If You Don't Flex With Lex I Don't Fuck With You | WCW Monday Nitro 8/4/97
LEX LUGER. HULK HOGAN. THE GREATEST NIGHT IN THE HISTORY OF OUR SPORT.
I grew up in suburban Detroit (Dearborn, to be specific, an ROH B-town), and there was nothing in the world that I wanted more than to go to this episode of Monday Nitro. I was nine, though, and school wasn't out for the summer yet, so alas and alack, my first live wrestling show would have to wait a few months, when Sting and Hollywood Hogan would collide in a steel cage. School night or not, I watched this one live — Monday was a work night for my mom, I had a small CRT in my bedroom, and had no idea what havoc staying up for a three hour long wrestling show would wreak on my still-developing brain.
It was worth it. The moment this episode of Nitro is booked around is one of the greatest in the history of wrestling, a white-hot title match between Lex Luger and Hulk Hogan in which the impossible happens and the nWo crumbles before the purple and gold of WCW. It's the first moment like it that I saw live, and it's still one of the best. It informs so much of my worldview when it comes to the great sport of professional wrestling, and it's been one of the great pleasures of my life as a critic to see so many people come around on Lex Luger, partially because of this match. There are twelve other matches on this episode of Nitro, and some of them are pretty fucking good!
Colette Arrand
UP NEXT: I'm gonna spoil what happens behind the paywall and tell you that not only is there a new #1 on the MASTERLIST, but that Hogan/Luger is the first **** match of the project, 187 matches deep. My first thought, of course, was whether or not I could find another **** match so quickly, and I have one hell of a candidate: let's pop over to 6/26/00 for episode 249 of Nitro, featuring "Hacksaw" Jim Duggan vs. Goldberg.