WON HoF Candidate Poll Thread

[Dylan Waco]

Does this make Ken Patera the Albert Belle of the WON HoF?

[jdw]

Didn't All Japan sell out their Budokan shows just by selling tickets to those in attendance at the previous show without announcing the card?

I tend to think that's been overplayed. They wouldn't have placed 100% of the tickets on sale at one Budokan for the next. Think of the amount of time it would take to process 16K tickets *live*. In addition, recall how the ticket business was done in Japan: a big block of tickets was "sold" to "certain ticket brokers" for a guarantee. Those ticket brokers would in turn sell them. I tend to think the tickets that "sold out" on the prior Budokan were simply those that the promotion retained to sell themselves at the venue.

 

As far as what would likely be on a Budokan that might not yet be announced but you're buying tickets for...

 

Here are the Budokans after the mask game off leading to the 10/92 addition:

 

06/08/90 Jumbo vs Misawa / TC: Hansen vs Gordy

09/01/90 Jumbo vs Misawa / TC: Hansen vs Williams

12/07/90 RWTL Final Night: Jumbo & Taue vs Misawa & Kawada / Hansen & Spivey vs Gordy & Williams

 

04/18/91 TC: Jumbo vs Misawa / WTT: Hansen & Spivey vs Gordy & Williams

06/01/91 WTT: Hansen & Spivey vs Jumbo & Taue / Misawa vs Gordy

09/04/91 WTT: Misawa & Kawada vs Jumbo & Taue

12/06/91 RWTL Final Night: Misawa & Kawada vs Gordy & Williams / Jumbo & Taue vs Hansen & Spivey

 

03/04/92 WTT: Jumbo & Taue vs Gordy & Williams / TC: Hansen vs Misawa

06/05/92 WTT: Jumbo & Taue vs Misawa & Kobashi / TC: Hansen vs Kawada

08/22/92 TC: Hansen vs Misawa / Jumbo & Taue vs Gordy & Williams

 

So if you're a Misawa Fan, it's kind of obvious that he's going to be in a big match. The *weakest* match on that list for Misawa in terms of cha-ching was the one against Gordy. It turned out to be his first singles win over Gordy, so it wasn't insignificant. The others are all major matches: TC, WTT, singles against Jumbo, RWTL Final Night matches.

 

You get the same thing leading into the 7/93 addition: Misawa main evented 12/92, 2/93 and 6/93.

 

You get the same thing leading into the 4/94 addition: Misawa main evented 9/93, 10/93, 12/93 and 3/94. That 4/94 Carny Final would be the first time he hadn't main evented / double main evented Budokan since 06/01/91.

 

So if you bought a ticket before the card was announced, you pretty much knew:

 

* Baba is going to give you a card you like

* Misawa is going to have a big match

 

John

[EricR]

The Sting debate kind of reminds me of the sabermetrician/traditionalist divide in baseball. You can point to all kinds of numbers showing that Sting wasn't really the featured guy in WCW all that often and usually didn't do great business when he was. But to a lot of people, it felt like Sting was the top guy, so he must have been.

I like the baseball comparison. Sting is Don Mattingly. Mattingly had great numbers while he played but his back shortened his career. His WAR totals would be among the lowest in the HOF. But he was also the face of the Yankees for a decade.

 

It's like Will Clark with the Giants. Face of the franchise (20 years later a LARGE percentage of Giants fans still have The Thrill as their favorite player, myself included) and arguably had HOF numbers, but chose to retire early and couldn't rack up counting stats that a lot of hall voters like. Yet to many Giants fans he's the greatest.

