Randy Savage 1993-1995: Missed Opportunities?

[The Eighties]

[YOUTUBE]OSaxk8t5N2w[/YOUTUBE]

The above is Randy Savage's last appearance on Raw, his last appearance ever in the WWF/E. It looks like maybe the start of a potential feud with Bob Backlund.

However from 1993 to Macho's exit at the end of 1994 he'd only been used sparingly as Vince wanted to phase out the guys that people associated with the Rock 'n' Wrestling era, but Randy still wanted to be a fully active wrestler so he left for WCW, not because he was banging Stephanie.

I can't help but feel there were a lot of missed opportunities here for the WWF, for starters Bret Hart's push as the next top face was not going to get a helping hand from Hulk Hogan so why not have Randy Savage be the guy? A face vs face match between Bret and Macho would have been huge and helped with that transition, the old torch passing match.

On top of that were heels like Yokozuna, Diesel and Shawn Michaels that all could have benefited from working with Savage who was still very capable of going in the ring and elevated any feud he was in with his intensity and legendary status.

The last name there, Shawn Michaels, was used in his second run as a support attraction to young champions like Cena and Orton when he wasn't putting them over, I feel Randy could have supplied the same role in the mid-90's for WWF.

In my view Randy Savage remained a high quality performer right up until 1998 when he suffered a leg injury, he was never the same after that, but until that point I think he could have still been a valuable in-ring player for WWF, and I'm interested in other posters thoughts.

 

[The Brain]

I’ve always felt Randy Savage vs. Bret Hart would have made a great main event for WrestleMania IX. Bret kind of snuck up on us when he won the title from Ric Flair and a non televised event. It was pretty cool to get that surprise championship win but it kind of robbed Bret of that big moment because not many people saw it. Getting a mania main event win over an established mania legend would have given Bret that moment. It also would have been a great match which is something that show really needed.

At least we got this from Randy Savage in 1993

[YOUTUBE]0gqSezZpNmg[/YOUTUBE]

 

[TheHitMark-SirJoseOle]

The above is Randy Savage's last appearance on Raw, his last appearance ever in the WWF/E. It looks like maybe the start of a potential feud with Bob Backlund.

That's what it indeed looked like it was leading up to, even though that wouldn't have been my preferred choice of opponent for Macho Man, just the fact that such a scenario would involve Macho Man was enough to make me enthralled. Macho Man was just that big of a favorite of mine back in the day and even to this day in the nostalgic sense I remain a fan. Hell, I could never get into Crush but Macho Man made that feud bearable even though it was otherwise throwaway in many aspects. Had it been anyone else working with Crush, it'd have just been completely forgettable. Like in many cases, a great performer like Macho Man can and usually is the difference maker in so-so scenarios. Sadly, the end of Macho Man's WWF stint consisted of such situations. And to be honest, a feud with Backlund, despite his talents would have likely been just that.

However from 1993 to Macho's exit at the end of 1994 he'd only been used sparingly as Vince wanted to phase out the guys that people associated with the Rock 'n' Wrestling era, but Randy still wanted to be a fully active wrestler so he left for WCW, not because he was banging Stephanie.

Absolutely, and trust me, as someone who grew up watching Savage in the 1980s, I was more than disappointed on November 7, 1994 when this was announced.

[YOUTUBE]YauJQoPzpAY[/YOUTUBE]​

I can't help but feel there were a lot of missed opportunities here for the WWF, for starters Bret Hart's push as the next top face was not going to get a helping hand from Hulk Hogan so why not have Randy Savage be the guy? A face vs face match between Bret and Macho would have been huge and helped with that transition, the old torch passing match.

