1991 ROYAL RUMBLE

THE PLAYING OF THE NATIONAL ANTHEM OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA FOR SOME REASON PRESUMABLY A WAR SIGNIFIES THAT IT IS TIME FOR THE 1991 ROYAL RUMBLE! I AM A LITTLE CONCERNED BECAUSE THIS ONE LOOKS LIKE IT IS  A WAY BIGGER FILE THAN THE OTHER ONES SO IT MIGHT BE INSUFFERABLY LONG YEEAAAAHHHH! 


THE FOLLOWING COMPETITORS ARE LISTED IN AN OPENING MONTAGE NARRATED BY GENE OKERLUND NOT USING HIS REGULAR VOICE AT ALL:


THE IMMORTAL HULK HOGAN
THE HITMAN BRET HART
ANIMAL FROM THE LEGION OF DOOM
THE UNDERTAKER
THE TUGBOAT
THE MODEL RICK MARTEL
MR. PERFECT
HACKSAW JIM DUGGAN
THE EARTHQUAKE
SABA SIMBA (poor tony atlas)
THE BRITISH BULLDOG
PAUL ROMA
TITO SANTANA
BUTCH THE BUSHWHACKER
JAKE THE SNAKE ROBERTS
THE WARLORD
DEMOLITION SMASH
TEXAS TORNADO KERRY VON ERICH
HAWK OF THE LEGION OF DOOM
SUPERFLY
LUKE THE BUSHWHACKER
THE ANVIL
DEMOLITION CRUSH
DINO BRAVO
GREG THE HAMMER VALENTINE
HERCULES
SHANE DOUGLAS (lol)
NASTY BOY BRIAN KNOBBS
HAKU
AND THE MACHO KING RANDY SAVAGE!


Plus we have a WWF Championship match with The Ultimate Warrior defending against number-one contender Sgt. Slaughter who has made some questionable political decisions recently!


Roddy Piper and cocaine join Gorilla Monsoon at the broadcast table as The Orient Express consisting of Kato and Tanaka accompanied by Mr. Fuji set to square off against The Rockers! Roddy Piper claims to have seen the Orient Express backstage "gnawing on raw fish" and actually you could do worse than a light meal of sushi before a tag team contest. These two teams are certainly tag-team specialists so I have high hopes for this opening bout. These hopes are realized early on as both Rockers dive through the ropes to the outside in awesome fashion and Roddy Piper tells us that if the Orient Express perform poorly they will beaten by Fuji because of Fuji's adherence to ancient Japanese custom. One wonders which martial arts Kato and Tanaka hold dan-ranks in? I do not know but were it within my purview I would award them the highest distinction in the field of having awesome matches with the Rockers. If you are looking for the Shawn Michaels super selling high point of the match it is probably when he is flung into the corner by Kato and he does that thing where he flips all around and then Tanaka reverse thrust kicks him in the face from the apron and it is like you cannot believe the extent to which Shawn Michaels cannot believe the extent to which that hurt. The hottest of tags follows, and Marty Jannetty dropkicks all Asians everywhere at once in retribution. A little later, Marty Janetty looks set to do a cool thing where he slams Michaels from the top rope onto the fallen Kato but Tanaka gets in on it and Michaels falls from the top to the floor and it's pretty cool. The finish has Kato and Tanaka going for their second straight slingshot-into-a-vicicous-chop maneuver but Jannetty pulls off a sunset flip for the one, the two, and, ultimately, the three. 


Sean Mooney is in the locker room area with Macho King Randy Savage who we are told has a statement: "I AM THE GREATEST WORLD WRESTLING FEDERATION CHAMPION EEEEEEEEEEVER AND I'M THE NUMBER ONE CONTENDER FOR THE TITLE." He then accuses Sean Mooney of being "SARCASTIC IN [his] VOICE." It's awesome. Sensational Queen Sherri is out in the arena with "Mean" Gene Okerlund to request that the Ultimate Warrior do what Sgt. Slaughter has already done: commit to defend his title against the Macho King should he be so fortunate as to emerge from tonight's title bout as the champion. Sherri hopes that the Warrior will so promise, and, further, that he is worthy of his word, and will keep by the promises he makes to the Kingdom of the Madness. The Warrior comes out in a USA leather jacket that is like basically the USA leather jacket that David Puddy would wear were he to wear a USA leather jacket. Sherri describs the Warrior's eyes as "hazel" as she attempts to entice him sexually. "And your hair, it's . . . very wonderful. I've often wondered what it would be like seeing you with the wind blowing through your hair." This is awesome. OMG SHE KISSED HIM and now she is kneeling before him, the temptress! The Warrior spits in disgust because he is lame and starts shaking because he is the worst and goes "NOOOOOO" because he sucks. I am sorry Andrew I know he was your favourite. Maybe I am wrong and the billions and the warriors are right, but this is how I feel.


