WCW Souled Out 2000

From Cincinnati, Ohio; Your Hosts are Tony Schiavone, Mikey Tenay, and Bobby Heenan.

Triple Threat Theater Round One: Catch-as-Catch Can Match: Billy Kidman v Dean Malenko: The idea here is that it's an amateur-style match, and it can only end by pinfall, submission, or forcing your opponent out of the ring. This was also a concept originally set for a series between Chris Benoit and Jeff Jarrett on this show, but Jarrett got injured and Benoit was shuffled up to the main event when WCW Champion Bret Hart also got injured. So we get this instead. Dean tries a side-headlock early, but Kidman railroads him into the corner, and Malenko hides in the ropes. Back to center ring, Dean takes him down in a wristlock, but Kidman kips up, and forces him into the corner again. Dropkick misses, so Dean tries a somersault cradle to capitalize, but Kidman rolls through and pounds him. Dean instinctively rolls to the outside to catch a breather, but that's a loss at 2:34. No one seems to know what to do though, as that wasn't the scheduled finish, and Malenko accidentally rolled out to the floor. Well, can you blame him? He was sick of WCW at this point (he left for the WWF practically the next day), and who could keep track of all these random, booked-the-day-of-the-show stipulations anyway? DUD

Triple Threat Match: Vampiro v David Flair v Crowbar: Not to be confused with the Triple Threat Theater, this is simple a 3-way. Flair and Crowbar were also the WCW Tag Team Champions at this point, so this is effectively a Handicap match. Vampiro holds his own against both in the early going, and dumps Crowbar to the outside for a tope. Flair tries chops to turn the tide, but Vampiro casually no-sells them, and unloads a few of his own before dumping David. Vampiro takes both champions out with a baseball slide, but he gets overwhelmed two-on-one, and takes a German suplex from Crowbar. Crowbar with a slingshot somersault legdrop for two, and Crowbar slams David onto him for two. Vampiro comes back with a uranage on Crowbar for two, but gets quickly overwhelmed again, and Crowbar gives him a flying splash for two. Flair with the Figure Four to finish, but now Crowbar is jealous that he doesn't get to score the fall, and they argue. That allows Vampiro to schoolboy Flair for two, and the Nail in the Coffin finishes David at 10:31. Bad match, but it was energetic, at least. ½*

The Mammalukes v The Harris Brothers: Johnny The Bull starts with Ron Harris, and gets smacked around in the corner, but Ron misses a cross corner charge, and takes a spinkick. Clothesline knocks Harris out to the floor to regroup, and back inside, Johnny controls with punch-kick stuff. Tag to Big Vito with a swinging neckbreaker for two, and a vertical suplex gets two. Johnny gets overwhelmed in a double-team when Don Harris fires off a cheap shot from the apron, and Bull takes a shot into the rail. Inside, Don hits a sidewalk slam, and Ron follows with a big boot as they cut the ring in half. Standard four-way brawl, and Vito falls off the top rope onto Don for the pin at 9:32. Decent formula tag match, but not as good as a real Hells Angels/Mafia brawl would likely be. ½*

WCW Cruiserweight Title Match: Madusa v Oklahoma: Oklahoma tries pushing her around, but gets taken down with kicks for two. Oklahoma responds with a series of hairpull snapmares, but ends up in the corner for a visually impressive headbutt to the nuts. Less impressive: Madusa's ugly looking 2^nd rope dropkick. She follows up with a better one, but a standard dropkick misses (in a terrible looking spot, as they missed their cue - forcing her to throw the dropkick after Oklahoma had already moved). Oklahoma with a DDT, but he gets beat down by Asya and Spice on the outside, and Madusa goes for the kill - only to take a sloppy oklahoma roll to job the title at 2:56. Total farce of a match, and worse, a terrible way to flush the once prestigious title down the toilet. DUD

WCW Hardcore Title Fatal Four-Way Match: Brian Knobs v Meng v Fit Finlay v Norman Smiley: The usual weapon-shot filled boredom, until Knobs clocks Smiley with a riot-shield to retain at 6:10. Yep. That's all you get. DUD

