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What if Giant Baba lived five years longer?

He hypothetically passes in 2004, after Inoki alienates the NJPW locker room with his shooty bullshit and Mutoh & Co jump. ship Do they join up and bolster the ranks of a stacked AJPW roster? Do they form their own company (a super-powered ZERO-ONE?) because Baba keeps in place AJPW's isolationist policies? Does Misawa get fed up and bounce anyways? I want answers.

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On 10/21/2021 at 5:12 AM, paintedbynumbers said:

one thing I can say for certain is Rap would still be crap. 

You've made a lot of bad posts, so believe me when I say that this one being your worst post is truly saying something. 

A healthy Perfect who jumps to WCW probably fits into a role with the Four Horsemen and has a pretty long career in WCW as a tag worker/sometimes TV or US champ through the mid-90s. Once Arn is hurt and Pillman leaves, the Horsemen are a complete mess pretty much the rest of the way, and Hennig as a stabilizing force in that group would have been cool. By the time he made it there, they just wanted to have him turn heel and join the nWo, which was sort of a waste except the Horsemen were dead by that time anyway, even if its members didn't know it.

I actually enjoy Mongo McMichael (only somewhat ironically), but that Mongo/Debra/Jarrett love triangle was awful. You stick Jarrett in a Horsemen with Flair, Benoit, and Hennig and that's actually pretty watchable! 

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2 hours ago, SirSmellingtonofCascadia said:

You've made a lot of bad posts, so believe me when I say that this one being your worst post is truly saying something. 

A healthy Perfect who jumps to WCW probably fits into a role with the Four Horsemen and has a pretty long career in WCW as a tag worker/sometimes TV or US champ through the mid-90s. Once Arn is hurt and Pillman leaves, the Horsemen are a complete mess pretty much the rest of the way, and Hennig as a stabilizing force in that group would have been cool. By the time he made it there, they just wanted to have him turn heel and join the nWo, which was sort of a waste except the Horsemen were dead by that time anyway, even if its members didn't know it.

I actually enjoy Mongo McMichael (only somewhat ironically), but that Mongo/Debra/Jarrett love triangle was awful. You stick Jarrett in a Horsemen with Flair, Benoit, and Hennig and that's actually pretty watchable! 

a lot of bad posts?  Grow some balls internet warrior and name some. Coming from someone who enjoys Mongo that's truly  saying something.  

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What if Flair and Bischoff don't fall out over Flair going to watch his kid's wrestling tournament over going to that Thunder taping in April 1998? Do the Horsemen reunite then? How does that change summer of 1998? Does that throw a monkey wrench into what they were doing with Goldberg? Does Flair perhaps get the spot that DDP got with Karl Malone against Rodman and Hogan at Bash at the Beach? Does he get the spot with Jay Leno at Road Wild? How does that affect Bret Hart who was basically just meandering through the midcard around that time?

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1 hour ago, odessasteps said:

It would have robbed us of the Greenville promo, arguably the best moment on Nitro 

It's crazy cause Flair talks for all of what? Two minutes? Bischoff comes out, Flair goes on his little infamous tirade, and they cut to commercial. Arn's introduction part lasted forever including bringing everyone out one by one. The real what if is imagining if Flair got real time to speak. 

Quote

What if Flair and Bischoff don't fall out over Flair going to watch his kid's wrestling tournament over going to that Thunder taping in April 1998? Do the Horsemen reunite then? How does that change summer of 1998? Does that throw a monkey wrench into what they were doing with Goldberg? Does Flair perhaps get the spot that DDP got with Karl Malone against Rodman and Hogan at Bash at the Beach? Does he get the spot with Jay Leno at Road Wild? How does that affect Bret Hart who was basically just meandering through the midcard around that time?

I think the wrestling tournament thing was just the straw that broke the camel's back. I think Eric was really starting to feel himself ego wise, and the Horsemen as a group were starting to be phased down if not completely phased down. Despite what Nash or Hall might have said on shoot interviews over the years especially the few years after WCW was no more, the Horsemen were still very much over. Not just in JCP areas. Every goddamn where. People throwing up the four fingers with the thumb tucked. Out of all of the things that stayed relatively cool despite the presence of the nWo, the Horsemen were one of them (along with DDP, some of the luchadors, and later Goldberg). The nWo did a great job burying the WCW name but it took them moving heaven and Earth for them to finally bury the Horsemen. And they did it. Flair in late 97 found himself in the exact same place with Herd in late 90. The folks in power thought he was done. However, thing is in 1990, business took a nosedive when Sting finally got the title. So out of nowhere, Flair wins the belt back at some house show and it buys us Flair in WCW another six or seven months. However, heads were going to butt at some point. Violently. WCW was hotter than fish grease in 1997 and Bischoff really thought he could put Vince out of business. It's clear he didn't see Flair as part of the plan to do that. 

