Previously on WCW Thunder: The first edition of WCW Thursday Night (recapped in our Best and Worst of Nitro column because WWE Network added Thunder like a week too late) saw Sting forced to vacate the Heavyweight Championship. Also, Juventud Guerrera becoming the new Cruiserweight Champion, and the nWo are breaking up*!
*they aren’t
If you’d like to watch this week’s episode on WWE Network, click here. In the coming weeks you’ll be able to read all the Thunder recaps on its UPROXX tag page, and of course if you’re reading these, you’re hopefully reading the corresponding Nitro bits as well.
Note: This is a new vintage column in the rotation, so if you like it, please make sure to comment below and share the column on all (or at least some) of your social media. It helps, especially when you’re writing about WCW Rain Delay.
And now, the first edition (of the second episode) of the Best and Worst of WCW Thunder for January 15, 1998.
Best: Annoying Kevin Nash Is The Truest Kevin Nash
You can keep your angry trucker with fringed leather pants, for my money the best and most honest version of Kevin Nash is the one who misses half his matches with “injuries” and then shows up for all the non-wrestling shows to be as detached and annoying as possible. The second truest version of Kevin Nash is probably “Oz,” but we’ll get to that in the Best and Worst of WCW 1991 column I’ll probably end up doing.
This week’s Thunder (outside of paradise) starts with The Giant coming to the ring and speaking a little too calmly about how he’s facing Kevin Nash at Starrcade, and now has a $1.5 million “performance bond” to guarantee it. He can’t put his hands on Nash before Starrcade, though, or he loses the match and the $1.5 mil of his own money he had to put up to get it. Because you can’t have a 7-foot guy out here in a caveman singlet and not have him attack people, Lodi shows up for some reason with a pro-Kevin Nash sign and gets chokeslammed. I take it back, the best version of Kevin Nash is the sedated, gen-X Flock Kevin Nash we never got to see.
The rest of the Flock shows up to get Also Beaten Up, including the great visual of Reg Show hitting Hammer so hard he ends up in the audience, then gorilla pressing Kidman from inside the ring over the rail into the crowd ONTO him. That’s when Nash shows up, of course, and uses a hot coffee mod to attack the Giant when he won’t throw punches. It doesn’t count as touching the other guy unless it’s literally your hands, I guess, and Giant’s forced to walk to the back with his hands on his head. It’s a very WWE Raw opener, but it works, and I never get tired of seeing six-ish Flock jobsmen getting tossed around like they’re in the pit at a Mudhoney show.
Best: Squad Goals
Up next we have three unknowing martial artists who are summoned to a mysterious island to compete in a tournament whose outcome will decide the fate of the world. [checks notes] Sorry, this is the affordable Japanese super team of Gedo, jacket master the Black Cat, and discount Raiden Michiyoshi Ohara. All I have to tell you about their fate is, “they’re in a match against the Steiner Brothers.” If a Japanese person steps food in the United States, an alarm goes off in the Steiners’ heads and they must drop them on their heads as soon as possible.
The actual match gets a Worst for one of the very worst wrestling plots: a guy on a winning team being mad that his team’s winning. Scott Steiner tags in and starts suplexing the souls of out people, as he does, and like 20 seconds into it Rick Steiner’s asking for a tag. When Scott doesn’t immediately comply, the story becomes that Scott’s ignoring his team and is a bad person. My read of it’s closer to, “WCW is a bunch of crybabies who can’t even be happy when they’re winning, maybe Rick should stop trying to tag in and let his Incredible Hulk-ass brother win the match he’s winning?” I was upset when the Steiners eventually broke up, but looking back it’s pretty obvious that Scott had needed to break away from Rick for like five years. He was Pacey, and Rick was everyone else on Dawson’s Creek.
Also obvious: Thunder should’ve included a lengthy Ohara vs. Glacier feud.
Worst: Sheamus Defeats Daniel Bryan In Only 18 Seconds At WrestleMania 28
Speaking of Mortal Kombat guys, Ernest ‘The Cat’ Gaffney Miller gets a strong win over Yuji Nagata. The two rules of Japanese talent in WCW are as follows: (1) all Japanese people are sneaky and evil, and (2) they’re all jobbers. Unless like, there’s a chance to prove Japan is better than America. WCW was booked by my grandpa in the 1950s, apparently.
Worst: Larry Zbyszko Tries To Save Our Nation’s Young People
Up next is supposed to be Scott Hall vs. Louie Spicolli. If you aren’t familiar with Spicolli’s work in the ring or at Ridgemont High, he’s a former ECW talent who competed in Mexico under the greatest wrestling name of all time (“Madonna’s Boyfriend”), and his gimmick is that he’s Francis Buxton from Pee-wee’s Big Adventure. I mean, it’s not, but yeah, it totally is. Francis is having his bath!
The match never happens because it turns out Hall is Spicolli’s hero, and he wants to join the nWo. That brings out Golf Grandpa Larry Zbyszko to try to save his soul, but it’s no use … wrestling’s James Corden cheap-shots him in the back of the head, and Larry must use a combination of heel miscommunication and a mastery of karah-tay to avoid a beatdown.
This is all to set up Zbyszko vs. Scott Hall at Souled Out (with one of the most absurd heel turns ever) and Zbyszko vs. Spicolli at SuperBrawl. That never happens for the saddest reason, which we’ll get into when we’re closer.
