Match of the Day - just Booker takes on fat Ahmed Johnson for the letter T

Booker vs. Big T - WCW SuperBrawl X (2000)

The story behind this ill-advised match between Booker T and a larger-than-I-remembered Ahmed Johnson was that Stevie Ray, Booker's brother and long-time tag team partner, decided to turn his back on his own flesh and blood. Apparently Stevie Ray felt that Booker T wasn't the man that he used be and a bigger, fatter version of the Harlem Heat - Harlem Heat 2000 - had to be created.

Along with introducing his new tag team partner, Big T (Ahmed Johnson, now 300 pounds), Stevie Ray also introduced J. Biggs (Clarence Mason from the Nation of Domination) as Harlem Heat's new lawyer. Mr. Biggs then used his lawyer magic to get the T in Booker T removed since Big T was the only one aloud to use a single T in his name. Along with Booker's T, he also lost his entrance music and the rights to Harlem Heat.

Soon though, Booker T - now just "Booker" - got a chance to win it all back in the match above against Big T at the 10th Anniversary of SuperBrawl. And while Booker looked to be getting his T back in no time, all of a sudden the lights go out in the arena and when the lights kick back on, is this even bigger guy than Ahmed Johnson standing there on the apron . At first, it looks like it's Mabel - seeing as the lights went out for that big man a year or so before this in the WWF when he made his transformation into Viscera, but nope. Turns out it was just a really big guy no one had ever seen before.

Or had we?

The man we see become the third member of this huge new Harlem Heat revamp was also that ridiculously huge chested man (who was never used) in the No Limit Soldiers, another poor angle that WCW felt was necessary to cram down our throats.

The aftermath to this match is pretty awful as well; from what I know, Booker never got his T back and Harlem Heat with all their potential and beef to them never went anywhere (no shocker there). Booker later would join the Misfits in Action (MIA) as "GI Bro" just long enough for people to forget about Harlem Heat 2000 so he could return as Booker T again and get his long overdue push before WCW went bankrupt.

This angle and match wouldn't have been that bad by itself but then Mark Madden, the worst wrestling commentator of all time (Mike Adamle doesn't count since he knew nothing about wrestling), decides that he'll mention that he once lived in Harlem with Stevie Ray and Booker T along with the legendary black civil rights activist, Malcolm X who was assassinated in 1964. Yeah...

Match of the Day - the Harlem Heat/Nasty Boyz food fight!

Harlem Heat vs. The Nasty Boyz - WCW Uncensored (1995)

WCW's Uncensored PPV was a lot like WWE's Extreme Rules PPV today; there was no blood, it wasn't extreme, and most of the time it was a big mess.

This falls count anywhere tornado tag team match between The Nasty Boyz and Harlem Heat along with Sherri, is one of the messiest matches in WCW history. Messy meaning like literal messy...

Like food fight messy.

This match starts out as any tag team match with no illegal man or tagging in would, but as soon as the fight is brought outside the ring and eventually to the concession stands, things get a little "uncensored". WCW's idea of uncensored at the time though was to see how much damage two teams could do to food, lemonade stands, and themselves.

Overall reaction to the match: This match is somewhat reminiscent of the concession stand matches that wrestling companies would have back in the territory days... because, you know, who wouldn't want to see a bunch of grown men beat each other with funnel cakes, cotton candy, stale pretzels, and mustard? Truthfully I actually had an action figure playset that revolved around this kind of activity... but that is neither here nor there. What is here is one hell of a messy match. At one point, the 'concession area' starts to get very slippery after some type of liquid is spilled on the ground and begins to wreak havoc on the two teams as well as Sherri who actually takes some pretty painful bumps as she - along with the everybody else - can barely stand or move around without slipping.

Then the match just ends.

Things get so disorganized that the camera misses Brian Knobbs pick up a pin fall on Booker in either the pop corn or funnel cakes area!

Despite all this, along with Stevie Ray almost pulling his groin multiple times and HH's uniforms getting so trashed they could never be worn again, this match was awarded runner-up match of the year in 1995 by Pro Wrestling Illustrated... the punchline to this whole ordeal!