What the World Was Watching: In Your House - D-Generation X

by Logan Scisco

-Jim Ross and Jerry “the King” Lawler are doing commentary and they are live from Springfield, Massachusetts.

-Opening Light Heavyweight Championship Tournament Finals Contest:  Taka Michinoku beats “Too Sexy” Brian Christopher with a Michinoku Driver to win the title at 12:03:

The predictable light heavyweight tournament finals ends here and I think they would have been better served using a round robin format to crown the champion than this.  They use a refreshing formula at the beginning of the match whereby Christopher tosses Michinoku around for a couple of minutes before Michinoku rallies, which gets the crowd into the match.  Christopher takes a nasty dive into the guardrail and cuts his lip open.  The match has an irregular flow because Christopher still wants to work a slow, Memphis style and Michinoku prefers to work faster sequences and transitions between moves.  Christopher completely kills the crowd by toying with Michinoku seven minutes in and this ends with the usual “you miss your finisher and I hit mine” sequence that the WWF is known for.  After the match, WWF officials present Taka with the title, but I couldn’t help but think at the time “what next?”  The division didn’t have anyone to elevate as a credible challenger for Michinoku’s belt and as a result, the division was dead on arrival.  Rating:  **½

-Kevin Kelly and the Jackal hype the Superstar line.

-Jose, Miguel Perez & Jesus defeat The Disciples of Apocalypse when Jose pins Chainz after Perez hits Chainz with a somersault leg drop at 7:46:

The Boricuas do a horrid rap on the way to the ring that makes R-Truth’s old gig completely comprehensible.  You can give them credit for trying, but 1998 Konnan this was not.  Since Crush is gone, DOA is down to only three members so we get a six man tag.  The match has nothing but lots of kicking and punching and the only highlight is that Perez feigns a knee injury off of a flying axe handle and runs in behind the referee’s back and alters the finish after Chainz hits a Death Valley driver.  Rating:  ¼*

-Butterbean tells Dok Hendrix that he’s ready to take care of Marc Mero tonight.

-A video package recaps the Marc Mero-Butterbean feud.

-Michael Cole interviews Sable, who he says was at Butterbean’s undercard fight the night before and held up his title belt.  Sable says that she’s in Marc Mero’s corner tonight and Mero interrupts the interview, telling her she doesn’t have permission to talk, and he pledges to knock out Butterbean.

-Toughman Contest:  Butterbean beats Marc Mero (w/Sable) by disqualification when Mero uses a low blow and hits Butterbean with a stool in the fourth round:

The match is scheduled for four, two minute rounds.  For those unfamiliar with Butterbean, he was a Toughman Contest superstar that eventually became a professional boxer and won the IBA Super Heavyweight title in April 1997, which he never lost.  The fans quickly turn on this, for obvious reasons.  They might get into it if it was a legit fight, but the biggest mark can tell there’s something amiss when Mero throws out a high knee in the second round and starts choking Butterbean behind the referee’s back with the tape that holds the ropes together.  They also didn’t bother to have any judges so that’s another clue the fix is in.  They book this to make Mero more of a jerk, but the whole exercise made Butterbean look weak with his obviously pulled punches.  That said, I would rather have seen Mero fight Butterbean at WrestleMania XV than Bart Gunn since Mero was a Golden Gloves champion and would have had a fighting chance.

-Kevin Kelly is in the WWF America Online center with Dude Love.  I can’t help but have the old AOL dial tone go through my head right now.

-The Artist Formerly Known as Goldust comes out with Luna Vachon, with her leading him on a leash.  He’s sporting a pink attire, pink hair, and white face paint.  He reads Dr. Seuss’s Green Eggs and Ham until Luna pushes him down and drags him away.  Really, really weird.

-Cole interviews the Legion of Doom and Hawk says that Road Dogg Jesse James and Bad Ass Billy Gunn remind him of boogers in his nose.  Was there a contest for oddest promo segment tonight?

