Question time!
From the inbox…
“I’ve been a long-time reader of your rants, and I’ve always looked to you as the most trusted recapper in wrestling. Anyway, I have a question for you regarding the nWo. I read somewhere that Sting was originally supposed to be the 3rd man at Bash At The Beach 96, before Hogan suggested himself. If that is true, and if it WAS Sting who turned heel, what would have happened with the nWo? I can’t see it being around for too long, because either Hogan would have had to chase Sting for the title (which I couldn’t see lasting more than 1 PPV), or the nWo never would have been booked to have dominant (much like the InVasion angle).”
They had a lot of ideas for who the third man was, and it depends who you ask and what time of day they were being asked. At times everyone from Sting to Bret Hart to Davey Boy Smith to Lex Luger was thrown out as a serious candidate. I wouldn’t say that Sting was ever “supposed” to be the third man, because lots of others were as well.
”Also, in your WM 2 recap, you referred to Davey Boy as the “Marty Janetty of the Bulldogs,” saying that he wasn’t supposed to get a singles push, but did by default. I’d wondered if you meant Shawn Michaels, because I don’t remember Marty getting a singles push (at least nowhere near Shawn’s).”
My rambling sentence structure failed me there. Let me explain.
The British Bulldogs = The Rockers. Dynamite Kid was Shawn Michaels, the crazy bumping machine who everyone assumed would be the singles star of the future. Davey Boy was Marty Jannetty, who was basically just the other guy in the team, but ended up getting a big singles push later on because his partner was retired and he could still ride the name of the team. He was still a great worker, just like Marty was, but neither one would ever match up to their partners. That’s what I meant.
”Finally, I was just about to ask you to do a rant on Backlash 04, because I wondered what you thought of the Triple Threat match. Of course, given that life has intervened, I would understand that you would never even watch that show again, and I wouldn’t blame you. If you could, though, what did you think of the Triple Threat match?”
Already did a rant on it after the show, in fact. That’s the source of my semi-famous Shane McMahon $100 bill story.
At any rate, here’s the match review. Blur out Benoit in your mind if you like.
- RAW World title: Chris Benoit v. HHH v. Shawn Michaels. Benoit brings the awesome by holding the belt in the faces of both challengers, just because he CAN. Some fans in the front row get on Shawn a bit during intros, but that’s nothing compared to the ambush we had in store for him later. Benoit attacks HHH to start and it’s a three-way slugfest in the corner until Benoit & Michaels work together for a backdrop and dump HHH. Shawn turns on Benoit and they exchange chops, which Benoit wins in intense fashion, and he kills Shawn with a lariat out of the corner. Shawn comes back with a neckbreaker, but HHH joins us again and slugs it out with Shawn. High knee puts Shawn down and HHH goes after Benoit next and tosses him, thus killing the crowd’s interest in the match as a whole. Shawn gets an atomic drop on HHH and slugs him down, but puts his head down and HHH goes for the Pedigree. Shawn escapes and they both knock Benoit off the apron again, but he makes it back in and throws a suplex on Shawn, and another for HHH. Back to Shawn, but he blocks, so Benoit chops them both down instead and backdrops HHH. Shawn throws his wussy chops again, so Benoit whips him out of the ring. HHH dives off the middle rope, but lands in a crossface. Benoit breaks to go after Shawn again, possibly because he’s still pissed about Shawn hitting like a girl. Back in, Benoit goes up, but gets knocked down by HHH and they slug it out on top. HHH tries a superplex, but Shawn breaks it up and Benoit hits the floor. Shawn takes HHH down with an electric chair and gets two. He slugs away on HHH, but walks into a facecrusher and both guys are out. Benoit sneaks in with a flying headbutt on Shawn, however, and gets two. HHH and Benoit slug it out and HHH loses that battle by getting tossed, but Benoit can’t suplex Michaels. The ref gets bumped on a forearm attempt by Shawn, and that allows HHH to go for the Pedigree, which Benoit reverses to a Sharpshooter attempt, but HHH fights him off. Benoit takes him down again and gets it this time, but there’s no ref. Shawn breaks it up, but gets taken down into a crossface as a result, so that was more of a pyrrhic victory. Benoit tries to revive the ref with no luck, but Shawn takes him down into a Sharpshooter as Earl Hebner runs out as the new ref. This was supposed to be heel heat, but it was more like “I can’t believe they’re doing this” heat, and it just made us more pissed off at everyone involved in Montreal. Shawn breaks the move and slugs away on HHH in the corner, and now begins the mother of all “You Screwed Bret” chants at Shawn as he gets two on Benoit. TV doesn’t even do the chant justice, as it was THUNDEROUS live. Even Shane was chanting it! Benoit takes him down into the crossface, which makes us all happy, but HHH breaks it up. I love JR & King doing their “get over it” speech to us, even though it was precipitated by a spot STOLEN FROM MONTREAL just five seconds earlier! HHH DDTs Benoit for two. HHH starts throwing chops, and now we get on HHH with “You tapped out”, which he seems to have inherited from Brock. Benoit comes back with chops and whips him out of the ring, but Shawn clotheslines him for two. Benoit fights back with chops, but gets tossed, so an annoyed Shawn goes up