Starrcade '89

Legacy Review

Starrcade '89

December 13, 1989 from the company's new home arena under the Turner regime, The Omni in Atlanta

Commentary: Jim Ross with either Terry Funk (singles matches) or Jim Cornette (tag matches)

This year's tagline is "Future Shock", and the shock is this isn't a normal Starrcade or PPV. Instead of a regular card, this show features an "Ironman Tournament" for both the singles and tag divisions. Think of it as a one night G1 with small blocks of four that wrestle each other round robin style, and a unique points system: 20 points for a pin or submission win, 15 points for a countout win, 10 points for a DQ win, 5 points each for a draw (15 minute time limit). Every match on the show is a tournament match. Your participants are:

Singles: NWA World Heavyweight Champion Ric Flair, NWA United States Heavyweight Champion Lex Luger, NWA World Television Champion The Great Muta, and Sting

Tag Team: NWA World Tag Team Champions The Steiner Brothers, The Road Warriors, The New Wild Samoans, and Doom

The stage looks like it walked off the Top of the Pops set. There's a very forced and cheesy intro with the tag teams scattered dramatically all over the stage. The Samoans are a last second replacement for the Skyscrapers due to a Sid Vicious injury (supposedly a punctured lung suffered in their Clash IX match with the Steiners).

The Steiner Brothers def Doom (w/Woman and Nitron) by countout in 12:24- Nitron is Tyler Mane, who never did much in wrestling and ended up becoming an actor. We've got another "late arriving crowd" here. It is Atlanta. Even during their '90s dominance no one showed up to a Braves home game until the 4th inning. Scott and Simmons start. Scott gets a powerslam for 2. Very slow pace. Simmons gets a jawbreaker on Rick to get out of a hammerlock. Rick counters with a belly to belly. Jim Cornette goes full King of the Gimmick Table Rocky Romero and says the crowd are all at the Midnight Express merch stand. Reed dodges a Scott clothesline and he goes over and out. Nitron beats Scott down. Scott goes face in peril. Hope small package for 2 in between some Doom near falls. As usual Rick can't stop himself from running in. Scott counters a suplex by twisting it into a cover but the ref is distracted. A Scott belly to belly at the 3 minutes left call leads to the hot tag. Steinerlines for everyone! And....stalling. Doom double teams. As Rick runs the ropes Nitron trips him. All 4 guys brawl on the floor. Rick just gets back in before the 10 count and Doom is counted out. Messy finish. Underwhelming match, as neither teams was interested in getting out of 2nd gear with lots more work to be done tonight. The Steiners take an early 15 points. *1/2

Lex Luger def Sting in 11:31- Luger jaws with the crowd and threatens to take a walk. Sting chases him down and brings him back. It's all Sting to start. Luger dodges a Sting dive and he goes over the top, but grabs the rope, lands on the apron, and clotheslines Luger! Nice. Slingshot splash for 2. Luger tumbles through the ropes and out. Great sequence from Sting. Luger eats guardrail and gets wobblelegged. Sting with a crossbody off the top for 2. Sting locks in an armbar in the match's only pause so far. Luger tries an inverted atomic drop. Sting blocks it, and while Luger's celebrating hits him with a clothesline. Sting springboard crossbody off the second rope for 2. He tries to go off the top again, but Luger catches him and gets the inverted atomic drop. And another one. Gutbuster. Luger works the midsection and plays to the crowd. He's settled very nicely into his heel role after the recent turn, and the crowd hates him. Luger double ax handle off the 2nd rope for 2. Powerslam. Luger goes for the Torture Rack but Sting slips out and starts no selling. Full Sting comeback at the 2 minute call. At one minute left Luger rolls out to play for the draw. Both guys get back up on the apron. Both fall over the top rope, but Luger lands on top, grabs the rope for leverage and gets the 3 as Sting fights to get out (and honestly had both shoulders up at some point). Another messy finish. But, even though I've seen other reviewers give this low ratings, I didn't hate this. Both guys went for it and didn't worry about having something left for later. 20 points and the early lead for Luger. **1/2

