83 Weeks - Road Wild 1997 [Show Notes] (Patreon)

Road Wild 1997 

We are coming off of Bash at the Beach 1997 featuring Dennis Rodman’s pro wrestling in-ring debut with him & Hulk Hogan losing to Lex Luger & The Giant, Roddy Piper defeating Ric Flair by submission, Curt Hennig debuting as DDP’s mystery partner to lose to Scott Hall & Randy Savage and Chris Benoit retires Kevin Sullivan.

Observer 7/21/97

Nitro on 7/14 drew 10,515 (8,398 paying $135,852) to the Orlando Arena. Show opened with the debut of the Nitro girls, Kimberly Falkenberg along with some local dancers.

Who’s idea was the Nitro Girls?
How long did it take from idea to presentation?
Any pushback from Turner regarding it?
Why Kimberly as the lead person?

Super Calo vs. La Parka went :50 before Savage attacked Parka and Page made the save, but Hennig KO'd Page with Knux and walked off allowing Savage to again drop the elbow on Page. Hennig did an interview calling Page the biggest mark in the dressing room. I think after these inside interviews, and I'm serious about this, when they use terms that 99% of the audience doesn't know, that the announcers should translate the terms into English. I know all the announcers are afraid to go there, but if a wrestler says something that the audience doesn't understand, the announcers really should try and explain it to the masses. Either that or the wrestlers should be told to do interviews for the audiences and not for the newsletter readers, the boys backstage and the boys in the WWF watching on video the next night.

Do you think with interviews like this people were left wondering what the hell he was talking about and on the platform these promos were cut, was it a good idea?

As far as a list of guys being let go, add Sherri to that list. The angle where Heat fired her was a shoot in as far as that was her final appearance. While this isn't confirmed, the belief is that Jacquelyn, since Kevin Sullivan is done as a wrestler, will end up managing Heat and heating them up.

Why the move to take Sherri out of Harlem Heat and release her and put Jackie with them? Was it because you thought it was a better fit because it’s hard to ignore the racial implications here?

WCW spent thousands of dollars to get a mold of Sting's face to create the mask that Nash wore at the PPV.

Eric...what the fuck?

Rob Van Dam and Dory Funk were backstage at Nitro. Funk was also at the PPV. The feeling is that the last time Van Dam showed up at Nitro, it turned into an angle that made him from a mid-carder to a main eventer and with the WWF thing falling apart, he showed up to get the press and the rumor mills going. WCW had no knowledge he was coming although we'd been told in advance, but did let him backstage.

What do you remember about RVD and working a deal for him to leave ECW to come aboard? 

WCW did try and get Jose Lothario to appear on either the 6/9 or 6/30 Nitro just to get rumors flying that Michaels would come as a future mystery partner, but it didn't materialize. Lothario is still under WWF contract.

Is this the new Mabel?

Richards won't be wrestling for several months so all his injuries can heal up and he'll be doing the Abbott & Costello routine with Raven every Monday until then. For whatever this was worth, since both Richards and Raven supposedly had signed contracts that wouldn't allow them to appear on a competing PPV for six months after 4/13, or mid-October, WCW wasn't sure until the last minute whether to put them on the show. Not sure exactly how everything went down but as you can see, WCW didn't take the ECW contracts (which in the case of Raven definitely did exist) seriously because they put them on without getting a release from Paul Heyman.

Was it just a general disdain for ECW causing you to do things like this or generally speaking not worried about the legal ramifications coming from Paul and ECW at the time?

At Nitro in Orlando, Bill Gold (real name Bill Goldberg) beat Hector Guerrero in dark matches. Gold is really green but has good size and people think he's got potential.

Whatever happened to Bill Gold?

