top of the second hour, facing RAW. They clearly are getting desperate here. And it's gonna get worse. For now though, this is pretty great. Not a great match per say, but clearly one of Sting's best in ages. What makes this so fun is two things : first, the heat is seriously amazing, WCW audience were so into Sting winning the title that they made this match so much better than it probably is. Second, they worked some terrific nearfalls at the end, and it seemed like DDP would lose and Sting would indeed win the title. Until he did. And they it exploded, litteraly. Great Nitro moment, and it showed that Sting still was worthy of a run at the top as the babyface of the company. Yes but....

 

Retarded match of the week : Sting vs DDP vs Goldberg vs Kevin Nash (Nitro) Yeah. For the title too. Because we need two fucking world title matches on the same show. Before making this match from "the loony bin", Flair also changed the Slamboree main event into Sting vs Goldberg. With two weeks of build. Nice. Anyway, so they throw these four together and it's a bit messy and doesn't attain near the same level of intensity as DDP vs Sting earlier on. And then. Randy Savage, who's a babyface feuding with Flair mind you, attacks Sting, saves DDP and basically gives him the victory, and the title. Yep. Yet another nonsensical heel/face dynamic on top, and Sting was the champ for a whole 90 minutes. Rating jerk-off booking.

 

Retarded title switch of the week 2 : Rey Mysterio Jr. pins Psychosis in 4 minutes to win his title back (Nitro). Yep. After winning an epic 20 minutes 4-way the previous and scoring the upset win, Psych jobs hard in a match that is nothing but a backdrop for another Horsemen attack on Rey. This is so stupid.

 

Godawful vignettes & angle of the week : Flair at the mental hospital gives instructions to Charles Robinson who is the active vice president of the company (Nitro) Yep. Charles Robinson apaprently was the vice-president and as such can overule Piper. The Flair vignettes are embarrassing to watch. Scott Hall making a cameo is the only "funny" moment. That muscular nurse only brings more bad memories. Complete shit. Again, this is as bad as anything Russo was doing in WWF at the time, and it's obvious Nash was copying the hotshotting and stupid vignette style of Russo.

 

Stupid job of the week : Raven doing the job to Steve and Scott Armstrong (Nitro). Why ? Supposedly Saturn had been attacked by the Horsemen earlier on. Still, this has no point and the announcers make it worse by calling it a huge upset, which really doesn't make Raven look like a big deal but rather make the Armstrong look like complete jabroni. They beat up a guy 2 on 1 and it's still a huge upset ? Shit.

 

Get some relief match of the week : Rey Mysterio Jr. vs Kaz Hayashi (Saturday Night). Apart from Hayashi doing his own version ofthe People's Elbow (seriously, WTF ?!!), this was a nice little cruiserweight match which ended the week on a better note.

 

This was hard to get through. So much shit going on. Booker T is now getting some unwanted help from his big brother, thrilling. He's also showing me each and every time that he was pretty much a poor worker at this point. Really got into a total routine with sloppy spots, awkward set-ups and shitty looking shots, always doing the exact same spots with the exact same transitions at the exact same point of the match. I never thought much of Booker, but his stock has dropped a lot thus far in 1999. Ditto Bam Bam who thus far has been way more disapointing than he already was in ECW. The same garbage matches every week with Hak are getting old, and that's coming from a Sandman fan. He's not working with terribly exciting opposition either, Hugh Morrus and now Brian Knobbs... Of course we'll get that thrilling feud between Konnan and nWo Black & White. And Rick Steiner is getting a single push. Meanwhile, Kaz Hayashi, The Cat, Norman Smiley, Fit Finlay among others do nothing of note. And I know it's not gonna get better with the horrible Summer on the horizon... I need some support people....

I was at this trainwreck of a Nitro from Fargo, North Dakota. They had a bus full of beer-fueled Canadians, and no Monday Night Jericho shirts to be found. The Hollyood Hogan bandanas we ended up buying were much less fun.

 

3 high points of the show: Seeing the Armstrong brothers win a match, getting the small child sitting behind us to boo Goldberg, and the guy who paased out on the bus and missed the show (his friend gave us the rest of his beer after he passed out, since he clearly did not need it).

