Lurker > Chronic1000

Airdate: February 26th, 1996
Arena/Location: Civic Center in Knoxville, Tennessee
Commentators: Steve 'Mongo' McMichael, Pepe, Eric Bischoff, and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

Typical start to Nitro with them hyping up the PPV, and talking about Bootyman. Apparently he was Hogan’s spy in the DoD. Why would they constantly attack/fight if he was as spy?

Match One: Big Bubba Rogers vs. Sting

As Rogers is coming out, Bischoff spoils the taped episode of Raw. That’s always nice to see [/sarcasm].

This is actually a surprisingly decent back and forth match between these two men.. until near the end of the match when Sting hit’s an ugly looking piledriver on Big Bubba. I’m shocked it didn’t injury him. After a bit more tussling around, Sting hit’s a cross body on Rogers for the pin.

Winner by pinfall: Sting

I think I mentioned in the first Nitro review that Rogers was a decently talented big guy, and this match proved it.. Well, that is before Sting botched a piledriver and won with a weak move. Still, I can’t take away from what was turning out to be a *** match. **¼.

After the break, We got Mean Gene interviewing the Tag Team Champions Sting and Lex Luger… That is until the Road Warriors are out. Basically, they demand a match, Luger gives it to them, and it will be a Chicago Street Fight for the titles. Glad to know Luger can make matches around here. Speaking of Luger, he’s in action, next!

Match Two: Lex Luger vs. The Renegade

If you think about it, this is like Hulk Hogan vs. Ultimate Warrior… Except this Hogan never buried seven people at once and this Warrior wasn’t bats*** insane. That’s a plus, right? Right?

I was expecting a total squash by Luger.. But Renegade got most of the offense in this contest. He no sold Luger’s moves, he ran around the ring like a maniac.. He looked as though we was going to win the match until Hart came out, pushed Renegade off the top rope, and Luger got the win with a Torture Rack.

Winner by submission: Lex Luger

Strange match. Last time we saw Renegade back on 11-5-95, he was jobbing to Sullivan and Hart was burying him. Here, he looks like he’s going to take out a top star of WCW. It wasn’t a terrible match (considering who was involved) but.. bizarre.*¼

Postmatch, Luger and Hart are celebrating the win. Sting comes out and is confronting Luger about Hart being out there. Luger claims he doesn’t know why, and Sting is really overdoing it here. It’s almost funny.

Match Three: Harlem Heat vs. Road Warriors for the #1 Contendershp for the WCW Tag Team Titles

Here’s a head scratcher for you. Earlier in the night, Luger and Sting gave the Road Warriors a title shot in a Chicago Street Fight. This match is for the #1 Contendership. Uh.. Doesn’t that make this match pointless? The mach ends with Animal hitting a big boot on Booker T and Hawk picking up the win, despite not being the legal man.

Winners by pinfall: Road Warriors

A decent tag team match with a weak ending in a match that should have been before the interview. I can't help but saying it was still a decent match. *¾.

Main Event: Flair/Anderson/Sullivan w/Woman and Miss Elizabeth vs. Hogan/Savage/Booty Man

Early in the match, Kimberly aka Diamond Doll comes out with flowers.. She looks intrigued by something. The match is a rather boring contest, that sees Hogan hitting the big boot on all three of his opponents and getting the pin.

Winners by pinfall: Hogan/Savage/Booty Man

Boring match was boring. *

Postmatch, Elizabeth handcuffs Hogan to the turnbuckle, and Flair starts to whip him with a strap to end the show.

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

The main event was good, the rest of the show could have been better. I‘m willing to say this was a whole point better than last week. At least Hogan didn’t no sell an illegal weapon shot. 4.5/10

TV Rating: 2.9

Other Nitro Notes:

1. Bobby Heenan, on Fit Finlay: “This isn’t the kind of leprechaun you want to mess with!”

2. On a completely random point, I wonder how many matches Hulk Hogan lost cleanly in post 1984. I can only come up with one immediately (Warrior/Hogan at WrestleMania) but I’m there had to be others… right? Right?

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Airdate: February 19th, 1996
Arena/Location: Wicomico Civic Center in Salisbury, Maryland.
Commentators: Steve 'Mongo' McMichael, Pepe, Eric Bischoff, and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

We get typical HYPE JOB from the commentary team. Mostly, they’re hyping up the Hogan/Arn and Flair/Savage matches. Speaking of which, let’s get to our first match!

Match One: Arn Anderson w/Woman vs. Hulk Hogan

This is obviously a return match from the previous Nitro. Bischoff notes that Arn shocked the wrestling world by pinning Hogan, even with the interference. Of course, he fails to mention Hogan post match shenanigans.

Hogan dominates the match. The fans respond with a strong Hogan sucks chant. Hogan goes for the Figure Four on Anderson. Sullivan is out, as well as Savage, who enters the ring. The bell rings and… Hogan lost?!

Winner by DQ: Arn Anderson

Hogan was in control the entire match, yet lost to a random fluke? Well, I’m glad to see Anderson getting more wins, but.. The match wasn’t a barn burner. ¾*.

Interview time with Mean Gene, who’s talking to Steve Grissom, the driver of the WCW car. He won at Daytona 500 or something. It was a rather boring segment.

Match Two: Alex Wright vs. Loch Ness w/Jimmy Hart

Squash match is a squash match.

Winner by pinfall: Loch Ness

This wasn’t even two and a half minutes long. N/R from me.

The commentary team state that Loch Ness wants Hogan…. Can they get me a barf bag?

Match Three: Belfast Bruiser Fit Finlay vs. Brad Armstrong.

Hey, it’s Fit Finlay… Only with a biker jacket, mullet, and pornstache. Brad Armstrong, along with his brothers, were mostly jobbers during their tenure with WCW. I think it was Brad who came up with the whole ‘Armstrong Curse’. Hey, it was better than Arachnaman and Buzzkill!

Anyways, Bischoff notes that Armstrong is part of the Cruiserweight tournament that will be taking place over the next few months. Wonder how many matches will be shown on Nitro.

Finlay wins with Piledriver.

Winner by pinfall: Belfast Bruiser

Sort of a squash, but not really. It wasn’t a great match, but did look good. *

Main Event: Ric Flair© w/Miss Elizabeth and Woman vs. Randy Savage

Good matchup here between these two men. Both Flair and Savage are able to control the match, and it looks like Savage is going to win when he intercepts a thrown heel from Woman, hits Flair with it and goes for the pin, but Flair is able get out of it. Arn is in, Sullivan and Hogan are out, Arn hit’s a spine buster on Savage and puts Flair over Savage for the win.

Winner, and STILL WCW World Heavyweight Champion: Ric Flair

The match itself wasn’t that bad, actually. It was a very good ten minute TV Match that helped put over Savage as a man deranged and fighting to gain his title back. ***¼.

Postmatch, Hogan comes in and is beaten up by Sullivan, Arn, and Flair. Then the Zodiac (not dressed as the Zodiac though) comes out and clears house, then chases Sullivan to the back. Hogan checks on Savage, and the ex-Zodiac is with them. Flair again at the announce booth and is ranting and raving about Savage and Hogan. The ex-Zodiac scares Flair away and the rest away. Hogan calls his new ally… The Bootyman. Ed Leslie couldn’t have a good gimmick to save his life. Nitro ends with Bischoff hyping up the six man tag team next week between Hogan/Savage/Bootyman and Sullivan/Flair/Anderson

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Discounting the final five minutes, the show may have gotten a 4.5 or 5/10. Not a great show, but it did showcase the younger talent in one match, and it had Hogan getting pinned. The Loch Ness stuff wasn't a pretty sight, and Savage/Morrus could have been a whole lot better.

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

My original score before the postmatch shenanigans was *3/4. It wasn't a classic encounter or even MotN, but it was a nice surprise to see Hogan get pinned by Arn Anderson.

Of course, seeing Hogan no sell the exact same move that 'put him in the hospital' a few Nitros back brought both the match and the rest of the show down. It was Hogan doing what he did best: making no one but himself look good.

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

The ending of the show was bad. The start wasn’t much better. The best part was the US Title match. Arn winning was nice, but obviously Hogan wasn’t too happy about that. 3.5/10

TV Rating: 3.7, though Raw didn’t air that week, most likely due to the Dog Show. Still, this was the highest rated Nitro up to that point.

Other Nitro Notes

1. Bischoff notes that Pillman had been fired after his match the night before. Years later, Bischoff would write that he and Pillman came up with a plan for Pillman to go to ECW for a while to build up heat for his character then return to WCW to a bigger response, though obviously that never happened.

2. Quote of Nitro: Mongo, on Loch Ness’s attractiveness “If looks could kill, he would be world champion.”

3. In one of the most unintentionally funny moments I‘ve seen thus far, Elizabeth says she was tired of being behind Savage and never given time to say anything… then immediately forgets her line. Well, that definitely explains why she was never given airtime!

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Airdate: February 12th, 1996
Arena/Location: Florida State Fair in Tampa, Florida.
Commentators: Steve 'Mongo' McMichael, Pepe, Eric Bischoff, and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

We kick off Nitro with Bischoff talking about SuperBrawl VI. Mongo tells us that if we didn’t tune into the PPV, we got a screw loose. I’m sure the exact same thing can be said for the people that did tune in. We then get exclusive photos from the “thrilling” :PPV the night before.

Match One: Hugh Morrus vs. Randy Savage
\
Boring matchup here. The three major moves here are the eye rake, scoop slam, and punch. It ends with Morrus going up for the No Laughing Matter moonsault, misses, and Savage hitting two flying elbows for the win.

Winner by pinfall: Randy Savage

This was basically a five minute squash. ½*

Postmatch, Savage gets on the mic and says he wants Flair. Well, he has him next week!

Match Two: Scotty Riggs vs. Loch Ness w/Jimmy Hart

Bischoff claims Loch Ness is close to 700 lbs. While I’m no weight expert, I seriously doubt a man that huge would be able to walk that well, much less wrestle.

This is barely a three minute match where Loch Ness absorbs everything Riggs throws at him. Riggs goes for a cross body and Ness fails to hold onto him. He wins with a two elbow drops

Winner by pinfall: Loch Ness

It almost falls short off the “too short to rate” category.. But not quite. This was just terrible. Loch Ness botched one of three moves. Ugh. DUD

Mean Gene at the entranceway with Woman and Miss Elizabeth, who are carrying a gurney out to ringside with Flair between the sheets. Flair then pops out from under the sheets. Flair cutting a promo on Savage. He’s really happy to be with both Elizabeth and Woman. He then gives the mic to Elizabeth. She says why she left Savage.

Match Three: ‘Dangerous’ Devon Storm vs. Konnan© for the WCW United States Heavyweight Championship

Storm, who would later be known as Crowbar, is making his debut here. He debuts and is going for the US Title?

We get a random cut to George Steinbrenner who’s watching the action in Florida.

Surprisingly good matchup between these two. Konnan is able to retain with powerbomb from the middle turnbuckle.

Winner, and STILL WCW United States Heavyweight Champion: Konnan

This was a good match that showcased the talent of Storm and Konnan. Konnan goes from having one of the worst matches on the show the night before to having the best match on Nitro? ***

Main Event: Hulk Hogan vs. Arn Anderson w/Woman

Partway through this bout, Flair and Elizabeth make their way to ringside. Arn hit’s a spine buster on Hogan, gets a two and.. Yep. Hulk up. Hogan takes down Arn, then mimics Flair by doing the walk and applying the figure four onto Arn. Flair is in, Hogan and Flair go at it, but no bell. Woman is on the apron, throws powder into Hogan’s eyes, then Arn hits him with Elizabeth’s shoe… for the win?!

Winner by pinfall: Arn Anderson.

Wow. Totally unexpected finish there. Hogan got pinned again! Not cleanly but still! I think I’m going to give this a -

Wait. Hogan is no selling that?! He’s up and destroys Arn and Flair. Savage is out helping Hogan, though he really doesn’t need it. Flair makes his way to the announce booth, cuts a promo on Hogan and Savage. Hogan and Savage run to the booth now and Hogan is now cutting a promo on Arn and Flair. Hogan wants another match against Arn..

*sigh* Arn wins, but Hogan completely buries Arn and Flair again. He no sold a move that apparently injured his eye. This went from a good thing to something terrible. ¾*

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Main Event: Hulk Hogan vs. Giant w/Taskmaster and Jimmy Hart in a unsanctioned Cage Match

Apparently Hogan’s match is unsanctioned. Thankfully WCW executives will allow it to he shown on PPV.

Match starts, and we immediately get a Hogan sucks chant. This match immediately got a whole lot better.

Even though Mean Gene claimed the cage was fifteen feet, I have reason to believe he was falsifying info there. I don’t think Hogan standing on the second turnbuckle with his head clearly over the top of the cage = fifteen feet.

The match ends with Hogan no-selling a choke slam, sending Giant headfirst into the cage like ten times, punches, leg drops, and he escapes the cage.

