Al Snow vs Big Boss Man (WWF, 9-26-1999)

WWF Unforgiven, Charlotte, NC

A request! A real classic here.

Long story short, Al Snow had a dog called Pepper and eventually the Big Boss Man killed him and tricked Al Snow into eating him.

The Kennel From Hell match.

1999 was great.

(Requests open and tips always appreciated!)

John Cena vs AJ Styles vs Bray Wyatt vs The Miz vs Baron Corbin vs Dean Ambrose (WWE, 2-12-2017)

WWE Elimination Chamber, Phoenix, AZ

A request! This one I’m excited to watch again. I remember liking this a lot, and as a huge Bray Wyatt fan, it was cool to see him win a big one, even if it was going to be a simple transition title win to put the WWE belt on Randy Orton at WrestleMania 33, which I was going to attend! Wow, I couldn’t wait to see Bray Wyatt vs Randy Orton at WrestleMania 33!

…

It’s a NEW Elimination Chamber!

(Requests open and tips always appreciated!)

Charlotte vs Sasha Banks vs Becky Lynch vs Bayley (NXT, 2-11-2015)

NXT TakeOver: Rival, Winter Park, FL

A request! It’s a FATAL FOUR-WAY for Charlotte’s NXT women’s championship. Charlotte is the champion. The others want the belt.

It’s pretty much that simple.

(Requests open and tips always appreciated!)

Takeshi Morishima vs Bryan Danielson (ROH, 8-25-2007)

ROH Manhattan Mayhem II, New York, NY

A request! We’ve got Morishima defending the ROH title at the Manhattan Center against the bald Bryan Danielson, a former champion of the Ring of Honor in his own right.

This is the first one-on-one meeting between Morishima and Danielson, who had crossed paths in ROH and NOAH tags between May and July, and teamed together to beat KENTA and Nigel McGuinness at Respect Is Earned in May at the same venue.

(Requests open and tips always appreciated!)

Ric Flair, Arn Anderson, Lex Luger & Sting vs Hollywood Hogan, Kevin Nash, Scott Hall & nWo Sting (WCW, 9-15-1996)

WCW Fall Brawl, Winston-Salem, NC

A request! It’s WARGAMES! And for the first time in a while, this truly feels like something big. The prior year’s WarGames was Hulk Hogan and Dungeon of Doom horseshit. The year before that did fucking rock, but the year before that had the Shockmaster, and really it’s been since ’92 when something felt like, you know, THE BIG THING in the company. The ’94 WarGames was like the last gasp of The Real WCW before the Hogan parade fully took over and it ruled, but it was really just a “Hogan doesn’t work the September PPV” thing in terms of company scope and all that.

Here we’re two months into the nWo taking over. On the nWo side tonight you have Hollywood Hogan, Scott Hall, Kevin Nash, and, apparently, Sting. On the WCW side you’ve got Ric Flair, Arn Anderson, and Lex Luger confirmed. It was going to be the Four Horsemen, but Luger and Sting wanted in, and Flair and Anderson complied. And then Sting, they think, turned traitor on them.

So the nWo are coming in with a mystery fourth man, and so is WCW, by default.

(Requests open and tips always appreciated!)

Hulk Hogan vs Bad News Brown (WWF, 9-11-1988)

WWF on MSG Network, East Rutherford, NJ

A request! This is a main event from Brendan Byrne Arena (the Meadowlands Arena) in East Rutherford, though it came mid-show as main events often did back then. It’s not the last match, but it’s the match the show sold tickets on.

Hogan isn’t WWF champion, that’s still Randy Savage, who isn’t on this show. The WWF ran another event in Guelph, Ontario, on this date, Savage wasn’t on that one either. That had the monster rundown of Powers of Pain vs Bolsheviks, Tito Santana vs King Haku, Sherri vs Rockin’ Robin, Hillbilly Jim vs Terry Taylor, Frenchy Martin vs Richard Charland, and Lanny Poffo vs DJ Peterson.

(Requests open and tips always appreciated!)

Diamond Dallas Page & Jay Leno vs Hollywood Hogan & Eric Bischoff (WCW, 8-8-1998)

WCW Road Wild, Sturgis, SD

A request! WCW’s third of four yearly events in Sturgis, Eric Bischoff’s annual jerk sesh because he loves motorcycles, and some people criticize that because they sacrificed live gate money and whatever, but to me? Fuck it. What if they’d done a live gate yearly in August instead. Would the company have survived in 2001? No. So who gives a shit? I didn’t work for Turner.

As a fan, the only criticism would come from the fact that largely the crowds did not care about wrestling, but honestly, whatever. It’s funny to watch Benoit and Malenko work an excellent technical match for half an hour while a bunch of drunk bikers become increasingly bored by their star ratings display.

I was 16 for this one, though, and I did think it was starting to wear thin already, and also wearing thin was WCW’s horniness for big celebrity things. Man, Dennis Rodman was one thing, as was Karl Malone, two professional athletes in their peak marketing periods, but Jay Leno?

Still, it’s fucking insane that WCW was running a cross-promotion with “The Tonight Show.” Actually interested to see how I look at this now with truly adult eyes, when I’m far more open to dumb shit done well, and also genuinely can’t stand Jay Leno instead of just thinking he’s a dork who isn’t as good as Letterman or Conan.

(Requests open and tips always appreciated!)

Hollywood Hogan vs Lex Luger (WCW, 8-4-1997)

WCW Monday Nitro, Auburn Hills, MI

A request! The main event of the landmark 100th episode of Monday Nitro, with Michael Buffer opening the show in the ring and then WCW putting “Detroit, Michigan” on the screen. This is not Detroit any more than Rosemont is Chicago. In fact, Auburn Hills to Detroit is nearly twice as far as Rosemont to Chicago.

It’s a special three-hour episode! WCW champion Hogan and Eric Bischoff lead the show. Let’s just get into the whole deal.

(Requests open and tips always appreciated!)

Chris Jericho vs Dean Malenko (WCW, 5-17-1998)

WCW Slamboree, Worcester, MA

A request! The request was for the full Thing here, which includes the Cruiserweight Battle Royal, meant to determine an immediate No. 1 contender for Chris Jericho’s WCW cruiserweight title. I thought about doing two separate posts, but then I thought, you know, it’s an eight-minute battle royal and the point of it is that it leads immediately into the follow-up match.

So I’ve decided to combine them!

(Requests open and tips always appreciated!)

The Gobbledy Gooker (WWF, 11-22-1990)

WWF Survivor Series, Hartford, CT

A request! Sometimes I get a request like this and I’ll be real with you up front, I never know really what to do with it. Match review is easy enough to figure, whatever twists and turns my bullshit might take, there’s a base format.

There is no base format for this sort of thing. So I do them. Sometimes they turn out OK, and sometimes I just hope the person does not want their three American dollars back, particularly because Ko-fi does take a cut so I’d be going into my own pocket for 43 cents or something.

Will this be anything good? I don’t know!

(Requests open and tips always appreciated!)