Professional Wrestling Thread

Quote: AZDuffman

I look at the WCW thing this way. All mergers result in layoffs. Pro Wrestling was no different. Vince really wanted 2 things. End the last real competition and get the film library. Vince saw the value of the library well before this. Pittsburgh had "Studio Wrestling" complete with curtains in the stands with people and faces painted on them to make it look more crowded. All the tapes were re-used for the news. Very little survives. A sad thing for wrestling history. This was strictly WIIC-TV AFIK, though Bruno Sammartino worked it along with the then-WWWF which still had a NWA Territory Franchise.

I basically agree with all of that. In the cases of some of the performers, they were simply happier to take the buyout or, 'Stay home,' amount (whichever was applicable) rather than get paid the reduced figure McMahon was willing to offer.

There was also some degree of self-satisfaction involved, Ted Turner was not McMahon's favorite person in the world. The decline of WCW is a pretty unparalleled, 'Jump the shark,' event and, barring an extremely unlikely comeback, it would have been pulled from TV eventually and McMahon could have got it even cheaper.

The AOL Time Warner merger is what really killed WCW because standards and practices were such that they really couldn't keep up with WWF's, "Attitude Era," even though WCW arguably started the edginess trend with the NWO. That was right about when Austin would win at King of the Ring, but the NWO consisted of already very established talent. Even before that, Time Warner had wanted to go in a new direction with more family-friendly content. Ted Turner had basically let Eric Bischoff do whatever the hell he wanted to before that.

Also in 1998, WCW would be asked to put on a second weekly primetime show, Thunder, and add another hour to Nitro. According to Eric Bischoff, WCW's overall budget was essentially unchanged, but now you have all of the costs associated with this second show, talent, lights, travel, etc...so the production quality of the already extant Nitro had to go down.

They even attempted a WCW/NWO brand split similar to what WWE sometimes does with Raw and SmackDown, but abandoned that idea pretty quickly. The extremely NWO heavy Pay-Per-View didn't go over particularly well.

It's also been said, by several sources, that WCW contracts were also way too expensive and way too guarantee-laden compared to the WWE's model.

All of these things combined resulted in the downfall of WCW. Eric Bischoff was also sent packing for a time, which put Vince Russo in charge of creative. With no real oversight, he was able to go full Vince Russo.

Don't go full Vince Russo.

By the time they brought Bischoff back, whose job at this point was mainly to try to keep Russo under some degree of control, they'd already lost a ton of viewers. Bischoff often cites something he was told by a major TV Executive that's basically, "It's twice as hard to get someone who abandoned the show to come back as it was to get them in the first place."

So, by the time it would be purchased by Vince McMahon, WCW was just hemorrhaging money. I guess McMahon felt like he was getting it cheap enough that it wasn't worth risking them making a miraculous comeback to wait for total failure and a lower price.

Quote: Mission146

I basically agree with all of that. In the cases of some of the performers, they were simply happier to take the buyout or, 'Stay home,' amount (whichever was applicable) rather than get paid the reduced figure McMahon was willing to offer.

There was also some degree of self-satisfaction involved, Ted Turner was not McMahon's favorite person in the world. The decline of WCW is a pretty unparalleled, 'Jump the shark,' event and, barring an extremely unlikely comeback, it would have been pulled from TV eventually and McMahon could have got it even cheaper.

The McMahon-Turner feud went way back. McMahon bought a slot on then WTBS. He put on an awful program the southern fans did not like and it went sour. Turner, like many, loved Professional Wrestling and had the money to get into it. He bought what was left of the sport that McMahon had not run out of business.

BTW: Turner's standards and practices got made fun of. Turner banned the word "foreign" from his news networks so wrestlers would attack with an "outside object" not the "foreign object" that was the classic term. Uncle Ted kind of didn't care too much about the bottom line, probably figuring like the casinos that cared little for the hotel it would make out in the end. But as you said, mergers merged Ted out of the business.

Your last paragraph makes another good point about the profits. I believe the year that WCW (basically under Bischoff) first turned a profit was either 1995 or 1996. Turner, as you pointed out, wasn’t terribly worried about it as long as it wasn’t losing too much money.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvv1wvegguA

Here is a neat video of a match between Verne Gagne and Lou Thesz...

Quote: RonC

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvv1wvegguA

Here is a neat video of a match between Verne Gagne and Lou Thesz...

Definitely! I've seen that one already, it's a classic!

The nice thing about Youtube is you can fast forward the rest holds...but you'll have those in a two/three falls match.

Quote: Mission146

Definitely! I've seen that one already, it's a classic!

The nice thing about Youtube is you can fast forward the rest holds...but you'll have those in a two/three falls match.

Wondering your favorite era, though you are probably too young to have a working memory of the kayfabe era.

Quote: AZDuffman

Wondering your favorite era, though you are probably too young to have a working memory of the kayfabe era.

Not a memory so much, but I've watched a lot of stuff from that era. Probably just because of my age when I was really into it, but I'd have to say the Attitude Era. You?

Quote: Mission146

Not a memory so much, but I've watched a lot of stuff from that era. Probably just because of my age when I was really into it, but I'd have to say the Attitude Era. You?

Kayfabe era. In the mania era things just got too out of hand eventually. When Vince bought the WWF he saw that fans screaming for blood was not a good base to build on so he cleaned it up for kids. Right business decision, but it got too unbelievable.

Watching
"Dark Side of the Ring" on the Vice channel
Episode - David Schultz and the Slap heard around the world

I Pretty shocked at Dave's action and remember when it was on TV back in the day.
It was a turning point for me. I could no longer watch fake wrestling
This happened a long time ago
Dave wants a sit down with John Stossel now
Stossel's reaction. Fu*k You.


Olympics and college, I'm still a huge wrestling fan. I find it funny that wrestling fans call real wrestling "scientific wrestling" lol

Added edit
Just tuned on the Vice channel
Another "Dark side of the Ring" episode
Chris Benoit. 2 parter
In a double-murder and suicide, Benoit murdered his wife on June 22, 2007, his son on June 23, 2007, and hanged himself on June 24, 2007
Gripping

I'm addicted. I want to see all the episodes.

I did enjoy The Rock and Steve Austin on the mic...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwjACCd3k6k