and overshoots, putting himself through the table with a crossbody attempt. HHH takes over on Benoit, whipping him into the stairs and bringing him in for a beating. Into the post goes Benoit, on both sides of the ring, and he hits the floor off the second one. Back in, HHH milks an “asshole” chant and slugs Benoit down again, into a camel clutch now. HHH pounds away in the corner, until Benoit hotshots him to break free, thus ending the only really weak part of the match. HHH gets a facecrusher, but walks into the rolling germans, and Benoit goes up, but misses the headbutt. Lawler notes that “showboats come crashing down to earth” before switching to a more apt metaphor about boats sinking. KICK WHAM PEDIGREE gets two, as Shawn revives and saves. Everyone is out, as HHH & Michaels revive first and slug it out, which no one cares about because they ain’t Benoit. Shawn gets the flying forearm and he’s filled with the PASSION OF THE CHRIST. Without the stigmata, or Mel directing. Shawn goes up with the flying elbow and tunes up the band, but the crowd won’t play along. Shawn takes it out on Benoit, superkicking him off the apron, which draws huge heel heat, but HHH goes low on him and gets two. KICK WHAM PEDIGREE, but Shawn reverses him out of the ring. HHH gets his trusty sledgehammer and hits Shawn in the back, right in the same spot as he did at Summerslam 2002 (nice touch, indeed). He overreacts the same way Bill does. Benoit tries to come back, but eats the stairs again at the hands of HHH. HHH sets up the stairs and tries a Pedigree on them, but Benoit catapults him into the post to remove him from the equation. Benoit heads back into the ring, nearly walking into a superkick from Shawn, but he catches the leg and takes him down into the Sharpshooter, as the crowd goes INSANE. Shawn makes the ropes, but Benoit pulls him back, and it’s Tap City, Population 1, at 30:09. Technical note: Nancy and the kids are seen at ringside, but they were only there for the previous insert and this match, as they left and were replaced by seat-fillers for the rest of the show. Couple of slow spots as compared to the non-stop action of Wrestlemania, but this stands as the second-best three-way ever. ****3/4 I’d say Benoit’s push is for real now.
FIRST off, you’ve always maintained that the heel turn by Michaels was supposed to get Marty over. That he was the one they thought had the total package to get over big. But, then it back fired, he fizzled and the took a liking to Michaels.
???
More revisionist history here? Seriously, I’ve been reading forever, and this is how you’ve always told it.
Speaking of Shawn Michaels rumors: anyone ever hear the one about him joining the Four Horsemen if he had signed with WCW in 1993?
I never heard that one but the thought of Flair, AA & a young Shawn as the basis for the horsemen would’ve been awesome.
I never heard of him joining the Four Horsemen but I heard somewhere that he could have sign with WCW because of the problems he had back in the day, especially in 1993. Good he didn’t sign and became what he is today. In WCW, with Hulk Hogan there there wouldn’t be the Shawn Michaels we have today, heck, Hogan didn’t want to do the right think when he left the WWE putting over Bret Hart, don’t think he would have done the same to HBK. In WCW he would have been jobbing to Jim Duggan and others.
I think Shawn would have eventually figured out what was going on and jumped back to the WWF by ‘96 or so. He just had too big of an ego not to be allowed to be “the man” at some point. He always had that option of jumping back from WCW. Kind of like how Bulldog and Jeff Jarrett kept going back and forth.
That rant is actually pretty depressing, especially with “Nancy and the kids are at ringside” at the end. That having been said, Backlash 04 remains one of my all time favorite shows all around. Don’t forget that in addition to the awesome three-way was the equally awesome Randy Orton/Cactus Jack hardcore match.
About Sting and the nWo… In Bischoff’s book, he says that he wasnt sure that Hogan was going to go through with the heel turn so he had Sting as a back-up. He says that he told Sting an hour before the show started that Hogan was going to go through with it.
And to elborate on what the original question was… Bischoff says that Sting could have pulled it off as the third guy but obviously Hogan turning heel was “a lot bigger”
Funny how instead of the two challengers teaming up on Benoit at the start out of respect to the champion, Benoit and Michaels gang up on HHH. Translation: Regardless of who’s on top, HHH is still the one to beat. Scott, you’re usually good about calling out Hunter’s ego tripping at the expense of match logic; I’m surprised you let that one go by.
Well, in all fairness HHH was the only true heel in the match as well. So there is logic in the babyfaces teaming up to get the heel out of the way, so they can then have a ‘fair’ match to determine who’s best.
A follow-up/addition to my comment. A counter-argument could be that Michaels was also essentially a heel in Canada as well, which is true. But HBK and HHH had also had a lengthy feud, while there wasn’t really a feud between Michaels and Benoit (other than the desire to be champion). So from that point of view, it also makes sense that Michaels would go after HHH first - he had a personal issue with him as well.
Johnny Nitro is the new Shawn Michaels. Discuss…
no.
If we knew then what we know now, that Benoit-CM Punk match at Vengeance could’ve REALLY meant something.
“Mr. Straight Edge” versus “Pills” Benoit.
Who knew it would’ve been such a clash of lifestyles?