Steven James
For close to a decade, professional wrestling fans loved Clash of the Champions, a series of supercards that aired on TBS, featuring the biggest stars of first NWA and the WCW. Over the course of 35 events from 1988 through 1997, fans were treated to championship contests, grudge matches, and spectacular moments. Many of these matches have never been released on home video until now. The Best of the Clash of the Champions, hosted by 3-time NWA World Heavyweight Champion and WWE Hall of Famer, “The American Dream” Dusty Rhodes, will highlight some of the greatest matches in the event’s ten-year history and features fan favorites Ric Flair, Sting, The Road Warriors, Lex Luger, the Four Horsemen, the nWo, and so many more.
World War 3 was an annual PPV event produced by WCW. The PPV's title also was the name of its signature match, a three-ring, sixty-man battle royal. The inaugural World War 3 match was contested for the WCW World Heavyweight Championship, which had been stripped from The Giant due to the outcome of his match with Hulk Hogan at Halloween Havoc '95. Other matches included Ric Flair vs Sting, Lex Luger vs Randy Savage, Kensuke Sasaki defending the WCW United States Heavyweight Championship against Chris Benoit, Big Bubba Rogers vs Jim Duggan, and Johnny B. Badd defending he WCW World TV Championship against Diamond Dallas Page. WCW released the World War 3 events on home video the following year, with the packaging for the first three releases reflecting the year that the video was released and not the year that the actual event took place, e.g. World War 3 1995 was released on VHS as World War 3 '96.
SuperBrawl 1991 took place on May 19, 1991 from the Bayfront Arena in St. Petersburg, Florida. The main event was WCW World Heavyweight Champion Ric Flair in a double title defense against NWA World Heavyweight Champion Tatsumi Fujinami. Arn Anderson also defended the WCW World Television Championship against Bobby Eaton while the Steiner Brothers defended the WCW World Tag Team Championships against Sting & Lex Luger. Other matches included El Gigante vs Sid Vicious, Brian Pillman vs Barry Windham, Tim Parker vs Oz, Big Josh vs Black Bart, Dustin Rhodes vs Terrance Taylor, and 2 other matches.
The Great American Bash (1991) took place on July 14, 1991 at the Baltimore Arena in Baltimore, Maryland. The card was originally to be highlighted by a Steel cage match between Ric Flair and Lex Luger for the WCW World title. Two weeks before the show, WCW Executive VP Jim Herd fired Flair over a contract dispute, stripping him of the title. Flair took possession of the WCW World title and brought it to the World Wrestling Federation with him. A new belt could not be readied in time for the event, so the company was forced to improvise. A Championship Wrestling title belt that was in the possession of Dusty Rhodes was used and a metal plate with "WCW World Heavyweight Champion" was attached to the front. The main event ended up being WCW US Champ Lex Luger vs Varry Windham for the WCW World Title. On the undercard was a match featuring Steve Austin & Terry Taylor versus Bobby Eaton & P.N. News in a Capture-The-Flag scaffold match, which was Austin's first PPV match.
Starrcade '91: Battlebowl: The Lethal Lottery was the ninth annual Starrcade professional wrestling pay-per-view event. It was the fourth Starrcade event produced by WCW, and it took place on December 29, 1991 from the Norfolk Scope in Norfolk, Virginia. The event solely featured the Battlebowl battle royal and its qualifying matches. Forty wrestlers were chosen at random to form ten pairs of tag teams. Each pair competed in a match, and the winning team advanced to Battlebowl. This was the first Starrcade event to not feature Ric Flair.