Somewhat briefly, in other non-Rumble action:


The Big Bossman reversed a Barbarian high-cross body off the top to win a surprisingly good match, like way way better than you would have ever thought possible out of these to unless you unlike me had the proper regard for the Big Boss Man. Have we on the internet already decided that the Big Boss Man was actually really awesome? Because if we have, that's great and I am sorry I missed it, but if we have not, I think it is time. The crowd was insanely "hot" for this in part because of the excellence of the match itself no doubt but also it would seem because they were really into the story from the outset, a story that seemed to be about the Heenan Family vowing to destroy the Big Boss Man, or something. Anyway, this was tremendous. It's easily the best match I have ever seen the Barbarian in, for example. He worked really hard, it looked like, and the Boss Man was just awesome. This went longer than you might have expected. 


Then right in the middle of the card we had Sgt. Slaughter accompanied to the ring by General Adnan and the scorn of millions for his treachery defeating the Ultimate Warrior for the WWF Championship in a match that had more than enough crazy shit going on to remain totally watchable. First off, you've got Sgt. Slaughter out there with Adnan waiving the Iraqi flag which is reasonably effective in drawing "heat" from the Miami crowd and then you've got the Ultimate Warrior's entrance which features awesome music and some serious running and then once he hits the ring you've got Slaughter and Adnan attacking him with the flag pole which the Warrior then destroys and he tears the flag in two so we are off to a solid start. After Slaughter takes a couple of rad turnbuckles (prefiguring his insane elimination at the 1992 Rumble iirc) we've got Sensational Sherri out there as a distraction and she runs down the aisle and the Warrior is like wtf? and follows her and then Randy Savage attacks him with a lighting pole and looks utterly given over to Macho Madness as he does so; it's top notch stuff, even better than I'd remembered. Sometimes when you are watching wrestling it is like you are watching a dude who has been told to go out there and do some crazy stuff, but when you are watching Randy Savage it is as though you are watching a legitimately crazy person acting the only way that it is possible for them to act ever. So eventually Slaughter has to interrupt the count, that's how out of it the Warrior is, and after he makes his way back to the ring and is ferociously rest-holded for a while he makes a comeback but OMG IT IS SHERRI AND SAVAGE AGAIN and it's awesome, man, awesome: Warrior gets Sherri up for a gorilla press and plainly needs to be reminded that a woman gave birth to him however after a bunch of silliness the Macho King utterly ruins the Warrior with his royal sceptre and that is all she wrote. Again, it's not like Slaughter or the Warrior even did all that much out there (Slaughter's turnbuckles: an obvious exception to this point I am making) but with all that awesome stuff going on around them, they didn't need to. It is worth watching this one for sure if you haven't in a while.


The next pre-Rumble bout is not good, and I get that this match was probably where it was in order to serve as the "cool-down" or whatever they call it between the two main events, but I don't need cooling down man I need more wrestling action and I did not receive it as I would have liked it from this bout between Jacques Rougeau now wrestling beardless as The Mountie and Koko B. Ware. The thing with Koko B. Ware is that OK he has the bird thing going and that's not bad at all everybody likes exotic birds but there are really only two cool things he does in the ring: one is landing on his feet after hitting a top-rope dropkick, and we do indeed get that here; the other is his completely sick brainbuster finisher, but he pretty much never wins so you pretty much never get to see it. And so he is unsatisfying. Jacques Rougeau is a very very very good tag team wrestler who is also a good singles wrestler, but he is far from his best here. He wins eventually with kind of as shitty thing that doesn't even look like anything man I can't even describe it. Throughout the match Roddy Piper expresses his strongly held conviction that Jacques Rougeau's dastardly tactics are not representative of any Mounties he knows but as I have mentioned at other times in other threads I have met some RCMP guys through my judo connex who well idk man idk.  


