WWF Monday Night RAW (August 22, 1994)

Original Airdate: August 22, 1994

Your Hosts are Vince McMahon and Randy Savage from a studio, as this is a special ‘Sunday Night Slam’ edition of RAW to hype SummerSlam. Jim Ross and Gorilla Monsoon provide commentary for the matches.

Lex Luger v Crush: The sound sweetening is really obvious here, even right away, as the crowd sounds like they're popping for Hulk Hogan at WrestleMania X8 while Luger holds a standing side-headlock. Crush escapes with fists in the corner, and he tries a piledriver, but gets backdropped, and Luger shoulderblocks him out of the ring. Inside, Crush controls with a bunch of forearms, and starts targeting the back. Camel clutch and a bearhug draw Ted DiBiase out, as Luger starts powering up. He dodges a cross corner charge, and hits a shoulderblock, followed by a pair of clotheslines. Powerslam gets two, and a DDT follows for two. Crush stops the onslaught with a sidekick, and hits a tilt-a-whirl backbreaker. That draws DiBiase up onto the apron to try and pay Crush to leave Luger alone, but Crush kicks the cash back into his face. Unfortunately, the distraction allows Luger to clobber him with the Running Forearm Smash at 15:08. Kind of long and very house show-ish, but it served its purpose. ¼*

Hate your parents? Call the SummerSlam Voteline, and chime in on the Lex Luger/Ted DiBiase scandal!

Review of the Hart Brothers feud

On Superstars, Raymond Rougeau brings WWF Champion Bret Hart out for an in-ring interview regarding the cage match with Owen at SummerSlam. He does a good job of getting his motivations over, as well as the dangers of the cage. While Bret was never the best at those 'shouty shouty' style promos, he excelled at 'just talking' to the audience, and was very believable - especially when he talks about the family drama

Leslie Nielsen burns the midnight oil trying to solve the case of the Undertaker before SummerSlam. Luckily, he's got plenty of Dominos Pizza to keep him company!

WWF Intercontinental Title Match: Diesel v Typhoon: Really? Typhoon? This late in 1994? They fight over a lockup to start, with Diesel controls with forearms in the corner, but gets bodyslammed and splashed for two. Diesel fires back with a shoulderblock and an elbowdrop for two, then slaps on a headvise. Typhoon escapes, so he bootchokes him in the corner, but a big boot misses, and Typhoon backelbows him. Avalanche, but Typhoon blocks with a big boot, and dives at him with a clothesline to retain at 8:00. Would have been worth it had he finished with the Jackknife. Typhoon was such a non-contender by this point, that I honestly forgot he was even in the promotion. Not sure why he was getting TV time, but I guess they figured he had something of a rub to give. DUD

Razor Ramon and Walter Peyton have words for Shawn Michaels and Diesel

We take a look at the King's Court last week, where Ted DiBiase's Undertaker choked out Paul Bearer, but Bearer claimed he could feel the spirit of the real Undertaker. Yeah, well, dying people say lots of crazy things. Let’s just ignore him, yeah?

They replay the Leslie Nielsen skit from earlier, since this was pre-DVR, and it would be cruel to those who might have taken a bathroom break, and missed it

BUExperience: Frankly, as a go-home show, the live episode last week was far better – especially since all the matches for this were in the can before that episode even aired. There’s a lot of things I think they did better twenty years ago in terms of the way they sold pay per views, but these hype shows are not something I miss.