Talk about it here.

This was great, probably the best singles match these two had in WCW and the best WCW TV match of the year. They did a great job working "big" by selling fatigue, doing lots of crowd-involving stuff and selling really well. They went long and did the overtime gimmick for a title shot, which I guess you could call a staple of Bischoff era booking going all the way back to Vader-Sting at Fall Brawl '94. I like this because it was wrestled like a big heavyweight main event but they added in the high-flying stuff only they can do to distinguish it. Rey wins the match, but a title change on Nitro changed the WW3 match from Rey/Kidman to something else.

I watched this prior to the release and was on the fence. Now, after seeing all the footage, this will be in my top 100 so it should go on but something still doesn't click for me. THey went long and emphasized the spots but I didn't think this had the spark or intricate intense wrestling or body part work to really draw me in. I did like they overtime finish since they have teased a good bit of those lately and things do pick up here before Rey ends up winning. Really good match overall that got a lot of time to develop but not something I would call great. (***1/2)

Closer to Chad on this--I appreciated the different approach they took to this, laying this out like a heavyweight match but adding the high-flying for a little extra spice. Still, there were times when Juventud seemed out of it and beyond a point where he was just doing your wrestling-style "wasting time to set up a comeback" routine. The covered the blown or nearly-blown spots nicely and had some good nearfalls before the Rey win.

 

Juventud seemed out of it, but Heenan seemed like he was on another planet, and Schiavone wasn't shy about expressing how he felt about the situation. Boy was the announcing bad.

I'll add another voice with Chad, where this felt very good (and the slower pacing was interesting), but ultimately a little shy of being a classic.