WWF Heat 9/13/1998

Written by: Bob Colling

World Wrestling Federation presents Heat
Date: 9/13/1998
From: Lowell, MA

Matches:
1.) Ken Shamrock defeated Vader
2.) Val Venis defeated Marc Mero by disqualification
3.) Gangrel defeated WWF Lightweight Champion Taka Michinoku by disqualification
4.) Kane defeated WWF European Champion D’Lo Brown by disqualification
5.) Jeff Jarrett defeated X-Pac in a lumberjack match

Angle Developments/Notes:
1.) Shamrock starts the match delivering a knee strike and rights hands on Vader. Vader drops Shamrock with a clothesline and catches Shamrock with a slam. Vader comes off the ropes but misses an elbow drop. Shamrock dropkicks Vader and drops Vader with a running clothesline. Shamrock goes for the cover but Vader kicks out. Shamrock pummels Vader with right hands and goes for a cross armbar. Vader quickly reaches the ropes to break the hold and rolls to the floor to regroup. Shamrock is sent into the ropes and Vader delivers a body splash followed by a big splash. Vader comes off the ropes to deliver another big splash but Shamrock kicks out at two. Vader drops Shamrock with a short arm clothesline and goes to the middle rope. Vader leaps off and nails Shamrock with another body strike for a two count. Vader works over Shamrock with body strikes. Vader takes Shamrock down to the mat focusing on his left arm. Vader continues to pummel Shamrock in the corner with strikes. Vader misses a splash in the corner and Shamrock delivers an elbow strike and heel kick. Shamrock drives Vader down with a powerslam for a two count. Shamrock tries for a hurricanrana but Vader counters with a powerbomb. Vader leaps off the middle rope but Shamrock catches Vader and gets the ankle lock on Vader leading to a submission. (**1/2. I thought it was a solid enough match. The finish was a little awkward, but this held my interest and I can appreciate a clean finish. They got plenty of time to work a good match and they executed that very well. It was odd to see Vader not get an entrance and was used like a jobber.) After the match, Ken Shamrock grabs a microphone to talk about the fact he’s had one WWF World Championship match in nearly two years with the company. Shamrock wants a piece of Steve Austin.

2.) Sable was on Pacific Blue recently as she made an appearance on the program. She cut a promo on Jacqueline saying that Jackie’s obsession with her is getting a little old. Sable has a challenge for Jacqueline and wants to wrestle her in an evening gown match.

3.) Venis takes Mero down with a drop toe hold followed by knee lifts and a side Russian leg sweep. Dustin Runnels is in the crowd with a sign again saying, ’He’s Coming Back”. Jacqueline leaps off the top to hit Venis and that causes a quick disqualification. I don’t understand the point of having a match if it lasted ten-seconds. After the match, Jacqueline accepts Sable’s evening gown match. Dustin Runnels attacks Venis with his sign and clotheslines Venis to the floor. Runnels drops Venis face first over the ring steps. Runnels uses his belt on Venis hitting Val several times. Runnels sends Venis into the ropes followed by a clothesline and chokes Venis with his belt. Several officials try to pull Runnels off and they are successful after a little bit.

4.) Taka attacks Gangrel before the bell to get the early control but Gangrel cuts him off with an elbow strike. Gangrel clotheslines Taka and gets tripped by Taka’s manager. Taka dropkicks Gangrel to the floor. Gangrel stalks towards the manager but Taka hits a baseball slide dropkick. Taka hits a springboard mooonsault to take Gangrel out. Taka keeps control with a dropkick to the back of Gangrel followed by a dropkick to the face as Gangrel was seated. Taka signals for the end playing to the crowd. Gangrel drops Taka with a double hook suplex. Gangrel drops Taka throat first over the top rope. Gangrel hits a bridging suplex for a two count. Gangrel hits a vertical suplex followed by an elbow drop. Gangrel nails Taka with a kick to the back of Taka’s head. Taka fights back with forearm shots but Gangrel hits a snap powerslam. Taka avoids a powerbomb and hits a spinning heel kick. Taka comes off the top with a missile dropkick. Gangrel plants Taka with a jumping DDT for the win. (*1/2. I understand that Taka is a champion, but this felt like Taka got too much offense in on Gangrel.)

5.) Backstage, Jeff Jarrett cuts a promo about his lumberjack match with X-Pac. Jarrett says that Pac has already pissed him off.

