WCW PPV's and cards that were big/brilliant

The Hillside

Pre-Show Stalwart
WCW roster was pretty much filled with brilliant talent and high profile roster back in around 1996-1998. There were some really big PPV's that may have made WWE's Wrestlemania look small at that time.

I was just watching Halloween Havoc 1997 today after remembering possibly the best WCW match ever between Eddie Guerrero and Rey Mysterio at this PPV.

Rest of the card looks really solid with some promising matches, adding the midcard with Mysterio vs Eddie, I would like to mention Jericho vs Gedo and Ultimo Dragon vs Nagata.

The upper midcard and main event card is filled with 4 big matches, Hennig vs Flair, Luger vs Hall, DDP vs Savage (Death match) and Piper vs Hogan (Cage match).

I don't think WWE would have been able to produce anything like back in 80's and 90's.

For those who have not watched this PPV yet, I say you should in order to get an idea how big WCW was back then.

Does anyone have any more big WCW cards to share?
 
I was a WCW fan and I used to dislike their PPVs. Honestly Bischoff had some great ideas in his time but he was so poor at booking pay offs to feuds on PPVs
 
WCW roster was pretty much filled with brilliant talent and high profile roster back in around 1996-1998. There were some really big PPV's that may have made WWE's Wrestlemania look small at that time.

I was just watching Halloween Havoc 1997 today after remembering possibly the best WCW match ever between Eddie Guerrero and Rey Mysterio at this PPV.

Rest of the card looks really solid with some promising matches, adding the midcard with Mysterio vs Eddie, I would like to mention Jericho vs Gedo and Ultimo Dragon vs Nagata.

The upper midcard and main event card is filled with 4 big matches, Hennig vs Flair, Luger vs Hall, DDP vs Savage (Death match) and Piper vs Hogan (Cage match).

I don't think WWE would have been able to produce anything like back in 80's and 90's.

For those who have not watched this PPV yet, I say you should in order to get an idea how big WCW was back then.

Does anyone have any more big WCW cards to share?


I actually agree with both you and the first responder. I do think we lose sight of how big WCW was at one point, and "on paper" I believe they could put together PPV's that the WWE could not at the time. But like the following poster their PPV's always seemed to be a disapointment for the most part once they were over with.
 
I actually agree with both you and the first responder. I do think we lose sight of how big WCW was at one point, and "on paper" I believe they could put together PPV's that the WWE could not at the time. But like the following poster their PPV's always seemed to be a disapointment for the most part once they were over with.

Because it was always the big wrestlers and Goldberg that got the big matches and the World Title/US Title matches. Eddie, Benoit, Jericho, Mysterio and Malenko were never pushed into big matches who were easily their best wrestlers. WCW always relied on heavyweights and WWE created talent (Hogan, Savage, Piper, Flair, Nash, Luger, Sid, Hennig and Hall) to fill most of their PPV's and draw the crowds in. Goldberg was just there for the streak's sake and that the wrestler would just do few moves and get the crowd going for him.

Meanwhile WCW was using WWE's already used talent, WWE was creating even better talent who excelled at everything gimmick, drawing more crowd and were better inside the ring then the previous WWE's wrestlers. WWE created Bret Hart, Shawn Michaels, The Undertaker, Steve Austin and The Rock while WCW was just banking of WWE wrestlers who were getting old and rusty inside the ring and got stale with time.

What is even more frustrating for WCW is that Jericho, Eddie, Benoit and Mysterio were all turned into main-eventers and World Title holders in WWE and never got a inch of success in WCW just because of their booking and looking down on small-sized wrestlers.
 
for me its starcade 98 every match was great, not just nash and goldberg but ddp vs giant to the 3 way cruiserweight match, i go back all the time and watch it on youtube
 
WCW always relied on heavyweights and WWE created talent (Hogan, Savage, Piper, Flair, Nash, Luger, Sid, Hennig and Hall) to fill most of their PPV's and draw the crowds in. Goldberg was just there for the streak's sake and that the wrestler would just do few moves and get the crowd going for him.

Meanwhile WCW was using WWE's already used talent

What is even more frustrating for WCW is that Jericho, Eddie, Benoit and Mysterio were all turned into main-eventers and World Title holders in WWE and never got a inch of success in WCW just because of their booking and looking down on small-sized wrestlers.
ok, firstly, yes WCW in the past put on really fine ppvs and a major reason was the midcard talent and the big names. the problem with WCW though was the big stars never got out of the way, Hogan is the prime example. i mean he's a heel and cant lose clean to Sting??? As for the quote above me. Ric Flair wasnt created in WWE, he was in WCW before WWE, then went to WWE for a time, then came back, so he was WCW. Hogan, Flair, Nash, Luger, Hall and Hennig now were WWE grown talent and while some (nash) had a short stint in WCW, they were known more for WWE, then came back to WCW to get huge pushes.

it is frustrating that the WCW midcarders who deserved a shot never got one. now personally, i never would've pushed Mysterio to the world title in WCW, but why not Benoit???? he could make a match with Hollywood Hogan work, same with Jericho and on top of that, Jericho's character in WCW was very funny. i also found fault at WCW with Hart. they should've pushed him to the world title right off by saying he deserves one after what he went through with WWE. i think if the midcard talent would've gotten a decent push, then WCW could've survived. Jericho never even won the US title and eventually Benoit got a world title push, but that was when he was out the door.
 
