John Cena vs. CM Punk - Viewer's Choice WWE Championship match - Raw (2010)
The first big match between the WWE champ, John Cena and then masked CM Punk gets hijacked on Viewer's Choice Raw by The Nexus, an eight man gang featuring young upstarts from WWE's developmental territory, FCW as well as all being original contestants on the first NXT program.
While it was not totally chaos, the NXT rookies of the first season really shook things up for a pretty stale product that was WWE at this point. I remember watching this episode of Raw and thinking that something new was upon us. Of course, nothing really happened. The ring gets stripped, Bryan gets fired for chocking the timekeeper with his own tie, and then for weeks John Cena does that thing he always does; he overcomes the odds.
Still, the damage that the Nexus created from their ambush on Raw was pretty impressive for WWE standards. To bad they were pretty much destined to fail once they started feuding with Super Cena.
Theme results
Ring Destruction: Apron skirts ripped off, mat gets exposed, padding torn loose, and the ring ropes are loosened and taken down.
Chris Jericho vs. Stone Cold Steve Austin - Match to unify the WWF Championship with WCW's World Heavyweight Championship and to crown the new Undisputed Champion - WWF Vengeance (2001)
WWE may be labeling Randy Orton and John Cena's TLC match to unify the WWE title and the World Heavyweight title as the first unification match of its kind, but as someone who watched WWF buy out WCW, the eventually Invasion angle, and the final unification match with both companies top titles, I would have to beg the differ on that. Yes, I am aware that Jericho and Austin were wrestling to unify the WWE and WCW titles, but that same WCW title is being considered the same title still used today (or was, we'll see what happens) as the World Heavyweight title when it was reintroduced in 2002. Saying that this title here is not the same as the one John Cena held before TLC, yet saying that the title that Booker T won in WCW is the same, is completely ridiculous. By the way, if you go back and watch Jericho's entrance from the previous match you can clearly see Jericho is labeled as the "World Heavyweight" Champion; not just the WCW Champion.
Clearly someone just wants to make this Orton/Cena showdown huge by calling it the first of its kind.
The context behind this Austin/Jericho unification match is that there was a mini-tournament of sorts to crown the first undisputed champion by combining the WWE title with WCW's World heavyweight title. The first match was Kurt Angle taking on the WWF champ, Steve Austin, then The Rock (unsuccessfully) defended the World Heavyweight title against Chris Jericho. Jericho, just hot of winning the WHC had to take on Austin in the match above to crown the very first Undisputed Champion. The rest is history.
Diesel vs. Shawn Michaels - No Holds Barred match for the WWF Championship - In Your House 7: Good Friends, Better Enemies (1996)
Today, Canadian wrestling legend, Maurice "Mad Dog" Vachon passed away at age 84. Maurice, along with being part of the Vachon family, was also a multiple time heavyweight champion in AWA and WWE Hall of Famer. No disrespect to the man what-so-ever, but - despite all these accolades and accomplishments and rivalries with guys like The Crusher or Dick the Bruiser - I will always remember him most for his participation in the Diesel/Michaels match at In Your House 7 in 1996.
The match between Diesel and his former tag team partner, Shawn Michaels is a notable match in of itself as it serves as the last match that Kevin Nash ever played the character of Diesel in WWF before jumping ship to WCW (not counting a couple of years ago where Nash was dressed in the Diesel gear during his Royal Rumble return). The match was also a "No Holds Barred" match for Michaels' WWF championship and the first PPV or televised match Mad Dog Vachon ever got involved in. Well, a part of him got involved at least. See, Mad Dog Vachon was just a spectator in the audience that night until Diesel got out of the ring mid-match and threw the 67 year old man over the guardrail. Diesel then grabbed at Vachon's leg and ripped it off revealing an artificial leg that Vachon had from losing his real leg in a hit-and-run accident. That's when Diesel took Vachon's prosthetic leg and brought it into the ring to use against Michaels.
Unfortunately for Diesel, the leg was snagged away from him by the Heart Break Kid - who ended up using it to tune up the band and harness super "Mad Dog" powers for a devastating Sweet Chin Music. So devastating in fact that Kevin Nash was never seen in the WWE again until 2002. In a way, one could argue that it was the power of Mad Dog Vachon (and his fake leg) that drove Kevin Nash away all along.
