wrestling / Columns

Ask 411 Wrestling: How Many Wrestlers Have Pinned Goldberg?

June 1, 2018 | Posted by Ryan Byers
Goldberg Credit: WWE

Welcome, guys, gals, and gender non-binary pals to an edition of Ask 411 Wrestling that is brought to you by the weight of the universe crushing down on me upon realizing that I’ve been doing this for over a decade and dear god what is wrong with my life.

We’ll be getting to your questions in just a moment, but, before we do, do not forget that you can submit those questions by writing to me at [email protected], or you can shoot me a tweet if you have an opinion to share but haven’t given it enough thought to fully realize it.

Oh, hey, a banner.

Errata, Et Cetera

Two weeks ago, I undertook the gargantuan effort of tracking what was essentially a linear history of the NWA World Heavyweight Title beginning with Ric Flair’s first reign, which, at the request of the question asker, we referred to as being “The Man.”

First off, commenter Matt (if that is his real name) pointed out that I made a slight error in the title history, though it ultimately wound up back in the same place after about five more title changes. So, if anybody else cares enough to memorialize that record somewhere, you’ll want to make sure that you correct for that.

Speaking of memorializing the record, a commenter by the name of Tatankasaurus put the answer into a Google doc that includes a summary of who has held the fake title the most. (It’s John Cena.) We’ll see if people continue to track this and if it haunts me for the rest of my life.

Also, reader Oscar sent in an e-mail to let us know he had worked on similar projects, with similar results:

Your answer to “The Man” question was very entertaining. I recently wrote Larry about a similar idea taken from Flair’s “Real World’s Champion”. Going back to 1949 and starting with Lou Thesz. Long story short, by the time I saw you were with Kane on December 4, 2007, I knew exactly where you would end up.

Had the same issue with Edge retiring and decided to go back to Miz. In an attempt to avoid Edge, I included the Royal Rumble and all Battle Royals since Titles are determined in them much the same way as a First Blood Match. While the lineage changed, it always ended up with Edge.

I also did this for the WWE title and end up with the same result, beginning with Buddy Rogers and ending with Brock Lesnar. Same applies if you do the WCW Title with Flair in 1991. All ends up being unified.

For all of the professional wrestling events that occur throughout the world on any given day, it’s amazing to me (and a little bit disheartening) that everything always comes back to the WWE main event scene.

Frank Pozen also chimed in on an answer that I gave about wrestlers changing their names in WWE developmental:

The WWE was going to call her [Asuka] Kana which is her real name (Kanako Urai) for similar reasons that they didn’t change Nakamura. HHH thought fans already knew about her. But she requested the change to Asuka which is the Japanese word for future. For her, the WWE represented a new beginning after getting paid peanuts or sometimes not getting paid at all in Japan for years. If the WWE hadn’t come calling, she was going to retire and run her two businesses, a graphic and video game design company and a hair salon. I’m glad that didn’t happen.

That was an interesting tidbit, as I’d always just assumed that “Asuka” was a tribute to legendary joshi wrestler Lioness Asuka.

If you like Frank’s insights on wrestling and MMA, which tend to skew towards the Japanese and women’s ends of the combat sports game, go follow his Big Bad Blog, where you can also hear his podcast.

What You All Came For

In terms of asking questions, Tim Era is next:

How many times has Goldberg been pinned, and has he ever tapped out? Thank you so much if you answer this question. He’s my favorite wrestler of all time.

(Tim actually sent in a second question about Goldberg as well . . . and the answer to that one is still in the works.)

I was able to find record of fourteen different Goldberg losses by means other than count-out or disqualification. He appears to have never tapped out in his career (at least not that we have record of), though as you’ll see below at least two of his losses arguably come via submission.

Here’s the list:

1. Before making his television debut, Goldberg did have one verifiable loss in a dark match for WCW, which came when he was defeated by Chad Fortune on July 24, 1997 in Atlanta during a WCW Saturday Night taping. Though I have not read it, I have seen secondary sources state this match is even referenced in Goldberg’s 2000 autobiography I’m Next (oddly ghostwritten by another guy with the last name Goldberg). The records I’ve reviewed don’t show precisely how Fortune won, but given his wrestling style and the fact that you almost certainly wouldn’t do a screwy finish in what at the time was a totally inconsequential dark match, you have to assume it was a clean pinfall victory for Mr. Fortune.

