Superbrawl VI

Legacy Review

Superbrawl VI

February 11, 1996 from the Bayfront Arena in St. Petersburg, FL

 

Commentary: Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan and Dusty Rhodes

 

Tonight is a double steel cage double main event, with Randy Savage defending the World title against Ric Flair once again, and Hulk Hogan once again taking on the Giant. As you'd expect, the order those matches should be in and the one they are in are two completely different things.

Street Fight: The Nasty Boys def Public Enemy in 7:49- Apparently this is also falls count anywhere. PE had just come in from ECW and were immediately put in a hardcore brawl feud with the Nastys, the only thing these two teams are capable of doing halfway decently so (I might pass out from shock typing this) smart move by WCW. PE get cheers on their entrance and it's a 50/50 reaction at best for the Nastys, who are supposed to still be the faces here. Interesting. And we're nowhere near Philly to boot. As soon as everyone's in the ring the brawl is on. Knobbs is immediately tossed over the top rope. Grunge tries coming off the apron but Knobbs throws something in his face. Think it was soda, hard to tell because they were on a super wide hard camera shot. Rock's already bringing a table in. Sags intercepts him with a chair. Chairshots for everyone! Knobbs gets posted and set up on the table. Rock gets poised to come off the apron. Knobbs grabs him and slams him off the apron through the table! Sags gets a trash can. Dusty calls it plunder. Heenan says its his lunch pail. He also has no idea what plunder means. Sags wails away with trash can lid shots. He piledrivers Grunge through the trash can. Cover but Grunge gets a foot on the rope. Now Sags takes some lid shots. Knobbs and Rock go to the "merch area" way back on the floor. Knobbs suplexes Rock through a table! More chairshots as all four guys start fighting back there. Knobbs throws what looks like water toward Grunge's face but Grunge uses a trash can lid like a shield to block it! Nice. Sags gets bulldogged onto a chair. More chair and lid shots fly. Sags drops a table on Rock. Knobbs gets set up on a table again. Rock goes all the way up into Kota Ibushi territory. Senton off the arena wall! Knobbs dodges and Rock crashes through the table! Knobbs covers and gets the pin. Fun garbage match, but it went a bit too long as they were running out of stuff to do the last couple of minutes before the finish. ***

Mean Gene gets right into tonight's hotline shill: there's a rumor that two former WWF champions are on their way to WCW, and who it is would be a surprise even in "offices in the New York area". The first teases have begun.

 

WCW World Television Championship: Johnny B Badd (c) (w/the Diamond Doll) def Diamond Dallas Page in 14:59- Somehow, this feud continues. They are putting on fairly quality matches though so I can't complain too much. Tonight's added stip is the rest of DDP's lottery winnings Kimberly's bingo winnings, $6.6 million, are on the line, as is Kimberly herself. Again. DDP comes out with roses that he tries to give to Kimberly. Badd jumps him from behind while he does. DDP gets whipped into the guardrail. He catches Badd coming back in. After some brawling Badd flips DDP back over the top back to the floor. Double ax handle off the apron. Slingshot legdrop back in for 2. DDP begs off and jaws with Kimberly. Reset lockup. Nice reversal sequence with Badd keeping the upper hand. Badd wins a backslide fight for 2. Small package for 2. Speed run and DDP nails Badd with a hot shot. Low blow elbow drop. Gutbuster. DDP wants a 10 from Kimberly. Not happening. Badd collapses on a whip attempt, still nursing his hurt ribs/groinal area. Another try and Badd gets a sunset flip. DDP counters. Badd counters the counter for 2. DDP stays on Badd's hurt ribs with stomps and gives Badd some aggressive arrogant slaps. Badd tries a hiptoss. DDP counters into a DDT! That was nice. But then he wastes time gloating and again demands a 10 from Kimberly. Kimberly gives him a 0! She waves the card in DDP's direction and he sells it, falling back into a Badd roll up for 2. Never give Kimberly anything to do other than stand there and look pretty. DDP hooks on a chinlock, climbs up the ropes to keep Badd from countering, then plays the rope leverage game with the ref and Kimberly trying to help Badd but just distracting the ref more. Badd gets up and does some more counters into a Gedo clutch for a long 2. DDP tries covers with tights holding but doesn't get anywhere. Sluggy comeback from Badd and he floors DDP. Double ax handle off the top rope. He returns the earlier favor by dropping an elbow in DDP's gut. Sunset flip off the top! DDP kicks out! Badd sit out powerbomb for 2. DDP maneuvers to the apron and snaps Badd over the top rope. Badd dodges in the corner and gets another roll up for 2. DDP gets an elbow up in the corner (with a great delayed sell from Badd) and a rope leverage cover for 2. He blocks a Badd flying headscissors attempt into a slam! Another great counter. DDP hooks on a weird sleeper with one arm on the back of Badd's head. Badd jawbreakers out and slaps on his own sleeper. DDP backs him into the corner. Another flying headscissors attempt is blocked again. But Badd learned from the first one, turns DDP over, and hits a tombstone! That gets the pin! Probably their best match yet as both guys continue to develop their strengths: Badd's athleticism (something we'd see a lot more of early in his WWF run), and DDP's match layouts and counterwrestling. Unsurprisingly Badd gives Kimberly the money. ***1/4

