JerryvonKramer

Yes; they were wrong to start with, but I ensured they were correct as of Jan 91. I am going to go it alone with a brand new company. WCW do not deserve me!

Well there aren't any other booking jobs available, so I might just have to start my own promotion ... A shame I've just signed every single former NWA champion to 3-year written contracts!

Man. I am pretty gutted because I'd put all the pieces in place to execute my masterstroke booking plan. I'd signed all of the people too, was just waiting for their start dates. Since it's not going to happen now, let me talk through it. Wrestler of the Century 1. Current NWA World Champion, Sting has been voted the "Wrestler of the Century" by the WCW fans. 2. During the presentation ceremony, someone interrupts proceedings ... Harley Race! He cites his 8 world titles and says that HE should have won the award. 3. Then Dory Funk Jr. comes out and says that since he held the belt for four years, HE should have won it. 4. Jack Brisco comes out. 5. Terry Funk comes out. 6. Gene Kiniski and Killer Kowolski both come out. 7. Buddy Rodgers comes out. 8. Lou Thesz comes out. 9. Ricky Steamboat comes out. 10. Ric Flair comes out. 11. Soon every living former NWA champion including Baba, Dusty and Tommy Rich are all there. Somehow it all works out that Sting has to go on the "Wrestler of the Century" gauntlet facing each of the former champions in turn, starting with Thesz at 70+, Rodgers and Kiniski in their 60s, etc. etc. until he gets all the way through Race to Flair. Most of the matches against the older guys would have taken place on Clashes / TV but the plan was: Superbrawl: Sting vs. Dory Funk Jr Spring Stampede: Sting vs. Jack Brisco Slamboree: Sting vs. Terry Funk GAB: Sting vs. Harley Race Bash at the Beach: Sting vs. Dusty Rhodes Fall Brawl: Sting vs. Tommy Rich Halloween Havoc: Sting vs. Ricky Steamboat Starrcade: Sting vs. Ric Flair I guess it wasn't to be.

However, unfortunately ... after less than two weeks ... I've been fired. Well that was rather sudden! Unbelieveable.

Week 2: Power Hour: Major plot point on this show was Ole rejoining the Horsemen as their manager. World Championship Wrestling: Here, I had Tully Blanchard return, turning Sid face in the process. Tully Blanchard! From nowhere, did he come from under the ring?! Schoolboy trip on the big Sid Vicious. Ole Anderson ... knee drop! Barry Windham in the knee! Arn Anderson with a knee drop. And ... Ric Flair has dropped a fourth knee onto the head of Sid Vicious. He's going to get a concussion! Arn Anderson and Windham now, they each grab one of Sid's huge arms and pin him down. Flair is beckoning for the house mic ... Flair: Since 1985, this organisation, the FOUR Horsemen has been a representation of the ELITE in this sport. And now, my good old friend Mr. Tully Blanchard is BACK in WCW. So, you see, Sid, you see, ha ha, you were only ever making up the places. You were never a TRUE Horsemen. Ole: This sport is about wrestling. Professional wrestling. That means picking a bodypart, be it an arm or a leg, and then ripping it apart like a Master Surgeon. That means knowhow in the ring. That means SMARTS. And you, Sid, you big musclehead, you meathead, you great lug, you are found wanting. All the things you'll never be are represented by the one and only Tully Blanchard. Tully: That's right! The Four Horsemen are BACK to take over Professional wrestling. And it's good to be back. Do you understand, "Sid Vicious", why this had to take place? *Arn and Barry hold Sid in place. Tully slaps him in the face.* Tully: That, boy, is a lesson I hope you'll learn. *Flair slaps Sid in the face.* Flair: You're no longer a Horseman, you never were a Horsemen, and you'll never be one! Get him out of my sight! *Arn and Barry roll Sid out of the ring. All five men -- Flair, Arn, Tully, Barry and Ole -- stand side-by-side and hold the four fingers aloft.

