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Post by Deleted on Oct 20, 2020 3:12:17 GMT -5
2000 July, Part 1
July 3, 2000
"The final episode of WCW Saturday Night drew a 1.4 rating."
"Mona (Nora Greenwald) was backstage at ECW TV but is still under contract to WCW, which hasn't been using her ever since she was supposed to be a movie character as a mystery person causing havoc and was then forgotten"
"The latest from those who are close to Russo is that he is sitting things out. His feeling was that Nitro the way it was structured last week had too much wrestling and over the long haul that will cause the ratings to drop and they'll come back to him. At this point most of the top talent is loosely bandying together against Russo, largely because of the belief that Russo wants Hogan out, which is probably the right thing but politically it's a tough move at this point in time because Russo doesn't have the track record for a fight with Hogan and Hogan is one of the best backstage manipulators ever."
"Page, who there is also a feeling he wants phased down, is also vociferous in that direction right now, although both Page and Hogan are political animals who usually are able to maintain good relations with whomever falls into power. The feeling they are pushing is that Russo has pushed himself too hard as a TV character and in angles (the Flair haircut angle) where it would have been better to have a wrestler involved in the cutting for the return, which on that specific issue they are definitely right."
"Flair is not a part of this as he's a Russo ally, as is obvious by letting Russo cut his hair which is the one angle promoters have begged him for decades to allow and he never would, the feeling also is that they shouldn't put a non-wrestler with no physique pinning a guy twice who held the world title twice in recent weeks."
"Bash at the Beach PPV looks to be Jarrett vs. Hogan (when this was originally booked, Hogan was to win the title, but who knows now, as Hogan is running around shooting his own angles on the radio in Tampa that don't involve the WCW title but jumping to Fox)"
"After some 27 years in the same time slot, the WCW Saturday Night dynasty ended this past weekend with the show moving to a one hour format at 11 a.m. Eastern starting on 7/1. This change to the morning has been in the works for about six months due to the declining ratings of the show, and the cancelling of the tapings was a prelude to the move."
"Keiji Muto is in Atlanta and temporarily living there. He didn't come to TV because they haven't come up with an idea of how to use him"
"The show opened with the limo driver (Harold Hoag, former wrestler Ice Train) giving Cat ideas for the card."
"Cat told the Animals to bring him Storm's head. As the show went on, all the FA's, who might as well be Kaientai the way they're pushed as incompetent heels, got bonked on the head one by one."
"Jung Dragons beat Vito in 1:40 by triple-teaming and pinning him after all three came off the top at the same time....The hardcore title didn't change hands, as Schiavone pointed out, because how could three guys hold a title at one time. Except that they just did a few months back on the same very show. If it wasn't so sad, WCW would really be funny."
"3 Count sang. Palumbo & Stasiak were in the production truck messing with their song. Abbott went into the truck and this was really weird. He grabbed Stasiak by the ear and Palumbo, through the force of I guess the gravitational pull of Abbott's gut, came to the ring as well."
"There was a sign in the crowd that read "Goldberg fears Hitler." "
"Scott Steiner beat Bagwell with a belly-to-belly in 3:32. The story is the two of them are great friends now, which makes perfect sense since they've turned on each other a zillion times. They hugged after."
"Douglas was scheduled in the match, but did a worked injury under the advice from Smooth (Ice Train) and fooled Cat to get out of the match. Then he got a real injury the next night. What karma."
"Booker attacked Kanyon at the book signing. They had fans there because Kanyon was giving them free drinks to show up."
"A guy in a Sting mask KO'd Vampiro. The announcers sold it may have been Sting. I believe it was Chris Harris, which means nothing in the long run."
"Goldberg had a chewed up Hall contract. This was very strange. He ate the contract last Monday. But the contract was fine, with no teeth marks or rips on Tuesday, but now on Monday, it's all chewed up. WCW should at least show us the time machine if they're going to run angles that don't make sense."
"Douglas pinned Wall in a total disaster. Douglas was injured, perhaps landing wrong on a DDT. He went for the Pittsburgh plunge but Wall mistimed his jump so Douglas couldn't get him up. Tried again, Wall went up better, but the move was a mess. Finally Douglas just dropped an elbow on him."
"Kanyon is now doing the Abbott angle where he's attacking non-wrestlers. He beat up indie wrestlers and stunt guys dressed up as a TV camera man, a technician and a catering guy during the show."
"Paisley beat Tygress in a match that was said to set new standards for bad. It was supposed to be a three-way with Major Gunns, like that would have made it better. She injured her implant (really) so she was there but couldn't work. Mona and Madusa have been training these women to be really bad pro wrestlers at the Power Plant so they can rush them on TV years before they are ready."
"Nobody can figure out why Bischoff isn't on TV which adds more fuel to rumors regarding the worked split promotion and Bischoff and Hogan going to Fox. Bischoff was at the TV's, although he flew out of Lincoln before the show started"
"Craig Leathers and Annette Yother, who head production and are totally hated by most of the wrestlers, were taken off the road so Keith Mitchell has more backstage input on the production end of the shows"
"Mike Tenay explained how Abbott has a background in submission holds. That was the funniest thing I'd ever heard being that his only submission hold is a hard punch to the face. So then, while laughing, Abbott is down there acting like he's Minoru Tanaka doing working submissions and even using the guard. I don't think I ever saw Abbott once in a fight use the guard. I was just thinking at this stage of the game to do Japanese style matwork with no education like there is anyone in Bozemon, MT who is going to have a clue what they are doing. And they didn't. So then, Abbott catches Steiner in a guillotine. Tony Schiavone, who clearly has never seen a shoot match in his life, is probably having someone explain to him and he's getting it all wrong, saying that Abbott has caught Steiner in the guard, like "the guard" is the name for a submission hold."