Bret Hart's push as the next top face started with Hulk Hogan being on a hiatus from the WWF. As far as why they didn't have Savage work with Bret Hart, you already answered your own question. As you said it appeared that Vince wanted to limit Savage's role, that was more than obvious by the fact that Savage wrestled so few matches from 1993-1994. Was it disappointing, you're damn right it was. But I'm going to have to strongly challenge your point about Hogan's "unwillingness" with Bret Hart as far as the "torch passing" goes. I've always maintained that it was in Vince's plans to have Bret Hart get his revenge against Yokozuna and Hulk Hogan was the baby face that Vince wanted Yokozuna to soundly crush while the buildup to Yokozuna-Bret Hart II was developing. Again, I can't see Bret's post-Mania IX accolades such as the King Of The Ring and his co-Royal Rumble victory with Luger as just random and arbitrary occurrences. Lex Luger in my opinion was a red herring, and I don't think there was ever any serious consideration of giving him the WWF title despite all the fan fare and hype that surrounded Lex's face turn. Therefore, as awesome of a scenario as your face vs face proposal with Macho Man vs Bret Hart in lieu of Hulk Hogan vs Bret Hart, the last time the WWF tried that with Hogan and Warrior, things didn't work out for the long term. Therefore, Vince played it safe and went with the tried and true method of the heel-face dynamic, and for its time Bret Hart's year long odyssey of redemption and closure with Yokozuna worked for its time. However, don't get me wrong I'd have loved to see Bret and Randy have a run against one another.

But like anything else, it was Vince's call that Savage take a backseat to the "New Generation" of performers like Bret Hart, Shawn Michaels, Yokozuna, 1-2-3 Kid, Owen Hart, Jeff Jarrett and Diesel to name just a few. Yes, it'd have made great sense to pair Savage up with these aforementioned names, some of whom you do cite in your next line, but it's obvious that Vince didn't see that as being the way to go. Although, in the case of Yokozuna and Shawn Michaels, Savage did have some encounters with them. However, there wasn't enough of it for my liking either. But I definitely am not going to cite this having anything to do with Hulk Hogan.

On top of that were heels like Yokozuna, Diesel and Shawn Michaels that all could have benefited from working with Savage who was still very capable of going in the ring and elevated any feud he was in with his intensity and legendary status.

No doubt man, my previous paragraph I think echoes your sentiments despite some minor disagreements.

The last name there, Shawn Michaels, was used in his second run as a support attraction to young champions like Cena and Orton when he wasn't putting them over, I feel Randy could have supplied the same role in the mid-90's for WWF.

Absolutely man, but it's a shame that Vince didn't see it the way we do. There was a wealth of talent Savage could have worked with even into the Attitude Era as well such as The Rock, Goldust, The Undertaker, Triple H, Steve Austin (their WCW encounter was only a tease of what REALLY could have been) and so on. I say shame on Vince and the decision makers of the WWF story lines for that.

In my view Randy Savage remained a high quality performer right up until 1998 when he suffered a leg injury, he was never the same after that, but until that point I think he could have still been a valuable in-ring player for WWF, and I'm interested in other posters thoughts.

I'm not going to go into specifics as to why Randy Savage never came back to WWF or why he left, that's the same school of thought as you citing that Hulk Hogan was absolutely opposed to working with Bret Hart, it's all speculative. Even my theory regarding Vince is speculative but I hope none of this will denigrate into the rumor mill about all the ugly stuff the IWC usually talks about in regard to what Savage did, especially since he is deceased and can say nothing on his own behalf.

Either way OP, thanks for the post, it had some good insight and I always love discussing matters involving The Madness. He was a top ten favorite of mine, and the "What-Ifs?" are always endless!

 

[THTRobtaylor]

I think the cycle of events that led to Savage going began all the way back with Rick Rude's departure in late 1990.

Had Rude gone over Warrior in that Cage, it added a new dimension to the title for that and subsequent years. Hogan/Slaughter didn't need the belt. Savage and Rude could have been a team against Warrior and perhaps a newly emerged IC Champ in Bret Hart. Savage eventually turning face when Flair appeared.

But over that 91-95 period you realistically could have had Savage in a much more prominent role, with another top heel he could have been working with - Jake's heel turn could still have happened too.

From 93 onwards if Bret was getting the push, then Savage is a great opponent for him as would Rude have been. Savage could also have helped guys like Shawn Michaels and Tatanka in the IC division.

One decision where Vince backed the wrong horse in 1990 has a knock on that goes for years...quite scary how different things could have been.