I need to get through the first week or two of TV in order to get all my ducks in a row, make all the major signings I want, and execute my plans. Also there have been some changes to TEW 2016 (as compared with TEW2013), so there's a bit of a learning process. I've fiddled around with the taping schedule a bit: Power Hour and World Championship Wrestling are taped on Wednesdays in the same venue. Power Hour airs Friday, WCW on Saturday. Worldwide is taped on Thursday in its own taping, and also airs Saturday. Pro and Main Event are taped on Friday in the same venue and both go out on Sunday. I've worked out a monthly schedule. Wednesday tapings 1. Cap Centre, Landover, MD (Mid-Atlantic) 2. Denver Coliseum, Denver, CO (South West) 3. Kiel, St. Louis, MO (Mid-West), 4. UIC Pavillion, Chicago, IL (Great Lakes) Thursday tapings 1. The Omni, Atlanta, GA (South East), 2. Riverside Centroplex, Baton Rouge, LA (Mid-South), 3. Spokane Arena, Spokane, WA, (North West) 4. Wildwoods Convention Center, NJ (Tri-State) Friday tapings Disney MGM Studios From running the first week of shows, I realised that World Championship Wrestling and Worldwide are both going to attract big crowds and so can be run in big arenas, but the B-shows aren't going to draw at all, so might as well do those at Disney. On this scendule, I eight of the major markets at least once a month. Also, for example, if you're a fan in Atlanta, you'll know Worldwide is coming to The Omni on the first week of every month, so always a reason to come back. Not much going on during these first shows, they are placeholders really while I am finding my footing here. Power Hour: Admittedly, a bit of an insult of a show. Traditional jobber matches with a pretty weak main event. But this is all you can expect from Power Hour under my reign. It's a C-show. Note, Eric Bischoff has started already and is hosting the show solo. He'll fill in as an interviewer across the TV also. Sal Bellomo also started as a face jobber. He can forget about the gimmick too, he's going back as the pudgy bland Italian guy a la mid-80s WWF. World Championship Wrestling: Jesse Ventura has signed but his contract hasn't started, he'll take over from Paul E. on colour from next week. Spot the lengthy road-agent note about production values. I have now upgraded them. Spending Turner's money pretty fast in the process: There was a hot match in the middle of this card: This match was mainly to remind fans of the idea of the Horsemen as a unit of four. And after that excitement, here's the definition of a "cooler" match: Like I said, Bellomo will be reverting to his mid-80s gimmick. NWA world title defense for Sting against a middling opponent. He did well. This was a good example of "peaks and troughs" style booking. 4 Horsemen match got the crowd pumped, Bellomo-Rose brought them back down, Sting-Taylor pumped them back up again. I learned that from VKM. Pro: As you can see, small crowd for these tapings. Note the line about "attractive women" being on the show. I might need to get more Missy Hyatt onto these shows. That reminds me also: I need to unite the World and US tag titles. I've never liked the idea of the US tag titles. Main Event: I need a few more jobbers to give Pat Rose a break. Losing to Bellomo and Norman the Lunatic in the space of a week is probably a bit much. Mark Youngblood pretty much shit the bed in his match and I think that the Youngbloods are going to be jobbers for me. There is a lot of shit buried deep in his roster underneath all the quality.

I remember the continuity skipping from right before the Dangerous Alliance War Games to some point months later with ZERO explanation. I was like "where's Paul E? WHO WON THE MATCH?! Where's Rude's tache!" They made it basically as difficult as possible to follow WCW in the UK. ALSO, while we're going down memory lane, do either of you guys remember THIS show that would air right before WCW came on? Usually sandwiched in the 10 minutes between Prisoner and wrestling. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N3jJb9TgJcg Should give our American friends an idea of the sort of slot WCW was in.

