Pillman - Alive and Well During Attitude

[wrestler36]

I did a quick search and didn't see anything about this, but apologies if this has been done before. Let's say Brian Pillman never mangled his leg and entered the WWF fresh and ready to go. It would have been the perfect time for him as when he passed, the Attitude Era was just about to go in full swing. What do you think he would have done during this time?

I think his Austin feud would have started later and that whole gun thing never would have happened. Maybe in 97 after Austin was a full face or maybe in 98 when Austin had the title and McMahon made Pillman a 'hired gun' to get the title back since he knew Austin better than anyone else. It would have been cool to see Pillman with the title (with corporation help), if only for a few weeks. His Loose Canon persona overshadowed his wrestling ability, as I thought he was just as good a wrestler as Shawn Michaels was. I would have loved to have seen that match. Anyways, what do you think Pillman would have done had he been around during that era?

 

[Bythedockofthebay]

The sad part of the attitude era is it had a chance to be ten times better. Pillman is one of the reasons it could've been. Pillman imo might have been bigger than austin, or at least had the ability to be. Without the leg injury he was going to be one of the best wrestlers of that era and showman. Could you imagine, Pillman, HBK, Austin, and Rock all healthy? Would've been amazing.

 

[thebarber]

without the leg injury he would not have left WCW. He knew WWE would be the pay day he needed to heklp pay the bills and continued medical expenses, WCW was not paying him the kind of cash WWE paid him. Simple as that

 

[HeyYo]

He's alive and well in Dean Ambrose.

 

[THTRobtaylor]

He didn't crash till after he'd signed with WWE. The intention was to make him the guy facing Shawn and Bret. A fit Pullman becomes what's Austin di with Steve being his "partner in crime". When they split and feud you have two big stars. The biggest difference is on over Pullman probably means Shawn jumps to WCW. At the time Brian was better than Shawn and a face turn for him had real potential having beaten cancer etc... DX wouldn't have been the same.

 

[MrMojoRisin]

He didn't crash till after he'd signed with WWE. The intention was to make him the guy facing Shawn and Bret. A fit Pullman becomes what's Austin di with Steve being his "partner in crime". When they split and feud you have two big stars. The biggest difference is on over Pullman probably means Shawn jumps to WCW. At the time Brian was better than Shawn and a face turn for him had real potential having beaten cancer etc... DX wouldn't have been the same.

Pillman had his accident in April 1996. He didn't sign with the WWF until June.

His intention the entire time during the "Loose Cannon" angle was to eventually return to WCW in a big money spot. He was technically 'fired' from WCW, but it was a worked firing between him and Bischoff. His time in ECW was being used for him to nail down the Loose Cannon gimmick.

After Pillman had the accident though, he was afraid for his growing families future. He knew how bad his injury was, but was fortunate enough that Vince McMahon didn't realize the extent of the damage done (or was desperate enough at the time that he convinced himself it wasn't that bad). After he'd been 'fired' from WCW, the WWF had presented him with a contract offer. So Pillman decided to take it realizing that if he didn't, there was a good chance he wouldn't be able to support his family anymore.

That is the real story of how Brian Pillman ended up in the WWF.

If he'd never had the accident? Three possible things happen:

1) He spends most of 1996 in ECW perfecting the Loose Cannon gimmick before returning to WCW white hot

2) The NWO angle takes away any shot of Pillman coming back to WCW as a white hot heel, but Bischoff is smart enough not to let Pillman go to the competition. He brings Pillman back, but puts him in the mid card like the rest of the ECW talent he eventually brought over. The Loose Cannon basically turns into Raven

3) Bischoff decides he doesn't need Pillman anymore because of the NWO, and Pillman as a result signs with the WWF. A lot of what's been said in this thread possibly happens. Brian Pillman with a completely fleshed out Loose Cannon gimmick and tons of ECW cred, who could also still go at a high level? Holy shit all bets would have been off. He would have been huge. The biggest question to me is... who doesn't end up having the type of career they had as a result of that? My guess would be Mick Foley or Mr. McMahon. (McMahon wouldn't have gone to Foley as his first corporate challenger to Austin, he would have used Pillman... if that angle even happens. He might just have gone with Austin/Pillman without that storyline and kept himself in his normal role).

 

[THTRobtaylor]

No... he didn't debut till June 1996 at King Of The Ring... Until a contract copy comes up we won't know the exact dates... but WWE didn't sign ANYONE on that short a lead time to debut, who is hurt and still debuts on crutches.

