Bengal Can't Change Its Stripes

Brian Pillman VS Shane Douglas - WCW 10/17/1992 

CJD: Can you believe in 6 years we haven't featured a single Shane Douglas match? Or a single Pillman match before this run as our MDTSOCWWKD Champion! The wild thing about that to me is back when I was working on a print PIF zine in our early days (maybe in another 6 years...) I was writing a match review series chronicling the Steamboat/Douglas VS Hollywood Blonds feud. It's one of the series of matches that bridged the gap between my childhood fandom to obsessed teen smart mark. So in some ways it feels like this match was always here waiting for me! I've never seen it before, and babyface pre-ECW Douglas doesn't always hit the same way he did when I was 10/11 years old, but this match still has some great stuff going for it. Mainly Pillman who I think I under rate sometimes, a really satisfying build to a well done finish, with a great little post match angle. This is the prequel to one of my personal favorite minor feuds in pro wrestling history. And I'm so glad our blog lead me on the winding road to find it after all these years!! Now where did I leave that .txt file with the other match reviews...

JJZ: Man, I would've went for this match right away baby! I'm stoked for this one. I always get a kick out of watching babyface Douglas since I'm so used to his heel ECW run. I always appreciate watching older wrestling when things that should be sold bigger are. Like a dump out through the ropes or a dropkick to the outside. That ground don't have no give. Can't really learn how to fall on concrete. I remember talking to my wrestling teacher about bumping on the outside and he said you just gotta suck it up and take the pain. Shane is playing a great pup in this match and Pillman is such a good dickheaded heel. I fully agree the ending is well done too. Great match baby cakes!

Strong-Arm Robberies, Flee With The Lottery

Brian Pillman VS Brad Armstrong - WCW 10/3/1992

JJZ: I've watched seven Brad Armstrong matches before finally landing on this one. All the matches were good. Any one of them would've been worth playing forward. But this match just had a little extra. And that was Armstrong working with much more fire. It was a nice change of pace. Pillman is the guy to bring it out of you. Brian plays such a good dickhead. I do wish this was longer but I think they told a great story in a short amount of time. I know we talked about finding a masterpiece Brad Armstrong match. This is not that, but this is really good and showcases the talent of both Brad and Brian. I would love to watch more from these two. Hope you enjoy it

CJD: I'll be honest, I don't think that masterpiece Brad Armstrong match exists on tape. At least not a singles that we've seen. But I totally get why this match spoke to you. They accomplished so much without very much to work with here. Even Larry was buying in hook line and sinker on commentary. So many classic TV match tropes were packed into this one and everything was done so well. Pillman was the more dynamic of the two but I loved what Brad brought to the table too. Great chemistry between these two, great choice!

Those Hollywood Nights

Ric Flair/Arn Anderson/Paul Roma VS Barry Windham/Hollywood Blonds - WCW 7/3/1993

JJZ: Alright cutie pie. So we've done a fantastic job of playing forward matches showcasing wrestlers at different point of their career. For this one I wanted to play a match that showcased wrestlers around the same time frame and same type of match. To see how much they lifted from the matches. I did notice a few thing but nothing crazy. Both are six man tags but these six man tags are extremely different. The last one was a fantastic house show match while this one was a fantastic, heated feud building match. Also, I recently played forward a match with fucking horrible commentary. This bout totally makes up for that one. Tony and Jessie absolutely killed it on the mic. Great back and forth. But! These guys absolutely killed it in the ring. They focus on the things that really make you want to see the payoff at Beach Blast. Big props to the ref who's name is escaping me at the moment. They had him running all around, plus he took one hell of a ref bump. Timing in a match with so many wrestlers is so key and they all execute it very well. I'm loving this tag team heater we are on right now. But most importantly about this match Chris. Very little Paul Roma. Hope you like it sir.

CJD: I love how right down to the way it's shot, you wouldn't know Roma was even in this match for about 75% of it without someone reminding you. I think we both have a soft spot for Pretty Paul but wow did he look painfully uncomfortable in this match. Couldn't agree more that Jesse & Tony were firing on all cylinders for this one. Master class in play by play with heel color commentary. I really liked this match sweet pea. Maybe even more than my house show 6 man. The way they built the heat up over and over here was so nice. I've got to say in both matches, I thought Austin was low key the star. Always giving the spotlight to someone else but every little thing he does both looks great and adds purpose. With what he became that's not a hot take or anything, but this era of his career is still severely underrated. Last but not least. I know the days of us keeping close track of our fictional MDTSOCWWKD Championship are long behind us. But we've had two tag team champs in a couple of weeks here between MaruKEN and now the Blonds. And even after all these years I know we've only successfully had a small number of tag teams retain the big gold imaginary belts. Just a little tidbit that I enjoyed!

It Was A 2 Cold Chill

Sting/Ricky Steamboat/2 Cold Scorpio VS Rick Rude/Hollywood Blonds - WCW Elimination Match 5/6/1993

CJD: The FanCam Connection doing FanCam Connection things! This match has less than 1k views and has only been up for a year which tells me there's a good chance it might not stay up for long. So drink in this 1993 house show goodness while you can. There's a lot of table I need to set for this match. First of all it's an elimination tag. Second of all this is a high school show in Terre Haute Indiana in 1993, and the crowd is every bit as homophobic as you'd imagine. Watch with the sound down if necessary. And third of all, the actual finish to this match is such a classic horse shit house show finish that I'd probably skip sharing it if there wasn't so much other excellent content otherwise. It's kind of a glimpse of how awesome WCW was in this era but all the reasons why they never realized their full potential in one tiny homophobic high school gym in Indiana. I thought everyone did some really great stuff in this match. Some unusual spots, great crowd work, and great apron work while guys weren't in the match. Not a lot of bumps punched on the bump cards as you'd expect, but nobody was taking the night off by any means. And yeah the finish was, well, you'll see, but at the end of the day there was no way I wasn't playing this one forward.

JJZ: So right off the bat, I loved the finish. It perfectly fit the tone of the match. If this was a PPV I would have a problem with it, but with all the gaga it worked. The fucking star talent in this match was insane CJD. Just wow. Six generational talents sharing the mat and all of the them showing the depth in their game. This would've been a perfect match for sharing with all of our wrestling buddies. I fully agree that the punch card wasn't hit too hard in this one, but that's to be expected with a house show like this. But that doesn't mean it wasn't entertaining and that the people didn't get their money's worth. 10 out of 10 fury cakes. Would watch again.