Ahead of the WWE Network’s British release on Wednesday I
thought I’d get into the spirit of things by watching and reviewing an old WWE
pay-per-view. I selected Unforgiven 2008 for two reasons. One, I remembered it
being a pretty sloppy show. Two, I found a DVD of it in a cupboard. I didn’t
(and still don’t) remember buying it or being given it so I took it as a sign that
it was the right thing to watch.
All set? Let’s begin…
Opening video
Before getting started it should probably be pointed out
that Unforgiven 2008 was built around a new kind of gimmick match. Vince
McMahon, so the story goes, felt that the company had become complacent with
regard to creating exciting new gimmick matches. It had been twenty years since
the Royal Rumble had been created, eleven since the first ever Hell in a Cell,
and six since the inaugural Elimination Chamber. Vince wanted a new toy,
dammit!
The creative team, and probably a fair number of agents
and senior wrestlers, went away to see what could be dreamed up. They returned
with a match that was part Royal Rumble, part five-way dance (because those are
always popular), and part Elimination Chamber (a gimmick match which is itself
a collection of various other matches). Two men would start. Another would join
them every five minutes. There would be a five minute period at the end. Guys
could pin and submit one another throughout, with anyone doing so becoming the
“current” champion. Whoever was the “current” champion once the twenty minute
time limit expired would be recognised as the official champion.
They called it… the Scramble.
It had its good points, in theory. It would allow
numerous title change pops in one match without actually having the title
change hands, protecting the prestige of the prize while still getting the
audience to pop. It could, with a bit of thought, tell a story you couldn’t in
many other matches. We’d get a couple of examples of that. It also gave guys
outside of the main event the chance to look more competitive than usual,
although in practice the one real attempt at that made just didn’t work.
In practice the concept was a shambles. As we’ll see
below. All you need to know at this point is that this show was built around
this convoluted new gimmick match and the intense feud between Shawn Michaels
and Chris Jericho. Again, more on that below. The opening video concentrated on
these two things, though mostly the latter. Amusingly it began with the words
“Tonight is the first ever championship Scramble." There hasn’t been
another since.
ECW championship
Scramble
In the arena we were greeted by the strains of Motörhead.
Todd Grisham and Matt Striker welcomed us to the show, immediately confirming
to me that I’d made the right choice in my search for a disappointing pay-per-view.
Tony Chimel announced the ECW Scramble and then Matt Hardy came out.
Matt was still fairly over at this point, although that
perception was helped at least in part by a healthy application of the Crowd
Roar Noise Machine™ what with this being a DVD. Striker informed us that there
was an eighty per cent chance of a new champ being crowned in each Scramble. Because
if there’s one thing Striker loves it’s maths! Apparently experience, health
and other things used to measure form don’t factor into WWE. Everyone has a
fifty-fifty chance of winning any given singles match, no matter who they are
or what they and their opponent have accomplished.
As Striker ran through the rules (winding himself in the
process). The Miz came out as entrant two. This was trilby hat, fingerless
gloves era Miz. A Miz who wore a bandana underneath
his hat because that’s what the cool kids do. He’s not great in the ring in
2014, but he is considerably better
than he was back in 2008. Seeing that he was involved in this match was not a
good sign.
The opening five minutes featured basic exchanges with a
strong focus on headlocks. The crowd were into that for some reason. Perhaps
Cleveland is a big headlock town. Or maybe Matt Hardy was so popular in the
early autumn of 2008 that people went crazy for him doing anything, even a
headlock.
 |
| Chavo's impressed. And Chavo is not easy to impress. |
Chavo entered third, wearing a poncho which he
immediately handed over to Bam Neely. Yeah, Bam Neely. I’d completely forgotten
his existence too. He was Chavo’s henchman for a couple of months before
getting released or demoted to Deep South or something. He was so dull he’d
make Justin Gabriel look full of charisma. This was the calibre of performer
then head of talent relations John Laurinaitis went for. It’s no wonder WWE was
so uninspiring for so long.
Continuing the obscure seconds theme Mark Henry waddled
out with Tony Atlas. I am not the biggest fan of Mark Henry but at this point I
was actually pretty pleased to see him. It felt like a legitimate star had
arrived, although I wouldn’t have thought that when this first aired. Henners
was still a year and a half away from opening his Hall of Pain.
Henry, the reigning champion, quickly pinned Chavo off a
World’s Strongest Slam to become the “current” champion. This brings us to the
first problem of the Scramble gimmick. Any reigning champion is a current
champion. That they chose that as the term to denote the man currently on track
to win was confusing and didn’t convey that the man in question wasn’t the
official champ until the final bell. Interim champion would have been better.