Triple Threat Theater Round Two: Bunkhouse Match: Billy Kidman v Saturn: Saturn was also, like, mere days from bouncing to the WWF, so don't expect much here. Saturn wins a reversal sequence with a short-clothesline, and hits a press slam for two as we get going. Kidman fires back with a headscissors takedown, and dropkicks him into the corner for a ten-punch. Kidman with a sloppy clothesline, but a bulldog attempt gets him crotched on the top rope, and Saturn knocks him to the floor for two (falls count anywhere). Back in, Saturn hits a spinkick, and slaps on an armbar, but Kidman cradles for two. Saturn pops off a clothesline before he can mount a comeback though, and hits a nice springboard legdrop for two. Suplex across the top rope gets two, and a superkick leaves Kidman down for another armbar. Man, you know he's wrestling lazy when a fucking superkick doesn't at least warrant a two count. Saturn goes to the floor to get a table, but Kidman dives onto him to stop the effort, and knocks Saturn back in for a slingshot headscissors takedown - only to charge into a clothesline as he follows up. Saturn with a bodyslam, and a well executed flying elbowdrop is worth two. Kidman counters a Northern lights suplex with a sunset flip for two, but gets clotheslined again, and creamed with an overhead suplex for two. Powerbomb gets two, but Saturn misses a flying moonsault, and takes a springboard bulldog. Sitout powerbomb gets two, but another bulldog attempt ends with Kidman getting overhead suplexed clear over the top, and through a table. Saturn follows him out and covers for two, then drags him back in to finish with a powerbomb off the top, but Kidman backdrops him, and hits a facebuster for the pin at 10:04. Solid match, as they ignored the stipulations and focused on wrestling, and Saturn looked really good on his way out - no wonder the WWF wanted him so badly. **

Booker T v Stevie Ray: Cheer this, or you're a racist. Booker destroys him with punches to start, and knocks him to the floor for a shot into the rail. Back in, Booker hits a diving forearm for two, but misses a blind charge, and takes a lariat - selling it with a 360. Stevie takes over, and tosses his brother (in the literal sense, not the black people sense) to the outside to exact some revenge with the guardrail. Inside again, Stevie slaps on a chinlock. Booker powers up, but takes a backdrop, so Stevie tries the Slapjack, but also takes a backdrop. Booker with the axekick, and a uranage follows, but suddenly Big T runs in (a very overweight Ahmed Johnson, in his WCW debut) to attack for the disqualification at 6:28. Total crap match - basically just killing time until Ahmed could make his big surprise debut. DUD

Tank Abbott v Jerry Flynn: Tank shoves him into the corner for a few body shots, and brings him out with a takedown. Flynn tries to hold him off with some kicks, but Tank blocks an armbreaker, and knocks him out with a punch at 1:38. Moving right along... DUD

Last Man Standing Match: Diamond Dallas Page v Buff Bagwell: Big slugfest to start, going Page's way, and they spill to the outside, where Bagwell rams him into the guardrail. Dallas reverses another whip, and they brawl into the crowd for a bit. Back into the ring, they trade swinging neckbreakers (Bagwell's version incredibly sloppy), and Page hits a short-clothesline. It spills out to the floor again, and they brawl over to the website simulcast location, and they start breaking monitors like Bret Hart on vacation in Montreal. Page breaks a keyboard over his back, but ends up going through a table over there. Back into the ring, Buff blows him low, but ends up getting crotched on the post after he showboats too much. He manages a nice pump-splash, and both guys are down for the count - both up at eight. They run the double-knockout bit a couple more times, until Bagwell catches him with an exploder suplex, and the Buff Blockbuster. Page is up at nine, so Bagwell whacks him with a nightstick. Again, Page makes it up, and this time hits the Diamond Cutter, but Bagwell beats him to his feet at 11:37. Really boring match here - both guys looking lethargic, and unable to pick and stick with either doing a brawl or a wrestling match. ½*

