What are your thoughts on Bret/HBK Ironman?

[strummer 0]

Meltzer made a post at the WC board where he said that while waiting in line in Anaheim to get into the show, everybody was talking about the return of the Warrior and no one was mentioning Bret or Shawn at all. It was definitely an Entertainment first/wrestling second crowd that night.

[JoeDirt 0]

Meltzer made a post at the WC board where he said that while waiting in line in Anaheim to get into the show, everybody was talking about the return of the Warrior and no one was mentioning Bret or Shawn at all. It was definitely an Entertainment first/wrestling second crowd that night.

I don't think the average pro wrestling fan cares about wrestling as much as they do entertainment. Though you think Wrestlemania would be where all the hardcore wrestling marks would show up, especially with an ironman match between two smark darlings.

[Hunter's Torn Quad 0]

Meltzer made a post at the WC board where he said that while waiting in line in Anaheim to get into the show, everybody was talking about the return of the Warrior and no one was mentioning Bret or Shawn at all.  It was definitely an Entertainment first/wrestling second crowd that night.

Though you think Wrestlemania would be where all the hardcore wrestling marks would show up, especially with an ironman match between two smark darlings.

The hardcore fans were all jammed in the first few rows, and they were into it.

[Guest Shadow]

From live reports, fans started getting restless about 6 minutes in, but those fans were way at the back. It appears that as the match went on, and with no falls taken, more and more fans realised that there would be no falls at all, and at about the half way mark is when people started leaving. I think a couple of falls in the body of the match would have helped the crowd heat a little, but I think the crowd itself just weren't interested in a 60 minute technical match. They popped huge for the return of the Ultimate Warrior, but the moment the bell rang for his match there was silence. It seemed to be crowd there more for the entertainment than the wrestling.

Something that Vince is aware of now since it's going to be pretty much the same crowd Considering how amazingly entertainmenty WMXXI has been promoted and set.

 

Ironically; in that "make it entertainment heavy", they made what might be the best work rate card since 17.

 

I would say among the casual fans; there is more of a buzz for the Pipers Pit segment; when the rey/eddy and for the most part; angle/shawn match has the attention of the IWC.

[strummer 0]

in regards to Mania this year, a lot of the casual fans I know, some who are on the net and some who are not not, the thing they are talking about the most is Austin on Piper's Pit.

[Guest Shadow]

Precisely and in all honestly for the company thats better then using that 20-25 minute spot on Austin/Piper then it would be on a meaningless tag title/us title match. I dont like it but it's the right thing to do because it would change or mean a thing if they do those matches anyway.

 

However; I really hope they use the austin/piper segment to put somebody over. Like Hassan. If Hassan were to do a "this is the man america worships" spiel on Austin it would be fantastic. I'd have Piper "turn" on Austin and help the beatdown and out comes Hogan who runs off Hassan and Piper. Austin and Hogan have a beer bath.

 

what does it accomplish? something the marks will eat up with a spoon.

 

sry to get off topic.

 

My thoughts on this match is this

 

Criminally over-rated by people who buy into the WWE machine hype. I still honestly believe not announcing a ironman stipulation and going 61 minutes would have been better and met with less apathy.

 

Sure some would know it would be a long match due to the limited card but would anybody assume it'd go 60 minutes? no.

 

I will always argue that Iron-Man matches are the most FLAWED gimmick match ever. The fans know that the first 50 minutes mean nothing because they dont have to pay attention til that point and know the match wont be "over" at that point anyways and some fans are afriad of knowing that a match can go that long.

 

It's better to go broadway then to do a Iron-Man.

[4hartthreat 0]

Can someone please explain to me how the match would be better if it wasn't an ironman match. I can see and argument for more falls, although I don't agree with it. But saying that the match was fine as a normal match but sucked as an ironman match makes absolutelty no sense to me. You either think a match is good or you don't, saying the exact same match classified as another type match would have made it good is just stupid.

[Guest MikeSC]

How anybody can call a match good because they have to JUSTIFY resting aplenty is beyond me.

 

Rock v HHH, Benoit v HHH, and Angle v Lesnar were all significantly better matches than the snoozefest at WM XII.

