Match of the Day - Curt Hennig saves Chris Jericho's life... basically

Curt Henning vs. Chris Jericho - WCW Monday Nitro (1997)

It might seem like a dream match now, but back in '97 a Hennig/Jericho match on Monday Nitro was just an excuse to talk about anything other than a Hennig/Jericho match. A shame really, but this was WCW at the height of the nWo days, remember.

While this match may forever be lost in the mix of other forgettable Nitro matches used to talk about the nWo, it does include a mishap on Chris Jericho's behalf that may not seem that big of a deal in hindsight, but it could have ended Jericho's career if it got any worse. What I'm talking about is Jericho's Lionsault (middle rope springboard moonsault) towards the end of the match that he botches by not rotating enough - the same exact move and mishap that paralyzed Hayabusa a few years later. Luckily in this instance, Curt Hennig, either on instinct or following out the spot, put his knees up at just the right time that Jericho ends up landing on Henning's knees with his back rather than on his head and, well, pretty much saving his neck:

phew.

Match of the Day - Goldberg melts Glacier! #wcw

Bill Goldberg vs. Glacier - WCW Monday Nitro (1997)

Damn, it's cold out!

Here's the first of a few Golderg versus the coldest man in the world, Glacier squash matches. The Sub-Zero-like Glacier's snowy entrance takes just about as long if not more than the match itself. 

Take that cold!

Match of the Day - Lance Storm looks to become a grand slam champion in WCW

Lance Storm vs. Booker T - WCW Heavyweight title match - Monday Nitro (2000)

Lance Storm takes on the WCW Heavyweight champ, Booker T in hopes to become a four title champion.

Storm at the time held the WCW Crusierweight title (which he renamed the 100 kg and Under title), the WCW United States Heavyweight title (renamed the Canadian Heavyweight title), and the WCW Hardcore title (renamed the Saskatchewan Hardcore International title AKA S.H.I.T.) - all he needed was the Heavyweight title and, after less than a year into WCW, the Canadian native would have had possession of all the singles titles in the company.

Despite this match being mostly a warm-up for Booker T as he headed into the New Blood Rising PPV to defend the title against Jeff Jarrett, this is still a pretty good match and far better than said match with Jeff Jarrett that summer.

Match of the Day - La Parka defeats the macho one?!?

Macho Man Randy Savage vs. La Parka - Monday Nitro (1997)

Macho Man Randy Savage gets more than he bargained for when "the Chairman" La Parka diamond cuts him out of no where in the middle of the ring and reveals to everyone that he was a certain arch-nemesis of the virus that was nWo. 

Who was it? I'll give you another hint: It was that self high fiving yoga guy. 

Match of the Day - Regal refuses to be squashed by Goldberg?

Steve Regal vs. Goldberg - Monday Nitro (1998)

Ah yes, the age old tale of Lord Steven Regal stiffing Goldberg in what was supposed to be a normal Monday Nitro Goldberg three minute squash match. The result: Regal's first release from WCW.

As it turns out though, the bookers actually told Regal to have a real rasslin match with Bill to show that the big green former football player could actually wrestle. Unfortunately, Goldberg was just not ready for such a match and the whole thing ended up looking like one big convoluted shoot fight. Goldberg looks surprised when Regal takes him down to his level because, well, he genuinely was. Regal, in the end, wasn't stiffing anybody but himself... 

As for Regal's first departure from WCW, that was all Regal's doing. Regal was having a lot of problems with drugs at the time and left the WCW to coupe with his "demons". After a short stint in WWF where he was given a hardhat and the moniker of a real man's man, Regal checked himself into rehab before one more WCW run.

Match of the Day - Last WCW match on the last Nitro ever!

Ric Flair vs. Sting - last Nitro main event - Monday Nitro (2001)

March 26, 2001: The Night of Champions, AKA the last Nitro of all time marked the end of an era and the dawn of WWF as the ultimate wrestling promotion. Vince had won the war and World Championship Wrestling had run its course. I guess it would only be fitting that the last match on the last Nitro, and the last WCW match (if you don't count the Buff Bagwell/Booker T "WCW" match on Raw) ever, be between the first man to be called the WCW World Heavyweight champion, Ric Flair, and the only big name wrestler to ever not jump ship to WWF, Sting!

