Potential lineups for The Four Horsemen in 1995 and 1999

[TEIWCSCSAATBHPHASP]

1995-96 saw the return of The Four Horsemen as heels with Ric Flair, Arn Anderson and new additions "Flyin' Brian" Pillman and Chris Benoit spending most of the timeframe feuding with Hogan, Savage and Sting, while gradually adding Steve "Mongo" McMichael, "Woman" Nancy Benoit and Miss Elizabeth to the faction's ranks throughout the first half of 1996. The original and most known lineup of The Four Horsemen were Ric Flair, Arn Anderson, Ole Anderson and Tully Blanchard from 1985 to 1987 with Barry Windham, Lex Luger, Sting, Sid, Hennig, Benoit, Pillman, Woman, Elizabeth, Malenko and Mongo being the Horsemen add-ons to join the group, in addition to The Horsemen being occasionally trotted out in the ring as babyfaces though the legacy for the Horsemen were the textbook heel factions before the New World Order became the first renegade gang faction of cool heels to ever do what the Four Horsemen couldn't even do.

Now let's say if The Four Horsemen were to be reformed in 1995 as a super face faction with Flair, Hogan, Savage and Sting as their key members instead of shoe-horning Benoit and Pillman in the group as a couple of young hungry hot-shots (Benoit with no personality, and obviously, Pillman with the Attitude Era-esque persona he recently cultivated), seeing how Pillman ended up getting fired from WCW in early 1996 to move over to ECW and later to the WWF that same year, thus it would've marked the first time ever that Hulk Hogan and Randy Savage may have joined the Four Horsemen.

Back to the Horsemen, it would've marked the second time that Sting joined the Four Horsemen, with his first time being in 1989-90 when Luger (who was the supposed face when he was feuding with Windham, Flair and the rest of Flair's ilk for most of 1988-89) became the heel in mid 1989 by illegally grabbing Michael Hayes' trunks for the WCW United States Championship and goading Ricky Steamboat, while Flair had to deal with a Terry Funk with pent-up rage and aggression (the years prior to Funk becoming an ECW hardcore legend). Sting's stint with the Horsemen in 1989-90 was short-lived for both kayfabe and legit reasons. Legit reasons, Sting wanted to be written out of the Horsemen according to Arn Anderson, plus Flair wanted to hand the WCW World Heavyweight Championship Belt over to him instead of Luger, but Sting became injured in February 1990, and so Luger had no choice but to turn face again, plus there was more money to be potentially made with Sting and Luger vs. Flair and the Four Horsemen (w/Arn Anderson, Barry Windham, Sid Vicious and Ole Anderson).

And for the 1999-00 lineup of The Four Horsemen, which was basically the last ever lineup of the Horsemen fittingly as heels after the double-turn with Hogan and the nWo, the 1999 lineup of the Horsemen would've featured Ric Flair, Kevin Nash, Lex Luger, Scott Steiner and Rick Steiner w/Arn Anderson, Miss Elizabeth, Charles Robinson and Flair's kayfabe nurse Asya because the nWo Wolfpac Elite had disbanded due to injuries while the B-Team were never assimilated back into the group and gradually dispersed altogether. That would've marked the first time since 1987-88 that Luger (second time) had joined the Four Horsemen, and the first time ever that Kevin Nash, Scott Steiner and Rick Steiner represented the Four Horsemen according to the WCW rumor mill back on the Internet way back in 1999, even though Nash, Scott and Rick hated Flair for their reasons while Luger never had any ill-will towards Flair. Flair's problems with Kevin Nash and Scott Steiner stemmed from:
-1) Flair sandbagging Scott in an early 1991 matchup at Clash of the Champions, and this was back when Scott was an actual capable wrestler. Scott cited this match with Flair's NWA World Heavyweight Championship Belt on the line as the reason why Scott later did a shoot promo on Ric Flair with mentions of WWF and "Stone Cold" Steve Austin as well as the original "Nature Boy" Buddy Rogers.

-2) Roddy Piper refusing to sell for Nash and Hall based on a two-on-three match of sorts with Piper/Flair vs. Hall/Nash/Savage in 1997, and Piper only felt he could trust Savage to sell for him and Flair, leading Nash to have a real-life backstage brawl with Piper on the same day that over in the WWF, Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels were fighting over Shawn's Sunny Days comment backstage in Hartford, Connecticut post-episode of WWF Raw is War. That's when Flair had a problem with Nash in particular. Even Hogan and Savage both hated working with Flair too, so by 1998, Flair had zero friends backstage except for his old Horsemen cronies Arn Anderson, J.J. Dillon, Kevin Sullivan and Ted Turner, while the main core of WCW by that point among the likes of Hogan, Savage, Nash, Hall, Bischoff, and The Steiners really had legit gripes with Flair, and even if Luger and Sting had zero problems and no ill-will towards Flair, I think both Luger and Sting were made to join in on the anti-Flair clique with their backstage hate of Ric Flair in 1998 orchestrated by Flair's own problems with Hulk Hogan, Randy Savage, Scott Hall, Kevin Nash, Scott Steiner, Rick Steiner and Eric Bischoff already shining a light on Flair's problems with him being the old guy in the way of the future main eventers.

