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Post by EoE: Well There's Your Problem on Oct 20, 2020 16:42:24 GMT -5
WWE loves to say that DX and the tank turned the tide in the Monday night wars --- it didn't do shit I barely remember seeing it all these years later I wasn’t missing a minute of Raw back then and I don’t even remember seeing it live. I remember seeing the awful DX fighter jet skit, but don’t even remember the infamous tank. What else was on that episode? uproxx.com/prowrestling/wwf-raw-is-war-best-and-worst-april-27-1998/Not much. (And I know it's written by a guy who ended being a total scumbag that got caught up in the Speaking Out stuff, but these are pretty detailed RAW reviews to find on short notice)
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Post by toodarkmark on Oct 20, 2020 18:31:30 GMT -5
Fingerpoke of Doom is way overrated as a reason that WCW closed. They were getting similar ratings until March of 1999, when WWF got hotter.
Even with the god awful Russo booking, WCW was getting 1997 WWF level ratings at the end, so it didn't kill them off. Not cutting costs and a sale to someone who hated wrestling killed WCW.
I actually liked the angle at the time, and I agree Goldberg should have held it, but I just think it gets way too much credit for the beginning of WCW's downfall. Rock and Steve Austin got red hot, and that more then anything hurt WCW's ratings. WWE is STILL eating off of that hot run.
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petef3
Don Corleone
Posts: 1,783
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Post by petef3 on Oct 20, 2020 19:02:36 GMT -5
WCW's ratings and buys cratered a few months after the Fingerpoke--the Hogan-Flair double turn is really what seemed to set everybody off. There was a tangible decline in business and viewership right after that.
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Post by Citizen Snips Has Left on Oct 20, 2020 19:02:46 GMT -5
Some folk around here have been talking about "The Biggah Pictah" like it was going to be a Hogan-joining-the-nWo moment for 10 years now.
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r.
Bill S. Preston, Esq.
Bye
Posts: 16,454
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Post by r. on Oct 20, 2020 19:43:04 GMT -5
What are moments or other things in wrestling that seem to be help up as examples of either the worst or best things ever that aren’t really important? Example: Why was everyone so up in arms about the Goldberg/Goldust thing? I understand Goldberg was a scary badass, but he was also a face, he wasn’t going to beat up another babyface for making a friendly gesture, if he had, it would have made him an asshole and a heel. It didn't really make sense character-wise for him to be that goofy
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Sephiroth
Wade Wilson
Surviving
Posts: 28,894
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Post by Sephiroth on Oct 20, 2020 19:48:19 GMT -5
This is the greatest night in the history of our sport!
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Post by A Platypus Rave on Oct 20, 2020 19:49:20 GMT -5
What are moments or other things in wrestling that seem to be help up as examples of either the worst or best things ever that aren’t really important? Example: Why was everyone so up in arms about the Goldberg/Goldust thing? I understand Goldberg was a scary badass, but he was also a face, he wasn’t going to beat up another babyface for making a friendly gesture, if he had, it would have made him an asshole and a heel. It didn't really make sense character-wise for him to be that goofy Goldberg himself wasn't goofy or silly in the segment. Golddust put the wig on and Goldberg told him that if he ever did anything like that again he'd murder him. That was like the entire segment.
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Post by GuyOfOwnage on Oct 20, 2020 20:06:54 GMT -5
The Austin 3:16 speech kinda mattered but mostly for being the start of something but it played out pretty slowly in real time. And keep in mind that PPV buys were pretty low in that era. What Austin did week to week mattered more, especially when he finally got around to the Bret feud four months later. You can't tell his story without that moment but it also wasn't an industry changing promo or anything. Yeah, the Bret stuff is what really got him rolling. Had that feud and those matches not happened, I don't think he gets the rocket strapped to him in 97.
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Jonathan Michaels
Bill S. Preston, Esq.
The Archduke of Levity
Here since TNA was still kinda okay
Posts: 18,126
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Post by Jonathan Michaels on Oct 20, 2020 20:21:46 GMT -5
It didn't really make sense character-wise for him to be that goofy Goldberg himself wasn't goofy or silly in the segment. Golddust put the wig on and Goldberg told him that if he ever did anything like that again he'd murder him. That was like the entire segment. Precisely, and people were screaming about how it killed his entire run dead. It absolutely didn’t.
