Is Sting a Hall of Fame Wrestler?

[Niners Fan in CT]

We were discussing the WON Hall of Fame in another thread and how Sting has not yet been inducted. if this was the WWE Hall of Fame Sting is a guy that will probably be inducted one day but if you are not familiar with the WON Hall of Fame, the ability to draw is an important factor. Maybe the most important. I don't want to see this thread bogged down by whether people care about the WON HOF, that's another argument for another day. We are only discussing Sting.

 

I think Sting deserves it because he was the #1 babyface during WCW's hottest period. There is an argument to be made that he was not wrestling and the nWo would have been just as effective without Sting but I disagree. I think Sting's story arc is what gave fans a reason to keep watching. Yes, the nWo were cool heels and there were large groups of fans who were content with their complete domination of WCW but in my view.. the nWo would have run its course a lot sooner without Sting lurking in the shadows. He was the beacon of hope. He was WCW. The pops he received when things eventually got physical were deafening. I don't believe the story works with anyone else.

 

The other side of this argument is that Sting was an awful draw in the early 90's and Dylan can shed more light on that.

[OSJ]

A very borderline case. Sting seemed absolutely unable to carry the ball no matter how many times it was handed to him. Does being #1 guy in a failing promotion equal HOF? I don't happen to think so. On the other hand, Sting has assembled a very impressive body of work that merits a long look. A "Gordy List" isn't the end-all of discussion, it should be a starting point, but roll out a Gordy List on Sting and you get some very interesting results (he scores very low in some important areas and remarkably high in others). He's really an odd case, I wouldn't get on the bandwagon to induct him, but I also wouldn't be upset to see him go in. I think Sting benefits from a lot of fond nostalgia that's perhaps undeserved, the reality is that he was most over when he wasn't doing anything except sitting in the rafters. When he was having all those great matches people came dressed as empty chairs. Also, FWIW, I have a pretty extensive library of DVDs, mostly comps of the guys that I enjoyed watching. I frequently pull out my Barry Windham or Ted DiBiase or El Samurai or Arn Anderson disks for an afternoon of nostalgia... Despite the impressive body of work, I don't find myself re-watching Sting on a regular basis.

[AlfredoE]

YES! Next question....

[Niners Fan in CT]

I love Arn and Barry but I also really enjoy Sting's body of work. His series with Vader is at the top of the list. Now, you could say Vader was putting on great matches with everyone because he was but I never felt like Sting was being carried through their epic wars. Sting was a guy with a tremendous combination of power and agility and for me that makes his matches very exciting. I was watching Sting/Luger vs. The Steiners from Superbrawl I and it's so much fun. I've seen the match a dozen times but I always jump out of my chair when Sting clotheslines Rick over the top, moves back to the far end corner and then just launches over the top rope down on top of him. A guy of his size getting that much air is awesome.

 

I wonder how much of WCW's down period can be attributed to him. When watching the shows.. and I was young then but even looking back, there's nobody more over on the roster than he is. You watch Sting vs. Rude from the Clash for the U.S. title and when he returns with the bum knee and they start brawling in the aisle the building is unglued. WCW was always a company in disarray, the people running things never knew what the hell they were doing. It's a miracle that we have years like 1992 or early '94 where the talent took over because behind the scenes it was always a total shit show. I find it difficult to believe that Sting was the lone reason why fans were giving up on the company. Stupid shit like too many fuck finishes and dumb rules like not allowing wrestlers to jump off the top rope had to be a contributing factor.

[Fallacy!]

All I have to add to this is that I agree 100% with both of Niners Fan's posts. Fantastic take on the fact that yes, WCW was completely in disarray for so much of the early 90s. How much better did business do when Hogan came to WCW, before turning heel? WCW was just such a mess then, it seems hard to place that blame on Sting. 

 

As far as the late 90s go, there is absolutely no way the nWo storyline would have been as hot as it was for as long as it was without Sting. The pops he was getting when he would show up were incredible. I remember me and all my friends watching Nitro basically just to see when Sting would come out. God, what an amazing storyline that was in hindsight. He was as popular as anyone in wrestling during that time, Steve Austin included, and had such a crazy mystique about him because you had idea what he was doing, why he was doing it or when he was going to do it.

 

With that said - yes, he certainly deserves to go into the HOF.

[DylanWaco]

I have said this before, but in my eyes Sting is a guy that looks like a solid, maybe even good candidate from a distance.  If you drop his name into a list of other guys who have gotten in from the rough era when he was a star he wouldn't look out of place, and there are certainly guys in the HoF who he is a better candidate than (Ultimo Dragon to take one obvious example).   But the closer you look at his career the worse and worse he gets.

