Loss

Eddy beat Rey at World War 3 1997, on Nitro on 12/21/98 and on Smackdown on 03/18/04.

They could milk even another storyline out of that. After the belts are unified, have The Mexicools steal the old belt and anoint Eddy Guerrero with it. He could defend it, the Mexicools could bully the announcer into announcing his matches as a title match, etc. Batista gets sick of it, and there's feud #2.

It wouldn't be silly if it was part of a storyline, like Smackdown being down and out, not having a world champion, wondering how they'll recover after losing so many stars and that sort of thing. The show should be in panic mode right now with everyone desperate and backstabbing each other until the right guy gets drafted in, comes in and calms things down, someone speaks out against him pretending to be a "savior" and voila, your first big feud.

Oh, and I also stood next to Sting in a urinal when I was like nine years old. Luckily, he was a messy guy, so I didn't get Stinger Splashed.

Jim Cornette -- Was every bit as animated as you'd expect, and a super nice guy. I was in line for an autograph at Axxess before Wrestlemania X-7 and everyone else was freaking out about HHH/Austin/Jericho/etc all being out at the same time and I was like "Fuck them, I wanna get JIM CORNETTE to sign!" I got the nervous bug and got unusually quiet, which surprised me, as I never thought I'd get starstruck at all. Was also great when a fan was dressed like Hulk Hogan in line and Cornette looked at him and said, "WCW just closed and you're ALREADY looking for a job??" Great stuff. Pat Patterson -- Part of the same event. I told him I had watched a lot of his footage on tape and really enjoyed it and he thanked me and that was that. Lord Alfred Hays -- I almost didn't know who he was at first because he was wheelchair-bound and very quiet. He was all smiles though and seemed happy to be there. Tony Garea -- I didn't really know what to say to him at all. Bruce Pritchard/Brother Love -- From the same event. I came up at a GREAT time, as right before I was about to get my autograph, Cornette and Brother Love had a really big, animated worked argument for the web cameras that were covering the event. Loved it! Pritchard was wearing his rings and I made a note that he still had those "gifts from the Million Dollar Man". He laughed and smiled. I was a total tool kind of in awe at the time, especially over Cornette. Other encounters have been brief and not really memorable, although I remember Cactus Jack getting a corndog from the vendor at a WCW house show I went to in 1992 and him politely saying, "Hi, how ya doing?" and my 12-year old ass being scared to death of him. All-time live markout moment was seeing Tommy Rich in wrestling gear working the sound booth at a six-hour NWA TV taping I went to in 1989. He had a beer in one hand and there was peroxide nearby as well, which I didn't understand. After reading the sleaze thread at DVDVR, I wish I still didn't know the story behind that.

Having to choose between Eddy/Rey and the Spurs is a choice I wouldn't wish on you. I care about your sanity.

Or we could do a match a day and really stretch this thing out. It could go for months that way.

Each show still has two draft picks. One of them will be a champ, I'm predicting, and this whole tournament idea will be rendered meaningless. The only way I could see them not going that route is if they really do want to recreate ECW and they're trying to move all the guys with ECW history over to Smackdown and they'll create their own title there. I'd say chances of that are very slim.

Yeah, I heard about that a while back. Lots of documentaries about the underbelly of wrestling in the past 8 years or so, that's for sure.

I think the feud has been blown off. I think Eddy should have gone over in the end. It wouldn't have damaged Rey in the slightest, and with babyface champs, they need to be building up strong heels right now in the worst way.

Barry Windham & Dustin Rhodes Booker T & Goldust Brainbusters (Arn Anderson & Tully Blanchard) British Bulldogs (Dynamite Kid & Davey Boy Smith) Chris Benoit & Dean Malenko Doom (Ron Simmons & Butch Reed) Fantastics (Tommy Rogers & Bobby Fulton) Heavenly Bodies (Tom Pritchard & Jimmy Del Ray) Hollywood Blondes (Steve Austin & Brian Pillman) Midnight Express (Bobby Eaton & Dennis Condrey) Midnight Express (Bobby Eaton & Stan Lane) Rick & Scott Steiner Rock & Roll Express (Ricky Morton & Robert Gibson) Rockers (Shawn Michaels & Marty Jannetty) Strike Force (Rick Martel & Tito Santana) Vitamin C (Chris Jericho & Christian)

