The Stinger

The day was: January 30th 1991 (Clash of champions XVI: Dixie Dynamite)

Why I chose this moment in history: Everyone is all but creaming their pants over Sting's presence in the WWE and how monuments and awesome this is.

I never watched WCW the only Sting I watched first hand was during the short period of time I watched TNA so I decided to watch some original Sting to get some perspective on how truly awesome he was / is.

Hipster side fact: This Clash of champions was the first to air after WCW left the NWA

Match of the day: Sting and Lex Luger vs. DOOM

First match

Winner: (24 year spoiler alert) Sting and Lex Luger

Quote of the match: This quote was actually more the quote of the whole night, each time I heard it I chuckled a little bit. Dusty Rhodes let us know through out the entire program that you could call a number and talk to Ric Flair . . . 2 dollars for the first minute and 45 cents for every additional minutes, what a steal.

Opinion / Observations:

- The cheesy opening and confederate flag gave me little hope as to how the following hours would go.

- Following that was the national anthem played by three band kids with some fierce 90's hair cuts and no ability to hold a tune.

- The ramp in the arena was . . . like 3 feet long, at that point honestly why have a ramp?

- Remember how I said it was weird seeing Teddy Long as a ref. well it's doubly weird to see him as the manager of DOOM

- Like I said the only sting I knew was the 'Crow' like version seeing him with the bleach blonde high top and tucan looking face paint it's like night and day . . . he sure looked a lot happier then. I understand it was a character change but I wonder if he ever misses being happy

- Lot of traditional Greco Roman moves, don't see that as much now a days . . . except for suplexes see a lot of those.

- This match made it clear why tag teams normally have one big guy and one smaller or faster or flashier guy because in this match it was three big bulky guys and sting. It was a lot of move for move shove for shove seeing which wall of muscle would move first to me it was quite boring I lost interest quickly.

- The anouncers kept pushing how awesome it was that Luger, Reed and Simmons used to play football, I'm fifty fifty on how AWESOME that is, for some wrestlers it makes them powerhouses for others it just makes them linebackers in a ring.

- Dusty letting the audience at home that Luger is "All man." was . . . odd.

- Finally Sting came out and sped up this painfully slow match doing double clotheslines, dropkicks and such what do they do?  Pan away from the action and focus back in on Luger.

- Dan Spivey who had an intresting mullet chaps combo came out to beat the tar out of Lex and peace out.

- The match ended due to a DQ because being tossed over the top rope is illegal I guess.

-  The only redeeming quality of this match was the small amount of time Sting was in the ring so maybe he is worth all this hype.


Other show observations:

- I got to find out who won the sexiest wrestler award and the winner was . . . Z-man

Agree to disagree

- I might not think he's good looking but his match against Beautiful Bobby was. It was better than the opening match.

- Neckbreakers are one of my favorite standard wrestling move.

- The York foundation made an acquisition  but all I could see was the ridiculously huge computer calculator thing.

- The free birds had the coolest theme so cool they sang and danced to it while entering the ring.

- The ref for the tag match was literally the worst . . . he missed . . . . everything.

- I found out Sid Vicious was from wherever he damn well pleases which I found quite funny.

- Also found out Paul E. Dangerously has a thing for chicks in jazzercise outfits as simply seeing one caused him to lose the inter gender arm wrestling competition.

- I wanted to watch to a Brian Pillman match to see if he really was as similar to Dean Ambrose as everyone says he was.

 

- What I didn't know was back at this time he wasn't exactly the Pilman he was remembered as.

- The only similarity at this point was that they are both billed from Cincinnati Ohio

- Someone else who doesn't look like remember? Scott Steiner, other than an obscene wedgie he looked fairly . . . normal, not all veining and bleached blonde and scary.

-Something I need to remember? The post button, bye guys.

Royal Rumble Drinking game

I know this blog is for reviewing older matches from different eras but I'm just so pumped for the royal rumble I have every intention of sitting down eating pizza (maybe even stuffed crust Seth Rollins) and drinking beer while watching the PPV. But drinking all regular like is not very hip and cool of me so I've decided to challenge myself and possible others to a Royal rumble drinking game I've compiled some rules from various game templets (Surprisingly I'm not the first person to think of this) and added some of my own.I'm going to give it a whirl and invite you to do the same, let me know if there are any rules to be added or removed so I can improve on it for next year's night of drinking.

