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Bischoff really fucked up with Bret

6K views 58 replies 25 participants last post by  Greatsthegreats 
#1 ·
He should have had him come out on Nitro the night after the Screwjob and unload on Vince McMahon and the company.
 
#24 · (Edited)
The person really to blame is Hogan BROTHER! No way he was going to let someone walk in and take over his spotlight. Hogan was back on top of the wrestling world and had 100% control and no Vince McMahon to answer to. Yeah, Bischoff was EVP and had a title, but didn't have a clue what he was doing....don't believe me, look at the fact he has failed in any leadership role in wrestling since he left WCW and just listen to his 83 Weeks podcast. The guy was and still is clueless when it comes to the wrestling business.

To be fair, at the very end of his WCW run, he was starting to be pushed and used better. He became the WCW Champion and was made the top guy in the nWo restart (Bret, Jarrett, Big Poppa Pump, Hall and Nash). Also, Hogan was mostly out of the picture and Bret had virtually a clear path to take off. But, one kick in the head from Goldberg canceled those plans and ended his career.
 
#25 ·
To be fair, at the very end of his WCW run, he was starting to be pushed and used better. He became the WCW Champion and was made the top guy in the nWo restart (Bret, Jarrett, Big Poppa Pump, Hall and Nash). Also, Hogan was mostly out of the picture and Bret had virtually a clear path to take off. But, one kick in the head from Goldberg canceled those plans and ended his career.
I think Russo, at least, TRIED to book Bret right but all his goofy writing and hotshotting with quick title changes and random stipulations didn't really make that much difference in the overall picture. Even barring that the kick didn't put Bret on the shelf, the nonsensical screwjob callback finish was even more of a wet fart than what they did, two years prior, in the Sting match. Bret Hart and Jeff Jarrett has members of the NEW N.W.O. reeked of a forced attempt to use a once popular property to help get guys over.
 
#21 ·
A cool idea would be have him go after the nWo, picking them off one by one over the months like, I don't know, a "Hitman".

In the meantime Hogan regains the belt but his help from his nWo is increasingly diminished as Bret keeps taking them out. Bret finally goes over Hogan in a dream-match at Starrcade 1998 for the title.

At this point Goldberg is still undefeated as Nash has been taken out of the picture. This sets up the next big match between the guy that took out the nWo one by one, vs. the guy who hasn't been beaten.
 
#22 ·
A cool idea would be have him go after the nWo, picking them off one by one over the months like, I don't know, a "Hitman".

In the meantime Hogan regains the belt but his help from his nWo is increasingly diminished as Bret keeps taking them out. Bret finally goes over Hogan in a dream-match at Starrcade 1998 for the title.

At this point Goldberg is still undefeated as Nash has been taken out of the picture. This sets up the next big match between the guy that took out the nWo one by one, vs. the guy who hasn't been beaten.
I think Bret needed a mouthpiece... A lot of his WCW promos were mediocre at best which I think affected his ability to get over. If you look at Bret's most memorable feuds in the WWF they all happened with guys who could carry the load on the mic; Owen, Lawler, Austin even HBK. I think they needed to put Bret with somebody who could cut a promo and that way Bret could just focus on his biggest strength; actually wrestling.

I've always thought Bret would have been an amazing member of the 4 Horsemen. I think fans would have absolutely got behind the 4 Horsemen taking out the nWo. Plus, you'd have Flair to carry the load in terms of promos. Then they could have had the Horsemen turn on Bret or have them all turn heel and feud with Goldberg.

Really though it's all moot. Ultimately the biggest mistake WCW made was not putting the best storyteller on the mic (Hogan) and the best storyteller in the ring (Bret) in any sort of meaningful angle. It could have been so great.
 
#31 ·
Bret was fired up to make a big impression but WCW didn't so much drop the ball as never even bring one to the game. He had good to great matches with the likes of Benoit, Booker T, Flair and DDP between being stuck in matches with Van Hammer, Will Sasso, Disco Inferno and Fit Finlay (who wouldn't feel deflated at times?). And his cocky but chickenshit heel promos in WCW were perfectly fine (when he was actually given mic time). The man was recovering from a groin pull the likes of which none of us has ever seen, after all. As for him arriving late to venues, that was his thing. He did it all the time in the WWF but was given more leeway there. Even Vince and Austin have both joked about it. Him being late did not mean he was not motivated; that was him just being his usual tardy self, right or wrong. The rest is just Bischoff BS.
 
#34 ·
My idea would have been to have Bret run down at Starrcade and stop Hall and Nash entering the ring in the main event. Then advertise the fact he's going to be on Nitro to defend his actions. Have him say he was screwed over and he's not going to see it happen here. Nash comes down to the ring and rips him a new one saying he couldn't get one over on his mate and he was forced out the North with his tail between his legs and they're going to do the same here, they're going to make his life hell. Nash then walks down to the ring as Hall rushes him from behind. Sting drops from the rafters and clears house. This then leads to Hall and Nash Vs Sting and Bret at Souled Out. Hall gets Sting at Superbrawl after winning WW3 and Nash and Bret go at it.
 