Speaking of Badd's WWF run, this would be his last PPV match for WCW. He was unhappy with the angle he was having to do with Kimberly and decided to pursue other opportunities. He'd drop the TV title to Lex Luger on his way out, and get laid out by DDP one last time, before making his WWF debut in March under his real name, Marc Mero.

 

WCW World Tag Team Championship: Sting and "The Total Package" Lex Luger (c) def Harlem Heat in 11:49- This is Heat's rematch after getting beat for the titles on Nitro in January. Sting and Luger have been doing this pretty decent "one guy is a face and one guy is a heel but we're still friends" story, but Luger's constant cheating is finally starting to wear on Sting going into this. The winner of this match has to defend the titles again later on in the night against the Road Warriors. Not sure why they're doing it this way but OK. The Roadies want to face Luger and Sting bad, so they've promised to make sure they keep the belts for later, making the outcome of this even more obvious. Sting and Booker start, which would be one hell of a singles match with both guys in their primes. Booker gets the first shots in. Sting reverses a corner whip and hits a clothesline. Headlock/headscissors counters end in a stalemate. Luger tags in with forearms. Booker gets a boot up in the corner and hits his own forearms. A Heat double back elbow sends Luger to the floor and he takes his time recovering. Sting hops down and talks him back in. Luger tags out to Sting and Sting doesn't seem so sure about it. Ray pounds him down. Sting hiptoss and dropkick. Ray does the ol' eye poke to kill his momentum. Nice tackle from Booker. Sting hits kicks and a faceplant. Luger gets back in and hits a kneelift for 2. Back suplex. Luger and Booker take turns missing elbow drops. Booker spinaroonie off his and he hits a heel kick! Luger goes champ in peril. Ray tags in to suck out any good this match might have had. Clothesline for 2. Luger gets a boot up in the corner and hits a horrible clothesline. Ray cuts the tag off. Atrocious powerbomb from Ray. Just fugly. After that he goes to the Nerve Pinch of Time Wasting +1. Thankfully Booker tags back in. He hits a scissors kick, but then wastes time gloating. He suckers Sting in and gets Luger back in the heel corner. Then they do the "ref didn't see the tag" spot. Sting doesn't give a damn and we're DONNYBROOKING. Stinger Splash on Booker. Sting gets tossed over the top rope. The LOD are out. Animal whacks Ray in the gut with a steel plate or something similar. Luger falls on top of him and gets the pin. LOD word kept. After the match Sting is happy, thinking Luger finally won clean. Man, does he ever figure things out the right way? The match was pretty decent when Sting and Booker were in, much less so with any other combinations. *1/2

 