-=Mike

[godthedog 0]

i don't find the resthold segments boring, really. the last third or so actually gets frustrating for me, as shawn is pretty clearly winded and bret has to basically kill time till his big comeback, and he starts blanking out (doing a lot of stuff in the corner and using a camel clutch twice, IIRC). and when shawn DOES get to his comeback, it's just 2 minutes straight of big moves, done in slow motion cause he's so winded. there should've been more back-and-forth, especially towards the end to make the desperation more clear and up the tension.

 

a regular match that ends up going 30+ minutes can create just as epic a feeling, and in retrospect that's what they should've done. in the end, there's only so much you can do with an iron man match. when done properly you DO get a pretty unreal tension for the last 2 minutes or so as the clock is wearing down, cause they fucking EARNED that tension, but you sacrifice the suspense that a match can end at any time. after you pass the 20-minute mark or so, you can still really play up fatigue and add a lot of tension to it, cause the fans can reasonably expect it to end with the next big near-fall. that gives you a lot more to work with than the iron man format.

[Guest LooneyTune]

The problem also was, with 0-0, even I as a young mark knew it was gonig into overtime. There was no suspension of disbelief there, and when Hart got Shawn in the Sharpshooter for the last minute, I knew Shawn was winning the title (guessing), and was going "pfft... he's winning, so he'll survive it."

 

Going 0-0 for 59 minutes is too unrealistic in 1996 WWF (or any WWF post 1979). They should've at least had it 1-1 or maybe 1-0 and have Hart win the last minute fall to go into overtime, but decided on 0-0.

 

At least for Angle/Brock, the 5-4 window was open for a tie when Angle applied an ankle lock, or the 4-4 tie for Benoit/HHH until the last minute when both men had dropped falls left and right for the last half hour, and Rock/HHH was doing the same. This had none of that.

[Scroby 0]

However; I really hope they use the austin/piper segment to put somebody over. Like Hassan. If Hassan were to do a "this is the man america worships" spiel on Austin it would be fantastic. I'd have Piper "turn" on Austin and help the beatdown and out comes Hogan who runs off Hassan and Piper. Austin and Hogan have a beer bath.

 

Sorry to turn the subject but yeah, I gotta make a few points on this.....

 

1. Piper turning on Austin in favor for Hassan would be stupid and pointless since Hassan already had a major, plus it would make no sense. Unless they run some stupid jealously angle with Piper saying he didn't like the fact Austin was getting more press than Piper.

 

2. 2 minutes into the "beer bash" Austin would stun Hogan so it'd be pointless, then again Austin has to stun everyone he ever comes across, so don't be surprised if it happens to Piper.

 

 

Ok now on to the ironman match, wrestling wise it was boring since Bret and Shawn paced themselves trading holds for really the first 30 minutes. Story telling wise, the match was done very nicely. The whole story going into this other than the fact Bret and Shawn hated each other with a passion was the fact both men had to prepare themselves mentally and train themselves hard for the match. So we saw all these clips of both guys working out, running up stairs, running up hills, etc, etc, etc... So we come to the match, if both guys started going into the match balls out or having to do a lot of spots, basically the match would have sucked. The whole rest hold part of the match was to tell that each guy was trying to wear the other down for the match. Psycology wise, thats how the match should have been done, it should have been rest holds from the start for a slow pace and worked its way to a more faster pace as the match went on. Of course to the casual fan, the casual fan will lose interest in the match because not enough ohhh and awwing is happing for the match, but then the match wasn't ment to be this exciting fast pace wrestling match, it should have been a classic slow paced wrestling match.

[Hunter's Torn Quad 0]

Can someone please explain to me how the match would be better if it wasn't an ironman match. I can see and argument for more falls, although I don't agree with it. But saying that the match was fine as a normal match but sucked as an ironman match makes absolutelty no sense to me. You either think a match is good or you don't, saying the exact same match classified as another type match would have made it good is just stupid.

