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\u00a0 \u00a0This week is a big one. It\u2019s the night after Mind Games and we\u2019ve been promised a new Intercontinental Championship and the return of two characters without the people that made the fans care about the characters.<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0 \u00a0First off we get Marc Mero facing off against Faarooq (still prepping for his enlistment in the U.S. Space Force) in the final match in the Intercontinental Championship tournament. <\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0This felt like a big deal, as the tournament had been going on for weeks, we\u2019re guaranteed a first-time champion and Pat Patterson is the referee. The pace is pretty fast, and both men give their all. Mero hits several planchas and high flying moves.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Also during this match is a phone interview with the walking elbow pad Ahmed Johnson. He talks about his plans to come back and beat up Faarooq. He says this in his own unique language that took an hour to decipher.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0The finish comes when Sunny gives her loaded purse to Faarooq to use to hit Mero with. He avoids it, decks him and hits the Wild Thang for the win and his only Intercontinental Championship. <\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0He cuts a promo afterward, thanking his partner Sable, Mr. Perfect and his lord and savior Jesus Christ for the victory. A very good match for the time.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0After this we see a vignette calling out Double J, Jeff Jarrett (who\u2019s making his debut on Nitro soon) for not actually singing his signature hit song, \u201cWith My Baby Tonight.\u201d We\u2019re told that next week we\u2019ll get an expose and learn who the real \u201cDouble J\u201d is. I\u2019m sure this will work out well.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0It\u2019s always fun to see these invasions, and I can\u2019t wait to get to February 1997 when it comes full circle. Also, the Harts win over the Donnas.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Our main event is Hunter Hearst Helmsley vs The Stalker. \u201cStone Cold\u201d Steve Austin is on commentary and trash talks Kevin Kelly and plugs his challenge to Bret Hart, while poking fun at The Stalker gimmick saying: \u201cWhy the hell does Barry Windham have all that stupid paint on his face? Everyone knows who he is!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Mr. Perfect once again steals one of Helmsley\u2019s valets and causes him to lose. At least we got to hear some classic Austin.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Then, we get Jim Ross in the ring to bring out Razor Ramon and Diesel. Yet before he does that, he goes on a fantastic worked-shoot rant about the WWF mistreating him, ousting McMahon as the owner of the company and gets the crowd completely on his side.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0He introduces the Fake Ramon, played by Rick Bognar. At first, the crowd loses their minds, hearing the music and seeing the silhouette. Then he comes out and everyone gets the air deflated out of them. It\u2019s actually kind of funny to see. <\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Then Ramon gets in the ring, and before Ross can interview him Savio Vega comes out of nowhere to get vengeance for the sneak attack that happened at Mind Games. Raw then frantically goes off the air and this angle will be dragged on for a few more weeks. Oh joy.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Overall, this was a much better Raw than the ones we\u2019ve seen the past few weeks. Faarooq and Mero put on a very solid match and the JR promo was fire. <\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0This show starts out with Hunter Hearst Helmsley cutting a promo on Mr. Perfect, the man who continues to steal his valets. He challenges Perfect to a match to settle their score in the near future. He especially notes that he’ll show Mr. Perfect “How we do it in the New Generation.” We\u2019ll see how that turns out. <\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Next up is \u201cStone Cold\u201d Steve Austin taking on Jake Roberts. This is a rematch from the King of the Ring finals where Austin cut the promo of his life. Three months later he is still in the mid-card and can barely beat Roberts without help from Jerry Lawler.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Late in the match, after the interference, Austin pins Roberts and helps King in double teaming him and beating on him until Savio Vega comes in for the save with the Carribean strap. Austin then runs away like 2015 era Seth Rollins. <\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0The next match is The Godwins facing The Grimms. I have no idea who The Grimms are, but they get crushed by the \u2018Wins in four minutes. I stress again, the Godwins are all over these shows and do nothing of note.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Following this we get more information on the travesty of Jeff Jarret not singing \u201cWith my Baby Tonight\u201d almost a year and a half prior to this show. Doc Hendrix has the scoop and reveals that the Roadie, or future Road Dogg, Jesse James is the \u201cReal Double J.\u201d We see some in-studio footage of him singing the song and we\u2019ll get even more unnecessary information about it next week.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0We then get to see the greatest gimmick in our sport, Fake Razor Ramon going one on one with Savio Vega. It\u2019s a trite affair that goes on for nine minutes too long. Gorilla Monsoon joins commentary and spends the whole time arguing logistics with Jim Ross about if it\u2019s proper to refer to Rick Bogner as Razer.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0The match ends when <\/span> \u00a0 \u00a0The main event is a refreshing affair, as Shawn Michaels teams with his manager\/mentor Jose Lothario against Vader and Jim Cornette. It\u2019s a nice little back and forth match, and the managers don\u2019t do much besides posturing and cheap shots every now and then.