What exactly is happening here? (Bad tape, or faulty VCR?)

[Kaitou]

If you could look at the words on the attached pictures (where it says play and hi-fi) So I'm trying to figure out if I am having a problem with a certain tape, or a problem with the VCR altogether. This is not the first time I have seen this issue on a VCR either, but before I thought it may have been a damaged VCR due to a power surge. Just played an old wrestling tape and when it started, it had a sync issue where the picture was slightly splitting, but then went back to normal a few seconds later. However, the same thing happened halfway throughout the tape, causing a bit of a blurry picture (like two split images that are just slightly not merged) and causing playback that was not smooth either. The tape did look like it had some weird chew marks across certain points when I checked it, and it's been quite some time since I last played this specific tape.

Am I missing something incredibly obvious? I'm hoping this is only a tape issue since I've played a few other tapes and did not run into this issue, and after adjusting the tracking, I did get the picture fixed on the faulty tape though the audio was slightly choppy.

Also for context, I am using a combo Sony VCR/DVD player (SLV-D281P)

[dellsam34]

All I see is a black screen.

[Kaitou]

All I see is a black screen.

Sorry I meant to say if you look at where it says Play, you can notice the fuzzy word on the first picture.