As for the celebrity match stuff, there is no way DDP doesn't get that spot. He was too over by then. The only way Flair becomes a bigger part of WCW at that time is if Bischoff somehow has a miraculous change of heart (and strategy) or if some of the other big name players decide they went too far. Flair has always been close with Hogan, but the other guys not so much. Backstage politics were always going to play a part in Flair not being utilized at a certain level. Going to the wrestling tournament was just the match to light the fire. Shit, just at Starrcade 97 (the biggest show in company history), you had guys taking off like it was nothing. Vince in a hundred years, short of a someone losing a loved one, would never allow someone who is abled bodied just to casually or otherwise miss a Wrestlemania. You're telling me Ric Flair who is easily in the running for the best wrestler and all around performer in pro wrestling history on any continent cannot go to his son's wrestling matches? It's just a convenient excuse to show Bischoff and Flair had little to no real relationship and real animosity had been building up. That's it.

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I always figured Page getting the celebrity matches was a make-good for an inevitable title push being put on the back burner because of Goldberg. I’m sure he made more money than he’d ever seen in his life from those shows. 

It’s wild how effective seeing Flair get that legitimately emotional was at the time considering nearly breaking down in tears became a standard part of his promos later. 
 

 

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4 hours ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

Shit, just at Starrcade 97 (the biggest show in company history), you had guys taking off like it was nothing. Vince in a hundred years, short of a someone losing a loved one, would never allow someone who is abled bodied just to casually or otherwise miss a Wrestlemania. You're telling me Ric Flair who is easily in the running for the best wrestler and all around performer in pro wrestling history on any continent cannot go to his son's wrestling matches? It's just a convenient excuse to show Bischoff and Flair had little to no real relationship and real animosity had been building up. That's it.

It seems like there were 20 people on that show who either had a last minute emergency so that they couldn’t wrestle or a last minute something else so that they couldn’t do business but still wrestle. I maintain that it was because they were sick about Hogan. Midcarders talking about how they never cared about WCW is as big a load as Eric saying not letting Sting win was best for business. He still says that nonsense. Anyway Hogan refusing to do business just plain killed their spirits. The only exception to that is Nash, but he probably would have went ahead and did business had Hogan done so because he wouldn’t have had the guts to be the first to try a fast one. 

Edited by BloodyChamp
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10 hours ago, zendragon said:

I know about Nash and his  "heart attack" but are there stories about Raven and Konnan not wrestling?

I believe the Konnan story is his girlfriend gave birth to a stillborn child. Raven had an inflamed pancreas. 

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Wow, that brought up a memory of Konnan cutting a promo on Nash (I think) after the Finger Poke of Doom/NWO Reorganization where he mentioned how Nash held him and cried with him after the death of his child. It’s his life, but even as a kid I knew that was heavy for a wrestling promo. 

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If that’s what happened to Konnan then I respect that but that would make 2 having a baby excuses. That’s why Dean mailed it in but at least he wrestled. Then Bischoff says now that he had to make Dean wrestle to draw the line on people not working the show. That implies that even he knew what was going on. And what a move...drawing the line on copout number 76,469. Inflamed pancreas, heart attack...I just dunno if I buy all of that happening at once over my feeling even though I can’t prove it. 

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24 minutes ago, BloodyChamp said:

If that’s what happened to Konnan then I respect that but that would make 2 having a baby excuses. That’s why Dean mailed it in but at least he wrestled. Then Bischoff says now that he had to make Dean wrestle to draw the line on people not working the show. That implies that even he knew what was going on. And what a move...drawing the line on copout number 76,469. Inflamed pancreas, heart attack...I just dunno if I buy all of that happening at once over my feeling even though I can’t prove it. 

