Henderson

Week 1, June 1997 LIVE from the Providence Civic Center - Providence, RI Attendance: 14,225 - Anticipation is thick in the air for this edition of Monday Nitro as JR welcomes everyone to this weeks show, fresh off Slamboree just a short 24 hours ago. Scott Steiner retained his US title and also now has a new manager, after securing Francine's services, as part of the match stipulations. We have a new Television champion in Fit Finlay, who shocked everyone by picking up the win last night but none more surprised than Lord Steven Regal himself. Harlem Heat failed to recapture the tag team gold from the Outsiders and from events after the match, it looks as though they might be parting ways. The brothers are here tonight and we will hear from them a bit later. To top things off for last night, Ric Flair and Brian Pillman suffered through a knock-down, drag out fight that ended with a double pin. If one thing's for clear, neither man will be satisfied with that result. JR also mentions a "huge announcement" that is to take place tonight. Ross has no idea what it is and he's tried to talk to Mean Gene to get some insight but he's sworn to secrecy. All three men at the commentary booth tonight will be looking out for whenever that announcement is to happen! Nitro's about to kick off with the first match tonight! - Rick Martel vs Eddie Guerrero vs The former model faces one of the hottest stars in WCW at the moment. Martel is in his own streak since returning to WCW though, as he's yet to be pinned. He's had quite an impressive introduction to WCW so far and hopes that momentum carries over past this match. The match started off very quickly paced as Guerrero looked to keep the speed up. Martel, for his part, did a good job at keeping up and hitting some of his own quick moves like some arm drags, drop kicks, and suplexes. It was a solid showing but Eddie continued to just be unstoppable, putting in another amazing performance. Eddie got the win at 9:31 with the Frog Splash. Winner: Eddie Guerrero Rating: 81 Cameras cut to the backstage area for the first time tonight. The screen shows Eric Bischoff in one of the dressing rooms and his feet are propped up on a small table while he lounges back. Bischoff seems to not have a care in the world as his arms are clasped behind his head and he's flashing his trademark smile. He says that Hollywood Hogan didn't just have more important things to do last night at Slamboree, but he also is way too busy to appear in some podunk state like Rhode Island tonight. Bischoff laughs and says that Hogan probably even has a higher income than the states GDP. Bischoff says that Hogan doesn't have to show up if he doesn't want to and seeing that he's the president of WCW, no one's going to tell him otherwise. Before the screen fades out, he says he can just hear the crowd wanting their money back now that they don't get to see Hollywood Hogan. Rating: 80 Diamond Dallas Page vs Kaz Hayashi vs Kaz attempted some quick moves at the start of the bell but it didn't take long at all to notice that this was going to be a one-sided match. Hayashi got some quick kicks in but DDP quickly out-powered his opponent. It was clear that DDP was in no mood for messing around tonight and got the win at 8:02 after turning a fireman's carry into the Diamond Cutter. Winner: Diamond Dallas Page Rating: 67 Nitro returns from it's first commercial break and Brian Pillman is backstage for a promo. Pillman says that last night's match result was less than stellar and as much as he doesn't like the Nature Boy, he's sure they have at least one thing in common - That last night was unacceptable to the both of them. Pillman knows he's the better man than Flair and would also love to inflict more pain onto him as possible. He makes the challenge right now before Flair can avoid it, he wants Flair again at the Great American Bash. Flair always claims that "to be the man, you gotta beat the man??" Well at the Bash, Pillman's going to walk away, THE MAN! Rating: 100 Scotty Riggs vs Brian Knobbs vs This match was everything you would expect it to be, nothing spectacular. Scotty Riggs did, as usual, impress with his beautiful drop kicks. The match also didn't take very long, as Riggs got the victory at 6:40 with a flying forearm. Winner: Scotty Riggs Rating: 37 Tag team action is up next, but first, Steven Regal grabs a microphone after he and Earl Robert Eaton made their entrance. Regal says the Blue Bloods take on Lance Storm and Mike Barton next. For the past several weeks, Eaton and Taylor have made strides to recruit Lance Storm into the Blue Bloods (mostly on Saturday Night). Regal says tonight he's feeling generous, though he shouldn't after being cheated out of his Television title last night, so he's going to give Lance Storm a couple of options first. 1. Regal will allow Storm to come out here and officially join the Blue Bloods and forego getting beaten to a bloody pulp, or; 2. He can come out with a loser like Mike Barton, get his bloody arse kicked, and still have no choice to join the Blue Bloods. Regal says either way, Storm will be joining the Blue Bloods, he can just either do it willingly or be forced to. He says with Lance Storm joining, they will be one step closer to obtaining the greatest workers from all around the world. He also says that Fit Finlay's win last night was a total fluke and that he will get his Television title back, one way or another! Rating: 100 Lance Storm & Mike Barton vs Blue Bloods vs Not many wrestlers can showcase their talent with the poise, professionalism, and skill such as the Blue Bloods. Lance Storm definitely ranks up there, though his tag team partner tonight, Mike Barton, was clearly more brutish. Storm clearly rejected Regal's threat, as he walked to the ring and proceeded to slap the taste out of his mouth. After the initial shock, Regal was able to take control over the younger worker. Traditional tag team wrestling then began to take place. Both teams utilized some double team moves, though the Bloods had the experience and worked better together. The ending saw Regal catch Storm in the Regal Stretch and get the submission victory at 10:12. Winners: Blue Bloods Rating: 75 Steve Austin vs Dean Malenko vs This match was interesting because it involved two men who are furious about two very different things. Austin showed up to Slamboree last night, JR tells us, to get his hands on Hollywood Hogan, only for Hogan to no-show the event. There's no doubt that Austin showed up tonight hoping to get his hands on Hogan, again just for Hogan to no-show. On the flip side, Dean Malenko just lost his manager last night to Scott Steiner. During Malenko's entrance tonight, he turned, expecting Francine to make the usual entrance, though she never did. Dean almost appeared lost on his way to the ring. Once the bell sounded, Malenko had trouble focusing and kept looking out to the corner where Francine usually stood. Austin wasn't about to let up on the Man of 1,000 holds and brutalized him with a physical offense. Meanwhile, the commentary team discussed that Francine wasn't very unwilling to go with Steiner, it seemed. It also was pretty clear that she helped Steiner win that match. Is there possible ulterior motives? Dean was eventually able to get his focus back and took control of the match, slowing things down greatly with his technical moves. Just as it looked like Malenko was going to attempt the Texas Cloverleaf though...... Scott Steiner and Francine made their way out onto the entrance stage. This immediately got the attention of Dean Malenko, who fully turned toward the two. Steiner had his hands all over Francine that immediately caused Malenko's eyes to nearly bulge out of his head. The shock overcame him even more when Francine planted a huge passionate kiss on the United States champion. Malenko was enraged and was beside himself, but he was soon brought back into reality as Steve Austin spun him around, kicked him in the gut, and hit the Stunner to get the win at 12:27 in a good match. Winner: Steve Austin Rating: 78 Nitro returns from a commercial break to Mean Gene Okerlund standing backstage with Harlem Heat and Sensuous Sherri. Mean Gene does the intros and jumps a bit as Sherri caresses him on his cheek in the middle of it. The brothers flank both sides of Mean Gene and he starts with Booker T, saying the two haven't exactly been on the same page as of late. Booker: Mean Gene, it's like this man, any time in wrestling and especially in tag team wrestling, things don't always go as planned! Teams go through ups and downs, and blood or not, it doesn't matter! Me and Stevie Ray are no exception to that rule! Right now, me and Stevie Ray are going through one of those tough times. Nothing seems to go right, and we can't get our gold back....But all that's gonna change soon, man! We'll hit our stride and we'll be back to being the very best tag team, not just in WCW, but in all of wrestling! Gene: Stevie Ray, I assume you have a similar opinion? Stevie Ray: Gene, we've been through harder times than this. We understand it, we know how to fight our way back! All we've done, from the streets to the ring, is fight! But we also know reality! And the reality is, Harlem Heat can't stay a team forever. Every team has a clock on it, and it could be that Harlem Heat's clock has just about run out! We're one of the most decorated teams in all of wrestling, Gene. We've held the WCW tag team titles 6 times! We've already established ourselves as one of the most dominant teams ever in WCW! There ain't much more to prove when it comes to being a team, Gene. Gene: Wait a minute! Does this mean Harlem Heat's breaking up???? Booker: Now hold on just a second there, Mean Gene! Harlem Heat ain't going nowhere, but let me just say that we've come to an agreement! My brother knows that I want some singles championships in my career! I know my brother has the same goals! We ain't gonna keep each other from those goals. We've agreed that we're gonna face the Outsiders one more time, this time at the Great American Bash! If we can't get our titles back, then we're gonna go our separate ways as a team. There ain't no hard feelings, there's no score to settle, it just means we're gonna start a new chapter in the life of Harlem Heat! Now can you dig that?!? Rating: 92 Cameras transition to another part of the backstage area next where Tony Schiavone is standing by with Ricky "The Dragon" Steamboat. Tony asks about the storied career that he's had up to this point and wants to know where the future stands. Steamboat gets into the questions but can't finish answering before he's interrupted. Bagwell scoffs and says that old relics like Steamboat continue to get time on Nitro when it should be younger guys like him that gets the spotlight. Bagwell goes on to say that Steamboat's not buff, and he's not the stuff, and that he should just go back into retirement where he belongs. Steamboat says that there's a big difference between saying words and backing it up in the ring, and so far, he's yet to see Bagwell back up those words. Things got a bit more intense now as Bagwell takes off his sunglasses and leans in, glaring The Dragon in the eyes as the two are nearly nose to nose. He challenges Steamboat to a match next week on Nitro and vows to beat him, not just in the match, but he'll send him back to retirement. Steamboat accepts and the image fades out. Rating: 66 Nitro returns from another commercial break to another promo backstage. The Nature Boy is standing with Arn Anderson, intense as always, and addresses last night's match with Brian Pillman and also what Pillman had to say earlier. Flair says that there's nothing he'd love more than to face Pillman again and kick his ass one more time. Pillman's nothing more than a punk who's made a career of riding other's coattails but he won't see another match at the Great American Bash as that...He'll just see it as an opportunity to show Pillman that he's half the man Ric Flair is! They both might agree that a double pin at Slamboree isn't the result they're looking for, but if Pillman thinks he's walking out of the Bash a winner, he's more mental than he thought. Flair finishes by saying it's true, to be the man, you gotta beat the man, but Flair's always going to be THE MAN! WOOOO! Rating: 100 Paul Levesque vs Ric Flair vs Flair made his entrance with the Enforcer while Levesque was oddly all alone. The bell rang and Flair was in complete form, clearly the performer of the night. The crowd was hot for everything the Nature Boy did, which was full of eye pokes, biting, and blatant low blows right in front of the referee. Flair didn't care though and several times dared the referee to disqualify him. Levesque did his best to cower and back off but the Nature Boy was relentless like a shark that smells blood in the water. Flair would toss Levesque out of the ring where Arn Anderson would inflict some pain while Flair distracted the referee. The crowd loved every second of it as that scene played out a few times. Levesque did get some offense in, but it wasn't enough to matter or remotely make any kind of difference. Flair synched in the Figure Four and got the submission victory at 15:58. Winner: Ric Flair Rating: 80 - Following the match, cameras go back to the announce booth where Jim Ross, Mike Tenay, and Bobby Heenan are wrapping things up. Ross says that there's nothing left on the format and Nitro doesn't have much time left in the show, so he figures they should run down everything that's happened tonight. Heenan says that there was supposed to be some big announcement but it appears it was nothing more than a false alarm. All three basically shrug their shoulders at each other and begin to go down the nights events. They don't get far before someone emerges from the entrance stage and walks to the end of the ramp. - Mean Gene: Ladies and gentlemen, if you happened to catch this weekend's WCW Hotline Report, you would've heard that I said there was going to be a huge announcement here tonight on Nitro. Similarly, my good friend and colleague, Jim Ross, also stated as much at the beginning of the program. I'm here to deliver on that promise because live, on the air, right now, we have a very special guest calling into the show! Now let me make sure that he's properly connected so we can get started..... Mister Turner, sir, are you there???? Jim Ross: It's Ted Turner!!!!!! Ted Turner: Yes, I'm here Mr. Okerlund and thank you for having me on tonight. I know you've generously given me the floor to finish off Nitro tonight, so let me waste no time in getting down to business. First, let me say just how proud I am overall of the entire WCW roster and all the hard work they put in each and every week to make this company something special. I've always had a soft spot in my heart for professional wrestling and I obtained a dream come true when I purchased WCW back in the late 1980's. It's the hard work and dedication of all the employees that have made WCW, in my opinion, the best wrestling company in the entire world., we're certainly the most successful. In the past several weeks and months, one man in particular has been making the success of WCW quite difficult, and that man is Eric Bischoff. I chose Eric to lead WCW in its infancy because he was a relative unknown in the world of professional wrestling. He didn't have connections, he didn't have favors to fill, and he wasn't corruptible by big names in the business. Well ever since Eric aligned himself with the New World Order, that all changed. Eric was no longer able to remain impartial, he wasn't looking out for the good of WCW, and he wasn't holding his employees accountable. Eric has repeatedly put the members of the NWO in good favor while causing WCW members to suffer. That isn't how a president of a company should be, or a Vice President, rather. Let me be clear, I left Eric Bischoff to run WCW and in a way he is considered the de facto president, but I still am in charge of the company and have the ultimate final say. I typically would stay out of the scene and let Eric run things because he had better vision for the business than I did, but this is one of those times where I'm stepping over Eric and some things are going to change. That's why next week, live on Monday Nitro from New Haven, Connecticut, not only is Eric Bischoff ordered to be present, but so is the WCW World Heavyweight Champion Hollywood Hogan. I'll be there next week in person to address the both of them, and they both will be there because if not.....If Eric Bischoff isn't there, he will be fired immediately from WCW. If Hollywood Hogan chooses not to be there, not only will he be stripped of the world title but I will direct Turner lawyers to file a breach of contract against Hollywood Hogan. As world champion, Hollywood Hogan is mandated to defend the title at least every 30 days. He has not defended the title since Spring Stampede, over a month ago. What I can confirm, along with me being present next week for Monday Nitro, is that Hollywood Hogan WILL be defending the WCW Heavyweight title against an opponent that will be announced then. Thank you. Rating: 100 Final Show Rating: 86

Hello everyone, I'm Mean Gene Okerlund to bring you this week's WCW Hotline Report! The fallout from Slamboree 1997 is very positive and everyone as a whole is very happy with how the show went down! The backstage atmosphere couldn't be any higher for WCW at the moment and everyone is excited for the success of the show. This was emphasized before the show began as Brian Knobbs entertained everyone before the show by doing funny impressions of several workers. I'm told the best impressions were of Hollywood Hogan and the Nature Boy Ric Flair. Arn Anderson continued to relax everyone backstage as he had a BBQ for everyone. A post-show speech was given by Eric Bischoff where he singled out Eddie Guerrero for his awesome performance and Brian Pillman and Ric Flair for their great performances in the main event. Earlier today, I'm told that Fit Finlay requested a meeting with Eric Bischoff where he wanted a $14,000 salary increase after winning the Television title. The full increase was not granted, though he was given a $3500 increase. I'm told Finlay was quite angry with being denied the full increase in his salary. We'll have to see how this plays out going forward. WCW and ECWA have come to terms with a developmental program where WCW can send wrestlers to the promotion to obtain additional skills and exposure. There has been several workers such as Billy Kidman, Lenny Lane, and one other newly signed wrestler that have been assigned there. I'm told this new signee could be one to look out for in the future. CMLL star Rey Mysterio Jr has sustained an injury that will keep him out of action for the next 2 1/2 months. The timing couldn't be worse for Mysterio or the promotion, as he was forced to vacate the NWA World Middleweight championship he's held since September 1996. CMLL has continued to suffer severe injuries from several of their top talent in the last year and a half. Sad news for WWF women's wrestler Candi Devine, as she recently recovered from a very severe injury she sustained while wrestling in May 1996. She made strides in returning to the ring though after conferring with her doctors it was determined that she retire from active competition. This has caused many within WCW to be concerned about Rick Steiner, as he suffered a very similar injury. Steiner is still currently recovering and the hope is that he will return to the ring. I'm told that WCW offices had reached out to Smoky Mountain Wrestling about ending the declared war that SMW had announced. Eric Bischoff was interested in exploring SMW for a developmental territory but Jim Cornette, the owner, wasn't interested in terminating the war. We still have no idea why SMW targeted WCW but they wish the war to continue, it seems. The WWF are looking to spice up their show a bit as it was announced that Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels will be starting a feud over the WWF world heavyweight title. We'll see if Michaels will be able to claim his first world title. It was also announced that a feud between Owen Hart and the Big Show will also be in the main spotlight soon. There could be a change to a couple of monthly WCW events. I'm told they are toying with the idea of replacing August's PPV Road Wild and creating a permanent event in January rather than Clash of the Champions. Nothing is confirmed as of yet and the idea is still in the infancy stages. Stay tuned in future Hotline Reports for more information. Folks, I have it on very good authority that there is going to be a major announcement for tonight's Monday Nitro! I can't elaborate but it's something you don't want to miss! Here is the lineup for Nitro! Week 1, June 1997 LIVE from the Providence Civic Center - Providence, RI Paul Levesque vs Ric Flair Steve Austin vs Dean Malenko Lance Storm & Mike Barton vs Blue Bloods (Regal & Eaton) Scotty Riggs vs Brian Knobbs Diamond Dallas Page vs Kaz Hayashi Rick Martel vs Eddie Guerrero

