Spending my Thanksgiving weekend watching the original SS shows (87-89). Couple random ones:
1) after wrestling in 87-88, Danny Davis is back to a ref in 89; was there an angle where he turned face and got his referee license back?
2) what was the plan for Bam Bam in 88? He was booked super strong in the main event and then bounced out of the title tournament at WM 4 and just gone
3) how awesome was the women's match at the inaugural event??? Is that the best women's match in WWE history? Or is the 95 elimination match better?
4) don't you miss the epic ten-team tag matches? Those were two fast and phenomenal 45-min matches
2) what was the plan for Bam Bam in 88? He was booked super strong in the main event and then bounced out of the title tournament at WM 4 and just gone
3) how awesome was the women's match at the inaugural event??? Is that the best women's match in WWE history? Or is the 95 elimination match better?
4) don't you miss the epic ten-team tag matches? Those were two fast and phenomenal 45-min matches
1. Not really an angle so much as Jack Tunney coming on TV one week and being like "I think Danny Davis has learned his lesson, and can now referee again." Sidenote: Vince McMahon thought Evil Referee Danny Davis would be the biggest thing ever and was apparently shocked when it bombed completely. The idea of a referee cheating all the babyfaces and then getting his comeuppance was supposed to be a moneymaker, I guess. Plus Danny was always a good worker and had a good look, which is why he was used as Mr. X when they need a jobber.
2. He was injured at WM4 (hence the short match) but in general Bigelow was a case of someone where they thought the look and aura was going to make him into a huge star, and he just never drew when they put him in those positions, and the relationship fell apart pretty quickly.
3. It was pretty great, but not the best ever. Jumping Bomb Angels v. Glamor Girls at the Rumble still holds that distinction for me. If we're counting the modern era, Trish v. Lita on RAW.
4. I miss having 10 tag teams at a given time, period.
Danny Davies was a weird one, he was over and a good worker but the character always had an upper limit. He could have done the Honky Tonk IC run however.
ReplyDeleteWasnt impressed by his working when he was used as a wrestler under his own name. Was i missing something?
ReplyDeleteThe other day I watched the 87 main event and the heat was off the charts. The E would kill for those type of reactions today.
ReplyDeleteJust a little more detail: Davis was brought back for a "probationary" period by Tunney before proving himself and being reinstated. It was talked about a lot on Superstars and Wrestling Challenge, so there was an acknowledgement. Personally, I'm not sure how Davis could take such a beating as a wrestler and stay on his feet but not be able to take the smallest hit as a referee and stay conscious. (Another sidenote: he wore the outfit he did so it would cover his muscles, cause he was BUILT and they wanted him to be a weakling.) As readers of Bret Hart's book will know, incidentally, the original idea came from Stampede Wrestling. It worked well there, and I think it worked ok at Wrestlemania III.
ReplyDeleteA little off the subject, but is anyone else disappointed with the NFL's booking concerning the Patriots Packers game? They have both teams going into the meeting booked really strong, and it's just not interesting to me. I'd prefer if Green Bay had lost to Minnesota last week or if New England hadn't been on TV for the last month and only had a couple wins. I mean, really, how am I supposed to care about two seemingly invincible teams trying to beat each other? Maybe the NFL will switch out to a Patriots Bills game along with a Packers Buccaneers game instead and bill it as a double feature. That would be twice as much fun, right?
The 1987-1990 shows were all amazing IMO, especially 87 and 88.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I'm with you there.
ReplyDeleteLove the reaction when Hogan gets counted out--dead silence as soon as the bell rings, to a building groundswell of cheers as Bigelow lines up to take on the rest of the heels 1-on-3. That crowd really believed the Bammer had a shot.
ReplyDeleteI always enjoyed Bam Bam. My favorite was the Jersey Triumverate with Bam Bam, DDP, and Kanyon. I was a bit of a DDP mark back in the WCW days.
ReplyDeleteDanny Davis was a HORRIBLE worker. Stall, punch, punch. Stall, punch, kick. Stall, punch, stomp. Kick, kick, stomp.
ReplyDeleteAs a kid I always saw Danny Davis as being a virtual midget, like 5'6 tops.
