[6.0] "A very solid match, although these two had better bouts against each other in the past and would go on to have even better ones down the line. The pace was good, and they had some nice spots planned, but they weren't given much time and had to cram a lot into a short match. The sequences leading to the finish were very entertaining, with some exciting near falls, and it served as a good setup for their next encounter."
[5.0] "Unfortunately, that's pretty much what you'd expect. Lots of the champion's sweaty '80s-style offense, featuring holds, punches, and little variety. Steamboat does manage to make it all look relatively believable, counters rather conservatively towards the end, and makes his own title win look quite narrowly won. That speaks in his favor, but overall, it doesn't really speak well of the match. Passed with five points."
[7.0] "Orndorff is an unsung heel of his era. He looked and acted like a salt of the Earth tough guy and it was believable. It worked well with the squeaky clean Steamboat. Nothing too special here but a solid match."
[5.0] "Something is up with the lighting on this match. Makes for an odd atmosphere. The beginning is a lot of holds, but steamboat does do a dive in this. Soon they're trading pinning combinations. The ending is sudden to this modern viewer, but finishes like this were more common in those days. A decent match but the beginning could have used less headlocks."
[7.0] "For a match between two very solid hands this was shorter than it should've been so there wasn't the level of selling you'd want, but they certainly did try to pack in as much as they could in under nine minutes."
[8.0] "Excellent match between two legends, underrated. I really enjoyed Orndorff's aggression here, pressing Steamboat with multiple strong pin attempts in a row was a cool strategy and looking legitimately exhausting for the Dragon. Lots of good stuff to be said for this."
[7.0] "I've never actually seen the aftermath of The Shockmaster's debut before, so I was amused to hear the commentators laughing and mocking the whole debacle during Steamboat's entrance here. The match was quite good, too. It was the basics all done really well. Very smooth, old school style wrestling. There were some very nice nearfalls for such a short, simple match, too. Really, the only knock against it is that it's a bit disappointing they didn't get longer to work, but at the same time I think part of the matches charm is how efficiently they managed such a short amount of time. Very nice."
[6.0] "The last solid match on this show in my eyes. I thought these two worked pretty well together. Orndorff was desperate to get the win here. Orndorff celebrates too early and comes to regret it as Steamboat rolls him up for the win and becomes the TV Champion. After the match, Orndorff got some heat back as he attacked Steamboat on the ramp and piledrived him on the title on the ramp."
[7.0] "Good match. Orndorff was arguably a better heel during this time than he was during his WWF run in the 80s; fans loved to give this guy crap probably more than anyone else in the company. Steamboat, not surprisingly, pulls off being the sympathetic baby face extremely well. Like a couple of the other matches, I just wish they had about 5 more mins to work, but it was still good."
[7.0] "I really liked this match. I loved how Orndorff just wouldn't let Steamboat catch a breath, constantly pinning him down and keeping a hold of him. Eventually, it was Steamboat who did this to Orndorff as they kept the bout highly competitive. They made the most of their 8 short minutes. [***1/2]"
[6.0] "This was a perfectly satisfactory match between these two that never quite reached its potential but then it only got just over 8 minutes. Finish came as they both went for flash pins that was a bit clunky. Orndorff hit Steamboat with piledriver in the belt after the match to get his heat back ***"
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