 

Here I would note that I am not saying this because I dislike Sting.  I have written tons about this in the last year, and I think the general takeaway a lot of people have is that I must hate Sting, but that's not true.  I grew up in NWA/WCW country.  I recently did the math and realized I saw over 100 NWA/WCW shows live (possibly as many as 150), and I would guess that Sting was a featured attraction on more than half of those shows.  I was a fan of his growing up, and I tend to like him as a worker MORE than many of the people who advocate for him as a Hall of Famer.  I was also in the building for Uncensored 97 when he came down from the rafters.  I have talked about that here before, but it was the loudest pop I ever experienced live, with the building literally shaking and my nominal fan brother leaping up and down and hugging strangers in the aisle.  To that end I would not dispute that he was a huge star in 1997, and a key part of WCW tv from late 96 through early 98.  

 

The problem is that when you step outside of the "crow" time frame, the case for Sting weakens dramatically.  In fact it weakens so much that you really are forced to argue that Sting's 97 run was other worldly (more on that later) in order to build any case for him at all.

 

When this issue came up at Classics last year I actually ended up comparing 1993 WCW when Sting was the top face for the bulk of the year to 1986 AWA.  Here is what I found:

 

Using Clawmaster and Graham Cawthon's results I was able to confirm my off the cuff statement. Using the shows we have available attendance figures for the AWA in 86 drew 3303 people per show. WCW in 93 drew 1911 people per show. 

Now this is EXTREMELY flawed. The AWA ran fewer shows and we are missing a lot of figures from them. For WCW I used the paid attendance figures where available and left off any show listed as all freebies (mostly shows from Center Stage). WCW also ran some small towns/venues that dragged down their average. 

WCW had a couple more cards with 5k or more in attendance. For the AWA I left off a couple of joint shows where Crockett talent took up a third of the card. If I had included them the number would have been even and that's without figures from some shows that presumably could have been 5k or higher (for instance we are missing some Salt Lake City figures and that was the AWA's last "hot" town in many ways). WCW was also helped dramatically in this area by international touring, where the bulk of their 5k shows occurred. AWA actually had more 10k plus shows (3-2). 

It's possible that if we adjusted for the much larger number of WCW cards run/with figures and the fact that they were running a couple of very small venues/towns with consistency they could close the gap on average attendance. It's also possible if we had all of the AWA attendance figures there average would go down. Would it be enough to make up the nearly 1400 per show gap? Maybe, maybe not.

The point in all of this? How much does "stardom" or "being on top" really matter, when you are AT BEST drawing numbers roughly identical to dying days AWA?

Edit:

AWA Results via Claw

http://sportsandwrestling.mywowbb.com/f ... 387-4.html

WCW results via Graham's site

http://www.thehistoryofwwe.com/wcw93.htm"
 

 

As I noted, there are real flaws with those results, but not to the point that they tell us nothing and what they tell us isn't good for Sting.  It is notable here that 91 and 92 WCW would not yield results dissimilar from what I found there.  1990 might to a degree, but some of that is offset by the initial value of Sting's win over Flair and the Luger v. Flair feud at the beginning of the year which inflated the overall attendance for the year (some of this is going off of memory I admit).

 

In fact the low point of WCW in terms of paid attendance at show's coincides with Sting's run as the top face of the company.  Some say this was because of the departure of Flair, and that Flair was Sting's natural rival and best opponent (I don't buy that but you hear this from Sting defenders) but here it is notable that Funk, Luger, Savage, and Hogan were all better drawing opponents against Flair from he period between 89-95 (basically Sting's rise up the cards through the beginning of the Nitro Era), and random opponents like Michael Hayes actually did better numbers v. Flair than Sting as well.  While there is no shame in not drawing at the level of those names (though Luger is an interesting case), you would think a guy who was the top face of a company for the bulk of this time would rate higher as an opponent for the top heel who's name he is often linked to.  Whatever the case may be, the reality is that business went down shortly after Sting won the title, and started to go back up right around the time Hogan came in in 94.  Sting's run as the "guy" was the low point of WCW when it comes to drawing power.   

 

Now one way of explaining this is that all of wrestling was in the shitter during the early 90's in the States.  And that is generally true.  But again this is a case where when you look at Sting more closely things look less and less favorable. Again if you compare him to the WWF during the same period, business was in certainly down up there, but not to the degree it was in WCW.  Here are the results for 93 WWF

 

http://www.thehistoryofwwe.com/93.htm

 

I picked 93 only because I had used that as a baseline before, but you could just easily look at 91 or 92 (or 90).  I think we can all agree that 93 wasn't a particularly strong year for the WWF, but it was a much, much stronger year for the WWF than it was for WCW at least in terms of paid attendance at shows. Again if you take a bigger picture look at the general period in question (90-mid-94) that isn't going to change things at all in favor of Sting.  