ReplyDeleteNot sure if that was true, or if I'm just remembering it funny.
Tho the NFL has done pretty well with 50-50 booking the past few years.
ReplyDeleteThe Triad! That was it! I just read it in Tommy's review, too. You'd think I'd retain that piece of information for more than 20 seconds.... But yeah, I was a mark for that group. Who better than Kanyon!?
ReplyDeleteThe extended shot of the Miz girl was even more creepy.
ReplyDeleteexacty. They had something with Bigelow. Bret said it was attitude issues in his book as well. Not being over just didnt seem to one of Bammer's problems
ReplyDeleteIf you believe Bigelow, he was getting the Savage spot, title at Mania and then assumingly losing it to Hogan, before he got hurt.
ReplyDeleteNot a big fan of their continuity issues. Bounties are the barbaric scourge of the Earth a couple years ago, during the Thanksgiving game between Dallas and Philly two days ago Buck/Aikman/Jimmy Johnson are all giggling and having a good ol' time yukking it up about them while a prepackaged video segment plays about it.
ReplyDeleteIf I had a dollar for every time a bitter ex-wrestler said he was promised a run at the world title, I would have enough money to be a indie wrestling promoter who actually doesn't stiff his talent on payouts.
ReplyDeleteAwesome heel at Mania 3 though. I remember people talking about him getting his ass kicked finally at Mania 3 just as much as Hogan Andre.
ReplyDeleteMore petty wrestler shit. The veterans hated that he came out of nowhere and was headlining shows with Hogan
ReplyDeleteThe 1995 Women's Match sucks. Full of botched. An accidental pinfall blown count that causes a babyface with flashy moves to be out too early. No heat. And dreadful commentary.
ReplyDeleteNo elimination tag matches, no elimination chamber - still called survivor series.
ReplyDeleteMiz girl is hilarious. Although Miz girl is a legit reaction, i swear it resembles Stephanie's bad attempts at acting.
ReplyDeleteBravo!
ReplyDeleteAs someone who's 5'7'', fuck you for that midget shit.
ReplyDeleteTito in 1992!!!! or one of the top candidates anyway!
ReplyDeletePart of the problem with Danny Davis is that he downplayed his wrestling ability. He's supposed to be this referee who couldn't wrestle so it would not have been credible for him to come out and do all these wrestling moves when he was a referee for all these years. In a way it's like the Ricardo Rodriguez problem, being a trained wrestler playing somebody who did not know how to wrestle. It's a hard role to play without exposing the business.
ReplyDelete"The uploader has not made this video available in your country."
ReplyDeleteBut I am in USA?!
I'm getting the same thing.
ReplyDeleteOliver Humperdink didn't bring much to the whole Bam Bam Bigelow deal. Had he turned heel, would have been a great opponent for Savage while he was killing time before the MegaPowers explosion. Or maybe even as a more able bodied partner for DiBiase.
ReplyDeleteNot with Honky Tonk Man being the IC champion he couldn't.
ReplyDeleteIn Virgil's he case, he really was unpolished and it showed.
ReplyDeleteOh, he was a GREAT heel, I'll give him that. Really smug, smarmy guy. And having him go over at Mania was the right decision because now the fans REALLY want to pay money to see that guy die. But he absolutely did not have anything to back up this awesome character they gave him. Danny Davis' career arc is the true sign of a guy that they just totally gave up on. He gets a victory at literally the biggest show in history. Then they keep him off TV for eight months, then they start a feud with Sam Houston, and a year later...he's STILL feuding with Sam Houston in the opening match at house shows, and on TV he's fallen so far that he gets the "currently in the ring" intro even with Jimmy Hart still in his corner. It was such a waste because a better worker in that initial role going into Wrestlemania III could have become a MUCH bigger star with that opportunity.
ReplyDeleteMaybe Rusev made the video to troll you?
ReplyDeleteSurvivor Series is a big PPV, it always outdraws SummerSlam in the buyrates.
ReplyDeleteI think Danny Davis was more of a case of the WWF having an idea but they did not know how to pay it off. Plus, with Honky Tonk Man in the same stable, Danny Davis was kind of superfluous.
ReplyDeleteRecently?
