NWA (WCW) Clash of the Champions IX: New York Knockout (November 1989)

Original Airdate: November 15, 1989

From Troy, New York; Your Hosts are Jim Ross and Gordon Solie.


Opening Match: The Fabulous Freebirds v The Road Warriors: The Freebirds were officially still NWA World Tag Champions at this point, though they had already lost them to the Steiner Brothers at a TV taping a few weeks before (which hadn't aired yet). Hawk starts with Michael Hayes, and (surprise, surprise) Hayes wants to stall. The Road Warriors respond by killing him (and Jimmy Garvin too, for good measure), but 'death' only makes Michael Hayes slower. What a weirdo. The Freebirds try to double-team Hawk to turn the tide, but he no-sells everything, and passes to Animal. Garvin tries eye rakes, but Animal promptly no-sells a suplex, and knocks Jimmy out of the ring with a clothesline - the crowd vocally chanting 'Freebirds Suck' and popping for all of the Warriors' no-selling. The Warriors keep casually destroying the Freebirds as Jim Ross announces that the Freebirds will defend the tag titles 'this weekend' against the Steiners, setting up the title change. Meanwhile, the 'champs' are getting destroyed, but Hawk gets overzealous and bumps into the referee - getting himself lamely disqualified at 5:19 - and the crowd don't like that, Monsoon! This was essentially a squash without the proper ending, but thankfully it was kept short, and the stalling at a minimum to work around the allotted time. ¼*

Doom v Eddie Gilbert and Tommy Rich: Doom are still masked at this point, but they're fooling no one: it's obviously two black guys. Gilbert finds that out quickly as Ron Simmons damns him to hell with clotheslines, and Eddie passes to Rich. Tommy tries to work the arm, but Simmons casually gut-punches him, and passes to Butch Reed. Rich and Gilbert make a futile attempt to cut the ring in half on Reed, but Butch shrugs Eddie off with a sidewalk slam, and adds a vertical suplex before tagging Ron to help show these fools how to properly double-team a mofo. That gets Rich's panties in a knot, but his attempt to gave Gilbert get him blasted in a 2^nd rope clothesline/spinebuster combo for the pin at 5:16. Total squash, but it was energetic, and served its purpose. ¼*

The Midnight Express v The Dynamic Dudes: Jim Cornette is the manager of both teams, and stands in a neutral corner as Bobby Eaton starts with Shane Douglas. They do a reversal exchange to establish that they're familiar with one another, until Eaton tags Stan Lane to school the kid proper. Apparently Lane's definition is different than mine, though, as he trades armbars with Douglas until Johnny Ace protests all... the... clean exchanges. He tags in to protest with his fists ('shake harder, boy!'), and a pair of dropkicks leaves Lane reeling. Scoop slam leaves him in the corner to pass back to Bobby, but Ace plants a pair of dropkicks on Eaton as well. A baseball slide leaves Bobby taking a walk around ringside to clear the cobwebs, but Shane is right on him with a visually impressive plancha. Bobby manages to get away from Shane long enough to tag Stan, but Douglas rekindles their armdrag affair for a while. Jealous, Bobby runs in to get some armdrags of his own, but I guess Shane wasn't giving it to him as good as he did to Lane, because Bobby decides to superplex him. Douglas manages to block with a 2^nd rope bodypress, and he tags Johnny Ace. He goes at Eaton with monkey flips and headscissors takedowns, but a cheap shot from Lane stops that effort, and Stan adds a Russian legsweep for good measure. Rocket Launcher, but Ace lifts the knees, and gets the tag to Douglas. Shane's a house of arson to trigger a four-way brawl, and Jim Cornette runs in to protest - only to whack Douglas with his tennis racket, and allow Eaton the pinfall at 9:25 - the crowd ecstatic at seeing the Dudes get turned on and lose. No classic, but the match was energetic, and didn't overstay its welcome. Good work from everyone, and well booked back-and-forth stuff. *

Steve Williams v Super Destroyer: Destroyer tries to jump Williams at the bell, but that goes about as well as you'd expect for a masked Jack Victory character, and Steve destroys him with the Stampede in 1:39. Destroyer was there to get squashed - Destroyer got squashed. DUD

The Steiner Brothers v The Skyscrapers: Rick Steiner starts with Dan Spivey, and quickly butt-fucks him. Or, I mean, 'outwrestles him' with go-behinds to set up a nice German suplex. A clothesline follow-up leaves Spivey on the floor, but he's quick to get back in and nearly kill Rick with a sloppy tombstone piledriver. Rick responds by no-selling a possible broken neck, and tagging Scott Steiner in to cream Dan with a Frankensteiner. He follows it up with an unbelievable blockbuster on Sid, and the crowd is just collectively losing their shit now - and I can't blame them! The dust settles on Scott and Sid, and Scott works the arm after suckering Sid into missing a blind charge. A double-team turns the tide (including a dropkick from Spivey that misses by a mile), and Dan casually slams Scott before hitting a big boot. Suplex gets revered by Steiner to allow that tag to brother Rick, and it's clothesline city for Dan Spivey. Powerslam triggers a four-way brawl, but Doom run in to attack the Steiners before it goes anywhere - Rick and Scott getting a disqualification victory at 6:06. Afterwards, Doom do a beat down on the Steiners, until the Road Warriors run in to save and brawl with the Skyscrapers. Spivey looked sloppy at several points, but the match was fun, energetic power stuff - something both teams excelled at during this period. * ¾   

