Would a WCW/ECW Talent Exchange Have Worked?

[thegame415]

OK, I know Heyman and Bischoff would've never been able to work together, and that Heyman pretty much hated anything involving WCW. However, what if in the spring or summer of 2000, WCW and ECW started a cross-promotional feud? Could it have worked? How would it start? Who would've been the key players?

The biggest question: Could it have helped WCW get higher ratings, making someone else more interested in buying the company?

[mcmahonfan85]

no, because WCW already signed several ECW wrestlers (Raven, Sandman, Public Enemey, Mikey Whipreck, Stevie Richards, Saturn, Lance Storm, Shane Douglas, etc) and in the end it didn't help

[Deleted]

That was years earlier and they all pretty much were buried by WCW or just looked at as forever mid-carders.

[agent817]

Nov 20, 2013 16:50:20 GMT -5 @jeffx said:

That was years earlier and they all pretty much were buried by WCW or just looked at as forever mid-carders.

Wasn't a lot of that due to the backstage power of Hogan, or even Nash?

[TGM]

I think the only people who might benefit from this would be the ECW guys getting some exposure. And even that might hurt them when WCW and ECW fold and they might be seen as a WCW Guy by the open minded and welcoming WWF locker room.

[SOR]

It wouldn't of been that beneficial for WCW. They were a distant second but ECW was way behind. WCW did take the guys with potential around this time (Awesome and Storm) the only other guy I could see having big time potential would of been Van Dam so it wouldn't of been that great for WCW.

For ECW, obviously it'd be a massive help because they'd have legitimate national stars appearing on their shows.

[The Dark Order Inferno]

No, ECW would have to have been a far bigger promotion than it ever was in order for WCW to see any benefit from cross promotion. Lets face facts, ECW was never a close third to WCW, heck it'd probably be charitable to suggest that the company was about half the size of TNA are today despite being active during a boom period for wrestling. Even with their slot on TNN, they didn't really qualify as a national promotion as they simply didn't run all that many shows outside of the northeast and their international exposure was laughable. On top of that, I don't think there was much appetite for the ECW style product from the WCW fanbase, when they started heading toward the sex/violence/crash TV route, interest in WCW declined, the WCW hardcore division wasn't a huge success, nor was trying to have established guys be more ECW.



It would have been the crossover with the WWF all over again, where they benefit hugely, but the bigger promotion gets nothing because the ECW audience just isn't big enough to make a noticeable difference.

[Reflecto]

It would have been doomed to fail just due to money and mutants. WCW would merely outspend ECW and sign away everyone with any value that they had (even in 2000, WCW would have that ability and ECW was missing enough paychecks so they wouldn't have a prayer]- and even if WCW released some people in a talent exchange to ECW, the ECW fanbase probably would have booed anyone ECW got from WCW. Best case, WCW releases to ECW a midcarder with some in-ring buzz like a Billy Kidman, and even then I think he'd have fallen to "WCW would boo him out of the building."

[Deleted]

Nov 20, 2013 21:50:47 GMT -5 agent817 said:

Nov 20, 2013 16:50:20 GMT -5 @jeffx said:

That was years earlier and they all pretty much were buried by WCW or just looked at as forever mid-carders.

Wasn't a lot of that due to the backstage power of Hogan, or even Nash?

Probably a combination of the two.

[Deleted]

They did...kinda. ECW had Arn Anderson and Bobby Eaton wrestle on a show while still contracted to WCW. They also had Cactus Jack vs Sabu. Foley even came to the ring with the WCW tag championship belt.

[Talent Name]

Honestly no, ECW's biggest strength was to hide their wrestlers flaws by having mostly hardcore matches yet WCW wasn't that into hardcore wrestling. The Public Enemy bombed in WCW

[Deleted]

Not if the respective creative teams remained the same; they're still going to write unbelievable crap that insults a fan's intelligence. The only difference would the the people involved.

Somehow I can imagine if Steve Austin & The Rock both jumped to WCW that they could find a way to screw that up.

[ICBM]

Nov 22, 2013 8:35:43 GMT -5 @sandman said:

Not if the respective creative teams remained the same; they're still going to write unbelievable crap that insults a fan's intelligence. The only difference would the the people involved.

Somehow I can imagine if Steve Austin & The Rock both jumped to WCW that they could find a way to screw that up.

I appreciate your honesty. Your reply is what I have tried to tell the wcw nostalgia wave in here about. Starting in late 98 all the way up until it died, the Internet and water cooler discussions across America were populated by statements like this. I ain't mad bro. I am thankful you are consistent. It was damn hard to be a wcw fan back then, but I made my choice and stuck with it.

As to your statement, I don't think they could have screwed up the rock or Austin had they jumped in 2000. You almost couldn't. Would there be great opponents for them? Yes. Would they get to them despite politicking? Unknown

[percymania]

In 96-98 it would have been great. In 2000 it would not have worked.

[Joe Neglia]

Wouldn't have worked. Too many cooks in WCW's kitchen would have been the death of it before it could start. The upper echelon in WCW barely put over anyone except each other, no way they would have been cooperative.