As for the quote above me. Ric Flair wasnt created in WWE, he was in WCW before WWE, then went to WWE for a time, then came back, so he was WCW. Hogan, Flair, Nash, Luger, Hall and Hennig now were WWE grown talent and while some (nash) had a short stint in WCW, they were known more for WWE, then came back to WCW to get huge pushes

First, let's get the facts straight. Hogan, Savage, Piper, Nash, and Hall were all WWF home grown talent in the sense that is were they fully developed their characters and had their first taste of big-time success. It could be argued that Henning was AWA grown talent being that he was world champ at a time when the AWA was still considered a viable number three wrestling promotion. Flair and Luger are without a doubt NWA/WCW home grown talent. Both reached their greatest level of achievements while in WCW, and prior to entering the WWF.

There were not any WCW ppvs during this time that made the spectacle that is Wrestlemania look small time. By this time Wrestlemania had developed into a weekend long event and had cities accross the country bidding to host it.
 
ok, firstly, yes WCW in the past put on really fine ppvs and a major reason was the midcard talent and the big names. the problem with WCW though was the big stars never got out of the way, Hogan is the prime example. i mean he's a heel and cant lose clean to Sting???

To be honest, I feel Hogan was the least worst offender when it comes to wrestlers who hung on to long in the main event spot. Would I have liked to have seen him lose the title differently (i.e. on PPVs like with his loss against Goldberg)? In some ways yes, but I think about how much PPVs were costing even back then, and in some ways I thought it was cool to see a free title change on Nitro, people who grew up when there weren't so many PPVs on the schedule. To see a legend like Hogan on free TV lose to an up and coming star like Goldberg (who sadly I wished would have met his potential but never did), it was awesome. As far as him not losing clean to Sting, that's debatable if you're citing Starrcade 97's ending, I know there was that whole controversy with the "count", and then Bret Hart got involved, I don't know how much of that was Hogan's idea, none of us really do. Period.

Then of course you fast forward to SuperBrawl VIII some two months later. Sting had Hogan beat and the referee was KO'd as a result of the Scorpion Death Drop, and then a myriad of nWo guys came down and Sting cleaned their clock, to be honest that made Sting look like a million dollars, not only did he have Hogan beat, but he took out a bunch of his cronies to boot.

The thing to me is this, for as prominent as Hogan's role in WCW was, I think things could have been worse. Don't get me wrong there were some moments we could have done without, i.e. the redux of Hogan vs Savage (with the same result being Hogan winning all the time), I was not a fan of, I truly believe Randy Savage deserved to get some comeuppance against Hogan. The fingerpoke of doom though, I could care less about, I was not offended like most people, especially when I think of how Vince put his own company's World Title on himself. But getting back to my point here, Hogan's creative control clause if it was as encompassing and as powerful as people say it was, I don't think he ever would have lost the WCW Title from the time he stepped foot in that company, if of course it was as powerful as people claim, he would have had that title all the way from 1994-2000 when his contract was winding down.

But when you add to the mix other star power such as Ric Flair, the returns of Hall and Nash to WCW, Bret Hart and of course a staple like Sting. Those are all egos whether we notice that or not, those are all big time players amongst the roost of WCW's veteran talent. To place all the blame on Hogan like the internet so richly chooses to do is questionable. That's not to say Hogan doesn't have anything to account for because I feel there were other angles that could have gone on a lot better had he approached things differently. I mentioned the Macho Man feud earlier, when he was feuding with Kidman, I feel a return to a heel persona as Hollywood Hogan would have made more sense. Kidman would have gotten a lot more support being an underdog face going up against a bully, instead of being some snot nosed punk picking a fight with the bigger dog in the yard.


it is frustrating that the WCW midcarders who deserved a shot never got one. now personally, i never would've pushed Mysterio to the world title in WCW, but why not Benoit???? he could make a match with Hollywood Hogan work, same with Jericho and on top of that, Jericho's character in WCW was very funny.

Couldn't agree with you more about this statement, however Hogan's matches did work, granted they weren't wrestling clinics, but Hogan's strong suit in getting a crowd reaction always worked immensely. However, seeing him up against an athlete the caliber of Benoit (despite my personal opinions of him, and this isn't even about what happened in 2007) would have been nothing short of amazing. Chris Jericho was hilarious as well and I enjoyed him immensely, granted he never got the US Title, but he had a hell of a lot of airtime and publicity with his Monday Night Jericho shirts and they even filmed a commercial for that merchandise. Yes it wasn't the World Title, but still what a memorable time for him and a big reason why the WWF couldn't resist in capitalizing on what WCW started.

What we fail to mention is that although a lot of these smaller guys were going after singles titles like the US and TV championships, a lot of them were still Cruiserweight contenders, and guys like Jericho, Benoit, and Malenko were still utilized to have matches with guys like Juventud Guerrera, Rey Mysterio, Billy Kidman, etc. That's one thing Bischoff always did very well in WCW was the airtime for guys in the Cruiserweight division and he gave them a prime time platform that a promoter like Vince McMahon only used as a novelty, while in WCW it became a staple. I am not saying it's right per se, but I think in my personal opinion that there was a concern about cutting guys like Malenko, Jericho and Guerrero away from the Cruiserweight division would hurt this thriving portion of the company. I could be wrong, but again like I said just a theory. It would have been nice to seen new talent harvested to replace those aforementioned names, and see how they would do with a promotion to the heavyweight ranks, but in hindsight I think we find it more easy to criticize WCW, because we fail to remember how thriving the Cruiserweight division was at that time. And let's be honest WWF's Light Heavyweight division could never ever compare.

i also found fault at WCW with Hart. they should've pushed him to the world title right off by saying he deserves one after what he went through with WWE. i think if the midcard talent would've gotten a decent push, then WCW could've survived. Jericho never even won the US title and eventually Benoit got a world title push, but that was when he was out the door.

