Compliment Sandwich: Wrestlemania XV

Full disclosure: this Wrestlemania holds a special place in my heart. It’s the first Wrestlemania I watched on PPV (watched it with a couple of my brothers), and a couple years ago, I got it on DVD. Not the Wrestlemania Anthology version: the original version (which, along with Sable: Unleashed, was the first DVD produced by the WWF).

Full disclosure again: this show is awful, especially when you hold it up against today’s product. It’s not on the level of IV, IX, and XI, but it barely clears the bar. Barely (on the strength of the main event alone). But among the “bad” Wrestlemanias, this is my favorite.

Wrestlemania XV took place from the First Union Center (today named the Wells Fargo Center) in Philadelphia on March 28, 1999, just a day shy of a year since Stone Cold Steve Austin first won the WWF title and set the wrestling world on fire. Since that day, the WWF had a renaissance. Once left for (and declared) dead by WCW executive vice-president Eric Bischoff, the WWF had caught and, in recent months, surpassed its rival in their head-to-head Monday night programming.

This was in part due to a style of wrestling programming dubbed “Crash TV” by head writer Vince Russo. His idea: have as many things happen as possible so as to keep the viewer constantly engaged. Matches were merely background noise for the stories surrounding them. Characters were outlandish and controversial. And there was always a surprise or swerve around the corner. As crazy as the idea was, it worked for the WWF, as they saw record ratings and revenue. Of course, having the McMahon filter certainly helped, as WCW would find out a year later.

Oh, in true Attitude Era fashion, the tagline for this Wrestlemania: The Ragin’ Climax. Can I make nice with this edition with the “Showcase of the Immortals”? Let’s find out.

