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Best/Worst examples of booking


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Fall Brawl 96 and Sting going crazy was amazing stuff, and hits so many subtle notes for human psychology. The first beatdown on Luger in the rain was damn near cinematic, and actually provided some cover for Luger not being able to tell the NWO Sting was obviously a fake. Then Luger gets it in his head that Sting turned and poisons his reputation in the locker room and nothing Sting says can convince anyone otherwise. Then he shows up in Wargames and wipes out the NWO by himself before leaving team WCW in a lurch because they wouldn't give him the time of day for no good reason. Luger's slow crawl up the ramp begging Sting to come back, before the NWO finished him off was a rare perfectly-acted Luger moment. The fallout was dead on too, with Sting becoming more and more of a recluse, while the rest of Team WCW (instead of introspecting on where they went wrong) just proceeded to blame each other, allowing the NWO to entrench themselves at the top even further (and also a series of surprisingly great Luger/Arn matches). Really, the whole of the NWO from Memorial Day 96 through Starrcade 96 was almost flawless, but that angle with Sting and the booking around Fall Brawl stands out among everything.

 

One of my other faves is Nigel's heel turn in ROH as champ. The match with Bryan in February of 2008 was a thing of beauty. The milking of his legitimate injuries finally went overboard with Bryan doing everything he could to be an upstanding competitor, and the crowd reacted perfectly. The finish with Nigel using his head that Bryan so valiantly went out of his way to avoid to nail Bryan's lingering injured eye that he never complained about was absolutely perfect. Then he added the elbows for extra dickishness and took a pass-out victory off an "injury" to his opponent. I honestly didn't follow the rest of Nigel's reign too closely, but this one match was about as good as it gets for in-ring story-telling.

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People talk about history's worst booking to a somewhat exhausted degree. The truly bad ones have been discussed at length, whereas the best stuff probably doesn't get enough credit. Some bright spots that immediately came to mind:

  • That one RAW that Watts booked where at the end of the show, Michaels, Undertaker, and Diesel all got completely massacred out of nowhere by Davey Boy, Mabel, Yokozuna and Dean Douglas, and the crowd was stunned by this moment that was totally shocking and was supposed to serve as a catalyst for like 3-4 new storylines. Really this entire thread could just be Watts stuff.

  • As crash soap opera TV goes, the Stephanie-HHH-Angle love triangle in the summer of 2000 was a good Chris Kreski idea that got over well.

 

How many Raws did Watts have influence in? I know he wasn't in the company for very long.

 

Also, while Kreski was head writer in 2000, I thought I read that the love triangle was more a product of Brian Gerwitz and it was the storyline that allowed him to ascend to Head Raw Writer.

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Copied from the network thread:

Month before Wrestlemania 3, 20 man battle royale with Hogan and Andre. Andre is billed as being undefeated forever. Andre tosses Hogan out with ease. Announcers go crazy about it

THEN ANDRE GETS TOSSED OUT AND HERCULES WINS

Why would they do this??? It doesn't make any sense. It was nearly thirty years ago and I am still angry about it today. Then they do promos where they still hype Andre as undefeated.

"It took 8 men to eliminate me, it took one Giant to eliminate you"

 

I'd take more of an issue with Andre's lame 1987 finishing moves (the butterfly suplex, the always awkward elbow drops) than trying to doubt he's undefeated based on the result of a battle royal. Would Andre not be undefeated since he lost some tag matches by DQ too?

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I wish that gif came with sound. That sound byte is the perfect response to a lot of wrestling booking.

One thing that bugged me and I wasn't a fan of any of the women involved was how the ended Mickie James' WWE run. Michelle and Layla spent months calling a fat ass and never got any payback for anything until the Rumble '10 when Mickie squashed them both. Then like a week later, Mickie jobs clean as fresh bleached and pressed sheets to Michelle and gets fired shortly after.

Nevermind Michelle and her skinny ass has a history of eating disorders or the fact that heels never got ANY heat because of the angle or Mickie looking like how most men want women to look. So many bullshit factors.

 

 

BUT!

 

It leads to "I'm leaving ... THE WWE ....!", so it is all saved!

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The RAW with the Bret Hart/Steve Austin streetfight was possibly the greatest WWF booked RAW angle they ever did.  Bret had gotten injured at the PPV the night before and was out at least a month as a result, and the show looked kinda doomed going in.  Austin comes out early, challenges Hart to a streetfight, Hart gets the advantage early but Austin beats the shit out of him with a chair, Bret gets stretchered out, Austin steals the ambulance, Austin comes back out to gloat, Owen and Bulldog attack, Shawn Michaels makes the save all for BRIAN PILLMAN to make his return and annihilate Austin with a chair.

