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Luger was way over. People who aren't wrestling fans but watched it sporadically during the Monday Night Wars still remember Luger, and are more likely to know who Luger is than Orton, or even Cena. Maybe not in the US or Canada though, I meant globally.
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Oct 28, 2012 12:08
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People who don't know the WWF changed to the WWE are more likely to know who Luger is, or was, than Cena. And that's a lot of people, worldwide. It's just because everyone loved wrestling in the late 90s, it was considered cool.
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Oct 28, 2012 13:32
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No, no, definitely not. I was speaking in pop culture terms. The average human knows who Hogan is, they connect his name to wrestling. Luger was a top star during wrestling's biggest boom period, he has that in his favor.
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Oct 28, 2012 14:07
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Last time the general public cared about wrestling was when you had two-three promotions that were competitive and thus driven to be original. Also, never disregard the power of a name - the WWF was a powerful abbreviation, and a great portion of said general public still thinks wrestling is equal to the World Wrestling Federation, they wouldn't know what the WWE is at all. In a way, the Padnas and their name dispute are more responsible for wrestling not being more popular, than John Cena. When analyzing the popularity of wrestling, you need to get to the most basic things. If the WWE went back to their WWF name, you'd see an increase in popularity just from that, not a major increase, but it wouldn't go unnoticed. I hadn't been watching wrestling for about eight years, and when I came back, Sheamus was champ. I was shocked. And Cena is the kind of wrestler I would always hate - I was that kid who liked Jericho and Raven. Last summer, with CM Punk, the WWE had a major opportunity to get into the mainstream in a big way, present itself with a new poster boy: tattoos, rebellious attitude, alternative lifestyle, doesn't look like he's on the juice and could be a genuine badass and a role model at the same time. He's a safe bet because he's drug free and a comic book nerd, which is like hitting the jackpot in a time when 'nerd' and 'geek' are considered as positive and trendy things. The face of a new generation and a new boom period. They've only used a fragment of that, and now with the mega heel angle, it reminds of when DDP or Goldberg were heels. So, what today's WWE and WCW in its decline have in common is a lack of direction and long-term planning, angles that don't finish, and not using their performers' full potential. But, they don't have any rivals, so this is as good as it gets.
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Nov 18, 2012 17:18
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Every now and then the dirtsheets post news about the WWE doing things 'on the fly', especially with Raw, which often changes stories hours before the show. Didn't they add John Cena to the Survivor Series main event, and change SS teams as well? WCW didn't even have a standing point like WrestleMania.
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Nov 29, 2012 18:46
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Well yeah, technically. And one of the biggest Starrcades was in '97 with Hogan vs. Sting, and that had a messy ending.
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Nov 29, 2012 19:15
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Sometimes I miss Schiavone. Actually, I miss the way he used to annoy me. For example, Lawler also annoys me, but he's definitely on a different level than Schiavone. Just imagine for a second, if you will, the commentator team of JBL and Heenan. One can only dream. Watching that clip of weird and funny WCW moments reminded me of why I hate Russo, it's because I felt, as a fan, that he was destroying everything I enjoyed about WCW, everything that made it original and different to the WWF.
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Dec 2, 2012 16:23
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The WWE's revisionist history will, of course, always favor Raw and the WWF, and make sure to emphasize all the bad sides of WCW, but I remember how it was back then. Two things stood out: the WWF looked better, their production was better, and they emphasized every match and made every title seem important. WCW had the cruiserweights, and that's what got me hooked, plus the in-ring work was superior, but it was all poorly produced compared to the WWF, plus the new guys you wanted to see become top superstars never got their chance. And this is speaking as a European viewer, I didn't get any Monday night war - Saturday Night was on Thursdays, Nitro was on Fridays and Saturdays, Raw was on Saturdays... on a whole bunch of channels. I never saw Raw VS Nitro, them going head-to-head, and that didn't even seem so important, but now I see it presented as the most important aspect of that whole era. Bischoff can defend himself all he wants, and guys like Nash can make smartass comments and point out AOL and Time Warner as crucial factors, but the most important factor in WCW's demise and the WWE's current reign is Vince McMahon. He invested everything in a company that was, well, everything to him. And he was an active player, you'd see him on TV every week, and his family. That is determination, the kind you have when your only option is to survive. Bischoff will always be just a producer, and he wanted to become a bigshot producer via wrestling, but lacked the knowledge. McMahon had the knowledge, and he worked his rear end off, that't why he won in the end. WCW obviously had a lot of good stuff to offer, which is why people are still analyzing it. I guess many of us feel WCW was taken away from us without a proper send-off.