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chrom
Backup Wench
Master of the rare undecuple post
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Member is Online
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Post by chrom on Oct 20, 2020 20:35:47 GMT -5
The Austin 3:16 speech kinda mattered but mostly for being the start of something but it played out pretty slowly in real time. And keep in mind that PPV buys were pretty low in that era. What Austin did week to week mattered more, especially when he finally got around to the Bret feud four months later. You can't tell his story without that moment but it also wasn't an industry changing promo or anything. Yeah, the Bret stuff is what really got him rolling. Had that feud and those matches not happened, I don't think he gets the rocket strapped to him in 97. Without Bret he would've been gone by the Royal Rumble
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Post by toodarkmark on Oct 20, 2020 21:06:23 GMT -5
WCW's ratings and buys cratered a few months after the Fingerpoke--the Hogan-Flair double turn is really what seemed to set everybody off. There was a tangible decline in business and viewership right after that. The ratings on November 2, 1998, two months before the fingerpoke, 4.1. The rating on March 1, 1999, two months after the fingerpoke, 4.3. The PPV buys for Fall Brawl 1998, two months and change before the fingerpoke, 275,000. The PPV buys on Spring Stampede 1999, three and half months after the fingerpoke, 255,000. You bought into a fiction.
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Post by Milkman Norm on Oct 20, 2020 21:14:36 GMT -5
WCW's ratings and buys cratered a few months after the Fingerpoke--the Hogan-Flair double turn is really what seemed to set everybody off. There was a tangible decline in business and viewership right after that. The ratings on November 2, 1998, two months before the fingerpoke, 4.1. The rating on March 1, 1999, two months after the fingerpoke, 4.3. The PPV buys for Fall Brawl 1998, two months and change before the fingerpoke, 275,000. The PPV buys on Spring Stampede 1999, three and half months after the fingerpoke, 255,000. You bought into a fiction. Spring Stampede 1999 was a great show.
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petef3
Don Corleone
Posts: 1,783
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Post by petef3 on Oct 20, 2020 21:29:56 GMT -5
WCW's ratings and buys cratered a few months after the Fingerpoke--the Hogan-Flair double turn is really what seemed to set everybody off. There was a tangible decline in business and viewership right after that. The ratings on November 2, 1998, two months before the fingerpoke, 4.1. The rating on March 1, 1999, two months after the fingerpoke, 4.3. The PPV buys for Fall Brawl 1998, two months and change before the fingerpoke, 275,000. The PPV buys on Spring Stampede 1999, three and half months after the fingerpoke, 255,000. You bought into a fiction. The double turn was at Uncensored, so I don't quite know what Spring Stampede-era ratings are supposed to prove.
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Post by toodarkmark on Oct 20, 2020 21:47:00 GMT -5
The ratings on November 2, 1998, two months before the fingerpoke, 4.1. The rating on March 1, 1999, two months after the fingerpoke, 4.3. The PPV buys for Fall Brawl 1998, two months and change before the fingerpoke, 275,000. The PPV buys on Spring Stampede 1999, three and half months after the fingerpoke, 255,000. You bought into a fiction. The double turn was at Uncensored, so I don't quite know what Spring Stampede-era ratings are supposed to prove. Spring Stampede was the month after Uncensored. I apologize though, I misread what you wrote. You're saying things really went south after Uncensored, not the Fingerpoke. I still dont think that's right. I think they were doing ok. In fact, the ratings for WCW pretty much remained the same if you look at certain dates. Like June 28, 1999 they got a 3.6, on June 30, 1997, they got a 3.3. It's just WWF got really hot with Austin and Rock, and it was a perception that WCW was doing worse. It wasn't until Russo's mess that it started to consistently go down. I mean, Halloween Havoc 1999 did 230,000 buys. I'll say it again, nothing WCW did, Finkerpoke of Doom seems to be the super popular thing to say, or that double turn at Uncensored, turned enough people away to cause it to close, or even for it to be hurt that much. Yeah they lost some audience, but it was still a HUGE audience and one of the top shows on cable. Russo's booking for the few years, the inability to cut costs, and them being canceled by the guy who took over (who also canceled Pinky and the Brain and Animaniacs), is why they closed.
