Could there be a reason to no more WCW?

[Trill Co$by]

Ok, so before I go off and talk about anything, let me just ask that you please follow along, read the entire post, and then let me know what you think.


In the year of 2001, Vince McMahon took WCW from Time Warner and started the Invasion angle. Now a lot of people look at this angle as a squash to WCW but in my opinion, Vince could've done a lot worse. I mean he gave the talented guys of WCW a chance in the WWE.

Buff Bagwell and Booker were given the main event of Raw as a respectable tryout match. And in my opinion, the match was really decent.

Several months later, he continued to help WCW by giving them champions that were WCW originals and should've been champion. People like Chris Jericho, Benoit, and Stone Cold. And then after the Invasion angle was done, there was no more trashing of WCW.

And my question to why it hasn't been done is, could all of this be because Vince still has respect for Ted Turner?

Keep in mind, Vince and Ted were very great friends in the old days. In fact, Vince wished the best for WCW athletes when Ted told Vince he had a company. And the entire war of WCW & WWE was mainly fought with Russo/Bischoff against McMahon.

And I know Vince has a knack for putting the boots to the groin of ECW (like last night's horrible Extreme Rules ppv) but once again, McMahon never had the respect for Heyman that he did for Ted Turner.

So with all of this in thought, could the reason why Vince doesn't trash WCW be because he respects Ted Turner as a person and in reality have an actual heart?

And in return, could this be why Ted himself hasn't invested in TNA?

 

[Johnny Dangerous]

Vince buried WCW to feed his own ego. The Invasion was a way to show how superior WWF/E was to WCW. The WCW continued to be buried by WWE for years after the invasion was over. See HHH's burial of Booker T. The destruction of the cruserweight division, and so on. Vince never saw ECW as a threat, so he doesnt go out of his way to destroy its legacy[he only does it through shitty booking].

 

[DL23]

Ok, so before I go off and talk about anything, let me just ask that you please follow along, read the entire post, and then let me know what you think.


In the year of 2001, Vince McMahon took WCW from Time Warner and started the Invasion angle. Now a lot of people look at this angle as a squash to WCW but in my opinion, Vince could've done a lot worse. I mean he gave the talented guys of WCW a chance in the WWE.

Buff Bagwell and Booker were given the main event of Raw as a respectable tryout match. And in my opinion, the match was really decent.

Several months later, he continued to help WCW by giving them champions that were WCW originals and should've been champion. People like Chris Jericho, Benoit, and Stone Cold. And then after the Invasion angle was done, there was no more trashing of WCW.

And my question to why it hasn't been done is, could all of this be because Vince still has respect for Ted Turner?

Keep in mind, Vince and Ted were very great friends in the old days. In fact, Vince wished the best for WCW athletes when Ted told Vince he had a company. And the entire war of WCW & WWE was mainly fought with Russo/Bischoff against McMahon.

And I know Vince has a knack for putting the boots to the groin of ECW (like last night's horrible Extreme Rules ppv) but once again, McMahon never had the respect for Heyman that he did for Ted Turner.

So with all of this in thought, could the reason why Vince doesn't trash WCW be because he respects Ted Turner as a person and in reality have an actual heart?

And in return, could this be why Ted himself hasn't invested in TNA?

Firstly I always enjoy reading peoples opinions about the whole Invasion angle, I personally enjoyed it, for what wrestlers WWE got from WCW they made the most of what they had.

secondly Vince give them champions, Jericho no, he was a WWF guy and won the title from another WWF guy The Rock, but yes Jericho was a former WCW guy who said he'd never join the Allience, Austin was WCW/ECW in the past him joining was to gim the a credible heel with a main event name, Booker T was WCW Main Event meterial NOT WWF meterial at the time. Benoit? He wasn't even part of the angle, unless he was part of the first few weeks, but he was injured at King of the ring 2001, which up intil that point only Storm, Morris and maybe Awesome had debuted KOTR was Bookers entrance into the WWE.

Thirdly Vince has great respect for Haymen, he paid him back in the 1997-2001 and used ECW as a farm league, and brought in some of the big names from ECW, watch Rise and Fall of ECW It's talked in-depth on their.