ReplyDeleteThis guy again.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.2xzone.com/wwe/buyrates.shtml#.VHpRosmiFEM
Those are falsified stats, mark.
ReplyDeleteFace managers never really worked in the WWF. The only one that ever worked was Captain Lou Albino and that's more because his face turn was part of redemption arc.
ReplyDeleteDamn got proven wrong
ReplyDeleteMaybe they'll have Drake Younger do the evil referee turned wrestler bit eventually.
ReplyDeleteHe sure did.
ReplyDeleteThat may not be true, but as a kid I never viewed SummerSlam as a particularly special show. I always thought it was the low tier PPV because WM was obviously the big one, and the other two had gimmicks.
ReplyDeleteIt's a perfectly good height for a referee.
ReplyDeleteAm I the only one around here who thinks Savage should have brained Liz?
ReplyDeleteIt may be true and it is true.
ReplyDeleteI've been watching old pay-per-views (pre-WM VII) this month as well. I love that era--everything feels special which is missing today.
ReplyDeleteThe modern version of a push is "hey, you get to be on TV the next 3 weeks."
ReplyDeleteWhen should Shawn have lost though? He was the top face champion then the top heel champion. Bret wasn't doing clean jobs for the hell of it as WWF Champion either.
ReplyDeleteThey JUST had the evil ref bit with Brad Maddox. They clearly have no idea how to play off old angles anymore.
ReplyDeleteI tend to agree with you. Only way Punk staying doesn't put Bryan in the main event is if they accept Orton/Batista will be shit on and move HHH/Punk to the main event.
ReplyDeleteBut when are they going to let Jennay Rice get her heat back on Ray Rice?
ReplyDeleteIf they took the 4 teams they had in WWE plus Ascension, Vaudvillians, some other NXT teams, they could do it. Heck toss Oneal/Slater in there. Problem is 8 out of the 7 out of the ten teams would be seen at the level of Zukhov/Volkoff or the Conquistadors. Only the Dust Brothers, Usos and MizDow are pushed as legit.
ReplyDeleteI love how people still bite for this bit. I remember someone presenting researched data for why you were wrong.
ReplyDeleteThey totally mishandled Brad Maddox. They could have done so much more with him then making him just another "authority figure."
ReplyDeleteand he stuck to tag teams.
ReplyDelete"8 out of the 7 out of the ten teams"
ReplyDelete56% of the teams, then. Or 11 out of 20 wrestlers. There's a fun little "game": "Who are the 11 jobbers?"
:)
If you're talking during the 96-97 period, I always felt HBK should have done more to put Vader over as a monster threat at IYH International Incident. Sure Shawn lost, but it took Cornette's interference to make that happen and then during the post match beatdown Shawn just made Vader look like a total jobber.
ReplyDeleteThe booking in early 1997 was a mess as the world title kept getting swapped around, but there's a lot of people that thought Shawn should have returned the favor for Bret at WM13.
And I'm not saying Shawn should have done more jobs, but he should have done more to bring his opponents up to his level. One of the reasons Shawn's title reign tanked in 96 was because he was too insecure to let another guy be considered at the same level as him.
Don't forget New Day.
ReplyDeleteAnd someone did the same just below. Between that, Ape rolling with his shots, and TBP's no-selling of his shots, Satan's having a poor week.
ReplyDeleteWell i always disagree with the general consensus because of reasons.
ReplyDeleteYes, that was my point.
ReplyDeleteBraziliankid doesn't respond to me because he's fearful. And I am successful, because I eventually remove him from the live threads.
ReplyDeletewell I think the idea was to run house shows with him against the guys he screwed, but again I think WWF was starting to realize the money train PPV was, had SNME, and realized house shows as blowoffs were going the way of dinosaurs. When millions were watching the product but only hundreds of thousands could see the blowoff, then you have an issue. It was one thing to book a feud around the horn when you ran just the northeast or down south when you were running weekly towns out of Memphis, but once ppv hit and people saw the feuds blown off live on a big show rather than hoping it came to their town, it left house show feuds and blowoffs seeming 2nd rate. It would still take them another 4 years to figure out house show feuds and blowoffs sucked in the ppv era (I think Hogan/Flair killed that once and for all) but for fans, the luster started to go from house shows.
