The Top 10 Events That Changed Pro Wrestling

[Jack-Hammer]

I was showering after working out today and, like a lot of other times, an idea popped into my head out of nowhere for what might be an interesting thread. We always say or hear others say that something has "rocked the wrestling world to its foundation" or that we've witnessed the "end of an era". Most of the time, those statements are pure hyperbole but every now and then, something does come about that does legitimately alter the course not just a single company, but pro wrestling as a whole. To me, these 10 thins have probably resulted in more industry wide effects than anything in the past 50 years. Some of these events might not sound like much as their effects sometimes were ultimately felt as time went buy and it's all completely subjective, but these things just always stood out to me.

10. The Internet - While simply saying "the internet" looks like a broad term, the internet has had a profound influence on the way fans view & see pro wrestling unlike anything else. The internet was able to rip away the shroud of secrecy & mystique of pro wrestling by giving fans the ability to actually find out what happens, to a large degree, in pro wrestling behind the scenes. Because many fans now know how things work, why they work and how things are; it's led to sort of a...I guess a death of the days of the innocent wrestling fan. Some view that fans having all this knowledge is a good thing and some view it as the worst thing that's happened to pro wrestling. While some fans are still able & willing to suspend disbelief

9. Vince McMahon, Jr. Buys WWF From His Father - When Vince purchased the World Wrestling Federation from his father Vince, Sr. in 1982, nobody other than Vince knew what grand plans he had. His father certainly did it or, at least according to Vince, he never would have sold him the company. Vince's ultimately goal was to turn the WWF from a regional territory into a major nationwide promotion. This completely went against wrestling tradition as promoters didn't "invade" the territory of other promoters. The WWF either bought or ran out of business many of the wrestling territories operated in the United States & Canada. With this new idea, and with cable television, the territory system was already on its way out. Had Vince not bought the company from his father, pro wrestling simply would never have been the same.

8. WCCW Syndication - Before Vince McMahon could really initiate his own master plan for the WWF to dominate the wrestling world, Fritz Von Erich's World Class Championship Wrestling based out of Dallas, Texas was already further along. Through television syndication, which WCCW began doing in the early 80s, they were able to broadcast their television programming to much of the United States and even into other countries eventually. Within the territory system, many of the promoters would have their wrestling programs broadcast through the local television stations within their regional territories. WCCW took it beyond that, however, and was all but thumbing its nose at the system in some ways. Even though WCCW wasn't leaving the confines of their geographical area, they may as well have been as fans from all over the country were now able to view their product. Their product grew extremely successful and many of the talent within WCCW, including Fritz's own sons, wanted to leave the Dallas territory in order to expand on this audience just as the WWF would later do. Fritz refused to do so, however, and didn't want to break with that major taboo. Had Fritz agreed to do this, you have to wonder what the wrestling world would have looked like. Vince McMahon would eventually do pretty much the same thing with the WWF, only he would leave the confines of the Northeast and tour his product everywhere.

7. Hulk Hogan: The Modern Superstar - It's been often said that Hulk Hogan is the biggest star overall in the history of pro wrestling. While Hogan is sometimes criticized for his lack of technical skills and general lack of overall athleticism, Hulk Hogan ultimately did for the WWF what every wrestling promotion hopes for: help to generate tons of money. Hulk Hogan was someone that emerged in the WWF as someone that signaled a change in pro wrestling on a huge scale. In many companies, the top wrestlers were usually either the person that the promoter thought was the most skilled wrestler or was the promoter himself. Hulk Hogan's popularity grew in large part due to his role in the 1982 film Rocky III as it brought him to national attention. Hogan would use the success of the film to go to Verne Gagne's AWA to become a major star. Hogan was loaded with charisma and a great physical look & presence. However, he couldn't "wrestle" his way out of a paper bag and Verne Gagne felt the World Champion should be the best "wrestler" despite the fact that Hogan's popularity towered above that of any other wrestler in his company. Hogan left the AWA in late 1983 and returned to the WWF. On January 23, 1984, Hulkamania was born with Hogan defeated the Iron Shiek to become the WWF Champion. Hogan's popularity helped bring pro wrestling to a massive audience during the 1980s and while his abilities inside the ring might not rank him among the best, he ultimately helped to change pro wrestling in a way that nobody before him did.