Finally, we've got the father and son team of Dusty and Dustin Runnels against The Million Dollar Man Ted DiBiase and Wrestling Superstar Virgil and it is always strange for me to see Dustin in any guise other than Razor Ramon's homophobic nightmare. This is a servicable match because three out of the four guys here are god damn professionals and the other is Virgil who all three are working hard to get "over" in his "face turn" so everything works pretty well! Roddy Piper is unbearable on commentary and let me say something to all the racists like Dave Meltzer who don't like Booker T on commentary and that is first off you are racist and secondly Booker T is way better on colour than Roddy Piper ever was. "If that's what it takes to be a millionaire, I'll stay poor!" he tells Monsoon after DiBiase does something untoward, and Gorilla is like "Yeah!" and then Piper goes, "I happen to like ridin' a jet-ski better than a yacht anyway. It gives me more freedom!" and Gorilla is like smdh. Eventually Dustin pretends that his knee has been seriously injured and so he is for real out of this pretend fight and really it's a one-on-one contest at this point because DiBiase has grown weary of his manservant's perpetual bumbling and has soundly beaten him and propelled him forcefully from the ring. Dusty comes in on the "hot tag" and we all expect this to be pretty much it for the Million Dollar Man and his insistence that there is one bond stronger than blood and that is the Million Dollar man's money, little man, but Dusty is overly exuberant as he attempts a (bionic?) elbow in the corner and DiBiase ducks out and rolls him up with the Leo Burkesque schoolboy for the flash pin and Dibiase does nothing more than look smug and say "that's right" as the referee raises his hand but in that look and utterance he is further proven to be better at this than pretty much anyone. His thirst for vengeance upon his ineffectual tag-team partner and employee unslaked by victory, DiBiase gets on the microphone and berates Virgil for his many failings and demands Virgil come into the ring and wrap the Million Dollar Championship Belt around his waist (the first WWF Magazine my mom got me at the train station featured a cover story on the Million Dollar Belt). The best part of this is not when Virgil strikes his "master," as Gorilla calls DiBiase here, but instead when a beer totally hits DiBiase in the back of the head and he completely "no sells" it but you can see security rush off toward the dude (perhaps a lady?) who hurled it. 


Jake "the Snake" Roberts is once again awesome in his prerecorded pre-Rumble comments. There seem to be far fewer of these this time out. Hulk Hogan does the worst interview I think I have ever seen him do although I suppose we can forgive his state of distraction given unconfirmed reports that Sgt. Slaughter has possibly defaced "Old Glory" because these are Very Serious Times in which all of a sudden people know where Kuwait is roughly located for like a minute but then don't care: 


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CO-5mUcqQSc


Mercifully it is time for the ROYAL RUMBLE MATCH ITSELF! Our first competitor is the current co-holder of the World Wrestling Federation Tag-Team Championship and greatest wrestler ever Bret "Hitman" Hart and he is facing a somewhat familiar foe entering at number two, Canadian Strongman Dino Bravo who is in fact Quebecois Strongman Dino Bravo and honestly I would guess Quebecois Sovereigntist Strongman Dino Bravo but I'm not even sure he lived to vote in the 1994 referendum that saw our federation survive by the slimmest of margins despite the extraordinarily charismatic leadership of Bloc Quebecois leader Lucien Buchard and no clear direction from the federalist camp. Greg Valentine enters next and promptly eliminates Dino Bravo and the extent to which "The Hammer" looks like a big fat baby is awesome. And here is heel Paul Roma, an entity I was not aware ever came into being. They beat up Bret Hart for a while. And now it is the Texas Tornado Kerry Von Erich who iirc was later revealed to have worked his entire WWF tenure without much of a foot in at least one of his intoxicatingly tassled boots. Did he lose it because of drugs? I am not sure how that would work but I think he lost most of his foot because of drugs.


At number six it is "The Model" Rick Martel who makes a beeline for Bret Hart because he has the sense to prefer working with a master of the art (perhaps properly a craft) than with these other turkeys. The crowd is enormously into The Model's near elimination at the hands of the Hitman which suggests that Martel's feud with Jake the Snake is probably a thing these people are into and they will like it a lot when Roberts shows up. Here comes Saba Simba aka Tony Atlas disgracing himself and in fact he even has this, like, special tribal way of running. Martel, who just like last year is awesome at almost being eliminated, has people shrieking as he endures the onslaught of the Texas Tornado. 


