Summerslam (Pat 1)
August 22nd, 1999
LIVE from the Target Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota
Attendance: 17,370
You know, Summerslam has always been one of my favorite shows of the year. There’s always been something about the show being built up as one big turning point event to end the summer that appeals to me. Maybe it has something to do with it being the last PPV I can enjoy before I have to drag myself back to school but I can’t help but stay hyped about Summerslam. Hell, there have been a few years where I’ve been more excited for Summerslam than I was for Wrestlemania. Considering that WM XV was horrendous, let’s hope that this show can surpass that. This show was headlined by a Triple Threat match between Mankind, HHH, and Stone Cold Steve Austin for the WWF Championship. Hometown hero and Governor of Minnesota Jesse “The Body” Ventura served as the guest ref. IT’S THE BIGGEST PARTY OF THE SUMMER, SON!
– To start out the show, we get a video recap of some of the more famous WWF guest refs in 98’ and 99’. Mike Tyson (WM XIV), Vince McMahon (Over the Edge 98’) and Shane McMahon (Over the Edge 99’) are included in the video. The video concludes by putting over Ventura as a hard ass that will do his best to maintain order while in the ring with three guys who would have no problem whooping the Body’s ass if he got on their bad side.
– “Are you ready for an out of body experience?” is apparently the tag line for this show. Makes sense, I’ve seen quite a few Vince Russo shows that made me feel like I took some hits of acid.
– You wanna know how hot WWF was at this time? For a building that can hold 17,000+, tickets sold out less than an hour after they went on sale. That’s amazing to me for a non-WM show.
– Backstage, Ventura informs HHH and Chyna that he isn’t having any of their shit tonight and that there will be a clean finish in the main event. He’s gonna let Chyna be at ringside but if she interferes, she’s gotta deal with “The Body.” Oh my. HHH is like, “I’m a heel and I’ll be a douche if I want” before storming off with Chyna trailing behind.
– Hey, it’s Chris Jericho’s debut in this review series! Backstage, Y2J berates Howard Finkle for taking so long to bring him his luggage, incorrectly calling him “Harold.” “Whatever” is the response when Howard tells Chris his real name. Not amazing or anything but it was an entertaining 20 seconds or so.
Match #1
Euro-Continental Championship
Jeff Jarrett (w/Debra and her puppies) vs. D-Lo Brown (c)
– Oddly enough, despite being the clear cut heel, Jarrett gets a big pop when he comes out. I’m gonna guess that Debra’s puppies are just really over. In fact, I’m almost positive it’s because of that because Debra’s name actually gets announced after Jarrett’s as if she was the main attraction. Gotta admit, her puppies may be hard as rocks but they’ve really grown on me. Those kids are stiff but they know how to work.
– After him and his main squeeze enter the ring, Jarrett demands that Debra go to the back. Of course, this gets a lot of heat from the crowd, even earning Jarrett some loud “Asshole” chants.
– After getting sent to the back, Debra pleads with D-Lo to let her be in his corner. Understanding the value of a good snow ho, D-Lo accepts and together, they come out to the ring to a massive pop from the crowd. That’s really good storytelling to get the desired reaction from the crowd. Something that the modern era could learn from, I’d say.
– LMAO at JR trying to play it off like the crowd is going nuts for D-Lo when they are really just happy that breasts have arrived. Damn, this crowd is thirsty. I like boobs too but come on now.
– Pissed at the crowd looking at Debra’s puppies, Jarrett jumps D-Lo from behind to start the match in a dastardly fashion.
– I must note that even though the crowd was initially going nuts for boobies, they do love D-Lo as they are eating up pretty much everything he does as he starts fighting back against Jarrett. Some simple Powerslams get a big pop.
– D-Lo controls the match for a while, even connecting with a Sky High Powerbomb for a close nearfall, before getting caught with a Sidewalk Slam while attempting a dive off the top rope. From there, Jarrett sends the champ to the outside where he gives him possibly the lightest throw into the steps in wrestling history. The champ soon makes a comeback, however, and sends Jarrett over the barricade. Ref isn’t even trying to count these guys out but whatever, it is a title match so I’ll give them some leeway there.