ReplyDeleteI could see that happening actually. Punk talks about trying to politic his way to a WM main event, but if he had stayed and let things run their course he may have gotten his wish. All Punk needed to do was to go up to HHH and tell him that the Orton/Batista feud was dying and that they needed to close WM, and I'm sure HHH wouldn't have needed a lot of arm twisting to agree with him.
ReplyDeletewell in 1999 the payoff would have been to have him keep escaping with a win for 2 or 3 ppvs then get his ass killed. Then the other faces can kill him too as he drops down the card. In 1987 though having one ppv (Survivor wasn't planned yet when WM3 happened), you let him escape, piss off the fans, but then 90% of them don't see him get his just deserts. As I keep mentioning, the juxtaposition of the ppv era with the phasing out of house shows as real blowoff shows caused some disappointments when it came to feuds.
ReplyDeleteLOL. I changed my mind between 7 and 8 teams.
ReplyDeleteive always seen survivor series as more important than summerslam
ReplyDeletedidn't watch Raws or SD. I heard they got crapped on though. Too bad. Kofi is always entertaining and I really, really liked Big E as IC champ.
ReplyDeleteDavis's outfit bears mentioning, too. I think the referee character was totally over, but then he debuts as a wrestler wearing that ridiculous outfit. He looked like he had a pretty decent physique under that getup, too. Maybe the point was to try to hide it because he was supposed to be a non-wrestler.
ReplyDeleteSame. In my head as a kid, the level of importance was Mania, Survivor Series, Rumble, SummerSlam. Then the 1992 and 1993 Rumbles happened and Rumble and SurSer switched places.
ReplyDeleteI figured that, but I couldn't resist a little fun with math.
ReplyDeleteWell I'll be damned.
ReplyDeleteYeah, this is not someone's best effort.
ReplyDeleteThey also tried and keep trying the evil ref bit with Scott Armstrong, hell he was just on PPV 6 days ago!
ReplyDeleteWeird since he was legit one of their top refs, did the angle cost him his job essentially or is he working behind the scenes?
Sounds like Steiner math to me.
ReplyDeleteThe guys who play Penguin and Riddler on Gotham are just creepy as fuck.
ReplyDeleteExactly. Thank God someone else actually watches these shows, lol.
ReplyDeleteI was disappointed when the four-way wasn't an elimination match this year. Shit like that really annoys me about this company.
ReplyDeleteWhich team has the 141 2/3% chance to win then? Usos? Dusts?
ReplyDeleteI think he's working with NXT somehow. It's a better fit for an experienced wrestler like Scott Armstrong.
ReplyDeleteAgreed. Bryan was deep in a feud with Kane (remember, Kane caused him to lose in the Elimination Chamber), and it wasn't until after that the gears were switched to Bryan vs Triple H.
ReplyDeleteIt wasn't like WWE switched to Bryan in the main event immediately after Punk left. It was over a month later.
Well, once upon a time, it was insisted the entire year was a grand design, including Daniel Wyatt and all that nonsense too. At least THAT argument's gone by the wayside.
ReplyDeleteAh, finally some Superstars action. Nice little match with Swagger and Axel. Axel could use a changeup.
ReplyDeleteOther people actually watched and noticed Bryan/Kane was the WM plan too?
ReplyDeleteWell hogan testified against Vince at the steroid trial and got the belt back 9 years later. Hart shit all over the WWF when he left and 12 or 13 years they got him back. So at some point, I do think punk will be back possibly. This would be up there with Bruno, Bret and Hogan returning though, and maybe he even won't. But its possible. Wrestling is a weird world.
ReplyDeleteI could see it being a Brock/Goldberg situation where they realize the fans are going to shit on it so they make it a midcard match and focus on HHH/Punk. Like you said, he may have actually gotten his way if he'd stayed.
ReplyDeleteDoes WWE pay for him to be at the shows now or he is there on his own dime?
ReplyDeleteConsidering Bryan spent almost the entire month of February feuding with Kane, I thought it was hard to miss
ReplyDeleteSo do I, which is why I cited it over and over and had it ignored.
