The SmarK Rant for Monday Night RAW – 07.11.94
Live from Bushkill, PA
Your hosts are Jim Ross & Randy Savage.
WWF World title: Bret Hart v. 1-2-3 Kid
The New Foundation has words for Bret before the match, but get chased back by the referees. Man, why can’t the family just all get along and maybe torment Steve Austin? This show is supposedly live but the canned heat is all over the place. Like, really bad. Kid takes Bret down with an armdrag and controls the arm, holding onto a hammerlock through Bret’s attempts to reverse it. Bret finally elbows him down and goes to a chinlock as JR is already busting out the sports metaphors. Kid monkey-flips him and follows with a mule kick to put Bret on the floor and we take a break. Back with Kid working the armbar, but Bret puts him down with a knee and pounds him with forearms in the corner. Neckbreaker gets two. Bret stomps him down very heelishly in the corner and poor Kid bumps around and builds sympathy. Crossbody gets two for Kid, but Bret beats him down again. Kid with a crucifix, but Bret blocks it and falls on top for the pin…but Kid’s foot was on the ropes, so Bret doesn’t want the win. So we take a break and the match MUST CONTINUE. Back with Bret cranking on a chinlock, but Kid gets a backslide for two. Bret puts him down again and gets a DDT for two, but he goes up and lands on the foot. Kid comes back with a spinkick and fires away with the kicks in the corner and a dropkick. Kid with a moonsault press for two. Powerbomb and he goes up with the Lightning Legdrop for two. Old school Kid! He dumps Bret and follows with a dive, but Bret catches him coming down and they both crash and burn. Back in, Kid misses a senton off the top and Bret gets the Sharpshooter, but Kid is immediately in the ropes. To the top and Bret gets a superplex, but Kid reverses in mid-air for two. Blind charge misses and Kid wipes out again, allowing Bret to bulldog him and go up. Kid slams him off and goes up himself, but lands in the Sharpshooter at 25:36. Well, you can’t say the Kid didn’t give it his best. ****1/2 This was probably the best match in RAW history up until that point, and certainly until 97.
Summerslam Report with Todd, and apparently the main event is Undertaker v. Undertaker. Even Todd is like “WTF?”
Crush v. Matt Hardy
Matt gets some gymnastics in before Crush superkicks him and adds a press slam. Backbreaker finishes at 1:23 as Savage takes great delight in Crush destroying Hardy for some reason.
Razor Ramon v. Barry Horowitz
Razor works the arm as JR is forced to push a storyline where Jack Tunney is hiring a detective to figure out why there are two Undertakers and why they’re wrestling each other in the main event of their second biggest show of the year. Horowitz gets some shit in and Razor puts him away with the blockbuster and a small package at 2:55. That’s a different way to finish.
The King’s Court with Ted Dibiase, although it’s pre-taped from what looks like a doctor’s office somewhere. Dibiase claims that Lex Luger is bought and paid for. Lex Luger would never take dirty money and join the other side without notice like that! Wait a sec…
IRS v. Ray Hudson
Hudson gets a crossbody, but IRS puts him down and gets his abdominal stretch, then works the leg while dripping sweat on the poor geek. STF finishes at 3:45. Do I have to sit through a boring IRS squash every week?
Next week: Diesel v. Lex Luger for the IC title!
Enough with these 4 star matches, I want Diesel and Luger doing chinlocks and "hug the injured ribs" spots, now!
ReplyDeleteSummer of '94 WWF: It's Kliq-errific!
ReplyDeleteIt's no wonder I never tuned into RAW during 94. I don't think it started becoming a SHOW SHOW til 95. One of my earliest RAW memories is Sid turning on HBK the night after Mania and thinking that HBK was seriously hurt at the hands or feet, for that matter, of Owen Hart.
ReplyDeleteSavage takes great delight in Crush destroying Hardy for some reason.
ReplyDeleteI just get the feeling no one liked the Hardy's around this time. Without Michael Hayes, I doubt they would have ever been hired. How'd they get so friendly anyway?
Dibiase was so misused during this time. They got it right in his first run and did everything wrong here.