 

[Wald]

Letting Savage walk away in 1994 is one of two decisions that baffle me from this time from Vince. Bret was anointed the number one babyface in the company in 1992 and into 1994 but had zero credible heels to work with up until Yokozuna had the belt for nearly a year and had established himself. HBK & Razor weren't ready for the jump up so he was desperate for some quality opposition.

I feel that Vince should have first used Flair up until Wrestlemania 9 and asked him to put over Bret before heading back to WCW. After that I would have definitely turned the Macho Man heel, citing a lack of respect shown to him by the WWF and its new poster boy Bret Hart, and had the two of them feud throughout 1993. This could have easily have kept the WWF ticking over from Wrestlemania 9 through to Summerslam 93 and possibly even Survivor Series whilst Yokozuna was being built up and the seeds of an Owen vs Bret feud were being planted. Macho could have been a great asset to Hart and then Diesel, Michaels etc. from 1994 to 1997 had he been kept around.

 

[theHeadliner]

I thought they shoulda turned Randy into the psychotic heel and had him win RR93 and face Bret Hart at WM, and build Yoko for after that. If Bret went up against Randy, I bet it would have garnered a lot more interest and attention.

 

[berlinbrawler]

Ah, Randy. Here's the thing:
In my opinion Savage from around 1992 onward was but a shadow of the performer he used to be in the 80s. He was getting up there in years and it showed in his ring work. I also remember he used to sell pretend knee-injuries a lot at the time. A lot!! To the point that I found his matches hard to watch. I don't think he would have been a good fit for most of the proposed feuds. Except maybe Bret Hart. That could have been something special. I wasn't a big fan of his work in WCW, either.
That being said I want to state for the record that the 1980s Randy Savage is one of my favorite Wrestlers of all time. Top 2 or 3 easy.

 

[SydTinDad]

Look, when you pop the cherry of the bosses' underage and overly permiscuous daughter, these things happen. We all know it's true. That story has been confirmed by WAY too many credible people in the industry to me personally.

Mach is the 2nd greatest "in ring" performer of all time (HBK 1 and Brett 3) and should have never left the "E". Fueds with Brett would have been great to watch and a passing of the torch to HBK would have also been great to see during that time. He still had not tapped into the Undertaker or Austin either.

His relationship with Stephanie is the common denominator of his demise.

 

[THTRobtaylor]

Warrior did get every chance to stand out it was just unfortunate that he didn't have people like Andre the Giant, Roddy Piper or Paul Orndorff to bounce off of. Hogan's push back to the top was in response to him just not getting over.

But honestly he had 6 months or so to establish himself and really just wasn't clicking with audiences the way he was a few years earlier.

He'd gone through so many people enroute to the title that they couldn't then become credible challengers. Only Rude was a really credible guy as he'd beaten him for a title before - and he wasn't prepared to be run over now Warrior was the top guy - had he got that run with the work he produced in WCW he would have helped Warrior, given Savage a meaningful fued (the same one as Flair had over Liz but Liz could have turned too.)

Guys like Andre were too banged up, they weren't turning Piper heel and even Jake's chance was blown by them quickly moving on to Randy as an opponent instead cos Warrior wouldn't job to smaller guys once he'd made it.

While none of us are privy to what went on in those days I can well believe that a lot of promises were made to Savage, Rude and Flair that ultimately weren't honored. Jake and Rude left mainly for that reason and Flair allegedly had an agreement where he could walk if he wasn't top 2. Randy had every reason to feel aggrieved with how he was treated, he had lost a quarter step by then - but even his match with Crush at WM 10 was bloody good - all of those guys still had "it" when they left but as ever Vince chose the big guys in Yoko and Nash... but if Rude stays - even guys like Perfect don't get hurt...so much changed once from that one decision by Vince.

 

[enviousdominous]

Are we forgetting that Vince has more mood swings than a post-menopausal designated hitter? No doubt Vince loved Randy Savage like a son, in the same way that Bing Crosby loved his kids and went through a lot of belts because of that.

Let's not forget that this happened.

