Hello Scott. Since nobody's sent in any videos lately I thought I'd
send this along: http://youtu.be/lSA4oKXGMz8 It's more of a curiosity
than anything. This was during Hogan's "dark side" period when he was
wearing all black and the fan apathy to him is particularly noticeable
here.
send this along: http://youtu.be/lSA4oKXGMz8 It's more of a curiosity
than anything. This was during Hogan's "dark side" period when he was
wearing all black and the fan apathy to him is particularly noticeable
here.
He's ripping up the dirt sheets, brother! He was just kayfabbing the Dungeon all along, Mean Gene!
I liked this match. And it's weird because Sting had cleanly gotten him in the Deathlock and had him begging for mercy before the D of D ran in. And this was superhero face Hogan. It boggles the mind that they couldn't have just booked Sting to look equally strong against the cowardly heel Hogan. I suppose if Sting had only bothered to lift a barbell or run a couple laps at some point during his 9 month hiatus, Hogan wouldn't have had to screw over every single WCW fan in order to protect the business.
ReplyDeleteYeah this is on the unreleased hogan matches DVD set. It's really weird. I wasn't watching any wrestling at the time and its just super strange to see.
ReplyDeleteTo be fair, Sting looked really, really out of shape at Starrcade 97. Doesn't excuse what Hogan did but he Sting could have at least attempted to hit the gym a bit beforehand.
ReplyDeleteIf they could of had the same match quality as this in their Starrcade match, WCW might still be in business, or at least lasted a little longer.
ReplyDeleteThere's just something wrong about Hulk Hogan san-stache.
ReplyDeleteYeah to me Sting showing up at Starrcade out of shape was extremely unprofessional. Off the top of my head I can't think of another wrestler in a similar spot doing that.
ReplyDeleteThis was by far the best Hogan-Sting match. And the last gasp of Sting getting to look like a credible threat prior to the Crow gimmick. Good stuff.
ReplyDeleteI totally agree. I remember my friends and I being really pumped as his music played and talking about how huge Sting was going to look. Then he took off his jacket and none of us could bring ourselves to say what we were all thinking. And the match is even probably his fault as he appeared to be winded the whole time. But the need for Sting to go over was so ridiculously obvious and necessary that we would have ignored everything and called it a great match if the last three moves had just been Leg-Drop, kickout, Scorpion Splash, Scorpion Deathlock, without any of the fast-count nonsense. They could have taken the title off Sting immediately after and done whatever to punish him for slacking on his training, but they hurt the fans and their own company by, for whatever reason, booking that match as they did.
ReplyDeleteWell to be fair, the dark shadows and rafters Sting frequented at the time probably didn't have a gym.
ReplyDeleteHad to maintain kayfabe in those days!
You all must have a MUSCLE FETISH!
ReplyDeleteVERY surreal moment at the time seeing Hogan booed in a big WWF town when he first came out.
ReplyDeleteIt's usually not something I'd complain about, except he also showed up without his charisma. As cool as the whole Crow buildup was it was really the end of any real appeal the guy ever had. He's gotten through the rest of his career on the memory of who he once was and what he once meant. And now he wears a shirt to the pool. At least he's kept his personal life together.
ReplyDeleteI'm being sarcastic I get burned all the time for mentioning this about a certain someone. I was also really let down when Sting came out with the one piece singlet and looking like a totally different dude.
ReplyDeleteSuch a huge dream match, yet the only thing people were talking about was the Shawn Michaels collapse on RAW.
ReplyDeleteYou either need muscle OR the ability to go in the ring.
ReplyDelete1:37 of that video is crazy. Hogan looks like such a different person without the stache. Very much a Superstar Billy Graham look. Wish he would've kept it.
ReplyDeleteIt didn't matter WHAT shape Sting was in. Barring a Jeff Hardy-like drug episode, he should have whipped Hogan in 5 minutes. Over and done with.
ReplyDeleteNobody cared how big his arms were or how tanned he was. They wanted to see the good guy beat the bad guy.
And it didn't happen. The beginning of the end...
Exactly. If he just kept his Surfer Sting build he would have been fine.
ReplyDeleteAnyone remember the Hogan vs Sting cage match that was broadcast only by audio via the WCW Website?
ReplyDeleteHoly shit, WCW sucked at pacing in matches.
ReplyDeleteYeah, the early days of internet audio!
ReplyDeleteWCW Live was great too, you'd get a mix of shoot/kayfabe stuff, but also some very insightful stuff too that was rarely filtered. That was really my first exposure to a 'shoot interview' and I'm sure that is true for a lot of folks. Paul Wight gave a great interview once talking about breaking into the business and such. I remember Scott Hall also being very open about his feelings about the first NWO Souled Out sucking and how rushed he felt the show was and how they weren't ready to do it at that point.
The most surreal thing ever though was Hulk Hogan coming into Randy Savage's interview and then both of them basically detailing how they'd like to share Elizabeth and Randy Savage basically being all like "that's cool!" about it. I should see if I can find that clip somewhere, I taped a lot of those back in the day.
See, matches like this illustrate that Hogan knew holds and stuff and could bust them out when he felt like it. But he made so much money doing the most basic of shit that he got lazy and didn't need to "wrestle".
ReplyDeleteMy god, the matches this company gave away for free. smh.
ReplyDeleteAs a result, he wrestled for way more years and made way more money for the companies he worked for than guys like Steve Austin or Edge.
ReplyDelete