Your Reaction to the Starrcade '97 main event.

[Gerard Gerard]

Something that came to my mind having read the "Hogan or Hunter: which was worse?" thread in the WWE board was how the notion that the Starrcade false finish and ending made zero sense. It got me wondering, what was your reaction at the time? Did you care? Were you too excited seeing Sting win that you blocked out Hogan clearly beating him, yet the non fast-count was a fast count? The whole thing actually predates my fandom, and when I have watched it, it has struck me as a skullf***ingly lame, but am very curious as to the views/reactions/opinions of those watching at the time.

[Capt Lunatic]

This was the match that made me say "I WILL NEVER TRUST PRO WRESTLING AGAIN"

[Mozenrath]

I think Foley once described WCW as a company who could "f*** up a wet dream", and this kind of thing is pretty much that. After a good build up, they have this match that, honestly, wasn't as good to me as Hogan's match with Luger, and they just kind of bungled it. They've had worse screwups with matches, but nothing as important as this one, nothing that had been THE angle in their company, arguably in wrestling at the time, and had so much riding on doing it right.

[Ben Wyatt]

My reaction was disbelief. They built that match to absolute perfection, probably the best build WCW ever did, and that dogshit of a match is what we got

[chronocross]

At the time, I was watching it with friends and marked out for the Sting win, just didn't see why couldn't let him win it like Luger did earlier in the year.

[sfvega]

At the time, my parents wouldn't buy me the PPV, so all I knew was the good ol stills from Nitro and that Sting won and saved WCW. Which is good, because had I watched that match, I probably would have hated that shit and wasted money.

When I saw it years later, I was taken aback how horrible it was. You could put that match on WCW Saturday Night and the fans would have sat on their hands. But as the payoff to a year-long epic feud at the biggest show of the year with Sting's return to the ring? There just aren't words for how disappointed people were. The whole fast count thing was just the dumbest thing ever. Why would you even give the visual of Hogan pinning Sting no matter how cheated he was? Why did they need to shoehorn Bret and his WWF story to this completely different one?

[Mozenrath]

Dec 13, 2016 7:06:09 GMT -5 sfvega said:

At the time, my parents wouldn't buy me the PPV, so all I knew was the good ol stills from Nitro and that Sting won and saved WCW. Which is good, because had I watched that match, I probably would have hated that shit and wasted money.

When I saw it years later, I was taken aback how horrible it was. You could put that match on WCW Saturday Night and the fans would have sat on their hands. But as the payoff to a year-long epic feud at the biggest show of the year with Sting's return to the ring? There just aren't words for how disappointed people were. The whole fast count thing was just the dumbest thing ever. Why would you even give the visual of Hogan pinning Sting no matter how cheated he was? Why did they need to shoehorn Bret and his WWF story to this completely different one?

It was especially stupid because Bret going to WCW was its own story, its own draw. Plugging him into that match was just wasteful, though it does go to show that WCW didn't really know exactly what to do with him even before they got him.

[sfvega]

Dec 13, 2016 7:10:35 GMT -5 Mozenrath said:

Dec 13, 2016 7:06:09 GMT -5 sfvega said:

At the time, my parents wouldn't buy me the PPV, so all I knew was the good ol stills from Nitro and that Sting won and saved WCW. Which is good, because had I watched that match, I probably would have hated that shit and wasted money.

When I saw it years later, I was taken aback how horrible it was. You could put that match on WCW Saturday Night and the fans would have sat on their hands. But as the payoff to a year-long epic feud at the biggest show of the year with Sting's return to the ring? There just aren't words for how disappointed people were. The whole fast count thing was just the dumbest thing ever. Why would you even give the visual of Hogan pinning Sting no matter how cheated he was? Why did they need to shoehorn Bret and his WWF story to this completely different one?

It was especially stupid because Bret going to WCW was its own story, its own draw. Plugging him into that match was just wasteful, though it does go to show that WCW didn't really know exactly what to do with him even before they got him.

Him being a special guest enforcer ala Chuck Norris was a terrible idea. God WCW Bret was so 2nd rate. Just like his theme.

[Rolent Tex]

Dec 13, 2016 7:10:35 GMT -5 Mozenrath said:

Dec 13, 2016 7:06:09 GMT -5 sfvega said:

At the time, my parents wouldn't buy me the PPV, so all I knew was the good ol stills from Nitro and that Sting won and saved WCW. Which is good, because had I watched that match, I probably would have hated that shit and wasted money.

