5 Worst Wrestling Matches of 1991

1991 was an interesting year for pro wrestling. The NWA still had Jim Crockett Promotions (the one that would eventually become WCW), which had some popularity after Vince McMahon’s national expansion. That popularity allowed it to compete with WWE to some degree. Unfortunately, it competed with WWE in terms of bad matches as well.

You see, the early 1990s ‘WCW’ was booked by a man named Jim Herd. According to many WCW alumni, Herd had little, if any experience in or understanding of, wrestling. He came up with some truly awful ideas during his four-year tenure in JCW, and by the time that company was re-named WCW, it as already in dire straits thanks to him.

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However, JCW/WCW wasn’t the only company to put on bad matches. WWF/E was also known for putting on cartoonish gimmicks and match concepts. Unfortunately, the term ‘cartoonish’ in this context is a synonym for ‘terrible’.

Some of these matches were so bad that they deserve to be ‘dishonored’ as the worst of the entire year.

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#5 Genichiro Tenryu & Koji Kitao vs. Demolition – WrestleMania 7

This boring match had several factors working against it that made it so bad. Firstly, Tenryu & Kitao did not speak English, so the audience had little reason to sympathize with them or care about them.

Second, this match took place right after a retirement match between the Ultimate Warrior and ‘Macho Man’ Randy Savage, so the fans were drained from the emotion of that earlier match.

Third, the team of Tenryu and Kitao were only there on a semi-regular basis, so even if the fans did understand them, they had little reason to care because that Japanese duo wouldn’t be around that much. Because of this, the match had little drama and excitement to it. The language barrier also played a part in the in-ring action, as there was little they could do.

They kept it simple and straightforward, with the most complicated move being Tenryu’s Powerbomb. Overall, there wasn’t much to this match, and it felt like more of a ‘filler’ match on an already-overcrowded match card.

#4 Jake Roberts vs. Rick Martel – Blindfold Match – WrestleMania 7

An important part of a passable wrestling match is being able to actually see your opponent

Blindfold matches tend to be among the worst match concepts in wrestling. The whole point of a wrestling match is have two opponents hit moves on each other, which tends to work best when said opponents can actually see each other.

This match was an attempt by WWE to do something different, and needless to say that the results were…mixed at best. Roberts had to use the crowd to find his way around the ring, which was a unique way to get the crowd involved in a match. Unfortunately, the crowd’s involvement wasn’t really enough to salvage this contest. The in-ring action was threadbare, and the pace was almost glacial.

Of course, this is to be expected since the wrestlers involved had virtually no concept of ring awareness. At least the crowd cheered for Roberts’ DDT much like today’s fans cheer for Randy Orton’s RKO. If it weren’t for the fans actually getting involved like they were supposed to, this match would’ve bombed much worse than it really did.

#3 Oz vs. Tim Parker – WCW Superbrawl 1991

This is one of those matches that was hyped up as a big deal only to be fail upon execution. Kevin Nash was unfortunate enough to be stuck playing the Oz character. No, seriously, he was dressed head-to-toe in garish clothing complete with fake hair and beard to make himself look like a seven-foot version of the Wizard of Oz.

Oz’s entrance took over four minutes, while his actual wrestling match took less than thirty seconds. He hit two clotheslines and a Powerbomb to end the match. While short, squash matches did become a common theme for Nash (who often had back problems and couldn’t do complicated moves), he was given a gimmick that was dead on arrival.

Any sane booker would’ve taken one look at Nash and would’ve given him a much cooler gimmick. What WCW did instead was take this enormous monster, give him a fake beard, and dress him up like a character from a film that was fifty-two years old at the time.

That makes perfect sense, right?

#2 Chamber of Horrors, Halloween Havoc ‘91

Trying to explain this match’s concept and execution might be funnier than the actual match itself. But here goes.

To win this gimmicky steel cage match, you had to force one person into a smaller cage and then into an electric chair (not the wrestling move, but a supposedly real electric chair that’s used for real-life executions), and then flip the switch. So apparently, the only way to win this match was to straight up murder someone.

As if that wasn’t asinine enough, the camera crew managed to catch something they weren’t supposed to. As the wrestlers brawled, one of the cameras caught a shot of the lever that was supposed to turn the electric chair ‘ON’. However, in that shot, the lever was already ‘ON’ and nothing was happening. So when the match came to its pre-booked end, one of the wrestlers had to pull the lever down to ‘OFF’ before turning it back ‘ON’ again and electrifying the hapless soul stuck in the chair.

In terms of actual wrestling, not much happened and there wasn’t much structure. Big moves were hit in the opening minutes, there was senseless brawling and blading, weapons were used, and Abdullah the Butcher ended up getting ‘electrocuted’.

This isn’t bad in an infuriating way; it’s just so bad it’s ridiculous, so thankfully it got lampooned in the Botchamania series.

#1 Bobby Eaton & PN News vs. Steve Austin & Terry Taylor – Scaffold Match - The Great American Bash 1991

The scaffold match is one of the dumbest and craziest match types in the world. Its biggest premise is wrestlers on a high platform, and you know that a lot of people are going to watch just to see if someone falls off of it.

It’s also potentially career-or-life-ending if you fall, so the wrestlers involved in this match decided that none of them wanted to actually take the suicidal bump off the scaffold (after all, the actual scaffold was a three-foot-wide wooden plank which looked like it would snap at any moment).

So instead of winning the match by throwing someone off the scaffold, this match was a ‘capture the flag scaffold match’ which involved taking your opponent’s flag and bringing it to your side.

While that’s obviously safer than falling off the scaffold into the ring, it made the contest boring beyond belief. Almost nothing happened, there was only one actually dramatic moment, and the match ended flatly.

Though, let's be honest, anyone would’ve been terrified to be wrestling in such a position, so the fault here lies with the bookers for forcing four wrestlers to compete in one of the most asinine concepts ever conceived.

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