World Wide Web Fights presents
WWWF GRUDGE MATCH

The Setting

As dawn breaks upon a quiet rural community, things are very busy at a specially prepared farm just outside town. Two identical barns have been constructed at opposite ends of a small field. Both have been filled with all kinds of "common" materials: old tractors, rusted car parts, half-full containers of household chemicals, duct tape, welding equipment, tools, etc. You name it, it's there. At the stroke of 7 am, the A-Team (with Murdock-- he was broke out of the nuthouse yesterday) is led into one barn, and MacGyver (with his buddy Pete) into the other. Both barns are locked from the outside, and will remain locked for five hours. At noon, the doors will simultaneously be opened, and the two competitors must try to destroy the other with whatever contraptions they have created while locked away. Who will win this battle, and what will they have made?

MacGyver, Richard Dean Anderson The A-Team: B.A. Baracus, Hannibal, Face and Murdock

MacGyver

vs.

The A-Team

The Commentary

SAM: First Lector vs. Dahmer, and now this matchup of 80's attempt at violent-nonviolence. I guess you and Brian only need me for the truly hard decisions. Nonetheless, I am honored to part of this one.

Steve, there is only one logical choice for this one, the A-team. Anyone who has watched both of these competitors in action will certainly agree with me. First, the A-team has worked together for decades starting with a tour in Vietnam. Just take a look at the members of this crack mercenary unit: a consumate aviator, a diplomat of sorts, a top-rate mechanic/driver, and a leader who thrives on "plans coming together" and is a master of disguise. I ask you, Steve, how can MacGyver compete with such an organization? Remember, the A-team is not scared to use guns like your boy MacGyver. How is ole' Pete going to help MacGyver? Historically, all Pete is good for is getting MacGyver into jams, not getting him out.

I'm sorry, but the science fair antics of the man with one name are no match for Hannibal and company.

STEVE: Sam, you forget two vital points in your flawed argument. First of all, the A-Team's opponent is always some gang of gun toting local boys who think they are running the show. The A-Team doesn't know how to fight someone who actually has any intelligence. Granted, when they're fighting their typical opponent, they are unbeatable. But MacGyver has skill and cunning. He won't fall for the A-Team's standard tricks. Which brings me to my second point.

MacGyver already knows what the A-Team is going to construct. Anyone who has watched the A-Team more than once knows what they are going to construct. MacGyver will be ready for their armor-plated school bus / tractor. MacGyver's far superior intelligence will allow him to build a high-powered laser which will make swiss cheese out of their dumpy tank. MacGyver will also use some pinecones to make landmines (I've actually seen this on MacGyver) to further pummel the A-Team into submission.

After less than a minute of fighting, the A-Team will emerge worn and battered from their makeshift vehicle. Hannibal himself will be waving the white flag of surrender.

SAM: Steve, I never claimed that the A-team was not predictable. Hey, you go with your strengths, wouldn't you? If you get results with slow moving, armor-plated vehicles, then so be it. I want to stress two things: (1) The A-team, and I stress TEAM, gets results. Hey, they make things happen. (2) MacGyver is timid and weak, with no rage. I would just like to see him try to allude the adament Col. Decker like my boys, the A-team. In a couple of days MacGyver would be in a federal prison, trying to figure out a clever, yet safe, way of picking up the bar of soap that he dropped.

So you want a scenario? After much contemplation, this is the most probable sequence. First of all, I'll give you the pinecone landmine, but not the laser. Ok, the A-team will indeed construct a armor-plated tractor, no arguements there. But you, nor MacGyver, is suspecting a two prong attack. Let me explain. Any military leader, such as Hannibal, knows not to put all there eggs in one basket. The Faceman will be in charge of procuring a local crop duster's airplane. How will he do this? Simple, he will flirt with the healthy-looking, Daisy Duke-like farmer's daughter before the contest. The plane will no doubt be there in the morning, awaiting B.A.'s modifications and Murdock's skilled hands. Everyone knows that the Faceman can do the impossible, hell the man drives a Corvette and lives for free! The battle will be hard fought, but MacGyver will be knocked out cold for several months from an explosion blast he encountered trying to save the bumbling Pete. Nobody will die, thats a given.

