FEEDBACK: 100th Episode of WCW Monday Nitro

This Friday on Rewind-A-Wai, we are reviewing the 100th Episode of WCW Monday Nitro, as chosen by Espresso Executive Producer @BrentyTenty

It’s a special THREE-HOUR EDITION of Monday Nitro and we want to hear your feedback and any questions regarding this show and WCW during this period.

Click here to view this episode on the WWE Network.

Tune in Friday on the POST Wrestling Café.

WCW Monday Nitro
Monday, August 4th, 1997
The Palace at Auburn Hills
*Mortis vs. Curt Hennig
*Dean Malenko & Jeff Jarrett vs. Hector & Chavo Guerrero Jr.
*The Giant vs. Scott D’Amore, Joey Maggs & Lenny Lane
*Public Enemy vs. High Voltage
*Alex Wright vs. Scotty Riggs for the WCW Cruiserweight title
*Syxx vs. Chris Benoit
*Vincent vs. Booker T.
*The Barbarian vs. Wrath
*Konnan vs. Psicosis
*Glacier & Ernest Miller vs. Damian & Silver King
*Diamond Dallas Page vs. Ric Flair
*Villano IV & V vs. Hector Garza & Lizmark Jr.
*Hollywood Hogan vs. Lex Luger for the WCW title

Jesse from Tulsa

This was part of the buildup for the huge Sting-Hogan match at Starrcade. I remember Starrcade 97 as the pay per view that turned the tide for me as to which Monday night show I was watching. Yes, after that pay pay view, I was still a channel flipper and would flip back and forth between Nitro and RAW but after that event I found myself becoming more and more interested in what the WWE was doing. There was no way any company could screw up a match that had been built up for over a year, like Sting and Hogan was, especially a company like WCW that had been on fire for as long as they had up until that point. Who would’ve thought at that time that WCW would’ve screwed it up the way they did? My question for you guys is, do you know at the time of this Nitro, what the plan was for that program at Starrcade? Obviously they knew that it was going to be Sting and Hogan but I have a hard time believing they knew at this time, they were going to have their match end the way it did.Obviously the thing that makes the most sense was to have Sting go over clean but if thats the case, why have Luger win the title here? If the plan was for Sting to go over clean at Starrcade, don’t you want Hogan to hold the title all the way through to the ppv so when he does lose it to Sting, it’s an even bigger deal?

Brandon from Oshawa

One of my favorite memories as a WCW fan, was this Nitro with Luger winning the championship. Watching it back, I thought they did a great job building Luger, with a video package and then a promo, before the main event. This was such a big moment and the fans in the building all knew it, but it was ruined with Hogan immediately winning the title back. This company can never get away from these questionable booking decisions, no matter what year it is.

The rest of the show was OK at best. There was a lot of garbage, that could have been scrapped, to give more time to Benoit/Syxx or DDP/Flair. With 13 matches on a 3 hour show, I shudder to think about how many matches there would be if WCW was still around, in this era of 4-5 hour shows. The highlight other than Luger, was the reveal that Sonny Onoo actually invented the selfie, who would have thought? I wonder what happened to his expensive digital camera from the Uncensored review.

When I was younger I remember watching a short Hulk Hogan biography and he was asked about his work as a heel in WCW. He said that when he was a face in WWF he was the champion for years and overcame bad, he then added that he was still teaching that lessons to kids as a heel as he couldn’t keep hold of the WCW title for a long period of time. Cut to this show where he’s reaching the 1 year mark as champion, he’ll lose it and regain it 6 days letter. I do understand that this was part of the bigger story of Sting coming to save WCW but man did that company miss out on making top babyface stars. This to me was a massive chance to change things round with Luger winning and having a reign, it would have made him and you could make more stars. I personally feel that if it wasn’t Luger it could have been DDP who could have had a reign as WCW champ, run through some of the other NWO guys before losing it back to Hogan. But Starrcade 97 did some of their best business so the long running story paid of for them, even though the match itself ruined the angle.
I know I’ve mainly talked about the WCW title match on this show but that’s the main thing I took away from it, the fans were really hot for it and for the title change. The rest of the card has a huge list of names but they’re very much rushed through. Plus there’s a Vincent match on here, it kind of sums up the show.

I wound up watching the first match of the labeled 100th episode before realizing I was watching the wrong thing, and now I’ll never get that 15 minutes of my life back.

I’m curious about Lex Luger. Eric Bischoff has said in the past that when Luger came to him looking for a job, Bischoff lowballed him not really wanting Lex, and was flabbergasted when Luger agreed. How did they go from that, to main eventing their biggest TV show to date? Basically, how did Luger go from not being worth a reasonable contract to their biggest face?

For my Hogan Bump Challenge, I chose 2. Sadly, I missed it by a single bump, as Hogan only took 3.

All in all, thought it was an okay show. Probably would have been watching, but having very little investment in any of the storylines, it was alright.

1 Like

Edit 2: Please disregard for feedback.

Hey guys, are you sure that you have your date right?

The 100th episode of Nitro is listed as August 11th and it’s only about 1:30 long.

Edit: Wait, there was a Saturday episode of Nitro that was counted as canon?

https://www.cagematch.net/?id=1&nr=82386

Yes it’s the August 4th edition. If you watch the August 4th during the show they call it the 100th nitro.

Edit: Please disregard for feedback.

A’ight. Cool. Thanks for clearing it up.

Jordan from Kitchener.

I don’t remember much from this time frame in WCW because of the TSN scheduling at that time. The only thing I remember from that time is the Sting year long build. It was kind of nice to relive this. Though it left me stretching my head as to who I was supposed to be behind and who I wasn’t in the WCW only matches. I thought that WCW was unified at that point. Curious to hear what your input into this wierd period in Nitro?

Looking at the roster at the time, they had one of the best rosters in that time with likes Eddie, Malenko, Jericho, Syxx just to name a few. What I didn’t get is the constant match, promo, match promo. I mean mean gene must have got his steps in for that day. It seemed that he was order to go out to the arena every second segment. Not sure if this was their format back then.

A couple of matches no one cared about. Benoit/Syxx having the best match on the card. Also great seeing the likes of James Mitchell and Scott D’more show up. A world title change that the crowd went nuts for. Shame in just five days they swapped it back.

So I rate this 6.5 cutting off promos for music out of 10. Still not a blow away show but better than any current raw.