 

Here the common argument is that you can't compare the two because WWF was a much better run company, and was often running in bigger areas.  Setting aside how silly I think that argument can be if taken too far, you can easily turn around and compare Sting's run to the few regional promotions left, namely the Memphis, Smoky Mountain and WWC in Puerto Rico (I would argue that ECW was still in its infancy during all of this and had entirely different goals as a promotion).  Looking at MSC results from the early 90's is not pretty given what we know Memphis wrestling used to be, but what is amazing is that the average attendance (and there are a lot of gaps in attendance here to be fair) is not much lower than the average attendance of WCW shows at least in 1993.  In the case of PR the attendance figures are murky at best, but what we do have indicates that WWC was generally speaking drawing as much or more during the period in question, and there big shows were doing considerably better than WCW's even with a much weaker talent pool to draw from.  Perhaps the most interesting comparison though is SMW because they ran many of the same markets WCW did during the period, but with a much smaller promotional budget, and a much thinner roster.  What you often see here is SMW drawing comparable or BETTER numbers to WCW.

 

Here are some examples:

 

Volunteer Slam - Knoxville, TN - Civic Coliseum - May 22, 1992 (1,000)
Moved from 5/11/92
Joey Maggs & Hector Guerrero defeated Rip Rogers & Barry Horowitz at the 11-minute mark when Guerrero pinned Horowitz
SMW Heavyweight Championship Tournament Quarter-Finals: The Dirty White Boy (w/ Ron Wright) pinned Dixie Dynamite at the 7-minute mark with the Bucksnort Blaster
SMW Heavyweight Championship Tournament Quarter-Finals: Brian Lee pinned Buddy Landell at the 7-minute mark with an inside cradle as Landell attempted the figure-4
SMW Heavyweight Championship Tournament Quarter-Finals: Paul Orndorff pinned Tim Horner at the 18-minute mark after Horner's leg became trapped between the bottom two ropes
SMW Heavyweight Championship Tournament Quarter-Finals: Robert Gibson pinned Jimmy Golden at the 18-minute mark with a bulldog
SMW Heavyweight Championship Tournament Semi-Finals: Brian Lee pinned the Dirty White Boy (w/ Ron Wright) at the 11-minute mark after DWB missed a headbutt off the middle turnbuckle; Lee bled profusely from the head during the match; after the bout, DWB assaulted Lee with a steel chair
SMW Heavyweight Championship Tournament Semi-Finals: Paul Orndorff pinned Robert Gibson at the 11-minute mark by grabbing the tights for leverage after clipping Gibson in his injured left knee
SMW Tag Team Champions Stan Lane & Tom Prichard defeated Davey & Johnny Rich at the 13-minute mark when Lane pinned Johnny after Prichard used a loaded boot to hit an enzugiri behind the referee's back
SMW Heavyweight Championship Tournament Finals: Brian Lee defeated Paul Orndorff via disqualification at the 10-minute mark to win the title when SMW Commissioner Bob Armstrong, who replaced the knocked out referee, caught Orndorff using a foreign object; Lee began the match with his head heavily bandaged and eventually bled from the head; late in the bout, the Dirty White Boy attempted to interfere but was taken out by Lee

 

WCW @ Knoxville, TN - April 9, 1992 (700)
The Junkyard Dog pinned Richard Morton
WCW US Tag Team Champion Greg Valentine & Mike Graham defeated Marcus Alexander Bagwell & Tom Zenk
Ron Simmons pinned Cactus Jack
Nikita Koloff pinned Diamond Dallas Page
Dustin Rhodes & Barry Windham defeated WCW TV Champion Steve Austin & Larry Zbyszko in a bunkhouse match
Rick & Scott Steiner defeated WCW Tag Team Champions Arn Anderson & Bobby Eaton via disqualification
WCW World Champion Sting pinned Big Van Vader
WCW US Champion Rick Rude defeated Ricky Steamboat via disqualification after Steamboat used Rude's title belt

 

SMW @ Knoxville, TN - Civic Coliseum - November 29, 1992 (1,050)