I won't lie, as a fan of the Naked Gun movies, I enjoyed Leslie Nielson trying to find the Undertaker.
ReplyDeleteHey! This RAW was on my ninth birthday!
ReplyDeleteYeah, I got nothin'.
Holy shit, the Hardys have been wrestling for 20 years. I feel old now.
ReplyDeleteThe Summerslam entrance was actually enjoyable with the light show and what not.
ReplyDeleteI wish I had an evil laugh like dibiase.
ReplyDeleteThe match is surprisingly good, from what I remember.
ReplyDeleteI think the big thing that hampered DiBiase (other than destroying the credibility of wrestlers he managed) was that it was obvious DiBiase wouldn't take any bumps so there'd never be any sort of comeuppance for the guy. They should of just stuck him as a full time commentator.
ReplyDeleteThey at least brought the goods in the ring so hard to say anything against them when they were mainly carrying the company around this time along with the Harts.
ReplyDeleteI wish they did an extended program in 95 when Diesel won the world title.
ReplyDeleteA heel Total Package vs face Diesel could've been good. Better than Mabel at least.
ReplyDeleteI was a huge Kid mark at the same so I was praying to the Gods and promising to go to church if he just won the world title from Bret.
ReplyDeleteAnd in hindsight it's pretty surprising how much Bret gave Kid here because Bret has always been protective of his babyface character and he must have known this match would have made him look bad and had some fans turn against him.
Would have been better than most of Nash's challengers.
ReplyDeleteNow that's a real opener, not Crush-Tatanka.
ReplyDeleteI thought Hardys were well liked in their early days? It was only when they got into drugs/became delusional that they started rubbing people the wrong way I thought.
ReplyDeleteI was there! My first ever Raw.
ReplyDeleteAm I the only one that loved Savage's commentary during the Crush/Hardy match? When he first shouted "GOOOOOOOOOOOOOAL!" at the superkick, I couldn't control my laughter. Having Gorilla throw the World Cup spin on it made it even funnier for some reason.
ReplyDeleteAlso, inb4 drug commentary.
Kid/Bret is one of my favorites.
ReplyDeleteDefinitely. When Diesel was motivated, he was pretty good.
ReplyDeleteHe liked Waltman a LOT as a wrestler and wanted to help get him over on a bigger level.
ReplyDeleteAnd really, Bret was always willing to work heelish when going against other faces. Look at his matches against Undertaker and Diesel, where he totally works like a heel.
DAMN! You got nothing for your 9th birthday? Thats pretty low.
ReplyDeleteLuger is one of the worst wrestlers on the planet from 94-95, but Diesel was okay with the right opponent. There was just a Luger match from like 2 weeks ago (Martel?) that went like 20 minutes and was abysmal.
ReplyDeleteDiesel doing suicide dives over the top rope is often forgotten. No way he went balls out against Luger, tho.
ReplyDeleteI remember it being a very energetic power match. Also, Savage had a good comment really putting Diesel over. Since Lex was basically a main eventer, and Diesel was just IC champ, Savage said "Give Luger credit for hanging in there against the power of Diesel!"
ReplyDeleteHe got to pin Kid twice and look like the "good guy" by doing a restart in the process. Bret was mad over, too. Kid wasn't on his level.
ReplyDeleteHe was stuck with a bunch of crap that no one would take seriously.
ReplyDeleteUnderfaker (lol!)
IRS - Not beating Undertaker
Bundy - passed his prime
Volkoff - LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL
Tatanka - Not with how he was used when he turned heel.
Bigelow - Maybe. That's about it though.
They were kind of gearing that way before Lex left though right? Didn't Lex help Diesel in a couple of his matches which would have led to the eventual heel turn on Big Daddy Cool?
ReplyDeleteJust watched Bret/Kid, that's a damn fine match. Why don't they do something similiar today? On a RAW have the WWE Champion put the title on the line against a midcarder and have the midcarder take them to the limit.
ReplyDeleteWhat I don't get: Waltman was getting pushed fairly consistently up to this match, then there's no real follow-up. Was someone grooming him for a larger role and then Vince waltzed back into the company was all "His thighs aren't thick enough!"