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0In the end, Vader manages to hit a powerbomb and a Vader Bomb on Michaels for the win in about 10 minutes. This kept Vader looking strong and he gained some momentum after the SummerSlam debacle. Unfortunately, he\u2019ll lose it all to Sid in a few weeks.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0All in all a decent show with a solid main event. There wasn\u2019t anything insulting besides the Fake Outsiders affair.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0This show begins with the real top draw in the WWF, Fake Diesel facing off against Marc Mero. It\u2019s a dreary affair where Mero gets some offense in here and there, then Fake Razor gives a picture in picture interview and later interferes in the match for the DQ at the nine-minute mark. <\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 It mercifully ends there, but my god JR is into this stuff. He\u2019s trying with all his might to get this stuff over, but it won\u2019t happen. Unfortunately, we have a few more months of this crap to go.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Next up we get The Smoking Gunns vs The New Rockers in a heel vs heel match that no one cares about. At this point, Sunny has left the Gunns since they are no longer champions, which makes Billy sad. <\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Even though the team is showing dissension, they cheat and get the win over Al Snow and Marty Jannetty, who will become the Marty Jannetty of his own team.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0After this we get the next chapter of the expose about the real \u201cDouble J.\u201d Road Dogg is in the studio singing parts of \u201cWith My Baby Tonight,\u201d a song that I can\u2019t help but sing along to after hearing it 20 times in a row. We have about three more segments of this stuff to get through, so look forward to that.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0The next match is a quick squash, with The Sultan beating Aldo Montoya handedly. At least it was short.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0This week\u2019s main event is Sycho Sid vs Goldust. Yet before we get that match, Jim Cornette and Vader make some good points about the logic behind The Mastodon having to beat Sid for a title shot when he pinned Michaels last week. <\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Of course, the commentary team doesn\u2019t answer these questions and Sid beats Goldust easily after no selling several minutes of offense. Then Vader ambushes Sid and hits a picture perfect Vader Bomb. So what does Sid do? He no sells it and hits a poor chokeslam on Big Van. <\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0This Raw had nothing to write home about, and is really treading water until Bret Hart comes back. For some unknown reason Stone Cold isn\u2019t seen at all on this show. Way to build up the hottest guy in the company.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Finally, we reach the end of this batch of Raw tapings and the go-home show for Buried Alive. While it started off strong we\u2019ve been going on a sharp decline after the introduction of the Fake Outsiders. This week doesn\u2019t start off much better,\u00a0however.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Vader faces off against Phineas Godwin, in what is sure to be a mat-wrestling classic. Spoiler alert: it\u2019s not and Vader wins in a quick affair. Sid shows up in an effort to intimidate him before their impending match.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0After this Jerry Lawler does his usual bit of making alcoholism jokes about Jake Roberts that in reality are true. It seems that the commentary team is as sick of it as us and they just talk throughout the promo. <\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Then Roberts comes out, staggering with a whiskey bottle in hand. It\u2019s clear that he\u2019s faking it because the announcers say so. Gorilla Monsoon comes out and flanks Roberts and tells him he\u2019s not fit to compete. Then Jake, in full view of the camera, tells Monsoon about the ruse and hits Lawler with a quick DDT for the 10-second win. <\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0This would\u2019ve been a great payoff to this angle, if it wasn\u2019t spoon fed to us that Roberts was faking it, and if Roberts was in control of his demons in real life, which he unfortunately was not. He then sics Damien the snake on the King and that\u2019s always a fun spot. <\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0I think we get one or two more weeks of this stuff and then we get to see \u201cThe Real Double J\u201d wrestle (shudder).<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Next, we see\u00a0Sunny, who is on commentary for the next match, Faarooq vs The Pug. The match is nothing, but Sunny is pretty fun to listen to and she talks about how she is no longer managing the gladiator due to hitting him with a brick accidentally. <\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Managers like Sunny and Jim Cornette are a bright spot in these shows, as they knew their role and wouldn\u2019t shut their mouth, which created some captivating interviews.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0We then get a clip from Livewire (which should be on the Network) where Ahmed Johnson is in the studio, wearing a glorious jacket. Faarooq calls in, and both men threaten violence against each other instantly. It\u2019s a great back and forth exchange that moves this feud forward, while Todd Pettengill and Sunny stand awkwardly in the background. Awesome segment.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Why is this woman ok with being handcuffed? Is she even a wrestling fan? Where does Helmsley get all these pretty women from to watch him perform fake athletics? Why does he have them there anyway? Do they give him special power in order to win matches? He\u2019s losing left and right at this point, so they can\u2019t be that much of a benefit to him.