"The chauffeur, who looked a little like Memphis TV announcer Cory Maclin, told the Cat the main event. Somehow I think if these guys actually talked with the local cab drivers in the cities they go to, they'd have a better idea what to book."
"Stasiak & Palumbo debuted in their new role as pranksters with no charisma."
"Paisley and Tygress worked just long enough to expose they had no business in a ring. I can see where Major Gunns as a gimmick can get over like a woman in a James Bond movie, but nothing against the other two women, but they are a waste of TV time. There are so many good looking implanted women running around in wrestling who mean zilch, that unless you have a unique charisma to go along with physique enhancements, this isn't two years ago where it was a novelty and it means nothing."
"Goldberg came out to do one of those interviews that epitomizes 70% of WCW's problems. He talked about Salisbury, MD on December 23 and how only because he's so professional that Scott Hall, who he hates more than anyone in wrestling, is still alive. Okay, for those 99.99% of the viewing audience that don't spend their lives listening to silly wrestling gossip, what the hell was he talking about? The announcers need to translate that inside crap into English, although it would be amusing to hear an explanation that Hall was told not to play babyface or do the survey, then against orders, on his interview, he played babyface and did the survey and Goldberg wanted to kill him for being unprofessional."
"Goldberg blamed Hall for his getting 196 stitches in his forearm. Even I have no clue how to translate that one into English. Maybe Hall is really a cartoon character with the power to transform himself into inanimate objects and he turned himself into a limo, and Goldberg thought he was punching Hall when it was really Hall turned into a glass window. Hey, it's the closest thing I can come to making this one make sense."
"David Flair told Daffney that it wasn't him making out with Miss Hancock, that it was Jarrett or somebody else with blond hair and she thought it was him because it was a production screw-up. Well, the second part of that was funny. He should have said it was his dad. At least that would have been funny also since he just had his head shaved. Daffney believed him. People who write pro wrestling scripts clearly had a lot of bad childhood experience with women."
"Booker T came out with his old music. The announcers talked about how we haven't heard that music in a long time. I guess they forgot that Stevie Ray & Tony Norris were using that same music just a few weeks ago. Then again, I'd like to forget that period as well."
"Miller told Douglas he could save his job because Miller needed ratings so he ordered Douglas to wrestle Kronik because he knew it would send the ratings sky high."
"David Flair then shaved the head of Woody Kearse in production for making him look bad. If that's the case, he should also shave the head of everyone that films any of his matches."
"Stasiak & Palumbo were laughing at Kearse's new haircut, so he ran away and locked them in the production truck."
"Stasiak & Palumbo played "Leave it to Beaver" type music instead of Kronik, and made fun of Kronik's music. Kronik went back to the truck and went in the locked door (who ever heard of a door that when locked, the people on the inside can't get out but people on the outside can get in) and beat them up."
"Vampiro and Torborg were in the middle of nowhere with a coffin in a hole. Torborg went to open the coffin to see his beloved bride to be, but Vampiro hit him with a shovel and did some line out of a 1991 Jake Roberts angle. He then brought Asya to Torborg and indicated he wanted the Hulk, I mean the Demon, to come back. Why would anyone want that?"
"Goldberg came out holding Hall's contract. Let's see, that contract was ripped up one week, and eaten the next. And yet it was still in one piece, and looked less wrinkled up than Undertaker"
"Hogan has been calling Bubba the Love Sponge regularly in Tampa. His latest was that FOX was giving him a $150 million talent budget and that after the July PPV, he was quitting WCW and working for FOX. He also said the Vampiro-Dale Torborg angle (largely taken from a movie called "The Vanishing") was terrible, which it is"
"The Nitro Grill in Las Vegas is now only open for dinner during the week and for lunch on weekends, which tells you how it's doing"
"Tom Hunt is the latest to leave WCW. He was the head of the PPV department but left to join the Turner Broadcasting sales force."
"Several major WCW executives including David Crockett are part of the Jay Hassman led team looking to buy ECW"
"The house show main events were all Jarrett over Nash via DQ doing the Dusty finish where Jarrett tried to hit Nash with the belt but Nash hit Jarrett, this after ref Charles Robinson was bumped. Mickey Jay then counted the pinfall with Nash winning the title but Robinson reversed his decision. Nash power bombed Robinson after the match."
"The most amazing thing about the Dusty finish is that you can directly trace killing several of the hottest wrestling markets in the country to overuse of the finish first in the late 80s which actually not only killed every key city (Richmond, Charlotte, Norfolk, Baltimore and Greensboro most notably) but again in the 90s with another round of them killing new cities like St. Louis."
July 10, 2000
"Paul Heyman has denied reports elsewhere the influx of capital came from a group headed by Jay Hassman and former WCW executives such as David Crockett and Rob Garner, who have talked in the past about purchasing the company."
