Clash of the Champions XXI — WCW Spends an Hour Digging a Hole and Barry Windham Climbs Out of It

Brian Pillman spends the entire setup pretending he has discovered remorse, then reveals the crutches are not a medical device so much as a blunt instrument with excellent timing. He attacks Brad Armstrong before the bell, tells the referee the assault cannot trigger a disqualification because the match has not started, and then clips the injured knee as soon as Armstrong insists on continuing. Twenty-five seconds later it is over. There is almost no wrestling to evaluate, but the segment succeeds as a heel turn because Pillman's logic is smug, technically defensible and completely rotten.

Arn Anderson and Bobby Eaton are handed one of wrestling's least enviable jobs: make the boss's inexperienced son look as though he belongs while pretending a ten-thousand-dollar bounty makes the exercise dangerous. Kensuke Sasaki brings real physical credibility and absorbs most of the heel control, which allows Erik Watts to arrive for a short comeback instead of being asked to structure the match. Arn and Eaton bump generously, Michael Hayes interferes and Watts eventually forces Eaton to submit with an awkward STF. The veterans work hard enough to keep six minutes moving. The result still feels like management insisting the audience see something it has not earned.

Wrestling boxing matches usually become arguments with gloves. This one survives because everybody understands that the joke is bigger than the sport. Johnny B. Badd is the only participant who looks remotely comfortable throwing punches, Scotty Flamingo sells every exchange like he has wandered into the wrong profession, and Diamond Dallas Page plus Vinnie Vegas turn the corner into a traveling scam. The first round ends with Flamingo saved by the bell. Page then soaks his glove in water, Vegas distracts the referee and one loaded right hand produces the knockout. It is absurd, transparently crooked and more entertaining than it has any right to be.

Ron Simmons' World-title reign again gets booked like a supporting role, but the match accidentally introduces somebody impossible to ignore. 2 Cold Scorpio flies over the top rope before the audience even knows his name, flips through Cactus Jack's offense and immediately changes the visual language of the show. Cactus does most of the bumping for the heel side, Barbarian and Tony Atlas provide size, and Simmons handles the power exchanges until Scorpio returns for the finish. Then he hits the 450 splash and Macon explodes. The match is ordinary. The debut is not. One move turns an improvised replacement into a new attraction in seconds.

Months of Paul E. Dangerously insulting and humiliating Madusa should produce catharsis. Instead WCW gives the audience five minutes of disguise comedy, Michael Hayes interference and a time-limit draw. A decoy Madusa absorbs the opening phone shot, the real Madusa charges the ring and the crowd briefly gets the beating it came to see. Paul stalls, begs, cheats and eventually loses his pants, but he never receives the definitive defeat the story has promised. The segment has some comic energy because Heyman commits completely to cowardice. As a payoff, it is baffling. This becomes his final WCW television appearance and somehow ends without Madusa actually beating him.

Sting and Rick Rude are good enough to make twenty minutes of body-part wrestling respectable even when the outcome feels announced by the presence of three judges. Sting works the ribs, Rude answers by attacking the back and both men sell their targets consistently enough that later power moves have consequences. The problem is inevitability. Every reminder about the judges tells viewers the time limit will matter, so the middle settles into maintenance instead of escalation. The final minute finally accelerates, Sting catches Rude with the Stinger Splash as time expires and the split decision advances him. Solid old-school work, but the structure telegraphs itself too loudly.

The main event rescues the show by making character development inseparable from the wrestling. Dustin Rhodes and Shane Douglas begin with respectful counters, while Barry Windham grows increasingly irritated every time Ricky Steamboat outwrestles or frustrates him. The champions isolate Douglas and build the match conventionally until Steamboat tags in and the old partnership with Dustin becomes the entire point. When Steamboat is accidentally hit low, Dustin refuses to exploit the injury. Barry demands that he finish the job, tags himself in and becomes angrier with every hesitation. Dustin finally pulls Barry off a cover, the champions fight and Douglas catches Windham with the belly-to-belly for the titles. Then Barry turns. Every beat earns the next one.