I hear Talk Wrestling Online (TWO) is 7 years old! I can’t remember much about 2000, other than that trip to the moon I took and jamming with Clapton. I’m doing a couple of matches from the year of the birth of TWO and I hear it was a particularly difficult labour for Kam. Heres to another 7 years, hopefully Shawn Michaels and Triple H might have retired by then.
– Fall Brawl 2000, No DQ
Goldberg vs. Scott Steiner w/ peaks
Steiner is at his coked out, roided up, could-snap-at-any-second-and-bitchslap-the-pregnant-nun-in-the-front-row best here and gives his usual insane promo before the match, the gist of which is Goldberg is a pansy ass, Steiner cares about nothing but his freaks and his peaks (quite the sound philosophy for life for all the kids out there I’d say. Money, job security, education, morality, friendship, religion, family…none of those matter because all that matters in life is freaks and peaks. Kids today could do with a hero and I know I’d want my role model to be a guy who went around calling himself ‘Big Poppa Pump’) and he finishes the promo off saying that after he beats Goldberg he’s going back to his hotel because he’s (and I quote) : ‘a loaded sex pistol’ and he’s ‘ready to explode’. Shakespeare couldn’t have said it better. Steiner badmouths a few of the Buffalo Bills at ringside who respond with ‘Yes sir Mr. Steiner sir’ and tells them to jump and they ask how high Mr. Steiner sir. This is 2000 Tony Schvivovnenevonensxyz so it is pretty painful to listen to, add ‘MTV generation’ Mark Madden and it’s like GBH on my eardrums. Scott Hudson is the 3rd man though which makes up for it somewhat. If TNA were smart (tee hee. If TNA’s brains were dynamite they couldn’t blow their own nose) they’d throw money at Hudson and team him with Cornette, Nash or Zbyzsdksosko on commentary because he’d be a darn sight better than Tenay. I could fart into the headset for an hour and it’d be better than Tenay. ‘THAT’S RIGHT, HE SAID HE COULD FART INTO THE HEADSET FOR AN HOUR AND IT’D BE BETTER THAN TENAY’, ‘WHOA MIKE! GO RED GO!’
‘Stiener Your Next’ sign in the audience. Ah wrestling fans, such enthusiasm, such idiocy. Goldberg’s entrance still leaves me as giddy as a 14 year old girl at a 1964 Beatles concert. I don’t care if he wasn’t Billy Robinson Robinson, I don’t care if he ‘bah Gawd, didn’t pay his dues’, he was awesomely awesome. Steiner again verbally abuses some sap in the front row telling him his mommy was great in bed and his daddy cried like a bitch when he killed him until he was killed. ‘MTV Generation’ Mark Madden mentions Gary Coleman. Ah don’t remind me tubby. A minor celebrity AND a midget, that was like chicken soup for the soul for Russo. SchvovnvoneneABC123 calls it a ‘war’ 30 seconds in which would make the slap fest I saw at 2.30am last week between two ‘females’ (I say females because I don’t even know what species they were to be honest. Probably from Belfast) the equivalent of the opening scenes of ‘Saving Private Ryan’ in his eyes. Steiner dedicates an Elbow Drop to the Buffalo Bills and scares referee Mickey Jay so much that he had delayed shock for 6 years, changed his name and went to ECW on Sci Fi because he knew Steiner would never find him there. This is pretty much Goldberg’s best ever match. He was always pretty damn stiff mainly because he didn’t really know otherwise and Steiner’s hobbies are freaks, peaks and stiffness so they basically just beat the piss out of each other with Steiner coming this close to breaking Goldberg’s neck with the Overhead Belly to Belly on a couple of occasions. Russo was kinda soured towards Goldberg because he couldn’t take credit for making him a star because after all Steve Austin, The Rock, Hulk Hogan, The Undertaker, Bruno Sammartino, Andre The Giant, Mick Foley, Clint Eastwood, Marilyn Monroe, Elvis and The Beatles would never have been stars without Vince Russo. He had a boner for Steiner so they were basically booked as equals. Steiner was the crazy, dominant heel saying what he wanted, doing what he wanted, beating the tar out of everyone and their disabled, blind, deaf and dumb grandmother for breathing in his direction, Goldberg was Goldberg so this was basically the biggest match WCW had going for it in 2000 but it was the 3rd last or so match on the card and it was just a shame that it came when the company was deader than…something dead, Buddy Holly or Vince McMahon or something. Supposedly the plan before WWF bought them out was The Big Bang PPV, WCW to be torn apart and rebuilt, Steiner to run more rough shed over everyone in 2001 leading to the Steiner vs. Goldberg rematch at Starrcade 2001. But c’est la vie, WCW died and I cried a million tears.