That said Vince does love to nut shot to ECW when ever he can, which surprises me as Vince is about making money, and he returned ECW after 2 pretty good ECW PPV's then RVD and Sabu pulled over and caught with weed pretty much closed the door on ECW imo, for ECW to have really suceeded they needed RVD at the helm and as Champion, once they cut him out Big Show was made to look dominating, but you could see he was VERY uncomfortable in the ring at that period due to weight issues, but yeah Vince pretty much hates ECW and I don't know why, if it wasn't for ECW they're would of been NO attitude era.

Forthly Vince screwing WCW whenever he could has nothing to do with respect, what would it prove? nothing, he brought Bischoff in, and made him look idotic whenever he wanted a laugh, he pretty much brought in all the BIG WCW guys and had his lone jewel HHH make them look pathetic, really Vince trashed WCW without opening his mouth, what would HHH pinning the Sandman or Tommy Dreamer mean? nothing as they were glorified jobbers in WWE, the only true ECW guy to make it in WWE was RVD, Austin was only in ECW for a month or two you can't really say he was main stay ECWer.

Back to teh invasion angle tho, I was around when it was going on and I remember the angles, talks and rumors of what WWE was going to do, bring back Monday Nitro, or put Nitro on Thursdays (over taking Smackdown) and having their own roster (Brand split) and pushing guys like Billy Gunn with the WCW title, guys who didn't really get over in WWF put them on WWF's version of WCW, it never happened, any surprise?

I wouldn't be surprised if down the road WWE actually bring back WCW with the fan fair is there for a WCW show, Vince has said he wants wrestling on TV 5-6 nights a week, with new programming being the main objective, now NXT looks to be closing down soon, and ECW failed, I could see WWE bring in Florida Championship Wrestling on to a national platform, to get the guys over and known, I could see WWE bringing in Nitro an hourly show on a Wednesday, but chances of this happening are doubtful as Vince would rather use one of his shows.

 

[DeadAndRising]

Has anybody read Bischoffs book he says he was going to buy wcw but tbs would not let him keep it on there most other channels would not allow him to buy a time slot to put it there because of the edgeyness they were going that is why vince moved back to usa Vince bought it to keep some of the talent employed not to crush it nor to show his suppioriority to wcw so please before oppinons are made research all the facts first

 

[Scared Stiff]

Has anybody read Bischoffs book he says he was going to buy wcw but tbs would not let him keep it on there most other channels would not allow him to buy a time slot to put it there because of the edgeyness they were going that is why vince moved back to usa Vince bought it to keep some of the talent employed not to crush it nor to show his suppioriority to wcw so please before oppinons are made research all the facts first

So Vince bought WCW so that the other wrestlers would have jobs? It has nothing to do with WCW's massive video library? It had nothing to do with Vince wanting to buy his only North American competitor? I read Bischoff's book too. He never said that Vince purchased WCW to keep the wrestlers employed. That's ludicrous to even suggest.

 

[Steve001]

Has anybody read Bischoffs book he says he was going to buy wcw but tbs would not let him keep it on there most other channels would not allow him to buy a time slot to put it there because of the edgeyness they were going

Firstly, The sale of WCW in January of 2001 to Eric Bischoff and Fusient Media Ventures never occurred for two main reasons:

After the AOL/Time Warner merger, a suit by the name of Jamie Kellner decided to boot all WCW programming from TV networks owned by Time Warner. He came to this conclusion after being made aware the dire straits WCW was in at this time. WCW was losing somewhere in the neighbourhood of US$ 1 Million per-month!

Secondly, WCW had always been the "black sheep" of Time Warner. Never being fully supported by the Turner brass, even when WCW Nitro was the highest rated show on cable TV in 1996 & 1997 and was making pots of money during it's heyday from 1996 to 1998 (WCW made a net profit of US$50 Million in 1998).

