WCW Slamboree 98'

WCW Slamboree 98'

Worcester, Massachusetts - May 1998

CHAMPIONSHIP RUNDOWN: The WCW World Heavyweight Champion is Hulk Hogan (he defeated Randy Savage for the title on the Nitro after Spring Stampede) while Goldberg holds the United States Championship. The World Tag Team Champions are still The Outsiders, while the Cruiserweight Championship is held by Chris Jericho. Fit Finlay is the Television Champion.

COMMENTARY: Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan, and Mike Tenay

Slamboree begins with a recap of Eric Bischoff's taunting of Vince McMahon and invitation for him to show up tonight. WCW head of security Doug Dillinger is waiting outside the arena, but so far, no sign of Vinnie Mac. 

The World Television Championship is on the line next - champion Fit Finlay defending the strap against Chris Benoit. Benoit and Finlay shove each other to start things up, the crowd firmly behind the Crippler and engaged for the duration of the match. Very physical, but not necessarily as captivating as one might expect, especially when you consider the reputations of these guys. The issue might be that, as good as they are, the story they tell is essentially Finlay working over Benoit's upper body and that just doesn't scream "Awesome!" the way having Finlay and Benoit just clobber each other until one of them has a broken nose would. Benoit doesn't look too smart at the finish, but I like that, even before the surprise appearance of his rival, Finlay had been somewhat in control. Logical match with a logical ending, but definitely a touch below "should watch" and even further away from "must watch." (3/5)

Lex Luger vs. Brian Adams is next. As shitty as one might expect. Brian Adams botches a piledriver to make sure the match goes from just not being good to actively sucking. I'm not a massive Luger fan, but he's underrated in the sense that, against the right opponent in the right setting, he can actually hold his own somewhat. Awful match that at goes 5 seconds past 5 minutes and at least 3 and a half minutes past when it should've ended. (0/5)

Chris Jericho interrupts Dave Penzer to announce tonight's contestants for a Cruiserweight Battle Royale (the winner receiving a shot at Jericho's title immediately after). Jericho's introductions are ridiculous, especially his lines about Johnny Swinger and Lenny Lane. Pretty weak battle royale, with everyone essentially eliminated the same exact way, prone on the top rope and dropkicked over. The fun of the match comes at the tail end, when we get the big reveal that the winner, Ciclope, is really (duh-duh-DUH) Dean Malenko. For the sake of the review, I'm going to attach the match that follows to the score - Malenko extracting some long due revenge on Jericho and the commentators actually doing a nice job of building up just how emotional this match is. The crowd is really hot for this too, which helps lift an actually sub-average match to a much higher level than it would normally be. Maybe the storyline-peak of the Cruiserweight division. (3/5)

As the cage lowers in the arena, Tony Schiavone segues us to the Vinnie Cam. We see a white limo arrive and Doug Dillinger approaches the door, but it is not revealed whose in there. Schiavone makes a snide remark about Jim Ross. 

The Bowery Death Match is upon us - Diamond Dallas Page vs. Raven in a no-holds-barred, weapons-heavy cage match. On paper, this should be an insanely brutal match, but it starts off relatively slow and kinda stays there, Page and Raven utilizing the bull rope and bashing each other with lunch trays and garbage cans but never really getting anywhere as far as story or suspense. There's also a ton of lying around as the match can only be won by a 10 Count - hence, Raven and Page getting "visually pinned" multiple times for 5-6 seconds after hitting what counts as "big moves." The only things good about this match are the Diamond Cutter that Page hits and the post-match angle featuring the return of Mortis (aka Chris Kanyon) one of my favorite in-ring workers. The chair shot he delivers to Raven is the best spot of the whole 15 minute stretch. (1.5/5)

Before the next match, we see various camera shots of the arena entrance and empty hallways as the fruitless and tiresome "Watch Out" for Vinnie Mac continues. 

Back in the ring, Eddie Guerrero vs. Ultimo Dragon happens. The crowd gives absolutely nothing to these two, the match falling flat from the bell. From a technical perspective, Guerrero and Dragon execute everything they do flawlessly, but they can't hook the crowd and Guerrero, despite a strong effort, just doesn't draw any heat (which is surprising considering how over the Chavo/Eddie storyline was at the previous month's show). At one point, a morbidly obese man takes his shirt off in the second row and the entire arena blows up. It is almost sad to watch Guerrero and Dragon try to so hard and achieve so little. (1/5)

