Mancow Vs. Jimmy Hart I & II

WCW's greatest mini feud was between a shock jock from Chicago and Hulk Hogan's manager.

Mancow was a radio personality from Chicago who was well known for his right wing commentary. (He was a huge wrestling fan who also appeared at ECW Anarchy Rulz 2000 in Villa Park, IL.) Hulk Hogan and Jimmy Hart were guests on his show at some point in 2000, where Mancow insulted Hart and told him Hogan can do better, prompting Jimmy to attack him in studio, igniting their feud and kayfabe injuring Mancow's eye.

This feud would produce two matches, one at Spring Stampede 2000 in Mancow's hometown of Chicago, and another at Mayhem 2000 in Milwaukee, a big market for Mancow. He was the babyface, inexplicably. Mancow is a natural heel, but it's WCW. However, he was super over in Chicago. Super duper over. I love the three signs in the above image: "Mancow Win It For Farley." "Mancow is the Man!" "Kick Manqueer's Ass."

Any footage of Mancow getting punched in the nuts is gold in my opinion.

Both of their matches are pretty similar and combined are a total of 4:26 of ringtime.

Mark Madden buries Mancow on commentary, which is hilarious. In their first match, Jimmy hits Mancow with a low blow and a bodyslam/cradle "takedown." Mancow responds with a low ankle pick and a weak looking flurry of punches. Jimmy has an enforcer with him to run interference, a guy who's name escapes me, but he gorilla presses Mancow on to his cronies at ringside. Mancow recovers and hits a chair shot for the pinfall.

Their second match is largely the same. Mancow buries Mark Madden in his pre match promo, great stuff. He also likens Jimmy Hart as the Al Gore to his George W. Bush. He might kick Jimmy in his "hanging chad." Oy. Jimmy is on crutches and selling a leg injury (he can't wrestle tonight.) 

Not much to this match. Jimmy hits Mancow with his crutches to begin the match. 3 Count interferes to counter Mancow's goons (for some reason.) Jimmy low blows Mancow. Mancow removes Jimmy's cast and hits him with it for the pin.

There you have it. Mancow-2, Jimmy Hart-0.

Madusa Vs. Oklahoma (Souled Out 2000)

This match is for the cruiserweight title. This is how you completely devalue a title. "Oklahoma" was a shite spoof on WWF commentator Jim Ross. I'm a fan of parodies, if they're done well. This is so low rent. BBQ Sauce is the foreign object? Oy. WCW shot itself in the foot, repeatedly.

Ed Ferrara was a writer who jumped ship from WWF with Vince Russo to revitalize WCW. It didn't work out for them, but we did get this gem of a match. Madusa had won the cruiserweight title a month before. ( WCW aping Chyna at the time.) Madusa is a trained wrestler who could work, and a former women's champion, but there was no way she was turning chicken shit into chicken salad in this scenario. Really tarnishes the title and what was one of WCW's only killer apps. 

It's so low rent to try to mock your competition's best announcer, it actually lowers your profile in the process. WWF mocked WCW's biggest star, Goldberg, and it was kind of funny. WCW goes for a commentator. BBQ Sauce is the foreign object in this match. I feel sorry for the people trying to call this match. At one point, Schiavone says "I dare say, the cruiserweight title has come a long way, in it's own way."

A far cry from Dean Malenko, Rey Mysterio, Ultimo Dragon, Chris Jericho, Eddy Guerrero, and others.

Gorgeous George Vs. Charles Robinson (Slamboree 1999)

WCW had *no* creative

Once again, we get a male vs. female bout, this time, between a referee and a valet. It must have sucked to be an actual wrestler on the roster and learn that WCW was again booking a match like this when they had other trained wrestlers who could have gotten this spot.

Charles Robinson was a very good referee. He was also a lifelong Ric Flair fan. He got to "become" Ric Flair for a night which has got to be a highlight for him. He did well as a caricature. I guess this is supposed to be a comedy match. It doesn't really work though.

Gorgeous George was Macho Man's girlfriend and part of his parade of concubines that started showing up with him in 1999. Macho Man, always a trailblazer, decided that one valet wasn't enough, he had to have three! I find that hilarious and over the top, in typical Randy Savage fashion. It works for him. I'm not sure how much training Gorgeous George had, but she did have Randy coaching her too. I believe this is her first match.

