It's been awhile since I've done one of these, but I'm finally back for a WCW PPV!! I'm still going to be pumping these out with a little less frequency until I'm able to get a little further ahead in my actual EWR game (haven't played in a few weeks, though I'm currently at the end of May 2001). My hope is, now that New Japan's Best Of The Super Juniors tournament is over, I can get back into playing the game and getting further ahead, so that I'm not waiting on myself to get further along before making a post.
So we've now officially entered 2001. Booker T comes into the new year as the WCW World Heavyweight Champion after an emotional title victory at
Starrcade. However, The Radicalz are still very much a threat, and one of the group's lead members, Chris Benoit, would end up getting another chance to take back the top title in WCW after scoring a big win over Diamond Dallas Page on the New Year's Day edition of
Nitro. If you're recall, the Four-Way Elimination Match at
Starrcade came down to the longtime rivals of Benoit and Booker T, but this time, it'll be a straight one-on-one encounter. Will Booker T be successful in his first major PPV title defense, or will Benoit bring the title back to The Radicalz?
Elsewhere on the card, we've got a number of notable title bouts. After coming up short in the main event of
Starrcade, Rob Van Dam decided to set his sights on the ECW World Heavyweight Title, which is a title he was never able to capture while ECW was in operation. If he wants to do that, however, he'll have to go through Rhino. Chris Jericho's NWA World Heavyweight Title is also up for grabs, as he defends against a pair of former NWA World Heavyweight Champions in the form of Ric Flair and Sting. Of course, Flair and Sting won the ECW World Tag Team Titles from The Thrillseekers at
Starrcade, so it only makes sense that they'd be next in line to challenge for the Ten Pounds Of Gold. Then, we've got the WCW United States Title on the line, as Owen Hart defends against Kurt Angle in a Submission Match. Yet another instance of a match on this show coming about based on what happened at
Starrcade. Owen Hart won the title from Angle, and now they're having a rematch with a stipulation attached. Pretty self explanatory there. The final title bout on the card would see Edge and Christian defend their newly-won WCW World Tag Team Titles against The Outsiders. No real backstory to this one, as The Outsiders issued a challenge that Edge and Christian accepted.
The rest of the card was just filled out with what I thought were interesting matches. Mick Foley and Terry Funk have been having issues since Funk came back to WCW (which was after Foley turned heel and joined The Radicalz), and they're going to be looking to resolve things in a Texas Death Match, which I'm sure will get pretty violent with those two. Another bout between The Radicalz and WCW on this card was Eddie Guerrero vs. Bret Hart, which is a dream singles match in some respects. This is a bout that mainly came together after the two of them were tag team partners of Foley and Funk respectively on the aforementioned January 1st
Nitro. The opening match is just playing off the aftermath of the Triangle Ladder Match at
Starrcade, with Amy Dumas and Spike Dudley getting added to the mix. I know that The Dudley Boyz already had the Duchess of Dudleyville aka Stacy Keibler in their corner, and she could've been in this match, but for what I'm planning with The Dudley Boyz (I'll get to that later), Spike being in the match makes more sense.
Finally, the last match to round out the card sees former rivals Goldberg and Mike Awesome team up to take on Buff Bagwell and Lex Luger, aka Totally Buffed. Much like the Six-Person Tag, this bout came together as a result of what happened at
Starrcade, when Scott Steiner fell to Goldberg in a Steel Cage. Bagwell and Luger are part of The Magnificent Eight, so that feud with Goldberg would carry over into the new year.
In terms of title changes, I have a couple to make note of. The big one involves the WCW World Television Title, as Kevin Nash captured the title from Andrew Martin on the New Year's Day
Nitro. A title that saw a number of switches was the WCW Hardcore Title (no real surprise there). The Giant defeated Sabu on the December 21st
Thunder, but then he lost it two weeks later to Fit Finlay in a Triple Threat Match on the January 4th
Thunder that also involved La Parka. That title reign for Finlay didn't last very long either, as he would lost to the title to Bam Bam Bigelow in a Three-Way Match on the January 13th edition of
Saturday Night that also involved Tracy Smothers.
