Raw #155 - April 15th, 1996

It's the WWF's first Tax Day in years without IRS! Tonight’s undercard has a “one half of tag teams” theme, with Bart Gunn of the Smoking Gunns taking on Steve Austin, and Leif Cassidy of the New Rockers facing Marc Mero. The Wildman enters with new valet Sable, who is decked out in leather. Mero celebrates by doing the Batusi. “Hunter Hearst Helmsley, eat your heart out!” says McMahon. HHH would have the last laugh, marrying Vince’s daughter and thus gaining control of the whole company. “I never thought she was that hot-looking to begin with,” says Lawler of Sable, two years before going nuts over her body-paint “bikini.”

Raw #154 - April 8th, 1996

With Jerry Lawler facing Shawn Michaels in tonight’s main event, the King has been replaced on commentary. You could say that tonight’s announcing will be “perfect.” You’d be wrong, though, as Vince is still at the announce table. Our opening contest is Vader vs. Yokozuna, the match that was originally scheduled for Wrestlemania.

Raw #153 - April 1st, 1996

It’s the night after the Wrestlemania XII, and all through the house, not a creature is stirring, except to flip back and forth between Raw, Nitro, and the NCAA basketball finals. And what better way to kick things off than Bob “Spark Plugg” Holly, whose music plays at the beginning of the show! A new wrestler named, “Mankind” enters the ring to ominous music. Vince is taking a chance by letting Mick Foley debut under this name, rather than “Mason the Mutilator.”

Raw #152 - March 25th, 1996

Shawn Michaels kicks off Raw by augmenting his male stripper gimmick with a Japanese tourist gimmick, coming to the ring with a camcorder to film everything in sight. After Shawn puts away the “Kliq Cam,” he introduces his hometown San Antonio crowd to Supersock José Lothario. Considering Michaels is the “Sexy Boy,” shouldn’t Lothario be “Supersoxy?” Or is the name “Lothario” sexual enough?

Raw #151 - March 18th, 1996

Vince’s opening narration announces Diesel’s heel turn, which occurred at last night’s house show at Madison Square Garden. We are also promised another Billionaire Ted segment, this time involving the FTC. Oh boy!

Raw #150 - March 11th, 1996

It’s the hundred-fiftieth episode of Raw, and it kicks off with history in the making. Yes, that’s right, Savio Vega is in action! But that’s not the historic part, of course. The historic part is that it is the Ringmaster’s first night as “Stone Cold” Steve Austin, although Vince is still reluctant to give up calling him “Ringmaster” altogether. Still, the transition to his now iconic moniker is a sort of mea culpa for the lame nickname he got saddled with in his first few months.

Raw #149 - March 4th, 1996

Tonight, the build-up to Wrestlemania XII gets weird. The fate of the Ultimate Warrior is revealed (sort of), Goldust hits on Roddy Piper, and the upcoming Geriatric Match gets a boost from a mock-trivia show about Ted Turner’s “obnoxious, sexist, racist remarks” that have nothing to do with wrestling or WCW. In more conventional booking, both men in the Mania main event wrestle singles matches.