Winner by escape: Hulk Hogan

This wasn’t a pleasant experience. Hogan, who’s got an eye injury, still beats a perfectly healthy Giant. Yeah he didn’t pin him but rather escaped, but that doesn’t help matters! ½*, mostly for the Hogan Sucks chant.

Postmatch, Taskmaster hits Hogan with a chair. Hogan throws Sullivan into the cage.. The entire DoD is out.. And Hogan beats every single member off with a chair. Seven guys, and Hogan is able to hold back every single one of them.. With a ****ing chair. They begin to retreat, and this extremely large guy comes out.. The Loch Ness Monster? The ****? Dude comes out and is trying to get into the cage, but the DoD stop him.

Is it sad that the MotN was the Street Fight with the Nasty Boys? That felt like days ago. Everything else was either poorly done, obvious as hell, or done to make Hogan look good. My only solace is that there is ABSOLUTELY no way the next PPV I watch will be this ba-

Pay-per-view chronology:
Starrcade 1995
SuperBrawl VI
Uncensored 1996

… Son of a b****. 3/10

Other SuperBrawl Notes:

1. They constantly referred to the Mega Powers once Savage was out. I would have assumed Vince had a trademark on the name, but it appears not. Or WCW didn’t care.

2. It’s bad that there was like ten minutes of nothing going on aside from either Luger or Flair stalling. I know they were trying to use all the time they could, but really.. We didn’t need that.

3. The whole ‘booker man’ thing was a pretty big controversy that really put over Brian Pillman. Though it’s unfortunate the tape of this show didn’t have it on here.

4. Where was Benoit, Guerrero, Malenko, or any of the other talent that has been putting on quality matches? Why was I forced to suffer through One Man Gang/Konnan match that no one cared for?

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Mean Gene in the back again with Ric Flair and Woman. Flair recaps what we just saw about twenty minutes ago between Arn and Sullivan. Then hypes up the cage match.

Speaking of the cage, the cage is being lowered to the theme of SuperBrawl.. Which isn’t exactly the sort of intimidating music the WWE uses to bring down their cage. It’s sounds like music from a bad 80’s B-Movie. Couldn’t we get a Jimmy Hart Version of something slightly more badass?

We were supposed to have a hype video for Uncensored (*shudders*) but thankfully it was edited out, so we get an interview with Mean Gene and Miss Elizabeth. Elizabeth looks great and it would be nice to see her talk for o- “STOP THE MUSIC!” Savage interrupts this interview to hype up the return of the Mega Powers, and then steals the to infinity and beyond line from Toy Story. Didn’t Hogan steal the exact same line a few Nitros back?

We go to the announcers, and.. Bobby Heenan for some reason or another is turned around looking at the ring, while Rhodes and Tony hype up the cage match.

Match Eight: Ric Flair w/Woman vs. Randy Savage© w/Elizabeth in a Cage match for the WCW World Heavyweight Championship

Yes, this isn’t the main event. There is another match after this. Wanna take a shot who is in it?

Michael Buffer is out. I always liked how they had Michael Buffer for the PPVs, and later on, Nitro, even though he was nowhere near as good at being the ring announcer here.

Ric Flair is now stalling. He grabs a mic and gives Elizabeth one final chance to ‘kiss’ a real man. There’s like fifty minutes left on this PPV, so this is really just to fill time. That or foreshadow something that’s going to happen in about twenty minutes, but they REALLY wouldn’t turn Elizabeth heel just for the hell of it, would they? … Would they? Oh, s***.

Not two minutes into the match, and Tony points out that a cage is supposed to hinder outside interference. Which means that the chances of outside interference happening now has increased by 500%.

Decent cage match going on. Flair is able to control part of it, Savage comes back for a bit. The camera angles get all weird for a bit, and I don’t understand why.. Until Flair tries to escape the cage, and Savage pulls Flair’s trunks down and half of his ass is showing. At least, that’s what the commentary team says. Thankfully, the edit doesn’t show any of this.

Oh, and they did it a second time. Really. Did we need two shots of Flair’s ass? Also, they’re doing everything they can to not show Ric Flair bleeding. We get far shots of the match, weird angles, everything. It really hurts the matchup.

The match ends with Woman distracting Savage, Elizabeth opening the door, handing her shoe to Flair, and Flair using it on Savage for the win!

Winner, and NEW WCW World Heavyweight Champion: Ric Flair

Decent Cage Match, but the video edits did hurt the match more than it helped. I understand why they did it, but.. Eh. **¼

Postmatch, Hogan is out. He attacks Arn with a chair, and Flair escapes.

After a replay of what just happened, we go to the back with Hogan talking to Mean Gene. Hogan scolds.. SCOLDS Elizabeth. He realizes now that Elizabeth had been in cohorts with Flair for a while now. Gene throws it back to the commentary team, and notes that the cage is fifteen feet high.

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Match Four: One Man Gang vs. Konnan© for the WCW United States Heavyweight Championship

Konnan won the title on WCW Main Event a few weeks back, something the commentary team never told us. You’d expect the second most prestigious title in WCW would get a small bit of airtime on their primary show, but no.

The graphic spells Konnan ‘Konan.’ That's a good sign. There’s a very small Konnan chant from the crowd. It isn’t surprising, considering Konnan has been on TV for all of three weeks, and One Man Gang has gotten all of one match on Nitro, and even that was to look like a complete joke.

Pretty boring bout that the crowd doesn’t give two s***s about. OMG controls for the most part. Konnan comes back with a poor hurricarana, a few drop kicks, and.. Uh.. Well, Konnan appears to slip and fall, though I think OMG was supposed to sidestep him or something. OMG with a 747 splash off the ropes, but pulls Konnan up off the mat, goes to the turnbuckle, misses a splash, and Konnan hit’s a somersault splash off the turnbuckle for the win.

Winner, and STILL WCW United States Champion: Konnan

Ugh. Not a good match. The crowd was dead, the action was sloppy, and it felt like this eight minute match went for several days. -*

Match Five: Kevin Sullivan w/Jimmy Hart vs. Brian Pillman in a “I Respect You” strap match

This is basically a strap match combined with an I Quit match. This was three full years before Russo appeared. Remember that.

Pillman runs to the ring, attacks Sullivan with the strap, Sullivan with a punch to the jaw and… Pillman grabs the mic, says “I respect you…” we then get a random cut to Pillman leaving the ring.

Winner by “respect” Kevin Sullivan

N/R for this not getting a full minute.

Pillman actually said “I respect you, booker man” but the official WCW tape of this show was edited to take that out, since it broke kayfabe.. or something.

Arn comes out in street clothes and red shorts. Sullivan hits him with the strap.. And we got a impromptu match?

Match Six: Kevin Sullivan w/Jimmy Hart vs. Arn Anderson in a “I Respect You” strap match.

Both men whack each other around for a bit, then Flair comes out and clears everything up. Arn and Sullivan shake hands and agree to take down Hogan and Savage. It’s an Alliance.. TO END HULKAMANIA! And.. It’s terrible.

No contest

Uh.. N/R? This was all very odd and confusing.

Mean Gene is now in the back with Jimmy Hart (who got to the back fast) and The Giant. They hype up the steel cage showdown between Giant and Hogan Giant says he’s going to erupt all over Hogan, and I just had a terrible image. Regardless, not a bad interview until it looked as though Giant was going to start crying at the end.

Match Seven: Road Warriors vs. Sting and Luger © for the WCW World Tag Team Championships

Luger stalls… and stalls… and stalls… Apparently Luger is scared to death of the Road Warriors. Five minutes later, the ref FINALLY calls for the bell and the match starts.

Road Warriors control the pacing here by working over Sting for a while. And by control the match, the Road Warriors apply submission holds on Sting. Very uncharacteristic from them. Sting tags in Luger. Hawk and Animal double team on Luger. Luger in control long enough to tag in Sting. *yawn* Oh, man.. I think I found the cure for insomnia. The match (finally) ends with all four men outside of the ring and we get a double countout. Thank you, [Insert deity here[

The best part of the match? Sting unintentionally head butting Animal in the crotch. Aside from that.. Crap. This is a slowly dipping into terrible territory. ¼*

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Airdate: February 11th, 1996
Arena/Location: Bayfront Arena in St. Petersburg, Florida
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan, and ‘The American Dream’ Dusty Rhodes

Match One: Public Enemy (Johnny Grunge and Rocco Rock) vs. Nasty Boys (Brian Knobbs and Jerry Saggs) - Street Fight

Good ten minutes match here that utilized the weapons properly. Unlike most matches like this, the weapons weren’t under the ring, but they had to a concession stand, which was different. Nasty Boys were able to pick up the win when Rocco Rock had Knobbs on a table, climbed into the crowd and was about ten to fifteen feet high, did a senton onto the table after Knobbs moved and got the quick pin.

Winners by pinfall: The Nasty Boys.

Postmatch, they are still going at it, but Nasty Boys are able to escape.

This is how you utilize a team like Public Enemy. They are great at using weapons and taking shots from weapons, as this contest demonstrated. **½.

Mean Gene in the back interviewing WCW US Heavyweight and ‘Mexican Heavyweight‘ Champion Konnan. He hypes up his bout against One Man Gang later tonight. He looks as though he’s reading off a cue card.

Match Two: Johnny B. Badd© w/Diamond Doll vs. Diamond Dallas Page for the WCW World Television Championship

How many title shots does DDP get for the same title? This is like his fourth straight PPV for the belt against Badd. Also, DDP has put up $6.6 Million dollars on the line, which is apparently Diamond Doll’s money. Kimberly is also on the line as well again. Okay.

DDP brings out roses and wants to give them to the Diamond Doll, but she won’t have none of it. No sign of chains, either. Tony notes that Johnny B. Badd won the title at Starrcade.. Then corrects himself and says it was at World War 3. Try Halloween Havoc.

DDP is able to control the majority of this contest, but he’s constantly asking for a ten from Kimberly. She gives him a zero, and he nearly loses by a rollup from Badd.

We cut to the Spanish announce team, and Konnan is at the table as well. He’s sectioned off the area around the Spanish Announce table for LAX territ- oh wait.

Badd comes back and hit’s a piledriver for the win.

Winner, and STILL WCW World Television Champion: Johnny B. Badd

This bout was a bit boring. It was fifteen minutes, and the last five felt like twenty. Otherwise, decent matchup that didn’t quite live up to the previous contests between the two. *¾

Mean Gene with Booker T and Stevie Ray. They hype up their title match against Sting and Luger for the WCW World Tag Team Titles. “LEX LUGER WE COMMIN’ FOR YOU, SUCKA!”

Match Three: Harlem Heat vs. Sting and Lex Luger© for the WCW World Tag Team Championships

The winners will have to face the Road Warriors later on tonight. They’re back for less than a month and already have two title shots?

Luger is dominated throughout the twelve minute bout. Sting is able to get the tag, but the ref doesn’t see it, so he tries to get Sting out. Sting is fighting with Booker T outside of the ring as the Road Warriors come out and attack Stevie Ray with a weapon, giving Luger and Sting the win.

Winners, and STILL WCW World Tag Team Champions: Sting and Lex Luger

Not a bad match for the length it had, but it could’ve been better. **¼.

Mean Gene interviews Sting and Luger. Neither Luger nor Sting saw the Road Warriors interfere.

The commentary team hypes up the matches thus far, and talk about the rest of the contests, before throwing it to the next bout.

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Other Nitro Notes:

1. The whole broom stuff was more confusing than anything else. Why not just have Orndorff appear as he hits Arn?

2. The power actually goes out during the Main Event for a few seconds. Bischoff tried to play it off like it was the WWF’s doing. The hell?

3. I plan on recapping SuperBrawl as well for tomorrow, for whoever is still reading this.

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Airdate: February 5th, 1996
Arena/Location: Jenkins Arena in Lakeland, Florida
Commentators: Steve 'Mongo' McMichael, Pepe, Eric Bischoff, and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

Match One: Chris Benoit vs. Randy Savage© w/Woman and Miss Elizabeth for the WCW World Heavyweight Championship

Benoit is pretty over with the crowd, which is surprising considering how little airtime he’s had. Something else completely unexpected? Benoit practically dominated Savage. Woman is distracting the ref as Benoit sends Savage over the top rope. Benoit goes for a suicide dive… and crash lands into the concrete floor. Back in the ring, Savage hit’s the diving elbow and looks to go for the pin when Flair comes out and is stalking Elizabeth. He could get arrested for that, you know.

Winner by DQ, and STILL WCW World Heavyweight Champion:Randy Savage

Savage goes out of the ring to attack Flair, but Woman turns on Savage! Arn and Flair attacking Savage, when Hogan comes out with a chair and clears the ring. Mean Gene now out to interview Hogan. Hogan has some band-aids and tape above his eye. Flair out again and attacking Hogan’s eye. Chairshot on Hogan, and Savage is back out. Heels bolt. Savage questions Elizabeth about why she didn’t warn Hogan. Hmm…

The match itself was pretty good for a eight minute TV match. **¼

Match Two: |Kevin Sullivan and Hugh Morrus w/Jimmy Hart vs. Arn Anderson and Flyin’ Brian

Pillman plays the character very well. He’s running around the arena, threatening fans, attacking cameramen, doing stuff that no one had quite seen before.