6. WrestleMania - While WrestleMania wasn't the first wrestling pay-per-view, it was the event that ultimately set the standard for what the biggest wrestling events would be. By today's standards, the first WrestleMania was extremely low key but not for the time. The WWF invited a lot of notable celebrities to the event, many of whom participated in some of the most memorable moments of the show. R&B icon Ray Charles sang America the Beautiful, Mr. T competed in a tag team main event with Hulk Hogan against Rowdy Roddy Piper & Mr. Wonderful Paul Orndorff & Mr. T was one of the biggest stars on tv at the time, Cyndi Lauper was major involved with the "Rock n' Wrestling" Era & was probably the top selling female recording artist in the world at the time. Vince gambled on WrestleMania being a smash and it was. From then on, every wrestling ppv in any company would pretty much forever be measured against WrestleMania.

5. The Montreal Screwjob - The Montreal Screwjob took place on November 4, 1997 and is arguably the single most controversial & debated event in the history of pro wrestling. In a WWF Championship match between Bret Hart & Shawn Michaels, Vince McMahon doublecrossed Bret Hart after Michaels placed Hart in his own finishing move. There had been a great deal of tension between Bret & Vince due to Shawn Michaels as the two legitimately hated each other at the time. This tension helped lead Bret Hart to ultimately signing with WCW and this match against HBK was Hart's last match with the WWF. The original ending of the match was intended for Bret to retain the title as he didn't want to lose to Shawn Michaels in his home country of Canada. Bret would then show up on Raw the next night and surrender the title. Vince, however, was worried that Bret Hart might instead take the WWF Championship with him and appear on WCW Monday Nitro the next night. Former WWF women's wrestler Alundra Blaze, aka Madusa, showed up on an episode of Nitro with the WWF Women's Championship and threw the title into a trash can on live television. Vince was worried that Bret Hart intended to do something similar. The aftermath led to a huge confrontation backstage between Hart & McMahon, one that resulted in Bret punching Vince. Bret Hart left the WWF and would hold a massive grudge against Vince McMahon before returning to the WWF in 2010.

4. Austin 3:16 - By 1996, a new kind of wrestler was emerging on the scene. This wrestler, known as a tweener, is one that walks the line between good guy and bad guy with an edge to him that traditional babyfaces and heels don't have. No wrestler exemplified this change more than Stone Cold Steve Austin. Steve Austin's character was a profane, beer swilling redneck from Texas that made no apologies for being exactly that. Austin's character was highly controversial, often using profanity, and reflected a change that was going on in other forms of media as well. During the late 90s, many of the most popular shows on television were programs that pushed the envelope when it came to content. Some shows featured profane language never before heard on network television, some featured such taboos as nudity and even female on female kissing scenes. This was also the era of when trash tv was massively popular, especially The Jerry Springer Show. Austin's irreverant attitude was completely unlike anything that anyone had ever seen in pro wrestling before. At the 1996 King of the Ring ppv, Austin won the event and forever changed wrestling with a promo in which he mentions his opponent Jake The Snake Roberts. Roberts, at the time, was heavily religious and Austin mentioned how Roberts would talk about the biblical passage of John 3:16. Austin responded "Well Austin 3:16 says I just whipped your ass". After Austin, the WWF continued to court controversy by introducing a number of controversial aspects to their programming such as portraying women in a highly sexualized manner and having characters such as Val Venis, The Rock, a faction patterned after the Black Panther Party called the Nation of Domination, tweaking already existing characters such as having Shawn Michaels & Triple H behave like degenerates, portraying The Undertaker as a satanic figure that conducted "occult rituals". Austin 3:16 may well have been the very beginning of the Attitude Era and good guys & bad guys have never been as black and white as they were before.