Pick the teams that you feel are the top 16 teams in this tournament, in no particular order and post them in this thread. The 16 teams to get the most mentions will all get a bye to the second round. The remaining 32 teams will square off in the first round. I'll keep this open until Sunday and we'll start the tournament Monday. ---------------------- 3 Count (Shane Helms/Shannon Moore/Evan Karagias) Barry Windham & Dustin Rhodes Booker T & Goldust Brainbusters (Arn Anderson & Tully Blanchard) British Bulldogs (Dynamite Kid & Davey Boy Smith) Chris Benoit & Chris Jericho Chris Benoit & Dean Malenko Demolition (Ax & Smash) Doom (Ron Simmons & Butch Reed) Dream Team (Greg Valentine & Brutus Beefcake) Dudley Boyz (Bubba Ray & D-Von) Edge & Christian Edge & Rey Misterio Jr Eliminators (Perry Saturn & John Kronus) Fabulous Freebirds (Hayes/Gordy/Roberts) Fabulous Freebirds (Hayes/Garvin) Fantastics (Tommy Rogers & Bobby Fulton) Gangstas (New Jack & Mustafa Saed) Hardy Boyz (Matt & Jeff) Harlem Heat (Booker T & Stevie Ray) Hart Foundation (Bret Hart & Jim Neidhart) Heavenly Bodies (Tom Pritchard & Jimmy Del Ray) Hollywood Blondes (Steve Austin & Brian Pillman) Ivan & Nikita Koloff Jung Dragons (Kaz Hayashi & Jimmy Yang) Los Guerreros (Eddy & Chavo) Midnight Express (Bobby Eaton & Dennis Condrey) Midnight Express (Bobby Eaton & Stan Lane) Miracle Violence Connection (Steve Williams & Terry Gordy) Nasty Boys (Jerry Sags & Brian Knobs) Natural Disasters (Earthquake & Typhoon) New Age Outlaws (Road Dogg & Billy Gunn) Outsiders (Scott Hall & Kevin Nash) Owen Hart & Davey Boy Smith Powers of Pain (Warlord & Barbarian) Public Enemy (Johnny Grunge & Rocco Rock) Raven & Perry Saturn Rick & Scott Steiner Road Warriors/Legion of Doom (Animal & Hawk) Rock & Roll Express (Ricky Morton & Robert Gibson) Rockers (Shawn Michaels & Marty Jannetty) Shawn Michaels & Diesel Smoking Gunns (Billy & Bart Gunn) Strike Force (Rick Martel & Tito Santana) Twin Towers (Big Boss Man & Akeem) US Express (Barry Windham & Mike Rotunda) Vitamin C (Chris Jericho & Christian) World's Greatest Tag Team (Charlie Haas & Shelton Benjamin)

I'm thinking this time, we'll still do invididual topics for the tournaments, but we're doing them in poll format. That way, those who respond will possibly be more inclinced to say why they're voting the way they are instead of just naming a name and leaving the thread for bare. Remember, the whole point of a tournament is to promote debate and discussion. I figure I'll start on Monday. I'm putting this in the wrestling folder hoping that some who don't frequent the Tournaments folder will see it and be interested in participating this time around.

If you feel like talking about something you've watched, but don't want to go to the point of doing something as formal as a review, do so in this thread.

The Iron Sheik! He'd be perfect!

I love how everyone -- Nash, Hogan, Bischoff, whoever -- lies blame on some invisible higher-up that squashed all of the good booking ideas. They always go to bat to protect each other when talking about the demise of the company, but they continually place blame on some nameless group of TBS execs who were determined to see them fail.

