Goody Bag 94: Broken Umbrellas

 

Rick Rude and Andre the Giant v Ultimate Warrior and Jim Duggan: From Madison Wisconsin on June 6 1989. Rude and Duggan start, and they scuffle around. Jim gets off a series of jabs, so Andre comes in to grab him, but Rude messes up the double team, and Andre ends up tied in the ropes. That draws Warrior in, and he and Duggan grab Rude, and use him as a battering ram into the tied giant! That was a really cool and fun spot! Jim stays on Rude with a wristlock after the referee restores order, and he tags Warrior to unload on Rick. The babyfaces pinball Rude around, until Andre successfully interferes, and Duggan is left down. Rude takes him into the corner to unload on, and the heels go to work. Warrior gets the hot tag, and… grabs a bearhug on Andre. That’s a very weird thing for a hot tag spot in general, but especially for Warrior. Andre escapes, and chokes Warrior in the corner, before passing to Rude for more of the same. Warrior responds with an inverted atomic drop, so Andre comes back in, and clobbers him. That allows Duggan to sneak in with the 2x4, and he cracks Rude with it, allowing Warrior a splash for the pin at 10:37. This was mostly fun, but felt kind of long. ¾*

Casket Match: Undertaker v Ultimate Warrior: From Rochester New York on August 19 1991, in only the second ever Casket match for Undertaker (the first was earlier that same summer, also against Warrior). Warrior takes it to him on the outside to get things started, and he delivers a turnbuckle smash on the way in. Cross corner whip, but Undertaker blocks the charge in, and chokes him against the turnbuckles. Warrior fights him off with a bodyslam, and a few clotheslines follow, but he telegraphs a backdrop, and gets clobbered. That allows Undertaker to deliver a tombstone, and he goes for the casket, but Warrior struggles. Undertaker responds by choking him down, and he gets him into the box, but takes for fucking ever closing the lid, and Warrior fights him off. That looked terrible, and luckily he’d get a lot better at the gimmick later. Warrior gets hold of the urn, allowing him to suck Undertaker’s power away, and he gets Undertaker into the casket at 5:45. Interesting as a novelty, terrible as a match. But, hey, we’re here for the novelty anyway. DUD

WWF Tag Team Title Match: Shawn Michaels and Diesel v The Headshrinkers: From Milwaukee Wisconsin on August 30 1994, the day after SummerSlam. Shawn and Fatu start, and a big criss cross ends in Fatu delivering an inverted atomic drop. Shawn is moving at a crazy pace here. Samu comes in for a tandem clothesline over the top, but when the Headshrinkers turn around, there’s Diesel with a double clothesline! He bashes their heads together, but that goes badly, and then double team. Stereo superkicks knock him out of the ring, so they champs decide to walk out, but the Headshrinkers drag them back in. The champs win a slugfest, but again go to the heads, and end up getting dumped again. The dust settles on Diesel and Samu, and the big man is able to fight him down into a wristlock. Diesel with a corner clothesline, but another one gets blocked, and Samu hits him with a standing dropkick before tagging. Shawn takes a cheap shot to distract Fatu, allowing Diesel to clothesline him out of the ring, where Shawn is waiting with a superkick. Shawn adds an axehandle from the apron, and that’s enough to leave Fatu in a bad way as he gets back into the ring. The champs work him over, until Samu gets the hot tag, and he runs wild - Roseanne Barr the door! The referee gets bumped, allowing Shawn to use the title belt as a weapon, but Fatu no sells him! Fatu takes the belt away, but just as the referee recovers, and disqualifies the challengers at 11:14. Shawn and Diesel were an extremely underrated team, and I wish that they at least had more teams to work with in the brief time the pairing lasted. ** ¼ 

Fatal Four-Way Match: Rock v Steve Austin v Undertaker v Kane: The WWF Title is not on the line here, and this is from Philadelphia Pennsylvania on November 29 1998, with Big Boss Man as the special guest referee. Everyone starts brawling before Austin even shows up, and here’s Steve to make it a proper party! Inside, Undertaker and Austin trade off, with Steve dominating. Kane comes in to lend a hand, but Austin beats him up as well, and everyone spills back to the outside for a brawl near the announce position. Inside, Undertaker tries a ropewalk forearm on Austin, but gets pulled down by the others, and pinballed. Austin tries a stunner on Undertaker, but gets shoved in a uranage from Rock, but Kane saves at two. Undertaker and Kane get dumped, allowing Austin to hit the stunner on Rock, but Boss Man refuses to count. Steve gets up to deck him, but that distraction allows Undertaker to chokeslam Austin. Cover, but Boss Man is down, so another referee slides in to count - only for Kane to break the pin at two. Steve lands another stunner on Rock, and this time it’s a pin from the new referee at 8:44. Just some top level, star filled silliness. ½*