Daniel Bryan vs. The World Heavyweight champion Chris Jericho - NXT debut show (2010)
In good fashion like the other Mondays following a new champion crowning, here is Daniel Bryan's debut match in WWE.
Despite Bryan being no stranger to the WWE ring as seen just last month in the callback to the Danielson/Cena match on Velocity in 2003, this was Bryan's first match on WWE not only after becoming an indie sensation but also as "Daniel Bryan", the NXT contestant and rookie. He wouldn't be a rookie very long though, that's for sure.
This match was also the first main event on the very first NXT episode. Double debut.
Also, check out that bump Bryan takes on the side of the announce table after Jericho "catches" him in mid-air after the suicide dive.
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.
Here's something interesting, a wCw match taking place on Raw.
This World Heavyweight title main event didn't just happen on Raw because Nitro was full that night. No, at this point in 2001, WCW and all of its talent (the ones still around) was now owner by Vince McMahon who could do whatever he wanted with it. So, before doing away with the WCW name all together and calling the wrestlers still around "The Invasion", or later, "The Alliance" as talent still lingering for pay with ECW and WWF Benedict Arnolds started joining in, it looked like WCW was going to have its own brand inside Raw. At least that's what they made it out be one night in July with Booker T, the current WCW World Heavyweight champion taking on Buff Bagwell in his only appearance on Raw.
To think, if this match didn't get booed out of the building, would we have seen WCW become a brand just like ECW did years later? Ehh, maybe - but probably not. Brands hadn't really been thought up at this point in WWF and I don't think McMahon wanted to give these wrestlers (he had acquired from the AOL Time Warner Buy-out) their own show every week. No TV network wanted that, that's for sure. The whole situation was sort of reminiscent of when WCW decided NWO should be its own separate thing; Thus creating WCW/NWO Revenge (the N64 game) and Souled Out, a PPV originally conceived as an NWO-only event with WCW wrestlers as challengers.
Overall impression of the match: I remember this happening very well actually. At the time, I was a huge WWF mark and seeing WCW talent coming in and having their own wCw logo and apron on the ring really gave me the frights! I mean, I really thought that WCW was going to somehow take over big and powerful WWF and I would have to put up with more of their crap that they tried pulling out of their ass like they did in 2000-2001.
WCW was done. With that being said, I don't think I watched this match the first time it aired - but I did stay tuned for the end when Kurt Angle and Stone Cold Steve Austin (who would later jump ship and join The Alliance themselves) attacked Booker to end this match and the fans misery. No wait! scratch that, I didn't! I think the last thing I remember from this Raw was Austin kicking Bagwell out of the building (literally) while my past self cheered for the fact that I'd never have to see Buffman - I mean Buff Bagwell - or his mom on TV ever again.
Also, Arn Anderson and Scott Hudson make one boring commentating team. That and this match was pretty much doomed from the beginning. Boring, un-WWF, not main event level wrestler, and an all around poor attempt to convince anyone that a WCW reincarnation in the WWF could ever exist.
It's the main event. It's a steel cage match. It features Dick the Bruiser as Popeye, Paul Heyman on commentary making Popeye and Gordon Solie jokes, and even a spaceship entrance to top it all off accompanied by the voice of The Shockmaster, Ole Anderson. What more do you want?
This was also the match that ended the Black Scorpion gimmick which, originally thought up by Ole Anderson himself, really had nowhere to go. So, after Dusty Rhodes took over booking in WCW, The American Dream put an end to whole gimmick by putting someone who could really be the man behind the mask after months of impostor Black Scorpions had been running around taunting Sting. I'm not going to give it away if you don't already know who signed up to be the real Black Scorpion but maybe you can figure it out yourself just by watching a little of this match. It's not as obvious as Mr. America (pic) but it's close-ish. Hopefully that flashy robe doesn't give it away after that out-of-this-world entrance too much.
Overall impression of the match: Beginning is crazy. Match is a little boring. Unveiling at the end is super rushed, especially with Good Ol' JR screaming the countdown and just who is under that mask,errr, those masks I mean. In the end though, definitely worth watching.
