Arn Anderson Abhors Jiggly Pecs | WCW Monday Nitro 8/19/96
Lord Steven Regal and Dean Malenko threaten to break the four star barrier. Arn Anderson and Sting lead a five star segment.
In the summer of 1996, WCW was on its heels. Hulk Hogan had just betrayed them at Bash at the Beach, joining up with Kevin Nash and Scott Hall to form the nWo. At Road Wild, Hogan regained the WCW World Heavyweight Championship from The Giant. The nWo doesn’t make B-cities like Huntsville Alabama, but their presence is felt regardless, as WCW is fractured and paranoid, blaming each other for their failures and trying to regroup. That affects two billed matches from this edition of WCW Monday Nitro, as neither Ric Flair & Arn Anderson vs. Sting and Lex Luger nor Randy Savage vs. The Giant take place as scheduled.
That’s a bummer, I guess, except that it’s still good wrestling — four long-time rivals find common cause to unite while two big pieces of Team WCW find each other at cross-purposes, setting the table for a Fall Brawl PPV whose fallout was felt as recently as 2024, when Sting retired at AEW revolution having never returned to the “Surfer” Sting colorways of the first decade of his career. Besides that, everything else on the show, even red flag matches like Jim Duggan vs. VK Wallstreet and Public Enemy vs. Nasty Boys, passes by breezily enough. It’s a good episode of Nitro, one that got me curious about Mike Rotundo’s run in All Japan Pro Wrestling, therefore, behold, this week’s WCW Monday Nitro Masterlist Xtra will be: Mike Rotundo & “Dr. Death” Steve Williams vs. Toshiaki Kawada & Masanobu Fuchi. Freak shit. End-of-a-wrestling-promotion type shit. Can't wait.
UP NEXT: The 288-sided die sends us to a 1999 where we’re in the wake of the Finger Poke of Doom — it’s February 1, 1999, episode #177 of WCW Monday Nitro, featuring the WCW MONDAY NITRO MASTERLIST debut of the greatest wrestler of all time, The Sandman Hardcore Hak, the very highly-regarded 1999 WCW Tag Team Championship tournament, Scott Steiner vs. Chris Jericho, and a double booked Chris Benoit wrestling Scott Hall in the main event. Could be good! Could be great! Could be World Championship Wrestling!
Colette Arrand