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Jan 17, 2013 15:04
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ThatCguy posted:Bingo. Production wise, WCW always made "sense", there was always a reason for the camera to be there. They acknowledged it was being filmed. Attacks that occured "off grounds" or backstage that were on camera? They explained why there was a camera, or had the wrestlers film it. Simple flow and continuity stuff that the WWF never picked up on, instead sort of going with a 4th wall mentality to the filming. Interesting. I wasn't getting at that, but one of the things I loved about Nitro and what made it seem more real than Raw was: it was treated primarily like a sports show, the wrestlers were athletes fighting over prestigious championships, or honor, or control. Raw was much closer to a cartoon/soap opera. But I never thought about backstage segments and acknowledged or not acknowledged the presence of a cameraman. WCW was really a level above the WWF in that matter. I was thinking more about the WWF's visuals, and that falls in the category of graphic design and video editing. Logos, music (especially the music), the TitanTron, pyro - it looked way better in the WWF. Especially the pyro, on WCW TV shows there would always be a ton of smoke after the pyro, whether it's the opening segment or Goldberg's entrance. This also may be just a small detail, but I preferred the sound of a WCW ring, the impact (no pun intended) seemed more intense, the WWF ring had a more metal sound to it. BTW, I know a lot of people compare TNA to WCW, I tried watching it, and couldn't. Tried during Foley's last days, when Anderson had a program with Sting. Back in the day, in 2000, I quit watching WCW. I love wrestling, but if it's bad, it's better to re-watch the good stuff than to force myself.
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Jan 17, 2013 19:51
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Thanks for reminding me about that stuff. I totally forgot about how Schiavone would emphasize they have a camera crew present backstage or wherever, and for what reason. So, when Russo came and they did that segment with the nWo attacking Flair somewhere far away from the arena, and the commentators didn't mention WHY there was a camera there, this would be Russo working in a WWF style? Because I remember that, and how stupid that segment was, and how it was heavily criticized online.
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Jan 17, 2013 20:06
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Yeah, I feel like the core of every modern WWE feud is an interview/debate in the middle of the ring.
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Jan 17, 2013 20:13
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Swagger Dagger posted:The worst thing WCW ever did, to me, was put sponsor logos on the mat. It looks so bad, and so low rent. The example I remember, and I don't know if this was the only time they did it, was the Masterlock logo on the mat at some PPV. Why? Don't they do that in Japan?
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Jan 18, 2013 17:11
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I watched the first SouledOut PPV for the first time ever just a couple of months ago - found the full PPV on YouTube. And it's crap, you can see they tried to do something alternative to what was a typical PPV back then, but it looked awful. And I agree with what was posted about the major difference between the WWF and WCW was that the WWF had characters that had a day job and then decided to wrestle as well, while WCW had actual wrestlers. I remember my dream booking at the time, I thought it would be cool if the WWF and WCW traded Austin and DDP. Austin, because I thought he would have awesome matches in WCW (I didn't know about Stunning Steve back then, bare with me), and DDP, so he can face The Rock in a People's Champ VS People's Champ match. Austin would have been good against DDP as well, Stunner VS Diamond Cutter. But I thought the Undertaker couldn't be traded or jump ship, because he was the ultimate WWF cartoon character wrestler. And I thought he was awesome, and he was one of the main reasons I never quit the WWF, even when WCW was superior.