The Nightstalker pinned Robbie Eagle at 4:31
Tracy Smothers pinned Dutch Mantell at the 11-second mark
Tracy Smothers pinned Dutch Mantell at the 8-second mark
Tracy Smothers defeated Dutch Mantell at the 32-second mark via disqualification
Robert Fuller & Jimmy Golden defeated Bobby Fulton & Dixie Dynamite at 8:22 when Golden pinned Fulton
Ron Garvin & Danny Davis defeated Paul Orndorff at 12:45 in a handicap match when Garvin pinned Orndorff
SMW Heavyweight Champion the Dirty White Boy defeated Tim Horner at 15:37 in a lumberjack match
The Mongolian Stomper defeated Kevin Sullivan via disqualification at 5:59
Ron Garvin won a battle royal at 5:20
Ricky Morton & Robert Gibson defeated SMW Tag Team Champions Stan Lane & Tom Prichard in a barbed wire steel cage match to win the titles when Morton pinned Lane at 6:48

 

WCW @ Knoxville, TN - Civic Coliseum - November 1, 1992 (matinee) (400)

Shane Douglas & Marcus Alexander Bagwell defeated Vinnie Vegas & Diamond Dallas Page
Kensuke Sasaki defeated Steve Austin
WCW/NWA Tag Team Champions Dustin Rhodes & Barry Windham defeated Cactus Jack & Tony Atlas
Big Van Vader defeated Nikita Koloff
Sting defeated Jake Roberts
WCW World Champion Ron Simmons defeated the Barbarian

 

SMW @ Johnson City, TN - Freedom Hall - November 28, 1992 (975)

Tracy Smothers pinned Robbie Eagle at 7:49
Robert Fuller & Jimmy Golden defeated Bobby Fulton & Dixie Dynamite at 20:16 when Golden pinned Fulton
Danny Davis & Ron Garvin defeated Paul Orndorff in a handicap match at 24:01 when Garvin pinned Orndorff
SMW Heavyweight Champion the Dirty White Boy defeated Tim Horner in a lumberjack match at 15:02
The Mongolian Stomper defeated Kevin Sullivan via disqualification
Tracy Smothers won a battle royal at 8:23; other participants included SMW Heavyweight Champion the Dirty White Boy, Dixie Dynamite, Robbie Eagle, Robert Fuller, Ron Garvin, Jimmy Golden, Tim Horner, The Nightstalker, and Paul Orndorff
Stan Lane & Tom Prichard defeated SMW Tag Team Champions Ricky Morton & Robert Gibson in a streetfight to win the titles when Prichard pinned Gibson

 

WCW @ Bristol, TN - Viking Hall - October 4, 1992 (1,450)

Erik Watts defeated Diamond Dallas Page
Shane Douglas & Marcus Alexander Bagwell defeated Greg Valentine & Dick Slater
Brian Pillman defeated Brad Armstrong
WCW TV Champion Scott Steiner defeated Arn Anderson
Sting & WCW/NWA Tag Team Champion Dustin Rhodes defeated Jake Roberts & Cactus Jack
WCW US Champion Rick Rude defeated Ricky Steamboat
WCW World Champion Ron Simmons defeated Steve Austin

 

SMW @ Knoxville, TN - Civic Coliseum - October 8, 1993 at 1,100)

Tony Anthony defeated Tim Horner
Bobby Blaze defeated Chris Candido
The Bullet defeated Killer Kyle
SMW Tag Team Champions Ricky Morton & Robert Gibson fought Scott & Steve Armstrong to a no contest
SMW Heavyweight Championion Brian Lee defeated Tracy Smothers at w/ Sensational Sherri)
Tom Prichard & Jimmy Del Ray at w/ Jim Cornette) defeated Rick & Scott Steiner via disqualification when, after Rick was hit with Cornette's tennis racquet and double teamed, Scott untied the Steiners' dog, tied to the ringpost, and chased Prichard & Del Ray from the ring at Wrestling Gold: Blood, Brawls and Grudges)

 

WCW @ Knoxville, TN - October 1, 1993 (800)
Ice Train defeated Dick Slater
Arn Anderson defeated Bobby Eaton
WCW Tag Team Champions the Nasty Boys defeated Marcus Alexander Bagwell & 2 Cold Scorpio
Ricky Steamboat defeated Paul Orndorff
WCW US Champion Dustin Rhodes & the Shockmaster defeated Harlem Heat
Sting defeated Sid Vicious via disqualification
World Champion Rick Rude defeated Ric Flair

 

Here I only used dates that were reasonably close together and which included Sting on the cards in some capacity.  The results are basically the same if you extend it out to include all dates in shared markets and include shows where Sting did not appear (if anything SMW would gain some ground on both Sting and WCW as a whole using that more expansive metric).  It is also worth noting that the highest drawing Sting headlined show in the States in 1993 was Superbrawl from Asheville, NC.  This area got SMW tv, and one of the matches on the undercard (which had been built to on both SMW and WCW tv) was the Heavenly Bodies v. the RnR Express.  While Sting v. Vader was the top match, attendance in that media market was nowhere near the level it was here (about 6200 paid) at any other point that year, which makes you wonder if Sting didn't get a bit of help here from SMW.  Either way the point is that a much more modest SMW was drawing comparable numbers in shared markets, which suggest that some of the excuses used to justify Sting's failure to draw are inflated.  

