Reznor

Nothing of note is harsh, find his work from the past 10 years in random indies and small time puro feds and stuff, it's fucking brilliant. Shame there wasn't eyes on it. Scorp is fantastic. Still one of the best cracking today.

That's my point.

 

He's great, so as long as he's in good shape, it should go without saying his stuff's going to be great. Not much use if it's hidden away to be seen by a few hundred folks and die-hards dedicated enough to hunt the footage down though.

 

If it's not in a real fed, it's nothing of note imo.

47 year old Too Cold Scorpio still flying high...

 

Nice to see him apparently in good condition. Sucks that he's done nothing of note for the past decade or more though. Then again, that's probably why he's still healthy.

 

Still, sucks that someone as good as him has had such a crap career when you weigh it up. A year and a bit in WCW, 2 or 3 relevant months in WWF, and scratching his arse in pointless NOAH tags on and off for a few years.

 

He's been some underachiever.

The classic Silver Vision intro. Someone I know swears blind around late 92 there was another version of this intro. Bollocks or not?

There was definitely another version. It was the same music but I think they took out the bloke talking over it. You know the one who went "so if it's body slams, suplexes, clotheslines, dropkicks and powerslams that you're after...'. It was just the music and was updated with the roster of '92ish with Flair and stuff. I forget which tapes it's on. Maybe air_raid will know, I want to say 1992 Year In Review but I'm not sure.

It is on that one, it's basically just PPV clips of Summerslam 91, Survivor Series 91, Rumble 92 and WM8

I do enjoy switching off my brain and watching a good old floppy flippy flip match. Hence why I probably am the only person on here that likes Jack Evans

That's another one of the (thousand or so) things that get me about that walloper; he isn't even a good flyer. The one thing he's hyped up at excelling at is a myth. Every spot or dive he hits is as ugly as sin. And looks like the impact would be akin to running up to his opponent and giving him a tickle. There are so many great high flyers and bare faced flippers out there, and the messy, contrived shit that he comes up with is just pitiful by any standards.Even if you are just an unashamed spotfest fan, there's a hundred or more better guys to watch for that kind of thing before you would check out Jack Evans. A good number of them even know how to work.

He was one of the first 'indy' talents that I ever discovered though. Hence why I also like 'Sick' Nick Mondo. They are both as sloppy as hell, but I only remember their big spots which simply blew my mind back in 2003/2004 as I had never seen anything like them at the time and when it comes to them, nostalgia clearly forms a big part of my opinion (bare in mind I was around 14 when I first saw them!)

That's about the one thing I'll give him. When I first saw him bust out that Phoenix 540 in TNA back around that time, I think it might've been in an X-Cup or something, it was something to behold. That's his lot!

I do enjoy switching off my brain and watching a good old floppy flippy flip match. Hence why I probably am the only person on here that likes Jack Evans

That's another one of the (thousand or so) things that get me about that walloper; he isn't even a good flyer. The one thing he's hyped up at excelling at is a myth. Every spot or dive he hits is as ugly as sin. And looks like the impact would be akin to running up to his opponent and giving him a tickle. There are so many great high flyers and bare faced flippers out there, and the messy, contrived shit that he comes up with is just pitiful by any standards.Even if you are just an unashamed spotfest fan, there's a hundred or more better guys to watch for that kind of thing before you would check out Jack Evans. A good number of them even know how to work.

Bully Ray seems to be regarded as something of a second coming these days, but was there ever anything said about that pathetic spot in the TLC match with Hardy a few weeks back where he just jumped onto the table and lay himself down to set up for a dive?

 

I watched it and cringed. I figured it would be a bit of a talking point as it was that bad but i don't remember anyone mentioning it.

 

It was even more embarrassing than Christian York's attempt at a Tajiri handspring Elbow!

A few weeks ago, Barry Darsow chalked up a win over Mike Enos by hitting him with a golf club.In this heated rematch, Enos extracts revenge by breaking the club... and it's on!~Barry Darsow vs Mike Enos from WCW Saturday Night, February 1999 (!)

On that subject, did Stewart Pain actually make it to TV initially for a week or two, or was the name ditched beforehand?

I remember asking that same question a while back;

Wonder who the dude was who went through the table at the 97 rumble, that was quite a fair bump that.

From watching Ahmed's shoot it was his friend from the Indy's who owned him money.