-WWF Tag Team Championship Match:  “The Road Dogg” Jesse James & “Bad Ass” Billy Gunn (Champions) defeat The Legion of Doom by disqualification when Hawk blasts James and Gunn with a bucket at 10:35:

James and Gunn take stalling to a whole new level, as they restart their ring entrance several times since the LOD won’t cede a clear line of access into the ring.  The LOD dominate until Gunn blasts Hawk with a cooler, which Lawler then completely writes off by reminding the fans that it is just made out of styrofoam.  Neither team does anything to make this interesting until the LOD prepare to give James a Doomsday Device, but Henry Godwinn breaks it up by hitting Animal with a bucket.  That bucket eventually finds its way into Hawk’s hands and like an idiot he hits the champions and nearly decks the referee and gets his team disqualified.  So, what is it going to take to end this awful LOD-Godwinns feud?  The tag division is really running on fumes at this point and the LOD are clearly past their expiration date. Rating:  DUD

-Call 815-734-1161 to get WWF the Music Volume 2.  It will cost you $20 for CD and $15 for tape with $4 shipping & handling.

-A video package hypes the boot camp match between Sergeant Slaughter and Triple H.

-Cole interviews Triple H and Chyna and Triple H is carrying a special “survival kit” for tonight’s boot camp match that has a comb, depends, and some other geriatric equipment.

-Jim Cornette interviews Sergeant Slaughter, who promises to beat Triple H up in the next match.

-Boot Camp Match:  Triple H (w/Chyna) beats Sergeant Slaughter with a Pedigree on a chair at 17:40:

This is actually Triple H’s first pay-per-view match in the United States since becoming a member of D-Generation X.  Slaughter comes out to the Patriot’s theme music, which is the theme later given to Kurt Angle.  A smart fan in the audience holds up a sign that makes it onto camera in the early going that asks a great question:  “Who booked this?”  Slaughter is too old to give this a good effort, as he is gingerly bumping around ringside and the crowd is dead silent.  The bump of the match goes to the guest timekeeper, who Helmsley takes out to get access to the ring bell.  Even that generates very little reaction.  By the way, Slaughter takes off his belt to choke Helmsley early in the match, but that causes him to keep pulling up his pants throughout this encounter.  The only person getting anything resembling a reaction is Chyna, who breaks up Slaughter’s Cobra Clutch and knocks out the referee.  Slaughter immobilizes her with powder to the eyes and re-applies the Cobra Clutch, but Chyna breaks that up with a low blow, and that leads to the end.  This was meant to help get Triple H over, but that’s tough to do when no one cares about the major storyline of Helmsley insulting Slaughter’s family.  I can’t believe someone thought it was a good idea to give this eighteen minutes.  Rating:  ½*

-Cole interviews Jeff Jarrett, who says that he is ready for his return to the ring.

-Jeff Jarrett defeats The Undertaker by disqualification when Kane interferes and chokeslams Jarrett at 6:53:

So this is the culmination of the “I’m not getting any respect around here” storyline that Jarrett has been harping for weeks.  His entrance music is horrid, with some generic music dubbed over by Jarrett talking about how great he is.  Definitely not one of Jim Johnston’s finer works.  The Undertaker squashes Jarrett for five minutes until Kane shows up and confronts his brother.  Kane strikes the Undertaker, but the Undertaker refuses to retaliate and Kane leaves.  Jarrett tries to put the Undertaker in the figure-four, but the Undertaker chokeslams him to get some of his heat back.  As you can imagine, this did nothing for Jarrett and he went back to his country music gimmick within the next few months.  He didn’t really get a reaction until Debra, who if you recall he blasted as a "dumb blonde" in his return promo, was brought into the company as his valet.  Rating:  ¼*

-Cole interviews Mark Henry, who is sitting with Milton Bradley executives.  Henry says he should return very soon to in-ring competition and he wants Steve Austin to win the next match.

-A video package recaps the Steve Austin-Rock feud.

-Hendrix interviews the Rock and the Nation of Domination.  The only notable thing is that this is the first time that I remember the Rock using the “People’s Eyebrow” in a promo.