Pillman and Anderson are able to control the majority of this matchup by double teaming Hugh Morrus. Sullivan finally in and is aggressively attacking Pillman. In a completely random moment, Arn and Sullivan attempts a spine buster near some curtains in the aisle way when someone attacks Arn with a broom. Arn sells it like crazy as Sullivan wanders back to the ring. Ref calls for the bell, and the match is over.

Double DQ

The match wasn‘t anything special, but the ending sort of left me wondering what the hell was going on. ¾*

Match Three:Marcus Bagwell vs. Ric Flair w/Woman

Paul Orndorff shows up at the announce booth and admits to hitting Arn. Er.. Why didn’t they just show him doing it?

Back and forth match that showcased a great deal of punches, kicks, chops, and clotheslines. Flair wins with the figure four.

Winner by submission: Ric Flair

Flair isn’t willing to let go of the hold, but eventually does when Savage (who had apparently just got back to the arena after taking Hogan to the hospital) runs in. Flair runs to the back.

Eh, not a very entertaining match. *

Main Event:Road Warriors vs. Sting and Luger© for the WCW World Tag Team Championships

Hawk No-sells a piledriver.. Again. *sigh* Sting and Luger work over Animal’s back for the duration of the match, then Jimmy Hart shows up with a lead bar, Luger has it, attacks Animal’s lower back with it, for the win.

Winners, and STILL WCW World Tag Team Champions: Lex Luger and Sting

Aside from no selling several moves, it wasn’t a bad tag team match. I’ll be nice and say *¾

Hawk and Animal demand a match against the winner of the Sting and Luger/Harlem Heat match at SuperBrawl. What I can’t understand is how does he get another title shot, despite being around for such a short time?

The Benoit/Savage match was good and surprising, the rest of the show didn’t quite live up to it. Not a terribly great show just before SuperBrawl. 4.5/10

TV Rating: 2.9

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Other Nitro Notes:

1. This is the first time Hogan has gotten pinned in a match. It is rather surprising to see, even if it was a cheap win.

2. Quote of Nitro: Bobby Heenan, on Hawk no-selling the piledriver: How can he get up from that? Well, I guess if you got no brains or nothing in your head, it’s just a solid cement stump.

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

At the Clash of the Champions, Sting/Luger retained over the Blue Bloods, Flair/Giant beat Hogan/Savage, and that’s about it. Well, Parker/Sherri didn’t get married due to Madusa coming out of Parker’s trailer.. Or something

Airdate: January 29th, 1996
Arena/Location: Civic Center in Canton, Ohio.
Commentators: Steve 'Mongo' McMichael, Pepe, Eric Bischoff, and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

Typical hype job to start off Nitro. Then Bischoff promises us this would be one of the biggest nights in Nitro.

Match One: Ric Flair w/Jimmy Hart vs. Hulk Hogan w/Miss Elizabeth

Yes, Hulk Hogan is opening Nitro. Do I still expect him to end the show? Definitely.

Decent twelve minute matchup between these two icons. Flair is able to dominate Hogan for the most part, but Hogan overcomes the odds. He hit’s the leg drop, but Arn comes out and he and Hart are able to remove the heel from Elizabeth, gives it to Flair, who hits Hogan in the eye with it for the pin!

Winner by pinfall: Ric Flair.

Hogan got pinned in a match? Even if it was cheap, that adds a couple of points to the score. **½

Postmatch, Savage is out and both he and Elizabeth are checking up on Hogan.

Match Two: Faces of Fear (Meng and Barbarian) vs. Road Warriors (Hawk and Animal)

At one point, Meng hit’s a nice looking sit down piledriver on Hawk, who no-sells it! Who the f*** no sells a piledriver?! Meng and Barbarian work over Animal’s back for the majority of the match. The match ends when Hawk is able to get in, both Hawk and Animal are able to get an upper hand, and Hawk hit’s a clothesline off the top rope for the pin.

Winners by pinfall: Road Warriors

The match got ten minutes, but it was a slugfest between two power teams. The no-selling really hurt it in my eyes. *

Mean Gene in the ring with Hugh Morrus and Kevin Sullivan. Sullivan rambles about Arn being a man of his word. Arn and Pillman are now out. Arn scolds Pillman for not being around when Flair won his match. Arn takes off his belt and to teach Pillman some respect, but Sullivan and Morrus attack Anderson. Sullivan now beating up Pillman with Arn’s belt. Arn saves Pillman, then demands a match against Sullivan and Morrus.

After a commercial break, we have Mean Gene again in the ring with Sister Sherri. Before we can her anything from Sherri, Madusa attacks Sherri from behind. We got a match!

Match Three: Sister Sherri vs. Madusa

Not really a match, but more of a punch/kick/slamfest. Sherri wins it was a reverse slam.

Winner by pinfall: Sister Sherri

Wait, why is Sherri going over Madusa? I understand it’s retribution for what happened at CotC, but.. Madusa is the newest talent and should be made to look stron- oh **** it. N/R

We have Giant and Macho Man set to fight for the World Title but the match never starts due to Savage attack Giant with his belt. Flair comes out and now it's 2 on 1 on Savage. After a bit of that, Hogan is out, attacks Flair and Giant with a chair, then destroys the DoD with the chair. Flair/Giant ambush the commentary booth, and hype up the cage match at SuperBrawl to end the show.

The show had one decent match (with Hogan losing) and the Arn/Pillman segment was done pretty well. The rest of the show didn’t really do that well for me. The end was a mess, the women’s match was hardly a match and the tag team matchup was sloppy. Even with Hogan getting pinned, he still looked strong at the end. 4.5/10

TV Rating: 2.8

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Things are rather hectic here, so no Nitro today. I expect to have one (or maybe two) up tomorrow, though.

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Other Nitro Notes:

1. I found it more than a little odd that at Mongo was commentating on the Pillman/Malenko match, considering Mongo replaced Pillman, and Malenko replaced Mongo in the Four Horsemen.

2. The more I watch Nitro, the more I can understand Nick Patrick’s screw up at Starrcade 1997..

3. They were constantly hyping up the appearance of Steeler’s player Kevin Greene at CotC. As some of you football fans might remember, Steelers played (and lost) that year to the Cowboys. Of course, the commentary team makes it sound like it’d be a blow out.

4. Two weeks in a row Hogan has main evented Nitro. Shouldn’t the World Title or World Tag Team match be at the end? Nah, it’s Hogan. He ends the show to get all the thunder.

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Airdate: January 22nd, 1996
Arena/Location: Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Commentators: Steve 'Mongo' McMichael, Pepe, Eric Bischoff, and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

Nitro starts off like most other Nitros: with us getting a hype job from the commentary team. While they are hyping up the Main event, Konnan shows up, hypes up his match against Psychosis at Clash of the Champions the next night, which is for the Mexican Heavyweight Championshp. I wonder how long after this El Gran Luchadore won the title. Anyways, let’s start with our first match!

Match One: Randy Savage w/Several Women vs. Ric Flair© w/Jimmy Hart for the WCW World Heavyweight Championship

Several women, including Woman and Linda Bollea (Hogan’s ex wife,) come out with Savage. Hogan comes out and wishes Savage good luck on his match, and demands the first shot at the title. Flair dances with Woman, but is promptly slapped in the face. There was some history between those two.

Flair is able to take control of the match, but Savage starts to gain steam when He hit’s a few double axe handles off the top rope. Hart distracts the ref as Arn comes out with brass knuckles. Arn accidentally hits Flair, which the ref sees. Hogan comes out and attacks Arn, the bell rings… but Savage hit’s the flying elbow drop of Flair for the win?!

Winner, and NEW WCW World Heavyweight Champion: Randy Savage

Crowd explodes as Hogan celebrates as though he won the title himself. Hogan says he ‘helped’ Savage win the title, to a chorus of boos. Hogan wants a title shot, Savage says he should be #1 Contender before he gives him a title shot. Then they hype up their match against Giant Flair at CotC.

The match itself wasn’t all that bad, but the title’s been thrown around quite a bit. **¾

Match Two: Dean Malenko vs. Brian Pillman

Good five minute matchup here, but it ending strangely. Malenko’s leg was tied up in the ropes, Referee Nick Patrick spotted this, but counted Malenko’s shoulders down for the three?

Winner by pinfall: Brian Pillman

I like the match, but the ending was screwed up by Nick Patrick. The refs were really messing up left and right *½

Match Three: Harlem Heat (Booker T and Stevie Ray)© vs. Sting and Luger for the WCW World Tag Team Championships

Harlem Heat is able to control Sting throughout the match. Jimmy Hart comes out, hands Luger some silver dollars. Luger is tagged in, punches out Booker T with the silver dollars, and gets the win.

Winner, and NEW WCW World Tag Team Champions: Luger and Sting

There are silver dollars strewn about in the ring, but the ref doesn’t seem them. Oh my.

Good tag team match, but I’m starting to see a pattern with this ref stuff. **¼

Main Event: One Man Gang vs. Hulk Hogan

This is a non-title match. Of course, you know what that mean. Hogan beats One Man Gang in three minutes.

Winner by pinfall: Hulk Hogan

Squash match = No Rating.

DoD and Four Horsemen out. Hogan takes out all of them (Savage is in there, but doesn’t really do much.) Zodiac yells friend again. Who cares? Hogan and Savage hype up their match at CotC as Nitro goes off the air.

The two title matches were good TV matches that got about ten minutes each. The Malekno/Pillman match would’ve been fine if the ref didn’t screw it up, and Hogan.. Well… A nice show overall, though. 6.5/10

TV Rating: 2.7

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Airdate: January 15th, 1996
Arena/Location: Knight Center in Miami, Florida.
Commentators: Steve 'Mongo' McMichael, Pepe, Eric Bischoff, and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

After a typical hype job from the commentary team, we kick off our first match.

Match One Lex Luger vs. Randy Savage

Partway through the match, Savage is dominating Luger, and a Luger chant actually erupts. That’s.. different. Savage on the top rope going for the diving elbow… and misses! Luger up, applies the Torture Rack and Savage is out!

Winner by submission: Lex Luger

The commentary team note this is the 4th time Savage has lost to Luger. Luger says he wants a title shot.

Eh, not a good start off for Nitro Match Quality wise. *

Back from commercial, we’re supposed to have a tag team matchup between the DoD and Four Horsemen, but both groups walk out together. Anderson says that the Horsemen and DoD are in a war that benefits neither side. He says he wants to put an end to it. Sullivan says he respects Flair and Anderson. He just dislikes Pillman. Arn says they respect, not fear the DoD. Pillman chimes in that Horsemen don’t fear anyone. Then Anderson slaps him. They all then leave the ring together.

Match Two: Public Enemy (Johnny Grunge and Rocco Rock) vs. American Males (Marcus Bagwell and Scotty Riggs)

Public Enemy were an old team from ECW. This is evident when the crowd starts up a sizable ECW chant partway through the match. Match ends with a rollup from Grunge on Bagwell for the win for PE.

Winners by pinfall: Public Enemy

Postmatch, PE takes advantage of American Males, Grunge puts up two tables atop each other, puts Bagwell on top of them and Rock does a senton off the top turnbuckle and goes through both tables. HSQ hits maximum.

The match itself wasn’t good, but that spot makes up for it. *½

Match Three: Sting vs. Ric Flair|© w/Jimmy Hart for the WCW World Heavyweight Championship

These two go against each other quite a bit, eh? Jakyl believes these two probably had more matches against each other than any other two people. I would not doubt it one bit.

Good matchup between these two, much better than the last few. It ends with Luger coming out, grabbing the microphone from Hart, ‘accidentally’ hitting Sting with it, and Flair getting the pin with the Figure Four.

Winner, and STILL WCW World Heavyweight Champion: Ric Flair

Postmatch, Luger attacks Flair, Hogan/Savage come out to help Sting. Mean Gene is in to talk to the three best friends.

Definitely match of the night. ***

Hogan tells Sting he made the wrong decision for trusting Luger, as does Savage. Sting can’t remember it happening that way, and is going to confront Luger. Hogan and Savage then get into it because Hogan is mad that Savage is getting a title shot next week on Nitro. Savage says he deserves it… I’ll discuss this a bit more in the Other Nitro Notes.

Main Event: Meng w/ Kevin Sullivan vs. Hulk Hogan

Wait.. Why is this the main event? Meng and Sullivan randomly beat up a camera guy at ringside. Hogan gets an entrance as well.. Despite being out there not five minutes earlier. Typical Hogan match. Meng dominates, hits Hogan with an illegal object. Hogan no sells it, hits Meng with it, and wins.

Winner by pinfall: Hulk Hogan

Yawn. ½*

Hogan and Savage celebrate in the ring as the commentators hype up next week’s Nitro and CotC.

