WCW World War 3 1995 - Norfolk Scope, Norfolk Virginia, November 26th 1995

World War 3 has arrived! 

The show kicks off with the commentary duo of Tony Schiavone and Bobby “The Brain” Heenan running down tonight’s card and hyping us up before throwing to Mean Gene Okerlund who is interviewing Hulk Hogan, Sting and Macho Man Randy Savage. Hogan peels off the black clothing and he’s back in the red and yellow - the dark side of Hogan is no more! He tells Sting that he’ll never doubt him again and regardless of what his deal is with Lex Lugar, he knows he can trust the Stinger. The three babyfaces high five and then Hogan brings up Macho’s arm injury - he says it's NOT injured and “the rag sheets” have it all wrong. This was WCW taking a shot at “journalist” Dave Meltzer and his insider wrestling paper. It’s funny because 30 years later, Meltzer is still the main insider journalist in wrestling.

WCW World Television Championship

Johnny B Badd © vs. Diamond Dallas Page (w/The Diamond Doll)

If Johnny B Badd wins, he gets The Diamond Doll’s managerial services

I’m glad that this match gets a video package because a lot of the developments took place on WCW Saturday Night rather than Nitro so I haven’t seen it. I think this is the most we’ve ever heard Kimberly Page speak on TV. 

Johnny has had a couple of good defences of the title since last month, especially against Eddy Guerrero on Nitro. This show immediately looks weird as there are three rings set up. It must have been even weirder for the fans in the arena. They start with a fight on the outside and Badd sent Page into the ring post before slowing things down on the inside with a series of headlocks. Page muscles out of those eventually and the two go back and forth with their series of trademark moves - Page has the short-arm clothesline and the pancake, which is kind of like a Styles Clash while Badd as a series of moves like the Badd Mood (flip over the ropes to the outside) and the Badd Day (a flip into a splash over the ropes back into the ring). DDP rushes Johnny in the corner who avoids it and he drives his shoulder into the post. Badd hits a nice sit down powerbomb for a close near fall and Page almost steals one with a roll up and his feet on the ropes. It’s a close match. They counter back and forth with tombstone piledriver attempts but its when Badd hits the Badd Mood to the outside followed by a slingshot leg drop back into the ring that he gets the win to retain his title and earn Diamond Doll’s managerial services. Another decent match between these two.

Kimberly looks stunned - she can’t believe this happened. She didn’t really want to go with Johnny, she just wanted DDP to treat her better. Regardless, she now manages Johnny B Badd and DDP is titleless and womanless. Post match, Mean Gene interviews the two of them and like a super babyface, Johnny B Badd says he will not be forcing her to be his manager - she can take the night to think about it and let him know but he wants her to live her dreams and do whatever makes her happy.

Taped Fist match

Big Bubba Rogers vs. Jim Duggan

The only ways to win this match are by pinfall or by knock out. This feud has been bubbling away for over a month - Hacksaw shared a video a few weeks ago on WCW Saturday Night where he went to Ireland to find out his family history. His grandmother was a wrapped fist champion (it was a black and white photo of Duggan himself dressed as an old woman which is pretty funny to be fair).

The idea of the taped fists is that it make your hand harder and therefore the punches hurt more. Despite this being a no disqualification match, the referee stops Duggan from using his trademark 2x4 as a weapon. The pair of them brawl in and out of the ring throwing punches - Bubba’s punches look exceptionally fake. It’s nice that he was protecting his opponent of course but his punches were inches away from making contact. Duggan has his fists taped up to the elbow which looks silly, but there’s a nice spot when he traps Roger’s head between two ring posts while the fight between the three rings. The crowd is hot for Hacksaw as he leads them in USA chants and “HOOOOO”

Bobby Heenan suggests that Bubba use the wrist tape to tie Duggan to the ropes which is a good idea and Bubba must have heard him because he does exactly that. Weirdly the referee keeps trying to count them out too, despite the announcer TELLING us this can only end via pin fall or knock out. 