– D-Lo goes for a Suplex on the outside but Double J counters, sending D-Lo face-first into the ring post!
– Jarret starts working over the champ’s arm in the ring as the crowd shows their thirst for puppies. While Jarrett goes for the “ten punches in the corner” deal, D-Lo counters it by tripping Jarrett and causing him to land face-first on the turnbuckle. Taking advantage of the stunned Jarrett, D-Lo hits an an awesome looking Running Sit-Out Powerbomb and both men are down. Love that move.
– “See what your puppies have done now, Debra!”- Jerry Lawler
– After both men make it back to their feet, D-Lo begins running wild on Jarrett as the crowd goes nuts. Eventually, he gets Jarrett in position for the Lo-Down but oddly enough, he instead goes for a Swanton off the top which fails due to Double J moving out of the way.
– As Debra hops on the apron for…no reason other than it’s time for the finish I guess, Jarrett teases hitting her with the guitar before Mark Henry runs into the ring and snatches the guitar from him. Henry has been D-Lo’s ally for months by this point so you can probably guess what happens considering this is 1999. Henry turns on D-Lo by smashing him in the back with the guitar, allowing Jarrett to pick up the win and the titles! The best part about this is that the ref had to pretend to not hear a goddamn guitar being smashed over someone’s back literally 4 feet away from him. I love pro-wrestling.
– As soon as the bell rings, Debra goes running into the new champ’s arms, proving that this was, in fact, one big ruse from the get-go. Henry leaves with Debra and Jarrett as a screwed D-Lo lays defeated in the ring as DJ Khaled’s “No New Friends” plays in his head.
– All of this was good. The match itself, while it could have been longer, was solid and had the crowd hooked. As predictable as the turn is in 2014, the crowd freaking hated Henry for screwing over their man D-Lo. This was about as effective as a turn can be. Big thumbs up to everyone involved here. This was probably the second best opener I’ve seen in this series so far (D-Lo & Henry vs. Kane & X-Pac at OTE was a bit better).
– Backstage, our good buddy Michael “Black As” Cole is interviewing Edge & Christian, who’ll be in a Tag Team Turmoil match tonight. In an “oh, isn’t that convenient?” moment, it’s revealed they will be starting off the match against the New Brood AKA The Hardy Boys who have aligned themselves with Gangrel. They cut a decent promo where they say that they outgrew Gangrel and they’ll prove that tonight when they beat the Hardys.
Match #2
Winning team gets tag team title match on Raw the next night
Tag Team Turmoil
– As stated before, E & C will start this one out with the HardyBoys. Edge & Christian had started making their entrance through the crowd by this point so yay.
– Both teams brawl to start the match with E&C getting the better of it. Edge and Matt are chosen to be the legal men as the babyfaces control the opening moments of the match.
– While beating on Matt, Christian’s momentum is stopped by a cheap shot from Gangrel at ringside. This allows the heels to gain the advantage as Jeff gets tagged in. Jeff does a sloppy but insanely cool looking Springboard Moonsault thingy on Christian for a nearfall. I wish I could describe it better than that but thankfully, the magic of gifs will let you see what I’m talking about.
– For the first time on PPV this year, Poetry in Motion connects. The Hardys continue to work over Christian as Jeff connects with a Swanton Bomb (again, kinda sloppy). This could have been the end for the blond bombshells but Edge breaks up the pin to save his partner.
– After laying out both of his opponents with a Reverse DDT, Christian makes the hot tag to Edge. The crowd gives Edge a big reaction as the future world champion comes in as a proverbial house of fire.