ReplyDeleteI would have liked him to put over Vader to, but I'm not sure how much of that is Shawn refusing to lose vs Vince just not feeling it with Vader. Shawn did lose twice to him in tag matches to set up the match so either they were REALLY going to put Vader over or it was all set up to have Shawn win from the start.
ReplyDeleteThe funny thing about Shawn/Bret from WM13 is even in Bret's book there's no mention of that being 100% the plan all along. Bret suggested a few times that that's what he wanted to do and Vince gives noncommittal answers. I'm sure it was an option and maybe penciled in at one point but it sounds like it was more Bret's wish than any long-term firm plan.
If Savage had sex with Steph, do you think his pecker was big or small? Because maybe he didn't do too much damage.
ReplyDeleteGood! I don't know how anyone can deny that Bryan was feuding with Kane. Just read the results on thehistoryofwwe.com - it's all there
ReplyDeleteYou're an odd bird, you know that?
ReplyDeleteSo Bam Bam lasts a year in the WWF, gets hurt goes to Crockett gets a big push but fizzles out there too even quicker then goes to New Japan for almost 4 years!
ReplyDeleteWas Inoki really paying that much back then?
Scroll down and feast your eyes.
ReplyDeleteBecause John Cena doesn't need Sting to drag his life-less body to victory?
ReplyDeleteThe funniest ever that no one remembers.
ReplyDeleteAt SuperBrawl I, right after Doom breaks up, they go to J.R. with some little kid who won a contest to appear on TV. The kid just looks totally shocked and despondent, and J.R. asks him "who's your favorite wrestler?" And the kid says ".....d..doom." So J.R. says "well sorry bud, but I don't think they're gonna be a tag team much longer."
He doesn't care about the money like Hogan and he's not a mark for his legacy like Bret, so I could see him actually being done. But who knows? Maybe his money doesn't go as far as he thinks it will or he looks back on his career when he gets older and wants to end it on a better note.
ReplyDeleteYeah agree. It looked like there was a similar reaction by another guy in that clip. They could have found plenty more guys too without using a plant.
ReplyDeleteI know I was watching it in bed and jolted upright. Don't think we'll ever see as big of a shock result like that again. Everything gets leaked nowadays.
Great point. Plus, Elimination Chamber was where Batista got booed facing Del Rio. And it wasn't in smarky Pittsburgh, it was in Minneapolis. That might've influenced the change of plans and made Vince realize that booing Batista wasn't just a smark thing.
ReplyDeleteI always felt Bret needed his win back anyway and that way they could have set up a rubber match, which would have done more buys.
ReplyDeleteAnd the only other tag match Shawn lost to Vader was that mixed tag with Jose and Corny and that match took place after Summerslam.
The Vader deal was weird as he was rumored to beat Shawn for the title at Summerslam before plans changed and then was rumored to face Shawn at Survivor Series before they went with Sid instead so it did seem like they had big plans for the guy originally but someone decided to bury him (most likely Shawn). Even December's IYH was subtitled "It's Time" making it seem like Vader was going to be champion heading into the show.
Whereas Bret's backbreaker was Screwed: The Bret Hart Story, if they released a Self-Destruction of CM Punk, Punk might rent out a theater to laugh at it with friends.
ReplyDeleteI think Cornette said that the plan was for Vader to beat Shawn at either Summerslam or Survivor Series and for Shawn to win the title back at Royal Rumble. If the tag match was after Summerslam they were still putting Vader over Shawn for some reason and the Summerslam screwyness suggests they wanted to leave the door open for another match, so maybe it was supposed to be Vader in Sid's place.
ReplyDeleteNope.
ReplyDeleteHart also implied Vince and Shawn were gay lovers.
ReplyDeleteThat could very well be true though
Oh yeah, Batista-Del Rio, lol. Seattle and Pittsburgh's revolts kinda overshadow that one.
ReplyDeleteEh, Punk is enough of a legacy mark that he wanted to be immortalized in a WrestleMania main event and was obsessed with his "spot". That's Bret Hart-ish behavior.
