Sunday, November 13, 2016

Top Five Worst Major Shows

5) TNA Victory Road 2011: I'm only including events that I've seen here and I wanted to spread the love (or disdain rather) to multiple promotions. There were some strong candidates here but in the end, I had to include TNA on the list. I debated between a few shows but ultimately chose this infamous event. This is the one where Jeff Hardy showed up for the main event drugged out of his mind and Sting beat him in about 90 seconds because of this. That would be enough but the rest of the card is rough. The Knockouts Tag Title is sloppy and has one of the worst looking finishes ever, full of botches. Mr. Anderson and RVD go to a double countout where the fans chanted "Restart the match", which was dueled back with loud "No" responses. Hernandez and Matt Morgan had a first blood that ended in the most ridiculous fashion. The cameraman gets a close up of Hernandez blading and then he pouts food coloring on Morgan. The referee sees Hernandez's blood first, then turns to see Morgan's fake blood and declares Hernandez the victor. What? There is an entire episode of Botchamania dedicated to it if you want to check that out.

4) ECW December to Dismember 2006: With split PPVs declining in 2006, this event pretty much ended them. The ECW brand was already failing because it was nothing like the ECW that people loved. While the brand would eventually become highly enjoyable, at this time, it barely even had a roster. It scored 90,000 buys, which is the lowest in history outside of the Network era. Part of that was because ECW sucked and part was because the WWE held a PPV exactly one week earlier. That's asking a lot of people to spend a lot of money close together. Before Christmas. Anyway, onto the actual show, which blew. The tag opener was fine but involved nobody from the ECW brand. Then, the ECW matches were shit. Tommy Dreamer vs. Daivari? Balls Mahoney vs. Matt Striker? The FBI vs. Burke and Terkay? Mike Knox and Kelly Kelly vs. Kevin Thorn and Ariel? There are no words for this. The main event was the Extreme Elimination Chamber, which actually wasn't awful. However, they took Sabu out of the match, someone who the crowd was hot for, and replaced him with Hardcore Holly. Paul Heyman wanted CM Punk to win this thing and eliminate the champion, Big Show, quickly, but instead, was the first one gone. To cap things, Bobby Lashley won the title and got this over the top celebration that the fans and viewers wanted no part of.

3) WCW Uncensored 1996: I only recently watched this event and my goodness, it falls off a cliff. The first two matches are decent to good. Everything after is god awful. Col. Robert Parker beats Madusa in an awful match, showing that Madusa should never have left the WWF. The Booty Man, who always sucked regardless of gimmick, but this was the worst, beat DDP in a terribly long "I Quit Wrestling" match. I should have quit watching. The Giant went over Loch Ness (remember him?) in short order before things got even uglier. Someone told Sting and Booker T that they had to wrestle the Road Warriors in a Chicago Street Fight, even though the show was in Mississippi, for 30 minutes and it made all four guys not give a damn. Everyone was so enthused and none of them seemed to care. It was lethargic. To end the show, we get the most ridiculous main event I've ever witnessed. Hulk Hogan and Macho Man enter the Doomsday Cage. It's a big ass cage that the two men have to work through against EIGHT opponents. They reach different levels of the cage, make it to the ring and then back to the cage. None of it made sense. The two biggest opponents didn't show up until late in the match, half the thing happened away from the cage, they use frying pans of all things in the finish and the WCW Champion, Ric Flair, eats a random pin at the end.

2) WWF King of the Ring 1995: In terms of missed opportunities, this Pay-Per-View basically takes the cake. While other Pay-Per-Views are flat out bad, this one is bad and features the most confusing booking of them all. So, the WWF in 1995 wasn't doing too hot when it came to top level performers. That's understandable. However, if we look at the top stars we'll find Diesel (who was WWF Champion) and I can think of eight guys that could have been in the tournament. Bret Hart, Shawn Michaels, The Undertaker, Razor Ramon, Jeff Jarrett (IC Champion), British Bulldog, Owen Hart. That's 7 and you could throw in Sid or Bam Bam to make a good KOTR. Instead, Bret was wasted in a dumb feud with the awful Jerry Lawler, Razor may have been hurt but was a manager for Savio Vega and Jarrett managed his lesser sidekick, Roadie, in the tourney. Bulldog and Owen? They wrestled to a draw in the qualifiers and were left off the show. HBK wrestled to a first round draw with Kama of all people while the Undertaker jobbed to fucking Mabel. With at least enough talent to make a decent tournament, we had to sit through FOUR Savio Vega matches and a Mabel win. Plus, the main event tag match pitting Sid and Tatanka against Diesel and Bigelow was terrible and drawn out. It's like they booked this show while drunk.

1) WCW Souled Out 2000: This is often overlooked on lists of worst Pay-Per-Views ever but I can't fathom why. It is absolutely atrocious in every conceivable way. I reviewed it here. Read that when you're done here. There are 12 matches and none are able to crack ** with a Saturn/Kidman match coming the close at *3/4. Four of the matches get DUD ratings and it's just all bad. Dean Malenko loses the opener by exiting the ring. Seriously. They debut their version of the Hell in a Cell (Caged Heat) and waste it on Kidman vs. the Wall in a match that I gave 1/4*. Vampiro, David Flair and Crowbar try to one down each other in a putrid triple threat match. The worst thing of the night was seeing the terrible Jim Ross parody, Oklahoma, take on Madusa for the Cruiserweight Title in a match that saw Oklahoma retain and involved BBQ sauce. Seriously, there are no redeeming qualities about this show.