Jeff JARRETT! Dean MALENKO! Steve AUSTIN! and other things I watched for the mountain of tape to arrive!
Howdy!
Welcome to Death Valley Driver Video Review #10!
I finished the last match of the last mountain of tapes I got, which
means a little down time between deliveries. I gotta a bunch coming in
soon, including enough for a Lucha Librathon III- which will be twenty
six hours if my math is right. I'll keep the yammering to a minimum
because I'm sure I'll be wearing out my bandwidth welcome after all that
and the batch of All Japan gets in.
- I watched Clash of the Champions: Miami Mayhem, which was at the end of
the Kingsized Bulldogs-Rougeaus-Quebecers tape that Paul (the no-longer
ECW-chasted:)) traded to me, and it was pretty choice in spots. Barry
Windham vs Brad Armstrong was pretty good, but it just made me wonder how
far Windham would have gone if everything hadn't gone wrong for him. By
the time this was on the air, he was a thoroughly amazing wrestler- even
if he was using a claw as a finisher.:) The Fantastics carried the
Sheepherders to a good match, thus sealing their fate as the greatest
forgotten tagteam of recent times. The main event was a highly
unsatisfying Sting/Dusty vs Tully/Arn. I hadn't watched a Dusty match in
a while and had forgotten that he wasn't as bad as Duggan is; heck, he
actually threw a dropkick. Sting no-sold enough to be a New Japan
Heavyweight contender, but still seemed to have enthusiasm for his chosen
field. The endless Horsemen screwjob booking ruined the ending and made
me want to punch someone- my guess, a certain Virgil Runnells.
- Jeff Jarrett rules the f*cking earth. His match on Nitro this week was
beautiful. I don't know who is the best in WCW now at getting opponents
over- Eddie Guerrero, Chris Jericho or Jeff Jarrett. The Argument for
Jericho would be his recent match against Mike Enos, the houseshow
reports of him pulling very good matches out of Disco Inferno, and the
>hell!< miracle match against Steve Armstrong Saturday on WCWSN, which I was amazed at seeing. I actually forgot for a minute that
Armstrong was jobbed into oblivion prior to this match and was just being carried by Jericho with such absolute perfection. Jarrett
might have it over Eddie because Eddie couldn't drag a decent match out of Bubba like Jarrett did Monday and Jericho may have it over Eddie because Chris pulled a good match out of Enos, unlike Eddie. Of course, the true proof is when they are in with real, honest to God workers. I'm guessing sooner or later we're gonna get the ass-stomping Benoit/Jarrett feud and then we'll see double J's true workrate colors. Benoit/Jericho was great, the elevenish Guerrero/Benoit matches RULED, and I'm guessing that the heat in a Benoit/Jarrett match may be enough to take to that same level- though Jarrett isn't quite in the other two's league, physical talent-wise- though he does have a flawless grasp of old-school American selling and psychology, and GOD! can anybody work a match better in the US?
- The Steve Austin/Shawn Micheals match SHOULD have been one of the
highlights of the year, but God! did it suck. I glad Austin has kicked
it into gear lately but it really is useless to work that hard for such a
crappy ending. Shit! Savio Vega got a clean pin over him, but Micheals
can't? Geez, how about a 45 minute time-limit draw? And the split
screen crap with Vader, Cornette, and Sid didn't thrill me either. I
don't know. WWF should be glad that it only pulled a 1.8 during this
match, because the mass frustration over something that high on the top
of the card could have caused irreparable damage.
- The other highlight of the wrestling week- for me at least- was the
very good Malenko/Brad Armstrong match Monday. The NWO crap hovered over
it, but the solid wrestling prevailed. I loved the inverted cradle with
a leg scissors on the legs finisher.:)
-The WTF section this week is the mask vs mask challenge by the Great
Sasuke that was accepted by Dos Caras. I don't want to figure this out.
Sasuke isn't dropping his mask, at least not to Dos, and I'm guessing the
Dos Caras is gonna be buried wearing his mask like El Santo, so I'm
truly baffled by this one.
NEXT WEEK: Back to the veiwing grindstone! LUCHA! LUCHA! LUCHA!
ALL-JAPAN! WHATEVER ELSE GETS SENT TO ME!
NANIWA~!
Dean Rasmussen, Jerichoiac!
