The Monday Nitro Workrate Report
A weekly look at what did and didn't work on Monday Nitro by Dean Rasmussen
Monday, October 4th, 1999
The pre-Russo, Post-Bischoff Nitros have been quite action-packed and
goodalicious and this one may have been the best ever. Who knows what
the future brings? I'll worry about it when it happens.
What Worked
Chris Benoit and Bret Hart have the Match Of The Year on free TV and
wonks can dispute the technical points when compared Match Of The Year
Candidate X and they will all lose in my eyes because this match was so
phenomenal and gets more phenomenal each time you watch it- simply
because there is so much story injected into this. The KEY to this
match is the understanding of what this match was- a vision and a lament
of what Bret Hart assumed wrestling would become, as this became a
rockhard story seeped in real life emotion with two master artists
expressing their sorrow through a sullen determination to show in one
match all that is good in their shared perspective of wrestling:
wrestling that is seeped in traditional forms and structures,
masterfully showing how a match is crafted while at the same time
infusing the piece with state of the art wrestling moves, man-sized
stiffness, man-sized selling, man-sized psychology- actual fucking
KING-SIZED professional wrestling as filtered through the basic tenets
of the Hart Dungeon. This is what US Pro Style SHOULD have become in
1990 after the end of the Flair/Steamboat era. This is Bret Hart saying
so IN THE RING and it you cannot get ANY cooler that THAT. The
backstory of this match is just coming out and it adds to the already
rich tapestry of the match: Bret was given the option to wrestle in the
same arena where his brother died- who died while working for a man that
betrayed Bret Hart and whom Bret Hart thoroughly despises. Instead of
doing what I would have done if it were my brother- which is try to
distance myself from the emotional trauma of that situation until I
could cope with the wellspring of feelings of love for my brother and
the hatred of whom I would consider the one responsible for his death,
instead Bret Hart decides to make his art his catharsis and decides to
show the world what his wrestling heritage is and he decides to show
what his family was capable of producing as he wrestles it's greatest
graduate- Chris Benoit. The backstory continues as Bret Hart requests
to put over Chris Benoit to the WCW, which is nixed by the WCW brass.
This is key to the understanding of this match because one can see that
Bret knows what Benoit is- Benoit is the one who has to embody the
pinnacle of the Hart style and tradition after Bret is through with the
sport. Even when Owen was alive, Bret knew that Owen's knees would
prevent him from reaching the pure wrestling artform pinnacle that he
was capable of reaching, thus Bret Hart wants to put over the real heir
to the Hart Family domination of TRUE WRESTLING. This match reaches
vastly cool proportions even before the bell rings.
THE MATCH ITSELF: This was an exercise in everything that Bret Hart
thinks is good wrestling with concessions to what Benoit thinks is good
wrestling. Hart supplies the Heavyweight US Pro-Style match structure
in the grand tradition by starting from a headlock, working through the
Knuckle Lock segment, into stiff chops and punches and kicks- allowing
for Benoit to hit big transitions with suplexes and counters. Here is
my favorite part- as Hart uses Old School Finishers: A fucking GREAT
DDT, a Memphis Piledriver, and Swinging Neckbreaker to counteract
Benoit's State-Of-The-Art Japanese Suplexes and quasi-shootstyle
submissions. EACH makes ONE concession as Bret Hart makes an Old School
US Pro-Style Back Suplex become a super High-Angle Back Suplex, while
Benoit takes a Boston Crab and mutates into his Boston Crab variation
(that Jericho would later use as his finisher.) The OTHER cool thing
about this match was that it was a forgone conclusion that Hart was
going to win so I was figuring that Benoit misses the headbutt and Bret
procures the SharpShooter- instead they go totally high tech with the
double finisher counter into a finisher ending and I was suitable
amazed. Bret Hart who has been doubting his role in Pro Wrestling-
probably because he is the greatest wrestler in North America and he is
being treated like a glorified Lex Luger- is able to focus again and cut
out all the horror around him and produce another great match after a
long layoff from even an opportunity to have a great match. Meanwhile
Chris Benoit is SO Automatically Great and SOO MONEY that his end being
held up is such a forgone conclusion. Just a great fucking match,
perfectly done by WCW and- the exception of Heenan's fucking
embarrassing inability to ever go a whole minute without trying to get
useless ass over- perfectly done all around. The ending and postmatch
was absolutely number one and the best and it made me proud to be a
wrestling fan. Fuck the bullshit- this match is why I watch
Professional Wrestling.
Malenko and Rey took EXACTLY one week to elevate their good little
experiment in Lucha roll-ups into a truly FAT ASS great match. Malenko
did this leg sweep roll-up into a kneebar that was cooler than the
greatest highspot ever (Doc Chan's Springboard Shooting Star Press). I
freaked out and partied! And THEN EVIL REVOLUTION! I'm all over it and
assume that Rey and Malenko wrestle next week, they shake hands at the
end and Malenko clotheslines Misterio and they beat the holy dogpoop out
of him. At least I HOPE so. Evil Malenko is so much fun and if we can
keep Evil Malenko and also keep Suddenly All Technically Perfect Malenko
in one giant wad, the sky is the limit for the greatness of this feud.