They have NEVER take than kind of chance and didn't for Pillman. The true part is they thought they were getting an A-grade athlete who then got hurt, but he signed the deal before the accident and that was why they were locked into it... No way Vince signs Pillman right after the crash... as I always understood it from what was written at the time it was days difference... he was likely celebrating the deal and "didn't call a cab" rather than anything else but Pillman was smart enough to cover injury and illness in his deal, likely due to the cancer in his past so WWE were stuck paying him, hence them using him. Brian Pillman WAS NOT signed hurt... there was no upside to doing so, and this was a WWF where JR was fighting to get Austin and Foley signed... but Vince was sold on his Cyberslam/Booker Man level persona with his in ring ability from WCW, there was a very big upside against Shawn and Bret and with Austin already there as a partner, no brainer... WWF/Vince signing a guy who had just been in a coma... nope never... not happening in 1996 or now. Having to use a guy who signed and then crashed and got in a coma/smashed his ankle cos he had covered it in his deal... that's WWF of the time...they never signed damaged goods again though... Ask Nigel McGuinness...

 

[CrucifiedRaven]

I don't know the timeline in terms of the crash, his signing, etc. But there are two things I don't really believe:

1) I don't for a second believe that Bischoff "work fired" Pillman and told him to go to ECW to develop the loose cannon character. I think he was legit upset that Pillman broke kayfabe at SuperBrawl VI and just plain fired him. Pillman then took it upon himself to develop this character in hopes of landing a bigger gig (almost exactly like his buddy Austin did a year prior).

2) I'm not sure that Vince wouldn't have tried to repackage Brian, just like he did Austin. He signed Austin just before, who had been doing a very similar thing in ECW in 1995. Austin's work in ECW was very "loose cannon", essentially shooting on Bischoff all over the place for firing him over the phone while injured.

When WWF brought Austin in, Vince didn't capitalize at all on the work Austin was doing in ECW. He debuted him with DiBiase as his mouthpiece and it wasn't until mid-96 (after Pillman was signed) that Austin finally started portraying his grittier character. Pillman likely got signed because he was a good worker, and was friends with both Austin and the Harts. Vince maybe would have tried to package him into something like The Ringmaster, or maybe he would have learned from his mistake with Austin.

IF Brian didn't get hurt and his WCW firing was a work, I agree that Bischoff wouldn't have capitalized on it properly and Brian would become Raven or buried by the NWO.

IF Brian didn't get hurt and signed with WWF... well that's a whole other ballgame. Austin 3:16 was already going ahead, and there probably wasn't any stopping this. Brian probably debuts as Steve's buddy, helping him in his feuds with Marc Mero, Yokozuna and Hunter Hearst Helmsley. Steve probably turns on him, just as he did for Brian taking Bret's side.. But maybe we have a healthy Pillman vs a healthy Austin at WM13 for the IC strap for all we know. Does this put Austin as over as a babyface as Bret did?

It's hard to say, but maybe the WM13 card should have shaped up like this:
Shawn Michaels 'C' vs Bret Hart - WWF Championship
Psycho Sid vs Undertaker
Brian Pillman 'C' vs Steve Austin - IC Championship

If this happens, it's impossible to say what would have happened. Is Austin made as a top babyface? Does Austin/Bret still happen since Shawn still loses his smile and refuses to do the job to Bret? What happens to Pillman then, does he become a main eventer or tops out where Owen and Davey did? Etc, Etc

 

[THTRobtaylor]

I'm pretty sure Pillman would have been the heel that Shawn became in the equation... Bret would possibly have been able to stay in that scenario if Shawn left. It's pretty clear a big chunk of 3:16 was what Pillman was planning but couldn't do... put it this way, Pillman at least wins King Of the Ring and goes to Summerslam to fight Bret for the title, that would have been a no-brainer.

The difficulty is would Pillman have "caught" in the way DX and Austin did... I think so, but it would have been more extreme if anything... less somophoric humor and just pure nastiness/unpredictability. The gun segment is a good indicator of what we're talking about... Austin later used the "bang" gun on Vince, I could see Pillman using that to win the title. Sponsors would have hated it, but the fans would have lapped up crazy Brian at his peak powers cos the matches would have delivered. Bret might have ended up going anyway as if he disagreed with Shawn, then he'd disagree with Pillman... but the tension with Shawn wouldn't be there to be a deciding factor...

The one thing that is genuinely scary though is the way Shawn was at that time... if Pillman doesn't get hurt and Shawn leaves, I really think it's him dead in a hotel in 97 not Brian...with WCW level money, his "enabler buddies" around him and their political clout, I think Pillman's misfortunes perhaps saved Shawn's life indirectly.

 

[Wald]

If he'd never got injured he would have ended up back in WCW I bet. He could have easily gone to Bischoff with WWF's offer and said they are trying to hijack our deal so I need a new contract with a guaranteed title run, like they had supposedly discussed with the worked firing angle.