You could be right about WCW's shelf life maybe being extended beyond what it was if Benoit and Jericho had been pushed better, but let's look at it like this, ever since the 1980s there always seemed to be some unrest and uncertainty with the company we came to know as WCW, for instance the Jim Crockett Family had to sell the promotion that was then called Jim Crockett Promotions to Ted Turner. That right there was an indication that a company as rich as this could go down in a blaze, (because let's not forget JCP was around for over 50 years before Ted Turner even bought the place). Granted they had a bounce back when Ric Flair returned, Hogan jumped ship, Hall and Nash came back, this time in more prominent roles, and the Monday Night Wars started.

But like anything else it didn't last, the overspending that plagued Jim Crockett Promotions, also happened to the Ted Turner version of the company, not to mention you had so many changes in authority figures and hierarchy, WCW just found itself in a state of limbo. From what I have heard, an overabundance of guaranteed contracts never helped matters, since some of these deals resulted in WCW getting the short end. And while the viewership had dwindled it was still a highly watched product, especially when you look at WWE's numbers today, they aren't far from what WCW was getting in their dying days.

As it's been said before, before Turner Broadcasting's new programming president decided to cancel WCW's programming, there was a press release stating that Turner Broadcasting would continue to not only air WCW program after selling the promotion to Fusient Media Ventures, but that they would still hold a minority interest in the organization. Click here for more on that. As far as Bret Hart's underutilization goes, it's unfortunate because I think things were starting to finally turned around in late 99 when he won the World Title, and then by a screwed up twist of fate had that concussion that ended his career.

Now I veered off, WCW had great events, go back to moments like Starrcade 83-85 (and other Starrcades to follow) the Great American Bash 1988, Bash At The Beach 1994 and of course who could forget 1996. There were also some sleeper hits and hidden treasures like SuperBrawl III, I thought Muta VS Windham for the NWA World Title was awesome. The Slamboree events were always cool when they had the legends portion of the event. WCW offered a lot whether we are talking about the JCP era of the company of the Ted Turner owned. It's unfortunate to see how it got overridden with a conglomeration of egos towards the end but hey that happens sometimes. It happens everywhere in life. Just my two cents.
 
First, let's get the facts straight. Hogan, Savage, Piper, Nash, and Hall were all WWF home grown talent in the sense that is were they fully developed their characters and had their first taste of big-time success. It could be argued that Henning was AWA grown talent being that he was world champ at a time when the AWA was still considered a viable number three wrestling promotion. Flair and Luger are without a doubt NWA/WCW home grown talent. Both reached their greatest level of achievements while in WCW, and prior to entering the WWF.

There were not any WCW ppvs during this time that would make the current juggernaut, that is Wrestlemania, look small time.

Not necessarily, Piper CLEARLY was an NWA guy, had several major feuds and played almost the exact same character in WWE. Hogan created his fan favorite personna and his in ring style in the AWA, clearly benefitting from his feud with Nick Bockwinkle. Randy Savage and Liz were doing almost the exact same routine in the Mid South area before joining WWE. None of those guys was WWE home grown talent.

Basically, McMahon didnt create top stars early on, he was the one who established the business modell talent wise Bischoff used in the mid 90s building the top of his card with guys who either were previously established stars for Jim Crockett & the NWA (Flair, Luger, Sting) or hit their highest points in WWE (Hogan, Savage, Nash). McMahon's early WWE success, circa 1984-86 was almost entirely built in guys who were main eventing in the other major promotions, many in the NWA such as Piper, Valentine, Steamboat, and a few from elsewhere (Savage, Hogan). Later in the 80s McMahon continued to sign guys who were already created, trained, and main eventing elsewhere (IE they were known quantities to the wrestling audience and already knew how to "work") but he would alter their gimmicks like "Million Dollar Man" Ted DiBiase, "Big Boss Man" Ray Traylor, or "Mr Perfect" Curt Henning. Even then most of his top stars were either were major players elewhere. Rick Rude kept the same name and gimmick that he used as a top star in the NWA when he went to WWE, basically the same character he played in Texas before joining the NWA. Jake Roberts also kept the same name and gimmick basically as his time in the NWA and Mid South (a former member of Paul Ellering's Legion Of Doom Stable, which eventually was paired down to just The Road Warriors).

To say that guys like Hogan, Savage, and Piper, all major wrestling stars prior to WWE, playing basically the same gimmick (especially Savage & Piper) were WWE homegrown talent isnt true.

That's not to say Vince didnt create some stars. He completely turned Shawn Michaels from a Rock & Roll Express rip off to a major heel singles wrestler (albeit with HBK admittedly copying a lot of Ric Flair's gimmick, but then Flair admittedly copied from Buddy Rogers & Joe Namath, Hogan recently admitted in a radio interview he copied a lot from SuperStar Graham & Dusty Rhodes), Brett Hart was clearly a "Vince Creation", and some guys who had wrestled elsewhere but unlike Piper, Valentine, Savage, DiBiase, Rude, Blanchard & Anderson, Paul Orndorff (NWA & Mid South Guy, kept ame name and style in WWE), Henning, etc WERE NOT major stars or well known commodities prior to WWE such as Kevin "Vinnie Vegas" Nash and Scott "Diamond Stud" Hall also were elevated by Vince (Hall actually was a major player briefly in the AWA and got a good push initially in WCW as "Diamond Stud", an almost identical gimmick to the Razor Ramoan character, but he was never able to rise above mid card status prior to WWE, unlike most of the other names in this post).