2. Goldberg doesn’t lose via pinfall or submission again until the match that broke “The Streak,” when Kevin Nash pinned him to win the WCW World Heavyweight Title at Starrcade 1998 in Washington, DC. Most people who know anything about Goldberg’s career will be acquainted with this finish, which saw Scott Hall zap Goldberg with a cattle prod en route to Nash getting the victory. The Mountie was so proud.

3. Bret Hart became the man to give Goldberg his second televised loss, which came almost ten months later on the October 25, 1999 episode of Nitro from Phoenix, Arizona. The WCW United States Championship was on the line in this match, and it was also a first round match in a tournament for the vacant WCW Title. Hart only won after interference from Sid Vicious and the Outsiders.

4. Interestingly, the next man to defeat Goldberg is also Bret Hart. This loss was not televised. Instead, it came on a December 5, 1999 house show from Chicago. Initially, Jeff Jarrett and the Outsiders interfered in the match causing a disqualification, but the then-babyface Bret Hart requested that the match be restarted. Once that occurred, Jarrett, Hall, and Nash interfered AGAIN, this time creating an opening through which Hart could defeat Goldberg, though the second wave of interference occurred behind the Hitman’s back.

5. Bret Hart next defeated Bill Goldberg AGAIN, though you can debate whether this match belongs on this list. The two faced off at Starrcade 1999 in Washington, DC in a WCW Title match, and the bout featured several ref bumps until finally “Rowdy” Roddy Piper ran in as the special guest referee. Late in the match, the Hitman looked for the Sharpshooter, and Piper called for the bell before the hold was even locked on, recreating the Montreal Screwjob from two years earlier. On paper that’s either a submission loss or a loss via decision for Goldberg, depending on how you want to categorize it.

6. The very next night on Monday Nitro (December 20, 1999), Bret Hart beat Goldberg YET AGAIN. During the show, it was revealed that Piper’s actions were the result of him reluctantly selling out to heel authority figure Vince Russo, while Hart was disgusted with how he won the prior evening. He vacated the WCW Title as a result. The two men had a main event match for the vacant championship, but it turned out that everything was a big ole’ SWERVE, as the Outsiders and Jeff Jarrett aided Hart in pinning Goldberg, giving him the championship back and forming the silver-and-black nWo 2000 in the process.

At this point, I’m beginning to think that Bret Hart really had Goldberg’s number . . .

. . . but, then again, Goldberg is the one who ended Hart’s career and not vice versa.

7. Booker T. pinned Goldberg on the July 24, 2000 edition of Nitro from Cleveland, capitalizing on interference from Jeff Jarrett and Ernest “The Cat” Miller before pinning him with the Book End.

8. In another somewhat debatable finish, Scott Steiner got a win over Goldberg at Fall Brawl 2000 in Buffalo, New York. In this match, Vince Russo interfered, which didn’t harm Goldberg but caused a distraction that allowed Steiner to hit him in the back of the head with a lead pipe. Realistically, this knocked Goldberg out cold, at which point Big Poppa Pump applied the Steiner Recliner and the referee called for the bell, as Goldberg was unconscious in the hold. So, much like the Starrcade bout, that is a loss by either submission or decision, depending on how you want to count it.

9. In what was Goldberg’s final match with WCW, he and his trainer DeWayne Bruce (a.k.a. Sergeant Buddy Lee Parker a.k.a. Braun the Leprechaun) lost to Totally Buff, the tag team of Lex Luger and Buff Bagwell at the company’s first and only “Sin” pay per view on January 14, 2001 in Indianapolis. A planted fan sprayed mace in Goldberg’s face just before the finish, which was Luger and Bagwell hitting a Doomsday Device variant in which Buff gave Goldberg a Blockbuster off of Luger’s shoulders. Lex then got the cover. The stipulation of this match was that Goldberg would have to leave WCW if he lost, and obviously the plan would have been for him to return at some point, though the company going out of the business in two months meant that it was legitimately the end of his run there.