Torch Talk Library Kevin Nash talks about being WCW booker, how he got the job, Bret Hart, Hulk Hogan politics (06-25-05) Jun 25, 2005, 04:54 PM Torch Talk with Kevin Nash, pt. 11 Originally Published: June 25, 2005 Torch Newsletter #867 In the following eleventh installment of a six-hour "Torch Talk" conducted on March 24, Kevin Nash talks about the challenges of being WCW booker, he reveals his reason for missing his scheduled job against the Giant, he talks about how WCW dropped the ball with Bret Hart, and he explains Hulk Hogan's role in hurting and helping WCW. Wade Keller: When you were booker of WCW, did you ever feel that you had a chance and enough control to implement your ideas? Kevin Nash: Absolutely not. Keller: You did implement more pre-produced segments and fewer meaningless matches. That was one of your staples early on. Nash: I tried. The only show I had complete control of was the show we did from Indianapolis that was a Thunder. That was the one where the guys in the Black & White were talking sh--. We set the camera up in the limo and me, (Hulk) Hogan, and Scott (Hall) watched them. That was the first show I booked, the Thunder in Indianapolis. Look that up. Maybe I was booker when I beat Goldberg. Maybe I'm in denial. (laughs) I think I booked (Chris) Jericho against (Chris) Benoit in a match. I mean, I put all the guys who could work - I picked my guys. Whoever was on that show that night, that was basically the guys I knew. Because Stevie Ray could f---in' act. Stevie was the leader of the Black & White. They had already screwed it up so much, I was trying to get some mileage out of those guys. That was my first show that I had control of - that Thunder in Indianapolis. Keller: Why did you want that job? Did you think you could make a positive difference at that point? Nash: It was one of those deals where every time Eric (Bischoff) had an idea, I was one of those guys who said, "F--- that, it's not gonna work." He looked at me and said, "Okay, do you think you could do any better?" I went, "Yeah. Yeah, I do." He went, "F---, it's yours." I said, "I ain't taken it on for free." He said, "I'll give you a raise." The next thing you know, he took me off TV. I was making almost two million bucks to book the show. At the same time, I had a lot people I felt were my friends turn on me (when I became booker). Booking is not a favorable place to be. Keller: Because everyone believes if you were friends with them, life will be great as soon as you get power? Nash: And the thing is, like anything else, there's a lot of guys that were my friends who I put in position and I gave them the ball and they f---in' went, "Well, I'll give you 30 percent" and I was asking them for 110. I looked at them and said, "I did you solid and you f---n' sh-- in my lap. I expect more out of you as my friend, not less." Keller: Did you gain sympathy for previous booking regimes that you were critical of once you sat in that chair yourself? Nash: I learned to respect it because, you know what, I mean - and I'll always say this about the dirt sheets. They're the best Tuesday quarterback in the world. Everybody can watch a show, digest it, and f---in' think about what could have made it better over a 24 hour period. But when you're going on live on a Monday night and you've got all the intangibles laid out in front of you, especially when you've got someone coming in going, "Brother, that doesn't work for me." You go, "F---! Not only do I have to re-book the show, I have to re-time this motherf---er because, guess what, we got commercial sponsors. It's 7:15 and we go on at 8:00. I have to re-write something that passes him to get through a segment four, six, and nine because we're on for three hours and he's all over the show. He won't return a call. It was not an easy process. It wasn't like I was the director of a movie and I could fire ya'. Keller: That was another problem with guaranteed contracts - the bulletproof vests that so many guys had. Nash: I learned a lot. I think if I ever booked again, I would be a much better booker just because my skin's a lot thicker now. The whole thing is every booker has vision, and if that vision doesn't work - it's like you wake up and say, "I want to take a boat to Tahiti." If the guy's running the boat don't want to go to Tahiti, you ain't going to Tahiti. So you pretty much have to sit down and kinda talk it out. I don't think TNA is really happy with the way things are going right now. There's a lot of unhappiness right now. Dusty (Rhodes) - I have no idea how long he's been in charge, but if it's been three weeks, it's been about five too many. I think the product - this is me talking - I think the product has dropped. I don't think it's what it was. You can't have the X match every f---in' month. You can't do it. You can't change the belts on those guys in the X class every month. I mean every match is a gimmick match. The next month we have two cage matches. Keller: That's another product of not having a two year guarantee as booker, and so