The SmarKdown Rant – September 11 2003

The SmarKdown Rant – September 11, 2003

– Lest we forget.

– Taped from Birmingham, AL.

– Your hosts are Cole & Tazz.

– Opening match: Rey Mysterio & Kidman v. Nunzio & Tajiri. Okay, now we’re getting somewhere with this Cruiserweight stuff. Nunzio attacks to start, but runs into a boot. Rey gets a headscissors and Kidman springs in with a rollup into a giant swing, for two. Nunzio rolls him into a Tajiri dropkick for two, and into the heel corner goes Kidman. Snap suplex gets two for Tajiri. Kneedrop gets two. Nunzio gets his own knee to the head and hits the chinlock, but Kidman flips out of it. Dropkick and Kidman makes for the corner, but Tajiri cuts it off. Kidman suplexes him, but Rey is knocked out on the floor and can’t tag. Tajiri tries a tornado DDT, which Kidman counters to a powerbomb, and now it’s the hot tag. He springboards in with a buttdrop and a cross body gets two. Tajiri tries a powerslam, which Rey reverses to an armdrag into a rollup for two. It’s BONZO GONZO and Rey rebounds with a 619 to the back of Tajiri, which sets up the real one, but Tajiri ducks and kills him with a kick for the pin at 4:19. Oh, sneaky. Good fast-paced opener, too short as usual. **1/4

– Elsewhere, Vince gloats about Zach Gowen’s death last week, and Stephanie flashes her cleavage in the guise of standing up to him. Brock is now a criminal and a liability to the show, apparently. This is of course 180 degrees different from her usual stance about her “Smackdown Superstars”. Brock offers to fight Angle, Undertaker and Gowen 3-on-1 tonight, but none of them are here. So that leaves Stephanie, since he’s already fought everyone else in the room. Try to follow THAT logic. Brutal segment setting up a match that no one wants to see and they have no intentions of delivering.

– Shaniqua v. Dawn Marie. Dawn attacks to start, but gets laid out with a clothesline. Shaniqua dumps her and beats on her outside, but Torrie & Nidia run in for the DQ at 1:24. DUD Wow, that was so worth my time.

– Elsewhere, Sable lets Steph know that if she quits, she’d be more than happy to take over for her.

– Chris Benoit v. Rhyno. Rhyno grabs a headlock to start and pounds him down, but Benoit takes him down with a wristlock. Crossface, but Rhyno makes the ropes. Benoit starts chopping and elbows him down, and a snap suplex follows. More chops in the corner and a clothesline, but Rhyno dumps him and A-Train runs in to post Benoit. Rhyno gets two. This guy can’t even do an effective run-in. We take a break as Rhyno argues the count. We return with Rhyno getting a superplex for two. He chokes away and hangs Benoit in the Tree of Woe, shoulderblocking him in the “crotchal area” for two. Sharpshooter, but Benoit makes the ropes. Rhyno stalls, allowing Benoit to come back with his own Sharpshooter. Whenever he does it, it’s over huge, but he never does it. Never got that, unless it’s a thing where he doesn’t want to step on Bret Hart’s toes or something. Benoit charges and hits elbow, but comes back with a german suplex. He goes up and Rhyno catches him, but Benoit sunset bombs him for two. Rebound clothesline is countered with a spinebuster, and both are out. Rhyno tries the GOAR GOAR GOAR, but Benoit crossfaces him for the submission at 10:35. This was actually a lot better than their house show match a month ago here. ***

– Elsewhere, Matt Hardy plays poker with the APA and protests their treatment of Bruce while abusing Shannon. Sadly, Faarooq then points out the joke for the idiots in the audience. I hate it when they do that. This leads to a match later tonight.

– We go back to Summerslam for Lesnar v. Angle and they show the whole thing in its entirety, setting up the Iron Man match for next week. Why you’d give away a PPV main event without even advertising it is beyond me. So anyway, that eats up about 30 minutes of airtime, plus commercial. Or maybe it’s just a thing for the Canadian audience only to fill the show up to 2 hours this week? Well, either way, it’s the whole match, so here’s the rant…