#3 ·
WCW really did do a bad job with Bret. However, it's a double edged sword because having him come in and beat the WCW guys sort of says that WWF is better than WCW.

However Hall and Nash had been doing it for a while before Bret arrived so it probably wasn't a big deal.

What WCW screwed up on is the big dream match between Hart and Hogan. Lost a bit of money there...

Many people blame Hogan's politics.
 
#8 ·
At the same time if you let all the WCW guys beat Bret, you're down playing the significance of acquiring that big name. That was why WCW took him in, he was top talent.

And if he's now under contract and working for WCW, who cares who he beats. He's a WCW guy and I'm sure if anybody asked him about his thoughts on the WWF at the time he would have severely put them down.

Anyways, that's just speaking to him beating WCW guys, not the quality of his debut in WCW.
 
#9 ·
How they booked Hart pretty much showed WCW was nothing more than WCW vs NWO. So Bret comes in and really looks out of place no matter what he does. If he's a face he's outdated like he was in the WWF and too northern for WCW's fan base. If he's a heel he's bowing down to Hogan. He fit well in the mid cards putting on great matches with Benoit etc, etc he was just above that and everyone knew that.

It's tough to book him but I think I would of kept in as his current WWF character before he left and had him feud with Sting on his own away from NWO. Let Hogan vs Sting end clean and then you could start Sting vs Hart, the break up of NWO.
 
#14 ·
Bret has told the story more than once that Vince told him "WCW wouldn't know what to do with Bret Hart" to Bret's misfortune Vince was proven right.

It should be noted that Bret's WCW run didn't last very long until it was cut short by the concussion, but it's hard to imagine the run improving to a meaningful degree.
 
#15 ·
He wasn't allowed to wrestle for WCW for a set period due to the no compete clause.

He was said to be in the wrong head space after leaving WWF and didn't really want to be in WCW.

He was said to arrive to the arenas late and left early. He chose not to really interact with the rest of the roster. So he became an outcast.

Owen died.

Bret was off for about 6 months in 1999.

He suffered multiple concussions and chose to retire.
 
#16 · (Edited)
He wasn't allowed to wrestle for WCW for a set period due to the no compete clause.

He was said to be in the wrong head space after leaving WWF and didn't really want to be in WCW.

He was said to arrive to the arenas late and left early. He chose not to really interact with the rest of the roster. So he became an outcast.

Owen died.

Bret was off for about 6 months in 1999.

He suffered multiple concussions and chose to retire.
What is sad, is people actually believe this bullshit narrative Eric Bischoff peddles.
 
#17 ·
I'm a huge Bret Hart fan, for me he's the GOAT, but even I struggle to book him here. You can't really throw him right in against Hogan because he's just lost to Sting, so you can't really see Hogan losing two major feuds in a row. Goldberg wasn't Goldberg yet. You can't put him in the nWo because it was way overcrowded.

Best I could come up with is he immediately challenges Sting for the title?
 
#18 ·
I think you're right, Bret & Sting probably would have been the best matchup for the Hitman right from the start. Nothing against Ric Flair or Curt Hennig but putting Bret in those "feuds" seemed like an underwhelming way to start his WCW run. A dream matchup against Sting would have got fans way more excited about him.

It's too bad the Starrcade 97 finish was botched so badly. Had it gone off correctly, they could have had Sting come out the next night on Nitro, thank Bret for helping him defeat Hogan and then offer Bret the first title shot as a thank you.
 
#23 ·
Should have created another Hart Foundation leading a Massive feud between the Foundation and NWO

Ending with Hart pinning Hogan on the grandest stage of them all- i mean the greatest stage of WCW at starrcade but Hogan's Ego wont let that happen so A Hart vs Nash or Hall at main event would be good and the Victory should have gone to Hart Foundation with a Rat in the NWO side , Savage .
 
#26 ·
Bischoff has stated many times(and has always been pretty consistent) that Bret was primarily brought over(and paid so much) because he was going to be the face of Thunder.

Hogan, Nash, Hall, etc... were all on a strict number of dates that they would work every year. Thunder was mandated on down from Ted Turner and Bischoff knew it was a terrible idea. All of those guys that were promised X amount of days didn't want to work any extra than what their contract said, so Bischoff had to go get a very large name in the industry to essentially stash on Thunder. Bischoff never had any solid plans for Bret other than to placate his buddies so they wouldn't be forced to work extra and try to alleviate the burden that Thunder was about to become.

