The SmarK Legacy Rant for Monday Night RAW - March 22 1993
- Live from New York again.
- Your hosts are Vince, Randy and Rob.
The Bushwhackers v. Damian Demento & Repo Man
Demento might have actually worked as a replacement member of Demolition. Damian hammers on Butch in the corner to start and it's quickly a pier-six with the heels getting run together. The Whackers clear the ring, but Luke gets jumped on the way back in, as Repo manages to crack the awesome intellectual prowess of the Bushwhackers. Damian chokes away in the corner while Vince and Randy have a funny exchange about the "March To Wrestlemania" pre-game show. Vince is looking for Randy's advice about facing Yokozuna and he notes "You've had some success" and Savage gives a sarcasm-dripping "Why thank you" in response. You don't often hear that side of Savage and it's kind of neat. Anyway, hot tag Butch and they double-team Demento, but Repo Man trips him up as this gets all kinds of awful. Damian tries to slam Butch, but Luke pushes them over. Repo tries to break it up, but hits Demento by mistake, and the Battering Ram finishes Repo at 5:15. This one managed to even kill the Manhattan Center crowd, so you know it sucked. DUD
Tatanka v. Reno Riggins
Classic jobber! Reno attacks but gets chopped and backdropped. He recovers with a sleeper, but Tatanka gets an atomic drop and chops him down again, into an armdrag. Reno throws his own chops in the corner, and that doesn’t end up well for him. Tatanka whiffs on a crossbody attempt, however, and Reno takes over again and hammers away on the mat. Tatanka is the PISSED OFF RACIAL STEREOTYPE and he chops Riggins down, powerslams him, and finishes with the Papoose to Go at 3:28. And even Vince calls it that!
Meanwhile, officials of the World Wrestling Federation have apparently announced a Hall of Fame of some sort, and of course the first inductee is Andre the Giant.
Money Inc. v. Scott Rich & Jeff Armstrong
Dibiase pounds on Rich and dumps him with a clothesline, and we get a shot of Bartlett flipping through the channels on the monitor, looking for "the competition". "There is no competition!" declares Vince McMahon, so file that one under "more things Vince said that came back to bite him in the ass." Money Inc works over Armstrong and Dibiase powerslams him, then IRS hits him with the Write-Off clothesline to finish at 3:00.
Wrestlemania IX Report! Bret Hart v. Yokozuna, Hogan & Beefcake v. Money Inc., Giant Gonzalez v. Undertaker…it all means the greatest Wrestlemania ever! Plus TOGAS! Man, they really did a shitty job of delivering the hype for this one, as Bret and Yoko had no interaction, Hulk did nothing, and we didn't even know most of the card until the show.
Kamala v. Doink the Clown
Doink suckers him in with a present and then takes Kamala down with an armbar, turning into a top wristlock. Kamala fights out, so Doink takes him down again and goes to the arm again. Kamala chops out of it and follows with an avalanche, and we take a break. Back with Doink in control again, but Kamala chops him out of the ring. So Doink grabs the present and gives it to Kamala, which calms him down and gives Doink the countout at 3:40. LAAAAAAAAAME. 1/2* Vince mentions that Kamala was facing Bam Bam at Wrestlemania. What happened there?
Next week: It's Wrestlemania! Not that you'd really know or care based on the terrible buildup here.
Related Posts:
- The SmarK Legacy Rant for Monday Night RAW – February 1 1993
- The SmarK Legacy Rant for Monday Night RAW – January 25 1993
- The SmarK Legacy Rant for Monday Night RAW – April 26 1993
- The SmarK Legacy Rant for Monday Night RAW – February 15 1993
- The SmarK Legacy Rant for Monday Night RAW – March 8 1993
Tags: Andre the Giant, Bret Hart, Kamala, Monday Night RAW, RAW, Undertaker, Vince McMahon, Wrestlemania
Were they still using Superstars and/or Challenge as the primary shows at this point, or was it pretty clear from the beginning that Raw was the new “A” show? I’m wondering if maybe the buildup to some of the WM matches took place on those shows instead of on Raw. Not only did Bret and Yoko have no interaction on Raw in the month leading up to WM IX, but based on what I’ve read here on your recaps, neither did Shawn/Tatanka or Luger/Perfect. Crush/Doink and Gonzalez/Taker were at least referenced in interviews or vignettes. Where was the Bret/Yoko contract signing that someone mentioned in the comments of one of the previous Raws?
The Bret/Yoko contract signing was on Challenge, which was odd as usually Superstars would have those types of segments.
I know for a fact that Shawn/Tatanka came about because Tatanka pinned Shawn cleaned on one of the Saturday morning shows, thus he earned the title shot…and guranteed he didn’t have a chance in hell of winning.
Luger/Perfect didnt really have a feud, did they? Heenan brought in Luger because he was pissed at Perfect for turning on him. But it could be that Luger couldn’t wrestle yet, since had had to sit out a year or whatever after leaving WCW (hence the whole WBF thing he did).
Doink started his feud with Crush on the Saturday morning shows so it probably kept going on there.
It is weird that Raw was in this sweet primetime spot but was still treated like PrimeTime was, as in, not the biggest show of the weekend. At least in the beginning.
The Tatanka / Shawn encounters leading up to the show had a couple of more notable points:
1. Shawn’s match with Tatanka on Superstars was the first use of the theme music he’s retained for the last 16 years.
2. Because Tatanka had countered the teardrop suplex in both that match and the six-man, Shawn stopped using it and stuck with the superkick as his finisher until he briefly used the jumping piledriver.
But, as noted in the other thread, the buildup to this show was WEAK. Tatanka / Shawn had the most build, and that was like two events. WM was more notable about what it set up going forward than what it did for blowing stuff off – Sherri and Luna re-debuted (would’ve been nice to know they were going to be there beforehand…), Luger attacked Bret, Shawn attacked Perfect, Hogan and Yoko were feuding, and the deck was cleared for Steiners / Money Inc.
Lord alone knows what they were thinking, but WM stinking isn’t surprising in retrospect with that many screwups.
At that point Raw was just an experimental show so it wasn’t their primary show. I believe Superstars was.
They “ran out of time” on the PPV for Kamala/Bam Bam. I even recall them running a notice on PPV after the event ended saying the match was cancelled, and then a brief video of Kamala walking around backstage where they were keeping the animals used in the first segment.
I never really understood Vince turning the bad ass NWA heel team of the Sheepherders into the retarded face licking Bushwhackers. I remember hating them as a kid when they were on Saturday night and never really understood their face change. Didn’t they also have a sick match against the Fantastics in the crocket cup or something?
Yeah, they did have a 5* classic with the Fantastics, according to Meltzer at least. I’ve never seen it myself so I can’t comment either way, but I’m sure someone here has.
Don’t remember seeing that match, but I do remember the Sheepherders as badasses from a stint in Mid-South Wrestling. They were the first team in the area to beat up The Bruise Brothers (Pork Chops Cash and Mad Dog Boyd), and they “injured” Ted DiBiase by breaking the New Zealand flagpole on his throat, I believe, in match against Ted and Dr. Death. Can’t remember if that was the angle that put Ted off of TV right before he went to the WWF or not. They may have beaten up The Fantastics in a match there, too. I may be mixing them up with Dick Slater and Buzz Sawyer, who destroyed Bobby and Tommy during their run in Mid-South.
Crap. Just remember Ted still being around to fight Terry Gordy in a cage match for the UWF title. Guess he went to Titan once UWF got sold to Crockett.