 

So when you consider the fact that Sting as a top babyface drew less than his peers in a similar role, drew comparably to small regional promotions with nowhere near the budget or exposure, drew numbers that were worse than 1986 AWA (a promotion and era which no one points to as a plus on anyone's HoF resume), and that his run coincided almost exactly with the worst years of WCW in terms of drawing to house shows, with higher numbers both before and after his runs, it is really hard to view the period where Sting became known as the "face" of WCW as a positive at all.  In fact if you are looking at it objectively it's hard to imagine it being anything other than obvious negative, especially since I have not been able to find any similar wrestler in history with comparable run that did so poorly at either a national or territorial level.  

 

So what are potential positives for Sting?  Well no one I know considers him an all time great worker.  In fact as noted above I tend to lie him more than many of his biggest HoF advocates, and he's not someone that would make my top 100 of all time.  While I would consider his work a net positive in an HoF calculus, it's hardly an overwhelming positive and he's not an "HoF level worker."  

 

Was he an influence?  I've never seen someone piece together any real argument for him on these grounds either.  In fact even though I was and am a huge WCW fan, I really struggle to see any case for Sting being much of an influence at all, let alone an "HoF level influence."  

 

So then we are left with the two things often used to tout him, he was on top for a long time, and his Crow Sting run.

 

Taking the "he was on top for a long time" point is always tricky because it means different things to different people.  Are we talking the absolute top guy, a guy in the mix, a person who could reasonably be plugged into main events?  It's open to interpretation to a degree, which is why I generally don't like it at all in HoF discussions unless there are specifics involved.  I recently looked at the specifics of Sting's run on the Figure Four Board, so I will copy and paste those here:

 

In 88 and 89 he was not the top star or top face. He was in the mix in the upper mid-card and started to ascend up the cards toward the back end of 89. He was being groomed and got hurt and came back in the middle of the 90 at which point you could say he was the top face for more or less the entire period between then and when Hogan came back. You could argue that Flair took that spot from him in late 93, but that's debatable. In any case this period was a terrible, terrible business period. When Hogan came in he clearly slipped out of the top face role, though he still had value. For a lot of 95 he was doing stuff like working against Meng in what were effectively upper mid-card feuds to buttress Hogan dominated ppvs. When Nitro started he was clearly not the top face, and you could argue that Hogan, Savage and Flair were all above him in the pecking order, with Luger as a co-equal until the Outsiders came in. The build to Fall Brawl was great and you got the big angle there but it's worth noting that Hogan did great business v. Piper and you had stuff with Savage during this period too. Sting was a star for sure, but it's not like he was the dominate face during this period even if they were clearly building to that. Obviously there is Starcade in 97, but by the time you get into 98 Sting is starting to cool off again and by 99 he's one of many guys in a dense "main event" scene that are all sort of rotated around. Goldberg passed him along the way for sure in 98, and there were periods where DDP was pushed just as hard and was more over. 00 and 01 he's doing what? Feuding with Vampiro (I don't even remember what year that was to be honest) and against one of many guys occupying space on a heavy roster. 

 

None of that should be taken as a wholesale dismissal of Sting's career, but rather an illustration that the length and significance as a "top guy" is often overstated.  It was a good run, but it's not like he was in a Hogan or Flair position for the bulk of his career.  He wasn't necessarily Kane or The Big Show either, but he falls somewhere in that murky middle.  

 

And then there is Crow Sting.  I am not interested in dismissing the significance of that run, but I do think it is important to note (as I did above) that Hogan did very strong ratings, numbers and buyrates against Piper, Savage and Luger among others during the period where Sting was in the rafters.  While you could argue that Sting played a role in the success of some of those numbers, it seems like a massive stretch to me to suggest that he was largely responsible for them, and was certainly no more responsible for them than Hogan was.  And really with that year Hogan is the elephant in the room because no matter how you look at it Hogan was the top star in wrestling at that point, Hogan had saved WCW from the dark business years (i.e. the Sting as top face years), Hogan was drawing huge against others, and most importantly the one time Sting was paired off against Hogan, is the one time we can point to him being an HoF level draw.  That last point is not irrelevant in a world where Paul Orndorff isn't in the Hall of Fame, and people would laugh out loud at the notion that the Big Bossman or Kamala are HoF level guys. While all of those guys were the absolute right guys for their roles, and you could argue that Sting was even more perfect and successful in his role than any of them (I actually think Orndorff can be debated), it is very hard to overlook the fact that Sting as the top guy almost never even did GOOD numbers, let alone outstanding numbers, without Hogan.  

