WWF Monday Night RAW – September 20th, 1993

September 20, 1993

From the Manhattan Center in New York City, NY

Your hosts are Vince McMahon, “Macho Man” Randy Savage, and Bobby Heenan

The show starts off with Vince narrating a video recap of last week’s Tag Team Title change when The Quebecers defeated The Steiners in a “Quebec Province Rules” match. It also saw Johnny Polo come out halfway through the match to become manager of The Quebecers. This of course sets up tonight’s match between Scott Steiner and Pierre with the stipulation being The Steiners get a title rematch as long as Scott wins.

Scott Steiner vs. Pierre w/ Johnny Polo

We start off with a slugfest that ends with Scott catching Pierre with an inverted atomic drop. Scott then hits a flying clothesline before tossing Pierre outside and into the guardrail as Polo complaining about this not happening under Quebec Province rules. Scott rolls Pierre back inside and hits a piledriver for a nearfall as Polo grabbed Scott’s leg. Scott then struggles before using a Muta Lock then yells at Polo before using a single leg crab. Scott chokes out Pierre in the ropes as Heenan wonders if we will see “winos, bums, and muggers” since Vince said the match is under “New York City” rules. Scott then hits Pierre with a super overhead suplex then chases Pierre & Polo backstage with the hockey stick as we go to break. The match returns with Scott pacing around with a hockey stick in the ring as Pierre comes back to barely beat the ten count then rolls back outside as Jacques is now at ringside. Rick then comes out to watch his brother’s back as we get both teams yelling at each other but as the ref is distracted, Pierre attacks Scott from behind. Pierre stomps away then hits a jumping DDT as Jacques applauds. Pierre now chokes out Scott as we see Rick back off Jacques with a chair. Pierre clotheslines Scott for a two count but Scott comes back with a sunset flip that only got one as Polo distracted the referee. Pierre works a chin lock on the mat as Jacques & Polo run interference so Pierre can put his feet on the ropes for leverage. Heenan puts over Radio WWF, saying its hotter than Rush Limbaugh, Tom Snyder, and Don Imus as Pierre almost puts Scott away with a Vader Bomb. Pierre goes back to the chin lock as the fans rag on Polo. Scott rams Pierre into the corner but gets scooped up with a slam then Pierre hits a flying leg drop for another nearfall. Pierre ducks his head for a back drop but Scott turns that into a backslide and gets two. Scott uses a small package but Pierre kicks out and rakes the eyes before putting on another chinlock. Heenan shits on Michigan University as Scott rolls away to avoid another Vader Bomb as both men are down. Scott is up first and hits a few punches then runs wild. Scott signals for the Frankensteiner and hits it for the win (12:43 shown) **3/4.

Thoughts: Match started off decently but then they struggled to maintain crowd heat by the end. Pierre did not really do much here and the chinlocks became too repetitive even if it was to allow Jacques & Polo to get heat for him. The win means The Steiners get a rematch but we will see what happens later.

Bam Bam Bigelow w/ Luna Vachon vs. Laverne McGill

Bigelow dropkicks McGill then hammers away as Heenan works a Laverne & Shirley joke. McGill hits a pair of dropkicks, with the first looking terrible, but misses a third dropkick attempt and gets stomped on the back of the head. Vince tells us that Crush is back on the phone after having his signal cut short last week. Vince asks Crush about his return as Crush puts over being in the best shape and will return soon to make a very big impact. Vince then has Savage talk about his relationship with Crush as Savage asks Crush a question but it appears that the signal has been lost again but Crush answers when Vince speaks. Crush then addresses Savage and says he will not speak to him and never will ever again as he hangs up the phone. Bigelow continues to beat on McGill as Vince wants to know why Crush will not speak to him as Savage is at a loss but said he will call him back. Bigelow dumps McGill outside where Luna roughs him up for a bit. McGill tries to slingshot back inside with a sunset flip but that gets blocked. McGill then avoids an avalanche and comes off the middle rope but gets caught and driven into the corner. Bigelow then suplexes McGill and crushes him with a senton that even gets applause from the crowd for the win (5:14).

Thoughts: Long, boring squash match that served as a back drop for a new angle about Crush all of a sudden being pissed off at Savage. We are now supposed to be in suspense as to why this is the case.

Against Heenan’s wishes, we are shown a clip from last week when Doink splashed Heenan with a bucket of water. After that we are shown Heenan at the table taking his temperature, which he says is 113.0, then puts over having a cold due to Doink.

Vince now welcomes Bret Hart into the ring. Heenan puts over Doink being guest on the “King’s Court” this coming weekend on “Wrestling Challenge.” Vince asks Bret about what happened on the “King of the Ring” PPV. Bret wants to know how anyone can think Jerry Lawler is the undisputed King of the WWF then says his only regret was that he did not hold on to the Sharpshooter longer and after he gets through with Lawler in their next encounter, Lawler will not have a head to wear a crown. The Hart/Lawler feud is the best thing the company has going and its not even close. Solid promo by Bret as he promises to completely destroy Lawler.

“WWF Unbelievable” ad airs with the attractive woman walking off with Savage, telling us not to fall for cheap imitations.

Mr. Perfect vs. Mike Bell

Heenan goes on about his new “All-American Wrestling” co-host Joe Fowler taking over his show. Perfect slaps Bell after a reversal sequence as another “we want Shawn” chants breaks out from a vocal minority in the crowd. Perfect dropkicks Bell then heads out to chop him a few times before taking the action back into the ring. Bell lands a couple of chops but Perfect reverses then hits a neck snap. Perfect beats on Bell some more before finally putting him away with the Perfect Plex (3:54).

Thoughts: This crowd did not care for Mr. Perfect, who has been quite uninspiring in his babyface role of late. This also served as a backdrop to talk about Joe Fowler on “All-American Wrestling” and boy did that not work out.

The Ludvig Borga polluted river vignette airs. Same as we saw the day prior on “All-American Wrestling.”

Heenan goes over to a couple in the crowd then we see the man ask his woman for marriage and she says yes. Heenan also pawned off his wet kleenex to the woman. The first time Heenan did this months ago was funny but this one was much less entertaining.

IRS vs. PJ Walker

Before the match, IRS says that Razor Ramon does not have the guts to face him and will show the crowd what he does to tax cheats. IRS beats on Walker as Heenan rags on the couple. We now see Razor Ramon stroll down the aisle as IRS is distracted. IRS goes over towards Razor but as that happens, Walker rolls him up from behind and gets the win (1:22). Walker bails as Razor laughs at IRS. IRS is restrained by several officials as a 1-2-3 chant breaks out.

Thoughts: They did another surprise win, this time to humiliate IRS for the feud against Razor, but the reaction was nowhere near when the 1-2-3 Kid defeated Razor a few months ago.

Heenan is backstage with The Quebecers & Johnny Polo. They name off all the other tag teams in the company and have a title match next week against someone who is deserving but that is not going to be The Steiners. With The Steiners being pulled off the road for a few weeks they never did a televised title match between these teams, just a few house show matches and some dark matches at TV tapings.

Next week, live from New Haven, CT, we will see Tatanka, Ludvig Borga, and the one night only return of Jimmy Snuka as we see the clip of Snuka hitting the Superfly Splash from the top rope. They are now advertising legends for one off appearances on RAW.

Final Thoughts: The show was fine this week with a solid match in Scott vs. Pierre and some other work continuing storylines and finding out Crush is pissed at Savage for some unknown reason. But again, the real story is behind the scenes and boy will that intensify when we get deeper into the Fall. And this would be the final RAW at the Manhattan Center for years as we will be going into smaller cities and venues for quite a while.