2004 Discussion

Discuss 2004 in Heat.

Lance Storm vs. Stevie Richards (Heat, 04/25/04)
If this truly was Lance Storms final match, he went out with a fine little affair against Stevie Richards. The Canadian folks went hog wild for Storm, giving the match some charm. Storm was fired up and Richards was getting the heel heat. Storm had the same offense as he has been using his entire career so the early sections of the match were nothing you hadn't seen before. Storm bumped big off the arm breaker and then Richards went to work on the arm which set up Storm as the babyface trying to make the comeback one armed. Man, the near fall off the leg lariat was great (which Richards wasn't afraid to lean into and that the crack production team wasn't afraid to nearly miss). I need a Richards/Venis tag team, as they are my favorite guys on the Heat roster fuck probably on the entire roster right now.

Rhyno vss. Shelton Benjamin (Heat, 04/25/04)
I loved Rhyno working as the world's pudgiest Gary Young. I tend to enjoy both his matches and Shelton Benjamin's. This was a fun yet flawed match. Rhyno probably needed to go about like two more minutes before actually locking up. And Benjamin needs to be willing to take the enormous bump of the top rope. If there was ever a match where Rhyno needed to bust out the body vice, it was this one. He could have easily worked it in inside of going to the chinlock twice. The nifty spinebuster earned a lot of points. The finish was eh. I cut this goes a lot of slack.

Val Venis vs. Matt Hardy (Heat, 04/17/04)
Val Venis vs. Matt Hardy is my WWE match of the week when I go to vote in Schneider's poll (also because I didn't see Smackdown). This really is old times as I am sure that I have written about this match on Heat on at least more than one occasion. Hey, Cubs says next week that it's the #300 episode of Heat. That's depressing. Anyway, was there a good reason this was forced onto Heat but the La Resistance vs. Hurricane/Rosey tag was put onto the PPV.... yeah, yeah, yeah bunch of chimps. I know, I know. Actually, it's for the best as I actually got to see this match. This was a nice simple match with simple but effective moves (armbar, elbow drop, standing surfboard, etc...) mixed with good looking chops and punches. I dug the battle for the superplex and I actually wondered if Matt would be willing to take the superplex to the floor. If this were on the PPV, he probably would have. The only real problem I had with the match was that Hardy couldn't decide if he was going to work face or heel. The crowd was clearly behind him, which is fine, especially in lieu of his impending face turn but against the porn star - who is going to be face both in Canada and the US - he needed to stay straight heel.

Matt Hardy vs. Tommy Dreamer (Heat, 01/04/04)
Boy, the more time passes, the more things stay the same. I gave this gig up a long time ago and Matt Hardy was working the show. Now, two? three? years later - here he is again. The match against Tommy Dreamer was fun. The WWE Tommy Dreamer has been quality which makes you wonder about the comical shit that were the majority of his matches in ECW. The punch exchange qualifies of amazing in the world of the WWE. It was right around there were things picked up. There was the side effect and I think Dreamer probably does the best Sky High around... maybe Tom Carter’s is better. I also dug the way Dreamer sold the second rope Twist of Fate.

Rico vs. Brandon Cross (Heat, 01/04/04)
Brandon Cross looked better on Heat than he did on Velocity. He took that the head smash into the barrier like a man and did a great sell of Rico’s neckbreaker finisher. He did a perfectly acceptable job in passing off Rico’s sad little offense as threatening. Dear Lord, did the WWE edit the shit of the match to cover up the bad, bad, bad punches and kicks of Rico. I was getting a seizure from the quick cuts.

Test vs. Stevie Richards (Heat, 01/04/04)
That Test/Richards match was real pedestrian right down to the listless over the shoulder backbreaker that looked like Richards had drifted off to sleep in to the worst schoolboy rollup finish.

Lance Storm vs. Rene Dupree (Heat, 01/04/04)
Okay – I am not up on all the RAW/Heat stories but I am to take it that Lance Storm has an enormous penis. If that is the case – being someone with an enormous penis – I am qualified to review this match. I don’t know why Storm is lower on the WWE food chain that Mr. Constatino but the crack production staff didn’t take the time to hide his clotheslines or kicks or punches. Woof – they were bad. And Renee Dupree is poopy. Val Venis shot his wad carrying Rayo so Dupree was up shit’s creek.

Matt Hardy vs. Lance Storm (Heat, 01/11/04)
It really is 1999 all over again as Matt Hardy is going to work every Heat show that I do a Workrate Report for – isn’t he? This match gets onto this side of the column with no help from Lance Storm. Holy Christ. Does he actually watch tapes of himself? Can he not see how his strikes look? Can he not see how mind-boggling horrific his “clothesline” (if you want to call that weird “I push my armpit into your eye socket” a clothesline) is? His pescada was the only tolerable part of his offense that entire match. Hardy through good looking punches and did a good job in selling Storm’s loose ass shit, despite Storm not returning the favor. Big dick my ass.

Randy Orton vs. Val Venis (Heat, 01/11/04)
This was way more enjoyable than I thought it was going to be. Venis > Rob Van Dam and this worked a lot more than that pile on Raw that I fell asleep during. Plus, Venis is on a little spurt where he tries to get me to over inflate his ranking on the 500 (if we ever actually get around to doing that.) I will admit it, Venis is another guy who does some spots that I like as wrestling holds (ex: the Blue Thunder Power Bomb) but not as a worker (execution not as crisp, etc..) so I tend to probably overcredit his body of work just because he is doing moves I like to see in a match. I am so rambling at this moment. I liked the opening with Orton being “stunned” by the challenge his was getting from V Squared. Orton is the best “Delta Chi drink spiker who I wanted to crush their face in with a shovel in college” in all of professional wrestling. I also dug the whole TRANSITION~! via untie bootlace. I had spotted it when the match started and was thinking “Awww Fuck. That’s going to bug me the entire match.” and it turned out to be part of the lay out. The double knockout collision out of the corner came off great but the comical WWE editing botched the split over the commercial break as it was really awkward when you came back from the 8732 John Henson Project spot and Venis is fighting out of a headlock. The bow and arrow was nifty but I truly appreciated it after Venis then sold not being able to do the suplex moments later. He forgot to sell the back the rest of the match but this is Heat and the Raw roster so I am not going to be that overly critical. I think the finish would have been better if Orton had gotten a foot on the ropes at 2 and 15/16ths off of the money shot instead of getting the knees up but I would have much rather watched this that almost anything on Raw.