NWA United States Title Match: Lex Luger v Brian Pillman: They fight tooth and nail over the initial lockup - Pillman refusing to let the larger Luger bully him. Again, but Pillman won't let Luger get the upper hand, and Lex is officially frustrated - walking around the ring and yelling at the crowd. He regroups by blasting Brian with a kneelift, but a big criss cross allows Pillman a pair of dropkicks to put the champ on the floor. Luger comes in hot with a series of closed fists, but Pillman dodges a cross corner clothesline, and dumps Lex to the outside again. Luger shakes the cobwebs off for long enough to kill Pillman's momentum, but Pillman won't quit, and stands blocking everything Luger throws - finally nailing Lex with a spinkick after skinning the cat to counter a toss over the top. He doesn't properly follow-up, however, and Luger wrecks him in the corner - only to miss another blind charge, and get blasted with a missile dropkick for two. Brian starts tearing at the arm, so Luger goes back to his power advantage, and side suplexes the challenger after ramming him into the turnbuckles. He threatens a press slam out of the ring, but the referee protests, so Luger casually drops Pillman to the mat instead. Again, but Pillman starts to get uppity, so Luger tosses him to the floor for a proper beating - scoop slamming him out there. Luger suplexes him back in for a two count, but gets distracted arguing with the official, and Brain schoolboys him for two. Lex responds with a powerslam, but wastes too much time gabbing with the crowd after, and Brain rolls him up again for two. Lex is good and pissed now, so Pillman starts throwing chops to slow the champ down, and blasts him with a clothesline coming out of the ropes. Backdrop sets up a flying bodypress from Pillman, but the referee goes down in the process, and Luger takes advantage of the situation by clobbering Pillman with a chair to retain at 12:52. Not quite as good as their awesome Halloween Havoc match the month before, but really well booked to make both guys look exactly as they should (Pillman a 'never say die' underdog fighter, Luger a cheating bully), and with great in-ring storytelling from both men. ** ¼

Main Event: I Quit Match: Ric Flair v Terry Funk: Flair is so pissed, he blasts Funk with a hellacious knife-edge chop so hard Terry flies over the top, and into the first row. Paging Hennig, Curt. Paging Hennig, Curt. Your bit has been stolen. Not that Flair is impressed though, diving at Funk with more brutal chops on the floor, and putting up his dukes for a slugfest. Terry tries a headlock, but Flair drops to the mat to sweep Funk, and starts choking at him like they're on the schoolyard. Terry responds by stomping Flair's head like he owes him money (to be fair, he probably did), and Terry tosses the limp Flair to the floor for some abuse with the guardrail. Inside, Funk keeps unloading closed fists, but Flair won't quit, so Funk shoves him into the corner for a ten-punch count - only he unloads some thirty shots before letting off. Still, Flair won't quit, so Terry decides to up the ante with a neckbreaker. Ric fires back by grabbing Terry by the throat, and chopping him right out of the ring again. Flair gets some revenge with the rail, but Funk is in no mood to quit, and Funk manager Gary Hart distracts Flair long enough for Terry to takeover and give Flair another of the dreaded neckbreakers. Flair still won't give, so Funk decides to teach him a lesson with another broken neck, and sets up the piledriver. Ric hits his knees to block, so Terry brilliantly uses his legs as a vise around Ric's neck to loosen him up, allowing him to hit the piledriver, but Flair still won't quit. To the floor, Funk drags the battered Flair over to the exposed concrete in the aisle, and it's piledriver: the sequel. Flair still says 'no,' so Funk beats him with the microphone for being insolent, and slams him on a table at ringside. Funk shoves Flair off of it so that he can set the table up against the ring apron for some more fun, but Flair reverses reverses him going into it, and shoves him HARD into the rail. More chops have people in the front row groaning in sympathy for poor Terry, but Flair shows no mercy as he drops Funk onto the rail - nuts first. Back inside, Flair works in a shindrop, and an inverted atomic drop follows. Flair starts going for the knee between a series of vicious chops, so Funk starts running. He's limping badly, however, and Flair tackles him in the aisle before giving him a kneebreaker on the floor. Hanging vertical suplex brings Funk back into the ring, and Ric calls for the Figure Four - but Terry rakes the eyes to block. He tries a suplex of his own, but Flair reverses - dropping Funk hard onto the ring apron. Inside, Ric takes a couple more shots at the knee before hooking on the Figure Four, and Funk is flailing in pain - grabbing at the official. He tries to counter or reverse, but Flair just keeps wrenching it on, and Funk finally submits at 18:33. Afterwards, Funk shakes Flair's hand out of respect, but that just earns him a beat down from manager Gary Hart, turning Terry face as the angle gets blown off. Really intense, stiff match - filled with well paced, hard hitting brawling and almost palpable hatred. Not putting Flair's NWA World Title belt on the line also helped make it seem intense - as if their hatred went beyond any championship. That said, for all the positives, there are some negatives: notably Flair's almost non-existent selling - especially for Funk's neck oriented offense – and very little psychology otherwise. Still one hell of a match, and a suitable blowoff to the epic feud - but not quite as good as the Great American Bash one. *** ½

BUExperience: The main event is a well remembered classic, and the rest is all fun, well paced action – in front of a hot crowd. While dark times were ahead for WCW, this is another good episode from a hot period - one that ended too soon, and for all the wrong reasons. ***