-Intercontinental Championship Match:  “Stone Cold” Steve Austin (Champion) beats The Rock (w/The Nation of Domination) with a Stone Cold Stunner at 5:30:

After being in a coma for more than an hour, the crowd wakes up for this one by showering the Rock with “Rocky sucks” chants and going nuts for Austin.  This is the memorable contest where Austin shows up in his Austin 3:16 pickup truck and proceeds to beat up the entire Nation of Domination with it.  The crowd eats all of that up and thinks it’s the greatest thing they’ve ever seen.  You can tell that Austin is still working cautiously because of the neck injury, though.  This is the match where Austin started to show more of a brawling style and it is also the debut of the Rock taking off his elbow pad for the People’s Elbow (which is not yet named).  Austin accidentally gives the referee a Stone Cold Stunner, but he isn’t disqualified and a second referee counts the fall when the Rock takes a Stunner shortly thereafter.  A quick, entertaining match that provided a small taste of things to come between these two.  Austin also has his Intercontinental title belt back, but he’s well above the title at this point.  Rating:  **½

-Kelly and the Jackal hype the Superstar line some more.

-A video package hypes the Shawn Michaels-Ken Shamrock WWF title match.

-Cornette interviews Ken Shamrock, who says that he has a lot of experience in pay-per-view fights and says Michaels will be squealing like a baby.

-WWF Champion Shawn Michaels cuts a generic promo on Shamrock.  You can tell Michaels hard lifestyle is really starting to catch up with him because he looks awful, much like he did in mid-1995.

-WWF Championship Match:  Ken Shamrock defeats “The Heartbreak Kid” Shawn Michaels (Champion w/D-Generation X) by disqualification when DX interferes at 18:28:

This is Shamrock’s only main event title match during his WWF tenure, which is somewhat surprising based on where his 1998 push seemed to be taking him.  Despite being pushed hard the last two months, with unofficial tap out wins over Bret Hart and Michaels, Shamrock just doesn’t seem credible in this spot because of how he had been booked up to that point.  I mean, wrestling the British Bulldog, weaker parts of the Nation of Domination, beating a depushed Vader, and making Billy Gunn tap out are hardly the accomplishments of a top talent.  Michaels wrestles a very toned down style in this match and it just doesn’t work against Shamrock, who doesn’t have the moveset to keep the fans interested if Michaels stays grounded.  DX’s interference doesn’t even illicit much outrage, unless Chyna is the one doing the damage.  Shamrock counters Sweet Chin Music with a belly-to-belly, but when he applies the ankle lock DX runs in and Michaels keeps the title.  I hate disqualification finishes in main event championship matches, especially because this didn’t lead to Shamrock getting another title shot.  Michaels also seemed to be going through the motions for whatever reason.  Rating:  **½

-After the match, Michaels poses on the ring apron as DX beats on Shamrock, but he’s knocked off and through a table by Owen Hart in street clothes and Owen pounds away until DX gets near him and he flees through the crowd.  Unfortunately, this didn’t lead to anything since Michaels and Austin did not want to work with Owen for separate, and arguably justified, reasons.

The Final Report Card:  Owen’s return was a nice way to end the pay-per-view, but this entire show was dull.  All night long you sit through matches and you figure that Shawn Michaels will put on a great performance in the main event and save the show, but he comes out and gives a poor effort along with most of the roster.  Austin’s match with the Rock was the highlight, but it was way too short and at the time I worried about Austin’s health and if he’d ever be able to have 15-20 minute matches again and if not, how the WWF was going to book around that.  This show received the lowest buyrate of the year, which isn’t shocking since Michaels-Shamrock seemed more of a RAW main event and the roster was really weak at this time.  Yes, the future star power was there, but it would take a few more months to take the New Age Outlaws, Mick Foley, the Rock, Triple H, and others to a higher plane.

Attendance:  6,538

Buyrate:  0.44

Show Evaluation:  Thumbs Down