pathetic little tramp posted:

Great White Hope posted:

When was Don West in WCW?

pathetic little tramp posted:

bobkatt013 posted:

Does anyone have the gif of Sting hitting Hogan with the bat from the end of the death of lex?

haljordan posted:

The fact that he's only wearing one boot makes it funnier for some reason.

The American Dream posted:

Why was it so hard for them to get TV after TBS/TNT cancelled them? Did it have to do with how much they wanted to get paid for WCW programming? They still had pretty good ratings for cable tv.

MassRafTer posted:

They had a week to get a deal before the company would be sold to the WWF, and no one wanted it. At that point WCW was doing 2.1s and pro wrestling was getting a stigma at that point. USA wasn't interested in wrestling unless they were getting the #1 product. FX was mildly interested but said no, and no other networks had interest. Of course at that point there weren't a ton of cable networks who were going to pay out millions for anything. Even if there were, a week isn't enough time to make a deal.

MassRafTer posted:

They had a week to get a deal before the company would be sold to the WWF, and no one wanted it. At that point WCW was doing 2.1s and pro wrestling was getting a stigma at that point. USA wasn't interested in wrestling unless they were getting the #1 product. FX was mildly interested but said no, and no other networks had interest. Of course at that point there weren't a ton of cable networks who were going to pay out millions for anything. Even if there were, a week isn't enough time to make a deal.

rovert posted:

Excellent post by MassRafTer. The feeling within the TV industry was that Wrestling was a fad that had peaked. Along with those in TV industry having the belief that Vince McMahon was the only person that could make Wrestling work.

HulkaMatt posted:

No derails please.

Observer June 3 1996 posted:

A combination of bad matches, bad commentary (even by company standards), little hype or excitement, bad interviews and bad angles resulted in a two-hour broadcast reminiscent more of a bad WCW Saturday Night show as opposed to the competing Monday Night Raw. However, amidst the attempt at a cure for insomnia was the debut of Hall, done in a manner that is almost certain to be one of the biggest money angles of the year.

Hall came out first, dressed in blue jeans but everything else similar to his old Razor Ramon character, in the middle of a dead match between Steve Doll and The Mauler (Mike Enos). The match basically ended with no finish and Hall came into the ring, doing his Latino accent, and acted as if he was a WWF wrestler who came out to avenge his company knocking WCW as if it were a hillbilly promotion and talking about Billionaire Ted, Scheme Gene and Nacho Man, the characters from the Vince McMahon parodies. The crowd was somewhat stunned by all this, with some cheering and most not really reacting out of shock.

From a one-upmanship category, it was the biggest strike Bischoff has pulled off including the Lex Luger debut, in that he's using McMahon's own storyline parody angles that were supposed to be used against WCW and end up being used in WCW's biggest angle against WWF as a way to draw money doing a Japanese style fake shoot angle built around the promotional war. It was a retribution for McMahon attempting to make a fool of Bischoff on his Raw show by putting one of his letters regarding the parodies on television and having Dok Hendrix saying "that this same executive from Turner Broadcasting" without mentioning Bischoff by name, who had days earlier called to say how much he enjoyed the parodies (on the day the ratings came out during a week where WCW Nitro scored its biggest win over Raw). No name was ever given to Hall, other than Bischoff's frequent references to him saying he wouldn't mention a name because he doesn't want any more legal letters "but you all know who he is." Hall's second interview was hyped throughout the second hour and came at the end of the show where he again acted as if he was a WWF wrestler challenging the WCW wrestlers to a three-on-three match and talked about his side taking over, and mentioning the "war" wouldn't be in commentary (referring to Bischoff's knocking of WWF) or in newspapers or in dirt sheets and continually using Billionaire Ted, Scheme Gene, Nacho Man and calling Bischoff a Ken-doll weatherman wannabe while Bischoff acted as if everything was an unplanned intrusion into the live show (which is why Bischoff had attempted to get word out that it wasn't definite Nash or Hall were coming and ran down Hall in a newspaper article because he was simply working an angle). The plan was that this match will end up being the main event on the 7/6 WCW Bash at the Beach PPV from Daytona Beach with Hall & Kevin Nash & likely Lex Luger (who, if it turns out to be him, it'll be revealed was part of a ruse to befriend people with the idea never stated but implied that the WWF was behind it all along), with the idea that they might be managed by Ted DiBiase.

Observer June 3 1996 posted:

In another King of the Ring qualifier, Jake Roberts pinned Hunter Hearst Helmsley in 10:30 after a DDT and Roberts put the snake on HHH after the match as well. The results was almost certainly punishment for the incident in Madison Square Garden on 6/19 where Helmsley, Shawn Michaels, Diesel and Razor Ramon did the curtain call in the ring after the show violating kayfabe big-time. There was a sizeable amount of internal heat regarding the wrestlers doing it even though the majority of fans had left before Michaels finished his post-match routine and it was mainly the hardcores left who liked it. Anyway, since they couldn't punish Diesel or Ramon since they were leaving (apparently flagrantly violating as many rules as possible on the way out) and Michaels is the company's golden boy and top draw, it was Helmsley who was the one made the example out of.

Observer June 3 1996 posted:

Dwayne Johnson, the son of Rocky, debuted under the name Flex Kabana as a babyface teaming with Brian Christopher in a tag title match on the 5/25 television against Lawler & Bill Dundee. Dundee hit the ref for the DQ finish saving the title. Kabana, who has only had about a half-dozen pro matches, was said to have shown a lot of potential.

Observer June 3 1996 posted:

Monday Night Raw tapings on 5/27 in Fayetteville, NC drew a sellout of about 5,000 fans (4,200 paying $51,756 with all tickets gone one day in advance). The show opened with a try-out match where the Overlords beat the Hardy Brothers. All four looked green.

haljordan posted:

I still can't believe how many matches are won/lost and how many belts change hands due to sheer pettiness and spite. The concept of forcing someone to job as a punitive measure is a really funny way of handling workplace discipline.

CopywrightMMXI posted:

Who were the Overlords?

Sydney Bottocks posted:

My favorite story along these lines comes from the pre-Bischoff WCW days, when Bill Watts told people like Brian Pillman that they either needed to accept a salary cut, or else they'd be used as jobbers for the duration of their WCW contracts. To which Pillman replied "Then I'll be the highest-paid jobber in the business."

Supreme Allah posted:

Tell the T-rex to stop wearing long tights, he has great quads & he should be showing them off.

ColonelJohnMatrix posted:

While I don't know where this quote came from, I can only assume it's from Vince due to how overtly gay it sounds.

triplexpac posted:

You know your pro wrestling!

Vince was amazed when he saw Jericho's manly thighs

Beautiful Ninja posted:

Didn't he also say the same thing to Miz?

Jerusalem posted:

Is there going to be a thing today?

Jerusalem posted:

Is there going to be a thing today?

ColeM posted:

Pope Corky the IX posted:

Isn't this just an excerpt from Death of WCW?