he has to produce results right now to gain the confidence of his bosses. So he does everything he can to not get fired after four weeks. Nash: I wrote an article he wrote in a Japanese magazine that they had a feature article on me in. He says that he can compete with Vince mentally, but he can't financially. He said where Vince was missing the boat was the rural market. You ain't Vince. He sat there and had the first meeting with us and told us that we need to get our sh-- together because the office was right. I went, "Oh, man, you've got eight people in the f---in' office that you can't a return call from in eight weeks and you're saying the office is right and the boys need to get their sh-- right?" Who's d--- are you sucking? He lost all credibility with us immediately. Keller: That's a good lead-in for my next question. There was some snickering because you said in your first speech as WCW booker at the time that you'd have zero tolerance for trying to get out of doing jobs or whining about doing jobs. But then the incident cited by your critics was your scheduled job to Giant in 1997 and you said you had a heart attack and couldn't make it. Fair criticism or not? Was there a serious health problem that people are downplaying because they don't know the circumstances? Nash: Sure. They don't know the circumstances. What happened was a buddy of mine came over and I had my in-laws in town. And he brought a f---in' pan of marijuana brownies. I said, "F--- it, I wanna get high, but my in-laws are in town and I can't smoke. Could you bring over some brownies? He put an ounce of the most kronic kronic in the world in these f---in' brownies. It's probably a six-by-six inch pan of brownies. He brings it over to my house, gives it to me. I don't think anything of it, so I cut in fours and put it in my closet. Merrry Christmas to me. So I eat one brownie. Nothin'. I eat another brownie. Nothin'. I eat the third brownie. Nothin'. I eat the fourth brownie. Nothin'. I'm drinkin' wine, I'm drinkin' beer, having a couple of muscle relaxers. The next thing you know I'm sitting on the couch and I'm getting a body buzz. F---, it's super potent sh--, so I was having a f---in' heart attack. I had a giant ranch - probably a six thousand square foot ranch in Arizona at the time. I took a walk back to the back. I was sweatin' f--in' bullets. It was cold as f---, like 42 degrees in the desert. Christmas day. I walk back and check on my little boy who wasn't two yet. I walked outside and I had probably a 2,000 square foot balcony on the back of the house overlooking the pool. I'm sitting there, sweating bullets. I said, "I gotta check my pulse." My pulse was like 120. I said, "Oh, f---, I'm having a heart attack." I called the paramedics. They came and my blood pressure was through the roof. I was having an incredible anxiety attack because of the body buzz from the pot. So I had trained legs and back that morning. I had a key to the gym and I went in and trained a double body barb because I was gonna take a couple of days off after the holidays. So I trained legs really heavy and back really heavy. So when I went in, the Indian doctor took a test. I guess they do a muscle breakdown test. It gave him a positive because of all the lactic acid and sh-- I had in my body and the amount of work I did that day. So he thought it was heart tissue, so he said I had had a heart attack. So they diagnosed me as having this minor heart attack. They put me in North Scotsdale Hospital. I was on the heart monitor. F---in', it wasn't until Monday when they did a nuclear dye CAT scan on me that I knew I didn't actually have a heart attack. My dad died at 36 years old of a heart attack. It ain't like I was f---in' working anybody. My dad dropped dead at 36. I was 38 and outlived my dad by two years. F---, like I give a f--- about putting The Giant over. Eric called me and said he'd send me a leer jet. I said, "Dude, you can terminate my contract. I don't give a f---. They're telling me the bottom of my heart stopped beating. I said, "I'm not moving nowhere." They're calling me at the North Scotdale Hospital. What a work that is, right? I'm gonna sit in the hospital for three days just to not have to do a job? Let me put my wife's son and her in-laws through it while we're at it because I'm that masterful of a worker. An ounce of kronic in your belly in about an hour and a half period with just some turkey with no carbs, and then drop about three bottles of wine, a half a bottle of Makers Mark, 12 beers, and a couple of somas and tell me you're not ending up in the E.R. somewhere. Keller: They always say nobody has ever died of a pot overdose. You were almost the exception. Nash: I almost scared myself to death. Let's put it that way. Keller: I think one of the biggest missed opportunities in WCW the last few years was Bret Hart. He came in right after the Survivor Series incident. Hulk Hogan, always a self-preservationist, noticed that February, two months after Bret jumped, he headlined a pay-per-view with (Ric) Flair