Kellner's decison rendered WCW practically worthless as without TV exposure and that platform to broadcast your product, there is no real value. By the time 2001 rolled around, Eric Bischoff and his cronies from FMV realized that WCW's product had delved to the depths that even the most pessimistic fan could have imagined as recently as 1999.
TV Ratings for WCW shows were in the toilet, live attendance at events had plummeted and many of the Wrestlers were awaiting their contracts to expire to join others who jumped to the WWF.

Fusient Media Ventures also realized that any other TV network worth a damn wouldn't accept WCW in it's current state and the deal, unfortunately for Bischoff fell through. It wasn't a total loss though, you can almost guarantee that if the sale had gone through for Bischoff and FMV, Hulk Hogan would have been back on top, finishing off a steady stream of hapless victims with his daunted, 'Legdrop of Doom!'

Vince McMahon was then approached by AOL/Time Warner to purchase WCW, Vinnie Mac accepted the deal and paid a paltry US$ 2.5 Million for the WCW name, 24 under-card contracts and the WCW video tape library. The rest as they say is history.

that is why vince moved back to usa

Vince McMahon moved WWF Raw is War to the TNN Network beginning with the September 25th 2000 episode, because his long standing deal with USA Network (dating back to 1993) had expired and TNN offered more money and greater sponsorship of the brand. That's why Vince made the move.
The WWF returned to the USA Network in September 2005...So anything to do with the WWF and USA Network had nothing to do with WCW at all.

Vince bought it to keep some of the talent employed not to crush it nor to show his suppioriority to wcw so please before oppinons are made research all the facts first

It was readily apparent to anyone with a fully functioning brain and a pair of eyeballs who was actually watching the "Invasion" angle at the time that Vince totally botched the whole angle by doing his best to "prove the WWF was better all along" by burying WCW talents. Vocal backstage power players such as Kevin Dunn and Brian Gewirtz were never keen on featuring WCW on WWF TV and most certainly influenced Vince.

The "Invasion" storyline never really took off the way many fans expected it to for many reasons. The complete lack of any real WCW headline talent hurt the angle the most. The reason why the WWF couldn't persuade Wrestlers such as Sting, Goldberg, Kevin Nash etc to sign with them is because they offered WCW guys 50% of their contracts overall worth to go on the road and become active with the WWF. All of those guys besides Diamond Dallas Page (who has always been a mark for McMahon) and Booker T declined as they could sit at home relaxing by the pool collecting on their Time Warner deals. Who could blame them!? Goldberg was earning US$40 000 per-week from WCW!

DDP was crushed by the Undertaker's then Wife on Raw, The tag-Team of Brian Adams and Brian Clarke (Kronik) were systematically destroyed at Unforgiven 2001 by Kane and 'Taker, Sean O'Haire and Chuck Palumbo were stiffed by Bradshaw and Faarooq at the Invasion PPV in July '01 and made to look like total jobbers, Lance Storm appeared and was immediately buried by The Rock when Rocky asked "...Who in the blue hell are you!?" on Raw. That's some of the instances that spring to mind anyway.

So of course Vince McMahon buried WCW...It was plainly obvious. Remember, WCW was set to start their own TV tapings in June of 2001 just weeks after the initial buyout, but that never happened as Vince became disheartened by the horrible response the live crowd had towards the Booker T/Buff Bagwell clusterfuck on Raw and questioned WCW's ability to draw.

Anyway, I've rambled on long enough, I'm hoping I stayed somewhat on topic!

One last thing, Pro Wrestlers or anyone associated with the business don't lie or exaggerate in their books do they!? *Cough* Hogan...*Cough* Flair...*Cough* Hitman...Why should 'Bisch' be any different?

 

[finoj05]

The fact of the matter is this. Even WITH the guys WWF brought from WCW to be apart of the group, the angle still was botched.

DDP, for instance, was a top star in WCW during it's biggest run. He had never wrestled in WWF before and everybody knew who he was. He was a huge fan favorite and was the biggest star willing to participate in the invasion storylines.

First thing they do with DDP is they make him a heel stalker, complete out-of-character for him, and he gets beaten and buried every time he was in the same place as The Undertaker. Within a month, nobody gave a crap about DDP.

