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The SmarK Rant for WWF Monday Night RAW– 01.31.94

(Once again, a reminder that these are NOT new rants.  They would have been written about five years ago.  Once the Network starts showing the RAWs from the end of Feb 94, I’ll pick them up again from there.) 

The SmarK Legacy Rant for Monday Night RAW - January 31 1994

- Live from Bushkill, PA.

- Your hosts are Vince & IRS.

- We're two weeks removed from Royal Rumble 94, and yeah it's been a while since I've done these so hopefully I can get back into the groove again with them.

Marty Jannetty v. Johnny Polo

1-2-3 Kid is at ringside, sporting a mightily broken leg, as this was originally advertised as Kid v. Polo even though they knew damn well that Kid was injured. Polo cuts a funny promo on Marty before the match, and Marty responds by hitting him with the microphone and then tying up his feet with the cord. Now there's a comedy spot that's totally lost in these heady days of wireless technology. So simple and yet it gets a huge reaction and Polo can bump around like a clown as a result. Polo tries to run away and gets chased and backdropped on the concrete, and they head back into the ring. Polo tosses him, but Marty comes in with a high cross for two. Superkick gets two. Polo comes back with a cheapshot to put Marty on the floor again, and we take a break. Back with Polo holding a chinlock, and they do a backdrop spot so ugly that even Vince scores off them about how bad it looked. They brawl on the floor a bit and back in for an elbow off the middle from Polo. Johnny GETS JIGGY WITH IT and gets two. Wait, was Will Smith a thing at that point? I think I remember people at work singing that stupid song around that time, but I was much younger and more regularly drunk back then. They collide and Polo hits the floor, and back in Marty gets a sunset flip for two. Polo kicks him in the face and sits on top for two, but Marty reverses for two. Polo inexplicably grabs a side headlock and goes nowhere with it, then goes up for that retarded spot where the heel lands on the babyface's foot. This match started on a downward trajectory and hasn't really righted itself yet. Marty makes the half-assed comeback and rams Polo into the turnbuckles, but can't get a superplex. Polo tries to come off the top, but Marty trips him up and Polo does the Flair bump onto the top rope. Marty misses a blind charge, but finishes with the Rocker dropper at 9:33. I'm not one to accuse anyone of taking illicit substances, but Marty was all but picking the rolled up dollar bill out of his nose during the match. Luckily Polo decided to bump like he was doing a demo of a ragdoll physics engine and somewhat bailed out this trainwreck. **1/4 IRS on commentary rages about how the finishing move should be banned because it's so dangerous. What is he, Charles Austin's lawyer? Or is that one too obscure now? Anyway, IRS smacks the Kid around, so Kid steals his briefcase and hobbles back to the dressing room with it.

- We take a break and IRS is pissed, so he goes back to the dressing room to exact his revenge, but uh oh, here's Razor Ramon, and he reclaims his gold from the magic briefcase.

- Meanwhile, senile President Jack Tunney explains the labyrinthine World title situation for Wrestlemania X. See, if Lex Luger wins the coin toss and finds the immunity idol, and Bret Hart wins the Power of Veto, then Owen Hart might get a rose from Flavor Flav while Crush runs the Wipeout course. I think. It all made much more sense when I was 20, honest.

Bam Bam Bigelow v. Miguel Rosado

Bigelow shoves Rosado around, but misses a charge and allows the jobber to get his minimal comeback. That doesn't last long, as Bigelow tosses him down with a press slam and drops a series of increasingly angry headbutts. On commentary, IRS throws out a challenge to Marty Jannetty. Vince questions why Marty would want to accept. Because if he has any guts, he will! See how EASY that used to be? And it's not like this was even a particularly good time for the promotion or anything. Bam Bam finishes at 2:11.

Vince McMahon and his army of kiss-ass sycophants bring out Jack Tunney for the COIN TOSS OF DOOM. Vince makes a big show about Tunney demonstrating that the coin is in fact not rigged, which just makes it all the sillier when Tunney in fact switches to the two-headed coin. Basically heads gives us the scenario we ended up with, and tails would have had Luger facing Crush first. So yeah, Luger wins the coin toss and gets to face Yokozuna first, and we get a nice bit of acting from Bret as he sells the conflicted feelings about facing Owen with just his facial expressions.