The crowd legitimately erupts as Bushwhacker Butch enters the match and walks around the ring doing that arm thing for really quite a while. It looks like Martel is gone but he ducks back in under the bottom rope but Saba Simba is not so fortunate. And here's Jake, and the crowd is certifiably bananas as he goes straight after Martel and hits him with a gutbuster and a short-whip clothesline and signals for the DDT only to see the Model bail out under the bottom rope in a clear violation of the spirit of the event but the officials' hands are tied in this circumstance. Hercules is the next man in and he is soundly booed, reminding me that oh yeah it was Hercules and Roma in POWER AND GLORY or something, right? 


So far I would say that this is an OK Royal Rumble made pretty exciting by the "hot" crowd. Nothing major has happened yet but some good rivalry stuff and yeah the crowd is just digging it which makes the home viewer inclined to do the same. Jake spent a minute or so tied up in the ropes and then Paul Roma took a run at him but Jake ducked and whoops there goes Paul Roma. Tito is in now and works over Martel, still smarting from that walkout vs. Demolition I guess. Tito is all "I NEVER MEANT TO HURT YOU RICK" but Martel will not hear a word of it. 


The Undertaker is up next and he shows absolutely no sign of fucking around. He picks up Bret Hart in a two-handed choke and throws him over the top rope and to the floor, thus eliminating him from contention. The Undertaker also eliminates Butch just as a particularly wild-haired Jimmy Snuka enters the match. Ghosts and goblins supernatural spooky nonsense is usually the worst in wrestling but the no-selling undead Undertaker is cool. The braids-and-beads era British Bulldog runs to the ring and I am reminded that his prerecorded comments earlier in the evening consisted of nothing but "WITH TWENTY-NINE OTHER MAN IN THE ROYAL RUMBLE MATCH IT MAKES ME GLAD THAT I AM (assumes "most muscular" poase) A BULLLLLLDOOOOOOOOG." Demoltion Smash comes in and he is fresh and Piper is like "that's what his girlfriend tells me" and I probably have to take back my earlier indictment of Piper because I mean HAYOOOOOO. 


Martel continues to be an awesome "chickenshit heel" in the inelegant insider language of our sport as he ducks out of the ring, jumps back up on the apron, and pulls his hated rival Jake Roberts out over the top. ROAD WARRIOR HAWK OF THE LEGION OF DOOOOOOM! His entrance is met with much excitement but then Hercules and the Undertaker and a couple of other guys gang up on him and he is quelled. Still a lot of clutter in the ring. I kind of expected the Undertaker to clean house a little bit. 


lol it is Shane Douglas! What a promising fresh-faced youngster he is in the World Wrestling Federation, in Gorilla Monsoon's view! I remember the Dean character of course but I never would have told you he did anything for them before that. One wonders where he is now exactly and how medical school is going. Or perhaps he is already practicing? lol fucking Shane Douglas. Kerry Von Erich and Superfly are out, the former at the hands of the Undertaker; the latter, those of Hawk. lol shane Douglas is totally a WOOOPITY DOO DAA YEAAH COME ON face in this and what I like about that is lol fuck you Shane Douglas you are a clown.     


There is some kind of delay here as the timer has counted down and yet no one has emerged from behind the black curtain that separates the superstars of the World Wrestling Federation from the fans who exhort them. I think this might be a legit fuck up like how that referee messed up Jack Swagger's kickout following CM Punk's top rope elbow that I am glad he does but that never really looks all that good if you compare it to like a Randy Savage or even the slightly lesser but still very good Shawn Michaels top-rope elbow.


Road Warrior Animal! Hawk and Animal "team up" to eliminate the Undertaker, who I don't think ever left his feet in his fifteen minutes or whatever in the ring. Martel, ever the opportunist, eliminates Hawk immediately thereafter. I like Rick Martel a whole lot. Demolition Crush! Believe it or not I made no connection betwen Crush the dude from Demolition's late period of excess and Crush the guy from Hawaii who wore purple until this guy I know was like "dude they are the same guy" and I was like "no you are stupid." 


Still a ton of dudes out there, and they are joined by "Hacksaw" Jim Duggan who remains loved. Hercules works over lol Shane Douglas with the worst looking jabs ever. The Earthquake is next and the crowd is like "OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO" because he is a whole lot of Tenta. It looks like Animal might have his number straight away but Earthquake moves out of the way as Animal rushes in with a clothesline and you know how that goes. Come on though man let's get somebody in here who just straight up fucking ELIMINATES some guys here man we've got to deal with some of this clutter.