– After a couple of seconds of babyface fire, the match breaks down as everyone goes to the outside. There, we get the most clearly choreographed spot I’ve ever fucking seen. Matt Irish-Whips Edge towards the barricade as Christian does the same to Jeff. Both men run up the barricade and run towards each other until they meet at the end of the ramp as Edge collides with Jeff in mid-air in what was presumably supposed to be a Spear. Hilariously stupid spot. You can just tell that when both teams were planning it out backstage, it must have looked so cool in their heads. In execution, it looked really hokey.
– LOL at the crowd’s reaction to that spot. They were like, “I don’t know what the hell happened there but yeah, bodies crashing into each other!”
– Gangrel tries to get uppity with Edge on the outside but here comes Christian with a Plancha off the top rope onto the vampire! Hardy doesn’t want to be left out of the high spot fun so he comes crashing down on the babyfaces with a Moonsault.
– Matt throws Christian back in the ring and places him on the top turnbuckle for something. We’ll never know what as Edge comes up behind Matt and places him on his shoulders before planting him with an Electric Chair Facebuster! One Elbow off the top by Christian later and the Hardys are the first team eliminated! The crowd loved the finish. See, this is the type of crowd that people think of when they talk about how over everything in the Attitude Era was because man, they are hot for everything tonight.
– Representing the Corporate Ministry, Mideon and Viscera are the next team out. Viscera immediately starts wrecking Christian’s shit.
– The baddies beat on Christian for a bit before Edge gets tagged in. He tries to knock Viscera off his feet but is stopped by a goddamn Spinning Heel Kick by the big man. That was, no joke on nothing, the most impressive thing I’ve ever seen Big Vis do.
– Viscera attempts to splash Edge in the corner but the blond wisely pulls Mideon in the way, forcing Vis to hit his own partner. E&C work together to send Viscera to the outside before Edge hits a Spear on Mideon for the pin. Edge & Christian have survived two teams!
– Droz and Prince Albert (what in god’s name…) are the fourth team in. The heels start working over Edge, including Albert hitting a cool looking Torture Rack Neckbreaker
– Droz goes for a football tackle on Christian but ends up sending himself to the outside after Christian pulls the top rope down. The babyfaces make a comeback, culminating with Edge planting Albert with the Downward Spiral (remember when that was his finisher?) to send the jobber team back to the showers.
– The blondes don’t even have time to celebrate their win as they are immediately mugged by the Acolytes, the next team in this match.
– Edge and Bradshaw are determined to be the legal men as Edge comes off the top rope with a Missile Dropkick. He soon gets murked by a Powerbomb from Bradshaw and has to be save by his partner.
– It’s a tag match so of course, the heels have to cut the ring in half and work over Edge. They beat on him for a while until he, of course, makes the hot tag to Christian. The match almost immediately breaks down as Edge and Farooq start brawling on the outside. Meanwhile, Christian goes for a dive off the top onto Bradshaw but gets nutted on the turnbuckle by Farooq. Captain Charisma no-sells the testicular pain and still has the strength to catch JBL with a Tornado DDT. Christian covers him but it’s not enough.
– For some reason, Crash and Hardcore Holly have sauntered out to ringside. Apparently these goobers thought that it was time for them to come out since they are the sixth and final team, not realizing that E&C and the Acolytes are still duking it out. Fortunately, they don’t have to wait long as Bradshaw kills Christian with a Clothesline From Hell to end E&C’s impressive run in this match.
– Taking advantage of already being at ringside, the Holly Cousins jump the Acolytes. Both teams brawl as Farooq plants Crash with a Dominator that he no-sells the shit out of by jumping back up to his feet not even three seconds after taking the move.
– The Hollys argue with each other over who is gonna beat up Farooq which gives the Acolytes the opening needed to take control. At one point, Crash force-tags himself in but walks straight into an ass whooping.
– Ebony and Ivory beat on Crash for a bit before Holly gets tagged in and lays out Farooq. The Hollys argue over who is gonna pin Farooq (which makes no kind of sense because only Hardcore can legally pin him) leading to Hardcore sending his cousin to the outside with some punches. Farooq just kinda looks on like “lol white trash” before delivering a Spinebuster to Hardcore for the win. The Acolytes earn the tag title shot!