Bret was in a no-win spot. He knew WCW wasn't going to use him right, and possibly knew about the whole Thunder deal too. But Vince pushed him out of the other company and WCW was willing to pay him close to $3 million a year. He was only in a spot to make a lot of money, but be ultimately unfulfilled.
 
#28 ·
I've always heard that WCW created Thunder, and planned to run it as the "nWo" show while Nitro would be the "WCW" show. We have to keep in mind that Bischoff had pursued the Hitman since mid 1996, so Bret was not brought in just for Thunder. Hart turned down the WCW offer in the fall of 1996, and opted to sign a 20 year contract for much less money with the WWE.

In December 1997, WCW ran a show that was entirely focused on the nWo, was dominated by nWo members, and was pretty much consisted of putting over the group. The fans hated it, and it ended up getting a relatively low rating at the time. This forced Bischoff to cancel plans to designate of the shows for the nWo, and ended up making it a extendion of Nitro until early 1999, where it mainly became the "B" show of WCW.
 
#32 ·
I'm sure after Bret fully realized that Hogan was always going to have Bischoff wrapped around his finger he lost motivation. Beating Hogan and getting him back for the Summerslam 93 thing was HUGE to Bret. To this day Bret will even say when people ask him what he should've done first upon arriving to WCW that he should've been making Hogan tap to the sharpshooter. I don't think Hogan would've ever agreed to lose to him. Bret said a lot of scathing things about Hogan when he left the WWF. Hogan didn't forget it.
 
#33 ·
Bret always seemed to have this weird obsession with wanting to settle his behind the scenes grievances by making guys surrender to the sharpshooter in the ring. He had this borderline "hero fetish" with wanting to get submission wins over top guys yet never seemed to want to entertain doing submission jobs himself. When you hear his ideas for how he would go over on Shawn to build to their rubber match (first, beating him by submission then beating him into hospitalization) or how he writes of his plans for Warrior (basically daydreaming of destroying his character because of how much he couldn't stand him), it really paints an interesting counterpoint to why some of the bigger names were not eager to put him over.
 
#36 ·
Ive mentioned before that I think Bret suffered with Post embitterment disorder after Montreal

WCW's booking of him didnt help, sure it's a whole different company from the WWF for a company man (Like signing the Undertaker)
That is all Bischoff's bullshit. Bret really wanted to make a splash in WCW, and considering how hot he was at the time, the WCW should ahve done something with him. Unfortunately, Hogan got in the way, and flatly refused to work with him, afraid he would be a threat to his #1 spot. Even after Owen's death, he still obviously wanted to wrestle, and ended up winning the World title, before the post concussion syndrome ended his career.

One thing I have learned over the years, listening to wrestling podcasts, is to never believe anything Bischoff says. He is a habitual liar.
 
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#37 ·
Montreal and Bret spelling WcW with his fingers on WWF television which to me was probably one of the worst things that could have happened to WWF at the time considering they were already suffering financially at the time.
It didn't happen on WWF-TV. The Survivor Series broadcast cut out almost immediately after Shawn was announced as the new champ. The footage either made its debut in Paul Jay's documentary or during the interview with Vince about the incident. If it was the latter, it really couldn't have been the "worst thing" if they knowingly aired it after the fact. It didn't get shown "live" so WWF had the call on whether it ever aired on their own TV.

The fact that Ric Flair had the real World title from WCW on WWF screens is something that Bischoff obsessed over.
According to what? I have never even heard him mention it and I don't think he was even an employee of WCW at the time it happened, let alone the guy steering the ship.

At the same time he had one thing that could do some damage to the WWF in the world title.
Something he refused to surrender until the night after Montreal but yet Bret didn’t have to turn up for any more in house shows as he had already fulfilled his contract
Incorrect. Bret was still under contract with WWF until either the first or second week of December. He could not have (and did not) show up on their TV until that time. Even as laid out in the Montreal planning, Bret was scheduled to work the following night's RAW, hence why their original agreed plan had Bret coming out, that night, and forfeiting the title.

If the deal was to have Bret turn up on TNT with the world title and watching that end
Do you think Bischoff would have followed through on his original plan for Bret?
I think Bret told Bischoff a certain Ending was in place and they made plans to put WWF out of business once and for all but all was undone by the screw job
No world champion from one switching like Flair did to the other company with belt in hand
I think Bischoff then lost interest in Bret because of the way he left WWF
That and Hogan feeling intimidated by anyone who could steal his spot light
There is no confirmation from any reliable source, not Bret, not Bischoff, and not anyone in either Bret's close circle or working in WCW that the original plan was ever for Bret to show up on Nitro with the belt. They could not have it on their television until December and because of their legal issues with WWF over numerous situations, Turner would not have cleared them showing the belt if Bret did bring it with him.

