by Rick Scaia
Exclusive to OnlineOnslaught.com

It's just another one of those shows, from the sounds of things.

So hit BACK and let yourself be surprised by the second-to-last SD! of 2003, or forge ahead and ruin the show for yourself...  whatever.  It's no skin of my nose, either way.

NOTE: Yeah, I've got the pre-RAW match results, those will only air on International Heat due to the PPV this Sunday.  So screw 'em.  This is just a compilation report from the TV tapings last night in San Deigo, based on 3 reports:

DARK MATCHES

Two Guys beat Two Other Guys, and nobody really got into it at all.

Jamie Noble beat Psicosis (ex-WCW) in a pretty decent match where Psicosis got a sizeable response but Noble was still the strong fan favorite.

VELOCITY MATCHES

Chuck Palumbo and Nunzio beat Paul London and Spanky Kendrick in a pretty good little match.  Finish had Johnny Stamboli interfering to set up the cheap pinfall win for the FBI.

Ultimo Dragon beat Some Guy.

Orlando Jordan beat Kanyon (who is doing his best to steal Some Guy's shtick, it seems like).

Tajiri beat Billy Kidman to retain the Cruiserweight Title. Another good match, and another case where the heel had a little outside interference to help him score a pinfall win.

SMACKDOWN! MATCHES

Pre-SD!: Rey Mysterio's wife and kids are escorted to ringside, where they have seats.  Positioned behind them all night are some dudes in Rey Mysterio masks, sort of like personal security guards.

Opening Promo: actually, this is probably a promo in two parts.  First part will (speculation by one live report) be a cold-open, with Paul Heyman in the darkened arena and a single spotlight on his face.  In this segment, Heyman makes a simple promise that Chris Benoit will never get a WWE Title shot as long as he is the General Manager of SD!.  Then they did the whole entrance theme and pyro for SD!... and when they came back, Heyman was still in the ring for Part Two...  And Part Two is all about putting over Brock Lesnar as the greatest champion ever in the history of the universe.  Brock himself eventually comes out to add his completely unbiased and impartial two cents.  Brock finally states that not only was Chris Benoit not enough of a man to beat him (fans remember the match, however, and are giving Lesnar a big ol' "You Tapped Out"), but also nobody in the building tonight is man enough to come out and face him.  And because it's San Diego, that can be the set up for only one man: Rey Mysterio.  Rey comes out, gets mocked for his tiny-ness, but eventually gets Brock to take him seriously after questioning the tiny-ness of Brock's manhood.  That gets Brock hot, and he and Heyman decide on a plan: tonight, it'll be Rey vs. Brock in a non-title match, and if Rey can win, he'll get his title match next week on SD!.

Rhyno beat Bradshaw.  This was a continuation of the Red Hot Velocity feud that started last week!  Yee haw!  This time, Rhyno wins cheap after both guys are KO'ed following a superplex.  Rhyno sort of draped an arm over Bradshaw for the pin.  I repeat: Yee Haw!  Expect this to be about 5 minutes of your life you can never have back.

Backstage: Paul Heyman is not happy, and the target of his bile is A-Train.  Team Lesnar is not pleased that A-Train beat on Benoit to win the title last week, and to prove himself to Heyman and Lesnar, he needs to win a big match this week.  A match against SD!'s next big superstar.  A match against the man Brock Lesnar is considering as the next member of Team Lesnar (which is as close as they come all night to mentioning Nathan Jones' absence).  A-Train must prove himself by beating Shannon Moore.  Next.

Elsewhere backstage (after a break): the FBI are running numbers on the A-Train/Moore match.  Matt Morgan comes in and puts a big bet down on Train to win.

Shannon Moore beat A-Train.  For about a minute and a half, this was a repeat of Shannon's last three or four SD! matches...  and then Shannon hit a fluke-y move or two and reversed his way into a surprise roll-up for a pinfall win!  A-Train continued his onslaught after the match, and then Big Show and Matt Morgan came out to join in... or did they?  When A-Train tried charged Moore in a corner, Morgan intercepted him with a big boot, and then Show chokeslammed him.  Mad about him losing?  Or made about them losing money?  