"Just before the start of the current tour, Johnny Ace informed All Japan that he wasn't coming and is expected to take a backstage job with WCW."
"Supposedly there are problems with the finish of the main event on 7/9, although so much b.s. is thrown out there and since it involves Bischoff, Russo and Hogan, everything has to be taken as a possible angle. Originally when this match was made, Hogan was supposed to win the title from Jarrett. Supposedly the idea now is for Jarrett to go over, but Hogan, who has creative control in his contract, is balking."
"Johnny The Bull did a springboard legdrop from the ring onto a chair on the floor, which looked phenomenal. Virtually everyone who heard about the move in the dressing room warned him against doing it, for good reason. He fell off the ropes the first time, but went back and did it again. He was totally messed up doing the move and hospitalized with what was believed to be a broken pelvis. He immediately told Funk to pin him (Funk wasn't supposed to win) and end the match. Funk, apparently feeling this was the match that was going to make him, refused to change the finish in the ring and kept it going another minute before he felt it was time to go home....He was throwing up backstage and had blood in his urine."
"They showed a clip of Asya being blown up practicing her ring entrance by the pyro. Vampiro, dressed as Sting, gave Torborg his Demon costume while another guy dressed like a monk (Chris Daniels?) was in the background."
"They brought out a fat snooty guy who they called Gaylen Chandler as the head of Standards & Practices to get mad about the skit because they were calling the women fat and Jarrett hit him with a guitar shot and laid him out dead. The funny thing is, and this is almost too funny to be true, that the head of S&P at the show is named Gaylen Chandler, as that almost had to be this poofy made up name. However, the guy who took the guitar shot was an actor playing the role of Chandler because the real Chandler refused to do the angle. You know things are bad when guys who have never even been on TV are refusing to do your angles."
"David Flair was kissing up to Daffney again saying it was another guy making out with Hancock. Hancock was wearing a short wedding dress in the ring and David was somewhat paying attention. Crowbar came out and threatened to cut Hancock's hair. David pretended he was sick as an excuse to leave Daffney and hit the ring. Daffney came out and poured Pepto Bismol all over David. David hit Crowbar with two chair shots and cut Daffney's hair, then put the hair and the clippers in Crowbar's hand so Daffney blamed him when she turned around. Daffney and Hancock rolled around on the ground."
"Disco & Konnan brought out Misterio Jr. & Guerrero dressed up like Kidman and Storm. There was a lot of comedy on this show but this was the only thing actually funny."
"The interference was explained, because there is supposed to be no interference in matches on Nitro, on the fact that Cat was having sex with Tygress for all of two minutes, which is the average length of time of a match on Nitro."
"Backstage at the 6/27 tapings in Lincoln, NE, Scott Steiner threw what was reported by several different sources as a totally unprofessional fit regarding being asked to do the job for Mike Awesome. Geez, and it wasn't even a clean job. Steiner claimed he was lied to and reportedly threatened to beat up Terry Taylor, who came back saying he'd sue if that were to happen. Steiner reputedly called him a nasty name for threatening to sue. Steiner was pulled from the TV tapings but scheduled back for the PPV. That'll really send a strong message to the locker room about threatening to beat up your boss."
"Kevin Nash reportedly had an exchange with Taylor a few weeks back as well, although it was just a smartass comment and not any kind of a threat. Taylor gives the impression that he believes he's very smart when it comes to wrestling booking (the only impression I can say is that he is smarter than most and of his four TV's, two were pretty good, one was okay and two weren't good which gives him a perfectly average track record). Nash allegedly said to him if he was so smart about wrestling, how come he never drew a dime"
"The Great American Bash PPV drew an 0.19 buy rate which would be about a $935,000 company gross on the show. That's with the combination of teasing Hogan's retirement, Flair's retirement and the announcement that was supposed to change the entire face of the pro wrestling industry and they did a buy rate along the lines of what ECW does with one hour of relatively low rated TV with no lighting. WCW has attempted to spin that as a success by stating it's a 25 percent increase over the previous months show"
"Brad Siegel has made it clear that he doesn't want Scott Hall back, this, of course, after they've started the angle on television to bring him back....Siegel's niece, Emily Sherman, was dating Hall (who is back with wife Dana) on-and-off for several years in from all accounts was a very stormy relationship"
"In Japan they are saying that Great Muta will debut on the 7/10 Nitro and that he hadn't started because he was busy trying to find an apartment in Atlanta. We'll see. I guess that sounds better than the bookers haven't figured out how to use him"
"Bischoff was mad because they set up to debut the Triple Threat, and Candido immediately showed up injured and it was felt Bigelow showed up out of shape"
"Misterio Jr.'s knee is really bad once again because he's been doing far more than he should"
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Post by Deleted on Oct 21, 2020 4:30:57 GMT -5
2000 July, Part 2
July 17, 2000
"Hogan and Russo worked their own angle last year at Halloween Havoc. It was actually similar to this one, except Hogan was in the Jarrett position, laying down for Sting in the main event. The buy rate for that show was 0.52, a figure they've never come close to since. Hindsight again speaks volumes. But hey, the boys were fooled."
