Dale's Exclusive Live Report
for the RAW House Show
at the Fargodome in Fargo, ND on September 26, 2003
Hi folks! I just got back from my first WWE house show, this is the second WWE event I've been to, the other was a Smackdown from early June 2001. I was also at three different WCW shows that were in the Fargodome in April 1998 (Thunder), April 1999 (Nitro), and March 2000 (Thunder). I was also at some indy show in Michigan for a promotion called Ultimate Professional Wrestling back in the summer of 2001, was a small promotion ran by former WWF'er, Bastion Booger. So this is my 6th wrestling event I've been to overall.
Originally the card was suppose to have Triple H vs. Kevin Nash in a street fight for the world title, but now since Goldberg is the champ and he's too damn lazy to do house shows we get Kane vs. Shane McMahon in a street fight as the main event instead. Those two and Rob Van Dam are pretty much the only real big names wrestling tonight. The other big stars like Chris Jericho, Ric Flair, Goldberg, Kevin Nash, Shawn Michaels, and Triple H were nowhere to be found here. Needless to say the arena was very bare, I didn't get an exact count from anyone what the ticket sales were, but Tommy Dreamer got on the mic in his match and said "Over 5,000 people" but it looked more around 2 or 3,000 to me. About 90% of the upper bleachers were completely empty. I had great seats, fourth row from ringside, but my digicam was working like crap, so please be happy with the following pics that you see in the report. There wasn't much of a shirt selection to choose from, but at least they had an RVD shirt there, so I got that, and paid $10 for a shitty RAW roster program pin-up book in hopes of getting a wrestlers autograph but none popped up after the show was over. Anyways, onto the show, and I'll ripoff Scott Keith with his star ratings (sorry Scott, I got both your books so don't kill me man!)
Match 1: Spike Dudley vs. Rico (w/Miss
Jacky)
Holy crap, Spike sure does look a hell of a lot shorter than he does on television. This was a decent fast pace match, aside from the usual gay acting from Rico at the beginning. Lots of good little spots here and there, but Spike was obvious as day yelling out the spots of the match. Weird thing about house shows I guess is Howard Finkel announces every 5 minutes how much time is left in the bout. This 10 minute time limit expired and went to a draw, but Spike called Rico back out to finish it off and within minutes got the pin with the Dudley Dog/Acid Drop. I give it about **1/4
Match 2: Tommy Dreamer vs. Test (w/Stacy
Kiebler)
Stacy was pretty hot but Test prevented her from strutting her stuff during the match. Tommy Dreamer should of had the win after a couple of big moves, but Test got the win in the end with the Big Boot. Decent match, about the same as the first one so again, **1/4
Match 3: Rodney Mack & Mark Henry
(w/Teddy Long) vs. Hurricane & Rosey
Teddy Long got on the microphone before the match and did a funny promo for his Black Power group. He said he noticed there was no black people in the crowd, and renamed North Dakota, "White Dakota," but after a while he spotted two blacks in the crowd and dedicated the match to them. The superheroes did their funny tag team moves again, where Rosey did his airplane leg drop, and duck 'n roll clothesline! These guys rule as a comedy team, and are probably the best one since Too Cool. Rosey looked right at our section after we got a cool "Shit" chant going in our section for a while. I thought the superheroes would win it, but Nation of Domination 2.0 won it after Mark Henry got a big front powerslam on Hurricane.
Match 4: Randy Orton vs. Lance Storm
Storm teased the crowd about tossing out a free Evolution
shirt to the hottest chick in the building, but he said there weren't any. He
must of avoided the hotty sitting a couple seats away from me who was apparently
his biggest fan because she had a "Randy So Hot" sign. Lance Storm seen her
though, and tossed the shirt at her in that direction but a guy right in front
of grabbed it. Gaah, I still I got my RVD shirt. Anywho, this was a great much,
and could of been better if Lance wouldn't of did all his stupid armbar's to
match up with his "boring" gimmick. Lance did a whole bunch of cool moves off
the turnbuckles and spinning heel kicks that I never seen him on do on
television before, but Orton got the win after he tossed Storm into the exposed
Turnbuckle and followed it up with the RKO. I'll give it **, it would've got one
more if it weren't for the stupid rest holds!
Match 5 (Tag Titles Tables Match): Rene
Dupree & Rob Conway vs. Champs, Dudley Boyz
Not that bad of a match. Quite a bit of "table" chants. There
was a funny spot in the middle of the match where Dupree and Bubba Ray tried the
test of strength, but Bubba kept switching arms and made the thing look like a
jumping contest. This was pretty much your standard table match where D-Von got
beat on for awhile until he made the hot tag to Bubba who cleaned house, and
they shortly got the win with the double powerbomb off the top turnbuckle to
Dupree. Solid match and the crowd was into it so I'll give it about ***1/4.
Afterwards they celebrated the win with a little kid and brought him in the ring
and raised. Pretty cool of the Dudleyz to do that!
Intermission
I got me a Jumbo Pretzel with Cheese and a Mountain Dew 20oz for $4. Rip
off, -** on the deal ;)
Match 6 (Intercontinental Title Match):
Rob Van Dam vs. Champ, Christian
Christian got on the microphone before the match to get his
new "CLB" catchphrase over. Match proceeded pretty good with both guys doing
their usual arsenal of moves, but Christian got the cheap win in the end by
holding onto the ropes to gain leverage. RVD gained vengeance afterwards tho by
getting the Five Star Frog Splash on him. This would of been great if it weren't
for the lame ending so I'll give it ***.
Match 7: Lita & Trish Stratus vs.
Victoria & Jacquelyn
Jacquelyn is even shorter than Spike!!! I looked it up in the
program and she is only 5'1" Wow! Victoria is also mighty hot in leather.
Another great women's match that they have been keeping up the pace of lately.
Lita & Trish dominated for the most part, and in end Lita pinned Victoria after
the Twist of Fate. About a good **3/4
Match 8 (Street Fight): Kane vs. Shane
McMahon
I'm surprised to see Shane working house shows now, I never
really expected him to do that. This was pretty much a Kane squash, with Shane
getting some good shots in here and there. They fought out of the arena and into
the crowd but you really couldn't make out a damn thing since there were no
titantrons or cameras. In the shocker of the night Shane McMahon won cleanly
after a Van Daminator!!!! Wow, I can't believe he did that move in an
un-televised event. I can't believe Kane put Shane over like that after how
they're building him up to be this huuuge monster!!!! This was around ***. But
to still have Shane get the win and RVD couldn't in their Summerslam bout is a
bit awkward to me. Kane got on the microphone afterwards and bitched for awhile
and says that Shane is safe nowhere and he can get him at anytime. And then that
was it. End of show. I stuck around for about 15 minutes hoping for some
wrestlers to come out so I can get some autographs and pics, but no such luck.
This was a good show overall, but it still felt like it needed one more big match to cap it off. As I said above, the 6 biggest stars of the RAW brand (Nash, Jericho, Flair, HBK, Goldberg, and Triple H) were nowhere to be found and this show was just begging for a bigger main event! This was still a decent show all around though, and I felt I got my money's worth, but it could've been so much better!
Well, that's all from me now. Feel free to
email me
and tell me watcha thought of this report.