– Fun match. It went on a bit too long and it really did peak after E&C got eliminated but everybody worked hard here.
– Backstage, we see Big Show and The Undertaker enter the building in street clothes. Fascinating.
This is probably my favorite picture from this show and I don’t know why
– We now go to another part of the backstage area where Al Snow is petting his dog, Pepper. He tells his dog that the Big Bossman is all talk and can’t do anything to them. Anybody else hungry all of a sudden?
– Hahahahaha, Road Dogg comes out in the douchiest outfit ever. This n**** is wearing a white Tommy Hilfiger shirt, white shorts, a fanny pack, and some ankle high white socks. Talk about taking it back to 99’, motherfuckers.
– Anyhoo, Dogg bitches that he’s not in the hardcore title match, actually implying that the bookers made a mistake. He didn’t directly say that but he might as well have. Since he can’t get a title match tonight, Dogg challenges the winner to a match on Raw the next night. Suddenly, the leader of the Dogg Pound is interrupted by the arrival of Y2J, who even gets pyro for some reason.
– Standing on a part of the sound stage, Jericho cuts a promo where he puts over his WWF PPV debut while at the same time burying Raw and Summerslam. He buries everyone on the Summerslam card, especially Road Dogg. There is a cute little cheap pop trick where Jericho tells Dogg to listen to the “embarrassingly small” reaction that the crowd is giving him. This, of course, prompts the crowd to pop for the face. Jericho, being a good heel, pretends the pop was for him.
– Jericho says that Dogg doesn’t impress him because he can spell his own name. He needs to spell words like “Legume” if he wants to impress Y2J! Jericho, rightfully, mocks Dogg’s outfit and his shitty white boy dreads. He then buries DX by saying that Road Dogg is dyslexic and is really trying to say “it sucks” instead of “suck it.” Because DX sucks, you see. Jericho says that now that he’s here to save the WWF, the crowd will never have to be bored by clowns like Road Dogg.
– So, what is Road Dogg’s response to such a verbal burial of everything he stands for? “Hey, why don’t you shut up, BITCH!?” This must have been where Brie Bella got her catchphrase from.
– Dogg says “You know, I’m almost scared to say this because I’m afraid you might take me up on it but *crotch chop*!” This causes Jericho to pout as RD’s music plays for no good reason. So, RD’s response to that long, amusing tirade by Jericho was to swear and imply that Jericho was gay because homophobia. What a burial of Road Dogg, haha. Dude came off completely ineffective against Jericho. He had absolutely no defense against the many criticisms that Jericho threw at him. I must note that the crowd still popped for the DX catchphrase.
– Entertaining segment but I can’t help but wonder what the point of it was other than to waste some time.
– Dogg sits at the commentary booth so I guess he’s doing guest commentary for the next match. “I don’t even own a computer so Y2K and Y2J don’t mean a damn thing to me.”- Road Dogg. Oh, now he wants to come up with some decent responses? Too late pal.
Match #3
Hardcore Championship
Al Snow vs. The Big Bossman(c)
– Snow leaves Pepper backstage for this match.
– “I don’t even know if [Al Snow]’s got the salt. He better bring Queen Latifah out here.”- Road Dogg. Christ, even I think that’s bad.
– In a brilliant move, Snow actually hides out on a piece of the set instead of going to the ring. When Bossman makes his entrance, Snow dives onto him as soon he walks out from behind the curtain and blindsides him, gaining the upper hand to start off the match.
– Dogg actually leaves the commentary booth with a mic in hand and says that he’ll do commentary while calling the action, following Snow and Bossman as they brawl to the back.
– Near the Gorilla area, Bossman and Snow dick around and do a bunch of wacky weapon shots. After blasting Snow in the face with a chalkboard, Bossman taunts Pepper before throwing her cage away! PETA was pleased with that, I’m sure.