I think this is my favorite Raw of all time and the moment that made me a Steve Austin mark.  Austin was like nothing I had ever seen, he was basically a wild animal with the singular instinct was to destroy Bret Hart.  It was incredible.

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One of the great booking moments was when ECW joined the 'invasion' storyline.

 

When Bubba, D-von, Rhyno etc were in the ring I didn't even click that they were all former ECW guys. Then when Heyman cut that absolute MONEY promo to let everyone know we were going to be taken to the extreme... jaw droppingly good.

 

This produced one of my all-time favorite recap lines from CRZ:

"Here comes the WWF LOCKER ROOM - tonight I see Tazz, the Dudley Boyz, Justin Credible... wait a minute - Raven, Rhyno...oh no....oh no."

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And Kane has Awesome in the goozle...but before he can hit the chokeslam - whoa! It's ECW's TOMMY DREAMER & ROB VAN DAMcome to town to stir up trouble, and looks like they've succeeded. (DQ 7:05) A SECURITY guy gets up on the apron...then gets the signal that this is part of the show and backs up. It's four on two as the WCW guys team up with the ECW guys to take out Jericho and Kane... Here comes the WWF LOCKER ROOM - tonight I see Tazz, the Dudley Boyz, Justin Credible... wait a minute - Raven, Rhyno...oh no....oh no. "Staredown" in the ring as Paul gets jolly. "Feel it, JR - FEEL this moment!" The WWF guys slowly turn round - and look at Kane and Jericho. "For the rest of your life - feel it." And now THEY punk out Kane and Jericho. We've got a ten on two here - amazingly, Ross STILL hasn't figured it out...but the crowd has. Heyman: "Spiccoli Driver by Tommy Dreamer! ... Oh my God - it's the Van Daminator! You wanna know what this is about? I guess you want answers! You want answers? Well I say you finally deserve, JR...a damn answer!" He drops headset, removes his tie, and heads up to the ring. The Dudley Boyz stop him - then part the ropes for him. "Well, I guess now it's time, JR - that YOU WANT THE TRUTH - so JR, tonight, I'm gonna give you the whole damn truth! I have been sitting, I have been sitting like a damned corporate sellout next to that damn pig - and I have been talking - I have been TALKING about WWF versus WCW - Ihave been spilling my guts about this Invasion, and it seemt to me like everyone has forgotten about the tribe of extreme. It seems to me like these men were too extreme for WWF versus WCW - it seems to ME that this man...and this man have LEFT Shane McMahon's WCW - it looks to ME like these six men have left Vince McMahon's WWF - it looks to ME like they all have joined..... E.... C.... W. So Vince - or Shane - any time you guys want revenge - we'll take on the WWF, we'll take on WCW - we're not hard to find, because THIS Invasion just got taken... TO THE... EXTREME." "Theme from ECW" plays - Jericho and Kane STILL haven't moved.

Ummm....call the lawyers?

I mean....."wow."

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The build to Flair vs. Kerry in the Cage on Christmas Day might be the greatest build to the greatest swerve in wrestling history:

 

- Kerry gets a title shot in Reunion Arena in August, and gets two apparent victories over Flair in a 2/3 falls match, but the outside, NWA-appointed referee Alfred Neely calls one of them as a controversial DQ before losing control of the match entirely.

 

- Fritz is so upset with this that he roughs up Neely after the match, drawing a fine and suspension from the NWA and causing them not to grant Kerry a return match.

 

- Kerry is now the "uncrowned champion" in the eyes of Texas. Then he gets injured by the Great Kabuki at a spot show in Oklahoma, where the "NWA isn't as strong."

 

- Rumors swirl that the injury was a hit piece orchestrated by Flair. Flair and Gary Hart deny, deny, deny, but Fritz is adamant that a bounty was put on Kerry's head.

 

- Meanwhile, union man King Kong Bundy demands a raise from Gary Hart. Hart blows him off.

 

- Bundy goes "on strike," and gets his hands on a check made out by Flair to Hart and gives it to Fritz as revenge.

 

- Fritz turns the check over the NWA, and over the protests of Flair and Hart, the NWA announces they're going to make a ruling.

 

- The ruling is: Flair must defend the title against Kerry in a cage, with a special World Class-appointed referee.

 

- Who's going to decide the referee? YOU, the fan. The Von Erichs' good friend, the hugely charismatic Michael Hayes, Fritz's old friend and rival Duke Keomuka, or World Class front office guy Ken Mantell. 

 

- The popular Hayes naturally wins the vote!

 

That's 4 months of build for one big payoff--Kerry refuses Hayes' help in winning the title and gets the door slammed on his head by Terry Gordy in return. Cue the hottest run Texas wrestling had ever seen and one of the biggest runs of business in the U.S. in 1983. And it incorporated all sorts of other guys on the roster, with every step of the way making logical sense. It's one of the most well-laid-out long-term angles with a decisive, pre-planned endgame that you'll ever see.

