1 4 my homies, RSPW chums The Cubs Fan and Todd Gerth, for giving the 411 on the Jung Dragons. I'd asked last week on the origins of the two new kids. It is agreed that Yang is a Power Plant grad, Jamie Howard, the white guy in the mask, might be a student from the Malenko school, but if not, would be a Power Plant grad also and no relation to Ultimo Dragon's Toryumon.

OK, on to this week's show!

In an interview with WCW.com, Vince Russo said of the upcoming April 10th Nitro, "You're probably going to see the best Nitro that you've seen in a year. (fill in your own joke) It will turn the company upside down and it will also make a statement that Nitro is getting back in the game." He then went on to say "Thunder will continue to suck as usual." Oh well, can't win them all.

Caught somewhere on tape (Astro Dome, Houston, Texas 3-27 '00) it's the last ever WCW Thunder! Next week will be a 10-minute special, the Best of Thunder! and the week after will see the debut of the Bischoff & Russo Wednesday Night Variety Hour. I can hardly wait!

Hey, if the company gets turned upside down like Russo says, will that make "Bad" Barry Horowitz World champ and Hogan a Worldwide jobber to US Champ Villiano IV?

OPENING MATCH (aka the Beginning of the End) - CHRIS CANDIDO vs. CHAVO GUERRERO, JR. A rematch from last week. Before I can even settle into play by play Mike Modest is out and the sports entertainment screwjob is on. Three years ago people complained that the cruisers had the best matches and no spotlight. I told everyone who would listen not to worry about it because in American wrestling, if you put the spotlight on it, the clean matches would disappear and the matches would no longer be any good. Lo and behold. Who wants to see Eddy and Rey wrestle for 20 minutes? I want my cruiser division to be a 40 year old woman whose breasts are bigger than her head wrestling a fat booker who's a parody of the other company's announcer! It's all about sports entertainment!

Ref bump lets Prince attack Candido, Modest hits his finisher on Chavo, Candido hits the headbutt and gets the pin on Chavo. Whee. O01nly thing worthwhile in this mess is Chavo's postmatch plancha on Modest and Candido. Tenay says 'the cruiserweight division remains so competitive' but I'm sure he meant to say 'so repetitive.'

WINNER OF THE MATCH: Chris Candido (about 2 minutes) ~?~?~?

I can't help wondering: If Eric B. and Vince R. (referred to from here out as Vinic Russchoff) are going to call "do over" and dump 95% of the current angles and start booking from scratch in April, why should we even bother with this show? Opps, I probably shouldn't ask that at the start of the report.

Clips from Nitro a few nights ago are played for no reason since all of this will be thrown out the window.

In the first of way too many annoying clips, an off camera voice asks wrestlers what they think about Russchoff. Dustin is first doing an Al Snow bit, talking to a statue of a horse. The crap's begun already. (no points for anyone saying 'The crap's being going on for years.) -break-

So who else thinks that the April 10th Nitro will open with Russchoff waking up and the whole last two years being just a dream? Hogan and Nash are still pals in the nWo, Sting is still in the rafters, RAW still gets ratings in the 2s...

The Jung Dragons and Los Fabulosos are interviewed about Russchoff. They say 'We just got fired since no one in America wants to watch Japanese or Mexicans.' In truth it was Kidman kissing up to Russchoff.

WCW celebs and Backstreet Boys had a charity basketball game. 10,000 people showed up. 9,999 of them were fans of Backstreet Boys. I'm sure there's a good joke about who that other 1 person was, but I'm not in the mood tonight.

TV TITLE MATCH - HACKSAW JIM DUGGAN vs. BARBARIAN - Oh good lord. USA USA USA HOOOOOO. Does anything else in this match matter? Of course not. Very Old Glory kneedrop.

WINNER OF THE MATCH AND STILL WCW TV CHAMP: Jim Duggan (about 4) ~?~?~?~?

Some chick I probably should recognize talks about Russchoff. Kinda looked like Sexton in a way. -break-

Smiley talks about Russchoff saying the same thing everyone else does. They should have these segments every week. Next time have the question be 'How do you feel about pretty flowers?' or 'Aren't kittens playing with balls of yarn just adorable?'