Marty this feud might break 4 stars, but it won't touch 4.75 and is way better then Savage / Bad News, so I think you're safe with the claim.

http://placetobenation.com/where-the-big-boys-play-86-1992-tv-and-end-of-year-awards/ Chad and Parv wrap up their look back at 1992 WCW with a roundup of the best TV matches of the year before handing out their annual awards for Chad, we should probs do same as 90 and 91: Awards discussed are The Total Billy Graham Award for worst wrestler, Best Feud, Best Show, Worst Show, Best Tag Team, Best Face, Best Heel, Top 5 matches and Top 5 wrestlers (plus the Ric Flair Award for wrestler of 1992). Also on the show, a look at WCW's and WWF's five different TV shows across cable and syndication at this time, Luger's 89 vs. Sting's 92, and much much more. List of TV matches reviewed: - Dustin Rhodes vs. Arn Anderson (1/4 WCWSN, finish on 1/5 Main Event) - Sting/Ricky Steamboat/Marcus Bagwell vs. Rick Rude/Steve Austin/Larry Zbyszko (1/18 Pro) - Brian Pillman vs. Rick Rude (2/15 Pro) - Sting/Dustin Rhodes/Barry Windham/Ricky Steamboat vs. Rick Rude/Arn Anderson/Bobby Eaton/Larry Zbyszko (2/22 WCWSN) - Ricky Steamboat vs. Arn Anderson (3/28 Pro) - Ricky Steamboat/Dustin Rhodes/Barry Windham vs. Rick Rude/Steve Austin/Arn Anderson (4/4 Pro) - Steve Austin vs. Barry Windham (5/9 WCWSN) - Ricky Steamboat/Dustin Rhodes/Nikita Koloff vs. Arn Anderson/Bobby Eaton/Larry Zbyszko (5/23 WCWSN) - Dustin Rhodes vs. Rick Rude (5/30 Worldwide) - Sting/Steiners vs. Rick Rude/Arn Anderson/Bobby Eaton (10/3 Worldwide) - Arn Anderson vs. Barry Windham (6/6 WCWSN) - Dustin Rhodes vs. Vader (11/21 WCWSN)

I'd tend to want to say that on a national or even international level, the bigger the audience the more it becomes a matter of demographics. Vince was exceptional when booking for kids (80s), got better with time when booking for teenagers (90s), but generally hasn't been as good booking for "everyone" (past decade or so) and not at all good booking for hardcores (again past decade or so). JCP generally swung for an older crowd with more hardcores in it, but with that came more dickery. Probably the best attempt to book for the hardcores came during the Kip Frey / Dusty era in early 92 WCW, where the quality of matches was sky high. Fantastic crowds on 92 cards. Trouble is that it wasn't getting over with a wider audience than the hardcores. If you look at the gates, even though business was declining WWF still drew 62,000 for Wrestlemania and 17,000 for the Rumble, and then drew 80,000 in London. He did it through appealing to kids. WCW was drawing 5,000-6,000 on amazing cards like Superbrawl 2, Wrestlewar and Beach Blast because they were only appealing to hardcores. For whatever reason though, the crowds in WCW 92 seem much better behaved than the crowds in Crockett 86-9. It might be because Dusty wasn't booking himself. Or it might be because he was on a tighter leash under Turner. Or that there were just more dicks in the crowds (see also Sorrow, Johnny).

What a sell out!

Even you can recognise the difference. Even you.

Oh, Jim Herd has spoken, he has set me some targets: There goes my plan of turning Gibson into a glorified jobber. I'm sensing R n R vs. MX part 328 on the cards. And maybe a Varsity Club reunion? I hope to ignore goal #5 by hiring Dory Funk Jr.