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Jan 18, 2013 17:16
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Gavok posted:Suburban Commando. I will stand by that. I loved Suburban Commando. It even has Christopher Lloyd. But I haven't seen it in ages. Here's a fine gallery of WCW promo pics, With Leather most likely got theirs from a gallery like this one, although, right clicking is disabled. I couldn't just post one photo, because seeing this as a collection really puts things into perspective. http://imageevent.com/publicgallery/mostrecent/wcwpromocollection000;jsessionid=mi64n46c15.eagle_s
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Jan 21, 2013 13:35
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Supreme Allah posted:The Crow? The Crow was never published by DC. It was originally published by Caliber, later on by Image, I have the original graphic novel as a TPB from Pocket Books, and the current series is published by IDW. On a related note, the Thunder logo was done in the same style as Superman's 'electric' logo, during that phase when DC made Superman go electric. What bothers me is that I've never seen this discussed, even back in the day. If you're into graphic design and typography, check out the u, n, e and r, they're exactly the same as in Superman's logo.   Searching for this has lead me to a bunch of ancient Tripod pages, plus this match of Dale Torborg VS. The Maestro - this was completely blocked out of my memory. http://www.wwe.com/videos/wcw-thunder-october-7-1999-dale-torborg-vs-the-maestro-25025478
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Jan 26, 2013 15:58
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I found the picture you used as well, but I didn't post it because it's not a screenshot. It does, however, have some nifty Photoshop tricks involved like the mighty lens flare. It's not 100% identical to the Superman logo, but they were used at the same time, but I never found out if they were designed by the same person, or if the Thunder logo was basically a ripoff.
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Jan 26, 2013 21:02
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STAC Goat posted:They're definitely similar but I think there's plenty enough differences that they're not the same thing. The basics are the same but a lot of the edges and ends are clearly different so I imagine that's enough to make them different. It's probably not hard to imagine that they were coming up with the logo and saw the Superman thing and said "like that". My guess is that it was designed by the same guy, otherwise it's a ripoff within Time Warner. And they're not bad logos IMO.
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Jan 28, 2013 16:14
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Back in the day, I used to go to DDT Digest to check up on WCW.
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Feb 1, 2013 12:08
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An Actual Bear posted:It's still online somehow. Glad to see some love for DDT Digest. Not only did they appreciate Stevie Ray, they also treated Silver King and El Dandy like stars, and made me take notice of Norman Smiley. I think that's the first site where I saw a screenshot of Booker T holding that framed Scott Hall portrait. Do you guys remember the Adventures of the nWo B-Team? I've been trying to find them for a while now, looks like there's a ScoopThis fanpage on Facebook, and it features all the B-Team's adventures. http://on.fb.me/12hQLhg
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Feb 2, 2013 14:27
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nasboat posted:Wow, now there's a blast from the past. I used to think these were hilarious back in 1999. Sadly, they don't seem to be as funny as 17-year-old me seemed to think they were. Yup, I too was 16-17-years-old when I followed the B-Team's adventures, my favorite bit was when Konnan is left alone in a prison cell and it's his turn to 'toss salads'. That's how I learned what tossing salads means! Good times. They also had some decent Photoshop parodies, like Ric Flair falling apart in the middle of the ring, and I vaguely remember Undertaker Comics. I still have some of this stuff on a CD I burned back in '99, full of wrestling stuff. If I find some glorious WCW pics, I'll post them.
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Feb 2, 2013 15:40
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I remember downloading .ram (yes, Real Media) and extremely crappy mp3 files of wrestling themes and marking out to them. Theme music is really where you could tell the difference between the WWF and WCW, but as crappy as they were, I really enjoyed Jericho's almost Even Flow and Raven's Come as You Are, ummm, parody.
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Feb 4, 2013 15:35
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I actually liked some of the rip-off themes: Jericho, Raven and DDP in WCW, I knew they were basically plagirised instrumentals, but I still connected them to my favorite wrestlers. And these guys are still my favorites. As for Goldberg's theme, I think it was originally used by El Dandy, Silver King or Glacier, someone from that group, one of the Saturday Night alumni. This way maybe featured on Botchamania, or possibly here, does anyone know?
