MAY 2019 WRESTLING TALK

[Boydy]

I would really love WWE to bring Ciampa back to NXT when he recovers and have him align with Gargano again have the crowd get behind Ciampa to have Gargano turn on Ciampa and they have their feud again but the roles reversed.

[James F'n X]

2 hours ago, Casey said:

Even if Vince went along with the WCW rebuild, it probably would have sucked, even with WWF talent jumping ship. The bigger names weren't available until 2002/2003, and someone like Sting was a fresh reborn Christian and didn't like the WWF product (or the WCW in the real late years). You'd have to wait for Steiner in the new WCW until late 2002. Hogan, Nash & Hall would come into WWF in reality in February 2002. Flair would be late 2001. It'd just be a wrestling show in a horrible timeslot on a Saturday night with lower card wrestlers like Hugh Morrus, and they'd likely have to position any top name like Booker T or whoever near the start of the show and viewership would fall off towards the end of the two hours. Basically all of this shit was doomed from the start.

If you don't rely on the aging WCW stars, you'd have to rely on WWF stars at the top of the card for a WCW show until they build people up in that brand to be at the top of the card. And WWF at that time is starting to ease into the attitude that we all know now, of never really building up people to the main event outside of a few people. That rewind post on Reddit points out how Matt & Jeff Hardy were hot as shit around this time (the chair shots angle with Austin & HHH beating the dog shit out of the Hardys and Lita, while kinda gross, helped) and then Jeff wins the IC title from HHH... only to lose it back to HHH, all of them get beat down again, and that's the last sniff of the main event for the Hardys. Jeff had a brief moment in 2002 with that ladder match against Undertaker, but that was it really for a long, long time.

It's not far fetched to assume they'd do the same thing with the WCW talent. If Mike Awesome started to get extremely over, would they recognize that and push him, or rely on the same people at the top of the card because "fuck you what else are you gonna watch?".

Agreed. My point is that the WCW relaunch was shit on not because it happened in Tacoma instead of Atlanta (and people think Atlanta would have reacted well to a McMahon-led WCW?) - it was shit on because the product that was given was bad (thanks, Buff!) and given the nWo Nitro treatment with way too much setup.

[RIPPA]

I finally started a 24/7 thread

Please put the social media posts you insist on posting there

[Rehabilitated Rick]

57 minutes ago, Boydy said:

I would really love WWE to bring Ciampa back to NXT when he recovers and have him align with Gargano again have the crowd get behind Ciampa to have Gargano turn on Ciampa and they have their feud again but the roles reversed.

[Cobra Commander]

for some reason, I think of Mr. Niebla when I see the name Mr. Aguila.. which is even more confusing when you consider Lita worked with Mr. Aguila/Essa Rios/Papi Chulo.

Lita seconding Mr. Niebla would be a slightly different dynamic

[odessasteps]

12 minutes ago, Cobra Commander said:

for some reason, I think of Mr. Niebla when I see the name Mr. Aguila.. which is even more confusing when you consider Lita worked with Mr. Aguila/Essa Rios/Papi Chulo.

Lita seconding Mr. Niebla would be a slightly different dynamic

Zacarias > Lita

[Infinit]

Was over at PWO and read that Pez Whatley and Ole Anderson were all buddy buddy in 1983. Is that the that the most random mismatched partner pairing of all time? 

[Infinit]

2 minutes ago, odessasteps said:

Zacarias > Lita

El Dandy would disagree with you

[Cobra Commander]

clicked on a Bob Backlund vs Narcissist Lex Luger match on YouTube and the prematch ad is from "Narcissist Help"... which is an interesting advertising target.

[John from Cincinnati]

3 hours ago, Boydy said:

I would really love WWE to bring Ciampa back to NXT when he recovers and have him align with Gargano again have the crowd get behind Ciampa to have Gargano turn on Ciampa and they have their feud again but the roles reversed.

[Dewar]

That might be a worse take than Jericho over Okada for the IWGP title. 

[Dewar]

4 hours ago, AxB said:

RVD did get super over at that point, and the WWE capitalised on that about as well as you'd expect.

If Wince's WCW had been based around the Radicalz and Jericho while they waited for the big money guys, that might have worked. If they were doing a hostile takeover angle, like. You thought you'd seen the last of us? Think again. We're back, and we're on top this time.

They put him over John Cena for the world title on pay per view. He got busted by the cops. Not sure what else the company could have done. 

[mattdangerously]

1 hour ago, Infinit said:

El Dandy would disagree with you

I am not one to doubt El Dandy.

[AxB]

17 minutes ago, Dewar said:

They put him over John Cena for the world title on pay per view. He got busted by the cops. Not sure what else the company could have done. 

Not during the InVasion they didn't. All he got to do there was give Austin his watch back. The WWE was years late on RVD's push. Not striking while the Iron was hot. It was a mildly reheated, slightly warmer than room temperature iron by the time they struck it.

[SorceressKnight]

16 minutes ago, AxB said:

Not during the InVasion they didn't. All he got to do there was give Austin his watch back. The WWE was years late on RVD's push. Not striking while the Iron was hot. It was a mildly reheated, slightly warmer than room temperature iron by the time they struck it.

Even then, the RVD push not happening given what happened when they did is the most appropriate non-push ever.

There's "no one saw this coming" failed pushes, there were pushes everyone could see coming, and then there's "wait a second. The wrestler who always talks about enjoying smoking marijuana, and was very popular with fans due to how much he talks about enjoying marijuana, who the fans wanted as champ because they liked how he talked about smoking marijuana, would make WWE look bad when as WWE Champion, he gets pulled over by cops and is found with marijuana on him that he presumably planned to smoke? YOU DON'T SAY!"