WCW United States Heavyweight Championship: Konnan (c) def One Man Gang in 7:27- Konnan ended OMG's inexplicable one month reign on non-Nitro weekly TV a couple of weeks prior. Well, Konnan's reign is just as inexplicable but it was all politics, trying to keep him happy while he was bringing in lucha talent for the soon to happen cruiserweight division. Zero reaction for Konnan on his entrance, other than a few random guys at ringside chanting for him on camera, probably at the behest of the cameraman. I've caught WCW cameramen coaching parts of the crowd on more than one occasion. Konnan turns his back for no reason right after the bell like an idiot and OMG jumps him. Generic big man beatdown stuff follows. For some perspective, OMG's "peak", using the term very loosely, was 10 years ago in the mid '80s. Konnan flips over in the corner and hits a couple of basement dropkicks to try to chop the big man down. Horrible Konnan dropkick off the second rope. Almost as bad crossbody in the ropes and both guys slowly tumble out to the floor. And then Konnad (as Dusty calls him) caps off the trilogy of crap with a terrible dive out to the floor. OMG snaps Konnan over the top rope to take back over. He hits a legdrop and side suplex. Konnan tries to punch back. OMG headbutts him. The dull beatdown continues. Konnan hits a kicks to the knee and rapid fire strikes. He goes up top, then flips over in perfect position just asking for OMG to pick him up. Konnan uses that to hit a pretty ugly flying headscissors. More dropkicks until OMG "dodges" one, really Konnan telegraphed missing it a mile away. The 747 splash hits but OMG pulls Konnan up at 2. OMG goes up to the second rope. Konnan dodges before OMG even jumps but he goes anyway and splats on the mat. Konnan goes up top, hits some kind of terrible senton thingy, and gets the pin. A festival of crap. DUD

 

"I Respect You" Strap Match: "The Taskmaster" Kevin Sullivan def "Flyin'" Brian Pillman in 1:36- You want crazy Brian Pillman? Here you go. This is born out of the Dungeon of Doom and Four Horsemen having issues with each other the last few weeks. Apparently this is an impromptu match. Tony quickly explains the rules: there's a strap, but to win you have to get your opponent to say "I respect you", like an I quit match. Sullivan is going full speed to the ring, no time wasted. Pillman charges in and attacks without ever putting the strap on. He whips Sullivan. As soon as Sullivan fights back Pillman corners the ref, takes the mic, drops the now legendary "I respect you, booker man!", turns around and leaves. Everyone is confused. Of course commentary ignores the "booker man" part. One story is Pillman wanted out of WCW, so he acted out on screen in his loose canon style until they couldn't take it anymore. And it finally worked as Bischoff fired him the next day. There's another story that Sullivan was in on this the whole time and they improvised the whole thing just the two of them, and no one but them two knew about it. The idea was to work a super-realistic angle on everyone, including Pillman pretending to want to be fired backstage, but it was so realistic when Pillman asked for his release WCW gave it to him for real. Personally I'm more inclined to believe the first version. NR

Sullivan stalls in the ring while the ref gets the strap set up. After a couple of minutes Arn Anderson comes out in street clothes. Sullivan whips him. Arn takes his shirt off, gets strapped up and ready to fight. In his golf shorts.

 

"The Taskmaster" Kevin Sullivan and Arn Anderson no-contest in 3:45- Quick Arn beatdown to start. He ties Sullivan up and tries to get him to quit. Sullivan gets an eye poke and strap to the crotch. He whips Arn around and tells him to "say it". Arn comes back and drops a knee right in Sullivan's crotch. He chokes and hangs Sullivan. Sullivan uses the strap to flip Arn over the top rope. Both guys are posted. When they get back in the ring Ric Flair comes out. He gets in between them and demands this stops. He gets the mic and cuts a promo for both main event matches tonight, saying Savage and Hogan are done. Arn and Sullivan agree to a cease fire. This would be the true start of the Alliance to End Hulkamania. The whole thing felt thrown together on the fly. I'm not rating any of it because something like this is impossible to say if it was good or bad because it's so freaking strange. It's easily one of the weirdest things you'll ever see make it on screen in a wrestling show. NR

 

