WWF SNME #30 2/8/1992

Written By: Matt Peddycord

WWF Saturday Night’s Main Event 30
February 8, 1992
Lubbock, TX
Municipal Coliseum
(Taped on 1/27/1992)

The current WWF Champs were as follows:
World Champion: Ric Flair (1/19/1992)
Intercontinental Champion: Roddy Piper (1/19/1992)
World Tag Team Champions: Money Inc. (2/7/1992)

This is the first SNME airing from FOX, so we get a new logo and a new style added to the intro.

Your hosts are Vince McMahon and Bobby Heenan!

WWF Intercontinental Champion Roddy Piper vs. The Mountie (w/Jimmy Hart)

So Mountie dropped the IC belt at the Royal Rumble to Piper after he beat Bret Hart at a house show while he was suffering with a high-grade fever. So they tell us. Word on the street was, Bret’s contract was about to expire and there was talk of Bret running off to WCW with the IC title to stick it to Vince for having Flair show up on WWF TV with the WCW World title, but the deal never went down. Just imagine if it had though. Who better to bring in and stop the Dangerous Alliance than Bret Hart? Anyways, this is Mountie’s rematch and the winner gets Bret Hart at WrestleMania 8 on April 5. Mountie gets in a cheapshot on Piper to start, but then makes the heel mistake by turning his back away to pose and takes a clothesline from behind. They go to the floor for a Double Noggin Knocker and then back in, Jimmy Hart grabs Piper’s leg for Mountie to stomp on Piper. Jumping back elbow connects, but then Mountie splashes on Piper’s knees! Piper goes for a running bulldog, but Mountie shoves him off into the ref. Mountie delivers a Piledriver to Piper and then gives Piper the Bret Hart Treatment by pouring a cup of water on him and shocking him with the cattle prod. OH SNAP! Mountie is going to retain the-WAIT A MINUTE! Piper NO-SELLS the electric shock, punches Mountie in the face, and jabs him with the cattle prod! Ref wakes up and counts 1-2-3. (3:30) Piper takes off his “Hot Rod” shirt to reveal a shock-proof rubber vest! I know it’s shock proof because it says so right there. So that’s why Piper didn’t go shirtless tonight! Short, but fun while it lasted. **

Let’s go back to the Royal Rumble with the last three men remaining: Hulk Hogan, Sid Justice and Ric Flair. We see Sid standing in the corner while Hogan looks to get rid of Flair. Hogan’s trying to stomp Flair out, but then Sid shocks the world and dumps Hogan out. The Horsemen got to stick together, pal! Now I’ve seen that Rumble match at least four times and I’ve never heard that many Hogan chants. Something’s fishy about that audio. Of course the end is near, as Hogan grabs hold of Sid’s arm and Flair helps toss him out to win the Rumble and his first WWF Championship. Forget what I said earlier about the Horsemen thing. The whole reason that clip was shown was to set up another clip of the recent WrestleMania VIII press conference where Hogan was named the number one contender to the WWF title and therefore, would face WWF Champion Ric Flair at WrestleMania. Naturally, Sid Justice was PISSED since he was actually the last guy to be eliminated from the Rumble, NOT Hogan. This is BOGUS, Tunney. Well, Sid has apologized now for his actions at the press conference and now everything is peachy. OR IS IT?

Ric Flair & The Undertaker (w/Mr. Perfect & Paul Bearer) vs. Hulk Hogan & Sid Justice (w/Brutus Beefcake)

Sid was such a better heel than a face, regardless of how many people cheered him. Brutus is Hogan’s best friend with benefits, which is why he’s out here. Sid starts off hot and heavy on Flair until he bails and Hogan gets a tag. Hogan hiptosses Flair and then hiptosses Undertaker. Taker and Sid tag in and we get an early preview to the main event at WrestleMania 13. WHO KNEW? Hogan tags back in and clotheslines the heels out. Sid comes in, but ducks low off a whip. Hogan tries to save him, but that just causes Sid to be double-teamed with a double-atomic drop for 1-2-NO! Hogan saves and a big brawl erupts, but then Taker regains control and puts Sid in his own corner and tags Flair. Sid becomes face-in-peril for a bit until he counters a double-teamed slam into a double-noggin knocker. Hogan gets the tag and cleans house until Perfect grabs his leg from the floor, which gives Flair an open kick on Hogan’s knee. Flair does a little work on the knee and then quickly applies the FIGURE-FOUR. Surely Sid will help Hogan out, right? Nope, not this time. Hogan reverses the Figure-Four, but the tag to Sid is cut off by Taker. He hits the Jumping Lariat and tags in Flair. He heads up top, and naturally gets slammed down. Hogan starts to crawl towards his corner, but Sid ain’t reaching for no tag. Nah uh. Hogan gets stuck in the heel corner, but HULKS UP and out with a double-clothesline on the heels. Hogan pleads for a tag, but Sid won’t do it and starts heading for the locker room. Beefcake tries to persuade Sid to turn around and help out the Hulkster, but he screams that “Hogan needs to help himself.” Meanwhile, the double-team beatdown gets out of hand as Flair throws Earl Hebner aside for the DQ. (10:57) Beefcake’s in the ring now, but he can’t help out. His face has screws in it! He doesn’t physically help out, but he baits Taker and Flair in for clotheslines from Hogan to send them out of here. The following interview explains Sid’s actions and sets up the new WrestleMania 8 main event. Well, one of the main events. **½