And for continuities sake Hipster side fact:

 SO HERE ARE THE RULES:

One sip

1) Every time a commentator reminds us that "it's every man for himself."
2) Every time Kane eliminates someone
3) Every time Roman reigns eliminates someone
4) Every time the WWE network is mentioned
5) Every time "twitter" or "trending" is mentioned

Two sips
1) if the ring gets cleared of all but one or if you really need a drink that bad 2 participants
2) whenever 4 or more wrestlers band together to eliminate a fat guy.
3) Someone is almost eliminated but jumps or lifts himself back in
4) Drink every time someone hits their finisher in the Rumble match.
5) When a champion of any sort comes out (Tag IC US hell diva for all I care)

Three sips

1) When a surprise entrant comes out
2) When your least favorite wrestler is eliminated
3) When your favorite wrestler comes to the ring
4 ) Every time the "lucky" number 27 is mentioned
5) When a eliminated wrestler takes revenge

Finish your drink or do a shot

1) When your favorite wrestler gets eliminated
2) If the person you predicted would win the rumble gets eliminated
3) whenever anyone gets eliminated in less than 10 seconds.
4) whenever the fans cheer a heel or boo a face
5) If someone starts bleeding
6) When participant 30 comes out

Have fun!

Armageddon 2000

The day was: December 10th 2000 (WWF Armageddon)

Why I chose this moment in history: An attitude era PPV I have to think this Armageddon is a perfect example, with the all the key players of the time on display. Multiple matches featuring the "attitude" of the time.

Hipster side fact: Armageddon was the only WWF PPV to be held in the state of Alabama


Match of the day: 6 man hell in a cell match for the WWF championship. Kurt Angle vs. Undertaker vs. the rock vs. HHH vs. Rikishi vs. Stone cold Steve Austin

Winner (15 year spoiler alert): Kurt Angle

Quote of the match: There were actually a lot to chose from here but first come first serve, the one that first stuck out to me was "Well this man doesn't have a limp bizkit I can guarantee ya' he's got more testicular fortitude than maybe anyone in this match up!" From JR in reference to the Undertaker and his theme music by questionably named band limp bizkit.

Opinion / Observations:

- First thing I noticed was how much Jay and Jimmy Uso look like their father Rikishi

- Second thing I noticed . . . how weird it is to see Teddy Long as a referee, he probably just showed up because he thought this was a tag team match

- And the free for all begins

- The undertaker goes about choking Kurt . . . with his bandana they were both selling it hardcore but dudes , , , it's a bandana.

- Poor HHH and Rikishi just getting the tar beaten out of them the first quarter of the match the other quarters weren't so good on them either.

- Austin was the first to draw blood, busting HHH's head open with a melee of punches.

- Adding insult and injury Austin then resumes raking HHH's face across the cage.

- Ref kind of useless for majority of the beat downs, just trying to convince anyone to get back in the ring. It finally pays off though, when the wrestlers realize that you have to be IN the ring to win.

- HHH and Rikishi hug it out momentarily, a heart warming moment destroyed by a pedigree

- Trying to toss the Undertaker over the ropes is all but pointless, he's freaky tall and his feet hit the floor before your attempt is 3/4 way done.

-Vince McMahon pimp cane in hand rides in on the back of a truck filled with what I thought was hay but was apparently kennel bedding . . . obviously. Hooked the truck to the door to rip it off. You would think the CEO would be able to get his hands on some keys.

- Drivers star hooking up chains to the rest of the cage but Mick Foley will be having none of that, getting security to escort Vince out of his own company's event and then flat out beating up Pat Patterson and Gerald Brisco

- The wrestlers that the ref had worked so hard to get in the ring start to neander out and away from said ring.

- HHH delivers an awkward choppy looking pedigree to the Rock on a car

- Made up for that sloppy move by taking one for the team and getting catapulted into a car. It made me smile the over the top extra elevation he got.