As far as WCW PPV in the Biscoff era, I agree with a previous post, the had great talent and at times really compelling storylines but the PPV often were disapointing. They routinely misused mid carders, they were often ingnored and not showcased, top talent in ridiculously booked pay off matches that often left fans scratching their heads ... Starrcade 98 is a great example, I give them a pass on Luger, Hart, & Sting, all out with different injuries, but Hogan isnt on this card ?? Why, because his "Im running for President" storyline was so important to WCW at the time he couldnt appear ? Half this card is basically built on Flair's Return, kind of like how big Taker-HHH III was to this year's WrestleMania, maybe more so. So none of the Four Horsemen are booked even in an undercard match ? Scott Steiner was heavily promoted in his new heel personna, and a key NWO guy, he's a non entity here. Things like that really hurt the company in the long term.

There were individual matches over the years on these shows that I enjoyed, DDP's matches vs Giant (SC 98), Henning (SC 97), and Goldberg (HH 98), both Flair-Henning bouts in 97, Goldberg-Nash, going back a few years Randy Savage matches vs DDP, Luger, and Flair, but as a whole these cards were not enjoyable to me, and I was a huge WCW guy. Basically it was the poor booking under the top of the card, too many name guys who were over with fans not being showcased, the opposite of WWE today where they rely heavily on older guys like Triple H & Taker to carry interest for the shows but try (though it's not working as well as they would like) to continually promote their mid card guys in the hopes they will be elevated with fans. People can complain today's WWE isnt succeeding in getting fans interested in the Del Rio's and Mizz's of the world and thats why they still need the Cena's & HHH's and Rock guest spots but at least they are trying, my memory of WCW was that even when they had guys who the audience was into they were often ignored, many times not even booked, on these major shows. To me that is worse.
 
You could be right about WCW's shelf life maybe being extended beyond what it was if Benoit and Jericho had been pushed better, but let's look at it like this, ever since the 1980s there always seemed to be some unrest and uncertainty with the company we came to know as WCW, for instance the Jim Crockett Family had to sell the promotion that was then called Jim Crockett Promotions to Ted Turner. That right there was an indication that a company as rich as this could go down in a blaze, (because let's not forget JCP was around for over 50 years before Ted Turner even bought the place). Granted they had a bounce back when Ric Flair returned, Hogan jumped ship, Hall and Nash came back, this time in more prominent roles, and the Monday Night Wars started.

But like anything else it didn't last, the overspending that plagued Jim Crockett Promotions, also happened to the Ted Turner version of the company, not to mention you had so many changes in authority figures and hierarchy, WCW just found itself in a state of limbo. From what I have heard, an overabundance of guaranteed contracts never helped matters, since some of these deals resulted in WCW getting the short end. And while the viewership had dwindled it was still a highly watched product, especially when you look at WWE's numbers today, they aren't far from what WCW was getting in their dying days.


Now I veered off, WCW had great events, go back to moments like Starrcade 83-85 (and other Starrcades to follow) the Great American Bash 1988, Bash At The Beach 1994 and of course who could forget 1996. There were also some sleeper hits and hidden treasures like SuperBrawl III, I thought Muta VS Windham for the NWA World Title was awesome. The Slamboree events were always cool when they had the legends portion of the event. WCW offered a lot whether we are talking about the JCP era of the company of the Ted Turner owned. It's unfortunate to see how it got overridden with a conglomeration of egos towards the end but hey that happens sometimes. It happens everywhere in life. Just my two cents.

Actually the company, known as the NWA to most fans, was doing very solid businee despite WWE's success for most of the 80s. WWE could not outdraw the NWA in GA, NC, SC, Kentucky, Tenn, Texas, much of FLA, St Louis and much as Missouri, and they had significant success moving into WWE areas like Pgh & Phi. Fact is, Jim Crockett, thanks in part to ratings sucess of his Sat Nite show on TBS, was expanding nationwide much like Vince was in the 80s, and was more popular in his home base than the WWE product.

The difference was in approach. Vince would slowly move into a new area, getting exposure with his TV, and only run occassional shows there, concentrating the bulk of his business in the areas where WWE was traditionally strong. Crockett wasnted to one up Vince, he wanted to expand his house show and touring business into areas previously dominated by Vince or Verne Gangne's AWA on a monthly or bi monthly basis. His travel expenses became outrageous, he wasnt the equal of Vince in marketing action figures and posters, etc so he didnt fully utilize the added revenue streams that McMahon did. Even without the merchandising, Vince was smart enough not to waste money traveling all over the country every month running shows nationwide. He made his money in his "home territory", and only occassionally ran shows outside of that, making those appearances special, likely to draw well.

Crockett also made a huge mistake buying up the failed UWF, basically to secure their TV contracts, and get first dibbs on their wrestlers. Fact was, Crockett alteady had sindicated programming on in many of the UWF cities where they had TV deals, plus TBS, he didnt need the added air time in those areas from the vacated UWF programming. Crockett was essentially on the hook for huge amounts of money the UWF owed, plus now he had to make room and pay a whole new batch of wrestlers. Most of the UWF roster was guys were veterans from other promotions like The Freebirds and Steve WIlliams, and Terry Taylor, the only new guy who clearly became a star was Sting. Since their was no DVD sales in these days and the whole markett for video compliation releases was really unknown to both Vince & Crockett at the time, buying up the rights to the previously produced UWF programming was financial waste to Crockett. Compare to that to Vince years later when AOL ended WCW, Vince did no take on any wrestlers conracts, he cherry picked a handfull of guys he thought would be helpfull to him and offered them reduced buyouts and new WWE deals if they were vacate their deals with AOL, who was happy to end any contract with wrestling talent since they no longer owned a wrestling company. Then he purchased only the video library of the company, nothing else (he did along with the video library get the PPV names). Anything else associated with the actual WCW company was not purchased. Crockett inherited huge debt at a high purchase price with minimal return, especially since he didnt need the TV deals. It was crippling. Vince learned his lesson in overspending when he purchased programming on TBS and was forced to sell it back because fans revolted, demanding the NWA be put back on. Initially it was a bad move for Vince, although in the end he played hardball with Turner execs and got a nice sum of money for voiding the contract. Still, he learned to manage his money and his resources much more carefully.

