[1993-01-13-WCW-Clash of the Champions XXII] Sting & Dustin Rhodes & Cactus Jack vs Vader & Barry Windham & Paul Orndorff (Thundercage)

[Superstar Sleeze]

Sting, Dustin Rhodes & Cactus Jack vs Vader, Barry Windham, Mr. Wonderful - WCW Clash of the Champions XXII Thundercage

 

The beginning of the big Cactus Jack babyface push that ended up in the Lost in Cleveland (a fate I would not wish on my worst enemy), but the first four months were awesome. Cactus vs Orndorff faced up a couple days before to see who join Vader's team. Vader, Orndorff & Harley beat up Cactus then cut a heel promo only for Cactus to come back and lay them all out with a shovel. The majority of the match is three on two with no Cactus Jack as Van Hammer is out (thankfully) and Cactus not actually a legitimate substitute.

 

The biggest miss of 1993 WCW was not giving the Windham/Dustin feud a proper ending. Nice sequence early on from them before we get to the main attraction. Vader vs Sting. Sting actually gets his licks in including a Stinger Splash, but Vader hits his body attack. Vader goes to the outside, but this is Lucha Libre rules and Orndorff comes in and hits a sweet German on Sting. The heels take over on the Stinger and all three are glorious in picking a part the Stinger. No use of the cage, which is lame. Sting punches Windham off of a superplex and it is a hot tag to Dustin. Dustin levels everyone and Cactus comes out with bolt cutters. It would have been more dramatic if he waited for the babyfaces to need some rescuing. Cactus has his boot off and is waylaying everyone. Orndorff goes for the piledriver on Dustin, but Cactus hits him in the head with boot for the win. Gaining some revenge and a big win. Cactus cuts a promo against Vader and Orndorff. He is very over! This would lead to the great Orndorff street fight at SuperBrawl and the vicious Vader matches in April. Initially WCW did a great job with the Cactus push. Not much time given to this match and not that heated. Just well done in regards to Cactus' push.

[Beast]

Somewhat underwhelming. Sting had some massive offense on Vader and the Windham-Rhodes dynamic is strong. Orndorff fits right into the uppercard scene for now.

The teams in this match were subject to a long game of musical chairs. Originally it was Sting/Rhodes/Simmons/Hammer (why?) vs. Vader/Windham/Rude/Barbarian. Rude had the same injury that took him out of Starrcade, Hammer was declared injured the day of the show (also knocking him out of the Atlas arm wrestling deal), Barbarian was kicked off of the heel team due to his association with Cactus, and Simmons was laid out immediately before the match. Orndorff was a late replacement for Rude and of course, Cactus shows up for the last 60 seconds here as a "replacement" for Simmons.

This never had much of a flow and Cactus showing up while the faces were in control anyway is lame. Good news is three solid main event feuds are continued out of this. At this time, WCW feels much more exciting than WWF, even with Raw beginning. I'll be curious to see how long this momentum carries on, assuming it lasts until at least Watts is fired.