WCW World Tag Team Championship: Sting & "The Total Package" Lex Luger (c) and The Road Warriors double countout in 13:56- Luger slow walks his entrance and takes absolutely forever stalling, not wanting to get in there with the LOD, even after encouragement from Sting. After literally about 5 minutes of this things finally get going with Sting and Hawk. Hawk shoulderblock and dropkick. Sting takes a walk around the ring to recover and suckers Hawk in. Back in Hawk goes for his neckbreaker but it's blocked by Sting, I think. That was pretty ugly whatever the intention was. Afterwords they do some mat wrestling. Hawk?! Mat wrestling? Yup. He puts on a sort of STF, Sting gets to the ropes. Animal cranks Sting's arm. Luger tags in. Lots of caution before Luger gets the first blow. Animal big boot and powerslam for 2. Hawk hits a couple of corner clotheslines. Luger's tossed out and whipped into the guardrail. Sting helps him back in. Luger eye pokes Hawk and works him over a bit. Sting suplex for 2. Sting and Animal collide and Sting does that "accidental" fall onto the groin that he does every match. Hard to call that accidental. Luger wants in bad and fires away on Animal. Inverted atomic drop. Sting faceplants Animal and goes up top. Big splash, but Animal gets his knees up. Both sides tag. Hawk pounds on Luger. Tackle, legdrop and signature Hawk fistdrops. Hawk hooks on a sleeper. Luger quickly jawbreakers out. Tags. Stinger Splash on Animal. He goes for the Scorpion Death Lock but Hawk murders him with a clothesline. Hawk wraps Sting up in a body scissors. A Sting sunset flip is countered. Sting tries to roll Hawk up. Hawk again kills him with a clothesline. Animal gives Sting a neck crank. Luger tries to come in. Hawk cuts him off. Violently. Sting hits a suplex. Animal pops right back up! Animal hits a suplex. Sting pops right back up! Animal dropkick. Everyone's in the pool and brawling again. The fight goes to the floor and both teams are counted out. The fight continues all the way back through the curtain. The match started out very rough but they worked themselves into something pretty decent by the end. Lame finish, but they didn't want to take the belts off Sting and Luger yet and the LOD almost never jobbed. **1/2

Ad for the second annual Uncensored, coming in March. The first Uncensored was one of the worst PPVs ever, surely the second one can't be as bad, right? After that they do the classic bit where Savage interrupts Elizabeth before she can talk.

 

Steel Cage Match for the WCW World Heavyweight Championship: "Nature Boy" Ric Flair (w/Woman) def "Macho Man" Randy Savage (c) (w/Miss Elizabeth) in 18:52- Flair stalls getting in the cage to psych Savage out. He takes a mic and gives Elizabeth one last chance to switch sides. Savage says no for her. More stalling riles Savage up even more. When Flair finally gets in Savage is all over him. While they fight in one corner the ref takes his sweet time closing and locking the door on the opposite end. Flair snap mare/kneedrop combo. Savage is run into the cage and falls in the ropes upside down. Flair decks the ref! And stomps on him! Not sure what that was about. Savage gets a backslide but the ref is still down. Savage backdrop. The ref is back up. Toughest ref in the history of wrestling, what an amazing recovery. Savage hits clotheslines for 2 and pounds Flair some more. He goes for a cage shot but Flair pushes out and Savage FLIES into the cage! Flair back elbow for 2. More chops. Flair goes up top and of course gets slammed off. Savage hooks on a figure four! He gets a couple of near falls out of it as Flair fights. Flair grabs a rope but there's no rope breaks. Finally Savage lets go frustrated he couldn't put Flair away, and stomps Flair right in the face! Straight right from Savage for a long 2. Setup slam. Savage climbs all the way to the top of the cage! Flair catches him coming down! Delayed suplex from Flair, still selling the knee afterward. Slow cover for 2 and Flair tries more covers after. Savage goes into the cage again. Man, Savage has been selling the hell out of these cage shots. Fantastic work. Flair hooks on the figure four! He gets a bit of extra rope leverage while Savage about tears the ref's shirt off fighting it. Savage grabs the ropes, then grabs the cage. I guess that's good for a break because the ref physically forces Flair to break the hold. Flair goes for the figure four again. Savage rolls him up for 2. They do their usual chops/jabs exchange. Flair's run into the cage! Savage gives him the cheese grater. More cage shots and Flair is bleeding. Savage pounds the cut. Flair inverted atomic drop counter. Flair Flop! Flair tries to climb up. Savage grabs him and almost pulls his trunks completely off! Flair falls and gets crotched on the rope. Savage covers for another long 2. Whatever idiot is working as timekeeper rings the bell. Two count, dummy. Savage chokes and Flair hits a low blow. Flair is fired up and attacks. Savage counters and Flair goes into the cage again. The door opens. After all that work the ref did on it earlier? He goes over to lock it again. The camera goes to a super wide shot because no one wants to get yelled at from Turner corporate for showing blood on their no blood show. Savage gets backdropped into the cage. Woman tries to throw powder in Savage's face but he ducks it. But it's just a distraction, as on the other side Elizabeth is giving Flair one of her shoes! Savage rolls Flair up with tights the same way he won their Wrestlemania 8 match. Flair kicks out, waffles Savage with Elizabeth's shoe, and covers for the pin and the title! Elizabeth has turned on Savage! All of Flair's years of work on her has finally paid off. It's officially world title win number 13 per WCW. Hogan comes out with a chair, gets pissed at Elizabeth, then runs all the heels off. Another fantastic Flair/Savage match. Much like their Great American Bash match they did a great job of making it look like a real fight as much as a wrestling match. It got run into the ground after, but this first turn by Elizabeth on Savage really was shocking. It's a new era. ****