Norman Smiley had about a year in TNA at one point, as a JTTS and in a tag team with Sharkboy I think. It was fun.

The problem with Nor-man in a tag team is that, after the Screamin' Demons, it can only go downhill.

It's bullshit that he's been lost to wrestling over the past decade. He was always a really fun act.I know he eventually had a month or so there, but with his ability and charisma, it's a bit strange that he never made it to the WWF whilst a whole load of cookie-cutter bore types were happily signed up around Invasion time. Likewise with Screamin' Norm' and Disqo. Were they offered contracts and refused for some reason or something?

As great as the card is, how much of a mess is Wrestlemania 8! The difference between the proposed original card to the card we got is staggering. In the original card you have the conclusion/advancement of several long running feuds and angles and in the revised card, you have some entertaining but completely shoehorned matches. It's not really the lads fault like. Vince lost his arse with the Flair/Hogan main event, thrown in with the problem of Hogan deciding to do one after Mania meant that the 'dream match' (that while a dream match drew fuck all on the spot shows) was binned. Apparently, Sid had a little deal in his contract which guaranteed him a Wrestlemania main event anyway (true or not true, I'm unaware) so I'm not sure where they were going with that whole main event deal. But it was a mess.Then as if that isn't bad enough, Jake Roberts feels buttfucked about not getting the recently resigned Pat Patterson's job on the booking team (because he was coming back anyway) so he decides the feck off to WCW, killing off any return matches he could have had with Undertaker but allegedly holding Vince up at Wrestlemania for a contract release. The confusion with the main event also meant that Savage/Jake didn't get the PPV blow-off match that was in the works or Undertaker/Sid which was proposed for both men (and Taker might have jobbed too). Flair/Savage get's created from this as well.The rest of the card is still a mess beyond that. The show ran over so Bezerker/Bulldog are left holding their dicks because their match gets canned. Jim Neidhart left in February so the New Foundation are out of the 8 Man Tag, meaning Owen gets reshuffled around the card. God knows what happened with the LOD. A few stories have circulated around like, drug failures and not wanting to drop the belts on TV. If you believe whatever, the plan was for The Disasters to cost them the titles anyway and we would get LOD/Disasters and Money Inc/Duggan & Slaughter. Maybe still those matches with the titles swapped about anyway. Marty Jannetty also got himself busted for coke in late January as well so he was bunked off, add that with a load of stars leaving/suspended, the sex and steroid scandals and the WBF on it's arse it's amazing the product was so good still in 1992. This could have been our Wrestlemania 8 card.Hogan/FlairSavage/JakeSid/UndertakerMichaels/JannettyLOD/DisastersBret/PiperVirgil, Boss Man, New Foundation/Repo, Mountie & NastysMoney Inc/Slaughter & DugganBezerker/BulldogTatanka/MartelWhich means poor Skinner gets absolutely fucked as well. That's another story mind.

That's basically what I think too. The natural lineup for WM8, as was anticipated around Rumble time, would have guaranteed one of the all time great cards. As it was, you can't be too hard on it as it was still a good show, and we did get Savage/Flair out of it.... but man, something like that above would just have been on another planet for a young me.Wonder how they'd book it (and the build up) if they were contemplating going with something like that. How would they do the double turn?What about Warriors return, and in what match? etc.

There's going to be tonnes more i reckon. Especially if you include one shot deals/cups of coffee (of which TNA has had loads you'll hardly remember) , ONS appearances, spells as jobbers, folk in non-wrestling roles etc, developmentals etc.WWF/WCW/TNA;Shannon Moore, Jimmy Yang, Curt Hennig, Johnny The Bull, Road Dogg, Nasty BoysThen for all 4; Kid Kash, Wolfie D, Tony Mamaluke, Stevie Richards, The Anvil, Big Vio, Chris Candido, Johnny Swinger, Sandman, Terry Funk, Ron & Don Harris, Pierre, Justin CredibleThere's a start, but i'd expect it to be just the tip of the iceberg.

Cheers, air_raid. Was that the last feud that was intended for house shows only? I can't think of anything since that never headed to a ppv/TV blow-off, but I'm probably forgetting loads. In theory, that practise would've still been in place until they started doing In Your House, wouldn't it?