ReplyDeleteJust watched that RAW a few days ago. Excluding the cop-out finish, it's actually quite good.
ReplyDeleteWorst? Look who he was working with. Yokozuna, Crush, Tatanka, and then teaming with Davey against the likes of the Harris Brothers. He didn't exactly have much to work with.
ReplyDeleteFollowing this match he had a DQ win over Owen where he looked like he was about to get the submission victory before Neidhart interfered, which is weird because Owen still had his big title match at Summerslam coming up. He had weird booking because for the most part he was a jobber, but he was always protected as well. He was booked the same way as the Hardy Boyz in the early 2000's.
ReplyDeleteIf Bryan hadn't have gotten himself hurt they could of easily done this with him as they could have done a fighting champion gimmick where every week Bryan makes some low card guy look like a million dollars.
ReplyDeleteI just feel like it shouldn't have been that hard to hook him up with another high-flier or a guy like Razor to give him a run with the tag belts, especially given the lack of depth that division had at the time.
ReplyDeleteNot only did Bret carry the Kid to a classic match, afterwards, in the dressing-room, he explained to him the birds and the bees. To this day, Waltman still credits Bret with calming him down when he discovered hair in places he didn't have hair before.
ReplyDeleteToday's midcarders are 1994's job guys, that's why. Dolph Ziggler is barely one step above John Paul.
ReplyDeleteI don't think Luger would have turned because they already did the big heel turn with Bulldog. I suspect if Luger would have stayed they would have run with Diesel/Luger vs Mabel/Bulldog on the houseshow circuit.
ReplyDeleteJesus, I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy.
ReplyDeleteOh yeah totally agree, Kid should have been a full time tag guy and been pushed as one of the top babyface teams in the company. There were a lot of reasons for this 1) Kid could work like Ricky Morton where he could have carried any team to a good match 2) it was the only division he had credibility in as he was too small at the time to be IC champion 3) Waltman was getting hurt a lot so working in a tag team would have worked in his favor because he could let his tag partner do most of the work on the nights he felt banged up.
ReplyDeleteI was expecting the punchline to be Waltman thanking Bret because without him, he wouldn't have found true love with Chyna or something.
ReplyDeleteHa, I know. I haven't heard any dirtsheet rumors what Luger would have done if he hadn't had left, so I suspect WWF didn't really have any plans for him and he would have continued aimlessly in the midcard. It's why I totally sided with Luger jumping ship the way he did because WWF was killing his career.
ReplyDeleteThat's what I was HOPING they would do with him after WrestleMania.
ReplyDeleteSo much for high hopes.
They'd go on to repeat this formula an awful lot, giving athletic little guys the plucky "aww shucks, ALMOST, but not quite" runs against main event guys and rarely ever followed through. I want to say that Mysterio, Jeff Hardy and CM Punk are the only guys that had that arc end in a world title.
ReplyDeleteI know Jeff was world champion, but WWE obviously had no confidence in his reign, which I always thought was a shame because I believe he could have carried the company.
ReplyDeleteThat's one thing I always loved about Bret: the willingness to go heel in matches like this.
ReplyDeleteOne of Raw's best matches for years. I remember watching this match as it aired. Even as. Kid, I knew a great match when I saw one.
ReplyDeleteThey tried him on commentary once or twice during the rotating color guy phase of RAW. He was okay, I guess.
ReplyDeleteI know he was nothing special as commentator, but no matter how average he was at commentating he was a far worse manager. I think being president/GM would have also worked for Ted after Tunney left. Sadly, I don't think DiBiase could have added anything positive to the WWF on-screen product after he retired. The only thing he would have worked well at was being an agent.
ReplyDeleteI think it makes sense that if Kid could hang with Bret Hart he could also hang with the top challenger (especially considering Owen Hart, just like Bret, is not that much bigger than him and even has a kind-of similar in ring style).
ReplyDeleteI still have very fond memories of the HHH v Taka match for that very reason.
ReplyDeleteyes! I would have liked Kid and Jannety to have an extended time as a team. his teams with Bob Holly and Sid were great as well.