[Loss]

Sting became a star for the first wrestling promotion ever that didn't have to make money to stay in existence. I'm not sure that being the biggest star in the early days of WCW - even if we're assuming that is true - is a HOF case, because WCW just wasn't successful. WCW was also not a national promotion because of any type of creative vision or the capitalizing on a hot angle or a new star. They were a vanity promotion that swallowed a once-hot territory whole, and just happened to be owned by a television juggernaut. They had great TV exposure as a result of their ownership. So that's why I argue that being a top guy in WCW for a long period of time doesn't really mean much pre-Hogan. I hate having to admit that, because I grew up preferring WCW to the WWF and I still think they were the more enjoyable promotion. Still, if Sting was the "face of WCW", he was the face of a dysfunctional, ineffective wrestling promotion that couldn't do much right except throw random matches together in the ring with workers who happened to be talented sometimes.

 

But even if you just make the case for him as a television wrestling star and judge him on those merits alone, the times when Sting carried the company were hardly a boom period for ratings, especially when you look at some of the other hot periods of wrestling on TBS. He was around, he was over, he worked on top, he was good in the ring when he wanted to be and he had some memorable matches and angles. I just don't quite see him as a HOFer, even though I see why some do.

 

I understand the case for Sting, because he was certainly a star. WCW had a business model that would oddly enough work better now (Poor house show attendance and PPV buys, but fairly reliable TV ratings sounds like a lot of promotions these days). And I even relate to the point that it doesn't feel right to not include him, even if the case isn't there based on the numbers. But instead of making a HOF case, I'll just be happy for him that he got a pretty nice paycheck out of a career built on having a few good matches here and there while he waited for Ric Flair to retire.

[Loss]

John also mentioned that Eric Bischoff should probably be in the HOF. I don't agree. His failures have outnumbered his successes, and they were so huge in scope that they had a far bigger and more lasting impact on wrestling as a whole than the two-year period where he was doing well. It's impressive what he accomplished during his good years, but the bad stuff can't help but overwhelm it.

[Johnny Sorrow]

I'm not saying he should be in the HOF, and honestly I don't give a flying rat's ass about Dave Meltzer's Hall Of Fame. (Yes, I'm aware this thread is about that but indulge me ).

 

I'm just saying that Sting was always presented as the face of WCW and therefore the fans who grew up watching WCW will always feel that he is. And to me, that feeling mixed with the promotion of that feeling as being so makes it so. Shit, he was so much of the face of the company at one point, they actually had his fucking face above the entrance ramp. The only time he wasn't was when Hogan came in, and even then Sting was "The Franchise" of WCW. And let's face it, a lot of die hard WCW fans resented and hated Hogan, despite PPV buys and early Nitro ratings. It's why Sting as the ultimate face during the NWO stuff worked. He was THE WCW guy, he felt betrayed, but still came back to carry the flag of WCW.

(Granted, I personally wanted the Horsemen to take out the NWO, and eventually they basically did years later, but by then it didn't mean shit.)

[JerryvonKramer]

Can someone explain to me what the basis of Bret Hart being in the HoF is? Well? Anyone?

 

What did Bret Hart do that was so deserving of being in the HoF that Sting didn't other than being a smarky favourite? His candidacy is hardly riding on his work in Stampede or as one of the Hart Foundation is it, it's based on his singles run.

 

And he was a 96 entrant so he got in even before the bulk of the heel run or Montreal, which are events that made him a "legend" in the eyes of many a casual internet fan.

 

I'm being serious here, what has Bret got on Sting?

[NintendoLogic]

I'm rather shocked that you think a Sting/Bret comparison works in Sting's favor. What exactly does Sting have over Bret? Was he a better worker? A bigger draw? More influential?

[JerryvonKramer]

Well how about you start by telling me what you think Bret has over Sting?

 

As far as I can see Bret's main event run was late 92 to mid-93, then 94-7, which happened to coincide with a steep downturn in business.

 

Sting's main event run was pretty much 90-2001 with some interruption circa 94-5 during Hogan's face run.

 

So Sting spent more of his career on top than Bret. It's been well-documented that Sting was never really a top draw like a Hogan, but can you demonstrate how Bret WAS? Can you demonstrate how he was a bigger draw than Sting?