When you bill a match where the most falls in one hour wins, and then have no falls in the hour and no winner in the hour, the fans, rightfully, feel ripped off. If you bill a match at being the most falls in one hour, fans expect there to be falls taking place. Having Bret v Shawn wrestle in an Iron Man match, then having them go the distance with no falls taken is a straight up screwjob on the fans, because they come away feeling ripped off. However, if they had just had Bret and Shawn wrestle to a 60 minute draw, and then gone into sudden death, then fans wouldn't have felt so ripped off, and had a sour taste left their mouth. A 60 minute match with no falls taken when done in the context of a regular match that just happens to go 60 minutes doesn't leave people feeling cheated, whereas a 60 Minute Iron Man match that goes the distance with no falls taken does leave people feeling cheated. Their WM XII match would have been better, and come off better, if they had just had them wrestle a normal match and just go to a 60 minute draw. It would have come off as more of an epic for one, because people wouldn't have seen a 60 minute draw coming, and it would have seemed more special that way. Not only that, Iron Man matches are notoriously hard to get heat for until the last five minutes, because people know the match isn't ending any time soon. It's also why they don't do so well ratings wise when put on tv; fans know the match isn't going to end before the hour is up, so tune in for the first few minutes, and then tune out until the very end.

[Some Guy 0]

I would have booked it with Shawn getting a pin at around the 20 minute mark and Bret evening it up at around the 40 minute mark and had the last twenty be a dogfight over that last fall with the finish being the same (needing two superkicks to beat Bret) done in the final minute of the match. Basically, I would have booked it to be three matches joined together by selling.

 

As it was it was quite boring except for a few highspots that they sprinkled in during the first 40 minutes or so. I'm a huge Bret and HBK mark and I don't like the match very much. In fact it is the only match on Shawn's DVD that I didn't bother to watch because I had already seen it a few times and had no interest in seeing it again.

[Guest Loss]

I think the match would be more fondly remembered if it:

 

(a) happened in the early 1980s

 

and/or

 

(b) didn't have the Ironman stipulation

 

I think the work in the match is excellent, with Shawn Michaels being an especially strong standout, doing things he'd never done before and hasn't done since. I love the hammerlock slam, and the way both Hart and Michaels switch back and forth between the subtle heel role. Had the audience just expected a straight match without any gimmicks that happened to go to a 60-minute draw before going into overtime, I tend to think the audience would have been very into it. It's hard to create suspense when the audience knows when a match is going to end. Then, they can just zone out and zone back in for the finish.

[Guest Loss]

Meltzer made a post at the WC board where he said that while waiting in line in Anaheim to get into the show, everybody was talking about the return of the Warrior and no one was mentioning Bret or Shawn at all.  It was definitely an Entertainment first/wrestling second crowd that night.

I don't think the average pro wrestling fan cares about wrestling as much as they do entertainment. Though you think Wrestlemania would be where all the hardcore wrestling marks would show up, especially with an ironman match between two smark darlings.

I actually tend to think "smart marks" are the only ones who make the distinction between wrestling and the rest of the product, period. A great match is a great match, but I don't think fans are any more or less interested in seeing an awesome match than they are the Rock talking for 30 minutes. They don't think in those terms. They think more in terms of their favorites getting retribution and their least favorites getting what they deserve, through whatever medium that takes.

[Guest Loss]

Can someone please explain to me how the match would be better if it wasn't an ironman match. I can see and argument for more falls, although I don't agree with it. But saying that the match was fine as a normal match but sucked as an ironman match makes absolutelty no sense to me. You either think a match is good or you don't, saying the exact same match classified as another type match would have made it good is just stupid.

Expectation is the creator of disappointment. Fans are typically responsive -- we react to the bill of goods we're being sold. It would have been a better match because the fans wouldn't have been expecting frequent falls, and the match couldn't have been criticized for not doing them.

 

Wrestling is as much about presentation and context as it content.

[Guest NateRizzle]

Worst iron man ever. One hour of rest holds and no selling.

[Hunter's Torn Quad 0]

I have watched this match again for the first time since it aired live, and I made some notes:

 

The first boos come at just shy of seven minutes into the math.

 

Lawler told too many jokes. While a supposedly serious wrestling match was going on, this little pervert was cracking jokes about Stu, Helen and Bret Hart

 

Bret played subtle heel through the match, tending to hit Shawn right at the break, while Shawn played total babyface.

 

Lawler would kill moves dead. When Shawn headscissored Bret through the ropes to the floor where Bret landed in a heap, Lawler totally blew the move off, saying it didn’t hurt Bret at all, and it only frustrated him. Even when they replayed the move, Lawler tried his best to kill the move, not only saying it didn’t hurt Bret at all, but that all of these “high flying” moves don’t really hurt much anyway.

 

Shawn worked on Bret’s left shoulder during the middle portion of the match, and at one point you can hear him ask Bret, “stay on the arm ?”, and what did it lead to ? Nothing. Oh, wait, I take that back. It led to Shawn putting a cross armbreaker on the wrong arm, which he immediately let go of, before applying the move to the arm he actually had been working on.

