It’s December 1999 which means it’s time for WCW Starrcade 1999 from the MCI Center in Washington D.C. The company would draw roughly 8,850 fans to the MCI Center for Bret Hart vs. Goldberg over the World Heavyweight title.
The Best
The best match on the card really seemed like a last-ditch effort to put something decent on the show. It’s like creative watched as the show rolled on and it sunk in “We actually need a good match on this PPV.”
Jarrett can go again, we’ve got Benoit and he’s got a belt, and I found this ladder—put something together.
Of course, you were going to get a decent-at-minimum Benoit ladder match but factor in someone who can work with anyone and you got your good match. It’s just unfortunate that it took until the end of the show before we got it instead of having a few peppered in.
The Rest
While it wasn’t the most explosive or exciting opening match for a PPV, the Mamalukes taking on Lash LeRoux and Disco Inferno: not a bad match. Again, it didn’t wow me or anything, but this was a perfectly acceptable match and an adequate PPV opener.
The WCW television shows in late 1999 are wild in the sense that stuff either doesn’t make sense or how we got to this point was so unnecessary. Madusa arrival into the Cruiserweight division falls in the latter category.
Oh, the WCW hardcore division. I dig Meng being in it—this was an A+ placement. Norman Smiley is entertaining as hell. I did not care about the two of them together even though it should’ve made for a funny five-minutes.
What we ended up with was something that could’ve simply been on Thunder.
Speaking of “something that could’ve simply been on Thunder,” The Revolution spanking Jim Duggan and the Varsity Club is the perfect example of that. There’s no way that WCW was out of competition for the Revolution to the point that the Varsity Club had to be resurrected.
Or maybe it was another shot at getting Benoit vs. Sullivan again. Those were cracking matches…definitely better than this display at Starrcade 1999.
I needed more of Vampiro vs. Steve Williams. It was just meant to get to Vampiro taking on Oklahoma but there was a little something there between these two. As for Vampiro and Oklahoma—there was absolutely nothing there but I didn’t expect there to be. Their match was in the 3-minute area, so it didn’t eat up any time on the show.
Again, this could’ve all been resolved on Thunder.
The six-man intergender match saw Harlem Heat and their valet Midnight take on Creative Control—the Harris Brothers—and Curt Hennig. After Chyna’s 1999 PPV run, WCW was really trying to see what women they had could stick to the wall. It would’ve been safer to just keep WCW as a sausage fest because some of the experiments haven’t been it.
One experiment was Midnight who had a cool theme for her gimmick but that was it. With that said, she put in an effort in this match. Stevie Ray was Stevie Ray—neither good nor particularly bad—and Booker T was just a hustle machine.
On the opposite side, you had Curt Hennig who was like Stevie Ray but he required motivation. Teaming with him was the Harris Brothers who have always disappointed, it seems. To put a wrap on this match: it just wasn’t it but this whole show wasn’t it for the most part.
I’d say that Jarrett vs. Dustin’s Bunkhouse Brawl was a solid brawl. Dustin always had brawling potential but his stuff was typically kept in the ring. Unfortunate.
Anyway, this wasn’t a bad brawl at all and I didn’t mind Hennig interfering. This was just a middle-of-the-board match.
Crowbar on a Pole match between DDP and David Flair. Oof. Actually, if two people had to be involved in this match, I can see it being DDP and/or Flair. Gritty fist-throwers work for DDP and David could’ve just been a hardcore/beatings guy because he’s not a five-star match with a mop guy.
However, both guys in this match that no one asked for or would’ve asked for on PPV just wasn’t going to work. It just looks like either nothing was planned for DDP or DDP had nothing to do.
Sting vs. The Total Package was a mess. They got five minutes and it was mainly an angle-match. It was definitely on the card for a proper match to occur but what we got was an angle featuring a lot of Elizabeth involvement.
What we actually had was Lex Luger who wasn’t as ring mobile as he was just last year, and Sting was getting written off TV for a bit. Both mean that this could’ve been put on TV.
First off, on paper: this was a stupid match. I doubt anyone plays the Finisher Mode or turns on Finishers to end a match in wrestling games—why apply it to broadcasted wrestling? On PPV? On the main PPV of the year?
This would’ve gone better as a regular-ass match. I could see a standard match between these two being watchable. Oh, we can’t forget that a powerbomb didn’t even end this match!
The main event match saw what would be the last match of Bret Hart’s career. This match was going to happen since Bret had the World title and Goldberg hadn’t really been in the title picture for some time.
It’s one of those matches that goes down as a “what if” mainly because of the outcome. As for the match itself—this wasn’t good at all. It would’ve made for something serviceable to close out a Nitro or even an episode of Thunder. However, it didn’t do the job for Starrcade 1999.
WCW Starrcade 1999 Verdict: Bronze Medal (3/10)
A lot of WCW shows in 1999 suffer from poor card composition. This has always been a problem with WCW shows where we have a bunch of matches but less than a handful actually delivers in-ring and might have a story while the rest are mainly for story purposes.
There’s nothing wrong with that approach if there’s a good amount of exciting content. Often, what’s there for the entertainment factor doesn’t pop. No one’s interested in it and less of it would be better.
WCW in 1999 was a very “less of this sh**” would’ve been a better approach. As a result, only Benoit vs. Jarrett for the U.S title really stood out. The rest of the show was the ongoings of WCW Thunder on PPV.
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