 

Having said all of that Sting's run in 97 was great, and if someone looked at a record setting buyrate, very strong ratings, huge enthusiasm for the character, et. and said "this year is so outstanding that it offsets all the other problems with his candidacy" I would listen to the argument.  The problem then is that there are a whole slew of guys with one great year and/or run of record setting business, but with decidedly better surrounding years than Sting who aren't in.  Many of them aren't even on the ballot (JYD just got on this year, Bearcat Wright isn't on the ballot, Baron Leone has never been on the ballot, et).  So even if I was going to concede that one great year can offset the damage of others bad years (and for the record I don't), I don't see what compelling reason there is to jump Sting to the front of the line over a bunch of candidates with a similar "great year," but much stronger supporting arguments.  

 

Finally I would just note that even with his own category of the ballot I would regard Sting as a middle of the pack candidate at absolute best.  If people want to debate the particulars of that assertion I am open to it.  

[Hagan]

I'd say yes. I think his late 80s-early 90s work was HOF fame caliber. Great matches with Flair, Foley, Vader, the Dangerous Alliance. He was an awesome babyface. I mean, I'd put him as a high-end babyface worker. I can't believe that even in the early 90s his Stinger merch wasn't selling well. And WCW's issues had little to do with him, honestly. And it wasn't like they were drawing TNA crowds. It seemed like Stinger was the top babyface "draw" for the number 2 promotion in the country, and one with a strong Southern base.

 

I mean, his work fell off a cliff but then he was a part of, at the time, what was the biggest angle in years.

 

I mean, even his TNA run had him personally doing great stuff. I think it's a weird oversight where people can't separate the death of WCW from him, and the Starrcade finish pissed everyone off. Also, the fact that he never went to WWE hurts him. I think everyone has a weird mindset (myself included) that the real stars are guys who were successful in WWE.

[DylanWaco]

Define "TNA crowds."  It is very easy to forget how bad WCW was drawing in the early 90's until you actually look at the numbers.  

 

More important than that, I have a question for everyone whether they or pro or con on this,  how does Sting compare favorably to Luger as a candidate or does he at all?

[Hagan]

Whoa, I wrote my post before Dylan posted his. Excellent stuff, dude. Hard to disagree with the numbers. A lot of stuff about WCW drawing that I never knew.

 

My thing is I can't shake the fact that he's one well-booked year in WWE from getting in. If he came in and like headlined a good buyrate with Helmsley at SummerSlam or fought Taker or Cena and did an above usual buyrate (though we're in a post buy-rate world now, but you get my point) I feel that the rest of his career gets re-evaluated, fairly or not.

 

I mean, this isn't applicable because it's fantasy booking but does anyone think that he couldn't have been successful in WWF in '92 if he jumps instead of Luger?

 

But again, hard to argue with Dylan's number. In fact, that April show is shocking. That's a lot of HOF or almost HOF-guys, and guys who drew a ton of money all over the world and they get 700 paid.

[Raziel]

The problem with Sting and assessing his drawing power is that he was always the top guy when the company was a shitshow.  His numbers are hurt never having worked for WWE and not knowing how'd he be with Creative behind him.

 

Yeah, he ran on top of JCP in 88-90, but we all know what kind of fucking mess was going on with Crocket and Dusty squeezing guys out (like how the pretty much fucked all the Horsemen out of the company and only saved Flair by bringing in Steamboat), or the fucking mess with Herd making boneheaded decisions.  His late 91-early 92 was fucked with injuries, and by the time he was kicking, Watts was in charge and fucked everything up with the top rope shit, pushing the MVC to the moon and acting like WCW was AJPW without AJPW's talent (and hotshotting the title over to Simmions in the "See, I'm not racist" move).

 

And he got shifted down to #3 when Hogan showed up and brought all his buddies in, then they fucked around with the main event of Starrcade, and yeah.

 

And shit, the less said about TNA, the better.

 

Its not a matter of Sting didn't run with the ball, they really never handed it to him.  

[DylanWaco]

There are a ton of problems with the way Sting was booked and presented in WCW (though I do find it funny that Luger was severely damaged long term as a result of Sting's injury in 90, and STILL drew better than Sting if we look at the wide scope of their careers).  Fuck there are just tons of problems with WCW period. As fans there was so much wrestling from the promotion that we liked that I think we often forget that WCW was horribly mismanaged from the very beginning, and even during it's brief profitable period, it was still a shit show in a myriad of ways.  

