The Hart Brothers vs The Steiner Brothers (WWF, 1-11-1994)

WWF, Florence, SC

This is a request. It’s a dark match from a Wrestling Challenge taping, which wound up released on the WrestleFest ’94 Coliseum Video compilation. This was something of a dream match at the time.

The Steiners had left WCW in late 1992 after (what else?) a contract dispute with Bill Watts, whose wrestling booking was still great but came with the enormous albatross of his badly outdated people skills. The story goes that Bruce Prichard and Pat Patterson wanted to push Scott as a singles wrestler when he came to the WWF, but Vince McMahon wasn’t that wild about it and the Steiners themselves wanted to keep teaming. But the Steiners, who were arguably still the best tag team in the world, just didn’t quite fit in the WWF, either. Their run really lasted about a year before they left, both putting in hilariously phoned-in short performances in the 1994 Royal Rumble. They didn’t appear on TV again until early May, winning a squash on Wrestling Challenge and then IRS beat Scott in a King of the Ring qualifier before went back to Japan full time for a while.

The Harts were only briefly a tag team, which was really just to set up their singles rivalry with one another, which started in full at Royal Rumble when Owen turned on Bret, leading to their classic WrestleMania match as well as their SummerSlam cage match that some people think is a classic.

None of these guys had ever wrestled each other before, and never really would again besides Bret and Rick being on opposite sides of some six-man house show tags in WCW, and also on opposite sides of a tag on one Nitro in ’99.

We’ve got Stan Lane and Gorilla Monsoon on commentary. We’re starting with Bret and Scott, and Scott takes Bret down quickly with a double leg, but Bret gets right to the ropes. More grapplefucking early. Gorilla saying the side headlock is an effective hold to wear down an opponent, but, “Never saw in over 30 years in this great profession anyone beaten with a side headlock.” He and Stan both say they were lucky and got zero cauliflower ears in their careers, Monsoon crediting “flexible ears.”

Bret gets a small advantage and tags Owen in. Owen grabs the same arm Bret had, but Scott just effortlessly slams him and tags Rick in to the barks of the crowd. Owen and Rick are GETTIN IT, hell yeah, and they come to a stalemate grappling. Rick hits a high angle back suplex, not quite a backdrop driver but as close as 1994 WWF is coming to 1994 Japan.

Rick tries the back suplex again, Owen lands on his feet and hits a German suplay for two. Scott tags in but Owen gets him with a spinning heel kick. To Stan Lane on commentary, this is a “nice martial arts move,” and Stan is a karate master so he would know. Scott comes back with a butterfly suplay, really a butterfly power bomb more than suplay, for two, but Bret breaks it up, then tags in.

Bret and Rick in now. Rick starts working on the arm. Kinda sad we never got a legit run out of Bret & Owen as a tag team. I get why we didn’t (Bret being too valuable as a singles guy and the WWF not really caring about tag teams) but it would’ve been fun. Gorilla: “They’re hootin’ for the Gremlin!” There are not enough Steiners matches with Gorilla Monsoon on commentary.

I’m gonna be real with you: for the style of match the others are trying to wrestle, Bret is the worst worker in the match by a good bit. He’s got a dang sleephold on. Come to the 90s for hot fiery tag team action, Bret, goddamn. When Rick breaks it, Bret goes right back to it.

On the other hand Bret sort of works WITH that, too. He holds a sleeper (which Monsoon rightly notes is really a choke, as Bret’s arm is too low) and then won’t let go once Rick gets to the ropes. Since he doesn’t work that faster paced 90s tag style, he cheats, like a dick. This doesn’t take away that Bret basically doesn’t work this style and feels out of place here, but he is at least smart enough to accept it in some way. And as mentioned a million times, the Steiners were good enough to work any style they came across until Scott’s body really started breaking down a couple years after this.

Rick hits the flying bulldog but doesn’t hook the leg and doesn’t get the pin. Bret takes the chest-first run into the corner, and Rick gets another two count, again not hooking the leg. Scott gets the tag and hits the tilt-a-whirl slam! Bret tries to come back on him, but Scott moves in the corner and Bret shoulders the post. It’s a shame that Bret and Goldberg, the two clear masters of shouldering a post, had such a checkered history. They should be buds, going around, running into posts.

Bret taking a long count on the floor, but Scott is doing enough to distract the referee so Bret doesn’t get counted out. Rick makes a clear show of not interfering. Once Bret gets back to the apron, Scott tries to suplay him back in, and Bret turns it around and dumps Scott over to the floor. When Bret was outside and hurt, the Steiners made a show of not capitalizing, being good guys. Bret’s a dick, though, so he picks Scott up and drives his back into the apron.