[YOUTUBE]ann0lZt_fHw[/YOUTUBE]

[YOUTUBE]1sCTi31Z2jA[/YOUTUBE]

So yeah, great things could have happened for Randy if he was allowed a bigger spot in the WWF. Vince was convinced that Randy was way past his prime, nothing would have convinced him otherwise. He left his heartfelt message to appear like a good sport and produced that fucking stupid match for WM 12. I have no faith that Vince would have allowed The Macho Man to be in any relevant storylines if he had signed him to a new contract and had allowed him to wrestle.

 

[donfryeismyhero]

Look, when you pop the cherry of the bosses' underage and overly permiscuous daughter, these things happen. We all know it's true. That story has been confirmed by WAY too many credible people in the industry to me personally.

Mach is the 2nd greatest "in ring" performer of all time (HBK 1 and Brett 3) and should have never left the "E". Fueds with Brett would have been great to watch and a passing of the torch to HBK would have also been great to see during that time. He still had not tapped into the Undertaker or Austin either.

His relationship with Stephanie is the common denominator of his demise.

FFS you're full of crap. Go troll somewhere else. As far as what the ts said, well said. I often wonder though when I remember that era if the steroid scandle played a part in Macho not being allowed to wrestle a full time schedule like he had wanted to.

 

[Mustang Sally]

.... as Vince wanted to phase out the guys that people associated with the Rock 'n' Wrestling era, but Randy still wanted to be a fully active wrestler so he left for WCW....

The very idea of using one of the greatest ring performers ever as a talking head was as misguided a notion as I've ever seen. Watching him sit behind the announcer's table with that ridiculous tie-dye shirt hiding his protruding gut was as depressing a sight as I could imagine, and I always wondered whether it was Savage's idea or McMahon's that he abandon fighting to function as a friggin' analyst.

Okay, the theory stated above that Vince wanted to get rid of the Rock n' Wrestling era performers is as good as any, I suppose, but if there was ever a more short-sighted decision, I can't think of it.

I found it truly depressing to see him turn up in WCW, not only for the apparent betrayal it represented, but also for his suddenly flat belly that made him look like the old Macho Man again.....although he didn't perform as such, the couple years of ring inactivity and advancing age leaving him far short of his prime-time prowess.

All in all, a disappointment. Guys like Savage and Hulk Hogan came from other wrestling organizations but earned their true fame in WWE. In fact, they were legends of such magnitude, they should have been with the company for life; that's what I think.

Missed opportunities galore.

 

[justtxyank]

Look, when you pop the cherry of the bosses' underage and overly permiscuous daughter, these things happen. We all know it's true. That story has been confirmed by WAY too many credible people in the industry to me personally.

Mach is the 2nd greatest "in ring" performer of all time (HBK 1 and Brett 3) and should have never left the "E". Fueds with Brett would have been great to watch and a passing of the torch to HBK would have also been great to see during that time. He still had not tapped into the Undertaker or Austin either.

His relationship with Stephanie is the common denominator of his demise.

Totally false. If that were true then when he was leaving the company Vince would not have given him an on screen farewell and tribute.

The issues between Vince and Randy had to do with Randy stealing the Slim Jim account and taking it with him to WCW. Vince assumed he would just replace Randy Savage with another WWF employee. Instead, WCW picked up Slim Jim as a sponsor thanks to Savage.

There were other things along those lines that pissed Vince off, but it was all professional.

 

[The Eighties]

That's what it indeed looked like it was leading up to, even though that wouldn't have been my preferred choice of opponent for Macho Man, just the fact that such a scenario would involve Macho Man was enough to make me enthralled. Macho Man was just that big of a favorite of mine back in the day and even to this day in the nostalgic sense I remain a fan. Hell, I could never get into Crush but Macho Man made that feud bearable even though it was otherwise throwaway in many aspects. Had it been anyone else working with Crush, it'd have just been completely forgettable. Like in many cases, a great performer like Macho Man can and usually is the difference maker in so-so scenarios. Sadly, the end of Macho Man's WWF stint consisted of such situations. And to be honest, a feud with Backlund, despite his talents would have likely been just that.