Week 4, May 1997 LIVE from the Fleet Center - Boston, MA Attendance: 18,000 (SELLOUT!) WCW Slamboree kicks off with what's become a regular sellout crowd, this time in Boston, MA! The capacity crowd is rabid and excited for tonight's show as the announce team of Jim Ross, Bobby Heenan, and Tony Schiavone welcome everyone and say tonight is going to be a huge night for WCW. Harlem Heat are in the first match of the evening and they have an opportunity to reclaim the tag team gold from the Outsiders. Heenan's worried about Harlem Heat as they haven't seemed to have been on the same page lately, which in his experience, doesn't bode well for the two. JR says that brothers occasionally go through tough times but when it boils down to it, they have each other's backs. He likes their chances tonight against two bullies like Hall and Nash. The Faces of Fear and Hostile Intent set forth to battle once and for all inside a steel cage, which the cameras show hanging high above the ring. Prior encounters between these two tough teams have not been able to contain them, so the only hope is they can square off inside the steel. Scott Steiner defends his US title against Dean Malenko, but that isn't the only thing on the line as Steiner has his chance to take Francine away from Malenko. It seemed that Francine was less than happy that Malenko put her up for grabs just to get a shot at the title. Heenan thinks this could backfire severely on the Man of 1,000 holds. To cap things off for the night, Ric Flair will finally battle against Brian Pillman. Flair blamed Pillman for the fracturing and eventual dissolve of the 4 Horsemen and has been itching to get his hands on him ever since. The time never seemed better than when Pillman was brutally kicked out of the NWO for being the "weak link" according to Hollywood Hogan and now Pillman's all alone. There's tons of action to get through and JR tells us that Mean Gene is backstage and has caught up with an arriving Steve Austin! - Austin's just getting out of his car and slinging his bag over his shoulder as Mean Gene, dapper as always in his event tuxedo, catches up as Austin begins to storm toward the inside of the building. Gene says that Austin doesn't have a match tonight, presumably because Hollywood Hogan has refused to compete tonight. Austin says that Hogan might not be wrestling inside the ring, but that won't keep him from finding that coward somewhere in the back and kicking his ass from one end of the arena to the other! - Rating: 100 Tag Team Titles: Harlem Heat vs The Outsiders (c) vs Each team made their entrance and the match got underway as the two brutes, Stevie Ray and Kevin Nash started things off. Scott Hall spent some time taunting Sensuous Sherri outside the ring that got the attention of Booker T. The ensuing referee distraction allowed Nash to take the quick early advantage. Things then evolved, oddly, into a pretty regular tag team wrestling match. There were a few tags made by both teams before Stevie Ray was eventually worn down by the Outsiders. Some quick tags by the champions and then isolating Stevie from his corner made things look bleak for the challengers. It wasn't until the Outsiders attempted some double team work on Stevie that the tides turned. Stevie ducked a double clothesline attempt and hit one of his own as all three men collapsed to the mat. Booker stretched out for the tag as the fans began to rally behind the challengers. Booker slapped the top turnbuckle pad and stomped his feet, getting the crowd louder as he urged Stevie while he began to make the long trek across the ring. Just before he was able to get to Booker's outstretched hand, Scott Hall grabbed him by the boot and pulled him backward, bringing him to his feet. Hall hit a few punches to the wobbly Stevie Ray before going for his signature discus punch, only for Stevie to duck out of the way! Kevin Nash had also gotten to his feet behind Stevie so when he ducked, Nash took the punch from Hall right to his face. Nash dropped to the mat and Hall rushed forward to try and catch his partner before he fell, but it was too late. This allowed Stevie to fall forward and get the hot tag to his brother, who rushed into the ring full of fury while the crowd went wild. Booker unloaded his assault on Hall, then Nash, then through them both into the corner before hitting a sandwiched clothesline on the two. Hall stumbled out of the corner and right into a Harlem sidekick before then focusing on Nash. Booker was on fire and he could feel the tides shifting as he climbed up to the top rope. Booker was perched and waiting for Hall to get back to his feet so he could hit the Missile Dropkick. The crowd was nuclear as they anticipated Harlem Heat getting the titles back from the NWO. Hall slowly got to his feet and began to turn around about the same time Nash was getting to his feet and focusing in on Booker. Booker, perched, began to stand to his feet high up on the top rope, waiting for Hall to inch closer. Stevie Ray saw Nash heading for his brother and ran to the ropes and bounced off, hitting Nash with a big boot. The only problem is, Stevie rushed the same side his brother was standing on and bouncing off the ropes caused Booker to drop hard on the turnbuckle. Scott Hall managed to clothesline Stevie over the top rope right after he had dropped Nash and then set his sights on the injured Booker T. While seated on the top rope, Hall turned Booker around and hooked him in the Outsider's Edge and dropped him. The match was over at 12:51 and the Outsiders just managed to defend their belts. Winners: The Outsiders Rating: 78 - The Outsider's barely celebrated their victory before escaping the ring and heading to the backstage area. Stevie Ray slowly climbed back in the ring and helped Booker up to his feet and tried to apologize. Booker had none of it and shoved his brother off, obviously frustrated. Sherri quickly got in the ring and got between the brothers as she tried to mediate things, but it was clear that the last few weeks has gotten the brothers frustrated. Booker turned and walked off, leaving Sherri and Stevie Ray in the ring. - Rating: 76 - Alex Wright is backstage with his new manager, and girlfriend, Kimberly. Wright says that he wants to be taken seriously as a main contender within WCW. He says he's just as tall as guys like Lex Luger and Sting but being a full-blooded German makes him far superior to any of them. Kimberly agrees and says that after experiencing everything Germany has to offer, it's clear that Alex Wright is the next big thing in WCW. Wright said he started things off by taking DDP's woman, next he's going to start taking titles. - Rating: 61 Cage Match: Faces of Fear vs Hostile Intent vs As soon as the cage door was locked and the bell sounded, the two teams went right after one another. It was clear from the start that this match wasn't going to be anything other than a wild brawl and the first team to inflict as much damage as possible were going to be the victors. This isn't the type of match to showcase in-ring ability, but Meng shone in this match and Tony Schiavone even commented that for the past several months, Meng has been quite impressive in his matches. This led the announcers to discuss potential singles success by not just Meng, but also Perry Saturn. The fight raged on with little control from the referee. The cage was properly used throughout the match by both teams as it seemed men were thrown into it left and right and faces were repeatedly grated against the unforgiving steel. The shocking end came at 9:46 after Saturn climbed high atop the cage and lept off with a body splash onto the Barbarian for the pinfall win! Winners: Hostile Intent Rating: 75 Cameras cut to the backstage area following a promotional ad to see DDP walking through a hallway. It doesn't take long before DDP is brutally ambushed from the side though.... Randy Savage rushes in with the attack but it isn't just him. Paul Levesque joins in on the assault with the Macho Man as the two double team him. The two on one assault is too much by itself, but factor in that DDP was blindsided, he stood no chance at defending himself. The assault continued on but suddenly one more person rushes in and floors Levesque. The Total Package is the one to rush in for the save on DDP. He hits Levesque a couple more times as he falls to the floor before turning his attention to the Macho Man, who's still putting the boots to a fallen DDP. Luger shoves Savage who then see's Luger. With his eyes wild, Savage begins to back off as he tells Luger he's making a huge mistake. Levesque then gets to his feet and the two NWO members make their exit while Luger helps DDP up. Rating: 81 Television Title: Fit Finlay vs Lord Steven Regal (c) vs The match kicked off and Regal acted like he didn't have a care in the world, until he had to lock up with Finlay. Afterwards, Regal acted like he was smelling the worst thing in his life and told Finlay to take a shower. Regal continued to strut around the ring with his British aristocrat manner that only he can do. He also took his time to lock several different wrestling holds on Finlay to showcase his superior technical ability. Finlay was able to fire back though and showcase his own offense which was a good mix of hard hitting moves and some unorthodox technical wrestling that can only be described as classic European. The two demonstrated very well that they have a vast variety of movesets. Regal took charge for a large part of the match and looked to lock in the Regal Stretch. Finlay surprised him though after reversing a body slam attempt and Finlay got Regal up for his Tombstone Piledriver finish. Regal furiously kicked to reverse it though, and he was successful. He had Finlay in position to hit his own Tombstone but Finlay was able to slide off and quickly rolled up Regal for the shocking win at 12:47! A stunned Regal sat up quickly as the bell rang with his eyes as wide as plates and a look of pure contempt on his face while Finlay celebrated his title win! Winner and NEW Champion: Fit Finlay Rating: 84 Brian Pillman is backstage for a promo and begins it with holding up the Horsemen sign and giving a "WOOOO!" Pillman is sinister and says he looks forward to getting ahold of the Nature Boy and showing him he's not as great as he thinks he is. Pillman might be all alone, but that's the way he's always preferred it. He only goes to the beat of his own drum and isn't interested in being a team player. Pillman takes credit for the 4 Horsemen breaking up and not giving Arn Anderson or Ric Flair any other path in wrestling since. He says that the 4 Horsemen is all that Anderson and Flair have while Pillman has his entire career ahead of him, forging his own way and doing it on his own, not on the coat tails of other wrestlers like the two of them have done their entire career. Pillman says tonight is going to be a sweet night and the Horsemen will be finished for good. Rating: 86 Eddie Guerrero vs Astro Rey Jr. vs I won't begin to even try and convince you that this match was competitive. Eddie Guerrero was far too skilled for Astro to make it a competitive match, but the two did showcase quite the high flying match that kept the crowd engaged. Eddie was just too good to allow Astro to get any kind of meaningful offense in. He did manage to hit a few high spots in the match, but it was all Eddie and everyone knew it. Eddie got the win at 11:43 with the Frog Splash, providing Astro with the best match he's had in his career so far. Winner: Eddie Guerrero Rating: 82 - Mike Tenay is backstage with Buff Bagwell for an interview. Bagwell says that he's tired of seeing old guys in WCW every time he turns a corner. Bagwell thinks that these old guys like Arn Anderson, Ric Flair, and Ricky Steamboat need to get out of the way to allow the young guys of WCW, like himself, to take the ball. - Rating: 67 United States Title: Dean Malenko w/ Francine vs Scott Steiner (c) vs The co-main event is up next and the crowd was definitely into this one. Steiner spent a substantial amount of time taunting Francine who stood on the outside. This almost cost Steiner the match and his US title as Malenko quickly rolled up the champion who just barely was able to get a shoulder up in time. The two men traded offense from there and the match spilled to the outside shortly after. They each took turns beating each other around the ringside area. Each time Steiner would put Malenko on the floor, he would turn his attention to Francine. He'd repeatedly ask Francine if she was ready to "be with a real man." Once back inside the ring, Malenko was able to take control again after Francine took an opportunity to rake Steiner's eyes. The advantage didn't hold though, as Steiner caught Malenko with a great looking butterfly suplex. Following the move, Steiner dropped to the mat and began doing pushups while looking right at Francine and taunting her, saying he can "go all night." Malenko became furious with the constant taunts toward his manager and hit a low blow on the champion. He called Francine to get a steel chair and get on the apron. He walked over to her and demanded the chair but Francine refused. Malenko again demanded the chair but she wouldn't hand it over. Malenko finally demanded the chair one more time and this time, Francine shoved it toward him, just a bit too aggressively. The chair caught Malenko in the forehead as he stumbled backward, right into a waiting Scott Steiner, who lifted him up for the Steiner Screwdriver. The win, and Francine's services, were then secured at 15:20. Steiner and Francine the left and headed up the aisle while Francine was saying "Oops!" Winner: Scott Steiner Rating: 86 - Eric Bischoff is seated in a dark room for the next promo. Eric's all smiles and laughs as he says that Steve Austin's probably wandered all over the backstage area for Hollywood Hogan, but he's never going to find him. He won't find Hollywood because he's not here tonight. Bischoff says that Hogan has much more important things to do than show up to Slamboree. Hollywood has movie premieres to attend, talk shows to be on, scripts to read, and elite parties to be at while Steve Austin just hopes to be booked on the card each night. Bischoff says that Austin might not like it, but Hollywood's the world champion, Bischoff is the WCW Executive Vice President, and Steve Austin is just dirt on the bottom of Hollywood's boots. Rating: 82 - Ric Flair cuts a pre-match promo backstage and says that Brian Pillman is a disgrace to the 4 Horsemen and a disgrace to professional wrestling. Wrestling is all about tradition and all Pillman does is spit in the face of tradition. Pillman would be nothing without the long line of men that came before him and that he's too enthralled in his own ego to recognize that. The Horsemen have never been about one man, it's always been about the group. Tonight, if Flair has to beat just a little ounce of respect into him, he's going to enjoy every second of it, and Pillman has no one to help him. - Rating: 82 Brian Pillman vs Ric Flair vs The bell barely rang before Flair rushed at Pillman. He tried to escape but Flair was all over him and chased him all around the ring. The performance between these two could barely have been any better and they showcased why they are two of the best not just in WCW, but in the world. The crowd was in the palm of their hand the entire match and Flair showed why he's the dirtiest player in the game. There were several low blows, eye rakes, biting, and hair pulling in between all of the classic Flair offense. On Pillman's side, he was blatant about the cheating and dirty moves and begged the referee to disqualify him, knowing it wasn't going to happen. Arn Anderson was at ringside and Pillman would take any opportunity he had to taunt toward the Enforcer. There were several times the taunts became too much and Anderson would jump on the apron but the referee's distraction only allowed Pillman to cheat more. As the match wore on, it looked to just be a stalemate and no clear victor would ever emerge. Even as they both grew tired, the blows were neck and neck. Flair eventually got busted open but he wasn't the only one, as Pillman soon after found himself bloodied. Flair attempted a Figure Four but Pillman rolled him up in a small package for a near fall. Likewise, Pillman went for the Air Pillman, only for Flair to roll it through and get his own near fall. Flair took advantage for one final time and sent Pillman into the corner, looking for a Super plex off the top rope. Flair got him up and lifted him and the two crashed extremely hard to the mat. Flair's arm was draped over Pillman but Pillman's arm was also draped over Flair. The referee saw this and began making the count, hitting the three at 26:08. The announcers and the crowd were all confused as to who the winner was. Neither man moved and neither man kicked out. The ring announcer walked over to the referee, who leaned through the ropes and told him his decision. The ring announcer looked a bit surprised and brought the microphone to his mouth to tell the crowd the decision. The referee has declared the match a double pin fall! Winner: Double Pin (Draw) Rating: 90 Final Show Rating: 92

Card Preview: Brian Pillman vs Ric Flair United States Title: Francine is on the line if Malenko loses! Dean Malenko w/ Francine vs Scott Steiner (c) Eddie Guerrero vs Astro Rey Jr. Television Title: Fit Finlay vs Lord Steven Regal (c) Cage Match: Faces of Fear vs Hostile Intent Tag Team Titles: Harlem Heat vs The Outsiders (c)

Week 4, May 1997 LIVE from the Coleman Coliseum - Tuscaloosa, AL Attendance: 15,000 (SELLOUT!) Captain Lou Albano In Memory - The video opener for Monday Nitro plays followed by a large pyro display of fireworks. Cameras bring us around where Jim Ross, Dusty Rhodes, and Mike Tenay welcome everyone for tuning in. JR mentions that Captain Lou Albano passed away over the weekend and the announce team all take a moment to extend their condolences to the family. Ross says that we're in the home stretch for WCW Slamboree this Sunday and things, not just the weather, is heating up. Last week ended on a cliffhanger with Sting giving Steve Austin an opportunity to hit him with a baseball bat, only for Austin to pass on the chance. We're bound to see a few more matches made official tonight for Slamboree and at this point, tonight's main event is set for Lex Luger taking on Wrath! There's tons of action to get to ----- - - It doesn't take long for the NWO music to hit, cutting off JR, who utters "what the hell?!" To the shock of many, it's the WCW World Heavyweight champion Hollywood Hogan who emerges from the fog with none other than Eric Bischoff. The two casually taunt their way to the ring to apparently kick off Monday Nitro. The two appear to be on cloud 9 as they make their way to the ring and climb in. Hogan takes a jog around the ring holding up the world title as Bischoff takes a microphone from his inside jacket pocket. - Ladies and gentlemen, the heavyweight champion of the world!!!!!!! Now you fans here in this arena are in for a special treat because not only do you get to start this show with the biggest name in professional wrestling, the heavyweight champion of the world, but he's also going to share with you all some gigantic, Earth-shattering news, right here tonight on Monday Nitro! See, the Hulkster has something to say pertaining to this Sunday's Slamboree, isn't that right Hollywood?!? Well ya know somethin', brah?!?! All these fans in attendance here tonight should take a moment to bask in the glory that is Hollywood, dude!! I know for a guaranteed fact that none of these fans have ever seen such a huge celebrity like Hollywood Hogan, much less a wrestling God such as myself, so how about all of these Hollywood worshipers, these NWO-ites, just take a moment to soak up the experience, dude!!! Now down to business. I've been the world heavyweight champion for over 230 days brother! I've taken on all opponents and I've taken them all down! I ran a big, smelly, pathetic giant out of this company, I've defeated the Nature Boy Ric Flair like the joke he is, I showed Scott Steiner doesn't have what it takes to compete in the main event, and I've shut that big mouth of someone who's too big for his boots, Steve Austin! I've defeated anyone who wanted to think they could take this title from around my waist and I've proven time and time again that they all don't have what it takes to compete with Hollywood and the NWO! So the big news, brother, is that this Sunday at Slamboree, Hollywood Hogan is taking a night off, dude! I've earned a nice, long vacation and there's no other so called "challengers" to step up to the plate! I'm done with facing the same old wrestlers time after time and proving that they aren't worth the dirt on the bottom of my boots! So before Mr. Ted Turner wants to say anything about it, it's in my contract, dude, that I don't have to defend my title against anyone that I don't want to, and I'm saying right here, right now, that I'm not facing Ric Flair, Scott Steiner, or Steve Austin for this belt again!!! And if Ted Turner wants to try and change that, then I'll just slap WCW with a giant lawsuit and then I'll be the one who owns WCW, dude!!! On top of that, this man right here, Eric Bischoff, holds the key!! Bischoff is the executive president of WCW and what he says, goes, brother! I hold the title, and Mr. Bischoff holds the key!!! That's right!!!! This man right here makes more money for WCW than anyone else on the roster combined! Until some real challenger can come along for Hollywood Hogan, a true competitor that can prove they're worthy for an opportunity, this man isn't going to be forced into any match, ever again! For anyone who doesn't like that, from anyone backstage to even Ted Turner himself, I've got two words for you - BITE ME! Rating: 100 Astro Rey Jr. vs Dean Malenko w/Francine vs w/ Francine is less than enthused as she comes out with Malenko, which can only be attributed to the fact that she is on the line this Sunday as Malenko takes on Scott Steiner for the US title. Malenko has been requesting a US title match and the only way Steiner would grant it was for Malenko to put Francine up for grabs. The match itself was a pretty straight forward, fast paced and high flying matchup. Astro hit a few moves that got the crowd on their feet and excited while Malenko methodically broke down his opponent. Malenko was also able to impress the crowd with a top rope military press into a gutbuster. Malenko won the match at 7:38 with the Texas Cloverleaf and Francine stormed off at the end. Winner: Dean Malenko Rating: 71 - Following a commercial break, the fans again get on their feet when, this time, trumpets can be heard fading into the arena. The Nature Boy Ric Flair walks out in one of his many custom designed suits while the Enforcer Arn Anderson accompanies him in his finest denim wear. They stop at the bottom of the ramp briefly to show the sign of excellence as they both hold up 4 fingers. Fireworks go off behind the two as they continue their way to the ring. - Did I just happen to hear correctly just a little while ago when Hollywood Hogan claimed to be the biggest name in professional wrestling??? Did I also hear correctly when Hogan claimed he's never defending the worlds heavyweight title against the Nature Boy?! On top of that, did Hogan just claim that he won't wrestle any time he doesn't feel like it?!? I guess as long as Hogan's got that little puissant Bischoff by his side, he can do what he wants, but as far as the Nature Boy goes, Hogan, you're never going to dictate what I can and can't do, pal! The fact is, you're afraid! That's right! You're afraid to face the Nature Boy and you're afraid of losing that title because even you know the NWO can't protect you forever! So if you want to go on your own little strike, be my guest!!! You won't wrestle, but the Nature Boy will! I'm not focused on you right now anyway, Hogan! That's right! I'm more focused on beating the living hell out of that scrawny little wimp Brian Pillman! Pillman!!! I've got you one on one this Sunday, pal!! I'm gonna make you bleed!! I'm gonna make you sweat!! And I'm gonna make you pay the price for ever turning your back on me, Double A, and the Horsemen! This Sunday's going to be sweet revenge but I don't want to wait until this Sunday! Pillman, I want you in the ring right here, tonight, in the main event!!!! Don't worry though, it won't be a one on one match, because I'm going to team with the Enforcer!! That's right!!! Pillman, if you can, by some miracle, manage to find anyone that'll team up with you, it's gonna be me and the Enforcer against you and a partner!!! - The crowd clearly loves the challenge that was just laid out and Flair and Anderson look toward the entrance for Brian Pillman to emerge. It doesn't take long before his music hits and he steps out on to the stage, oddly, laughing. - Oh Nature Boy, Nature Boy....You're so damn predictable!!! How did I know that you were going to want to get me in the ring prior to Slamboree??? If you think coming out here and laying down a...."challenge" will intimidate me, than you're even more delusional than I ever imagined, my friend. Just to avoid coming out here and being as long-winded as you, I'll keep it simple. I accept your challenge tonight and don't you worry, I DO have a partner. The only thing you need to be concerned with, Ric Flair, is even making it to Slamboree this Sunday! Rating: 100 Alex Wright vs Rick Martel vs - Prior to the match beginning, Alex Wright gets a microphone - Achtung, Achtung, ich habe eine besondere Ankündigung, also alle dummen Amerikaner, haltet euren Mund und hört zu! Oh I forgot....All you American's are so stupid that you can't even understand the most dominant language in the entire world!!! It just goes to show how superior I am to all of you!!!! Not to mention, you Rick Martel!!! You're just as pathetic as these American's, maybe even more since you're French Canadian! The French....HAH! You're all pathetic! Now, as I was saying, I have a special announcement to make, so I want all of you American rednecks to shut up and listen to what I have to say! I have a new manager! This manager is going to take me to the heights that I belong and not only that, but I'm going to be the envy of every one of you losers in this arena! She knows how superior German's are to everyone else and she wants to be with a proven winner! So right now, I want my new manager to come out and stand in my corner while I put on a showcase of real talent and masculinity! Rating: 45 Kimberly emerges, all smiles, and joins Alex in the ring where she plants a long kiss right on the lips of Das Wunderkind. The crowd boo's loudly and Kimberly, satisfied with herself, exits the ring and the bell sounds to finally begin the match. Martel took firm control while the commentators discussed Wright's new valet and the controversy behind Kimberly now being his manager. A while back, there was quite the buzz going around that the two were caught together which led to the split between Kimberly and DDP. In addition, it seems this new pairing was thought to be quite awkward by the fans in attendance and didn't go down particularly well. Much was the same in this match as Alex Wright didn't prove his superiority and submitted to the Boston Crab at 7:43. Winner: Rick Martel Rating: 66 - Mean Gene is backstage to provide a Slamboree preview for this Sunday. He highlights the cage match pitting Hostile Intent against the Faces of Fear, a feud that has become quite physical between two tough teams. Their weeks of fights and out of control brawls will be contained inside a steel cage where anything goes and the toughest team will come out the victors! Mean Gene thinks that whatever team comes out victorious has quite the claim to become #1 contenders to the tag team titles. Rating: 73 Mean Gene then segues into his interview guests as they walk in. - Mean Gene says that Harlem Heat have a chance to recapture the tag team titles this Sunday as they take on the Outsiders but things haven't been going so well for the brothers for the past few weeks. Stevie Ray says that's all old news and the new news is that the two brothers from Harlem are going to beat down the two fruit booty's from the NWO and get their titles back. Booker agrees and says even the best teams run in to speed bumps from time to time, but Harlem Heat is back on the same page and ready to take their titles back from the Outsiders. Rating: 84 Television Title: Disco Inferno vs Lord Steven Regal (c) vs Between both Disco's dancing and Regal's antics, this turned into quite a fun match. The contrasting styles somehow blended to create some really good in-ring chemistry between the two competitors. When it came to the actual wrestling, Regal showed why he's one of the best in the entire world, taking Disco down with wrist locks and various other submissions and suplexes. Disco didn't get dominated though, as he fought back with a fury of offense and nearly picked up the win a couple times on some close pin falls. Regal was too far skilled in the end though, picking up the win at 9:40 with the Regal Stretch. Winner: Lord Steven Regal Rating: 81 - Nitro returns from a commercial break to a video of the US champion driving in a car. Steiner provides some commentary during the short drive saying he's getting everything in order for this weekend when he takes the services of Francine. The car comes to a stop and Steiner steps out. The camera pans out to see the entrance of a grand hotel as Steiner walks through the revolving door. The camera cuts to the inside where Steiner's standing at the lobby counter and signing paperwork. He looks in the camera and says he's going to have all the finest amenities for Francine and she's going to be amazed at what a real man can provide, as compared to Dean Malenko and his....Short comings. The camera cuts again, this time inside the hotel room where a bellhop is rolling in a cart full of room service. Another camera cut shows a maid turning down the bed and sprinkling rose petals on it, to another camera cut inside the bathroom where Steiner is lounging in a bubble bath and sipping champagne. Steiner says this weekend will be a new experience for Francine and a complete eye-opener. Francine's going to never want to go back to Malenko after he gives her the ride of her life! - Rating: 100 Buff Bagwell & Paul Levesque vs El Hijo Del Santo & Jim Duggan vs Quite the odd pairing of Santo and Duggan and Bagwell and Levesque spent a large amount of time making fun of the two, from their physical appearance to their age. Bagwell posed quite a bit, pointing to his body and then pointing to Duggan's or Santo's. Levesque and Bagwell though this was a real leg-slapper. Their attitudes changed pretty quick when Santo went on some offense to catch Bagwell off guard and very nearly win the match. The more aggressive style from Bagwell and Levesque then emerged. The match was not well received though and aside from Levesque, no one performed particularly well. Bagwell got the pin on Santo after the Blockbuster at 7:31. Winners: Bagwell & Levesque Rating: 61 Wrath vs Lex Luger vs In what was to be the main event, the crowd was pretty hyped for this one. Wrath has been on a great streak for awhile and Bobby Heenan thinks it's only a matter of time before we see some gold around his waist. The problem in grabbing a title in WCW is that there's fierce competition around every corner. Wrath started off with a great showing. He used his power to completely take control in the early parts of the match and Luger appeared to be in trouble. There were several very near falls and it seemed that all Wrath had to do was hit his Meltdown for a victory. Instead of going for the kill though, Wrath continued to try and weaken his opponent but this proved troublesome once the fans started rallying around the Total Package. Luger began to feed off the crowd as they got louder and louder and his offense started to become more impactful. This led to Luger hitting a few clotheslines followed by his Bionic Forearm. Luger started motioning for the Rack that got the crowd totally on their feet but Wrath rolled to the outside to slow things down. Luger went over to lean through the ropes to grab Wrath, but the big man had grabbed a chair and hit Luger with it, causing a blatant disqualification at 9:42. Winner by DQ: Lex Luger Rating: 73 DDP has a pre-taped promo next where he talks about the Macho Man. Page says that the two can only do so much talking and he's tired of hearing Savage talk. At some point, Savage is going to have to back it up in the ring because last he checked, DDP had his number at Spring Stampede. DDP doesn't care when or how, all Savage has to do is name the time and place. Rating: 79 Austin is backstage for his own promo next. He says that last week's Nitro left people wondering if Austin and Sting were on the same page with each other. Austin says he's going to quiet those questions real fast and says the only page Austin's on is his own. He says he doesn't give a damn about Sting and isn't worried about being his friend, the only thing he's concerned about is becoming world champion. Austin says the only reason he didn't hit Sting last week was because he turned his back to him. If he wanted to hit Sting, he'll hit him face to face. Sting can play all the mind games he wants with him, but when it boils down to it, there's one title and Austin doesn't care who has it, or who's in his way. You can be successful in wrestling or you can have friends, but you can't have both. Rating: 100 Ric Flair & Arn Anderson vs Brian Pillman &.......... vs Flair and Anderson made their entrance first followed by Brian Pillman, who came out alone. Pillman stopped at the end of the ramp while Flair and Anderson looked on, almost laughing that it didn't seem that Pillman had a partner. Music that's familiar to the crowd then starts to play and someone is seen walking through the fog. Everyone's shocked to see Eddie Guerrero walk out as Mike Tenay reminds everyone at home that these two men had quite the bitter feud over the US title last year and now seem to be joining together. He also says that Eddie's just gotten cleared to return to the ring after suffering a fracture earlier this month. The two make their way to the ring and the match gets started. Pillman starts off against Arn Anderson and the Enforcer quickly finds his way in the driver's seat. Pillman is reeling and Double A is relentless as he goes after everything he can. The crowd goes nuts when Anderson tags Flair in and Pillman quickly rushes over to tag out to Guerrero. Flair lays in measured hits but Eddie is able to use his quickness to duck an attempted attack as he comes off the ropes. What ensues next is a pretty straight forward tag team match. Once Eddie managed to wear down Flair a bit, Pillman was then happy to get in the ring and take over the offense. The fight eventually spilled out onto the floor where things then broke down a bit. The referee was able to finally gain a bit of control and get the fight back inside the ring as Eddie and Arn Anderson were the legal men. After Arn hit his signature Spinebuster on Eddie, things broke down again after the pin attempt was broken up by Pillman. Flair and Anderson managed to clear the ring of both Eddie and Pillman and the crowd was electric as the two regrouped on the outside. After conferring with each other, they both said "forget it" and began walking up the aisle toward the back. Anderson and Flair looked on in disbelief as the referee completed the 10 count and officially awarded the match by countout. The crowd began to boo heavily and tossed trash at Eddie and Pillman as they walked up the aisle, but the two didn't care at all. The match officially came to an end at 18:02 and it seems everyone is going to have to wait until Slamboree where the Nature Boy will finally get his hands on Brian Pillman. Winners by Count Out: Ric Flair & Arn Anderson Rating: 88 Final Show Rating: 91

Hello ladies and gentlemen, it's been awhile but I'm Mean Gene Okerlund here to bring you a WCW Hotline: Special Report! There's all kinds of activity in the world of professional wrestling and on the eve of the mid-year review, I thought I'd bring you some exclusive content and backstage access that you don't get during the usual mid-year review! Starting with the exits from World Championship Wrestling, both Steve Armstrong and Dick Slater have left WCW after their contracts have expired. WCW opted to not renew either contract and wishes the best going forward for both wrestlers. Starting with area battles between the top two companies in the world, you can see that WCW is in total domination to the WWF when it comes to star power. I'll start with what should be the #1 wrestling company in the world; World Championship Wrestling. With two shows and 56 active wrestlers, television time is a premium for the talent. Sting is by far the most popular wrestler in WCW and that's without him competing in the ring since 1996! As you can see here, Sting's final match was when he was involved in the War Games match at Fall Brawl 1996. His last proper match was in a successful tag team win with Lex Luger as his partner against the Amazing French Canadians (No, not the Quebecers) in August 1996 on WCW Saturday Night. Despite being away from in-ring action, Sting has continued to be the most popular wrestler in North America, however, he is #9 on the global stage due to his popularity lacking in Mexico and Europe. WCW's most successful event to date is Spring Stampede 1997 and top rated match is Scott Hall defeating Ric Flair on Monday Nitro in September 1996. All of these matches and events have led to WCW increasing company size and increasing attendance! The WWF remains the #1 company in the world despite being a smaller size than WCW and less popular. CMLL has continued to surprise the wrestling world by competing with the two well-known companies and holding their own. The WWF holds higher popularity in The UK, Europe, and Mexico which gives them a slight edge in the top company title. I've heard rumblings that WCW plans to venture out and hold some shows in Mexico and might also possibly try to work out a deal with CMLL to help increase their popularity. Here's a look into the WWF and their current feuds they have going on. On most of their Monday Night Raw broadcasts and PPV events, there isn't much going on to further their feuds. Folks, look forward to the mid-year review that will be coming up in June. It'll be interesting to see how WCW is competing with the WWF and what company is the most improved thus far!