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For me, it's actually been harder to think of worst booking.

 

For as good as the NWO was in 1996, there a couple obvious examples of terrible booking afterwards that played a noticeable role in the company's downward spiral. Of course, there was Starrcade 97, which was the easiest thing in the world to book, but Hogan had to be protected for some reason. All you had to do was have Sting kick Hogan's ass for 10 minutes, with Hogan getting a couple minutes of offense by cheating, then Sting comes back for a clean, decisive win. Instead we got a match where Hogan controlled most of it, and a screwy finish that wasn't even executed well and the biggest WCW show ever only served to drag out their biggest angle instead of blowing it off.

 

The other one is the fingerpoke of doom incident, which was the nail in the coffin for me as a WCW fan at the time. Nash beating Goldberg was questionable, but not necessarily terrible by itself. Following it up with this, however, was. The fake arrest on Goldberg, Tony's "butts in the seats" comment, and all the shenanigans surrounding the match and post-match were awful. Any angle that makes you stop watching a promotion entirely has to qualify as one of the worst ever.

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Hogan's heel turn / joining the nWo was the best booked moment in the history of booking.

 

I love Mick Foley and am not the biggest fan of HHH, but McMahon kissing Austin's ass and putting the belt on Mankind because Austin did not want to put over HHH was rubbish booking.  HHH was ready and he should've gone over clean in a singles match with Austin.

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That Kerry/Flair angle recap is badass.

 

My favorite booking is how Heyman turned the 4-foot-4 Taz into an unstoppable killing machine. Proof that it's not how big the wrestler is, but how he's booked.

 

Worst booking? Hell, I dunno. The Black Scorpion deal, Cactus Jack's amnesia, the payoff to Sting-Hogan qualify, but in retrospect, probably it's Dusty holding back Magnum T.A. far beyond the date where he should've pulled the trigger on him, only to have T.A. go out in the car wreck. If Dusty wasn't so hell-bent on keeping himself on top, he could've started yet another boom period for his promotion.

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I thought that part of the whole Magnum TA deal was partially Flair's doing?  I thought that Flair refused to put over Magnum in favor of Dusty or Ricky Steamboat because they were proven names or some dumb shit like that?

 

Flair being friends with Tully might have had something to do with it, also.  I know that Magnum is currently married to Tully's ex-wife, but I don't know whether or not they were seeing each other when Magnum was a worker.

 

Just as well that Magnum never really broke the upper card given that his US Championship run was the mortar holding the upper mid-card together.

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I've never heard that Flair wouldn't work with Magnum.  It's rumored that, if the accident hadn't happened, Magnum's next program would have been with Flair - maybe with Flair dropping the belt.

 

Magnum got together with Tully's ex well after their wrestling days.  I'm under the impression that they're on good terms now.  One of them said in a shoot that they (Magnum and Tully) still socialize.

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To add to jstout's comments re: Taz, I think that the buildup to Sabu/Taz at Barely Legal '97 was pretty much perfect. 

 

Taz turns heel at November to Remember '95, aligns with Bill Alfonzo, and proceeds to call out Sabu any chance he can. Sabu, being Sabu, never answers. Meanwhile, Taz embarks on the Path of Rage, demolishing everybody that's put in front of him, while Sabu enters into a feud with Rob Van Dam. Seeing his chance, Taz (through Fonzie) tells Van Dam about Sabu's neck injury, which Van Dam proceeds to exploit in their rematch, causing Sabu to be carried out on a stretcher. Their feud continues through the summer, while Taz continues to wreck shit and call out Sabu to no answer. Then, at November to Remember '96, one year after this all gets started, they face off in the ring for the first time, but it's just a tease, as it gets broken up right away before anything can happen. That scene was repeated a couple of times over the following months, until Barely Legal was finally announced in February, and that Taz vs. Sabu would be one of the headline matches.

 

The brilliance of this angle lies in that they were kept apart for a year. Each of them did their own thing, and never directly confronted each other. However, by constantly calling Sabu out, Taz/Sabu was in the front of everyone's mind, and fans were rabid to see the two of them go at it. Then they teased it a little, never involving actual physical contact, and it left the fans wanting it even more. Just start to finish, it was great.

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I've never heard that Flair wouldn't work with Magnum.  It's rumored that, if the accident hadn't happened, Magnum's next program would have been with Flair - maybe with Flair dropping the belt.

 

Magnum got together with Tully's ex well after their wrestling days.  I'm under the impression that they're on good terms now.  One of them said in a shoot that they (Magnum and Tully) still socialize.

