Before anyone asks, the black void in the banner isn’t a mistake. It’s intentional and sort of expresses my feelings on this show… but regardless… yeah, this is it… the last WCW 2000 PPV that I’ve yet to watch… and then it’s over.
No, I’m not watching any Nitros. I’m not watching any Thunders. Fuck off with that noise. This is the last word on WCW 2000.
For context, this would’ve been shortly after Vince Russo was turfed from creative and we’re left with a booking crew that’s mostly cruising along until the eventual demise of WCW.
Cruiserweight Champion MIKE SANDERS defeated KWEE WEE to retain the title. There’s run-ins from Ric Flair and Meng/Haku for some reason and I’m not sure what to expect from this, but it was a thing that happened and that’s all I’ve got to say about that, so…
After the match, Ric Flair – apparently an authority figure of some sort – declares that there would be no more outside interference. That is a fucking lie.
Three Count (Helms and Moore) defeated the Jung Dragons (two dudes) and Jamie Nobie/Evan Karagias in the obligatory spot match. It was an entertaining ten minutes of spots and moves, if nothing else.
Mancow defeated Jimmy Hart in the long-anticipated rematch… to someone, at least. Jimmy tried to get out of the match with a leg cast that Mean Gene Okerlund claims is as real as Major Gunns… nobody is going to get that. Anyway, Jimmy gets foiled and Mancow beats him in a short match. Is there any reason why we needed Mancow/Hart II at any point? Are we just entertaining ourselves at this point, guys?
Hardcore Champion Crowbar defeated Reno and Big Vito in a pretty dull hardcore match that makes me long for the days when Screamin’ Norman Smiley was a thing… and that’s not necessarily a bad thing, but this match ain’t that, kids. This is duller than goose piss.
Billy Kidman and Rey Mysterio defeated Alex Wright and Kronik… so, the idea is that it was going to be Disco Inferno teaming with Wright, but he hired Kronik to take his spot, but they’d only be there for like six or seven minutes or so. Anyway, after about six minutes, Kronik bails on poor Wright, thus allowing Kidman and Mysterio to get the win. The match itself was nothing, but the brief story they told with Kronik gave me a bit of a chuckle. That is a positive in this show’s favor and I’ll take whatever I can get.
Ernest “The Cat” Miller defeated Shane Douglas via loaded red shoe of death… or something. This was a battle of who can cheat better than the other. This was also a waste of time that could’ve been put into another match. Worthless.
Meanwhile, we get a GLACIER promo… in the year 2000… a clear sign that Vince Russo is no longer booking this shit because god forbid you have a promo for fucking GLACIER that you can’t turn into…
Okay, for those who don’t know, once upon a time, WCW ran promos for a guy named GLACIER, which was their take on Mortal Kombat’s Sub-Zero. The promos looked pretty good for the most part, but when he actually debuted, he was just a guy who did karate and needless to say, nobody cared. So years after that, we’re back to doing promos for GLACIER because only he could save WCW or something. I mean, hey, they’re trying something to get people excited, but we’ve already seen GLACIER in the past and… nothing special…
Bam Bam Bigelow defeated Sergeant AWOL (a.k.a. It’s Da Wall, Brutha!) in a hardcore match or something that went about five minutes and made me wonder what the point of this was. All I know is that Wall was a replacement for Mike Awesome, who apparently got hurt or something and couldn’t wrestle or something. Why not just cancel the match? I know Flair said that 10,000 people paid to see Bam Bam wrestle, but… oh wait, never mind. THAT’S A FUCKING LIE, TOO!
General Hugh Erection defeated U.S. Champion Lance Storm to win the title in five minutes… yes, I know Lance calls it the Canadian Title and has Canadian Title stickers, but am I really supposed to care? Am I supposed to care about this stuff at this point? Does it really matter? Hey, I guess I should be thrilled that I get to watch one Lance Storm match on this return to WCW 2000, but I would much rather watch a GOOD Lance Storm match… maybe dip into the ECW archives or something.
Jeff Jarrett defeated Buff Bagwell via el-kabong… which is funny because earlier in the show, they showed a backstage bit of Jarrett witnessing his stockpile of guitars all destroyed, which placed him in a precarious situation until “Oh wait, there’s a couple guitars hidden under the ring because of course there is.” This magical underneath the ring gimmick of storing all sorts of kooky items would be acquired by WWE and used for some of their own craptacular programs. Anyway, this was another short match that felt like a complete waste of time. Almost as though Russo was still around despite not being around or something.
Kevin Nash and Diamond Dallas Page defeated WCW World Tag Champions Shawn Stasiak and Chuck Palumbo to win the titles in a match that lasted longer than fifteen minutes… barely, but it’s longer than the usual fare and one of the participants is KEVIN NASH. The crowd is so into this match that they’re chanting for Scott Hall, who was either suspended or no longer with the company and thus doing ECW spot shows here and there. For what it’s worth, the match was alright. Nash and Page could pull off a decent showing and carry the younger kids to a watchable match… of course, once again, we’ve got the old guys winning championships at the expense of the young guys. While that might not be a big deal nowadays, back then, it was the kiss of death and often the reason people stopped tuning in… because no matter how much people clamor for the younger, fast-rising starts, WCW’s mandate is to always go back to the old stock. But when that old stock ain’t drawing a dime… yeah, well, moving on…
Goldberg defeated Lex Luger while knocking out a ref with a jackhammer. It’s a Goldberg match and Luger came out of it in one piece… meanwhile, Bret Hart is shaking his fist in rage because Goldberg can’t work or something.
Scott Steiner defeated WCW World Champion Booker T in what is billed as a “Straightjacket Caged Heat” match to win the title. Basically, they take a cage that looks similar to the Hell in A Cell cage – big one with a roof and covering the surrouding ringside area – and call it Caged Heat because anything involving Cell or Hell is out of the question. There’s also a straightjacket used to incapacitate a wrestler, but when Booker tries to put Steiner in it, Big Poppa Pump just rips it off, so that was rather useless. Eventually, Steiner puts Booker in his Recliner chinlock move, but if you look closely enough, he doesn’t have the move all the way in and it looks looser than usual. Despite this, Booker passes out from the pain and Steiner wins the title, which was bound to happen sooner or later. In hindsight, though, maybe they should have given Steiner a run with the belt rather than Jarrett, but then given who was booking this shit at the time, maybe we we were better off waiting until Russo got turfed to give Steiner his run with the belt, which would last until the very last Nitro where he’d drop the belt back to Booker T… but that’s another story.
Well, I wish I could say that I saved the best for last… and for what it’s worth, Mayhem 2000 is miles above the other two WCW 2000 PPVs I saw by a considerable distance… but all that means is that the show is largely dull and boring. There were a couple decent matches here and there and the rest of it was a smattering of stuff that was either stuff that should’ve been on Nitro or stuff that should’ve been launched into the sun. The end result is a show that I didn’t outright hate, but felt like my time could’ve been better served doing something else.
And with that, I can safely say that the book on WCW 2000 as far as I’m concerned is closed for good and on that note, I’d just like to say…
Thank Fuck For That.
FIN
dtm666 