I was watching a classic match between Macho man and Ted Dibiasi earlier when Macho man won the title and it got me thinking. We always discuss and complain about how a wrestler from Wcw, tna or any other promotion comes to wwe and just aren’t used right. Names from wcw like Diamond Dallas Page, Sting, Luger to name a few could have been used so much better. It what is rarely spoken of is how bad wcw took some of the greatest wwf/wwe, and ECW wrestlers and did absolutely nothing with them. Here are some that come to my mind;
Macho man. He was an absolute legend, and household name in wwf. He went to wcw and had a decent run as champ but spent most of his time as a punching bag for the NWO before he later joined them and basically stood in the shadows.
Ulitimate Warrior. It was Insane how bad he was booked.
Mr perfect Curt Hennig. Same as warrior. Absolutely one of my all time favorites who was absolutely ruined in wcw.
Bret Hart. I loved his feud with Sting but other then that all they did with him was beat the Montreal dead horse angle to death.
Big Bossman. Nothing at all done with him
Raven: had one of the best wrestling minds and one of the best talkers maybe ever. Should’ve never left ecw because they had no idea how to use him.
Scott Hall. I know many will see this and say what, but he should’ve been so much more and had a great title main event run. Whether his personal problems were the cause of it or it was the result of booking we’ll never know. I believe to this day if he would’ve stayed in wwe he would have been a major major player as Razor.
That’s just a few that come to my mind but there’s many many more.
With the guys listed there are reasons why all happened as they did.
Randy Savage: Remember he was signed by WCW at a time he had been "inactive" for much of the year previously and considered no longer able to go by Vince. While he did manage to put on some good matches in WCW, he HAD clearly lost two steps and this only worsened as time went on. That he was still in the ring at all by the late 90's was a bad thing... WCW didn't sign Savage to be a top star or worker... they signed him to prove they COULD sign the two most famous names in the business at the time.
Ultimate Warrior - He had creative control and so did Hogan... trying to do business with Warrior would have been like pulling teeth, so whatever WCW did with him was either HIS idea, or Hogans... take from that all you need to know.
Mr. Perfect & Rick Martel- You could say both were underused in the WWF as they had been AWA World Champion, Both ended up mid carders and the latter didn't even get the IC title, when he would have been just as valid a candidate as Hennig and arguably should have had it ahead of The Mountie, even if it was to put someone over like Piper or Razor. This was a lot to do with the AWA title being a "lesser" title in the eyes of the WWF, which then was long gone by the time both went to WCW.
Hennig is often touted as a guy who "shoulda" won a World title...but he already had, it just wasn't a WWF or WCW one, and that doesn't mean he should ever have...the AWA title is as valid as the TNA one is today but by the time his singles career had begun to take off, his back was wrecked and he didn't have the Austin style gimmick that could make up for the reduced performance in the ring.
Hennig also had a very checkered reputation as a businessman by the time he got to WCW. There were issues with Lloyds of London over his insurance/retirement and this had impacted WWE shows to the point he was booked for Survivor Series on Razor's team and had to be replaced with Savage rather than risk his payments stopping... This with it being unclear how bad his problem actually was meant that it was hard to put too much of a push behind him.
Vince had twice and it had been forced to end. It's no coincidence that once Lloyds stopped paying out, Curt worked far more regularly and reliably for WCW and later Vince again... he was relatively well used considering all those factors, especially getting a US title run and in 2002 perhaps COULD have gotten that World title in WWE had he not screwed it up on the plane ride from hell... he was definitely being used correctly at the time, as a veteran main event level guy.
Martel was similar, Vince had lined up a great push for him but he chose to stay home and (rightly) care for his sick wife... which cost him future runs in the WWF... WCW were using him as TV champ when he got hurt... so in his case it just "never panned out" rather than anything he did "wrong" but Martel could have been used much better after HIS AWA World title run.
Big Bossman: A lot of the confusion stems from how big Bubba was in the NWA before he went to Vince...but he was also still relatively green at the time so he was pushed well, but not to the top... he was fed to Hogan and Savage as part of the Twin Towers then built as a face... to be fair that role could have lasted for years had he not left for WCW... but Bubba/The Guardian Angel/The Boss/Ray Traylor was used correctly in WCW, a "big name/face" star who legitimised the Hogan era there. He was arguably used better than Brutus, John Tenta, Barbarian and Honky Tonk Man... perhaps only Meng was used more effectively at the time, to the point where you would wonder why Vince didn't use him better.
Raven: He was never going to main event in either WCW or WWE and he knew it... He had been Scotty Flamingo and Johnny Polo and the fans KNEW it... this was before a cruiserweight like Rey or Bryan could legit win the top prize and before WCW threw their title under the bus with Arquette. WCW used him better than WWE did, but at the same time he had monster ego issue by the time he got back to WWE and REALLY didn't fit what they wanted in a main eventer... that he was used at all by them means he was used effectively.
I hear a lot about his "mind for wrestling" but that is all to often seemingly used to describe guys who should have done more with their talent but either couldn't get over, couldn't control their backstage vices or are simply overrated largely by themselves with others too polite to pull them up on it... Raven and certainly Jake would fall into that category... Indeed, Jake perhaps deserves mention even more with his WCW run in 92, done correctly, and had he been in proper shape, a feud with Rick Rude could have taken WCW to the pinnacle... but Jake was a shell and only there cos Vince wouldn't put up with his crap anymore.
Scott Hall - Did WCW misuse him? No, it's impossible for them to have as he had final say over every move he made there. He spent a lot of time tagging with Nash cos it was easy work for them... their team mannerisms and spots as The Outsiders/NWO meant they didn't have to do much for their massive contracts, Hey Yo, SOS Spot, Pinfall, Too Sweet... Go get loaded. That was the extent of what was required, so why do more? WCW WERE going with him as a solo guy when he won WW3 that first time, but by then his demons were in control - see the above.
None of those guys you could say were truly misused.
Here are some who were:-
Davey Boy: Not in the latter run, but his 1993 run... the feud with Vader was white hot and the match where he powerslammed Vader so hard on the outside where he couldn't get up got rave reviews... but by then WCW had wind that Hogan was interested and on the way potentially so they seemed to give up on Davey... likewise, when he returned to the WWE, he was badly misused until his heel turn. There might have been an element of "punishment" for ballsing up his previous run with the roid issue, but even then it seemed to go on a little too long, well over a year.
Dean Douglas: Again, Shane reaped what he sowed because of the way he left the WWF, claiming he was returning to Med School when he then signed for WCW. He also suffered for being the guy first planned to have the HBK gimmick, something Shawn wasn't going to let go while he was "the guy" there. All told they misused Douglas terribly in 1995, to the point where it seems a very expensive rib on him rather than a legit attempt to use him.
Jeff Jarrett: Jarrett was misused the opposite way when he returned to WCW... he was pushed way above his station. That guy had no business near a world title at all, Austin was correct on that.
Diamond Dallas Page: To this day I will NEVER understand the Stalker angle... when they quickly went to "Positively Page"... The irony is of all these people and bad gimmicks, that was the one that actually worked... not for the WWE but for Page himself. That "Positive" gimmick IS DDP today and he's made millions...for himself from it. Without that Stalker angle, that could have been money in Vince's pocket...
