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The Magnificent Seven: The Top 7 Big Van Vader Rivals

February 8, 2016 | Posted by Mike Chin

For regular readers of my columns, it should come as little surprise that I’m a big fan of Big Van Vader. He’s one of wrestling’s all-time great monsters—a physical spectacle, a superheavyweight, and he could actually put on some very good matches in the ring. This week, I’m looking at some of the top programs from his storied career.

As a caveat to start things off, I’m less familiar with Vader’s Japanese work than his work in the States, so I’ll own the fact that his work in the Far East is probably underrepresented in this countdown.

With that out of the way, here are my top seven Big Van Vader rivals.

#7. Ron Simmons

Ron Simmons gets the nod for this countdown less out of longevity, heat, or any particularly great matches than for a historical moment. Simmons may not be remembered as a WCW legend, but between Simmons, Vader, and head booker de jour Bill Watts delivered one of the promotion’s most iconic and historically important moments (particularly for the pre-Nitro era) when Simmons pinned Vader to become the first black world champion in a truly national US-based promotion.

Simmons got catapulted into the main event scene when Sting got incapacitated and had to give up his title shot against Vader, prompting a raffle to name a new challenger. Simmons got the call and picked up the fall. He would go on to feud with the likes of Cactus Jack, Rick Rude, Steve Williams, and The Barbarian, before circling back to Vader who won back his title.

Simmons is a bit of a historical oddity—a legit, real-life badass and a perfectly good pro wrestler, such that no one really cries foul on his world title reign, but he also had a forgettable enough reign before spending the rest of his career in the mid-card that it’s hard to really place his legacy. His power and explosive offensive made him a suitable foil for Vader, though, and the two created a truly great moment in concert with each other.

#6. Yokozuna

The year was 1993 when Vader vs. Yokozuna emerged as a dream match—two superheavyweight heel world champions who could deliver world war hoss if they ever found their way into the same promotion. Lo and behold, that scenario would become a reality when Vader surfaced in the WWF in early 1996 and promptly attacked the newly face Yokozuna, ostensibly taking Yoko’s place as the big man in Jim Cornette’s stable. As was the case for much of Vader’s early run in WWF, he started a war in brutal fashion, handcuffing and demolishing his larger rival.

I would love to rank this program higher in the countdown, and could probably justify doing so if Vader-Yokozuna had built to the rumored WrestleMania match the two were bound for. Rather than a one-on-one encounter, though, the two would end up on opposite sides of a six-man tag—likely a better match for the extra men involved, but diluting the personal issue between the two giants. Nonetheless, when they did lock horns, it was pretty electric, and Vader picking up the fall precluded Yokozuna from getting five minutes alone with Cornette—a victory that not only put over Vader as a killer, but further solidified his heat for denying fans Yokozuna’s presumptive retribution against his old manager.

I’m being a bit generous in giving this rivalry a spot on the countdown, but as a kid who loved his fantasy booking, I have a soft spot for this underdeveloped program.

#5. Shawn Michaels

Here endeth the portion of the countdown in which I weigh massive potential and great beginnings against underwhelming outcomes. In 1996, the WWF had done an alarmingly good job of capturing the essence of the Vader character from WCW and putting their own spin on it in a handful of particularly vile acts like decimating beloved WWF President Gorilla Monsoon and taking out Yokozuna. Thus, The Mastodon was perfectly positioned as a killer and likely insurmountable threat to plucky babyface Shawn Michaels.

Add onto all of this good storytelling the fact that Vader is one of the greatest big men workers of all time and the fact that Michaels was near the peak of his considerable talents as arguably the single greatest worker who ever lived, and you have the makings of a pretty special showdown.

The Michaels-Vader program got off to a good enough start with Vader attacking HBK outside the ring and later pinning him in an In Your House six-man tag. The program did culminate in a very good main event match at SummerSlam 1996. The trouble is that the wonky finish—Vader winning by countout and then DQ only for Jim Cornette to get the match restarted both times, only for Michaels to then pick up the pin—came across as overly complicated and contrived. The finish was probably booked to protect Vader and I can see the logic. Just the same, an annoying, drawn out finish followed by eating a pinfall spoiled most of the big man’s momentum and he would descend to the upper mid-card from there, never meaningfully reprising the feud with Michaels and, despite getting booked into a handful of title match scenarios, never coming across as a serious threat to the strap again.

#4. Stan Hansen

The Big Van Vader-Stan Hansen rivalry, for as few encounters as it entailed and as little impact it had on any kayfabe programming in the US, could easily have been lost to the sands of time. It became the stuff of legend, though, in February 1990 when the two squared off in Japan. It was a showdown between two big, powerful, hard-hitting men in an environment in which stiff strikes were celebrated, and thus it all but promised a brand of ugly, blunt violence we don’t often see in an American wrestling ring.