10. Goldberg made his WWE debut on March 31, 2003, and he didn’t remain undefeated in the company for long at all. Triple H pinned him on a house show on July 20, 2003 in San Jose, California, which resulted from the interference of HHH’s Evolution stablemates Randy Orton and Ric Flair.

11. Speaking of Triple H, he also pinned Goldberg a month later at Summerslam 2003 in Phoenix. This was in an Elimination Chamber match for the World Heavyweight Title which also involved Chris Jericho, Kevin Nash, Randy Orton, and Shawn Michaels. Goldberg racked up the majority of the eliminations in the match but lost overall when he was pinned by HHH, thanks to a sledgehammer shot that connected while Goldberg was going for the spear.

12. Apparently Triple H wanted to make sure that he beat Goldberg as many times as Bret Hart did, because, on the November 17, 2003 edition of Raw from Beaumont, Texas, the Evolution team of Batista, Randy Orton, and Triple H defeated Goldberg in a three-on-one handicap match, with HHH getting the direct pinfall after each member of Evolution hit his finisher. This was a fairly clean victory, or at least as clean a victory can be when a man is outnumbered three-to-one.

13. Continuing their feud, Triple H pinned Goldberg one more time at Armageddon 2003 in Orlando, Florida in a World Title triple threat match also involving Kane. This seemed like an incredibly odd decision, because almost everybody watching WWE TV at the time had assumed that Kane was inserted into the match so that you would have Triple H win WITHOUT having to pin Goldberg. But, hey, what do we know.

14. Finally, in a match that I’m sure almost everybody reading this remembers, Brock Lesnar became the first man to defeat Goldberg in over thirteen years when he pinned him at Wrestlemania XXXIII in Orlando to win the WWE Universal Championship, the title that Lensar continues to hold to this very day.

So that’s the story on people pinning and, in two instances, arguably “submitting” bill Goldberg throughout his professional wrestling career.

Let’s continue by giving the floor to veteran Ask 411 participant Night Wolf the Wise:

We all know it’s very hard being a wrestler. You have to have the ability to wrestle, cut really good promos, be athletic, etc. We’ve seen so many wrestlers rise up and become great wrestlers and achieve stardom. At the same time, we’ve seen wrestlers crash and burn and become nothing more than low card wrestlers and even jobbers. What’s even harder than being a wrestler, is being a multi generation (2nd, 3rd, and 4th generation) wrestler. People expect so much from you and basically live in your parent’s shadow. You aspire to be a great wrestler to not only carry on your family’s legacy, but to step out of their shadow and achieve success on your own to separate yourselves from them. In your opinion, who are the 10 best muti-generational wrestlers (past or present) that lived up to their parent’s legacy or surpassed them and became great wrestlers in their own right?

Also, who are the 10 worst wrestlers that never lived up to the hype and that never achieved the same level of success as their parents?

This question is fairly straightforward, so I don’t know that I need a lot of explanation up top, but I will make it clear that I’m only considering wrestlers who are children, grandchildren, etc. of prior generations of wrestlers. So, competitors like Horace Hogan or Rey Misterio, Jr., who got into the industry because they are nephews of prior generations of stars, will not be eligible for consideration.

Also, I’m going to go in the opposite order of what Night Wolf requested, starting with the disappointments and then moving to the best of the best.

Most Disappointing Multi-Gen Wrestlers

In order to head off what I can see as being a tsunami in the comment section, let me state that I am NOT including David Flair here. Very few people seem to actually get this, but the whole David Flair gimmick was that he was an unprepared wrestler getting overly pushed because of who his father was, basically a play off of many of the careers that we’re getting ready to discuss. I can’t say that he was bad when the entire point of his existence in professional wrestling was to be bad.

That said, here’s the list.