 

Let's talk about "influence" too. Influence on who? Smart fans? Or workers? When I look at the workers who have dominated the WWE since 2001, do they appear closer to Sting or closer to Bret? Sting was a maineventer who had "the look" but who could also work a bit as well.

 

He also was a main eventer who would telegraph his signature spots in such a way that would pop the crowd. He'd give a yell or beat his chest and hit his Stinger splash. Guys didn't do shit like that in the early 80s. Sting can be credited with popularizing "the special move" in wrestling.

 

Look at wrestlers a generation on.

 

Jericho, The Rock, Rey -- people of that generation. Are their showy signature spots closer to the shit that Sting did or the shit that Bret did? Well? Think about it, it's the Sting model.

 

Sting yells and does a stinger splash, for Rock it's the people's elbow, for Jericho it's the Lionsault. Yes, I'm saying that Sting helped to get THOSE sorts of spots over in the main event.

 

Bret was basically an oldschool technical wrestler. He didn't "influence" anyone in terms of anything you can actually see. Go through the current WWE roster and ask yourself for each guy "Sting or Bret"?

 

Are you telling me the MAJORITY of guys are closer to Bret than to Sting? Really? I'm calling bullshit.

 

So if he didn't draw better, and he didn't influence more people, then all you're left with is work, and work is subjective. Does Bret really have a shit ton of classic matches MORE than Sting does? Well?

 

Come on, I'm waiting for this.

[Loss]

Can someone explain to me what the basis of Bret Hart being in the HoF is? Well? Anyone?

 

What did Bret Hart do that was so deserving of being in the HoF that Sting didn't other than being a smarky favourite? His candidacy is hardly riding on his work in Stampede or as one of the Hart Foundation is it, it's based on his singles run.

 

And he was a 96 entrant so he got in even before the bulk of the heel run or Montreal, which are events that made him a "legend" in the eyes of many a casual internet fan.

 

I'm being serious here, what has Bret got on Sting?

I actually think this is a perfectly reasonable question, even if I don't quite agree with it.

 

I do think Bret is a HOF pick, but I don't think he should have gone in by fiat. I still think he should have gone on the ballot. Now, he's a HOFer for sure, but I'm not sure that was a clear cut case in 1996. I do think by 1997, he made the case.

 

Austin was the guy they needed to carry them to new heights, but I've always contended that the turnaround could not have happened without Bret. There was a noticeable difference on shows he headlined compared to those he didn't, even as early as late 1995, when there was a house show boom almost instantly when they switched the title from Diesel to Bret. He became the Flair of that time period in a sense - not a huge draw, but a guy they always seemed to go back to because whatever new thing they tried didn't quite work.

 

The WWF always had a foothold in Canada, but Bret made it a strong market in 1997 that they were running more regularly. He also was *probably* an international draw. (I don't know how those tours did after he made it to the top, but he was so beloved that I'm willing to

believe it.) He was the best worker in the company for a pretty long stretch, and I say that as someone who gets really bored by Bret going on auto pilot on small shows. He had main event matches that were much better than just about anything we got out of the company in the 1980s.

 

He's probably not a slam dunk pick, but he's a strong pick.

[Dylan Waco]

I don't have time to give the sort of in depth answer I want to give to this at the moment but I agree with Loss that Bret is one of the guys that should not have gone in by fiat. Others who shouldn't have gone in that way off the top of my head include Jim Cornette, Dynamite Kid, Ricky Steamboat and Ted Dibiase.

 

Having said that I think Bret is a stronger candidate than Sting and I do think you can demonstrate that he was a better draw than Sting was. I also think he was clearly a better worker. And I think Jerry's argument about Sting being influential because he pounded his chest after moves is...well...totally bizarre and not a very good one.

[Matt D]

He's big in Germany.

[El-P]

Bret was a better worker, not even close.

