User Reviews

King of the Ring 1997 continued the event's losing streak with another mediocre entry here. Triple H and Mankind put on a decent final, and Shawn Michaels PPV return, thankfully in a non-title match, had a good match against Stone Cold but the semi finals and WWE Championship match were rather disappointing also.

The night started off with Hunter Hearst Helmsley, not long from becoming Triple H, defeat Ahmed Johnson in a KOTR semi Final match. This was one of Johnson's better matches, but still wasn't good.

Mankind won the next match, the second semi final, defeating Jerry Lawler in a dull match that was longer than it needed to be and so he would be facing Helmsley in the King of the Ring Final later on in the night.

Next match saw Goldust, still a good guy, defeat the Nation of Domination's Crush (with D Lo Brown and former manager Clarence Mason). This was just a filler match, but did the job. Pass.

Our next match saw Sycho Sid making his first PPV appearance since Wrestlemania 13, teaming up with the Legion of Doom and losing to the New Hart Foundation (Owen Hart, The British Bulldog and Jim Neidhart). Given the talent involved this was about as good as could be expected. Sid wasn't much longer in the WWE, while the New Hart Foundation was gaining momentum heading into the next In Your House PPV where they would be fan favourites for a night in Canada.

Next was the King of the Ring Final which saw Helmsley defeat Mankind thanks to interference from his female bodyguard Chyna. This was a fun brawl. Hunter and Mankind did some great work together and this match elevated both men. Helmsley broke his King of the Ring crown which would become a running joke with Hunter breaking two more at attempted coronations.

Next saw WWE tag Team Champions Shawn Michaels and Steve Austin collide in an excellent singles match. The feud was part of Bret Hart's evil plan to turn the tag champs against each other. And it nearly worked, but they got control of their emotions in time for no real damage to be done. The New Hart Foundation then attacked both men, forcing a double DQ.

The Main Event saw the Undertaker retain the Title over Farooq, the leader of the Nation of Domination in an instantly forgettable match.

And so there you have it, the extra our on this King of the Ring PPV actually served to hurt the card, as it meant they put on meaningless filler matches. But the big matches were all good, or at least watchable. Not a bad PPV, but not a good one either.

As the WWE moved into the middle months of 1997, they faced a bit of a clashing of styles. Despite finally building up a roster of players that was pretty solid, they were still using old-school formulas to pair them up. In a few years, this would all change: Stone Cold would become the beer-swigging everyman, The Rock would be Mr. Cool, and the McMahon itself would even take center stage. Like it or hate it, I would argue that was a much needed shake-up because of what we see in events like King of the Ring 1997: Great talent in boring match pairings.

Let's look at a few of them:

-HHH beating Mankind for the KOTR mantra. "HHH" was not yet the more interesting "Triple-H" character, while Mankind had yet to sprout his different personalities. As a result, this is just a typical match between two good ring athletes, with little to no heat behind it. -Michaels/Austin suffers from the fact that for whatever reason, that pairing doesn't quite work as well as Austin/Hart (as seen at WrestleMania 13). These two were the top superstars in the game at the time, but again really didn't have any angles to play off of. Once again: a solid match with little hype. -Featuring Faarooq in any sort of main event is a bit ridiculous, but at the same time the WWE was running out of opponents to pair with Undertaker. It wouldn't be until Kane came along later that 'Taker really got a compelling opponent.

So, KOTR '97 is a bit odd in that it features a very solid stable of talent, yet with most of those figures not reaching (or being allowed to reach) their full potential. A straight-down-the-middle 5-star rating is the result.

1. KoR Semifinal: Ahmed Johnson Vs. Hunter Hearst Helmsley - Crowd was 100% behind Ahmed... But he loses...again. Match was obviously nothing special with some mistakes and misunderstandings. 6.5/10

2. KoR Semifinal: Mankind Vs. Jerry Lawler - Ordinary match. Mankind advances. 7/10

3. Crush Vs. Goldust - They did some decent moves. Yes, even Crush. 6.5/10

4. Hart Foundation Vs. Legion of Doom/Sid Vicious - Nothing worth-for-watch occurred. 6/10

5. KoR Final Match: Mankind Vs. Hunter Hearst Helmsley - Mankind is one tough bastard. He could eat all the pain of the world! But HHH became KoR 1997. Exciting was only the 2nd part of the match. 8/10

6. Steve Austin Vs. Shawn Michaels - Pretty awesome match with terrible DQ ending. 8.5/10