And we have done it! I have now caught up to my in-game progress. It's been a long road and I hope everyone is enjoying so far. Despite the mid-year review coming up at the beginning of June for my game, I'm going to still do a bit of a "review" up to this point. This won't be focused on top rated matches or cards, but more the inner-workings of the current game world. I'll be providing an in-depth look into popularity of workers in both WCW and the WWF, I'll go over feuds in both companies and also providing screen shots of certain things, just so it's clear that these things are actually occurring in my game. I'm also pretty relived I'm up to date now as I'll be able to give more insight into the match reviews and give road agent notes and specific finishes. I've had plenty of cheating wins or flash pinfalls throughout this game but I can't remember them and I didn't note them down unless I followed it up in the next show with an angle, so now I'll at least be able to add those things. I'll also still do the mid-year review when it comes up so that'll give everyone an idea of award outlooks for 1997. I'll also be adding in the area battles as well. Despite me crushing the WWF in the area battles every month and being a bigger size, somehow they are still considered the #1 promotion and I'm #2.

Week 3, May 1997 LIVE from the Worcester Centrum - Worcester, MA Attendance: 14,800 (SELLOUT!) - This sold-out Massachusetts crowd is excited and rowdy for this week's Monday Nitro. The usual video intro is followed by a rather large firework display that hypes the crowd up even more. There's a sea of fan-made signs throughout the crowd as cameras are brought to the commentary table where JR makes the customary introductions. There's a buzz in the air as Jim Ross outlines what happened this past weekend on WCW Saturday Night. The team talk about how action has definitely increased in recent weeks on the weekend programming because there's so many things happening in WCW lately and it all can't be contained on Nitro. Ric Flair made it clear that he wants Brian Pillman at Slamboree for a good old fashioned, knock-down, drag-out fight, free of gimmicks and interference. The Nature Boy wants to get his hands on Pillman for all the damage he's done to the 4 Horsemen and now that Pillman is all by himself and out of the NWO, the timing couldn't be better. The Blue Bloods continued their efforts to recruit Lance Storm but the young upcoming star has again refused their efforts. Scott Steiner gave a peculiar interview where he said he would put up his United States title against Dean Malenko at Slamboree if he would put up his "hooch." The commentary team spent some time talking about what that could possibly be and Bobby Heenan was positive he was talking about alcohol. Finally, they spent a good amount of time talking about the ending of last week's Nitro where Lex Luger came to the aid of Booker T as he felt the wrath of the NWO. Booker provided an interview on Saturday Night claiming that there are no problems between him and his brother while Luger gave an interview saying he's happy to help out Booker T or anyone else against the NWO. As for tonight's show, the main event will feature Scott Steiner defending the US title against Scott Hall, Lex Luger and Diamond Dallas Page will be in action, the World Heavyweight champion Hollywood Hogan is here, and rumor's have been going around all day that Steve Austin has been looking for Sting! - It doesn't look like we're going to have to wait long to find out what Austin wants as his music interrupts the commentary and the fans jump to their feet, again in a total frenzy. Austin walks with his usual purpose to the ring and gets there, posing on each turnbuckle to the rabid fans as Mean Gene is seen trying to hurriedly get in the ring to meet Austin for an impromptu interview. The music dies off and Austin meets Mean Gene in the center of the ring as he says he's heard all day long that Austin's been looking for Sting and wonders what he wants with him. Austin: Mean Gene, as you and everyone else knows, Stone Cold never mixes words and I let people know exactly what I'm thinking and what I'm going to do! I ain't gonna make you read between the lines and if I've got a problem, I'll take it straight to your face! The fact of the matter is, last week I not only called out the NWO, the week before that I said I never asked or wanted Sting's help! Well last week, the NWO did what they always do, they attacked from behind. I expect the NWO to continue to be a pain in the ass but Sting's proving to be just as much a pain in the ass to me as they are! I told Sting to stay out of my business but what'd he do last week while the NWO had their run on Stone Cold? He stood way up top in the arena and watched me get beat up! Now don't for one second think that I'm pissed off that he didn't help me...Nah! The fact is, he still wants to stick his nose in my business and make his presence felt! So what I'm gonna do tonight, Mean Gene, is real simple! I'm gonna get that S.O.B. right in this ring tonight and I'm gonna get him face to face so I can look him in that painted face of his and tell him, once and for all, to stay the hell out of Stone Cold's business! And that's the bottom line... Cause Stone Cold said so! Rating: 100 Paul Levesque vs Diamond Dallas Page vs This match carried off where these two left off at SuperBrawl. It was a solid, back and forth encounter where each man got in plenty of offense and Levesque did his best to cheat around every corner. It was clear that DDP was in the driver's seat of this match, though and firmly had the crowd behind him. Everyone was caught off guard when DDP managed to reverse a Spinebuster attempt into a Diamond Cutter to win the match at 14:50. It was definitely not as good as their previous match but it was serviceable. Winner: Diamond Dallas Page Rating: 68 Mean Gene is getting his work in early tonight as he's backstage with Booker T for a quick word. Last week he had a target on his back by the NWO but the Total Package Lex Luger came to his aid, amidst some trouble that seems to be brewing between Harlem Heat as they haven't appeared to be on the same page since losing their titles to the Outsiders at Spring Stampede. Booker says that all great teams have moments when times are tough but it's those tough times that make great teams even better. When you toss in the two being brothers, there's bound to be some conflicts. Booker says he's got all the confidence that Harlem Heat will work out the kinks and he knows that Stevie Ray will always have his back not just in wrestling, but also in life. He says Harlem Heat's going to get their belts back at Slamboree but they aren't just going to stop there; Booker's wanting some singles titles to go along with it! Rating: 87 Alex Wright vs Lex Luger vs Saturday Wright Fever's got a tough task ahead of him this week as the Total Package made his way toward the ring. The harsh German actually appeared more focused for this match and didn't back down from Luger. The opening bell saw Wright rush to Luger and immediately go on offense that at first had Luger reeling. He hit several European uppercuts that rocked Luger and things were looking good until he tried chopping the chiseled chest of the Total Package. It had no effect and the crowd began to get loud as Luger mounted his offense. Once that started, there was no turning back as several clotheslines and a forearm smash later, Luger had him locked in the Torture Rack for the win at 8:08. Winner: Lex Luger Rating: 78 The Macho Man cuts a pre-taped promo where he says that Diamond Dallas Page can defeat all kinds of "lesser opponents" but when it comes to facing the cream of the crop like the Macho Man, Page can't get the job done! He taunts DDP again that his wife left him for a smaller chump and he's all alone in life while the Macho Man has climbed Mount Everest, soaring with the eagles and slithering with the snakes. Page won't get the job done or be a success in life because he's a loser and will always remain a loser (all while ignoring that DDP beat him and throwing fellow NWO member in with "lesser opponents"). OH YEAH! Rating: 99 Following a commercial break, we return to what's become a familiar scene within WCW and the backstage area - a backstage brawl. This one is between Ric Flair and Brian Pillman, who's paths have apparently crossed. We join mid-fight where officials are trying to break the two up. Plenty of shots are received by both parties as the fight is eventually broken up but the two continue to jaw back and forth. Rating: 86 Rick Martel vs "Sting" vs This wasn't much of a competitive match though both men were on par with their performance. "Sting" generated a ton of heat from the crowd as he continued to play up the mannerisms of his actual counterpart. Martel proved he has a decent amount of skill in the ring as he finished things off at 8:24 with the Boston Crab. Winner: Rick Martel Rating: 64 Dean Malenko and Francine appear for a backstage promo. Malenko says there's one reason he's in wrestling and that's to be successful and win titles. There's nothing much more prestigious than the United States title and he says if he has to put up his manager Francine in order to claim it, that's exactly what he'll do. Francine was all about what Malenko was saying until he agreed to put her up in order to face Steiner. She looked disgusted as the picture faded to black. Rating: 76 Scotty Riggs vs Wrath vs It's been a little while since we've seen Scotty Riggs on Nitro. His work's cut out for him tonight with this opponent. It was a foregone conclusion for Riggs, however, as soon as Wrath stepped through the ropes. In sheer domination, Wrath easily disposed of Riggs, putting him out of his misery at 6:59 with the ever-impressive Meltdown, to the crowd's delight. Winner: Wrath Rating: 61 Hostile Intent vs Big Bubba Rogers & Scott Norton vs This is the second time these two teams have faced off and this time the result was much better. Both teams took immediately to some hard-hitting action and didn't want to back down from the other. It was probably inevitable that the larger of the two teams would gain the advantage, however. Saturn impressed the crowd with not just his strength as he hit multiple suplexes on both big men, but also his speed and aerial attack. Paul Roma ended up being the weak link in this match but it wasn't enough to keep the team down. Saturn hit an impressive Death Valley Driver on Big Bubba to get the win at 7:59. Winners: Hostile Intent Rating: 72 The NWO music hits the speakers and the crowd get on their feet, as usual. They get a bit louder as they see Eric Bischoff and then the World Champion emerge. Hogan struts toward the ring as he plays the world title like a guitar, laughing and cutting it up all along the way. Once inside, both men take their spot as Hogan begins to flex his 24 inch pythons. Bischoff goes through his usual schtick, saying he can't get enough of the crowd and loves them all, JUST as much as they love him. Trash begins to pelt the ring as Hogan takes over, saying the NWO has never been better since they cut the fat off that's been slowing them down. Hollywood has never been better, either. Hogan says he's too smart, too talented, too rich, and too big for anyone to challenge him and the "NWO" World Heavyweight title, and that includes Steve Austin. Hogan says Austin wishes he could be half as successful as Hollywood, let alone have arms half the size as Hogan's. As a matter of fact, Hogan says since he's been so successful since winning the title, he's earned himself a vacation! He proved to the entire world at Spring Stampede that Austin doesn't have what it takes to compete in the main event and Ric Flair and Scott Steiner have both failed time and time again to take the title from him. Hogan says there's not one person in WCW that can step up to the plate and beat him and as such, he has no challengers for Slamboree. Hogan says he's going to take the time off and sit on the beach in Tampa. As for any possible rematch against Austin? Hogan says he's already beat Austin and he's not facing him again. Ric Flair and Scott Steiner both got multiple chances at Hollywood and those were too much. He's tired of giving proven losers more and more opportunities to make millions of dollars off him. Hogan says he's not a charity foundation and it's time people stop using Hollywood to make themselves millionaires. Rating: 84 United States Title: Scott Hall vs Scott Steiner vs One half of the tag team champions gets an opportunity to become a dual-champion, hoping to take the US title off of NWO nemesis Scott Steiner. The match started off in much the same way as you'd expect, Steiner spent some time feeling out Hall, Hall stalled and went to the outside a few times before Steiner got fed up and chased him around ringside, before finally getting back in where Hall took advantage. It was apparent that Hall was still working off some of the ring rust that accumulated during his extended absence but he still did quite well. Steiner looked to be in trouble several times but always worked his way out of it. The last bit of buildup had the crowd firmly behind the US champion as he rocked Hall with right fists that were followed up with some big Steinerlines. The longer the match went on, the more people looked to the stage or the crowd for NWO assistance. To the shock of everyone, that never came. The commentary booth wondered if this was a new direction for the NWO, letting them prove who's worthy, but then they all decided the NWO has no integrity about them to let someone prove themselves. Hall had one more resurgence and it looked like he was on his way to adding another title as he set up for the Outsider's Edge. Steiner was able to backdrop himself out of it, though, and hit his impressive Steiner Screwdriver for the victory at 16:26. Winner: Scott Steiner Rating: 87 After a final commercial break, Austin's music again hits and causes just as much excitement as it did earlier. Austin powers down toward the ring and gets in. He starts talking before his music even stops and says that there's been enough waiting around tonight. He knows Sting's here and he wants him in this ring, face to face. Austin says that Sting doesn't have to worry about any kind of attack, though. If Austin wanted to attack Sting, he'll do it to his face, unlike the NWO. He tells Sting to get out to this ring because the two need to settle a few things. Screams of an excited crowd erupt shortly afterwards. The camera zooms out slightly to see a figure dropping from high above the arena. The commentary booth is at a loss of words as Sting drops from the rafters and slows as he approaches the ring mat. Sting unhooks the cable and Austin and Sting lock eyes. Both men stand motionless and neither man is seen saying a word, they just intensely stare at one another, daring each other to make the first move. The tension begins to grow with each passing second while the crowd look from one man to the other. It seems like an eternity passes before one of he men finally move. Sting's the first as he slowly steps forward toward Steve Austin. Austin continues to look on intensely as Sting closes the gap. Sting stops just before the two are nose to nose and the thought that the tension couldn't get any higher before has now become a reality. The atmosphere is thick while it seems the pot could boil over at any second, but the two men just continue to stare at one another. From Sting's coat sleeve, a black baseball bat begins to emerge. Sting holds the bat at the end, slightly tapping it against the side of his leg almost like he's pondering his next move. Sting then begins to take a slow walk around Austin while he stands in the same spot. The entire short distance around, Sting continues to stare at Austin but Austin doesn't follow Sting's path. Sting comes back around to face Austin but has given himself a bit more distance between the two. Sting extends his arm with the bat to Austin's chest. There wasn't much reaction from Austin who just continues to stand, burning holes through Sting but still not saying a word. The commentary team isn't even saying anything so we're left with just the visual and the growing roar from the crowd as the tension continues to rise. Sting then moves the bat just up from Austin's chest to just under his chin. Sting's almost daring Austin to move so he can hit him with the bat, but Austin stands defiant, not backing down. Sting cocks his head just slightly before removing the bat from under Austin's chin and then flips the bat so he grabs the barrel and presents the handle to Austin. Austin is the one this time to just slightly cock his head to the side before ever so slowly reaching his hand up to grab the offered bat. He takes it and Sting releases his grip on it and the two stand for just a few seconds, staring at each other again. Sting then extends both arms out to his side before turning his back to Austin, seemingly giving him a free shot on the Stinger. Austin just stands, continuing to stare at Sting and never even raising his arm up with the bat. After Sting stands for several seconds, arms extended and looking up and nothing happening, he looks over his shoulder at Austin. He see's that Austin is still in the same spot holding the bat and drops his arms. Sting then goes straight to exiting the ring and walking up the aisle, not ever looking back at Austin. Nitro fades to black with the camera in front of Sting so we get a final shot of Sting's face with Austin left standing in the background holding the bat. Rating: 100 Final Show Rating: 90

Week 2, May 1997 LIVE from The Pit - Albuquerque, NM Attendance: 18,000 (SELLOUT!) - Nitro kicks this week off with all of the usual fanfare. The pyro display is on point, followed by a panned shot of the jam-packed arena. Jim Ross says we're live this week from Albuquerque and WCW shows are red hot as we approach the summer. Fans have been selling out arena after arena as of late and the action here in WCW couldn't get any better! As the cameras go to the announce booth where the introductions are made, JR tells everyone that the action has even spilled over to WCW Saturday Night, as this past weekend's show had a lot of stuff happen. Brian Pillman spoke about being kicked out of the NWO saying he's alone and that's how he likes things, going as far as saying Ric Flair will get the loose cannon. Dean Malenko also challenged Scott Steiner for the United States title. Steiner interrupted and said he'd be more than happy to take Francine but doesn't think much of Malenko. The Blue Bloods made a pitch to Lance Storm to join their group that was turned down, and Alex Wright must have case of amnesia because he wants to challenge again for the TV title. - Things are sure to heat up much more quickly tonight as cameras cut to the backstage area as Steve Austin arrives. He heads into the arena pulling his bag behind him while he stares into the camera and says he's not afraid of anyone and if the NWO wants a fight on their hands, he's easy to find. Rating: 100 Earl Robert Eaton vs Rick Martel vs Rick Martel was a surprising arrival here tonight on Nitro as Jim Ross says he just signed a WCW contract earlier this week. The fans started out pretty unsure how to take Martel since he hasn't been seen in the US for quite some time. He easily was able to fall into the babyface roll against Earl Robert. The announcers also touched on their attempted recruitment of Lance Storm this past weekend on Saturday Night. This was a technical, if not exciting matchup that you'd expect from two veterans. They did a good job of getting the crowd ready for more to come without over-doing things. Martel picked up the Submission win at 9:53 with the Boston Crab. Heenan remarked that he can see Martel easily challenging for the TV or US titles. Winner: Rick Martel Rating: 65 Wrath vs Diamond Dallas Page vs Wrath entered the match to another solid reaction from the fans. JR commented that despite being aggressive and brutal in his matches, the crowd has seemed to really take to the big man. He was also able to hold his own against DDP, who enters this match riding a wave of momentum. The crowd had no problem eating up anything DDP did but it was a tough task as Wrath began hitting him with his powerful offense. DDP soon found himself at the mercy of Wrath, who took control of the match and began hitting one power move after the other. With the crowd fully behind him, DDP slowly began turning the tides after breaking out of a bearhug. Just as the favor began shifting toward DDP, Randy Savage interrupted things. DDP was oblivious to Savage's presence as he continued mounting his comeback. DDP hit a flapjack and signaled for the Diamond Cutter just as the Macho Man entered the ring. As DDP got up to his feet, Savage clubbed him from behind. Seeing the attack, the referee had no choice but to call for the bell at 9:43. Despite the bell ringing, Savage continued the attack on DDP as JR told everyone that Nitro had to take a commercial break! Winner by DQ: Diamond Dallas Page Rating: 80 Nitro returns from commercial to find Mean Gene Okerlund backstage with the Television champion Lord Steven Regal. Mean Gene starts things off saying that Alex Wright again requested a TV title opportunity against Regal at Slamboree. Regal did his usual scoff at the remark and asked why he would give Alex Wright a shot at his title when he just beat him at Spring Stampede? Regal said that Wright needs to go back to Germany and learn how to wrestle if he ever wants a title shot against him ever again. Instead, Regal said he's going to defend his title at Slamboree against a skilled worker, one that's much more worthy of a title opportunity than Alex Wright. He's going to give some new life into the TV title by defending it against fresh opponents, ones who might not otherwise be given opportunities. Yes, Regal thinks his time will be much better spent at Slamboree as he takes on.... Fit Finlay! Rating: 97 Fit Finlay vs Scott Norton vs Finlay must have been watching the prior interview because he entered this match with a newfound energy. This was a surprisingly hard hitting and physical match as Finlay was showing he wasn't afraid of Norton's no-nonsense, tough offense. In fact, Finlay might have taken Norton off guard as he proved he can give as good as he gets. This resulted in a match that was pretty well-received by the New Mexico fans. Finlay shocked everyone by getting the win at 9:21 but got the win with a Powerslam, as Norton was way to big to be able to get him up for the Tombstone. Winner: Fit Finlay Rating: 75 El Hijo Del Santo vs Hugh Morrus vs Unfortunately for those in the arena, and probably those watching at home, this matchup was not quite the kind that fans were too eager to see. It's been pretty apparent that WCW administrators have been trying to get Santo some positive exposure in the North American market but he just isn't catching on with the crowd. It probably doesn't help that his opponents like Hugh Morrus don't generally have much going on for them, either. It wasn't anything too spectacular, though it was much better than the last performance they had together. Morrus picked up the win at 8:27 with his No Laughing Matter moonsault. Winner: Hugh Morrus Rating: 58 The crowd suddenly comes much more to life as Steve Austin's music hits the speakers and he comes walking out and heading straight to the ring. Austin takes the time to pose on each corner rope before getting a microphone and getting down to business. Austin says that he's not going to stand out here and do a 15 minute promo and he's never been long-winded, so he'll just cut to the chase. Austin says he's got Hogan's number and it's only a matter of time before the world title is his but he knows Hogan's going to try to dodge him as much as possible. Austin says he'll take on the NWO each and every week all by himself until he gets his hands on Hogan one more time. He calls out the entire group to face him and again says he's not scared of anyone. Austin stands, awaiting a response from the NWO but one never comes. He waits a moment before again calling out the NWO and says he knows they all arrived earlier because he saw their limo in the back. Again, there's no response from the NWO and Austin says they must have finally wizened up a bit or they're all just huddled in their locker room with their tails tucked between their legs. He again gives a few moments of pause to look toward the stage, but now there's some movement from the crowd... What's become known as the NWO henchmen, Paul Levesque and Buff Bagwell are seen coming through the crowd and jumping the barrier. The two slide in the ring behind Austin who's still looking to the stage. They approach Austin as the crowd begins to rumble and spin him around, though Austin must have been expecting this as he immediately begins throwing kicks and punches. The distraction was just enough to allow the rest of the NWO to come out from the backstage area and get to the ring. Hogan, as usual, hung back just enough to allow Hall, Nash, and Savage to get in the ring first and commence the beat-down. The world champion entered the ring, supremely confident as Austin began to succumb to the numbers advantage. Bagwell and Levesque held up Austin which allowed Hall to hit a few well placed punches followed by Nash with a big boot. Austin fell to the mat as they then put him in position to allow Hogan to hit a series of leg drops. The camera cuts away from the attack to Sting standing high atop the arena in the rafters. He looks down at the on-going attack as the announce booth ponders why Sting isn't helping Austin out this time. It took Bobby Heenan to remind both Dusty and JR that last week Austin said he didn't want any help from Sting after he came to his defense at Spring Stampede. It looks as though Sting is just fine with Austin's demand as he continues to watch the attack. By now the NWO have gotten out their spray cans and begin to brand Austin with "NWO" on his back. They're putting the final touches on their graffiti as Nitro fades to another commercial break. Rating: 100 Billy Kidman vs Brian Pillman vs Nitro resumes with a match following commercial and Brian Pillman came out determined to not allow last week's events to derail his momentum. He went straight after Kidman as soon as the bell rang and what followed was a fast paced encounter with several high flying moves. Pillman was on top of his game tonight as he took time to taunt out to the crowd after firmly having the match in control. He never gave Kidman an opportunity to mount any kind of meaningful offense and put the match away at 7:26 with an Air Pillman. Winner: Brian Pillman Rating: 70 - Mean Gene is backstage all by himself as he takes a moment to say he thinks there's more to the story between Steve Austin and Sting and that he's going to do some more digging. He also says the NWO takes advantage of every opportunity they can to play the numbers game. Either way, he's going to get to the bottom of it and report his findings to his Hotline Report. Rating: 95 Next up, we're given a short replay of events this weekend on Saturday Night where Dean Malenko requested a US title shot against Scott Steiner. Steiner interrupts and says he'll take Francine but Dean's a loser. It appears his challenge was brushed off. Back live on Nitro, we see Francine walking backstage and she eventually comes to a stop when confronted by Scott Steiner. Steiner continues to close the gap while Francine backsteps. She continues to retreat until she's stopped by the wall behind her. Steiner gets in close and says he doesn't have to beat Malenko up for her to have an excuse to be with a real man. He says she's tried to make Dean a winner but she needs to face the facts, Malenko will always be a loser that can't get the job done. Steiner says he's the complete opposite. He's a winner that gets the job done......Every time. Francine eventually ducks under Steiner's arm to walk off. Rating: 85 Faces of Fear vs Mike Barton & Brad Armstrong vs The latest victims to be fed to the Faces of Fear are Barton and Armstrong, unless, of course, they could shock the world and pull an upset over one of the most feared tag teams of all time. No? Ok....The Barbarian had a very good performance while Meng surpassed all others at an impressive 81/100 rating. As tough as Barton and Armstrong are, they were never a match for the two beasts. Meng got the win at 8:15 with the Tongan Death Grip on Armstrong. Winners: Faces of Fear Rating: 68 Booker T vs Randy Savage vs Tonight's main event was refreshing to see it involve Booker T, who's fresh off an impressive performance this past Saturday Night where he challenged for the TV title. The result of that match was a time limit draw, so Booker's sure to have a rematch on the horizon. His high-profile matches continued tonight as he takes on one of the most popular names in all of wrestling. It was clear from the bell that Savage wasn't going to make it an easy night of work for Booker T. While the two traded offense, the commentators also mentioned how Harlem Heat had difficulty against the Outsiders at Spring Stampede, with the end result of them losing their titles. A rematch has been confirmed for Slamboree, but it's clear the brothers from Harlem have to work better as a team if they want to reclaim their gold. In this match though, a tag team title shot seemed to be the furthest from Booker's mind as he looked to possibly further his singles career. He gave the Macho Man a tough time and made it clear from his own standpoint that he wasn't going to make things easy for Savage. Later in the match, Booker was on fire. He had Savage reeling and put him down with a sidewalk slam before breakdancing back to his feet. He stood, poised and ready to strike, looking to hit a sidekick after Savage got to his feet. As he stood waiting though, there was an interruption. Scott Hall made his way down to ringside and got on the apron, distracting Booker away from his opponent. Booker rushed over and hit Hall off the apron, but the distraction was enough. Savage got to his feet and just as Booker turned back, Savage clocked him with a foreign object he pulled out of his tights. Booker crashed to the mat and Savage ascended to the top rope where he hit his Flying Elbow at 15:08 for the win. Winner: Randy Savage Rating: 81 The bell's rung and the match is over but Kevin Nash has now gotten to ringside. He checks on Hall, who's picking himself up off the floor and they both get in the ring. Hall, Nash, and Savage look to strike as Booker's still laid out on the mat but the crowd erupts in cheers and screams as someone's come from the back. Luger rushes out and sprints down the aisle with a chair in his hand. As Luger slides in the ring, the NWO members see the weapon he's carrying and it gives them reason enough to bail from the ring. Just as Luger gets to his feet, they all hit the floor and regroup in the aisle. Luger dares them to enter the ring as he stands with the chair, cocked and ready to swing, before bending down and checking on Booker, who's now sitting up. Nitro fades to a close as Luger continues to dare the NWO members to get in the ring as they retreat up toward the stage. Rating: 84 Final Show Rating: 86

