OOOLD SCHOOOOL

[IANdrewDiceClay]

Yeah, The Harris Boys, while dead shite, always struck me as being loyal "men of their word" types. And I really don't see HBK as being their kind of people. Even if they are mental white supremacists.

As shit as the Harris Brothers are, their love for Jeff Jarrett has always been charming. Its strange with Jeff. A drunk Kevin Nash took to twitter last night bashing TNA and telling them Jeff needs to be in charge. Scott Steiner risked all kinds of lawsuits by doing Jeff's bidding on twitter. Double J has these super loyal friends in the business. Even Kurt Angle was like "ah he fucked me wife and lives with my kids. Whatever. He's alright.". A business where rarely do people stick up for you. Jarrett has a shit load of mates willing to go public to defend him, though.

[PowerButchi]

I loved Jeff Jarrett's thought process in forming TNA.

 

"Right, so I've got Borash. He's hiring number one. Now, who shall I hire second? It obviously needs to be someone who'll be important and integral to my fledgling company. I know, I'll give Big Ron and Heavy D a ring."

[air_raid]

"I know, I'll give Big Ron and Heavy D a ring."

 

At first I misread that as "Big Ron and Heavy D can set up the ring."

 

 

In labeling my Raw discs with what's on them, I've only just realized if mama sees a disc labelled "Kid & Holly / Heavenly Bodies" she might assume it's porn.

[PowerButchi]

Haha, well as it turns out they did!

[darkship]

Yeah, around the time of KOTR and SummerSlam in '93 he was a bit of a tubby sod. By early '94 he was back in good shape if I'm remembering right. I don't remember chubby HBK in the Royal Rumble match in '94 anyway. And his TV matches with Razor and the Kliq tag with Diesel vs Razor/Kid, he looked in good shape as well.

 

Speaking of Summerslam 1993 while I have fond memories of this year looking back why did they just have such a lackluster show?

 

 

It almost seems as if they loaded the card with people who'd have a great match with each other to atone for how lousy Undertaker/Gonzalez and Luger/Yoko were going to be. Steiners/Bodies, the six-man and Bret's matches were all stellar outings. Shawn and Perfect didn't deliver, but the thinking was clearly "let's get two guys who'll have a classic". You could probably have ramped it up by putting Razor and Bigelow together, maybe Kid and DiBiase, but it's probably as good a card as you could have made. It's just not very star-heavy or particularly historically meaningful.

[Mr Butternut Squash]

In Your House Six. Part 2!

 

Bulldog vs Yokozuna

Yoko got fed up with Cornette and his motor mouth and had just turned face. Doc Hendrix is there for the big man's FIRST EVER INTERVIEW. And wouldn't you know it . . he speaks perfect English! And he's a pretty good promo too, full of real fire and fury, not phoney DERP DERP anger like Duke the Dumpster. Doc signs out with "Ladies and gents, lets get ready for a trainwreck". Thanks Doc. Bulldog zips around the ring trying to take down the tree. Yoko gets knocked off his feet a bit too early for my liking. Make the fucker work for it. Yoko is bigger than ever here but he still moves and bumps pretty damn well for a big man. There's an odd bit where Bulldog's laid out next to the turnbuckle and Yoko signals for the banzai drop, but instead of climbing the turnbuckle right in front of him he drags Davy all the way over to the other side of the ring to do it. Before he does though Cornette drags Davy out from the ring. Couldn't Cornette have just gone round to the other side? The match ends prematurely when Jim comes in with the racket and whacks Yoko four or five times for the DQ. Lawler's like "No! He didn't mean it ref, it was an accident!" Vader comes out, still in sexy leather, and cuffs Yoko to the rope and him and Bulldog beat the shit out of him. Vader and Yoko exchange some stiff meaty shots. Delicious. Got to track down a match between these two now. I love Vince's line "Vader's an animal! He doesn't belong in the WWF!" It's gutting how they didn't do more with the beast. Yokozuna was a tremendous wrestler. Good little match.

 

Owen Hart vs HBK

A title shot at Mania is up for grabs in this one. For Shawn's entrance he's wiggling his booty on top of the roof of the 'house' and Vince is already all, "UNBELIEVABLE WHAT CHARISMA WHAT ATHLETICISM MR FLAMBOYANT!" They never seem to put that much effort into putting someone over these days. Shawn gets in the ring, tosses Owen over the top and gets on with his strip routine. I know he had things going against him but there's no way a cocky babyface chippendale act was going to be a huge money maker, no matter how great he was. It starts with an awesome sequence where Shawn gets Irish whipped and dodges Owen by sliding between his legs all the way to the outside. He then tags the fans and kisses the lasses. Back in the ring they do the same bit but this time Owen slides outside, goes to the fans with his hands up and gets nothing but blank stares. And a cross body from Shawn. I do adore Owen. There are some nice cheeky babyface spots with HBK pulling hair and the ever brilliant Cornette losing his rag, and a cool bit where Owen and Shawn do kip ups in stereo. Owen's back work and cut offs are sweet as ever, including a nasty powerslam to the concrete. The usual great pinballing and hope spots from Shawn although I can see why people criticise him when he dusts off all the back work and kips up for the finishing stretch. He avoids another Enzuigiri of Death and hits the music for the win. Very fun match.