"Remember Hogan's retirement in late 1998? That was an angle to improve the morale of the boys, who by this time hated Hogan. The guy who rallied the boys against Hogan was Kevin Nash. Hogan and Nash, as the story went, couldn't get along, and when Nash got the book, Hogan retired from wrestling. The wrestlers celebrated. New guys were going to get pushed. In reality, Hogan and Nash were working together planning an angle. Nash would get the respect of the wrestlers for standing up for the rest of the locker room to Hogan and eliminating him. The wrestlers were all led to believe Hogan was gone. Morale went up. Hogan would get a vacation and get to come back as world champion. Nash wouldn't have to do a job to lose the title, and he'd get to end the Goldberg win streak."
"I actually only had one person in the company call me the night of the show who thought it was a shoot, but everyone who called, thought they were about the only ones who didn't think it was real saying everyone else believed it. By the next morning, the beliefs were starting to change as things worked out too conveniently, but many in the company were still of the belief it was a shoot. The big clue everyone was clinging to was that Eric Bischoff stormed off during the show, flew home as to not be at Nitro, and was getting the word out how mad he was that it all took place."
"Hogan gets to be Bret Hart, and swerve himself into the position of trying to be relevant again, just as he's tried by making himself, count 'em, red and yellow Hulk, Stone Cold Terry Bollea and finally the return of Hollywood Hogan to smaller and smaller ratings and attendance figures all year. Russo gets the respect of the dressing room for ridding it of the Hogan cancer and even got to mention names of the frustrated guys to make them feel important, and most importantly, if it worked, he'd have undying loyalty, something a booker needs to get things accomplished, and something no booker in WCW has had in years."
"In front of the wrestlers, the word was out that Booker T was going to end the show as world champion. Hogan was going to get to look good and beat Jarrett via DQ due to a Scott Steiner run-in, which happened to also be the basic agreed upon finish for Bret Hart vs. Shawn Michaels in Montreal, which also had a similar back story evolving behind-the-scenes all week, and when that match was over and became legendary, we knew it's basics would be repeated in rings for years. How would that possibly make sense to lead to a Jarrett vs. T match later with T winning the title, at least having it come off any different from the other million title changes this year that have meant nothing?"
"Even if Cat could make a ruling regarding interference and ordering Jarrett back out, having Booker T and not Hogan come out at that point would be a natural letdown and still leave Hogan far too strong for a guy who he supposedly wanted gone. Though this story certainly took the spotlight in a sense away from T's winning, it added tons more tension to their match."
"We know Russo is obsessed by the match that made Montreal famous in wrestling, as he's done offshoots of it so many times in both companies, well past the point of them meaning anything. This came off too much like an offshoot of something that only happens once or twice in a lifetime, by people who live for the swerve. But no, Hogan refused to do anything but take the belt clean and Russo's hands were tied. Hogan is perceived as selfish enough and disliked enough in the dressing room that this could happen. But the idea that he'd demand to win a belt that isn't worth anything is where it falls apart."
"Clearly, if it was a work, the only ones in on it appear to have been Hogan, Bischoff and Russo, and maybe Siegel. Jarrett and T both knew about the later match and T knew he was getting the belt. They even went to the extent of having Johnny Ace book a complicated finish, this time with Hogan winning the title, in front of Jarrett, at least according to Hogan's version of the story he said the next morning with Bubba, as he insisted it was all a shoot, which has been his vehicle for pushing all his recent works."
"The show had a storyline throughout involving Cat and the Jung Dragons. At the beginning of the show, Cat got out of the limo and heard their music. They tried to attack him but he laid them all out. They did a few more segments, one with them stalking him and another where they finally laid him out, all based on an old Pink Panther movie."
"Goldberg was backstage with Hall's contract. It was a most remarkable piece of paper, having returned to its original form after being crumpled up as well as eaten on previous TV shows."
"First the girls pulled Mark Johnson's pants off. He looked ridiculous. David Flair had his pants pulled off. He looked semi ridiculous. Daffney put Hancock's face in David's crotch. Crowbar ran in and took his own pants off. So then he and David started doing spots. Imagine how ridiculous David Flair usually looks trying to wrestle, and multiply that by having both guys working in their underwear. The shears got involved and there was threats to cut Hancock's hair. Then, as things couldn't possibly get worse, Hancock grabbed the mic, said she knew what everyone came to see, and took off her dress and starting dancing in her panties. They explained she voluntarily lost. It ended up with everyone throwing cake at each other."
"They did a lot of near falls. In fact, both the PPV and Nitro the next night had a totally different match style that to me looked based on All Japan near fall structure, which makes sense with Johnny Ace working here."
"They did a spot where T took the brick out of the book. Kanyon hit him with the book. T sold it for a near fall, but then got right up, with them explaining it by saying he was playing possum."
"With the bad lighting in the graveyard, it was hard to watch and a total waste of time. They ended up in a river. Vampiro kidnapped Asya. Asya was laying dead and Vampiro came out of a casket and spit stuff in Demon's eyes. Finally Vampiro hit Demon with one of those breakable tombstones (an actual headstone, not a piledriver), put him in a casket, threw him in a grave, and lit it on fire."
"Hogan put his foot on Jarrett for the pin. Jarrett got right up and walked out and didn't look very happy in the process. Hogan said it was bullshit like this that Russo was doing that was ruining wrestling. The announcers went on and on about what they just saw saying it was real life, not a part of the format, etc. Mark Madden, who hates Hogan, took great delight, clearly thinking it was a shoot, that Hogan was exposed for what he is."