Crockett also failed to follow Vince's lead in signing arenas to exclusivity deals, basically saying that they could not host other wrestling shows unless cleared by WWE. Vince started doing this after the NWA started running (and drawing really well) in PA and then moved into Nassau Coliseum a few times too. Some arenas signed quickly to guarantee WWE shows, especially in major WWE sites like Madison Sqaure Garden. The NWA was able to occassionally get into the Meadowlands Arena. Other places like Pgh waited years before signing such agreements, because the NWA drew well there, at least until it was purchased by Turner Broadcasting and became WCW. Crockett should have done the same in major cities like Tampa, Miami, Charlotte, ST Louis, Dallas, places his product was well known and sold well, at least in his home base in the Carolinas & GA if nothing else.

Overall, the wrestling wars of the 80s were in many ways more interesting and involved than the Monday Night Wars in the 90s, but Crockett did make a handfull of mistakes, basically motivated by a "moving too fast" mentality that Vince didnt make and it cost him.
 
Not necessarily, Piper CLEARLY was an NWA guy, had several major feuds and played almost the exact same character in WWE. Hogan created his fan favorite personna and his in ring style in the AWA, clearly benefitting from his feud with Nick Bockwinkle. Randy Savage and Liz were doing almost the exact same routine in the Mid South area before joining WWE. None of those guys was WWE home grown talent.

To say that guys like Hogan, Savage, and Piper, all major wrestling stars prior to WWE, playing basically the same gimmick (especially Savage & Piper) were WWE homegrown talent isnt true.

That's not to say Vince didnt create some stars. He completely turned Shawn Michaels from a Rock & Roll Express rip off to a major heel singles wrestler (albeit with HBK admittedly copying a lot of Ric Flair's gimmick, but then Flair admittedly copied from Buddy Rogers & Joe Namath, Hogan recently admitted in a radio interview he copied a lot from SuperStar Graham & Dusty Rhodes), Brett Hart was clearly a "Vince Creation", and some guys who had wrestled elsewhere but unlike Piper, Valentine, Savage, DiBiase, Rude, Blanchard & Anderson, Paul Orndorff (NWA & Mid South Guy, kept ame name and style in WWE), Henning, etc WERE NOT major stars or well known commodities prior to WWE such as Kevin "Vinnie Vegas" Nash and Scott "Diamond Stud" Hall also were elevated by Vince (Hall actually was a major player briefly in the AWA and got a good push initially in WCW as "Diamond Stud", an almost identical gimmick to the Razor Ramoan character, but he was never able to rise above mid card status prior to WWE, unlike most of the other names in this post).

I'm not sure where to start. Your facts are pretty screwy too. If the criteria for being WWF home grown talent is that during their wrestling tenure this is where they fully developed their character and had their first time big-time success Hogan, Savage, Piper, Nash and Hall all fit.

Hogan hd his greastest achievments, developed his character such as the red and yellow. Never was he a world champ in the AWA and it wasn't until his time in the WWF that he became one of the most recognizable faces in the world.

Piper is CLEARLY a WWF guy! He may have started in the NWA and had limited success early on. However, his character fully matured and he easliy had his first taste of the big-time with the WWF. It was here he achieved national mainstream success. He was an integral part of Rock n' Wrestling.

Savage never wrestled in Mid-South and again his character was not fully developed nor did he have the national spotlight until the WWF

Nash was a broken down basketball player who had a couple of stints as a WCW mid-carder....niether which are comparable to the character he developed into while in the WWF, and while there went on to hold the championship for a year

Hall achieved upper mid-card success in AWA(not a major player) but the growth of the character Razor Ramon in the WWF resembles nothing he did in the AWA or the Diamond Studd(who was a character similar to Ravishing Rude) He reached the pinnacle of his success in the WWF and was a bonafide singles star

One could make a good argument either way as to whether Henning is home grown WWF or AWA. Henning, who followed in his father's footsteps, cut his teeth in the AWA. His heel persona in the AWA was much closer to his Mr. Perfect character than the WCW Diamond Studd was to Razor Ramon. The AWA was the number three wrestling promotion and had national televison exposure at the time he was their World Champion.
 