The Road Warriors (w/Paul Ellering) def Doom (w/Woman and Nitron) in 8:31- Doom's already out again. No time to rest. Cornette to JR: "Is that scorecard girl your daughter? You called her baby." Frakking hell, that was Worst Lines of Jerry Lawler bad. If he starts screaming about puppies I'm turning the show off. Animal and Reed start. Lots of power shoulderblock standoffs. Hawk posts his shoulder and goes FIP. Doom rolls through power moves for near falls with a bit of heel 101 to keep Hawk in. After the 5 minutes left call (the clock they're using tonight is....variable) Hawk gets the hot tag. Donnybrook. Reed tries to piledrive Animal. Hawk gets the clothesline off the top rope and Animal gets the win. Doom falls to 0-2 while the Roadies take the lead over the Steiners 20-15 in the second quarter. *1/4

Oh hell, Norman is out here dressed as Santa Claus. Just...don't ask. I've not had to mention him yet since he'd only been on Clashes up to this point, but he's about to start getting PPV paydays so it's coming. Well, so are the Clashes.

Ric Flair (w/Arn and Ole Anderson) def The Great Muta (w/Gary Hart) in 1:55- Flair is in the rarely seen pink gear tonight. It's a very short match so we get a very fast start. Muta blocks a hiptoss and lays in some punches. Handspring elbow. Reverse Flair Flop! Here come the chops. Flair gets the kneebreaker and hooks in the figure four. Hart calls down a couple of goons from the J-Tex Corporation to help but the Andersons stop them before they get to the ring. Muta with a backbreaker. He goes for the Mutasault but Flair gets his knees up, rolls him into a Paul Smackage, and it's done. Well, that's one way to end Muta's undefeated streak. It's like they suddenly realized he was about to go back to Japan. Flair ties Luger up top at 20. *1/2

The Steiner Brothers def The Road Warriors (w/Paul Ellering) in 7:27- In other circumstances this would be a potential show stealer. Sadly, it's also the only major show that these teams would cross paths. Code of Honor handshakes and high fives at the start. Hawk gets an enzuguri on Scott. Scott mat wrestles out. Rick does a 360 sell of a Hawk clothesline! Rick counters with a huge Steinerline on Animal. Rick reverses and hits Animal with a belly to belly. Hawk makes the save. Hawk press slam on Scott. Now Rick makes the save and Hawk looks annoyed. Scott hits Hawk with a belly to belly off the second rope and Hawk almost lands on his head. He immediately tags out but shakes it off and keeps going. The doctor even sneaks in barely in frame to ask if he's OK. Rick saves a couple more pin attempts and Hawk finally has enough, running in illegally and attacking, triggering your mandatory end match donnybrook. Animal gets an assisted German suplex on Scott. All four shoulders are down, Scott gets one up just before 3 to win. Decent with the potential for so much more. I like they tried to get a little story in there instead of just having a Generic Tournament Match. The Steiners take back the tag block lead 35-20. **1/2

Sting def The Great Muta (w/Gary Hart) in 8:41- Muta blows off some green mist steam before we get going. Full nelson tradeoff (and just when you think that's an antiquated moved that's dead forever, it gets brought back again, thanks Bobby Lashley). Mule kick from Muta on a corner break. They turn it up with a nice speed sequence. Sting goes for the Scorpion Death Lock but Muta gets to the ropes and powders. Back in Muta takes over with green mist covered fingers eye rakes. Muta locks in CATTLE MUTILATION! CATTLE F'N MUTILATION! (I'm a massive old school Bryan Danielson fan, this excites me) Sting powers and flips out of it. Press slam for 2. Muta hits the backbreaker and goes for the Mutasault. Sting rolls and Muta lands on his feet and nails him with a roundhouse kick. Muta goes up top again, but Sting dropkicks him while on the top rope, goes up, hits a superplex, and that gets the 3. Good, but not their GAB '89 match good. Sting ties Flair and Luger at 20. ***

