I recently watched Great American Bash 1995. We’re in Dayton, Ohio. Tony Schiavone and Bobby Heenan on commentary with Mean Gene handling the interviews. Neither Hogan nor Vader will wrestle at the PPV. Okay, then. Well, for people sick of Hogan (count me in that group) this should be a treat.


First match is Brian Pillman v Alex Wright

Now this is what I call an opening match. WCW did something smart for a change. I haven’t seen Pillman in quite some time and had assumed that he was gone from the company. Anyway, he’s back, and is apparently a babyface, so we have a rare face-face match. However, the crowd is very clearly behind Pillman. Partly because this is his hometown crowd, partly because he’s got more personality, and partly because he’s a better wrestler than Wright. So, of course, WCW books Wright to win this match. I couldn’t believe it. Pillman goes for a sunset flip but Wright blocks it for the pin at a bit over 15 minutes. This was a great match. Wright is still a bit green and made some mistakes and Pillman had to help him out a bit, but both guys worked hard and this was a very enjoyable match, probably the best WCW match I’ve seen for WCW up to this point. Unfortunately, the rest of this PPV can only be downhill.

By the way, Pillman supplexed Wright out of the ring at one point, yet that’s not a DQ even though throwing someone over the top rope is an automatic DQ? That makes no sense! Just get rid of this stupid rule already! There was also some bad camera work here, making some of the action hard to follow.


Next is an Arm Wrestling match – Diamond Dallas Page v Evad Sullivan

If Evad wins he gets a date with the Diamond Doll and if DDP wins he gets Evad’s rabbit, which he will presumably turn into rabbit stew. I really couldn’t care less about this (though it does at least keep Evan from wrestling, which is a plus) but Evad wins with some accidentally help as Kimberly bumps into Muscle Maxx who bumps into Page, causing the loss, I guess.


Next is ”Hacksaw” Jim Duggan v Sgt Craig Pittman

This was supposed to be Marcus Bagwell instead of Hacksaw, but he suffered a legit inury. Apparently, his calf implants exploded. That is such a WCW thing, and also such a Buff Bagwell thing to have happen. WCW, in their infinite wisdom, thought it would be good to replace him in a match versus a very green, shoot style wrestler with none other than Hacksaw Jim Duggan. That goes about as well as you would expect. This match was awful. Duggan wins by DQ when Pittman refuses to release his submission hold (an armbar/armbreaker) even after Duggan reached the ropes. Oh, and the crowd chanted “USA”, and keep in mind Duggan’s opponent was a former US Marine. People’s stupidity never ceases to amaze me.

Oh, and our all American “hero” Duggan swing his 2x4 at the referee at one point! What a guy. Also, Renegade clotheslined Duggan over at one point, but of course it’s not a DQ because the wrestler’s “momentum” is what carried him over the top rope, not the clothesline itself WTF?


Next is Bunkhouse Buck/Dick Slater w/Colonel Rob Parker v Harlem Heat w/Sister Sherri

I guess Col. Parker forcibly kissed Sherri a couple of weeks ago, to help set up this feud.

Harlem Heat get the win when Booker has Buck in a small package, and Parker reverses it so that Buck is on top, then Sherri comes over an reverses it back so that Booker is on top, and the ref finally turns around and counts Buck out. Another bad match, but what do you expect when only one out of the four guys (Booker) is really all that good?


We see that Vader stormed out and roughed up Eric Bischoff and Prez Nick Bockwinkle during an interview, saying he’s sick of Hogan (aren’t we all?) and demanding a rematch. We’ll find out later what Bockwinkle’s response is.

We later find out that Bockwinkle says that Vader will get his rematch with Hogan, but that it will be a cage match, and it will be at the next PPV. Unfortunately, Bockwinkle forgets the name of the next PPV (making him a perfect. President for WCW). Uh, that would be Bash at the Beach, Nick, I guess this precipitated his departure from WCW.


Next match is for the TV title – Arn Anderson (c) v The Renegade w/Jimmy Hart

Renegade is a poor man’s Ultimate Warrior. Just think about that statement. Anyway, Arn Anderson tried, but Renegade is just awful. Oh and Renegade won (after about 9 minutes) with a splash off the top rope (probably his best move of the night). I don’t know how WCW could have thought it was a good idea to give the title to somebody so clearly lacking in talent and skill, but that’s WCW for you. Did they think that people still thought Renegade was really Jim Hellwig??


Next match is for the WCW tag titles – The Nasty Boys (c) v The Blue Bloods

The Nasties got the title back from Harlem Heat at the last PPV. The Blue Bloods are Lord Steven Regal and Earl Robert Eaton. Who??? Oh, that would be Beautiful Bobby Eaton, whom they’re now repackaging as a British aristocrat. Uh, sure thing.