"A whole bunch of Stings came out with masks. One of them, actually Nashville wrestler Chris Harris, hit Vampiro with a bat with the announcers asking the question as if it was the real Sting. God, after four years, they still make their announcers look like idiots and they wonder why nobody believes any of their angles."
"When Vampiro came back, in the background you could see Hogan and son Nicholas leaving the building ("Wrestling with Shadows" with young son Blade in tears as daddy was screwed by the evil promoter)."
"Russo then came out and tried to do a face interview. Nobody reacted to what he said. It was kind of embarrassing having him do his pep talk ("Beyond the Mat," Paul Heyman before the first ECW PPV show) and the paid and papered crowd, apparently not computer savvy enough to be in on all the things that happened during the week, had no clue what he was talking about."
"As everyone in the WWF will attest, if nothing else, Russo is loyal. He came to save the career of Booker T (hey, didn't he make him G.I. Bro before the discrimination lawsuit got more heated?) MIA, FA's and Jarrett and started ripping on the egomaniac Hulk Hogan. Hogan played his "creative control" card ("Wrestling with Shadows," because Russo is to this day obsessed with getting over that the other Vince was right). He said that Hogan insisted that he win the title from Jarrett. So he gave Hogan a belt and said that you will never see Hogan again."
"It made for great TV for me, but the crowd reacted about like they did when Andy Kaufman faked a shoot and faked breaking character on Saturday Night Live all those years ago."
"The basic theory seems to be eventually breaking up WCW into a Bischoff led group on one show, which would actually be the old Millionaires Club, against a Russo-led group on another show, the New Blood, which was probably the original idea for April but they felt swerving everyone with them being put together and giving 12 weeks of programming that made no sense was more important I guess."
"Bill Goldberg pinned Diamond Dallas Nash (Kevin Nash) in 4:21....Scott Steiner came out in the guise of Nash's best friend (replacing Scott Hall, who apparently wasn't allowed back for this angle despite them hyping him like crazy including on the show) and turned on him at the end. I think that's four PPVs in a row where the most hyped match on the card had the exact same finish. Goldberg then speared and jackhammered Nash and ripped up Hall's contract."
"The next day on TV, WCW acted like something had happened but never touched on it, aside from Madden making reference after reference to guys who show up once a month and steal their check. They made reference to the idea they couldn't talk about things for legal reasons."
"Hogan did his obligatory interview on Bubba the Love Sponge....Hogan talked about getting the biggest pop on the show and recognized things were amiss when he saw Russo come out, but he said the original finish involved Russo but that Steiner was going to run Russo off and help Hogan win the title. He said he went looking for Russo back stage ("That dirty rat fink has locked himself in his office," -- Wrestling with Shadows) but couldn't find him. He saw Russo and started yelling at him when Doug Dillenger told him that he didn't need a lawsuit and escorted him out of the building and Russo has someone covering his back (according to two wrestlers, this would have been Steiner). He said he'd be on Raw tonight except he couldn't get out of his contract."
"Russo was still insistent the next day it was a shoot claiming that people will know it's a work if Hogan ever returns to the company and he doesn't quit. The explanation given by those close to Russo is that Siegel actually backed him and not Hogan, and Bischoff was neutral, but that wouldn't explain, based on how it went down, Russo not taking any punishment for double-crossing Bischoff, his superior, on a finish, and for Bischoff not being at television the next day to at least clear the air with everyone about what happened. After all this came the word, and people in the company at this point expect that everything like this could be a work, that Siegel made the decision that Russo would be in charge creatively of Nitro and PPV while Ed Ferrara would be in charge of Thunder."
"WCW Saturday Morning debuted in its new time slot with an 0.8 rating."
"The match quality was much improved from a combination of more of the All Japan style false finishes (no doubt attributable to Johnny Ace), more time allotted to the matches and more clean finishes, leaving the run-ins and angles until after a finish, not to mention most of the bad wrestlers (okay, don't bring up Kronic's match) were off the show so they used good athletic guys against each other."
"In a hilarious segment, Tank Abbott came out with his shorts and a tux, while 3 Count came out all in tuxes with a supposed gold record. They came to the ring and Shane Helms was on a ladder hanging the gold record above the ring. The Jung Dragons attacked them. Tank KO'd all three with one punch each until Great Muta returned and blew mist. Muta got a shockingly huge pop considering his big United States run was in 1989"
"It should be noted that the match quality on the show, like the PPV, was generally way up because Johnny Ace had a hand in laying out a lot of the finishes, which meant they did a lot of near falls and All Japan style pacing."
"Cat has turned total face and is no longer playing an incompetent role (a black commissioner with a positive portrayal and a black world champion on the same weekend, right after an AP story about Bobby Walker protesting the Thunder card in Columbus, GA)."
"Lenny Lane was back after doing a worked angle everywhere that he hated the company and was quitting, at ringside with a large sign that said "Use me." "
"Vampiro did an interview and brought Demon, his new partner, out of the casket. Vampiro is saddled with the lamest gimmick in the company. He ordered Demon to attack Asya, which he did until another fake Sting came out with the lights off so you couldn't see closely, doing Sting signature moves to lay Vampiro out. The fans booed the hell out of this because they could see it wasn't the real Sting, which was only made worse for TV viewers with the announcers trying to sell it was the real Sting. I don't know that it wasn't, but not one fan at home or at the building thought it was and were booing and made the announcers look bad selling it."