Vader and Hansen spent the duration of this match pummeling one another. The opening brawl saw Hansen break Vader’s nose with his bull rope. Minutes into the slugfest, Hansen (by all accounts accidentally) poked Vader in the eye, which led to Vader’s eye popping out of its socket. It’s a testament to Hansen’s commitment to his craft that he didn’t slow down from there, and a testament to Vader’s toughness that he took off his mask, plugged his eye back into place and went on performing.

When people talk about Vader as a legit badass, some of it is his intense power offense highlighted on American television over a period of years. Some of it, too, roots back to this incident–there was no faking wrestling with a loose eye, and only growing more intense for the injury.

#3. Ric Flair

In 1993, Vader owned WCW. He won back his championship from Ron Simmons and beat back challenges from the likes of Sting, Davey Boy Smith, and Cactus Jack. And as if he weren’t a menacing enough presence on his own, he had Harley Race in his corner, adding immense historical credibility. Then he won Battlebowl that November—the spot out of which a new challenger for Starrcade would have presumably arisen.

By most accounts, the plan was for Vader’s fellow top heel and occasional running buddy, Sid Viciious, to turn face and ultimately defeat Vader at WCw’s flagship PPV. Vicious got into a nasty shoot brawl with Arn Anderson in a hotel during the build, though, and got released from the company instead.

And so, as he had done before, and as he would do again, Ric Flair stepped up to the main event when WCW needed him most. He entered Starrcade with the storyline that he was putting his career on the line for one more world title shot. So the stage was set for a truly special match between the two, in which Vader brutally dominated the overwhelming majority of the action against Flair, playing the very best never-say-die plucky babyface incarnation of his character. Flair would end up winning via roll up to launch a new title reign.

Vader-Flair was a far from obvious program, pitting against one another two major stars from different eras with seemingly clashing styles. It’s a testament to each man’s versatility and skills as a worker that they not only made it work, but put together one of the greatest Starrcade matches of all time, and also a largely forgotten, abbreviated gem of a rematch at SuperBrawl IV in the Thundercage.

#2. Cactus Jack

There’s an argument to be made that Vader vs. Cactus Jack marked a high point in WCW programming, particularly in the pre-Nitro era. There’s also an argument to be made it’s one of the worst-blown angles in the promotion’s history.

Here’s the good of it: there are ways in which this was a very old school blood feud. Vader and Jack had an excellent brawl on WCW Saturday Night that culminated in Vader powerbombing Jack on the concrete floor and putting him out of action. Jack returned after over a month out of action to seek revenge, working his way through hired gun Yoshi Kwan en route to blowing off the feud in a very good Texas Death Match at Halloween Havoc.

The bad: rather than Jack just plain going missing, or telling a sincere and simple human interest story of a veteran incapacitated with a head injury, WCW tried to sell us all on an amnesia angle in which Jack lived on the streets. WCW kind of sort of explained away that angle as Jack playing mind games en route to seeking his revenge. Additionally, the Texas Death Match ended not in the sort of decisive finish the match is built to facilitate, but rather in Harley Race stunning Jack with a cattle prod in the back of his leg to keep him down.

In rating this rivalry so high, I’m remembering the matches themselves though—arguably the very best pure brawls WCW ever offered up. I also appreciated the coda to this feud at Battlebowl 1993, in which Vader and Jack were wedged into a reluctant partnership in which they entertainingly brawled with one another en route to victory. They’d follow up on all of that months later with a one-off bout in Germany which would probably have been lost to history were it not for Jack getting his head caught in some too-tight ropes and all but tearing off his ear, before Vader’s clubbing blows finished the job.

#1. Sting

When I started formulating this column, there was no question in my mind that Sting would wind up in the top spot. He was Vader’s quintessential rival, to the extent that the two established a paradigm of overmatched courageous face versus monster heel that few pairings have broached since.

This rivalry started in the spring of 1992 with Vader brutalizing Sting in a match that he technically lost via DQ but won the war on in kayfabe injuring The Stinger. This led to The Great American Bash at which Vader finished the job, dominating Sting and beating him clean in a match not so dissimilar from Brock Lesnar squashing John Cena at SummerSlam 2014. The two would continue as on-again off-again rivals at the top of the card for three years to follow, clashing not only one-on-one but in high profile tag matches, a War Games encounter, and battle royals.

In the pre-Nitro era, Sting built his name as a constant underdog and hero, starting by chasing Ric Flair and then briefly Lex Luger, before evolving into Vader’s foil. All of this laid the groundwork for The Crow character when, despite all of his good deeds, no one trusted him, and so he snapped. Thus, the Sting-Vader feud was not only great in its own right, but foundational to some of WCW’s biggest successes in the years to follow.

Which Vader rivalries would you add to this list? Let us know what you think in the comments section.

Read more from Mike Chin at his website and follow him on Twitter @miketchin.