The Nasties attack the Blue Bloods before the bell (who are the heels there) and break every rule in the book in beating on their opponents for a few minutes while the ref just lets it all happen. Eventually things settle down a bit and we get some semblance of a tag team wrestling match (Though even then tagging seems optional). The crowd start a USA chant because we hate thos evil Britishers, especially the ones from Alabama. At the end, Harlem Heat come out to apparently interfere on behalf of the Blue Bloods (even though they were upset that the Blue Bloods got the title shot instead of them) but it backfires, allowing the Nasties to pin for the win. Bad match. So far, the opener has been the only good match.


Next is the US title tournament final – Sting v Meng w/Colonel Robert Parker

The US title was vacant (I guess because of Vader’s violent actions towards Evad Sullivan, which doesn’t really make a lot of sense), so they held a tournament to crown a new champ. This is the final match of the tournament, so the winner is our new champ. We get highlights from the tournament, plus promos by all involved in this match.

Meng actually powers out of the Scorpion Deathlock, but Sting wins it with a jumping DDT. This was a decent match, thanks to Sting. At one point, I think Meng actually got knocked out by hitting the guardrail, so Sting stalled by going after Parker until Meng could revive.


Now we get the Main event – Randy Savage v Ric Flair

This is a major grudge match, as Flair (and Arn Anderson) attacked and viciously beat Savage’s father, Angelo Poffo, at the last PPV, with Flair then putting him in the figure 4. Poffo now comes to ringside with a cane. Savage wants to win this match for is father. Adding to the significance, this is happening on Father’s Day.

I don’t understand why Savage isn’t also mad at Arn Anderson, though. He was almost as involved in the beatdown as Flair was.

This is a brawl from before the bell even rings, with much of it taking place outside the ring. At one point, Savage delivers his patented elbow drop, but then pulls up Flair after 2 for more punishment. Big mistake. Flair eventually wins by knocking Savage out with Angelo’s cane for the pin.

This was a very good match, with a lot of intensity and good storytelling. Virtually no wrestling, though.



Overall, the first match was very good, the next several matches were not good, then the last 2 matches were good again.  Not a terrible PPV, but below average.  I guess it did a decent buyrate. for what it's worth.

Great write-up as ever, dbutler69 , and I’d love an excuse to share the pages as covered in WWF Magazine:












Okay, this event wasn’t shown live in the UK. I did like the idea of PPVs of lesser renown, it made the Big Five feel special, although at the time, I thought we’d be getting too much of a good thing. Between the WWF and WCW, there were 18 PPVs available for wrestling fans in ‘95. Us Brits got some of those included “free” as part of our Sky Sports packages, but could any American have afforded 18 PPVs?

However, it did show up on VHS - with two “dark matches” included: The Undertaker vs. Kama, and Tatanka vs. Bam Bam Bigelow. Beat that, Americans. 

Overall, I thought this was a solid PPV, and an interesting first instalment for the IYH series, but it pissed me off that the prize of a house was only available to Americans. Don’t we Brits count? I mean, who doesn’t want to win a house in Orlando, Florida?

Back to the dark matches: Owen Hart vs. Davey Boy Smith, and Bob Holly vs. Jean-Pierre Lafitte were also part of the PPV, but they weren’t included on the UK VHS release. I presume Silver Vision, the licensee for videotapes in the UK, believed that the Undertaker/Kama and Tatanka/Bigelow bouts were more worthy of including than Owen/Bulldog and Holly/Lafitte. That said, Owen/Davey Boy was a KOTR qualifying match, so its omission from the tape is bizarre. Kind of like “WCW logic”.

As for the main card, I don’t think there’s a bad match, and Bomb/Mabel was short, which means it worked well and didn’t outstay its welcome.

This did a 0.83 buyrate, and wasn’t a success (332,000 buys). I wonder, was there a perception among Americans that these were B-PPVs, or just a symptom of a WWF that wasn’t really having much success at the time? 

I know I couldn't afford 18 PPV's per year!

As far as the winner of that house in Orlando, I read that he actually lived in California, not Nevada (wrestling announcer lie even when they don't have to, just to keep in practice) and his family wound up selling the house, since they didn't want to move to Florida and I guess didn't want to pay the taxes on a house they weren't living on. Heck, we might as well have let a Brit win it.

As far as the Bulldog-Owen dark match, yes, that was used as a qualifying match for King of the Ring (it was shown on either Raw or Superstars) and it drove me crazy that it had a 15 minute time limit draw. That makes no sense for a qualifying match. Of course, it ended in a time limit draw, so both guys failed to qualify for the KOTR tournament, and they then held a Lex Luger-Yokozuna match to replace it as a qualifying match for KOTR.  Personally, I'd much rather see either Owen or Bulldog in that tournament than either Luger or Yoko.  Plus, this goes against the precedence of the previous two years of KOTR qualifying where, when a match ended in a time limit draw (again - WHY THE HECK PUT A 15 MINUTE TIME LIMIT ON THESE QUALIFYING MATCHES???) they simply had the same two wrestlers have a rematch the following week. Why, oh why, do I expect pro wrestling to make any sense??

I suspect that the low buyrate was because WWF was struggling at the time (the Roadie, with zero singles matches under his belt, qualifies for KOTR in a couple of weeks!) and perhaps the lower price also flagged people that this one wasn't as "important".