Let me know which of the two potential lineups of The Four Horsemen had the most to be more valuable than the other:
-1) 1995-96: Flair, Hogan, Savage and Sting as faces
or
-2) mid 1999: Flair, Nash, Luger, Scott, Rick, Elizabeth, Arn, Asya and Lil' Naitch as heels

 

[sikkbones]

Shakes head.... Those two line ups are just variations of the nwo

The four horsemen have never worked long term as faces.

Also whatever you're smoking I want Some of it, you're long nonsensencial posts belong in the spam zone... I had trouble reading that.... Are you related to the warrior circa 1990?

Believe in the power of the ultimate warrior hoak hogan!!!

 

[Makaveli31]

I think you're missing the point of the Four Horsemen and what made that faction so successful. It is also why I think they are the greatest faction of all time. What made the Horsemen successful was that they were compartmentalized. They weren't a bunch of wrestlers thrown together for the sake of just throwing them together. Each wrestler had a role and each wrestler sacrificed his own career for the betterment of the entire faction.

Case in point, Ric Flair was the unquestioned leader of the Horsemen and the rest of the Horsemen would run in support of Flair and his holding of the World Heavyweight Championship. Tully Blanchard would sacrifice his own career and quest for the Wold Heavyweight Championship for focus on the US and TV Championship and then the Tag Team championship with Arn. The Horsemen were extremely loyal to each other and never considered challenging Flair or disrupting the chemistry of the TEAM by putting their self-interests before the Horsemens' as a collective group.

So you had roles. Flair was the figurehead, the ultimate spokesman for the group. He gave the Horsemen an identity and his charisma spread throughout the group. Tully was the wrestler's wrestler. He did the dirty work whether it was taking on Magnum in a bloody cage match or Dusty Rhodes. You had to go through Tully to get to Flair. Arn was Enforcer. "Nuff said. Ole gave the Horsemen had rough edge. Flair, Tully, and Arn wore expensive suits, wore Rolex's, and drove exotic cars. Not Ole. His presence made sure the Horsemen were still viewed as a bunch of tough bad asses.

So every one had a role. What would Hogan's role be? Savage's? Someone has to take a backseat in order for a faction to survive. Sting's role as a Horsemen was purely for story line purposes. Make no mistake, the Four Horsemen as originally envisioned by Ric Flair stopped existing when Arn and Tully went the WWF in 1988. After that, the Horsemen (every incarnation) was used purely for storyline purposes.

The same goes for your '99 line up. Nash was already a leader of a faction. So was Scott Steiner. What would their roles be? Do you think they would be OK taking a backseat to Flair? I don't think so.

 

[relentless1]

4 horsemen have always been the gritty dirty heel workers of the promotion ever since the first iteration. Its too bad Pillman left, actually too bad Austin left WCW as he would've been a perfect addition to the Horsemen in 1995. Imagine this: Flair, Arn, Austin, Benoit or Flair, Arn, Pillman, Austin. Either of those teams would have been fire.

 

[Makaveli31]

4 horsemen have always been the gritty dirty heel workers of the promotion ever since the first iteration. Its too bad Pillman left, actually too bad Austin left WCW as he would've been a perfect addition to the Horsemen in 1995. Imagine this: Flair, Arn, Austin, Benoit or Flair, Arn, Pillman, Austin. Either of those teams would have been fire.

There was nothing "gritty" about mid-90's WCW. Nothing.

 

[New Hot Fed]

It's funny how this guy writes a long post about the Four Horsemen yet obviously having no idea who the Hell are the Four Horsemen, what you need in the group, what makes them great.

1995 group were fine. I think the problem was in their reformation in 1998. In my opinion, while Benoit had been a great 4H, he had fought his own battles since they disbanded and had outgrown them and for him it was a step down joining them. Also Mongo should not have been brought back either. He worked great for a short time cause he was needed to swerve Kevin Green and filled the place left by Pillman. But he wasn't that great to begin with. Malenko was great but he wasn't heelish enough.

I think the 1998 version should have included Jericho has sort of a Flair pupil. Then you bring back Luger into the fold as the power guy. And fans of the south loved Lex. They booed Hogan against him. Then in 1999, if you remember, Bischoff brought back Windham as a heel to feud with Flair. But they could have had him instead return in 1998 and rejoin the group. Also make sure if they feud with the nWo that they are tweener, not just faces that loses to the nWo all the time.

 

[relentless1]

There was nothing "gritty" about mid-90's WCW. Nothing.

Except "loose cannon" Brian Pillman, except for insane Macho Man. Except for the 4 Horsemen...

 

[Makaveli31]

You want gritty??? I suggest you watch old territory tapes from Jim Crockett, CWF and Memphis. Those were gritty and make mid-90's WCW look like Disney Land.

 

[relentless1]

Im not saying that old school 80s NWA wasnt wayy grittier than anything WWF or WCW were producing at that time, I'm saying that there were some realistic elements on Nitro around that time period, thats what Bischoff was going for and aside from anything surrounding Hogan which was of course Dungeon of Doom cartoony.