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r.
Bill S. Preston, Esq.
Bye
Posts: 16,454
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Post by r. on Oct 20, 2020 23:21:21 GMT -5
It didn't really make sense character-wise for him to be that goofy Goldberg himself wasn't goofy or silly in the segment. Golddust put the wig on and Goldberg told him that if he ever did anything like that again he'd murder him. That was like the entire segment. Fair enough
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Post by Cyno on Oct 20, 2020 23:34:05 GMT -5
The funny thing about the Fingerpoke of Doom was that was also the night Tony Schiavone gave away that Mick Foley was going to win the WWF Championship with the infamous "butts in the seats" comment. I watched before Nitro and Raw regularly, but Nitro tended to have priority until that night. The combination of Foley being a favorite of mine and the absolute idiocy of the Fingerpoke made Raw my main wrestling fix for Monday nights. The continued decline of WCW's quality in 1999 and especially 2000 drove me away from WCW entirely and I mostly watched just WWF from that point on. Though sometimes I was curious to see what was going on in WCW and one unfortunate night I caught a glimpse of the Oklahoma character.
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Post by protuberance on Oct 20, 2020 23:47:36 GMT -5
The double turn was at Uncensored, so I don't quite know what Spring Stampede-era ratings are supposed to prove. Spring Stampede was the month after Uncensored. I apologize though, I misread what you wrote. You're saying things really went south after Uncensored, not the Fingerpoke. I still dont think that's right. I think they were doing ok. In fact, the ratings for WCW pretty much remained the same if you look at certain dates. Like June 28, 1999 they got a 3.6, on June 30, 1997, they got a 3.3. It's just WWF got really hot with Austin and Rock, and it was a perception that WCW was doing worse. It wasn't until Russo's mess that it started to consistently go down. I mean, Halloween Havoc 1999 did 230,000 buys. I'll say it again, nothing WCW did, Finkerpoke of Doom seems to be the super popular thing to say, or that double turn at Uncensored, turned enough people away to cause it to close, or even for it to be hurt that much. Yeah they lost some audience, but it was still a HUGE audience and one of the top shows on cable. Russo's booking for the few years, the inability to cut costs, and them being canceled by the guy who took over (who also canceled Pinky and the Brain and Animaniacs), is why they closed.
I appreciate the stats and discussion here. I'd like to add that ratings aren't the only way to tell when or why WCW was losing interest.
Ratings tell you how many people watched, not exactly how much they were enjoying it.
WWF was on a roll, WCW was disappointing fans over and over. I don't think WCW fans saw one bad Nitro and immediately stopped watching. But after a trend of disappointment, they gave up at some point.
Even in 1998 and 1999, they needed to start going in the right direction product-wise, and they didn't.
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Post by toodarkmark on Oct 21, 2020 0:03:55 GMT -5
Spring Stampede was the month after Uncensored. I apologize though, I misread what you wrote. You're saying things really went south after Uncensored, not the Fingerpoke. I still dont think that's right. I think they were doing ok. In fact, the ratings for WCW pretty much remained the same if you look at certain dates. Like June 28, 1999 they got a 3.6, on June 30, 1997, they got a 3.3. It's just WWF got really hot with Austin and Rock, and it was a perception that WCW was doing worse. It wasn't until Russo's mess that it started to consistently go down. I mean, Halloween Havoc 1999 did 230,000 buys. I'll say it again, nothing WCW did, Finkerpoke of Doom seems to be the super popular thing to say, or that double turn at Uncensored, turned enough people away to cause it to close, or even for it to be hurt that much. Yeah they lost some audience, but it was still a HUGE audience and one of the top shows on cable. Russo's booking for the few years, the inability to cut costs, and them being canceled by the guy who took over (who also canceled Pinky and the Brain and Animaniacs), is why they closed. I appreciate the stats and discussion here. I'd like to add that ratings aren't the only way to tell when or why WCW was losing interest.