• Boyz II Men doing “America the Beautiful”. Promising start.
• Love the opening with Classy Freddie Blassie.
• Cole and Lawler on the call. No. Just… no. Yes, I fully understood the situation regarding Jim Ross around this time (Bell’s Palsy from a couple months back).
• Smart call to start Wrestlemania XV with a hardcore title match. First person through the curtain: Al Snow, a former ECW combatant. Did I mention the ECW Arena’s not too far from the First Union Center?
• Billy Gunn inexplicably in the hardcore title match with Al Snow and “Hardcore” Bob Holly. No. Do not like.
• “LET’S GO FLYERS!” “ECW!” At least Philly is engaged.
•  Al Snow and Hardcore Holly would go on to be trainers on the original Tough Enough a couple years later.
• Billy Gunn does the work, Bob Holly reaps the reward. Sucks for Billy. I believe Billy’s the first to lose his title at Wrestlemania without actually being beat for it.
• Not even 30 seconds after the opener, we go to the tag title match. The challengers were decided in this manner: 20-man preshow battle royal, last two become a team for the night. In true Russo fashion, the final two don’t get along. Those two: D-Lo Brown and Test.
• What is Debra almost wearing? (Side nugget: Debra recently became a college graduate at age 53.) I likes so much.
• Nice shirt, Test. Guns don’t kill people. I kill people. Good thing it was 1999, I suppose.
• Five minutes of my life I won’t get back. That match sucked. The tag title match the year before: The New Age Outlaws going HAM against Cactus Jack and Chainsaw Charlie for 14 minutes in a dumpster match. The year after: the triangle ladder match classic that forever set the bar for ladder matches since.
• Wrestling ring being converted to boxing ring for the Brawl for All match. Your judges: former Mike Tyson trainer Kevin Rooney, the man that inspired the Rocky movie series Chuck Wepner, and Gorilla Monsoon in his final major public appearance before dying six months later.
• 36 seconds, and Bart Gunn’s wrestling career in America got the GTS in the form of Butterbean’s left hand.
• San Diego Chicken right on time though. Gotta wash the taste out of our mouths after witnessing that sudden victory.
• Mankind, aka the odd man left out in the world title picture, taking on Big Show in his first PPV match in the WWF. He debut six weeks earlier at St. Valentine’s Day Massacre.  
• Oh, the winner of the match gets the referee gig for the main event. I hate that stipulation so much, and I hate it even more that it’s being decided on PPV. Couldn’t ya have decided it in the preshow? Or on RAW the week before? (Smackdown wasn’t around yet.)
• Way to injure a vital player in the WWF with that backdrop, you fat fuck.
• That’s an odd disqualification. You know, a ref bump would have been just as effective. Just saying.
• And why is McMahon miked up?
• Any time Vince gets knocked on his ass is a good day. I like.
• You never seen Mankind get stretchered out? Hell in a Cell, King of the Ring 1998 says hello. Fucking Michael Cole.
• Intercontinental Championship is up next. Three of the four men involved in this match are connected with “Ken Shamrock’s sister”, Ryan. Road Dogg, the champion, is not.  Should have been Billy Gunn in this spot. Fucking Russo booking.
• I never was a Ryan Shamrock fan.
• Four corner rules apply. Two in at a time, anyone can tag anyone else. Get beat, get gone. Last man remaining wins. This was before they figured out a fatal-four-way-everyone-in-at-once would be way more effective.
• And of course it degenerates into a fatal-four-way-everyone-in-at-once match.
• Ken Shamrock proving once again he’s not the sharpest knife in the drawer by making it back at 10.5. Idiot. Venis also gets counted out but at least he earned his countout. He got his ass whooped.
• And Road Dogg wins less than a minute later. To quote Justin Henry from the Camel Clutch Blog, this match had “soap opera opportunites up the wazoo and they made it a slow paced 1 on 1 encounter”.
• Ryan with some awful, awful acting.
• And as it turns out, Big Show fits in a police car.
• Kane vs. Pete Rose: round 2. Second verse, same as the first. That’s the best part of this segment, as the match that follows…
• Triple H vs. Kane is slow and plodding. Neither was in their prime yet.
• Oh, this was the “Chyna’s eye put out by a fireball” match.
• Yeah, this crowd is not engaged. Can’t blame them.
• A wild Robo-Chyna appears.
• And Robo-Chyna nails Kane. Triple H gets disqualified. That’s two disqualifications, a countout, a knockout, and a title changing hands without the champion losing if you’re scoring at home. No. Do not like. At all.
• Show’s half over, still four matches to go.
• I heart Sable 1998.
• This, however, is Sable 1999. She’s “defending” the WWF Womens Championship against Tori. It’s gonna suck, ya’ll.
• Tori in a catsuit coming out to no reaction whatsoever.
• This, by the way, is the Trish Stratus-Mickie James angle done wrong. They would get it right seven years later.
• It should be worth pointing out that Tori was a pretty competent wrestler on the indie circuit prior to her WWF run.
• Sable’s in-ring skills have improved over the past year. Really, Cole?
• I’m trying to say nice things about this match, but the list of nice things about this match start and end with Sable’s outfit.
• Fuck me, there’s a ref bump in this match too.
• And Nicole Bass.
• Five more minutes of my life I’ll never get back.
• Shane McMahon: champion of Europe. It grinds my gears but he was the most credible McMahon champion of all the ones that held a belt until Triple H post-marriage.
• I always digged the custom shirts Shane had for his bouts.
• I also digged that they booked X-Pac like an underdog here. He’s fighting like seven or eight guys here not named Shane McMahon.
• Seriously though, they overbooked the hell out of this match.
• And the swerve I still hate to this day: not even 30 minutes after DX reunites, they break up. Triple H with the Pedigree to X-Pac, and that’s a wrap. Fuck Russo booking.
• Big Bossman gets the jobber entrance for the first Hell in a Cell match in Wrestlemania history. How bad is this Hell in a Cell? Well, there were two HIAC matches between the first one in October 1997 and this one that were on RAW. They made the compilation. This one did not.
• And Satanic cult leader Undertaker looks awesome. That’s the only redeeming quality of the next fifteen minutes or so.
• I know I have to be positive, so I’ll do that by doing this: I’m skipping this match. You should too.
• Seriously though, this match can go die in a fire.
• JIM ROSS! JIM ROSS! JIM ROSS! JIM ROSS! Fuck. Yes. Hit the bricks, Cole, you are out.
• Vince Mcmahon, clearly not in his best referee shirt.
• Shawn Michaels, clearly not dressed for Philadelphia weather. After the travesty that was Hell in a Cell, the crowd is engaged again.
• Ok, this promo’s going a bit long. This probably could have been done in about three minutes: McMahon’s out, Mike Chioda gets to referee. Where was Earl Hebner?
• The Rock, your WWF Champion, is out first.
• Vestless Stone Cold.
• And they’re throwing hands. I love that.  
• Chioda playing referee and security. Hope he got double pay.
• They’ve spent a lot more time outside the ring than inside at about four minutes in.
• Backdrop on to the lights. That sucked.
• This is a main event fight, and good on Austin and Rock treating it as such.
• The logo be swaying a little too much there. Just saying.
• About six minutes in, and they’ve pretty much gone around the whole arena floor.
• About eight minutes in, they finally get back in the ring. First move is the Rock Bottom. Damn.
• Goddamn, Chioda got killed dead with that chairshot. Get a hand up, man.
• Hey look! Psychology appears. Rock working on Austin’s knee. Here’s what happens when you get a couple guys that know what they’re doing and great chemistry with one another.
• A wild Tim White appears.
• It’s about eleven or twelve minutes and we finally get a resthold. Been that intense of a match.
• Rock Bottom to Tim White.
• Oh, hey. There’s Earl Hebner. Five seconds too late.
• A wild Vince McMahon appears. We’re getting dangerously close to overbooking territory.
• McMahon KOs Hebner.
• A wild Mick Foley appears. Referee #4. (#5 if you count Vince.)
• Austin nearly okeydoked Rock with a rollup.
• Rocky bricks the Corporate Elbow.
• Austin with the Stunner. Mankind counts 3. AUSTIN WINS! AUSTIN WINS! AUSTIN WINS! I approve of this main event. After what Philly’s been served with throughout the night, they deserved a sweet ending.
• Austin pulling Hebner in like, “we’re gonna celebrate until the wheels fall off.”
• Austin stuns McMahon. I love. LOVE.

For all the faults Wrestlemania XV had, it didn’t hurt WWF’s momentum against WCW a bit. In fact, WCW was going through one of their many periods of consistent incompetence at the time of Wrestlemania XV. So is it one of the worst PPVs ever? Yeah. But in this pile of garbage is the first major match of one of wrestling’s greatest trilogies: Austin-Rock. That match alone is worth your time. The rest: probably not so much.