Ricky Steamboat & Nikita Koloff vs Joe & Dean
Malenko
Decent opener, albeit with a little sloppiness. Nikita is
really positioned as the game-changer here, with the Malenko’s not able to
counter his strength advantage. He impressively catches Dean on a crossbody
and, though knocked down by a Joe dropkick, he press slams Dean out of the ring
on the cover, turning defence to offence. Joe is responsible for the sloppiest
moments in the match, awkwardly dropping Steamboat to give his team the
advantage and going down too quickly on a Steamer facebuster which leads to the
hot tag. Dean was more impressive, really liked the way he held onto
Steamboat’s wrists and feet when slamming him to the mat, transitioning
straight away into a submission hold. Koloff is a beast on the hot tag and lays
out Joe with the sickle to win.
Rick Rude & Steve Austin vs Tom Zenk & Marcus
Bagwell
I thought this was a better laid out match than the opener,
as they worked it exactly how an upper card heel vs midcard face team should
be. There are moments of hope for the faces, but the Dangerous Alliance team
are too overpowering and too experienced to be in danger for long. Loved
Austin’s vicious blows to Bagwell in the corner early on, and Rude no selling
Bagwell’s blows to the abs was perfect character work. The Alliance work heat
on Zenk, maintaining control by cutting the ring in half. Bagwell gets a brief
run off the hot tag, but misses a dropkick and quickly gets dispatched with the
Rude Awakening. Good hierarchy establishing bout.
Steve Williams & Terry Gordy vs Larry & Jeff O’Day
Infamous squash, and one that hasn’t become any less
entertaining with time. Amusingly, it’s not the younger Jeff O’Day who gets
destroyed, but his oddly-skeletal father who gets folded up with a Gordy back-suplex,
hilariously has a double-clothesline attempt no-sold and instead gets
double-tackled to the mat and then gets decimated with an Oklahoma Stampede for
the win.
Barry Windham & Dustin Rhodes vs Arn Anderson &
Bobby Eaton
Windham and Rhodes were my favourite tag team as a kid, and
it’s nice to be reminded why here. Loved Windham’s beautiful right hand to
Anderson early on here, and Arn sells it with the perfect mix of pain and
bewilderment. Lots of lovely little touches in this match to make this match
stand out in a card of tag matches. Dug Eaton stopping short on a Dustin
leapfrog to punch Rhodes in the stomach, and the sequence of Dustin grabbing
the ropes to block an Arn DDT, only to be in the right position for Eaton to
level him with a right hand. Dustin takes a big spill from the ring on a missed
crossbody, which looks as good here as when he still does it 24 years later(!)
There’s a great nearfall off an Anderson spinebuster as Rhodes is face in
peril. Love the twist on traditional tag formula, as Rhodes never makes the hot
tag, instead taking advantage of an Eaton mistake to hit a quick bulldog for
the win. This was pretty great.
The Freebirds (Michael Hayes & Jimmy Garvin) vs The
Silver Kings (El Texano and Silver King)
This, however, is very much not great. The Kings are only
referred to here as Silver Kings #1 and #2. An absolute clash of styles here,
and Hayes especially doesn’t seem to be up for selling anything. This is
typified by the Kings hitting Total Elimination on him, which Hayes awkwardly
bumps for, then goes right back on offence. A Silver King drop toehold somehow
ends up with Hayes on top, and this is such a mess. The end sees the crowd
begging for the DDT from the Freebirds, but Hayes instead gets a small package
for the win. Rubbish.
Jushin Liger & Brian Pillman vs Chris Benoit & Beef
Wellington
Interesting match here, feels a bit ahead of its time. This
is a very back-and-forth lightheavyweight tag match, with neither side really
taking a prolonged period of control. WCW’s top rope ban was relaxed for the
tournament, and it feels like these guys are taking full advantage of being
unleashed, as they come off the top and to the outside on a regular basis (with
Jim Ross and Jesse Ventura constantly bringing up the lack of outside padding).
Wellington heels it up slightly by hurling Pillman over the top behind the refs
back, but misses a plancha. Benoit and Pillman share the best exchanges of the
match, first with Pillman hitting an insane back suplex from the top rope, then
with both guys exchanging nasty sounding chops on the floor. Wellington is the
weakest link here, as it does feel like he’s sandbagging Liger on occasion,
with the ending seeing an awkward looking Liger slam, before a beautiful
moonsault for the win.
The Headhunters vs Hiroshi Hase & Akira Nogami
Apparently, this was supposed to be the massive fat guy
Headhunters, but they couldn’t make it, so we get Arn Anderson and Bob Cook in
masks. You’d think this would be a squash, but this is actually worked pretty evenly,
albeit with the Japanese team getting the flashier moves. With name guys in
disguise, it’s always fun to see if you can spot any noticeable mannerism, and
yes, Bob Cook still has a great punch here. This is pretty heatless, but I
loved Akira’s leaping enzuigiri, the swank thrust kick by Hase and the winning
pinfall coming from stereo suplexes, Nogami with a German and Hase with a
Northern Lights.
Steve Williams & Terry Gordy vs the Steiner Brothers
The Steiners were due to face a Puerto Rican team before
facing Doc and Gordy in the next round, but the Puerto Rican’s are apparently
injured (which Doc and Gordy unsubtly take credit for), so the Steiners get a
bye and we get this second round match up early. The initial stages probably aren’t
what the crowd as expecting, as all four go to the mat, jockeying for position
and takedowns. Rick hits a huge overhead suplex on Doc out of nowhere to a big
pop. Williams slaps Steiner, who responds with a barrage of punches to another,
bigger, pop. Things move on a big quicker from here, with Doc and Gordy
controlling Scott. Love the double team of Gordy dropping Scott from his
shoulders onto Doc’s knee. They initially focus on Scott’s back before moving
to his leg. Scott makes what we assume is the hot tag to Rick, who has a great
brawl in the ring with Gordy. Rick tries a cover, but is informed by the ref
that he’d not seen the tag, and Scott is still legal. A worn out Scott is
outside the ring, and Doc clips his leg from behind. Lovely bit of misdirection.
Back in, Scott tries a belly-to-belly on Williams, but Gordy clips his leg out
again, and Doc lands on top for the win. Big shock victory, but I love how
logical this all was. Williams and Gordy outsmarted the Steiners and simply had
the better gameplan.
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