Smoke a cigar and jump in the van, Hannibal, the plan has come together.

Steve, MacGyver has his place, but its teaching high school chemistry, not in a death match with professionals like the A-team. Maybe MacGyver should be helping Julia Childs in her kitchen. As for Pete, he was last seen in a canoe entering the "Deliverance Zone".

STEVE: I have only one question for you. What good is a plane going to be if no one is flying it? The entire A-Team is locked up in the barn, remember? Even if Face somehow manages to get a plane, by the time Murdock starts it and gets it aloft, the battle will already have been lost. That is, assuming he even gets a chance to get the engine running.

And, as far as lasers are concerned, I can think of two episodes just off the top of my head where MacGyver constructs a laser. You underestimate MacGyver, just as the A-Team is going to do. I daresay MacGyver could defeat the A-Team with some chewing gum and tinfoil. The A-Team will be praying for Col. Decker's prison soap when this match is through.

The Results

MacGyver (599)

defeats

The A-Team (403)

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Voter Comments

I regret to inform you that I passed a brain-stone and accidentally deleted a number of responses. Those affected were those who mailed in responses in the first week or so. It is too bad, because some of them were some of the funniest I've seen. I'll make backups next time....

Ok, so the A-team is made up of hardened veterans and they outnumber MacGyver & Co, but in all of their fights, have they ever really hurt anyone with their homemade mortars and machine-guns? No! All that ever happens is that their opponent's vehicles turn over. MacGyver will no doubt foresee this and not build any kind of transport. Instead he'll mix together some kind of crazy-glue from horse droppings and dirt. Armed with this he will face the A-team totally unprotected, since they by definition _cannot_ hit him if he is not in a car. Then glues the A-team to the ground and waits for them to suffocate in their tank/tractor.

-M. Wangel

Sam, Sam, Sam... You seem unable to make the right choice when it comes to tough decisions. You made the right call in the bake-off, but this time you are picking the wrong person. Just because they share the same first name does not mean that "Hannibal the Cannonball" and his "team" will prevail over a Beakman-like genius with outdoors survival knowledge. Also, a "master of disguise"? The best disguise George Peppard ever came up with made him look like Leslie Nielsen in drag - on a bad hair day. MacGyver, on the other hand, is able to harness his knowledge of chemistry, physics, and other sciences I failed in high school to create something just as destructive as the atom bomb, without any of the nasty fallout.

The A-Team will fabricate their typical armored vehicle and will blast out of the barn with guns blazing. Since the A-Team never actually killed any of the bad guys, this leads me to believe that they are really lousy shots; heck, I'd be willing to wager that they couldn't even hit the broad side of Roseanne Barr. There is one more component that will seal the A-Team's fate: Mr.T won't be focused. B.A. Barakas will be thinking about how he will defraud Don King of all the pay-per-view profits from the televised rematch with Mr. Clean.

Meanwhile, MacGyver will construct a simple, yet rugged means of transport that is powered using a solar cell and an electric egg beater that is able to attain a top speed of 137mph, despite the skies being overcast. Pete will simply be snoozing in the hay, since MacGyver politely told him that he was a liability and not an asset. MacGyver will load up on pinecone and chewing gum grenades, heat-seeking sparrow-tipped arrows, and hollow-tip bullets made by melting down the rusting Chevy Duster that was in the barn.

The battle begins with the A-Team barelling out of their barn and MacGyver driving a sensible 30mph towards the onrushing, bullet-spewing, armored "bus of death". To protect himself, MacGyver has attached suspenders to Pete and is using him as a human shield (Pete doesn't die, the A-Team are lousy shots; I already said that). Just as MacGyver starts laying down tracer fire, B.A. mistakes a hedge for Don King and makes a violent turn towards the hedge in an effort to eliminate "vertical hair man". The entire A-Team realizes too late that they are about to dive into a canyon a-la-Thelma-and-Louise. Hannibal and his men die in a fiery explosion at the bottom of the canyon with MacGyver looking from above and saying something witty like: "You should have turned right."

MacGyver in less than 3 minutes. Look for the sequel on ABC this fall.

-HotBranch!