and it drew the same buyrate with Hogan not on the card that Hogan had been drawing. After that, it seemed that everything that could be done to sabotage Bret happened. I brought that up to Hogan when he did a "Torch Talk" and he said he didn't recall paying attention to buyrates at the time. Do you think Hogan saw that and said, "Wow, Bret's a threat"? Nash: I know for a fact, because I remember one time telling him when I first started booking, I said, "Terry (Hulk Hogan), I'd like to make you the commissioner." He said, "Brother, that doesn't work for me because I get paid on buyrates." He was well aware of buyrates. Buyrates equated to money in his f---in' pockets. There is no way he didn't know about buyrates. I know when he was at the King of the Ring, he wouldn't put Bret over. I was there, man. I was there that night in Ohio. He wouldn't put Bret over. He would put Yoko over, who put Bret over, to get Bret the belt. Bret was our guy, he dressed in our locker room. He said, "That mother f---er won't put me over." I remember that whole thing going down. He was complaining that Hulk wouldn't pass the torch to the young guys. I'm sure that wasn't going to change when Bret (arrived in WCW). I'm sure there was animosity there. Keller: Why was Hogan so dead-set against putting over Bret even at that point? Was Hogan particularly threatened by Bret, or was it a size issue? Nash: Terry never said this, but I don't think he felt that Bret was in his category, that he was in his league. I don't think he felt Bret was worthy of him dropping the strap to him. I never beat him! There ain't many mother f---ers who beat Hulk. The only reason Goldberg beat the mother f---er is because he got such a big peice of the house and everything else at that Nitro. That was a four, five hundred thousand dollar job for him. Keller: Going back to the original question, do you agree that Bret was a lost opportunity? Nash: He could have been a new fresh face with all of those fresh match-ups. Bret was the kind of guy who could have a great match with everybody. At that point, Bret could have worked babyface/heel. He could have worked against everybody. He could have worked against (Lex) Luger, Sting, me, Scott (Hall), Goldberg, Hogan. There were probably eight or nine really good runs he had that were probably two month runs at least. Bret was a year of booking. They paid him a sh--load of money and they didn't use him. Keller: People talk about the top five things that if they were different would have changed things drastically as WCW began the downslide... Nash: That's definitely one! Because, I'm a huge Bret Hart fan. In my life, if I had to pick the top five guys I ever worked against, he's definitely in my top five. Keller: Do you think Bret wasn't pushed out of incompetence and negligence or out of spite? Nash: Probably a combination. Keller: If Hogan was part of that, and now there's no competition to WWE because WCW is out of business and that's one of the reasons why, for all the talk of all the good Hogan has done for the industry, there's one example where there were pretty big negative ramifications from his self-preservation at all costs approach. Nash: You know what, to me, it's one of those deals it's kind of like Terry know what's good for Terry and I mean, I watched what he did at the last WrestleMania I was at. So Terry knows what's good for Terry and I kinda got to go with it (laughs). You know what I mean? F---, you know? Keller: Isn't there a point where you go, gee, give back. Nash: I think Terry is taking care of Terry, and I think Terry is in a position in his life where he is because he did. It's a nobody loves anybody cut-throat business. If anybody wanted to assassinate anybody, including me and Scott, it was Terry. He'd always rise above everybody. So I mean, did it cost us, yeah, but would Bret have come in if Terry didn't turn? Would we have had the genesis we had? Probably not. Terry's ability to see a good thing and turn made it a viable product. I guarantee Bret never made more money than he did sitting on his ass during those couple of years. Keller: So you're saying you build up enough equity through doing good for yourself that also helps the industry that you get a free pass almost destroy a company as long as you get yours in the end? Come on... Nash: I mean, if I'm Terry - the thing is, there was a point where I despised him. There was a point where I loved him because I came to be his friend. I came to understand him and actually sit down and have conversations with him that weren't based on bullsh-- but instead was based on two guys having a beer talking about sh-- that went down. When we went into New York, he knew he needed his back covered because everyone was going to kill him. He had to trust Scott and I, so we became friends because it was like three pirates. I understood for the first time because I came in under the same animosity basically that he had been under his whole f---in' career that I understood the psychology of why he does what he does.

Jun 11, 2005, 03:18 AM Torch Talk with Kevin Nash, pt. 10 Originally Published: June 11, 2005 Torch Newsletter #865 In the following tenth installment of a six-hour "Torch Talk" conducted on March 24, Nash explains what he thinks went wrong with WCW during the Nitro downfall, his involvement in the end of the Bill Goldberg winning streak, what was supposed to happen and why it didn?t, his idea to work with Chris Jericho during his latest WWE stint, and the corporate higher-ups? attitude that ultimately cost the money-losing WCW any chance at being subsidized any longer by Time-Warner. Wade Keller: One of the reasons often cited for why WCW went on the downslide was the lack of new stars coming up at a time when the WWF had many new stars coming up who were fresh in the eyes of the fans. How much of a concern was it to you when you were booker and when you were just watching and trying to nudge people certain ways, how much of your concern during that time period was that you needed to some new people over and rotate and get some fresh names going? Kevin Nash: It?s really pertinent to get new people over, but at the same time I know that when I got over and Shawn (Michaels) got over, it was kind of one of those deals where in this business you have to get over on your own. I mean, to get over at the expense of everyone else to the point where you give the booking committee no choice but to push you. There weren?t guys doing that. There were guys sitting back waiting to be pushed. To me, when I broke in, you were given an opportunity and that?s the biggest problem I think they?ve got in New York right now. Guys are waiting to get pushed. "I think they should push me." F---, dude, don?t give them an option. Keller: For instance, just to grab a name, Chris Jericho, he?s over to a degree. You can argue how much. How does he get a bigger push? Nash: I think that Chris - and I?ll say it and please put it in print - his problem is, he?s too vocal to the creative aspect of the thing and they f--- him because he?s like that. He?s too critical of the booking and he f---in ? pays the price. Keller: In WWE or WCW or both? Nash: Both. Chris is not afraid to say, "Your f---in? ideas suck. Keller: And he?s not diplomatic about it. Nash: It gets to the point where after so many years in the business, you feel you?ve earned the right to say "that blows." In the wrestling business, they go, okay, well maybe it does, and then the next thing you know you get beat. I think Chris is probably the most over guy in the business who lately hasn?t gotten a push. I mean, they don?t push him at all. I think Chris is a great worker. I really like - I enjoy him. I was hoping - my whole deal was on my last run I wanted to be Diesel with Chris. That?s what I wanted. I figured we could do that forever. I could get a three year run. Keller: You would say that in WCW when there were these same guys on top and the ratings were going down and wheels are coming off the wagon, it was the fault of the mid-card wrestlers for not stepping up; it wasn?t the fault of the bookers for not making it happen? Nash: It wasn?t anybody?s fault. What basically happened was, it?s like when you have a party at your house and some guys from outside of your group get into a fight and break your picture window. It was nobody?s fault that the sh-- went wrong. It was just so out of control and running so crazy that it?s like anything, it?s like driving 200 miles an hour after 20 beers. Eventually you?re going to smash into something. That?s what we were. Keller: It was a success story built to crash. Nash: Yeah, it was a free-fall. A complete free-fall. I mean, that?s what it was. Keller: Do you believe there was a certain inevitability to it at one point when the ratings began going down. Nash: In retrospect, yeah. There was no incentive due to the guaranteed contracts. That?s where people say that the guaranteed money killed the business because there was no incentive for people to get over. I mean, like, everybody worked their ass off for three months until you got that four-year deal. Then you got that and it was like you back the Brinks truck up and pack the money in it and went, "Okay, now I just gotta do my time." Keller: I don?t think Sting or Stevie Ray or Rick Steiner were staying up late at night trying to figure out how to earn their guaranteed paychecks. Rick?s a friend of yours, but I don?t think he was sitting there thinking to himself, "Man, I want to make this company a success." He had his seven figure deal from his hunting buddy and he was going to do what he felt like doing. Nash: Absolutely. Keller: He would probably smile, admit that?s true, say, "I got my money and I did what I did." But that is where guaranteed contracts did contribute. To say it had nothing to do with it, I think, ignores human nature. Nash: Oh, Absolutely. I talk to guys who were in the business at that point. I ask them what they were making. They tell me, and I say, "Get the f--- out!" Keller: Yet, it became so miserable for some guys that they left for less guaranteed money - Jericho being one of them. You want to have fun doing what you do. It?s not all about the money for everyone. Nash: There?s a point to that, but there?s also the mark factor. To me, tomorrow if somebody told me I could become the WWF Champion for 20 million dollars or work at Burger King for 21 million, I?ll work at Burger King for 21. I do it for money. When I leave my house, when I leave my family, when I have to alter my lifestyle, I do it as a business. I?ve never lost that (perspective). This is a business. Keller: You did leave WCW with a 100,000 dollar-plus guarantee and rolled the dice you?d make more in the WWF. Was that not a "mark move" on your part? Nash: To me, it was one of those deals where if you?re playing for the Tigers right now and you?re making 200,000 a year and they said to you, "There?s a real good chance you can play for the Yankees. Wanna come aboard?" Would you stay with the f---in? Tigers or go to the Yankees? At that point I had already talked to the people at the strip joint before I went to New York. He said, "Anytime you want to come back, you got five shifts." To me, it was like a gamble, but I was taking a gamble on the pretense of knowing that if it didn?t work in New York (with the WWF), I was going to go back to the strip joint business and make my 100 grand. Keller: You had a net. Nash: I was thinking to myself in WCW that maybe I?m not going to do this any longer. I was pretty much ready to quit. Dallas (Page) was the only reason I didn?t quit the wrestling business. Dallas has that positive f---in? guru crazy "stay positive" message, Positively Page. F--- you, dude. I can make more working a strip joint, smoke a fatty before the shift starts, and f---in? be on cruise control, go to the gym every day, and be home with my wife. F---. Keller: Do you remember the first Nitro after the streak had ended? Was it like a funeral, or was it such a mess anyway? Nash: I don?t think I remember. I think I remember it more because, like, all of a sudden people who had ideas suddenly became really important. People to this day will say I took over the book and beat Goldberg. To this day, people say that. I started booking at the end of February. I beat Goldberg on December 27th. I had absolutely no creative f---in? voice when Goldberg was beat. I took over TV at the Wichita, Kansas Thunder, wherever that was. [Editor?s Note: This is clarified later in the interview.] I think it was February, or maybe even March. Goldberg put it in his book and people think it?s the gospel. It?s one of those deals. Was I one of those people who sat in the f---in? room and said, "Hey, the guy?s gotta get beat." Absolutely. Was I the guy who put the angle together for me dropping the belt to Hogan and we put the heel factory in front of Goldberg? Was I the guy who told Goldberg to then get so f---in? pissed off at Scott Hall that he put his hand through a f---in? limo and he was out for nine months. No. Sorry, when I booked it, I didn?t put the mark factor into it. My bad. Now we?re f---ed. All of a sudden, out of nowhere, I?m a mother f---in? piece of sh-- for beatin? Bill. I?ve watched the match back several times and it?s 50-50, if not 60-40 me at MCI Arena that night when we went to Starrcade. They wanted him to get beat until he got beat, and when he got beat, they went, "Oh, f---. Wait, we don?t want him to get beat. Keller: I?m looking at a Torch Newsletter detailing the February 1 Nitro and one of the headlines was "WCW booker Kevin Nash made a speech to wrestlers before Nitro to establish stricter set of rules. He told the wrestlers they need to get to the arena when asked to. They plan to do more producing." Nash: That must have been it. That must have been the day I took over. There was probably so much heat when Bill got beat in December that he probably went f--- this. Keller: Let me get this clear. You were or were not in favor of how your match went with Goldberg? Nash: I was completely in favor of it. The fans were chanting "Goldberg sucks" at the arenas. I said, "The thing is, he?s become the Yankees. He wins, wins, wins. Once we beat him, they?re going to go, ?Oh, f---, we don?t want him to lose.? Which they did." You can watch that match and watch the heat. The people pop like f---, and then there?s a 15 second pause and they went, like, "F---, we didn?t want him to get beat." It worked. Everything we had planned out would have worked if he would have gone through everybody to get to (Hulk) Hogan for nine months. It was the old Hogan heel factory. I mean, it would have worked. It would have given us another f---in? nine month run with what we had. He was the guy to do it. Keller: What went wrong with Goldberg? Nash: What went wrong is he went to Salisbury, Maryland. At that time the NWO was the black and silver. It was me, Scott (Hall), Bret (Hart), and (Jeff) Jarrett at the show. It was the first time WCW had been in that town. That?s a staunch New York (WWE) town. So, they came out and told Scott, "Whatever you do, don?t cut a promo on Goldberg." Which means Scott will cut a promo live. We were drinking beer all day. Scott goes out and says, "How many people came here to see Goldberg?" They went boo! He said, "How many people came to see the NWO?" They went, "Yeah! Goldberg sucks! Goldberg sucks! Goldberg comes out. He?s f---in? livid. That was the night he threw his f---in? arm through the limo. He was so pissed. (Kevin) Sullivan churned up Goldberg, telling him, "Brotha, Nash and Hall are burying ya? and you don?t even know what?s happenin?." They told Scott not to do the promo and he did it anyway. Goldberg looked at that as, "F---, these guys are going to kill me off." Keller: Do you think Goldberg was a big baby about it? Nash: No, I?m sure he was trying to piss on his turf like everybody else was. I?m sure in retrospect - I mean, I look at it and say Bill had every reason to be hot because he sat in the room and he was there when they told Scott not to do it. Scott did it. Keller: Goldberg did make himself a target to pick on because it?s so easy to push his buttons because you knew you?d get a reaction out of him. Nash: That?s the whole thing. He was never in a car with a Rick Rude and sitting there having a cold one and Rick Rude looking over and telling him, "Brother, don?t f---in? sell the bullsh--." Or Jake, "Brother, don?t let them see you sweat, brother." Or even Hogan. He was never under that learning tree. He came in as a nobody and they went, "Okay, you?re going to go 190 and 0." Keller: And he looked enough like the hottest act in wrestling at the time, Steve Austin. Nash: Because Austin was f---in? through the roof, they saw him as a bigger, badder version of Steve. But he didn?t have Steve?s charisma and couldn?t cut a promo. Keller: That was another cause of the WCW downfall. They banked so much on Goldberg, but when the winning streak got a little repetitive, and it was time to move from second base to third base, and Goldberg couldn?t pull it off because he couldn?t have longer matches and he couldn?t talk, they didn?t know where to go with him. Nash: That was the whole thing. I watched where Dallas - I think he worked with Dallas before he worked with me in Vegas - and they went 12 minutes and it was a stretch. He was working with Giant on the road and Giant was smoking cigarettes and blowing smoke in his face and ducking a clothesline and tackling him and pinning him. That was their main event, 30 seconds. Fans were leaving going, "What the f---." When I was main event, you went 20-25. That?s what you did. Keller: Can you list one major reason, or three or four major reasons, that contributed 70, 80, 90 percent to why WCW went down? Is there a short list? Or is it two-dozen equally valid reasons? Nash: There?s soooo many things. Like I said when we started this conversation. You?re talking about a multimedia conglomerate, the biggest in the world, going from 78 dollars to 13 or 14 dollars a share. The economics of that alone - think of Brad Siegel. Here?s a guy, I forget what movie it was, one of those Cable Ace (Award) movies, a Schindler?s List type of thing. Not that, but a high-brow Cable Ace movie. They spent 55 million dollars to make the movie. I asked what they expected to make on it. He said, "Well, hopefully we?ll do a 2.5." I said, "How many times will you play the movie?" He said, "Once a quarter." I?m thinking, they just spent 50 million dollars to basically do a 2.5 once a quarter, and you?re wanting to cut us out of your programming which is doing a 3.2 for three hours of original programming. I wanted to ask if they were in the television business or just looking to get blown at the Cable Aces. When you?ve got guys like that running the helm - people want to point the finger at (Eric) Bischoff. Point the finger at Brad Siegel. What a moron that guy is. I?m sure he?s no longer with the company. Everybody who was a higher-up, they?re all gone. They?re all fired. I mean, the jackoff meter above WCW was beyond imagination. It was a bunch of Napoleonic little pieces of sh--. They hated us because of what we were.