Rey Misterio Jr.'s first match back is scheduled for 8/23 in Greenville, SC against Konnan. Supposedly people realize they've blown it with Misterio Jr., but working him against Konnan means they still haven't figured it out. It's all wrong for reasons as apparent as the dye job on Eric and Vince's hair. Still lots of thought in WCW to get Misterio Jr. to drop his mask between now and the end of the year.

First off, when did you start dying your hair? Second off, why was the push so hard to get Rey to drop his mask?

Wrestling Observer 7/28/97

ECW was expected to have filed a federal lawsuit early this week against WCW regarding a number of issues including Scott Levy (Raven) and Michael Manna (Steve Richards) appearing at the Bash at the Beach PPV show on 7/13 in Daytona Beach, FL.

What was your initial reaction to this lawsuit?

Steve Karel, who is handling the legal situation for ECW wouldn't comment on legal affairs or if the suit itself had been filed at press time, but did say that ECW considers the actions of both men having violated the terms of their agreements with ECW. Paul Heyman had said over the weekend and ECW had reported on its hotline that a lawsuit would be filed in Federal Court in the Southern District of New York for contract tampering, tortious interference with contracted personnel and violation of the company's intellectual property although we have no confirmation such a lawsuit had been filed as of press time. Heyman claimed he sent copies of Levy's contract agreement for the 4/13 Barely Legal PPV which included a six month non-compete clause in regards to appearing on a rival wrestling PPV show to Eric Bischoff but Bischoff, or Nick Lambros, or whomever in WCW made the actual call, still put the Raven and Richards segment on the show.

I’m sure you weren’t the one who dealt with this but do you know about getting this?

Heyman said that ECW had threatened legal action against WCW if they were to use Levy on the PPV show and there had been talks in the past between Heyman and Bischoff regarding a contract buy out where WCW would pay ECW for the rights to use Raven immediately on PPV, however WCW refused the deal. Heyman also claims WCW tampered with ECW contracted personnel by using Levy as an intermediary in trying to get James Fullington (Sandman) into WCW and is also claiming WCW has slandered ECW on its hotline.

How factual is this regarding using Raven as an intermediary to Sandman?

The contractual situation with Richards is another of those disputed situations. Heyman claims Manna (Richards) signed on 5/10 an "intention to sign a contract" as opposed to an intention to negotiate a deal with ECW and thus was legally under an agreement with ECW at the time he was negotiating with WCW...ECW is claiming the intellectual rights to the characterization of Stevie Richards and not contractual rights to the person of Michael Manna.

How much did you know about all this at the time of putting them on TV and PPV?

Meltzer did a comparison of WWF’s 1st 6 months of the last 3 years to WCW’s 1st 6 months of the last 3 years. The growth in WCW is outstanding. Is this the moment when you felt you had turned the corner regardless of TV ratings?

WORLD WRESTLING FEDERATION

'95

'96

'97

Paid attendance

3,275

5,486

5,615

Average gate

$44,658

$80,505

$88,951

Average cable rating

2.13

2.03

1.60

Est. average buy rate

0.95

0.79

0.60

Est. average PPV revenue

$2.66M

$2.19M

$1.60M

WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP WRESTLING

'95

'96

'97

Paid attendance

2,008

3,502

5,317

Average gate

$20,668

$40,801

$73,484

Average cable rating

2.10

2.17

2.12

Est. average buy rate

0.75

0.56

0.65

Est. average PPV revenue

$2.01M

$1.62M

$1.95M

Nitro on 7/22 in Jacksonville, FL drew a sellout 7,465 (6,264 paying $100,979). Overall a good, but not great show…

$100k gate for a TV tapings. Was this the new norm for WCW at this point?

Ultimo Dragon won the TV title from Steven Regal via tap out with the dragon sleeper in 3:23. Crowd went nuts for Dragon's offense and for the surprise title switch. It was good, but it wasn't enough time to develop a match these two should be doing.

For such a styles clash between these two they never had a bad match. Do you credit that evenly or for one over the other?