[Casey]

I don't think the weed did Sabu and RVD's WWE careers in, it was probably having prescription pills.

[Cliff Hanger]

12 hours ago, clintthecrippler said:

I wouldn't be surprised that if he hung around long enough for the brand extension era that Owen would have gotten a token "lifetime achievment" title reign like some others did. 

Or if he retires from full-time 2000-01 anyway, he still pops back for one-off appearances in ROH like Lance Storm and oddball "Produce" shows in Japan, and maybe one last cagey veteran WWE run like Finlay did or as part of Bret's return. 

And you know damn well in 2019, Janela would be doing everything he can to get a free agent Owen Hart to come to Spring Break. 

I distinctly remember reading an interview with him during his run with Jarrett where he said he wanted to retire from full-time in 2-3 years, then do a couple tours a year with NJPW.  Can't find it now, but it was an internet interview in 1998 on a site I don't remember the name of...so either it's going to be impossible to find or I dreamed it and it'll be REALLY impossible to find.

[Casey]

Owen Hart working people like Fujita and Bob Sapp in the early-to-mid 2000s NJPW would have been... something.

[Cliff Hanger]

17 minutes ago, Casey said:

Owen Hart working people like Fujita and Bob Sapp in the early-to-mid 2000s NJPW would have been... something.

I always assumed he saw himself as slimming back down to junior size.

[Casey]

The DDP reveal and subsequent promo was great, I'll give you that. But everything that came before it and after it was just shit, I'm sorry.

8 minutes ago, Cliff Hanger said:

I always assumed he saw himself as slimming back down to junior size.

Owen/Kanemoto doesn't really do anything for me. Aren't these years of New Japan generally considered the dark ages or whatever? Their junior division just seems really lacking, but maybe I've been spoiled by the talent they've had in that division for the past handful of years, which is where most of my NJPW viewing comes from.

[The Natural]

The interviewer, Chris Latchem was also diagnosed with leukaemia as Roman Reigns leukaemia came back.

Edited May 24, 2019 by The Natural

[GuerrillaMonsoon]

I don't get why they took on the 30 odd contracts that they did upon purchasing WCW.

Those 30 odd contracts would have continued to get paid by AOLTW until it expired or they accepted a lump sum buyout.

Weren't too many who took that to go work for NWA:TNA a year later. Would have made sense to take maybe 4-5 guys they saw as developmental types and prepared to be a mark and take cents on the dollar, then pick off guy by guy as their contract expired, having them doing HWA shots and talking head appearances on dvds talking shit about WCW.

2001 post Mania was terrible prior to the Invasion. May as well maintain a form of goodwill by keeping people hanging on waiting for the eventual Invasion angle to occur.

Hindsight being wonderful as it was, they had all the guys they wanted from WCW within 18 months of the buyout anyway. The 01 main event scene without DDP and Booker isn't that much impacted. Rhyno and RVD just become more important than they were, and the McMahon feud still goes as it were without promotion wars or 30 guys doing nothing but standing in the ring for an opening show promo. If anything you could easily fast track the Lesnar debut a few months too. 

A decent what if is that they cooled their jets and didn't rush things if HHH and Benoit don't get hurt within weeks of each other. Does Shawn's planned return that got nixed due to his drug issues end up going ahead? 

I'd have loved to have seen a return of the smaller 2hr IYH PPVs where it was just months on end of debuting WCW guy announced as making his debut at PPV facing WWE established guy with something big at stake. Stuff happens. Go from there.

Heel/face alignment based on brand was terrible (except XPac. That was hilarious)

[The Natural]

 

[RIPPA]

Again - it was is becoming the new norm - the WWE rescheduled Monday's SDL house show (at least this one was rescheduled, the one last week was just cancelled)

Also - this what they are advertising for the Singapore show at the end of June

Seth Rollins vs. Shinsuke Nakamura - Universal Title

Becky Lynch vs. Alexa Bliss - RAW Women's Title

And the included Gallows and Anderson in the list of people "scheduled to appear" which made me giggle

[MORELOCK]

9 hours ago, L_W_P said:

Those 2 should be like Zayn and Owens - As far away from each other as they can, need at least 2-3 years to let that rest.

More like 10 - they pulled the "every 2-3 years" shit with Cena/Orton and Kane/Undertaker and it just made nobody ever want to see those matches EVER again.

 

9 hours ago, L_W_P said:

Also what's  all this "DDP as the Stalker sucked" hot take BS. The angle was great, Page was a legit shocker & the reveal/promo is still one of the most surreal home runs WWE ever hit.

Sure the booking went to shit but the choice of Page was perfectly fine.

The only thing true about any of this is "legit shocker." DDP did his best with the promo, but it has never made any sense for 99% of wrestlers to stalk anyone's (let alone the fucking UNDERTAKER's) wife as a way of getting inside their head or whatever. Of that 99%, DDP is probably one of the least likely characters in modern history to do it. The booking didn't go to shit - it was built on a shit foundation. It was garbage when Styles and Joe did it last year too.

 

6 hours ago, RolandTHTG said:

I don't get why they took on the 30 odd contracts that they did upon purchasing WCW.

Those 30 odd contracts would have continued to get paid by AOLTW until it expired or they accepted a lump sum buyout.

I don't believe that this was the case. The contracts that were picked up (with the exceptions of Booker T and DDP, who IIRC willingly agreed to take the pay cut) were directly under WCW, while the people that sat out were the ones that were contracted directly to AOLTW.