What the World Was Watching: Monday Night Raw - November 17, 1997

by Logan Scisco

-Post-show footage of last week’s main event is shown.  Triple H didn’t get a three count after Shawn Michaels hit Ken Shamrock with Rick Rude’s briefcase because Commissioner Slaughter broke up the count.  In the chaos, Shamrock schoolboyed Michaels and Slaughter counted to three and awarded him the victory.  That’s some WCW-type booking there.

-Jim Ross and Jim Cornette are in the booth and they are taped from an undisclosed location.

-Intercontinental Champion Steve Austin comes out and the crowd gives him a “hell yeah” to beat up Rocky Maivia.  Austin goads Maivia to come down, but Maivia sends the rest of the Nation of Domination.  D-Lo Brown eats a Stunner, but all of that is a distraction that allows Maivia to steal the Intercontinental belt.  After that, Austin lets Ross know that he is going to be around for the whole show to make sure that Maivia pays.

-In the last first round match of the Karate Fighters Holiday Tournament, Sunny beats George and Adam.

-Opening Contest:  Jerry “the King” Lawler (w/Brian Christopher) beats Marc Mero (w/Sable) by disqualification when Sable interferes at 4:41:

This opening match does have a storyline, with Lawler trying to avenge Brian Christopher’s defeat to Mero last month.  Butterbean is back this week and Mero gets in his face before the match.  Christopher continues a streak of being on commentary for the opening RAW match.  Lawler and Mero box for while and that goes as well for Lawler as you might expect and then Christopher tries to come onto Sable at ringside.  Mero isn’t happy about that, but the distraction allows Lawler to hit a piledriver.  Before the pin can be registered, though, Sable delicately climbs in and breaks it up.  After the match, Mero gives Lawler a TKO and then berates Sable for costing him the match.  This is the first match that Lawler has won in a while and while the wrestling wasn’t great, the stuff that happened outside of the match was pretty well played.  Rating:  *

-Ross recaps Montreal and interviews Vince McMahon about it.  This is where McMahon gives his famous account of the incident where he says that he didn’t screw Bret Hart, but that “Bret Hart screwed Bret Hart.”  I remember being so confused about this stuff as a kid, but I can appreciate this segment much more looking back at it.

-“Road Dogg” Jesse James & “Bad Ass” Billy Gunn defeat Savio Vega & Miguel Perez by disqualification when Jesus & Jose interfere at 45 seconds:

James and Gunn come out in some of Los Boricuas ring gear and their attire, which they seemingly stole before the show went on the air.  Savio and Miguel attack James and Gunn as they are making their offensive entrance, but before this really gets going the other Boricuas interfere and they beat down James and Gunn.

-A video package hypes Ken Shamrock.

-Shamrock giving Triple H a belly-to-belly suplex is the Lazer Tag Slam of the Week.

-Sunny comes out to be the guest referee for our next match.

-Mini Tag Match:  Max Mini, Mini Nova & Mini Tauras wrestle El Torito, Tarantula & El Battalion to a no contest at 2:50:

Tauras is an interesting mini, as he uses a series of legdrags to befuddle his opponents.  There’s lots of flipping and flying and Sunny has to leapfrog El Torito.  Suddenly the lights go out and Kane comes down to the ring to a huge pop, but this isn’t a WrestleMania 2 incident since the minis flee the ring and hide behind the commentating team in a funny spot.  The Headbangers come to the minis aid, but Kane doesn’t sell getting a boombox broken over his head and each of the Headbangers eat a Tombstone.  If Kane had Tombstoned Max Mini this would’ve been a ***** segment.

-Rick Rude introduces D-Generation X.  This is a notable segment because this is when Rude jumped to WCW, so he appeared on a live episode of Monday Nitro and this taped episode, thereby becoming the only superstar of the Monday Night Wars to appear on both shows on the same night if you don’t include the simulcast that happened on the last edition of Nitro in 2001.   Knowing this piece of trivia helped me win tickets to a WWE house show a few years ago.  Cornette alludes to this on commentary by noting that Rude “gets around.”  Anyway, WWF Champion Shawn Michaels says he can’t wait to beat up Bret Hart’s friends now that he has run Bret out of the company and Triple H calls out Commissioner Slaughter.  Triple H says DX makes the rules in the WWF and insults Slaughter’s manhood.  When Slaughter attacks Helmsley, DX lays him out.

-Light Heavyweight Championship Tournament First Round Match:  Scott Taylor pins Eric Shelley with a flying DDT at 5:26:

Jerry Lynn was supposed to face Shelley, but has been replaced in the tournament by Taylor with no reason given.  Jeff Jarrett calls in during the show and says he is going to return on RAW next week.  Shelley looks much better here than he did on a RAW earlier in the year, but that might be because Taylor is dominating the action.  If either of these guys had more build heading in, the crowd would’ve been into what is a pretty proficient contest.  Taylor advances and faces the winner of Flash Flanagan-Brian Christopher in the semi-finals.  Rating:  **¼

-Marc Mero comes out with Sable and demands an interview.  Ross complies and Mero alleges that Butterbean is stalking Sable and challenges him.  Butterbean gets in the ring and pushes Mero down, but WWF officials intervene before anything else happens.  Mero’s ring work deteriorated significantly by this point, but he had great mic skills and did a great job playing his character here.

-A second part of Ross’s interview with Vince McMahon over Montreal is shown.  McMahon says he would welcome Bret back to the company, but they would have to sit down and have a clear understanding of each other’s motivations.  He says he’s already over Montreal and that part of Bret will always be in the WWF and he’ll remember the good times over the bad.

-Vader-Goldust is scheduled to take place, but Goldust comes out with Gerald Brisco and says that he has medical documentation that he cannot compete.  As Vader argues with Brisco over the documentation, Goldust pulls an object that looks like a hammer out of his sling and blasts Vader with it.  Vader quivers after the blow and sells it pretty well as Goldust marches off.

-Call 1-900-737-4WWF to hear all of the latest news and gossip!

-Commissioner Slaughter comes out and orders Triple H to face him at In Your House.

-Dude Love beats The Rock” Rocky Maivia (w/The Nation of Domination) by disqualification when the Nation of Domination interfere at 4:49 shown:

Maivia makes sure to clarify on the mic that this is a non-title match is a hilarious bit, since he is sporting the belt he stole from Steve Austin earlier in the show.  This is a standard TV main event, which is butchered by the commercial break.  Maivia has such natural crowd heat in this role that it is unreal.  Love hits Sweet Shin Music, but that triggers interference from the Nation.  The Nation beats down Love until Steve Austin comes out to help, but Maivia escapes with the title belt in the midst of the chaos.  Rating:  **

The Final Report Card:  The McMahon segments are really interesting from a business perspective and to hear some of McMahon’s arguments about Montreal.  I know that I criticized the company for not diving into Montreal on their last show, but showing the McMahon segments on this taped RAW was a stroke of genius because it gave fans something to flip back to that was interesting and yet could not be spoiled.  The rest of the show was effective in building up storylines for the next In Your House pay-per-view, as Mero continues his spiral into being paranoid about Sable and Triple H is strengthening his feud with Commissioner Slaughter.  Enjoyable show for what it was.

Monday Night War Rating:  3.1 (vs. 4.1 for Nitro)

Show Evaluation:  Thumbs Up