J.J. Dillon came out to sign Raven to a contract, but Stevie Richards said that he'd signed with WCW and acted like he negotiated the deal for Raven. Raven gave one of his interviews nobody understands and ripped up the contract.

Was this a spoof on the whole Raven/Stevie lawsuit situation?

Finally Hall & Nash retained the WCW tag titles beating Flair & Benoit in 8:21 when Nash pinned Benoit after a foot to the face. This was a good match as well. Syxx interfered attacking Flair and wound up putting him in the buzzkiller after Flair had his shoulder run into the post while the camera was in the ring, until McMichael made the save. Earlier in the show Flair was going to announce the Fourth Horseman, but instead Syxx came out which led to the main event challenge. Later in the show Flair was shown backstage talking to Hennig and making it clear Flair expected Hennig to come out and Hennig acted like he'd listen to Flair's offer but hadn't decided to accept it yet.

Was the plan for Hennig always to be in the nWo?

WCW will be meeting sometime this week with George Steinbrenner with the idea of doing a Nitro taping from Yankee Stadium.

How close to a reality was this?

WCW recently paid $100,000 to the estate of Jimi Hendrix for Hogan & Dennis Rodman to use "Voodoo Child" as their ring entrance music for the next 12 months.

GOD DAMN ERIC!

Dandy and Villano V have signed contracts with WCW.

Looking back...is El Dandy your biggest booking regret?

Wrestling Observer 8/4/97

Billy Crystal plans to make a movie about the life of Andre the Giant starring Gheorghe Muresan of the Washington Bullets (and the famous television commercial fame) as Andre. The irony of it is that it appears New Line Cinema, owned by Turner/Time Warner would be producing the movie. People are joking, and seriously, that Eric Bischoff is going to make a play for a starring role in the flick playing the role of--you guessed it--Vince McMahon.

Oh man did anyone ever bring this up to you and how amazing would it had been?

Nitro on 7/28 in Charleston, WV drew a sellout 9,575 (8,769 paying $129,411) for an overall flat show. Lex Luger announced he'd be getting a title match against Hulk Hogan on the 8/4 Nitro from Auburn Hills, MI and it was also said Sting would be there and J.J. Dillon would offer him a wrestling contract to start in September.

With this being the first 3 hour Nitro obviously you had to load it up. Who pushed for 3 hours? Did you not want to do 3 hours here or only wanted it as a one-time thing?

Alex Wright won the Cruiserweight title from Chris Jericho with a german suplex in 6:26 of a good match. There had been talk of doing an angle where Wright would win the title but then come in over the weight limit and be forced to relinquish it.

Why Wright here and what would the point be to do the weight gimmick?

Giant pinned Great Muta in 5:59 with a choke slam after blocking the mist spot. Match was pretty bad. After the match, Eric Bischoff, who did the commentary, had a confrontation with Larry Zbyszko. Zbyszko threw him into the ring and Giant choke-slammed Bischoff for the expected big pop.

How did the chokeslam feel? Why work with Zbyszko instead of a younger guy to give him a rub? 

The ratings were the closest they've been in a long time. Nitro drew a 3.35 (3.15 first hour, 3.55 second hour) rating and 5.98 share. Raw did a 2.92 rating (2.50 first hour, 3.26 second hour) and 4.91 share.

Did you feel any heat on the ratings gap closing or was it just a nature of running TV every week?

At a meeting with the wrestlers last week, Eric Bischoff specifically said he doesn't want any bad words, vulgar or distasteful gestures on the television shows. There were complaints from the higher-ups about these things. Among the new words banned for use on television is hosebag. Bischoff told the wrestlers to leave the dirty words and vulgar gestures to Vince McMahon.

Was this Standards & Practices cracking down on you? Who delivered this message to you or was it you framing Turner and it was just something you believed in?

