The Talent That WCW Wasted

[Bockwinkel's Class]

I'd say Ultimate Warrior was wasted. I think he only had one proper match and that was the horrible match with Hogan. He should of worked a few squash matches to build his steam back up, and then had a showdown with Goldberg.

He was brought in for one reason and one reason only: To appease Hogan's ego by getting that 0-1 off his record.

 

[THTRobtaylor]

Regal was good but he would never have worked outside of the early to mid-WCW. He was too much of the long-gone cartoon British character to work in the realistic Monday Night Wars. And his style of wrestling was probably too classic and not hard-hitting enough. He would have been booed out of arenas during the reign of the nWo.



Douglas' greatest window for success in WCW was probably the early 90s. He was a young star coming into his own, he almost seemed like the heir apparant to guys like Ric Flair. And WCW had nobody else of this age. Well maybe him and Dustin. He really all the tools. But later on, after a visit to ECW, he had become more of a brawler and his style was less refined, I thought, he had taken bad habits of working for ECW.

Douglas blew nearly all his chances. His greatest chance for success was the push he was scheduled for in the WWF...as the Heartbreak Kid! Many think Shawn was irreplaceable but Shane not only was going to have the gimmick first but arguably could have done it as well as Shawn, Shane as the HBK, with simillar attitude and the mic skills he possessed with the NWA title/ECW belt would have evolved pretty much as Shawn did... if not succeeded quicker...

However he decided to leverage himself out of his WWF deal somewhat dishonestly supposedly to go back to med school when in reality he waited out his no compete and signed for the "more money" of the time in WCW... and could only look on in envy during that initial WCW reign as a bland, vanilla Tag Champ while Shawn went from strength to strength. You think it was coincidence the Kliq made Shane's life hell during his 95 run? Or was it that Shawn knew that everything he had was down to Shane leaving as he did and wanted to make sure Shane knew he was now 2nd choice.

By the time he got to WCW the 2nd time he was damaged beyond repair, having lost his ECW momentum to go back to WWE, been bitchslapped out of there by the Kliq...he had lost his spark big time and no wonder he is one of the more bitter guys out there, but he only has himself to blame cos he could have been a VERY big WWF star in 1991-92 had he not played Vince.

 

[BigBombB]

I'm going to toss another name in here even though WCW built him to begin with...

Chris Kanyon

It seems that everyone who knew him or worked with him has a story about how unfairly Kanyon was treated. I can't think of another person that has so many peers who will complain about how much that person's talents were squandered. Kanyon may have had a slight lisp, and when it came down to it I'm sure his homosexuality hurt him too, but in every other aspect he should have been one of the top stars in WCW.

Kanyon could be compared to Dolph Ziggler these days if not for the fact that Ziggler has been given numerous opportunities to put on big money matches in his career. Kanyon was relegated to the midcard and treated as if he was lucky to be there. To be fair, WWE was just as bad when it came to this, but in a time when WCW was starving for new talents to push, Kanyon was never among them.

We talk a lot about Vince McMahon's infatuation with size but WCW may have been an even bigger culprit of this bias. With their backs against the wall, they pushed Scott Steiner and Booker T, both fairly large guys. Now imagine if they didn't implement the glass ceiling quite like they did and they had a few other names milling around the top of the card with Steiner and Booker. For example, if WCW had a main event scene of guys like DDP, Jeff Jarrett, Goldberg, and Sting mixed in with Steiner, Booker, Lance Storm, Mike Awesome, Chris Kanyon and, hell, even Billy Kidman then WCW would have had that shot of youth that they needed to stay relevant.

Instead, Kanyon was relegated to DDP-lite, Storm reached the glass ceiling and never got back up, Awesome was sabotaged in every imaginable way, Kidman may be the first person to ever have their career ruined by WINNING a match against a legend, and even Booker just kind of had the World Title thrown on him with no rhyme or reason. If I was a business executive, looking at how much money WCW was bleeding, and seeing no future chance of drawing money, then I'd have closed them down too.

 

[justtxyank]

Bogus posts are bogus.

Chris Kanyon? Give me a break. As someone who agreed that there was nobody "better than Kanyon" during the 90s, even I can't work up a rational argument that he should have been pushed harder than he was.

He had a weird voice that hurt him on the mic. WCW put him in a mask and made him part of a storyline that they hyped BIG TIME in Blood Runs Cold. Story was a total flop. Still, they pushed Kanyon, making him a major part of one of WCW's biggest undercard storylines of 1998 with the Flock. Kanyon was being put over nightly by the announcers. The problem was he just couldn't hold any heat, he was ugly and he had bad mic skills.

 

[Kayfabe]

Wrath.

I think he could've been WCW's next main eventer in 1998/1999 if it wasn't for Kevin Nash. Wrath was receiving a similar push to Goldberg, he was building up an undefeated streak of his own, the commentators always hyped up his Meltdown finisher as if it were just as devastating as the Jackhammer, he looked great and he was getting over with the fans because of his vicousness and attitude. It could've been huge if Wrath had went on to face Goldberg for the WCW Title in a streak vs. streak match. Wrath has mentioned in a shoot interview that it was actually the plan at one time and he wouldn't have cared if he had lost that match so long as it happened. But unfortunately, Kevin Nash decided that he needed to be the guy to end streaks.

I was also a big fan of Wrath. Sure, he didn't come across as having much of a personality, but he was one of the few who really didn't need to. His first finisher - the Death Penalty - was cool. Then, that became the setup to his newer finisher - the Meltdown - which looked GREAT!

Hated, hated, hated it when he was put in Kronik. What a waste.

 

[LBGetBack]

Alex Wright. I always thought he had talent. He had a pretty good start to his career, but it flamed out quickly and he was never really given anything important to do. I thought he should've been at least a solid midcarder for a long time, and had a much longer and better career than he actually did. When he came back with completely different gimmicks and shaved head(I think), etc.....terrible.