[1997-08-09-WCW-Road Wild] Hulk Hogan vs Lex Luger

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

Last few minutes. The NWO run-ins commence and again, Luger fights them off. Sting shows up but it's obviously a fake. He hits Luger in the back with a baseball bat and Hogan regains the title. Pretty sure it's Scott Hall. The announcers are so stupid thinking it was the real guy.

 

I miss the long announcer reflection after main events that used to happen on WCW pay-per-views. Tony's despondence over the NWO getting back in power when it finally seemed like they were turning things around is great. We get a clip of the NWO celebration and they repaint the belt. That's a powerful pay-per-view conclusion.

[Zenjo]

It's just painful when the announcers are going on about Sting's betrayal when it's so obvious to the audience that it's a fake.

[Kevin Ridge]

Again, where are the WCW guys to fight off all the NWO interference? With the amount of distrust WCW announcers and officials have been showing Sting the last year plus, it's surprising he ever joined their cause against the NWO. Rodman sucks at spray painting as he he makes the N and W too large and has trouble fitting the O in.

[soup23]

Crowd is fn awful which is to be expected in Sturgis. The first shot on Sting was fine as it was quick and you could assume that it was the real one. The later shots made it look ridiculous that they couldn't tell that it was a fake. Hogan misses another legdrop making that percentage go way down. I don't know if he ever missed the legdrop in two consecutive matches. Hogan regains the belt in a huge mistake by the company, I would argue the first big one since the NWO angle. Steiners and Hennig come out to check on Luger way too late. I do like the analytical end to the PPV's and hope that is something that will continue with the WWE Network. The NWO celebration is just as good as the WCW one was Monday but we feel back to the status quo and Luger is seriously damaged.

[El-P]

Match went a bit long, but Hogan really carried the whole thing with his maneurisms and badmouthing.

Fake Sting ? Well, that was really lazy booking here, and the announcers really look dumb, again. Too bad because like Loss said, Tony is actually really good here selling the moment. So yeah, here we have the booking showing signs of complacency and lazyness. And putting the belt back on Hogan immediately was probably a mistake, they could have gained a month or two before Starrcade without having to ressort to, well, Piper again. Maybe that was Hogan using his creative control. Would love to see another WCW Timeline with Sullivan for 97 to hear what was the idea here, but you can see the first few cracks on the major feuds booking at this point (earlier on, the Steiners won by DQ which means the Outsiders are still the champs, which in itself is good since the Steiner kinda suck, but really made WCW look bad).

[PeteF3]

Heenan's sober this year, thank goodness. Y'know, Luger would have been better off just covering up and let the NWO attack him. Take a beating and keep your title. I guess Darth Helmet's declaration about evil triumphing because good is dumb still holds up. A fake Sting whacks Luger with the bat as he bounces off the ropes and even though this is a little bit better disguise than Nash's at BATB, the announcers still come off as dumb for buying it. I don't know why they feared this, but it REALLY seems like WCW was afraid of another crazy trash-throwing incident as the NWO gets out of there FAST with Hogan covering up his head, though we don't get a lot of bottle-throwing. Then apparently it takes 45 minutes for them to get to a proper backstage/locker area, so we get a LONG panning crowd shot of whooping fans who really feel broken up about the title change. Does Tony have a TATTOO on his forearm?? The NWO re-spraypaint the belt with a cameo from Dennis Rodman. The action of the match itself wasn't too bad, but another fake Sting already feels lazy and it's starting to make less sense why Sting would stick by WCW considering how often he continues to be doubted.

 

The Outsiders retain the tag belts AGAIN?? Talk about milking something ridiculously past its sell-by date. That's arguably even worse booking than this World title turnaround, which hurts Luger but for whatever reason never really bothered me either.

[PeteF3]

The Observer covering this main event is pretty fascinating, piggybacking on Loss' recent post about the NWO vs. Flair conflicts. Running down the key points:

 

- Terry Taylor booked this show to have Jericho to regain the Cruiserweight title from Alex Wright, and the Steiners to win the tag titles from the Outsiders. Then the Wolfpac went to Bischoff and told him that WCW had been running too many title changes--two title switches were then changed to zero.

 

- Zero title changes quickly got changed to one--you get one guess why that was. They had no finish planned for Hogan to regain the title, which is why they had to rehash yet another fake Sting gimmick.

 

- Hogan was hit by a rock after regaining the title--Meltzer made it a point that this was a much more wrestling-oriented crowd in Sturgis than last year. Hogan got the proper reaction this time, and there was no particular hatred for Harlem Heat. As a result of that, he called an audible and ushered the NWO to the back. That resulted in the broadcast booth having to stall--which Schiavone did a commendable job of, drawing on his experience at the '91 GAB presumably.

 

The last part of '97 really feels like the Clique will be going all-out to take over both promotions, and almost(?) succeeding.

[Superstar Sleeze]

Hogan ultimately had to win the belt back. I love Luger's title victory as a hope spot in the larger story. I think a quick cutoff (Hogan victory) is way better for the narrative. WCW gets a fleeting victory but needs Sting. If Luger gets a two month reign dilutes Hogan/Sting. However the quick switch ends the slog of NWO's Reign of Terror and gives a glimmer of hope. Luger is collateral damage but serves a greater purpose.

 

The slight change I would make in the aftermath to salvage Luger is move the Outsiders to a Luger/Giant program (get that Big Sexy/Giant program) and accelerate Scott Steiner's heel turn.