57 Channels (And Nothin' On But 1992 WCW)

Bobby Eaton v Dustin Rhodes (Power Hour, 5/8/92)

This only clocks in at about 7 minutes, but man it’s good. First half is sort of built around Eaton trying to get the upper hand with cheapshots, but Dustin just gets more and more pissed off and keeps finding new ways to smack him in the face. Dustin’s nose gets busted open and there’s a great spot where he pulls a Ken Shamrock “snap”, drops to one knee and rifles Eaton right in the chops with an uppercut. Eaton finally takes over with a chop block, and Eaton really has a great chop block. He doesn’t come from behind with it like you’d usually see guys do; he’ll come from the side or even the front and it looks way nastier than most guys’. There’s only a few minutes of leg work before the run in finish, but Dustin selling a bad leg is always good times; being whipped into the ropes and collapsing because he can’t stand, rallying back and leapfrogging Bobby only to collapse on the bad leg again; it’s the stuff you expect out of Dustin once you’ve seen enough of him, but it’s always great. Run in finish is what it is, but this was a bossy little TV match that I must’ve missed the first time I went through Will’s Dangerous Alliance comp.


Bobby Eaton v Dustin Rhodes (Worldwide, 5/9/92)

Not quite as good as the last match, but they get the same amount of time and they work a different sort of match, which I dug. Some great early bumping from Eaton and both guys throwing awesome punches remains a constant, though. Eaton loves to do the spot where he’ll eat a bionic elbow, fall into the middle rope and bounce back into another one, rinse repeat a couple times, and he does that spot here, capping it off by taking an AWESOME uppercut from Dustin and sailing over the top rope. The uppercut looks really spectacular; he rotates his arm all the way around like he’s “winding it up” and conks Eaton right in the chin. Eaton works the arm here instead of the leg after Dustin clotheslines the ring post. The arm work section isn’t as awesome a little work over section as the leg section in the last match, but we get the clean finish here that we didn’t in the last. Not something one needs to go out of their way to see, but it’s a fine way to spend 6 or 7 minutes all the same.


Barry Windham & Dustin Rhodes v Bobby Eaton & Steve Austin (Power Hour, 5/16/92)

Unsurprisingly this was good. We’re a day away from Wargames so this is basically a little taster of what’s to come from four of the guys that’ll be in it, but we get a nifty opening babyface shine period, a couple solid FIP sections, and then we even get a clean finish to boot. Couple cool spots in this that I don’t think I’ve seen in any of the other matches from ’92, like Dustin leapfrogging both Windham and Austin at the same time as Barry’s trying to push Austin into the ropes and bring him back for a roll up, Austin holding on and turning around into an oncoming Dustin flying lariat. Not one of the best tags that year, and by the time I’ve finished this project I wouldn’t be surprised if I rank close 40 tags ahead of it, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t check it out regardless.


WCW 1992 Project