Cut To The Crap 9.21.07: Booker T Promo Messup, The Brawl For All and Kane's Superpowers
Posted by Magnus Donaldson on 09.21.2007
Highlights this week include Booker T botching a promo, Butterbean vs Bart Gunn in the Brawl For All and Kane showing us his almighty superpowers. Plus my ROH thoughts.
Welcome to Week 3 of Cut To The Crap, the weekly look at pro wrestling most horrible moments, whether it's bad matches, gimmicks, angles or just something completely stupid.
First of all, I again appreciate all the feedback I have received on the column. Every single one is read and I try (and usually fail) to improve my column based on the criticisms and keep doing the things that people like. Keep them coming as they are extremely helpful.
So let's not waste any time and instead move straight into our three items this week.
Crappy Moment Number One: Booker T Messes Up At Spring Stampede 97
We all know that Booker T was one of the shining lights in WCW: he was a great wrestler who in most cases would provide a solid, worth watching match to any WCW event. He had fan support, good in-ring skills, and could cut strong promo's. Well, most of the time.
Why do I say most of the time. Well, that because there was one little exception to this rule, at Spring Stampede 1997. Booker was scheduled for a Four Corners match against partner Stevie Ray, Lex Lugar and The Giant to determine the number one contender to the WCW Title (held by Hulk Hogan).
This lead to a pre-match promo by Harlem Heat and their manager Sherri Martel where they discussed this upcoming match. However, this was no ordinary promo. Sherri started by telling us that they have their strategy all planned out. Nothing wrong with this.
However, it was Booker T's part that went a little bit wrong. He cuts an energetic promo, telling us that the Harlem Heat are a brotherhood. He then say that they will beat Lex Lugar and The Giant tonight. Then he drops the "N" word on Hulk Hogan.
Yes, you thought it was bad when Vince Russo called Hulk Hogan bald, but this is a sin worse than death, calling Hulk Hogan a "n****r". Booker instantly puts his head to his hands realising what he's said, and the implication it will have on his career (hey, if you thought it was the glass ceiling that kept Booker T from the WCW title until Hogan left, then you were wrong). And Sherri has a massive grin on her face after he says it, as Booker tries to re-compose himself after that.
Anyway, rather than discuss it further, I'll let you watch it for yourselves.
So that's crappy moment number one. Now it's time for Crappy Moment Number Two.
Crappy Moment Number Two: The Brawl For All: Butterbean vs Bart Gunn
Hey, among all of the brilliant stuff that the WWF did in 1998, I'm sure nobody remembers something that they didn't do so well: the Brawl For All. This was basically a shoot, unworked tournament that, according to Scott Keith, was supposed to be won by Steve 'Dr Death' Williams. The problem with that is that he got knocked out (by Bart Gunn of all people). But that whole tournament is discussion for another day.
What I'm focusing on here is the next step in the Brawl For All. The tournament itself was won by Bart Gunn of all people, who had the pleasure of taking on boxer and mix martial artist Butterbean in a boxing match, and not a worked one like his match with Marc Mero. If Bart Gunn could legit beat a boxer like Butterbean then surely this would send his career into orbit.
Now does anyone remember any Wrestlemania's or PPV's after this headlined by Bart Gunn. No. Then you can probably guess what happened.
The two men came out and prepared for the match, and it then got underway. And indeed the two men exchanges some blows, with Bart Gunn looking nervous and outclassed by a far superior athlete. Butterbean decks him with one right hand, which Gunn was only just able to recover from, then when he gets up Butterbean decks him with a second and he's out. With only 27 second gone.
So with one foul swipe, Butterbean pretty much ended Bart Gunn's wrestling career in the WWF. He would wrestle in Japan and TNA before getting into MMA where he has had decent success.
And now we move on to our final crappy item of the week.
Crappy Moment Number Three: Kane Displays His Almighty Superpowers
When Kane first came to the WWF, his gimmick seemed too stupid to even be considered a possibility to work. He came in as the half brother of The Undertaker, when Paul Bearer had a one night stand with his mother, burned as a child seeking revenge against him for killing his parents and scarring him when he burnt the house down. And for whatever reason it worked, and Kane got over big time.
However, than didn't mean that there wasn't some crap along the way. Like Kane's showing us his almighty (and I do mean almighty) superpowers. And this would happen on an episode of Raw the week before their epic Wrestlemania showdown.
Kane and Paul Bearer came out to cut a promo, giving us an interesting fact that Kane has just the same powers that The Undertaker has. What powers are these I wonder. We will just find out as Kane is going to give us a demonstration.
Kane first of all raises his hand, and lightning appears hitting part of the lighting. The crowd, obviously smart enough to realise how completely setup this segment is start booing loudly. Paul Bearer treats is as the crowd not liking it because they are scared. I think the crowd don't like it because they don't like it, period.
Next Kane, spotting the announcers at ringside, raises his hand and destroys one of the monitors with a lightning bolt. then destroys a spotlight that has been in Paul Bearer's eyes. Then Paul bearer tells us that this is only a taste of what they will do to The Undertaker at Wrestlemania.
However, the coup de grace of the whole segment would be Kane's final act. He fires one final lightning bolt, setting a crew member on fire (well, not a real crew member, almost certainly a stuntman), and he is on fire for a good 20 seconds before it is put out. That was very dangerous and could have ended a lot worse than it did.
Please note that this video clip is only some brief highlights rather than the full segment, but it's all I could find.
And now that the crap has been wiped under the mat, here are a few of my thoughts on the world of wrestling this week (though again mainly ROH related).
My Thoughts
So the Age Of The Fall, or Project 161, turned out to be Jimmy Jacobs all along. I'm not surprised in any real way, as this whole thing seemed very like something Jacobs would do from the beginning. However, the big surprise were his fellow members: Tyler Black and Necro Butcher. Black is a great talent, and has deserved a chance in ROH for a while, but a big shocker turned out to be that he was responsible for the blogs, not Jacobs. I'm not a huge fan of Necro Butcher, but he has his place in this group and people have been crying out for him in ROH. So I guess this means that Jacobs is the mouthpiece, Black is the online mouthpiece as well as wrestling and Necro is the enforcer. The real question is suppose is: is there any more members yet to be revealed. I say yes, since I think this group will bring in more recruits to the darkside and try a hostile takeover of ROH. Either way, I'm really interested in this and can't wait to see where it goes.
It seems like the end of the year is speeding closer and closer, and I'm still undecided as to what my MOTY is. At the moment, it's either Bryan Danielson vs Go Shiozaki from ROH In Tokyo or Motor City Machine Guns vs Briscoes from Good Times Great Memories. I expect that the El Generico vs Claudio Castagnoli RTTT match and Bryan Danielson vs Nigel McGuinness from Driven will be added to that list as well. Either way my MOTY is very difficult to decide this time 9as it usually is), but when it's decided then I'll post it here.
Anyway, thanks for reading this week's column, and I hope you enjoyed it. Next week I will be looking at three more crappy moments in wrestling history, including The Crawl Of Shame, Road Warrior hawk's drug addiction and The Headbangers doing their best impression of the New Age Outlaws (in other words, not a very good one). Until next week, see you then.