It wasn‘t a bad show. Just.. Same people, different Nitro. 5/10

TV Rating: 3.5, which to this point is the highest rating either Nitro or Raw has gotten. Though it wouldn’t be the highest for long…

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Other Nitro Notes:
1. Unless I’m mistaking, I think this is the first time Nitro has came from the same arena live twice. Pointless fact, but I found it interesting.

2. I mentioned this a few Nitros back, but Savage is still selling that arm injury he suffered several months back. I give props to Savage for selling something like that for so long.

3. Quote of the Week: “I thought I told you to dress appropriately. This is a business meeting!” - Arn Anderson to Brian Pillman for wearing a shirt and jeans to the ring. Ric Flair, who is standing behind them and dressed to compete, looks down at what he’s wearing.

4. So.. Sabu putting Alex Wright through one table = Match reversal. Public Enemy putting Bagwell through two tables = Nothing? Even the refs hated Bagwell.

5 Here’s a head scratcher for you: Randy Savage, who’s lost four matches to Luger, lost on the Saturday Night before this Nitro to Ric Flair for the title, and didn’t win a single match clean as World Champion gets a World Title shot on the next Nitro. How? Why can’t they give the title shot to Luger, or Hogan (I guess Hogan was filming a movie so..)

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Other Nitro Notes:

1. Quote of the Week: “You know, he (DDP) had a terrible 95, and starting 96 off by losing to Sting is no way to start the year off.” - Steve ‘Mongo’ Michael, before the DDP/Sting match began.

2. The main event was practically the exact same match as the Hogan/Sting vs. Arn/Flair match a few Nitos back. Sting takes most of the punishment, Hogan is on the sideline, Hogan gets the hot tag, and beats Arn after no selling the spine buster. Couldn’t they come up with something original?

3. Speaking of Arn, was he the weakest enforcer ever? Brass knuckles, spine busters.. Hogan no sells every attack from Arn like it’s nothing. Jeez, it’s bad.

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Airdate: January 8th, 1996
Arena/Location: North Charleston Coliseum in Charleston, South Carolina
Commentators: Steve 'Mongo' McMichael, Pepe, Eric Bischoff, and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

Commentary starts off Nitro by hyping up the main event of Hogan/Savage vs. Anderson/Flair. They throw it to the first match!

Match One: Chris Benoit w/Brian Pillman vs. Alex Wright

Benoit dominated the early going with frequent outside help from Brian Pillman. Wright was getting a second wind, but failed after Benoit hit a suplex pin for the win.

Winner by pinfall: Chris Benoit

Good match for the time it had. **½

Match Two: Lord Steven Regal w/Jeeves vs. Eddie Guerrero

Bit of a slugfest here between these two. Regal is able control the pacing of the match, but Guerrero wins with a reversal into a backslide

Winner by pinfall: Eddie Guerrero

Regal continues to attack Eddie, but Eddie is able to get out of there.

You’d expect a ***+ match from these two, but this wasn’t a technical mat based bout, or a match with lots of high flying and great counters. It was a slugfest. Lots of punching, elbows, clotheslines, that sort of thing. Definitely not a bad match, but it could’ve been much better. **

Mean Gene is now interviewing Sting and Luger. Guess what they talk about? Their friendship. This stuff is getting very annoying very fast. They are now a tag team.

Match Three: Sting vs. Diamond Dallas Page

DDP starts off strongly early off, but Sting is able to turn the tides by reversing a back suplex then gets DDP to tap out to the Scorpion Deathlock

Winner by submission: Sting

Decent seven minute match here. **¼

Main Event: Anderson and Flair vs. Hogan and Savage

Savage stays in the ring for most of the match. Hogan gets the hot tag, cleans house, no sells Anderson’s spine buster, and wins by hitting him with the legdop.

Winners by Pinfall: Hogan and Savage

*½ from me.

DoD come out as does Benoit and Pillman. There is a fight outside the ring as Giant comes in and attacks Hogan and Savage. After chokeslamming both men, Zodiac holds back Giant and is yelling friend. This is the second week in a row Zodiac has stopped DoD from inflicting much punishment on Hogan and Savage.

The first two matches weren’t so bad, and the main event was a step down. Sting/Page was alright for the time it had. It wasn’t a bad Nitro, but the one I saw yesterday was definitely better. 6.5/10

TV Rating: 2.8

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Other Nitro Notes:

1. Bischoff constantly mentioned the Raw Bowl and gave away who won that (The Smoking Guns.) Anyone else remember that matchup? Well, besides Jakyl?

2. During the Benoit/Regal match, Heenan mentioned that Benoit, Anderson, and Flair took out Orndorff. That was Pillman, Heenan. The entire reason he came out was that Pillman insulted Orndorff. Is it apparent by now that Heenan was doing this for the money?

3. Quote of the week: Jimmy Hart, standing at eye level with Gene Okerlund: “You know Mean Gene, are you really that short, or are you standing in a hole?”

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

WCW won the World Cup, Flair won both the triangle match (Double countout.. in a triple threat match) and WCW World Heavyweight Championship (with help from Arn Anderson and brass knuckles.) Kensuke Sasaki lost the United States title to One Man Gang. And now to kick off 1996 with Monday Nitro!

Airdate: January 1st, 1996
Arena/Location: The Omni in Atlanta, Georgia.
Commentators: Steve 'Mongo' McMichael, Pepe, Eric Bischoff, and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

Commentary kicks off Nitro hyping up Wednesday’s PPV, and the card for tonight.

Match One: Arn Anderson vs. Randy Savage.

Anyways, good TV matchup here that got about ten minutes. Arn worked over Savage’s bad arm for the majority of the match, but Savage won when he hit Anderson with brass knuckles while the ref was down.

Winner by pinfall: Randy Savage.

Benoit and Pillman come out to attack Savage, but Savage escapes.

Good way to start off the year. It reminds me of how Raw started this year. **¾.

Match Two: Lord Steven Regal w/Jeeves vs. Chris Benoit

This match was only six minutes, but it was definitely a fun six minute match. Lots of mat wrestling, high flying action, and brawling. The match ends when Benoit dives to the outside, Regal moves, Benoit crash lands, and Regal rolls Benoit back in the ring for the pin.

Winner by pinfall: Steven Regal

These two always put up good matches with whatever time they had. This was no different. Too bad it wasn’t a fifteen minute match. **¼.

Mean Gene in the ring with the Horsemen (minus Flair). Gene talking to Pillman, Pillman chides both Arn and Benoit for going 0-2. Benoit retorts by saying that only sheer luck beats Benoit. Arn notes that their job is to protect the world title. He then calls out Pillman for being a loose cannon. Pretty much this was to put over how ‘crazy’ Pillman is.

Match Three: Super Assassins w/Col. Parker vs. Sting and Luger

The match begins and… we have Sgt. Craig Pittman talking to Mongo McMichael. He’s asking Mongo to be his manager. Mongo declines the offer. After about a minute of this split screen, we finally go back to the match.

Sting plays Morton here, as the Super Assassins work him over. Luger finally gets the hot tag, and gets one of the Assassins to submit to the Torture Rack

Winners by submission: Sting and Luger

We go to Mean Gene who’s at the entranceway. Hart and Giant come out, where Hart talks about Hogan. Giant mentions that Hogan cost him the title a few weeks back. Guess their feud is back on.

Main Event: Hulk Hogan vs. Ric Flair© for the WCW World Heavyweight Championship

Ric Flair is pretty good here. Hogan no sells a hit by brass knuckles. No really. Arn comes in, hits Hogan with the brass knuckles, and Hogan’s up immediately, destroys the entire Four Horsemen with the brass knuckles. He’s about to put them all down when Giant comes out…wielding a wooden stool of all things. Savage comes in and takes the stool from Giant, and they are standing side by side in the ring.

Winner by DQ: Hulk Hogan (Flair retains)

Eh, the match wasn’t so bad. Considering Hogan was involved in this match, I’ll give it *½.

Mean Gene in the ring talking to the two friends. It’ll be Hogan/Savage vs. Flair/Anderson next week. Hogan says they’ll go to “infinity, and beyond!”

This was actually not all that bad. Hogan no sold the brass knuckles, but it’s Hogan. You expect him to no sell things that he should logically sell. Other than that, it was a pretty good Nitro! 7.5/10

TV Rating: 2.5

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Other Nitro Notes:

1. This was taped the week prior, because it was Christmas and even Bischoff gives people a week off. Well, save for the fact the PPV is on a Wednesday. Guess they didn’t have any other place to put it without either competing with WWF, or it being New Years Eve.

2. The commentators not that Hulk Hogan is suspended for the rest of the year, so he’s off the card for Starrcade. That’s actually some good news.

3. Luger and Sting have fought on each Nitro since the start of December. Savage and Flair have fought on three. No one from New Japan has appeared. I understand they want to put the main event guys in the spotlight, but they could at least gave one or two Japanese guys some airtime on Nitro.

4.Even if I didn’t know what was going to happen on Starrcade, it is obvious Savage is losing the belt. He hasn’t won a single match

5. Speaking of Starrcade, should I make it three in a row and watch that show as well?

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Airdate: December 25th, 1995
Arena/Location: Richmond County Civic Center in Augusta, Georgia
Commentators: Steve 'Mongo' McMichael, Pepe, Eric Bischoff, and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

Match One: Lex Luger w/Jimmy Hart vs. Scotty Riggs

No intro for Riggs, and I begin to smell squash. The match lasts about six minutes, Riggs gets the majority of offense, but Luger is able to pick up the win with a power slam, then the torture rack.

Winner by submission: Lex Luger

Not a bad match, unlike his match the week before. Riggs got more offense in. Eh, I’ll go with ¾*. Squash match is a squash.

Mean Gene talking to Sting. Basically a hype match for the triangle match at Starrcade. They mention the WCW vs. NJPW series that Sting will be apart of as well.

Match Two: Sting vs. Big Bubba Rogers

Five minute match, where Rogers gets the majority of offense, but Sting is able to pick up the win with a reversal from a suplex into a rollup.

Winner by pinfall: Sting

Again, squash. ¾*

Mean Gene (now with Santa hat) interviewing Luger and Hart. Hype central for his match at Starrcade. Can we get some interview time for more than just these two matches? During the interview, Sgt. Pittman comes out and asks Hart to manage him. Hart says no.

Match Three: Dean Malenko w/Badass music vs. Mr. JL

Quick back and forth match that saw Malenko win with a fireman suplex from the top rope. He locks on a leg lock, and the ref immediately calls for the bell.

Winner by pinfall: Dean Malenko

Short match that probably was cut so short because it JL injured his arm after the fireman suplex off the top rope. Still it was nice for what they had. *½.

Mean Gene now talking to Ric Flair. It sounds as though Mean Gene calls Flair the World Champion, but it is rather ambiguous. Flair starts talking about Jimmy Hart comes out. Does everyone interrupt Flair when he cuts a promo? Hart apologizes for Kevin Sullivan’s interruption last week. Hart thanks Flair for saving his life, then asks to manage Flair tonight for the main event. Flair tells him do whatever he wants.

Main Event:Ric Flair w/Jimmy Hart vs. Randy Savage© for the WCW World Heavyweight Championship

Flair is able to control most of the match, and works over Savage’s leg. It ends when Hart grabs onto Savage, Savage punches Hart, then starts to punch out Flair, and Lex Luger comes out to attack Savage.

Winner by DQ, and STILL WCW World Heavyweight Champion: Randy Savage

Savage chokes out Luger as Sting comes out. Flair and Sting go back and forth, and both Savage and Sting are standing tall. Sting and Savage start to slap each other as Nitro goes off the air.

Eh, it was a decent TV match that ended like it did to protect both guys. **½.

How much airtime does the same four people need? I understand they’re wanting to put over Starrcade, but they could have at least put some different people on the card Luger and Sting wrestled on every Nitro, Savage and Flair competed on three. None of the New Japan workers appeared, and only a few of the WCW Guys who were competing in the best of seven series appeared. It wasn’t a bad Nitro on it’s own, but considering that four people have gotten the majority of airtime in the last month, and it gets boring really fast. 5/10

TV Rating: 2.5

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Airdate: December 18th, 1995
Arena/Location: Richmond County Civic Center in Augusta, Georgia
Commentators: Steve 'Mongo' McMichael, Pepe, Eric Bischoff, and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

We start off Nitro with a huge shocker: WWF Women’s Champion Madusa (Alundra Blaze in WWF) comes out, dumps the title into a trashcan, and says WCW is where the big girls play. Bobby Heenan looks legitimately shocked here. Mongo introduces William “Refrigerator” Perry to make sure no one else gets to the announce booth.

Match Two: Eddie Guerrero vs. Ric Flair

Guerrero doesn’t get an intro again this week. Flair does. Decent back and forth action, but Flair is in control for most of it. He wins by applying the Figure Four to Guerrero, and Guerrero fails to get up for the three.