To be honest, I feel Hogan was the least worst offender when it comes to wrestlers who hung on to long in the main event spot. Would I have liked to have seen him lose the title differently (i.e. on PPVs like with his loss against Goldberg)? In some ways yes, but I think about how much PPVs were costing even back then, and in some ways I thought it was cool to see a free title change on Nitro.
true, but i was discussing more on his booked losses, even the Goldberg loss had some interference that distracted Hogan (DDP and Malone attacked Hennig who came to help Hogan while Hogan was up on his feet). i didnt mind the title change on Nitro, that helps get viewers too, but it's how he lost the title. the prime example is Sting. why shouldnt Sting beat Hogan clean??
As far as him not losing clean to Sting, that's debatable if you're citing Starrcade 97's ending, I know there was that whole controversy with the "count", and then Bret Hart got involved.
that was part of it, but it was the other title win too where he has Macho help Sting by attacking Hogan, sure it made Sting look strong with attacking nwo guys, but it also didnt show Sting beat him clean. i would've liked a Sting win where Hogan was out, nwo came out, got attacked and sent to the back by other guys while Sting had him in the deathlock and then heel Hogan to tap out, that would've been better and had more fans loving the title change, sorta like Goldberg's win.
The fingerpoke of doom though, I could care less about, I was not offended like most people, especially when I think of how Vince put his own company's World Title on himself.
i dont kill the fingerpoke of doom, just the angle it sold which was the nwo re-uniting. i always liked nwo best as the 3 rebels and maybe adding 3 more would've been ok, but nwo just go too big and by the time 99 happened, some people were just sick of nwo.
when he was feuding with Kidman, I feel a return to a heel persona as Hollywood Hogan would have made more sense. Kidman would have gotten a lot more support being an underdog face going up against a bully, instead of being some snot nosed punk picking a fight with the bigger dog in the yard.
yeah, that would've been perfect actually. having Kidman stand up to a big Bully, even if they wanted to do an nwo rehash, it would've been nice seeing Kidman standing up to the nwo gang by attacking the leader and Kidman was real over at the ppv before that.
Couldn't agree with you more about this statement, however Hogan's matches did work, granted they weren't wrestling clinics, but Hogan's strong suit in getting a crowd reaction always worked immensely.
it would've been great. benoit would've been pushed and if Hogan was a heel, it would've been a perfect match to get the title off Hogan
Chris Jericho was hilarious as well and I enjoyed him immensely, granted he never got the US Title, but he had a hell of a lot of airtime and publicity with his Monday Night Jericho shirts
yeah and that's my issue, Jericho should at least had a US title run. he would've been great for that title as he was already funny with the tv title calling it the most important title in wcw. imagine what he would've done with the US title.
What we fail to mention is that although a lot of these smaller guys were going after singles titles like the US and TV championships, a lot of them were still Cruiserweight contenders, and guys like Jericho, Benoit, and Malenko were still utilized to have matches with guys like Juventud Guerrera, Rey Mysterio, Billy Kidman, etc.
i could see them (WCW) doing that too with Malenko, Mysterio, Guerrera and some others, but they should've moved Jericho and Benoit up the card and even Kidman would've been a nice US title contender.
As it's been said before, before Turner Broadcasting's new programming president decided to cancel WCW's programming, there was a press release stating that Turner Broadcasting would continue to not only air WCW program after selling the promotion to Fusient Media Ventures, but that they would still hold a minority interest in the organization.
the reason, the key reason in my book on why wcw is dead is on the guys (Time Warner/AOL) not wanting it. if they sold it and Fusient and Bischoff had the tv time to air it, then WCW would've been alive.
As far as Bret Hart's underutilization goes, it's unfortunate because I think things were starting to finally turned around in late 99 when he won the World Title, and then by a screwed up twist of fate had that concussion that ended his career.
yeah, i agree. he was doing well with the world title until his concussion. i just think they should've pushed him quicker as he was a hot new signing coming off a screwjob.
 
A few years ago I bought every WCW PPVs from late 95 to late 98. When WCW was going strong I watched Nitro but since I was at school I could not afford them. So I took the opportunity to watch what I had missed on PPV. And I must say I was only disappointed by two shows, Souled Out 97 and Starrcade 97. But the rest were formidable shows, a great mix of great wrestling and star power. It's amazing the level of talent WCW had back then. But to say WCW should have replaced the big stars but the guys in midcards was revisionist history. WCW was great because they had everything, not just for the cruisers. And some people might say Hogan was not the greatest wrestler but frankly it never showed as all his matchs had great heat and you never knew what was going to happen during the nWo days.
 
Good thread.

Starrcade 95: The PPV featured a World Cup Of Wrestling tournament that saw the very best talent of WCW, going up against the very best talent that NJPW had to offer, and there wasn't one bad match or name in the tournament. On top of that, you had two top notch main events that saw Flair, Luger & Sting competing in a #1 Contender Triple Threat to decide who would go onto to face Savage for the World Title right after, which Flair won then he ended up going on to defeat Savage for the belt in the main event. And what probably made it better was that Hogan was nowhere to be seen on the PPV to ruin anything. The PPV wasn't big on paper because not many people were familiar with the NJPW talent, but WCW still pulled off a solid PPV without Hogan. And you have to give kudos to Savage, Sting, Flair, and Luger for pulling double duty on the PPV. This is probably my favourite Starrcade of all time.

Starrcade 96: PPV opened up with a great Championship Unification match for the J-Crown & Cruiserweight Title between Dean Malenko and Ultimo Dragon. Later in the night, you saw the best highflyer in Japan at the time, Jushin Liger take on the best highflyer in the US at time, Rey Mysterio Jr. The US Title Finals between Eddie Guerrerro & DDP, who were both promising stars heading into 97. Luger vs. The Giant, which was awesome for Sting's interference, and Luger racking the big man. And the match Wrestlemania 1 missed out on, and that we hadn't seen happen in years, Piper vs. Hogan, which saw Piper getting his first ever win over Hogan, and with a clean finish. Card looked good on paper and delivered.

Halloween Havoc 97 and Superbrawl 8 are two other cards I would consider big/brilliant.

