JRH

According to Sex, Lies, and Headlocks, the indy fed Windy City Wrestling did an angle where the lead heel beat up a mentally handicapped fan (the way it was worded it made it seem like it was a legit fan and not a plant). I dont know much about this angle, but it sounds pretty scummy to me (even if the fan was just a plant, it's just real cheap heat).

Austin giving a stunner to Stacy Keibler for the "crime" of not wanting to drink beer. Bear in mind that both Austin and Stacy were babyfaces at this time, and it led to nothing, so not only scummy, but pointless. The 2002 Molly Holly angle comes to mind as well, shaming her for both being a Virgin and having a large butt. Im still trying to figure out why she even allowed them to do that angle.

Dont know how good the match would have been, but i always wanted to see Vader vs Nash in some "battle of the powerbombs" thing. I wonder if that was planned if Nash hadnt left the WWF in 1996.

Also for the "it was 1992" list, but check out the 2:00 minute mark of this: which is pretty damn dark for the time period. i Thought the Nailz Beatdown of Bossman was pretty intense as well. Not much talk about the state of WCW in this thread. It seemed that WCW at this time period was a weird mixture of serious wrestling and ultra-campy gimmicks (even the Bill Watts era still had Vinnie Vegas, Super Invader, Scotty Flamingo, Slazenger and Pierce, and that Tom Zenk/Johnny Gunn vignette). Thngs started changing when the luchadors and Guerrero, Malenko, and Benoit came in, but the shift wouldnt be complete until the debut of the NWO.

I never liked Brian Pillman in long tights, it never really worked for me.

Was there a reasoning for making Starrcade 89, 90, and 91 gimmick-driven ppvs (89 with the iron man tourney, 90 with the tag tourney, though that was only part of the ppv, and 91 with battlebowl)? Looking back, it seems like they were pushing Great American Bash to be more important during those years.

Cena did wear tights when he debuted in WWE, but they were so incredibly generic that the jean shorts were a step up.

Owen's Nation tights (the "danger" singlet) was pretty hokey as well. He really should have stuck to the black hart singlet.

It may seem external, but ring attire can make or break certain wrestlers (can you imagine Flair in his prime without the "RF" on the side of his tights?). However, what are some of the worst ring attires you can think of? This only applies to stuff worn while wrestling, stuff like Steamboat's dragon outfit doesnt count. Zack Ryder had a hideous pair of tights in WWECW where he had tights where one leg was long and the other was short. IRS was also a ridiculous outfit, he had some good matches while wearing the business suit, true (mainly as a member of Money Inc), but i could never take him seriously with it on (Mr Hughes OTOH, while not the best wrestler in the world, looked more effective in the suit and tie look).

The problem with banning the top rope moves to make it an "outlaw" move, was that it crippled the light heavyweight dvision, which, at the time, was built off high flyers like pillman and liger. By getting rid of that move, you make LHW matches the same as every other match in the promotion. That aside, there was enough good in 1992 wcw to make it worthwhile. 1993, while i liked it while watching, had those atrocious Disney tapings where they pretty much booked the rest of the year right then and there (WWF did the same thing in the late 80s/early 90s, but never on such a large scale), therefore making it useless for any wrestler to try to get over since theyve already penciled in the new champs. Im also kind of bitter that Cactus Jack never got his revenge on Vader (at least have him win a non-title match).

I wonder if it would be possible to turn Undertaker heel in 1995. He was pretty much spinning his wheels during that year, so a heel turn would be something at least. He also had credibility so he could feud with the top guys like Diesel, Bret, Razor, and Michaels. I would have changed his character though, make him darker (not ministry-era style darker mind you) and get rid of the campy horror movie aspects of his character like the coffins and such. Maybe even have him turn on Paul Bearer and take him off tv (he could still work backstage as a road agent).

Parv, you should check The Best of WWF Vol. 16 video tape. It's the only one that WWE COD never broadcasted most likely because there is a New Japan match and an All Japan Women match. This is the line-up: Best of the WWF #16 (WF056) 09/13/85 Tatsumi Fujinami vs. Giant Machine 1980s Jumping Bomb Angels vs. Bull Nakano & Condor Saito 1980s Mr. Fuji vs. ??? 10/19/85 The Killer Bees vs. Mike Sharpe & Barry O 04/88 The Ultimate Warrior vs. Hercules 04/88 Andre the Giant vs. Jim Duggan 1980s Several Outback Jack skits 10/23/87 Junkyard Dog vs. Harley Race (special referee Andre the Giant) 10/23/87 Jacques & Raymond Rougeau vs. Dino Bravo & Greg Valentine First two matches are from other promotions. Mr. Fuji's match is from somewhere in the Middle East. The 85 match is from the Puerto Rico rainstorm card that you may have already seen. The 1988 matches are from Italy and the 87 matches from Paris. It's a cool tape because they left the original commentary in all the different languages. If I remember correctly the matches from France had a ring skirt with a giant CANAL+ logo, so that was quite a different setting for the WWF. I've always wondered about the Fuji match on that tape. Does anyone know if it was even a WWF show, or just footage that the company happened to have?