DUSTIN RHODES vs. MIKE JONES (w/ the Cat) - I think Russchoff is deliberately making this show suck as much as it is possible to suck just so ANYTHING they put on in two weeks will be an improvement. Miller was on the mic and he was supposed to be the one wrestling but he let the backup dancer Mr. Jones take the match. Miller says "ass" a couple of times. You can't say "ass" on TBS! Where's Standards and Practices? Dustin beats up Jones, Terry Funk comes in to hit a chair shot on Dustin for the DQ.

WINNER OF THE MATCH BY DQ: Mike Jones (about 1) ~?~?~?1/2

Tank gives his opinion of Russchoff. He says 'This time next month I'll be world champ! Yipee!' -break-

Curt Hennig earlier today said it'll be a thumbs up year for him which is probably a clue that he's going to be stuck in a stupid gimmick of being a match reviewer in a ripoff of Siskel & Ebert.

3 COUNT (w/o green circles) vs. LOS FABULOSOS (w/ Miss Hancock) - Shannon Moore has his hair in ponytails ala Lenny Lane. If you ain't down with the 3 you just don't count. So says Helms. They do the out of sync thing, then out comes Hancock to do the intro of her team. El Dandy and Silver Kings outfits have been redone a bit. Evan hits on Hancock to no success. There was a decent spot or two here but this match sucked. El Dandy Magistral and we're done. Next.

WINNERS OF THE MATCH: Los Fabulosos (El Dandy pins Moore in about 2) ~!1/4

Chavo on the return of Russchoff 'Never mind about that, would you be interested in seeing some product catalogues? It's all fine quality merchandise.' -break-

Ernest Miller does the interview thing. He hopes that he and Glacier can get back to the whole mystic sacred helmet Blood Runs Cold stuff.

DISCO INFERNO vs. TANK ABBOTT - Disco is a real good guy, you know. Disco does some mic work to explain he's got the tag title match on the way but the Paisans aren't buying it. They are going to be Disco's manager and got him the match against Tank. Disco plays dead when Abbott shows up. "Scoop" Tenay only takes half a minute to get that Disco is faking. KO punch.

WINNER OF THE MATCH: Tank Abbott (under 1) ~?~?~?1/2

Anyone want to bet the April 10th Nitro main event will be a battle royal for the world title and Tank will win it?

Does anyone care about how Big Ron feels about Russchoff? Didn't think so. -break-

J Biggs talks about Russchoff. I don't care. You shouldn't either.

US TITLE MATCH - JEFF JARRETT vs. JUST PLAIN BOOKER - Jarrett gets to say he'd rather look at a dog's ass than the people in Texas. You can't say dog's ass on TBS! Sign in the crowd says "Slappiness is a warm guitar." Meanwhile I gently weep. Girls get to stay out again tonight. If you don't know how this match will turn out you've just not being paying attention. I should do play by play for this but why start now? It's not a minute before the Harrises are out. They actually let the match go another four minutes before the DQ is caused by the tag champs' interference. Somewhere in this match Tenay complains about Booker not getting a fair deal and Heenan replies 'Who cares about Booker' summing up years of WCW booking philosophy in one four word sentence.

LOSER OF THE MATCH AND STILL WCW US CHAMP: Jeff Jarrett (about 5) ~!/34

What does Stacy think about Russchoff? 'Oh gross me out to the max, I think he's an awful, wicked man who should be burned at the stake. Like, you know?' -break-

Hacksaw Jim Duggan, asked about Russchoff, puts himself over. MY GOD there's another FORTY minutes in this show.

MAMALUKES vs. HARLEM HEAT 2000 - Supposedly Disco has had the winner of this match set to be #1 contender to the tag belts. Paisans have tried to play face all night but it's not working in Tejas. Guess Italian Mafia types aren't over in the Lone Star State. Good news is Ahmed doesn't maim or injure anyone in this match. Bad news is that the match isn't very good. They kill a few minutes and then Stevie Ray with the blackjack in plain view of the ref.

WINNERS OF THE MATCH BY DQ: Mamalukes (under 4) ~?

