The SmarK Legacy Rant for Monday Night RAW – August 2 1993
– Live or taped or whatever from somewhere in New York outside of the usual Manhattan Center. Alexandria Bay, apparently.
– Your hosts are Vince and Bobby, as Randy Savage is wrestling this week.
The Steiner Brothers v. Barry Horowitz & Duane Gill
Scott hiptosses Barry out of the corner to start and then catches him with an overhead suplex. Boston crab and it’s over to Rick, so Barry tags out to the other half of the jobber dream team. Gill immediately gets killed with a clothesline and Scott gets a pumphandle slam and the Frankensteiner, and it’s FUHGEDDABOUDIT in the words of Vince, at 2:45.
-And now, call your friends and neighbors, because it’s part one of a special FIVE (!!!!) part series on Lex Luger and how fucking amazing he really is. This time around: The early years. Now, you’d think that having him, oh, wrestle, would be a more effective tool for turning him into the #1 babyface they wanted him to be, but clearly you don’t understand the brilliance of Vince McMahon in that case.
Adam Bomb v. Tony Roy
It wouldn’t be a 1993 RAW without an Adam Bomb squash. Bomb pounds away in several different ways, then drops Roy on the top rope. Backdrop suplex and Bomb goes up with an ugly flying clothesline, then finishes with the Atom Smasher at 2:14. Same old same old.
Doink the Clown v. Randy Savage
This is either gonna be awesome or incredibly stupid and I get the feeling there will be no middle ground. See, now Savage as All-American Crusader is actually a babyface that fans like and wanted to get behind, and yet Vince stubbornly refused to let him wrestle on a regular basis. Savage is Captain America and Luger is the Iron Patriot, basically. Luger’s even bionic! It works on so many levels. Really though, Hogan was gone for good and this was seemingly Macho’s chance to carry the promotion on his own, and for whatever reason he wasn’t given that shot. Even WCW, two years later, gave him that chance, and they were run by people who only remembered that wrestling was on the network when they stumbled across it while flipping channels on Monday nights. Doink goes to the eyes right away and Savage bails and grabs a chair in response, which is exactly the kind of overreaction that was always Savage’s problem. Doink gets a cheapshot and chokes him down, then goes to a Boston crab before releasing to work on Savage’s leg. Doink hammers him in the corner, but misses a blind charge, and Savage puts him on the floor with the high knee. And we take a break. Back with Doink holding a neckbreaker submission, but Savage reverses out, so Doink goes to a neck vice instead. Belly to belly out of the corner gets two. He hits the chinlock and goes up for the Whoopie Cushion, but it misses and Savage makes the comeback. Doink immediately cuts him off and tosses him as Savage takes a nice bump out, but he goes under the ring and produces…THE MACHO MIDGET. Doink thinks this is hilarious, which fits perfectly with his character, and in fact he gets so distracted that Savage blindsides him and finishes with a small package at 9:18. I’d go with awesome here. ***1/2 See, I liked that instead of getting under Doink’s skin, Savage got into his head and appealed to his bizarre sense of humor to outsmart him, rather than the "slip on a banana peel" type of finish you’d normally get here. Doink is presented as smart, Savage was smarter here.
Ted Dibiase v. 1-2-3 Kid
From Wrestling Challenge the past weekend, and we’re joined in progress with Dibiase putting Kid in the Dream. Ramon comes out to distract Dibiase, however, and Dibiase cockily lays back on the Kid, but gets pinned instead. See, now that’s a "slip on a banana peel" finish. Thank you for wonderfully illustrating my point, show.
Jim Cornette makes his WWF debut and immediately hugs it out with Bobby Heenan in a funny moment, and the crowd boos him out of the building right away. So he accepts the Steiner Brothers’ open contract for Summerslam, on behalf of The Heavenly Bodies.
Mr. Perfect v. Barry Hardy
Hardy gets a hiptoss and celebrates it with too much enthusiasm, so Perfect grabs a headlock and then dropkicks Hardy out of the ring so he can finally do the gum swat. He brings Hardy back in with a backdrop suplex and follows with the neck snap, then works the leg a bit for some reason before it’s time for the Perfectplex at 2:26.
Next week: Tatanka v. Mr. Hughes, and Lex Luger and Yokozuna sign their contract. Gee, I wonder what’ll happen there. Plus, the Heavenly Bodies debut.