Overall morale was really high at the Orlando tapings. Terry Taylor had all the matches planned ahead of time so wrestlers would show up in the morning and know who they were working with and when. Under the old system, they would show up and have to stay all day and sometimes not even work because the schedule was being done as the way went on.

What was your opinion on Terry Taylor and why did he love talking to Dave Meltzer so much?

WCW is claiming a 1.0 buy rate for Bash at the Beach, which by the standards of the day should be considered a success overall, but not an overwhelming one. When WWF did a 1.5 two years ago for the Lawrence Taylor Wrestlemania, and that's with a $34.95 price tag, it was considered a failure so standards keep going downward. Independent sources dispute those figures and place the buy rate at 0.78 which would be a $2.75 million company gross. By no means could the latter figure be considered a success considering how much Hogan and Rodman were making for the show.

Did you feel it was a success?

There have been rumors about Disco Inferno returning, but it appears the only way he can come back right now is to agree to do the job for Jacquelyn.

Why did no one like Glenn Gilberti?

Wrestling Observer 8/11/97

NITRO 100~!

The results of the first experiment are in and it looks as though we are in for a lot of three-hour long Nitros.

The 100th edition of Nitro, on 8/4 from Auburn Hills, MI, headlined by Lex Luger winning the WCW title from Hulk Hogan by submission with the torture rack in 11:25, drew a record setting 4.34 rating (4.13 first hour, 4.25 second hour, 4.65 third hour) and 7.39 share.

How excited were you when the ratings came up and did you know that it would shift you into doing 3 hour Nitros on a regular basis?

As a live show, the total crowd of 17,616 fans at the Palace would have been the second largest in company history (trailing the record setting 18,003 fans at the Fleet Center in Boston on 6/9), as was the live gate of $240,519 (the Boston set company record is $243,946). The only reason the gate record wasn't broken is because the show had 4,258 comp tickets so the paid attendance was 13,356 (Boston record was 16,025), which would be somewhere near the top in company history as well.

For Raw and Nitro combined between 9 p.m. and 11 p.m., the total rating was 7.11 and an 11.86 share meaning a total of 5,065,000 total homes. That share figure is phenomenal because it shows just how mainstream pro wrestling really is at this point. It's the first time the five million homes barrier had even been broken when it comes to viewing pro wrestling at one time in the history of cable television (virtually all the NBC specials in the WWF's heyday drew far larger audiences than the combined audience of both these shows). That destroyed--by a full 13 percent--the all-time record combined rating of 6.27 (4,470,000 homes) set the previous week.

However, the Hogan-Luger match (3,614,000 homes) fell short of the Hogan-Flair record set on the August 24, 1994 Clash of the Champions (4,126,000 homes) as the most watched match in the history of cable television.

All around this is a great time for the wrestling business and the amount of eyeballs on the product. Do you feel this Nitro was your best foot forward at this point with the big main event and title change? Did you feel you needed to change the title here or was it to take the most amount of eyes on the product and push the rematch on PPV on that Sunday?

Steiners introduced Ted DiBiase as their new manager. DiBiase nearly called the tag belts the WWF tag titles. Hall & Nash were on stage telling jokes about DiBiase saying the only reason the Steiners wanted him was so they had someone who could read the menus to them in restaurants on the road.

This is really funny.

Konnan beat Psicosis in 1:48 with the Tequila Sunrise. Misterio Jr. came out limping. Konnan kicked the crutch away and threatened him again. Misterio Jr. then used his other crutch to KO Konnan and danced around showing his knee was fine. In actuality, his knee isn't fine and there is some heat about him having to come back as soon as this week as the company promised him two months off and cut it to five weeks, plus because of Nitros and the Mexico City trip for the documentary, he has to miss several days of rehab.

Who had the heat with the office for pushing Rey to come back too soon?

Eric Bischoff and J.J. Dillon had an interview confrontation with Bischoff using a line from an ancient movie called "Billy Jack" (so ancient that the wrestler who took the name from the movie at the start of his career is now 44 years old) saying he was going to kick Larry Zbyszko between the eyes and Dillon laughed and left.

