Monday Night Raw
December 19, 1994
Poughkeepsie, NY
Mid-Hudson Civic Center

The current WWF champs were as follows:
World Champion: Diesel (11/26/1994)
Intercontinental Champion: Razor Ramon (8/29/1994)
World Tag Team Champions: Vacant (11/23/1994)
Women’s Champion: Bull Nakano (11/20/1994)

Your hosts are Vince McMahon and Shawn Michaels. They’re both wearing Santa hats. How adorable.

• Lex Luger vs. Irwin R. Schyster (w/Ted DiBiase)
  

A druid joins DiBiase and IRS here. Lex is all headlocks and shoulderblocks to start. IRS takes a powder, but comes back inside with turnbuckle smashes. Luger comes back quickly and grabs after the druid only for IRS to knock him to the floor. The druid puts the boots to Luger on the floor and then IRS puts the boots to Luger inside the ring. We take a look at a couple rings the druid is wearing on his hand. Vince thinks those rings look familiar. Commercials! When we return, IRS grabs a chinlock and cheats using the ropes. Eventually, Luger comes back with punches and a back suplex. HERE COMES LEX. During the comeback, the druid grabs Luger’s foot and almost gets him pinned by Schyster. Lex goes after the druid and beats him up around ringside until he’s counted out. (7:00 shown) The druid gets revealed as Tatanka. SHOCKER. Irwin saves his buddy Tatanka from Lex as the MDC escape to the locker room. *½

From this past weekend on Superstars, clips are shown of Bam Bam Bigelow and Tatanka victorious over Men on a Mission in the first match of the WWF tag titles tournament.

In the back, Howard Finkel is getting ready with the Bushwhackers.

Elsewhere, Jeff Jarrett meets Rip Taylor in Las Vegas outside Bally’s. Better be careful, Jeff.

• The Smoking Gunns vs. Chris Avery & Roy Raymond
  

HBK mocks the cowboys for the whole match. The Gunns hit their best double-teams on Chris Avery including the Sidewinder and culminating in the move where Billy flies off the top and Slop Drops Avery off Bart’s shoulders. Something like that. Looks like it could be a very messy move. Anyways, that gets the win at 4:07.

As the King’s Court with Jerry Lawler gets underway, Vince discusses with Shawn why he is seconding Bob Backlund in his rematches with Diesel. Well, Mr. Bob Backlund is Lawler’s guest tonight. Bob insults the people and then starts downing Bret Hart as only he can. He brings up the subject of Diesel – drops the Kevin Nash name – and Shawn takes the credit for that knowledge on commentary. Are we supposed to believe that people thought his real name WAS actually Diesel? Anyways, that is their way of putting over the fact that Shawn has the ear of Bob Backlund and that Diesel’s title run is in jeopardy. They close the interview with Backlund telling Diesel that the Crossface Chickenwing will DESTROY him.

• Bob Holly vs. Chris Kanyon
  

Since we have another babyface squash, Shawn points out that Bob Holly ran into the wall during his race on Sunday. Kanyon looked pretty good here, but doesn’t bump quite to the level he would as Mortis. Vertical suplex and a flying elbow from Holly gets the win at 3:36.

Time for the Royal Rumble Report with Todd Pettengill. The Royal Rumble takes place on Sunday night January 22 at Tampa FL – LIVE on PPV. Pamela Anderson will be here!

• WWF Championship: Diesel (c) vs. Bret Hart
  
• Royal Rumble Match: Ten participants have been announced. They include Lex Luger, Bob Backlund, King Kong Bundy, Doink the Clown, Kwang, Henry O. Godwinn, Duke Droese, Aldo Montoya, Adam Bomb, and Dick Murdoch.
  

• The Bushwhackers (w/Howard Finkel) vs. Well Dunn (w/Harvey Wippleman)
  

Finkel does his best Bushwhackers impression. HBK – “I may be going out on a limb here, but I’m guessing Howard Finkel doesn’t get a lot of chicks.” Nice. The Bushwhackers clean house to start and Finkel joins in on the celebration. Back in, Luke and Butch continue to outsmart Well Dunn, which is insanity. Eventually, Well Dunn cheat and Luke takes a DDT from Dunn. Well hits a flying back elbow for two. Short heat segment here. Butch gets the hot tag, but Dunn tries to sunset flip him over. Both Well and Wippleman want to help Dunn, but Luke takes care of Well while Finkel pulls Wippleman’s pants off and yanks him down off the apron. Meanwhile, Butch drops to his knees and hooks the legs for the pinfall. (5:20) Way too silly. As if having a team name like Well Dunn isn’t bad enough, you have to deal with this crappy comedy booking where the blowoff is Wippleman and Fink in a tuxedo match. ¾*

So what’s Santa up to right now? Mabel is sitting on his lap. His reaction is pretty unintentionally funny IMO. Anyways, they switch roles and Mabel lets Santa sit on his lap. KINKY!

• Jim Neidhart vs. Nick Barbarry
  

Neidhart has some sort of problem with the Spanish announce team for some reason. We JIP with this match. He just bullies Barbarry and submits him with a camel clutch at 2:16.

NEXT WEEK: The British Bulldog meets Tatanka! In action, we’ll see the Undertaker! Plus, WWF champ Diesel will be the special guest on the King’s Court. We’ll also witness the in-ring debut of Henry O. Godwinn!