tirtefaa
Unicron
If you wanna know the truth, you gotta dig up Johnny Booth.
Posts: 2,865
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Post by tirtefaa on Jan 18, 2023 0:06:18 GMT -5
Bret is my all-time fave, but he's just not a good fit for a NWO foil. Sting was WCW's franchise, Goldberg was a one-man army, DDP had more guts than sense, and Nash and Savage were the friction from within. They were all more natural fits for a full-fledged feud with the NWO and, outside of Sting, they ultimately (namely when Bret was there) had relatively lackluster feuds with the faction. Hogan didn't want to sell for Bret. Nash was never again physically able to have a match as good as their WWF match, and had some sour feelings about Bret not wanting to take his finisher. The problem is the same with so, SO many of WCW's main event feuds is the match-ups that you wanted to see would not end up very good in the ring because of 30 other issues outside of it. After the Goldberg moment, the guy who had the most heat with Hogan was Nash and we all saw how that went. Nash and Goldberg was an overbooked mess. Goldberg/DDP was amazing and almost nobody really saw it. Flair/Hogan was a booking disaster. Sting/Hogan was the biggest disaster to ever happen. Hogan/Bret would not have gone well. Nash/Bret would not have gone well. Hall/Bret would have been a great match that they gave away on free TV. All roads lead to more main event mediocrity. But if you look at the timeline, it would have been a short run as an nWo foil. By spring on the next year, Bret turned heel. The problem was that Bret immediately shot down the card and was working with a bunch of stars in the making. He was working a limited schedule, which may in part be why they were hesitant to push him more, but it still seemed like way too little. I wouldn't have even been disappointed if Bret became the focal leader of the nWo earlier. The fingerpoke of doom was always going to be terrible, but I wonder what would happen if they put Bret in Hogan's role, with them moving the Goldberg feud up as well? I think in the end, as long as Bret eventually lost the belt to Goldberg, it would have been fine, but I'll be honest...as a fan in the late 90's, I didn't care about guys like Hogan, Savage, Flair or Bret winning the title, so at some point ALL of those guys needed to step aside and let the next gen of guys maintain the ship. |
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Sephiroth
Wade Wilson
Surviving
Posts: 28,961
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Post by Sephiroth on Jan 18, 2023 7:38:08 GMT -5
I could actually have seen Bret in The Rock’s place as The Corporate Champion For me, more Mankind's position, the initial corporate candidate, but gets thrown under the bus to get the belt on Rocky. In another thread I proposed that Owen would have been a more than adequate fill in for Mankind/Dude Love in that role; he and Austin had a history complete with sone real life best, Owen had played along with some of Bret’s shtick about not liking the direction wrestling was going snd fans needing wholesome role models, and the memory of Montreal was still fresh. I could totally envision a Mister McMahonnpromo talking Owen up, saying he’d be a worthy face for the company and that he can redeem the Hart family name, and “I once punished you for nearly ending the career of Stone Cold Steve Austin. But now I realize I should have been thanking you!” |
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tafkaga
Samurai Cop
the Dogfather
Posts: 2,124
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Post by tafkaga on Jan 18, 2023 9:37:35 GMT -5
The TLDR version of my OP is simply that I think Bret's time as most popular/company "it" guy/perennial main event star had already come to a close by late 97. He was not the biggest fish in his own pond anymore, and he was moving to an even bigger pond where he lacked political clout.
Based on responses, some seem to be reacting as if I said that Bret was all washed up, had nothing left to contribute, there was no spot for him, could not have been better utilized in WCW, nobody cared about him, etc. That's not it.
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Post by HMARK Center on Jan 18, 2023 14:24:15 GMT -5
Bret is my all-time fave, but he's just not a good fit for a NWO foil. Sting was WCW's franchise, Goldberg was a one-man army, DDP had more guts than sense, and Nash and Savage were the friction from within. They were all more natural fits for a full-fledged feud with the NWO and, outside of Sting, they ultimately (namely when Bret was there) had relatively lackluster feuds with the faction. Hogan didn't want to sell for Bret. Nash was never again physically able to have a match as good as their WWF match, and had some sour feelings about Bret not wanting to take his finisher. The problem is the same with so, SO many of WCW's main event feuds is the match-ups that you wanted to see would not end up very good in the ring because of 30 other issues outside of it. After the Goldberg moment, the guy who had the most heat with Hogan was Nash and we all saw how that went. Nash and Goldberg was an overbooked mess. Goldberg/DDP was amazing and almost nobody really saw it. Flair/Hogan was a booking disaster. Sting/Hogan was the biggest disaster to ever happen. Hogan/Bret would not have gone well. Nash/Bret would not have gone well. Hall/Bret would have been a great match that they gave away on free TV. All roads lead to more main event mediocrity. But if you look at the timeline, it would have been a short run as an nWo foil. By spring on the next year, Bret turned heel. The problem was that Bret immediately shot down the card and was working with a bunch of stars in the making. He was working a limited schedule, which may in part be why they were hesitant to push him more, but it still seemed like way too little. I wouldn't have even been disappointed if Bret became the focal leader of the nWo earlier. The fingerpoke of doom was always going to be terrible, but I wonder what would happen if they put Bret in Hogan's role, with them moving the Goldberg feud up as well? I think in the end, as long as Bret eventually lost the belt to Goldberg, it would have been fine, but I'll be honest...as a fan in the late 90's, I didn't care about guys like Hogan, Savage, Flair or Bret winning the title, so at some point ALL of those guys needed to step aside and let the next gen of guys maintain the ship. I've given my personal fantasy booking of Bret in 1998 WCW a few times before, and it basically goes that Bret does turn heel fairly early, but for the purposes of usurping Hogan as leader of the nWo. Bret, after all, was coming in from WWF, and big names "jumping ship" was the main draw of the nWo. You could debut him face but then have him end up allowing Hogan to win the title back at some point, becoming Hogan's consigliere and, well, "hitman" in the process, even if they do like they did in '98 and don't formally have him join the black and white. Bret would use this proximity to Hogan to start making him increasingly paranoid and suspicious of the people around him, even all the way up to Bischoff, which would then lead to some kind of moment where Bret could pull the trigger on his betrayal, coinciding with Hogan taking time off at the end of '98, and taking control of the faction and reshaping some of it in his own image. Hogan could've then been freed up to do a face turn, and you could spend '99 building to Hogan vs. Hart at Starrcade. Alas, WCW politics being what they were, nothing like that could have ever happened. |
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HeyYo
Trap-Jaw
Posts: 447
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Post by HeyYo on Jan 19, 2023 6:12:52 GMT -5
If anyone asked me, "name your favourite wrestler and your favourite year of theirs," mine would be Bret in 97.
I'm Canadian but he and the Hart Foundation were the talk of my school and town then. You couldn't go a day without seeing multiple people wearing his merchandise in one form or another, kids or adults. His total would have been like if you combined Hulk Hogan, Steve Austin and nWo merchandise at their popularity peaks. For as much flak and eye rolls Bret gets for saying he was a Canadian hero, there's truth to it. If there was any time in my area where a wrestler was the most relevant to the public, this would have been it. Hadn't seen anything like it before and never will again.
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