JRH

I'd argue you could blame that on Savage/Warrior. Heck, you could even go back to 1987 and Steamboat/Savage and Hogan/Andre. Good matches to be sure, but they did have that "epic" style to them.

I've heard BTW that AAA only owns the rights to 1997 and up footage, and that Televisa owns the pre-97 footage, so even the benefit of having AAA footage is still limited (if they even do anything with it).

I didnt watch the whole HOF but Luger's speech and the speeches by Tenta's family and Fred Ottman were genuinely touching (it's a shame that Fred will only be known for the Shockmaster falling over, as he seems like a truly nice individual).

Decided to bring back this thread. Now this next one is a cheat as WCW Saturday Night WAS the A-Show back in 1993, but I couldnt resist posting this incredibly fun big vs little match:

Thought we could get a topic going on this. What would you say the first one was? I'd go with either the Lawler/Funk empty arena match, or maybe Inoki vs Saito's Island Death match (which was longer than most actual movies taking place on Islands). Any other good early examples?

Oh, WCW was going after the WWF long before then. They were going to bring in Giant Haystacks as a jobber named "Titan" in 1990, with the intent being that the announcers were going to make a bunch of snarky comments about "Titan" getting dominated, but Haystacks' wife got sick so it was cancelled. But going after the competition can backfire, just remember them giving away the result that Mankind was going to beat the Rock (and just to show WCW wasnt also making mistakes, Bobby Heenan claimed that the Billionaire Ted skits just told people where they could see Hogan and Savage).

The legacy wing is back with Kamala, Dory Funk Jr, and Ivan Koloff being inducted. People have been wanting Ivan in there for a long time so this is pretty big (Also, every WWF champion from Bruno through Shawn Michaels is now in the HOF).

My only problem with the WCW Vault channel is that they're uploading Nitro/Thunder episodes, but skipping over episodes that have Benoit matches. While understandable, they could simply just delete Benoit stuff like WWE 24/7 did, instead of skipping over entire shows, including matches that have nothing to do with him.

Now they're inducting individual matches, first up is Austin vs Bret from WM13: https://www.si.com/fannation/wrestling/wwe/steve-austin-vs-bret-hart-wrestlemania-13-match-to-be-inducted-into-wwe-hall-of-fame

Personally, I never liked the idea of wrestlers working barefoot in the first place, too much risk for injury. Back on topic, apparently Ken Shamrock is also being considered (surprised it took this long).

To be fair, Kamala was a pretty legit heel back in the 80s, people were even doing stretcher jobs for him. It wasnt until the 90s WWF run when they turned him into a goofy cartoon character (sadly, that became his default mode even up to the end of his career).

As I said on another board, the first thing that came to mind was Jason Sensation as Owen Hart.

WCW House Show from Manchester England 3/13/93 Would have rather seen the one where Sting beat Vader for the belt, but this is a nice rarity as well.

Kamala is also being considered. Considering how vocally anti-WWE he was in the last years of his life, this is definitely a surprise.

Here's a neat little match, Kerry Von Erich vs Ric Flair in 1992 (they make reference to Flair being WWF champion, so this must be from early in the year)

For some reason I can see Lexis King being called up. I dont know what they could do with him though (Maybe put him in Judgement Day and have some second generation tag team thing with Dom).

I see what you did there.

And the Disasters are confirmed: https://itrwrestling.com/news/wwe-legend-confirms-upcoming-hall-of-fame-induction/ Really, Quake should be going in by himself, but this allows his friend Fred Ottman there too.

I wouldnt say wrestling is in a new boom period, but it's more accepted now. You dont really see people being mocked for being wrestling fans as much anymore (even during the 80s and 90s boom that was common), and it's pretty much seen as another form of entertainment, even Sports Illustrated, who mocked wrestling mercilessly back in the day (Ali being ringside for a WCW event was mocked as one of their "signs of the apocalypse") now covers wrestling.

I wonder if WCW saved any of their dark matches, wouldnt mind seeing some of those on this channel (Maybe put on some pre-tv goldberg matches).

The Natural Disasters are also going in. EDIT: Turns out this hasnt been confirmed yet.

If Demolition do go in, I wonder who inducts them. Fuji and Johnny Valiant have both passed on. Maybe Tito Santana, Bret Hart, or even the Powers of Pain (test the waters for a future PoP induction).

That would make Brian Zane happy (DeBeers was one of the people who trained him).

There arent any more Samoan family members to induct are there?

OTOH, I dont see them uploading any shows with Benoit, Brock, or Vince (aside from shows where he's on commentary) anytime soon. On a more positive note, here's a compilation of various dark matches: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAxZoUMqXHc&t=304s