Ric Flair versus Sting also just makes sense as the send-off match for Nitro. These two had gone toe-to-toe with each other countless of times including at the main event of the very first Clash of the Champions where they wrestled until the 45 minute time-limit. Flair and Sting even wrestled each other for the US Heavyweight title at the very first Nitro at the Mall of America right before the Hogan/Big Bubba Rogers main event less than six years prior. So yeah, perfect.

Anyways...

RIP WCW.

Theme Results:

Final match: Ric Flair in WCW, Sting in WCW, Nitro, and WCW.

Match of the Day - Chris Jericho vs Fandango of the 90's, Disco Inferno

Chris Jericho vs. Disco Inferno - WCW World Television Championship match - Monday Night Nitro (1998)

Fifteen years before Chris Jericho lost to Fandango in the ball-room dancer-turned-professional wrestler's debut match (at WrestleMania, no less), Chris Jericho had no trouble putting away the "disco never died" enthusiast, Disco Inferno here in this match on Nitro for the TV title.

Looking into it, I checked to see if there was ever a time that Disco upset Jericho just as Johnny "Fandango" Curtis had at WrestleMania this year. I was unsuccessful at finding such match, so I decided that this match above was the closest that Disco ever got to defeating the brash and arrogant World TV champ.

The video above also features the Nitro Girls, a high school gym teacher throwing a Nitro Party for his students, Mike Tenay unaware of what was going on and unable to answer The Brains simple question of who his (Tenay's) role model growing up was, and Jericho speaking in German for a split second.

Remember: Disco Inferno vs. Fandango WMXXX. I got a lot of money riding on it. It's going to happen.

Other WrestleMania XXX prodictions: Antonio Cesaro vs. Bork Lesnar vs. Steel Steps.

Match of the Day - Insane Clown Posse challenge Mike Awesome and his bus to a hardcore match... and lose

Hardcore Wednesday:

Insane Clown Posse vs. That 70's Guy Mike Awesome - Hardcore handicap match - Monday Night Nitro (2000)

While I'm on the subject of shitty handicap matches...

It's 2000, my mark meter is off the charts, I didn't miss a Hardy Boyz match, and I'm pro-WWF through and through, but for some reason one Monday night I decide to switch the channel over to the competition -  WCW and their Monday night wrestling product, Nitro. I'm not sure why I did it, probably curiosity or some shit like that, but I did it. And guess what I just so happened to stumble upon? Ding ding! This very match...

Now to be fair, before getting into WWF and The Hardyz, I actually watched quite a bit of WCW. But when I tuned into Nitro again for the first time in some time, it didn't look like I remembered it... No, this time, there were two clowns, a guy dressed like the 70's, and the Partridge Family bus. No ring, no NWO, no nothing.

Then it happened, Mike Awesome 'Awesome Bombed' Shaggy 2 Dope on top of the bus and 2 Dope slides off and takes a nasty splat onto the ground. Thanks to this unforgettable match, I believed for some time that handicap matches were matches where someone ends up handicap like that stupid-looking clown on Nitro in 2000.

Theme Results

Non-ring: Mike Awesome's "That 70's" bus.

Match of the Day - Spring Break-Out w/ Rey Mysterio & Ric Flair!

Rey Mysterio Jr. vs. Ric Flair - World Heavyweight title match - WCW Nitro Spring Break-Out (1999)

What better way to kick off my Spring Break then with a little blast from the past featuring Ric Flair taking on the unmasked Rey Mysterio Jr. in Rey Rey's first World Heavyweight title shot (according to Michael Buffer) at WCW's coverage of Monday Night Nitro at Panama City Beach, Florida for their annual Spring Break-Out special. AKA the WCW with the swimming pool around the ring!

This match isn't so much a blast from the past as much as it just reminds me of how much MTV and other teenager-friendly channels on TV used to broadcast Spring Break related events like this one at Club La Vela.

Match of the Day - The young and the ridiculous

Konnan vs. "Dangerous" Devon Storm - WCW Monday Night Nitro (1996)

One year before having a short run with WWF in their short-lived light heavyweight division, Devon Storm took to the skies, ropes, chairs, stairs, and what ever he could jump off of as the spot hungry, "Dangerous" Devon Storm in WCW to take on Konnan, the current US heavyweight champion at the time.

Both of these athletes would later reinvent themselves in WCW many years later as Konnan made a name for himself again as a member of NWO Wolfpac and eventually with The Filthy Animals while Devon Storm went on to be a bet more of an uncanny competitor as he donned the ripped jeans and went by Crowbar as he aligned himself with Zombie-hot but screams like a banshee Daffney and the Nature Boy's dysfunctional son, David Flair.