 

Tully and Magnum are on good terms now.  You can occasionally see them at some civic events in Charlotte.

 

It's easy for Flair to say that, "If it weren't for the accident..." because he knows that the program would never happen.   You have to think that eventually they'd have to put the belt on Magnum.  He couldn't stay the #2 guy for long because there'd be more money in cycling the title between him and Flair.

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Hogan's heel turn / joining the nWo was the best booked moment in the history of booking.

 

I love Mick Foley and am not the biggest fan of HHH, but McMahon kissing Austin's ass and putting the belt on Mankind because Austin did not want to put over HHH was rubbish booking.  HHH was ready and he should've gone over clean in a singles match with Austin.

 

They didn't want Ventura raising a heel's hand.

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Hogan's heel turn / joining the nWo was the best booked moment in the history of booking.

 

I love Mick Foley and am not the biggest fan of HHH, but McMahon kissing Austin's ass and putting the belt on Mankind because Austin did not want to put over HHH was rubbish booking.  HHH was ready and he should've gone over clean in a singles match with Austin.

 

It was because they didn't want special referee Jesse Ventura raising a heel's hand and getting booed in the process. 

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One piece of terrible booking that I didn't mention because it led to one of my favorite pieces of booking was having Undertaker beat Hulk Hogan at Survivor Series 1991.  They spent the entire year building up a match between Hogan and Flair to see who was the "Real World's Champion," but they ruined it by having Hogan lose the title.  It led to the Flair/Savage Wrestlemania VIII program so I'm not too mad.

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Hogan's heel turn / joining the nWo was the best booked moment in the history of booking.

 

I love Mick Foley and am not the biggest fan of HHH, but McMahon kissing Austin's ass and putting the belt on Mankind because Austin did not want to put over HHH was rubbish booking.  HHH was ready and he should've gone over clean in a singles match with Austin.

 

It was because they didn't want special referee Jesse Ventura raising a heel's hand and getting booed in the process. 

 

 

It was still a horrible decision, IMO.

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That Kerry/Flair angle recap is badass.

 

My favorite booking is how Heyman turned the 4-foot-4 Taz into an unstoppable killing machine. Proof that it's not how big the wrestler is, but how he's booked.

 

Worst booking? Hell, I dunno. The Black Scorpion deal, Cactus Jack's amnesia, the payoff to Sting-Hogan qualify, but in retrospect, probably it's Dusty holding back Magnum T.A. far beyond the date where he should've pulled the trigger on him, only to have T.A. go out in the car wreck. If Dusty wasn't so hell-bent on keeping himself on top, he could've started yet another boom period for his promotion.

When should Magnum have been elevated to the top?

 

Also, about Flair/Hogan for WrestleMania VIII, I think the two big issues were 1) booking a finish to satisfy both the WWF and Hogan's ego and 2) their rematches on the house show circuit didn't really set the world on fire and do the mega business that I think most people expected.

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The build to Flair vs. Kerry in the Cage on Christmas Day might be the greatest build to the greatest swerve in wrestling history:

WWE needs to swipe this with Reigns as Kerry and Ambrose as Hayes/Gordy.

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DDP stalking the Undertaker's wife counts as bad booking, right? they could have easily given that spot to Kanyon. Or got Bam Bam Bigelow to return to the WWF so that Bam Bam would stalk the Undertaker's wife, and then have Undertaker/Bigelow matches.

 

then again, a lot of the shitty booking of the Invasion is due to the lack of notice before Wrestlemania of the last WCW show and the lack of name guys due to AOL deals.

 

Could have easily had Vince buy WCW on-screen, then Shane beats Vince at WM17 to obtain control of the WWF, then Vince gathers WCW invaders with the plan of destroying his WWF. Sorta like the build to the WWF-nWo thing. But there'd be pro-Vince WCW guys, and some WCW guys who wouldn't go with Vince but might morph into being more pro-Vince since WWF guys would go after them too in response to the invasion.

 

Plus having Vince as the invader of a Shane-WWF could also mean that pro-Vince people on the inside of the WWF would be quietly aiding WCW guys ability to do run-ins and assorted other things.

 

Having Vince as the face WWF owner v. the heel Alliance of Shane/Stephanie was just a little too much.

 

Could have also kept ECW sorta separate of WCW in the Alliance. Have ECW guys function essentially like a pro-WCW special forces. Where they go after guys who WCW is targeting.

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The handling of DDP and more importantly the Diamond Cutter are probably top 5 examples of long term booking in my memory.  DDP went from sleazy chickenshit heel to the most beloved babyface in the company.  The Diamond Cutter was probably the most over move in the industry and he was the only person in WCW who ever seemed to be a step ahead of the NWO.  The La Parka angle was probably the best part of that particular run.

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