10. David Sammartino: We all know that Bruno Sammartino is essentially the champion that laid the foundation for what we now know as WWE. His son David attempted to follow in his footsteps, debuting in 1980 and wrestling for promotions like All Japan, Jim Crockett Promotions (where he was billed as Bruno Sammartino Jr.), and ultimately the WWF. Particularly given the slower-paced style of the era, David wasn’t the worst in-ring performer, but he lacked the personality and presence that made his father a star and could never get out of the old man’s shadow. Frustrated with his position in the Fed, David threw a match that he was booked to win to prelim wrestler Ron Shaw (see the video above) and bounced around for a couple of years before being let go by the WWF in 1988 when he got into a fight with a fan. David continued to wrestle regularly until 1991, after which he vanished for a while before popping back up again sporadically in 1995 and 1996, including losing a Cruiserweight Title match to fellow second generation wrestler Dean Malenko on an episode of Nitro.

9. Shawn Stasiak: Stan “The Man” Stasiak was a transitional WWWF Champion in 1973, holding the title for nine days to move it between Pedro Morales and the second reign of the aforementioned Bruno Sammartino. Twenty-five years later, his son Shawn decided that he was going to get into the professional wrestling business and had a fairly unusual career. He had very little pre-WWF experience and essentially started off in Power Pro Wrestling, a Memphis-based developmental affiliate, where he feuded with Jerry Lawler and Mae Young (no, seriously) From there, he became “Meat,” the sex slave to Terri Runnels and Jacqueline on the Fed’s main roster (no, seriously) before getting fired for allegedly recording other wrestlers’ conversations in the locker room (no, seriously). From there, he had a middling run as a Natural Born Thriller in WCW before getting scooped back up by the WWF when they acquired their competition. While there, he had gimmicks in which he was a klutz and a poet (no, seriously). Once WWE released him from his last contract, he essentially exited wrestling and now works as a chiropractor. On the whole, Stasiak was really bad early in his career, though he eventually gained enough experience that he was an acceptable though not outstanding wrestler.

8. Wes Brisco: As the son of former NWA Tag Team Champion and long-time WWF backstage employee Jerry Brisco, when Wes Brisco decided that he was going to get into professional wrestling, he signed directly with WWE and began his career in then-developmental territory Florida Championship Wrestling. After over a year and a half in FCW, Wes was released at around the same time that he suffered a knee injury. (For what it’s worth, Brisco claims that he and tag team partner Xavier Woods were scheduled to be called up to the main roster very shortly had this not happened.) After being cut, Brisco bounced around the indies and spent some time in Puerto Rico’s World Wrestling Council before landing in TNA and lasting about ten months there. Though not an embarrassment as an in-ring performer, Wes certainly isn’t at the level of father Jerry or uncle Jack. However, he is still an active competitor, so perhaps he’ll work himself off this list yet someday . . . if he isn’t yet again attacked in the shower by a man who can’t keep his pants on, as in the video above.

7. Scott Putski: Much like David Sammartino and Wes Brisco, Scott Putski wasn’t really all that bad as an in-ring performer. In fact, he was probably better than his father Ivan, who was rather limited but got by based on his physique, charisma, and ethnic appeal. The younger Putski had his first appearances of any significance in the Global Wrestling Federation in 1991, and he wrestled there and in various Texas-based offshoots almost exclusively until 1997, when he was brought in to the WWF to be a centerpiece of their new light heavyweight division. A knee injury ended his time there, and he wound up as an enhancement talent in WCW through the end of the 90s, followed by a return to the Texas indy scene and some appearances as recently as 2014. Compare that to his father, who main evented Madison Square Garden on several occasions and was an early inductee into the WWE Hall of Fame, and it’s easy to say that Scott fell short of Ivan’s mark.

6. Sim Suka: While Scott Putski was a competent wrestler who wound up on this list mainly due to his lack of significant accomplishments in our favorite “sport,” Sim Snuka was not particularly good in the ring and never got any better, despite the fact that he was given just about every opportunity to improve that a young wrestler in the 2000s could receive. Getting in some tours of Japan? They did that. It didn’t work. Signing him to Ohio Valley Wrestling? They did that. It didn’t work. Heck, the fact that OVW and WWE stuck him in a tag team in which he dressed up as an extra from Grease as opposed to trying to cash in on his family lineage just goes to show how little faith that they had in him. After that tag team broke up and the gimmick went away, so did Snuka Jr.’s career, as his indy appearances post-WWE release have been incredibly sporadic.