Let me have a quick look at the non-wrestlers. Managers: Paul E. Dangerously Alexandra York DDP Harley Race Teddy Long Refs: Nick Patrick Randy "Don't Call Me Peewee" Anderson Jimmy Jett Mike Atkins Play-by-Play: Jim Ross Gordon Solie Lance Russell Tony Schiavone Colour: Magnum TA Missy Hyatt Authority Figures: Jim Herd Jim Crockett Jr. Ole Anderson Road Agents: Dick the Bruiser Grizzly Smith Jody Hamilton Mike Graham ----------- I've already made a move for Jesse, but it seems to me that while I'm absolutely loaded up with top play-by-play guys I don't have that many colour men. I like the idea of re-uniting Tony Schiavone and David Crockett, and I might stick them on Worldwide together. Jim Ross can front World Championship Wrestling, but I want Gordon Solie on that show too as a spiritual link to its roots. Russell can take Main Event. I'll give Solie Pro. If Eric Bischoff comes in, he will get Power Hour. If not, I'll give it to Ross. If Jesse comes in, he'll be on PPVs and World Championship Wrestling. I could put Paul E., Michael Hayes or Dutch Mantell on colour on some of the shows. I wonder what Corny is up to ... if I'm going to reunite Eaton and Condrey, he needs to be around anyway. Well Eaton approves. As does Ross. But the boss doesn't. I'm going to try to sign him anyway. Okay, let's try 9 months. Bill Watts is currently unemployed, so maybe he could come in as an analyst. There is also the option of putting MYSELF on colour; but I think I will resist that temptation. And there's always Dusty For now though, I'm thinking: WCW: Ross and Ventura Worldwide: Schiavone and Crockett Main Event: Russell and Mantell Pro: Solie and Hayes Power hour: Ross / Bischoff and Cornette Jesse has better chemistry with Tony than with JR, Corny has better chemistry with Ross. But I kinda love the idea of having Tony / David Crockett back together in 1991.

Schedule and TV: I've gone for the most "classic" feeling line-up of WCW PPVs for the year. 12 is far too many PPVs, so I've gone with 8. I plan to have four Clashes for the year in Jan, March, August, and November. Five different TV shows is quite a lot, that's 6 hours of TV to fill every week. World Championship Wrestling is the traditional flagship show on TBS (the GCW Saturday slot). Also on TBS are Power Hour (Fridays) and Main Event (old Watts Sunday slot). Worldwide is the old JCP syndicated slot, and Pro is the old MACW syndicated slot. Worldwide has a deal to be shown on ITV giving exposure in the UK, while World Championship Wrestling can be seen in the rest of Europe on DSF. Canadian viewers can see Power Hour on TSN. This means that of the five shows, Worldwide (UK), World Championship Wrestling (Europe) and Power Hour (Canada) are probably the most important in terms of eyeballs. Currently, there is no way for viewers outside of USA to see any of the PPV events, and ideally I need to find a way for them to see them -- especially for a certain young man in South Wales. Let's take a look at the roster. Faces: Main event: Sting Lex Luger Scott Steiner Rick Steiner JYD Upper-midcarders: Dustin Rhodes Brian Pillman Ricky Morton Robert Gibson Tommy Rich Midcarders Brad Armstrong Norman the Lunatic Owen Hart Steve Armstrong Terry Taylor Tracy Smothers Z-Man JTTS Chris Youngblood Mark Youngblood Pez Whatley Ranger Ross Tim Horner Jobbers: Keith Hart Italian Stallion Special attractions: Dusty Rhodes El Gigante Heels: Main event: Ric Flair Vader Stan Hansen Sid Vicious Upper midcarders: Arn Anderson Barry Windham Bobby Eaton Butch Reed Ron Simmons Michael Hayes Jimmy Garvin Kevin Sullivan Larry Zbyszko Michael Wallstreet Midcarders: Big Cat Dan Spivey DDP Dutch Mantell Master Blaster Blade Master Blaster Steel JTTS El Cubano Jack Victory Lethal Larry Moondog Rex Motor City Madman Rip Morgan Rip Rogers Scott Armstrong The Juicer Sgt. Buddy Lee Parker Jobbers: George South Jim Clontz Mark Kyle Pat Rose The Minotaur ------------- Thoughts: Roster seems heel heavy. There is a huge amount of talent on this roster, but also a lot of total shit like Motor City Madman and Master Blaster Blade. Need to beef up on faces, and clear out the crap. Going to see who is currently unemployed. Well, this one is a no-brainer. Ditto. Ditto. Maybe one last MX run. Let's see if he accepts. He's young, but I think this one has potential. Just to annoy Johnny Sorrow. Cos early 90s WCW wouldn't be the same without Sexy Eric Bischoff Seem to be short on face jobbers. Okay, let's see who else I could pick up who isn't locked down on a written contract. Complete no brainer. Of course. You're right Dusty.