Worst: Disco Inferno Gives Without Taking, But We Send Him Away
Unstoppable rage homie William Scott Goldberg is scheduled to face Chavo Guerrero Jr., which is sorta like booking a semi truck in a game of chicken against a go-kart. Disco Inferno interrupts for some reason, and Chavo combats that with one of the worst promos you’ll ever hear. It sounds like a kid on Reading Rainbow trying to be threatening about a book he liked. At one point he tells Disco to “go back to the Copacabana.” First of all, racist. Second of all, sure, ‘Copacabana (At The Copa)‘ is technically a disco song, but telling a disco guy to go be Barry Manilow is like telling a rapper to go back to his No Cussing Club.
Goldberg shows up lays the man low (cough), and that’s the end of the segment. It’s interesting to see how WCW clearly knew Bill Goldberg was the next big thing and had to find as many ways as possible for him to avoid wrestling so spear comma jackhammer comma win wasn’t exactly the same every week. Hopefully Disco will be Ready To Take A Chance Again soon!
Worst: Chris Jericho Almost Gets Paralyzed AGAIN. AGAIN.
This has gotta be on purpose at this point. At Halloween Havoc, Jericho almost killed himself trying to hurricanrana Gedo off the top rope. Then he almost paralyzed himself again on Nitro botching a Lionsault, and Curt Hennig had to save his life. Now here he is almost breaking his neck AGAIN, hopping a little too early for an inverted Gory Special, a move they’ve done successfully plenty of times before.
Watch this through a pinhole in a piece of paper.
Hey, if you ever wanted to see the first Vertebreaker on American TV, there you go. Between all of that and Jericho almost badly injuring himslf on a dive against Guerrero at Clash of the Champions, it’s a wonder the guy didn’t show up as WWF’s “Millennium Man” in a wheelchair.
Best: Mysterio Got You Sprung With His Tongue Ring
His lifestyle’s wild, he was living like a wild child, trapped on a short leash, paroled the police files. So yo, what’s happening now? Rey Mysterio’s winning the Cruiserweight Championship from Juventud Guerrera, ending Juvy’s historic 7-day title reign.
This is a pretty great match all around, from Chris Jericho’s promo about how he attacked Mysterio from behind on Nitro because Rey was “talking under his breath” at him so only he could hear, to the INCREDIBLE finishing sequence where Juvy goes for a 450, misses and lands on his feet just in time for Mysterio to counter with a rana through the legs and pin him. If you’ve never seen it, you should watch it here. This is the Rey/Juvy match featured on WWE’s ‘Biggest Little Man’ DVD, which sounds less like a cool nickname and more like what you say to a 7-year old wearing a tie.
Not sure why they did the Cruiserweight Championship hot potato other than giving these first few Thunders big (little) moments. They could’ve just had Guerrero drop the belt to Mysterio before Mysterio/Jericho or even go directly from Guerrero to Jericho instead of going Guerrero to Dragon to Juventud to Rey to Jericho in the span of a month, but I guess not every title reign is supposed to be lengthy. Regardless, this is the best match in Thunder’s young history, and it’s nice to remember WCW can do longer matches of consequence with clean finishes on their weekly shows when they want to.
Note: they never want to.
Best/Worst: A Main Event More Overbooked Than The Library Of Alexandria
This one’s going to take a while to explain.
On Nitro, Diamond Dallas Page challenged Macho Man Randy Savage to either a one-on-one match or a handicap match on Thunder. I’m not sure I totally understood it because he was busy cramming in every weather simile he could remember. It’s gonna be STORMY on Thunder, Macho! The storm clouds are gonna roll in, and I’m gonna rain all over you! You’re gonna hurt like hail! Etc. After Nitro, off screen, Page apparently got “mugged” in the parking lot, injured his knee, and can’t compete. So instead of just not having the match, the announce team acts like this is the first they’re hearing of it despite the three days between Monday and Thursday, and the match is now Lex Luger vs. Macho Man and Kevin Nash. Cool?
Nash and Savage have been in each other’s faces lately, and it’s made worse by Hollywood Hogan deciding to valet for them. This also makes the match suddenly 3-on-1, which Luger’s fine with because he gains +5 to his Torture Rack and Metal Forearm Of Doom when more than two people are attacking him simultaneously. If Luger could’ve wrestled every match against 3-8 people he’d have been champion for a decade.
The match happens, and Luger has to force Page to stay in the back. Page doesn’t listen, so Hogan shows up and re-re-injures him with a crutch to the leg. Hogan gets involved in the match too and accidentally kicks Savage in the stomach, causing them to go nose-to-nose. The endless Mega Powers pissing contest continues.
While Hogan’s distracted — he’s the focus, even when he’s not wrestling — The Giant shows up to be Lex’s partner. Not sure why Lex didn’t go to Giant or like, Sting and say “hey guys, DDP got mugged, will one of you be my tag team partner?” Hell, Rick Steiner’s trying to get in the ring, ask him. Ask Jerry Flynn for Christ’s sake so you aren’t out there by yourself fighting three guys.
But yeah, Giant shows up and sneaks up behind Hogan somehow, setting up the Hulkster to use his High Noon At Mega Mountain acting prowess to nail one of the most comical Vince McMahon gulps you’ve ever seen:
Yadda yadda the rest of the nWo shows up, yadda yadda Sting arrives to even the odds, yadda yadda Tenzan doesn’t get the memo about stooging for Sting and tries to kick him in the stomach. You know how it goes. Just because they changed the color scheme and name and are making people enter through a Legends of the Hidden Temple set doesn’t mean the format’s any different.
Next Week:
Super Calo runs afoul of La Parka again, Bill Goldberg faces his biggest challenge yet in the third best West Texas Redneck, and The Giant gets his first experience ending a show with a broken ring. All this and more on WCW Heavy Rain! Repeatedly press X to enjoy the show with your family!
