I can't believe WCW fell as hard as it did

[erisi236]

I'm just watching some older Nitros and I got to the infamous "finger poke of doom" ep which was Jan 4th of '99, and it just boggles my mind that nearly 2 years to the date later WCW was no more.

Looking at the crowd at that show compared to the crowd at the "Night of Champions" 2 years later just makes you think it was two different promotions entirely.

I know there's DVDs and books devoted to the subject, but still when you sit down and watch those shows and think on it a minute, damn. Such an abject lesson to never say "it'll be around forever".

[dlg3000]

I cannot believe it either. I don't recall any organization that lost as much money and also as much credibility as WCW did in later years. It was like TNA, if that is a fair comparison. They had so much potential and so many talented stars, but they screwed the pooch, and I mean Scooby Doo pooch.

[Dean-o]

WCW from 96-98 was must see television. Sadly, it all came crashing down in 1999. The same guys wrestling over and over, just simply turning heel/face to "freshen things up"

Before you know it, it crumbled from within. Titles quickly became meaningless, feuds and angles were stupid and had swerves on top of swerves. Their roster by the end was a joke.

I stuck around till the last show, but man it was horrible television.

[Hit Girl]

With Bischoff and Russo running the show, I can easily believe it fell so hard.

[DavidArquette]

I still found WCW entertaining during it's final year and couldn't believe it when I found out Vince had bought it. But yeah, watching WCW in late '97 to early '98 and then comparing that to the product a year and a half later, the difference is insane!

[Danimal]

Bisch let the inmates take over the asylum. Say what you will about Russo but the guy did inherit a company where egomaniacal politicians had the run of the place. Bisch also wasted a ton of money on celebrity tie-ins that did nothing. I like Bisch as a heel and he had some good ideas but he had too many bad ones.

Russo could've saved it and failed but Bisch is the one that put WCW on life-support.

[El Dandy]

Having PPV quality matches on free TV pretty much killed potential dream matchups that should have been main events that were built for future major events. Goldberg vs. Hogan for instance. Great TV moment, but that was built for a big PPV.

[johnnyk9]

like they said on the rise and fall of WCW all they cared about was the ratings war and didn't notice Vince was doing better things then them at the time

[Ryushinku]

It is pretty scary stuff.

The way their PPV buyrates particularly fell year-on-year is just terrifying. Look at Starrcade '99 compared to Starrcade '98 for one example, a 72% drop for the 'Grand Daddy of them All'. If next year's WrestleMania only pulled in 280k buys, Vince would probably have an aneurysm.

Up to about...say...mid '99, WCW still looks and acts like a genuine rival to the WWF. But then after that point, it's like air going out of a balloon.

[rchi84]

crash and burn, if I ever saw one

[Deleted]

I can believe it. They were run by morons. For the longest time the only things that saved them were the nWo angle, Goldberg, and the cruisers putting on good matches all the time. They somehow managed to screw all of them up.

["Handsome" Whitey Fats]

Sadly, WCW was actually getting decent at the very end.

[Citizen Zero]

Jun 14, 2011 10:45:01 GMT -5 @akeem said:

I can believe it. They were run by morons. For the longest time the only things that saved them were the nWo angle, Goldberg, and the cruisers putting on good matches all the time. They somehow managed to screw all of them up.

Well that and Sugar Daddy Ted.

[joebob27]

Yep, that's the thing that gets lost, it wasn't a functional business. That's how it falls as hard as it did. Even if WWE totally went to shit, it'd still exist as a business.

Turner proped them up. Turner goes away, WCW is dead because now it needs to be functional.

[molson5]

Ya contracts dropped them more then bad booking. They basically needed the wrestling boom to continue forever at the rate they were spending money, and that was never going to happen even if they had better booking.

[Deleted]

Jun 14, 2011 14:40:09 GMT -5 "Handsome" Whitey Fats said:

Sadly, WCW was actually getting decent at the very end.

I agree, I came back to WCW at the end. I liked the direction of the Cruiserweight division. Couldn't tell you when I stopped watching WCW altogether - probably the middle of 1999. The only time I watched WCW in between was when my brother brought over a friend's copy of Bash At The Beach, just so I could see and give my impression of Vince Russo running down Hulk Hogan.

That's right. Not to see the actual PPV itself, just to see the promo.

[woodface]

Jun 15, 2011 7:56:24 GMT -5 molson5 said:

Ya contracts dropped them more then bad booking. They basically needed the wrestling boom to continue forever at the rate they were spending money, and that was never going to happen even if they had better booking.

Millions upon millions of dollars still get lost by WCW in 2000 if the entire roster worked for free.

[kingoftheindies]

it's interesting if you listen to what Nash, Sid, Bischoff, and Russo all say.

Nash pointed out that part of the problem was Hogan's creative control. Not putting full blame on it, but he basically said he had no idea how hard it was to book a tv show, and there were a few times he and the rest of the crew would have a show written, and Hogan (who only showed up 2 to 3 hours before they went on air) would invoke his creative control and the bookers would have to rewrite the show.

Russo said similar things happened with him, but he and Bischoff both said that after Turner and Time Warner merged, network executives would show up to booking meetings, and also take a bunch of things out of the show. Russo said it was more of a problem for him because of how much he wrote, Bischoff got himself in trouble because he wouldn't have things prewritten.

Sid said in his shoot he felt that everybody was too concerned about ratings and not about attendance. He said that the WWF got better because, even when he was there in 96/97, the ratings for the WWF weren't great but they were starting to sell out the house shows again. Sid basically said that if WCW would have been more concerned with getting the house show quality up, the ratings would come and not vice versa.

[turkeysandwich]

Jun 15, 2011 11:44:36 GMT -5 kingoftheindies said:

Sid said in his shoot he felt that everybody was too concerned about ratings and not about attendance. He said that the WWF got better because, even when he was there in 96/97, the ratings for the WWF weren't great but they were starting to sell out the house shows again. Sid basically said that if WCW would have been more concerned with getting the house show quality up, the ratings would come and not vice versa.

It's funny because I never think about the fact that WCW ran house shows. I would always hear about WWF house shows, and interesting things that happened at them, especially at MSG. But I can't remember hearing any stories of things that happened at WCW house shows.

["Handsome" Whitey Fats]

Didn't Booker beat up Steiner at a house show?