When I saw it years later, I was taken aback how horrible it was. You could put that match on WCW Saturday Night and the fans would have sat on their hands. But as the payoff to a year-long epic feud at the biggest show of the year with Sting's return to the ring? There just aren't words for how disappointed people were. The whole fast count thing was just the dumbest thing ever. Why would you even give the visual of Hogan pinning Sting no matter how cheated he was? Why did they need to shoehorn Bret and his WWF story to this completely different one?

It was especially stupid because Bret going to WCW was its own story, its own draw. Plugging him into that match was just wasteful, though it does go to show that WCW didn't really know exactly what to do with him even before they got him.

Oh...they knew exactly what they were doing with him. Bischoff hooked up Starrcade 97 to the Montreal Screwjob Express and never looked back.

[Milkman Norm]

Yay! Sting won!

[The 1Watcher Experience]

My reaction to watching it live on PPV was something along the lines of: "Yeesh, what a mess."

[Deleted]

I liked the giant WCW crowd in the ring celebrating afterwards.


..........that's it.

[corndog]

Dec 13, 2016 10:10:13 GMT -5 Milkman Norm said:

Yay! Sting won!

Yeah, at the time, I was happy Sting won even though it was kind of screwy. The real shitshow followed Starrcade with the fast count non-sense, stripping Sting of the title, the Nitro rematch that went off the air before the finish and the finish that was revealed at the first Thunder being a no-contest.

["Evil Brood" Jackson Vanik]

Sting looked like he was sick for the entire year he was out. He was certainly one of the smaller issues in that debacle but he did not do himself any favors. I honestly would have loved a Goldberg/Brock-esque type match. It was never going to be a ****+ match. Make it memorable (in a good way).

[chronocross]

A part of me wanted him to ditch the bodysuit and go back to his old look as I preferred that over Crow Sting, but grew to like it over time.

[Toilet Paper Roll]

I thought it was the worst match I ever saw and I stick to tha today.

The need to shoehorn Bret and the Montreal screwjob into the Main event was idiotic and unnecessary.

Bret should have shown up at starrcade as his debut and announced since he never lost his title he wants to challenge the winner of the main event.

The match should have been Sting beating he crap out of Hogan and then plenty of nWo interference that Sting overcomes.

Maybe... maybe Bret could have helped and we could have had a Bret v Hogan feud over who should have the next title shot.

But that forced ending.... and that poorly cropped match... worst ever. Incredible damage to the product.

[MWC]

I was 8 at the time and I remember my Mom ordered it for us to watch because she was excited for it. Once it ended the way it did she said "I will never order another WCW PPV."

We never did. It was straight back to WWF at the time.

[Ben Wyatt]

Dec 13, 2016 10:40:46 GMT -5 The 1Watcher Experience said:

My reaction to watching it live on PPV was something along the lines of: "Yeesh, what a mess."

That whole PPV was hot garbage, and it sucks, because on paper, the talent they had should have made it their definitive show. Instead, it was the Titanic hitting the iceberg

[chazraps]

I was 10 or 11 then, and was still looking at the TV like "Wait...did they mess something up?"

Even being that young, I remember earlier in the show with the announcement of Nick Patrick as the referee and being like "OK...that's weird, why are we even talking about him again. I thought we were beyond that."

And then the vagueness of Bret as the enforcer. And Hogan clearly, cleanly winning but Bret being a bully.

And I tried to find a reason to be happy about it like "OK, we played dirty against the people who played dirty against us, but doesn't that make us cheaters too?"

By the next morning, I was pretty sad. Especially considering how over-the-moon I was after Starrcade '96 when I thought Piper had won the title as WCW's bait-and-switch was super vague when they just dropped all references to the main event as a world title match and suddenly solely referred to it as a "grudge match" going forward two weeks prior.

[chazraps]

Dec 13, 2016 12:35:13 GMT -5 Ben Wyatt said:

Dec 13, 2016 10:40:46 GMT -5 The 1Watcher Experience said:

My reaction to watching it live on PPV was something along the lines of: "Yeesh, what a mess."

That whole PPV was hot garbage, and it sucks, because on paper, the talent they had should have made it their definitive show. Instead, it was the Titanic hitting the iceberg

I do remember really liking DDP-Hennig, and the build to it really cementing DDP with a solid cap-off to his star-making 1997.