– Bossman tries to crush Snow by pushing a freezer, the kind that you see in convenience stores to hold sodas and stuff, on top of him but the challenger moves out of the way.
– Much like last month, both men brawl out in the streets. Road Dogg is treating this like one big ass joke on commentary BTW.
– After being on the backfoot for most of the brawl, Snow fights back with some karate kicks. He soon gets put through a plastic table, however, as Bossman regains the upper hand.
– They somehow brawl their way into a bar as all the drunken patrons hoot and holler at getting to see two guys fight while being on TV at the same time. After rocking Bossman with some punches, Snow briefly flirts with a fine mamacita at the bar before going back to beating Bossman booty.
– A bunch of dudes in a bar are screaming that they want “Head!” Sometimes, comedy writes itself.
– They brawl in the bathroom where Snow actually rubs a urine cake on Bossman’s face. That had to be a clean one because holy shit, I would begin legit fighting anybody who rubbed a used one on my face
– Bosman has a great punch, I gotta say.
– It’s shades of the Iron Circle match from last month as Snow begins choking Bossman out with a steel chain. Somehow, Bossman winds up on a table and Snow tries to do a Moonsault off the bar through it! Sadly, Bossman kinda sorta moves out of the way causing Snow to go through the table awkwardly.
– They brawl near the pool tables as the champ smashes a beer bottle over Snow’s head (after chugging it’s contents, of course). Angered by Dogg’s commentary, Bossman takes a swing at the degenerate. RD responds to this by cheap-shotting Bossman in the back with his own night stick.
– For literally no reason but to be a dick, Snow hits Bossman in the balls with some pool balls before covering him for the win. New champion!
– So, the story is that Bossman, the heel, was unfairly cheated out of his title by outside interference. Wonderful, haha.
– After briefly celebrating his win, Snow goes running to check on Pepper. When he makes it back into the building, he sees Stevie Richards and the Blue Meanie threatening Pepper! Knowing that he has to respect his bitch, he goes HAM on the BWO and lays them out.
– As I’ve said before, I’m desensitized to Hardcore Wackiness but this was completely inoffensive.
– Backstage, Jesse Ventura tells Mankind that the pinfall in the main event has to happen in the middle of the ring. Mankind responds by making a reference that I don’t get that I’m sure was hilarious in 99’.
– The camera briefly shows a shot of the Lion’s Den where Blackman and Shamrock will do battle later tonight.
Match #4
Women’s Championship
Tori vs. Ivory(c)
– In the build to this match, Ivory wrote “SLUT” on Tori’s stomach and “SKANK” on her back in black marker on Sunday Night Heat. Holy shit, haha. That’s something you’ll only see in this era. Like, can you imagine if one of the Bellas did that to the other? I can’t.
Only a heel supports slut shaming
– I <3 Ivory, I feel like you guys should know that. Tori, on the other hand, has the distinction of having the worst match in the history of this series against Sable back at Mania XV. So, not sure what to expect here.
– Both women start swinging as soon as Tori gets in the ring. They have a brief skirmish before Tori plants the champ with a Powerslam that actually looked decent.
– The match spills out to ringside as Ivory rakes Tori’s eyes and sends her face first into the ring post. Ivory throws the challenger back in the ring and goes for some covers but Tori kicks out each time.
– Tori rallies her way back into the match with sloppy looking Rolling Suplexes. Ivory regains control of the match with some dirty tactics and wow, Tori’s selling is horrendous.
– Ivory tries to pull the bitch’s weave out by yanking on only Tori’s hair while doing snapmares.
– Ivory actually does a Giant Swing and manages a few rotations before dropping Tori. Cesaro, eat your heart out. You’ll have to fight me though because Ivory is my boo.
– Tori hits a Spear on the champ and does some ground and pound before dragging Ivory back up to her feet and lighting up her chest with some chops.
– Tori hits a Reverse Powerbomb on Ivory that looks botched. After getting out of a rough looking Sunset Flip, Ivory counters another Sunset Flip attempt by, and I’m not joking here, sitting down crotch first on Tori’s face. Somehow, this incapacitates the challenger long enough for Ivory to get the win and be the first champion this show to retain.
