In a previous blog, I wrote about 1994 for the WWE being utter trash, 1995 was not much better. Case in point, SummerSlam of that year. Held at the Civic Center in Pittsburgh, this event was just bad. Looking at the card and you're like, wow, WWE just figured we will trot out cartoonish-like characters and the fans will still cheer. Back then, I didn't realize that this was outlandish and preposterous. Watching it now, I am thinking that it is 100% preposterous. There were two good matches in this event. Bret Hart had a decent match against Isaac Yankem (cartoonish-like character), who would become Kane and the Mayor of Knox County in Tennessee. The ladder match between Shawn Michaels and Razor Ramon for the Intercontinental Championship was a classic.

Unfortunately, the WWF Championship match had to follow these two. Diesel was in the middle of his long WWF Championship reign (358 days to be exact) and if I'm being honest, people tend to crap on his long title reign, but I really dug this reign. And yes, I realize that the roster had the Undertaker, Shawn Michaels and Bret Hart. The challenger for this match was Mabel. That's right, Mabel. He won the King of the Ring tournament, a tournament based to elevate a wrestler to become a future main-eventer. Steve Austin, Triple H and Bret "Hitman" Hart have won this tourney to become main-eventers and future Hall of Famers. In 1995, Mabel won this. For those of you who don't know anything about Mabel, look him up. He was a very huge man (God rest his soul). That was one of the reasons why he got the push. 

Mabel, sorry King Mabel, came out with people carrying all 6'9" 487 lbs of him on his throne. Diesel was interviewed by Todd Pettingill, giving a babyface-like promo that Seth Rollins would do right now. The first minutes showed that Kevin Nash could carry a match, trying his best to get Mabel to be capable in the ring. That is not saying much. Nash did show some quickness with Mabel which again isn't saying much. King Mabel, at one point, was sitting on Diesel and they finally showed King Mabel's manager, Sir Mo. We didn't see him coming into the ring until 10 minutes into the match. Diesel was able to power out of King Mabel sitting on him or as it looked, King Mabel was probably tired of sitting on Diesel, so he let him up. Then when King Mabel was on the offense, Mo jumped on the apron and referee Earl Hebner looked at him as to say "Oh, you're on the apron, that's cool." As Mabel was going to the ropes, he shoulder-blocks puny ol' Earl Hebner out of the ring, and misses an elbow on Diesel. With the referee out, Mo comes in to double team on Diesel, then Lex Luger comes in and Diesel attacks him which confused me since the crowd was cheering Luger since he was a babyface. Luger would fight off Mo, as Mabel did a belly-to-belly suplex on Diesel. Hebner would slowly crawl back into the ring and by the way, it's a testament to Earl Hebner still trying to do his job after being shoulder-blocked by a 487 lb man. Mabel covers and Diesel kicks out. Mabel goes the second rope for a splash and misses. Diesel goes the second rope and hits a flying clothesline. While rolling on the floor, Mabel almost crushes Hebner's left arm. Earl counts the 1-2-3 as Diesel retains his title and mercifully end this main event. The action was lackluster. The crowd wasn't into it. It was just WWF in 1995.

I thought about ending this blog here, but I read something interesting that went on behind the scenes leading up to this match. A week before the SummerSlam event, they were having second thoughts on having King Mabel as the top heel and the challenger for the WWF Title. You see, according to Nash, Mabel was deemed reckless in the ring and used a sitdown splash on Nash during that match that caused pain on Nash's back. Mabel had already injured several wrestlers due to lack of safety, yet the WWF went ahead with the Diesel/Mabel match-up. Nash also recalls that Vince McMahon was very angry with Mabel and was ready to fire him, but Nash talked him out of it. Mabel's title push would end after that match.

(Kevin Nash recalling this is on Kayfabe Commentaries) (R.I.P. Nelson Frazier Jr. aka Mabel, Viscera, Big Daddy V 1971-2014)

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