3. WCW Raiding WWF's Roster - During the mid 1990s, many of the biggest stars on the WWF roster began to leave the company for its chief rival, World Championship Wrestling. Owned by Ted Turner, WCW had practically unlimited financial resources that it would use to lure many of the wrestling industry's top stars to work for them much the same as the WWF would do a decade earlier. In the summer of 1993, the WWF's biggest star, Hulk Hogan, left the company and went to work for WCW for what was said to be even to this day the greatest deal in pro wrestling history. After Hogan, more big stars would continue to jump to WCW including Macho Man Randy Savage, Lex Luger, Scott Hall, Kevin Nash & X-Pac. Even though WCW had been around for a very long time, and was actually Jim Crockett's Mid-Atlantic territory that operated along the east coast for many decades before Turner purchased & renamed it in 1988, this was really seen as a time in which WCW was on the same level as the WWF. They had the finances & resources to go toe to toe with the WWF in a way that no other company ever came close to doing.

2. The Monday Night Wars - The Monday Night Wars was a time of great change & excitement in pro wrestling as WCW and the WWF were going head to head in a ratings war with both of their programs, Nitro & Raw, airing simultaneously on TNT & USA respectively. The real life feud between the two wrestling companies led to a boom in wrestling's popularity in which record audiences tuned in every Monday night. In high school, my friends and I lived for Monday nights and would spend much of the rest of the week talking about what'd happened on Raw & Nitro, which show was better, who had the better roster, etc. While professional wrestling is scripted with scripted outcomes, the rivalry between the companies wasn't something that was made up. It was a true, legit battle for supremacy. That along with a host of edgier characters than what we'd been used to seeing in the past and controversial angles led to one of the most fascinating times in wrestling history.

1. Vince McMahon Buys WCW & The Monday Night Wars End - By the very late 90s & early 2000s, WCW was in a desperate state. The company was hemoraging money and executives at Time Warner were growing highly dissatisfied with the company. Even though WCW programming continued to draw strong ratings, the quality of the product was at an all time low. With new executives coming into TNT, they decided that WCW ultimately outdated and didn't fit with the image they wanted to create, thus canceling WCW programming. On March 25, 2001, AOL Time Warner sold all the various trademarks, 25 contracts and an extensive tape library to the WWF for a mere $3 million. The final episode of WCW Monday Nitro took place in Panama City, Florida during a simulcast with WWF Monday Night Raw in Cleveland, Ohio. While they would eventually use WCW as part of an Invasion angle, WCW was ultimately dead. In the final ratings war tally of 269 head to head broadcasts, WWF Monday Night Raw earned 154 wins, including 122 consecutive wins from November 1998 through the end of the Monday Night Wars, while WCW Monday Nitro earned 112 wins and the shows tied in the ratings 3 times. When the Monday Night Wars ended, the boom period in pro wrestling was over as the ratings began to gradually decline even though the WWF, soon to be renamed WWE, continued to produce controversial content. WCW, with its lineage, had long since been an institution among wrestling fans and the fact that it would no longer be on the air was something that truly rocked the wrestling world like nothing else quite has. Many fans yearn for wrestling to return to the days in which there's another company that's able to challenge the WWE, but whether it'll happen or not is anybody's guess.

 

[The 1-2-3 Killam]

Well, I was going to respond, but ya done took all my options! Instead I think I'll throw out a few options for what changed Pro Wrestling in the past decade.