Winner by pinfall: Ric Flair

Not bad, but this was an apparent squash match. Guerrero did get some good moves in. **

Arn and Mean Gene come out and we get an interview. Arn talks about what they did to Orndorff last week, Flair starts talking, but Taskmaster comes out with Jimmy Hart. Does everyone interrupt Flair? Sullivan calls Pillman a loose cannon, then tells Arn to keep Pillman on a short leash. They banter for a bit before Sullivan and Hart leave.

Back to the commentary desk we go Sgt. Pitbull Pittman now shows up at the desk and asks Heenan to manage him. Heenan says he doesn’t manage anymore, but will find someone to manage him. Pittman says do it or else. I guess Perry found some donuts or something in the back.

Match Two: Marcus Bagwell w/Scotty Riggs vs. Lex Luger w/ Jimmy Hart

Bagwell with no intro. Luger wins with the Torture Rack.

Winner by submission: Lex Luger

Quick squash match that puts over Luger. ½*

Mean Gene now interviews Luger and Hart. Hart says Luger’s the uncrowned Heavyweight Champion. Luger hypes up his match at Starrcade.

Match Three: Earl Robert Eaten w/Jeeves vs. Sting

Another squash, though Eaton got an intro. Sting wins with the Scorpion Deathlock.

Winner by submission: Sting

¾*

Sting is now being interviewed by Mean Gene. Sting talks about Flair and Luger, then hypes up his Starrcade match against.. Flair and Luger.

Main Event: Giant w/ Jimmy Hart and Kevin Sullivan vs. Randy Savage© for the WCW World Heavyweight Championship

Giant dominating the match here, throwing Savage around (and out) of the ring. Match ends with the Giant hitting a choke slam on Savage, Hogan coming out with a chair and attacking Giant before the three. Hogan attacks everyone, including the referees. Nevermind that s***, here comes Mongo! .. and Perry to calm down Hogan.

Winner by DQ The Giant (Savage Retains)

Interesting match that got about ten minutes, but it ended on a DQ. Not a horrid match though. *¾

Gene back out. He talks to Hogan as Giant comes out, but Sullivan trying to hold him back. Hogan attacks Giant and Sullivan with a chair. Hogan back in the ring, wants a title shot against Savage. Savage says he’s got a match against Flair at Nitro. Then he’s got matches at Starrcade. Crowd wants Savage/Hogan, though.

We end Nitro with Mongo trying to explain what he was doing, and hype for next week’s main event.

Overall, I'd call this slightly above average. There were three squashes, one of which was alright. Seeing The Giant perform a splash and dropkick was surprising, and Madusa was a big deal then. Still, three squashes, a meh main event, and Hogan dominating everyone isn't a recipe for a good show. 5.5/10

TV Rating: 2.7

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Other Nitro Notes:

1. Madusa Miceli admitted years later that she didn’t want to do that to the WWF Women’s Title, but Eric Bischoff told her to do it. As a result of this, Vince McMahon was forced to take all the belts after each show, because he didn’t want any other thrown in the trash on WCW television. In fact, this one event factored into a major event two years later…

2. The Stink-o-Meter went off when Mongo calls Giant stinky, but it doesn’t count since it wasn’t Hulk saying it between all the brothers and dudes. That came out all wrong.

3. You know, it’s unusual to see a top guy sell an injury for longer than a week. Savage has been selling that arm injury for over a month now. It adds a bit to a match when it appears that the heels can actually hurt the good guys.

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Other Nitro Notes:

1. Aside from the major stars, the only person to get a huge reaction was Eddie Guerrero. This is 1995, and he’s getting more of a reaction than just about anyone else on the roster.

2. Quote of the Week: - Pretty much this is the quote that was either too funny, too stupid, or completely silly that I liked too much not to add in somewhere. This week’s quote is from Eric Bischoff, on Disco Inferno: ‘He cares about only one thing in his life; his booty and his hair!’ I was half expecting the next thing out of his mouth to be “Two things! The only two things he cares about is his booty, his hair, and Disco music… The onlythree things…”

3. I got some words of advice for those that ever want to run their own wrestling organization. This should be one of the first rules you abide by…. NEVER PUT OVER A WORKER WHO’S EITHER ABOUT TO RETIRE, OR IS LEAVING YOUR PROMOTION! When someone is on their way out, you must have them job to someone. Don’t let them get one up over your current talent. Steve Austin and The Rock both lost in their final matches. If two of the biggest superstars ever do it, so can anyone else. </rant>

4. Luger was overselling the turnbuckle smash from Duggan like it was the worst thing he’s ever been hit with. I guess this is better than not selling a damn move.

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Airdate: December 11th, 1995
Arena/Location: Independance Arena in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Commentators: Steve 'Mongo' McMichael, Pepe, Eric Bischoff, and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

Standard intro to start off Nitro with the gang running down the card tonight.

Match One: Eddie Guererro vs. Mr. J.L.

The match is already going by the time we get to it. Good back in forth action that ends with Guerrero rolling up JL, JL reversing it, Guerrero reversing that for the pin.

Winner by pinfall: Eddie Guerrero

Good opening match with the six minutes (minus the few seconds we didn’t see) they had.. **½

We go to the entrance ramp with Mean Gene Okerlund interviewing Jimmy Hart and Lex Luger. Hart calls Luger the uncrowned champion. Luger trash talks Savage. Luger says he’ll win the triangle match and beat Savage for the championship.

Match Two: Disco Inferno vs. Mr. Wonderful Paul Orndorff

Disco takes control of the early match, but Paul Orndorff comes back and wins with a side suplex.

Winner by pinfall: Paul Orndorff

Mean Gene again at the entrance ramp talking to (three of the) Four Horsemen. Benot isn't there. Gene asks Pillman what it’s like to be a Horseman. Pillman said Hogan and Steve McMichael wanted to be Horsemen. Glad THAT never happened. Paul Orndorff wanted in as well. Gene turns to Flair who gets a massive pop from his hometown. Orndorff comes out to confront Pillman. Arn tries to cool things off, but Pillman slaps Orndorff and it’s a 3 on 1 on Wonderful. Arn and Flair perform a spike piledriver on Orndorff. This was their way of writing Orndorff out.

Match Three: Lex Luger w/Jimmy Hart vs. Jim Duggan

Duggan with an early advantage over Luger with Turnbuckle smashes. Duggan is distracted by Hart, and Luger puts him in the Torture Rack for the submission.

Winner by submission: Lex Luger

¼* match. Hey, that’s a big improvement over Luger's last match!

Mean Gene with World Champion Randy Savage. Savage hypes up his match against Giant next week for the title.

Main Event: Four Horsemen (Flair/Arn) vs. Hulk Hogan/Sting

Sting comes out to a pop, while Hogan is getting more heat than anyone else. How much heat, you ask? The entire crowd is chanting Hogan Sucks.

Hogan no sells about everything Arn and Flair throw at him. Partway through the match, Luger and Jimmy Hart come down to ringside, Hart distracts the ref while Luger attacks Hogan and performs the torture rack. Arn/Flair double team Sting for a few minutes before Sting can finally tag in Hogan. Spinebuster on Hogan from Arn, but Hogan no sells that. Hogan does the 5MoD on Arn, and wins with a leg drop, much to the dismay of the crowd.

Winners by pinfall: Hogan and Sting

The match wasn’t so bad, considering one of the people was Hulk Hogan. Still, pretty decent.. **¼

Pillman out now attacking Sting, while Flair and Arn team up on Hogan. Luger comes out, pulls Pillman off Sting, and now it’s three on one on Hogan. Sting’s up and attacks the Three Horsemen. Savage out, Sting punches Savage. Savage and Sting about to go at it while Hogan is up trying to calm things down.

Gene out there now interviewing the three men. Hogan tries to settle the dispute, Savage compliments Sting’s right hook, while asking what’s going on with Luger. He admits he didn’t mean to hit Savage. Hogan says Sting saved his rear end. These three patch things up, to massive heat..

A huge step up from the previous Nitro, though it’s apparent the crowd is disliking the ‘friendship’ between Hogan, Sting, and Savage, particularly Hogan. Otherwise, decent Nitro. 6/10

TV Rating: 2.6

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Other Nitro Notes:

1. Remember the joke I made about how there were five other wrestling shows aside from Nitro? Turns out I was spot on. In 1995, WCW had six TV shows: Nitro, Saturday Night, Main Event, Pro, Worldwide, and Prime. I think only two of them were syndicated. How bad must it had been if you wanted to keep up with all the storylines and title changes? Yeah, WWE has four shows now, but one of them is a C-Show no one watches except hardcore wrestling fans because it’s completely different than what we anticipated it would be.. And the other is NXT.

2. I think I read somewhere once that Barkley, Malone, and Ric Flair were good friends, so I guess it makes sense if you knew that. Plus, I think TNT had rights to show basketball, and this was their way of hyping it up? Anyways, that whole segment just came off as random as hell.

3. Bischoff notes that both Hogan and The Giant are on probation. I guess for hitting the referees last week. Ref bumps happen all the damn time, and you’re just now enforcing probations?

4. Hulk Hogan stink-o-meter: One. “We ain’t worried about no stinking referee, brother!”

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Airdate: December 4th, 1995
Arena/Location: America West Arena in Phoenix, Arizona.
Commentators: Steve 'Mongo' McMichael, Pepe, Eric Bischoff, and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

Match One: Harlem Heat© w/ Sister Sherri vs. American Males for the WCW World Tag Team Championships

… Wait, when did Harlem Heat win the titles back? According to Wikipedia, they won the titles back on September 27th, yet it wasn’t aired until October 28th. I knew the WCW Disney Taping thing was bad... but holy crap.

The American Males must have got a ticket from the fashion police, since they’re no longer wearing those suspenders. Larry King is still at large.

Partway through the match, Col. Rob Parker shows up and whisks Sherri away. Then Booker T argues with AC Green from the Phoenix Suns. Still, Harlem Heat wins the match with the Harlem Hangover.

Winners, and STILL WCW World Tag Team Champions: Harlem Heat

Alright match that got eight or so minutes, but all the cuts from the action for pointless stuff hurt it. *¾

Mean Gene at ringside with Sting and Luger. There will be a triangle match between these two and Flair at Starrcade for the #1 Contendership for the WCW World Heavyweight Championship. Sting says friends are friends, even though he doesn’t agree who he’s with. Sting says Luger might win the World Title tonight against Savage. Luger agrees, though I don’t think anyone else agrees.

Match Two: Sting vs. Kurasawa

No Colonel Parker with Kurasawa, though I guess he’s still with Sherri. Kurasawa works the arm of Sting, but Sting hit’s a splash and wins with the Scorpion Deathlock.

Winner by submission: Sting

This match got less than three minutes. Basically a squash. ½*

Hypre video for Starrcade. It’ll be New Japan vs. WCW in a best of seven match.

Match Three: Scott ‘Flash’ Norton vs. The Giant w/Jimmy Hart and The Taskmaster

Giant dominates early, but it looks like Norton is coming back as he hit’s an atomic drop on the Giant, which the crowd popped for. Norton tries to take Giant down, goes to the top rope for a double axe handle, but Giant grabs him by the neck and hit’s a choke slam for the win.

Winner by pinfall: The Giant

Another squash that got three minutes, but with more power moves. ¼*

Back from commercial, and we have Charles Barkley coming out with Ric Flair o_O. Mean Gene interviews the duo, asking if Barkley will be Flair’s tag team partner. Yeah, a basketball player teaming up with a wrestler. That’ll be the day. I think Jay Leno getting in the ring would be more likely. The crowd boos Barkley till he gets a cheap pop, Flair mentions he might make Barkley a Horsemen. Right..

Main Event: Lex Luger w/Jimmy Hart vs. Randy Savage© for the WCW World Heavyweight Champion

LONG match where the most popular move was a hammerlock. Or a punch. Take your pick. It ends on a DQ after a mess in the ring with an exposed turnbuckle, Hogan running out, and Flair with brass knuckles.

Winner by DQ: Lex Luger (Savage Retains)

Yuck. Bad match that shouldn’t have gotten fifteen minutes. Can I go into negative star territory? Oh, yes I can -**

Hogan hits Sting by accident when he was aiming for Luger.. Sting and Hogan in the middle of the ring with Sting in Hogan’s face. Savage is back up as Mean Gene enters the ring. Sting and Hogan argue. Sting admits to being on Hogan’s side, to massive boos. They argue about Luger, but admit to being on each other’s side.

One half decent match, two squashes, and a stinker. Can they highlight someone not named Hogan, Savage, Luger, or Sting? 2.5/10 And I’m really being generous here.

TV Rating: 2.6

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Other Nitro Notes:

1. Why came up quite a bit when Hogan first came out. Why can’t Hogan put over one person for once? Why can’t they just buy the encore presentation of World War 3 to show Savage what happened? Why does Hogan bury everyone? Why can’t they put over someone that isn’t called Hogan, Savage, Sting, or Luger?