FDM?

Dillon then came out with a contract for Sting to wrestle Curt Hennig, but Sting ripped it up and left. There were a decent amount of boos for Sting at that point. The storyline is that Dillon will bring out a contract for guys each week higher up on the food chain, eventually leading to Hall and then Nash, and Sting will continually rip it up and leave until they get to Hogan, when Sting will sign. From the timing of everything, you'd think they can only stretch it until October's Havoc show, but I'm still told the plan is for the match to be at the new Washington D.C. Arena in December.

This is a pretty ingenious booking idea. Who came up with it?

Finale saw the Hogan-Luger title switch, complete with a great post-match celebration with tons of babyfaces and even a few heels celebrating together. Nobody was more excited about the title change and celebrating more than ref Scott Dickinson. They showed Hogan throwing tables in the other dressing room after losing.

What the fuck was up with Scott Dickinson here? Was this the win Luger needed almost earlier in the decade and never got until here? Any immediate thoughts on not changing the title at the PPV?

The status of Steven Regal is questionable at press time. Regal was allegedly involved in some sort of disturbance on an airplane coming from to the United States from Japan for the G-1. We don't have details, but Regal allegedly caused a major disturbance in first class which caused the plane to make an emergency landing in Anchorage. A felony charge stemming from this could affect his working visa and cause him to be deported which would cost him his job. Even if he's not deported, there was considerable internal speculation that his job was in jeopardy because of the incident as the airlines don't react well to problems in the air that cause emergency landings.

What do you remember about this and what was the reason/cause for it you were told?

Wrestling Observer 8/18/97

WCW ROAD WILD POLL RESULTS

• Thumbs up 4 (04.2%)
• Thumbs down 84 (88.4%)
• In the middle 7 (07.4%)

BEST MATCH POLL

Alex Wright vs. Chris Jericho 30

Konnan vs. Rey Misterio Jr. 7

WORST MATCH POLL

Hulk Hogan vs. Lex Luger 23

Diamond Dallas Page vs. Curt Hennig 12

With PPV shows coming with such frequency, there are going to be good ones and bad ones. The industry is moving at such a ridiculously frantic pace that there is no time to savor the good ones or dwell on the bad ones, because for the most part by the end of next night, they are already old news.

WCW's Road Wild was one of the bad ones. That in itself isn't a big story because WWF and WCW have their bad ones. But the reasons why are a huge story.

There have been inner demons festering within WCW during this period of outward success. We know about the good and often great ratings, the best house show business in company history and a talent pool with depth when it comes to both marketable names and those who work at a world class level that would be the envy of virtually any wrestling promotion in the history of the industry. We also know about the egos involved, and the problems that entails.

The failure of Road Wild as a show points more to the problems with egos and decision making than to the poor show as a measuring stick of where the promotion is today.

To start with, there's the very concept. The Sturgis rally is a big deal to biker enthusiasts around the country. It doesn't mean crap to anyone else. The idea of doing a show on location outdoors near the mountains in front of the bikers was a novel concept last year, much like the beach show in Los Angeles in 1995. As a concept, it failed, like the beach show, but every time you take a new chance in this business you take the risk of it failing. But since it gave those in charge of the company and some of the top wrestlers a chance to ride their Harleys from Detroit (or Minneapolis) to Sturgis for a week, which apparently is more akin to their leisure time than riding waves, it was done again. WCW is in a lot different situation than it was in 1995. Today in any major market, a WCW PPV event will, between ticket sales and merchandise, gross from a low of $150,000 to a high of around $300,000. So doing a free show is basically giving away the opportunity for a tremendous amount of revenue. One can argue that Eric Bischoff turned the profitability of the company around far more than that, and doing shows that are fun for the boss and a few of the boys that like to ride and hang out in that atmosphere is just a perk of the company's success. But the show suffered for it. The whole situation, with the ring on a platform, limited greatly the out of the ring antics and flying moves because the ring itself was elevated so much higher than the ground and made the risk factor such that a lot of out of the ring antics weren't even attempted. This hurt the excitement of the matches last year, and this year did so even more because most of the high fliers were kept off the card since their talents couldn't be used properly. And that handicap was already going to take the workrate down a couple of notches.

