WCW Fall Brawl 1993 

Date: 09/19/1993

Location: The Astro Arena in Houston, TX 

Announcers: Tony Schiavone & Jesse Ventura 

The Setup 

This was the first Fall Brawl PPV for WCW, as well as the first in six straight years of the annual show being headlined by War Games. We covered the atrocity that was Shockmaster’s debut during our last Clash review, but this was essentially the Bash at the Beach main event of Sting & Vader vs. Sid & Bulldog with random friends thrown in. 

The Business 

The show did 95,000 buys, which, as we’ve discussed before, was their pretty solid 1993 range of 95,000-100,000, except for a slightly higher Starrcade and a much lower Battle Bowl. Nothing was moving the needle. Probably not surprisingly – not even Shockmaster. 

Prowrestlinghistory has the show doing 6,000 in attendance with a $33,000 gate. At just over $5 a head, that means a shit ton of comps. 

The Results 

WCW TV Title Match: Steven Regal def. Ricky Steamboat (C) in 17:05 to win the title. Steamboat looked like he was putting some extra on his chops, but they worked on the mat for too long in a match given too much time, and they lost the crowd. Regal did a good job working the “injured” ribs of Steamboat, and it was well worked, but it dragged. Shout out to Bill Dundee for a perfect umbrella shot on Steamoat for the win. **1/2 

Charlie Norris def. Big Sky in 4:34. This made zero sense to put on the show with foresight. Norris won with a shitty kick. 1/2* 

2 Cold Scorpio & Marcus Bagwell def. Paul Orndorff & Equalizer in 10:46: Watch the parts with Equalizer and Bagwell if you want a real chuckle. Orndorff not only got megaheat, but the match was legit good when he was in, especially with Scorp. Did I mention how horrible Equalizer was? Scorp pinned him with the 450. *1/2 

Ice Train def. Shanghai Pierce in 3:27. My thoughts on this are the same as Norris vs. Sky. Train fell down giving Pierce the powerslam finish. Man, he was green. DUD

World Tag Team Title Match: The Nasty Boys def. Arn Anderson & Paul Roma (c) in 23:58. The big news was Missy Hyatt joining the Nasties here, marking the first time in the entire history of WCW that she was a heel manager, arguably her most suited role. I’m not sure why the Nasties were booked in super long matches during this run, like they were Tully and Arn, but they surely weren’t. Has Roma ever really been entertaining in his career when working as a babyface? The Roma team is probably on the bottom tier of regular Arn Anderson tag teams. The Nasties worked a lot of long, sometimes excruciating holds to ensure Arn couldn’t save this at all. Sags hit his top rope elbow on Roma with the ref distracted for the pin. Arn looked relieved. *1/2 

Cactus Jack def. Yoshi Kwan in 3:38. Kwan is Chris Champion trying to appropriate some stereotypical Asian culture, although I’m not sure which one. Cactus tried, but come on. Cactus won with the double arm DDT. *1/4 

Big Gold Belt Title Match: Rick Rude def. Ric Flair (c) in 30:47. Yep, that was the name of this title match because the NWA stripped Flair on 09/01, and they had yet to invent the WCW International sanctioning body. The same as many matches before, as it was way too fucking long, even if the guys looked good in spots. A lot of long fucking holds in this one, too, and the crowd was consistent in not caring. Rude hit Flair with an object to put us all out of our misery. *3/4 

War Games: Sting, British Bulldog, Dustin Rhodes & Shockmaster def. Vader, Sid & Harlem Heat in 16:39. The match started well enough with Dustin and Vader opening, but quickly slid downhill. Dustin and Stevie Ray gigged, but production tried not to show it. Fuck you too, WCW. Besides the lack of blood and violence one would usually associate with War Games, this was pretty bland. Shockmaster made Kole (Booker T) submit with a fucking bearhug of all things. Jesus. Solidly below average. *3/4 

The Verdict

Thumbs down. There were too many unnecessary matches on the show. Those were thankfully kept short, but the matches that had potential went too long as a result. This was a total waste of PPV time.