There are a lot of people ringside to distract viewers from the fact that they are watching a referee "fight"a valet. You get Ric Flair, Asya, Randy Savage, Madusa, and "Miss Madness '99." Oy. 

As to be expected, a basic match. They trade arm twists, George hits a wristlock and a hammerlock that the announcers put over like it's amazing. Charles sells really good. He basically does all of Flair's spots. A decent impression, I guess. Crowd seemed to be in to it. There's a lot of stalling in this match. 

We get to see GG reverse the Figure 4 before Macho hits Charles with the brass knux to set up the big elbow from George for the pin.

Not a pay-per-view quality match.

David Flair Vs. Kimberly Page (Mayhem 1999)

What a shite storyline. This is part of a weird trend of pitting untrained or partially trained men vs. untrained or partially trained women on pay-per-view. WWF was having great success with Chyna at the time, spurring loads of copycats. I want to place the blame squarely on Vince Russo, much maligned booker of WCW during it's death rattle. This is part of a trilogy of matches i've selected for this list, and it almost feels like beating a dead horse honestly. All the matches are pretty short, poorly worked and very basic. They all have ridiculous storylines that. Not compelling stuff.

Not to pick on David Flair but he shouldn't have made it on ANY of these pay-per-views.

The storyline was something around the lines of "David Flair beat up DDP (Kim's husband) because his dad, Ric was feuding with DDP" or something. Kimberly attempted to seduce young David at a hotel but Ric shows up and "spanks" her. So yeah, that turns into a valet vs. wrestler match. 

The match is kept short. Kimberly low blows David but he's wearing a cup. David threatens with crowbar. Kimberly seduces, removes cup and THEN low blows him, kicks him, hits a slap combo. Kanyon and DDP run interference. Arn Anderson shows up to help David and clears the ring. Then, David turns on the man who saved him, because he's a crazed loner. This is WCW.

Steve McMichael Vs. Reggie White (Slamboree 1997)

Steve "Mongo"McMichael is the patron saint of basic matches. I could have picked a number of his matches, as they are almost all snoozers. Looking back, Mongo wasn't that bad, he just wasn't a great worker and pretty new to the wrestling business. This match is similar to (Rodman V. Savage) in that it pits a pro athlete from another sport (untrained in pro wrestling) against a trained professional. The results are never going to be good. The announcers did mention that this is the "1st ever battle of Super Bowl champions." Mongo was  a former Chicago Bear and Green Bay Packer, and Reggie was  an Ex-Packer. Natural rivalry.

Reggie White isn't a pro wrestler. This is his first match. Of course it's going to be bollocks. Mongo possessed a very basic arsenal of restholds. They do some football spots, which is almost mandatory in Mongo matches. Slow paced match with basic wrestling moves. Mongo does get in a couple funny lines about "going to church" and disparages Reggie's faith. 

Yeah, this match isn't great. You could put pretty much any Mongo match in here, though. I chose this one because it reflects again on how poorly WCW made decisions. Bringing in pro athletes ususally equals instant credibility, but only if you protect them and put them in situations where they can shine. WCW didn't do this. They repeatedly tossed untrained guys on to pay-per-view, which is pretty bogus for the paying customer. Then again, we all need piss break matches, so maybe they had the right idea? 

Go watch some Mongo matches. 

Dennis Rodman Vs. Randy Savage (Road Wild 1999)

This match is symptomatic of WCW in general. They did a lot of "featured" bouts which had celebrities or other untrained people get in the ring, with understandably mixed results. Dennis Rodman had two other matches in WCW, tag matches at Bash At The Beach '97 & '98. Those weren't technical marvels, but they did gain WCW a lot of mainstream attention and I believe popped a buyrate, so it was a decent move. WWF pioneered this concept with the first WrestleMania, and it was what took them to the next level. WCW tried to replicate it many times with diminishing returns. This match would fall under that category.

