Welcome back to the Dark Match Dungeon! Now entering our 19th year in syndication, this is the feature where I dig through the poorly-compressed archives of the internet and pull out some forgotten footage of today’s wrestling stars. It’s kind of like traveling through the Rickstaverse, except with fewer chances of having to dispose of your own corpse. By some good fortune, today’s edition is another two-for-one deal. Set against the backdrop of early ’90s WCW, here are Kevin Nash and Rob Van Dam duking it out. I hope you’re taking notes, because Finding The Right Gimmick 101 is now in session.
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What To Look For:
- Vinnie By-God Vegas. Most of us know at least one facet of Kevin Nash (sarcastic WCW booker, cool big-rig driver, SummerSlam main-event ruiner), but there was a period where WCW just had no idea what to do with him. Lest we forget that before he was Vinnie Vegas, he was Oz. Think about that before you go saying that James Franco was the worst version of the character.
- And let’s not forget Rob Van Dam, trying to pull identity theft on Jean-Claude Van Damme in everything but name. I kept expecting a Tong Po run-in.
- Tony Schiavone casually mentioning that Jesse Ventura will be in the upcoming film Demolition Man. That’ll put some butts in the seats!
- Van Dam going the 2013 Rusev route and electing to leave shoes behind. Big Cass would disapprove.
- A version of Snake Eyes that looks way more forceful than Undertaker’s.
As advertised in the video title, this was from a tournament to crown a new WCW Television Champion after Scott Steiner vacated the belt and left for the WWF. Who was the eventual winner? None other than Mr. Wonderful himself, Paul Orndorff. Meanwhile, Kevin Nash would pull a page from Steiner’s book and leave for the WWF later that year. As for Rob Van Dam, it wasn’t until he found a little promotion called ECW that he started really gaining steam. Nice little company, shame it had to go out of business.