With all of that out of the way, let's dive into the PPV (credit to whoever made the logo shown at the top of the post)!!
WCW
Souled Out 2001January 14th, 2001 - Conseco Fieldhouse - Indianapolis, Indiana
1.) Six-Person Tag - Team Xtreme (WCW Women's Champion Amy Dumas & The Hardy Boyz) def. The Dudley Boyz (Bubba Ray Dudley, D-Von Dudley, & Spike Dudley with The Duchess of Dudleyville)
2.) Eddie Guerrero def. Bret Hart
3.) Texas Death Match - Mick Foley def. Terry Funk
4.) Goldberg & Mike Awesome def. Totally Buffed (Buff Bagwell & Lex Luger with Elizabeth)
5.) WCW United States Title - Submission Match - Owen Hart (c) def. Kurt Angle
6.) NWA World Heavyweight Title - Triple Threat Match - Chris Jericho (c) def. ECW World Tag Team Champion Ric Flair & ECW World Tag Team Champion Sting
7.) WCW World Tag Team Titles - Edge & Christian (with Trish Stratus) (c) def. The Outsiders (WCW World TV Champion Kevin Nash & Scott Hall with Sable)
8.) ECW World Title - Rob Van Dam def. Rhino (c)
9.) WCW World Heavyweight Title - Booker T (c) def. Chris Benoit
For
Souled Out 2001, I got an overall score of
80%. That's down significantly from
Starrcade 2000 (which got a 91% score), but for the first PPV of the new year, that's not a bad score. In what was a little bit of a surprise, Match Of The Night honors went to Edge and Christian vs. The Outsiders for the WCW World Tag Team Titles, which got a score of
88%. Just behind that was Owen Hart vs. Kurt Angle in a Submission Match for the WCW United States Title, which earned a
84% score. Two bouts (Bret Hart vs. Eddie Guerrero and Chris Jericho vs. Ric Flair vs. Sting for the NWA World Heavyweight Title) wound up with a score of
82%, while Rhino vs. Rob Van Dam for the ECW World Heavyweight Title finished with an
81% score. So five matches total ended up north of 80% which, again, isn't bad by any means. Booker T vs. Chris Benoit for the WCW World Heavyweight Title earned a
79% score, while two matches (Team Xtreme vs. The Dudley Boyz and Mick Foley vs. Terry Funk in a Texas Death Match) got a
75% score. Finally, the worst match of the night was (not surprisingly) Goldberg and Mike Awesome vs. Totally Buffed, which wound up with a
72% score which, for the worst match of the night, isn't horrible either.
As a whole, I'm happy with how the card turned out, though I wish some of the matches scored a little higher. When I'm putting together these PPVs, I feel like I have a habit of trying to cram as many people onto the show as I can, and that results in a number of multi-person tags (which aren't a bad thing, necessarily) or a number of three-ways or four-ways. In this particular instance, I kept things pretty simple, and just left people off the card if I didn't have room for them. Five singles matches, one three-way, and a couple of tags, so not too shabby. In terms of other happens, I want to go back to what I teased earlier regarding The Dudley Boyz. Their loss to Team Xtreme here set Bubba Ray and D-Von off, and later in the night, they attacked both Edge and Christian as well as The Outsiders after their bout for the WCW World Tag Team Titles. This would be their official heel turn, and it wouldn't be long before they would join The Radicalz, but more on that in a future post.
That's all for Souled Out 2001! It's shaping up to be an exciting year for WCW, and I can't wait to go through all of it. Up next is the debut of a brand new PPV name....
Bound For Glory. As a bit of a teaser, it's a show that's going to feature a few talents from a certain promotion that's famous for having a green ring.