Sean Mooney (he’s still around?) stops Sid in the dressing room for questioning. Sid tells Mooney to shut up! He blames Jack Tunney for showing favoritism towards Hulk. He tells Hogan that he couldn’t beat Flair on his best day and can’t beat Sid on HIS worst day. Oh yeah, by the way, Sid rules the world.

After the break, Mean Gene meets up with Hulk Hogan and Brutus Beefcake. Hogan calls Sid a backstabbing liar. How dare someone choose to go against Hulkamania? After Hogan finishes telling us what he thinks of Sid, he and Beefcake share a moment together and talk about how they’re always there for each other. Apparently when Beefcake was in the hospital after his parasailing accident, Hogan was there in the hospital bed pumping blood into him. You may insert your own joke at this time. Hogan tries to get the interview back on track by saying he’s still heading to WrestleMania to regain his title.

Jim Duggan & Sgt. Slaughter vs. The Beverly Brothers (w/The Genius)

Duggan and Slaughter are undefeated in the WWF, but so are the Beverly brothers, says Heenan. In case you’re unaware, the Beverly brothers are Wayne Bloom (Beau Beverly) and Mike Enos (Blake Beverly) from the AWA. Duggan murders Blake until Beau nails Duggan from the apron with Genius’ slate. Slaughter comes in to protest and causes Duggan to receive the double-team Leapfrog Backbreaker that Benjamin/Haas use or did use. Nevertheless, Duggan kicks back and tags in Slaughter. He delivers a backbreaker to Beau after an abdominal stretch and gets two as Blake makes the save. Duggan comes in and throws out Beau while Slaughter takes the slate and KO’s Blake to set up the Irish whip into a THREE-POINT STANCE from Duggan for the 1-2-3. (2:39) Short enough, and fun. *

Let’s recap the Savage-Roberts feud that ends tonight! Back in November on Superstars, Jake Roberts caused Lucifer the “Poisonous” Cobra to bite Macho Man’s forearm! In December at Tuesday in Texas, Roberts smacked Elizabeth around. That’s a big no-no and now Savage wants revenge once and for all.

Macho Man Randy Savage interview with Mean Gene: You thought he was crazy before? Oh, you haven’t seen crazy yet.

Randy Savage vs. Jake Roberts

This is one of the few match-ups to air on SNME more than once and I could be wrong, but it’s also the only SNME two-timer where the roles were reversed in the second match. We see some INTENSE brawling down on the floor to start, as Roberts gets posted shoulder-first. Once they’re in the ring, Savage is choking and clawing at Roberts like a crazy man. Roberts finally puts on the brakes during a turnbuckle smash and throws Savage out to gain a breather. Roberts then follows Savage out and sends him into the ringpost. Back in, Savage fires back and attempts a flying double-ax handle, but Roberts catches him on the way down and then levels Savage with the DDT. Roberts doesn’t want the pinfall victory like he could’ve gotten – instead, he lets ref Earl Hebner start the ten-count. He gets to eight, but Savage is up to his knees. Roberts gives Savage a short-arm clothesline. He makes the mistake though by taunting the crowd and then takes a backdrop out to the floor once he tries another DDT. Roberts tries to pick himself up using the guardrail and doesn’t see Savage coming down from the top with a double-ax handle! Back in, Savage finishes Roberts off with the MACHO ELBOW DROP. (5:16) Savage ain’t done with Roberts just yet. He heads up top and comes down on Roberts with another MACHO ELBOW DROP despite the pleas from the referees and security guys. Savage goes out and grabs the ring bell, but by the time Savage is back in the ring, Roberts has already rolled out and headed to the dressing room. ***

Elizabeth runs down to celebrate with her man while Roberts sulks behind the curtain and says, “It’s not over yet.”

The show cuts off right there, but we’d find out in the weeks to come what Roberts meant by that statement. As Savage and Liz were walking back through the curtain, Roberts was waiting to crack the first head he saw with a steel chair. Did he actually nail Liz in the face with a steel chair? No way. Who stopped this from happening? You’ll never guess! It was The Undertaker! How about that guy? Maybe those undead people aren’t so bad after all!

Final Thoughts: I believe it achieved exactly what it set out to do, and that’s build towards WrestleMania. The matches were basically just harmless fun and Savage was really on a roll since his return (although Jake was noticeably not the same Jake we saw back in ’86) , so I’m going with thumbs up for SNME 30.