But with the nWo kicking in by the end of the summer I think the way Pillman returned would have been different. He probably was going to come back as an out of control heel but instead what if he returned from ECW as an out of control face looking to dismantle the nWo? Pillman definitely had the promo chops to take fire at Hogan and the rest and without the injury Pillman was one of the best workers in the business.

In essence I'm substituting Pillman in for Sting here and I think it might even have worked better than that great angle. Pillman had an edge to him that no-one in the business had at that time and arguably never has had again. The guy just had it all and he could have easily turned a WCW return in to the Loose Cannon vs the nWo, plugged in to the outsider vs the evil empire vibe that Sting had and Austin had with McMahon and could legitimately have brought all those ECW fans over to WCW to watch him take down Hogan and created the Attitude Era in WCW.

That's all allowing for Hogan & Co. letting that happen of course but the above is genuinely how highly I think Pillman could have gone in the business.

 

[MrMojoRisin]

No... he didn't debut till June 1996 at King Of The Ring... Until a contract copy comes up we won't know the exact dates... but WWE didn't sign ANYONE on that short a lead time to debut, who is hurt and still debuts on crutches.

They have NEVER take than kind of chance and didn't for Pillman. The true part is they thought they were getting an A-grade athlete who then got hurt, but he signed the deal before the accident and that was why they were locked into it... No way Vince signs Pillman right after the crash... as I always understood it from what was written at the time it was days difference... he was likely celebrating the deal and "didn't call a cab" rather than anything else but Pillman was smart enough to cover injury and illness in his deal, likely due to the cancer in his past so WWE were stuck paying him, hence them using him. Brian Pillman WAS NOT signed hurt... there was no upside to doing so, and this was a WWF where JR was fighting to get Austin and Foley signed... but Vince was sold on his Cyberslam/Booker Man level persona with his in ring ability from WCW, there was a very big upside against Shawn and Bret and with Austin already there as a partner, no brainer... WWF/Vince signing a guy who had just been in a coma... nope never... not happening in 1996 or now. Having to use a guy who signed and then crashed and got in a coma/smashed his ankle cos he had covered it in his deal... that's WWF of the time...they never signed damaged goods again though... Ask Nigel McGuinness...

Actually the exact dates are all over that thing in front of you right now. You just have to look for them.

http://www.wrestleenigma.com/wrestl...tragic-tale-of-the-loose-cannon-brian-pillman
http://www.obsessedwithwrestling.com/profiles/b/brian-pillman.php
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Pillman

There's just a few. The first two give the exact date of his crash as April 15, 1996. They don't give the exact date of his contract signing in WWE, but they both confirm it happened after the crash, and in June 1996. The wikipedia article gives an exact date of June 10, 1996. I may take the exact date with a grain of salt considering the source, but with all the sources stating the same thing, it at least confirms what I said about the signing happening after the crash.

I had a book I unfortunately can't find anymore... Dave Meltzer's wrestling obituaries. It's a pretty good read with stories about guys like Andre, Owen, Rude and many others. And of course Pillman. I tried looking up that obit online, and I found this old article from Meltzer on Pillman. I suggest you read it

http://www.angelfire.com/wrestling/battleground/flyinbryan.html

Here's a quote:

In the middle of all this, Pillman, who was so whacked out playing this loose cannon persona on a local radio and in his private live never sleeping, that he fell asleep at the wheel of a humbee he'd brought while on an insane spending spree, was thrown 40 feet into a field, where he was lying in a pool of his own blood. His face was so swollen that his friends who visited him couldn't even recognize him. Because everything else was a work, people believed the accident was as well, and even medical documents and police reports couldn't convince the wrestlers who had been worked once that anything in this world, or at least Pillman's world, was real. By this point, Sullivan, as paranoid as Pillman was a loose cannon, was insisting to everyone he knew that Pillman had worked his own accident. His facial injuries Sullivan told everyone was really plastic surgery so he could look like Shawn Michaels for a feud. Pillman already had the bad ankle from football, which explained that operation. Pillman was scared he'd blown his gig, but gave the impression to McMahon and Bischoff the doctors said he'd be able to return and his ankle, bad from football, would actually be stronger due to the surgery and he'd be back near 100 percent.

Secretly he was scared to death he's destroyed the future of his family by getting into a car wreck while executing his master plan, and be left with no job. As it turned out, both companies remained interested. The story of this angle ended when McMahon's offer stayed on the table. Bischoff, playing hardball on the negotiations from the start and apparently skeptical of his ability to return, refused to drop the 90-day injury termination wind-down. Fearing that he's never work again, he felt he had no choice in the contract matters at this point. As everyone knows, the Pillman story in no way had a happy ending. But in changed pro wrestling for ever.