In the thick of the match after a long string of punches, VK Wallstreet comes down to ringside and passes a tiny metal chain to Big Bubba. He wraps it around his first and punches Duggan out cold with it. He hides the chain and slowly climbs to his feet. The knock out is more like Last Man Standing match rules so the referee counts to 10 and Bubba Rogers gets the win via TKO. This was pretty dull.

At the interview podium, Mean Gean speaks to Nature Boy Ric Flair. He fires up himself and the crowd (they’re deep in Flair Country for this show) and says that he will win tonight, become a 12 time World Champion and rule WCW once again. Woooooo! 

Bull Nakano and Akira Hokuto (with Sonny Onoo) vs. Mayumi Ozaki and Cutie Suzuki

This is a showcase match for two promotions with Bull Nakano’s team representing All-Japan and the Cutie Suzuki team from rival JJP. Pretty cool that WCW was able to negotiate a working relationship with rival companies like this. Mike Tenay joins commentary because he’s an expert and knows his stuff, covering for Tony and Bobby who are clueless about Japanese women’s wrestling (as am I).

The four of them scream constantly which is a little distracting but the action is very crips - Bull is awesome and wrestles as the big power woman in this match, throwing both opponents around with ease. 

Bull was one of the big centre pieces of the WWF’s women’s division the previous year but was fired when she tested positive for cocaine. So she’s a bad girl! Cutie Suzuki IS a cutie. 

There’s an awesome stretch of moves in this one with tandem hurricanranas and diving clotheslines off the top. Stiff suplexes with Ozaki landing hard on her head more than once and a series of double foot stomps off the top to Bull but she kicks out. In the end, after a Doomsday Device on Ozaki where she again lands right on her head, Bull Nakano hits a big leg drop off the top rope to get the win. Awesome stuff.

Mean Gene has his working boots on tonight and is back up at the interview podium with Jimmy Hart and Lex Lugar. Jimmy puts over Lex as both the man who will injure Macho Man and will win the WCW world title tonight. Lex stares down the whole time he talks - I assume he was reading his promo. There is a hilarious moment as he puts his hand up for a high five from Jimmy who doesn’t see it and so he’s left hanging and has to turn it into a wave instead. Poor Lex. 

WCW United States Championship

Kensuke Sasaki © (w/Sonny Onoo) vs. Chris Benoit

Sasaki won the United States title from Sting in Japan on November 13th. I’m glad to see the title back in circulation again after Sting seemed to forget he was even champion for the past two months. Benoit is the newest member of the Four Horsemen but I haven’t seen him interact with the rest of the group yet! He has Sonny Onoo with him and this is our first proper look at Bobby Heenan’s business partner. He is leading this Japanese incursion into WCW. 

Benoit beat Sasaki on Nitro a couple of weeks ago so this is a rematch with much higher stakes. It's slow and not bad but not very exciting - this is technically heel vs. heel, but the fans cheer for Benoit because they want the US title back in WCW hands I guess. They trade sleepers and headlocks and stiff slams to little reaction from the crowd. 

Sonny Onoo goes over to chat with Heenan and Schiavone. The business deal they struck involving WCW’s weekend shows has fallen apart so Sonny says that they have a new deal involving Starrcade next month, which is WCW’s version of Wrestlemania. I guess we’ll find out more about that tomorrow on Nitro.

Back in the ring, Benoit finally picks up the pace a little with a tombstone piledriver and a diving headbutt off the top rope. He hurts himself (ominous foreshadowing) and takes too long to get the pin so Sasaki kicks out. He counters a powerbomb into a hangman, dropping Benoit throat-first across the top rope and follows up with a brainbuster to win the match and retain the United States title. Not an awful match but pretty dull - maybe I just didn’t care enough about the outcome.