Secondly, Booker T was made to look good for the 1st couple weeks of the angle but despite being the babyface, he kept attacking Steve Austin (a heel that still got mostly cheers) from behind, like a heel would. WWF fans booed him for that. He didn't look bad ass. He looked like a coward.

Thirdly, despite having WCW stars already on the roster such as Jericho and The Big Show, they refused to utilize them as part of Team WCW and decided to have them apart of the already over-stacked WWF team, till they turned Stone Cold and Kurt Angle, completely ruining the concept of the invasion 1 month into it's run.

The addition of Stephanie McMahon into the mix didn't help matters either. It was completely useless to have her involved. Paul Heyman was the leader of ECW. They didn't need anybody else for that.

Like many have said before, WCW did more with 3 men than WWF could do with 25. WWF popped one big PPV buyrate with Invasion (because people expected the real WCW guys to show up) but WCW was able to expand a storyline with 2 big signings from WWF and one guy they signed 2 years earlier, scattered in with a bunch of jobbers as team mates, and make a storyline that made money for 3 straight years.

The invasion angle was done in 5 months.

I don't care how you slice it, there are no excuses. The Invasion angle was terrible managed, terribly booked and with no direction besides to feed the ego of Vince McMahon, Kevin Dunn, Gerald Briscoe, Pat Patterson and locker room stiffs like The Undertaker and The APA who wanted to bury all the new guys that were coming in and get themselves over.

After the angle was done, McMahon and the bitter WWE management did everything in his power to bury WCW and it's name for years to come and only making nice with it when it felt like it (Bischoff, Goldberg and the botched nWo).

WWE achieved 2 5.7 ratings for RAW during the angle and several 5.0+ ratings in July (the 1st full month of the storyline). After July when Austin turned, the angle never drew a 5.0 again. WWE would draw it twice more since then. Both nights were after WrestleMania X8 during the botched nWo storyline. After that, 8 years later, WWF hasn't touched a 5.0 rating again. The botched handling of the WCW and NWO invasions can be pointed at as the moments WWE never recovered from. They still do great business but the wrestling business as a whole never recovered from it.

 

[WWEWrestleFest]

the names people associated with wcw were ric flair, hulk hogan, scott hall, kevin nash, scott steiner, goldberg, sting, randy savage, lex luger, dallas page, booker t, and eric bischoff. of all those guys, only dallas page and booker t were used in the invasion angle.

i understand that vince has his issues with luger and savage, and sting refused to work for wwe, but they eventually brought in the rest of those guys at some point.. an invasion angle with actual wcw headliners would have been so easy to book, it practically writes itself. they should have waited an extra year or two for their time-warner contracts to run out, or to offered them the same money to wrestle immediately so that they could do the invasion angle right.

eventually, when those guys did join wwe, they were all booked terribly and made to look weak compared to the wwe talents. ddp as a stalker? hogan as captain america? nwo with shawn michaels and booker t? king booker? all awful. even changing things like goldbergs shorts and theme music to put their "wwe" stamp on him. the guys that weren't wcw main eventers, like curt hennig, kronik, and buff bagwell, were even used terribly.

and the wcw guys that were pushed well, chris benoit, eddie gurrurero, chris jericho, big show.. they were guys that chose to leave wcw for wwe when wcw was still up and running. you could make an argument for rey mystero as an exception to the rule, but i think that had more to do with him being close with eddie.

 

[DirtyJosé]

Ok, so before I go off and talk about anything, let me just ask that you please follow along, read the entire post, and then let me know what you think.

Fair enough.

In the year of 2001, Vince McMahon took WCW from Time Warner and started the Invasion angle. Now a lot of people look at this angle as a squash to WCW but in my opinion, Vince could've done a lot worse. I mean he gave the talented guys of WCW a chance in the WWE.

It was done not to bury or respect WCW, but because there should have been a LOT of fucking money in a WCW vs WWE angle. Done right, and with the right people, it could have made so many PPV buys. As it was, it was still a marginal success (in terms of ratings, PPV's, and merch sales) but creatively a disaster.

Buff Bagwell and Booker were given the main event of Raw as a respectable tryout match. And in my opinion, the match was really decent.

