WCW Mayhem 2000

1) Mike Sanders vs. Kwee Wee – 2
2) Evan Karagias & Jamie Noble vs. The Jung Dragons vs. Three Count – 5
3) Jimmy Hart vs. Mancow – 0
4) Big Vito vs. Crowbar vs. Reno – Hardcore Match – 3
5) Rey Mysterio Jr. & Billy Kidman vs. Alex Wright & Kronik – Handicap Match – 3
6) Shane Douglas vs. The Cat – 3
7) Bam Bam Bigelow vs. Sgt. A-Wall – 2
8) Lance Storm vs. General Rection – 3
9) Jeff Jarrett vs. Buff Bagwell – 4
10) Kevin Nash & Diamond Dallas Page vs. Shawn Stasiak & Chuck Palumbo – 3
11) Goldberg vs. Lex Luger – 2
12) Scott Steiner vs. Booker T – Straight Jacket Caged Heat Match – 5

Coming off the heels of a rather un-enjoyable Halloween Havoc, the craziness continues with the second installment of Mayhem. The opener was awful, mainly due to the fact that the Natural Born Thrillers (remember them?) came in and interfered about thirty seconds in. Jindrak interfered directly in front of the ref but it wasn’t called. Then Meng runs down with Paisley and starts fighting with the Thrillers. Ric Flair comes down with security and runs everyone off. More interference by Paisley doing a handspring elbow right in front of the ref. Rest of it was bland offense in an unexciting match in a cruiserweight division that should offer exciting matches. Next bout up was yet another bout in the ongoing series between Three Count, The Jung Dragons, and the former members of each stable, Noble and Karagias. The ref didn’t really do anything to keep control and it broke down into a jumbled mess with everybody doing dive spots and double team moves without any semblance of storytelling or selling. Three Count was great as heels but their act was getting stale as they’d been doing the same schtick since February of that year. Jimmy Hart and Mancow was just as bad as you would think as it was pretty much the same match they’d had at Spring Stampede 2000 with Mancow throwing bad punches and both guys rolling around on the mat. Continuous weak weapon shots highlighted the hardcore match. Why did Crowbar wear a 70s style polyester shirt and some cheap bling out of a prize machine to the ring? There was a brawl to the back and a lame spot at the end with some girl named Marie telling Reno to stop beating on Vito that led to Crowbar getting the win. It felt like a match in one of those shitty WCW Electronic Arts video games. The handicap match was supposed to be Rey, Kidman, and Konnan against Disco and Alex but there was a lame angle earlier in the show where Disco feigned an injury and him and Alex paid Kronik to replace Disco. Kronik agreed to 7 minutes and 30 seconds of work. Sound confused? It was obvious that Kronik didn’t give a shit because they kept checking the stopwatch they brought to ringside with them. This whole thing made the heels look totally inept because right after Kronik left the match, Wright got beat. The best part of the Douglas/Cat match was the very beginning where they brawled around the ring and Cat grabbed Mark Madden by the throat and started choking him to the delight of the very few that were watching the show. Rest of the bout was terrible as Douglas was worse than he ever was by this point and Madden was making fake coughing sounds on commentary trying to sell the fact he’d been choked. This really should’ve been the main event of a Thunder taping.

Second half started off pretty miserable with Bigelow coming out for his match and claiming that he was the winner over Mike Awesome via forfeit. Flair came back out and said “there are 10,000 people here to see you wrestle”, to which the entire announce crew scoffed at, and brought out Sgt. A-Wall to fight Bigelow in a terrible match in which A-Wall set up the table he brought out in the ring and it never got used. Even Stevie Ray, who’s commentary was one of the most enjoyable parts of the show, questioned A-Wall’s logic. Both dudes looked like shit. Afterwards, they did an injury angle with Bigelow which led into the next bout with Bigelow jumping off the stretcher and attacking General Rection from behind. There was an awkward moment where Storm had Rection crotched on the ringpost and the camera cut to Major Gunns for a split-second. When they cut back, Storm was in mid-slide and it looked as if he slid himself into the railing. Storm worked over Rection’s knee but that was quickly forgotten about as Rection climbed to the top rope with ease at the end , not selling anything, and delivered a moonsault to capture the U.S. Title. Next up was a decent bout between Bagwell and Jarrett. Bagwell looked rather good here but a lot of it was negated by Jarrett’s laziness. The whole point of the match was that Jarrett was pissed at Bagwell for destroying his guitars. So to finish, we get unlogical interference from David Flair and a blatant guitar shot which went wood everywhere which the referee didn’t see. This referee must be blind because it’s the same person that reffed the opener that had all the bullshit interference. DDP and Nash got an decent bout out of Stasiak and Palumbo. The beginning of this featured all the Thrillers coming out posing as WCW security and doing more interference until Flair came out with the real WCW security and banished everyone to the back where I’m sure they each got their dick sucked by Leia Meow (aka Kimona from ECW). Match fell apart with legal man issues and Mike Sanders pulling the ref out of the ring after Nash issued out some powerbombs. Luger and Goldberg was a complete four minute squash where Luger looked terrible and could barely move. The main was acceptable on all fronts but had a few logic issues that Stevie Ray was kind enough to point out, such as why would Booker attempt to put Steiner in the straight jacket instead of pinning him? Why was the straight jacket even involved in the first place? The cage barely came into play at all. Booker helped hold this together as Steiner slopped all over the ring. The finishing point with Booker in the Steiner Recliner looked pretty bad but otherwise it was one of the best bouts on the show and that’s not saying much.