 

Bret was a bigger draw, not even close : basically, Sting flopped on top at every turn, and his only "major" drawing period was the nWo days when he actually wasn't working in the ring nor on house-show, and like John demonstrated most of the drawing power of that era comes down to Hogan, Eric, Hall & Nash anyway. Bret coming back on top after the disastrous Diesel reign of terror is the one who turned things around in early 96 working with Taker, Bret working with Austin is what put Stone Cold on another level and pushed him to the doors of superstardom. Bret was always a big factor for WWF both in Canada and in Europe, and it got bigger in 1997 with the whole anti-american angle.

 

As far as influence goes, I don't see how Sting howlering before hitting his spot his different from Hogan adressing the crowd before dropping the leg or Lawler dropping the strap to signal a comeback. Ultimate Warrior was hitting his chest too, does that make it influential ? No, I don't see any correlation between Sting and the way Rock or Jericho did their spots, really.

[JerryvonKramer]

Oh yes, I did forget about that, Bret was undoubtedly a bigger draw internationally than Sting ... however, I'm not sure if that is something you can pin on any intrinsic qualities of Bret himself. I've always maintained that the wrestling boom hit the UK a couple of years later than it did in the US (1992 sort of time), which just so happens to be when Bret was getting his main event push -- I'd warrant the same goes for Germany. That isn't taking anything away from Bret, but it does seem like a right place, right time sort of deal.

 

I'd prefer to see a direct comparison of WWF with Bret on top and WCW with Sting on top vs. the periods either side. I suspect it might go Bret's way, but I wonder by how much. How many more 1000s of people are coming to see a Bret main event as opposed to a Diesel or Luger one? How many more 1000s of people are coming to see a Sting main event over a Ron Simmons or Vader one? I think this wouldn't take a lot of work to show quickly. My suspicion is that it's closer than it may appear. (NB. you don't compare WCW figures with WWF figures, but WCW figures with other WCW figures and same in the other case ... the idea we can look at one guy and pin an entire company's hopes on him is a misnomer created by exceptional people like Hogan or Austin). Each other normal "mortal" main eventer is only going to affect so many people. I think in the cases of Bret and Sting we can measure that, even allowing for a Bill Watts booking run or Pat Patterson departure.

 

---------

 

And Dylan, I don't think my argument is "bizarre" as you dismissively put it, I think you can see the influence of Sting on the way main event guys worked their spots. Would you say the way Jericho or Edge or any of the main stars to emerge from that generation worked was closer to Sting or to Bret? Well? I'm being serious.

[Cross Face Chicken Wing]

John also mentioned that Eric Bischoff should probably be in the HOF. I don't agree. His failures have outnumbered his successes, and they were so huge in scope that they had a far bigger and more lasting impact on wrestling as a whole than the two-year period where he was doing well. It's impressive what he accomplished during his good years, but the bad stuff can't help but overwhelm it.

I compare Bischoff's WON HOF credentials to Marvin Miller's credentials for the Baseball HOF.

 

Without Miller's work in eliminating the reserve clause in MLB, the game would be vastly different today. Without Bischoff going w/ Hogan as a heel and coming up w/ the NWO, wrestling would be vastly different today.

 

Some might argue that baseball and wrestling are actually worse off today because of Miller's and Bischoff's actions, but I think those people are wrong.

 

Yes, both Miller and Bischoff are mainly known for doing one thing, but that one thing made such an impact that it altered the course of baseball/wrestling forever.

 

If I had a vote, both Miller and Bischoff would be in the HOF. Miller has a stronger case, though, IMO.

[WingedEagle]

John also mentioned that Eric Bischoff should probably be in the HOF. I don't agree. His failures have outnumbered his successes, and they were so huge in scope that they had a far bigger and more lasting impact on wrestling as a whole than the two-year period where he was doing well. It's impressive what he accomplished during his good years, but the bad stuff can't help but overwhelm it.