It's Mr. Perfect! And were I in charge I would have him perfectplex everyone out immediately and he would hang out in the corner waiting for further dudes like Stone Cold Steve Austin and while that does not happen he does eliminate Jim Duggan who says "HOOOO" a bunch on the way out and the crowd is totally with him in that. 


AAAAAAAAAAAAND IT'S THE HULKSTER! THIS PLACE IS GOING CRAZY! EVERYONE UNLOADING ON THE HULKSTER AND NOW HE STARTS UNLOADING! There goes Smash. Earthquake gets a head full of fists and a face full of Hogan's crotch in the corner. Mr. Perfect refuses to be intimidated despite his elimination at the hands of the Hulkster last year. Hogan is still wearing his shirt but one expects he will do something cool soon and then rip it off. Kind of weird that Hercules is still out there.


Haku is in; Valentine is out (Hulkster). Nothing happens for a couple of minutes and we've got the Anvil in just as Earthquake tosses Tito. I totally expected Hogan to wreck some guys but that has not happened; instead he is just kind of settling in as another dude in the Rumble with, like, The British Bulldog and lol Shane Douglas. What about our servicemen and women in the Gulf to whom you dedicated your performance, brother? Also, here is evidence that it is Butch who is the true star of the Bushwhackers because Luke comes out and nobody seems to care however he is immediately eliminated and then walks to the back unfazed with his funny arm motion thing still happenin' jack and the crowd responds to that because in truth it is pretty good. Piper goofs on sardines but sardines are great and healthy and an ethical fishery so eat it pal.


Here's Knobbs! So what is the situation here: Knobbs, Anvil, Martel, Haku, Hercules, the Bulldog, Crush, Hogan, Earthquake, Mr. Perfect, and lol Shane Douglas. We are really getting down to it and they are going to have to come up with some cool shit in the remaining few minutes here to OOOOH there goes Hercules, back body dropped by one Brian Knobbs. The Warlord is in now and he is fucking huge at this point, even bigger than you remember probably. Crush takes a pretty big spill from the corner to the floor courtesy of the Hulkster. Perfect inadvertently chops the Warlord and apologizes comically. Still on the theme of the Warlord, he is eliminated by Hulk Hogan. 


Aaaaaaaahahahaha the last entrant is Tugboat! MEEEEEEP MEEEEEEEEP HE IS COMIN FOR YOU EARTHQUAKE


So the Macho Man -- or King, rather -- was the guy who did not show up at number eighteen. Savage's interviews thoughout the evening and his lighting rig/sceptre assaults on the Warrior have totally been the best part of the show, so it is disappointing that he is not actually taking part in this the Royal Rumble match itself. Knobbs eliminates lol Shane Douglas off camera. And Tugboat's got the Hulkster over the top oh wait he has tucked back in under the bottom rope and now it is the Tugboat who has been eliminated at the hands of the Hulkster! Mr. Perfect takes an awesome fall to the floor, dropkicked off the top by the British Bulldog! The Model dumps the Anvil! Bulldog eliminates Haku! So after that flurry of activity we are down to Martel, Davey Boy, Earthquake, Knobbs for some reason, and Hogan. 


OH WAIT: Martel goes up top but is crotched by the Bulldog and eliminated. His night is over, but his record-setting performance will totally last for a little while! The apparently menacing combination of Earthquake and one of the Nasty Boys does away with the Bulldog, and then lay into Hogan. True to form, Hogan takes Earthquakes finisher and then spazzes and puts Knobbs out with the big boot and gets all fired up to toss the big man out BUT THEN he does the fails-to-successfully-body-slam-the-big-man spot and I did not see that coming. THINGS ARE LOOKING GRIM FOR THE HULKSTER HERE FRIENDS. Oh wait it's cool he "Hulks up" again this is it I guess. YOOOOOUUUUUUU! block PUNCH PUNCH PUNCH BIG BOOT I CAN'T HEAR YOU DO YOU WANT ME TO LIFT THIS DUDE OR NOT BODY SLAM SERIOUSLY IF YOU WANT ME TO WIN THIS MATCH LET ME HEAR YOU  SHITTY CLOTHESLINE YEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!


Really what I want to know coming out of this one is WHERE IS THE MACHO KING? Maybe he is going to jump Hogan during his post-match celebration and it will own? No, that does not in fact happen.


A replacement-level Rumble at best here bros if I may adopt for a moment the language of sabrmetrics but next year is fuckin NINETEEN NINETY TWOOOOOO 


Hey finally here is the poster for this one, pretty cool really: