Loss

Agreed. As Meltzer has said, WWE could obviously do much more, but Vince McMahon has done more to fight drug abuse and ban unsafe moves than anyone ever has. I've never understood how people can complain about Londrick not being able to go all out on one hand, and decry their lack of regard for their wrestlers on the other. You're either on one side or the other of the issue.

So they don't care. That's understood. That said, Mick Foley got a huge reaction for falling off the top of the cage and then getting chokeslammed through it. WWE was smart enough to never do it again (without gimmicking). WWE is far more successful than ROH or TNA, and they've done it by creating characters people care about. With effort, any indy could accomplish the same thing if they really wanted to.

And for the record, I know you and I have gone back and forth in the past on Jumbo's career compared to Flair's career, but I really do think the whole "Jumbo was lazy on small shows" thing is crap. Jumbo is a guy with a ton of great matches, many of which aren't even the Misawa/Kawada/Kobashi/Tenryu/Terry Funk matches that get the most play. They weren't even huge deals at the time. Far more than anyone from the Samurai version of Classics (and probably the G+ as well), Jumbo is the guy you can most count on to pop in a random match from a random show that you've never even really heard anything about and expect to enjoy it. Many of them are even against the American midcarders that he supposedly was never inspired to work with.

Do fans always deserve to get everything they want?

Wow. Even great wrestlers benefit from a road agent. Otherwise, who makes sure spots aren't repeated throughout a show, you don't end up with juice in every match, you don't overdo things like low blows and chair shots, etc. I really hope Gabe is working when he says that, because otherwise, it shows that virtually no thought is put into creating a card and getting key guys over by making them stand out from the pack.

Dave has always loved Jumbo. The only thing he has ever really argued was that you didn't get the same Jumbo on small shows that you did on big shows, whereas with Flair, he worked equally hard every night.

Okay, but if you were not a WON reader or a tape trader at the time, this question isn't aimed at you.

I understand what actually happened with both Luger and Sting. My question involves Luger's rep among WON readers and tape traders of the time, and how and why it changed. Sting is an easy answer in retrospect, but there were obviously times when the promotion clearly had more faith in Luger.

John, I was curious if you could provide some insight on a couple of things: (1) Lex Luger. I've recently gotten my hands on all the WON issues from 1987-1992. Meltzer was never afraid to criticize Lex, but also seemed to be a pretty big fan of his at one time. I remember seeing him jump up and clap when Luger won the US title at Chi-Town Rumble, and also for several of his power spots throughout the match. Obviously, at some point, that ended, and Luger earned the rep of being a disappointment. When did that change in rep happen? Was it as a result of him dogging his run when he finally got the title? Was it a result of him juicing himself up to the gills at SuperBrawl and embarrassing Frey after Frey was making a big deal out of implementing a new drug testing program? In 2000, when Meltzer ran the biggest PPV draws ever, Luger was #6 on the all time list, ahead of guys you wouldn't expect like Foley and Taker (admittedly, Foley and Taker are probably ahead now because they've both headlined big shows since that time). But my question is this -- what was the general hardcore fan consensus of Luger at that time? If it was good, did something specific happen to make it drop off? Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't Luger a better drawing opponent than Sting on house shows between '88 and '90? (2) Luger vis-a-vis Sting. Between the two, who did WCW feel was their best bet for the future? I'm talking in terms of late 1989 here, after both had good years and Flair was starting to show age. It seemed to alternate at times, and I know Flair seemed to have far more faith in Sting than Luger, but how did the hardcores feel at the time? Were they split? Who did everyone think had the brightest future at the time?

1. How big of a WCW fan were you during the company's actual run? Huge. Even as a kid, I preferred it to the WWF because I liked Flair, Sting and Luger far more than Hogan and Warrior. 2. Are you a bigger fan of WCW now or then? Equally both, and I think most of the good stuff holds up very well. 3. Best Year/Period for WCW Easily 1992. There were several changes in direction, as was typical for WCW for their entire existence, but 1992 had SuperBrawl II, which I still think is the greatest wrestling pay-per-view of all time. It had great runs from people like Vader, Rick Rude and Sting, and people like Brian Pillman, Ricky Steamboat, Dustin Rhodes, Barry Windham, Steve Austin, Larry Zbyszko, Arn Anderson, Bobby Eaton, Ricky (Richard) Morton, Cactus Jack and even Big Josh. I love the period of 2/3 falls main events on WCW Saturday Night. I love the way that Bill Watts closed out shows with tag team title matches and made them the most important belts in the company. Other high points for me are 1989, for obvious reasons, and the summer of 1996, which I think had the most genuine intrigue and shock in terms of booking in main events that any company has ever had. It didn't last, though. 4. Best World Heavyweight Title run It would either have to be Ric Flalr in 1989-1990, or Vader in 1992-1993. I think between the two, I'd go with Vader, because Flair was really being booked like a chump toward the end of his run when Ole got booking power. 5. Best United States Championship run Lex Luger in 1989-1990, especially during '89 when he was a heel. Luger was more effective at this point in his career than I think he has ever been at any other time. He was having good matches almost constantly, which can be partially but definitely not completely attributed to his opponents. No one held the belt in a way where it seemed like a main event title in the way Luger did. Running neck and neck would be Rick Rude in 1991-1992. The big difference is that Rude had a PPV title defense all of one time and never even defended the belt on a Clash. Rude was at a career peak at this point, but rarely even defended the US title. 6. Best Tag Team Championship run Either Doom in 1990-1991 or Steve Williams and Terry Gordy in 1992. There's also the Steiners who had some good stuff as well, but I think Doom were a more consistent tag team, and Doc and Gordy were given more emphasis and had lots of good matches. 7. Best Television Championship run Steve Austin in 1991-1992 was pretty synonymous with that belt. He used it to catapult himself to stardom in WCW (yes, I know, he got bigger later but bare with me). Really fun series of matches against Dustin Rhodes and Barry Windham. 8. Best Cruiserweight Championship run I enjoyed Jericho's immensely, but let's look back at it with some perspective. It's the point when you started seeing screwjob finishes, when it had previously been a title that had pretty much all clean finishes. It pretty much killed the division, because Jericho got away from it the moment he dropped the title because he wanted to be a heavyweight. He basically spent close to a year beating everyone cleanly multiple times with no real payoff, because when the payoff with Dean at Slamboree did happen, they couldn't just let it lie and then started booking the belt pretty horribly. The match quality dropped during Jericho's time as the top star of the division considerably. Give me Eddy Guerrero in 1997, who was every bit the compelling character and had far better matches. I think also, the period of Dean and Ultimo Dragon feuding in 1996-1997 produced more great matches than the division had at any point. 9. Best feud Despite any bumps along the way, WCW vs NWO would take this in a cakewalk if there was any type of happy ending even halfway attempted. But there wasn't. So I'm going to go with Ric Flair vs Terry Funk from 1989. 10. Most Underrated Feud The whole triangle feud with Raven/Saturn vs Benoit/Malenko vs Rey/Kidman in '99 was tons of fun in terms of unpredictable finishes that made sense and advancing the storyline in a way where every team had a role. 11. Best Angle or Storyline Fake Sting turns on Lex Luger in a dark, rainy parking lot, as the NWO tricks everyone into believing it was the real one. The real Sting is so disgusted when he tries to explain himself and no one believes him that he retreats to the rafters and morphs into a completely different character. 12. Most Underrated Angle or Storyline DDP vs Johnny B. Badd in 1995-1996, with DDP losing his fortune, his woman and his career. Also loved the match on Nitro where Kimberly had the bouquet of flowers with the chain in it. 13. Best Booker Dusty Rhodes. Lots of horrible periods, but lots of really good periods as well. Kinda like his entire career. 14. Wrestler who had the most surprising run I don't think anyone expected a returning Rick Martel to be awesome in early 1998, but he was. He was so good at that point, and it's really a shame the run was cut short due to injury. 15. A worker they could have done more with Steve Austin is the obvious answer. Bret Hart is the second obvious answer. Bill Goldberg is the next obvious answer. 16. The worker who's most synonymnous with WCW for you Easily Ric Flair. 17. The point where Flair got old The first time I remember thinking Flair looked old was in 1993, going against Austin and Pillman at that Clash. But I think he still contributed in a good way on and off all the way to the end. 18. Best Face Sting or Ric Flair 19. Best Heel Hollywood Hulk Hogan. He went into a territory where most of the hardcore fans hated him and he was getting booed out of buildings in places like Charlotte and Atlanta. They were having to do everything from stage fake parades, to hand out signs and merchandise, to pipe in crowd noise, just to make it seem like he was over. They finally went with it and he was more effective than he had been in years and began drawing money. WCW itself was a great heel as well. They knew how to constantly piss off their fans and draw heat. 20. Most Underrated Face Eddy Guerrero gets a lot of credit for his run as a heel, but in 1995-1996, he was also very over as a face. WCW surveyed their audience in 1996 to see who fans thought was the most likable wrestler. Eddy Guerrero won, which shocked them. 21. Most Underrated Heel Maybe Luger in '89? It's hard to think of someone here. 22. The worker who was most effective whether they were heel or face Ric Flair. 23. A worker who turned (heel or face) too many times Ric Flair, Lex Luger, The Giant 24. Favourite Commentating Pairing Jim Ross and Jesse Ventura 25. Lasting Memory of WCW The company that managed to be great at times, and horrible at times, all in spite of itself. People who didn't understand wrestling were interfering in day-to-day operations from pretty much day one of their existence, but they still had more and better wrestling than the WWF until 2000, when the Radicals jumped. It's also the company that probably screwed up more things on live television than any company ever. There are a million things you can say "Only in WCW ..." about. Which makes me want to add a question. 26: Favorite "Only in WCW ..." moment Definitely a strap match taking place with cats o'nine tails being used instead of belts.

Vince can take steps, but most indy promoters operate so close to the margins that it would be financial suicide. Not that things should be that way, it's just the reality. Honestly, fuck the fans who complain about it. They're contributing to the problem.

Here is usually where you would get the following Bryan Alvarez post: Ok, here's the deal. YOU think that wrestling from the early 90s was better than the wrestling today. But the VAST MAJORITY does not. You can not force your opinions on someone else.

Everyone sit tight. For some reason, when I record in flex mode, I can't pause the recorder for commercials, which is causing some problems. I've always been able to do it when I'm just recording 2-hour discs, but in flex mode, I can't pause for some reason. It's going to be a chore to try to get all these matches on two 4-hour discs anyway, and it's even harder when commercials can't even be edited out. If anyone knows how to get around this, please let me know.

John, as an FYI, he has also argued numerous times on his board that the overall quality of wrestling is higher now than it was at any point in the 90s.

There is nothing about being a wrestling fan who posts on message boards that is more frustrating than arguing with Bryan Alvarez. Nothing. And that covers a lot of ground.

This bears repeating.

"Ric was the drug." - David Crockett

In the case of Harry Smith, he's been gone longer than 30 days. What's the deal with him now?

All of the wrestlers suspended for Wellness reasons as of late were using steroids that were popular in the 70s-80s and are very easily detected. I'm not saying doctors should run to the press after every blood test, but since steroids are illegal aren't they required to report that to authorities? Pretty sure that would be a violation of HIPAA.

I can't wait to see Shawn Michaels, Ric Flair, Batista and the Divas.