Tatanka/IRS between WMX and Summerslam 94 is another one I guess. I'd highly doubt that the original plan for any high profile feud in 1993/94 (or even earlier - like Taker/Warrior) wasn't to squeeze a PPV match out of it though as the practice of TV feuds for house shows only was more an 80s thing. Plans and circumstances just change I imagine. Occasionally there were some mini feuds that they advertised for MSG house shows and the like but they were never high profile rivalries with any significant coverage or angles on weekly programming.

He actually wore his usual colours for a bit when he debuted, I'd guess that's what he's asking for. If it was different it must've only been in terms of minor stuff like patches and badges as I remember just thinking it was his WWF outfit.

It's a shame he got lost in the shuffle in early 1998 WCW too, he was in pretty good shape at that point - had quite a few spirited little tv matches v the likes of Benoit, Jericho and Raven. It's especially shitty when you consider the likes of prince Iaukea was getting plenty of exposure with PPV matches at the same time.

 

He disappeared for a bit in the summer before coming back in neon pink and green for a couple of matches too. I take it that wasn't a firing as i'd imagine he wouldn't have been rehired if it was?

How did they react to babyface Lex Luger? I remember him getting a lot of cheers in there when he was heel.

 

By the time Luger actually wrestled a match on Raw after his turn they had moved out of the Manhattan Center and were on the road in the usual medium-sized venues full of kids in Bumfuck, PA.

 

Speaking of Luger, I just watched his post-WM9 match with Crush and why wasn't I made aware of this match before? I don't remember it from first time round. It's an absolute blinder aside from the Doink-affected finish.

 

I know Crush doesn't get much love and neither does Luger for his WWF run, but this is a great match. Here it is:-

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLJGqSB3M7U

It's great, a big favourite of mine. Was quite pleased to read someone else give it a mention on here last week too.

 

Like Doink during that same 2-3 month period, I wish neither of them turned.

13 years ago, CZW was the supposed great new thing on the indies

 

To who though? I remember seeing their shit on offthetoprope.com where I'd buy tapes and I thought it was low rent rank, judging by the covers. No forums I posted in talked about them either. People started piping up in 2002 for their TOD stuff, and when they started using (probably awful) cruiser weights (I remember TWO board exploding about the news Jonny and Jody were going there in 02/03 whenever it was.) But one mans shit is another mans gold I guess.

 

EDIT: Going Wayback~ you can see the official CZW covers back then, it looked trash to somebody who was getting used to the dizzy high standards of an ECW Pioneer release: http://web.archive.org/web/20010411001845/....com/main.shtml

To you and I, sure, it didn't take long to catch on that it was muck. But around the turn of the millenium, they were receiving a lot of attention across the board. Most of it was for the shock value and novelty admittedly, but over the internet, in print, and amongst hardcore fans, CZW was being pretty heavily hyped. They brought the fleshshredding shit over from Japan and the novelty brought a lot of intrigue and curiosity. They coined their new 'ultraviolent' term which was becoming a bit of a buzzword, and established their own gimmick cage match long before the deathmatch torurnament came into being. Then you had the stir caused by controversial characters like Wifebeater, the rumours of Onita coming over to face Funk, talk of Matsunaga appearances, clowns like Rick Blade outdoing the Hardys in terms of jumping of high stuff (you need to check out that dive off the truck btw!), as well as their credibility being helped through occasionally bringing in real wrestlers like Juventud and Super Crazy as well as fly-ins like Jun Kasai and Minoru Fujita.

 

And of course, the big one for them; the tie-in with Big Japan which was pretty unfathomable to all who were familiar with them. But to those who knew little of CZW but were familiar with the Jap scene, that was a pretty big deal. Sure, the BJPW guys indulged in all that crazy bullshit, but strip that away and you basically had a fed of guys who were still pretty talented and would've done ok in a straight or traditional sleazy indie fed. Honma, Yamakawa, Mr Danger, Kasai, Teioh, Winger, Kamikaze, along with promising rookies like Sekimoto and Ito breaking through. They at least knew what they were doing.

 

Big Japan's stock was really high amongst the hardcore/internet/tape trading community around that time too, thanks in no small part to that Honma/Yamakawa series towards the tail end of the 90s. Yet here was some recently formed US indie group being positioned as their equal. When you became familiar with just how bad the CZW guys were, all you can do is marvel at the genius of Zandig or whoever it was who negotiated that deal. But as much as we could see that CZW was dreadful, that relationship was a big boost and definitely improved their credibility and perception amongst observers.

