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To be fair, I think Booker was pushed into that attitude by the culture Hogan, Nash, and some others at the top created.Great White Hope posted:I can't imagine a world where Vince runs anything that could be considered, even if in name only, competition to his own ideas. Great White Hope posted:WCW probably had a chance until the AOL-Time Warner merger. Before then, they had people who loved wrestling and had lots of money in charge, as well as a reliable TV deal, so they could have at least maybe survived (even if they would need to actually find competent leadership) and turned things around. LividLiquid posted:This is, and always will be the answer, but if they kept up creatively and were still making poo poo-tons of money, AOL Time Warner wouldn't have cancelled and sold them.
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Jul 15, 2016 03:43
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The burning question of Starrcade 97: Why the slow fast count? 1) Did Hogan demand it as per his CC clause? I can just imagine that pitch: "Ok, I'll drop the title. I'll go along with the screwjob storyline. But when Nick counts, I want him to count his normal speed." Everybody else: "Why? That defeats the whole purpose and ruins a year's worth of buildup?" "It'll be fine. You tell the fans it's a fast count, they'll go along with it. Bullshitting the fans: how wrestling works. Also I get final say because Eric left himself very little wiggle room when negotiating my contract." 2) Did Hulk go with the plan then collude with Nick Patrick? 3) Is Nick Patrick just bad at his job?
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Jul 15, 2016 03:45
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ChrisBTY posted:The burning question of Starrcade 97: Why the slow fast count? He colluded with Nick Patrick.
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Jul 15, 2016 03:48
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ChrisBTY posted:The burning question of Starrcade 97: Why the slow fast count? No, Yes, Yes
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Jul 15, 2016 03:52
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Scott Dickinson would have kept it on the straight and narrow believe you me
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Jul 15, 2016 03:55
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Halloween Jack posted:Yeah, there is this notion that in the end, WCW was just betrayed by Time Warner in an analogy to the Rural Purge, and it didn't matter how good or bad they were doing. Even The Death of WCW gives implicit support to this narrative, to have its own narrative come full circle with a note of irony. This is bullshit; it wouldn't have been dumped if it wasn't a reeking dumpster fire of a company that was burning through money. Well I wasn't saying that it died because of some vile ploy, as part of my 'competent leadership' involves not burning through every penny you can get your hands on and then some. It's just that the merger meant that the people in charge looked at WCW objectively rather than as a beloved project that happened to lose money. Admittedly, 2000 was absolutely horrific with not much good on the horizon, so maybe even without the merger they were dead.
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Jul 15, 2016 04:04
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After this week's nitro, I think if they ever bring back a wrestling theme restaurant, the chocolate milkshakes need to be served in limo shaped cups.
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Jul 15, 2016 06:23
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It's hard to say when their last chance was, because there was never any one mistake that doomed them- it was a whole bunch of mistakes piled on mistakes. Goldberg could have been used better during his title run, and not only did it end too soon, they immediately sent him down the card while the main event scene reverted to the same old guys. As pointed out they really seemed to actively try to kill Flair's heat and at least partly succeeded with the whole "crazy President" angle. Then you have Russo, then... etc. It really is interesting to see this period unfolding. It's like in Bischoff's desperation to win the ratings war, he completely forgot the basics of putting together a television show, and Nitro just keeps getting flabbier and more incoherent. Like, in 1998, they had problems with long-term booking and building up stars and putting together exciting main events. In 1999 they had problems putting a single segment together properly.
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Jul 15, 2016 06:38
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MassRafTer posted:They lost about 500,000 viewers. The overrun did a huge number as people came back to see Goldberg stomp people (then get beaten up.) Didn't the Fingerpoke get a record-high rating or something, because WCW was still in the "product is hot, you can do anything" period (though that changed very fast after the Fingerpoke)? Or am I getting my timeline all wrong here?
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Jul 15, 2016 07:09
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Benne posted:Didn't the Fingerpoke get a record-high rating or something, because WCW was still in the "product is hot, you can do anything" period (though that changed very fast after the Fingerpoke)? No, they lost that week to Raw. It was still a good number and ahead of Raw in adults, but not record breaking. You might be confusing that with the record breaking gates in that run. That show was the third of three nearly million dollar gates Nitro did for Stadium shows in about as many weeks.