'The Heartbreak Kid' Shawn Michaels vs. A WCW Legend Comments/Guesses On Who The WCW Legend Is: Based on the way your diary's going? Ron Simmons WCW World Heavyweight Title Number One Contender's Tournament, Semifinals 'The Nature Boy' Ric Flair vs. 'Iron' Mike Rotunda Comments: Non-Title Match The Giant vs. Chris Kanyon Comments: Christian Cage and 'Living On The Edge' Sexton Hardcastle vs. Steiner Brothers Comments: WCW World Heavyweight Title Number One Contender's Tournament, Semifinals 'Flyin' Brian Pillman vs. 'The Macho Man' Randy Savage Comments: Comments About The Diary In General: Just getting caught up on your reset. It's good you made your own title because mine definitely isn't any better than yours. I've slacked off quite a bit as well and think my dynasty has been pretty lackluster lately. I totally agree with you about comments and readers getting engaged. It's tough to stay motivated when you're replying to your own posts and it doesn't seem like there's interest from the board. Holy crap do you have a diverse roster this time around. WCW is stuck between moving into the modern era and staying in the classic JCP era. I could see these two "divisions" eventually clashing with one another. Could be an interesting alternative. You've also got some odd pairings that leave a ton of possibilities. Piper and Michaels, Warrior, Valentine in the Horsemen, then teams like Harlem Heat and the Road Warriors potentially battling other teams like the Varsity Club and Rock n Roll express. You've definitely made this your own and are doing your own thing while still having things similar to how it went in real life.

Week 1, May 1997 LIVE from the Birmingham-Jefferson Arena - Birmingham, AL Attendance: 17,000 (SELLOUT!) - The crowd is exited and rowdy as WCW is fresh off of last night's Spring Stampede where, Jim Ross tells us, Steve Austin was a cat's hair length away from dethroning Hollywood Hogan of the WCW world heavyweight title, if not for the NWO. A recap of Spring Stampede is done at the announce booth while still photo's are shown on screen for the viewing fans. The Outsiders managed to reclaim the WCW tag team titles but they failed on their objective to reclaim the United States title from Scott Steiner, as he defeated Brian Pillman. They didn't quite get through the entire recap before being interrupted by the NWO's music blaring through the arena speakers. - - The entire NWO, minus Bischoff and the bogus Sting, come out in full force, led by the world champion. The group marches to the ring where Hogan wastes no time getting a microphone and demanding the music be cut off. - Hogan: Last night, I proved to the world that Steve Austin is nothing but a pathetic fraud who can't cut the mustard! I said I was going to beat him from one end of the ring to the other, and I did! I did it all by myself, and if Steve Austin has one ounce of self respect for himself, he won't show his face around here, and he damned sure won't go after me or my world title again, dude! Now it's time to get down to some NWO business! Last night, I got the job done and defended my world title! The Outsiders reclaimed what's rightfully theirs, the tag team titles, from those two thieves known as Harlem Heat! They proved to the world that those two jabroni's were nothing but placeholders for those belts until big Scott Hall was ready to come back! They proved that the Outsiders are going to remain lightyears ahead of any other tag team in WCW! So on paper, the NWO had a pretty good night! But the NWO doesn't pay attention to what's on paper, the NWO pays attention to results! Two outta three just doesn't cut it, dude, and there's one guy who DIDN'T get the job done last night, and that man is you, BRIAN PILLMAN! Now before you start standing here and giving excuses, I'm gonna lay it out right here. Pillman, simply put, you dropped the ball, brother. Now, strike one, that's something the NWO can overlook. Strike two, you got people taking notice, and I can sure as hell promise you that strike three is gonna produce some action, dude! If you want to have a spot in the NWO, then you need to produce results! Scott Steiner has had your number time and time again and last night, you couldn't bring the US title back where it belongs, in the NWO! So Pillman! Tonight is your last chance, my man!! It's the last time you're going to be able to drop the ball in the NWO! We're gonna give you one final chance to prove your worth your spot in the NWO. Tonight, you're going to be in a wrestling match, and if you win that match, you'll prove to all of us that you still belong! So Pillman, we're giving you plenty of time to get ready, so I suggest you get to the back and prepare, because tonight in the main event, you're gonna face these two, the foundation of the NWO, and the new tag team champions, The Outsiders in a handicap match! Rating: 100 The Headbangers vs Hostile Intent vs The Headbangers were able to match up with someone just as unorthodox as them; Perry Saturn. Hostile Intent actually didn't have much problem working over the Headbangers in this one and they worked very fluidly as a team together. It's been clear in the last few weeks that they've really been coming together as a team and making people start to take notice. Roma got the pin fall victory in 8:12 after hitting a Flying Body Splash. Winners: Hostile Intent Rating: 62 Eddie Guerrero vs Lance Storm vs This match had all of the speed and high-flying that you would expect from these two. Eddie was, as always, completely on top of his game and had the crowd in the palm of his hand. Storm tried to stay squeaky clean in this match but every time he turned around, Eddie was doing something sinister. Eddie would take advantage of the referee glancing away for a second to either gouge the eyes of Lance Storm or hit a low blow. Despite being much less popular than his opponent, Lance Storm got in a surprisingly large amount of offense. Just when it looked like Eddie was firmly in control, Storm would fight his way back, garnering a large amount of support from the crowd by match's end. Eddie hit the Frog Splash for the victory at 15:26. Winner: Eddie Guerrero Rating: 89 - Mean Gene could very well have himself a busy night tonight. Nitro returns from a commercial break to see the world's most beloved interviewer standing in the center of the ring, welcoming everyone back to Monday Nitro. Mean Gene says his guest tonight is a man who needs no introduction. His guest had a perfect opportunity to take the world heavyweight title back to WCW as he faced off against champion Hollywood Hogan. In no surprise to anyone, the NWO came to his rescue and his endeavor came up just a bit short. His guest is none other than Stone Cold Steve Austin! - Austin: Mean Gene, I'm gonna make tonight's work real easy for you, in fact, just stand there, hold your little microphone, and let Stone Cold talk and don't think about interrupting me because I've got a hell of a lot to say tonight! Everybody knows that you're the greatest interviewer in the world and normally I'd let you ask me some questions, but tonight ain't one of those nights! The fact of the matter is, everybody in the entire world saw me beat the ever living hell out of Hollywood Hogan last night at Spring Stampede! Another fact is that if it weren't for that group of crybabies he goes everywhere with, not only would I have won that match, but you'd also be staring at the world title in my hands right now! And last but not least, Mean Gene, if Hollywood Hogan and the NWO think things are finished between them and Stone Cold Steve Austin, they're either delusional or stupid and last I checked, ain't not one of em' claiming to be seeing things! Hollywood Hogan, you're just about THEE dumbest son of a bitch if you think you can get rid of Stone Cold that easy! You better strike out a long section in your little black book, son, cause Stone Cold's coming after you and your little world title and you won't have one bit of time to make any more of your straight to VHS movies! Now Mean Gene, I have a feeling that I know what else you'd ask me about; You'd say "Last night, Stone Cold, Sting came out to help you while the NWO attacked you while out-numbered..." Well Mean Gene, what I'd have to say about that is, I never asked for Sting's help or anyone else's help! I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself and I never wanted any help from Sting! All he's done the last several months is brood around and throw a tantrum like a baby! Maybe what Sting should've been doing this entire time was wiping away those tears and putting up a fight if he was so hurt by everything! Maybe, just maybe, Gene, if he'd done that, then Stone Cold wouldn't have had to come to the defense of WCW and I could've just focused on doing what I want to do, winning titles! So Sting, the next time you get a wild hair up your ass and think to come and help Stone Cold, you can sit back, crack open a cold beer, and remember that I don't want your help!! And Gene, that's the bottom line! Rating: 100 Alex Wright vs Lynx vs All is Wright in the world as Das Wunderkind and Saturday Wright Fever continue! His opponent is known on the Mexican circuit as Violencia and he looks to expand his horizons to the US. He's an extremely talented worker but was definitely out-sized by Wright. It was a good match and kept the fans engaged mostly due to Alex Wright and his taunting and dancing. Wright won easily at 7:55 with a German Suplex. Winner: Alex Wright Rating: 56 Harlem Heat are backstage for what's presumed to be a pre-recorded promo. It's clear the two brothers are not happy about losing their tag team titles the night before to the Outsiders. Booker says that he and Stevie have always had to fight for everything they have and were never given anything. They've had much tougher fights and facing the Outsiders is nothing like fighting for survival on the streets of Harlem. Booker says that it's only a matter of time before the best tag team in wrestling gets their titles back and after that, they may not even stop there. Booker says that Hollywood Hogan himself better look out, because after they take back their tag titles, they want the gold, sucka. Hulk Hogan, they coming for you, SUCKA! Stevie Ray says that a couple of fruit-booty queens like the Outsiders better enjoy their tainted victory while they can, because the brothers from Harlem are tough, mean, and unforgiving! Rating: 82 Hugh Morrus vs Diamond Dallas Page vs DDP is coming fresh off his huge win last night against the Macho Man and the momentum couldn't have been any more clear. DDP was on fire tonight and the crowd were firmly behind him. This caused a massive uphill climb for Hugh Morrus as DDP repeatedly fed off of the crowd's support. He tried his best but it was clear tonight was DDP's night, still riding on a huge wave of momentum. DDP won at 9:55 to a Diamond Cutter that the crowd went wild over. Winner: DDP Rating: 79 - Following a commercial break, Nitro returns to another backstage promo. The United States champion Scott Steiner stands ready for his cue, the US belt slung over his shoulder as he gives a slight smirk. Steiner says that Brian Pillman once again couldn't get the job done last night and it looks like he now has to pay the consequences for it. Steiner's going to enjoy propping his feet up and sitting back with some popcorn to watch the beatdown on him. He also says that he hopes last night woke Pillman up to the fact that things are now over between the two of them and Steiner's looking forward while Pillman will have to do nothing but constantly look behind him. Rating: 70 Dean Malenko vs Lex Luger vs The announce booth mentioned how Lex Luger appears newly rejuvenated in this match as last night's match against the NWO's Paul Levesque looked to finally put an end to that chapter with the NWO. They also wondered if Lex Luger would be the next in the long line to go after Hollywood Hogan and the world title. First though, he'd have to get through Dean Malenko. Though Malenko is much smaller than Luger, it was a pretty even matchup. Luger used his strength while Malenko used his technical prowess and speed. It was a good showing from Dean, but Luger was too much. The end of the match came at 9:46 after Malenko submitted to the Torture Rack. Winner: Lex Luger Rating: 80 - As things were getting cleaned up in the ring, Mean Gene stood at the base of the ramp to bring out his next guest for an interview, one who might have been paying attention to this last match. The Television Champion Lord Steven Regal is introduced and he walks out to meet Mean Gene. Regal disgustingly looks toward the ring as Malenko is picking himself up off the mat. Mean Gene says that Regal's fresh off his title defense last night against Alex Wright and says that there are several competitors going after him and his title, namely Dean Malenko. Regal scoffs at the question, saying he's already beaten Fit Finlay, Alex Wright, and that man Dean Malenko. He's so bored of having no competition, he's half tempted to go back to England and defend his title where real wrestlers are. Regal thinks there might be someone in his home country that could put up half of a challenge. Regal says he's got nothing left to prove to those three "blokes" and that his next defense will be against some other challenger because he's getting bored. - Rating: 92 - Nitro returned from its final commercial break and Mean Gene is once again backstage but not in the formal interview area. He's apparently found Ric Flair backstage for an impromptu interview. Flair has a million dollar smile flashed across his face and Mean Gene wonders why he's so happy. Flair says he's having an amazing night, watching Brian Pillman's world come crashing down around him. Pillman has caused tons of heartache for Flair and the Horsemen and now the tables are turned, seeing Brian Pillman all alone and helpless. Flair says he's going to love watching Pillman get destroyed so much that he might even record it. Flair walks off as it looks like we might be seeing the beginnings of a new feud and Flair possibly finally getting revenge on Pillman for fracturing the Horsemen. - Rating: 100 The Outsiders vs Brian Pillman vs The Outsiders made their way out first with their newly won titles. They were all fun and games the entire way to the ring. Next out was Brian Pillman, who was anything but fun and games, with the stakes so high in this match. JR reminds everyone that this is a must win for Pillman, per the NWO, or else he's seemingly out of the group. Bobby's just waiting on some kind of typical NWO swerve. It doesn't appear so, at least at the start of the match, as the bell rings and Scott Hall starts things off. Pillman was very timid and didn't want to get caught up in Hall's ploys to lure him in. He also worked hard to stay out of the Outsider's corner as each time they tried to pull him in, he used his quickness to escape. It was a tough battle for Pillman because not only was it a handicap match, he didn't even have the fans on his side despite the odds clearly stacked against him. The longer the match went on, the more dreadful it looked for Pillman. Taking on one of these men is a task itself but taking on the both of them and being the tag team champions made it colossal. After some back and forth, Hall floored Pillman with a clothesline before tagging in the big man. Nash took his time to approach his downed opponent and they were confident that Pillman was finished after putting him through a beating. Nash leaned down to grab him but Pillman shocked him and everyone in the crowd as he rolled him up in a small package to get the near fall. This seemed to wake Nash up like a slap in the face as his demeanor quickly changed to one of aggression. Nash clubbed Pillman and threw him back into the corner where he punished him with a series of knee strikes and back elbows. Pillman stumbled out of the corner and dropped to the mat but Nash wasn't finished. He hit a huge sidewalk slam before lowering the straps on his singlet. Nash signaled the end as he put Pillman in position and then hit a Jackknife. He looked at Scott Hall who didn't think that was enough and called for one more. Nash obliged and hit another devastating Jackknife on Pillman before making the cover by way of putting a boot on Pillman. The match was over at 12:03. Winners: The Outsiders Rating: 80 - Everyone wonders what's to happen next as the rest of the NWO make their way out from the back. They join the rest of them in the ring and look at Brian Pillman, who's still laid out on the mat. Hogan and company look at Pillman who's now beginning to stir back to life as he directs Levesque and Bagwell to lift him up. They do and Hogan leans in, saying something to Pillman and pats him on the shoulder. It looks like the fences have been mended, JR says as the NWO begin to all tell Pillman that he "passed" the test. Hogan high fives a couple other members of the NWO before abruptly turning back toward Pillman and hits him with a huge slap across his face. Not a second later, Randy Savage jumps Pillman as the beat down commenced. The NWO jump him like a pack of wolves as Hogan grabs a microphone, telling Pillman he's nothing without the NWO and that the NWO now trimmed the first layer of fat that's been slowing them down. He says Pillman couldn't get the job done so now he's out on the streets, all alone like the loser he is. Nitro fades off the air as the attack on Pillman continues. - Rating: 90 Final Show Rating: 86