After another peak at Vince McMahon's dressing room (which is labeled with the puzzling phrase "The Reason for Ratings"), we're back in the ring for the United States Championship fight - Goldberg defending against Raven's Flock member Saturn. In a pre-match interview earlier in the show, Saturn stated that he'd be going into this match alone and wanted to keep it 1-on-1 so he could prove it was "his time." Goldberg dominates early, but eventually falls prey to veteran cut-offs, the exact way his matches should've been going as he climbed up the ranks and took on guys with more experience. Saturn never comes off as Goldberg's equal (the champion shrugs off most of the challenger's blows), but that would've been silly so it absolutely works. I'd call this an average match - which is actually a bit of compliment when you consider so many of Goldberg's appearances were just squash matches. (2.5/5)

Streetfight time! Michael Buffer welcomes the two most powerful men in professional wrestling - first, after a lengthy, lengthy introduction, "The Man Who Fired the First Shot" Eric Bischoff. Buffer then welcomes Vincent K. McMahon - who isn't in the arena. Buffer announces McMahon's name again but he's still not there. What a stupid segment. Bischoff grabs the mic and the ref states that they'll have to count out McMahon. Bischoff asks for the audience to help and the crowd boos. What was the hope here? More heat on Bischoff? If so, it works - but it also counterproductively paints Vince and the WWE being above the challenge. Silly stuff, but bizarrely entertaining enough throughout the night to give the show an extra point. (+1)

Our first of two "featured bouts" is next - freshly heel-turned Bret Hart vs. Randy Savage with Roddy Piper as special guest referee. The storyline coming into this match is that, weeks prior, Hart helped secure Hulk Hogan the WCW World Championship on Nitro (joining nWo Hollywood in the process). Much more of a back-and-forth brawl than one might've predicted, Savage's offense has whittled away into jabs at this point, but when Hart does take control, he goes straight for Macho's knee in order to weaken him for the Sharpshooter. Compared to what he'd been doing in WCW previously as a face, seeing him back to working heel is surprisingly good - Hart had mastered the art in 97' versus Austin and the Undertaker and here, against someone as popular as Savage, he's far more engaging than he was as a face against Curt Hennig and Flair. Hart hits a delicious piledriver and than makes a cocky cover before arguing with Hot Rod and the fans for a minute. Workers of today would be wise to watch Hart work as a villain - he does an excellent job of getting across the idea that, at any point, he can win this match, but is too distracted by the fans, by Piper, by his own arrogant attitude that he makes mistakes leading to brief Savage comebacks. Bret locks in the Sharpshooter, but Savage somehow reverses it as Elizabeth shows up. Piper tells her to get out of the ring, which makes Macho irate. Low blow from Hart and then a ref bump, the match devolving into new levels of overbooking. Hogan shows up and the fix is in, Savage tapping to the Sharpshooter. Not a great match, but definitely not bad or even average. Hart was misused by WCW many times and ways, but this particular match was not one of them. (3/5)


Main event time - the World Tag Team Championships on the line with The Outsiders defending the straps against Sting and (freshly heel-turned) The Giant. Hall and Nash arrive first with Dusty Rhodes and conduct a survey. The Giant arrives sporting a black-and-white nWo shirt to the nWo theme while Sting gets his own entrance (as he had yet to show allegiance to either side of the New World Order). This is another one of those WCW main event matches that is much funner to talk about than it is to actually watch. Its a pretty fascinating scenario we have and the audience is respectably game for it. Nash is mega-over as a face after recently jacknifing Hulk Hogan. Sting is over as a face is teamed with The Giant, who is getting booed heavily. Scott Hall, who'd been off TV for a month, gets a warm welcome back but falls into that tweener category - the fans cheer his schtick while still rooting for Sting to take him out when they're duking it out. Speaking of Sting, this is one of his better matches in months as he keeps the energy up for every one of his stretches. Show and Nash always had great chemistry and their minutes together get great reactions too. There's a loud "Let's Go Wolfpack" chant at one point that really should've clued somebody in to call an audible and not go through with the heel turn finish. The crowd was ready to cheer The Outsiders (especially Nash), so splitting them immediately upon Hall's return was just rushed booking. (3/5)


With a Kwang score of 2.25-out-of-5, this is WCW's worst pay-per-view since their last, always-terrible World War 3 show almost half a year earlier. Before then, you'd have to go all the way back to Road Wild 97' to find a show worth watching less than this one. That being said, the show isn't a total dud. The Cruiserweight Battle Royal-into-Malenko/Jericho match is a great 30 minutes of wrestling, maybe even the best storyline-driven moment in the history of the division. DDP/Raven disappoints, but Mortis's re-debut is awesome. Savage/Hart and the main event aren't great matches, but they're interesting. The Bischoff/McMahon hype is Wrestlecrap, but there's a place for it in the genre and it certainly helps give historical context to the booking (or over-booking) that WCW was becoming known for at this time. 

FINAL RATING - High Risk Maneuver