The Birth of TNA Wrestling: Making their debut in 2002, TNA Wrestling gave wrestling fans their first real alternative to the WWE since the collapse of WCW (which juuust narrowly missed the list). Of course it wasn't for years after its inauguration that most fans started taking it seriously - many still don't - but they've managed to pull consistent cable ratings, maintain their spot on a network, and some fans actually consider them the better product (myself included...sometimes) in 2012. No doubt Impact Wrestling changed pro wrestling this decade, as many fans probably would have dropped out in their boredom with the PG-era of WWE. TNA didn't just provide an alternative to the fans, they provide an alternative for the wrestlers! Guys who were tired of working 320 days a year, and who just needed a break. Kurt Angle, Christian, Booker T, Rob Van Dam, etc. It also provided a place for older guys to go and still keep wrestling and doing what they love. Ric Flair, Taz, Sting, Hogan (yeah, I know...) Jeff Jarrett, etc.

Eric Bischoff to Monday Night Raw: Perhaps not as icon as Degeneration X, Vince McMahon, or "Stole Cold" Steve Austin, but almost every bit as important to the Raw product. The night "Easy E" showed up on Raw, well...let's just say if Twitter had been around in 2002, it would have BLOWN THE FUCK UP! Once WCW folded, many thought that was the last they'd ever see of Bischoff. And rightfully so. His presence on Raw meant that the doors were potentially open for ANYTHING to happen in pro wrestling. Before that point, it was inconceivable that Vince McMahon would work with somebody like Bischoff... And let's not under-value him being probably the best general manager in pro wrestling history, either.

John Cena - The New Hulk Hogan: I think this goes without saying, but John Cena changed the wrestling business. He did it almost the same way Hogan did it too. After Hogan left WWF, there was a noticeable absence in the main events of Vince McMahon's product. It wasn't a bad thing neccessarily (I liked it more, actually), but instead of there being "THE GUY" on top for years and years, there was a revolving doors of talent that held the proverbial "ball". Shawn Michaels, Diesel, Bret Hart, Triple H, Steve Austin, the Rock, etc. All icons, legends, Hall of Famers, etc. But John Cena was the first guy since Hogan to come around, get the ball from Vince after a WrestleMania title victory, and then hold onto it for the better part of a decade. I think Austin would have, if he was medically able to, but...such is life. And for better or for worse, John Cena has definitely changed the wrestling world.

Linda McMahon's Senate Race: I'm not going to get into this. It's changed the product, let's move on before a big ole' unnecessary debate fires up.

Chris Benoit Tragedy; The Push Towards Regulation: What happened with Benoit broke the furthest into mainstream news media, but it was quite simply the tipping point for several others deaths that had already happened in pro wrestling. Tragedies that went back a long ways. Chief among them was Eddie Guerrero, which regularization (if there is such a term) used to bring up the mental and psychological strain wrestling puts on a person. His drug use was seen as another symptom of the bigger problem. Benoit was used to make the product safer, and I'm honestly glad they did. The product may not be as interesting, but that has nothing to do with guys hitting each other in the skull with chairs or bleeding out everywhere.

The Television Recession: What a lot of people who harp on wrestling's low ratings don't realize is that all of television really went through a recession around the same time WWE lost ratings following the Benoit death. It was common that new shows would get 15-20 million viewers on a season or series premiere, and those ratings would slowly dwindle down between a 3.0 and a 5.0, depending on the network and its popularity. But what people don't realize is that they ALL collapsed. With the rise of DVR's, Netflix, and an ungodly amount of torrenting being done, the whole industry suffered a crucial blow in ratings. Funny thing is, if you look at some external data collected from torrent sites (which networks wont' display because it's not strictly legal in the US) is that shows are still drawing the same amount of viewers. But fewer and fewer people actual use cable television. It's a flawed system, but the effects on the product are still visible. WWE saw the falling ratings and went after the younger, yet untapped audience with the women and the kids. Behold, John Cena's popularity! WWE went from a pro wrestling show that just went out to entertain and make good television, to having to do real market research and find new avenues to make money. Enter: world tours several times a year, connecting to the military, partnering with Make-a-Wish, all the Axxess events, a more structured PPV schedule, celebrity guest hosts...all attempts to get back in the public eye.