[El-P]

WEEK 23 (June 7 to June 12, 1999)

 

Death of WCW angles of the week : Female contortionnist in a bag throwing sewage over Savage's head/Savage's ladies hitting on Nash to have him enter the limo and get squashed by a hummer. (Nitro) I won't even go into details. These are infamous, and this is just embarrassingly bad. Russo was all over this product way before he was even hired. And of course it leads to the immortal question : who drove the hummer. My guess is Rikishi

 

Stupid promo of the week : Roddy Piper (Nitro) Yeah, *that* Piper promo when he made fun and light of the younger workers in the back complaining about not getting opportunities. Sure, because that wasn't a real issue with the company. Remember Piper is supposed to be a babyface. And who does he want to carry the ball, after making fun of him in the most absurd and stupid way imaginable (asking a WCW bred worker if he ever worked in Madison Square Garden... dumb) ? Buff Bagwell, who's been exposed at this point as a terrible babyface (awful over pandering promos) and a rather poor worker (blame either the injury, lazyness or the fact Buff was roided as all). And he puts him in a PPV match with Disco Inferno, who had also complained that the young generation didn't get any opportunities. Of course, Buff already beat Disco clean the previous week on Nitro. Kill me.

 

Swerve match of the week : Ric Flair & Chris Benoit vs DDP & Bam Bam Bigelow (Nitro). Flair convinces Benoit to work their differences out and gives themselves a title shot. Good little match, Bam Bam is much better in that setting. Of course Flair ends up betraying Benoit when he was going for the hot tag, which led to Arn first proposing himself as Benoit's partner, to the delight of the crowd, until Saturn came out, got the tag and "won" the titles. But it was a Dusty finish, since Saturn really wasn't officially in the match. Which led to :

 

Shitty title change of the week : Perry Saturn vs Kanyon (Thunder). Yeah. You read it right. Kanyon is technically able to defend the tag titles since the Triad uses the Freebirds rules. Why not. What I hate though, is that it's a single match which turns into a tag match 4 minutes before ending, when DDP then Benoit jump in the ring. And it actually is a tag title match, with the belt changing hands. I just hate when this kind of shit happens. The tag division was the most fun part of the product, but in a week they managed to shit over it with a Dusty finish and a completely illogical and anti-climatic title change, three days before the PPV, in a match that was a single match for the 3/4 of its duration. Kill me.

 

Stupid match and announcing performance of the week : La Parka & Silver King vs Damian & Ciclope (Nitro). "A Mexican, falls count anywhere, hardocre match ! Ah ah ah ah !" Yeah, *that* match, with Bobby and Tony just making fun of the entire deal while thse guys were killing each others in the ring. That being said, I blame the workers too for going all out for nothing and just doing stupid shit to no reactions. This is just a gigantic mess.

 

Match of the week : Juventud Guerrera vs Psychosis (Saturday Night). At this point we've seen a hundreds of these, but in such a terrible week it was refreshing nonetheless. When Juvy works against Rey, he's a rudo, when he works against Psychosis, he's a technico. Go figure.

 

Spot of the week : Sting doing the Stinger Splash in the corner on Mona first, then Madusa (Nitro). These girls are aces. ALthough the idiotic WCW crew had to zoom in right when Sting asked Debbie if she was allright and she was visibly nodding yes as an answer.

 

Spot of the week 2 : Mona doing a missile dropkick on Brian Adams (Thunder). Yep, those girls were aces. And it's a good thing, because Savage really looks like he doesn't want to do much of anything in the ring sadly.

 

That was one hell of a horrible week. The Rap vs Country angle is keeping on developping, with a decent Rey Jr. vs Bobby Duncum match on Nitro, and we still get that bizarre First Family vs Kidman & Hak affair going on too. The main event and upper mid-card scene is cluttered with horrible angles and Rick Steiner being pushed while his brother was injured (I think). I'll have to take a break after Bash at the Beach, if I don't want to destroy all my brain cells and will to watch this.... stuff.

[thebrainfollower]

You can do it El-P. We're all pulling for you here.

 

And the Hummer driver was obviously evil wrestling mastermind Carmen Electra.

[Death From Above]

I thought the rest of that Nitro was alright, aside from the Piper interview and the contortionist/Hummer stuff. The "old WWF guys are the ones killing WCW" point is really on display by this point. I like that "Mexican hardcore" match (but I do have a strange sense of humor), as long as you ignore Tony being a douche on commentary. Boy, was that getting to be a common trend. At least there were matches this week, and most in and of themselves filled a role.

 

Arn threatening to get in the ring was awesome. Like most things WCW they tease you with something that would be good, but no.