ReplyDeleteHang with him and have a great match yes, but not have a almost clean win over the guy when Owen needed to be protected at that time. Plus it wasn't like Kid was pushed as a main eventer afterwards so WWF nearly destroyed their Summerslam main event buildup over nothing.
ReplyDeleteisn't that pretty much what they did with Randy Orton vs. Antonio Cesaro?
ReplyDeleteBut didn't the Bulldog turn happen AFTER Lex jumped?
ReplyDeleteJannetty was awesome, but was flaky. They really should have stuck with Holly long-term.
ReplyDeleteKind of, difference being is that Cesaro was ready to break through as a main eventer. The thing with Kid and and Taka (as Andrew noted) was that they were essentially jobbers and all of a suden made you believe they could become world champion. If Cesaro won the world title, it wouldn't be too surprising.
ReplyDeleteThe network needs to hype their product better. They should be promoting what they are putting up and what they are going to be putting up such as this show. a short little video package to play on the stream and on Raw (it's 3 hours long) hyping "hey...we have this holy shit match you probably haven't seen going up on such and such date"
ReplyDeleteHappened before. The turn took place a week or 2 before Summerslam and Luger showed up at Summerslam.
ReplyDeleteif Cesaro had won the world title in february, it would definitely have been surprising.
ReplyDeleteThey had Kofi do just that with Orton a couple times.
ReplyDeleteOkay, a little surprising yes, and a feel good moment for sure, but at the same time WWE have been protecting the guy and slowly building him up as a main eventer whereas Kid just came of losing to Jeff Jarrett on Superstars.
ReplyDeleteKofi was depressing. With Kid and Taka we knew them taking the world champion to the limit was a one time thing but with Kofi I believed they had some big plans for him.
ReplyDeleteMuch like Van Dam, no matter how popular he was/could've stayed he would've done SOMETHING to fuck up/embarrass the company while on top & they would've had to let him go. Didn't he get busted like a month after voluntarily leaving WWE or some such?
ReplyDeleteNo, it was well into his TNA run. He got arrested for selling like a jar of pain pills to a cop posing as a fan, or something else ridiculous like that. I'm amazed he didn't do any time.
ReplyDeleteHe did yeah, but without a magic 8-ball you can't predict things like that, you have to book in the here and now and Hardy was the most over guy in the company and one of the top merch sellers and a guy that was having good matches every week.
ReplyDeleteIf either can go in the ring they should do this (or already have) with a Rose or Bo Dallas. after all the hype videos come up with some reason why they get in their with the champ. Have a long great match to show off what they can do and have them come "this close"...you've made a star in 1 night...or you know...beat Sin Cara after selling for Sin Cara for a few minutes works too.
ReplyDeleteFrom what I remember it was soon after he left the WWE and I believe the story was a fan asking him if he wanted pills and Jeff gave him his address so when the pills arrived at his house, that's how he got busted.
ReplyDeleteGood idea to get a rookie over fast but the only problem is that Bo and Rose are pretty limited workers and not talented enough to make something like that work.
ReplyDeleteI also believe it's harder for "us" to buy into something like that.
ReplyDeletedo you remember the match between Sandow and Cena at the beginning of this year? Sandow got a good chunk of his offense in etc. ... but did any of "us" ever think he would beat Cena? (the only way I can see someone like Sandow getting a win over Cena these days is if the current guy Cena was feuding with stood on the ramp and they did that distraction/rollup-finish)
Luger/Martel was OK, but really dull. Luger vs. Diesel wasn't a all-time classic, but **1/2 for them is 4-stars for anyone else. They worked well (enough) together and were motivated. That would be a GOOD **1/2, not a "match was alright, but boring as ass" rating like Headshrinkers/Quebecers.
ReplyDeleteYeah really. Like when they uploaded all the Clashes. You'd think during Michael Coal's "shill the network" segment on Raw he'd mention "And guess what WCW fans....." or something like that.
ReplyDeleteI agree completely that you have to book in the here & now but with someone like Jeff Hardy that shit wouldn't have exactly been surprising. I'm still kind miffed about the way they treated RVD because, yeah, he got caught with a bunch of pot right after becoming champion, but it's not like they weren't profiting from his image as a stoner already.