The Internet: You already said it. Facebook, Twitter, email advertisement campaigns, forums and message boards, DIRT SHEETS, wrestlers communicating with the public, etc. It's a whole new world out there.

 

[braveh]

Great thread

Rock, Austin and Lesnar walks out on the WWE within a year (or two). This is a very overlooked event. The boom of the late 90s ended and the WWE had to scramble to get back together.

The death of Eddie G and the Benoit murders. Nothing has ever damaged pro wrestlings reputation like the death of Benoit and nothing ever will ....and Guerro's death was the perfect build-up to the perfect storm.

edit: I'm a little skeptical to the Montreal screw-job because it was much bigger in the wrestling community than in the mainstream realm. I don't see how it changed wrestling. It didn't start the attitude era it just coincided with WWF getting their act together.

 

[#MrScissorsKick]

You guys hit the main points that i was also thinkning before reading this thread, obviously the big 5 i was thinking about was Wrestlemania, the internet, monday night wars, and hulk hogan.

I wasn't old enough to remember the ECW, WCW days when both promotions were in there prime, so i don't remember many events that changed pro wrestling. Like I said i agree with most of what you 3 have all said, but i thought of some events that didn't affect pro wrestling as a whole, more or less the WWE.

1.) 2002 WWE Draft

The first draft in the history of sports entertainment. This ended the invasion storyline, and set up 2 brands within the WWE's promotion. Instead of having wrestlers compete on both shows, wrestlers were selected to one brand. Also, creating the World Heavyweight Championship resulted from this.

2. Survivor Series - 2001

On one team you had the bad boys from the WCW/ECW promotion. On the other team you had the guys from the WWE. Not only were buisinesses on the line, but pride itself too. The WWE ended up winning, and eliminating the WCW when Kurt Angle defected Team WCW and helped Team WWE to win.

3. Survivor Series - 2003

Plain and simple - Team Bischoff vs. Team Stone Cold. Unfortunately this was the begining of the end for Stone Cold's WWE days, but it set apart the Co-GM's and having 1 GM to run Raw.

Social Media - Like, in the OP for the internet, but the WWE uses Facebook, Twitter, Tout, Youtube to help broadcast it's products.

[will edit in more when i think of more]

 

[LascoX]

I think the previous posters have hit most of the big events of recent years so I am not going to go the top ten route but just add in a few honorable mentions others might not have concidered.
- Vince declares wrestling "Sports Entertainment" . at this point keyfab had the proverbial bullet to the back of the head as the largest promoter came out and basically admitted wrestling was fake. Prior to that some debate remained but that action sealed the fate of that argument.
-Georgia Championship Wrestling turns into World Championship Wrestling, as Jack Hammer noted about WCCW crossing lines, another promotion that was broadcast over the teritorial lines was Ga. Championship Wrestling. The superstation brought it into homes across america and when Turner bought Crockets promotion it launched WWE's major competition on the back of a proven product.
-The creation of Gorgeous George, (no not savages girl friend from the WCW days) , Way back in the 40's&50's George Raymond Wagner knew he needed to stand out from the pack if he was to be noticed. With urging from his wife and an idea yet to be done in pro wrestling he launched one of the greatest heels in wrestling history. His impact would be seen later in the over the top charictors to emerge in the industry exspecially in the likes of Golddust type androgonist personalitys. This day and age its easy to overlook his impact on the industry but his charictor opened a whole new dimension on the industry.
Side note: I definatly belive the Montreal Screw Job deserves to be on the list. I support it being on there on the grounds that it set in stone one of the greatest rivalries the wrestling world had ever seen. That event would haunt Shawn on every return trip to Canada as well as sit festering in Bret and Vince. Did it change wrestling, in a way it did as it was the most public screw job ever and made wrestlers realize the climate and watch thier backs. Did it shake wrestling to the core? No but it made a bunch of leaves fall off from the impact and sent one of WWE's most loyal and hardest working workers to the compitition. That action told the boys in the back that no one wasnt expendable in the grand scheme of things.