I think it's gotten a little lost over the years exactly how well Pillman worked the business as the Loose Cannon, and how much the people IN the business, not just the fans, bought into it. Considering that, why is it so hard to believe that Vince McMahon would give out the first guaranteed contract in WWF history to a guy who'd just shattered his ankle and been in a coma weeks earlier? Because that's EXACTLY what happened.

 

[CrucifiedRaven]

I'm pretty sure Pillman would have been the heel that Shawn became in the equation... Bret would possibly have been able to stay in that scenario if Shawn left. It's pretty clear a big chunk of 3:16 was what Pillman was planning but couldn't do... put it this way, Pillman at least wins King Of the Ring and goes to Summerslam to fight Bret for the title, that would have been a no-brainer.

The difficulty is would Pillman have "caught" in the way DX and Austin did... I think so, but it would have been more extreme if anything... less somophoric humor and just pure nastiness/unpredictability. The gun segment is a good indicator of what we're talking about... Austin later used the "bang" gun on Vince, I could see Pillman using that to win the title. Sponsors would have hated it, but the fans would have lapped up crazy Brian at his peak powers cos the matches would have delivered. Bret might have ended up going anyway as if he disagreed with Shawn, then he'd disagree with Pillman... but the tension with Shawn wouldn't be there to be a deciding factor...

I thought Pillman signed/debuted around June 1996. This was right around the time of the King of the Ring, (the result of which had already changed once from Hunter to Austin) I don't think Vince would have pushed him this fast. Winning the KOTR without any real hype or build from the WWF. I think after Hunter, Austin was going to win the KOTR regardless of what shape Pillman was in.

That said, title matches vs Shawn and Bret certainly would have happened. If Pillman could work the way he used to, he for sure could have been slotted into a PPV match as a challenger to Bret or Shawn at any time in late 1996 or throughout 1997. Add in Pillman vs Austin in 1998 as well. In fact, Pillman could have very well received the heel push and Austin feud that ended up going to The Rock as IC champion in 1997-1998.

As for Bret, if it was Pillman instead of Shawn I don't think Bret has any issue at all. Pillman was a Stampede guy, Bret would have done anything to help him get over in the business.

If he'd never got injured he would have ended up back in WCW I bet. He could have easily gone to Bischoff with WWF's offer and said they are trying to hijack our deal so I need a new contract with a guaranteed title run, like they had supposedly discussed with the worked firing angle.

But with the nWo kicking in by the end of the summer I think the way Pillman returned would have been different. He probably was going to come back as an out of control heel but instead what if he returned from ECW as an out of control face looking to dismantle the nWo? Pillman definitely had the promo chops to take fire at Hogan and the rest and without the injury Pillman was one of the best workers in the business.

In essence I'm substituting Pillman in for Sting here and I think it might even have worked better than that great angle. Pillman had an edge to him that no-one in the business had at that time and arguably never has had again. The guy just had it all and he could have easily turned a WCW return in to the Loose Cannon vs the nWo, plugged in to the outsider vs the evil empire vibe that Sting had and Austin had with McMahon and could legitimately have brought all those ECW fans over to WCW to watch him take down Hogan and created the Attitude Era in WCW.

That's all allowing for Hogan & Co. letting that happen of course but the above is genuinely how highly I think Pillman could have gone in the business.

I think the last quote in your post is the most important thing here. Pillman's success in WCW would have 100% depended on how high Hogan would have allowed him to go. If Hogan didn't want, Pillman wouldn't have come close to him... that's why I think he gets buried in WCW.

Also, there's no replacing Sting in the 1997 WCW equation. Sting was already an established top guy with a ton of backstage stroke... he was also friends with Hogan and wasn't a mark for himself so had no problem with Hogan always putting himself over. That's probably the only way to get along with Hogan is to not care if you lose to him. I just don't see Pillman ever having success at a main event level in WCW. When you consider his size as well, there was no way the Hogan's and Nash's would allow him to be anything more than what Benoit, Raven or Jericho were.

 

[wrestler36]

Shawn vs Pillman is definitely a dream match I would have loved to have seen. Michaels would not have gone to WCW. I think those guys wanted to be the top dogs in both federations so he would have stayed. One thing I just thought of that could've been possible is Pillman vs Undertaker. Imagine if somehow they built a story to WM. Granted, the streak wasn't a big deal then, I can imagine Pillman playing some serious mind games with Taker, maybe even using DDPs stalker storyline.

I could've seen him being used as part of a comedy tag team too, like with Mankind or Goldust. I think he was already 35 when he signed and with guys like HHH and Rock as champ, his window of opportunity was pretty slim. Like I said earlier, it's feasible that he could've been champ for a few weeks as a rogue Corporation member. Still, the possibilities...