The other key to the goodness of this is that Rey-Rey is fearlessly
wrestling like a motherfucker again. I'm stoked.
The Psic vs Disco match was good in that Psic got to kick DI RIGHT IN
THE FACE REALLY HARD. DI tried not to suck and Psic almost killed
himself a coupla times. The questions arise: Why did they Rio de Janero
Psic with the Cruiserweight strap just to job him to the crappy Disco
Inferno? Why does Disco Inferno have the Cruiserweight strap- he sucks.
Why not stick the Cruiserweight strap in with the Filthy Animals vs Team
(where is) Chavo section of the feud? Is Disco and Scotty Riggs gonna
fued over the strap? Is the strap finally dead? I'm SOO sure I ain't
gonna like ANY of THEM THERE answers. Psic did kick him right in the
face REALLY motherfucking hard and the actual match itself was a-okay so
it's right here. The booking was as baffling as the bad old days three
weeks ago.
Juventud vs Kidman was the least of all their encounters- as Juventud
decided to kill time trying to be an Actual Worker Version of Austin
Idol by taking huge chunks of the match to shake his sweet keister in
front of the rubes to get all that CHEAP HEAT!- but the least chapter of
all the Kidman-Juventud Odessey is quite enough to make it past the
Mendoza Line. I was digging Psic making Kidman lose and the ensuing
heating up of an angle that will produce WADS of great wrestling as it
also defrayed the stupidity of the Cruiserweight Belt idiocy. I'm so
digging this whole angle within an angle within an angle crap. They need
to really BRING THE HATE to this feud and let's get Kidman losing that
hair.
Sid the Thespian is TRULY GREAT. I loved his MENDOZAAAAAAAAAAA! yell
last week and was looking forward to more sheer stupid money wasting as
they crush a fine German luxury sedan to build up a match I could give a
fuck about. THIS WEEK: Sid stares into the maw of his empty life as his
fine German luxury sedan is flattened and assumes the role of Everyman
when he asks the eternal question, "WHYYYYYYYY MEEEEEEEEEEEEEE?" I'm
looking forward to next. Ooooh yeah.
What Didn't Work
Sid and Bryan Adams have a little match. Sid is actually trying not to
suck, I think, but he is just SO clueless- fr'instance: Bryan Adams hits
a lowgrade suplex and Sid hops up- APPEARING TO NO-SELL- but in
actuality he is jumping into position to take a bump out of the ring
from a clothesline- totally forgetting to sell the prior move. I'm
thinking he's just a big idiot as opposed to just another horrible
wrestler. Or ACTUALLY, maybe he is a non-highspot Sabu. Either way. I
think he would be watchable if he could just think Outside Of The Box,
see Himself In Big Picture, Plan Ahead For The Next Big Step and then he
would not end up Sucking So Much. The ending was as bafflingly hideous
as the match. Sid doesn't go over Bryan Adams clean? Huhn? I guess...
ya gotta...yeah sure.... protect Crush. Right.
The Villanos get stuck wrestling Stevie Ray. Reread old Nitro
Workrate Reports and pick your favorite Stevie Ray Stiiinks Joke and
also get a scoop of Outrage Over Misuse Of Great Motherfucking
Luchadores while you are in there. I can't muster the hatred anymore
for this kinda shit.
The Main Event that follows fricking Benoit vs Bret Hart looked a
WHOLE LOT like one of those Cien Caras vs Perro Aguayo matches that
would follow Love Machine/Eddy Guerrerro/ Blue Panther vs El Hijo Santo/
Octagon/ Heavy Metal matches in AAA in 1994. PEEE-YOO!
Brad Armstrong corners Berlyn in the hallway and STARTS CHANNELLING PAT
BUCHANON and starts with a whole "your in MERKA, SPAKE INGLISH!"
mantra! Brad loses miserably when he misses the raison d'etre of his
former Nixon-Speechwriter homage- since he was verbally assaulting a
German- a people for whom Buchanon has been chief apologist for the last
thirty years. Brad on WCWSN as Southern Redneck ass-kicker is so much
more deep and satisfying. Brad as veiled mouthpiece for the White Aryan
Resistence isn't what we want.
The First Family are a-okay fueding in WCWSNMEMPHIS with the
Armstrongs because they put the far superior Armstrongs over at the
right times and actually try to work a little when in with the said
Armstrongs. Here they are fodder for the Boredom That Is A Goldberg
Squash and it STIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINKS.
Who gives a fuck if Hall and Nash are drunk at ringside? They really
suck dick and now they threaten to waste more seconds of my life as I
wear out the fast forward on my VCR to avoid their ass-sucking Sports
Entertainingness. Fuck them to hell- they suck ass.
THERE YOU HAVE IT.
DEAN RASMUSSEN.
DVDVR#100 - http://mh106.infi.net/~dhracr/dvdvr100.html