KWANG v. Sonny Myers

We're joined in progress for whatever silly editing reason. Kwang gets a leg lariat in the corner and shoots some red mist (which, as a reminder, gives Ed Leslie new and unpredictable gimmicks if spit at him) and a spinkick gets two. Kwang uses the MARTIAL ARTS~!, and gets a running elbow in the corner, but a hiptoss only gets one before he picks up the jobber. Oh man, after a devastating hiptoss like that why not just put the poor guy out of his misery? The jobber misses a crossbody and Kwang finishes with a superkick (with extra hand-waving for SUPER DUPER MARTIAL ARTS POWER, much like when Hulk Hogan winds up his fist like Popeye for extra torque) at whatever time it would have been if I gave enough of a shit about Kwang to start the stopwatch. I know you're saying to yourself "How fucking stupid does a gimmick have to be for Caribbean Legend Savio Vega to be an improvement?", but there you have it.

- Meanwhile, Paul Bearer assures us that Undertaker will return. I bet he'll go on to do pretty good at Wrestlemanias, as well.

Earthquake v. Corey Student

This is John Tenta's triumphant return before heading off to WCW later in the year. Quake gets a belly to belly and a body vice, and puts him down with a clothesline for two. Avalanche and Vince notes that "You could say that this guy is getting SQUASHED" Oh man, he's SHOOTING. I didn't even get a chance to make a joke about having to change the name of the running splash from "Avalanche" to "Shark". Powerslam and butt splash finish at 3:18.

- Meanwhile, Marty accepts the challenge of IRS, because HE HATES THE GOVERNMENT, MAN. Yeah, always busting the little guy for carrying a couple of ounces of weed and/or pills in their glove compartment or bags! That shit's unfair, man! I think we need a new game where we take bets on exactly how high Marty Jannetty was while cutting promos around this time. At least he had positive role models like Razor Ramon and 1-2-3 Kid to keep him from doing anything REALLY stupid.

Next week: IRS v. Marty Jannetty, who apparently became a redneck survivalist sometime during a commercial break and failed to notify anyone. Plus SPARKY PLUGG! And the Smoking Gunns!

Comments

  1. I forget which Blog o' Doomer called WWE out on the weak lineups (Devin Harris? Vince Jordan?), but in an era of all squashes/1 feature match, we've been offered two matches in a 6-week span where Johnny Polo, a manager, is in the "feature" match. No offense to him as a worker, but it's not like he's Bobby Heenan getting his comeuppance. He actually had two fairly competitive matches with Jannetty, which makes Jannetty look bad (well, more-so than his drug and alcohol problems).

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  2. What's the sound of 400 pounds of shit hitting the fan? KWANG!

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  3. I remember actually watching this live at the time while I was in 6th grade. And I was pissed that Bret didn't win that coin toss. I really wanted to have luger and hart fight at wmx. I figured that yokozuna had no chance to beat Bret (I'd seen Bret almost beat yokozuna a few times) but there was a good chance yokozuna might beat luger. Bret vs Lex was a legit dream match of mine that never happened (until years later in wcw when I didn't care)

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  4. "Vince McMahon and his army of kiss-ass sycophants" - Was this a bit borrowed from one of those CM Punk promo's to hype MITB '11?

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  5. WCW turned every dream match into a Nightmare. Most of them revolving around Bret. vs. Sting, vs. Hogan, vs. Luger (which happened in the WWF, just not on TV. Pretty sure a Coliseum Video has a match of there's, and it's not too bad from what I recall)

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  6. Tenta stays with Titian until May and then shows up at Halloween Havoc in October.

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  7. Special BOD Ring Announcer Pat Patterson: "Dis is a reminder dat dis is not a new rant."

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  8. That coin toss was so telegraphed. Even the markiest of marks knew that Crush was a lock to face Savage to WMX, and the suspension of disbelief is lost when the prospect of Luger facing him instead was presented. Of course Lex was going to win the toss so that he would get first crack at Yoko while Bret would wrestle Owen. It was painfully obvious.

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  9. ... and da crowd go BONZOS GONZOS.

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  10. The coin toss was corny, but necessary. Unless you're Vince Russo, you have to have the Lex first, Bret second scenario play out because it made sense with where everything was going, but yeah, "Luger vs. Crush" as an alternative was SO weak, it wasn't even possible to buy into.

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  11. What's the "US Title"?

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  12. So is 4 new 1994 RAWs all that went up today?

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  13. I'm in the same boat. Love those old shows and to have the accompanying PPVs with them are great. Love the 45 minute shows with no commercials, as compared to about 3:15 for the current shows with commercials.