How do you apply something like this to Japanese wrestling or lucha libre? You don't

FIP sequence on Steamer in third fall is one of the best of all time.

As a follow-up to what I just said, I've always wanted to think about workers in a more holistic way like this. So great match workers, great skit workers, great angle workers, great promos. Being a great promo does not necessarily make you a great skit / angle worker. Flair for example is without doubt a top-ever-level promo, but he's way more awkward in skits and talk show segments. This is one reason why Flair for the Gold sucked so hard. It was always one of my DiBiase arguments that he was a tremendous worker of skits and angles. It's a slightly different skill from being a great promo. People generally don't want to analyse workers in that way though.

For a period of at least a year (2012?), I tried to make this point here. That fans focus too much on matches when it is just one punctuation point in the "grammar" of pro wrestling storytelling. I guess the "trouble" is that a wider appreciation of angles and things like that feels less quantifiable or evaluative. I've got a great idea of what a five star angle is like (e.g. Flair in Memphis episode), but a much less clear view of what a four or three star one might look like. It quickly becomes a bit too complicated. To try to break it down ... Your typical feud consists of: - angles - promos - matches Something like Bruno vs. Larry feels like a five star feud, but it's carried almost entirely by the promos. There is one angle (Larry turns on Bruno hits him with a chair) and the matches have great heat but aren't amazing. But what about all the stuff outside of feuds? Character building stuff: - Iron Sheik Persian club challenge - Sgt Slaughter five minute challenge - DiBiase skits (basketball etc.) - TNT in general - Interview spots on "talk shows" (e.g. Piper's pit) These aren't angles that advance feuds, they are more about establishing norms and establishing character that can be used as a launchpad to start feuds. I guess we'd call them all "skits". So building up our grammar: - Skits - Angles - Promos - Matches I once had a go at approaching some Flair promos like literary analysis (in audio form, see Fair for Flair #2: The Art of the Promo). The best stuff on angles etc. that I can recall is again in audio form, seek out any time Will discusses Mid-South stuff. Especially DiBiase vs. Duggan feud. I can't remember the exact show but he gives a blow by blow account of every angle and discusses the logic at every point. I'd generally love to see more writing about stuff outside of the matches.

In a move that has shocked the wrestling world, WCW Chief Executive Jim Herd has replaced Ole Anderson with a booker who has not been active in wrestling since 1983. Jerry Von Kramer, known by many industry insiders as "the man who had Bruno pinned in his last match at MSG", last worked for Vince McMahon but left Titan in mysterious circumstances in the September of 1983. Among other things, his time with the WWF will be remembered for making Jimmy "Superfly" Snuka WWF Champion and a big star, and the long "battle of the generations" feud between Bruno Sammartino and Ted DiBiase. Von Kramer joins WCW at a difficult time. Gates are at an all-time low, and last year's storylines included the infamous Black Scorpion debacle and Robocop becoming an ally of Sting. Some commentators on the business, such as Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer, criticised Anderson's tenture for pushing older veteran stars over up-and-coming talent, who have increasingly been jumping over to arch-rival WWF. It remains to be seen if Von Kramer can reverse any of these trends in order to compete effectively with his old employers. Watch this space for further updates!

Do you think he's as famous as Molly Ringwald was in the 80s?

Arguably he was here: That's about the only time I can think of though.

For those who have been following, part 3 of Top 100 music act list now online (in my sig, faves list not greatest list).

[shane McMahon's Jump vs. The Undertaker at Wrestlemania 32] Thank you for giving us all the moments. Your honour, As you can see, The Undertaker is guilty of many Crimes Against Wrestling. In other words, you should lock him up and throw away the bloody key, just in case he thinks about coming back one last time. Case closed. Jerry Von Karma

Just think, if that had been Baba, he wouldn't have got his shot against Flair until 1991!