Halloween Havoc 98 looked big on paper, with Nash/Hall, Bret/Sting, Warrior/Hogan II & DDP/Goldberg, it's such a shame the PPV didn't live up to the hype though.
 
I'm not sure where to start. Your facts are pretty screwy too. If the criteria for being WWF home grown talent is that during their wrestling tenure this is where they fully developed their character and had their first time big-time success Hogan, Savage, Piper, Nash and Hall all fit.

Piper is CLEARLY a WWF guy! He may have started in the NWA and had limited success early on. However, his character fully matured and he easliy had his first taste of the big-time with the WWF. It was here he achieved national mainstream success. He was an integral part of Rock n' Wrestling.

Savage never wrestled in Mid-South and again his character was not fully developed nor did he have the national spotlight until the WWF

Nash was a broken down basketball player who had a couple of stints as a WCW mid-carder....niether which are comparable to the character he developed into while in the WWF, and while there went on to hold the championship for a year

Hall achieved upper mid-card success in AWA(not a major player) but the growth of the character Razor Ramon in the WWF resembles nothing he did in the AWA or the Diamond Studd(who was a character similar to Ravishing Rude) He reached the pinnacle of his success in the WWF and was a bonafide singles star

One could make a good argument either way as to whether Henning is home grown WWF or AWA. Henning, who followed in his father's footsteps, cut his teeth in the AWA. His heel persona in the AWA was much closer to his Mr. Perfect character than the WCW Diamond Studd was to Razor Ramon. The AWA was the number three wrestling promotion and had national televison exposure at the time he was their World Champion.

The Diamond Stud was very similair to Razor Ramoan, especially the cheezy cuban fake accent. He was more over in the AWA however. In my post I point out that Nash & Hall enjoyed far greater success, actually crediting Vince for their creation. Same goes for HHH, and the others in that section of the post. UNLIKE Savage, Piper, Rude, et all those guys who had little success and no discernible character before landing in WWE. Vince "created" them.

Piper did very little different in WWE as in the NWA. He was not an NWA mid carder, he was a main event talent who had major feuds with the likes of Greg Valentine and Ric Flair, both when Flair was US champ and during his first run as World Champ. He was not a WWE homegrown talent. Vince & WWE did not create him.

The point on Hogan (noted in my post as a "lesser extent" than Savage & Piper) was that much of his ring style, promo delivery, etc was honed in the AWA, where he was a main eventer (initially as a heel, in the end he was a fan favorite). Vince created the whole "Real American" angle but that angle was not that distant from Hogan at the end of his AWA tenure, especially in terms of promos and wrestling style (his famous catch phrases though were post WWE arrival).

Savage was wrestling, dressing, and acting the same in his wrestling stints before WWE. Even with the "jealous mainiac" angle with meek Liz. When he landed in WWE he just copied the same thing he'd been doing for years prior. Changes to Savage's character and presentation didnt come about until his fan fav turn in late 87, nearly two years after he first arrived in WWE and previously headlined vs Steamboat & Hogan. He was not created by Vince.
 
Spring Stampede 1999 was a great PPV, and probably the last WCW PPV that could be considered great.


It had a great opener in Blitzkrieg vs Juventud Guerrera

A serviceable Hardcore Match with Hardcore Hak (Sandman) against Bam Bam Bigelow.

A good Cruiserweight Title match in Rey against Billy Kidman, who were the Tag Champs at the time.


An absolutely AWESOME Tag Team match between Chris Benoit and Dean Malenko vs Raven and Perry Saturn! Honestly, it's in my top 10 favorite straight up tag team matches ever!

Like most WCW PPV's during that era though, the quality dropped off when the Main Event guys had their matches.



Although, The World Title 4-Way match wasn't terrible.
 
Thanks everyone for replying. All the Halloween Havoc PPv's from 1996-1999 look solid.

I would like to add in Starrcade 1996. It has Ultimo Dragon vs. Dean Malenko and Jushin Liger vs. Rey Mysterio Jr. in the Cruiseweight matches, should be an eye candy. It also features Jeff Jarrett vs Chris Benoit No DQ. and Eddie Guerrero vs. DDP in the midcard/upper-midcard and the main-event features Lex Luger vs. The Giant and Hulk Hogan vs Roddy Piper. What is interesting that all these matches got more then 10 minutes. Nothing over-booked and a decent card from top to bottom.

I am going to look for this PPV on the internet/Youtube.
 
later when AOL ended WCW, Vince did not take on any wrestlers conracts, he cherry picked a handfull of guys he thought would be helpfull to him and offered them reduced buyouts and new WWE deals if they were vacate their deals with AOL, who was happy to end any contract with wrestling talent since they no longer owned a wrestling company. Then he purchased only the video library of the company, nothing else (he did along with the video library get the PPV names). Anything else associated with the actual WCW company was not purchased. Crockett inherited huge debt at a high purchase price with minimal return, especially since he didnt need the TV deals. It was crippling. Vince learned his lesson in overspending when he purchased programming on TBS and was forced to sell it back because fans revolted, demanding the NWA be put back on. Initially it was a bad move for Vince, although in the end he played hardball with Turner execs and got a nice sum of money for voiding the contract. Still, he learned to manage his money and his resources much more carefully.

I have heard that Vince doesn't own the actual WCW company just the name and the video library. How that makes sense I don't know, but it is what I've heard.

WCW PPV cards were always a mixed bag (and I am the HUGEST WCW fan ever) their opening matches to middle of the card matches usually tore the house down. Unfortunatley, there were so few main event guys who could truly work that thier uppercard matches usually suffered. Flair, Sting and Savage were really the only three consistent mainevent guys who could REALLY work. I know some may argue about Hall, DDP and Hennig, but thoes guys (who were greats and all favorites of mine too) were never consistent mainevent guys in WCW. They were upper middle card guys who sometimes (Page more than the other two) competed in the mainevent.
 