Decent, but not good. Buff Bagwell himself went on the record as saying that his and Booker's nerves were shot that night, as they were afraid that many fans wouldn't buy into it. When fans in the arena started leaving halfway into the match, things just got worse. It was a match that shouldn't have been made because both men deserved a little bit better than to be fed to the sharks.

Several months later, he continued to help WCW by giving them champions that were WCW originals and should've been champion. People like Chris Jericho, Benoit, and Stone Cold. And then after the Invasion angle was done, there was no more trashing of WCW.

Jericho and Benoit were not WCW originals. I don't really see Stone Cold as one either, but his stay in ECW came after his WCW stint unlike the other two. Anyway, people like Jericho, Benoit, and Austin got the title because....they were WWE employees. And were so long before the WCW walls fell. Not because they had deserved it while in WCW, but because they were more reliable, in Vince's eyes, than the WCW newcomers.

And there was no more trashing of WCW because McMahon now owned the name. Why would he go on trashing something that, at the time, he was entertaining ideas about spinning off into it's own shows?

And my question to why it hasn't been done is, could all of this be because Vince still has respect for Ted Turner?

No, it's because you are one hell of a mark. Also, you need to learn paragraph structure. Anyway, no, Vince didn't bury WCW (intentionally, anyway) out of respect for a man who no longer had anything to do with that name, but because it was indeed now his name attached to it.

Keep in mind, Vince and Ted were very great friends in the old days. In fact, Vince wished the best for WCW athletes when Ted told Vince he had a company. And the entire war of WCW & WWE was mainly fought with Russo/Bischoff against McMahon.

Um, no.

1. Vince wished the best for WCW on the phone with Ted because he isn't a monumental dick in public or to other people's "face". It's called being polite, dude. It's not like Vince went out and started plugging his new competition.

2. That is the dumbest thing I've ever heard (the whole Russo/Bischoff vs McMahon). Russo was with McMahon right up until after WCW had taken a turn for the worse. Russo was brought into WCW as a remedy (which failed). The entire beginning to WWE vs WCW included parody skits involving "Billionaire Ted" and wacky adventures. Don't use selective memory as the basis for your posts.

And I know Vince has a knack for putting the boots to the groin of ECW (like last night's horrible Extreme Rules ppv) but once again, McMahon never had the respect for Heyman that he did for Ted Turner.

Whoa, oops, this might be even dumber than the last. I hope you are being a Sidious type here and just saying things to start reaction and conversation, because you really don't seem to have much more of a grasp on things other than what you can put together in your head to make McMahon look bad.

Well, back to the comment. Vince had a habit involving ECW, yes; he couldn't stop giving them money. He didn't need to have them on WWE television and PPV's. He didn't need to send them guys to work with on ECW bookings. He didn't need to promote them. And he certainly didn't need to put Paul Heyman on WWE payroll back in 1996 when he felt a little guilty about hiring away some of ECW's talent. Vince McMahon was the life support of ECW; without his help it wouldn't have even made it to national television. Heyman and McMahon don't see eye to eye on many things, but I didn't see McMahon give a booking and creative gig to Turner. I didn't see McMahon and Turner paying each other when they signed away each other's talent. McMahon had plenty of respect for Heyman.

And last night's show was fine. Can you tell me what you didn't like? Oh, was it that there wasn't like, blood, and like, more violent stuff? Your info says you are 18, but I suspect instead a 16. I bet you don't like all the talking too, you just want weapons shots and high spot after high spot. Your kind got what you wanted once, and it almost killed the business. ECW failed for many reasons, one of which was that in the end, a hyper-violent wrestling program can not promote itself well enough to appeal to a big enough audience to become profitable. The long run costs alone are not worth it.

Go watch snuff films online if that's what gets your jollies off.

BTW, did you even watch Extreme Rules? Or did you just read the spoilers? And if you did watch it...was it paid for, or did you stream it? Just wondering, to prove a point.

So with all of this in thought, could the reason why Vince doesn't trash WCW be because he respects Ted Turner as a person and in reality have an actual heart?

