D'Lo Brown vs Doug Basham WWF Shotgun Saturday Night 07-24-1999
Everyone my age has a favorite wrestler from The Monday Night Wars
I was in the tail end of elementary school in the late 90s, which was prime Pro Wrestling fandom time. There were wrestling shirts are far as the eye could see, which I was a short kid so not very far, but you get my point. I remember going to a Boy Scouts Pinewood Derby on a Monday Night and there was a kid who was relaying the information about that night's Raw to everyone. It was 1998 so he must have been calling someone on a payphone or something during breaks, how the hell else would he know? Everyone had their favorites, there were the DX Kids and the NWO kids and The Stone Cold kids and The Rock kids and the ECW kid but the ECW kid was the bad kid so we all sort of stayed away from him. By the time I hit middle school the popularity of wrestling was waning and I had to return underground, lest I be accused of being uncool. Me? Uncool? Did you not see this Limp Bizkit shirt I'm wearing sir? I As time goes on though, people's attitudes towards wrestling soften and nostalgia sits in. For a lot of people, The Monday Night Wars lines up perfectly with some of their last carefree days of youth. Middle School is an absolute warzone, pun not intended, so I think a lot of us tend to look before then when we search out happy memories. If you talk to any guy my age about wrestling, a lot of them will hand wave it and make fun of it and then once you start sharing stories they begin to remember what they liked about it. All of them have their favorite guys. You're always gonna hear about DX, or NWO, or Stone Cold, those are a given. What's always fun is when they go deeper down the roster and start mentioning their favorites.
D'Lo Brown always shows up on the list.
I don't know if it was the chest protector, or the head wobble, or the theme song, or because he was awesome but if you talk to a former fan about The Monday Night Wars long enough...you will get someone waxing poetically about D'Lo Brown. As they should, because D'Lo Brown was great. D'Lo came into WWF as essentially a glorified bump guy for the Nation of Domination. For a while his biggest accolade was getting Pearl River Plunged on top of a car by Ahmed Johnson. D'Lo grew as a wrestler and most importantly as a character. He developed enough quirks that he began to break from the pack. I think all of us have done the D'Lo Strut out of a bar at midnight. You haven't? Just me? . It also helped that D'Lo was a really fun wrestler. Who would have thought that a fun wrestler mixed with charisma and blended together with unique character traits would make for a memorable character? D'Lo never made it past the mid-card, but ultimate it didn't matter. He's remember more fondly than a lot of people, and to stand out that much in such a crowded field of talent is a hell of an accomplishment.
D'Lo Brown is the real deal
Now (Best transition of all time for you Jim Johnston heads), let's get fully in our nostalgia feels as we had back to July of 1999 for an episode of Shotgun Saturday Night where D'Lo Brown will be taking on Doug Basham. D'Lo is out first and at the risk of sounding like a nerdy old white guy, man that D'Lo Brown has swagger. D'Lo struts with the confidence of a college freshman who just snuck alcohol into the dorms. One time I saw a drunk friend of mine get by security and she was so happy she tried to jump and click her heels, but she fell and twisted her ankle and needed crutches for two weeks. Back to rasslin', D'Lo's opponent is a very young Doug Basham. This is before he and his brother got into BDSM, so it's jarring to see Doug Basham wearing a singlet that looks like Kurt Angle let him borrow it. A lockup leads to some sweet D'Lo punches and Doug is already bumping like a maniac here. You can tell he was trained by a Southern wrestler, because he's all over the place. To quote Billy Gunn " I put bumping and feeding as skills on my resume". D'lo hits a beautiful flying forearm. I don't know how to say something is graceful in wrestling without sounding pretentious but I swear to god it was graceful. D'lo chops Basham in the corner who couldn't sell it harder if he had invested his life savings in a MLM based around getting chopped. D'lo does the Reverse Bret Hart, meaning he pulls down Basham's straps for him and chops him some more. Doug in the corner now as D'Lo charges and Doug finally gets separation with a boot to the face. D'Lo rushes back and Doug uses the ropes for a HEADSCISSORS TO THE OUTSI...Wait...D'Lo got stuck between the ropes so D'Lo sort of awkwardly bounces back in the ring. Doug clearly improving here . He's looking for a suggestion and someone says dropkick so Doug throws one of the worst dropkicks I've ever seen. He then kips up and taunts . This motherfucking is trying to gaslight me into thinking I didn't just see his awful dropkick. Doug's momentum comes to an end when ,ironically, he is caught by a D'Lo dropkick. That's a nice dropkick Doug, takes notes. Bodyslam by D'Lo and then THE D'LO LEG DROP. You know the one. If you were worth a damn in No Mercy, your CAW had that legdrop. D'Lo gets Doug on the ropes and climbs there with him, and D'Lo WITH A FRANKENSTEINER OFF THE TOP. HOLY SHIT. DOUG ROLLED THROUGH INTO STANDING ON HIS FEET AND THEN TOOK A EXAGGERATED BUMP.
BOTH THESE GUYS RULE.
D'Lo with some more nice punches, but Doug counters with a sunset flip. D'Lo rolls through into a Texas Cloverleaf. That was fucking nice. Doug gets to the ropes, which is a mistake, as D'Lo returns to chopping him. I'm underselling these chops, unlike Doug, but they are really fucking loud. Snapmare by D'Lo and a nice front elbow. Doug pokes D'Lo in the eye and finally gets some offense in including a not terrible back elbow. He goes to Irish Whip D'Lo, but SKY HIGH BY D'LO. D'Lo knows the end is nigh so he climbs the top rope and LODOWN FROM SPLASH FOR THE WIN
This match is rad as hell. This was a five minute match that really exemplifies why D'Lo is so memorable. Swagger and Charisma out the ass on top of doing some really cool moves. The Top Rope Frankensteiner was awesome. Props to Doug Basham too, who bumped his ass off and sort of stole focus from just how good D'Lo was. Couldn't ask for a better wimpy performance. It's a awesome, awesome match
TLDR Review
D'Lo is the real deal. Now I want to find more Doug Basham squashes. I am playing No mercy this weekend
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