"Jarrett was throwing furniture backstage while Kanyon banged another guy."
"T pinned Kanyon clean with a uranage, which is now called the book end. The music guy played T's music before the ref even finished his count. It would not be his last mistake of the show."
"David then shaved part of trainer Danny Young's hair because he was rubbing Hancock's upper thigh. She told him she had an injury and it needed rubbing. David walked in and saw it, and she claimed she wasn't hurt so David freaked out on the trainer."
"Miller grabbed the ref shirt and went to count the pin. The music guy screwed up and played T's music before Jarrett kicked out."
"Bob Ryder, who does the WCW Live show as well as runs 1wrestling.com, and Bill Banks (who did so on WCW's own web site), on the same day, wrote somewhat similar stories about the sorry state of affairs in the company. Both ran down the current state of the company, and offered the same basic suggestion of giving more power to the bookers (Banks mentioned Vince Russo, who was the one who brought him in from WWF, in particular) and not letting the talent run the show....Ryder also suggested firing Goldberg as an example and insinuated his injuries from the windshield had healed and he'd been taking additional time off holding the company up (and he'd hardly be the first to have that belief)....Goldberg was furious about the article. Reportedly a close advisor to Goldberg told him "not to take the bait," believing it was a planted story designed to get Goldberg hot and have him lose his cool and thus justify the position of his enemies that he was out of control and wouldn't do business that wanted him out."
"It was well known that Goldberg had gone back to Brad Siegel complaining about the heel turn and that he thought it had been a bad idea. It was very hard for Russo and Bischoff to convince Siegel to allow the turn and convince Goldberg to do it since Goldberg had been against it from the start before agreeing. Probably both by that point were upset that Goldberg wanted to do a Sting after the fact where it would be forgotten in three weeks"
"With Russo taking himself off television, Ric Flair was screwed again. The angle he waited 25 years to do, getting his head shaved, and wouldn't you know it, once again there is no comeback"
"John Hugger (Johnny the Bull) suffered several internal injuries including pelvic problems and a ruptured bladder from his landing doing the springboard legdrop to the floor in the 7/3 match against Funk. He also suffered a torn up buttocks and is expected out of action for about two months....Hugger practiced the move during the day using a crash pad for his landing. At one point there was talk of having the crash pad out there for the move, but for whatever reason, that was decided against and people backstage were advising him not to do the move."
"The prevailing talk in the company now is that they need to make a big push for September, feeling that the ratings will increase big when Raw moves to TNN, and fans that traditionally turn to USA and see a movie will then watch TNT."
"As mentioned on Nitro, over the weekend, Bam Bam Bigelow saved two children in a fire and suffered second degree burns in the process"
"There was a large ad in an Australian newspaper on 7/8 for the WCW Down Under tour with a photo of Goldberg on the ad calling him the "current world champion." Goldberg hasn't held the title since losing it at Starrcade 1998. The original plans, but those were scrapped when Russo and Bischoff took back over in April, were actually for Goldberg to win the title at this past weekend's Bash at the Beach PPV."
"A lot of internal panic among office employees increased when Robin Shaw, who is the daughter of Bill Shaw, who formerly ran WCW and is a long-time bigwig at Turner, transferred out of WCW to another Turner company"
July 24, 2000
"Going unopposed, Raw drew a disappointing 6.17 rating (5.77 first hour; 6.58 second hour) and 10.1 share, its lowest unopposed rating since 1998. There are two factors in the rating, the first being that overall viewership was down, and the second is that TNT's movie "Nuremberg Part Two" drew a 5.31, nearly double Nitro's average in the same slot."
"In regards to the Jay Hassman group that had talked about buying into ECW, which included current WCW Vice Presidents David Crockett and Rob Garner, Crockett has told people that while he was approached by Hassman, he has already turned him down about being a part in any proposed wrestling endeavor"
"The match quality has gone way up with the All Japan style in-ring work with Ace helping lay out matches."
"Muta beat Vampiro with a moonsault in 3:59. Vampiro was with ICP, who are back. We should have an over/under on those guys. He had to be talked into doing the job as there was a fuss backstage."
"The announcers explained there was no interference on Nitro, forgetting that Torrie Wilson interfered twice earlier in the show."
"Main was Goldberg NC Steiner in 5:18 with Cat as ref. Both guys were cheered, Steiner maybe more since he's the local guy. Nash came in and power bombed both guys and left them laying to set up the three-way. Goldberg wasn't thrilled about being left laying but did it."
"Steve Borden was the guy under the mask as the Sting that the people didn't believe was Sting at the Jacksonville tapings"
"Kid Romeo was released for unprofessional conduct and unreliability, in that he was booked on spot shows and no-showed"
"The word from above in WCW is that all show advertising from this point forward is to not list either line-ups or even names appearing, with the belief that it is WCW Nitro and WCW Thunder alone that sells the tickets and that by not announcing any names, since none of the names are draws, then there becomes no such thing as no-shows"
"Lots of people in the company have gotten really upset over how far everyone went trying to get last week's work, noting that Vince Russo even went to the bar after the PPV, which he never does, to say goodbyes to everyone acting like he expected he would be fired, and Eric Bischoff working everyone with the idea he was either taking a sabbatical or even quitting the company in disgust, and the lack of trust of anything and anyone within the company has gotten worse."