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Feb 4, 2013 21:14
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triplexpac posted:I thought it was pretty common knowledge that Hogan just wasn't that popular anymore when they turned him heel. But yeah, I guess WWE would never want to say that even if they're on bad terms with the guy right now. It's not; I started watching Nitro in the summer of '97 and had no idea he was booed before the nWo era. I'm finding out about it thanks to this glorious thread. Funny how some guys just don't know how to make the right business decisions; and analyzing WCW makes me realize this even more. I mean, look at where Hogan is right now, in TNA. Such a pop culture icon should have a business empire behind him, and should be doing gigs with the WWE, as a manager or a commentator, just for the love of the game. I guess his ego got the best of him, or maybe he just isn't that intelligent.
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Feb 19, 2013 12:36
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LordPants posted:He was right until his son's lawsuit and his wife's divorce. I took that into consideration as well, that's why I'm doubting whether he's an intelligent man at all. It seems to me guys like Rock, Austin and Piper have the brains, real life smarts or whatever you want to call it, while guys like Hogan, Hardy and Angle are, well, just not smart. Cause when you look at their career choices and the way they express themselves, one group is obviously not like the other.
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Feb 19, 2013 18:42
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El Gallinero Gros posted:Piper's made some VERY questionable choices. Yeah, but... THEY LIVE Rock was in some crappy movies too, Austin is doing straight to DVD, but with guys like Dolph Lundgren, so that's justified, while Hogan's best effort was Suburban Commando. But let's get back to WCW being insanely stupid, I like that. Actually, there is a connection there. Hogan was feuding with Sting and doing Santa With Muscles, which means he was on the very top of the wrestling food chain, but he wasn't a big enough superstar to do something better. One domino effect of bad decisions later, and he's in TNA.
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Feb 19, 2013 19:29
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Welcome to the Jungle is an awesome movie. I might watch it again over the week. I got back into wrestling in late 2010, thanks to this movie being on TV, and the fact that I watched The Other Guys and MacGruber shortly after. You wanna talk WCW? Let's recall that one time they did an episode of Baywatch. The first time I watched this episode, it reminded me to start watching wrestling again, and that there's this fed that's not the WWF and Hogan and Macho are there. Bash at the Beach (Feb. 1996)
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Feb 20, 2013 14:44
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You'd get The Outsiders on Nitro, Vicious and Delicious on Saturday Night.
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Feb 21, 2013 19:09
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SteelAngel2000 posted:
Sting was the man, he was also The Crow, I loved The Crow and still do; I was introduced to WCW in '97 and loved it for so many reasons. I still have my red and black nWo Wolfpac T-Shirt, it's in excellent condition, I never wear it outside, I'm keeping it as a personal treasure. I marked out for the Wolfpac when Macho joined, but when Sting joined, that was just pure joy.
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Mar 5, 2013 11:46
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Exactly what you said. Luckily, I have some of that Jericho/Malenko feud on VHS. In hindsight, it was magnificent. Golden promos, golden matches. I really felt bad for WCW when Jericho left, I couldn't believe it; I guess it made me realize WCW was never going to push him all the way to the Big Gold Belt, or make the Cruiserweight title their second-tier championship. It's terrible when a booker has all the right ingredients and then just fails. Even back then, I though that due to the fact that WCW was more realistic than the WWF, they should focus on weight classes, and present themselves as a promotion closer to the UFC, rather than the WWF.
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Mar 5, 2013 12:29
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Think about how stupid WCW's bookers were at the time. After they had witnessed how much heat a Cruiserweight championship feud generated, how much fun the wrestlers and the fans had, they basically ignored it and eventually gave us The Fingerpoke of Doom. I mean, Malenko wasn't insanely popular, but he played his role perfectly, as did Jericho: a serious veteran against a stuck-up hotshot new guy. Stuff like that made me grow up as fan, for better or worse, because it taught me about backstage politics.
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Mar 5, 2013 12:46
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SteelAngel2000 posted:Was it Russo's idea to have Sting and Vampiro fight in the "human torch" match? I hated that. I watched that thinking 'so, WCW wants to be like the WWF'. Which was loving stupid from whatever way you look at it. Marketing wise, it's the worse form of rebradning, by copying the competition. And fans didn't want that, all we wanted was cruiserweights, Jericho, DDP... Not torch matches and DJ Ran.