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Jul 15, 2016 07:14
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MassRafTer posted:No, they lost that week to Raw. It was still a good number and ahead of Raw in adults, but not record breaking. You might be confusing that with the record breaking gates in that run. That show was the third of three nearly million dollar gates Nitro did for Stadium shows in about as many weeks. Ah, that's right, the live gates were still doing gangbusters in spite of all the stupid bullshit WCW did in '98. I guess the next logical question is, when did the tide turn on live gates? Was it around the point that top guys simply stopped showing up at house shows despite being advertised?
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Jul 15, 2016 07:26
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Benne posted:Ah, that's right, the live gates were still doing gangbusters in spite of all the stupid bullshit WCW did in '98. Spring. Slamboree is in the TWA Dome and has 8,000 less fans than the Nitro six months earlier.
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Jul 15, 2016 07:31
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Jeff Jarrett was always great. He's a Memphis-style Heel Born and Bred, and he's never not done it well. He was a good hand in the ring (not a "literal master of all forms of wrestling who will never be used for anything but making worse people look good," like a Dean Malenko, and actual Good Hand like an X-pac) and an above-average promo who knew how to get heat when he needed it. He should never have been the company headliner of any company he wrestled for, WCW least of all, but he's always been perfect UMC Gatekeeper/Jobber To The Stars Low-tier Main Eventer material, and when given that role he always excelled even in TNA's darkest days. When Bryan Alvarez had praise for you in TNA circa 2010, you had to be doing SOMETHING right. That's my opinion and I stick by it 
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Jul 15, 2016 07:50
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OctoberCountry posted:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9U-M8nnGJxY Oh my god, the dropkick. 
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Jul 15, 2016 08:00
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Jeff Jarrett did a Matt Hardy insomuch as he was at his best in the latter days of his career when he didn't give a poo poo and was booked very very sillily by a company too incompetent to stop him. Double J Double M A, and World's Greatest Dad are legitimately good.
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Jul 15, 2016 08:09
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A few months ago, probably around the time of Daniel Bryan's retirement a few friends and I watched the beginning of the "Best of In Your House" DVD. The match was Shawn against Jarrett. Which provoked the response from me: Daniel Bryan wasn't a B+ player. Jeff Jarrett, on the other hand is a B+ player. But when a guy like Jeff is booked to be a multiple time world champion and headliner of multiple promotions for years on end, it's hard to see him as anything but an overrated pile of nothing.
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Jul 15, 2016 08:39
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I've always looked at Jarrett like this: If Triple H is a 9 booked like a 10 so people think he's a 7, Jarrett is a 7 booked like a 10 so people think he's a 4. Which makes me yearn, for pro-wrestling science purposes, a Tom McGee God Push. If a 1 is booked like a 10, what do people think he is...?
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Jul 15, 2016 09:45
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NameHurtBrain posted:Which makes me yearn, for pro-wrestling science purposes, a Tom McGee God Push. If a 1 is booked like a 10, what do people think he is...? Roman Reigns
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Jul 15, 2016 10:30
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I always felt WCW's last stand was the New Blood angle. The company may have already been in trouble by that point, but they didn't seem like they were beyond the point of no return. They had a chance to showcase a bunch of new stars with this angle, and establish a new base of guys to build the company around. It seemed like after losing Jericho, The Giant, the Radicals and Raven that WCW had finally come to their senses and was going to establish their new generation. Then they turned them all heel and jobbed them out to the old-timers and you realized that it was still going to be the same old poo poo forever.
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Jul 15, 2016 12:07
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Great White Hope posted:Well I wasn't saying that it died because of some vile ploy, as part of my 'competent leadership' involves not burning through every penny you can get your hands on and then some. It's just that the merger meant that the people in charge looked at WCW objectively rather than as a beloved project that happened to lose money. Admittedly, 2000 was absolutely horrific with not much good on the horizon, so maybe even without the merger they were dead. CopywrightMMXI posted:I always felt WCW's last stand was the New Blood angle. The company may have already been in trouble by that point, but they didn't seem like they were beyond the point of no return. They had a chance to showcase a bunch of new stars with this angle, and establish a new base of guys to build the company around. It seemed like after losing Jericho, The Giant, the Radicals and Raven that WCW had finally come to their senses and was going to establish their new generation. Then they turned them all heel and jobbed them out to the old-timers and you realized that it was still going to be the same old poo poo forever.