Anything would have been better!
While we’re at it I’ll mention the second trouble with
the format: the audience seemed unclear on whether the title was changing hands
or not. While I could be wrong on that it seems like the safest way of
explaining their tepid reaction to some of the results throughout the night. The
rules weren’t indecipherable but any gimmick match with as many stipulations as
this is probably not going to do well.
Henry slowed things down so everyone could catch their
breath. After Striker had described him as "the strongest... human
being... on... the... planet” Finlay
came out as final entrant. He was a wildly over babyface with jaunty panpipes
for music. Hornswoggle was with him. I’d completely forgotten this era of
Finlay’s career, which would include him doing jigs with Hornswoggle in the
ring on a semi-regular basis, and didn’t appreciate being reminded of it. Finlay
was over, which speaks volumes about roster depth at this time.
Hornswoggle distracted Henry and the referee, allowing
‘The Belfast Bruiser’ to sneak his shillelagh out of the corner and smack Henry
in the head with it. Then, in the most confusing spot of the night, Finlay and
Hardy teamed up to throw Henry over the top rope, as though they were in a
battle royal. Striker and Grisham, being a pair of stone cold pros, didn’t even
acknowledge that.
Finlay immediately hit the Celtic Cross on Hardy, pinning
him to become the “current” champ. Hardy recovered fairly quickly and hit a
Twist of Fate on Miz to take the title for himself. The final two and a half minutes
were an omnishambles of moves, pin attempts and breakups. The match ended with
everyone but Miz (he was busy lying at ringside with a nasty hard way gash on
his face) piling on top of each other writhing around in one of the most
shambolic displays I’ve ever seen in a wrestling ring.
Your winner and new ECW-but-not-really-actual-ECW
champion Matt Hardy.
Striker talked about Hardy climbing the cliffs of Dover
and standing at the apex as the champion. Stuff like that is why Striker was
fired. Thankfully he would not appear on this show again.
Backstage segment
one
New champ Matt hugged his brother Jeff, who was at this
point the most popular man in wrestling about to embark on a quest to win the
WWE championship. Matt said he wanted a Hardys clean sweep and declared it the
greatest night of his life. I wonder if he even remembers this show now.
A split screen showed WWE champion Triple H and World
Heavyweight champion CM Punk in corridors preparing for their respective title
defences. Both had long hair. It was weird.
Question time fun
with Jim Ross
Back at ringside Tazz and JR introduced themselves and
rambled about the show a little. JR asked whether SmackDown GM Vickie Guerrero
should have let Big Show compete in the WWE title Scramble match and told
viewers they could vote on their answer on the WWE website. No Twitter here.
Presumably there was some controversial aspect to this topic. Whatever it was
it wasn't made clear.
And then... "Yo yo yo yo! Shad Gaspard and JTG, it's
Cryme Time! Brooklyn, Brooklyn!"
Tag team
championship: Cody Rhodes and Ted DiBiase v Cryme Tyme
Yes! Everyone’s illiterate gangsta thug wrestlers were on
this show! Michael Cole and Jerry Lawler were both massively excited by this entrance.
I felt nauseous. Ted DiBiase and Cody Rhodes came out to face them. This was
blue boots with the Triforce on them era Cody Rhodes. He also had trunks with
'The Prince of Pro Wrestling' scrawled on the back. That nickname should have
caught on.
Cryme Tyme were more over than I remembered and had more
double team spots too. With a better gimmick, better timing, and an
understanding that speaking out against the way you’re booked doesn’t help your
standing if you’re a guy in WWE’s mid-card, they could have gotten somewhere.
 |
| Dripping with charisma... |
The match was decent. Cody and Ted cheated to isolate
JTG. Shad came in fired up off a hot tag and threw his foes around like a hoss.
The Legacy lads thwarted a double team move which looked like it may have been
More Bang For Your Buck (it definitely wouldn’t have been) then Ted flipped a
small package from JTG over, giving Cody the win.
After the match the debuting Manu ran in to save Cody and
Ted from a post-match beating from Cryme Tyme. Cole described him as a "mysterious
violent stranger.” This was about as good as it got for Manu. He was chastised
on-screen and off- by Randy Orton for being lazy and having a bad attitude. You
know you’re in trouble when Orton’s knocking you for being unmotivated. He was
released in February of 2009 having accomplished nothing of note.
Backstage segment
two
A doctor told Shawn Michaels that he would risk making
his injured tendon worse by competing. Michaels didn’t reply. We’d find out
what the silence and disregard for safety was about in a video recap.
