WWE Survivor Series '92

WWE Survivor Series ‘92
November 24, 1992
Richfield Coliseum
Richfield, Ohio

Survivor Series returns to where the first two were located in Richfield, Ohio in the greater Cleveland area. As I spoke about during the SummerSlam review, a lot of changes happened between August and November. Vince McMahon was almost certainly going to get indicted by the federal government for the steroid scandal, so the housecleaning was rampant. Two notable casualties were the Ultimate Warrior and Davey Boy Smith, who were both headlining SummerSlam. This all happened less than two weeks away from this event where the Warrior was going to be teaming with Randy Savage to take on Ric Flair and Razor Ramon (Scott Hall for any of you that only saw him during his nWo days in WCW). This all led to Savage gaining some revenge on Ric Flair by blowing up the Flair-Perfect-Heenan trio and getting Perfect to align with him as Warrior’s replacement. WCW was really starting to pick up steam and had the backing of billionaire media mogul Ted Turner’s money. They were scooping up any former WWE stars left and right. It would really get into high gear a few years later, but they were poised to take advantage of McMahon’s imminent legal troubles. In other words, Survivor Series would continue its tradition of being a transitional show.

Commentators: Vince McMahon and Bobby “The Brain” Heenan

Headshrinkers (Fatu and Samu) w/ Afa vs. High Energy (Owen Hart and Koko B. Ware)
Poor Owen. WWE just had zero direction for him and this was the best they could come up with. Put him in oversized baggy pajamas and team him up with JTTS (and future Hall of Famer) Koko B. Ware. This is merely a glorified squash match as the Headshrinkers had just debuted. They were very athletic for their size and I always enjoyed their high impact offense. Match is okayish. *1/4

Nightstick Match
Nailz vs. Big Bossman
And we’re off to a white hot start to the show. A squash match, and then this one. Nailz came into the WWE and brutally attacked the Bossman back in June or July I can’t quite remember and stole his nightstick. Bossman would return, and this match would get signed. Bossman goes over here in a predictably terrible match. Nailz is one of the worst workers in WWE history. DUD

Tatanka vs. “The Model” Rick Martel
Yes, it’s a rematch from their epic encounter at WrestleMania VIII only THIS time, Martel had stolen Tatanka’s sacred eagle feathers. Once again he did this long before SummerSlam. I guess I can give them points for long term booking, but by the time the payoff actually happened, the few people that did care about the angle, didn’t anymore. Tatanka wins here. This match is notable as the first PPV appearance by Doink the Clown. *1/4

“Nature Boy” Ric Flair and Razor Ramon vs. “Macho Man” Randy Savage and Mr. Perfect
Once again, the advertised main event happens on the midcard. This is actually a pretty good tag team match, but has no payoff at the end. Razor got included because he was the one who cost Savage the WWE title to Flair in September. So Savage and Razor were set to feud. The problem with the match is that Flair still had to wrestle Bret Hart on house shows, so he had to remain strong. Razor was a fresh new heel that Vince desperately needed so he had to be kept strong. The baby-faces weren’t going to lose not to mention, a returning Mr. Perfect wasn’t going to lose, so despite a well wrestled tag team contest, the ending was going to be disappointing, and it was as Flair and Razor lost by disqualification. Flair at this point had also given his notice that he was not going to renew his contract. He would wrestle basically through January, put over Mr. Perfect in a career match on the new Monday Night RAW weekly television show, and head to WCW for more money and a much lighter schedule. ***

Yokozuna w/ Mr. Fuji vs. Virgil
Yokozuna came in as a mammoth Japanese wrestler. He was definitely a phenomenon and was immediately pushed as a monster heel. This was a total squash match as Virgil gets virtually no offense. In fact it really wouldn’t be until WrestleMania IX that anyone got any meaningful offense against Yokozuna. Vince truly had big things planned for him. ¾*

4 Team Survivor Series Tag Team Match
Money Inc. (Ted Dibiase and IRS) and Beverly Brothers (Beau and Blake) vs. Natural Disasters (Earthquake and Typhoon) and Nasty Boys (Brian Knobbs and Jerry Saggs)

The rules here are that if one member of the team gets eliminated, both guys are gone. Jimmy Hart continued his managing carousel in 1992. He stabbed the Natural Disasters in the back, and then did the same thing to the Nasty Boys after SummerSlam. You could say he made the right decision as Money Inc. ultimately ended up with the tag titles. Since the Nasty Boys were the latest team to be screwed over by Jimmy, they were going to get the token win here to continue their feud with Money Inc. that had no payoff. Nasty Boys would be gone before WrestleMania. This match is just filler. *

Casket Match
Undertaker w/ Paul Bearer vs. Kamala w/ Kim Chee and Harvey Wippleman
Basically take their SummerSlam match, add a casket, and take away Kamala’s top rope belly flops on the Undertaker and you have this match. Undertaker stuffs Kamala into the casket and unfortunately this leads to Harvey Wippleman wanting revenge on Taker, which in turn gave us Giant Gonzalez. Poor Undertaker. ¼*

Main Event
WWE Championship
Bret “The Hitman” Hart (champion) vs. Shawn Michaels
Of course this is 5 years before their much more infamous Survivor Series match. Here they were (according to them) still pretty good buddies and just went out and saved this show from being one of the worst ever. This was a classic back and forth contest between two of the greats. Not much more to add here. Bret was the new WWE champion and Vince pinned his hopes on Bret to carry the company through some turbulent times. Shawn submitted to Bret’s sharpshooter for Bret to retain. These two could dog it and still have a *** match. They weren’t dogging it on this night though. ****1/2

Final Analysis: This show has not aged well at least for me. I loved this show on original viewing, but man was there some complete and utter crap. I guess the booking was solid, although I wonder if my opinion would have changed if the tag main event had an actual finish. I have no idea. I also wonder if Vince had the same opinion of the show, because not long after this a certain guy would be returning that pretty much change any long term booking plans Vince had established in November 1992. That man of course would be Hulk Hogan. That’s for another time. My suggestion to anyone is get the Bret Hart vs. Shawn Michaels rivalry dvd if you really want to see their match here, otherwise, this is pretty much a throwaway show.