"Another key employee quitting this week as part of the mass exodus in the front office was Suzanne Stern, who was in charge of promotions and was considered very good at her position"
"On the announcing front, while many in the company feel Schiavone should be removed, he has so much political power in key places he's untouchable. The general feeling was Stevie Ray did well, although I didn't think so, and because of the lawsuit, they are pushing far more African Americans in positions where they have positive characters so that's another positive."
"Evan Karagias was complaining about wanting 3 Count to have a tougher persona than they're being portrayed and didn't like the idea that all three get bossed around by Abbott"
July 31, 2000
"On 7/21, the first show that went on sale, a Nitro taping in Melbourne on 10/13, sold out the Rod Laver Arena (capacity for a Nitro taping would be probably close to 10,000) with tickets priced from $300 Australian down to $65, sold out in less than three hours (reports of a 90 minute sellout are exaggerated, but only slightly). No figures were available at press time but because the majority of the seats were priced at $150, the gate, even in U.S. dollars (Australian dollar is worth 58 cents U.S.), may close in on the magic $1 million mark that no WCW event in history has topped (probably will fall closer to $900,000 but we haven't been given breakdowns)."
"There was some trepidation going in that the local promoters, the Paul Dainty organization, had priced the shows out of the market. The group paid WCW a flat $1.5 million fee for five dates plus had to cover expenses for all the major stars coming abroad for one week, a 10/7 Nitro taping in Brisbane for airing two days later, a 10/9 Thunder taping in Sydney for airing two days later (which was also a first-day sellout of a 10,000 seat building), a house show on 10/11 in Perth (which had the weakest advance of the shows), and the double-shot in Melbourne on 10/13 and 10/14 (which sold about 4,000 tickets at last word), for a Nitro and Thunder respectively."
"Sid Vicious represented WCW on the promotional tour and it was considered a success. The media liked him because he didn't try and pretend pro wrestling was a shoot, which is the usual turnoff for the media when it comes to dealing with pro wrestlers."
"The special Tuesday edition of Nitro on 7/18 drew a 2.36 rating (2.00 first hour; 2.70 second hour) and a 3.9 share. The new day was heavily hyped and they did present a strong show....The show's rating built throughout, which is the sign of a good show, peaking at 3.7 for the final four minutes of the Goldberg-Steiner match, which shows that there is money in that match-up if, and of course that's the big if, handled correctly."
"Early estimates have the Bash at the Beach doing an 0.19 buy rate, which is a $1.22 million company gross. More than half of the total would go to Hogan ($675,000 base)"
"Who would have ever thought that Mitsuharu Misawa causing the All Japan split might have ended up being the saving grace for WCW because it led to Johnny Ace retiring from the ring and laying out the matches All Japan style here"
"Highlight was Vito going to pull out a table and it got stuck under the ring."
"Cat said they would let the fans vote on the internet for T's challenger. It wound up with Sting getting 35%, Goldberg 30% and Vampiro 10% and the rest of the guys were way down the line. Hogan did a great job of elevating Kidman since he got 1% There were a total of 11,000 votes cast, and the system crashed due to overload, so that may be a very low level of what it would have done."
"T vs. Sting never happened. Goldberg jumped Sting and he went out on a stretcher. Fans at the house shows this weekend seeing him in a mask and out of shape didn't believe it was him. He did the interview so everyone could tell it really was him, and vowed to unmask later in the show (since he was stretchered out, it was another undelivered tease)."
"Goldberg then beat T by destroying him, making him juice, and trapping him in an armbar. Stevie Ray threw in the towel but Goldberg threw the towel out before the ref saw it. Cat came out and stopped the match at 2:41 and awarded it to Goldberg but said that he couldn't win the title because there was no pin. The announcers tried to play it up as heroic than Booker didn't tap to the armbar, which may have meant something if anyone had ever tapped to an armbar on a WCW telecast in the last 20 years."
"At one point a ladder was involved and Misterio Jr., Disco and Rection were on top of the cage and a table was set up. Rection in the afternoon thought about taking the Mick Foley bump off the cage through a table. Keep in mind that Bill DeMott has very bad knees and has already had too many concussions, and Foley, taking the same bump, hurt himself really bad. Anyway, he was up there and was supposed to say something to Misterio Jr. like "out of my way" if the crowd adrenaline would give him the "guts" (I wouldn't use the word guts) because when he looked down, it was awfully high and scary, as the signal to stay out of his way he's taking the bump. He screamed it but thankfully for him, Misterio Jr. didn't hear it and didn't get out of his way, and probably saved his career in the process. Cajun then took a bump into a table for no reason other than recognizing it had been set up and Rection wasn't falling."
"T then beat Goldberg in 2:28 with a uranage suplex when Jarrett attacked Goldberg (the announcers explained this by saying Jarrett would rather face T on the PPV for the title than Goldberg, thus burying T once again as champion), and Cat also came out and kicked Goldberg, to set up the pin. Goldberg got right back up and speared and jackhammered T. Goldberg took almost the entire match until the interference. Let's see what this all accomplished? Goldberg lost with no apparent purpose other than for T to have a pin on him because T isn't really over as a champion. However, the scenario of the pin only served to hurt T, since Goldberg treated him like Hogan treated Kidman, and after Kidman and Vampiro's wins over Hogan, we've seen how much that affected their respective careers. They gave away a much stronger main event--twice--for free, on TV, established their champ isn't in Goldberg's league, and then expect fans to pay $30 for T defending against Jarrett."