- Everyone starts to congregate back to that thing called a ring

- Kurt using a chair on the Undertaker does momentarily remind people that he's a part of this match.

- HHH starts climbing the cage . . . for what reason I don't understand, all I know that he was precariously close to getting pantsed

- Undertaker calls out for and gets thrown a chair, now that's service, but be careful what you wish for cause Rikishi made far better use of that chair, at Undertaker's expense.

- Time for the use of that convenient kennel bedding truck still sitting right outside of the ring

- It wasn't a chokeslam so much as a push

- Everyone paused to see Rikishi's "fall from grace." It was an impressive fall, he really sold it lip quiver and all.

- "Undertaker still can't get down from the top of the ring." King notes that Undertaker is out of the running because he's the last man standing up on the roof, all that effort for nothing.

- After all the blood sweat and stunners Kurt crawls over for an underwhelming pin and win. Regardless a win is a win good for you Kurt!

- Mostly

- "This is the after birth of hell in a cell." Gross yet hilarious comment from King

- All in all I liked the match I get why it's a classic but some of it seemed too much too over the top. blood for just bloods sake but that's not a new problem and it's not one that's gone away it's just something you either grow to love or bear . . . I'm somewhere in between on that one.

Other show observations:


The hardyz and Lita's intergenender match aganst the radicalz was . . . stupid, mostly because it was beyond predictable and sure a lot of WWF / WWE matches are predictable but for some reason knowing how this match was going to go down made me even less intrested than I already was.It wasn't a total wash there were some great moves Jeff did a nice corkscrew and Lita's moonsaults always look pretty.

I just think they don't do intergender matches that often for a reason. Because it ends one of two ways the chick tries her very hardest but ends up losing and getting manhandled or she wins but only due to some sort of outside interference, there are exceptions to the rule but not many.

- My favorite quote of the whole night, actually made me give a mild laugh out loud, not sure why I found it so funny but I did. Lillian was interviewing Kurt and he had a question of his own to ask her.
Kurt: Are you Bulgarian?
Lillian: No
Kurt Do you know any Bulgarians?
Lillian I can't say that I do Kurt.
Kurt" Well I do!
 And he goes on and on about his Olympic prowess and all the nationalities he had to beat to get the gold, just the intensity of which he let everyone know that HE knew Bulgarians was funny to me.

- Next was a match for the European title. Remember the European title? I don't really, I was aware of it but had never really watched it in action that i recall, I could be wrong.

- William Regal started a soliloquy on how red neck Alabamans were only for Alabama's own hardcore Holly to come out and set his straight.

- King was more intrested in harkerchiefs than the match not a good sign.

- The Bow and arrow submission hold put on Holly was something I'm not used to seeing but I should see that move more often it's awesome.

- Poor Holly nothing goes his way as out of nowhere and for reasons I don't understand Raven comes out and DDT's Holly.

- Remember when I said there were exceptions to Intergender matches being entertaining? Chyna vs. Test as well as I'm sure many Chyna's matches meet the criteria for the exception.

- Side note Chyna's entrance kinda cool.

- Between Clothslines and Swinging neckbreakers and Ivory's face oh my! Match of the year? No. A worthwile filler yes.

- Next was a match I had already watched before: Kane vs. Chris Jericho in a last man standing match. I love any match with Kane in it, even ones he loses so I watched it again . . . and loved it again. Kane and Jericho are both great wrestlers and they both put on a great match.

 - The four way match for the tag titles also fun to watch. Of which I learned three things:

1. R-Truth or K-Kwik as he was known at the time looks exactly as he did then as he does now . . . time has not effected this man at all.

2. Right to censor was a waste of space and ill-fitting white dress shirts.

3. The Dudley's doing the whole wasssup thing didn't get old, I thought it would but it was fun every time.

After this match the network cut out on me and I figured it was god's way of saying stop watching, which after already seeing the main event I did just that stopped watching hoping I didn't miss something.

Feel free to let me know if I will regret that decision for the rest of my life, but right now I'm making the decision to end this painfully long post.