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Mar 5, 2013 18:04
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Master P was one of the most profitable hip hop artists at the time, so it's not strange that WCW wanted to feature him, but Swoll's paycheck is insane. The more I look into it, the more I realize WCW made it to the top based on the talent and versatility of their roster, but how they misused that talent is what killed the company.
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Mar 9, 2013 17:19
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crankdatbatman posted:I saw it as a 12 year old and totally bought into the Rebirth of the Total Package. I had blocked this out of my memory completely, and I can see why, this is the worst promo I have ever seen. Maybe the worst part was Schiavone just naming all muscle groups. I'm not from the States so when this was on, I was unable to switch the channel over to Raw. Imagine the pain, if you will.
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Apr 18, 2013 11:46
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I loved Daffney since day one. But! Does anyone remember Chastity? She was fine. Not a lot of photos of her around.
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May 6, 2013 23:49
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EugeneJ posted:If I'm remembering right, Goldberg-Hogan at Georgia Dome was originally advertised as non-title (maybe the dark match?) and then it was changed to a title match on TV a week or two before it happened. I hate non-title matches. That's what's eating away WWE today, and it reminds of WCW in the worst possible way. As far as Bischoff goes, I think we need to look at his personality to explain his actions: I've always felt he's the kind of guy who had never met anyone smarter than him, in any field of work. Thus, in his mind, his decisions were infallible. But speaking as a fan from Europe, this obsession with US ratings was (and still is) just plain ridiculous. And I remember Vince or someone mentioning that the WWF never declined in ratings in Canada, that Raw was always more popular than Nitro over there. Anyone have any more details on this?
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May 7, 2013 22:38
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This show was just... Wow, so terrible. I heaven't seen it before, and now I've seen some of it, but I couldn't go on after The Booty Man VS. DDP. Who was playing the role of DDP? Once the Giant VS. Loch Ness was about to start, I stopped. I got into WCW in '97, when the main angle was Sting VS. the nWo, and Raven had just made his debut. Was WCW usually this bad before their peak?
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May 15, 2013 12:12
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The more I look into it, it seems that WCW really hit the jackpot with the nWo. That, combined with stuff like the cruiserweights and a talented midcard (remember Raven's debut and his feuds with DDP over the US title?) got them on a roll. Then Bischoff went on an ego trip and wanted to be a TV star, gave the nWo too much of everything, the cruiserweights and the mid card went nowhere, people started to jump ship and everything tanked. Yeah?
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May 18, 2013 19:18
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The American Dream posted:Holy poo poo I remember that same moment! I watched it, like most WWF shows in the late 90s, on Deutsches Sportfernsehen. Grew up in Croatia, so that was my cable TV. Today it's called Sport1, and it's a German sports channel, so I didn't hear Ross, I heard a German dude channeling Ross. But it was a cool channel. They aired WCW and WWF shows, edited and with a three week delay, but they also had an original weekly show which introduced me to ECW, Smokey Mountain, NWA, lots of Japanese and Mexican stuff... I'm mentioning all of this because they even had an nWo commentator, who turned about the same time as Bischoff. This is also the channel where I watched WCW Saturday Night, and to this day, I only watched that show in German. All these shows were on late at night, which means they wouldn't show toy commercials, but 'sexy hot lines', including a recurring one with a S&M grandma in leather. But hey, I learned basic German that way. And I used Real Player whenever I could. 180p memories. I actually still have some RM videos with stuff like Jericho's WWF debut.
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May 21, 2013 16:26
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I tried watching it, as I tuned into that Uncensored sync some time ago, but the DDP VS. Booty Man match just had me... Amazed, and not in a good way. I couldn't even recognize DDP. I stopped there, but found the main event on DailyMotion, tried watching it, and just couldn't. It's unbearable. If you can enjoy it in that 'this movie is so bad that it's good' way, good for you, I wish I could.
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Jun 5, 2013 21:19
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Watching the Nitro sync right now. Insane, chaotic. Dumb. But Flair is pure gold, and so is Macho. I'm discovering new ways to hate Bischoff. Also, is chat working or not? Can't seem to comment.
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Jun 5, 2013 21:57
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