 

From the shows I saw, sure it wasn't translating into huge attendances or anything, but they were getting their name out, attracting a fair bit of spotlight and were probably as well known as any fed outside of the 3 main ones.

 

Fast forward a bit to around 01/02 and they were also receiving a lot of praise for all the guys they were showcasing who I touched on earlier - Red, SATs, Brian XL, Quiet Storm etc, in addition to CZW homemade guff like that flippy fellow Ruckus, the sick garden strimmer lad, and the west coast head-droppy spot artists they were starting to bring in also. Absolutely awful it all was, but doing as much spectacular shit in as short a space of time was generally looked on positively back then when it still felt like something of a novelty

 

In short, CZW were being hyped and praised by the same type of folk who were praising the likes of Ace Darling, Reckless Youth, Mike Quackenbush, Colorado Kid, Steve Bradley etc as Butch mentioned. The difference being, CZW became widely available so we could see that any praise or positivity about it was a mile out. Chances are, it was probably the same case with the mid-late 90s crop too.

 

Lets face it anyway, they can't have been up to much if ECW or WCW with their humungous roster never even took them on. Apart from Simon Diamond who wasn't anything to write home about either.

When did the indies become shit? I remember a great thread here on old indies, and 13 years ago everyone knew Reckless Youth, American Dragon, Spanky, Mike Rapada, Samoa Joe, Streve Bradley and all that

They were probably shit then too, we're just able to see a lot more of it nowadays. The fact that Reckless Youth turned out to be crap when he did start getting exposure lends some credence to that theory. Likewise with Quackenbush. Before the millenium, unless you could get localised TV of a regional promotion, about all that was available (without digging too deeply anyway) was the Super 8's and Omega. Those guys were pretty much just names we remembered from reading magazines.

 

13 years ago, CZW was the supposed great new thing on the indies and that was utter shit. And it was for the same reasons we hate it today. You only have to look back at those movefests and choregraphed shit like Fleisch and Storm during that Best of the Best tournament that was being raved about - that was a whole 11 years ago. And that was around the time all that godawful spot-obsessed nonsense with those hideous Mikey Whipwreck 'students' was all the rage.

It was the weakest the tag division's ever been,

 

Steady on mate. There were four teams going for the belts most of the summer - Rockers, Gunns, Godwinns and Body Donnas - proper actual tag teams whose actual main goal in the WWF was to be tag team champions, not bored singles stars with nothing better to do. FOUR. That instantly makes it better than the tag team division has been in WWE for YEARS.

It was a throwaway comment, but since you pulled us up on it, It got me thinking... and to be honest, I still stand by it, at least during the years i'm familiar with. Granted, I kinda drifted away between around 2005-2008, but I know there was still some fun stuff to be found and good matches here and there. I can't think of any other year where there's been so little entertainment to be had from tag wrestling. The way I see it, just scrapping it in 1996 and having nothing would've been an improvement on most of the stuff we got.

 

It really was terrible for the most part. Fair enough, as you say the dedicated division with 'real' teams at least gave it a focus, but the terrible action and characters more than negated the positives of that imo.

 

I have vague memories of the Shawn/Ahmed v Gunns match with Sunny and Faarooq being fun, and I did enjoy Gunns/Bodydonnas at the rumble but that was before all the role-reversals. I'm struggling to come up with much else. Even as a massive Marty Jannetty fan, there was next-to-nothing to bother my arse about - a couple of entertaining workratey tags v the Bodydonnas is about all that springs to mind. Did Shawn and Ahmed ever face Bulldog & Owen?

 

Of course, there at least was one absolutely brilliant tag match that year, but I wouldn't count that as it was a 6 man not featuring anyone from the tag division.

 

I'm banging on about the stupidity of all the heels being faces and vice-versa, but to be fair, the Gunns were half-decent on both sides, so it's not so much directed at them, but the Godwinns and Bodydonnas as goodies with the Rockers as rulebreakers was just a bad joke. What was plainly evident was they needed a top babyface team in there if the Gunns were turning, whether that be creating a new team or signing up LOD who I think were done in WCW by around Mar-Apr time.

 

Also thinking back to the original comment on the Summerslam card, that was a really crappy show overall, wasn't it? And yet it was sandwiched in between two great (big 5) PPVs. The undercard was bloody awful - bad matches, pointless stuff thrown together, Owen and Savio in an iron man match. Granted, Taker/Mankind was decent and Vader/HBK was really good, but not enough to be a show saver.

