WCW Worldwide 1993 YouTube Playlist
With 1992, 1994, and 1995 WCW Worldwide playlist spotlights in the books, now felt like a breezy time to fill that 1993 gap and break down the year that was in the wonderful universe of Worldwide Wrestling.
1993 was a year that saw the biggest face-lift the show would receive. By the summer, the tapings went from being on the road in the various arenas around the country to being stationed from the Disney MGM Studios in Orlando, FL. This was Eric Bischoff’s attempt to de-southernize the company and send WCW into the mainstream. As a kid, I found it kind of silly that a show entitled Worldwide would air its episodes from the same location week after week.
But we’re getting ahead of ourselves.
WCW Worldwide was hosted by Tony Schiavone and Jesse Ventura throughout the year and made quite the team. Tony sounded more comfortable and confident working with “The Body” during their WCW run as opposed to their WWF days . . . probably since guys like the Ultimate Warrior weren’t getting Ventura’s dander up in Turner Land.
The attached link above contains over 50 videos of not only matches from WCW Worldwide but from the Power Hour . . . full disclosure, most of the Power Hour matches are merely matches from the previous week’s Worldwide with an updated commentary track. As always, we’ll touch on some of the more memorable matches and moments here.
On January 23rd, #1 Contender to the NWA Championship Barry Windham had a fun, albeit short match against Brad Armstrong.
Roughly a month later, Worldwide was main evented by one hell of an eight man tag team match when Ricky Steamboat, Shane Douglas, and the Rock & Roll Express took on The Hollywood Blonds and the Heavenly Bodies. This was a part of the short lived talent share program between WCW and Smoky Mountain Wrestling. During the entrances, Jesse Ventura claims Jim Cornette is out of money. Had to be a rib . . . I think.
Fast forward another month and we would see Ricky Steamboat and Shane Douglas defend their WCW/NWA Unified Tag Team Titles against Steve Austin and Brian Pillman. This wasn’t the Hollywood Blonds’ first shot at the titles and they knew they had to do whatever it took to win, otherwise it could be their last title shot.
Two weeks later, we see Tex Slazenger and Shanghai Pierce’s finest moment in WCW when they took it to Steamboat and Douglas as the babyfaces looked to get back in title contention.
On April 17th, NWA Champion Barry Windham faced off against relative WCW newcomer Steve Regal. On Twitter, Regal commented on the match saying, “The last match I had as Steve before I became the most suspect (and that’s saying something!!!!) Lord to ever grace the US. What an honour it was to Wrestle Barry Windham for the NWA championship. I was 25 and couldn’t believe it.”
Sweeps month in May meant we would see the Computer Contenders Challenge where “the computer” would determine challengers to different champions all month.
On the May 15th Power Hour (May 8th Worldwide), one of the finest televised tag team matches post-Crockett took place when the Hollywood Blonds defended their gold against 2 Cold Scorpio & Marcus Alexander Bagwell. Unfortunately, the Worldwide version of the match that had 2-3 extra minutes towards the beginning of the bout was blocked on YouTube. However, the Power Hour version (with commentary from Eric Bischoff and Blackjack Mulligan) made it through.
On May 15th, the controversy behind the WCW United States Title would hopefully be settled when the ageless Dustin Rhodes defended his title against the man who only lost the belt due to injury, Ravishing Rick Rude.
Other title matches included Barry Windham defending the NWA Championship against Johnny B Badd on the 22nd and Vader putting his WCW Championship on the line against former NWA Champion Ricky The Dragon Steamboat on the 29th.
On July 10th, WCW Worldwide brought fans a PPV worthy attraction when the British Bulldog took on Vader.
A loss to the Hollywood Blonds on August 7th caused Erik Watts to turn heel on his partner Frankie Lancaster. They would meet the next week. However, it doesn’t appear this was a part of cannon as Watts would be out flashing his pearly whites as a babyface for the next year as if the turn never happened.
Finally, we would head to the Disney MGM Studios where we see a batch of matches from the Power Hour called by Tony Schiavone and Terry Taylor that originally aired the previous week on Worldwide.
With the storylines having to be planned out months in advance due to the bulk tapings of the show, we would see the story behind the start of the Nasty Boys vs Hollywood Blonds feud. It seemed to hint that maybe . . . MAYBE the Blonds were about to turn face until the man with the pencil broke up the Blonds and sent Austin on a path to the US Title.
On December 4th, Disney MGM would get treated to Cactus Jack and Maxx Payne against WCW rookies Harlem Heat. I really miss when guys like Harlem Heat would get to cut mini-promos to the camera on the way to the ring. It helped develop their characters without having to take 5-7 minutes to cut a full blown in ring promo.
The next week, we’d see The Shockmaster, complete with a takeoff of “Satisfaction” by the Rolling Stones as his entrance music, take on the one and only . . . Sugar Daddy.
December 11th would see an amusing interview conducted by Gene Okerlund with Lord Steven Regal and Sir William. Regal almost corpsing at the sound of a heckler booooing over and over and over again makes it worth a click.
On Christmas morning, fans of the Power Hour got to see the Finals of the Jesse The Body Strongest Arm Tournament when Ice Trail took on Vader.
We round off the playlist with a match from January 1st (I included it since it originally aired on the December 25th Worldwide) where Ric Flair looked to get positive stars out of King Kong. It was a magical day at the most magical place on Earth as Flair successfully performed a sledge off the top rope.
And exhale . . . it really is a jam packed playlist and I left out many notable matches, but if I listed them all, it would eliminate the pleasant surprises.
As of this writing, my YouTube channel has nearly 5,000 videos and 192 playlists so if this one doesn’t fancy you, perhaps another will. See ya next time.
A Gorilla Monsoon mark who has a YouTube channel that ironically features more WCW matches than WWF ones. @Monsoon_Classic
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