I compare Bischoff's WON HOF credentials to Marvin Miller's credentials for the Baseball HOF.

 

Without Miller's work in eliminating the reserve clause in MLB, the game would be vastly different today. Without Bischoff going w/ Hogan as a heel and coming up w/ the NWO, wrestling would be vastly different today.

 

Some might argue that baseball and wrestling are actually worse off today because of Miller's and Bischoff's actions, but I think those people are wrong.

 

Yes, both Miller and Bischoff are mainly known for doing one thing, but that one thing made such an impact that it altered the course of baseball/wrestling forever.

 

If I had a vote, both Miller and Bischoff would be in the HOF. Miller has a stronger case, though, IMO.

 

Bischoff convinced Turner to give him a Monday night time slot and, so the story goes, wanted to push an inter-promotional feud after seeing the NJPW/UWFI Dome show. I don't know how instrumental he was in selling Hogan on a heel turn as opposed to Hogan reading the tea leaves. If we give him substantial credit for that its a great resume and historic impact on the business. But as Loss and others noted, he was at the helm when the ship began taking on water and rather than plug those breaches, he blew them wide open. I don't see any case for Nitro + NWO overcoming that.

[Matt D]

I still kind of want people to explore Kevin Sullivan.

 

I don't know how much credit to give him for what he did in Florida with the Missing Link and imparting a more "Sports Entertainment/theatrical" overlay upon wrestling. I don't know how Sullivan vs Dusty drew. I don't know how Hogan vs Dungeon of Doom drew. I don't know how much credit to give him for NWO as a booker. I don't know how successful he was as a 70s babyface or how he did as a pre-satanic heel in Memphis. I don't know where else he booked.

 

I know he gives himself credit for a lot of things (including convincing Hogan to go heel).

 

But yeah.

[El-P]

Agreed. Eric did way too much harm for whatever positive he brought. Plus let's not forget about Kevin Sullivan, he's as much if not more responsible for convincing Hogan to turn heel, and he's the one booking the most successful years of Nitro.

[Cross Face Chicken Wing]

Agreed. Eric did way too much harm for whatever positive he brought. Plus let's not forget about Kevin Sullivan, he's as much if not more responsible for convincing Hogan to turn heel, and he's the one booking the most successful years of Nitro.

Wouldn't putting Sullivan in over Bischoff be like the football HOF putting in Bill Parcells' offensive and defensive coordinator over Parcells?

 

(Sorry, I really like my sports analogies).

[El-P]

I have no idea what you're talking about. I'm not a sports fan to begin with, and I'm French, so the only football names I know are the ones who have been involved in pro-wrestling.

 

I'm not saying Sullivan should be in, but that Bischoff should not be given too much credit either for the nWo years. He stole the idea from NJ and UWF-I, he had a vision for Nitro and agressive tactics, he did some good, but really Sullivan deserves a lot of credit for actually booking the promotion and playing with all the huge egos and Hogan's creative control. Bischoff's ideas in 1994 sucked. The Worldwide tapings, the piped in crowd reactions during promos on Saturday Nights. Ugly stuff. The negatives badly outweight the positives in Bischoff's resume. But I give him credit for being a part and some of the reason why WCW finally got off the ground, for a little while. Doesn't make him HOF material to me though.

[Dylan Waco]

Oh yes, I did forget about that, Bret was undoubtedly a bigger draw internationally than Sting ... however, I'm not sure if that is something you can pin on any intrinsic qualities of Bret himself. I've always maintained that the wrestling boom hit the UK a couple of years later than it did in the US (1992 sort of time), which just so happens to be when Bret was getting his main event push -- I'd warrant the same goes for Germany. That isn't taking anything away from Bret, but it does seem like a right place, right time sort of deal.