– After the match, Ivory tries to yank Tori’s top off but is stopped by Luna Vachon! Luna chases the champ to the back as Tori stops her boobs from spilling out in the ring.
– Match wasn’t good but it wasn’t horrible either. It wasn’t much worse than any match you’d see on Raw nowadays with the divas. Ivory actually looked pretty decent for the most part. Tori was terrible as expected.
– Backstage with Michael Cole, The Rock is going off on Cole for interrupting him earlier in the night (on Sunday Night Heat, I guess). As retaliation, Rocky says that he’s gonna interview Cole for a change. He questions Cole’s sexuality before cutting a short but sweet promo. He gets the crowd to chant his name and promises to beat Billy Bitchcakes tonight. He does his “If Ya Smell” catchphrase to cap off the promo.
– The camera cuts to Billy Gunn sneaking around with something hidden under a tarp. Weird.
Match #5
Lion’s Den Match
Ken Shamrock vs. Steve Blackman
– These two have been beefing for months so this is supposed to be the blowoff to their feud.
– Blackman chose the weapons in the cage. Not too sure on what the rules of the match are so don’t ask.
– Blackman pulls out a pair of nunchucks from his trunks as both men size each other up. Shamrock ducks under an initial shot to the head but gets whacked in the back of the leg before taking a shot to the face. For some odd reason, Blackman drops his weapon and opts for some karate kicks instead. Unfortunately for him, Shamrock catches his leg and takes him to the ground with a Dragon Screw.
– After attempting a Knee Bar, Shamrock grabs the nunchucks and tries to hit Blackman with him but Stevie listens to his sensei and sweeps the leg. As payback for Shamrock choking him out last month, Blackman tries to choke his rival out with the nunchucks. “The World’s Gooniest Man” avoids being put to sleep by slapping on an armbar.
– Kenny works over Blackman with some knee strikes before doing a fucking Irish Whip. Yes, in this intense match between two legit fighters, they used an IRISH WHIP.
– Shamrock grabs a Kendo Stick and tries to whack Blackman with it but Blackman actually absorbs the shot with his forearm in some shit you’d see in a martial arts movie. Awesome.
– More Irish Whips. lol.
– In this totally legit shoot fight, Blackman hits an ATOMIC DROP. Next time I get in a fight with someone, I’m gonna do that.
– After beating on Kenny with the broken pieces of the kendo stick before going for ANOTHER irish-whip. This time, Kenny jumps off the cage and catches Blackman with a Forearm strike
– Blackman tries to grab a weapon but is stopped by Shamrock and hit with a Back Suplex.
– Haha, Shamrock Irish-Whips Blackman into the cage and Blackman, instead of selling it, bounces off the cage just like he would if he was running the ropes so Shamrock can hit a powerslam. So dumb.
– Both men duck Roundhouse Kicks before Blackman hits him with an Enziguri. The Lethal Weapon starts working Kenny over with a Kendo Stick. He hits him with multiple body shots before laying him out with one final shot to the head. It looks Shamrock might be down for the count. Blackman could theoretically win by having the ref open the cage door and escaping through it but, like a goddamn idiot, he refuses to leave.
– Loud “Blackman Sucks!” chants as Stevie goes for a Bicycle Kick. Kenny ducks under it and catches him with a Belly to Belly Suplex.
– It’s at this moment that Shamrock seemingly realizes “wait, I’m a goon” so he starts murdering Blackman with Kendo Stick shots. After one final shot to the head, Blackman is out like a light and The World’s Gooniest Man is declared the winner.
– That…happened. There was a lot of goofiness (seriously, why the hell were these guys doing Irish Whips in a shootfighter environment!?) but the match itself was kinda enjoyable. Wouldn’t go out of my way to watch it again but it wasn’t bad.
“Gunner can suck my intense dick”