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Jul 15, 2016 12:43
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Turner was always hands off though, he was never an active player in WCW.
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Jul 15, 2016 20:04
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Sanguinia posted:Jeff Jarrett was always great. He's a Memphis-style Heel Born and Bred, and he's never not done it well. He was a good hand in the ring (not a "literal master of all forms of wrestling who will never be used for anything but making worse people look good," like a Dean Malenko, and actual Good Hand like an X-pac) and an above-average promo who knew how to get heat when he needed it. I agree he did the Memphis shtick well, the issue is that I'm not sure that was enough to make fans give a gently caress by the time he was pushed to the main (which you understand, so don't take this spiel as a criticism). As much as I love Steve Corino, his King of Old School gimmick would have died a horrible death in WWE. It worked in ECW because 90% of the roster worked with weapons and brawling, in WWE, nobody would have cared. And to make it full circle, it probably would have ended up just like the "NWA" invasion of WWE did. Similarly, Jarrett doing a somewhat updated Jackie Fargo and Honky Tonk Man act got a big loving collective yawn from WCW audiences. Don't even get me started about his pseudo-Lawler TNA run. What Jarrett forgot about Lawler's run in Memphis is that Jerry would do jobs for guys like the Dream Machine, and Taras Bulba, and Doug Gilbert, so that he would actually seem vulnerable sometimes. And of course, it would build up a rematch that sell out the mid south coliseum. If Lawler saw Jarrett's initial superman run up to the point he fought off Raven while handcuffed plus several stablemates of Raven, there would not be a big enough  motion for him to make.
El Gallinero Gros fucked around with this message at 00:42 on Jul 16, 2016 |
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Jul 16, 2016 00:32
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CopywrightMMXI posted:I always felt WCW's last stand was the New Blood angle. The company may have already been in trouble by that point, but they didn't seem like they were beyond the point of no return. They had a chance to showcase a bunch of new stars with this angle, and establish a new base of guys to build the company around. It seemed like after losing Jericho, The Giant, the Radicals and Raven that WCW had finally come to their senses and was going to establish their new generation. Then they turned them all heel and jobbed them out to the old-timers and you realized that it was still going to be the same old poo poo forever. This is very true. The New Blood could have been very cool. A bunch of young hungry wrestlers taking on the old stale wrestlers clinging to their spots. It could have made new stars, and set up multiple fueds/programs and revitalized careers and the company. Instead, WCW made the young guys heel, and the old boring guys babyface which made absolutely no sense to anyone. It fizzled and died as teh old guys with creative control, (*cough* Hogan *cough*) refused to job so the young guys were seen as goofs, weren't allowed to shine, and were quickly shuffled off and things went back to the status quo with old men that the audience no longer cared about doing stupid things that the audience didn't understand. WCW.
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Jul 17, 2016 05:35
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BrigadierSensible posted:This is very true. The New Blood could have been very cool. A bunch of young hungry wrestlers taking on the old stale wrestlers clinging to their spots. It could have made new stars, and set up multiple fueds/programs and revitalized careers and the company. The old guys were older big stars and in several cases (Hogan, Flair, Sting) were guys the fans didn't want to boo. The "clinging to their spots" storyline idea is always awful. The whole thing was a mess.
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Jul 17, 2016 05:41
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No you see, Chuck Palumbo and Shawn Stasiak would have been the biggest stars ever if it weren't for old people holding them back.
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Jul 17, 2016 05:43
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The New Blood is even worse now that I've seen the did 3 other "the main eventers are holding us down" storylines in the previous 18 months.
