WCW Fall Brawl 1994 9/18/1994

Written By: Matt Peddycord

WCW Fall Brawl 1994
September 18, 1994
Roanoke, VA
Roanoke Civic Center

The current WCW Champs were as follows:
WCW World Champion: Hulk Hogan (7/17/1994)
WCW U.S. Champion: Ricky Steamboat (8/24/1994)
WCW World Tag Team Champions: Pretty Wonderful (7/17/1994)
WCW World Television Champion: Lord Steven Regal (6/23/1994)

Your hosts are Tony Schiavone & Bobby Heenan.

Country music singer Martin Delray sings the national anthem.

Gene Okerlund announces he will be talking to Hulk Hogan via satellite and the crowd boos like CRAZY.

WCW World Television Champion Lord Steven Regal (w/Sir William) vs. Johnny B. Badd

Regal wears a powdered wig during his entrance and Tony think it’s peculiar. Heenan counters by saying that Johnny B. Badd comes down to the ring looking like a gumball machine, but Tony didn’t say jack. He does have a point there. This is the apex of Badd chasing any WCW title he could in 1994. Badd wrenches the arm to start. He shows Ricky Steamboat-like consistency with the arm until he delivers an airplane spin that puts Regal out on the floor. Badd follows him out with a pescado. Back in, Badd whiffs on a crossbody and Regal starts to rearrange Badd’s face with forearms. Badd makes a comeback with a tilt-a-whirl headscissors. Regal battles a sunset flip and grabs hold of Sir William’s cane only for ref Nick Patrick to kick him back down for 1-2-NO! Heel miscommunication ensues and Badd rolls up Regal for 1-2-NO! Regal fires back with forearms until Badd blocks one into a backslide for 1-2-3. (11:11) We’ve got a NEW WCW World TV Champ. Badd gets his first title win in a pretty decent match with an ironic finish of sorts. A little overrated though in my book. ***¼

They replay clips of everything that happened to Hogan at the last Clash a few weeks earlier.

Cactus Jack vs. Kevin Sullivan (w/Dave Sullivan) – ‘Loser Leaves WCW’ match

The crazies are here and the loser heads to ECW. Well, that’s essentially what happens. These two actually start out fighting on the floor where Cactus takes a NASTY bump over the guardrail and then they decide to head into the ring. Aside from the ultimatum given to the loser, there is no rule changes for this match. Back out to the floor, Cactus peels up the ringside mats and slams Sullivan for the Flying Elbow, but Sullivan gets up and with a little help from Dave, he tosses Cactus from the second rope down to the concrete. Whyyyyyy would you do that to yourself? After a slam on the concrete, Sullivan claws Cactus into the ring where he mounts his comeback. Cactus is still VERY over at this point even in Roanoke. Running elbow drop by Cactus gets 1-2-NO! They go back to the floor where Cactus attempts a piledriver, but Sullivan backdrops him onto the exposed concrete. Cactus grabs a chair and tries to whack Kevin, but Dave pulls the chair away from him. Now Kevin tries to whack Cactus with the chair inside the ring and in plain sight of the ref, but Dave pulls the chair away AGAIN. Cactus charges and cracks heads with Dave to set up the 1-2-3. (6:08) Fun little brawl even if the finish was terrible considering the consequences of the pinfall. **½

Since Steamboat is injured and cannot wrestle, he forfeits the U.S. title to Steve Austin. However, WCW Commissioner Nick Bockwinkel says Austin will still be wrestling tonight against…Hacksaw Jim Duggan?

WCW U.S. Heavyweight Champion Steve Austin vs. Jim Duggan

Austin goes nuts saying that he isn’t prepared for Duggan and WHAM! Just like that, he takes the THREE POINT STANCE and before you know it, Jim Duggan gets the 1-2-3. (0:35) We’ve got a NEW WCW U.S. Champion. Sadly enough, this kickstarts the last major feud for Austin for WCW. Of course we would need the Jim Duggan from ten years before to make their matches any good. It’s no wonder Austin wasn’t happy.

WCW World Tag Team Champions Pretty Wonderful vs. Stars and Stripes

Before the match, Blacktop Bully (Barry Darsow) touches Bagwell and gets ejected from the front row. Little bit of “Paula” stalling to begin things. Roma shuts up Bagwell with a knee to the gut. Bagwell answers back with a crossbody and the challengers start cranking on the arm. Orndorff puts a stop to that as he grabs Bagwell coming off the ropes and nearly breaks his neck in the process. Haha, Orndorff tags and gets down with his bad self to set up an elbow drop. More like Pretty Funny. Bagwell fights out of a front facelock. Orndorff kneels down and poses to stop a sunset flip, but gets rolled over anyway for two. Roma tags and delivers a jumping dropkick for two. He follows up with the Flying Elbow Drop for 1-2-NO! Patriot comes in and grabs Roma while on the other side, Orndorff takes Bagwell to the floor and dumps an ice cooler full of ice on him. That sucks! Back in, Bagwell backdrops out of the PILEDRIVER from Orndorff. Can he make the tag to Patriot? No! Roma cuts him off and grabs a front facelock to set up the false tag spot. Patriot doesn’t care and gets rid of Orndorff. Instead of messing with the guy who he can’t even pin to beat, Orndorff heads over to Bagwell and drops him with the PILEDRIVER on the floor! Meanwhile in the ring, Patriot delivers the FULL NELSON SLAM to Roma. The ref gets rid of Patriot as Orndorff throws Bagwell back in the ring for Roma to cover and get the 1-2-3. (13:00) Call me crazy, but I liked this match. Very simple tag formula with the heel champs taking advantage. Everything worked here. The following week on a live edition of the Main Event, Stars and Stripes would defeat Pretty Wonderful in a rematch and win the belts. ***