2. When Hogan was ‘hitting’ Giant with the chair, the chair shots were really weak. I mean, it looked as though he barely hits him.

3. Heenan claims he hasn’t seen Sting and Luger team up before. They teamed up together just a month ago against Harlem Heat, and won. This doesn’t fall under the 3MR, so does Heenan have that bad of a memory?

4. By the end of the show, Hogan had took out Hugh Morrus, Giant, Arn Anderson, Brian Pillman, and Ric Flair by himself.

5. Speaking of the Four Horsemen, why didn’t Benoit show up?

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Airdate: November 27th, 1995
Arena/Location: Salem Civic Center in Salem, Virginia.
Commentators: Steve 'Mongo' McMichael, Pepe, Eric Bischoff, and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

We start off Nitro with the commentators talking about WW3. Heenan is waving a small flag of Japan, while Mongo says Sting and Luger are ready to eats raw meat O_o.

Recap of Hogan getting rid of his ’dark side.’ Mean Gene acts surprised, but didn’t he notice Hogan’s pants were red and yellow?

Match One: Johnny B. Badd© w/ Diamond Doll vs. Diamond Dallas Page for the WCW World Television Championship

DDP comes out with a bouquet of flowers, which he gives to the Diamond Doll. Then he sucker punches Badd! Doll is looking in the flowers, and pulls out a chain. She looks confused, DDP asks for the chain, she throws it, but Badd is behind him. He grabs it, punches Page, and gets the 3 count.

Winner, and STILL WCW World Television Champion: Johnny B. Badd

Postmatch, Badd asks Doll who she was throwing it to. She said he won, and that’s what matters. Hmm…

Very short match that we only get to see from behind the Diamond Doll. This was more to build up the storyline than anything else. *

We go to Mean Gene who’s talking to Taskmaster and Jimmy Hart. Gene asks Sullivan about World War 3, but he ignores him and talks to Hart. They are bickering over what happened with Sting/Luger. Hey, more time with them!

Match Two: Cutie Suzuki and Mayumi Ozaki vs. Bull Nakano and Akira Hokuto w/ Sonny Onoo

Back and forth match here that ends with Hokuto hit’s a brain buster on Suzuki.

Winners by pinfall: Bull Nakano and Akira Hokuto

Didn’t get the same amount of time as their match the night before, but still good. **½.

Match Three: Hugh Morrus vs. Hulk Hogan

Typical Hogan match that he wins with the leg drop of doom.

Winner by pinfall: Hulk Hogan

Boring. ½*.

Mean Gene at the entranceway to bring out the new World Champion Randy Savage. Savage talks for a minute, then Hogan comes back out. Hogan and Savage talk about what happened, and they finally show the video footage, but it malfunctions when Hogan is being pulled under the ropes. Giant comes out and attacks Hogan and Savage. Hogan gets in the ring, Giant attacks him, Sting comes out, distracts Giant, Hogan gets a chair, hits Giant several times, and the Giant goes over the top rope. Then Hogan randomly elbows the ref. After attacking the Giant, Sting and Hogan check on Savage.

Main Event: Arn Anderson and Brian Pillman vs. Sting and Luger

Sting plays Morton here, as both Arn and Pillman attack him. At one point, Pillman distracts Luger, Luger chases Pillman down and punches him, but Sting is looking for a tag. End comes when both Arn and Pillman are attacking Sting, Luger takes both out, and Sting gets a rollup.

Winners by pinfall: Sting and Luger

Flair immediately runs out and attacks Luger, while Pillman and Arn attack Sting. Flair hit’s a ref, and Hogan comes out. Hogan takes out both Pillman and Arn with one punch. He’s about to do his 5 moves of doom on Flair, who is able to escape. Horsemen retreat from Hogan.

Hogan goes after Luger, but Sting stops him. Sting and Hogan argue for a bit, before shaking hands, to quite a few boos, I might add.

The match was alright, but the aftermath just shows how much pull Hogan had, even then. *¼.

This Nitro didn’t start off too bad, but it slowly dipped downward as Hogan kept showing up. The only redeeming quality was the women’s tag team match up. 3/10

TV Rating: 2.3

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

That may have been much better. Hell they could have had one man come out once every thirty seconds, every forty five seconds, or something that didn't have a crap load of people stuffed in three rings at one time with three different angles going on. No one person could follow this match.

On paper the concept is fine, since battle royals aren't all that bad, but at least separate the action some. Do something so not all sixty men are going at it at one time. Regular 20 man battle royals are pushing it in terms of followability (not a word, I know.)

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Match Three: Cutie Suzuki and Mayumi Ozaki vs. Bull Nakamo and Akira Hokuto w/ Sonny Onoo

Mike Tenay joins Tony and Bobby at ringside for this match. Tenay’s there to talk about the two Japanese promotions as well as talking about the women at length.

Back and forth match between both teams. End comes when Bull Nakamo does a guillotine leg drop from the top turnbuckle onto Ozaki for the win.

Winners by pinfall: Bull Nakamo and Akira Hokuto

A women’s match that gets more than three minutes, and is good? Wow, talk about revolutionary ideas that the WCW is having. I wonder how long it’ll be for the WWE to cat-

Airdate: November 26th, 1995

Oh, right. ***

Mean Gene now interviewing Jimmy Hart and Lex Luger. Luger looks as though he used an industrial size bottle of baby oil tonight. Luger seems to be reading off a cue card as he talks. Says he’ll win the World Championship.

Match Four:Chris Benoit vs. Kensuke Sasaki© w/Sonny Onoo- WCW United States Heavyweight Championship Match

Wait, when did Kensuke win the title? I remember Bischoff noting he was defending it against Kensuke a few Nitros back, but we never got the results until just now? What the f***?!

Well apparently, Bobby Heenan had sold off half of WCW Pro Wrestling (the show) to Sonny Onoo for that money a few Nitros back so they could showcase more Japanese talent. I think it was their way of bringing in more talent from the talent exchange between WCW and NJPW

Great back and forth action that ended with a brain buster from Sasaki.

Winner, and STILL WCW United States Heavyweight Champion: Kensuke Sasaki

Great match that showcased the talent of both men very well. ***½

Mean Gene with Giant, Taskmaster, and Hart. More hype about World War 3.

Video package showcasing the Savage Luger feud.

Mean Gene again with Randy Savage, who hypes up his match against Lex Luger. Savage says his arm is a million percent. Somehow.

Match Five: Macho Man Randy Savage vs. Lex Luger w/ Jimmy Hart

Savage controls the early part of this match, but Luger is able to get the upper hand. He applies an armlock on the taped up arm of Savage. The referee does the three arm drop test and Savage doesn’t answer it.. Luger wins o_O.

Winner by submission: Lex Luger

Postmatch, Luger doesn’t let go of the hold. Sting comes out and tells Luger to drop it, and he does.

Wait. Hogan said that the whole bad arm deal was a lie. Savage said he was a millions percent. Yet it was still taped up, and he lost the match due to an armlock to that arm, an arm that wasn’t attacked during the entire match… ¼*. I need booze.

We get a video package of Sting/Flair.

Match Six: Ric Flair vs. Sting

Col. Rob Parker and Sherri come out to ringside for some reason or another partway through this match. Flair and Sting fight in all three rings at one point. End come when Sting hit’s a superplex on Flair, then locks on the Scorpion Deathlock for the win.

Winner by submission: Sting

Of all the battles did two have had, this one ranks pretty low. Most of the match was Sting chasing Flair around the three rings. And punches. and Gorilla press slams. Yikes. *1/4

Tony and Bobby doing more hype for World War 3. We then get a video package for the 60 Man Battle Royal and how the title became vacant.

Mean Gene again interviews Hogan. Hogan hypes up the 60 Man Battle Royal title match.

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Other World War 3 Notes

1. How much hype did most of this card get? Very little. Aside from Savage and Luger, and a bit of Sting and Flair, none of these matches got any sort of major hype on Nitro. I’m sure if I were watching the other five shows WCW had at the time, I would have known about all of this, but nope. Nothing on Nitro.

2.Hulk Hogan Stink-o-Meter: 1

3. So The Yeti (Yetay), aka the wrestler that broke out of the iceberg and was a mummy? He’s now a ninja. No joke. The Yeti (Yetay) is a ninja. What the f***?

4. When Savage wins the title, he puts it on backwards, then after a few minutes, he flips it around. That was kinda funny.

5. So, the referees saw every single other person go under the bottom rope, through the middle rope, and everything else just fine.. Except for Hogan? They had only one referee in the ring for the last few people? In the Royal Rumble, I think they got at least three refs around the ring, even when two people are left. This was basically a really cheap way to have Hogan lose the match sine he had creative control and all that. Even though Savage is Hogan’s ‘best friend’ he sure as hell wouldn’t put him over, would he?

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Main Event: 60 Man Battle Royal for the WCW World Heavyweight Championship
To cover all this action, we get three two man announce teams. At ring two: Eric Bischoff and Dusty Rhodes. At ring three: Chris Cruise (who?) and Larry Zbyszko.

The participants are: Arn Anderson, Alex Wright, Brian Knobbs, Ricky Santana, Squire David Taylor, Scott Armstrong, Sting, Joey Maggs, Pez Whatley, Disco Inferno, Meng, Stevie Ray, Mark Starr, Sgt. Buddy Lee Parker, Lt. James Earl, Lex Luger, Eddie Guerrero, Cobra, Giant, Mr. Wonderful, Chris Kanyon., Bobby Walker, Earl Robert Eaton, Chris Benoit, Randy Savage, Marcus Bagwell, The Yeti, Kurasawa, Hugh Morrus, Zodiac, V.K. Wallstreet, DDP, Scott Norton, Brian Pillman, Sgt. Craig Pittman, One Man Gang, Super Assassin #2, J.L, Bunkhouse Buck, Kensuke Sasaki, Mike Winner, Shark, Steve Armstrong, Hawk, Dave Sullivan, Scotty Riggs, Johnny B. Badd, Big Train Bart, Lord Steve Regal, Dirty Dick Slater, Maxx Muscle, Super Assassin #1, Fidel Sierra, The Taskmaster, Jerry Sags, Jim Duggan, Booker T Big Bubba Rogers, Ric Flair, Hulk Hogan. Whew.

You can barely tell what’s going on, and they have three different cameras set up to show all the action, but it’s still insane. Men are fighting in the rings, on the floor, everywhere. Partway through, ring two loses ten men, and now the remainder go to ring one. The same thing happens a few minutes later when ring three empties enough so the rest go to ring one. We finally go to one camera that shows the action going on in ring one.

The final ten are Arn Anderson, Eddie Guerrero, Giant, Hulk Hogan, Lex Luger, One Man Gang, Paul Orndorff, Randy Savage, Ric Flair, and Sting. Mr. Wonderful tries to power bomb Hogan out, but Hogan flips him over to eliminate him. Eddie Guerrero hits a missile dropkick on Arn, Flair applies the figure floor to Guerrero. Arn Anderson with a spine buster, and he throws Guerrero out to eliminate him.

Flair goes to the top rope and Sting uses Arn to eliminate Flair. Hogan then clotheslines Arn out of the ring. Sting and Luger work together against Giant, while Hogan and Savage work over OMG. Both pairs trying to throw their respective big man out of the ring. Hogan goes to eliminate Sting, Luger, and Giant as Savage eliminates OMG. Giant pulls Hogan under the ropes and they start fighting. The referee calls for the bell.

Winner, and NEW WCW World Heavyweight Champion: Randy Savage.

Postmatch, Hogan is trying to tell the ref that he was pulled under the ropes, but the referee isn’t listening. Savage says he didn’t see it. Mean Gene tells the ref what happened, ref still gives the belt to Savage. We’ll see the film of what happened tomorrow night on Nitro <_<.

The match was chaotic. The first half of the match was separated on three different cameras, so you couldn’t see all what was going on. The ending was basically done so Hogan wouldn’t lose clean. Not a great way to end a Battle Royal match. *

The US title, Women's tag team, and TV Title matches were pretty good. The rest? Eh. Not so much. Those three matches are enough to give it a slightly more favorable rating. 5.5/10

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Airdate: November 26th, 1995
Arena/Location: Norfolk Scope in Norfolk, Virgina
Commentators: Tony Schiavone and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

To start off the PPV we get a video of several wrestlers talking about the 60 Man Battle Royal. Among them are Sting, Giant, Lex Luger, Eddie Guerrero, Duggan, Johnny B. Badd, and several other fellas. They are asked various questions like, who would be the first person you throw out (almost everyone said Disco Inferno, Sting said Flair) Last guy you’d throw out (Several say Hogan, believe it or not >_>), if they become champion (celebrate, mostly.) Decent video package.

We go to Tony and Heenan, and Tony says this is the biggest night on PPV ever. That is, until Starrcade (the next PPV.) Heenan asks Tony to pick a winner. Tony goes for Hogan, Heenan picks Savage… Then Giant… Then Ric Flair.