Back inside and a fresh Owen tags in and slams Scott, then follows up with a flying headbutt into the damaged lower back. Owen grabs an abdominal stretch now. Gorilla hates it, first of all Scott’s too strong for this crap, and second of all it’s “not even applied correctly, Stan.”

Bret tags back in pretty quickly and Gorilla’s all over the logic of that, too. Monsoon could always be a little bit of an old bitch but by his latter years behind the mic he was growing really impatient with logic gaps. Owen back in and he drops down on an Irish whip of Scott, so Scott hits the other side and runs into Bret’s knee in the lower back. Bret rules so much. Stan Lane hilarious on commentary, trying to defend good guy Bret. Refusing to go with the story being told. Calls it a “collision” and says Bret “wasn’t even aware Scott was headed his way.” I mean other than he blatantly goes halfway down the apron to stick his knee in there, sure.

Owen misses a dropkick and Rick gets the tag from Scott, Owen unable to make it to Bret. Rick with a tilt-a-whirl backbreaker for two. Rick gets Owen in position for a Tombstone but drops Owen down on the back instead. Scott tags in with a very friendly dragon suplay on Owen. Rick with a quick tag back in — STEINERLINE! HOO HOO HOO HOO!

Rick with a camel clutch. Scott gets a wonderful idea on the apron. Scott tags back in and immediately hits the Screwdriver on Owen. The cover is delayed and Bret breaks the pin anyway, and now Scott’s fully had enough of Bret. Scott’s the hothead of the Steiners, as always, so he lets his temper go and throws Owen over the top to the floor in anger, but Owen comes back slingshotting Scott to the floor, switching places with him.

Owen crawling and leaps for the tag to Bret, which isn’t really “hot” for the crowd as Bret has acted like a shit the whole match. Bret runs through his moves. Bret goes for the Sharpshooter on Scott, Rick breaks it up. Owen immediately tries it, too, Rick punches him in the face as well.

We’ve got Scott and Owen in now, and Scott gets Owen up in the electric chair. Rick goes up trying for the flying bulldog, but Bret holds his foot and Owen rolls forward for a two count on Scott. And now it’s breaking down. Owen bumps into Rick, who bumps into Bret, and they fall out of the ring. Scott dives onto Bret, Owen dives onto Rick, everyone goes down and they get counted out.

Post-match, tempers still flaring. Bret whips Scott into the guardrail, Rick and Owen keep fighting. More referees run in to try and break it up. Eventually they do. Scott gets the mic. “Hey, Bret and Owen Hart! We came here to beat you! Get your butts back in this ring!”

So the Harts come back and we get MORE brawling. Pat Patterson, Tony Garea, and Rene Goulet come out to help. Eventually the Steiners head out. Now Bret gets the mic. “Hey, Steiners! What are you waitin’ for?!” So HERE COME THE STEINERS! It’s on again for a moment, and then broken up again. Eventually they are talked down enough to respect the Code of Honor. Scott is the least enthused about it.

I think in some respects this match is probably a little overrated. It lacks some heat being a face vs face matchup and not being on a big stage with any story or anything, which you can pull off OK if you’re old Ring of Honor or somewhere, but WWF fans want stories attached.

The wrestling is very good; Bret doesn’t fit in, really, as everyone else can work a faster-paced, more state of the art 90s style and that’s just not his bag. It does make him the weak link in some ways, but the Steiners worked with the Arns and Eatons of the world, too, they don’t need to go nuts to have a good match, and Bret goes back to some of his pre-1988 heel work, which he never totally lost as a babyface. He’d call on it when he needed it.

The best work is when Owen is in, really, but what Bret lacks in being Hiroshi Hase the Steiners help him make up for by just allowing him to be Bret, so it’s never bad. And when I say this match is “overrated,” I’m not saying it’s not good or even that it’s not pretty great. It is, particularly for mid-90s WWF, but it has long had a reputation perhaps a hair beyond its quality. I also realize I’m doing about the same thing people do when Savage-Steamboat at Mania III comes up and a million dudes go, “It’s not THAT great!” but oh well, I am a hypocrite. (But I think Savage-Steamboat is about as good as its reputation, unless the reputation is “greatest match of all time,” which is really more a WWE marketing creation and I can’t actually fight that machine and neither can you.)

Rating: 4/5