 

I probably shouldn't use "contortionist" and "hummer" in the same sentence ever again.

 

Piper's such a horrible promo by this point. Possibly the worst promo in the big two. I mean Nash's references are all dated, but he's funny enough to make you forget he said "Eddie Money" on purpose during this run. Piper's references are from the school that burnt down before they built the old school. And he's just a rambling, incoherent mess.

 

Savage really isn't much better. This run for him was kind of painful, which I wish wasn't true but it is hard to miss.

[El-P]

You can do it El-P. We're all pulling for you here.

Thank you !!!! Nash is killing me !!!

 

Piper's such a horrible promo by this point. Possibly the worst promo in the big two. I mean Nash's references are all dated, but he's funny enough to make you forget he said "Eddie Money" on purpose during this run. Piper's references are from the school that burnt down before they built the old school. And he's just a rambling, incoherent mess.

I'm glad I'm not the only one thinking that way. Yeah, Piper was just awful, he perfectly embodied the term "hasbeen" at this point. And he got long promo time every damn week.

[Ditch]

See the thing is, mid-1999 WCW was near toxicity levels as it aired live. It was never meant to be mainlined like this.

 

YOU'RE TOO YOUNG EL-P! STOP WHILE YOU CAN!

 

*sobs*

[El-P]

I'm hardcore ! I'm hardcore ! I'm hardcore !

 

PPV 6 : Great American Bash 6

 

Match of the Night : Curt Hennig & Bobby Duncum Jr. vs Rey Mysterio Jr. & Konnan. Hennig finally got the "Rap is Crap" theme song. Awesome ! Master P and his goofy-ass gangsta crew is at ringside. Oh boy, for two seconds I actually forgot these guys were involved and it was better that way. As much as Konnan sounds pretty natural spitting hip-hop stuff on the mic, I always though Rey came off as really cheesy doing the same thing. Let's be honest, Rey is just not a very good promo at all. ONe thing about Hennig that is striking is that he's taking good bumps again, and not the awkward way he was doing it in 98, which is a part of why he's so much better. He's also clearly working way harder too. Him and Rey ae really fun together, Duncum is decent enough, and Konna doesn't get in the way and delivers short burst of energy. At the end Barry Windham shows up with working gloves (??) so to eve the score, Master P.'s bodyguard Swoll gets involved and Rey wins the match. Good stuff, as it is.

 

Second best match of the night : DDP & Kanyon vs Chris Benoit & Perry Saturn. The work is better than in the previous match, but it goes a bit too long so it kinda drags a bit at points. Kanyon is a really good bumping heel, I feel the guy was underrated, and he works especially well in a tag team setting as he doesn't have the burden of carrying the load by himself. DDP still is one of the most efficient worker in the company, alwyas trying to do some good and exciting sequences. Saturn is also better in tags, for obvious reasons. Nice old-school tag match with face in peril and hot tag, it's simple but it works. Tag team wrestling should have never died. The final is a bit bizarre, as you get Dean Malenko coming out to aid Saturn get up on the outside, but the execution was a bit odd and at times it kinda look like Malenko was preventing Saturn from entering the ring back to save Benoit. Maybe the toxicity of WCW has already affected my brain and I except a swerve in every match... Title change *again*. Mike Tenay said a really stupid line about it's ironic Benoit had to leave the Horsemen to finally get a title. Yeah, he has been a title holder on and off since the beginning of the year, but let's not be bothered by facts. The announcing was terrible at this point anyway, Tony was an asshole and Heenan was not giving a fuck, only spewing clichés every time he opened his mouth.

 

ECW match of the night : Hak vs Brian Knobbs. Hey, this is better than it had the right to ! Knobbs "shines" in this kind of match much more than Bigelow because his awkwardness actually add to the aura of brutality, and he's willing to take stupid bumps and shots. Hak sells pretty well, so all in all it's a good garbage match. Plus it makes sense as at the beginning of the match, which was supposed to be a cane match, Knobbs asked that they let go of the cane and fought the old-school way, and at the end he would get beat by a stiff cane shot, which was nice. So yeah, one of the most enjoyable Hak match, and I credit Knobbs for being a mindless goofball.

 

Better than on paper match of the night : Disco Inferno vs Buff Bagwell. Nothing special, but Disco did a good job with Bagwell.

