As in Starrcade 97 had been booked with him going over after clean after Hogan tried to screw him out of the title. We all know what happened there and it has been done to death as to what should have happened/how badly it was botched.
We rarely talk about the aftermath though and that's the focus here. For those not in the know here's a timeline.
The Nitro after Starrcade was probably a bigger clusterfuck than the night before. Basically the rematch between Hogan and Sting ended with the ref being knocked out and Nick Patrick, the nWo ref, ran down and counted the pin on Sting for Hogan to win. This started a brawl between the nWo and WCW, during which the original ref woke up, saw Sting on top of Hogan and counted that pin. Oh and most of this happened after Nitro had ended so as to try to hook us for Nitro next week (might have been Thunder by this stage actually).
This lead to Sting beating Hogan for the title at Superbrawl cleanly, so finally the guy who had been built for a year and a half as the saviour of WCW had defeated Hogan and the nWo.
Sadly his title reign lasted for a total of 7 weeks before he lost the belt to the Macho Man, then part of the nWo, who would lose it to Hogan the night after he won it.
This would be Stings last title reign until 1999 when he would defeat DDP on Nitro for the belt but lose it back to him as part of a 4-way the very same night. He would win the WCW title one more time, hold it for 6 weeks and end up being stripped of it for attacking a referee following a fight with Goldberg.
So how come WCW lost faith with Sting as their guy so quickly? Did the Starrcade and Nitro messes really do that much damage to his character? Was Goldberg a factor? Did WCW ever believe in Sting to be their number one face in the first place?
We rarely talk about the aftermath though and that's the focus here. For those not in the know here's a timeline.
The Nitro after Starrcade was probably a bigger clusterfuck than the night before. Basically the rematch between Hogan and Sting ended with the ref being knocked out and Nick Patrick, the nWo ref, ran down and counted the pin on Sting for Hogan to win. This started a brawl between the nWo and WCW, during which the original ref woke up, saw Sting on top of Hogan and counted that pin. Oh and most of this happened after Nitro had ended so as to try to hook us for Nitro next week (might have been Thunder by this stage actually).
This lead to Sting beating Hogan for the title at Superbrawl cleanly, so finally the guy who had been built for a year and a half as the saviour of WCW had defeated Hogan and the nWo.
Sadly his title reign lasted for a total of 7 weeks before he lost the belt to the Macho Man, then part of the nWo, who would lose it to Hogan the night after he won it.
This would be Stings last title reign until 1999 when he would defeat DDP on Nitro for the belt but lose it back to him as part of a 4-way the very same night. He would win the WCW title one more time, hold it for 6 weeks and end up being stripped of it for attacking a referee following a fight with Goldberg.
So how come WCW lost faith with Sting as their guy so quickly? Did the Starrcade and Nitro messes really do that much damage to his character? Was Goldberg a factor? Did WCW ever believe in Sting to be their number one face in the first place?