5. Angelo Mosca, Jr.: Though he doesn’t get a lot of credit these days, Angelo Mosca, Sr. was a legendary Canadian wrestler who made a major mark in the WWWF, the NWA, the AWA, and All Japan throughout the 1970s and into the first half of the 1980s. He challenged Nick Bockwinkel for the AWA Title and Bob Backlund and Pedro Morales for the WWF Title, in addition to having his own NWA Canadian Heavyweight Title that he defended against all comers, usually in Toronto. And then . . . he had a kid. Angelo Mosca Jr. did have some reigns as the NWA Mid-Atlantic Heavyweight Champion in 1984, but he was nowhere near the caliber of the wrestler or especially the promo that fans of that territory were expecting around the time, resulting in his flaming out and largely being out of wrestling in the United States by 1985.

4. Tiger Ali Singh: Tiger Jeet Singh, an Indian professional wrestler who came to make his home in Canada, turned into one of the biggest heels in all of Japanese wrestling in an infamous angle in which he brutalized Antonio Inoki outside of a shopping center. He parlayed that one angle (and a feud with the original Sheik in Detroit) into a wrestling career in excess of thirty years. He also opened the door for his son, who was born in Canada, to join the wrestling business. Unfortunately, things didn’t work out that great. Known in Japan as Tiger Jeet Singh Jr. and in the United States as Tiger Ali Singh, the younger Singh wrestled a lot like his father . . which was a problem because Tiger Jeet was slow paced even by 1970s standards and Tiger Ali was trying to make it into the 1990s. The younger Singh was under contract to the WWF from 1997 through 2002, though during that run he was used almost exclusively on international shows and in dark matches for the first few years until he was finally converted into a low card manager in 2000. Tiger Ali really hasn’t wrestled on a full-time basis anywhere since then, though he has made sporadic appearances, mostly on shows that somehow relate to his father.

3. Lacey Von Erich: The granddaughter of Fritz Von Erich and the daughter of “Texas Tornado” Kerry Von Erich, young Lacey signed a WWE developmental deal with zero wrestling experience and kicked around Florida Championship Wrestling at the same time as the Bella Twins, but she lasted less than three months there. She claims that she quit because she wanted to spend more time with her fiancée and child. After a few indy shots, she worked the tapings for the short-lived GLOW clone Wrestlicious and then signed with TNA, where she stayed for about a year before retiring. Some might argue that having somebody with such a brief career on this list, much less so high on this list, is unfair. However, in terms of in-ring talent, she is the dirt worst person here. That’s not entirely her fault. Because of her looks, her family lineage, and the incredibly low standards for women’s wrestling in the early 2000s, she was rushed into the ring on a main stage much faster than she should have been and never had a good shot at learning the fundamentals. If she were coming up today and given time to more naturally develop her talents, she might turn into something worthwhile, but as it stands she will always be an odd historical footnote.

2. Mike and Chris Von Erich: Speaking of the Von Erich family, the hits just keep on coming. Part of me feels bad for including these two on the list because they both met tragic ends, but the fact of the matter is that, if we’re looking at their actual careers and not their lives outside of professional wrestling, they definitely meet this list’s criteria of being second generation wrestlers who didn’t live up to the standards set by the prior generation. While their father Fritz challenged for the AWA and NWA World Heavyweight Titles and feuded with the Giant Baba in All Japan, Mike topped out at being a Six Man Tag Team Champion in the promotion his father ran and Chris’s most memorable feud was with manager Percy Pringle III (a.k.a. Paul Bearer). Not only did they fail to live up to the standards set by their father, they also failed to live up to the standards set both their brothers, all of whom – particularly David and Kerry – were bona fide second generation stars.