 

[SWSTOKES]

The Montreal Screwjob - How many future storylines and characters did that create? Leading the to heel Mr Mcmahon, Would Stone Cold have been so big without Mr Mcmahon to go against?

Hogan Turns at Bash at the Beach - after this it was full steam ahead for the nwo. The angle was hot at the time and when hogan turned Wcw took over.

those two really stick out in my mind

 

[FlairFan2003]

I think the previous posters have hit most of the big events of recent years so I am not going to go the top ten route but just add in a few honorable mentions others might not have concidered.
- Vince declares wrestling "Sports Entertainment" . at this point keyfab had the proverbial bullet to the back of the head as the largest promoter came out and basically admitted wrestling was fake. Prior to that some debate remained but that action sealed the fate of that argument.
-Georgia Championship Wrestling turns into World Championship Wrestling, as Jack Hammer noted about WCCW crossing lines, another promotion that was broadcast over the teritorial lines was Ga. Championship Wrestling. The superstation brought it into homes across america and when Turner bought Crockets promotion it launched WWE's major competition on the back of a proven product.

Turner's purchase of Jim Crockett Promotions basically ENDED the wrestling war. As Crockett's NWA Programming was dominating TBS the company was doing very strong business, outdrawing everyone in GA, the Carolinas, Kentucky, drawing strong in Fla, St Louis, WVA, and Chicago while successfully moving into WWE territory in Pittsburgh & Phila and parts of Ohio. Between 1984-87 the NWA was hot, and even though other promotions existed for the majority of wrestling fans the hndustry was a two party system. Crockett's mistake of trying to tour the West Coast monthly and the costly purchase of the failed UWF (which came with significant debt) hurt his national expansion (McMahon focussed his touring in his core areas, only running occasional shows in rival territories although he would saturate TV markets with his programing). Once Crockett decided to leave the business and sell his assetts to Turner, the NWA (soon to become WCW) QUICKLY declined after a strong 1989 and by 1991 they were a shadow of their former self, attendance and ratings WAY down from The Crockett years and top stars jumping off the sinking ship in droves (Flair, Road Warriors, Sid, Luger, not too mention top talent they misfired on and let go before they became big like HHH & Kevin Nash). Turner's initial was a major industry changing event only because it effectively ended the war for domination of the industry, basically handing it to WWE on a silver platter of bad management and missed opportunity.

Now, I would add the promotion of Eric Bischoff to President in 1993 was a game changing event in the industry. Bischoff put Flair back as champion and the two recruited Hulk Hogan, which made it easier to recruit Savage... and the War was renewed.

 

[It's Damn Real!]

How has only one person mentioned Bash at the Beach '96? Hogan's turn on WCW was one of the single most important events in all of pro-wrestling history. You youngsters who never had the opportunity to actually grow up in the Hogan era have no idea how insane that moment truly was. When people talk about the "face" of a company these days, they often talk about guys like Cena or even Punk, but fail to realize that the face of professional wrestling for a good 20 years was Hulk Hogan. When he unleashed that Atomic Leg Drop on Savage, it set into motion the most successful angle in televised wrestling history — an angle that nearly bankrupt the now billion-dollar WWE industry. Think about that for a second. Really let it set in. WCW nearly killed WWF/E, and it all started with the Hogan turn and the birth of the nWo.

I can basically recite the entire segment from memory. That's how memorable it was. "What is he doing!? Is he the third man!? Hulk Hogan has betrayed WCW! He is the third man in this picture!" Absolutely amazing. Still gives me chills. God, I miss WCW...

JH, your list is great, but Hogan's turn at Bash at the Beach '96 should have mad that list, as WCW raiding WWF's roster and the Monday Night Wars to me are the same topic.

 

[midgensa]

IDR hit that right on the head and I think that Hogan's turn at Bash at the Beach is flat out No. 1. It literally got ignited the Monday Night Wars and started a ratings climb that was never seen before or sense.

