Sunday Night Heat Workrate Report 5/5/02

The return of the workrate reports, Dean and I were talking on the phone and we decided to do these again. No real reason, I am taking the RAW brand for now, while Dean or Rippa or someone will do the Smackdown brand, Tom wrote a bunch of these jokes by the way. I really don’t know how this will work and odds are it will peter out as WWE continues to painfully suck, but this little Heat show was actually pretty good so maybe it is a good sign.

What Worked

-Tommy Dreamer continues to be the superworker of the B-Show set as he continues his weird ode to Ricky Steamboat bodypart selling. There was an actual story told in this match, as Dreamer starts by attempting to one up Hennig by doing his signature spots. He isn’t perfect though so he jacks up his knee, which he does a great job of selling the damage. Hennig is basically useless at this point, as he was always a big bump guy, but is too broken up to bump anymore so has to rely on his pretty shitty offense. Dreamer didn’t really need an opponent to make this match good though. The last two Dreamer matches and the Smackdown RVD v. Jeff Hardy match a while back are the only WWF matches in recent memory built around bodypart selling and the performances were both from ECW veterans, a promotion where no one ever sold anything.

-The WWE celebrates the tenth anniversary of the L.A. uprising, by having the black man v. the cop match. Weirdly the brother goes over which I found weird in what is normally a politically reactionary promotion,. Even stranger this match was actually good as Bossman had nice punches for the first time since coming back, and D-Lo took some nice bumps including a nutty Jerry bump where he landed on his feet. I also dug the finish as Bossman hooked the top rope with the nightstick to block the sunset flip before the tough guy WWF ref nightstick kick. No Justice No Peace.

- I was amused by Raven shitting all over RVD offense by saying that the standing moonsault is flashy but doesn’t hurt. Tee hee fuck you white Ruckus

-Fit Finaly’s ladies division continues to bust out the entertaining matches which are stiffer then any of the men’s matches. Molly is a really solid worker and Trish is game in a Hombre Sin Nombre- nice spots-questionable execution way. Molly hit some nice armdrags, and Trish took two bumps. I also like how Molly has to throw all of her chops to Trish’s throat to avoid popping her implants, by the end of the match Trish looked like she had just participated in a choking bondage video. I am unclear how Sean Shannon would rate her struggling.
 
 

What Didn’t Work

-Eddie Guerrerro cuts a promo where he fucked up the “Do You have a little Latin in you joke” by saying “Do you have a little Latin Blood in you” “Do you want a lot of Latin Blood in you” Which made it sound like he was proposing some sort of really deviant bloody S+M sex with Terri. That is such a bad idea considering the amount of I-V steroids Guerrerro injects and the fact that Terri is really getting a call girl who has to resort to street hooking to sustain he smack habit look to her. Considering Bradshaw and his “hazing” is on the RAW brand, we don’t need any sort of wide ranging Hepatitis outbreak.

-RVD v. Justin Credible had some nice parts including a cool double leg takedown roll up by RVD. But Van Damn still has a really backyard look to some of his moves, and Justin seemed off too. Plus Van Damn hitting the world ugliest firemans carry roll which really hurt him considering the quality of the Finlay homage’s in the womans match. This match didn’t suck but I am going to start with a slightly higher bar in the Workrate Report Restart.