WWF Mania 1/9/1993

WWF Mania 1/9/1993

Todd Pettengill welcomes us to the show and catches us up on Doink's antics like nailing Jannetty with water and tripping The Big Boss Man.

Crush vs Dave Sigfrids

Crush makes quick work of our buddy Dave here who has a pretty good look to him actually. Crush does an inset with a Hawaiian accent and promises to win the Rumble. He says "SHAKA from Crush" and then Macho Man on commentary yells "SHAKAAAAAA", which was awesome. Doink is down in the aisle way spitting on the fans and abusing them as Crush nails a gorilla press on Dave and a nice big legdrop. He signals for the Cranium Crunch and the kids love it as they copy him. He puts Dave to sleep with the Cranium Crush as Macho says "we're gonna get some pineapple juice", which was a great line. Not sure how this move puts you to sleep though.

Doink throws a ball on a string at a kid in the aisle way and then tries it with Crush. Crush grabs him and warns him to knock it off.

Crush then gets a quick interview in with Raymond Rougeau where he claims his grandfather was a clown and while picking on wrestlers is bad, picking on kids is worse.

Todd uses a weird accent to announce All American Wrestling will be from NYC tomorrow.

Hacksaw Jim Duggan vs Repo Man

WWF Mania exclusive here. Nothin' but the best, eh? Lord Alfred calls Todd "Put-in-jail" over Pettengill, which was a good one. Hacksaw clears out Repo Man early to loud "USA" chants. Repo pulls Hacksaw down on the ropes and takes over. Hacksaw grabs Repo's strap to pull him in to punch him. Duggan hits 5 mounted punches in the corner and then takes Repo out with the 3 point stance. Nothing amazing here or bad, just Duggan doing his schtick which works fine.

We go back to Todd and he says there's two ways to beat Repo - Like Duggan did or by making your payments. Maybe Duggan didn't make the payment on a 2x4? More goofing around by Todd.

Yokozuna vs. George Anderson

"Hailing from the Polynesian Islands - Yokozuna" - The announcer, while Fuji waves a Japanese flag

The long lost Anderson brother appears! Not really. Lawler said Yoko's last 3 opponents were slid under the dressing room door to him after the match. George gets immediately pancaked with a belly to belly. Yoko drops a huge leg. Earthquake does an inset promising Yoko won't win at the Rumble and gives him the title of the biggest man in the company. Yoko avalanches George with his back then does a nasty looking double throat thrust to him. Yoko then Banzai Drop's him for the quick win in a good squash. Yoko then finishes out with sumo poses.

The various wrestlers do a promo for Headlock on Hunger. The Undertaker and Paul Bearer say no one should starve to death.

Shawn Michaels vs Jim Brunzell

The finish

We get a "Shawn Michaels has left the building" sign and Shawn rocks the blue strap IC title. "Look at him, he's chewing gum, Brain", says Gorilla. Heenan replies with "Well, he's not eating a pizza". Brunzell hits an atomic drop and takes down Shawn. Shawn misses a stinger splash and Brunzell takes him down again. Michaels hits a great standing dropkick twice in a row  Jim gets a big sleeper in before Shawn drops down. Brunzell gets even more offense in here with his own big dropkick. Soon after, Shawn threw him into the ropes and hit a superkick to the gut for the win. This was so much more than I expected and if anything, this was a highlight match for Brunzell. Jim looked great here and the crowd and announcers were totally into it. Good stuff. They also heavily hyped up Shawn vs Marty here at the Rumble.

More Todd goofiness.

Ray Rougeau interviews Owen Hart. Owen was talking in a chair when Razor Ramon came in and lariated him backwards out of it. Razor hits him with a trash can then chokes him. Razor told Owen to tell Bret that he's next.

Razor Ramon did a quick promo and said Bret was next again. Bret did a promo back, calling him Chico and said he's gonna pound the daylights out of Razor.

Royal Rumble Report with Mean Gene

Gene goes over some of the participants. Macho said he's going there for one reason, and that's to win it. Mr. Perfect is in a jolly mood and said no one else is Perfect in the Rumble.

Todd says it's not Monday Night Medium, it's not Monday Night Rare, it's Monday Night Raw!

Mr. Perfect vs The Berzerker

Perfect nails Berzker with his towel as he throws it. Berzerker should have cut it in half with his sword or gotten it stuck on his helmet horns. Some kid wears a homemade Bret jacket which is pretty cool. The criss cross with Perfect ducking a big boot and then nailing a huge dropkick as Berzerker goes flying out over the top. Perfect takes a shoulder into the post and Berzerker goes for his sword and tries to behead him! Of course Perfect moves. Vince is appalled while Lawler loves it. Back in and Berzerker hits a huge boot. Berz gets backdropped over the top rope in a great bump. Flair comes down to distract Perfect and Perfect knocks him off as Flair tries to enter. Berz again gets knocked away and then Perfect sits on the apron only to take a giant boot to the head to put him down on the floor. Berz hits a nice slam and ducks down before getting hit with the Perfectplex for the win. Perfect then dropkicks him out of the ring again. The Berzerker got totally jobbed out here worse than Jim Brunzell despite looking amazing as usual. Very sad. This was super rushed.

WWF Magazine Update

Bobby Heenan rips Mr. Perfect's cockiness and said Flair will make him flawed, scarred and tarnished. Heenan promised to unveil someone who was beyond perfect and "in love with himself" at the Rumble. Heenan said Perfect will see he wasn't Perfect at all and will wish he looked like "Narcissus", which was The Narcissist's original name. Mean Gene said he looked up Narcissus in the dictionary and he tells us about it.

Todd then closes the show promising Doink and Kamala for next week.

 Overall thoughts:  Perfect/Berzerker and Michaels/Brunzell were good but man Todd P. is the worst. I'm sure he was told to do all this, so the blame doesn't solely fall on him, but yikes. This surpassed my expectations as I expected nothing but one way squashes. This was about as good as you were going to get for this TV frame minus Todd.