Week 4, April 1997 LIVE from the Orange Bowl - Miami, FL Attendance: 74,608 We're introduced to this event by a great looking shot high above the open-roofed stadium in Miami. Once the overhead shot is through, we're brought to the announce booth where Jim Ross, Bobby Heenan, and Tony Schiavone welcome everyone. Excitement is in the air as there are a lot of key matchups tonight, JR tells us. The stakes couldn't be any higher than for the main event where Steve Austin will attempt to dethrone reigning world champion Hollywood Hogan. Schiavone tells everyone that tonight marks the in-ring return of Scott Hall, who we haven't seen compete since last October. There's all kinds of exciting matchups tonight and WCW isn't going to waste any time in starting them because we go to the ring right now! Television Title: Alex Wright vs Lord Steven Regal (c) vs This was a last minute challenge laid out by Das Wunderkind in his attempt to be crowned not only Television champion, but the best wrestler to come out of Europe. Regal, on the other hand, was happy to have a challenger to his title not named Fit Finlay or Dean Malenko. The match began with plenty of stall tactics from both wrestlers but the European style took over soon after. What resulted was a series of quick reversals and lots of mat-based wrestling before both men got to their feet and exchanged several European uppercuts. It quickly changed to each man trying to one-up on who had the most impactful uppercuts, which Regal eventually won. The crowd were receptive to the match, thanks in large part to the charisma from both competitors, but they didn't really know who to support. Regal ended up coming out as the lesser of two evils though as Alex Wright worked extra-hard to get negative feedback from them. Alex Wright was eventually in a great position to hit his top rope finish - The Missile Dropkick, but Regal was able to avoid it, causing Wright to crash hard to the mat. Regal saw the opening and quickly locked in the Regal Stretch for the submission win at 11:12. Winner: Lord Steven Regal Rating: 78 Lex Luger vs Paul Levesque vs The action doesn't break as we go straight to the next match. Luger was in no mood for games, which was plainly obvious by the look on his face. As soon as Levesque got in the ring, Luger attacked and didn't let up. The crowd became electric as the Total Package continued his assault and got even louder when the referee attempted to pull him off, only to get shoved back. It wasn't long before Levesque was begging Luger to back off, which only seemed to fuel his desire to beat him even more. The crowd loved every bit of it as in between beatings and physical offense, Levesque looked for help to arrive from the back; help that never came. After a series of clotheslines and a flying forearm, Luger motioned out to the crowd that it was time for the Torture Rack. He lifted him up and locked in the move, securing the submission win at 9:58. Winner: Lex Luger Rating: 77 United States Title: Brian Pillman vs Scott Steiner (c) vs After a brief reset and promotional add for where Nitro will be visiting in the next few weeks, WCW rolls right on with Spring Stampede with the next match. This one was much more competitive and the crowd even louder. It probably should have been the co-main event but the crowd was still heavily invested. Scott Steiner had the crowd firmly behind him and Pillman did his best to avoid Steiner's powerful offense and control the pace of the match. Pillman utilized his speed and high-flying offense to stay out of Steiner's grasp throughout much of the match but he got caught a few times. One of those attempts, Pillman jumped off the top rope, which looked like he was attempting an Air Pillman, but Steiner caught him and pressed him high over his head. Steiner even pressed him several times before tossing him to the mat. To the delight of the crowd, Steiner continued the attack even though Pillman begged and pleaded for a timeout. In much the same turn of events from the last match, when Pillman realized he was in huge trouble, he looked to the stage entrance for help to arrive, though it never did. A few overhead belly to belly suplexes followed by a Steiner Screwdriver resulted in a solid title defense by Scott Steiner. The match ended by pinfall at 14:44. Winner: Scott Steiner Rating: 98 Tag Team Titles: The Outsiders vs Harlem Heat (c) vs At the risk of crowd burnout, Spring Stampede continues on with the 3rd consecutive match and another highly anticipated bout. The questions about Scott Hall being rusty were put to bed early as he started things off against Stevie Ray. Hall and Nash worked flawlessly together and isolated Ray from his corner, leaving Booker nothing to do but watch on. After wearing him down for some time, Hall and Nash then began toying with him. Hall would slap Stevie's head several times and the pair also switched in and out several times behind the referee's back when Booker was trying to get the referee to pay attention to the cheating that was going on. From the looks of things, the NWO's poor night was going to change in this match. That is, until Booker got the hot tag in. Booker had the Outsiders reeling quickly, exploding in the ring and hitting them back and forth. The crowd was going crazy as Booker cleaned house and toppled to the outside as he fought Scott Hall. Things were hectic as Stevie Ray then began fighting with Kevin Nash inside the ring. The referee was trying to restore order and get Hall and Booker back in the ring when his focus changed to Nash and Stevie Ray. Hall was able to slow Booker down by throwing him into the ring post and he re-entered the ring to help out Nash. The two double teamed Stevie Ray and Nash was about to help Hall with the Outsider's Edge on Stevie when Booker got back in the ring. A brief fight in the ring resulted in Booker again getting toppled to the outside and Nash hit the Jackknife on Stevie Ray. Scott Hall made the cover but the referee didn't realize that Booker, not Stevie Ray, was the legal man. He made the pinfall count at 11:17 and awarded the titles to the Outsiders! Winners and NEW Champions: The Outsiders Rating: 72 We get our first proper break in the action with a backstage promo by the Faces of Fear. Jimmy Hart says that the Faces of Fear are, without a doubt, the toughest team in WCW and will prove it tonight against Hostile Intent. He then says that they're getting their tag team titles back, whatever the cost, sooner rather than later. Rating: 68 Randy Savage vs Diamond Dallas Page vs Grudge match time and things have gotten extremely personal between these two in the last several weeks. The match began as Savage proved to have the veteran advantage, easily taking control and bringing the match to his pace. Savage used hard hitting moves and also blatant illegal moves to quickly wear down DDP. Savage didn't care what the rules were in the match and nearly dared the referee to disqualify him. When he sufficiently beat DDP inside the ring, he tossed him outside and began working on him then. He threw DDP into the steps, ring post, choked him with TV cables, and used the barricade all to his advantage. He tossed him back in the ring and DDP wearily got to his feet and began swinging wildly in the hopes of hitting Savage but he easily dodged the attempts. He knocked DDP to the mat and then began taunting him for several minutes before finally leaning in to pick DDP up. In a twist of surprise, DDP nearly got the win with a quick inside roll-up but Savage was able to kick out at the last second. Furious, the Macho Man began a heavy attack again that left DDP reeling once again. This beating didn't last as long though because DDP was able to slowly fight his way back that only got the crowd more and more behind him. Just as the Macho Man was the one now reeling, DDP bounced off the ropes to hit a clothesline, only for Savage to duck under it. When DDP turned around, he was met with a signature Macho Man punch to the face and then Savage kicked him for a low blow. With the opening, Savage climbed to the top rope to hit his Flying Elbow. He leapt off and crashed down hard on DDP and the referee was right there for the pin, but Savage didn't make the pin! To dish out more punishment, Savage slowly made his way back to the corner and again climbed the ropes for another Flying Elbow. As he got to the top and taunted the crowd, DDP began to stir and get out of position. Savage hopped down and made his way back to DDP and brought him to his feet. Savage lifted DDP for a body slam but Page slipped behind him. Savage turned around just as the crowd were all getting to their feet and DDP hit the Diamond Cutter! The crowd exploded as the two dropped to the mat and DDP slowly moved to make the pin. The referee counted and the match was over at 10:12! Winner: Diamond Dallas Page Rating: 82 Wrath vs El Hijo Del Santo vs There was no buildup to this match and Santo really didn't have an opportunity for any offense. Wrath gave a pretty solid performance and the crowd were hyped to see the Meltdown, which they did, which also ended the match at 6:57. Winner: Wrath Rating: 70 Faces of Fear vs Hostile Intent vs A longer promotional break was in between the last match and this one. The self-proclaimed toughest team in WCW takes on the newest team in WCW who also looked to be set out to claim the "toughest" prize. Meng was seemingly on fire tonight and put in one hell of a performance. Bobby Heenan gave the opinion that Paul Roma is holding the very talented Saturn back from greener pastures. He also said if he was able to go back to managing, Saturn was a guy he would take under his wing and go right to the top! As in their similar encounter at last month's event, it was extremely difficult for the referee to try and maintain any sense of order in this match. The match broke down several times and there were plenty of times when two men would be fighting on the floor and another two inside the ring. After one instance of all 4 men fighting on the floor, Saturn threw a chair in the ring. Unbeknownst to him, Meng also threw a chair in the ring. The two climbed in and grabbed their respective chairs, only to notice the other ready to attack. The referee warned both men but it was clear they weren't paying attention to the referee. Both men rushed forward and swung their chairs and both men connected. Saturn and Meng dropped to the mat and the referee disqualified both teams at 9:42. Winner: Double Disqualification Rating: 69 Eddie Guerrero vs Fit Finlay vs Finlay came out in this one with a new look, hoping the bleach blonde haircut and shaved mustache will result in better fortunes. The haircut might work but the mustache should've definitely remained. The match was a complete success, mostly attributed to the incredible performance by Eddie Guerrero. He had the crowd eating up everything he was doing and while Finlay had some good moments of his own, it was clear that Eddie overmatched him. Eddie got the pin at 10:03 with the Frogsplash. Winner: Eddie Guerrero Rating: 87 We weren't going to have a show without Mean Gene and his tuxedo! Gene's backstage with Steve Austin to hype up the main event, which is next. Austin was laser focused as Mean Gene did the intro. Austin said he's been playing the NWO games long enough and tonight it's time they start playing the Austin game, and that's where he beats anyone's ass who steps through the ropes. He doesn't expect a fair fight against Hollywood Hogan and actually encourages the entire NWO to come to the ring because he'll stomp a mudhole in whatever sorry piece of trash that decides to get in his way. Rating: 100 World Title: Steve Austin vs Hollywood Hogan (c) vs The stadium was completely electric for this epic event. Austin made his entry first and stared intently as Hollywood Hogan made his grand entrance. The introductions were made by Michael Buffer and Austin got an extremely loud reaction from the crowd. Austin was zoned in though and didn't even appear to hear the wild cheers from the crowd. Following the introduction for the World Champion, though, things took a turn. All the attention in the stadium, aside from Hollywood Hogan, turned to the stage entrance when the NWO music began playing. Austin looked as the entire group came strutting out and heading to ringside. Hogan stood in the ring, smiling and appearing extremely confident while his friends made their way to the ring. Bobby Heenan on commentary said that Austin just dared the entire NWO to come to the ring, and that's exactly what they're doing. Jim Ross said he wasn't surprised the NWO made an appearance, just that it was at the beginning since the group like to make their presence felt at the end of the match instead. He also reminded Bobby that invitation or not, the NWO was probably going to get involved anyway. The group got to the ring and surrounded it as the bell rang to start the match. Austin remained weary, looking as they all surrounded the ring but this cost him. Hogan rushed at the sound of the bell and attacked Austin who was distracted by the group on the outside. He took Austin around the ring as he attacked him with clubbing blows and scratching at his back. Hogan sent Austin into the ropes but Austin was too quick on the rebound for the champion and hit him with a Thesz Press, igniting the crowd into cheers as Austin rained down fists on Hogan. Buff Bagwell and Paul Levesque quickly jumped on the apron to get Austin's attention and get him off of Hogan, which worked. Like a man possessed, Austin went after Bagwell and Levesque but stopped short at the ropes as they dropped back to the floor. He knew going outside to follow them would've been a grave mistake as Tony Schiavone commented that this is the kind of stuff Austin will have to contend with all match long, urging the referee to remove the NWO from ringside. It didn't happen though and the distraction was long enough for Hogan to recover and regain control after a poke in Austin's eye. Hogan worked Austin in the corner and then sent him to the opposite side before rushing right behind him with a clothesline. He hit two more and then began working on Austin's leg. Hogan, happy with his work, casually dumped Austin through the middle rope and out to the floor. Hogan grabbed the referee by the shirt to distract him while the NWO went to work on Austin on the floor. The crowd began throwing trash as screams were heard, begging someone from WCW to come out to help Austin. Help didn't arrive though and the NWO, after their gang attack, tossed Austin back inside the ring for Hogan to continue to work over. Hogan went for a pin that only generated a 2 count but he went back to work on Austin. He dropped a couple of elbows on him before covering him again, but this time arrogantly laying his back across Austin as he kicked out at 1. Hogan continued to work over Austin for the next several minutes and never actually trying to win the match, though he would make pin attempts. After a belly to back suplex, Hogan said Austin was finished and taunted out to his NWO buddies that it was time for the Leg Drop. Hogan ran to the ropes and bounced off, jumping high in the air and crashing to the mat, but Austin moved out of the way! Hogan writhed in pain while Austin did his best to get up, though he was extremely slow due to the beating he's taken so far. The crowd got louder and louder, willing Austin to get to his feet, which he and Hogan did nearly at the same time. Hogan went for a punch but Austin blocked it, hitting his own, much to the crowd's delight. Hogan tried again and again his punch was blocked, allowing Austin to hit his own again. Hogan was now rocking and Austin was pushing the gas pedal ever more each time. The momentum shift was being felt all through the arena and the NWO took notice on the outside, doing their best to quiet the crowd. Austin began hitting consecutive punches, bringing Hogan back to the ropes. Austin whipped Hogan to the opposite side and on return, went for a wild clothesline but Hogan ducked under. Austin turned around and Hogan went to kick him in the stomach but Austin caught Hogan's foot. He flipped Hogan off and dropped his foot to the mat before kicking Hogan in the stomach and then hitting a Stunner!! The crowd was going insane as Hogan dropped but panic mode then set in for the NWO on the outside. Almost in unison, they all jumped on the apron before Austin could even make the cover. The referee rushed toward the ropes to prevent Pillman and Levesque from entering on his side, but there were three other sides with men jumping up. It was impossible to stop them all from getting in and Buff Bagwell, Kevin Nash, and Randy Savage found their way inside. Austin promptly met Bagwell with a Stunner but he wasn't so lucky against Nash and Savage. Savage clubbed him from behind and Nash wasted no time then hitting Austin with a Jackknife. The referee was sufficiently distracted and Savage and Nash made a quick escape. Hogan then hit a complimentary Leg Drop before pinning Austin at 15:53. Winner: Hollywood Hogan Rating: 97 The bell rang but the NWO, as usual, continued their assault. They were now all in the ring and Austin was being pummeled. The beating went on for a couple minutes before screams were heard from the crowd and someone finally came to the rescue. Sting comes out from the side of the stage entrance, quickly making his way toward the ring. The NWO is too busy beating on Austin to see and isn't noticed until he gets to ringside and begins climbing the steps. Sting quickly gets in the ring and is met by Levesque but Sting quickly strikes with a chop, doubling him over. Bagwell is next to rush at Sting but he's ready for him too, kicking him in the gut. Sting clubs down on the back of Bagwell for good measure before taking a baseball bat out from inside his coat. The rest of the NWO now see's Sting but isn't about to charge him due to his weapon. Sting decided to hit Levesque with the bat, for good measure, which sent him out of the ring. Savage was about to charge at Sting but Nash was quick to pull him back while Hall and Hogan continued their attacks on Austin. A quick moment later and Sting rushed the rest of the NWO in the ring. He met Savage first with a strike with his bat before moving on to hit Nash in his leg. Hall and Hogan then turned their focus to Sting but Hall was met with a shot from the bat. Hogan, naturally, didn't want any of it and bailed from the ring and the rest of the NWO followed suit. With the NWO retreating up the aisle, Sting checked on Austin who was beaten and down on the mat. Spring Stampede rolled the credits with Sting standing in the ring, once more running off the NWO. Rating: 100 Final Show Grade: 98

Thanks for the nod, @Old School Fan! I'm not sure I deserve to be on the list, seeing my production has greatly decreased in recent weeks. I hope everyone still gets enjoyment out of the shows though!

WCW Hotline: SPECIAL REPORT Hello ladies and gentlemen, I'm Mean Gene Okerlund bringing you this week's WCW Hotline! This week's edition is a Special Report in preparation for Spring Stampede from the Orange Bowl in Miami, Florida! This past week's Monday Nitro scored the highest rating yet with a 4.99 on TNT! The WWF with their Monday Night Raw program didn't stand a chance with a 3.81. Lex Luger just extended his contract with WCW this week, so he will be seen on WCW programming for the foreseeable future! The World Wrestling Federation held their In Your House PPV this week, headlined with Bret Hart successfully defending the world championship against Psycho Sid. No titles changed hands at this event. We wish Big Van Vader well as he was recently injured. He reportedly suffered an unknown type of fracture and will be out of action for the next 6 months. Now on to the Spring Stampede Preview!!!! World Title: Steve Austin vs Hollywood Hogan (c) Eddie Guerrero vs Fit Finlay Faces of Fear vs Hostile Intent Wrath vs El Hijo Del Santo Randy Savage vs Diamond Dallas Page Tag Team Titles: The Outsiders vs Harlem Heat (c) United States Title: Brian Pillman vs Scott Steiner (c) Lex Luger vs Paul Levesque Television Title: Alex Wright vs Lord Steven Regal (c)

Week 4, April 1997 LIVE From Freedom Hall - Louisville, KY Attendance: 17,596 Rating: 100 - Following Brian Pillman's opening taped promo, Nitro goes into its usual intro video and camera shots of the arena tonight. JR, Mike Tenay, and Bobby Heenan welcome everyone to tonight's show, the final Nitro before Spring Stampede this Sunday! They're all excited about the possibility of Austin getting his hands on Hollywood Hogan this Sunday, but so far Hogan and the NWO have thwarted every attempt and throwing every member in Austin's path, this week it's the Macho Man Randy Savage. First up though, we have a ton of action to get through this Nitro, starting right now!! - Billy Kidman vs Eddie Guerrero vs This was a high action, fast paced match that had the crowd's attention. Kidman and Guerrero complimented each others styles very well and "wow'd" the crowd with their high risk maneuvers, almost like they were each trying to out-do the other after every move. A blocked SuperPlex turned things around for Eddie and he managed to hit the Frog Splash for the win at 10:25. Winner: Eddie Guerrero Rating: 76 - We head backstage for an NWO promo, but it's clear from the beginning that this one is centered around Kevin Nash. The rest of the NWO are in view but Nash is the centerpiece. - So Arn Anderson managed to find his way outta the old folk's home and decided to return to WCW for some more punishment, eh?? Well Double A, I can't help it if you really like getting beat up that much and I always like to try and accommodate people whenever I can! The fact that you returned really doesn't bother me. I've got other things to focus my time and energy on than you...But once again, last week you just had to stick your huge nose in the NWO's business when we were dealing with Austin. In case your dementia kicked in and you forgot, the NWO put the Horsemen out to pasture a long time ago! Your little thing with Austin is long over, my man! That's ok though, because you got involved with the NWO one too many times. I took you out before, and this time I'll make sure to finish you off once and for all, and let me tell ya another thing; This time, there won't be any coming back for you. I'll make sure of that. Rating: 99 Dean Malenko w/Francine vs Ricky Steamboat vs It's been nearly a month since we've seen The Dragon and the fans were very receptive to him. While Malenko was performing great in the ring, Steamboat didn't do quite as well and he was noticeably slower in the ring than his opponent. This allowed Malenko to mostly remain in control. Factor in Francine distracting Steamboat whenever possible, this spelled doom for him as Malenko was able to lock in the Texas Cloverleaf at 14:56 for the submission victory. Winner: Dean Malenko Rating: 62 We get a brief break in the action as we go to a video replay with the "Saturday Night" caption in the lower screen. JR tells everyone that Kimberly Page was on WCW Saturday Night this past weekend and explained her reasoning for setting up Diamond Dallas Page to get attacked last week on Nitro by the Macho Man. The video plays and Kimberly says she set him up because she's tired of being under DDP's thumb all the time. Kimberly says DDP's done nothing for her and her career other than hold her down. She says Page's always been jealous of the fans wanting her instead of him and she's now stepping out onto her own, not to be standing off in his shadow. The video replay set up the next segment where Mean Gene was inside the ring and introduced his guest at this time; Diamond Dallas Page. DDP's music hit and he marched straight to the ring, clearly not happy. He stepped in and met Gene in the center of the ring where Mean Gene tried to ask DDP about what Kimberly had to say this last Saturday. Ya know, Gene, normally I'd be happy to stand out here and answer questions for you but tonight, these questions are just a little too personal, ya know? The fact of the matter is this, Kim and I were married.......Were. We are no longer, m'Kay?! So as far as I'm concerned, she can do whatever the hell it is she wants to do. I'm done with that skank and everything about her! That was my personal life, this is my work life, so what I'm gonna do, is stand here and talk about my work life, and that has to do with you - SAVAGE! You wanted to use what was going on in my personal life to your advantage and jump me?!? I'm going to make sure you regret ever crossing paths with me! If you wanted to do business with me and have some matches, fine....But this went way beyond business, Savage! It's now gotten personal! You wanted to cross that line, so you're gonna reap what you sow and I don't wanna hear any crying from you! At Spring Stampede, you're going up against a man with nothing to lose and that makes me more dangerous than you could ever wish you were! Rating: 83 - Following a commercial break, we return to the arena with the NWO music playing. Eric Bischoff is the one to walk out this time and does his usual taunting all the way toward the ring. He gets in and taunts the crowd some more on the mic as trash begins to find its way being tossed inside the ring. - Oh you people are just too much!!! You people obviously love me, and I love you!! What I want to do right now is take a moment to apologize to all of you people....And all of you people watching at home! I can't forget about all of you, either! That's right, I want to apologize! I told everyone that last week, Sting was going to be in action. I'll admit, I.....Stretched the truth just a little bit last week, and for that, I feel terrible! I feel really, really bad. I do. So I wanted to make it up to you fans tonight, especially you fans here in Louisville, because I love you! So to make it up to you, right here tonight, I want Sting to come out here and I'll tell Sting personally, right to his face, that I'm sorry!!! Not only that, but whatever Sting decides to do because of my shenanigans last week, even if that means punching me right in the face, I'll take it like a man! So Sting!!! Please! Come down here and I will apologize right to your face! Come on Sting! - There's a buzz in the arena as "A Man Called Sting" begins to play, though no one walks out right away. Bischoff stands in the ring and it appears he's serious. The playful taunts, the million dollar smile, all the antics are all gone now and Bischoff stands in the ring looking serious. When it seemed like no one was walking out, there was a figure that could be seen through all the fog and smoke on the stage. The crowd began cheering loudly when they saw the movement and the clear painted face. - JR: Oh for crying out loud! - The cheers quickly turned to boo's when it was evident that it wasn't the real Sting walking out. Bischoff still played it off like it was real though as Sting got to the ring and stepped inside, up to Bischoff. Eric held his hands up, indicating he didn't want any physical altercation with "Sting" as the boo's rained down even louder and more trash found its way being pelted into the ring. - Now Sting, please, hear me out, ok??? I want you to know, deep down, just how terribly sorry I am about last week! I told all the fans that you would be wrestling for the first time in months! Instead, I brought out the NWO's very own Sting and had him in a match where he completely dominated his opponent and really, really showed you up on all levels, doing a better "Sting" than even the real Sting! He clearly out-performed you on every single level possible but I'm getting ahead of myself! I'm not here to talk about how our Sting is so much better than you! I'm here to apologize! Sting, truly, deeply, I apologize and I hope you can find it somewhere in that black heart of yours to forgive me! Can you, Sting, please forgive me!? - There's a pause as Bischoff holds the microphone to "Stings" mouth. He doesn't talk and just slowly nods his head and then holds his arms out to Bischoff. - JR: Oh this is sickening! - Bischoff looks shocked at the offered embrace before closing in. The two have a grotesque moment of hugging in the center of the ring as Bischoff fakes wiping tears away from his eyes. The crowd's turned nuclear with boo's deafening the arena and trash now begging to pile up inside the ring. The loud boo's suddenly switch like flipping a light switch to shrieks, cheers, and a frenzy crowd growing more excited by the second as cameras finally pick it up. - - The real Sting is making his way through the crowd and toward the ring at a brisk pace. He quickly climbs over the guardrail and stares at the disgusting scene inside the ring for the briefest of moments before going up the ring steps and stepping into the ring. The crowd is beside themselves and the three are completely losing their minds on commentary. The fake imposter is the one to notice Sting first and the embrace stops. Bischoff turns and see's the real Sting standing just feet away from him and jumps. He cowers behind the imposter and tells Bischoff not to worry. He turns his attention back to Sting now who just stands in the corner, staring at the two. "Sting" had a baseball bat with him and threatens to hit the real one. Sting just stands there and stares at him before a bat of his own slowly slides from the inside of his long trench coat. Sting raises the bat and rushes forward to hit the imposter but at the very last second he stops, just as "Sting" cowers. The imposter stands back up just to be met with a stiff punch to the face, dropping him to the mat. Sting then turns his attention toward Bischoff and takes a step in his direction. Like a jet was strapped to his back, Bischoff bailed from the ring and up the aisle as Sting stalked around the ring and glared down Bischoff. - Rating: 70 Wrath vs Big Bubba Rogers vs These two have never faced each other before so there was a lot of initially feeling each other out as the match started. Bubba had the experience advantage that allowed him to maintain control early on but it didn't last. Wrath was able to utilize his immense strength to his advantage and put Bubba away at 7:15 with the Meltdown. Winner: Wrath Rating: 68 - In the backstage area, the tag team champions Harlem Heat are arriving to the arena and getting their bags out of their car. They turn to head into the arena and are interrupted by Kevin Nash. Nash taunts the two as they come to a stop. Booker T and Stevie Ray don't take to kindly to Nash poking fun at them and ask what his problem is. Nash replies that his problem is that they hold something he wants; the tag team titles. Nash also says that he overheard what Harlem Heat had to say a few weeks ago, that they'll take on any one at any time. About that time, the brothers get attacked from behind with a steel chair. It takes a moment through all the chaos before cameras can pick up the attacker. - JR: Oh my God, He's back!! - Scott Hall blindsided the two and now Kevin Nash joins in on the attack. They continue to punish Harlem Heat before they're satisfied with the attack. - Nash: Shine those belts up real nice, cause we'll see you boys this Sunday at Spring Stampede. Rating: 80 Blue Bloods (Eaton & Taylor) vs Hostile Intent vs There wasn't much of anything significant to take place in this match. Saturn shone above all the other competitors in the ring and Hostile Intent proved to be the better team. The put the Blue Bloods away at 9:31 after Saturn hit a Death Valley Driver on Taylor. Winners: Hostile Intent Rating: 64 Rating: 75 Scott Armstrong vs Scott Norton vs It's a complete and total mystery why this match was taking place now, really why at all, on Nitro. Norton completely dominated Armstrong as soon as the bell rang in this short match. It wasn't a competitive effort at all and Norton won easily at 7:10 with a Powerbomb. Winner: Scott Norton Rating: 58 - Austin's music hits to presumably salvage the crowd and they all jump to their feet. Austin goes to the ring and is clearly ready for action when he climbs in and grabs a microphone. - Austin: I don't need to come out here and do some song and dance. Randy Savage, I know you're back there eating a few Slim Jim's and staring at the monitor. Get your sorry ass out here now so I can toss it in the gutter! Rating: 100 Steve Austin vs Randy Savage vs The Macho Man rushed out and sprinted to the ring, enraged at the taunt he just received. Savage slid in the ring and got to his feet, trying to get to Austin before he had time to react. The plan failed though because Austin was ready and waiting in the ring the entire time Savage sprinted to ringside. Savage tried to throw a punch that was immediately blocked and Austin began lighting up Savage with fists. He reeled back to the ropes where Austin whipped him to the opposite side and hit him with the Thesz Press before lighting him up with more fists, this time on the canvas. The crowd was losing their minds as Austin didn't let up his attack while Savage tried seeking refuge in the corner. Austin didn't care and began "Stomping a mudhole" in Savage, according to Jim Ross on commentary. The referee tried to intervene as Austin was ignoring the 5 count but Austin simply pushed him backward to the center of the ring, flipped him off, and continued stomping Savage in the corner. Soon thereafter, the fight spilled to the floor where Austin continued the assault, though it wasn't long before Savage was able to take advantage now that more weapons were available. A quick distraction from the referee allowed Savage to turn things around and remain in control for awhile. Savage used everything at his disposal on the floor; TV wires, chairs, steps, ring posts, everything. The fight went back in the ring where the first wrestling move of the match was actually executed; a pile driver from Savage. He went for the cover that only got a two count before continuing his attack. Savage put Austin in the corner before hitting repeated and perfectly aimed jabs to Austin's face. Austin reeled out of the corner and dropped to a knee while Savage quickly climbed the ropes and jumped off with a double axe handle. The move connected and Austin again spilled out to the floor. Savage again climbed up to the top rope, this time looking to hit a double axe handle from the top rope out to the floor. Austin moved out of the way at the last second which caused the Macho Man to hit his chin on the metal guard rail. Austin slowly started to fight his way back as Savage was now bleeding from the mouth after missing his move. As Austin rolled Savage back inside the ring, all three at the commentary desk wondered how long it would take the NWO to appear. Austin hit a diving elbow from the middle rope and tried a pin, only getting him a two. He hit some more offense before sending Savage into the ropes and on return, hit a surprising Stun Gun, his old finishing move. Austin went for the cover but Savage managed to kick out just at the last second. Austin moved Savage into the corner and lifted him to the top rope where he followed. Austin looked to hit an uncharacteristic SuperPlex but Savage was able to fight Austin off and shove him off the turnbuckles. Austin hit the mat hard and Savage was left standing up top where he saw his opening. Savage flew from the top, looking to hit the Flying Elbow! He landed on the mat but Austin was able to move out of the way as the crowd cheered loudly on for Austin, who was getting to his feet about the same time a wincing Macho Man got to his, holding his arm. The two met in the center of the ring where Savage threw a wild punch at Austin, who ducked it. Savage spun around and was quickly met with a boot to the gut, doubling over, and just as fast Austin hit the Stunner! The crowd was electric as Savage dropped to the mat and Austin immediately covered him for the win at 15:56. Winner: Steve Austin Rating: 90 Final Show Rating: 92