ReplyDeleteBaba was. I'd imagine inoki was too. Lots of big names worked New Japan
ReplyDeleteIn the Colt podcast and other shoots, Punk always sarcastically throws in a "but I'm a mark" somewhere, and to me that reputation covers the February booking - Vince thought Punk couldn't pass up a WM payday and was a big enough mark for himself that given a couple weeks (as he's had his snit fits before and always came back), he wouldn't be able to pass up beating the great and powerful Hunter at WM to "get his win back." Turns out he wasn't, lol. And so everything got flushed after Batista kept getting booed throughout Feburary and Punk refused to come back. Good thing both those things happened to give 'em a shove in the right direction.
ReplyDeleteWell, he WAS teaming with hulk before mega powers formed.
ReplyDeleteOh absolutely - but Pittsburgh is a smarky city and Seattle is basically Bryan's home arena. They probably expected that from them. The fact that a PPV crowd in mid-America rejected Batista too was a much, much bigger concern
ReplyDeleteI'd always heard it was Vader's time (heh) at SummerSlam until Shawn refused the last week.
ReplyDeleteI thought Davis was a BRILLIANT gimmick, myself. Everyone hates refs and is annoyed by then anyways, right? So an EVIL red should be even MORE hated. The WM III crowd was insanely bloodthirsty against him, so I thought it worked.
ReplyDeleteJust,a short shelf life, I guess.
Yeah, give some love to Minneapolis. Of all the factors that got Bryan where he went, Minny deserves some plaudits.
ReplyDeleteMe too.
ReplyDeleteJapan combined good checks with an awesome party scene and a much lighter schedule. Welp, time to get a job on Japan!
ReplyDeleteAgreed. I love that reaction
ReplyDeleteYeah, Alundra was horrible in that. Botching everything, and Kyoko went out accidentally.
ReplyDeleteWhy don't you watch the video before making an uniformed comment.
ReplyDeleteYeah, people want to give the Rumble crowd in Pittsburgh all the credit for pushing Bryan into the Mania main event. I give most of the credit to the Mini Apple.
ReplyDeleteGreg Gagne with muscles, ooooh. I like it.
ReplyDeleteOh, I do have to give a big slice of the pie to Pittsburgh, that was riotous. But certainly as you said a middle American non-smark town pissing on Batista helped too.
ReplyDeleteSee, I thought it was that Hogan testified McMahon did not distribute steroids.
ReplyDeleteHogan "testified against" Vince in name only. The US government thought Hogan was going to blow Vince up and instead Hogan said Vince didn't distribute or force steroids on anyone. Called by the prosecution, he wound up testifying for the defense.
ReplyDeleteVery true. It's clear that Vince expected him to come back after cooling down/healing up since he didn't officially get fired until June.
ReplyDeleteI was watching with another fan, and once the hand dropped for three we just sorta stared at each other, like "did that really just happen?"
ReplyDeleteYeah. It's easy to forget that just because Punk bailed in January doesn't mean they weren't burning up the phone lines in February, as the status quo merrily went on.
ReplyDeleteDidn't Bam Bam have a bad attitude or something and pissed people off?
ReplyDeleteHe snapped into it.
ReplyDelete"Whereas Bret's backbreaker was Screwed: The Bret Hart Story, if they
ReplyDeletereleased a Self-Destruction of CM Punk, Punk might rent out a theater to
laugh at it with friends"
I'm guessing Punk takes himself far too seriously for that to happen. He was even pissed that they called him a "quitter" in his hometown.
So if anything, he would probably file a lawsuit against WWE if they came out with such a DVD.
Shit, I'd hope not. R-e-l-a-x, Punk.
ReplyDeleteYeah. We seemed to go from the Bryan vs. HBK rumors (unfounded) to Bryan vs. Sheamus, Bryan vs. Wyatt, Bryan vs. Kane. All sorts of rumors
ReplyDeleteTo a degree, that strategy works in some markets. Apple comes to mind. The difference of course is that WWE is not producing something worth buying.
ReplyDeleteSo with three years of perspective, how do people think Punk should have been booked from the Pipebomb on? How would you give him his WM main event? A more legit shot at #1 spot? Etc etc
ReplyDeleteI think they should have booked Punk and Cena as the top 2 babyfaces of the roster and have Punk be Cena's equal instead of the #2 guy in the company. WWE could of then had the best of both worlds as they use Cena to market to children and used Punk to attract the adult demographic.
ReplyDelete