Road Wild was ruined before it ever started. The setting was strike one. The backstage maneuvering was strike two. And the results of that maneuvering, the lame hastily-put together finishes up and down the show, were strike three. Booker Terry Taylor had put together a show and subsequent bookings for the next couple of months built around three title changes on this show--Chris Jericho to regain the cruiserweight title from Alex Wright, The Steiners to finally win the tag team titles from Kevin Nash & Scott Hall, and Hulk Hogan to regain the WCW heavyweight title from Lex Luger. The fact that some fans knew this ahead of time, which has caused WCW and other promotions in the past to change long-term plans, had absolutely nothing to do with the fact two of the three never took place. And the result that there are cards booked with matches that make no sense and will likely have to be re-done.

What exactly happened wasn't clear. The belief is that Hall & Nash went to Bischoff and told him that they thought there had been too many title changes of late and it was ruining the credibility of the titles. At least that's where everyone was placing the blame. On the surface, they have a valid point. Bischoff agreed. Which may have been the correct thing to do. The problem was, if that was the case, it needed to have been done before all the plans were made. And the fact that it was Hall & Nash who came to that conclusion at the same time they were going to drop the titles does give that viewpoint something of a conflict of interest. The whole idea beforehand for Hall & Nash to lose the titles was to then put them into singles programs, with the Nash-Giant program thought to be a potential big moneymaker. So just before the beginning of the show, the three title changes had been switched to one. This threw the 8/21 Clash of the Champions, the company's next major show (not to mention all the upcoming house shows) for a loop since it was supposed to be built around three title matches, all of which became almost obsolete. The Steiners were to defend the tag titles against Dean Malenko & Chris Benoit. Well, the Steiners don't have the belts. Chris Jericho's cruiserweight title defense against Eddie Guerrero is out, since Jericho didn't win the title back as planned. And Ultimo Dragon's TV title defense against Alex Wright, which was booked that way because Wright was going to lose the cruiser belt and then be elevated to TV champ, also looks to be in jeopardy because he didn't lose the cruiser belt, and one would think if Bischoff believes Hall & Nash to have a valid point, that point would be undermined by having Wright beat Dragon. Oh yeah, you're asking. What about Hogan beating Luger? Wasn't the one good thing done on Monday the post-match celebration really getting the emphasis back on the world title belt as the focal point of the promotion? If that's the case, why kill it all by changing the title back five nights later with such a ridiculous cliche of a finish? Yet another NWO star dresses up as Sting and causes Lex Luger to lose. The announcers again destroy whatever credibility they have left by all acting as if it was the real Sting doing it despite it being the same angle they've done a million times over the past year. What gives? Well, there is one ultimate authority in WCW, and when he showed up, zero title changes moved back to one although at this point with the show about to start, nobody had figured out a finish to accomplish this. All the changes meant all new finishes, most of which were really bad, particularly in the Steiners vs. Hall & Nash. The fact the work rate wasn't too hot, largely because of the setting the matches taking place meant the fliers were mostly kept off the show, didn't help matters. The one title change that probably made the least sense to take place on that night of the three (although Hogan did have to regain the belt shortly because the big money match they've been building for more than one year is Hogan vs. Sting and Hogan needs to be champion for that match to reach its money potential) was the one that did because it specifically involved Hogan, Hogan's creative control of his programs, and Hogan not winning back the belt. If you're keeping score, Hall & Nash won their power struggle with Taylor, who has now become this month's version of Kevin Sullivan, a booker who does all the work, takes all the heat, and then gets overruled almost all the time. But Hogan beat Hall & Nash again, because even though they were able to maintain their tag belts they were supposed to lose, they weren't able to keep Luger with the belt he was supposed to lose. And everyone else in WCW were the big losers. Several of the wrestlers who were told what they'd be doing on the show and after the show ended up feeling lied to. Those involved with promotion were advertising matches that make no sense now and will probably have to be changed. And the booking team has to change its basic game plan, to a game plan that once implemented, may be changed again to render it useless once again, if any part of the plan gives any of the stars a bug up their ass.