Vampiro is asked about Russchoff. He says 'Jerry Only and the Misfits suck.' Actually he says the same thing everyone else has except he's thoughtful enough to mention in Terry Taylor and thoughtless enough to mention Ed Ferrera. -break-

If you're hoping I do some joke about WCW Motorsports in regards to the Big WCW Reset, you're outta luck.

Shannon Moore asked about Russchoff. He's too busy and needs to make a long distance collect call and he refuses to use 1-800-COLLECT! Good for him!

Before I forget, I wanted to make a personal comment. Schiavone said on Nitro this week 'Eric uses women one way and Vince uses women another way.' It's wrong to "use" women in any fashion. Where I come from, you don't "use" women. You treat them with dignity and respect. So just keep that in mind Russchoff. Thanks for letting me get that off my chest.

BILLY KIDMAN (w/ Torrie) vs HEAVY RON(w/ BIG D) - Speaking of chests, is Torrie Wilson racked or what? Yowza! Talk about fan service! After a bit of back and forth, the two Harii H-Bomb Kidman and Tenay does a lame JRism about 'the damn nWo damn them!'

WINNER OF THE MATCH BY DQ: Kidman (under 4) ~!.

I guess that's Helms talking about Russchoff. I know you're tired of seeing me talk about Russchoff. Well I'm being just as annoying about it here as they had it in the show. -break-

Mamaluke Johnny says Bischoff was burned out when he left and Russo already made his point when he left so it's good they are back. Somehow I don't think that came out the way he intended.

HARDCORE TITLE MATCH - THE DOG vs. BRIAN KNOBBS - If you guessed I was going to give play by play for this match a miss, give yourself a cookie.

WINNER OF THE MATCH AND STILL HARDCORE CHAMP: Brain Knobbs (about 4) ~?~?~?~?1/2

You just know Russo's going to keep the Dog around in the new WCW.

Buff Bagwell pisses off thousands of internet fans by saying that Bischoff will push the young guys and not the old guys when he comes back. -break-

Hey, Brian Knobbs goes to head of the class. When asked about Russchoff he says ask me in a couple of weeks. He really does use his head!

BUFF BAGWELL vs. LA PARKA - LaParka wears his gold bone outfit. He takes the mic because it's the logical thing to do after the last two times got him beat up so bad. Anyone remember Bagwell's first match under Russo? If you're lucky you've put it completely out of mind, or even better, wasn't watching in the first place. The Voice runs down Buff while LaParka produces a sign that says "I'm sorry / I 'm not really saying this." Buff accepts LaParka's explanation. And no hard feelings about last time we wrestled. The two shake hands, embrace, La Parka raises Buff's hand AND SUCKER PUNCHES BAGWELL~! That's why LaParka is the coolest. LAPARKA STRUT~! But it rather goes downhill from there. Spot of the match is La Parka's standing enzuigiri and not his springboard moonsault attempt. Blockbuster gets the pin.

WINNER OF THE MATCH: Buff Bagwell (just over 3) ~!3/4

Ric Flair can't talk about Russchoff in 10 seconds, he'll do 10 minutes on Nitro. -break-

Maybe I should be calling them Rischoff instead of Russchoff, it's kind of got a better ring to it. What do you, the readers, think?

Hey, we come back from commercial and they ask Kevin Sullivan what he thinks about Russchoff! Cool! There *is* a payoff to this whole thing! 'What do I think? I think they're a pair of fuc-' and then some naughty stuff is muted and Sullivan trashes the place and beats up the cameraman.

Ok, that didn't really happen.

THE MAIN EVENT (aka The End of the End) - Vampiro vs the Wall - Too much horror business tonight. New gimmick for Vampiro: He sees dead people. Or even better, dead people see him! Finish sees the Wall setting up a table, Vamp hits a chairshot, Wall falls through the table he set up. Bell rings and the match is done. Wall gets up and he and Vampiro fight some more and the fans are totally unimpressed.

WINNER OF THE MAIN EVENT: No contest (a little over 3) ~!1/4

No need to dwell on anything shown here. Forget it, put it out of your mind, we're going to start all over in 10 days. Next week: No rest for the recapper! A report on the Best of Thunder and a special preview of the WCW2000!