It caused tons of fans of WWF Hulkamania to tune back in after tuning out during the steroids era. In the long run it inspired DX and Stone Cold and the rest is history.

The moment where Hogan went heel, wrestling changed like it never had before or has since.

 

[Spinebreaker]

OK... 5 slightly more obscure ones here...

5 - Realisation wrestling is 'fake'. - somewhere after 1910 a number of newspapers ran stories on how 'real' wrestling was. Almost destroyed the industry, but it lead to SOOOO much.

4 - Ali Baba - 1930's. The first wrestling gimick.

3 - Wrestling televised in the 50's

2 - Antonino Rocco - Invented high flying. Without him, no cruiserweights, no x-division, no rey mysterio...

1 - Stunning Steve Austin gets fired from WCW... Whether it was because of injury, or down to Flair, or due to money. WCW basically gave WWF their way to win the Monday Night Wars, even if neither company knew at the time.

 

[FitFinlay4Life]

This is more what I would consider the chronological 10 events rather than in level of importance:

1) The Gold Dust Trio - Three wrestlers to combat falling interest in carnie style wrestling create a wrestling company. Further promotions were to follow.

2) Larger than life performers - Most famously brought to prominence by 'Gorgeous' George and (in the early days anyway) heels, these were the guys who prompted hatred by their very character and the desire to see the blue collar good guy defeat them.

3) The formation of the NWA - To combat the rivalry and cutthroat nature of competition between companies, a governing body of many of these federations was created to bring harmony. As a result of this an overall champion who would travel round the different promotions and take on their top stars.

4) Falling out - As normally happens when many independent companies have a voluntary governing body, dissension over decisions perceived as detrimental to their own promotion lead to various companies left the Alliance to form competition to their former coalition. Most notably, the AWA and the WWWF.

5) Andre the Giant and steroids - If the type of 'Gorgeous' George brought larger than life characters to the world of pro-wrestling, then Andre brought in the larger than life physical specimens and as, they couldn't make themselves as large as Mr Roussimoff, steroids provided wrestlers with the ability to give themselves superhero physiques instead.

6) Vincent Kennedy McMahon - The WWWF, as run by Vince Snr, may have had it's own World Champion but it was happy with it's own piece of the territorial pie. When Jnr got control of the reins his father's gentleman agreement with his competitors went out the window, total domination was this man's obsession. By taking the top stars from his foes, bringing the sport into the mainstream via the new innovative MTV and creating a more cartoony feel (to go with the physiques) he quickly came close to this quest.

7) Ted Turner - The WWF (as it was now come) had surpassed the NWA and the AWA and was the dominant force in the US. Along came media mogul and wrestling enthusiast Billionaire Ted who put both his money and his TV companies up to do to Vince what he had done to the territories and he may well have done this if not for...

8) The death of kayfabe - Effectively, kayfabe died in 1989 when Vince admitted it was entertainment for tax purposes. While this was major news at the time, in the WWF and WCW life continued as normal... however, this was soon to change...

9) ECDub - Looking back now and having seen the joke that it became under WWe tutorship, many people forget just how much influence Paul little train had. "Attitude"? Yeah, pretty sure I saw this somewhere else before. "Lucha Libre"? Not only did WCW steal the style, they stole many of their guys. "Breaking the fourth wall"? Long before the nWo and DX were at that caper, guys like Shane Douglas, Brian Pillman and a certain Steven Anderson were revolutionizing the wrestling promo.

10) Vince wins and the fallout - In 2001, WCW was purchased by Vince McMahon and wrestling in the US became a monopoly. Since then, only one company has stepped up to offer any level of competition but they are still too far adrift to cause the WWe stockholders any restless nights. Unfortunately, interest in wrestling has dropped way off for a multitude of reasons (bad mainstream publicity and lack of new stars to name two) and wrestling as an industry now faces it's biggest test since three guys got together back in the 1920s to create a wrestling promotion.