The 1992 version of the Great American Bash was dominated by a tag team tournament to crown champions for the newly created NWA tag team championship, a tournament which certainly looks exciting on paper, with teams such as the Fabulous Freebirds, the Miracle Violence Connection and the Dangerous Alliance being involved, alongside several unique pairings. The big match of the night, though, is undeniably Sting vs Vader for the WCW world heavyweight championship.
NWA World Tag Team Title Tournament Quarter Final Match
Flyin’ Brian & Jushin Thunder Liger vs. Nikita Koloff & Ricky Steamboat
It’s worth noting that if you’re only used to watching modern tags, you may find the style of these matches a little jarring, with many of the usual staples and wrestling logic not being present. For example, hot tags may often go nowhere and a wrestler may make the big comeback and choose to not go for the tag. Considering its 1992, there’s an interesting dynamic here with a heavyweight face team going up against a Juniorweight face team. The fan support is largely behind Steamboat and Koloff early on, but they essentially play heels with their power offence, whilst Liger and Pillman (Flyin Brian is Brian Pillman by the way) pull out the flashy fan friendly offence. Momentum shifts often from the get-go and Liger pulls out a moonsault and a tombstone, whilst Pillman breaks out a springboard lariat and a missile dropkick for close falls. Things eventually descend into tag team chaos and in the end, Steamboat pulls out the win for his team after rolling through a cross body from Pillman. This was a fun opener in front of a pumped crowd and a great way to start the event.
NWA World Tag Team Title Tournament Quarter Final Match
Hiroshi Hase & Shinya Hashimoto vs. The Fabulous Freebirds (Jimmy Garvin & Michael Hayes)
Akira Nogami was Hase’s original partner but was replaced by Hashimoto due to injury, which the announcers put over as being something that will throw their opponents game plans off. Put frankly, this match is just awful, mostly due to these two teams having no chemistry when facing each other whatsoever. Everything just comes off as awkward, with random moments of no-selling, and no rhythm or flow apparent at all. The Japanese team control at a slow pace for most of the match, to the sound of U-S-A chants, because its 1992 and foreigners are bad guys (Thank goodness that has changed now, right?). Things descend into chaos near the end following a hot tag from Hayes to Garvin, but Garvin soon runs into a superkick from Hashimoto and a northern lights suplex from Hase and thankfully the match is over.
NWA World Tag Team Title Tournament Quarter Final Match
Barry Windham & Dustin Rhodes vs. The Dangerous Alliance (Rick Rude & Steve Austin) (w/Madusa)
The announcers out over Barry Windhams taped fists as being beneficial to his striking, and Austin sells big for any Windham right hand. The heels soon find themselves in control though, and use typical heel tactics to stay in control. The heel duo work Windham over for a long, long time and a top rope dropkick and piledriver from rude nearly gives his team the win. Finally though, Windham gets the hot tag to Dustin who clears house. Things descend into typical four man chaos, and Austin looks to go for a piledriver on Windham, but Dustin hits a (weak looking) top rope lariat/cross body on Austin for the win. The heels isolation of Windham dragged on for what seemed like forever, but in the end this was descent enough.
NWA World Tag Team Title Tournament Semi Final Match
Nikita Koloff & Ricky Steamboat vs. Miracle Violence Connection (Steve Williams & Terry Gordy)
Williams and Gordy are already the WCW world tag team Champions and look to unify the belts by winning this tournament. It’s an odd situation, since the WCW titles themselves were known as the NWA tag titles not too long before this, the difference between the belts is essentially that WCW/Jim Crockett promotions always owned that version of the belts (even when it was known as the NWA Tag titles) and these new belts are directly owned by the NWA board. The Miracle Violence connection didn’t have to wrestle a quarter final match this evening, since they already won their quarter final match prior to this event, so, in typical heel fashion, they have a huge advantage. They go for an old school technical wrestling style affair, which is commendable, but it never really goes anywhere, and the complete lack of pace just kills it. Things once again descend into tag team chaos, and steamboat is pushed off the top rope into Williams, who catches him and gets the three with a stampede/cradle style manoeuvre. There’s no two ways about it, this was disappointing.