I felt the same about Macho Man, he could get me to invest in anything he was involved in because he committed to it 100% and brought a sense of authenticity to anything he was involved in. I remember just after he won the title at Mania 8 he wrestled on a Uk Rampage event in Sheffield, I'm from the UK and we got those events on a Sports channel here, not sure if they aired in the US. On that show he wrestled Shawn Michaels who had just went solo, as a 12 year old I was disappointed to see Randy wrestling someone so far below him, but he shared the ring so completely that by the end I was convinced that HBK was going to do well in his new singles career. The Crush feud was another great example as you stated, he never amounted to much but for that brief period I was really into his feud because Macho made it so compelling and to be honest other than wanting to see Bret win the title, their match was what I was most anticipating going it WrestleMania X.

Absolutely, and trust me, as someone who grew up watching Savage in the 1980s, I was more than disappointed on November 7, 1994 when this was announced.

[YOUTUBE]YauJQoPzpAY[/YOUTUBE]​

It's so surreal to look back on that now.

Bret Hart's push as the next top face started with Hulk Hogan being on a hiatus from the WWF. As far as why they didn't have Savage work with Bret Hart, you already answered your own question. As you said it appeared that Vince wanted to limit Savage's role, that was more than obvious by the fact that Savage wrestled so few matches from 1993-1994. Was it disappointing, you're damn right it was. But I'm going to have to strongly challenge your point about Hogan's "unwillingness" with Bret Hart as far as the "torch passing" goes. I've always maintained that it was in Vince's plans to have Bret Hart get his revenge against Yokozuna and Hulk Hogan was the baby face that Vince wanted Yokozuna to soundly crush while the buildup to Yokozuna-Bret Hart II was developing. Again, I can't see Bret's post-Mania IX accolades such as the King Of The Ring and his co-Royal Rumble victory with Luger as just random and arbitrary occurrences. Lex Luger in my opinion was a red herring, and I don't think there was ever any serious consideration of giving him the WWF title despite all the fan fare and hype that surrounded Lex's face turn. Therefore, as awesome of a scenario as your face vs face proposal with Macho Man vs Bret Hart in lieu of Hulk Hogan vs Bret Hart, the last time the WWF tried that with Hogan and Warrior, things didn't work out for the long term. Therefore, Vince played it safe and went with the tried and true method of the heel-face dynamic, and for its time Bret Hart's year long odyssey of redemption and closure with Yokozuna worked for its time. However, don't get me wrong I'd have loved to see Bret and Randy have a run against one another.

But like anything else, it was Vince's call that Savage take a backseat to the "New Generation" of performers like Bret Hart, Shawn Michaels, Yokozuna, 1-2-3 Kid, Owen Hart, Jeff Jarrett and Diesel to name just a few. Yes, it'd have made great sense to pair Savage up with these aforementioned names, some of whom you do cite in your next line, but it's obvious that Vince didn't see that as being the way to go. Although, in the case of Yokozuna and Shawn Michaels, Savage did have some encounters with them. However, there wasn't enough of it for my liking either. But I definitely am not going to cite this having anything to do with Hulk Hogan.

No doubt man, my previous paragraph I think echoes your sentiments despite some minor disagreements.

Well Bret Hart claims he has promo pics him and Hogan took with the belt for that years Summerslam, only for Hulk to pull the plug on the idea. Like with most things in wrestling we may never know the full truth, however if Bret can produce the pics then it would suggest that a match between the two was indeed slated to happen.

Bret's journey back to the title is still something I think was undercooked to this day, Yoko was an amazing athlete for a man his size but asking him to wrestle two big matches in 90 minutes was a bad idea and he was spent by the time he faced Bret, hence the awkward finish. To this day I still think they should have had Randy win the title from Yoko at Survivor Series 93 and went with Bret vs Macho at Mania X with Bret beating Yoko at KOTR 94 in his first defense, I know it changes so much booking for that event and the rest of the year but still.