 

Having said that I don't think any of that is really helps Sting in an HoF argument.  It might help him in a though experiment where we debate alternative histories that may have come about if X or Y happened, but in terms of HoF discussions I see no reason to focus on things that might have happened.  Though even if we did that I'm sure we could come up with arguments that would hurt Sting.  

[JohnnyJ]

I do think its worth noting that WCW in the early 90s was a regional promotion with national tv and toy deals. I grew up in the Northeast and WCW was not coming to town.  But that didn't stop me and my friends from watching the programming, and buying up the galoob toys and the WCW wrestling buddy ripoffs. And we were all about Sting. He was the guy in WCW who would appeal to the kid market.

 

Sting wasn't  a huge draw in the early 90s. However, these factors can't be completely ignored.

[Raziel]

Well yeah, Sting could not have fucked his ribs right after taking the belt off Luger in 92 and not sit out until WrestleWar and had some title defenses and ended up bombing worse than the period did numbers wise.

 

Or they could've rigged the wheel at Havoc 92 and drawn *anything* but that Coal Miners Glove match, and Roberts could've not relasped and turfed himself out of WCW and him and Sting could've ran an awesome top of the card fued longer than one PPV.

 

I'd also like to think that had Rude not fucked his back the night before Starrcade 92, 93 would've been a massive Sting/Rude series over the World Title and Foley could've gotten a win or two in that fued with Vader.

[LooseCannon]

I'd like to see some analysis of the numbers during Sting's tenure in TNA.

[Niners Fan in CT]

It's difficult to argue with Dylan's numbers and I'm glad he posted them so everyone could see. I just think he was such a big star through WCW's run on top that it offsets a lot of the dismal attendance numbers in the early 90's. I really do think it had more to do with WCW management than Sting. I mean, Flair vs. Steamboat was an absolute classic wrestling rivalry but even they did poor numbers in the Superdome right? I don't remember the figures but it wasn't good.. 

 

I think if you bring TNA into the argument it helps Sting in a weird way because TNA gained more viewers and notoriety when they brought Sting in and even his final match in the company during what most people would call the lowest TNA has been on the wrestling radar.. the taped show still drew more viewers than any show they had done in weeks. If there are people willing to watch a completely over-the-hill Sting on a taped show in a terrible promotion...  how many more people would be wanting to see him have a run in WWE? Case in point, Hulk Hogan's star power dwindled in that promotion but as soon as he goes back to WWE.. it's all over the news and it looks like the opening hour numbers for RAW were pretty good.

 

Final note, I think my other issue is that there are guys already inducted who were less of a draw than Sting. Wrestlers who never had a '96-'98 hot streak where ratings were off the charts and attendance numbers were good. Two wrongs don't make a right and I get that.. but as said, I think he's done enough to warrant induction.

[Raziel]

Only issue I had with Dylan's numbers is until the nWo angle started, no one moved WCW's needle on house show numbers.  I went to a WCW House Show in Philly in 94 I think (whenever Hogan had shown up), and the Main was Sting/Savage vs. Avalanche/Bubba, with Austin/Duggan running as well (post Vader winning the US Title), and they ran the Civic Center Exibition Hall, which had one level, no bleachers, and looked like only about 600-700 from memory.

[DylanWaco]

I don't really disagree that Sting's run was hurt by WCW management (only a crazy person would disagree with that), but the problem is that argument could easily be framed in another way.  For example given that we know business was better before and after Sting, couldn't someone argue that an example of the consistent incompetence of WCW was that they kept him a top face slot for so long?  I'm not necessarily arguing that position as my own, but my point is that I think that sort of talking point is one that has limited value in an HoF discussion, because there is almost always a counterpoint that is just as reasonable.  

 

On TNA, I struggle to see how it's a real plus for Sting, though I don't really see it as a massive negative either.  No one has really made a significant dent for TNA over the long haul.  Sting had some initial value, but it didn't last.  Same with Hogan.  Same with Angle (moreso than Sting really) and same with Hardy.  None of it was sustained, and more than that none of it was even close to HoF level drawing power.  What does hurt Sting some in my eyes is that even now when he is played up as a legend, and put in markets and places where you would think that could make a difference it really doesn't.  For example WWC built their anniversary show in large part around Sting's first appearance in Puerto Rico, and while the number for the show was good (I think about 4500 paid), it was considered disappointing all things considered, and wasn't even WWC's top drawing show of the year (which was considered a major shock).  