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Anyway, Perfect miraculously has the key to the cuffs, lets the woman go and punches Helmsley in the face when he tries to intervene. Perfect leaves, and Helmsley follows, getting counted out in the process. We\u2019ll see the blow-off to this feud next week. Will it be worth it?<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0This week\u2019s main event is a dream match that will main event a WrestleMania in two years, but the WWF could care less about it on this night. \u201cStone Cold\u201d Steve Austin faces Shawn Michaels in a non-title match. <\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0It\u2019s pretty solid, as the two have a good feeling out process. Pre neck injury Austin is just great as a brawler\/grappler, and they have some fine technical sequences. However, during the match, there are two picture in picture interviews with Sid and Vader, as they hype their upcoming match. <\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0Then, just as the match starts to pick up, Vader runs in for the DQ and Sid runs out to even the odds, teasing the upcoming Sid-Michaels feud to begin next week.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0All in all, there were some bright spots in this show, such as the main event and the Livewire segment, but everything else was either forgettable or bad. Luckily, business is about to pick up next week.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0That\u2019s it for this batch of Raw episodes. Check back next Monday where we’ll look at the Raws following In Your House: Buried Alive. We\u2019ll see the ending of the Mr. Perfect vs Hunter Hearst Helmsley feud, one of the most controversial segments in the history of Raw and the return of Bret \u201cHitman\u201d Hart. Keep it here next time for more of the Wolski Wrestling Rewind!<\/span><\/p>\n Henry Wolski<\/strong> Welcome to another look at the Monday Night Raws from fall 1996. This was a period of time where business was going down in the company, as several big names jumped ship to WCW and the WWF was scrambling to make new stars out of a thin roster. This batch of shows was taped in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10416,"featured_media":20634,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2104,2109,3,2138],"tags":[2000,2141,1384,2618,74,2438,2644,772,2173,2642],"class_list":["post-20695","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment","category-opinion","category-tartan-news","category-wrestling","tag-henry-wolski","tag-online-exclusive","tag-opinion","tag-raw","tag-reviews","tag-wolskis-wrestling-ramblings","tag-wolskis-wrestling-rewind","tag-wrestling","tag-wwe","tag-wwf"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"cc_featured_image_caption":{"caption_text":false,"source_text":false,"source_url":false},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Screen-Shot-2018-07-05-at-5.10.30-PM.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5s3vR-5nN","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20695","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10416"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20695"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20695\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20753,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20695\/revisions\/20753"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20634"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20695"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20695"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20695"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Screen-Shot-2018-07-09-at-10.51.19-AM-300x158.png\")
\u00a0 \u00a0We then get The Bodydonnas facing Owen Hart and British Bulldog, the new tag team champions. It\u2019s the usual affair, until the crowd gives massive ECW chants and Tazz and Bill Alfonso jump the security rail with signs, most notably one that reads \u201cSABU FEARS TAZ\u201d to build ECW\u2019s first pay per view, Barely Legal. <\/span><\/p>\nRating:<\/strong> 3 out of 5<\/span><\/h2>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Screen-Shot-2018-07-09-at-10.19.42-AM-276x300.png\")
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<\/h1>\nSeptember 30, 1996<\/b><\/h1>\n
The Christmas Creature<\/span><\/del> The Unabomber<\/span><\/del>\u00a0Isaac Yankem<\/span><\/del> THAT\u2019S GOTTA BE KANE<\/span><\/del> Fake Daddy Cool Diesel attacks Vega and puts the boots to him with his fake counterpart. <\/span><\/p>\nRating:<\/strong> 2 out of 5<\/span><\/h2>\n
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October 7, 1996<\/strong><\/h1>\n
Rating:<\/strong> 1 out of 5<\/span><\/h2>\n
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October 14, 1996<\/strong><\/h1>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/jake-roberts-gorilla-monsoon-drunk-300x221.png\")
\u00a0 \u00a0Now it\u2019s time for the fourth installment of \u201cJeff Jarrett sucks, and here\u2019s our replacement for him,\u201d with Jesse James talking about his history and respect for country music and his time serving in the military. He\u2019s also joined by Jim Johnson, the writer for most of the WWE themes you know and love since the 80\u2019s, who gets a few words in.<\/span><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/ahmed-johnson-livewire-suit-300x222.png\")
\u00a0 \u00a0Following this, Hunter Hearst Helmsley battles Freddie Joe Floyd for the right to have three names. To combat Mr. Perfect\u2019s constant interference, Helmsley handcuffs his lady valet to the ring post. It\u2019s kinda weird and it does bring up some questions. <\/span><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Screen-Shot-2018-07-05-at-5.14.01-PM-300x273.png\")
Rating:<\/strong> 2 out of 5<\/span><\/h2>\n
\nExecutive Editor<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"