 

I'd prefer to see a direct comparison of WWF with Bret on top and WCW with Sting on top vs. the periods either side. I suspect it might go Bret's way, but I wonder by how much. How many more 1000s of people are coming to see a Bret main event as opposed to a Diesel or Luger one? How many more 1000s of people are coming to see a Sting main event over a Ron Simmons or Vader one? I think this wouldn't take a lot of work to show quickly. My suspicion is that it's closer than it may appear. (NB. you don't compare WCW figures with WWF figures, but WCW figures with other WCW figures and same in the other case ... the idea we can look at one guy and pin an entire company's hopes on him is a misnomer created by exceptional people like Hogan or Austin). Each other normal "mortal" main eventer is only going to affect so many people. I think in the cases of Bret and Sting we can measure that, even allowing for a Bill Watts booking run or Pat Patterson departure.

 

---------

 

And Dylan, I don't think my argument is "bizarre" as you dismissively put it, I think you can see the influence of Sting on the way main event guys worked their spots. Would you say the way Jericho or Edge or any of the main stars to emerge from that generation worked was closer to Sting or to Bret? Well? I'm being serious.

"Right place, right time" is the story of wrestling in many ways. I suspect there are many people who believe Backlund could have been replaced by any number of people. There are those who think Flair's job could have been done just as well if not better by Dibiase. I suspect Ken Patera could have done at least as well as Billy Graham as WWWF champ. But that doesn't change what actually happened. What actually happened is that Bret was on top of one of the five biggest drawing shows in history, during the exact same period when Sting struggled to get a couple thousand people into buildings that had been strongholds for the promotion just a couple of years before.

 

I would never point to Bret as a strong, HoF level draw. But he does have positives you can point to. He also was not the bomb as an ace that Sting was which gives him less negatives. I would be all for you going through and pulling the results to see what they show and if I'm wrong I'll be the first person to admit it.

 

I honestly don't see any similarities between the way Edge and Jericho work and the way Sting works. We can argue about how much of an influence Bret had on them stylistically (though I think you could argue that Bret was one of the guys who set the table for the modern WWF main event style), but I don't know that picking two guys that grew up/were trained in Canada is a favorable comp for Sting on any level. You hear a lot of wrestlers say Bret and Shawn were their favorites in the 90's. Not very many say Sting was.

[Dylan Waco]

John also mentioned that Eric Bischoff should probably be in the HOF. I don't agree. His failures have outnumbered his successes, and they were so huge in scope that they had a far bigger and more lasting impact on wrestling as a whole than the two-year period where he was doing well. It's impressive what he accomplished during his good years, but the bad stuff can't help but overwhelm it.

I compare Bischoff's WON HOF credentials to Marvin Miller's credentials for the Baseball HOF.

 

Without Miller's work in eliminating the reserve clause in MLB, the game would be vastly different today. Without Bischoff going w/ Hogan as a heel and coming up w/ the NWO, wrestling would be vastly different today.

 

Some might argue that baseball and wrestling are actually worse off today because of Miller's and Bischoff's actions, but I think those people are wrong.

 

Yes, both Miller and Bischoff are mainly known for doing one thing, but that one thing made such an impact that it altered the course of baseball/wrestling forever.

 

If I had a vote, both Miller and Bischoff would be in the HOF. Miller has a stronger case, though, IMO.

 

My problem with putting Bischoff in is that his "peak" as a promoter is incredibly short. In many ways promoters have had a more difficult time getting in, in my view because of the fact that people remember the negatives (i.e. the companies dying) and the positives get obscured by those broader failings. It took a long time for Roy Shire to get in and he was a clear Meltzer favorite. Jim Crockett Jr, Don Owen, Jerry Jarrett, Ray Fabiani and others with clear promoting positives aren't in. We could argue that Bischoff's peak was bigger and more substantial than any of those men - but all of them lap him in longevity. Hell Carlos Colon laps him in longevity as a promoter and drew some huge houses on shows he promoted and he can't get in.