At this point the Michaels and Jericho dispute had been
going on for around six months. It had started when Michaels super kicked his
friend and mentor Ric Flair into retirement at WrestleMania XXIV. Batista,
another friend and student of Flair’s, took issue with Michaels retiring
‘Naitch’ and challenged him to a match. Jericho offered his services as a guest
referee for that match, which HBK won by faking a knee injury.
Batista moved on to other things after that, leaving
‘Y2J’ to take Michaels to task for cheating. Even though Michaels had cheated
in a face versus face match he was seen as the good guy in this scenario, with
Jericho as the villain. The pair had a match at The Great American Bash during
which Michaels received a cut near his eye which Jericho targeted, giving him
the edge and allowing him to win the match.
Michaels announced his doctor had advised him to retire,
so serious was the eye injury. During his farewell speech he knocked Jericho,
saying that he’d never achieve the success ‘The Showstopper’ had. This led to a
meeting where Jericho verbally laid into Michaels and accidentally struck his
wife. Because he exhibited no signs of remorse for this accidentally blow
Michaels announced his plans to remain an active wrestler so that he could take
on Jericho in a non-sanctioned street fight to gain retribution for his family.
Non-sanctioned
match: Shawn Michaels v Chris Jericho
This match is the saving grace of this entire show. It’s
the only match on it that’s worth watching. While the latter two Scramble bouts
did some interesting things and featured some memorable moments this is the
only match that is good from start to finish. Without this on the show it would
have been far closer to train wreck levels than it is.
Lilian Garcia kicked things off with a reminder that both
combatants had signed paperwork that ensured they could not hold each other or
WWE responsible for what would happen in the match. Michaels immediately got a
takedown on Jericho and then lamped him with his boot. They went out into the
crowd and round ringside before Jericho floored Michaels with a DDT,
introducing a chair to the match and setting up a table outside the ring.
Michaels escaped a suplex through table and choked
Jericho. He stopped a Sweet Chin Music attempt because he wanted to hurt ‘The
Highlight of the Night’ more, sinking in a Crippler crossface to do just that.
Cole understandably didn’t name it, the Benoit incident having taken place just
a year before. Jericho staggered to his feet and sent Michaels head first into
a chair.
Jericho fired off jabs at Michaels’ injured eye before
applying the Walls of Jericho. With no rope breaks in an unsanctioned fight
Michaels had to use a technical counter to escape: a fire extinguisher to the
face.
 |
| He learnt that from Jose. |
Jericho’s protégé Lance Cade showed up to interfere for a
bit, eventually getting wiped out with Sweet Chin Music. Michaels then smashed
Jericho with a chair, sending off the top rope through the table standing at
ringside. He followed that up by draping him on an announce desk (he was spoilt
for choice with three at ringside) and elbow dropping him through it. Jericho got
back into the ring (because wrestling) and Michaels whipped him with his belt
(because southern justice). ‘King’ chose this point to suggest Michaels may
have been possessed by the devil. His sense of timing never fails.
Michaels trapped Jericho in an armbar and pummelled his
eye, retribution for Jericho’s unsportsmanlike attacks. With Jericho
unconscious the referee stopped the match and awarded the victory to Michaels.
Jericho did a great job of selling unconsciousness.
Michaels pummelled him more after the decision.
The ref yanked him off (to stop Jericho getting hurt) and got a super
kick for his trouble. More officials showed up (including Mike Chioda) to
protect Jericho as he was taken backstage. The segment ended with Michael Cole
wandering aloud if God would ever forgive Michaels for what he’d done.
Backstage segment
three
Cody, Ted and Manu were joined by Legacy boss Randy Orton.
At this point in time the group was having problems, although my memory of the
group is that it was always having problems and never really felt like the
cohesive, Evolution 2.0 it was probably meant to. Cody formally introduced
Manu, telling Orty that the new boy recognised and respected talent when he saw
it.
Manu piped up at that point, revealing another reason he
would ultimately be released: he is not a natural at wrestling speak. He told
Orton that Cody ‘n’ Ted were in a different class in the most bland, hollow,
passionless voice imaginable. He said the words because he was scripted too,
not because he believed them. Fair enough, he didn’t believe them, but he should have tried to make viewers feel
like he did.
Orton cut a promo memorable only for its abundance of
shoulder movements. He rambled a bit but seemed to feel the lads had gotten
lucky. It ended with him saying he wasn’t impressed with them. At all. Over at
the commentary desk JR said Cody and Ted didn't want to hear that. Then Tazz
put over Motörhead and JR asked his Big Show question again.
