Burning Hammer Tape Review #2

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WWF: Royal Rumble 1999 January 24, 1999

--Taped from Anaheim, CA

--Your hosts are Michael Cole & King

--Road Dogg V. Big Bossman. Road Dogg had just won the Hardcore title, but for some reason this isn't a hardcore match, pretty much guaranteeing it will suck. A whole lot of nothing happens, then Bossman decides to up the excitement factor by busting out a Bearhug. Road Dogg then adds to the excitement with a scintillating Sleeper. Bossman gets the pin at 11:52 with a Sidewalk Slam. 1/4* Boring match that was nothing but punching & kicking.

--WWF Intercontinental Championship Match: Billy Gunn V. Ken Shamrock. Gunn was in the middle of gimmicks at this point, he was still Badd Ass, but he was slowly changing into Mr. Ass. Gunn goes to a Chinlock at a minute and a half into the match, we're not even 2 minutes into the match and he's gassed already. Gunn livens things up a little with a Rocker Dropper, but since it wasn't his finisher yet it only gets 2. Shamrock goes to work on Gunn's ankle. One thing I'll give Shamrock, at least he understood the concept of working the ankle over before you apply the Anklelock, which is one of the few things that Kurt Angle has never quite grasped. Shamrock pulls out a Guillotine Choke, which Gunn sells like a resthold. Just when I thought this match couldn't get any more exciting, we get a ref bump. Val Venis interferes and gives Shamrock a DDT, but that only gets 2 for Gunn. Shamrock wins by submission at 14:24 with an Anklelock. * Another boring match, with Gunn being totally gassed out and adding absolutely nothing to the match.

--WWF European Championship Match: Gangrel V. X-Pac. Gangrel has the coolest entrance package ever, the music, the lights, his mannerisms, it is so SWANK~. He does have the disadvantage of being married to Luna Vachon in real life though, so maybe that overrules the SWANKNESS~ of his entrance. Fast paced start as Gangrel is able to keep up with everything X-Pac can throw at him. Capture Butterfly Suplex by Gangrel gets 2, and man do I ever love that move. Teddy Long, B'Lee Dat Playa, screws up and counts 3 on a Gangrel top-rope Crossbody, so he decides to ignore it and just continue with the match like it never happened. X-Pac gets the pin at 5:54 with a Facebuster. **1/2 Nice little match that could have used about 5 more minutes, and I've always like Gangrel as a worker.

--WWF Women's Championship Match, Strap Match: Luna Vachon V. Sable. This is touch all four corners to win rules here. Shane McMahon joins us before the match to try and further some angle he had with Sable that I don't remember and don't particularly care about. Strap matches as a general rule suck, and this one I see being no different. A bunch of stuff happens that's pretty bad, but not so bad that it actually deserves to be described. Sable wins at 4:43 when her stalker, who turned out to be Tori, attacks Luna, allowing Sable to touch the 4th turnbuckle. 1/4* Sable sucked here, and she still sucks today.

--WWF Heavyweight Championship, I Quit Match: Rock V. Mankind. This is the infamous match from Beyond The Mat, which essentially cast Vince and the WWF in such a bad light that he decided to ignore the fact the documentary was ever made. Rock decides to wrestle the entire match in his warm-up suit. Mankind nails Rock with a mic, and it makes a loud "Crack" sound every time he hits him with it. Mankind takes his sick Irish Whip over the steel steps bump. Mankind with the Mandible Claw, but it knocks Rock out so he can't say I quit. Awesome spot as Rock catches Mankind running at him, and all in one motion gives him a Belly-To-Belly Suplex over the railing on the outside. Rock debuts the bell spot, as he takes the ring bell places it on Mankind's head and hammers away on it. Rock tries a Rock Bottom on the announce table, but it gives way before he can finish the move. They fight down the aisle, and up the balcony so Rock can shove Mankind off and onto a giant electrical box of some kind. This of course causes Michael Cole to cream his pants on the spot and use every superlative he knows right then and there so that he has nothing left to offer for the rest of the match. They decide to lift a spot from Douglas/Cactus in ECW as Rock handcuffs Mankind's hands behind his back. This is when the match takes a turn towards the extremely brutal side. Rock grabs a chair and starts wiling away on Mankind with shots directly to his head. These are just some horrifically brutal shots. They get so bad that Mankind keeps on trying to offer his back to Rock, but Rock keeps on hitting him in the head, until he finally hits him with the edge of the chair in the back of his head to knock him out legit. Rock wins the match and the title at 21:49 when a pre-recorded voice submits for Mankind. ***1/4 The beginning was a good brawl, which was the best type of match for Rock at this point in his career, but it got real ugly near the end. All those shots that Mankind took to the head were just unnecessary, and ending up making the match less enjoyable for me.

