WCW SuperBrawl, St. Petersburg, FL
This is the THUNDERDOOM CAGE MATCH. Doom have imploded and broken up. Teddy Long is suspended above the ring in a shark cage.
Kind of a sad match for Butch Reed, who leaves the company right after this, having done his job helping Ron Simmons become a much better wrestler and setting him on the path to singles success. He did come back to WCW in ’92 briefly but that was his end on the big stage.
Ross makes sure pre-match to mention about three times that Simmons’ jersey was retired at Florida State, and once that he is documented to be Burt Reynolds’ favorite wrestler. (Reynolds also went to Florida State, where he roomed with Lee Corso!)
Basically the first guys (not the last) to show real fire all night. When I say this is one of my favorite shows I do not really mean to suggest that it is notably good. I just like it a lot. These are also the first guys on the show who seem to have a clear idea about what they really want to do, like they thought about how to do their match before hand.
Simmons gets busted open on the cage, because they’re using the cage. Reed hammering right hands into the side of Simmons’ bloody head, and yells up to Teddy Long not to worry, he’s got him. Simmons has to brawl his way back into it, showing big babyface heart, which we’re learning he has here. But Reed keeps using his veteran smarts, knows the ring, knows how to use the cage.
This is honestly a much better match than I used to think it was. It’s a very good bunch of story work, even with Ross and Rhodes just absolutely throbbing jerking off over Florida State football.
Reed with a piledriver, then slows it down with a chinlock, having put the work in to batter Simmons. But that gives Ron a chance to recover some, actually, only for Simmons to get caught with a swinging neckbreaker, having committed the cardinal mistake. Simmons comes back again, Reed cuts him off again, and then they’re both down on a double clothesline.
With both down, Teddy Long tosses a small chain for children into the ring. With odds as good as 50/50 that this will horribly backfire, you gotta do it! But it doesn’t even backfire. Reed does get it, swings wild, Simmons ducks and hits the spinebuster for the win.
The finish is finish a little sudden and lacking in drama, and honestly if I had one (well…) complaint about WCW over the years as compared to the WWF, it’s that they never had a finish wizard like Pat Patterson. A lot of stuff probably would have been better if they’d had a guy like that. But this is a good, solid cage match. It’s not great, but I always kind of underrated this one.
Tape Machines Are Rolling 
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