 

- Commissioner Piper's out for a promo. He tells us he's taking no shit, he don't believe in the boogeyman and he don't believe that Michael Jackson's innocent, which was all quite ballsy of him. He also says that recently turned bagbyface Yoko is 'dumb' and has a fat arse and calls Vader an inbred who wears a jockstrap on his face. Vince clearly sounds a bit sweaty under the collar.

 

Diesel vs Bret Hart Cage match WWF Title

I'm gonna do away with the play by play shit cos looking back it's quite bloody tedious to read, plus I've had a few. Bret has tunnel vision and goes for the leg whenever he can. I tend to prefer NWA style cage matches more than the WWF escape ones but the escape teases do occasionally create delightful drama. It starts off slow but it turns into another good'n and HOLY SHIT. Diesel's about to escape the cage door but Taker suddenly appears from inside the ring mattress! He drags him down into purgatory while Bret escapes and retains and heads on to Mania to face Shawn. I remember that Taker bit showing up on Raw video packages but I never thought to associate it with this match.

 

Great end to a surprisingly good PPV. Every match here was decent if you ignore Duke the Shitester Droese.

[Reznor]

Yeah, around the time of KOTR and SummerSlam in '93 he was a bit of a tubby sod. By early '94 he was back in good shape if I'm remembering right. I don't remember chubby HBK in the Royal Rumble match in '94 anyway. And his TV matches with Razor and the Kliq tag with Diesel vs Razor/Kid, he looked in good shape as well.

 

Speaking of Summerslam 1993 while I have fond memories of this year looking back why did they just have such a lackluster show?

 

Vague memory of the show but surely if we were led to believe that Hogan/Bret was to Main Event the show Bret to be fair should have won the belt at Summerslam or failing that have Luger beat Hogan for the belt on the show then the other guy can win the Rumble and win the belt at mania.

 

Dibiase/Razor was another match that bothered me as would have preferred The Steiners there and then at Summerslam to win the titles.

 

Maybe the slight disruption between Macho & Lawler might have led to a interesting match.

 

Mr. Perfect I would probably have put him in the ring with Luger and let Shawn & Marty have a decent match on the show for their final encounter.

 

I suppose Razor could have finished off his feud with The Kid where a new found respect is earned.

It wasn't really that lacklustre, the lineup was pretty strong, considering there was no Hogan. All it would've took was for Perfect and HBK to have a good night, and Luger to win the belt and it would probably be considered a classic show.

 

1993 was such a fun year though, there's loads of great alternatives you could wish for / fantasy book for big shows as you've done, especially as there were still loads of matchups we never got. Personally, all I'd have changed in that Summerslam lineup would be making Razor/Kid v Money Inc a tag match, and giving Ludvig Borga somebody other than Marty to squash. Someone like Hacksaw would've been ideal if he hadn't left a month earlier. That would also have freed up Jannetty to get a match out of someone like the Model as originally advertised, or Diesel, who was the natural rival after screwing him out of the IC belt.

 

What I would criticise them for back in 1993 was keeping Savage out of the ring. That was just flat out mental. Particularly when he apparently wanted to wrestle.

[wandshogun09]

Personally, all I'd have changed in that Summerslam lineup would be making Razor/Kid v Money Inc a tag match, and giving Ludvig Borga somebody other than Marty to squash. Someone like Hacksaw would've been ideal if he hadn't left a month earlier. That would also have freed up Jannetty to get a match out of someone like the Model as originally advertised, or Diesel, who was the natural rival after screwing him out of the IC belt.

 

Yeah, Jannetty vs Martel would have been a good PPV opener. Wonder why they didn't go with Razor/Kid vs Money Inc in a tag as opposed to splitting them off into singles. Doesn't matter I suppose but it probably would have been a really good tag match. I did quite enjoy the Kid vs IRS match we got though, pretty fun short match I thought.

 

I loved the Steiners vs Heavenly Bodies match at SummerSlam '93. Although I remember wondering at the time why the Steiners' sister said 'Rob and Scott' when she was interviewed. I thought 'she doesn't even know her own brother's name? It's Rick and Scott you silly tart'. The innocence of being an 8 year old wrestling fan. Great match though, and Jimmy Del Ray busting out that float-over DDT (later stolen by The Rock) blew me away at the time.

[air_raid]

Yeah, Jannetty vs Martel would have been a good PPV opener. Wonder why they didn't go with Razor/Kid vs Money Inc in a tag as opposed to splitting them off into singles.