Sting vs. The Guardian Angel vs. Vader (w/Harley Race) – Triangle Match

Don’t get too excited. All three men get involved in a coin toss and the odd man out (which is Sting) receives a bye and faces the winner of the first match. If the total time-limit goes thirty minutes, we have a five-minute overtime. If a decision still has not been made, then we go into SUDDEN DEATH~! First man to be knocked on his butt loses. By the way, the winner will be named the #1 contender to the WCW world title.

Vader vs. The Guardian Angel

Big test of strength between these two to start. Heenan makes a faux pas and said the words Bossman. Whoops! He recovers nicely though. Vader corners Angel for some forearms and splashes him. You know the usual dominating moves early on from Vader. Angel finally avoids a corner splash and school boys Vader up for 1-2-NO! He takes Vader down with a crossbody for another nearfall. They head out to the floor where Vader punches Race by accident. Back in, Angel tries to slam Vader and DOES! Bossman Straddle connects as does the sliding out uppercut. Angel inadvertently whips Vader into the ref. He still manages the BOSSMAN SLAM. As Angel covers, Race sneaks in and hits Angel with a Diving Headbutt. That sets him up for the Pump Splash from Vader for the 1-2-3. (7:06) That eliminates the Guardian Angel from the mix. Another fun big man contest from two of the best big men ever. **¾

Sting vs. Vader

We have come to another end of an era in WCW. This would prove to be the last time Sting and Vader would ever square off on PPV after six main events together over the last two years. Early on, Sting NO-SELLS Vader’s corner shots and that really freaks him out. Finally, Vader catches a charging Sting hard and delivers a Pump Splash. Looked like he hit him in the face with his knee on the way down too. He goes for another, but Sting pops up and kicks him down. Vader puts Sting back down with a clothesline and this time misses the Pump Splash. Sting sends Vader to the floor with a clothesline and follows him out to punch on him some more. Race tries to suplex Sting, but that’s countered. It’s always countered. Back in, Sting delivers a suplex and heads up top for a Flying Splash. It appears Vader was supposed to bring his knees up to block it, but that didn’t look too good. Sting may have overshot him. Sting comes off the ropes and splashes knees for real this time. Vader gives up on the Pump Splash and looks for the MOONSAULT. Sting rolls out of the way and gives Vader a superplex! He follows up with the Jumping Elbow Drop for 1-2-NO! Fireman’s carry drop gets another nearfall! Sting pounds Vader back into a corner and hits him with the Stinger Splash! Cover, 1-2-NO! He follows up with a release German suplex and again Vader kicks out at two. Vader starts to punch Sting back and kicks him out to the floor for Harley Race to have a little fun by smashing Sting’s head into the apron. Back in again, Vader unloads with short-arm clotheslines until Sting starts to NO-SELL those blows to the head. He fires back until Vader takes a powder around ringside. Vader crawls back into the other ring and turns around into a Flying Clothesline! Ha. A second Flying Clothesline sets up a Flying Splash that connects this time for 1-2-NO! Vader pounds away some more and delivers a back suplex. Slow covers gets two. Vader heads up top and gets slammed down to the mat. There’s supposedly thirty seconds left in the time-limit. That can’t be right. It’s only been about 25 total minutes at the most. Sting clotheslines Vader down and grabs the SCORPION DEATHLOCK. Vader grabs hold of the bottom rope as the time limit expires. Now we have our five-minute overtime. They don’t get much of a thirty-second rest period, but what good would that really do? Vader takes over with a suplex as they really start to slow down the pace. Either Vader is blown up which I don’t think he is, or someone must be hurt. Sting punches down a superplex attempt and comes down off the top turnbuckle. Vader headbutts Sting down and heads up top again, but Sting backdrops him to the mat. Vader reverts to his ‘pound you until you bleed’ strategy as one minute is left in the overtime. Vader splashes Sting on the mat and gets 1-2-NO! With ten seconds left, Vader delivers a POWERBOMB for 1-2-NO! Overtime has expired. It’s time for SUDDEN DEATH~! Vader starts up with the heavy artillery by delivering short-arm clotheslines, but Sting refuses to go down. Vader pounds Sting all around the ring as he becomes dependent on the ropes and the turnbuckles to keep himself vertical. As Sting catches Vader with a roundhouse right, a paranoid Harley Race hops up on the apron. While Sting charges at Vader several times trying to knock him down, the Guardian Angel runs down and beats Harley Race up the aisle way. That brings ref Nick Patrick out to break them up while in the ring, Sting finally knocks Vader down on his back! The ref sees nothing as the MASKED MAN Shane Stant (I’m still convinced its him!) comes up through the audience and WHACKS Sting in the knee! That puts Sting on his butt as Vader returns to his feet. Nick Patrick runs back down the aisle and awards the match to Vader. (25:15) A rather overbooked finish screws up a genuinely great match. This was like every Sting/Vader match wrapped into one match. The other aspect that hurts it was the five-minute overtime where they rested a lot. Not sure if that was because of an injury or what. So Vader is named the #1 contender to the WCW world title and it takes him five months to get a title shot. ***¾