Konnan defeats Devon Storm with somewhat ease as he clearly was a very capable and skilled wrestler. Being a well-trained wrestler is not what get's you big in pro wrestler believe it or not, however, and Konnan would pretty much get overlooked through most of his career in WCW up until about the point where he just started wearing the street clothes and all that. One place he definitely wasn't overlooked at was Mexico considering Konnan was basically the John Cena of his day in Mexica.

That's a big deal I've heard.

Match of the Day - Hulk Hogan wrestles as himself to take on younger wrestlers trying to get over

Hulk Hogan as Terry Bollea vs. Mike Awesome - WCW Nitro (2000)

Would you like the long version or the short version?

Short version it is.

In 2000, WCW had a big brain idea to pit young up-and-comers with seasoned vets and well past-their-primers. Though the intention was to get the new guys over, WCW management made the god awful decision of putting the two biggest wrestling personality heels, Eric Bishoff and Vince Russo, in charge of the young talent. Combine that with the fact that the veterans were known as The Millionaire's Club and led by Hulk Hogan, a man who supposedly passed the torch on in 1990 but still needed the spotlight every year he wasn't making terrible movies in Hollywood (sound familiar), made the chances of the young guys getting over a lot harder. Like WCW hard.

I understand that sometimes a company already has solid top guys and don't need green competitors getting a push, but this was WCW 2000; the top guys of the past were gone and it was time for the top guys to carry the weight of the company.

So, in the mist of the New Blood (the young guys looking for a break) versus the Millionaire's Club (the guys who needed to step down from their pedestals , Hulk Hogan decided that he needed to take matters into his own hands and fight as himself, Terry Bollea, to take on Mike Awesome, an up-and-comer with high potential to keep the power of WCW to the old guys.

Hulk Hogan also had a running feud with Billy Kidman, a kid who was never big enough to be a main eventer, as well as his own nephew, Horace Hogan, who was always just destined to be in a B-list NWO. Soon after he would feud with Jeff Jarrett before leaving the company after the Vince Russo shoot/work incident at Bash at the Beach. A story for another day.

As for Awesome, he was never given the main event status push he really deserved and was repackaged numerous times starting with the "Career Killer" gimmick, then the "Fat Chick Thrilla" gimmick, then "That 70's Guy" gimmick, and then finally the "Canadian Career Killer" gimmick after joining Team Canada in the dying days of WCW. It should also be noted that his gimmick as the Career Killer was because he could kill careers but in an ironic turn of events is what killed his career.

Theme Results:

Jeans: Terry "Hulk Hogan" Bollea

Match of the Day - Special guest referee 4-way ladder match... must be WCW

Bret Hart vs. Scott Hall vs. Goldberg vs. Sid Vicious - Texas Tornado Ladder Match for the WCW US Heavyweight Championship WCW Nitro (1999)

Today is the first time I have actually heard of this match. It's a four man ladder match featuring Razor Ramon - I mean Scott Hall, Bret Hart (who was in the first WWF ladder match - though Hall's ladder matches are more recognized as firsts), Sid Vicious, and Bill Goldberg. Oh yeah, and the special referee was Kevin Nash because fuck it this is WCW and there needs to be a special referee in a match where one person wins by climbing a ladder to retrieve a belt hanging high above the ring and that's it.

One must also put into account that WCW at this point was essentially the Kevin Nash/Scott Hall show and lacked a lot of substance. So, in a not so surprising turn of event, Nash knocks out Bret Hart who has the title in his grasp with a nightstick at the top of the ladder... Nash then miraculously catches the title as Hart drops to the mat which allows Scott Hall to climb the ladder and snag the title from Nash's hands.

There was also a bit with Rick Steiner and his heel run as he comes out to attack his former friend, Sid Vicious. WCW wasn't the Rick Steiner show though so his little spotlight and impact was overshadowed by what Nash and Hall were really up in this match. Steiner, who was the TV champ at the time would soon lose the title at Mayhem because he was too injured to compete. The title was then given to, yep you guessed it, Scott Hall. 

Scott Hall eventually throws the TV Championship away a week later...

Literally though, he throws it into a trashcan on Nitro.

All in all, this is not one match you will be seeing on a ladder match compilation anytime soon (unless the next Ladder Match DVD runs out of good or legitimate ladder matches). 

It is however a hell of a good look at what WCW was like in 1999.