Why, I'm sure Vince has a heart. He's a human like the rest of us.

I've said it twice already, Vince doesn't bag on WCW anymore because he owns that name. And because that name isn't really relevant in the current televised environment (by that I mean within kayfabe there really isn't any reason to mention WCW).

And in return, could this be why Ted himself hasn't invested in TNA?

Ted wasn't a wrestling promoter, you tit. He bought into wrestling because he believed in it's appeal and potential as a television producer and cable network owner. He saw the opportunity in owning a wrestling promotion for use on a network as a ratings draw, tried doing business with, and eventually purchased his own company. He then failed to run it properly, passed it around to others to run (some knew what to do with it, most others didn't), and by the time it tanked and got bought by McMahon, Turner was already long gone from the cable network and the wrestling promotion he used to own.

I don't get it, what's the point of this post?

 

[Charismatic Edge]

Vince buried WCW to feed his own ego. The Invasion was a way to show how superior WWF/E was to WCW. The WCW continued to be buried by WWE for years after the invasion was over. See HHH's burial of Booker T. The destruction of the cruserweight division, and so on. Vince never saw ECW as a threat, so he doesnt go out of his way to destroy its legacy[he only does it through shitty booking].

That's the best summation of how Vince felt about WCW. Vince fucked it up on purpose. Imagine if Goldberg was the first wrestler seen on tv instead of Lance Storm? Nothing against a great technical master like Lance but he wasn't a superstar.

If you can think of a big WCW in 2001 under contract, then they were available to Vince. According to the book Death of WCW, Vince never used them because it would've upset the salary structure. Ok, but they still brought them all back in 2003. Of course, that was only to satiate Triple H's ego.

 

[DirtyJosé]

That's the best summation of how Vince felt about WCW. Vince fucked it up on purpose. Imagine if Goldberg was the first wrestler seen on tv instead of Lance Storm? Nothing against a great technical master like Lance but he wasn't a superstar.

If you can think of a big WCW in 2001 under contract, then they were available to Vince. According to the book Death of WCW, Vince never used them because it would've upset the salary structure. Ok, but they still brought them all back in 2003. Of course, that was only to satiate Triple H's ego.

Wrong!

When WCW went under, the majority of the major stars were under deep pocket contracts with AOL/Time Warner corporate, not WCW. This was foresight on the wrestlers part to get the ink done with a parent company to ensure that even if things went tits up (and they did), they'd still get a paycheck. Many of these same stars have similar contracts with Panda or Spike instead of TNA proper.

So, in the fallout, the smaller stars of the mid card and main event like Booker T and Bagwell were free to sign because they needed the money and were no longer contracted anywhere, while the older superstars like Kevin Nash, Sting, and Goldberg were still contracted to AOL/Time Warner, and could stay at home continuing to collect these paychecks. Signing with WWE would have required breaking these contracts, and most of these stars were unwilling to.

So, instead of it being how McMahon made the Invasion weak because he hated WCW, it is in fact instead a story of how big lazy WCW top guys wanted to stay at home and collect free money instead of working. And to be fair, I would have too.

 

[DL23]

So, instead of it being how McMahon made the Invasion weak because he hated WCW, it is in fact instead a story of how big lazy WCW top guys wanted to stay at home and collect free money instead of working. And to be fair, I would have too.

To be fair to the top dogs were lazy and stayed at home, check DDP out, great guy took a 50% cut in wages and cut his big contract to be made to look like a fool, check the others out who joined later, all were made to look pathetic, they had the right mind set to stay at home and be paid, then go and get money to be made a fool of.

 

[pyrusane]

To be fair to the top dogs were lazy and stayed at home, check DDP out, great guy took a 50% cut in wages and cut his big contract to be made to look like a fool, check the others out who joined later, all were made to look pathetic, they had the right mind set to stay at home and be paid, then go and get money to be made a fool of.

Except that this isn't at all accurate. Let's look at the big guys that came in later. There were seven that I can think of. We'll address them one at a time.

1) Ric Flair - This one is easy. He was brought in as the financial backer of Shane/Steph, was given RAW, and was treated like the legend he is over the next seven years. Not a lot that can be said about Flair.