Randy Savage is in my top 5 best performers in pro wrestling ever, but even he couldn't carry "The Worm" to a passable match. This is a very basic brawl that doesn't really accomplish anything. Rodman has a super limited moveset and he doesn't know how to bump...he's a basketball player. At one point Savage drops Rodman super ugly style on the top ring cable. Savage beats up a couple refs and ringside photographers before they go to the backstage area and the spot that pretty much sums up this entire match:

Savage puts Rodman in the port-o-potty and proceeds to push it over. That's the big spot for this match. Unfortunately there are some boxes with what I presume to be equipment in them and the outhouse doesn't tip over completely. Probably better for Rodman that way.

This match is Pure WCW. Macho Man really doesn't deserve to be anywhere near something like this. I think they should have really just let these guys shoot fight. That'd be infinitely more entertaining than what we got here. So yeah, another horrible match on WCW's epic descent.  If you, like me, are a connoisseur of bad matches, you will have to give this a watch. 

Literally the drizzling shits.

Buff Bagwell Vs. Roddy Piper (Boxing Match @ Bash At The Beach 1999)

Worked Boxing matches are pretty much a recipe for shitty television. It has never worked and this is no different. I forget exactly what the storyline is, I think Piper turned on Buff at the previous PPV and aligned himself with Flair (WCW "President" at the time.) Flair and Piper were feuding over the WCW presidency in a series of ridiculous matches and Buff inserted himself at some point and was turned on by Piper, for some reason. So they decided to box it out.

They brought in Judge Mills Lane to referee, MICHAEL BUFFER to do the introductions, and Flair was in Piper's corner, Bagwell countered with his mother, Judy.

Buff seems like a bonafide stooge in general, but I do have an amount of respect for the guy because he showed up and did his job. I don't think he was a great worker, but he wasn't the worst. Piper was a badass and would've demolished Buff in shoot fight. Buff's jabs and hooks look horrible.

Mercifully, this only goes to the 3rd round (two minute rounds.) Before the 2nd round, Flair coats Piper's gloves with ether presumably, giving Piper the edge as he blinds Bagwell with his jabs. Just completely hokey. Buff sells the blindness. Amazing. Idiocy. Piper gets a knockdown. Round 3. Flair wipes the substance off Piper's gloves so they don't get caught. Judy Bagwell interferes and bites Piper's ear (referencing Tyson/Holyfield.) Oy. Buff hits his finish for the pinfall victory? I thought this was a boxing match? Sigh. Extremely Crappy Booking. Really makes you appreciate WWE  (at times) and the ECW PPV's on the network. This match was downright goofy.

Mike Awesome Vs. Jeff Jarrett (Fall Brawl 2000)

It's weird that his match even happened. Jarrett had come over from the WWF when his contract ran out and he got a big push since he was friends with Vince Russo (head booker at times for WCW during their dying years.) Mike Awesome had jumped ship while still the ECW World Heavyweight Champion, a bridge burning like we haven't seen to many times in pro wrestling, although not uncommon. Awesome did okay but he was given the horrible gimmick of "That 70's Guy" and a "Fat Chick Thriller" which really sounds like someone was ribbing him. These guys feuded for a month for god knows why and it culminated at this show, which was one of that last 7 pay-per-views the company produced.

-Mike Awesome, Pamela Paulshock, and Gary Coleman have a ridiculous interaction before the intros.

-Some of The Buffalo Bills are in attendance, Jeff Jarrett is wearing a Tennessee Titans jersey and disparages them, basically cheap heat 101.

Jeff Jarrett has some good mic skills, but he barely addresses why he's fighting Mike Awesome. Why are they feuding? Was Awesome a Bills fan? There's nothing at stake here. You could put any body in Mike Awesome's place.

We get dueling chairs & a nearly botched back body drop (from the top rope) through a table. ECW Lite.

The Bills jump on the apron and taunt Jarrett, one guy hangs Jarrett on the ropes, helping Mike hit the Awesome bomb. Jarrett is supposed to be the heel, but he's got people interfering against him (which only happens to babyfaces traditionally) so the alignment is all off.

So, we get yes, a GARY COLEMAN RUN-IN. He low blows Jarrett and plays to the crowd before eating a guitar shot, which is hilarious to watch. Even that doesn't save this match, though. It's just so random and you already have like eight NFL players ringside.