1. Erik Watts: This isn’t a unique answer. This isn’t a creative answer. But, dammit, it still feels like the RIGHT answer. Erik Watts was the son of Bill Watts, who was a main event star across the country in the territorial era and the promoter of Mid-South Wrestling during one of the most critically acclaimed booking runs a wrestling promotion has ever had. After that territory folded up, the elder Watts was brought in to book WCW in 1992, and he brought his son Erik along with him. Despite training for less than three months, Erik immediately got a roster spot and was wrestling Rick Rude for the U.S. Title before the year was out. Before the end of 1993, he was facing Barry Windham for the NWA World Heavyweight Title. Oh, and he was also Pro Wrestling Illustrated’s rookie of the year for some inexplicable reason. And he was terrible. After Bill fellow out of power, Erik remained with the company but slid further down the card, into a position perhaps more befitting his level of experience. However, the damage was already done and wrestling fans weren’t going to take him seriously no matter what he was doing. To Erik’s credit, he didn’t give up on wrestling once WCW was done with him and toured with the CWA in Germany before becoming part of Tekno Team 2000 in the WWF. Around this time, he had developed into a semi-competent performer and became a c-show wrestler back in WCW during the Monday Night War, ultimately rounding out his career with stints in ECW, All Japan, and TNA in the early 2000s.

Aaaaaaaand you know what? I feel like I’ve already spent too much time on this topic for one edition of this column. Why don’t you all come back here NEXT WEEK, and I’ll reveal my rankings of the best multi-generation wrestlers to grace the squared circle.

Much like the Royal Rumble match, Kristian is all about the numbers:

I was watching a recent whatculture countdown video on highest raw rating segments ever. And one of the moments that was snuffed that surprised me was Mick Foley’s 1st WWF title win. My question is: What was the official Nielsen TV rating for Mick’s title win? Surely, having so many WCW fans change the channel to see this moment after the commentator’s gave away the ending should’ve given them a significant ratings boost.

Wellllll, here’s the thing. Sometimes there are narratives created in history – particularly wrestling history – that don’t quite match up with the facts when you go back and scrutinize them.

First off, it’s important to note that on the evening in question, January 4, 1999, Nitro was a three hour show while Raw was a two hour show. If you compare the total ratings of each show, Raw received a 5.8 whereas Nitro received a 5.0. However, if you only compare the two hours that went head-to-head, Raw’s score remains at a 5.8 (duh) whereas Nitro’s drops down to a 4.7. That means Mankind’s title win helped Raw along to a significant victory, right?

Not exactly.

Though Raw won the ratings war for the evening, it’s not entirely due to the Mankind victory and Tony Schiavone’s infamous announcement of it. Quarter-hour ratings are available for the show, and the highest rated quarter hour of that episode of Raw wasn’t even the quarter-hour in which the WWF Title match occurred. Instead, the show peaked at a 6.2 rating during the eleventh quarter, which was well before the title match. The title match and post-match celebration would have actually occurred during quarter twelve and the show’s overrun, which scored 5.9 and 5.1 quarters, respectively. You’ll note that the 5.9 quarter is only one-tenth of a ratings point above the show’s average rating, and the 5.1 overrun is eight-tenths of a rating point BELOW the show’s average rating.

Interestingly, though Nitro’s last quarter that evening was a 4.6 compared to Raw’s 5.9, Nitro’s overrun actually did significantly better than Raw’s, scoring a 6.5 rating compared to the aforementioned 5.1. However, comparing overrun-to-overrun isn’t entirely fair. This is in part because the lengths of the overruns are not always uniform and in part because the strength of the audience tuning in for the show after wrestling will skew the numbers.

So, while Foley’s career highlight drew well and was on a show that beat Nitro pretty handily, the story of a sea change in the ratings as a result of WCW spoiling the WWF’s main event result are pretty overblown.

Michael K. is wearing some flowers in his hair:

I saw on Wikipedia that Booker T once beat Jeff Jarrett for the world title in a “San Francisco 49’ers match. What the hell kind of match was this?

It was one of the dumbest matches in the history of professional wrestling, and frankly I’m surprised that it doesn’t get written up more as one of the low points of WCW. I think the issue is that WCW had so many low points that some of them, including this one, get lost in the shuffle.
Coming out of the September 27, 2000 edition of Monday Nitro, Vince Russo was the WCW World Heavyweight Champion. (See, the story starts off bad and doesn’t get much better.) He beat Booker T. for the title the week before by “escaping” the cage in a steel cage match, though he only escaped because Goldberg speared him through the cage wall. On the October 2 episode of the show, Vinny Ru declared that he was not an athlete and that he would immediately vacate the championship.