 

It's not just promoters either. If we are being really generous we can give Eric four years as an HoF level promoter - who is in the Hall of Fame for four years or less? Sayama maybe. Perhaps The Rock. Maybe Foley though I suspect most people would factor in his pre-WWF career as a worker and things like the KOTM show if they were being honest. Angle, but just about everyone here views him as a mistake pick. There may be others, but the point is the number is very, very small and none have the negatives of Bischoff.

 

I wouldn't reject Bischoff out of hand as a candidate, but there are guys with peak runs of similar length and more positives before and after their peaks that aren't in and may never get in. It's hard for me to see how ATM Eric merits inclusion, before JYD.

[Cross Face Chicken Wing]

John also mentioned that Eric Bischoff should probably be in the HOF. I don't agree. His failures have outnumbered his successes, and they were so huge in scope that they had a far bigger and more lasting impact on wrestling as a whole than the two-year period where he was doing well. It's impressive what he accomplished during his good years, but the bad stuff can't help but overwhelm it.

I compare Bischoff's WON HOF credentials to Marvin Miller's credentials for the Baseball HOF.

 

Without Miller's work in eliminating the reserve clause in MLB, the game would be vastly different today. Without Bischoff going w/ Hogan as a heel and coming up w/ the NWO, wrestling would be vastly different today.

 

Some might argue that baseball and wrestling are actually worse off today because of Miller's and Bischoff's actions, but I think those people are wrong.

 

Yes, both Miller and Bischoff are mainly known for doing one thing, but that one thing made such an impact that it altered the course of baseball/wrestling forever.

 

If I had a vote, both Miller and Bischoff would be in the HOF. Miller has a stronger case, though, IMO.

 

My problem with putting Bischoff in is that his "peak" as a promoter is incredibly short. In many ways promoters have had a more difficult time getting in, in my view because of the fact that people remember the negatives (i.e. the companies dying) and the positives get obscured by those broader failings. It took a long time for Roy Shire to get in and he was a clear Meltzer favorite. Jim Crockett Jr, Don Owen, Jerry Jarrett, Ray Fabiani and others with clear promoting positives aren't in. We could argue that Bischoff's peak was bigger and more substantial than any of those men - but all of them lap him in longevity. Hell Carlos Colon laps him in longevity as a promoter and drew some huge houses on shows he promoted and he can't get in.

 

It's not just promoters either. If we are being really generous we can give Eric four years as an HoF level promoter - who is in the Hall of Fame for four years or less? Sayama maybe. Perhaps The Rock. Maybe Foley though I suspect most people would factor in his pre-WWF career as a worker and things like the KOTM show if they were being honest. Angle, but just about everyone here views him as a mistake pick. There may be others, but the point is the number is very, very small and none have the negatives of Bischoff.

 

I wouldn't reject Bischoff out of hand as a candidate, but there are guys with peak runs of similar length and more positives before and after their peaks that aren't in and may never get in. It's hard for me to see how ATM Eric merits inclusion, before JYD.

 

Normally I hate people that play devil's advocate and argue positions they don't necessarily belive in themselves, but I'm going to do that right now because I'm genuinely curious about people's responses:

 

Sure, Bischoff's run was short, but he helped forever change the course of wrestling. Isn't four years of making history more impressive than 25 years of just doing decent business?

[Dylan Waco]

Yes it is, but I question how much history Bischoff actually changed. Guaranteed contracts and the expansion of cable market in wrestling were big deals, but his challenge to Vince was short lived. Bischoff was a part of a big boom and I'm not completely dismissive of the notion that he should be in. But if he gets in he'll be alone as a candidate, in on four years or less, with a major negative that arguably runs lateral to his biggest positive.

[WingedEagle]

Bischoff unquestionably changed history. But one can do so in positive and negative ways. I believe his role in letting WCW spiral to near 9 figure losses and the cancellation of TV outweighs what he brought to the table before that point.