The New Wild Samoans (w/The Big Kahuna) def Doom (w/Woman and Nitron) in 8:22- We've had face vs face, now it's heel vs heel. Long Fatu/Simmons lockup. Fatu hits a running powerslam. Reed barely sells it. A headbutt staggers both guys and both tag out. Savage no sells a Simmons powerslam and headbutt. Hard Samoan skulls. Doom takes over with a blind tag. Savage goes in peril for a long stretch. The Samoans are nominal faces here and it doesn't really work. Savage gets a sunset flip for 2 but then Doom uses ref distraction to double team. Savage dodges a dive off the second rope and tags. Donnybrook. Savage and Reed collide and collapse. But Savage collapses in the ropes. Humperdink pushes him over onto Reed and he gets the pin. All the no sells the first part of the match were mildly amusing but that's about it. Doom ends the night 0-3 and Woman looks extremely displeased (I'd say murderous, but, well, we know what ends up happening to her and I'm not going there). Soon after this she would leave Doom for the reformed Four Horsemen. Doom would pick up Teddy Long, lose the masks, and quickly become much more interesting. And just plain better. The Samoans are on the board with 20. 1/2*

Ric Flair and Lex Luger go to a 15:00(ish) time limit draw- The clocks are very subjective tonight. You could probably wrap a Doctor Who or Red Dwarf time flux plot around it. Flair gives Luger a little Slick Ric at the start. Luger's jawing with the crowd again. Luger pushes Flair back on a lockup. No one is impressed. A "Luger sucks" chant leads to more Luger stalling. Flair with a headlock. Luger pulls the hair to power out and reverse it. Flair rolls it into pin attempts. JR makes a really good point: the 15 minute time limit might be detrimental to Flair because that's usually how long he takes to warm up and really gets his claws into a match. Much like Kazuchika Okada today. Luger tries to no sell chops in the corner but Flair eventually chops him down and turns Luger's chest beat red. Flair works the arm. Double underhook suplex for 2. Luger tries to power out, but every time Flair outwrestles him back in. Luger finally goes to the heel 101 playbook, complaining about a hair pull then poking the eyes when the ref's not looking. Flair slips out of a slam and goes through a few Ricky Steamboat-like quick pin attempts. Luger takes over and rolls through the power moves. At the 4 minute call Luger is in control but getting a little desperate. Flair counters a suplex into one of his own. Flair backslide for 2. Flair Flip! He gets off the top rope but Luger hits him on the way down and gets a long 2 count off it. Flair goes up again and Luger gives him the Flair throw with under a minute left. Flair dodges a big elbow drop and locks in the figure four with 30 seconds left. Luger fights until the bell for the time limit. 5 points each for the draw. With one match left for all four guys it's Flair and Luger 25, Sting 20 and Muta 0. **3/4

The New Wild Samoans (w/The Big Kahuna) def The Steiner Brothers by DQ in 14:05- Everyone gets on all fours and the Steiners strike their pose. Rick makes fun of the Samoans' ceremony. The Samoans mock the Steiners' pose. Back and forth between Rick and Fatu with Rick still mocking. During a Steinerline one of Fatu's locks gets caught in Rick's headgear and pulled out! Rick keeps it on as a trophy. Major stalling from the Samoans. After a stiff clothesline exchange Fatu rolls out again. Savage complains about a phantom Scott hair pull to kill another minute. Rick ducks a double team and the Samoans hit each other. They tease a fight and Rick eggs them on but they end up hugging it out. Scott's thrown out and crotched on the barricade. More double teaming on Scott and more failed run ins by Rick. Rick runs in and bites Fatu's ass. A Samoan powerslam at the 2 minutes left call gets a 2 count. Scott gets a backslide but the ref is getting Rick out again. Frankensteiner! But Scott can't get the tag. Rick has enough and runs in for good. In the confusion Scott throws a Samoan over the top. The ref sees it and calls for the DQ. Another sloppy finish. This was another potentially good power match wrecked by the tournament format. The Steiners looked like they just wanted to go through the motions until they could hit the showers. With one match left the tag standings are Steiners 35, Samoans 30 and LOD 20. *3/4