 

Washed up match of the night : Ric Flair vs Roddy Piper. Again, "better than it should" considering Piper is rotten, or simply embarrassing to see these two old guys looking exactly like what they are : washed up oldies. Flair is basically a comedy worker to me at this point, especially facing Piper who you can't take seriously anyway. Finish is stupid as hell, as Bagwell *jumps in the ring* to help Piper, so Piper loses the match and the shot at presidency. Of course, Piper turns of him, and it's the "old vs young" issue that was a big real problem in WCW turning into a "shoot". Where is Shane Douglas when we need him ?

 

Vince Russo angle of the night : Sting is attacked by dogs. I HATE this kind of shit. Just hate it. So, Sting and Rick Steiner work a rather long and plodding match until Rick drags Sting backstage where he gets assaulted by Tank Abbot and then Scott sends the dogs. Stupid, offensive, ridiculous.

 

Sad match of the night : Randy Savage vs Kevin Nash. Sad because it's obvious that Savage has nothing left in him. As much as I hate Nash's booking, as a performer he's been quite good thus far, and here he's having a match by himself, selling his rib injury. Savage half-ass attacks it, but he's lost all explosivity, doesn't bump, doesn't do any kind of spot, plods around. Pretty sad to watch. Easy to understand why he had the Girl Gang with him, to distract from the fact he wasn't able to work anymore. So, Madusa drops some cool and sexy kicks to Nash's side, and Mona gets the two spots of the night, first kicking off a great missile dropkick from the top rope and then later taking a huge snake eyes in the corner, which looked devastating. Basically Nash had a few fun spots against Madusa and Mona. Then of course the final toxic affair, with the comeback of no other than Sid Vicious ! Gets a pop, looks great. Ok, can you go away now ?

 

I won't talk about Cat vs Horace Hogan, because it was supposed to be Scott Norton so it's nowhere near as fun, although it's the debut of the red slippers. And you also get Mickey Whipreck on PPV again, after not being on TV basically ever, this time doing the job for Van Hammer who's gone through yet another gimmick change, this time as a bad motha a-la Wrath.

 

One month to go until the next PPV and I'm taking a break.

[blueminister]

A heel stable consisting of the Steiners, Tank Abbot and a pack of wild dogs sounds way cooler than it actually was.

[El Boricua]

El-P, you're a brave man to trek through this. Piper during this time really elevated incoherent rambling to an artform. Even during his prime, Roddy always seemed to have moments when he would ramble off into the ether during interviews but his energy more than made up for it. Around this time, more rambling combined with less focused energy and dated references = not a good combo.

 

To me, Flair around this time became a caricature of what he used to be. He sometimes seemed like a Flair impersonator amping up the flairness to 11 instead of the genuine article.

 

I miss WCW.

[flyonthewall2983]

The shine started to come off when he came back in '98. The Flair of 1986 wouldn't have done a promo cuffed to a rope in his underwear. I'm not even sure if he would have done it '96. That off-time he had that year must have done something irreversible to him because in a sense it was never the same again.

[Johnny Sorrow]

He's always said that the last few years at WCW basically killed his love for wrestling, and left him depressed with no self confidence.

[Guest Andrews]

The shine started to come off when he came back in '98. The Flair of 1986 wouldn't have done a promo cuffed to a rope in his underwear. I'm not even sure if he would have done it '96. That off-time he had that year must have done something irreversible to him because in a sense it was never the same again.

That segment was Gold though. Pure Gold.

 

I think things went down south for him in 99, when he was really being treated like a nobody. Oddly, in WCW 2001 things started looking up for him and he seemed to be enjoying himself again, would have been interesting to see where things went.

[El-P]

Flair wasn't exactly treated as a nobody. He was in the main event scene for the first few months, got the belt from Hogan, was the insane president of WCW. And really his work didn't deserve that much, he was mediocre at best in the ring at this point. Flair had no business being at the top of the card anymore to be honest.

[Marty]

He's always said that the last few years at WCW basically killed his love for wrestling, and left him depressed with no self confidence.

When did he actually start saying that? Because he'd still have the odd inspired performance like the promo on the last Nitro. I always assumed "I had no self-confidence, until Vince/Trip/WWE helped me" was his way of putting over WWE 10 or so years ago.

[Loss]

Ric Flair, even this late, was the single biggest ratings draw in the company. He was the only guy who could post numbers that were competitive with RAW numbers. I do think Flair promos were terrific even this late. Yes, it was over the top, but I don't think Flair lost it as an interview until he went to WWE, where I don't think he cut a single good promo the entire time he was there, which I blame primarily on him not being allowed to be himself.