 

As far as Sting being better than some guys who are in, I agree, but I also think The Big Show is better than some guys who are in.  Luger is better than some guys who are in.  Kerry Von Erich is better than some guys who are in.  Et, et, et.  Now it may be that you think all of those guys belong in, or that you think Sting is better than those particular guys, but the point is that I think looking at the bottom rung as a point of comparison is the weakest way to argue these sort of things.  I also think it's sort of hypocritical (not necessarily in your case Niners, but more generally), that people will bitch about the WON HoF because wrestler X who they think clearly doesn't belong got in, but then turn around and use it as an argument for why wrestler Y should get in without even discussing the candidacy of wrestler Y.  

[DylanWaco]

Only issue I had with Dylan's numbers is until the nWo angle started, no one moved WCW's needle on house show numbers.  I went to a WCW House Show in Philly in 94 I think (whenever Hogan had shown up), and the Main was Sting/Savage vs. Avalanche/Bubba, with Austin/Duggan running as well (post Vader winning the US Title), and they ran the Civic Center Exibition Hall, which had one level, no bleachers, and looked like only about 600-700 from memory.

 

This is often mentioned, but I don't see how it is terribly relevant.  The best that could be said is that we should just throw out everything pro and con from Sting for the period in question because no one was doing anything.  The problem there is it puts a huge dent in his longevity argument, and basically leaves him with the one year run and not much else in terms of him being a "top guy."  More importantly than that, it's not really an argument in his favor to say "no one drew during this period."  If no one drew during the period, it means no one was a draw during the period, including Sting.  

 

The other problem I have with this is it ignores things like Luger drawing better v. Flair than Sting, or Hogan spiking business (especially on ppv) almost immediately when he came in.  Sting was not a uniquely bad draw in WCW from 90-94, but he was the top face generally speaking during that period and it was the low point of the company.  Whether or not that was entirely his fault, or not his fault at all, doesn't concern me as much as the fact that it happened.  

[DylanWaco]

Also would note that house show numbers did go up some when Hogan came in, though the real turnaround is generally cited as Flair v. Savage feud

[Niners Fan in CT]

Yeah - for me, I dislike using arguments such as wrestler x is in so why not Sting..  but even in hall of fames such as the baseball hall of fame (which lord knows they have their own issues), that is very much a deciding factor for some people. They will look at Bert Blyleven or Jim Rice and measure their numbers against the current candidates and decide based on that very type of analysis. I think it kind of waters down the hall because now instead of one or two people sneaking in you end up with many more than that..

 

Unfortunately, I think the WON HOF is already watered down to a degree so when I look at Sting and his peak run for drawing power which we agree is '96-'98..  I believe it's more than enough to warrant induction. Being a top star in that era should probably weigh more than being a top star over a less popular time period.

[Fallacy!]

How big an income source was t-shirts/merchandise in the early 90s for a wrestling company?

Thought JohnnyJ made a great point about WCW being more regional. Growing up in Los Angeles, they didn't exactly come through very often, but all my friends and I had every piece of Sting memorabilia you could fathom.

[DylanWaco]

I would be interested to hear the guys you think Sting would be comparable to or better than as a candidate.  My general view is that if you are going to play the comparison game in the case of the WON, the best way to do it is to look at the original class and ask "is wrestler X equal to or better than any of these candidates?"  I'm not saying that's the ONLY way to do it, but I think it's the best use of that sort of tool in this case.  Offhand I can't of anyone in that original case I would rate Sting as equal to or better than, though I think you can debate a couple of names.  

[DylanWaco]

How big an income source was t-shirts/merchandise in the early 90s for a wrestling company?

Thought JohnnyJ made a great point about WCW being more regional. Growing up in Los Angeles, they didn't exactly come through very often, but all my friends and I had every piece of Sting memorabilia you could fathom.

 

WCW was generally terrible with merchandising.  It's been said that even via their dismal standards Sting was not near the merchandise mover you would expect a top guy to be, though I don't think there is data available to back up that assertion. 

[Niners Fan in CT]

Oh yes, that's a good point but I'm unsure if there are even figures available because WCW merchandise and toys were sold up here and elsewhere while I was growing up and a lot of my friends did own the action figures, etc. Also, WCW Saturday Night was weekly viewing but hell if I could find an actual show to attend.

 

I'm not saying this would make a real difference in Sting's candidacy, just an interesting observation..

[GuerrillaMonsoon]

Trying to think of anyone below him on the card who really benefited from a program with Sting other than Mick Foley.

 

Vampiro bombed. Bagwell as his protege never really went anywhere. Regal program got cut quick due to the NWO angle. Vader maybe, but think his series with Cactus were more substantial in getting him over.