 

Steel Cage Match: Hulk Hogan def The Giant (w/Jimmy Hart and Kevin Sullivan) in 15:04- Because Hogan had to main event. Unlike the last match this is WWF style escape rules because that's also what Hogan wanted. Hogan's got a bandage over one of his eyes from an attack by the Dungeon of Doom on Nitro. Hogan climbs into the cage the long way around to get in and start the match. He immediately eye rakes Giant and runs him into the cage. There's a small but vocal group of fans chanting "Hogan sucks". The first part of the match is the usual Hogan punchy/bitey/back rakey offense before he tries for a slam and fails. Completely predictable. Giant lets loose with clubbing blows. After a knucklelock he puts Hogan in the inevitable bear hug. Hogan bites out but Giant throws him into the cage. He finally goes for the hurt eye (even commentary was wondering him what was taking so long), ripping the bandage off. After a Giant slam Hogan dodges an elbow drop. He throws some punches and goes for another slam which also ends poorly. Giant's done the exact same corner whip and low kick three times already. Hogan takes more cage shots. Giant suplex. He tries to leave through the door but Hogan stops him. Backbreaker from Giant and the bear hug is on again. For a while. Finally Hogan fights out. Another Giant low kick. Goozle and choke slam. Hulk Up. Giant acts shocked. Please. Hogan runs Giant into the cage about a bazillion times with Giant getting kinda sorta busted open. Big boot. Legdrop. A second. A third. Hogan climbs. Giant is back up and follows. After a chopfest Hogan knocks him off back into the ring, barely gets himself over the top of the cage, and down to the floor for the most predictable win ever. The crowd was almost completely out of it, as much as any Hogan WCW match to date. Utter trash. DUD

As soon as Hogan hits the floor Sullivan whacks him with a chair. Hogan confiscates it. The entire Dungeon of Doom runs out and corner Hogan in the cage. Hogan, being Hogan, fights them all off. All eight of them. And they wonder why no one took the DOD seriously. As the DOD retreat their newest member, the LOCH NESS MONSTER (British wrestling legend Giant Haystacks), comes out while the Giant curiously leaves completely. The whole DOD hold Loch Ness back from getting in and the show ends with Hogan celebrating as usual. This whole segment was so terrible it almost defies description.

OVERALL SHOW THOUGHTS- It started out good, fell off a cliff, recovered with a great Flair/Savage world title match, then suffered rapid unscheduled disassembly quicker than SpaceX's Starship rocket. The whole Pillman/Sullivan oddity in the middle is one of those extremely strange things that has to be seen once.

OVERALL SHOW GRADE: C-