When I look at the heels Randy could have faced over that time, I even missed out guys like Bam Bam Bigelow would would have been a great opponent, but I guess this was the case right through his career, matches in the later 80's with Rude and Boss Man that never happened and then in WCW he never faced Vader. I think I have more rgrets of Macho Man matches that didn't happen than with any other wrestler.

Absolutely man, but it's a shame that Vince didn't see it the way we do. There was a wealth of talent Savage could have worked with even into the Attitude Era as well such as The Rock, Goldust, The Undertaker, Triple H, Steve Austin (their WCW encounter was only a tease of what REALLY could have been) and so on. I say shame on Vince and the decision makers of the WWF story lines for that.

That's a great point, Macho would have still been in the mix when the Attitude Era hit, and in truth around the time 1997 Austin was feuding with Bret, Macho Man was feuding with DDP and the two angles had a very similar theme to them, I imagine Austin vs Randy at that point would have created some magic.

I'm not going to go into specifics as to why Randy Savage never came back to WWF or why he left, that's the same school of thought as you citing that Hulk Hogan was absolutely opposed to working with Bret Hart, it's all speculative. Even my theory regarding Vince is speculative but I hope none of this will denigrate into the rumor mill about all the ugly stuff the IWC usually talks about in regard to what Savage did, especially since he is deceased and can say nothing on his own behalf.

In the case of Hogan and Bret I was going off the words of Bret as a source but I certainly have no intention of going into the whole Randy and Vince saga. I believe it to be as simple as I said in the opening post, Randy wanted to wrestle, Vince didn't want him to, the choice Randy made simply hurt Vince and he couldn't see his selfishness due to his anger over his perception of Macho's disloyalty.

Either way OP, thanks for the post, it had some good insight and I always love discussing matters involving The Madness. He was a top ten favorite of mine, and the "What-Ifs?" are always endless!

I appreciate the well thought out reply, Macho Man is in my top 5 favourites of all time and I think he truly was a unique performer.

 

[The Eighties]

The very idea of using one of the greatest ring performers ever as a talking head was as misguided a notion as I've ever seen. Watching him sit behind the announcer's table with that ridiculous tie-dye shirt hiding his protruding gut was as depressing a sight as I could imagine, and I always wondered whether it was Savage's idea or McMahon's that he abandon fighting to function as a friggin' analyst.

Okay, the theory stated above that Vince wanted to get rid of the Rock n' Wrestling era performers is as good as any, I suppose, but if there was ever a more short-sighted decision, I can't think of it.

I found it truly depressing to see him turn up in WCW, not only for the apparent betrayal it represented, but also for his suddenly flat belly that made him look like the old Macho Man again.....although he didn't perform as such, the couple years of ring inactivity and advancing age leaving him far short of his prime-time prowess.

All in all, a disappointment. Guys like Savage and Hulk Hogan came from other wrestling organizations but earned their true fame in WWE. In fact, they were legends of such magnitude, they should have been with the company for life; that's what I think.

Missed opportunities galore.

Indeed Sally, I can't imagine Vince ever admits to being wrong but I can't help but think the way he used HBK in his second run was based off him realizing what an error he had made with Randy.

I honestly felt he gave WCW 3 good years, I wont argue that he'd lost a step and he wasn't booked very well due to how many has-beens that roster had for him to work with, but his reignited feud with Flair and his feud with DDP are worthy additions to his body of work and I enjoyed his cage match with Hogan at Uncensored 98. Funnily enough when he went rogue from the NWO in the early part of 1998 he was arguably as over as he'd ever been.

I remember him wrestling Bret at Slamboree that year and thinking how it was simply too late, just like Bret's match with Sting later the same year. His return in 99 with a bland new look and so little agility was sad and seeing him fight Dennis Rodman around a portable crapper was the ultimate indignity, as you say Sally, he should have ended his career in WWE and got the kind of send off Flair and HBK got.

On the point about him losing the shirt once he got to WCW, I always wondered about that as he made that change when he returned to face Jake Roberts in late 91, so it may have just been a case of freshening his look up as he didn't become a part timer until 93 when I imagine he likely stopped working out as rigorously and perhaps needed to cover up a bit.