6.) D’Lo Brown is scared to death of Kane and kisses the WWF European Championship before the match. Undertaker is at ringside as is Mark Henry. Kane misses a right hand in the corner as Brown shows his speed advantage. Brown punches Kane but Kane comes back with a right hand to drop Brown to the floor. Brown sees Undertaker and gets frustrated before walking around ringside. Kane works over Brown with right hands and rams Brown into the corner a few times. Kane drives D’Lo down to the mat with a scoop slam but misses an elbow drop. Brown dropkicks a seated Kane and taunts him. Kane sits up and Brown delivers several right hands. Brown tries to clothesline Kane but the big man doesn’t budge. Brown gets stopped on the middle rope and Kane stalks after the referee. Kane punches Brown several times followed by a big boot. Kane clotheslines Brown over the top to the floor and Mark Henry gets on the apron, but he backs off. Undertaker comes over and sends Henry into Brown. The Rock enters the ring with a steel chair and lays out Kane with several chair shots. Taker goes up the aisle way to chase Rock away. Brown taunts Kane in the ring but Kane grabs Brown by his throat. Kane attempts a chokeslam but Henry gets in the ring and helps Brown. Taker makes his way back to the ring and the Nation are taken out. Henry suffers a double chokeslam. Kane spikes Brown with a spike tombstone as Taker came off the top rope. The match was thrown out. (*. They didn’t really do too much and the idea of this was probably just give Taker and Kane momentum leading into their triple threat match against Steve Austin.)

7.) Jarrett bails to the floor early on but quickly returns and Pac works over Jarrett with strikes and a kick in the corner. Jarrett dropkicks Pac to the floor where Pac gets hit a few times before getting sent back into the ring. Jarrett rams Pac face first into the corner followed by right hands. Pac ducks a right hand and dumps Jarrett to the floor where Jarrett gets hit by the Outlaws. Pac continues with a quick legdrop for a near fall. Pac misses a splash in the corner and Jarrett drives Pac down with an arm breaker. Jarrett continues to hammer away on Pac in the corner. Jarrett sends Pac hard back first into the corner. Jarrett sends Pac over the top to the floor where Pac gets attacked by all the heels. Jarrett drives Pac down with a vertical suplex for a two count. Jarrett misses a splash in the corner and holds his ribs. Pac continues to hammer away on Jarrett but gets a kick to the chest. Jarrett plants Pac with a back suplex as we go to commercial.

Jarrett boots Pac but Pac connects with a spinning heel kick on two occasions. Pac hits the bronco buster in the corner. Jarrett is sent into the corner where the Outlaws ram Jarrett groin first into the post. Pac distracted the referee with a knee injury. Pac misses a clothesline and falls to the floor where Southern Justice trey to hit Pac with a guitar. Road Dogg runs over and smashes Dennis Knight with the guitar. That leads to a massive brawl at ringside. Pac hits the X-Factor on Jarrett but there isn’t a referee. Mark Canterbury enters and plants Pac with a pump handle slam and that allows Jarrett to win the match. (**1/4. The usual lumberjack match you’d expect between these two. They had some decent action and the finish with the brawling was a hot finish. Jarrett needed to win since he lost the hair vs. hair match, which was good for his look anyway.)

8.) WWF World Champion Steve Austin makes his way down to the ring to cut a promo to close the program. Austin talks about his SummerSlam match and respects Undertaker for not lying about having a one on one match. Austin says that Kane and Undertaker will not be getting anymore nice guy treatment from him. Austin will not give Vince McMahon the satisfaction of someone beating him for the championship. Austin talks about Ken Shamrock complaining about getting only one title match. Austin tells Shamrock they aren’t in the UFC and tells Shamrock to come out if he wants a title shot and he’ll kick Shamrock’s ass. Ken Shamrock makes his way down to the ring to answer the challenge. Several officials come out to prevent Shamrock and Austin from fighting. Shamrock tells Austin he wants the title. Vince McMahon and his stooges make their way down to ringside. Austin tells McMahon to ring the bell so he can wrestle Shamrock. McMahon acts like he doesn’t know to end the program.

Final Thoughts:
It’s a good hour of television though the final segment just felt like a way to fill time before the show ended. There were a few solid feature matches. I like how Heat has a lot of wrestling matches and not so much in regard to just talking segments. The hour always goes by quickly.

Thanks for reading.