Road Wild on 8/10 in Sturgis, SD drew a crowd estimated by various sources live as between 6,000 and 10,000. Tony Schiavone was in the Pinocchio role, having to say over and over again that the crowd was 20,000. Can you believe one week earlier in Auburn Hills at the Palace when they really had nearly 18,000 in the building, not one announcer mentioned a crowd figure.

1. Harlem Heat (Lane & Booker Huffman) beat Marcus Bagwell & Scott Norton in 10:20. A solid match. Jacquelyn came out at 7:20 to get in Heat's corner. At the finish, Vincent distracted Stevie Ray. In the ring, Norton gave Booker T a shoulderbreaker. At that point Jacquelyn attacked Norton. Norton must have loved having to sell for her choke. As Norton was being held, T gave him a thrust kick followed by a side kick and pinned him, while Jacquelyn held Norton's leg to keep him from kicking out. **¼

Obviously this is done to setup Jackie with the Harlem Heat but it really was a solid match here.

2. Konnan (Charles Ashenoff) pinned Rey Misterio Jr. (Oscar Gutierrez) in 10:56. Originally this was to be a long match, but Misterio Jr. explained that his knee wasn't up to it so it was cut way back. From the standpoint of working a cohesive storyline and most missing moves while telling it, this was the best match on the show. It was mainly Misterio Jr. doing a few basic flying moves which Konnan sold, then selling his knee. The most spectacular move was a double springboard into an Arabian moonsault, but Misterio Jr. sold the knee upon landing. Finally he made yet another comeback, and tried to climb the ropes while selling the knee. When he came off, Konnan caught him in mid-air with the 187 DDT and used a move called the Tequila Sunrise, but actually it was closer to a cloverleaf for the tap out. ***

How good was Rey at this point and was he under utilized? Was Konnan ever destined to be put at the top or was there no way it could’ve happened?

3. Chris Benoit & Steve McMichael beat Jeff Jarrett & Dean Malenko (Dean Simon) in an elimination match in 9:36. Malenko was in virtually the entire first fall while Jarrett, who had tremendous heel heat, did nothing. Finally Malenko tagged Jarrett at 6:45. Jarrett didn't want to come in against McMichael. Jeff then laid down and held McMichael on top of him for the pin at 7:11, and strutted away, pointing to his head. This left Malenko against both. Malenko got a quick flurry in before he was overwhelmed, and hit with tombstone piledrivers first by Benoit and then by McMichael. In between, Benoit also delivered a head-butt off the top. McMichael scored the pin after his tombstone in 1:25 of the second fall. Some of the wrestling in this match was great, but the booking left the match totally flat. **¼

This is to put Malenko in the Horsemen it seems like but was it the plan at this time?

4. Alex Wright pinned Chris Jericho (Chris Irvine) to retain the WCW cruiserweight title in 13:03. A slow builder that turned into the best all-around match on the show. Jericho went for a rolling reverse cradle, but Wright reversed the move and held the trunks for the pin. ***

These guys had no chance in front of this crowd

5. Ric Flair (Richard Fliehr) pinned Syxx (Sean Waltman) in 11:06. This was a sad day to be a Ric Flair fan. A day when Hulk Hogan was a better worker than Flair, and not because Hogan was any good. Syxx worked hard to carry Flair, but Flair just didn't have anything. Finish saw Syxx run into the corner for the Bronco buster, but Flair stuck his foot up and basically caught Syxx in the groin, and then pinned him with his feet on the ropes. *¼

Where was Flair’s heart and head at this point and was this one of the poorest performances ever for Flair?