2) Goldberg - He was brought in immediately into a feud with The Rock, chased Triple H and the title for several months before finally winning it, and was made to look pretty dominant. The only time he really looked "like a fool" he did to himself, at WrestleMania, against Brock Lesnar.

3) Scott Steiner - Steiner was in such terrible shape by this point (and by that I mean the amount of pain he was in) that he couldn't put on a good match. Just look at the shitfest that was his title match against HHH.

4) Rey Mysterio - Come on. He is the underdog of the century, the little train that could, the smallest former World Champion ever. He has received the type of push that even the most die-hard Rey fans can't completely justify.

5) The NWO - To be fair, Vince tried here. He tried to make the NWO look credible, and he did the right thing bringing in the three original members. Each had problems though...
5a) Hulk Hogan - He immediately began a feud with The Rock, culminating in their match at WM18. The problem was, no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't maintain any heat with the fans. And make no mistake about it, it was not Hogan's ego that led to that turn, the fans gave them very little choice. He was getting bigger pops than the Rock, who was the most over face in the company at the time, and to ignore that would have been stupid.

5b) Scott Hall - Hall was placed into a feud with Stone Cold that led to their WM18 match. Unfortunately, the Scott Hall that invaded the WWE in 2002 was not the same Scott Hall that invaded WCW in 1996. His personal demons had wreaked havoc on his life and taken a toll on his body, and he couldn't keep it together long enough to make an impact. He was released very shortly into the WWE version of the NWO run.

5c) Kevin Nash - Nash was the glue that always held the NWO together. Even after Hogan turned and Hall got released, they still tried to keep an NWO around Nash. They brought in X-Pac, who had both a relationship with Kevin from their days in the Kliq as well as being a former member of the original NWO (Syxx in WCW). They added Big Show and Booker, both former WCW guys and in Big Show's case another former member of the original NWO. They even added a freshly returned Shawn Michaels to the group to try to make it seem more credible, and hinted at either adding HHH or starting a feud with him. Then Nash tore his bicep, had to miss six months or so due to rehab, and with all three of the founding members gone, it made no sense to keep the NWO name around when the HBK/HHH feud was around the corner.

So in truth, the main event players that did eventually come over from WCW were treated as seriously as they could be, given their circumstances. But what about the guys that came over for the Invasion angle?

One thing that a lot of people seem to forget is that there was a major difference between working for the WWE and working in WCW...the size of the ring. WCW used a much smaller ring than the WWE, and for the guys coming in who had never previously worked for the WWE, it took a lot of adjusting to get used to it.

Booker T commented in one interview that he felt like he had to learn how to wrestle all over again. He had grown accustomed over the years to the smaller ring, so there were occasions when he would run the ropes, and just stop in the middle of the ring because he expected to be at the other side and was nowhere close.

So...you're the WWE, you just bought WCW (which, regardless of the reasons for the purchase, did save jobs. Without a television contract, the other option was WCW just closing down altogether) and you have all of these guys under contract who don't know how to work in your ring. Do you throw them out there and let them sink? Do you spend so much time retraining them that by the time they debut no one really cares anymore? Or do you take the ones who adapt the quickest, let them start the invasion so that it stays fresh in the fan's minds, and bring other guys in as they are able to make the transition?

It was a lot more difficult situation than people acknowledge. Yes, there were things that could have been done differently. But I have never believed that Vince buried these guys just for the sake of burying them. I was a WCW fan in those days, not a WWE fan at all, and even I could acknowledge that the WWE talent was far superior in the ring to most of the guys that they acquired from WCW. In the end, Vince put them out their and let the talent that could excel, do so.

 

[luxferre]

I believe one of the reason's turner hasn't got back into wrestling is part of the deal Vince made. I'm sure i've read that Vince made sure TT signed something like a contract that said he couldn't own or invest in a wrestling company.

But to say the WcW guy's were given a fair shake is a bit much. DDP-Buried. Buff Bagwell(momma issues). Booker T-Might have a case.

The only guy who got a push in the invasion angle was RVD. Ex Ecw.