We go to Mean Gene, who’s with Hogan, (still in black) Savage, and Sting. Crowd is mixed for Hogan, to say the least. Hogan says he’s been through the dark side, but his best friends (Savage and Sting) helped him to get rid of it, then it’s revealed Hogan is still wearing the Red and Yellow. Hogan throws the black clothes into a fire, then Hogan says Sting will be his best friend forever, and Sting says Hogan’s black attire is gone for good. Also, Savage’s arm that has been injured? It’s fine. Hogan holds up a ‘ragsheet’ and says that it said that Giant was going to win, Savage was injured, that it was wrong and he throws that in the fire. He then proceeds to say that the Internet has all the scoops. I’m.. wow.

IIRC, this entire promo stems from the fact that The Observer had released what would happen at the World War 3 PPV, and WCW changed the outcome just to swerve The Observer. The thing here is that I think this entire promo made sense to exactly 1% of the entire audience. Not to mention the entire promo was fueled on hilarious in hindsight moments.

Match One: Johnny B. Badd© vs. Diamond Dallas Page w/The Diamond Doll- WCW World Television Championship match

This match is also for the managerial services of The Diamond Doll. We got a video package of what’s been going on Saturday Night with DDP and Diamond Doll.

I should point out that there are three rings for the 60 Man Battle Royal.

Good back and forth match here. It ends when Badd punches DDP out of the ring, throws him back in, and hit’s a leaping leg drop from the apron for the three.

Winner, and STILL WCW World Television Champion: Johnny B. Badd

Postmatch, Diamond Doll celebrates with Badd, much to the crowd’s approval.

Good match, much like their match the month prior. **¾.

Mean Gene interviews Badd and Diamond Doll. Badd taught DDP some respect, and Diamond Doll is overwhelmed by it all. Badd allows Doll think about the decision.

Match Two: Big Bubba Rogers vs. ‘Hacksaw’ Jim Duggan in a taped fist match

Hacksaw attacks Big Bubba from behind to start this match. About the most advanced move in the entire match was a scoop slam. Lots of punching, clotheslines, and uppercuts. End comes when V.K. Wallstreet comes out, throws the chain to Rogers, and Rogers knocks out Duggan for the win.

Winner by knockout: Big Bubba Rogers

Ugh, what would you expect from a ten minute long match with Hacksaw Jim Duggan in it? It felt like ten hours. DUD

Mean Gene interviews Ric Flair. Flair brings the goods here as he hypes up his match against Sting and the 60 Man Battle Royal. Wouldn’t be the first time he won a Battle Royal for a title.

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Airdate: November 20th, 1995
Arena/Location: Macon Coliseum in Macon, Georgia.
Commentators: Steve 'Mongo' McMichael, Pepe, Eric Bischoff, and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

The commentary team starts Nitro by hyping up Sting vs. Hulk Hogan. They are saying it’s a big time match that should be on PPV, but is on free TV. Wait about two years.

Match One: Scott ‘Flash’ Norton vs. Shark

This was called a special rematch. What’s so special about it? Shark attacks Norton when he’s going to the ring, and is able to control this short match, but Norton is able to pin The Shark.

Winner by pinfall: Scott ‘Flash’ Norton

Short match that was what you expect from these two. ½*

Mean Gene at the entranceway talking to Taskmaster and Jimmy Hart. Gene says Hart is the original Benedict Arnold.. Wouldn’t Benedict Arnold be the original? Hart talks about the Hogan/Sting match coming up, Taskmaster talks about World War 3.

Hey Disco Inferno! He’s got a CD and is apparently trying to sell it. He dances for a second, but this just segues into..

Match Two: Eddie Guerrero vs. Brian Pillman

This was supposed to be Guerrero vs. Flair, but Flair didn’t want to fight Guerrero. This got seven minutes and was a back and forth match. It ends with Pillman going for the superplex on Guerrero, but Guererro threw Pillman off and hit the 5 Star Frog Splash (Jackknife is what they’re calling it here.) for the win.

Winner by pinfall: Eddie Guerrero

Is it obvious that the bookers had high hopes for Eddie? He’s been on most Nitros, and has looked good in all of his matches. The match itself was like most of Eddie’s matches on Nitro thus far: the best match of the night. **¾

Match Three: Road Warrior Hawk vs. Big Bubba Rogers

Bischoff keeps saying someone might jump to WCW just to enter the 60 Man Battle Royal. Hmm.

Rogers controls most of the match, but when it looked as though Hawk was coming back, Rogers taped his fist up and looked to use the taped first on Hawk, but Jim Duggan ran out, tripped up Rogers who fell on his taped first, and Hawk got the pin.

Winner by pinfall: Road Warrior Hawk

Eh, not a entertaining match. Hawk was much better when he was in tag team matches. ¾*.

Main Event: Sting vs. Hulk Hogan

Sting comes out wearing the red and yellow again, and Heenan calls it a slap in the face to Hogan. Does Hogan have exclusive rights to that color combination?

Hogan’s music plays as Randy Savage (bad arm and all) comes out. He keeps gesturing toward the entrance, but Hogan doesn’t come out that way. Instead he comes from the crowd, still wearing that goofy mask, though he takes it off before the match itself.

The match ends when Sting has the Scorpion Deathlock on Hogan, he powers out of it, goes for the leg drop, which Sting got out of the way for, reapplied the Scorpion Deathlock, and Hogan was screaming to Savage that Sting was going to break his leg.. Then the DoD came out and attacked Savage.

No contest through interfence

Hogan and Sting take down most of DoD, until Giant comes to the ring. Giant is about to choke slam both men when Savage hits Giant with a chairshot, that Giant no sells. Giant hits Savage with a choke slam, then Hogan and Sting use a chair to push Giant out of the ring.

It wasn’t all bad, considering Hogan was competing. I’m feeling lenient right now. *½

Commentary ends the show by hyping up World War 3

Eddie Guerrero/Pillman easily MotN, and the rest of the show hyped up World War 3 pretty well, considering they mentioned once every two minutes >_>. Still, pretty average stuff here. 5/10

TV Rating: 2.5

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Other Nitro Notes:

1 Hogan got a huge heel reaction during his entire match, though the commentators never mentioned it. Seems that it was at this point where the majority of fans were getting tired of Hogan. That or the boos were covered better elsewhere <_<.

2. During the whole broadcast, Bischoff would keep noting when the ‘other show’ was at commercial so the fans wouldn’t change it. Don’t fans typically change the channel during commercials only?

3. So, should I watch World War 3, like I watched Halloween Havoc? Or just ignore it and watch the next Nitro?

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Other Nitro Notes:

1. This was actually taped the same week as the 11-6-95 Nitro, so it wasn’t really live. Why it was taped, I’m not sure.

2. With the bizarreness of Hogan/Giant, I am starting to think this is a bad Highlander movie.

3. Mean Gene, talking to Sting: “If it looks a rat, if it smells like a rat, and if it quacks like a rat, it must be a rat.” Rats quack?

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Airdate: November 13th, 1995
Arena/Location: Jacksonville Memorial Coliseum in Jacksonville, Florida.
Commentators: Steve 'Mongo' McMichael, Pepe, Eric Bischoff, and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

We start off this “live” episode of Nitro with the commentators talking about what happened last week. They send it to a video of Hogan, who’s in a graveyard wearing a hood and a mask. He pulls out a sword, talks about wanting Mengs head, then says he doesn’t know where Sting’s head is at. Sting’s neck would be my guess. Very bizarre segment.

Match One: Meng w/ Kevin Sullivan and Jimmy Hart vs. Randy Savage.

Savage attacks Meng prior to the start of the match, but Meng is able to control part of this match itself. Savage is able to overcome the odds by hit’s the elbow drop on Meng.

Winner by pinfall: Randy Savage.

Postmatch, Shark and Luger come out and the DoD constantly attack Savage’s arm.

Eh, not a really exciting match. They’re really focusing on Luger/Savage though. *¼

Match Two: Kensuki Sasaki vs. Chris Benoit

Back and forth match that Benoit won with two German suplexes and a full nelson suplex pin.

Winner by pinfall: Chris Benoit.

Bischoff mentions that Benoit is the newest member of the Four Horsemen. Would’ve liked to see how that came about.

It was a nice match that should have gotten at least more than two and a half minutes. *½

Match Three: Johnny B. Badd© vs. Eddie Guerrero - WCW World Television Championship match

Bischoff asks Heenan what was up about the exchange in money, but Heenan gave a rather vague answer.

This was another back and forth match with all sorts of action. Both men did everything from high spots, mat wrestling, and brawling, but neither man won the match due to a time limit draw.

Time Limit Draw: Johnny B. Badd retains.

Postmatch, after a brief amount of shoving, Eddie shakes Badd’s hand in a sign of sportsmanship.

Good match that, despite what was said, got only nine minutes (not ten.) Still, a very nice match that showcased both men’s talent in the ring. ***¼

Bischoff states that next week it’ll be Sting vs. Hulk Hogan, then sends it to Mean Gene.

Mean Gene in the ring with Taskmaster, Giant, and Jimmy Hart. Gene notes he’s upset at Hart for what he did…. Two week ago. Hell of a time to bring it up. Each man talk about Hogan. Taskmaster says Giant will win the 60 Man Battle Royal, as does Giant. Sullivan random on the ground and mocks Hogan.

Main Event: Dean Malenko vs. Sting© - WCW United States Heavyweight Championship match.

Dean Malenko dominates the matchup here. He goes for the Texas Cloverleaf, only for Sting to win with a rollup!

Winner, and STILL WCW United States Heavyweight Champion: Sting

Didn’t like the ending at all. The match was fine up till that point, so I’m knocking off some points. **¼.

Mean Gene in the ring with Sting and asks him why he walked out with Luger. Sting states that he never thought Hogan would knock on Sting’s door for him. Sting’s looking forward to a match against Hogan. Mean Gene sends it back to the commentary team by saying Bischoff is no conman. Well…

Commentary team wraps up this edition of WCW Nitro.

The Hogan stuff, like most of the Hogan video packages lately was awkward and weird. The promo with the DoD was meh, but the Guerrero/Badd match was good. The Benoit/Sasaki match should have had more time, and the Sting/Malenko needed a different ending aside from the fluke that happened. 5.5/10

TV Rating: 2.0, which is the lowest Nitro has gotten thus far.

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Obviously. It's bad enough that Giant didn't get a clean win after Giant nearly 'broke' Hogan's neck, but to make it so cheap they stripped him of the title.. What the hell.

Then again, why was Giant even in a World Title match as his first real match?

Seriously, this is like a big pile of crap. The only redeeming qualities on Nitro thus far are the Eddie Guerrero matches.

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Other Nitro Notes

1. Hulk Hogan Stink-o-Meter: 1

2. I think even the commentary guys were baffled by random guy in that Hogan/Savage video package, since they all brought it up several times during the show.

3. What’s sad about the whole Renegade bit was that the guy who played Renegade, Rick Williams, committed suicide following his release from the company.

4. Either the fans of 1995 are stupid sheep, or it was predetermined from the very beginning that it‘d be Sting/Flair. I think the only reason they did this was to see how much money they could get from fans from that 1 dollar a vote thing.

5. Bischoff mentioned that Savage was in the building shortly after he was supposed to be in Venice Beach, though he was never used. Why even bring it up?

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Airdate: November 6th, 1995
Arena/Location: Jacksonville Memorial Coliseum in Jacksonville, Florida.
Commentators: Steve 'Mongo' McMichael, Pepe, Eric Bischoff, and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

This is Nitro Interactive tonight. Call the hotline, pay 99 cents, and you can pick the main event. If you believe this, then I got some wonderful property on the moon to sell you. Let's go to our first match

Match one: Cobtra vs. The Giant© w/Jimmy Hart for the WCW World Heavyweight Championship.

Cobra, who would later on become nWo Sting, is somehow the #1 Contender.

Chokeslam on Cobra and.. A pin. That’s it?

Winner, and STILL? WCW World Heayvweight Champion The Giant

N/R since it was a squash match.

To the Red Locker Room we go with Gene Okerlund and several of the people up for the Main Event tonight. Its Flair doing most of the talking though.

To the Blue Locker Room we go with Tony Schiavone (or Schiavany as Mean Gene called him) Sting, and some other people are there, though Sting does the talking. Wonder what match they're setting up <_<.

We get a video of Hogan and Savage at Venice Beach. Some random guy is between Hogan and Savage, I don’t know who it is. Random bearded guy randomly chimes in on whatever Hogan and Savage are talking about, but neither really acknowledge him. Weird as hell promo.

Match Two: Taskmaster Kevin Sullivan w/ Jimmy Hart vs. Renegade

The Renegade was an expy of Ultimate Warrior that they tried to pass off as the real thing.

Taskmaster wins this one pretty easily.

Winner by pinfall: Taskmaster

Hart grabs beer from the audience, pours it on Renegade’s face paint, and wipes it off saying he’s just plain Rick. This was WCW way of writing out the character after the real Warrior said it wasn’t him, then went to the North Pole and did unmentionable things to Santa Claus.