Week 3, April 1997 LIVE from the Five Seasons Center - Cedar Rapids, IA Attendance: 10,000 (SELLOUT!) Monday Nitro opens with the usual spectacle this week, the opening video followed by a wide shot of the excited crowd for tonight's show. The cameras finally settle on the announce booth where Jim Ross introduces his colleagues and gives the rundown for the night. All three are excited for the announced in-ring return of Sting tonight, as Bischoff said last week that he will be competing, but they all remained wary of what nearly guaranteed trap the NWO are planning. It doesn't take long before music fires up and we get our first match underway! Brian Pillman vs Perry Saturn vs Saturn has proven himself to be quite formidable in the ranks of WCW, forming a competing tag team with Paul Roma. He's also been quite the singles competitor, nearly matching his top match rating of 90 in this match. Pillman was his usual fire for this match, ranking a 96/100 performance. Not only is Pillman an extremely strong in-ring worker, but he's also one of the most popular stars in WCW and proved why in this match. Pillman was able to put Saturn away with the Air Pillman in 10:07 for a great opener. Winner: Brian Pillman Rating: 88 Next we see a pre-taped promo by Eddie Guerrero. He says that he's been a top star in WCW since arriving and it's time he gets back into a title picture, any title picture. He's had runs with both the TV and the US title but it's now been a year since holding any gold. Eddie says that's nothing more than a travesty for someone of his talent. From what he's seen, Scott Steiner looks like he could use a challenge for that belt, and Eddie knows just who can do it. Rating: 90 Fit Finlay vs Alex Wright vs All is "Wright" with the world. Das Wunderkind is back on Monday Nitro and he's back to dancing - though he's still a bit more focused and ruthless in the ring. The battle of the Europeans is underway and while Wright was more aggressive, as seen in the last several weeks, Finlay was able to match that and probably even surpass it. It was a competitive match that the Iowa crowd responded to well and Wright was able to pick up the win at 10:30 after a Superior German Suplex. Winner: Alex Wright Rating: 74 Nitro returns from a commercial break to a backstage locker room. Francine is talking to Wrath and making it pretty clear she would make it worth his while to take her on as a manager. She continues stepping towards him before grabbing the strap on his singlet, toying with it a bit and further trying to convince him. She doesn't get too far before Dean Malenko walks in to the room and stops upon seeing the two standing there. Malenko asks what the hell's going on and Wrath just steps up to Malenko and looks at him briefly before exiting the room. The scene closes with Malenko looking at Francine for an explanation. Rating: 55 Back out in the arena, the crowd get on their feet as the NWO music begins to play. Out walks Eric Bischoff, who appears to be in a great mood tonight and is all smiles as he taunts the crowd on his way to the ring. Bischoff gets in and, as usual, pats his chest to the crowd and points out to his "fans." Bischoff: Ohhhh!!! Can you believe it?!?!? What a crowd!! You people! Man, you really do love me, and who can blame you?! But let me just say, you people don't love me nearly as much......As I love you!!! And you all love me, you know why??? Because I give you people all the best wrestling action each and every week! I give you the people you wanna see! Because I hold up my promises I make to every one of you that sit in those seats and all of the people watching at home! I said last week that since Sting was now officially part of the WCW roster, that that makes him my property, seeing that I am the Executive President of WCW operations! And since I make the rules, well I've decided that you people don't deserve Sting standing off to the sidelines! No!!!! You people deserve Sting competing inside this ring, and you're gonna get Sting competing inside this ring, right here tonight, RIGHT NOW!!!! So Sting, I know you're back there, because quite frankly, I told you to be! That's right! I'm the boss, I'm the President, and when I tell a talent that they have to report to a show, they do it or face the consequences!!! Even you, Sting! So Sting, you've had a long enough vacation, so get on out here right now for your match! JR: Oh you've gotta be kidding me! - It's apparent, as soon as "Sting" walks out, that it isn't the real Sting. It also didn't take the crowd long to catch on as the imposter headed to the ring. The cheers quickly turned to boo's and inside the ring Eric Bischoff continued to try and play it serious. "Sting" climbed in the ring to meet Bischoff, who quickly started laughing. - Bischoff: I told you people you were gonna get Sting in the ring tonight, and here he is!!!! Now send out his opponent! Rating: 72 "Sting" vs El Hijo Del Santo vs The crowd were not happy about this one, even moreso when "Sting" began doing all of the real one's taunts. It wasn't a very competitive matchup, though Santo did start to mount a comeback that got the crowd behind him. After executing a couple of very poor Stinger Splashes, "Sting" locked in the Scorpion Deathlock for the submission win at 7:40. Winner: "Sting" Rating: 64 The Headbangers vs Faces of Fear vs The Headbangers make their WCW debut but couldn't have had a tougher task as their first opponents are the Faces of Fear. Mike Tenay, ever the professor to provide fans with inside knowledge, tells everyone watching at home that the Headbangers were a known tag team in other promotions such as ECWA and Smoky Mountain Wrestling. They've now found a home at WCW for the time being and surely are looking to establish themselves as a top team to go after the titles. The unorthodox heavy metal supporters took their unusual style straight to their opponents but the Faces of Fear adapted well. Any other team would have more than likely been thrown off their game by the antics of the Headbangers, but the Faces of Fear didn't blink an eye. It was a good debut, but the Headbangers were victims of their environment in this one. Meng got the win with the Tongan Death Grip at 8:17. Winners: Faces of Fear Rating: 59 We get another pre-taped backstage promo next. Arn Anderson lets fans know that he's back and he's never been better. Kevin Nash and the NWO attempted to take the Enforcer out for good but they've failed. Anderson says that the NWO can try as they might, but in the end, they're always going to fail. He stares intently into the camera as he says Kevin Nash will quickly regret his life's choices as the screen fades out. Rating: 99 We stay backstage where Kimberly had stopped DDP from advancing through the hallway. She pleads with DDP to take her back, that she made a mistake and feels terrible. DDP does his best to shrug her off and bypass her, but she jumps back in front of him and prevents him from walking away. DDP is clearly not interested in hearing what she has to say, but she tries anyway. In an instant, DDP is clubbed from behind as Randy Savage rushes into the picture. Kimberly jumps back and begins laughing as DDP is now being beaten down by Savage. She walks off the screen as the Macho Man continues the attack, with Page unable to even defend himself. The screen fades out as Savage walks off, leaving DDP on the floor. Rating: 77 US Title: Hugh Morrus vs Scott Steiner (c) vs On paper, this match would seem like an uncompetitive event, however, Hugh Morrus actually surprised quite a few people by taking Steiner's offense and then dishing out his own. While it was competitive, don't think for a second that Steiner was really at any risk of losing his title. Scotty made an example of his power by tossing Morrus around the ring with ease and hitting a couple of press slams. A top rope Frankensteiner finished things off at 14:45. Winner: Scott Steiner Rating: 79 - Following the match, Steiner wasted little time grabbing a microphone. He said Brian Pillman may have gotten the best of him last week, but that was when attacking him from behind. Things will be a different story at Spring Stampede because Steiner will be happy to kick his ass then and he won't need to attack Pillman from behind, he'll do it to his face. - Rating: 100 Steve Austin vs Kevin Nash vs Anticipation is high in the air as Nitro returns from a final commercial break and Austin's music hits. Both competitors made their way to the ring and the surprising bit was Kevin Nash walking out alone. The announcers all talked about the uncertainty of a clean match between Austin and Nash, or would the NWO inevitably make their presence known if the co-founder found himself in trouble. It didn't take long for Austin to strike like the rattlesnake he is, firing multiple punches at Nash as soon as the bell rang. Nash retreated back to the corner but he found no respite there because Austin kept the assault coming. Nash dropped to the mat and Austin switched to his signature boots in the corner before the referee finally got in the middle and shoved Austin back to the center of the ring. Austin didn't care about the reprimand from the official as he pushed him aside and went back to the corner where Nash was. The separation gave Nash just enough time to recover though and he grabbed Austin and spun him into the corner where Nash began his own assault with his typical knees. From there, the match took the turn of events to be expected. The two fought outside the ring and all around the ringside area before getting back in the ring. Nash was able to maintain control, probably just from the size advantage and looked to finish things off after hitting his signature sidewalk slam. Nash made the preparations and put Austin in position for the Jackknife. Austin, still with just enough gas left in the tank, was able to block the lift and flipped Nash over. The two slowly got their way back to their feet and Austin found a resurgence of energy and began punching Nash back into the ropes. Austin whipped him to the other side and then caught him with the Thesz Press and again lit him up with punches. This is where things quickly broke down. Austin got to his feet with the crowd raging and signaled the end, only to be interrupted.... The two local NWO stooges, Buff Bagwell and Paul Levesque, sprint out from the stage and toward the ring. Austin turns and see's them running toward him and he braces for them to enter the ring. The crowd is then heard quickly changing from groans and boo's to loud cheers as another subject runs out from the stage. Double A runs out, but he isn't alone; he's got with him a tire iron and he quickly rushes toward the ring. Austin was ready for Bagwell and Levesque and delayed their entry into the ring just long enough for the Enforcer to reach them and quickly blasts both of them in the back of the head with his weapon. The two drop and Austin turns to refocus on Kevin Nash inside the ring, but he's met with a huge Big Boot to the face. The events also continue outside of the ring as Hollywood Hogan and Randy Savage run out and head toward the ring, but Arn Anderson is still there with the tire iron and holds them off from advancing any further as he kicks at Bagwell and Levesque. Meanwhile, inside the ring, Nash again looks to go for the Jackknife and again has Austin in position. This time though, he does lift Austin up but Austin surprises Nash when he flips out of it. Austin lands on his feet and delivers a quick kick to the gut before the crowd goes crazy and Austin hits the Stunner. The pin was made and the referee made the count at 14:23. Winner: Steve Austin Rating: 84 There's no time for a celebration though because now that the match is over, Arn Anderson gets in the ring and stands beside Austin, still holding his weapon and still ready for the NWO to run in. They stay on the outside though as Austin shoves Nash out of the ring with his feet before grabbing a microphone; Austin: Hogan, you sorry son of a bitch! You can throw whatever you want out at me, but I got your number! I beat your little stooge Buff Bagwell, I just beat Kevin Nash, and now there's no running away and hiding from me for Spring Stampede!!! Of if you'd prefer, you can climb in this ring right now, put your little belt on the line, and get the ass beating of your lifetime over with early!!! - The crowd would love for nothing more than Hogan to face Austin right now but Hogan on the other hand, not so much.... - Hogan: Obviously you can't win without some help, Austin!!!! You're yet to prove to me you're worth little more than a speck of dirt on the bottom of my boot, brother! If you want a shot at me at Spring Stampede, next week, right here on Nitro, you take on the man, you take on the legend, you take on the man who's been like my right hand throughout my life, you take on the Macho Man Randy Savage and beat him, THEN, and only then, will you get to face me at Spring Stampede for the NWO world title, dude! Rating: 94 Final Show Rating: 89

Hello ladies and gentlemen, I'm Mean Gene Okerlund with this weeks WCW Hotline Report! To give the most important update right off the bat, fans will be pleased to know that I have extended my contract with WCW! You will all be seeing me for at least the next 3 years on WCW television! Tony Schiavone also has extended his WCW contract. WCW has recently signed a new tag team to the roster in the hopes of spicing up the division with some new matchups. Look for a new team debuting soon! Smoky Mountain Wrestling continues their woes, having recently fallen to "Small" size. As such, they are no longer considered to be "at war" with WCW. Now for what you all are here on this hotline for; the card for this Monday's Nitro event! Steve Austin vs Kevin Nash US Title: Hugh Morrus vs Scott Steiner (c) Debuting Tag Team vs The Faces of Fear Sting vs Mystery Opponent Fit Finlay vs Alex Wright Brian Pillman vs Perry Saturn

Week 2, April 1997 LIVE from the Key Arena - Seattle, WA Attendance: 16,702 Monday Nitro kicks off the airwaves for the second week in April with the usual intro video followed by panoramic shots of the arena this week in Seattle. The fans are excited for the action WCW is sure to bring this week as Jim Ross welcomes everyone to the broadcast. The announcers all take the time to talk about last week's Nitro and how the show ended, the way it should end, according to Bobby "The Brain" Heenan; with Sting standing tall in the middle of the ring with the rest of the defenders from WCW against the NWO. WCW has, no doubt, been riding high for the last couple of weeks after Uncensored and last week's show. In the middle of their discussion, music hits the speakers that gets another loud cheer from the fans as Lex Luger comes out. Mean Gene Okerlund has already gotten in the middle of the ring to await his entrance. After a few moments of introduction, Mean Gene says that no one should be happier with the last couple of weeks more than the Total Package. Luger can't help but smile and have a smirk on his face during the intro and he confirms that he has, along with the rest of the WCW locker room, been the happiest he's been in the last several months. Luger said he knows that everything seemed in limbo for the last few months regarding Sting and his appearance to align with the NWO. Luger says he's known the Stinger for the last 15 years and though he made the mistake of doubting him before, he didn't make that same mistake again. He knew that Sting didn't join the NWO and knew he just needed his time, his time to show everyone where he really stood. Well the confusion is set aside, there's no question any longer for anyone, and the Stinger's right where he belongs, back with WCW! Luger says that as for the rest of the NWO, they're all on borrowed time and he's going to prove just that at Spring Stampede. For the last few weeks, Paul Levesque has been trying to make a name for himself in WCW at Luger's expense. That's all coming to a tragic end for him, because Luger says he's finishing that chapter with Levesque at Spring Stampede and afterwards, he might just start a new one involving Hollywood Hogan and the WCW World Championship belt, bringing that, too, back to WCW where it belongs! Rating: 96 Camera's switch to the backstage area (dubbed with the caption "Earlier Tonight"). Jim Ross narrates for us, saying earlier today when Scott Steiner was arriving, he was blindsided. No sooner did Steiner shut the trunk, we see Brian Pillman show up, attacking Steiner from behind. Steiner didn't even have a chance to defend himself before Pillman attacked, using the car as his support for the attack. Steiner was slammed against the closed trunk lid a few times before Pillman laid in the boots on the downed Steiner. Just as quickly as he attacked, he ran off before Steiner could gain any kind of comeback. Rating: 97 Diamond Dallas Page vs Eddie Guerrero vs The first match tonight has two very capable wrestlers, both trying to break their way through to the upper card of WCW. DDP has been caught waging a personal war against Randy Savage while Eddie's been trying to regain his footing ever since losing the US title. After finishing a vicious feud against Arn Anderson at SuperBrawl, Eddie was provided some much-needed time off. His freshness was very apparent as DDP struggled to keep up with the high flier. Page managed to fight his way back into the match and Eddie sensed that he was finding himself in trouble. DDP signaled that it was time for the Diamond Cutter but Eddie was able to push DDP off into the ropes. On the return, DDP went for a clothesline but Eddie was quick to pull the referee in the way, who ended up taking the move instead. Eddie dodged out of the ring and began making his way back up the aisle and the referee came-to a short time later, calling for the disqualification at 12:03. Winner by DQ: DDP Rating: 80 After a quick commercial break, we return to see Mean Gene again standing in the center of the ring. He announces his guest as the new Television Champion, Lord Steven Regal. The TV champ makes his way out as arrogantly as he possibly can, no doubt with the Television title strapped securely around his waist. He gets in the ring and snubs his nose at Mean Gene who says in spite of all his arrogance and claims, Regal made good on his promise at getting the TV title back. Regal says the title never should've been taken from him, but it was, and he corrected all the mistakes by getting it back at Uncensored. Regal was quick to dismiss Fit Finlay and said that Dean Malenko is no challenge for him, he was simply a placeholder for when the real TV champion came back. Regal says that he's the best worker in WCW and he has no problem proving that against anyone. Things took an interesting turn when the sound of trumpets slowly filled the arena and the crowd got on their feet. The Nature Boy walked out onto the stage, still in his custom-designed suit and took a moment to look out at the capacity crowd before heading to the ring. Flair stepped in, looking at Regal, before stepping up to Mean Gene. Flair, with a smirk of his own, said he couldn't help but hear Regal claim to be the best wrestler in WCW. Flair says that while Regal might think he can take that claim, the Nature Boy's the best wrestler in the whole damn world, not just WCW! If Regal wants to put his money where his mouth is, how about they have a match here tonight to prove it! The crowd goes crazy and Regal cringes. He responds and says he'll face Flair in a match tonight, but it won't be for the TV title because as far as Regal's concerned, he's not done anything as of late to earn a shot at his title! Rating: 99 Wrath vs Kevin Nash vs A battle of the big men in a rematch from this past December. By all accounts, it was a better match than the first one, but not by much. Wrath proved that he can stand up well against a big name opponent but it was clear that Kevin Nash was still a few steps ahead of him. The match ended at 7:47 after Nash hit the Jacknife Powerbomb. Winner: Kevin Nash Rating: 68 The Amazing French Canadians vs Hostile Intent vs Paul Roma and Perry Saturn have proven themselves to be a contending team for the tag team titles while the Amazing French Canadians (Not the Quebecers) have never really gotten a good foot hold in WCW. Despite the clear talent the two possess, they just have never been able to get a fire lit in their matches. It's hard telling what they may be able to do in a singles run, but as a team, something just hasn't been able to "click." Hostile Intent, particularly Saturn, showed great progress and potential in this one. Saturn was able to get the win at 8:18 after hitting the Death Valley Driver on Oulette. Winners: Hostile Intent Rating: 63 Nitro returns from another commercial break and the NWO music hits the speakers. The crowd get on their feet, not knowing who to expect, and out walks Eric Bischoff. Easy E is all smiles as he struts out and points out to the crowd, and to the shock of the announcers, he's walking out to the ring all by himself. Bischoff gets in the ring and takes some time to pander to the crowd, who ruthlessly boo back at him. Instead of hearing the boo's from the crowd, Bischoff instead pats his chest and acts like they all love him. Bischoff says that after the last couple of weeks, no one should be more furious than him, but he isn't. Bischoff says he actually couldn't be a happier man because everything is falling exactly in place for the NWO. Bischoff said he couldn't help but hear what Harlem Heat had to say last week, that they're willing to take on anyone. Bischoff says that Harlem Heat should be careful what they wish for, because they just might get it! He says that he's still the President of WCW and he makes the rules, signs the paychecks, and makes the matches. Bischoff says there isn't anyone in WCW, aside from Ted Turner, who can tell Bischoff what to do, and Ted has made it perfectly clear that WCW is his baby to run and Ted won't interfere. Bischoff says that translates into Bischoff being the top man, the one in charge, and no one can stop him. Bischoff made things even more sickening by comparing himself to God. He says he's also glad that Sting finally showed his true colors and knew he never had the fortitude to stand next to Hollywood Hogan. Sting couldn't put his ego to the side long enough to stand at Hollywood's shoulder, but that's all ok! He says Sting never could and never will fill Hollywood's shoes. Sting struggled for so many years trying to be the main star of WCW, trying to keep WCW in the limelight while Hogan prospered in other promotions. He said that deep down, Sting was so relieved when Hollywood joined WCW because he knew that the success of WCW was off of Sting's shoulders! Bischoff says that now that Sting has established himself to be back on the WCW sidelines, that now makes him officially a WCW talent - Talent that Bischoff now controls! As a result, Bischoff says that Sting will be back in action, wrestling on this very show next week, with an opponent to be determined! Rating: 64 Paul Levesque vs Arn Anderson vs The announce team was shocked to see the return of Arn Anderson. The last time we saw the Enforcer, nearly a month ago, he was being stretchered out of the arena following a brutal attack by Kevin Nash. Double A appeared fresh, razor sharp, and relentless as soon as Levesque stepped through the ropes. Arn was like a man on fire, brutalizing his opponent with his signature moveset. Levesque would beg for mercy only to find none given. When that didn't work, he tried bailing out of the ring and going to the back, only for Anderson to catch up to him and beat him some more. Things got back in the ring where the Enforcer was calculating in his every move, almost like he was stalking Levesque around the ring. After a Spinebuster and DDT, Anderson won the match at 10:30. Winner: Arn Anderson Rating: 77 Next up, we get a backstage promo where Francine does all the talking in her irritating New Yawk accent. She says that Fit Finlay cost Dean Malenko the TV title because he couldn't know his place at the bottom of the card. She says that Finlay will learn his mistake and Dean will send him back where he belongs. When Dean's through with him, then maybe he'll set his sights higher than the TV title, but one thing's sure, Fit Finlay is gonna feel pain. Rating: 51 Things get much more lively next as Steve Austin's music hits the speakers and the crowd get on their feet. Austin emerges from the entrance and wastes no time powering straight to the ring. Austin gets in and is quickly given a microphone where he says he's played enough of the games of the NWO. He took out the garbage at Uncensored when he beat Buff Bagwell from one ring post to the other and he played their little games last week when he teamed with Lex Luger. Austin says it's time to cut through all the crap, he's calling out Hollywood Hogan for Spring Stampede and there's no way in hell he can dodge Austin this time. Austin says he isn't leaving the ring until Hollywood Hogan walks his little ass out here with the world title and accepts Austin's challenge! It doesn't take long for the NWO music to play once again and out walks Bischoff, Nash, Hogan, and Savage. The four stop short on top of the stage as Austin challenges them to come to the ring, despite the disadvantage. Interestingly enough, they don't take him up on the offer and stay on the stage. Bischoff has a microphone and questions who the hell Steve Austin thinks he is. While it's true that he managed to defeat a superb talent like Buff Bagwell at Uncensored, that hardly qualifies him to be the #1 contender to the world title. Bischoff reminded Austin from his earlier statement; he's the WCW President and makes the matches, Austin is in no position to walk out here and demand a match. In fact, the NWO could come to the ring right now and beat Austin within an inch of his life, but they won't do that. They won't do that because they don't want Austin to have any excuse when he eventually does get to face Hollywood Hogan and loses in record time in the center of the ring. If Austin wants to be in the ring against the big dogs, then he's got to prove it! Bischoff says if he wants Hogan at Spring Stampede, then he has to beat Kevin Nash clean in the middle of the ring, next week right here on Nitro! An annoyed Austin says that it doesn't matter how many blocks the NWO wants to stack up in front of him, he's gonna knock them all down on their ass. He started with Buff Bagwell and he'll do the same thing to Kevin Nash next week. Austin doesn't care how many NWO members he has to go through either, because when he beats Hogan's ass and takes his title, he won't have any excuse available! Rating: 99 Ric Flair vs Lord Steven Regal vs The crowd was firmly behind the Nature Boy in this one and Flair's performance was rated a 98/100. Regal was no slouch either, as his performance was rated a 91/100. How that translated to the overall match though was interesting and it didn't come off the way you might expect it would. The two put on a master class of ring work, psychology, and performance. Neither wrestler held back in getting dirty, either. Flair would hit enough low blows to make a man sterile, but not a manly-man like Steven Regal. Between the biting, chops, low blows, eye pokes, and rope holding, it was like one man tried to out-do the other when it came to dirty tactics, but Regal soon found out that no one tops the "Dirtiest Player In The Game!" There were several near falls throughout the match as well, probably none better than a great looking SuperPlex that Flair hit late in the match. The match came to an end at 24:22 when Flair locked in the Figure 4 right in the center of the ring, causing Regal to submit in what should've been a 5 star match. Winner: Ric Flair Rating: 76 Final Show Rating: 84