ReplyDeleteexactly, I understand the PPVs are the biggest selling point but at this point they should be hyping everything and anything that might get another subscriber. I mean unless I was watching all these RAWs or going to a site like this you wouldn't know this particular raw has an amazing match.
ReplyDeleteHell...you might even get a buyer for todd pettengill's collarless denim shirt alone.
ReplyDeleteHa I can imagine Cole saying "guess what WCW fans" and Vince having a heart attack and screaming in his ear.
ReplyDeleteI haven't seen either of their stuff...crazy me I just assumed if they were putting this much into their development guys...they would be able to go in the ring. So lets say "when Generico finally debuts"
ReplyDeleteOr reading glasses.....
ReplyDeletehttp://24.media.tumblr.com/a12e30a2dac22820368b7d172ad8cca1/tumblr_n3ilkbsicz1tv3mi9o1_1280.jpg
Well with his Network performing well below expected, he better start embracing WCW's archive and anything else that can get him more subscribers.
ReplyDeleteSure some guys aren't surprising when they run into trouble with the law and RVD was very open about his pot use, but WWE still put the title on him anyway and that's what wrestling should be, giving a guy a run at the top if you believe they can make you a ton of money and if they embarrass the company, it's a risk you should be willing to take.
ReplyDeleteThey also need to start selling those mid 90's Razor Ramon shirts.
ReplyDeleteYeah, Generico can make it work for sure. And I don't want to say the development system is bad, it can be good, just that some guys pick up the wrestling thing quicker than others and Rose and Bo aren't at that level.
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with you, but I can't imagine Vince ever embracing WCW despite the fact he owns it now.
ReplyDeletePeople seem to like NXT so I wasn't besmirching it either just the fact that guys should probably continue to stay in "development" if they still need to develop.
ReplyDeleteI watch NXT here and there and not religiously. I've only seen one Rose match, but he just strikes me as an average worker. I've seen quite a bit of Bo and he's been in development for a long time now and it's unlikely he'll improve as he hasn't improved that much in the time I've seen him, but I guess WWE's reasoning is that Bo's been in development for awhile now, might aswell promote him to the main roster and see if he sinks or swims, which is reasonable.
ReplyDeleteThe Lex/Diesel match on the next week's raw is pretty strong too.
ReplyDeleteGive him Bam Bam, Sid, and a heel Kid, and he'd be fine.
ReplyDeleteI'm just getting the impression that them being green teenagers, with no dues paid wouldn't endear them to the roster. Just a guess though, could be completely off.
ReplyDeleteThey should have huge network video packages on Raw all the time. Even things to catch people up on stuff like Legends House.
ReplyDeleteI think they did for a while?
ReplyDeleteI think it was a fair prediction to assume Jeff Hardy had an 8 ball.
ReplyDeleteHHH also did a pretty good match with Tajiri. He tried the formula with Spike Dudley but it was 2002 and HHH sucked that year.
ReplyDeleteYou're like six weeks older than me. Lot of 85ish birthdays around these parts?
ReplyDeleteI actually think he would have made for a killer heel president/authority figure role, if that had been a thing back then.
ReplyDeleteSeems like it would have done better on PPV. One thing that's funny to me is the blow away positive reviews for Summerslam 95 in the WON then. Even as a mark kid I thought the show was a turd and the Mabel main event was a joke. They were also nuts not to finish with Shawn/Razor II.
ReplyDeleteHe was basically in the Dolph Ziggler "damaged goods" category.
ReplyDeleteIt was a good PPV. Most of the guys brought their working boots with
ReplyDeletethem and most of the matches were good with everyone trying. Plus it had
a really good build up too. It only doesn't age well because the Mabel
stuff never went anywhere and he soon went back to being a jobber.
Man, that Bret/Kid match is unbelievably good. It's astonishing how good Waltman could be with the right opponent, which is all the more upsetting that he got paired off with weak shit for years instead- he never matched this level of quality again, despite being a contemporary of some other really good workers.
ReplyDelete