They already had the story out that Bret didn't actually lose in Montreal so if they wanted to work that angle, they could have. They could also have gotten a replica WWF belt for him to throw in the trash. Even this did happen, none of this would have put WWF out of business for good though. It's not like all the WWF fans were going to stop watching RAW and buying tickets because WCW trashed their belt.
 
#38 ·
Bret was actually doing well initially. They had him go after members of the nWo, one by one, and this came after his first PPV match being a big win over Ric Flair. So Bret felt like he was on a great direction to eventually cross paths with Hollywood Hogan....

Then they turned him heel and did that stupid "He's friends with Hogan, but not really in the nWo" deal. Ugh.
 
#39 ·
Yeah, there were small pockets where the booking seemed to be going somewhere but all the constant heel turns and bait and switch tactics (and this was before Russo came in) kind of ruined it. That deal with Goldberg where he did the metal plate thing could have developed into something interesting but they never seemed to follow up. I think they were also building to something with Nash but it fell through because Owen's death happened.

I think once Thunder came along (which pretty much coincided with Bret's arrival), there was just a lack of focus in the booking all around. Bret was one of the most obvious people affected by it but it wasn't like they were hitting home runs all over the place. Even Warrior whose arrival in WCW got a huge rating ended up basically just there for some goofy one-off that really just looked suspiciously like he was hired so he could do the job for Hogan at Halloween Havoc.
 
#40 ·
WCW was so top heavy at that point of the top guys that either couldn't work a shit(Hogan) or didn't want to work a shit(Nash), that Bret's true value got lost in the shuffle. It would've been amazing to see Bret having matches and elevating workers like Ultimo Dragon, Mysterio, Malenko, Jericho, instead of older guys like Flair, Hennig, Piper, Luger, etc...

I know Bret should've been a main eventer, but if they weren't going to let him be at the top of the card, he should've been doing something way more valuable than toiling in the middle of the card without direction and having subpar matches with older workers.
 
#41 ·
Bischoff has said in the past that Bret was supposed to be the star of WCW Thunder which would be separate from the nWo angle on Nitro.

I don’t know if it would have been super successful ratings wise but I think it would have made much more interesting TV. Especially if, as you suggested, they put Bret in angles with guys like Jericho, Mysterio, Guerrero, Benoit, Booker T or DDP.
 
#43 ·
It arguably could have been the beginning of the end for WWF but the difference maker was "direction". Vince saw with Bret that as big of a star as he was for the company, he was the highest paid talent by a considerable margin, and he was getting to a point where the angles where not going to justify the expenses. He'd had an incredible run as a heel but the direction was starting to shift toward other stars. As the highest paid talent, putting the focus on other guys over Bret would be costly to the WWF's bottom line but making Bret the top guy when the audience was thirsting for something fresh and new would have hurt them in the long run.

By comparison, WCW had a deep roster but they were starting to lose focus and their creative direction wasn't there. They had too many stars, too much TV, and while Vince was willing to make those hard cuts when the roster was too flooded, Eric didn't want to risk losing anyone to the competition, even if it meant having more stars than he had time for or story ideas to build with. Sting was clearly in line to be the babyface savior at Starcadde but you also had Bill Goldberg emerging as a major new WCW star. With his paycheck, Hogan commanded to be the top star but as with Bret in WWF, they really only had so much left for him to do. With the addition of Bret, you now had pretty much every major main event guy from WWF and WCW/NWA from the mid-80's to 90 besides Taker, Shawn, Yokozuna, Sid, and Warrior (and the latter two would end up there within the next year or so).

Vince beat them with "direction". He didn't have the depth of stars but he had a creative makeover plan with the "Attitude Era". He could push the envelope with his usual half dozen or so guys at top and a strong cast of supporting players. By making himself heel, he could be a dependable presence on the weekly television but would not be required to be programmed into a main event spot as a wrestler in anywhere near the frequency that one of his paid stars would expect to be. Of the big stars associated with WWF just two years prior (Bret, Shawn, Taker, Diesel, Ramon, Sid, Warrior), only Taker was still an active full-time roster guy after Mania in 1998. His focus was guys like Austin, Foley, Hunter, Rocky, Shamrock, and talent he had been bringing in since 1995. He cut ties with all the Hart Foundation guys except Owen (the youngest). It was a risky gamble but in the long run, most of the younger WCW guys (Paul Wight, Jericho, etc.) saw the WWF as a good place to get noticed.
 
#56 ·
Bret Hart was still technically under contract with WWE for the week after the Montreal incident. Considering WWE had filed a lawsuit against WCW in 1996, Bischoff legally was in no position to bring out, or mention Bret (although Rick Rude cut a promo about Montreal when he showed up on Nitro). I believe the day after his WWE contract expired, Bischoff, and the nWo came to the ring with Canadian flags, and sang O Canada, insinuating they wanted him to join the nWo.
 
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