The Cat's Special Musical Performance.  This craptacular segment was a little bit of booty-shakin' by Cat, followed by his announcement that to make this a memorable night, he was going to have a special guest come out and shake HER ass for the fans.  Sable came out, teased the fans for a moment, and then announced they didn't deserve to see her shake her tail feather.  On her way out of the ring, Sable was sexually harrassed by the Cat, and didn't seem to like it.  But Cat got a kick out of his little taste of Sable, and went into one of his patented madman dances.  Cat's seizure ended with him stripped down to his boxers.  Yee haw?

Backstage: Eddie and Chavo Guerrero are talking about their match (it's next) against the World's Greatest Tag Team.  They start just talking about how it's important to win, but end with each one talking about how it's important that HE score the win.  Uh oh.

Los Guerreros beat the World's Greatest Tag Team.  This is the proverbial bomb, folks, about a 20 minute match by most accounts.  Good fast-paced action, with some brawling stuff thrown in.  Eddie may or may not have been hurt in the first five minutes of the match (one says it was legit, two apparently assumed it was just part of the show), but continued to work the rest of the match at close enough to full-speed... finish was Eddie cleaning house and setting up for a Frog Splash when Chavo tagged himself into the match.  The delay was enough to allow Haas and Benjamin to recover a bit: they toss Eddie out of the ring and start double-teaming on Chavo.  As the ref tries to get the illegal Haas out of the ring, Eddie resorts to the second of the Three Demandments, and Cheats.  He pulls something out from under the hood of his low rider (the carburetor seems likely enough) and pastes Benjamin with it.  Chavo manages to fall on top to get the pinfall win.  But after the match, he insists he didn't need Uncle Eddie's help, so they have a few wordss.

Freestyle Rap Challenge: John Cena vs. Big Show.  Show comes out in Cena Wear, which immediately strikes everybody as funny, so Show only gets half boos for this whole segment.  He says he can bust rhymes with the best of 'em, and wants Cena to come out and do a rap-off with him.  Cena obliges.  Show goes first, and further amuses the crowd with a B+ caliber rap that included some funny Kobe-Bryant-inspired lines.  Cena and the crowd seem to appreciate Show's effort... but then Cena got on the mic and did a solid-grade-A caliber rap to win the fans fully over to his side.  Show didn't like this, got frustrated, and wound up just kicking Cena in the nutsack when Cena wasn't expecting it.  Boo, Big Show, boo!  But also, sort of Yay!  But mostly boo!  A fun waste-of-time segment in exactly the way that the Cat's thing wasn't.

Backstage: Josh Matthews got a few words with Chris Benoit.  Benoit refused to make excuses about last week or obsess over how he did make Lesnar tap out or anything.  He just wants to focus on doing his job and doing whatever he can to, despite Heyman's promise, get himself another WWE Title shot down the line.  You do know what this means, right folks?  Lesnar/Benoit at WM20...

Brock Lesnar beat Rey Mysterio.  This was an excellent 12 minute main event, with a hot crowd and everything (the non-title nature meant they actually believed Rey might win, which was a nice touch).  Lesnar's power moves looked sweet on Rey, and Rey's high-flying offense was flashy enough to pop the crowd.  Not necessarily the total heel beat down followed by brief hope spots for Rey that you'd expect.  Instead, Lesnar gave Rey a decent amount of offense, but instead sold it like Rey was a fly, a nuisance, and always recovered to kick out of big moves or go back on offense.  In the end, a rally by Rey was squashed by a powerbomb, and then Lesnar locked in the Overhead Half Crab (Lesnar Stretch?  Does it have a real name?) he used last week on Benoit... Rey tapped out.  Brock celebrated and taunted Rey's family a bit... at which point one of the three masked personal security dudes jumped over the railing to go after Brock.  He quickly pulls off the mask and reveals he's Bob Holly.  Brock retreats as the show ends.

Sounds like an "eh" first hour, but another killer second hour.  Check it out tomorrow, and come on back to OO on Friday for full results and analysis of the as-aired version of the show.
 

E-MAIL RICK SCAIA
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Rick Scaia is a wrestling fan from Dayton, OH.  He's been doing this since 1995, but enjoyed it best when the suckers from SportsLine were actually PAYING him to be a fan.

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