Austin/hart, mania 13

[Guest]

It was an I quit match, meaning that the loser had to say "I Quit", not have their hand dropped three times. Shamrock asked Austin if he wanted to quit in the sharpshooter, and he didn't respond, so Ken stopped the match.

 

True enough. But Austin never gave up, so how could one say that Bret won...ah, never mind. I'm just nitpicking.

[Guest godthedog]

I was quite underwhelmed. I've heard great things about this match, but it didn't seem very good to me.

 

Bret didn't sell the Boston Crab at all. And when he grabbed the ropes, Shamrock made Austin break despite it being No-DQ.

 

Most, if not all, punches looked incredibly weak, and the four minutes in the crowd was pretty pointless.

 

Austin did a decent job of selling the injury off and on. Limping one minute, not the next.

 

I didn't get to see the hype leading up to the match, so maybe it was better at the time. Just as a standalone, all but the last few minutes was pretty weak.

 

What'd you guys think?

ok, i just saw the match again, so here's a point-by-point response:

 

actually, bret did sell the boston crab.  the camera doesn't catch it very well, but right after the hold is broken & bret is still lying on the mat in pain, he's grabbing his back.  he doesn't sell it for the rest of the match because he wasn't in the hold for a very long time, & i think it's more realistic to sell it for a short while.

 

i believe the point of having shamrock in the match was so that you could get a break if you reach the ropes.  shamrock couldn't have disqualified austin, but he could've beaten the shit out of him.  same reason why bret stopped beating on austin after the match.

 

i thought the punches looked fine, so we'll have to agree to disagree there.  the 4 minutes of brawling in the crowd was to establish the fact that these 2 men didn't care whether or not they kept it in the ring, they wanted to kill each other.  brawling in the crowd has become commonplace, but in 1997 it was unheard of to start a match with it.  the common match style back then was to start with a lock-up & do a slow build, with a crescendo into an intense finish.  this match didn't really build up the volume, it maintained its war-like intensity right from the start.  again, this is commonplace now, & fans have come to expect a match that starts big, ends big & doesn't have any low points.

 

there's a few seconds, right after hitting bret with a chair, where austin doesn't sell the knee, but right after that he started limping again.  while he had control with the chair, he was pacing around between chairshots, obviously trying to walk it off.  i think he stopped selling it just a little too soon, but again, i think it's more realistic to not sell a body part from start to finish.

 

some other things i noticed about the match:

 

the brawling was off-the-charts for sheer variety.  these guys used the ring post, the railing, a chair, the ring bell, & even wiring.

 

the transitions were flawless.  each time the offense was switched, it was totally believable.  when austin kicks bret in the nuts, it catches me by surprise every time because it's so out-of-nowhere.