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  14. Nearly finished with the ECW show with the change to Extreme Championship Wrestling. Weird seeing Doink on that show. Also, the Sandman/Dreamer cane thing went WAYYYY too long, IMO. Still not finished with the Douglas/Scorpio, but not bad.

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  15. Watching the end of superbrawl 1. Steiner bros vs sting and luger might be my favorite tag team match ever. Its kind of like warrior vs hogan in epicness. Great fucking match.

    Now I'm about to watch AA vs Bobby Eaton! Fuck yeah

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  16. I love how bobby Eaton was introduced as being from the dark side.

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  17. Wow Eaton vs Arn was pretty fucking awesome. ***1/2
    I'd call Steiners vs Sting and Luger 4.5 stars too. Superbrawl 1 is really good

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  18. Magoonie NOT Teddy BelmontApril 28, 2014 at 11:30 AM

    Watched half of Superbrawl 2 so far and that's a really good show as well.

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  19. Magoonie NOT Teddy BelmontApril 28, 2014 at 11:33 AM

    Have to disagree the Sandman/Dreamer thing was perfect. You have to give Tommy time to sell each cane shot to show how brutal it is and how much it hurts him. You have to have Women being a bitch, mocking him and offering him a way out by humiliating himself after each shot. Then Tommy has to turn it down each time to come off looking bad ass. everything works there.

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  20. So is great american bash 91 really that bad? I'm watching all the wcw ppvs in order that's what I'm up to.

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  21. Yes? Absolutely? Definitely? Certainly?


    I'm not sure how emphatic I need to be here.

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  22. Luger vs Windham must have been good though right?

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  23. Windham was unmotivated/washed up, Luger was Luger.


    As a match, it's not the worst thing ever. But that crowd would have booed anyone not named Ric Flair out of the arena.

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  24. Austin definitely has a type. Lady Blossom and Debra are pretty similar looking.

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  25. Lady Blossom was a decent looker. Debra's not a bad MILF, just not my first choice.

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  26. What makes it even better is when they do the Starrcade stats at Starrcde 90 and he's listed as from: The Dark Side ( formerly Huntsville, AL). Like Huntsville had changed its name.

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  27. Oh man I'm glad someone else enjoyed that too. That graphic made me laugh my ass off.

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  28. Watching the new 94 raws on the network. IRS is terrible on commentary.

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  29. Or Stan Hansen's favorite move being the "Lariet"


    (I think that was the typo... or was it Stan's name?)

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  30. It could have been, probably should have been, but that match just fell flat.

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  31. Adding in Tommy's (really kind of weird) desire to be accepted by ECW Arena fans, and you can kind of see the desperation that builds into it.

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  32. That is one pay per view that seems to live up to the hype of how bad people say it is

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  33. Amsterdam_Adam_CurryApril 28, 2014 at 2:31 PM

    IRS is just terrible.

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  34. Amsterdam_Adam_CurryApril 28, 2014 at 2:33 PM

    It's not as bad as people make it out to be, but it is boring as all hell. If you're expecting a Heroes of Wrestling-esque shitshow you'll be disappointed.

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  35. Amsterdam_Adam_CurryApril 28, 2014 at 2:33 PM

    Not really. **ish at best.

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  36. Amsterdam_Adam_CurryApril 28, 2014 at 2:35 PM

    At least Tommy didn't get his fingers broken. Yet.

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  37. Anyone know why on some of the old non-MSG house shows on the Network they only show 3 matches? Was that just how they were broadcast back then? I seem to recall on the classics on demand the Boston Garden and Spectrum stuff was shown in full.

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  38. Are you like me watching some of the early 90's raws and you see what your eyes tell you is a hipster in the crowd then you realize they aren't dressed ironic.

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  39. Were scaffolding matches a draw? Because I can't believe five years after night of the Skywalkers wcw is still running this shit.

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  40. I think that match mercy killed the gimmick.


    ECW ran at least a couple (I remember Dark Patriot/JT Smith and Dreamer/Brian Lee), but they did the classic scaffold rules (with a shitton of tables added in the latter).

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  41. Amsterdam_Adam_CurryApril 28, 2014 at 4:38 PM

    CZW has done a few, and I want to say TNA has done some X-division match that was a scaffold match in everything but name. Don't think WWE has ever done one, at least not since Vince Jr. took over.

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