[1997-10-26-WCW-Halloween Havoc] Lex Luger vs Scott Hall

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

Last few minutes. Way too many atomic drops. Syxx runs in after Bischoff distracts Zbyszko and he reluctantly counts the fall to give Hall the win. Luger's push really ended after dropping the title back to Hogan. Anyway, Zbyszko insists on seeing the replay and then ends up restarting the match. Luger ends up putting Hall in the rack after a shoving match with Larry, giving Luger the win. Syxx tries to attack Zbyszko and ends up laid out. Hall then lays Larry out from behind and Bischoff gets in a few kicks. Hall counts a Bischoff fall on Zbyszko to set up Starrcade. Syxx's selling of Larry's hold is awesome.

[Kevin Ridge]

Larry does the delayed three count to try give Luger more time to kick out. But since Lex didn’t kick out it makes him look worse getting pinned. Larry wants to see replay. Instant replay does not belong in wrestling. Match is restarted and Luger gets the rack on for submission. Bischoff and NWO beat up Larry after with Eric getting the pinfall. No storming down by officials to break up any of this.

[soup23]

I really liked this finish as the misdirection from Syxx and Bischoff was quick enough to make it look good and not ridiculous on Larry's part. Him calling for the replay and the finish we actually got was even better as a set up for Starrcade. Tony's "Mama, I want to be a wrestler" line when Bischoff pinned Larry was superb.

[Robert S]

Zbyszko pulling guard on Syxx, at first trying to get an armbar and then settling for a guillotine choke is fun. Schiavone claims that Zbyszko learned that hold from Gene LeBell in the 70ies. I am not sure if that is true, but Zbyszko learning some grappling from some old-time hookers when he was a guy breaking into the business seems much more likely than him trying to reenact some MMA stuff, especially in 97.

[El-P]

This is all about setting up Hall vs Zbyszko because this was a total nothing match, as always with those two together, boring test of strenghts and sleeperholds. Luger was on autopilot, his last good match seems eons ago now. The highlight is Larry Z putting a submission hold on Syxx. Okay, were are the dozen refs who jumped on Flair twenty minutes before ? *sigh*

[PeteF3]

Not a good match, but I dug the ending--both the false one and the real one. We get a Judo Gene LeBell reference on 1990's WCW television as Zybszko temporarily gets a guillotine choke on Syxx, but Hall and Bischoff end up laying him out. Luger's fallen off hard ever since his quickie title reign, but this was more good set-up for the inevitable Hall-Zbyszko match.