 

Your milage may vary on elbowdropping the mat stuff. I wasn't a huge fan of it. But it got a reaction.

[El-P]

WEEK 24 (June 14 to 19, 1999)

 

Match of the week : Barbarian vs Booker T (Thunder). It's been a while since we've seen Booker. not that I missed him much. He's only as good as his opponent, and I'm glad Barbarian was allowed to be competitive with him. Nice little match with Barbie kicking the ass of Booker a whole lot, and allowing Booker to make only timely comebacks. I enjoyed this more than most of Booker matches this year.

 

Young guards vs Old guard match of the week : Ric Flair & Roddy Piper & DDP & Kanyon vs Chris Benoit & Buff Bagwell & Dean Malenko & Perry Saturn. (Nitro). So, we get that old vs young feud that will surely put WCW back on tracks. Yeah, right, like this was the way to do it. Not as simple to create stars. BTW, where the fuck is Goldie ? Anyway, the two most featured guys here are Benoit, as the workhorse, and Bagwell, as the guy who gets the pin pinfall on Ric Flair. See what's bound to fail here ? And really, you think Perry Saturn and Dean Malenko look like future main event talent anyway ? Chris Jericho did. Last time he was seen was at the last PPV on the Internet location. He's waiting to leave to feud with The Rock. Anyway, this is an action packed match with DDP and Kanyon shining, Roddy looking useless (depsite the announcer putting him over as smarter than the Benoits and such...) and Flair throwing a thousand chops.

 

Payback match of the week : Hak vs Rick Steiner (Nitro) These guys go backstage to bust out Harley Davidsons and Hummers, which is decently fun, until Sting springs out of said Hummer to attack Rick Steiner with a baseball bat. Apparently the dog bites weren't too severe. Hopefully this ends the Sting vs Steiner feud, which has been terrible.

 

Comparison match of the week : Disco Inferno vs Scotty Riggs (Thunder). It's sad for Riggs he never got the opportunity. He's obviously a much better worker than Bagwell, especially at this point. Now he's settled with a Narcissist kinda gimmick, complete with a small mirror in which he's looking at himself during matches. He makes the most of it though, despite being a glorified JTTS. This match is better than Disco vs Buff from the PPV, and the reason why is obvious.

 

Epic fail of the week : "Hoody hoooo !! Hoody hooo !!! " > chorus of boos. (Nitro) Who the fuck is Master P anyway. From what I gather he sucks as a rapper, and certainly was shit on by WCW audience when he tried to have them do his goofy-ass shout. Interrupting the great "Rap is Crap" song, now with complete verses and all, maybe wasn't the best idea as obviously, as much as they love Rey, they don't want to see or hear Master P at all, and would rather sing along with Curt Hennig. Gigantic waste of money and time. It'll get even better the following week I think.

 

Line of the week : "She's a movie star you know. I still haven't seen it but I've heard about it." Eric Bischoff, talking about Chastity on Nitro. So, they already knew at this point that she did *one* blowjob scene in a porn but she wasn't fired yet. Dumbfuck puritans, like anybody cared. I liked Chastity, she had that fun sleazeball look to her.

 

Cameo of the week : Sable is sitting at ringside on Nitro. Which of course, and thankfully, will lead to nothing. Bischoff was getting agressive again, but it was the wrong strategy at this point. He also made fun of JR during the show. Well, that worked when you were gaining viewers in 1996. This doens't work now.

 

The big main event feud will be Nash vs Sid. Yeah, because it drew so much money in 1995. The Rap is Crap angle will be fun for all the wrong reasons, namely WCW crowds shitting on Master P.

[Death From Above]

I like how Meltzer said the rap vs. country feud apparently caused a ton of friction in WCW Corporate because it split the office workers down racial lines. It's no wonder they cut it off at the knees later I guess, but it still ruined a pretty decent gimmick.

[flyonthewall2983]

He's always said that the last few years at WCW basically killed his love for wrestling, and left him depressed with no self confidence.

When did he actually start saying that? Because he'd still have the odd inspired performance like the promo on the last Nitro. I always assumed "I had no self-confidence, until Vince/Trip/WWE helped me" was his way of putting over WWE 10 or so years ago.

 

As an aside, I remember in an interview he did with Meltzer around this time (for Dave's Eyada show), him saying that the most fun he'd ever had in his career was the time he was on top with the Horsemen and when he was in WWF.