WWF: Raw is War
July 20, 1998
Binghamton, NY
Broome County Veterans Memorial Arena

The current WWF champs are as follows:
WWF Champion: Steve Austin (6/29/1998)
Intercontinental Champion: The Rock (12/8/1997)
World Tag Team Champions: Kane & Mankind (7/13/1998)
European Champion: Triple H (3/17/1998)
Light Heavyweight Champion: TAKA Michinoku (12/7/1997)

TIME TO GET RAW! Your hosts are Jim Ross and Jerry Lawler.

Mr. McMahon comes out to the ring and reflects on the last two weeks of the Undertaker’s methods of becoming the number one contender to the WWF title and stirs the pot concerning collusion between UT and Kane. The evidence is fairly convincing that there is collusion on some level. Anyways, Vince brings out the Undertaker to give him one more opportunity to answer the question as to whether or not Taker is in “cahoots” with his brother Kane. McMahon tells UT that he felt disrespected after last week when he was told to “go to hell”. If Taker really wants to be a “champion of the ages” that he is capable of becoming, McMahon requires his respect and refuses to take any disparaging actions anymore. Vince asks him the question once more and begins to get angry when Taker stays quiet. McMahon cools down and then tells Taker he will learn a hard lesson by competing in a handicap match against Kane and Mankind – TONIGHT! As Taker begins to leave, McMahon stops him and tells him to “go to hell”. CHOKESLAM TO VINCE! Pat Patterson gets punched down! Gerald Brisco takes a CHOKESLAM as well! So does Commissioner Slaughter! Taker is walking tall to the locker room while McMahon slips and falls getting out of the ring on top of Pat Patterson. I’m sure that was unintentional. Wink, wink.

• WWF European Championship: Triple H (c) (w/Chyna) vs. D’Lo Brown (w/the Rock)
  

Obviously, the crowd is more focused on the Rock being at ringside than poor D’Lo here. D’Lo tells Triple H he better recognize with his knockdowns and such, but Triple H fires back with some of his own. D’Lo sees the Pedigree coming early, but takes a clothesline out to the floor instead. Chyna and D’Lo have a confrontation, but she ducks a punch and fires back with a forearm smash. Back inside, Brown rallies back with the Sky High for two. Rock reaches in and gets a cheapshot on Helmsley. D’Lo mocks HHH though and takes the High Knee. The Facebuster and a clothesline gets two. The suplex connects, but Rock trips up Triple H in the corner when he looks for the Knee Drop. Chyna comes over and shoves Rock into the ringpost. Cue Mark Henry to the ring. Chyna goes to meet him with a steel chair. Meanwhile, Rock gets in the ring and blasts Helmsley with the ROCK BOTTOM. D’Lo covers and gets the three-count to win the European title. (6:06) The wide-eyed reaction from D’Lo is just fantastic. This loss however renders DX without any titles for the first time since September. *½

Backstage, the Nation celebrates. Owen Hart actually kisses Brown.

After the break, DX is backstage showing us how pissed off they are. Helmsley promises that the Rock won’t leave the building with his IC title.

• Brawl For All: “Dr. Death” Steve Williams vs. Quebecer Pierre
  

This is the WWF TV debut of “Dr. Death”. They show a clip of the Sooners football head coach Barry Switzer to remind us how tough the man is. Naturally, Ross enjoys going over his football credentials. Ref Jack Doane plays the part of Danny Hodge again this week. Doc with an instant takedown. Pierre’s punches aren’t landing. Another takedown. Doane is announcing points this time to make it easier for us to follow along. After one round, replays seem to support Doc being in front 15-5. Round 2 looks like Williams again. At one point, Doc eggs on Pierre, who swings but Doc ducks it. Standing eight count at the end of the round. The replay shows some vicious punches to the back of Pierre’s head. The unofficial score is now 35-5. Round 3 seems like it should be coasting time for Williams, but he’s still a house afire. I think he wants the knockout, but Pierre is taking the punishment. Doane ends up calling it off when Pierre doesn’t want anymore.

They take us back to last week where Val Venis revealed he was sticking it to Mrs. Yamaguchi. Back in the arena, Yamaguchi-san shows us he’s very angry and looks to punish her. She holds the ropes open for Yamaguchi-san and Kaientai so they can all get in the ring. Yamaguchi-san now wants her to do the “crawl of shame” towards him and then paddle her for her wrongdoings, but of course Val Venis runs down to save the day and clears the ring of Kaientai with the giant paddle. Val then helps Yamaguchi’s wife out of the ring and walks out carrying her in his arms honeymoon threshold style. She’s all smiles, he’s all smiles – yep, they’re off to do some big time love makin’. Remember kids, adultery is fine and dandy so long as the husband is an evil Japanese guy!