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Jul 17, 2016 05:59
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All the guys who could have made the New Blood angle work were gone by that time. (Not that I'm saying it would have definitely worked if it had those guys, but I feel like say, a Jericho/Radicalz vs nWo feud would have at least worked a little) And of course part of the issue with those kinds of angles are logistics. Are you going to turn all your major merch movers heel all at once? Or are you going to do what WCW did? Make them the faces and force the 'stagnation is good, upward mobility is bad' angle? I think maybe the whole concept is an interesting bit of insight into the perception of a hardcore vs. a more casual fan. Hardcore fans seem to want constant change. Casual fans want familiarity. ChrisBTY fucked around with this message at 09:01 on Jul 17, 2016 |
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Jul 17, 2016 08:49
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Tomorrow night the stakes get even higher in poop feud, and one of the most legendary segments in WCW history airs.
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Jul 19, 2016 01:11
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I've been going through and tossing a bunch of VHS tapes I'd recorded of WCW from 1995 through to the very end. A few pages ago, Russo was mentioned in regards to if WCW was salvageable at that point. Financially, probably not, but whatever life the company might have had left, Russo killed dead. WCW's booking had never been great, but whatever daft angles they had had went from being daft to offensively stupid or plain offensive under Russo. Every single female was degraded horribly under him, except perhaps Daffney. If I remember right, many of the valets were given the ultimatum to wrestle or be fired and that included Elizabeth. There were lots of women's matches against men, none of which made sense. You had his one-off joke names like Hugh Morrus becoming General Rection and Lance Storm renaming the US title the Saskatchewan Heavyweight Invitational Title. Oh, y'all are wondering what shittiness to look forward to in the middle of 2000? I don't remember which Nitro, but one from that summer features Mark Madden in the ring. He might have been shirtless.
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Jul 19, 2016 03:11
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RC and Moon Pie posted:I've been going through and tossing a bunch of VHS tapes I'd recorded of WCW from 1995 through to the very end. But he also gave us skull daddy skit. It was probably poo poo but I have fond memories of that segment.
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Jul 19, 2016 03:32
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RC and Moon Pie posted:If I remember right, many of the valets were given the ultimatum to wrestle or be fired and that included Elizabeth. There were lots of women's matches against men, none of which made sense. You had his one-off joke names like Hugh Morrus becoming General Rection and Lance Storm renaming the US title the Saskatchewan Heavyweight Invitational Title. Also Lance "  " Storm was one of the best things about Russo's WCW.
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Jul 19, 2016 04:30
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Halloween Jack posted:
Agreed. This was the best use of Lance Storm's character. They let him be boring and stern, but a great technical wrestler who was extremely difficult to beat.
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Jul 19, 2016 05:12
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BrigadierSensible posted:Agreed. This was the best use of Lance Storm's character. They let him be boring and stern, but a great technical wrestler who was extremely difficult to beat. Storm and his Canadian group were great. I found it quite stupid that Russo changed the name of the title just so it spelled poo poo.
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Jul 19, 2016 05:22
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RC and Moon Pie posted:Storm and his Canadian group were great. I found it quite stupid that Russo changed the name of the title just so it spelled poo poo. It's actually worse than that: initially he wanted it to be the Stu Hart Invitational Title. So not only is it puerile, but also insulting.
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Jul 19, 2016 06:55
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The worst part about that Canadian stable was Hacksaw's turn. Here's a guy that had been an all-American borderline-retarded face for decades, his turn should have been shocking and momentous. Instead, not only was it telegraphed for weeks, but it was about exciting as renal failure. poo poo, even WWE did it better when the Brooklyn Brawler became a Red Sox fan.
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Jul 19, 2016 13:34
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Pope Corky the IX posted:The worst part about that Canadian stable was Hacksaw's turn. Here's a guy that had been an all-American borderline-retarded face for decades, his turn should have been shocking and momentous. Instead, not only was it telegraphed for weeks, but it was about exciting as renal failure. poo poo, even WWE did it better when the Brooklyn Brawler became a Red Sox fan. Actually he is a very smart man.
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Jul 19, 2016 14:15
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Endless Mike posted:Actually he is a very smart man. are you saying he's a college educated man
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Jul 19, 2016 14:48
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Then why wasn't he in the Varsity Club with decorated collegiate wrestlers like Scott Steiner and Kevin Sullivan?
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Jul 19, 2016 14:50
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Is there such a thing a Duggan Math? Didn't think so.
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Jul 19, 2016 15:22
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h + oo = America.
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Jul 19, 2016 15:26
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