Ratings tell you how many people watched, not exactly how much they were enjoying it. WWF was on a roll, WCW was disappointing fans over and over. I don't think WCW fans saw one bad Nitro and immediately stopped watching. But after a trend of disappointment, they gave up at some point.
Even in 1998 and 1999, they needed to start going in the right direction product-wise, and they didn't.
Right, so I can't prove it with facts, so then I will point out that I watched every Nitro, and was not disappointed at all by the Fingerpoke of Doom. I also still enjoyed parts of Nitro all the way until Russo started booking it. Let's see, I also used to go on Compuserve and AOL and discuss the hell out of wrestling, and people still enjoyed WCW until around when Russo started booking. Sure they disliked stuff here and there, and the WWF trolls hated it, but it was still popular. I also went to sold out shows in 1999. Let's see, how else can I prove to you that people weren't all that super disappointed in the overall, product until mid 1999, when issues with management, Bishoff feeing the pressure and getting let go, and just it getting too big and them not controlling costs, and hiring the worst booker in history, pretty much led to it falling off. And this is my point, if statistics, personal experience, and memories of the mood of the time isn't enough, then I'm not even sure what I could say. Reading through your posts, you were a huge WWF fan, and you have your perspective. My original point is this, people who say the Fingerpoke of Doom led to the death of WCW are wrong.
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Post by protuberance on Oct 21, 2020 0:09:10 GMT -5
I appreciate the stats and discussion here. I'd like to add that ratings aren't the only way to tell when or why WCW was losing interest.
Ratings tell you how many people watched, not exactly how much they were enjoying it. WWF was on a roll, WCW was disappointing fans over and over. I don't think WCW fans saw one bad Nitro and immediately stopped watching. But after a trend of disappointment, they gave up at some point.
Even in 1998 and 1999, they needed to start going in the right direction product-wise, and they didn't.
Right, so I can't prove it with facts, so then I will point out that I watched every Nitro, and was not disappointed at all by the Fingerpoke of Doom. I also still enjoyed parts of Nitro all the way until Russo started booking it. Let's see, I also used to go on Compuserve and AOL and discuss the hell out of wrestling, and people still enjoyed WCW until around when Russo started booking. Sure they disliked stuff here and there, and the WWF trolls hated it, but it was still popular. I also went to sold out shows in 1999. Let's see, how else can I prove to you that people weren't all that super disappointed in the overall, product until mid 1999, when issues with management, Bishoff feeing the pressure and getting let go, and just it getting too big and them not controlling costs, and hiring the worst booker in history, pretty much led to it falling off. I guess I really can't say anything, right? And this is my point, if statistics, personal experience, and memories of the mood of the time isn't enough, then I'm not even sure why I'm spending time typing this out. My original point is this, people who say the Fingerpoke of Doom led to the death of WCW are wrong. Haha, I feel you, man, and I appreciate your passion for that time. I agree, the Fingerpoke of Doom didn't lead to the death of WCW. It's more of a very convenient example of some odd booking.
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metylerca
King Koopa
Loves Him Some Backstreet Boys.
Don't be alarmed.
Posts: 12,477
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Post by metylerca on Oct 21, 2020 0:26:20 GMT -5
Maybe I'm remembering wrong, but every thread following a Smackdown in first half of 2010 heralded CM Punk and the SES as the biggest faction since NWO or DX. Couldn't get a word in to defend Mysterio or Kane or Big Show during this time without being told you were wrong in some form for considering any segment where they got the upper hand a complete burial.
I mean, SES were cool and all, but even then they were midcard heels doing midcard heel things. Punk didn't feel truly like a counter-culture main eventer until just before the Pipebomb when it was common knowledge from commentators he would be leaving soon. Punk would lay in some bombs on the mic that the crowd would "oooh" and "ahhh" to like he was saying the thing that shouldn't be said. Like his heel run in 2009 on top against Jeff Hardy was alright, but it was evident when put against Undertaker at the time that WWE was land of the giants still and he wasn't in the club. And the less said about his 2008 title run, the better.
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