Week 1, April 1997 LIVE from the Arrowhead Pond - Anaheim, CA Attendance: 19,000 (SELLOUT!) - Rather than the usual intro video for Monday Nitro, followed by the elaborate pyro display and crowd shots, the picture begins to fade in for this week's Monday Nitro as the trail of fire is lit and followed to the exploding "Monday Nitro" picture. When the fire is first lit, we hear commentary, but it isn't commentary from tonight's broadcast. What is heard is the announcers from just 24 hours ago at Uncensored and the unmistakable voice of Tony Schiavone. - Tony: The NWO is beating the team of Ric Flair, Scott Steiner, and Lex Luger merciless! Someone's got to do something about it! Ross: Yeah, and Sting's just standing there! With the NWO! Not doing a damned thing! Tony: Oh no! Heenan: Here he comes! He's stepping forward!! What is going to happen to everyone when he attacks Luger!? This is WCW's death right here tonight! Tony: Look out!! He's got a baseball bat!! Heenan: He just shoved Luger!!! Ross: But Lex isn't backing down!! Look at him get right back up in Sting's face!! Heenan: Telling him to do it again!!! Tony: And he did!!!! He shoved Luger again!! Ross: Yeah but Luger's going right back up to him! C'mon Lex! Heenan: Hit him!!! Hit him!! Don't stand there and get intimidated! Tony: He's not intimi----HE SHOVED HIM AGAIN!! Ross: And Hogan's loving it all! Tony: OH MY GOD! Ross: STI-----STING'S FIGHTING THE NWO! Heenan: Listen to this crowd!!!!!! Tony: He's fighting with everything he's got!! Look at him go! Heenan: Month's of aggression is being let loose right now! Ross: There's only one man left now!!! Heenan: And he's got nowhere to go!! Ross: You're damn right! Grab that son of a bi--- Tony: Stinger Splash!!! Ross: The first we've seen that in months!! And another!!! Heenan: He's not finished with him yet!!! Ross: Reverse DDT! Tony: No, no!!! That's a Scorpion Death Drop! Heenan: Opposite of the death lock! I love it! - The picture finally fades in and it shows Ric Flair, Lex Luger, Scott Steiner, and Sting all standing in the middle of the ring, united, while the NWO is in disarray, backtracking up the aisle as trash gets pelted at them from the crowd. The picture again fades out before coming back in to show a panoramic shot of the packed arena for tonight's Nitro. - Rating: 84 We're brought to the commentary desk finally where Jim Ross tells us of last night's unprecedented Uncensored broadcast where Sting has finally, unquestionably, returned to WCW. Bobby Heenan says that he knew all along that Sting was with WCW and just toying with the NWO but he just played along to make people think he believed Sting turned coat. Both Mike Tenay and Jim Ross just look at Bobby, who looks back at them innocently, before Tenay says that it's a night that no WCW fan, employee, or wrestling fan in general will never forget. Sting is home where he belongs and he's joining in to take the fight right to the NWO. Ross says that Hollywood Hogan and the NWO will be in attendance tonight, and you can be sure they're going to have something to say about Sting. Scotty Riggs vs Dean Malenko w/Francine vs w/ Another man not too pleased with how Uncensored went is Dean Malenko, who lost the TV title last night in the 3-way match against Steven Regal and Fit Finlay. Malenko was clearly in no mood to mess around and Francine also looked less than happy. It was a decent opener that went for a good amount of time but Malenko just used that time to dismantle his opponent. Malenko ended it with the Texas Cloverleaf at 10:22. Winner: Dean Malenko Rating: 72 The NWO's music begins to play which brings the sold out California crowd to their feet, because everyone is wondering what the NWO will have to say after what went down last night. The group comes out in full force tonight and no one looks very happy. The usual taunts and smiles and hand slapping is foregone tonight for more annoyed looks and gritted teeth as they make their way toward the ring. Hogan un-customarily is the first with a microphone as he demands the music be cut off. The world champ says that he and Kevin Nash made clear that the NWO was going back to their roots, being more ruthless, being more aggressive, and putting WCW out of their misery for once and for all but last night's Uncensored was anything but ruthless. He called out every NWO member for dropping the ball. He called out Bagwell for losing his match and then he singled out Levesque, Pillman, and Nash for embarrassing the NWO in the main event. Nash started to take exception to the verbal lashing and began stepping up toward Hogan but Hogan was quick to cut him off and say he wanted a more aggressive NWO, he wanted a more mean Hollywood Hogan, so that's what he'll get. He told Nash to step off before he sent him back up North with another bad gimmick. Hogan tried to deescalate a bit and said to show Nash that he has good faith, to show he only wants what's best for the NWO and to light a fire, he's going to team with Nash in the main event tonight to take on Lex Luger and Steve Austin. Hogan also says that after he's done tearing those two limb from limb, he's coming after that face painted coward Sting and he's going to make him regret ever stabbing the NWO in the back. Hogan called out every NWO member that if they wanted motivation to become a pack of wolves to look no further than that coward Sting. Sting is the cause of all the NWO's trouble right now and whoever delivers Sting's head to Hollywood on a silver platter will be a made man. Rating: 88 Meng vs Paul Roma vs This is a continuation of the tag team feud between the Faces of Fear and Hostile Intent. The Meng manly meter was way off the charts on this one! Roma threw everything he had at the Mengster but he just shrugged it off and kept coming after him. Roma had no idea how to forge some kind of effective offense and lost the match at 7:54 to the Tongan Death Grip. Winner: Meng Rating: 68 Disco Inferno vs John Tenta vs This was an odd matchup and you'd never believe me if I told you that Disco picked up a victory in this one. Well he did, after Tenta went for the Tenta Splash and missed, allowing Disco to get a schoolboy rollup for the surprising win at 8:24. Winner: Disco Inferno Rating: 57 Harlem Heat and Sensuous Sherri are backstage with Mean Gene Okerlund. Fresh off their successful title defense last night at Uncensored against the Blue Bloods, the brothers are riding high. Booker says that Harlem Heat are ready and willing to defend their tag team titles against any one, at any time. Rating: 88 TV Title: Lenny Lane vs Steven Regal (c) vs This all stems from the pre-show last night at Uncensored where Lenny Lane, in an interview, requested a title match on Nitro to prove his worth. The issue is Regal is the champion after getting "his" title back and it's his first defense. No easy task for the young Lenny Lane. It was a surprisingly good match and Regal was in prime form tonight, getting the submission win at 9:46 with the Regal Stretch. Winner: Steven Regal Rating: 77 Lance Storm vs Alex Wright vs Much to the dismay of the crowd, there was no Saturday Wright Fever again here tonight. Alex Wright surprisingly came to the ring and was prepared to face Lance Storm in a no-nonsense wrestling match. It could have possibly caught Storm off guard because Wright showed his German aggression and pummeled the quick wrestler. Lance was able to fight his way back into the match and the two traded high-flying moves that got the crowd vocal on a couple occasions. Wright got the pinfall victory at 10:21 with a German Suplex. Winner: Alex Wright Rating: 57 DDP is backstage for a taped promo this time. He talks about the Macho Man and the issues he's had with him for the last couple of weeks. He says if Savage has a problem with him, then he should be a man and tell it to his face, rather than hide behind that tramp of his. Whatever personal things Savage wants to expose about his life will be "personally" dealt with. Rating: 81 Mean Gene is backstage again, this time interviewing Fit Finaly. He discusses coming up short last night in the TV title match. Finlay says Regal was in his way, which is typical for a Brit getting in the way of an Irishman. He threatens Regal that he should've stayed out of the way and he'll take that title off him whenever the two might meet again. Rating: 78 Lex Luger & Steve Austin vs Kevin Nash & Hollywood Hogan vs The crowd got on their feet as the entrances were being made and didn't sit back down. Austin wasn't thrilled, it seemed, to be teaming with Luger but the two were able to quickly settle down and work well as a team. Meanwhile on the other side of the ring, the same questions were being asked about the ability of Nash and Hogan to work well together, after the scathing promo the world champ cut earlier at the expense of the NWO. Still though, it seemed once the bell rang, both teams settled into where their hatred was to be focused. Austin wanted Hogan to start but he obviously avoided him. Nash was also quick to step in the way as he didn't want to be seen as a pushover. Nash started with some punishing offense but Austin quickly turned it around before dishing out his own and then demanding Hogan be tagged in. Nash had enough and was happy to oblige, tagging in Hogan who looked less than thrilled. As the tension mounted and Hogan slowly stepped through the ropes, he started to walk toward Austin before abruptly turning and slapping Nash on the shoulder, tagging him back in. Nash looked back in shock as Hogan ducked out of the ring. Nash stepped back in and the match continued. Luger eventually found his way into the match and after Nash took over the offense, Hogan was happy to tag in then. After this, the NWO worked well together and isolated Luger from his corner, building to the ever-awaiting hot tag. After Luger managed to knock both Nash and Hogan down following a failed double team move, Luger slowly clawed his way toward his corner. The crowd urged him on with every small inch forward until he finally made the tag. The crowd exploded as Austin rushed into the ring and wasted no time with his assault. He went after Nash before finally getting his hands on Hogan, which caused the crowd to cheer even more loudly. Clearly in an attempt to save face, the NWO began rushing out as soon as Austin made the tag. They rushed to the ring and Pillman and Levesque were first to slide in, jumping Austin. The rest of the members made their way in and began going after Luger as well, but reinforcements weren't far behind.... The crowd cheer again as Scott Steiner and Ric Flair quickly come rushing out from the backstage area. They quickly get in the ring and join in on the on-going brawl. The referee is nowhere to be seen and the match is officially declared a No Contest at 13:13. No Contest Rating: 85 It's no surprise by now that a match between the NWO and WCW results in either a disqualification or no contest. The two groups clearly can't be contained to a single match, evident by the massive fight going on in the ring. Both the NWO and WCW groups are at a stalemate as men fight all around the ring. In the midst of the fighting, the crowd is shocked as explosions go off at the top of the arena followed by a screech of the crowd as a figure is then lowering down toward the ring. The shrieks and screams turn into a burst of cheers from the crowd when they realize who it is. Unbeknownst to the men fighting in the ring, Sting is being lowered to the ring from high atop the arena's roof. As he gets closer, men start noticing before Sting finally lands in the ring. The fighting briefly pauses before Paul Levesque goes to attack Sting, who quickly meets him with a chop. Bagwell rushed in and Sting fended him off with a kick to his gut. The crowd went wild as Sting joined in the fight and after seeing him, the rest of the WCW team quickly joined in. Hollywood Hogan saw Sting and wasted no time bailing from the ring before he could get his hands on him. In much the same way as the prior night, the NWO was again run off from the ring, leaving only the WCW guys standing in the center of the ring as the Nitro credits appeared. Nitro went off the air with Sting standing in the center of the ring, glaring out to the NWO. Rating: 94 Final Show Rating: 87

I got to keep WCW being WCW! Uncensored '97 got higher attendance than the WWF's Wrestlemania.

Week 4, March 1997 LIVE from the Pontiac Silverdome - Detroit, MI Attendance: 73,962 - The Pay Per View feed goes live and WCW wastes little time before a panoramic shot of a jam-packed arena is shown while an excited Jim Ross welcomes everyone to the March edition of their monthly event - Uncensored! After shots of the wild fans, the cameras settle in on the announcers and Jim Ross introduces "The American Dream" Dusty Rhodes and Tony Schiavone. JR tells everyone that halfway through the show, Bobby Heenan will replace Dusty on commentary and that tonight looks to be quite the evening! Brief footage from this past Monday Nitro was shown and footage after Nitro went off the air - Showing Sting enter the ring to again cause a standoff between the NWO and WCW and then Sting leaving with the New World Order. Dusty says the last few months have proven to be an extremely dark time for WCW with Sting siding with the NWO. WCW has fought valiantly and continues to fight against the NWO despite the odds being stacked against them. Ric Flair, Lex Luger, and Scott Steiner have all proven to be worthy men trying to be the solid foundation for WCW against the NWO, but it just proves to be too much for just the three of them. Steve Austin has shown moments of solidarity with WCW but he more often than not goes to the beat of his own drum. Dusty says it's going to take someone else to stand up with Flair, Luger, and Steiner, but the WCW locker room seems to be running dry! Schiavone believes that tonight's main event is going to be a pivotal moment for WCW and their fight against the NWO. This is their opportunity to get one up on the NWO after months of being beaten down and attacked. Whether they can do it when the odds, like Dusty said, are still stacked up against them because remember, the NWO has the numbers advantage. With all the exciting action ahead of us, we're going right to the ring for the first match tonight, sure to live up to the "Uncensored" title! - Hostile Intent vs Faces of Fear vs Tensions have been running high between these two physical teams for the last couple of weeks. It all started when Jimmy Hart and the Faces of Fear promised to make examples out of Hostile Intent, who were very early into their newly formed team. They, namely Perry Saturn, took that personally. At the beginning of the match, Saturn started things off against the Barbarian. Saturn started strong with a very impactful offense. Schiavone had announced that Saturn was a former Army Ranger and not afraid to mix it up, even against an intimidating team as the Faces of Fear. Before long, Barbarian tagged out but Saturn didn't seem to mind, waiting for Meng to approach him in the ring. Pretty soon, the two were brawling all over the ring and eventually spilled out to the floor. After a brief fight between all 4 men, order was once again restored and Saturn and Roma traded quick tags and worked fluidly as a team. Faces of Fear were able to regain the advantage once Roma was in there for awhile though, as his offense isn't nearly as physical as Saturn's. Meng and the Barbarian took turns wearing down Roma and leaving Saturn seething to get tagged back in. After several illegal double team moves, Saturn had enough, rushing into the ring and attacking both members of the Faces of Fear. Roma was eventually able to get back into the mix and all four men spilled out to the floor to continue their fight. Saturn and Meng ended up brawling up the aisle as Roma and Barbarian fought all around the ringside area. It wasn't long before the ringing of the bell was heard and the referee had counted both teams out at 7:51! Winners: Double Count-Out Rating: 61 Alex Wright vs Ricky Steamboat vs There's no Saturday Wright Fever tonight because Wright attacked Steamboat as soon as he stepped in the ring. In a newly focused and aggressive attitude, Wright pummeled Steamboat around the ring as the Dragon attempted to take off his robe. The match got officially underway and Steamboat slowly began to build his way back, culminating in hitting his signature chop to Wright as he rebounded off the ropes. The crowd was firmly behind Steamboat as he continued his comeback but things were stopped short as Wright hit a beautiful dropkick after Steamboat ducked under a clothesline. There was a bit more back and forth action but Alex Wright secured the win after hitting a German Suplex at 11:58. Winner: Alex Wright Rating: 61 - We've got the first backstage segment of the night up next as the WCW world champion Hollywood Hogan and Kevin Nash are climbing out of a limo. It's just the two who are in, which the commentary team finds a bit odd. As the two step out, Hogan says that the last couple of months have been rough on the NWO and that everyone didn't seem to be on the same page. Hogan tells Nash that he was right, the NWO got a little soft which allowed WCW to gain a bit of momentum back. Hogan says with Nash setting the ship on the right sail, the NWO's new direction to be more ruthless than ever will result in them being even more powerful than when they first got on the scene. Nash and Hogan slap hands and Nash says that Arn Anderson was just the first, but certainly not last. People can either join the NWO express or they can get run over and if they choose the latter, they won't look pretty at the end of it. - Rating: 92 Tag Team Titles: Blue Bloods (Eaton & Taylor) vs Harlem Heat (c) vs w/ The first of two title matches is next and Harlem Heat looked to be in prime condition as they made their way to the ring with Sensuous Sherri. Dusty points out that these two teams know each other quite well, though this is the first time since December that they've competed against each other. Booker started things off first against Taylor and easily overpowered him. After a ring-shaking hip toss, Taylor crawled backward toward his corner to tag in the former "Beautiful Bobby." Eaton stepped in to take his own turn against Booker and didn't fare much better. Booker had his way with Eaton before a sneaky eye poke halted Booker's offense. After a short advantage, Booker tagged in his brother who had even more of a powerful offense on display. Both brother's from Harlem were on form tonight as they easily dispatched the Blue Bloods. Booker wowed the fans by getting the win at 9:53 with the Harlem Hangover. Winners: Harlem Heat Rating: 63 Cameras switch after the match to once again in the backstage area, where this time pure chaos has broken out. Randy Savage is in the midst of a vicious beatdown of Diamond Dallas Page. Savage is using everything he can as a weapon and eventually settles on a chair, where he repeatedly jabs the steel into DDP's midsection while he's down on the floor. A slew of officials rush in to try and break it up, but by this point it looks as though the damage has already been done. Rating: 87 Television Title: Fit Finlay vs Dean Malenko (c) vs Steven Regal vs vs Tony Schiavone dubbed this match one of the most anticipated matchups on the card tonight as the men all made their way to the ring. Malenko was accompanied by his valet, Francine, who looked on in disgust at Fit Finlay. Regal also seemed unpleased, but not as much as Francine, at Finlay's presence but that was only because he was another obstacle in his way of reclaiming his never-lost TV title. The match awkwardly got underway as the three men tried to figure out how to fight against each other. Finlay was the only babyface in the match but it was crystal clear very quickly that Regal had no intention or interest in working with Malenko on anything. Malenko hooked Finlay in for a suplex and looked to Regal to join in for a double but Regal wasted no time clawing at Dean's face with an eye rake. There was a funny moment in the match where Regal tossed Finlay out to the floor in order to work his own offense against Malenko. The distraction allowed Malenko to get an advantage and when Finlay re-entered the ring, he also quickly tossed him out to the floor in order to work on Regal. This only proved to fire up the Irishman as he got back in the ring with a ball of fury and took on both Malenko and Regal. The crowd was getting into the match as Finlay had both his opponents reeling as he traded blows from one to the other. From here on out, the fans were on the edge of their seat for the rest of the match. All three men managed to pull off everything from brawling to wrestling to all three trading blows to incredible spots. Steven Regal was able to vindicate himself when things were all said and done. With Regal recovering in the corner, Malenko took the opportunity hit a SuperPlex on Finlay. Both men crashed hard on the mat but Regal saw his opening and locked the Regal stretch on Malenko. With Finlay incapacitated and in no position to break up the hold, Malenko had little choice but to tap out at 18:14. Winner: Steven Regal Rating: 91 - Things take a bit of a break for a short promotional video for next month's PPV - Spring Stampede - before we're back to the commentary table where Bobby "The Brain" Heenan replaced Dusty Rhodes. Heenan gives his two cents to the show so far, re-iterating that the stakes for WCW couldn't be much higher than they are tonight. Heenan is more concerned with a total takeover by the NWO if more people in WCW can't come together. Music hits while the trio are talking and the crowd all get to their feet. - John Tenta vs Lance Storm vs There wasn't much substance to this match and the fans weren't so much into it either. Tenta started the match off strong and quickly took control of the match. Things changed though when Storm was finally able to utilize his speed and aerial attack to slow the big man. I a bit of an upset, Lance Storm was able to pick up the submission win at 10:13 with a Single Leg Crab. Winner: Lance Storm Rating: 60 - Austin gets right in the ring and gets a microphone, which quickly changes the crowd's excitement level from the previous match. He says he came to Uncensored for a fight against Hollywood Hogan but he knows damn well that Hogan won't fight him tonight. He says it doesn't matter that Hogan's in the back hiding from Steve Austin but he's standing in this ring and one way or another is going to beat the crap out of a member of the NWO, so they need to send whichever piece of trash out here now to get a mudhole stomped in them. - - Austin looks like a kid at Christmas as Bischoff struts out onto the stage. Bischoff tells him to wait a minute because he knows what he's thinking; he's not out here to fight Steve Austin. He says what he IS here to do, is bring out the opponent for Austin tonight but he first tells Austin that it doesn't matter who he beats tonight because he's never in a million years going to beat every member of the NWO to get to Hollywood. Bischoff says his opponent tonight is Buff Bagwell! - Rating: 97 Steve Austin vs Buff Bagwell vs Austin was like a man possessed as soon as Bagwell stepped halfway through the ropes. Austin was on the attack and the bell rang, to little concern from Austin, who was just focused on beating the ever living hell out of Bagwell. In an attempt to get away or slow the assault, Bagwell tried to go to the opposite end of the ring and exit, but Austin was right behind him, refusing to let up on the attack. He sent Bagwell into the ropes and hit a Thesz Press on return before pummeling Bagwell with lightning-fast punches. Austin got up but he still didn't let up the attack. He grabbed Bagwell and brought him to his feet, only to flip him off before kicking him in the gut and hitting a Stunner. The referee counted the three at 6:52 and Austin looked back at the stage where a dismayed Bischoff looked on. Winner: Steve Austin Rating: 67 El Hijo Del Santo vs Hugh Morrus vs Other than a match against Eddie Guerrero on Nitro a couple weeks back, not much has been seen from Santo aside from some Saturday Night matches. As a result, the Michigan crowd didn't quite know what to make of this match. The announce crew mentioned that Santo is quite a big star in Mexico and WCW is hoping some of that popularity transfers over not only to the US, but also WCW as they look to expand their market to the Southern part of the hemisphere. It was a pretty bland matchup that saw Morrus score the win at 8:26 with the No Laughing Matter. Winner: Hugh Morrus Rating: 49 Rating: 84 There was zero possibility that a major monthly event would be absent of Mean Gene! He eagerly stands by backstage and introduces his guests for the interview, the men who will take on the NWO tonight! All three men make their way into the picture and take their spot and all three men are extremely fired up. Flair, naturally, is the first to speak, animated as ever and proving his point. Flair says that all three men walk into battle tonight and there's only one team walking out! This isn't a cage match, no DQ, or any other gimmick but WCW is going straight to battle tonight and they're not pulling any punches! With the Total Package, the best body in wrestling, the United States champion and best amateur wrestler in the history of college athletics, and the 13-time champion Nature Boy, everyone's going to bleed, everyone's going to sweat, and the NWO, most of all, will pay the price tonight! Luger is up next and says that revenge tonight against the NWO will be bitter sweet, not because he has any feelings for the NWO, but because tonight's moment when WCW finally puts one nail in the coffin of the NWO, he's going to have to stare at his best friend who, rather than standing by his side, will be standing on the side of the enemy. Luger says it's past friendships, it's past betrayal, it's past personal feelings. He says it's now a matter of fighting for your livelihood. The NWO is trying to put an end to WCW and that threatens and hurts Luger far more than any best friends betrayal ever could. If push comes to shove, he won't hesitate to drop his former best friend to the mat if that means being able to keep WCW alive. Scott Steiner says that while the NWO was on free reign for several months unchecked, someone needed to stand up for WCW alongside Lex Luger and Ric Flair and he stepped up to the plate. Steiner says he's never been about winning accolades, he's just been about proving himself in the ring against any opponent. Now that he holds the second top title in WCW, he's going to be the champion that Hollywood Hogan wishes he could be! There's one thing he's looking to dish out tonight - Pain. Rating: 97 Ric Flair, Scott Steiner, & Lex Luger vs NWO (Kevin Nash, Brian Pillman, & Paul Levesque) vs The time for waiting and anticipation is over, the moment has arrived. WCW made their entrance first followed by the NWO. The WCW team was clearly urgently waiting for their opponents to get to the ring, as they all three paced uneasily around the ring. The NWO could almost sense this as they took their time getting to the ring and were all smiles and pre-celebratory on their way down the aisle. Once the NWO did get to the ring, it was pure, unleashed havoc. Ric Flair was like lightening flashing, all over the ring and uncontrolled. Flair not only had the performance of the match but easily the performance of the night while Paul Levesque appeared to not be up to the task of being in such a high-profile match with this caliber of opponents. Despite this, the match was pure fire and the crowd was on their feet the entire time. It took what seemed an eternity to get any kind of control over the match before each team made their way to their own corner. Pillman did his absolute best to avoid Ric Flair and Levesque and Flair remained in the ring. Flair easily controlled the pace and had his way with the younger wrestler. He eventually tagged into Lex Luger who also overpowered and controlled the less-experienced member of the NWO. As if the plan, Steiner was then tagged in who took his own turn and time to punish Levesque. Flair was tagged back in who, in plain sight of the referee, struck a nasty low blow on Levesque before shoving him into his own corner to finally tag out. Nash made the tag and slowly stepped over the top rope and entered the ring, spitting into his hands before rubbing them together, doing his best to intimidate WCW's team. The match slowed way down to Nash's pace and he used his brute power to take over the match. Things resembled an actual tag team match for awhile and all 6 men saw plenty of action. Advantage traded off between both teams as action settled down and rest holds were applied. Flair finally ended up getting his hands on Pillman, which brought the crowd back to life, and took his turn dishing out some brutal punishment on the former Horseman. It wasn't long before chaos again erupted during the match and before long, all 6 men were in a furious brawl. The referee was desperate to gain control of the match but he was doomed to failure. It didn't take long before Hollywood Hogan, Randy Savage, and Buff Bagwell made their appearance and emerged at the entrance. What followed was an eerie quiet that fell over the arena as Sting also followed behind them. They all walked at a medium pace toward the ring and Sting was about 10 steps behind them. By the time Savage stepped in the ring, Luger was getting Pillman lifted up in the Torture Rack, not seeing his former best friend making his way into the ring. Savage got in the ring and quickly kicked Luger below the belt, causing the Total Package to drop Pillman and also drop to the mat in pain. The referee didn't hesitate to call for the bell at 17:49, awarding the DQ win to WCW. Winners by DQ: Team WCW Rating: 91 - It seemed that things have only just begun despite the match being over. Hogan entered the ring and began slowly clapping his hands as the rest of the NWO started getting to work on the WCW team. Sting was last to enter the ring and Scott Steiner, who was still on his feet along with Ric Flair, began taking the fight right to the NWO. They quickly traded blows to whoever approached them. Luger was struggling toward the ropes to get himself back to his feet to prepare for a fight as well as more chaos erupted inside the ring. The crowd became unglued as the all-out fight started to take shape and the commentator's all kept a watchful eye on Sting, who was at this point still behind the rest of the NWO as the fighting started up again. The numbers game began to show the advantage as Flair and Steiner were attacked and held captive as Luger was allowed to get to his feet. Confusion showed on his face as he turned to see Ric Flair being held by Kevin Nash and Buff Bagwell while Steiner was being held by Savage and Levesque. The confusion was furthered as Sting slowly stepped forward to meet his former friend in the center of the ring. Sting stared at Luger and showed no emotion as Luger had plenty of things to say in Sting's direction. After getting nothing in return from the Stinger, Luger stepped closer so the two were nearly nose to nose. Sting took a baseball bat from the inside of his trench coat and stuck it into the center of Luger's chest before pushing him back. Luger didn't hesitate to step right back into Sting's face which only resulted in Sting again shoving Luger back toward the ropes. Hollywood Hogan was behind Sting watching the series of events and loving every bit of it. After the second shove, Hogan turned to look out toward the fans, holding his arms out to the side and laughing. While the camera was focused on Hogan, a loud "thud" could be heard in the ring followed by Tony Schiavone on commentary exclaiming "OH MY GOD!!!" - Sting shoved Luger back a second time and while Hogan was taunting out to the crowd, Luger went back to get in Sting's face for a 3rd time. Again, Sting shoved Luger backward but this time Luger sprung forward to attack. Just off to Sting's side was also Brian Pillman, taunting and loving the encounter between Sting and Luger. As Luger sprung forward, Sting ducked a forearm, resulting in Luger planting it square in the center of Pillman's forehead. Pillman dropped to the mat and just as quickly, Sting spun around and swung his baseball bat right into the midsection of Randy Savage! The crowd reaction nearly caused the roof of the Silverdome to blow off. With one arm free due to Savage doubling over, Steiner quickly began attacking Levesque again, who was so caught off guard with Sting's attack that he didn't even have time to react to Steiner. In another fluid motion, Sting used his bat to go after the knee and leg of Kevin Nash, dropping him to the mat as well, allowing Flair to get into the fight. All this took place as Hogan was turned and taunting the crowd, only to turn back to see the carnage now in the ring and his smile quickly vanish from his face. Now solely focused on Hogan, Sting quickly stepped up to the world champion seething. The crowd again became unglued as Sting began assaulting the world champion, now allowing Hogan a second to retreat. Repeated punches and kicks doubled the world champion over as Sting sent Hogan into the corner and rushed forward with a Stinger Splash, the first one seen in months! Each move from Sting caused new life in the crowd and impossibly an even louder roar from the crowd. Sting sent Hogan into the opposite corner again and looked to deliver a second Stinger Splash, but Levesque was able to pull him out of the way and took the brunt of it himself. Luger sent Pillman over the top rope and to the floor while Flair was hitting low blows and biting everyone near him. Eventually, Bagwell, Savage, and Nash were also sent outside. Levesque didn't last long as Steiner clotheslined him over the top and to the floor, leaving the world champion all alone in the ring with Steiner, Luger, Flair, and Sting. A low rumble began and got to almost earthquake levels as Hogan slowly realized he was all alone and being stalked like prey. Steiner delivered a clubbing blow to the back of Hogan's head and he doubled forward, right to Sting. Sting turned him around and hit a reverse DDT that Schiavone called a "Scorpion Deathdrop." The NWO was able to grab a leg of Hogan and pull him out of the ring. The final shot of Uncensored 1997 was of Ric Flair, Lex Luger, Scott Steiner, and Sting all standing in the center of the ring with a raging crowd throwing trash at the NWO as they retreated, beaten and bloody, up the aisle. - Rating: 84 Final Show Rating: 91

