WWF Action Zone (June 16, 1996)

 

Original Airdate: June 16, 1996 

Your Hosts are Todd Pettengill and Dok Hendrix from the studio

King of the Ring Tournament Quarterfinal Match: Jake Roberts v Justin Hawk Bradshaw: From the June 15 episode of Superstars (taped May 28) in North Charleston, South Carolina. Bradshaw gets a standing side-headlock right away, so Jake forces a criss cross, but takes a shoulderblock. We get a split screen of an intimate interview with Jake, as he talks about his troubled childhood. Bradshaw drops him with another shoulderblock, so Jake tries a headlock of his own, but Bradshaw easily powers into a reversal. Jake forces another criss cross, and catches him with a punch to the gut this time, followed by a kneelift. DDT, but Bradshaw bails to the outside to avoid it. Back in, Jake gets an armbar, but Bradshaw fights him off in the corner. Bradshaw tries a charge, but hits a boot, and Jake tries for the DDT again, but Bradshaw blocks once more. Bradshaw with a pair of elbowdrops, and a few cross corner whips rattle the ring. Bradshaw pounds him down and hooks the leg for two, but a lariat misses, and Jake delivers the DDT at 7:15. This was pretty weak. Jake did a good job of selling, and brought strong psychology to the table, but Bradshaw’s offense was really limited. ¾*

Attitude Adjustment Tour ad

The Sega Saturn Slam of the Week is Vader delivering a pump-splash during a squash on Superstars

The Smoking Gunns v Jeff Hardy and Matt Hardy: From the June 15 Superstars. The WWF Tag Team title is not on the line here. Sunny sits in on commentary, which should tell you everything you need to know about her judgment. I mean, her whole gimmick at this point is that she’s a tag title slut, and she isn’t even scouting the team that would end up becoming more successful than any of the ones in the promotion at this point. Meanwhile, the Godwinns split screen in, and Phineas is still all broken up about Sunny. The Gunns with a combo at 2:40. It was a squash only, but still fun to see. And the Hardy’s did a great job of making the champs look strong. ¼*

We get a Father’s Day trivia segment, showing a photo of Larry Hennig, and asking you to guess whose dad it is

Todd and Dok hype the latest WWF Magazine, and the accompanying free issue of Ultimate Warrior’s comic book. That thing was weird as hell, especially to a little kid in 1996

Jerry Lawler is still laughing about breaking a portrait over Warrior’s head on RAW. Via puns

Undertaker is going to take great pride in taking Mankind’s soul at King of the Ring. By the sound of things, Paul Bearer is taking pride is some extremely tight underwear 

The Ross Report features Jim Ross airing more footage of his personal interview with Jake Roberts, who goes into his difficult childhood. His mom was only 13 when he was born, though thankfully, he doesn’t get into the circumstances of exactly how that came to be on a Sunday morning show aimed at children

Owen Hart v Barry Horowitz: From the June 15 Superstars. Gosh, just how many times did they run Owen v Bret Hart? Enough already! Harvey Wippleman acts as the referee here, in his first gig. Barry with a takedown into an overhead wristlock, but Owen counters to a headscissors, but Horowitz counters to a side headlock. Hart counters out to a hammerlock, but Horowitz counters a leg-feed enzuigiri to a corkscrew legwhip. Horowitz unloads in the corner, but a cross corner whip gets reversed, and Owen catches him over an overhead belly-to-belly suplex on the rebound. Hart uses a backbreaker and a gutwrench suplex for two, and he goes to an armbar from there. Barry escapes, and hooks a rollup for two, but Hart cuts him off. Hart with a cross corner whip, but Barry throws an elbow when Owen follows in, and Horowitz hiptosses him. Barry throws a dropkick to set up a legdrop for two, and a bridging northern lights suplex is worth two. He tries a Thesz-press, but Owen counters with a spinebuster into the Sharpshooter at 6:00. But then Owen doesn’t let off the hold for, like, five seconds, and Wippleman reverses the decision on him. A little overzealous there. The match was nothing special, but fine and dandy like sweet cotton candy. * ½

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Can We Golf? is a feature on Todd and Dok playing a competitive game of golf against one another. They’re no Gene and Bobby. And that’s all we’ll say about it

BUExperience: The only bit of new information here is Todd mentioning that Sunny was listed as #7 on People Magazine’s ‘most beautiful people’ issue. That’s pretty major for an ice cold product like this, and I’m surprised they didn’t make a much bigger deal about it on their shows.