Clearly MacGyver must win. At first the outcome was not obvious, but like all MacGyver related plot devices it was quite subtle yet compelling in its certainty.

While both the A-Team and MacGyver are in their Barns working on their implements of destruction, MacGyver will build one more tool, a cellular telephone, and contact Col. Decker. This will give a sufficiently narrow (yet guaranteed) margin of victory to satisfy the MacGyver plot device criteria.

-Bill M.

MacGyver Vs A-Team? No contest! A-team all the way! MacGyver is a big sissy-boy who lives in some kind of fairy tale land where the bad guys never resort to actual physical violence. The A-team on the other hand, are battle-worn veterans that can kick come serious ass! Since the barn is stocked with so much stuff, I think that MacGyver will become engrosssed in his little science experiments and forget all about the A-Team. "Ooh, a 1954 RCA d-model transistor radio! You know the fuse settings on this model were quite ingenius for it's time. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah."

The A-team are focused, focused on the total destruction of MacGyver! Sure they will probably construct some big combine/tank vehicle. But more importantly, the will have guns. The combine will come rolling out of the barn, with guns blazing. Of course, no one gets shot in either the A-team or MacGyver universes. So B.A. will have to punch out MacGyver. "I pity the fool that lock us in that barn!"

-Daric

This is a silly match. A group that can't hit the broadside of the barn with the entire arsenal of all four branches of the US armed forces against one guy who refuses to hurt anyone.

-Dave

This one is an easy pick. MacGyver fights people with Cunning Plans; the A-Team fights people who look like they're Cylons on their off day come looking for their ol' buddy Dirk Benedict. And of course Hannibal is going to be distracted at this point with plans for an all-out raid on the FDA, what with the fuss over tobacco, and can't be giving his full attention to this brawl.

-Bruce

-- I think that Mac will win. He will rip apart an old jukebox in the barn and using the spring shocks from an old tractor he will launch spinning discs of death across the field handily decapitating Face. Then he will use some scrap iron and some copper cable and make super electric magnet that he use to catch the A-Teams tank and shake every one out into a tiger trap full of sharp pointy bamboo. As Hanibal falls he takes a shot at Mac but ends up hitting Pete in the knee. Mac preforms emergency surgery and saves his leg. Then he goes to Tiajauna and picks up a sleazy hooker who is really a Ukrainian spy, a bottle of tequila and a bottle of vodka.

-Ragk Cockweenkie

Like Steve said, the A-team is no match for a thinking adversary. They may have a shot against typical punks from their show or from CHiPs or from Hardcastle & McCormick, but not against MacGyver. I am under the belief that MacGyver (with or without Pete) can construct a nuclear weapon from a light bulb, some tin foil and a half a quart of 30 weight motor oil in less than 90 seconds (average length of suspense clips leading up to a MacGyver resolution). Imagine what he can do in 5 hours!!!!!

The A-team is toast.

-Mr. BW

There's only one possible winner: the A-team. Here's why:

1) No weapon that Mac can devise in half a day could possibly penetrate Mr. T's gold plated-armor (oh. It's jewelry? Same diff.), or his thick skull. Any laser (provided that Mac can put one together) would be harmlessly deflected by Mr. T's gold protected chest (not to mention sunny disposition.)

2) The A-Team is apparently nigh-invulnerable to ranged attacks of any kind. In the 5 years that they were on TV, they were hit by bullets a grand total of ONCE (must have contained Krytonite or something)! (Mr. T took it in the shoulder as I recall.) Anyway, the various local yokels of the world have attempted to exterminate the A-Team at close range with automatic and semi-automatic weaponry many times. They can't even hit them. What makes Mac think he can?? On the other hand, Mac got beat up pretty badly on more than one occasion. And, since Mac can't hit these guys at range, what's he going to do, try hand to hand? (I pity the fool.)

3) Pete?! Pete????! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

4) A-Team was produced by Stephen J. Cannel. (sp?) Mac was produced by Fonzie, who, you might remember, was defeated in a grudge match by Mork. Since we know that Mork is no match for The A-Team, we must suspect that Fonzie is not either, nor are any of his creations.

So, the A-Team Wins!!

-Scott

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