6. Curt Hennig pinned Diamond Dallas Page (Page Falkenburg) in 9:41. Another bad match, although this one was harder to pinpoint the fault. They were both just way off working with each other. At one point they had three sequences in a row that were terribly mistimed. The first ref bump came when Page had Hennig pinned and Hennig kicked out with Page landing on Mark Curtis. Hennig undid the padding on the turnbuckle and ran Page into it. Page came out bloody, which supposedly was a hardway although many in the company are skeptical of that. Page hit the fisherman suplex but Page kicked out. Hennig went to run him into the exposed metal again, but Page reversed and Hennig took one of his patented bumps. Page went for a pancake, but Hennig's legs clocked Curtis who took his second bump and Curtis grabbed his nose like he was really shaken up. Flair did a run-in, only to get hit with the diamond cutter, which gave Hennig a chance to use the fisherman suplex again. It took Curtis way too long to get up and still count three, which is probably why Page was kicking out at the finish. Just a bad night for all concerned. 3/4*

Two ref bumps necessary to protect DDP? Did these two just not click?

7. The Giant (Paul Wight) pinned Randy Savage (Randy Poffo) in 6:05. There were lots of engines revving during this match which is biker's heat. Savage came off the top with a flying crossbody for a near fall. When he came off a second time, Giant caught him and choke slammed him for the clean win. Short and uneventful with no build, but there was nothing that bad about it either. *

Savage just kind of seems like he’s floating in the wind while in the nWo don’t you think?

8. Rick & Scott Steiner (Robert & Scott Rechsteiner) beat WCW tag champs Kevin Nash & Scott Hall via DQ in 15:29. Fans were really into the Steiners. Coming out on bikes didn't hurt their cause. It was a well-built sound match, which was totally killed by a lame finish. Hall finally set up the Outsider edge for the finish, but Rick clotheslined him. Scott then gave Hall a belly-to-belly and made the hot tag to Rick. Rick cleaned house and used a bulldog off the top on Hall. Scott then covered Hall even though Rick was the legal man. At the count of two, Nash pulled ref Nick Patrick out of the ring. Patrick signalled for the bell as if he'd counted three, but instead ruled it a DQ. *¾

Was this the best finish to come up with considering all that happened the day of the show?

9. Hulk Hogan (Terry Bollea) regained the WCW title for a third time beating Lex Luger (Larry Pfohl) in 16:15. It's amazing watching Hogan work as a heel as he basically does a Ric Flair routine minus all the Flair bumps. Match was pretty bad and way too long for these two. Hogan missed the legdrop and Luger started another comeback with a series of clotheslines. At this point Bagwell, Syxx, Vincent and Kevin Nash came out to be bumped around by Luger. As Luger went after Nash, the latest bogus Sting (this time being Scott Hall) came out and hit Luger with a baseball bat allowing Hogan to get the pin. They were to have a post-match celebration including re-spray painting the belt in the ring, but the fans throwing things like rocks and bottles made them head for higher ground. Backstage they let Konnan hold the belt while Hogan allowed Dennis Rodman to spray paint the belt again. Rodman was in Sturgis as a motorcycle enthusiast and decided to drop by so his appearance was a freebie which is why he wasn't involved in the title change angle, which at least would have made it more newsworthy than involving yet another fake Sting. The announcers sold the finish as if the real Sting had turned on Luger, which was pathetic since it was way too obvious it wasn't the real one. 1/2*

The fake Sting stuff was ridiculous with the announcers. Why the start stop for Luger if the plan is to get to Sting and Hogan? Was it really necessary to do the title change two times so close together?