 

There was a lot of work done on arms and limbs during the match that led nowhere.

 

There were a few “Let’s go Bret”, chants here and there, but no such chants for Shawn.

 

There was a ref bump half way through, but it didn’t lead to anything and served no purpose whatsoever.

 

Around this time, Bret hits a piledriver on Shawn, which Lawler naturally pushes like hell as a fall winner, but Shawn kicks out, which is when the booing gets really loud.

 

For a 60 minute Iron Man match, there were very few pinfall or submission attempts made.

 

The whole match was wrestled like a standard match that was going to a 60 minute draw, rather than in Iron Man match that was going 60 minutes, and it showed glaringly. Neither man really went for any pinfalls or submissions nor did they show anything in terms of struggling when it came to fighting for decisions.

 

Both men were guilty of some really sloppy work, where they would hit a big move, and instead of going for a pin, where the other guy was flat on his back, they’d instead go to a rest hold or go right into the next high spot.

 

Shawn took a really big bump over the top rope, like his one against Jeff Jarrett at IYH 2, and Bret spent a long portion of the match working over both the back and Shawn’s legs as well. This was all well done stuff actually. All of which Shawn promptly no-sold when it came time to make his comeback. No limping, no grimacing, not even a squeal of pain. It was as if the last 15 minutes had never happened.

 

About the 45 minute mark it really started to drag, which wasn’t helped by the aforementioned fact that the match wasn’t wrestled with any real intensity or fire, and both men seemed to be going through the motions of wrestling for 60 minutes as if it was an exhibition. You never got the impression that these two men were fighting over any issue of importance, but rather they were just going out there and doing an exhibition of moves and holds with none of it really meaning anything.

 

All in all, the work itself was ****, but the structure of the match, and the fact that none of the work really led to anything, drags the match as a whole down to **1/2

[Aero 0]

I just watched the match earlier today, and after reading your mini-review, I have to agree with basically everything you said. The biggest flaw, I think, is the lack of pinfall attempts. I may be wrong, but there is less than five in the first half. The crowd is literally ready to get excited for ANYTHING in the first half. Just one instance, Bret tosses him over the top, but HBK skins the cat in and runs at him (with the crowd starting to pop), only for HBK to take him down into a headlock, quieting the crowd. The match definitely would've benefited from being a normal match.

[Guest MikeSC]

Thing is, I put a lot of blame on Bret here. When Shawn was jobbing to Bret, their matches tended to be quite good. When Bret jobbed to Shawn, I thought Bret dogged it. These two used to click, but when Shawn was put over, the match suddenly reeked.

-=Mike

[JoeDirt 0]

Thing is, I put a lot of blame on Bret here. When Shawn was jobbing to Bret, their matches tended to be quite good. When Bret jobbed to Shawn, I thought Bret dogged it. These two used to click, but when Shawn was put over, the match suddenly reeked.

-=Mike

Was there ever a match Bret jobbed other than Summerslam 1992 that he really busted his ass in?

[Guest Shadow]

Owen Hart. WMX.

Bob Backlund. Series 1994.

 

 

just off the top of my head.

[JoeDirt 0]

Owen Hart. WMX.

Bob Backlund. Series 1994.

 

 

just off the top of my head.

Then I guess it was just the fact that he hated Shawn.

[Guest MikeSC]

Owen Hart. WMX.

Bob Backlund. Series 1994.

 

 

just off the top of my head.

Then I guess it was just the fact that he hated Shawn.

And that is an issue. While Shawn didn't job a lot and bitched incessantly when asked to, he didn't often dog it when jobbing (he dragged Sid to a darned good match when he jobbed to him at SSeries).

-=Mike

[Guest Salacious Crumb]

I would blame it more on their unwillingness to lay down for each other and Michaels falling apart as a worker after about the 30 minute mark more than anything.

[Betty Houle 0]

I like that match a lot. Just watched it for the second time ever when I bought the HBK DVD. Probably my favorite Iron Man match (although the Rock-HHH match is very entertaining).

[MillenniumMan831 0]

They wrestled as if their characters were intimidated of wrestling for 60 minutes and wanted to pace themselves and make sure neither made a costly mistake. Made for a dull match, IMO.