WWE championship
Scramble
The second championship Scramble is remembered for one
thing: ‘The’ Brian Kendrick pinning Jeff Hardy with Sliced Bread Number Two to
become the “current” champ. It was the sort of surprise this match was probably
designed to incorporate. Ultimately it was nothing more than a token shock that
accomplished nothing.
What this match should
be remembered for is its final five minutes. It marked the beginning of a
friendly rivalry (by which I mean a face versus face rivalry) between ascending
babyface superhope Jeff Hardy and WWE champion Triple H. Entering last ‘The
Game’ quickly pinned Kendrick to keep his title reign on track but Hardy would
become the “current” champion by pinning MVP with a Twist of Fate. They
exchanged the lead a few more times and although Triple H ended the bout still
the champion Jeff Hardy was just seconds way from pinning Shelton Benjamin at
the final bell.
It was a story that could only be told as effectively in
a match like this. Hardy and Helmsley were shown to be on a similar level,
essentially trading the title back and forth, desperately trying to retain the
upper hand until the time limit expired. It could have gone to either of them. A
good feud in which Hardy would win his one and only WWE championship would come
out of this. Sadly the rest of the match dragged and Kendrick, MVP and Benjamin
were made to look like the enhancement guys they clearly were, with Kendrick
and MVP taking a cumulative six losses between them.
Backstage segment
four
In the back Todd Grisham asked Michaels how he was
feeling. That was a slap in the face to the Brand Extension: Grisham was
supposed to be an ECW guy! Michaels said it was the first PPV in three months which
hadn’t resulted in him being hospitalised. He said he was going home to his
wife and kids, content but not satisfied and with no sense of closure. The
worst, he said, was still to come for Jericho.
The location of his smile was not touched upon.
Somewhere else in the building Eve Torres (here just an
interviewer) channelled Matt Striker and reminded WHC CM Punk that the odds
were against him successfully retaining his belt. Punk started the standard
life of adversity promo before Orton showed up and called him a fluke champion.
DiBiase, Rhodes and Manu then attacked Punk, roughing him up and throwing him against
a plastic container. Kofi Kingston (who at this point still had the potential
to become a somebody) tried helping Punk out but didn’t get far. Orton gave
Punk a Punt kick and told his cronies that was how to make an impression.
There’s a more relevant point to discuss this segment
below…
Divas championship:
Maryse v Michelle McCool
I’d love to say that they surprised me and had a great
match, but they didn’t. It was Maryse and Michelle McCool. Did you really
expect anything else?
Promo segment
spectacular
JR revealed that seventy seven per cent of viewers felt
Vickie Guerrero had made the right decision not allowing Big Show to compete
the WWE title match. Once again they provided no context for why this question
was being asked. Looking into it I’ve found out that Show had interfered in a
qualifying match for the Scramble and had been generally disrespectful to heel
GM Vickie. It was also very clearly designed to play into what would happen
between the two minutes later.
And then he appeared: Mike Adamle. Dim-witted, wooden, vacant,
clueless Mike Adamle.
He didn’t really do enough to warrant me going into much
detail on him here but it was a pleasure to see him fumbling his way through a
promo he probably didn’t understand. Basically he was there to announce that CM
Punk might not compete. With any other babyface that would be the setup for
them making a gutsy comeback in their scheduled defence. That wouldn’t be the
case here. But again, I’ll get to that. Adamle said if Punk couldn’t compete he’d
find a suitable replacement.
Adamle left and Big Show came out. Full-on babyface Big
Show, high-fiving, waving and smiling. He volunteered his services for Punk’s
vacant spot and then awkwardly plugged the SmackDown Your Vote campaign
(something that was done to help ease the McMahon name into the political
sphere ahead of Linda’s failed attempts at getting elected). Vickie came out
and had a go at him for disobeying her instructions.
Then The Undertaker’s druids came out. Dimmed lights,
hooded robes, smoke machine, eerie music, the whole deal. Show loled it up,
literally holding his sides because he found it so funny that Vickie was going
to finally be caught by The Undertaker. A gross oversimplification: ‘The Dead
Man’ wanted revenge on Vickie for costing him the World Heavyweight
championship and using him as a weapon against her ex-boyfriend Edge.
 |
| All this was done so we could get to this thrilling piece of work at No Mercy. |
The druids parked a casket at ringside and ‘Taker
appeared on the Titantron, telling Vickie to get in. She didn’t so he came out
to ringside to get her, Big Show happily holding her in place to stop her
escaping. When ‘Big Evil’ arrived in the ring Show swerve turned on him, giving
him a big ol' right punch to the face. Show smacked Undertaker around for a few
minutes before giving him a second KO punch. Then he held 'The Dead Man' up for
Vickie to slap him.