NWA World Tag Team Title Tournament Semi Final Match
Barry Windham & Dustin Rhodes vs. Hiroshi Hase & Shinya Hashimoto
Another slow paced grappling affair, but this time things work out a lot better, with slick counters and some strong style submissions making this a lot more fun to watch. If you’re a fan of the old fashioned, chess match style technical wrestling then your likely enjoy this. There’s just enough striking and big moves, including a spike piledriver from the Hashimoto/Hase team, to keep things moving along nicely. This time it’s Rhodes who has to survive a lot of punishment, and after a missed diving knee from Hase, makes the tag to Windham who clears house and win the match for his team with a lariat on Hase. A decent match and the second best of the night so far, following the opener.
WCW World Heavyweight Title Match
Sting (c) vs. Big Van Vader (w/Harley Race)
This match is pretty much the polar opposite in terms of style to everything else on the card, in that it is much more of a theatrical affair (sports entertainment, if you will). That’s not a plus or a minus against it, but it does make for a nice change of pace. You might expect Sting to play the underdog throughout here, but he brings the fight to the big guy and soon has him reeling from suplexes and closelines. It’s only when Vader counters a victory roll attempt with a standing bonsai drop that we get to Sting being the babyface in peril. Vader hits several big elbow drops and splashes and punishes Sting with his own scorpion deathlock, before Sting comes back with a rolling kick and a DDT. The ref ends up taking a boot to the face when Vader tries to backdrop Sting, but Sting flips out and delivers a German suplex, only getting the two count though, thanks to the delayed count. Sting hits the stinger splash, and then for some dumb reason tries for another on a crouched over Vader, but goes headfirst into the ringpost. I don’t know if Vader was supposed to be standing upright and then move at the last second, but Sting literally just three himself into the ringpost like a complete buffoon. A now bleeding Sting survives a pinfall attempt, but a powerbomb puts him away for the three and we have a new champion! This wasn’t quite what you’d call a classic, but a great match, nonetheless. The only flaw is the finish, which looks even sillier in the post-match replay, with Sting literally taking himself out. Easily match of the night.
NWA World Tag Team Title Tournament Final
Barry Windham & Dustin Rhodes vs. Miracle Violence Connection (Steve Williams & Terry Gordy)
I’ve always loved that the WCW tag titles could feasibly main event of the singles title back in the day, but this has no business main eventing over Sting/Vader and the crowd shows minimal interest here. This match also isn’t helped by the fact that both teams have already wrestled tonight, with this being Windham and Rhodes’s third match. The result is a match that feels very much dead in the water from the get-go. That said, Williams and Gordy do show off some great tag team psychology: isolating their opposition, using lots of quick tags and preventing their opposition from tagging in. All very basic stuff of course, but they do it better than anyone. The babyface’s meanwhile, seem a little foolish at times, each trying to take on everyone on single handily, and taking way to long with their tags. Once again we end up with all four guys fighting, with Dustin and William inside the ring, and Windham and Gordy on the apron and the floor. Dustin avoids a corner splash from Williams and seems to have the advantage, when he sort of just runs in to Windham on the apron and knocks himself groggy. This comes across like a botch of sorts, in that perhaps Windham was supposed to hit Dustin here, but the result is Dustin doing a Sting and knocking himself silly. Williams takes advantage with the big lariat and picks up the win for his team, unifying the tag belts in the process.
Maybe it’s just me showing my age against a dated product, but the theme of the evening almost seemed to be the Babyfaces making dumb decisions. Whether they were going solo when they should have tagged, or throwing themselves into people or inanimate objects, I really didn’t find myself having much sympathy for them. The heels meanwhile often came across as just being smarter than their opposition, as opposed to being evil or conniving. It’s kind of funny how your view of wrestling changes over time, especially when it comes to the older stuff. Considering all the names that were involved, the tag tournament as a whole was largely disappointing, with only the opener standing out as something worth checking out. Vader/Sting is by far the biggest highlight though, and if nothing else, it’s a great moment to watch if you’re a Vader fan.