It’s Mean Gene time! Jimmy Hart is back but this time he has Taskmaster and The Giant with him. Taskmaster issues warnings to the usual suspects (Sting, Hogan, Macho) and hints that they have friends in places they wouldn’t expect - another heel turn and new Dungeon member? Jimmy Hart calls Hogan, Savage and Sting the three stooges and says that the Giant is the uncrowned champion. Gene tries to stirr the pot and says that they can’t trust the DoD won’t all turn on each other to win the title. Giant promises to throw Hogan over the top so hard he’ll go back to Venice Beach. That would be a hell of a throw! 

Lex Lugar vs. Randy Savage

This match has been building since the very first episode of Nitro when Lex Lugar returned to WCW. 

Before the match, Mean Gene speaks to Macho Man at the interview podium where he says that his arm is “one million percent” which is obviously a lie, but it plays into the finish of this match (spoilers) so I think that’s the point! Savage is all smiles and high fives on his way to the ring and seems fully confident of having a good night in this match and in World War 3.

Lugar doesn’t fit in with the Dungeon of Doom. He’s a proper main eventer and doesn’t have a silly gimmick! He attacks Macho quickly but Savage - whose arm is bandaged despite his claims about it being healthy - is a man possessed and hammers away on the Total Package with right hands, stomps in the corner and chokes him on the ropes. Lugar bumps around inside and outside the ring and makes Savage look like a million bucks. Macho hits the elbow drop in the ring and has the victory but Jimmy Hart springs into action and distracts the referee. Savage shakes it off and just keeps beating on Lugar outside the ring until he’s reversed into the ring posts/one of the other rings. The ringside area at this PPV is very dangerous with the extra ring posts and ring aprons. Lugar actually locks Randy in the Torture Rack on the outside and punishes him with his finishing hold but can’t win by submission outside the ring. Lex might be able to win via count out after that but drags him back into the ring instead. Lugar locks a submission hold on Macho’s injured arm and…he passes out from the pain. Lex Lugar beats Randy Savage! 

He refuses to break the hold and keeps the pressure on Macho Man until Sting comes down. Just like with Sting and Flair a few weeks ago, Sting calmly talks his friend Lex down and he releases the hold and leaves so that Stinger can check on Randy who is out for the count. Sting and Lex remain friends despite their conflicting loyalties - I’m really enjoying this storyline. 

Ric Flair vs. Sting

Tony Schiavone calls this next match a super grudge match, which is appropriate given how long these two’s history is together. The below video package doesn’t make the storyline make any more sense - what was Ric Flair’s plan and why did he and Arn pretend to be at odds for the better part of two months just to draw Sting in and attack him?

Ric Flair, much like Hulk Hogan and many others, is a performer who has been tarnished by his real life actions and in the many years since his heyday. It’s a difficult thing to separate “the art from the artist” but I do my best and it is a lot easier with Ric Flair - I love The Nature Boy. 

The two are evenly matched but Sting is a lot stronger (strong as a bull you might say) so keeps getting the advantage. Each time, Flair bails out of the ring and moves to another one to get some distance. Weirdly as the match continues, Sister Sherri and Col. Parker come out together to watch the match from the aisle, arms linked and kissing each other. They seem very in love - Parker is punching out of his weight class there. 

Flair is in full on time-killing mode, pretending to take a walk but coming back to the match when the crowd boos. I’m sure he just wants to save energy for the battle royal which is up next.

Flair gets control on the outside with chops to the chest and sends Sting to the ring barrier. Back in the ring he maintains control with a well timed low blow which the referee didn’t see. They call him Slick Ric for a reason. Flair puts his focus on Sting’s leg, hammering on his knee and working towards the Figure Four which he locks in. He makes the mistake of slapping Sting in face which just fires the Stinger up and he muscles up out of the hold and throws Flair around some more, basically not even selling his knee anymore. Flair changes rings one last time and stops Sting with a kick to the knee and goes to the top rope but is brought down with a big slam and then Sting wins with the exact same finish as their match on Nitro earlier this month - a superplex and then the Scorpion Death Lock for the submission. Despite his pre-match comments that he’d never release the hold, he does quite quickly,  satisfied with the win.