No context was provided throughout any of this. It was
just stuff that happened.
Backstage segment
five
William Regal and Mike Adamle had a chat about Punk's
status for the World title match (which was next). Regal wanted in on the action
and reminded Adamle he’d pinned Punk to become the 2008 King of the Ring.
Adamle made his excuses and left.
World Heavyweight
championship Scramble
The future Drax the Destroyer and John Bradshaw Layfield
started the main event. That may sound alarming but they actually had a pretty
enjoyable five minutes together, the highlight of which was Batista using a
figure four (because it looked so strange to see him do it). Batista was
massively over as a face. JBL was well established as a heel. His limo entrance
was still a thing and helped him come across as a big deal. Unfortunately there
was no hot stepping from him. I was gutted at that.
Bald headed evil Kane was third. JBL had been wiped out
by a collision with the ring steps, so we were treated to Kane and 'The Animal'
for several minutes. He got back into the match just in time to break up a
Batista bomb and get pinned after a choke slam. Yes, Kane became the “current”
champion.
 |
| Kane thinking he's flying. Mysterio's hair mask. There's so much going on here. |
Rey Mysterio was the fourth man introduced, wearing a
mask with a thoroughly ridiculous Mohawk headpiece attached to it. This could
well be where my problems with Rey started. Broadly speaking it was Kane and
Layfield v Mysterio and Batista during this portion. The faces busted out some
double team moves. Rey cheekily rolled Batista up from atop his shoulders and the
two had a few heated words but JBL thumped them before they could come up
blows.
Entrant number five’s time arrived and CM Punk did not
come out. Instead it was Chris Jericho who got the spot. Yes, the same Chris
Jericho who’d been beaten and left unconscious by a vengeful Shawn Michaels
earlier in the night. He was clearly in a bad way but he had been deemed fit
and healthy enough to compete in a second match. Meanwhile Punk had been on the
receiving end of a generic backstage tussle and blasted with Orton’s Punk kick.
True, the Punt has been built up as a particularly devastating move since this
show but even so it didn’t seem like much to take out a world champion,
especially when compared to what Jericho had been through.
At the time this move was interpreted as a burial of
Punk. I can see why people would think that but looking at the bigger picture I
don’t think that was the case. Rightly or wrongly Punk had been portrayed as a
man who’d broken into the main event a little too early and had found himself
out of his depth. He would regain the WHC in 2009 and be presented in a far
better light. His falling to a single Punt was one aspect of the story being
told at the time rather than a single incident designed to make him look bad.
It’s also obvious with hindsight that the World title was transferred onto
Jericho to freshen up RAW’s title scene and boost the status of his feud with
Michaels.
Punk being written out of this match was bad. But it was
at least done for a reason.
 |
| Come on, baby! |
The closing moments of the match were very good. Batista
escaped a choke slam attempt and floored ‘The Big Red Machine’ with a
spinebuster. Mysterio sprung into the ring and tried a hurricanrana on Batista
but Batista countered it into a Batista bomb. With the clock ticking down ‘The
Animal’ made the pin… just a little too late and seconds after Jericho had
snuck into the ring and pinned Kane. The final klaxon rang out and Batista was
left to despairingly sink his head into his hands as ‘Y2J’ was awarded the
championship.
It was another example of how the Scramble format could
be used for interesting storytelling. But it was also the last example. In one
night WWE did everything they were realistically going to with the Scramble
match. Which is why we haven’t seen one since.
Final thoughts
This was a shambles of a show that benefited greatly from
hosting one of the most memorable encounters of the Jericho v Michaels feud.
Without that it would have been awful. The Scramble match concept was flawed
and presented poorly. Although it is
something I think could work somewhere like Ring of Honor or if WWE had a deeper
mid-card and were willing to put the time in constructing a five way feud for
the IC title.
The show would have been better had they been scrapped
entirely. Triple H and Jeff Hardy could have had a singles match. Benjamin,
Kendrick and MVP could have had a three-way for Benjamin’s US title. Mark Henry
could have had a weapons-laden brawl with Matt Hardy. The only thing they would
have lost by swapping the Scramble matches around was Jericho’s surprise title
win, and they still could have found a way to get to that if it was what they
wanted.
There are worse shows out there. But none of them have
the Scramble match to offer. And for that we should probably be thankful.