Our talk with Hulk Hogan via satellite turns into a ten-minute phone conversation between Hogan and Flair. Hogan’s working out at his home in Florida while Flair is partying with some ladies in Las Vegas. Not too much was said that made this awesome. Kind of surreal thinking about Hogan and Flair just talking on a phone though. Long story short, WCW has rehashed the real world champion angle from three years before from Flair’s WWF days. While that angle was actually brilliant and backed with a legit (well, as legit as wrestling gets) world title belt, this time Flair just creates his own title that looks similar to the AWA world title belt and calls himself the real world champion. Now how Flair can claim he’s the real world champion by beating Hogan on a countout at the last Clash is beyond me, but this is what we have going on right now. Hogan challenges Flair at Halloween Havoc in a “loser must retire” match. Flair’s down with the plan, but guess what Hulksters? Don’t tell Ric Flair, but Hogan’s knee isn’t really that hurt after all! What a sneaky liar. Geez, who is he praying to when he says all those prayers? After Okerlund goes and finds Bockwinkel, he warrants this phone conversation as a verbal contract. The only extra stipulation the “board of directors” will add to the match though because of that pesky masked man Shane Stant is that the match will be decided inside a STEEL CAGE!

The Nasty Boys, Dusty & Dustin Rhodes vs. Terry Funk, Bunkhouse Buck, Arn Anderson & Col. Robert Parker (w/Meng) – Wargames Match

Dustin Rhodes and Arn Anderson start the match, which makes sense. After Dustin sends AA into the cage, Arn takes Rhodes into the other ring. He thinks he’s about to get the advantage, but Dustin smashes his face in the cage again. They repeat the same spot from Wargames ‘92 where AA gets his head stuck in between the rings. Dustin LEAPS over both ring ropes and kills Anderson with a Lariat. That’s just awesome. The heels win the coin toss. Shocker, I know. Right before Bunkhouse Buck enters the cage for the 2-on-1 heel advantage, Arn drills Dustin with the DDT and beats him to a pulp. Notice how I didn’t say bloody pulp. Yeah, no blood in these Wargames matches. Buck and Arn continue what they tried to do back at Bash at the Beach and that’s break Dustin’s arm. Jerry Sags enters next and takes over on the heels, including Buck being slammed into the cage. Buck receives a piledriver from Sags as Rhodes pounds away on AA in the corner. Dustin wears AA down in a sleeper as Terry Funk comes in with a boot in hand. He beats Sags and Rhodes with the cowboy boot and the mauling continues. Sags takes Funk in between the rings and gives Funk a piledriver THROUGH the gap! Don’t worry. Funk crawls back out and continues the match. Brian Knobbs is the fresh man in and counters a toss into the cage by sending both Funk and AA into the steel instead. Sags helps out Knobbs and together they toss AA into the cage. Afterwards, Sags goes over and beats Funk in the face with his own boot until the wobbly old man falls on his back. Now it’s Colonel Parker’s turn to enter the cage. He’s hesitant, but he enters once he sees Buck has Rhodes held for him. Parker starts punching Rhodes and hurts his hand. Who is he, MacGyver? Parker starts kicking all the faces in the cage instead while Buck goes around and holds them all down for him. Belts come off and people start getting whipped. The “Dusty” chants are getting LOUD. Rhodes has a leather belt and whips everybody in sight. Meng is getting angry and begins to SHAKE the cage wall. And here comes Dusty. Everybody eats Bionic Elbows except for Parker. He’s splashed by the Nasties and put in the Figure-Four by Dusty. Dustin holds off Funk, AA, and Buck until Parker surrenders. (19:05) A real formulaic Wargames, but harmless old school fun all the same. No blood though. That easily knocks off a full star from these later Wargames matches. ***¼

Final Thoughts: The buyrate definitely took a HUGE drop with no Flair or Hogan wrestling on this PPV. Nevertheless, there’s some real good solid wrestling with not a bad match in the bunch – apart from the US title catastrophe that is. Nothing MOTYC-worthy by any means, but certainly a fun card to watch if you can find a copy of it. Thumbs up for Fall Brawl 1994.