This match was good fun but it felt like the guys were on auto-pilot. That’s not a bad thing as they had great chemistry and could obviously have a good match with their eyes closed. I’m sure I’ll see plenty more Sting vs. Flair matches in the years to come as I continue through WCW. 

60-man World War match for the Vacant WCW World Heavyweight Championship

Hulk Hogan, The Giant, Ric Flair, Sting, Randy Savage, Lex Lugar, Scott Armstrong, Steve Armstrong, Arn Anderson, WCW World Television Champion Johnny B. Badd, WCW World Tag Team Champion Stevie Ray, WCW World Tag Team Champion Booker T, Marcus Bagwell, Chris Benoit, Big Train Bart, Bunkhouse Buck, Cobra, Disco Inferno, Jim Duggan, Bobby Eaton, Eddy Guerrero, Mr. JL, Chris Kanyon, Brian Knobbs, Kurasawa, Joey Maggs, Meng, Hugh Morrus, Max Muscle, Scott Norton, One Man Gang, Paul Orndorff, Diamond Dallas Page, Sgt. Buddy Lee Parker, Brian Pillman, Craig Pittman, Lord Steven Regal, Scotty Riggs, Road Warrior Hawk, Big Bubba Rogers, Jerry Sags, Ricky Santana, WCW United States Champion Kensuke Sasaki, The Shark, Fidel Sierra, Dick Slater, Mark Starr, Dave Sullivan, The Taskmaster, Super Assassin #1, Super Assassin #2, David Taylor, Bobby Walker, VK Wallstreet, Pez Whatley, Mike Winner, Alex Wright, James Earl Wright, The Yeti and The Zodiac

It’s fine that you didn’t read the full list of names - neither did I. There is a video package to explain how we got to this point. This is exciting as there’s six or seven realistic winners.

This video package is also the first mention of The Yeti since Halloween Havoc. As it goes, while Hogan is the 3rd giant, that wasn’t the original plan - the 3rd giant was supposed to be Giant Gonzales. He didn’t come in. Then it was going to be British talent Big Daddy aka Loch Ness but his visa wasn’t sorted out in time. Before the match, Mean Gene interviews Hogan. It’s not a noteworthy promo but it is interesting how much the crowd booed him. He does also say that while he, Sting and Macho are friends it’ll be every man for himself and there’s no hard feelings. Remember he said that for later. 

At ringside there’s some house keeping to do as Bobby and Tony show off the vacant WCW title belt. As there’s three rings there will also be three commentary teams with Ring 2 being overseen by Eric Bischoff and Dusty Rhodes (baby) and Ring 3 being overseen by Chris Cruise and Larry Zybysko. The feed switched back and forth between the three teams all throughout the match so they could give us updates, almost like reporters in a war zone. It’s a clever idea but I don’t think it really worked. All 60 men are introduced one after another, walking to the ring single file to fill up the rings. The big names are scattered amidst a bunch of people I’ve never heard of but my two important notes; The Yeti now has a wildly different look, dressed like a big Ninja and the final two men are Ric Flair and Hulk Hogan; quite funny to imagine them standing next to each other backstage, waiting their turn and staying chill about it. 

Shout out to William Regal who pulls a string of hilarious faces during his entrance and as the match begins, looking around like he’s terrified of the mass of humanity around him. Michael Buffer says this match contains “almost a quarter of a million pounds of muscle and mayhem” which would put the average weight of the participants at around 4166lbs each.

This is going to be a struggle to cover but I’ll do my best. It’s a lot of punches and kicks because it’s a battle royal. The second production issue in addition to the three commentary teams throwing to each other is that they put all three rings on the screen at once. There’s too much going on to follow! It’s another idea which looked good on paper but I don’t think really worked. I’ll try to cover the big spots as and when they come up but I’m certainly not covering every elimination!

