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Had Russo not come into WCW 1999...

5K views 14 replies 15 participants last post by  Big Pete 
#1 ·
How would storylines have changed? I think WCW was leading to Goldberg vs Hogan II at Starrcade. This time it wouldve been the Red and Yellow vs the unstoppable Goldberg. Hogan was feuding with Sting, Goldberg was feuding with Sid. They finish those feuds and Goldberg becomes number one contender to face Hogan. Also wcw had Sting turn heel but it wasnt going to work. I think Starrcade wouldve looked like this:

Goldberg vs Hogan II
Sting vs Luger
Hart vs Sid
Nash/Hall vs Harlem Heat.

Also think the Revolution(Benoit,Malenko,Douglas,Saturn) wouldve had a feud with the Filthy Animals.

I still wonder where Flair would be? Possibly a feud with Benoit.

Also I dont think Jarrett wouldve been signed.

Bagwell would be getting pushed. They were starting to push him before Russo came in.

I also think Steiner wouldve interfered in the main event and beat down both of them to start his push.
 
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#2 ·
Re: Had Russo not come into wcw 1999...

The show was already a sinking ship by then, but it could have been saved. Jeff Jarrett probably would've been signed. At least i'd hope since i do see him as a good talent.
 
#4 ·
Re: Had Russo not come into wcw 1999...

The company still would have been a mess without any new guys getting pushed. Russo's booking didn't help the company at all but at least when he came to WCW, he gave the new guys from the WCW Power Plant gigs rather than focusing so much on Hogan, Kevin Nash, Goldberg, Scott Steiner, etc. I'm most certain we wouldn't have seen any Natural Born Thrillers, Booker T vs Jarrett for the WCW title, and much other things Russo came up with in WCW.

WCW would have inevitably been brought out but Vince Russo's new vision of WCW wouldn't have happened.
 
#5 ·
Re: Had Russo not come into wcw 1999...

The likes of Jericho, Malenko, Benoit, Guerrero and Mysterio should have been pushed. Likes of Hogan and Nash used sporadically but not in a WCW Title scenario. They were losing lots of money already in 1999 and losing the battle but they were still pulling decent ratings and had a great time slot and brand recognition. Fans still wanted WCW to do well and sometimes tuned back in to see what was happening and they saw horrible booking. I think WCW's focus should have been on having the superior wrestling product.
 
#7 ·
Re: Had Russo not come into wcw 1999...

1999 in WCW was the worst year they had during the years Nitro was on and Vince Russo didn't even come in until October that year which would have meant that most of the booking for Starrcade and going into 2000 would have already been in place or began being built towards. WCW spent so much time invested in the usual wrestlers like Sting, Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair, Randy Savage, Kevin Nash and Lex Luger because of their contracts in 1999 whilst misusing Goldberg and Bret Hart and not pushing Chris Benoit, Chris Jericho, Scott Steiner and Eddie Guerrero and nothing could have helped Starrcade really be any better than it was.
 
#8 ·
Re: Had Russo not come into wcw 1999...

Dont think anything could have saved WCW. What killed it wasn't the product. That is what people forget. AOL killed WCW.
 
#10 · (Edited)
Re: Had Russo not come into wcw 1999...

Dont think anything could have saved WCW. What killed it wasn't the product. That is what people forget. AOL killed WCW.
True. WCW was set to relaunch/go in April 2001 again. It was the suits who pulled the plug. That's not to say Russo, Hogan, Nash and others didn't contribute hugely to its demise. The Big Bang PPV was scheduled for April or May, I forget.



I vaguely recall reading Joey Styles was in the running to replace Schiavone.

As of today, the cancellation of that PPV and sale of WCW is the single worst thing that has ever happened to wrestling. You can be guaranteed that if WCW was around today, it would've almost certainly be running a second 'attitude era' right now to get one over on WWE's PG and awful booked nonsense. And it would've exploded again.
 
#9 ·
Re: Had Russo not come into wcw 1999...

It wasn't just a case of booking. I grew up in the AE and I only had Nitro on teresteral TV with only Heat for wwe on a Sunday. WCW didn't have the production values that WWE had. There was nothing WCW could have done. The show looked dark as if it was being filmed out of a basement. Kinda like TNA today. Sure it had pyro and stuff but it still looked dark. There was also the stupid sound the ring made. Just didn't sound right.
 
#11 ·
It might have still been salvageable in 99. Still had Benoit, Guerrero, Saturn, Malenko and Bret Hart in 99, and Jericho and Raven were both there in the first half of the year too. If they had just kept the same style of presentation they'd been doing for years (and not changed it drastically with the red ropes and rip off Attitude Era that Russo tried in 2000) but stopped relying on the NWO and pushed a lot of their younger, fresher talent (not in the clumsily booked New Blood V Millionaries Club way either) to main event status things might have been different and WCW could have closed the ratings gap and been in a much stronger position by the time March 2001 rolled around.
 
#13 ·
Goldberg vs Hogan II
Sting vs Luger
Hart vs Sid
Nash/Hall vs Harlem Heat.
I think Starrcade would have probably looked like this:

Goldberg vs Hogan
Sting vs Hart
Nash vs Sid

With Russo taking Hogan off TV, Hart got Hogans spot. Russo basically tried to replace Hulk with Bret. He gave him the title, the Starrcade main event, the Goldberg feud and the NWO leadership.

It might have worked but Bret was out with a injury 4 weeks into the angle. Together with Goldberg injuring himself, Jarrett being injured and Hall having his usual troubles ruined everything.
 
#14 ·
WCW was in bad condition even before Russo came on board. A lot of stupid booking occurred all because of how they could continue the nWo storyline. They misused Bret Hart, one of the biggest stars in the 90s, Sting joining the Wolfpac was just stupid. The only good thing about WCW at that time was that they featured a lot of good talent from Mexico and Japan.
 
#15 ·
Basically you wouldn't have seen as much Bret Hart, Jeff Jarrett, Chris Benoit, Filthy Animals, Medusa, Oklahoma, Dr. Death, Harris Twins, Misfits in Action, Three Count etc.

It'd still be a mess of a show, as Nash's booking from Superbrawl 99 on was just mind boggling. Yeah, Russo ended up executing some mind boggling ideas, but he didn't have anywhere near the same calibre of talent as Nash did and didn't spoil as much as Nash did, he just added to the downfall.

Just spit-balling but I'd imagine Starrcade would have looked like...

Goldberg/Sting (c)
Ric Flair/Diamond Dallas Page
Kevin Nash/Bret Hart
Scott Hall/Chris Benoit

Then a bunch of irrelevant mid-card matches that fans would appreciate but the company would barely acknowledge in the long run. Like, Kidman/Inferno, Konnan/R. Steiner, Booker/El Dandy & such.
 
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