Anyways ¾*. Not a good match.

Match Three: Eddie Guerrero vs. Chris Benoit

The commentary talks more about the Cruiserweight title. Good back and forth action that you expect from these two. Eddie picks up the win with a cross body, though Benoit’s feet were on the ropes.

Winner by pinfall: Eddie Guerrero

Six and a half minute match, butwas a bit lower on the scale than their previous match. Still, it was easily the best match thus far. **½.

Bischoff announces that Sting/Flair will indeed happen.

Main Event: Sting vs. Ric Flair

Heenan says Vintage Ric Flair. More vintage vintage! End comes about when Flair hits Sting with brass knuckles, Sting kicks out at two, Sting hit’s a superplex then applies the Scorpion Deathlock for the win.

Winner by submission: Sting

Sting refuses to let go of the hold. Several people finally get Sting off Flair, but Sting goes back on him, and doesn't stop till Luger comes out and whispers something to Sting, then they both leave.

This was better than their match on the first Nitro, so **¼

We got Okerlund with Taskmaster, Giant, and Hart. Hart says he put a stipulation that said if Hogan got DQed Hogan would lose the belt. Okerlund brings out some random attorney that states that Giant isn’t the World Champion because of the dubious nature of the DQ. The Championship Committee will now be award the belt to the winner of the 60 Man Battle Royal at War World 3.

Next week Nitro: Savage vs. Meng , Eddie Guererro vs. Johnny B. Badd, and Sting vs. Dean Malenko

The last two matches weren’t all that bad. So this was a definite step up from the week before. The whole World Title business is pretty cheap though. 5/10

TV Rating: 2.3, which is a step down from the 2.5 the week before.

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Other Nitro Notes:

1. Bischoff, the great announcer he is, called Sgt. Craig Pittman ‘Pimple’ a few times.

2. For some reason or another, they didn’t want to give away what happened at the PPV the night before at the start of the show. They mentioned that the Giant left with the belt, but not how or why. Was it to keep everyone from switching to Raw? If so, then it’s not a terrible idea, but why not keep all the information for later in the show?

3. When the table spot botches, Bischoff stated that Sabu was overacting.. Dude could have broken his back. I would be more than a little mad when the table that was supposed to break doesn’t.

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to win the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Airdate: October 30th, 1995
Arena/Location: Hara Arena in Dayton, Ohio.
Commentators: Steve 'Mongo' McMichael, Pepe, Eric Bischoff, and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

We start off Nitro with Bischoff calling Halloween Havoc as shocking. I’d have a few different adjectives. Terrible, horrible.. Stinky. Anyways, let’s get to our first match!

Match One: Sgt. Craig “Pitbull” Pittman vs. Eddie Guerrero.

During the preshow of Halloween Havoc, Sgt. Pittman beat V.K. Wallstreet. That’s nice. This was supposed to be Pittman vs. Savage, but Savage couldn’t make it due to ‘injuries’ he had at the PPV. I guess being humped by a mummy would injury my psych, so let’s go with that.

Pittman is able to control most of this match, but Eddie picks up the win with a reversal into a rollup.

Winner by pinfall: Eddie Guerrero

Pittman isn’t a half bad wrestler, though obvious he‘s nowhere near the league of Guerrero, and isn‘t as good of a match here. . It’s apparent that management liked Guerrero though, since he’s been getting quite a few wins lately. **

Match Two: Scott Norton vs. Shark

We get a review of what happened back on September 11th when Shark unintentionally helped Savage beat Norton. Also, Heenan left the announce booth during the break, unfortunately. He appears with Sonny Onoo, which also happened at Halloween Havoc. Match ends with a double countout.

No Contest through double countout

Both men keep beating each other post match.

Eh, nothing spectacular. ½*

Back to Onoo and Heenan, as Onoo hands Heenan an envelope filled with money.

Tony Schiavone in the ring. He talks about the tag team match the night before between Flair and Sting vs. Arn and Pillman where Flair turned on Sting. The new Horsemen come out. Each one spends a few minutes talking about Sting.

Match Three: Sabu vs. Disco Inferno

Before this match starts, Bischoff notes that the next Nitro will be an interactive Nitro. Apparently the fans will make the card. Sure they will.

I admit it’s highly unusual to see one of the hardcore legends going against Disco Inferno. The match itself isn’t all bad. Sabut picks up the win after a leg drop from the apron and over the top rope.

Winner by pinfall: Sabu

Postmatch, Sabu puts Inferno on a table, and Inferno gets out of the way and Sabu crashes on the table.. But the table doesn’t break. Sabu looks pissed as he throws the table, picks up the stairs and throws them as well.

Match itself could’ve had more time, but it wasn’t bad for what we saw. *½

Main Event: Luger and Meng w/ Jimmy Hart and Kevin Sullican vs. American Males (Scotty Riggs and Marcus Bagwell)

Apparently, American Males lost their belts, as they don’t come out with the titles. Hmm. Riggs plays the role of Ricky Morton here. Bagwell comes in and dominates Luger. Hart distracts the ref , Meng takes advantage, and Luger wins this one.

Winners by submission: Lex Luger and Meng

Not a very good match. * from me.

Postmatch, we go to the announce booth as McMichael annoys both Heenan and Bischoff. He sprays silly string and Heenan. We then get a recap of Hogan’s match at Halloween Havoc. They show the Yeti (Yetay) coming out and the double hump of doom.

Back in the ring, Tony is interviewing DoD. Giant is wearing the belt. Jimmy Hart says he’ll explain his actions next week. Each man talks about what they the night before. Giant says he’ll defend his belt next week against anyone.

Ugh. Not a good Nitro. About the best part was the Guerrero/PIttman match, but that only got five minutes, and The Horsemen promo, but overall it was a poor show. 4/10

--
The Miz: Well, the Green Bay Packers aren't going to win the Superbowl! The Miz's attempt to gain cheap heat from the Green Bay crowd. Three months later...

Halloween Havoc
Airdate: October 29th, 1995
Arena/Location: Joe Louis Arena in Detroit, Michigan
Commentators: Tony Schiavone and Bobby 'The Brain' Heenan

Anderson and Pillman attacked Flair before the PPV. Gee, I wonder what’s going to happen in that match later tonight.

Match One: Johnny B. Badd vs. Diamond Dallas Page © w/ Maxx Muscle and Diamond Doll - WCW World Television Title Match

Video package of how this match came about. Not bad.

The match they had on Nitro ended in DQ when DDP attacked Badd with the title belt prior to the start of the match.

For some reason, DDP is out first. Badd comes out second.. Wait, that’s a fake Johnny B. Badd. The real one attacks DDP from behind. Did every Halloween Havoc have a someone impersonating a character on it somewhere?

Hey, Heenan said stinky! I don’t think that counts, though..

The main story during the match is that the Diamond Doll isn’t too happy with how DDP has been acting lately. End came when DDP was holding onto Badd, and DDP gets clotheslined by Maxx Muscle. Badd rolls up DDP for the win.

Winner, and NEW WCW World Television Champion: Johnny B. Badd

Postmatch, Diamond Doll is happy to see Badd win.

Good way to start off the PPV. Both guys did well here, and the crowded was on fire when Badd won. ***

Schiavone recaps the Hogan/Giant feud. He notes that this will be the Giant’s first official match in WCW. Well I guess the Sumo Truck match is the first, while his second match is for the title. That’s pretty damn crazy.

Match two: Zodiac vs. Randy Savage

Where is Zodiac from? The Land of Yin and Yang. This was supposed to be Savage vs. Kamala, but Kamala left days before the PPV itself.

This match went only a minute and a half. The most notable thing here is that a random fan got in the ring, but was subdued by the ref. That was always a pretty big problem in WCW. Savage wins with an elbow drop.

Winner by pinfall: Randy Savage

Not much of a match, so not much of a rating. ¼*

Video package of Kurasawa ‘breaking’ Road Warrior Hawk’s arm.

Match Three: Kurasawa w/ Col. Rob Parker vs. Road Warrior Hawk

Hawk had the upper hand during most of the match, and even took out Col. Rob Parker at one point, but Kurasawa was able to get the win when he had his legs on the ropes.

Winner by pinfall: Kurasawa

*. Lots of punching, clotheslines, and scoops slams from Hawk, but that was about it.

Mean Gene with Macho Man. Savage talking about his match, and Hogan.. He blurts out that Mean Gene’s mustache is crooked o_O. Savage then admits to being very curious about the machine vs. machine match.

Match Four: Mr. J.L. vs. Sabu w/ The Original Sheik

J.L. is very mysterious. Who knew? Sheik’s original stomping grounds was the Michigan area, so he gets a pretty good pop.

Decent high flying action here, that Sabu was able to win. Postmatch, The Sheik threw a fireball at Mr. JL. At least he didn’t throw the fireball at himself. Hey, Tony used vintage! Vintage vintage!

Winner by pinfall: Sabu

Bout the same as their Nitro match a few weeks back. **½.

We go to The Master and The Taskmaster. Oh god, The Master is talking. He yells for a while, and I’m not 100% sure he knows what he’s talking about. Sullivan says Hogan is evil.

Hey, Tony pronounces Yeti Yetay as well.

--
"Roads? Where we're going we don't need roads." Dr. Emmett 'Doc' Brown

Match Five: Meng w/ Kevin Sullivan vs. Lex Luger

Tony theorizes that Luger and the DoD are in cahoots. This is a pretty meh match that got way too much time. Meng hit’s the golden spike on Luger, goes for the three… but Kevin Sullivan kicks Luger, causing the DQ… wtf?

Winner by DQ: Lex Luger

Not a great match, but I guess the story here is that Luger is much more tired going in his match with Savage. ¾*

Match Six: Arn Anderson and Flyin’ Brian vs. Sting and Ric Flair

Flair doesn’t start with this match due to the beat down from Brian and Anderson, so Sting is at it alone. Partway through the match, Flair finally arrives and seems to be on Sting’s side, but turns on Sting!

Winners by DQ: Sting and Flair

Post match, Flair says that the 4 Horsemen are reunited. Though obviously it’s just these three men… for now.

So Flair spent an entire month as face just to troll Sting? Regardless, good match that had a rather obvious ending (obvious in that I knew it was happening >_>) ***¼

Hey it’s Mike Tenay! He’s interviewing Luger. He calls himself the greatest wrestler in WCW… if you discount about three or four hundred people then yeah sure. He was hyping his match with Savage.

More shilling as Heenan and Tony talk about the Sumo Monster Truck match some more Now we have Bischoff and a monster truck expert (Bob something or another) there with Bobby Heenan. Apparently the two trucks are welded together?

'Match' Seven: Hulk Hogan vs. The Giant - Sumo Monster Truck match

Heenan calls it exciting, though I think he's talking about the two women making out in the corner of the arena. Hogan is able to push Giant’s truck out. Ugh.

Winner by.. Pushout?: Hulk Hogan

Post’match’ Giant is angry. Giant is chasing Hogan who is slowly backing up to the edge of the roof. Hulk pushes Giant, and the Giant falls! Hogan runs off yelling for help... For some reason.

Ugh.. This was a terrible idea all around. Really, who thought this was a bright idea? Can I go with -*****? If not, then N/R

Match Eight Randy Savage vs. Lex Luger

Savage wins with an elbow drop after Luger had used the ring ropes for leverage. I thought Luger was the greatest WCW wrestler?

Winner by pinfall: Randy Savage.

Meh, Savage was alright here. *¼

Hogan is out saying what happened in his match against The Giant wasn’t supposed to happen.. Then The Giant comes out as though nothing is wrong with him.

Main Event: Hulk Hogan© w/ Jimmy Hart vs. The Giant w/ The Taskmaster - WCW World Heavyweight Title Match

Giant does pretty well here! It’s a pretty long match that looks as though Hogan is about to win it when Jimmy Hart attacks the referee! Then Hart hits Hogan with the belt, who no sells it. He is choking Hart out when The Giant attacks Hogan from behind.

Giant attacking Hogan as Luger and Savage come out. Savage tries to Help Hogan, but Luger turns heel by helping out the DoD. The Yeti comes out in mummy wrappings.. Wait. Yeti.. Iceberg.. Mummy wrappings. wtf? Now Giant and Yeti are giving a double hum- 'bear hug' to Hogan. After the ‘special’ move Yeti realizes he’s a mummy and starts walking around as a mummy, while Luger applies the Torture Rack to Hogan. Bobby Heenan: “You will never see a PPV like this ever again. You can bet on that.” Yeti and Giant are now ‘bear hugging’ Savage. Jimmy Hart gives The Giant the title, even though he won it by DQ.

Winner by DQ: The Giant

Not a good match. The whole stuff after it was over wasn’t much better. ½*

If you cut out all the Hogan stuff, this may have gotten a 6.5, but with the Hogan stuff, Yeti, Monster Truck crap, it really brings it down. 4/10

--
"Roads? Where we're going we don't need roads." Dr. Emmett 'Doc' Brown