Rick Steiner definitely comes to mind. Also, Mark Henry originally had "WSM" on the back of his singlet to match up with MVP who had MVP on the back of his attire, but mark STILL has those initials on the back of his singlet. Then you had Al Snow as Leif Cassidy. Not only did he still wear the new rockers outfit as a singles wrestler, but when he came to ECW as Al Snow, he STILL wore the new rockers outfit for a time.

Slick managing Sheik and Volkoff (and later the Bolsheviks) never made sense to me. I know blassie sold him the contracts, but it just looked weird for some streetwise hustler to be managing foreign menaces.

Did Rey get ANY major wins during that run? I think he defeated JBL at Judgement Day, but thats all i can remember.

I'd say TNA's attempt at a "Monday Night War" in 2010 definitely qualifies.

You know who was a surprisingly decent color commentator? Hillbilly Jim. Im not saying he was an all-time great, but he was pretty good and toned the whole Hillbilly gimmick WAY down. Not surprisng that he became a radio DJ much later.

While watching various programming from both companies lately, i noticed that WCW commentary seemed to focus more on the in-ring abilities rather than the gimmick of a wrestler. Yes, there were plenty of gimmicks there, some incredibly absurd for that matter, but it was always treated as just an aspect of their personality, and the wrestling was what mattered. Meanwhile, with the WWF, the gimmick was what was being "sold", and that continues even to this day. To make an example, watch any wcw match with an absurd gimmick (ie, big josh, glacier, even the dungeon of doom) and compare the commentary with wwf/e matches with absurd gimmicks (ie, repo man, IRS, or for a more recent example, the wyatt family).

Well, not to threadjack, but the thing about Heenan in WCW was that he was out of his element. In WWF, the announcing was to put over the gimmick first, and their wrestling ability second (unless the wrestler had no real gimmick to speak of, in which case they'd put over the current angle the wrestler was in). This continues to this day to be honest. In that format, Heenan shined. In WCW though, the gimmicks (even the goofiest ones) were just seen as part of the wrestler's personality and the wrestling was what was important, which meant people like Heenan had to rework their announcing drastically, and he just never really worked while doing that (though i will admit Heenan's commentary during Goldberg matches helped Goldberg quite a bit IMO).

The point about 80s/90s themes being more diverse is true though, just look at a show like Summerslam 90 (just picked a show at random) for example: Rockers: Heavy Metal Texas Tornado: Southern Rock Mr Perfect: Classical (Exodus theme ripoff) Tito Santana: Mexican-tinged pop rock Hart Foundation: Synth-rock Demolition: Heavy Metal Bossman: Blues rock Jake Roberts: Electronic music (this theme kind of reminds me of Tangerine Dream) Duggan/Volkoff: Forgot what theme they used (Stars and Stripes forever?) Orient Express: Stereotypical "Japanese" music, but with an 80s feel Dusty Rhodes: R&B/Funk Randy Savage: Classical (Pomp and Circumstance) Hulk Hogan: Hard Rock/AOR Dino Bravo:French National Anthem Earthquake: Sound Effects Ultimate Warrior: Metal Rick Rude: Knockoff of "The Stripper"

Im surprised that, outside of New Jack, no wrestling company really tried to capitalize on the popularity of gangsta rap when that was popular. They wouldnt even have to worry about the lyrics if it was in-house, just produce something that had the hard-edged sound of that.

I think the battlebowl ppvs could have worked if they didnt have the champion in there and instead threw in a token world title match, with the winner of battlebowl getting a shot at the worlds champion (kind of like an expanded version of the royal rumble, only this one would actually require teamwork to get a chance to get the title). Now, while i love this show, i'd have to say ECW One Night Stand 2005 qualifies. NOTHING from this show had any ramifications (aside from the meanie/bradshaw stuff) or led to anything later in the year (unlike ONS 06). I understand it was just meant to be a fun nostalgia-driven show, but i expected to see it lead to something.

Warlord and Barbarian under masks as The Super Assassins in 1996 WCW. Bear in mind this was the same WCW that picked up 80s WWF guys on a regular basis at the time, so why they would bring in two well-known guys and stick them under masks makes no sense to me.

What are some finishing moves that wrestlers used for only a short time? For example, when Diesel first started wrestling in the wwf, his finisher was a heart punch before he switched his finisher to the jackknife powerbomb soon after. Also, didnt Big Show use an inverted ddt variation called "the final cut" for a few months?

How about Butch Reed's short lived "return" to WCW, which IIRC, only consisted of the Clash X match with Barbarian against rhodes/windham and a match on Power Hour with Butch Reed against Zenk and Jimmy Garvin.