Lex Luger def The Great Muta (w/Gary Hart) by DQ in 14:15- Luger limps down to the ring. The knee gives out early on a leapfrog attempt. Muta targets it. Luger begs off. He rolls out but Muta chases. Back in Luger gets a kick with his good leg and tries a suplex but the leg gives out again. Muta works the knee for a long stretch with good selling from Luger. Almost New Japan-ish. Handspring elbow. Luger uses raw strength to separate Muta's hands on a hold and gets an eye poke in. Muta responds by kicking Luger's leg out of his leg again. Muta locks in a half crab, then turns it into the Mutalock. Luger gets to the ropes. At the 4 minutes left call Luger starts hulking up with punches. Muta counters with a reverse kick, but Luger kills him with a clothesline. Luger hits some power moves. Guess the knee suddenly got all better then. With under a minute left Muta sprays the green mist in Luger's face right in front of the ref and gets DQ'd. Woof. Another bad finish. For 10 minutes this was pretty good with solid Japanese style submission wrestling from Muta and Luger selling it well, but it was all downhill after that. Luger takes the lead with 35 points to Flair's 25 and Sting's 20. Muta takes the goose egg, going out on his back at the end of his WCW run. His last piece of business before wrapping up his excursion and going home to NJPW would be to drop the TV title to Arn Anderson on weekly TV in early January. **1/4

The Road Warriors (w/Paul Ellering) def The New Wild Samoans (w/The Big Kahuna) in 5:18- Any Samoan win will give them the tournament. The Roadies have to get the full 20 points to win. A draw will lead to a Samoans/Steiners tiebreaker. Animal no sells a piledriver. Hawk and Fatu trade chops with Hawk whiffing on a couple of them. Hawk no sells a Samoan headbutt. The LOD is giving nothing. Animal takes a Samoan coconut to the gut and goes down. Animal dodges a Vader Bomb. Tag. A botch filled finishing sequence mercifully ends with Hawk getting the clothesline off the top to win the match and the tournament. The Steiners come out to congratulate. Both teams just phoned it in. 3/4*

Sting def Ric Flair in 14:30- Despite the screwy nature of the show Flair's streak of main eventing every Starrcade to date remains intact. Remember these guys have been on the same page and partners against Funk and Muta lately. There's lots of scoring possibilities here so lets just say a full 20 point win will give the winner the tournament and worry about the rest if needed. Much like Hirooki Goto in the 2016 G1, Luger can still backdoor a win if there's a draw. Sting comes out hot and Flair slows it down with a walk outside. They have a WOOOOO/Sting yell yell off. Sting works the arm. Flair shows his underrated strength by scooping him up into a fireman's carry. He places Sting on the top turnbuckle and...walks away. Mind games. They pick the pace up, ending with a Sting press slam. Flair starts getting frustrated and shoves. Sting shoves back harder. Flair slides out again much to Sting's consternation. Sting blocks a hiptoss into a backslide. Chop time! Flair turns Sting's chest red. Sting responds with a hiptoss and a couple of dropkicks. Flair begs off, suckers Sting in and throws him out. Flair is slowly starting to heel it back up as the match goes on. Flair delayed suplex for 2. He puts Sting in an abdominal stretch then uses it as a roll up for 2. Flair gets on Nick Patrick like he's Tommy Young. Sting charges out of the corner with a clothesline for 2. At the 5 minutes left call Sting starts no selling chops. Flair punches out of a sunset flip. Flair tries to suplex Sting out of the ring but Sting reverses it. More chop no sells. Stinger Splash at the 3 minute call. He hooks the Scorpion Death Lock in but Flair gets right to the ropes. Kneebreaker into the figure four. Sting gets to the ropes. Flair works the knee some more. Bridge up spot and another backslide for 2. At 1 minute left Flair hits a long delayed kneebreaker, then gets cocky and takes his sweet time putting the figure four on. With less than 30 seconds left Sting rolls him up into a Paul Smackage 3 to win the tournament! Afterward the Andersons come in and they tease a confrontation, but everyone, including Flair, congratulates Sting and Arn throws up the 4. Slow burn, kids, slow burn. Right after this the Horsemen would reform with Sting as a member. For a while. This isn't in the pantheon of great Flair/Sting matches, but it's still a good one with nice character work and foreshadowing as Flair slowly crept back heel. ***1/4

OVERALL SHOW THOUGHTS- WCW's great year of 1989 ends not with a bang, but with a whimper, kicking off what would be nearly two years of struggle with poor creative and worker apathy. In absolute classic WCW style, they take what could have been a decent idea and smother it with poor planning and execution. The night is filled with the most screwy finishes in a single show until Bischoff era WCW. This is really for completionists only, or people who want to watch every single step in the Flair/Sting feud.
OVERALL SHOW GRADE: D+