"The idea was on paper to get T over and Goldberg wasn't cooperative and decided to lose like Hogan and Nash (and if they understood how to book, this wasn't the time or the place for him to do it but that's a fruitless argument). After a very long period of haggling, the end result is that they just wanted Goldberg to lay down for three for the uranage, to get the uranage over as Booker's finish, and then Goldberg could kill him after, but the way it went down, I don't think they accomplished that either."
"Supposedly what was going to happen in the poll is that whomever got the most votes, and they figured it would be Sting, would then be laid out by Goldberg to set up the two matches. They are still going to do T vs. Sting somewhere down the line"
"Highlight of Thunder on 7/19 was a Nash interview, which was positively brilliant. It was the "new work" deal, where he pretended he was shooting because WCW spends far too much time booking for the two percent than the other 98 percent, burying Goldberg for getting the big head, never paying his dues and basically saying the company gave him everything, which only serves to weaken Goldberg to the average fan, talking about his contract expiration date and ending with Hudson doing the new work idea that they have another problem with the finish and Nash was out there saying he never lost a bar fight in seven years as a bouncer and he was going over."
"Nash gave Booker T the ultimate backhanded compliment saying he was happy when they gave him the strap because he'd been with the company so many years, basically telling everyone watching the show he was a hand-picked company champion rewarded simply because he'd been around (as opposed to getting it because they had to create a new star and he was the best candidate they found since they wanted to keep it from Goldberg or Steiner and the politically astute members would understand whoever got the title was only there to put Goldberg or Steiner over strong later, not to mention the complete change in the face of WCW in the wake of the racial discrimination lawsuit) as opposed to someone who in any sense had earned his spot. Ohmygod, next thing you know on TV they're all going to say it's a shoot."
"An idea that has been batted around is for Sting to make a save for Nash under the ski mask, but when he takes the mask off, it's actually Hall."
"They gave Mike Sanders a surprise win over Crowbar using Jarrett's guitar. This led to a show long angle where Sanders was first laid out by Jarrett's guitar, mad at him for gimmick stealing, then as he recovered, was hit with a weak chair shot by Daffney for screwing Crowbar, and then when he was recovering several segments later was one of the many on the show (including Jimmy Behrend doing the road report) that Kanyon used the diamond cutter on."
"They did an angle where Wall lost a tables match to Lenny Lane, but it came out after the match that Wall lost on purpose for his buddy since Lane needed to win to get his job back, and Cat fired Wall because he threw the match, and obviously, you can't have anything like that in wrestling."
"Tank Abbott destroyed Great Muta in 1:29 with the KO punch after Muta sprayed the mist at Cat. Wonder if WCW booked Nash or Goldberg or Steiner to Japan and New Japan asked any of them to job for Fujita in 1:29 how WCW management would react and how badly any of those wrestlers would cry about it? It was too obvious how Muta felt since he got right back up immediately after the pin."
"As things stand, the company is still projecting losses to be around $60 million this year, and if the losses are only $30 million, which is believed to be difficult to impossible to get to, it would be considered a huge success"
"Steiner, once again, for his outburst on Taylor, was suspended for exactly two TV shows, and with pay. His suspension after the Flair interview was also with pay. And people wonder why WCW has so many problems."
"Reports are with Hogan and Bischoff gone, the morale is the best it has been in years since the young wrestlers finally see them getting a fair break, although there is a lot of worrying about Hall & Nash back together with their savvy putting a stop to that. The morale did take a major downturn among the crew that worked the house shows over the weekend with the reality check of where the company still is. A lot of the big stars were mad to be on the road in front of such small crowds, complaining that the shows should have been canceled."
"The woman always with Kiwi is a now red-headed Kathy Dingman, who was B.B. in the WWF until recently getting released, and will probably go under the name Papaya. She is also engaged to Bob Holly, who WCW is apparently going to make a play for when his contract expires. Originally the role with Kiwi was going to be played by April Hague (Hunter), who was one of the original NWO Girls with Jarrett from earlier in the year, but some were squeamish over how revealing her photos were on her web site and she wasn't brought back"
"There was legit heat with Brian Adams regarding the commentary by Konnan on Thunder during the Kronik match with FA's saying that Kronik was stuck in the 80s on TV. Adams was so hot after talking with family and friends that he wanted to fight Konnan, and the two had a confrontation at the 7/24 Nitro before Konnan talked Adams out of being so hot"
"From the WCW's daily desk calendar for Christmas for the date of 7/25, it covers in 1996: "In a bizarre final, no one was ever declared the winner in a match which pitted Kevin Nash, Razor Ramon and Hollywood Hogan against Sting, Lex Luger and Randy Savage." Things like that just do wonders for WCW if the WWF lawsuit ever goes to court"
"In Toledo, they had literally a 20 second Sting vs. Vampiro match after about a 40 second Sting vs. Demon match that the crowd crapped on, largely because they didn't believe the masked guy was Sting (he actually was) and the bout was so short. In Dayton, they went 5:00 but the crowd, seeing Sting in the mask, didn't believe it was him and booed that and the shortness of the match."
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