 

"Succession planning" thinking. Ted's leaving, so you can have Razor beat him. After the PPV Razor is going on the road with Irwin, so you let Kid give him a competitive match which IRS wins, so he looks strong for the series with Razor.

 

To be honest, it would have been a little too soon for me for Razor & Kid to be actual buddies and tag team partners. Their individual feuds with Money Inc overlapped, but it wasn't a straight forward 2 vs 2 deal. Razor had been disrespected by them, so he cost DiBiase a match that happened to be against Kid, so that he could laugh at Ted about the same thing they had laughed at him about. Obviously losing that match meant Inc wanted to get back at Kid, independent of their on-going issue with the Bad Guy. Kid and Razor were both babyfaces and both had their separate issues with the Million Dollar Man and IRS, but they weren't portrayed as actually having become friends on television by the time of SummerSlam, and really weren't as such until the build for Survivors started.

 

I know in the over-simplistic world of 90s WWF just being on the same side of the fence made you friends by default, but I still would have had a hard time believing Razor tagging up with Kid just two months or so after he was still walking out on Raw with "1-2-3! 1-2-3!" ringing in his ears.

 

Marty's situation on the card is a little weird for me - the original announced match with the seldom-seen Model seemed to suggest to me a match that Marty would win en route to rebuilding for perhaps another go around with Shawn, since Martel's days as a serious threat were long gone and he was in the dreaded "good hand" role, but in hindsight Marty, as a guy with still some momentum after his hot potato with Shawn, was the perfect guy to go out and put the new monster heel on the map, in turn making Borga look a decent threat for Luger on the house shows to build him back up for his eventual big moment at Mania X. Yes, they still thought that far ahead in 1993.

 

I don't think a Diesel match would have made any sense at the time, since he had only been portrayed as bodyguard/interference runner (though menacing) and not as a wrestler, and realistically the match would have only served to put Diesel over strong for his forthcoming foray into the ring to work Perfect on the house show circuit. Which would have been wholly unnecessary as the booking of Big D at the end of Michaels/Perfect was more than adequate to make him look a monster and real threat for Mr P, so Marty instead wrestled Borga. Makes sense, even if it wasn't aesthetically pleasing.

[EdgarTheSlouch]

Someone like Hacksaw would've been ideal if he hadn't left a month earlier

 

Duggan worked WWF till at least late August. If he had been there, it would've been too similar to the program that Luger was gonna have with Borga.

[air_raid]

Duggan worked WWF till at least late August.

 

Really? That's a new one on me. I always thought his loss to Yokozuna on the SummerSlam Spectacular (taped on the 16th) was his last match for the company.

[EdgarTheSlouch]

Duggan worked WWF till at least late August.

 

Really? That's a new one on me. I always thought his loss to Yokozuna on the SummerSlam Spectacular (taped on the 16th) was his last match for the company.

 

Mid/late whatever...my point was he was in there quite close to Summerslam and also after Borga debuted in June.

[Reznor]

Someone like Hacksaw would've been ideal if he hadn't left a month earlier

 

Duggan worked WWF till at least late August. If he had been there, it would've been too similar to the program that Luger was gonna have with Borga.

Nobody's talking about a program, just a quick, emphatic squash which would've made fans take notice. Going through the lesser patriotic hero before being put in their place by the main guy was usually how American v Foreigner feuds played out in the WWF anyway. It's something that would have had no chance of happening in the previous 5 years or so (referring back to how protected Duggan was, as has been discussed on here before), but may just have been feasible at that time with it being his swansong. In the event that they wanted to protect Jannetty, Duggan would've had far more impact than the other possibilities like Owen, Virgil, Backlund, or Tito (again, if he hadn't packed it in a couple of weeks earlier).

 

Without significantly affecting the rest of the card and existing feuds, the only other option which could've raised eyebrows and built him up to a level where fans would buy him as a threat to Luger would be having him shock Savage, not that I would've been for that. I guess Borga could've ended Tatanka's streak a few months early on a big show, but his feud with Bam Bam was pretty hot and high-profile throughout that summer and totally deserved a Summerslam match from it.

[darkship]

Duggan/Borga couldn't have happened on a show where Luger/Yoko was the main event, surely. One "America stands up for itself against nasty foreigner!" match was too many for this observer. Two would have been naff and it would have potentially meant the crowd getting all their patriotic "USA! USA!" chanting fervour out of their systems before the main event. Not a good idea.

[IANdrewDiceClay]

You could have had Duggan fail and put doubt in the minds of the USA faithful for the Luger match. Having Ludvig proper squash Duggan, and tell the story that the USA's momentum has been lost and maybe Luger will choke on the big occasion. Really push it home that Luger was the WWF's resident flag waver for years and he couldn't get it done. And that would have set up Ludvig as a natural opponent for Lex. Mind you, that would have only worked if ... you know ... LUGER ACTUALLY FUCKING WON THE BELT. Still can't believe he was made to celebrate a count out win.