The new champion was decided first by holding a tag team match – which totally makes sense – with Booker T. and Jeff Jarrett facing Sting and Scott Steiner. The idea was that the winning team would wrestle each other later in the evening for the belt. Booker and Jarrett got the victory, when Jarrett, apparently not interested in winning a world championship, got out a guitar and attempted to hit his partner with it but missed and clobbered Sting instead.

Then, out of nowhere, storyline WCW commissioner “Above Average” Mike Sanders declared that the Booker T. vs. Jeff Jarrett match would be a San Francisco 49ers match, a match that to my knowledge had not occurred in professional wrestling anywhere before and has not occurred anywhere since. In the match, there were poles erected on each ringpost (a staple of Vince Russo booking), and there were boxes hanging from each pole. The Big Gold Belt was in one of the boxes, and the other four boxes contained . . . other things.

If you were the first one to retrieve the belt from its box, you would be the new champion. Think of it as a ladder match without any of the athleticism or excitement.

The “49er Match” name came from the fact that both of the competitors were attempting to find gold, much like the miners who participated in the California gold rush in 1849. (Of course, the NFL’s San Francisco 49ers are named after the miners as well.) The name was really an attempt to be cutesy because the episode of Nitro the match was broadcast on emanated from San Fran. Had the same show occurred in Detroit, we might be talking about a “Find Jimmy Hoffa’s Body” match or something equally ridiculous.

Jarrett and Booker took turns opening boxes, finding in them the following items: 1) a blow up doll, 2) a framed picture of Scott Hall (who was under contract but sidelined at the time, prompting “We want Hall!” cants at several WCW shows), and 3) a coal miner’s glove, in reference to another infamously bad WCW gimmick match from eight years prior.

With all that crap out of the way, there was only one box left, and it clearly contained the title belt. Booker and Jarrett fought to get to it, and Double J had his opponent down and out at one point . . . only to leave the ring to start grabbing under the apron for a guitar. Unfortunately for everybody involved, the guitar was stuck on something and couldn’t be easily removed, so Jarrett had to actually climb back in the ring and beat up Booker some more before leaving the ring again, at which point the announcers began actively questioning why he didn’t just grab the box and win the match.

Eventually Jarrett gave up on the guitar and started to climb the turnbuckles. He climbed in such a manner that it appeared he was getting ready to leap off on to Booker, even though the box that he had to open to win the match was hanging TWO INCHES OVER HIS HEAD. However, before Jarett could do anything, the match was interrupted by BEETLEJUICE.

No, not the beloved zany ghoul portrayed by Michael Keaton. For those who don’t remember (and I don’t blame you), this Beetlejuice was Lester Green, a dwarf with microcephaly who had become a d-list celebrity by appearing on Howard Stern’s radio show. Beetlejuice had been on the prior week’s Nitro and eaten a guitar shot from Jarrett, and he extracted his revenge here by hitting JJ with a series of what were supposed to be low blows but looked a lot more like attempts by Beetlejuice to shove his fist into the Chosen One’s sphincter.

From there, Jarrett fell down and Booker recovered to grab the box, though the belt fell out the side of it and down to the arena floor, where it was snagged by ring announcer David Penzer and handed to the Book Man as he has declared the winner. This being WCW in the year 2000, I’m amazed Penzer wasn’t declared champion on the spot.

So, Booker T. became your new World Heavyweight Champion, not because he was the superior wrestler, but because he got a helping hand from a little person who had been exploited by a cynical radio personality and a ring announcer.

You can see some limited clips of the match, including the finish, on WWE.com.

With that edition of “Ryan Describes WCW Idiocy” at an end, let us also close the books on today’s installment of Ask 411 Wrestling.

Remember that if you’d like to participate in this little column, you can send me a question at [email protected] or drop a comment down below. Also, don’t forget to follow me on Twitter, where I comment on wrestling when I can be bothered to watch it.