 

The WWF were really down to the bare bones around that time, the roster was so thin. Compare and contrast to around Wrestlemania time with Warrior, Bret, Diesel, Razor, and Kid all gone. Added to that, Ahmed was out, and they still decided not to use the new star and KOTR winner (on the main show at least). HHH was conspicuous by his absence too. I don't know the reason, whether he was injured, or still getting shit for the MSG stuff, but it wouldn't surprise me if they just didn't have anybody for him to face, such was the lack of depth to the roster. To offset all that, the only new faces of note were Mankind and Mero. Survivor Series and a new beginning couldn't come quick enough!

 

Outwith the main event, about the only other good stuff on the show was Sunny on the free-for-all, and The King's pre-match antics towards Jake!

Just watching Summerslam 1996 and that four corners tag team title match. Absolutely fucking awful match, but just how much of an absolute tit did Tom Prichard look as Zip? Christ almighty. I'd forgotten Sunny managed The Smokin' Gunns for a while as well.

That was just par for the course in 1996 sadly. Pretty much everything about the division was rank rotten that year.

 

It felt as if it was all some sort of joke to see how bad they could possibly make it. Almost every single regular team were miscast for some inexplicable reason (not that it would have been the greatest division if they were booked to their strengths, but still....). In addition, the Bushwhacker had a 'resurgence' after changing their nationality. Some shit crossdresser hung around with the Bodydonnas. They even brought back the Tekno Team 2000!

 

It was the weakest the tag division's ever been, and it wouldn't have been difficult to at least make it mildly entertaining, but whoever was booking had lost the plot.

Yeah.. I wasn't a fan of the post-match shenanigans; I assume that's what has coloured everyones' overall opinon of it.

 

But the match itself I thought was good and the finish, as you mention, I thought was pretty cool. It referenced the build up nicely.

I thought the finishing spot was great. Pretty creative, logical, and looked good, whilst not being decisive so there was scope for the feud to continue.

 

The match as a whole was decent I thought. For all the ott Henry worship, that extended bearhug was lame though. He could at least have tried to make it look like he was putting a bit of effort/pressure into it. He redeemed himself a bit with that sick looking headbutt as it was being broken out though,

 

On the subject of spots, one minor thing I loved at Wrestlemania were those DDT's in the main event - they looked absolutely fantastic! I love a good DDT (preferably as a finisher, mind) and those were the best I've saw in a long time, particularly considering neither of them are renowned for their excellent execution. Sucks that something like has been reduced to a nothing move .

The photos probably lasted longer than the match.

 

Is that Dragon unmasked?

Does anybody know anything about those obscure foreign Rampages the WWF put out in the early 90s?

 

I know they did one in Barcelona Spain in 1991, one in Germany in April 1992 and a Italian one in April 1993 or was it a french one that month?

 

I remember years ago reading a website that had info on all of them but as the language wasent English it was hard to work out the reports. Not a clue what site it was now.

 

Did they televise many in their regions?

I think you've got most of them, but in April 1993, they aired shows from Paris, Milan and Barcelona. The French show had the Sheffield crew, whilst Spain and Italy got the other half of the roster with matches like Hitman/Bam bam, Taker/Yoko, and Steiners/Money Inc.

 

I'm only aware of shows from the historyofwwe site thgough, and only know about what they list - so that might not be an exhaustive list.

What's that Hogan and Konnan picture all about? I assume it's 1994.

 

I could be wrong but wouldn't it be late 95 early 96?

Aye, it would be '96 as Konnan only won that belt in late January

A question for CZW fans, does AR Fox always land on the back of his own head when he does dropkicks?

He looks really dreadful from that match. Just the worst. So blatantly trying to show off and get all his (flashy but ugly) shit in - yet he was supposed to be a rudo. It came as no surprise to learn he was a CZW guy. Looks very much like one to throw into the Evans/Hart category. I think i'd rather watch a Daga match, so hopefully that appearance was just a one-off.

 

Actually, first impressions are that most of these new AAA recruits are just rotten. I thought it would be pretty cool seeing a lot of new faces as they were all popping up on Fusion, but it turns out they're practically all just DTU backyarders, spot monkeys, and slice&dicers.