SLAM OF THE WEEK (brought to you by Skittles): Earlier tonight on RAW, the Undertaker’s chokeslams on Vince and his stooges.

• Road Warrior Animal vs. Skull (w/Paul Ellering & 8-Ball)
  

Hawk is “conspicuous by his absence” here. Screw the match. The DOA do a number on Animal. Ellering wants to run over Animal with the Titan Bike, but Hawk comes to Animal’s aid. Fortunately, Animal doesn’t get ran over, but the DOA and Ellering continue to pound away until the refs and Commissioner Slaughter put a stop to it.

• Steve Blackman (w/Ken Shamrock & Dan Severn) vs. Jeff Jarrett (w/Tennessee Lee & Southern Justice)
  

Oh that’s right. These two are feuding. Still. Seeing that he’s outnumbered 4-to-1, he leaves and comes back with Shamrock and Severn. Blackman delivers some martial arts kicks and what have you, but misses a weak Swandive Headbutt. Jarrett points to his brains. Boy, ain’t he great. He takes Blackman to school until he’s kicked off into the corner. The Bicycle Kick connects and Blackman gets the three-count. (2:11) Wow, just like that? Afterwards, Owen Hart comes out and grabs Shamrock for a ride into the steps. Dan Severn isn’t the least bit concerned about Shamrock as he straightens his tie and walks to the back.

Backstage, Michael Cole is trying to get a word from the Undertaker. It’s really hard to conduct an interview though with a guy who has his bags in his hands and walking out of the building. All Cole can tells us is that Taker says he will see us all on Sunday at Fully Loaded.

ENTER THE WARZONE! Your hosts are Jim Ross and Jerry Lawler.

Stone Cold Steve Austin hits the ring to begin the second hour. Jim Ross meets him to conduct the interview, but Austin grabs the mic to talk because he can’t stand still. Like usual, Austin isn’t concerned about anybody being by his side because he doesn’t trust anybody anyways. Whether the Undertaker is on his side or not, he’s going to Fully Loaded to whip somebody’s ass no matter who it is. Knowing that the Undertaker left the building, Austin wonders if Taker left because he didn’t want to fight his brother Kane or to screw Vince before Vince screwed him. Austin feels that if anybody deserves to be screwed, it’s Vince McMahon. Well, that brings out Vince and his stooges. Since Austin is so concerned about who is getting screwed around here, McMahon puts Austin into the handicap match instead. Austin has already beaten both of them and doesn’t feel he’s got anything to prove, so he’s not going to wrestle Kane and Mankind. He says just like the Undertaker got on the highway, Austin can do the same thing. To ensure Austin wrestles Kane and Mankind tonight, McMahon adds the stipulation that if Austin no-shows, he will be stripped of the WWF title and the Undertaker will be crowned the new WWF champion. Austin agrees to the match, but says he’s going to beat the living “shit” out of McMahon once he gets done with Kane and Mankind. AND THAT’S THE BOTTOM LINE ‘CAUSE STONE COLD SAID SO! Awesome.

They take us back to Jason Sensation’s performance from last week where his imitations get him a manly beatdown from Owen Hart.

• Owen Hart (w/the Nation) vs. Faarooq
  

It’s been a little over a month since we’ve seen Faarooq around here. Faarooq overpowers Owen in the early going, but he lowers his head for a backdrop and Owen twists him around with a swinging neckbreaker. The crowd starts chanting “nugget” related things. He applies a backbreaker to set up a Boston crab, but Faarooq powers out. Owen gets so mad, he grabs a mic and yells at the people. I’m loving it. He gets distracted allowing Faarooq to hit a comeback powerslam. Faarooq does the spot where he drops down on Owen’s back until Owen flips around and brings the knees up. Missile dropkick by Owen. Faarooq blocks a hurracanrana with a spinebuster. He misses a legdrop from the second rope though and Owen grabs a SHARPSHOOTER for the submission. (5:36) Afterwards, Ken Shamrock chases Owen Hart through the crowd. *½

Backstage, Paul Bearer promises that the Undertaker is *not* on their side, and they really wanted that shot at him. Mankind is happy that they will be facing Austin tonight. He’s looking at the eye-for-an-eye angle. As usual, Kane has nothing to say.

Marc Mero and Jacqueline come out to talk smack about Sable and to give her the chance to bow out of his bikini contest. Sable heads out to the ring in a maternity dress to brag about how good her body looks. Yeah, that’s attractive. Jackie rips off the maternity dress to reveal Sable in – SURPRISE – her bra and panties. Shocking, I know. Jacqueline takes a hair toss bump and heads to the floor. Lawler is about to have a heart attack over there. Ross wonders what Sable will be wearing this Sunday at Fully Loaded. Next thing we know, EDGE shows up in the ring and off camera gives Marc Mero what Ross refers to as the “Downward Spiral”. He leaves through the crowd without saying a word. We kind of see the move in the instant replay after the break, but not really.