--30-Man Royal Rumble, Inter-Gender Match: The story going into this Rumble was that Vince had guaranteed that Austin wouldn't win, and to that end had rigged the draw so Austin got #1, and had put a $100,000 bounty on Austin's head for whomever eliminated him. Then Commissioner Shawn Michaels made it so Vince was #2 to try and even out the odds a little, and there you have it. Steve Austin is of course #1, followed by Mr. McMahon at #2. Austin proceeds to beat the living hell out of McMahon. Golga is #3, and Austin eliminates him right off the bat. Austin & McMahon brawl to the back as Droz is #4, but this leaves him with no one to fight, so we get thrilling footage of him pacing in the ring for 2 minutes. Edge is #5. Gillberg is #6, and Edge tosses him out the moment he enters the ring. In the back, the Corporation lays out Austin. Steve Blackman is #7, and amazingly he didn't have a personality here either. Dan Severn is #8, complete with his Whomp Ass theme music. Meanwhile, Austin gets driven off in an ambulance. Tiger Ali Singh is #9, as the arena lets out a collective "WHO?" upon seeing him. At this point it's Edge and a bunch of dead weight in the ring, and unfortunately this was too early in Edge's career for him to be able to make anything out of the situation. Blue Meanie is #10, and Edge has an effective way of dealing with him, repeated slaps to the stomach. Mabel is #11, as he knocks out Mosh to take his spot in the Rumble. Mabel eliminates Severn & Blackman at the same time. Mabel then eliminates Singh. Road Dogg is #12, as Mabel eliminates Droz & Meanie. Road Dogg tosses Edge, and then the lights go out as Undertaker sends his Ministry down to eliminate Mabel, presumably so he can ass-rape him in the back. This of course leaves Road Dogg alone in the ring for even more dead time. Gangrel is #13, and Road Dogg eliminates him right away. Kurrgan is #14, and damn was he big. Al Snow is #15 to some rather sizeable "Head" chants, but Road Dogg eliminates him almost the moment he gets in the ring. Goldust is #16. Godfather is #17 with nothing going on worth any note. Kane is #18, as it's time for some whole-sale eliminations. Kane tosses Road Dogg to eliminate him, he eliminates Kurrgan by Clotheslineing him over the top. Kane eliminates Godfather & Goldust at the same time. Kane then eliminates himself to avoid some orderlies in another forgettable Russo storyline, which leaves us with nobody in the ring, and even more dead time. Ken Shamrock is #19, but since there's nobody for him to fight we get to watch him stalk around the ring as well. McMahon joins us to do some commentary, which is actually pretty funny. Billy Gunn is #20, but minus a shoe as he's still selling the ankle injury from earlier in the night. Test is #21, as the attempted ass-rape of Mabel continues outside, which is when we see Austin arriving back at the arena driving an ambulance. Big Bossman is #22, as Austin rejoins the match and eliminates Shamrock. HHH is #23 and he's all toned and lithe here, which is quite the difference when compared to the walking advertisement for steroids that he's become today. Austin murders Gunn with a vicious Lariat. Val Venis is #24. Austin eliminates Gunn. X-Pac is #25. Mark Henry is #26, as the match in the ring has grinded to a screeching halt. Jeff Jarrett with a very hot looking Debra is #27. D-Lo Brown is #28, complete with Terri wearing a see-through top, and since this is back when she was doable, it's all good. Austin eliminates Test. Bossman eliminates X-Pac. Austin and Jarrett have a nice little mini-match in the middle of all the punching & kicking, and it's pretty sad that those 2 never had any sort of extended feud, because they look like they would have worked well together. HHH eliminates Jarrett as Owen Hart is #29. Chyna is #30, and immediately eliminates Henry, but takes time to celebrate so Austin sneaks up from behind and eliminates her. HHH eliminates Venis. Austin hits HHH with an Ace Crusher, and then eliminates him with a Clothesline over the top. Austin backdrops Owen over the top to eliminate him.

The final four are Austin, Bossman, D-Lo, & McMahon, who is still on commentary. Bossman eliminates D-Lo, and then Austin eliminates Bossman. We're back to where we started as the final two are Austin & McMahon. They brawl all over the place, and then finally get back into the ring. Austin has a bunch of chances to eliminate McMahon, but since Russo's booking he doesn't, and instead focuses on Rock who had come down to ringside. This allows McMahon to sneak up from behind and eliminate Austin at 56:39 to win the match. **1/4 Not a good Rumble, with way too many jobbers, way too much dead time, and the Austin/McMahon storyline for this match really blew and hurt the match a lot as a result.

--Final Flash: Very bad, and totally forgettable show. The undercard with the exception of Gangrel/X-Pac sucked ass. Mankind/Rock was decent but it was too brutally violent and that really detracted from the match. The Rumble itself was perhaps the worst Rumble I've ever seen.

Not Recommended.

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