P. S. Steiner wins following interference from Midajah looking like the pneumatic great-granddaughter Joan Rivers never had, having spent more on her face than Chelsea did on Shevchenko. I’m trying to decide which was the bigger disaster (bit of topical satire there). ‘New Yawk’ Russo shows up after a cup a cawfee and a hamboiger to interfere too and…DEAR GOD ALMIGHTY, THE HUMANITY OF IT ALL…THE STEINER RECLINER OF ETERNAL DAMNATION AND MILD DISCOMFORT finishes Goldberg off after he powers out of it a couple of times. Nothing particularly spectacular and it was probably a lot better watching it the first time 7 years ago because it doesn’t hold up particularly well, still a fun little stiff brawl.
– ECW on TNN, 25/02/2000
Rhino vs. The Sandman
RHINO VS. THE SANDMAN IN 2000?!? Well I never. Yeah this happened more times than Triple H has had boring matches. I think Heyman is a good booker, not great, but good and his greatness is perhaps a little exaggerated. Whilst I did enjoy a lot of aspects of the later years of ECW and it was still fun, ECW did go downhill fast when Raven left. There are only so many times you can go into a PPV with one or two matches announced and the rest all IMPROMPTU MATCHES~! If I had a dollar for every time I saw New Jack vs. Random Baldie I’d have…a lot of dollars. Although they’re not legal currency in Ireland. I suppose I could get them changed at the Bureau Du Change or whatever the hell you call it (what is that thing called?). Rhino vs. Sandman fitted right into that category of ‘Ah I haven’t a clue what to do on this card, screw it, put Sandman out there with Rhino’ and it became somewhat of a running joke in 2000 how many times Rhino would come out, Gore someone, cue ‘Enter Sandman’, couple of cane shots, Sandman would get distracted, Rhino Gores him through table. I’m not even joking, go back and check, it was literally every week. I don’t think ECW in the later years was helped by people jumping ship to the bigger promotions (rightly. You can harp on about loyalty and respect for da bizness all you like) because just when it looked as though they were building towards, say, RVD vs. Mike Awesome, Awesome was gone. Nor was it helped by lack of promotion by TNN, nor was it helped by Heyman being to bookkeeping what Lance Hoyt is to great wrestling matches. But their booking didn’t exactly help and the mystique of Heyman as genius booker extraordinaire who could lead WWE to the promised land and get them 15 million buyrates for PPVs is perhaps a little bit of hyperbole. He’d be better than Vince Russo though, that goes without saying. I know the talent roster was perhaps a little thin in 2000 but Justin Credible, Jerry Lynn and Steve Corino at the top of the card? I like Corino but those three wouldn’t main event a show in Paul E. Normous’ or Crippler Chris Chaos’ or some backyard turd’s show in his mommy’s garden.
Anyway, this one was early in the Sandman-Rhino Neverending Story. Sandman I’ll never heard a bad word against. You know what I do with all those roided up, Vitamin shake drinking, gym going, tattooed pretty boys? I wipe my ass with all those roided up, Vitamin shake drinking, gym going tattooed pretty boys. Professional wrestling is a beer drinking, cigarette smoking son of a bitch with a beer belly and a face that tells a thousand battle weary tales caning people upside the grill while a crowd of drug addicted, STD ridden, toothless degenerates with an ugly wife and 9 kids at home sing along to Metallica. Rhino’s short T-Rex arms always twisted my melon man. Anyway, Sandman kicks his ass, Table Suplexes his stinkin’ carcass, gives him the Heinekenrana and the White Russian Leg Sweep (he names his moves after alcoholic beverages, a man who hates that is a man who hates life itself). Tajiri runs in, gives him the Green Mist, Rhino Gores him through the table (told you, it was common as a Headlock in their matches). Super Crazy saves the day and kicks everyone’s ass. It should be noted that High Spot Jack Victory is the greatest wrestler of all time, is probably the father of 95% of the people on this website and if he told you the sun wasn’t coming up tomorrow you better go out and buy a torch.
This was about 4 minutes long, wasn’t even really a match and for some reason ended in a No Contest which doesn’t really explain why I covered it…
Naitch