By spring and summer 1998, you could make a decent roster of guys who were just sitting out "injured". I'm sure some were valid, but you cannot have just 15-20 guys out at one time and they're not getting major surgery. Time off when you've been on the road forever? Fine. Getting major surgery like a Rey Mysterio? Absolutely fine. But sitting out with something that cannot be verified...that's setting a dangerous precedent. It's much like early in the Bischoff run when he was just producing the TV in 1993. You had people (disgruntled guys who had been hired and fired in previous regimes) suing WCW and knew how to game the system. You could sue for some ridiculous amount, but you could get a settlement of $100,000 or $150,000 just because Turner legal didn't want to deal with it. I think the ATM Eric thing should apply to stuff like the mysterious injury or mysterious personal reason and sitting at home rather than paying talent overall. The latter is just how wrestling was trending at that time. If you wanted to compete, you had to pay top dollar. However, you cannot amass a huge roster and then have several people deciding when they're going to work or just sit at home collecting checks. Eventually, that starts to add up especially running a touring endeavor with real production costs.

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3 hours ago, driver said:

What if The Freebirds had been in Crockett Cup '86?

There are a number of people missing, including anyone from Continental: no Nightmares, Stud Stable or Armstrongs. 

If the Cup had taken place a few months later, you'd prob have Hayes and Buddy, with Gordy defending the UWF title against Duggan. 

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On 10/21/2021 at 5:47 AM, AxB said:

What if, when Chris Jericho put the first Jericho Cruise together, Vince did allow him to use NXT as the partner promotion, so he never contacted ROH?

Was that before he did the first Omega match? I think so it was. I'd assume Jericho would have had one more WWE run and then would have probably looked to do something else, or would have just started taking the Saudi money and worked like 3 times a year. 

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And AEW episode one still ends with the formation of the Inner Circle, only now it's Pac, Sammy Guevara, Santana & Ortiz, and a newly heel turned Luchasaurus.

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23 hours ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

I believe the Konnan story is his girlfriend gave birth to a stillborn child. Raven had an inflamed pancreas. 

Never knew that about Konnan. Man, that's an awful story and can't imagine that sort of pain.

Raven talked about missing Starrcade in a shoot once. IIRC, he was taking all kinds of pills at that point. He'd stopped drinking but kept popping pills like crazy and his pancreas was fucked because of it. He detailed his pill regiment and it was pretty staggering.

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On 10/22/2021 at 8:55 PM, (BP) said:

I always figured Page getting the celebrity matches was a make-good for an inevitable title push being put on the back burner because of Goldberg. I’m sure he made more money than he’d ever seen in his life from those shows. 

It’s wild how effective seeing Flair get that legitimately emotional was at the time considering nearly breaking down in tears became a standard part of his promos later. 
 

 

Take this for what it's worth, but Bischoff said he gave Page those spots in 1998 because having a guy like Flair, Sting or Goldberg there would damage their credibility or some shit. He made it seem like if they somehow stuck Goldberg in one of those spots, people wouldn't buy him as a top act or something like that.

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On 10/22/2021 at 8:29 PM, Elsalvajeloco said:

It's crazy cause Flair talks for all of what? Two minutes? Bischoff comes out, Flair goes on his little infamous tirade, and they cut to commercial. Arn's introduction part lasted forever including bringing everyone out one by one. The real what if is imagining if Flair got real time to speak. 

Yeah it's pretty short when you go back and watch it. It's funny to think about it but whenever people talk "best promos", pretty much all of them are under 3 minutes or so. For instance, I think Hard Times is barely 3 minutes long and the first 30 seconds is Caudle introing Dusty and Dusty getting warmed up.  He really only gets rolling and into "Dusty" mode for about 2 minutes.

Edited by cwoy2j
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5 hours ago, cwoy2j said:

Never knew that about Konnan. Man, that's an awful story and can't imagine that sort of pain.

Raven talked about missing Starrcade in a shoot once. IIRC, he was taking all kinds of pills at that point. He'd stopped drinking but kept popping pills like crazy and his pancreas was fucked because of it. He detailed his pill regiment and it was pretty staggering.

Shit, in other ones he said he started shooting up Oxys, and even OD'd Sandman with a shot. Heyman finally told him to stop and got him into rehab.

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Bischoff’s wife must have been ugly. That’s the only way they weren’t all sleeping with her because he would have let them if it meant that he got to pretend to be their friend. Not even joking because see Bubba the Love Sponge! I mean what a c*ck. That’s the only thing Eric didn’t let them get away with, which had to be because they didn’t try it. I truly think that after learning everything that they pulled on him as he still tries to justify and rationalize all of it to this day.

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Wasn't Bischoff's wife in Playboy or something?

I remember during the MNW, a few internet wierdos had a strange obsession with DDP and Bischoff doing wife swaps.

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