Now, when the Dangerous Alliance was at it’s peak I was roughly two or three years old, so I wasn’t able to experience their greatness as it happened. I have always had a great appreciation for old school WCW so when I started to watch footage of the company from late 1991 or early 1992 I was quickly interested in the faction.
The faction saw Paul E. Dangerously (Paul Heyman) as the manager for perhaps the greatest, most underrated faction in wrestling history. The group featured Rick Rude, Steve Austin, Arn Anderson Bobby Eaton and Larry Zbyszko. Madusa was with the group for a little while and Michael Hayes had a very loose association with the group.
The whole premise of the group was a for Dangerously to get revenge on WCW for firing him as an announcer. So, he was able to get an incredible cast of heels to fight the top babyfaces for the company. One thing that makes the group great is the fact that every member was capable of putting on a great match. Aside from Eaton, they all were incredible talkers. So, having the heel group as a main point of television was not at all a bad thing.
There was no doubt about how important and over the faction was. I remember watching several of their matches and the crowd ate it all up. The feud between Sting and Rick Rude was the main focus while the Steiner Brothers, Ricky Steamboat, Dustin Rhodes and Barry Windham were also involved. As you can imagine the matches never failed to entertain.
I can never get tired of watching Rick Rude wrestling Sting. They seemed to have some kind of chemistry that hooks me every time. I have never watched their match from NJPW where Rude suffered his career ending injury. That would just bum me out for days.
It’s unfortunate that the group wasn’t able to continue for a longer period of time. They were formed at Halloween Havoc 1991, but less than a year later they were disbanded. A lot of it had to do with backstage politics, which is just too bad. Once they lost at Wrestle War 1992 in May against Sting and the other top babyfaces in a War Games match, it seems like the group just sputtered to September where, for the most part, the group was no longer together. From what I know, Dangerously was managing Steve Austin at that point, but Heyman would be gone from the company at the end of the year.
I’d suggest that everyone seek out to watch the angle and some of the matches that were part of it. Especially Rude vs. Steamboat from Superbrawl and Beach Blast in 1992. Plus, the War Games match in May 1992 was memorable too. The Dangerous Alliance is a group that doesn’t get enough credit, but in reality they were one of the best.
What are your thoughts or memories of the Dangerous Alliance? Feel free to leave them below.
Thanks for reading.
I was 7 years old when the Dangerous Alliance burst onto the scene and while I usually would root for the “good guys” there was something about the Dangerous Alliance that was really cool. The Four Horseman had set the bar in the 80s and the DA brought back the dominating heel group, I am not saying that the DA were the horsemen, but they kept up the tradition of the best bad guys tearing it up. It could be one of the best groups of talent ever assembled in wrestling, there is always a weak link in factions and this group had just unlimited talent, all were capable of excellent matches. I had been a fan of Stunning Steve Austin before he had joined the group, when he was beating guys like the god awful PN News I had to root for him because the some of the low card good guys in WCW at the time were horrible. I have a compilation of everything the dangerous alliance did during this period and it still holds up today, and the war games match at wrestle war is the only war games match that lives up the original. I really loved this article because as a lifelong wrestling fan I really appreciate reading about things that I thought were awesome back then and still do today.