If that wasn't enough, Sting interferes and hits his finish on Jarrett, giving Awesome the win in (9:04.)
This is where the match just goes into negative stars territory. You have like 10 people interfering against the heel, a complete absence of basic booking logic. It's a clusterfuck.

There's something entertaining about these bad matches for me personally (it's like watching an Ed Wood movie,) but this match just breaks some very basic booking rules. It's not a good match by any standard. It's Diet ECW and there's no storyline, no reason to invest in either of these men. Just crummy booking.

Hollywood Hogan Vs. The Warrior (Halloween Havoc 1998)

It's well documented how bad this match is considered. Dave Meltzer gave it -5 stars, as well as Wrestling Observer readers voting it the worst match of 1998. This pay-per-view was the first I had ordered, as I had just become a huge wrestling fan in the fall of 1998. I was new to pro wrestling and also 12 years old so I couldn't really look at it with a critical eye, but re-watching it recently, I would have to echo the sentiments of the critics. There's no comparison to their first match at WrestleMania VI. That was the World Champ versus Intercontinental Champ @ the biggest show of the year. They should have at least saved this for Starrcade, right?

Their first match was no technical marvel by any means, but they were both white hot acts who the crowd absolutely loved and ate up every exchange between the two men. It was electric. Warrior came out of that match looking like a million bucks. Both guys came out of this match looking quite bad.

The actual match itself is pretty basic. They trade test of strenghths, criss cross rope running into bodyslams, there's intererence from N.W.O. members. Warrior gets the visual pin on Hogan at one point. Hogan whips him with his work belt. Warrior returns the favor.There's little heat and poor execution. Hogan famously botches the finish with the flash paper, which is just icing on the cake for this one. Bischoff & Horace Hogan interfere to give Hogan the pinfall after (14:18.)

There's a lot of speculation on this match being booked purely on the desire to satiate Hogan's massive ego, and the evidence points to that not only being plausible, but likely. Hogan's politicking was a major reason why WCW would lose the Monday Night Wars and die within the next 27 or so months. This not an isolated incident. Hogan has a ton of bad main events under his belt for WCW. This one is egregious, but I could cite a couple others off the top of my head, a couple against Roddy Piper and the most famous being against Sting at Starrcade 1997.

In classic WCW fashion, in parts of the country, the show cut off after this match because they had run over their time limit. Many people (myself included) missed out on the Goldberg Vs. DDP main event. This is why WCW couldn't compete with the WWF/E in the long run. A very poor match.

WCW: The Depths Of Ineptitude

Since WWE Network launched, i've been running through WCW PPV's starting from Bash At The Beach 1996 ( Beginning of N.W.O. angle) to it's demise. It took me over a year to finish all of them. A lot of thoughts come to mind, I could probably write a book  or at least a novella, but I think for the purposes of this blog, i'm going to pick out some of the very worst matches during this period, because, man, did they put some shitty matches on PPV. It's real easy to see why they couldn't compete with the (at the time WWF.)

Some notes/observations;

-Watching WCW PPV's from 2000 feels like watching a pet or friend die of a terminal illness, kinda.

-I'm not interested in taking mean spirited potshots at performers who were only doing their jobs. My goal is to pick out some matches that were just plain bad. For different reasons, which i'll elaborate on when I review the matches themselves. A lot of them are matches between untrained people or a pro vs. an untrained "guest" wrestler or celebrity who has no business being in the ring.

-There were a shit ton of bad matches on these shows.

-WCW's ineptitude was SAVAGE. DEEP. Utterly hopeless.

-Although some of these matches are bad on a technical level ( or, every level) I still strangely enjoy some of them. (i'm a glutton for punishment.)

-Steve Mongo McMichael is the patron saint of bad matches.

-I ended up gaining respect for a lot of guys that I didn't have much for previously.

-I'm trying to develop some type of system of tiers of how bad the matches get, with a couple potential categories: The Drizzling Shits/-5 Stars/Pug Fugly/Bowling Shoe Ugly. I guess they'll be in no particular order. Haven't decided yet.


-I'll be focusing on one match per post.




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