Out comes Shawn Michaels to kill some time with an entrance. He joins the commentators for the final half hour. They show us some highlights of “Earlier Tonight” and Scorpio facing 8-Ball in a “Brawl for All”. Probably wisely, they show us highlights instead of the entire match. Round 1 showed 8-Ball with some huge punches. Round 2 showed Scorpio switching to takedowns and meeting with some success. Round 3 gave the impression that Scorpio beat up a winded 8-Ball, but who can say with the brief glimpses they showed us. Anyways, Scorpio won.

Backstage, the Rock promises that there’s no way X-Pac will win *his* title.

JVC KABOOM! OF THE WEEK: RAW, 7/13/98. X-Pac giving the Rock the X-Factor for the upset win.

• WWF Intercontinental Championship: The Rock (c) vs. X-Pac (w/Chyna)
  

The Rock and X-Pac come out to the ring with their respective groups for a big brawl, but refs and agents come out to stop it to set up a commercial break. When we return, Chyna is the only one welcomed back to ringside. X-Pac controls to start with headlocks and hiptosses. Rock avoids a corner charge causing X-Pac to take the Bobby Eaton bump. X-Pac chops back, but Rock catches him for a hotshot. Rock dumps out X-Pac for some guardrail violence. Back in, Rock applies a chinlock. When X-Pac fights out, Rock catches him for a Samoan Drop. Back to the chinlock. Rock hits the People’s Elbow for two. X-Pac rallies with an X-FACTOR and slowly rolls over to cover him for 1-2-NO! He connects with the Bronco Buster, but comes charging out of the corner into a powerslam. Now the Rock takes a ride out to the floor. X-Pac complains to ref Tim White over a knee injury allowing Chyna to wallop the Rock with his IC title! X-Pac covers for 1-2-NO! Tim White gets wiped out by the Rock. D’Lo Brown comes out through the crowd, but Triple H is right there to crotch him up top. Helmsley then walks over to the Rock and gives him the PEDIGREE as retribution for earlier in the show. X-Pac covers the Rock and White starts to count, but ref Jimmy Korderas is out to narc on the whole thing for the DQ. (9:45) Chyna is more than happy to knock out Korderas. The Nation and what’s left of DX comes out for a brawl, but refs and agents once again put a stop to it. Once the Nation clears out, DX is left to celebrate (their DQ loss?) as Triple H gets a hot looking plant to show everybody her tits. Lots of nearfalls, but not the best match in the world. **

• Kane & Mankind (w/Paul Bearer) vs. Steve Austin
  

Mankind comes after Austin to start and gets blasted with the WWF title belt. In the ring, Austin meets Kane in the ring and does fine until Mankind joins the fray. We see Vince McMahon on the split-screen enjoying what he’s seeing. He may as well have a tub of buttery delicious popcorn with him. Austin fights out of the corner and knocks Kane to the floor for some guardrail violence and a trip to the steps. Austin goes after Mankind in the ring and takes the MANDIBLE CLAW. Back out to the floor, Austin breaks up the hold by smashing Mankind’s head into the post. Kane and Austin brawl back into the ring. The Thesz Press connects, but Mankind trips up Austin and pulls him out to the floor. Austin absorbs some right hands and bounces Mankind’s face off the announce table. In the ring again, Kane shoves off a Stone Cold Stunner into Mankind for a clothesline. That cues the Undertaker to come down to stand in Austin’s corner – armed with a steel chair. Austin gets sent to the floor where Paul Bearer uses his shoe like a blackjack. Austin rolls back inside and gets pounded down into the corner, but he avoids the running knee from Mankind. Austin punches back and delivers the STONE COLD STUNNER! Kane immediately breaks up the pin. Kane looks for the Chokeslam, but Austin kicks him in the nards about 4-5 times. As Austin gets backed up into his own corner, Taker reaches back with his chair to nail Austin or Kane. Austin goes for the Stone Cold Stunner, but sees the chair coming and ducks out of the way, causing Kane to get wiped out by his brother. DQ? (4:55) Austin takes out Mankind with a weak (but understandably so) chairshot. Because he doesn’t trust the Undertaker any farther than he could throw him, Austin leaves the Undertaker laying with a chairshot as well.

He then heads up the ramp holding his WWF title high in the air as we close out another week of RAW.

FULLY LOADED IS NEXT! Until then, so long for now.

MAIN EVENT:
WWF TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP: Kane & Mankind (c) vs. The Undertaker & Steve Austin
2/3 Falls for the WWF Intercontinental Championship: The Rock (c) vs. Triple H
Bikini Contest: Sable vs. Jacqueline
Dungeon Match: Owen Hart vs. Ken Shamrock
LOD 2000 vs. Disciples of Apocalypse