In a shocker, The Yeti is literally the first man eliminated - so much for the giants in this match. Hogan gets out of the ring under the ropes so that he’s not eliminated and beats up Ric Flair and others. Hogan is the only one who gets out of the ring which makes him look like a sneaky bastard. Larry gives some good analysis from Ring 3, talking about how Horsemen Benoit and Pillman are working together which is smart. Sgt. Craig Pittman locks in his arm bar submission on old rival Cobra…in a battle royal. Come on, man. The commentators do their best to list the men eliminated but other than the Yeti, there was no one of note for the first 10 - 15 minutes of action. The actual match is pretty dull given that it's just a lot of punches and kicks but I did quite like listening to the commentary; they infuse it with some energy and I’ve decided that throwing back and forth between the three teams is a good idea. In Ring 3, Lex Lugar and Arn Anderson pair off and fight on the outside with a back drop and a suplex on the floor. The Giant is dominating that ring and throwing people around but the eliminations are very slow thus far. The entire Dungeon of Doom seems to be united in trying to eliminate Hulk Hogan but obviously they are no match for the almighty Hulkster. 

Ring 2 is the first one to whittle down to only 10 men and so they move over to Ring 1 and Bischoff and Dusty say goodnight.

Not long after, Ring 3 is the same and we lose Larry and Chris. The match then becomes the Hulk Hogan show, focusing on how every heel in the ring is going after him. All of the big names are still in the match but with 30+ people in one ring it is now impossible to follow and pick out individual spots. Hacksaw does get some revenge from earlier in the night by eliminating Big Bubba, and Scott Armstrong is taken out on a stretcher - he was fine, it was just a bit of injected drama to make fans see this match as really dangerous. 

Lugar is smart and stays on the outside of the ring, picking his spots to throw punches and choke people on the ground when they come near him. Lugar is having a good night! There’s also a moment where new Dungeon of Doom member, One Man Gang, squares up to The Giant. They’re both huge so that’s a “spot”. The ring clears a little so we can see a little more of what's going on and so can the fans - big pop for Hogan eliminating The Taskmaster as well as Macho Man leaving the ring to go after Lugar. Neither of them went over the top rope so aren’t eliminated. Almost 25 minutes in, there’s still just over 20 people in the ring as Johnny B Badd and DDP eliminate each other! 

The final eight men are Horsemen Flair and Anderson, Dungeon of Doom members Giant, One Man Gang and Lugar, Sting, Hogan and Savage. That’s a strong group! Sting and Hogan work together to eliminate both Flair and Anderson at the same time and Ric is furious, running around into the empty rings before walking to the back. Sting and Lugar work together as a team against The Giant and with them all leaning on the ropes, Hogan runs up and dumps out all three men! Hogan is pulled out of the ring under the ropes by The Giant just as Savage eliminates the One Man Gang and, with only one man in the ring, Randy Savage is declared the winner! Macho Man is the new WCW World Heavyweight Champion! 

This is where Hogan’s real life political shenanigans are laid out for the world to see - he gets in Randy’s face who looks very confused. Hogan complains and whines that he was pulled out under the ropes and not eliminated, asking the fans to agree with him and spending close to 10 minutes bitching. He rolls his eyes as Macho Man raises the World title belt and gives him no time to celebrate, cutting off Mean Gene as he goes to speak to the new World Champion and instead making it all about himself and how he wasn’t really eliminated. The fans boo Savage and Hogan as they debate who the real Champion is. Hogan smirks and patronisingly rolls his eyes as Savage speaks and tells him that they’ll talk about it on Nitro. Macho Man looks so confused by it all which is understandable as this finish was NOT what they all agreed before the match started. World War 3 ends in controversy, with Hogan not letting Macho Man celebrate his first WCW World title victory in the “biggest match of all time”. The two do at least shake hands and hug at the end of the exchange and stay babyface at least for now.