Hello everyone, I'm Mean Gene Okerlund bringing you this week's WCW Hotline Report! Fans were shocked on WWF Monday Night Raw this week when Bret Hart defeated Psycho Sid to become the new WWF world heavyweight champion. This victory was the final Raw before this weekend's Wrestlemania XIII. I'll get to those results later. Larry Zbyszko extended his exclusive contract earlier this week with WCW. I'm told the deal was for 1 year, so we'll be seeing the "Living Legend" at least for the next 12 months! Lance Storm, Dave Taylor, and Lenny Lane all also extended their WCW contracts this week, though I'm told this is for a non-exclusive handshake deal. WCW is still trying to gauge who they want to keep on the roster. Tommy Gilbert passed away last weekend at the age of 61. Gilbert had been unemployed at least since 1995 and has not had any involvement in the wrestling business, to my knowledge. Still, it's sad news and condolences go out to his family. This weekend on WCW Saturday Night, we were able to take a look at footage of this past Monday Nitro after the show went off the air! Sting had made his way into the ring amidst the all-out brawl between WCW and the NWO. Upon entering, the fighting came to a stop and both sides had a standoff in the ring, similar to what happened a number of weeks ago. The difference is, Sting this time made eye contact with Hollywood Hogan, which promptly ended up with the NWO exiting the ring and Sting exiting with them. The group then made their way to the backstage area, leaving Ric Flair, Scott Steiner, and Lex Luger all in the ring. Wrestlemania XIII was held in the Louisiana Superdome. The main event saw Bret Hart successfully defend the WWF world title against Psycho Sid, The British Bulldog, and the Ultimate Warrior in a 4-man match. Yokozuna defeated Ahmed Johnson for the Intercontinental title, and the New Rockers defended the tag team titles against Freedom Force. Other matches saw The Undertaker defeat Owen Hart, Shawn Michaels defeated The Big Show, 123 Kidd defeated Henry O. Godwinn, and Bam Bam Bigelow & Animal defeated Team XXX (Crush & Dennis Knight). There were a couple other matches of zero significance. LIVE from the Pontiac Silverdome - Detroit, MI Ric Flair, Scott Steiner, & Lex Luger vs NWO (Kevin Nash, Brian Pillman, & Paul Levesque) El Hijo Del Santo vs Hugh Morrus Steve Austin vs NWO Member John Tenta vs Lance Storm Television Title: Fit Finlay vs Dean Malenko (c) vs Steven Regal Tag Team Titles: Blue Bloods (Eaton & Taylor) vs Harlem Heat (c) Alex Wright vs Ricky Steamboat Hostile Intent vs Faces of Fear

Week 4, March 1997 LIVE from The Spectrum - Philadelphia, PA Attendance: 20,000 (SELLOUT!) - Nitro kicks off this week full of excitement and energy as Jim Ross, Bobby Heenan, and Mike Tenay welcome everyone to the final Nitro of March as we head, JR tells us, straight to Uncensored this Sunday where that show is looking to surely live up to its name. After the pyro display and video open, the three man commentary booth hypes up tonight's show, promising that the rowdy Philadelphia crowd will see all kinds of action. It seems that each passing Pay Per View each month gets more and more important in the massive battle between WCW and the New World Order. In recent weeks, WCW has slowly started to band together and fight the group of intruders but JR thinks they have a long way to go before finally showing 100% solidarity. Things are kicking off with high stakes tonight as two of the top men from each side will to battle right now! - United States Title: Randy Savage vs Scott Steiner (c) vs The Macho Man emerges with the lovely Elizabeth before the US champion walks out. Things got heated right away as soon as Steiner entered the ring and made a gesture toward Liz that the Macho Man didn't appreciate. The bell rang and the two went at it full steam, taking turns battering each other before the fight spilled to the outside. Both men were nearly counted out before Steiner got back into the ring to break up the count before going back to the floor to continue the fight. It was clear that Savage wasn't too intent on becoming the new champion and was more focused on hurting Steiner, but clearly winning the US title and bringing it back to the NWO would have been an added bonus. Savage risked disqualification by picking up a steel chair on the floor and prepared to hit Steiner in the head with it. The referee halfway exited the ring and stood on the apron, threatening Savage. The two argued a bit which allowed Steiner to recover enough to kick Savage in the stomach, doubling him over and causing him to drop the chair. Steiner rolled Savage in the ring and climbed in afterwards, the referee taking a second to scold Steiner upon entering. This allowed Elizabeth just enough time to slip Savage some brass knucks that don't look like brass knucks, but we'll call them brass knucks anyway. Steiner leaned down and picked Savage up who went to swing with those brass knuckles. Steiner blocked it and rocked Savage with his own right hand, which caused the knucks to fly off Savages fist. Steiner saw this and walked over and bent down to pick them up before putting them on his own hand. This caused Liz to jump on the apron and desperately flag down the referee. With the referee yelling at Liz to get down, the crowd then was seen getting to their feet as something was going on at the stage. The crowd was on their feet as DDP ran to the ring and slid in. Steiner had gone over to Elizabeth and the referee while DDP went right up to Savage, who was now getting back to his feet. The crowd exploded as DDP promptly dropped Savage with a Diamond Cutter in the middle of the ring and exited just as fast as he entered. DDP hustled through the crowd as Steiner got the referee's attention and made a pin, ending the match at 12:05. Winner: Scott Steiner Rating: 82 Alex Wright vs John Tenta vs We saw a sort of rejuvenated and more aggressive Alex Wright in this one. The German still found enough time to dance in the ring but not nearly as much as in the past. He took a more ruthless approach toward Tenta, which isn't clear if it was due to the larger opponent or an attitude change for the young wrestler. A highlight of the match saw Wright attempt his German Suplex finisher on the large Tenta, only for him to land completely on top of Wright, nearly ending the match there. Wright was able to compose himself and regain an advantage, hitting a top rope flying body splash for the win at 9:31. Winner: Alex Wright Rating: 56 Following Nitro's first commercial break, we return to see the Macho Man pacing all over backstage with Elizabeth struggling to keep up. Savage is yelling out for DDP and is furious from his earlier interference. Savage kicks open every door and looks around every corner, hoping to find Dallas Page. Rating: 97 Dick Slater vs Disco Inferno vs The dancing madness continues in this one, though Slater was in no mood for Disco's antics. The mighty DI actually had some good offense that was pretty hard-hitting for the grizzled veteran. Disco was able to get the win at 6:40 with a Piledriver. Winner: Disco Inferno Rating: 42 The crowd is heard loudly as Mean Gene is standing backstage with Steve Austin. Austin makes quick work of this interview by saying he knows that Hogan's going to dodge him at Uncensored, so there's no point in wasting his breath by challenging him to a match this Sunday. He says regardless, he'll be at the Pontiac Silverdome in Detroit this Sunday and that he'll take on any sack of trash from the NWO that they want to throw at him! Rating: 100 We get a promotion package of Kimberly next, showing that she's on the cover of this months WCW Magazine! The timing couldn't have been worse.... Rating: 41 Francine and TV champion Dean Malenko are backstage next. Francine does the talking in this promo and does her best trash talking while stating Steven Regal has no chance in hell at beating Dean Malenko for the TV title at Uncensored. Rating: 58 - After a commercial break, replay video is seen of last week's Monday Nitro where Arn Anderson was the victim of a brutal attack by Kevin Nash. The sheer viciousness of Nash is on full display as the video goes through the attack, followed by the sight of Anderson being stretchered out and put into an ambulance. - We return live backstage to Kevin Nash and Brian Pillman on screen. Boo's can be heard as Kevin Nash looks intensely into the camera. He says when the NWO first arrived on scene, it was take-no-prisoners, full on anarchy. The NWO made their statements by beating people up and leaving debris behind them. Somewhere along the way, the NWO got lost, got soft, and lost their direction. Nash says he's leading the charge and bringing the aggression back to the NWO. He wants guys like Brian Pillman and Randy Savage to follow his lead and stop taking it light on WCW. Nash says this ain't little league anymore. The ruthlessness of the NWO returned last week, and Arn Anderson was just the start of it. Rating: 81 Jim Duggan vs Wrath vs Ol' Hacksaw found himself on Nitro for a match, though unfortunately it was against big man Wrath. Little by little as each month progresses, the crowd has been warming up to Wrath quite a bit, despite his heel disposition. Some of it can be contributed to his powerful offense but most of it can be contributed to his finisher - The Meltdown, which they saw tonight, ending the match at 7:23. Winner: Wrath Rating: 57 The match is over and the commentary team is just beginning to go through the events of the night as the crowd is all distracted and looking up toward the ceiling of the arena. After a moment, cameras focus on a figure that hasn't been seen for quite some time - Sting. Sting looks on from above as the announcers all question why Sting is showing up tonight after being missing in action for awhile. Heenan mentions that the last time Sting was around, he was associated with the NWO. It was all clear to everyone that Sting has officially turned his back on WCW by joining the NWO's side and failing to prevent an NWO attack on WCW. Sting might be seen alone here tonight, but he's no friend of WCW anymore. He's undoubtedly showing up here tonight to let everyone know that he's still watching. Rating: 85 Things switch gear to the chaos that is the WCW backstage. Hostile Intent is in a full-on brawl with the Faces of Fear as Jimmy Hart hops all around the backstage carnage, blaring his annoying megaphone. A series of officials rush in to the scene to try and break up the fight. The chaos continues as Nitro fades out to a commercial break. Rating: 65 Nitro returns from a break with Mean Gene Okerlund standing backstage in the interview area with Lord Steven Regal. Mean Gene announces to everyone that at Uncensored this Sunday, what was going to be a one-on-one matchup for the Television title will now be a 3-way match for the title, involving Steven Regal, champion Dean Malenko, and Fit Finlay. Mean Gene announces that apparently WCW officials couldn't decide who was the actual #1 contender and added Finlay to the match now. Regal snubs his nose at the announcement and says it's nothing short of a travesty. He says WCW is doing its best to keep the title away from him - a title he never lost, by the way. Regal says he doesn't care who else they decide to throw in the match, the Lordship is walking out of Uncensored with his title. Rating: 91 Brian Pillman vs Ric Flair vs Tensions ran high in this one as soon as Flair made his entrance. In fact, Flair began sprinting to the ring while he was halfway down the aisle, dropping his robe on the floor in the process and sliding in the ring as Pillman and Flair unloaded on one another. The Philly crowd was buzzing as the two went ahead full steam. Flair and Pillman could barely have performed any better in this match and the history between the two proved to be like pouring gasoline on a fire. Pillman backed Flair into the corner and began hitting knife-edge chops but Flair quickly turned it around after a couple and began slapping Pillman's chest with his own signature chops. Flair didn't hold back and then began hitting rapid-fire punches on Pillman as he slumped in the corner. The referee, seconds away from disqualifying Flair, finally got in between the attack to pull Flair away. While in the midst, Pillman was able to hit a low blow on Flair to gain the advantage. Pillman himself was on the verge of disqualification as he gouged at Flair's face and attacked him in the corner. Soon the fight spilled to the outside where they began trading offense and getting anything in their hands for weapons. Pillman would choke Flair with TV camera cables and Flair would send Pillman into the ring posts. Pillman grabbed a chair and went to hit Flair with it, only for Flair to get a foot to Pillman's stomach at the last second. Flair then attempted to use the chair after picking it up and the referee grabbed onto it, which caused a livid Flair to get in the referee's face. The distraction allowed Pillman to attack and put Flair back in the ring. Pillman slid the chair inside the ring and grabbed another before entering the ring as well. He set Flair up after hitting a backdrop. One chair was on the mat and he placed Flair's head on it. He grabbed the other chair and was going to bash it between Flair's head and the other chair before the referee grabbed that and did his fair share of scolding Pillman. Pillman yanked the chair back from the referee as Flair got up, grabbing his own chair. Pillman swung but Flair ducked out of the way and kicked Pillman again in the stomach. Doubled over, Flair raised the chair before sweeping it down across the back of Pillman. He went down to a knee but used the chair he was holding to prop himself up still. Flair went to swing the chair again but Pillman was able to avoid this one and jabbed Flair in his gut with his own chair. The referee, clearly unable to control either man, called for the bell and declared a double disqualification. Winner: Double DQ Rating: 94 - Monday Nitro, especially a go-home show to a PPV, will never just end there. Flair and Pillman continued to brawl and fight with each other while the referee saw the carnage and just left the ring. The two continued their attacks until the expected interruption occurred..... The reinforcements arrived and the NWO made their way out to the ring. They rushed in to gang attack Flair but the Philly crowd didn't boo for long. Quickly the boo's turned into screaming cheers from the fans as more people were running out from the backstage area. Flair's teammates for this Sunday rush out and quickly met the NWO in the ring before they could begin their outnumbered attack on the Nature Boy. The brawl was wild and uncontrolled as each man in the ring went after another before moving on to someone else. The NWO tried to double team Flair but were quickly cut off by either Luger or Steiner, then their attention would turn to someone else. No one was gaining an advantage and no attempt at a double team lasted long. The crowd's attention was again taken away by something, or someone, else. Sting was once again shown high atop the arena but this time he appeared to be looking on more intently. Sting stood silent for a few seconds but clearly focused on what was going on in the ring. The crowd roared even more as Sting then moved and began walking. The roar of the crowd grew even louder as it was clear that Sting was heading toward the ring. As Sting began working his way through the frenzied crowd and toward the ring, Jim Ross informed us that Monday Nitro is all out of time and to tune in to this Sunday's Uncensored while Bobby Heenan was heard begging for just a couple more minutes to see what Sting is going to do! - Rating: 95 Final Show Rating: 94

Hello ladies and gentlemen, I'm Mean Gene Okerlund bringing you this week's WCW Hotline Report! There hasn't been much noteworthy news in the world of professional wrestling for a little while and though this week isn't very profound, there is a bit of news to disclose! The Mexican-based Universal Wrestling Association (UWA) has recently moved up in size, now being seen as a medium-sized company. Due to the size increase and their branching out to new Mexican markets, they terminated the agreement with the World Wrestling Federation to accept their developmental workers. This reportedly infuriated WWF owner Vince McMahon, who immediately adopted a hostile attitude toward the promotion. Eric Bischoff, never one to miss an opportunity, contacted UWA owner Antonio Pena and not only adopted a friendly attitude toward the company but also negotiated a talent-trade agreement! Part of the deal will also see WCW accepting any UWA employees who decide to go on an excursion. I'm told the very first talent-trade was accepted by WCW offering popular Mexican wrestler El Hijo Del Santo in exchange for Silver King for an undisclosed number of dates. Speaking of Del Santo, in rather odd and unexpected news during an interview last week, Miss Elizabeth revealed she is now dating the 33 year old Mexican wrestler. Good luck to them and what a score for Santo! Injury Report: Meng, Dave Taylor, and WCW world heavyweight champion Hollywood Hogan continue to be effected by their current knee injuries. Despite the injuries, all are continuing to work through it though the impact is noticeable in their performances. Many believe this to be the reason behind the lackluster match that headlined SuperBrawl between Hogan and Ric Flair. Alex Wright just received a clean bill of health for his knee injury that has effected his in-ring performance for the last year. Rick Steiner continues his rehab efforts for his neck injury and I'm told that continues to go well. We hope to see Steiner back in action later this year. The WWF heads toward Wrestlemania XIII and WCW heads toward Uncensored. I'd look for the WWF to have a particularly big Monday Night Raw as they have their go-home show prior to their biggest show of the year. Raw is taped from Madison Square Garden this week while Nitro is LIVE from the Philadelphia Spectrum. Week 4, March 1997 Brian Pillman vs Ric Flair Jim Duggan vs Wrath Tag Team Titles: The Amazing French Canadians vs Harlem Heat (c) Disco Inferno vs Dick Slater John Tenta vs Alex Wright United States Title: Randy Savage vs Scott Steiner (c)

Can't mess with those Samoan's heads!