Triple Threat Theater Round Three: Caged Heat Match: Billy Kidman v The Wall: 'Caged Heat' is basically a really porno sounding name for Hell in a Cell. See, because hell is hot. Hehe, hoho. Kidman dropkicks him into the cage to start, and whacks him with a chair a couple of times, but Wall ends up punching it back into his stupid little face. Okay, that's not fair. His face isn't that little. Billy fires back with a dropkick for two, but walks into a big boot as the crowd dies. Wall presses him into the cage a couple of times, and hits a lariat for two. Superplex, but Kidman counters into a powerbomb for two - only to get dropped like a Samoan when he follows up. Chokeslam, but Kidman counters into a rana (nice spot there - really visually impressive given the size difference), and follows with a flying bodypress - only for Wall to catch him in a chokeslam on the way down at 5:02. Boring as hell (or heat?), but at least it was quick. ¼*

Hardcore Match: Kevin Nash v Terry Funk: If Nash wins, he becomes Commissioner of WCW. If Funk wins, the nWo disbands. They brawl in the aisle right away, and Nash controls with a pair of chairshots - complete with Funk's goofy selling. Kevin Powerbombs him through the announce table out there, and we see that Terry is busted open. Nash takes mercy on him, and tells him that if he can just crawl into the ring, Nash will let him keep his title as Commissioner. Terry makes it, but Nash quickly turns on him, and pounds away in the corner. Back out to the floor, Funk bleeds everywhere (treating us to the usual wide camera angles), and inside, Nash whacks him with the chair some more. Funk fires back with a DDT, as the crowd ignores the comeback, and spends their time waving to the hard camera. Funk tries to finish by setting up a stack of chairs, but ends up getting Powerbombed onto them, and pinned at 8:02. Couple of good bumps from Funk, but the match just didn't work, especially with the fans completely behind Nash, and not responding to Funk's attempts to build sympathy at all. ¼*

Main Event: WCW World Title Match: Sid Vicious v Chris Benoit: Arn Anderson is the special guest referee here, and the winner gets the vacant title - vacated after Bret Hart's injury at Starrcade. People can be seen literally yawning in the front row as the bell sounds, which is always a good sign. Slow start, as they trade holds, and a bunch of other wrestlers come out to stand in the aisle and watch - attempting to give the match an epic feel, which is smart. Sid controls with power stuff, and hits a release forward suplex, but gets dropkicked after taking too long to capitalize. Chris cuts him down to size by going after the leg, and on the floor, he slams the steps into the knee. Back in, Benoit hooks a figure four, but Sid reverses. Chris keeps control with a dropkick, and he goes back after the leg for a while. Bridging Indian deathlock (called a 'really weird chinlock' by the announcers) fails to get a submission, so Benoit goes after the knee to weaken him further. Chris with a German suplex, but Sid blocks him from turning it into the rolling version, and powerslams him for two. Benoit nicely sweeps him into a grapevine, but Vicious makes the ropes. Chris with another German suplex, and the flying headbutt hits, but Sid kicks out with authority, and chokeslams him for two. He argues the count with Anderson, and Chris slaps on the Crippler Crossface for the submission win at 14:50. The idea here was that new booker Kevin Sullivan (taking power after Vince Russo was dismissed) wanted to give Benoit the title to show that there was no bad blood between the two, and entice him not to jump to the WWF. Of course, Benoit ended up vacating the title right away, and jumping to the WWF - debuting on RAW before the end of the month. The match itself didn't really live up to the epic booking they were going for, but it was decent, and Sid actually sold for Benoit - something he didn't during their program the previous Fall. Unfortunately, none of this went anywhere, as Benoit basically tossed the title in the trash after the show went off the air, and they had to start all over again the next night on Nitro. ¾*

BUExperience: Hey, no negative star matches! There’s some historical significance here in the Benoit title win, and the subsequent jumps to the WWF for Benoit, Saturn, Malenko, and Eddie Guerrero, but the show itself is really terrible, and not at all worth watching.

DUD