Good thread.

Starrcade 95: The PPV featured a World Cup Of Wrestling tournament that saw the very best talent of WCW, going up against the very best talent that NJPW had to offer, and there wasn't one bad match or name in the tournament. On top of that, you had two top notch main events that saw Flair, Luger & Sting competing in a #1 Contender Triple Threat to decide who would go onto to face Savage for the World Title right after, which Flair won then he ended up going on to defeat Savage for the belt in the main event. And what probably made it better was that Hogan was nowhere to be seen on the PPV to ruin anything. The PPV wasn't big on paper because not many people were familiar with the NJPW talent, but WCW still pulled off a solid PPV without Hogan. And you have to give kudos to Savage, Sting, Flair, and Luger for pulling double duty on the PPV. This is probably my favourite Starrcade of all time.

The Ending with the intervention of the Four Horsemen was tremendous. It was like they were back better than ever with Flair on top of the World as champ. I loved the whole Flair-Macho feud in WCW.

Halloween Havoc 98 looked big on paper, with Nash/Hall, Bret/Sting, Warrior/Hogan II & DDP/Goldberg, it's such a shame the PPV didn't live up to the hype though.

-Aside for the pyro botch and the mock putting Warrior on fire, Hogan/Warrior was not so bad as the storyline leading up to it was bad and both guys were in the wrong role. Nobody wanted to cheer for a super-hero type guy like Warrior in the late 90s while Hogan had reivented himself with the time. So people were supposed to boo Hogan and cheer Warrior but it was the opposite so the vibe of the match was all screwed up. The whole psychology failed in part because of it.

-Bret/Sting two guys that should have had a good match I think somehow did not mesh well in the ring. I have to wonder if Bret was broken down at the time and that maybe Vince was clever to part ways with him. Bret rarely had great matchs in WCW. It was a solid brawl but could have been better.

-Nash/Hall was good but the booking sucked with Nash leaving instead of pinning Hall. I also think a Hall/Nash match should have had better hype. Hell make it the Main event.

-DDP/Goldberg was Great. Possibly Goldberg's best match in WCW. I keep re-watching it over and over how great it was booked. How people were into it and you didn't know how it would turn out.

Another great PPV was Road Wild 96. Good matchs all around, great storyline developement and my favorite WCW match ever Benoit vs Malenko in a Iron Man match.
 
-Bret/Sting two guys that should have had a good match I think somehow did not mesh well in the ring. I have to wonder if Bret was broken down at the time and that maybe Vince was clever to part ways with him. Bret rarely had great matchs in WCW. It was a solid brawl but could have been better.

I have often wondered about this. It wasn't like Bret didn't wrestle guys who were subpar during his time in WCW. He wrestled against Flair, Sting, Hennig, DDP, Booker T, but the only really great match he had while he was there was the Owen Hart tribute match against Benoit. I don't think Bret was broken down. I just think he was completely disheartened by what Vince did and the politics in WCW probably made that even worse. I am not sticking up for Hart because I am not a fan of his (every recent interview I have seen with him all he say's is me, me, me, I, I, I,) but I do think that the things that I said had a lot to do with his lackluster performances in WCW.
 
I have often wondered about this. It wasn't like Bret didn't wrestle guys who were subpar during his time in WCW. He wrestled against Flair, Sting, Hennig, DDP, Booker T, but the only really great match he had while he was there was the Owen Hart tribute match against Benoit. I don't think Bret was broken down. I just think he was completely disheartened by what Vince did and the politics in WCW probably made that even worse. I am not sticking up for Hart because I am not a fan of his (every recent interview I have seen with him all he say's is me, me, me, I, I, I,) but I do think that the things that I said had a lot to do with his lackluster performances in WCW.

I do agree that Bret's lackluster performances in WCW may have a lot to do with the treatment of Vince to him in WWE during his last days.

But there could be other reasons as well, he had done it all in the wrestling world, he was the face of WWE for sometime, he had battled all the big matches/popular wrestlers and some brilliant matches especially against HBK, Owen Hart and Austin (3 excellent Wrestlemania performances) and even at other PPV's against them. Still WWE screwed him over towards the end.

WCW was already filled with big names and there wasn't any space left for him to become the biggest star of a promotion again.

I would also like to remind everyone that there really isn't any excellent match in the WCW main event from mid to late 90's. Seriously, I have never heard of any fanstastic match other then some really nice Cruiserweight or US Title Matches.

If Bret Hart got more matches against the likes of Benoit, Jericho, Malenko, Eddie Guerrero, Chavo Guerrero, Jushin Liger or Rey Mysterio Jr., his WCW career may have been filled with much better matches.

Bret Hart was not even an important figure of WCW's main event scene. It was always Goldberg, Sting, nWo, Hogan and The Giant.
 
I remember WCW's PPV being stacked. You had the crusierweights, and then all of the big names, but I liked their ppvs even more in the early 90's. Even in the NWO era it seemed that WCW had trouble finishing their ppvs, and after they were over I found myself going huh? or even being disappointed. WCW was big, and a lot of my friends were die hard WCW, and I think if the bigger names would have known when to pass the torch then the company may have been around a lot longer.
 

Users who are viewing this thread

Members online

No members online now.

Forum statistics

Threads
174,847
Messages
3,300,827
Members
21,726
Latest member
chrisxenforo
Back
Top