– Smackdown World title: Kurt Angle v. The Real Brock Lesnar. Brock
gives him a clean break to start, but Kurt takes him down with a facelock.
They reverse each other and Angle takes him down again with a headlock,
which prompts Brock to take a breather. Back to the headlock and Angle
hangs on, but Brock kips out of it. Brock overpowers him off a lockup, but
Angle shoves him into the corner in response. Angle takes him down with a
pair of armdrags and Brock bails and throws a tantrum. So much for Happy
Fun Brock. Brock takes a walk with the belt, so Angle attacks him and they
brawl down the aisle, and back to ringside, as Angle sends him into the
railing and back in. Brock misses a charge and Angle gets the overhead
suplex for two. Brock comes back with a nice military press right out of the
ring. If Michael Cole uses “lunatic fringe” one more time, I hope Tom
Cochrane sues for royalties. Angle meets the stairs and Brock steps on his
face. Back in, Brock stomps him down and gets an overhead suplex of his
own, hardly even going down himself on the move. That gets two. Brock
tries another press, but Angle rolls him up for two. Brock follows through
with a backbreaker for two. Brock hooks in a chinlock, and Angle fights
free and makes the comeback, but walks into a knee. Brock gets a
backbreaker and stomps away in the corner, and chokes him out. Angle
fights back with a rollup for two, but Brock clotheslines him down again.
Delayed fisherman’s suplex gets two. Brock pounds away in the corner and
they do what appears to be an extended planning session there before they
slug it out to give Brock advantage again. Brock charges into the ribs in the
corner, and amazingly DOESN’T miss. Another try does miss, however,
and he hits the post. Angle shoulderblocks him a couple of times to work on
the weakened shoulder, and then clips him. Rolling germans further hurt the
shoulder, and Angle gets two. Another overhead suplex, and he blocks an
Angle Slam with a spinebuster that gets two. They seem to be throwing
each other around with abandon tonight. F5 is countered by Angle, but they
mess up the spot and Angle lamely drops an elbow for two. Then they
break rule #1 of wrestling by repeating the spot, with Angle this time
countering to a DDT. That gets two. That would have been edited off
Smackdown. Angle pulls down the straps and gets the Angle Slam, but it
only gets two. Anklelock, but Brock counters and the ref is bumped. That’s
what we needed, more ref bumps. Angle grabs Brock in what appears to be
a rimjob, and then thankfully lets go and switches to the anklelock. The ref
is still out. Brock taps with no ref, and of course Vince breaks it up with a
chair to the back. F5 gets two as a result. Everyone’s shocked, apparently.
Vince calls for another one, but Angle takes him down with another
anklelock. Brock makes the ropes, but Angle pulls him away. Um, how
does that work? Again to the ropes, and again he gets pulled back, which is
totally outside of the rules, but Brock taps regardless at 21:19. Kinda
oddball booking — building up Brock as a monster killer psycho destroyer
for two weeks and then having him tap clean? Match was good, but I
wasn’t digging it as much as Wrestlemania, perhaps because of the ref
bumpery and Vince’s involvement. ***1/2 Angle puts Vince through a
chair as a birthday present.

– Street Fight: John Cena v. Eddie Guerrero. Cena’s rap is particularly low, noting that the lowrider’s hydraulics are just Eddie sitting on the stick shift. Eddie attacks him from the car, but gets sent into a car. This is like the Steve Blackman-Ken Shamrock circle of death thing from RAW a few years back, with cars in a circle. Eddie puts him on a hood and tries a suplex, but Cena reverses and suplexes him onto the roof. Cena raids a minivan and fires up a lawnmower. That’s certainly not something you see every day. The LAWNMOWER OF DEATH misses, but Eddie gets sent into another car and Cena grabs a shovel instead. He misses with that, but charges and gets dropped on a car hood. Eddie misses with the shovel, but opens the car door to knock him down, and then chokes him out with the seat belt. This is some really creative stuff. He opens the trunk, but Cena goes low and sends him into it. It’s obviously Kane’s car, because the latch doesn’t close and Eddie pops right out again. Cena tosses him into a windshield and gets two. He slams a door on his face for two. Was that a rib on Shawn Michaels? Eddie dodges another door, and slams Cena’s head through the window. Geez, call Ralph Nader, these things ARE dangerous! Cena returns the favor on Eddie, slamming his head through the window for two. They get into a car and Eddie rams his head into the horn a few times, and then burns him with the cigarette lighter. That’s gotta hurt. Eddie uses the power of windshield washer fluid to blind him, but charges and gets backdropped onto the hood for two. Cena goes for the FU, but Eddie counters and hiptosses him through a windshield, as Chavo returns and adds a shot with a weapon, and a frog splash from another car finishes at 8:08. Tremendous fun. ***1/2

– The APA v. Matt Hardy & Shannon Moore. Shannon tries attacking Faarooq to start, which proves unwise. He gets hit with the CLUBBING FOREARMS~!, and a powerslam gets two. Matt comes in and gets nowhere, as Bradshaw suplexes him, and Moore is drafted into service again. Bradshaw misses the clothesline, but gets the blockbuster slam and a big boot for Matt. Elbowdrop gets two. Matt is tossed and a neckbreaker on Moore sets up a powerbomb attempt, but Matt clotheslines Bradshaw to give Moore two. Clothesline From Heck ends the slaughter at 3:12. Total squash. ј*

– Vince and Brock call out Stephanie for her “match”. She goes low on both guys and runs away, but Brock brings her back in, and Kurt Angle makes the save. Oh well, maybe next time.

The Bottom Line:

Hey, I don’t know about you US viewers, but the Canadian version of this show kinda rocked, with a pair of ***1/2 matches and a really good Benoit-Rhyno match eating up nearly an hour of the show. The main event was a joke, of course, but you take what you can get these days.