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Let's talk about... Bill Watts' WCW

3K views 2 replies 3 participants last post by  charlemm1 
#1 ·
What hasn't been said about Bill Watts' WCW?

It was said that it was outdated, bad, strict, Erik Watts...

But what do you think about it?

I think Watts had some decent ideas during his time. He pushed Vader, the MVC and Cactus Jack, and during his time you had some good matches.

This era of WCW is very underrated in my opinion.
 
#2 ·
I feel that if Watts' past comments didn't come back to bite him in the ass, he would have been one of the best bookers WCW ever had. Besides Crockett, Watts was the first guy WCW had in charge that had prior success running a territory. So, he was quite familiar with knowing how to run a successful company.


Hands down, the best thing he did was push Vader. Now, that introduces the element of a monster heel on top, since for the 4 years prior, you only really had Ric Flair as the top heel, without a gimmick that implies he's unstoppable. I think the reason for Vader's push was because Watts always felt that the business should have more natural athletes on top, which kind of coincides with him pushing Ron Simmons (that and the fact he was black).

Along with that, behind the scenes, Watts was initially brought in to cut costs. So basically, he began operating under a "budget", which saw the shows have a more intimate feel to them and, the one thing that got him PLENTY of heat, trying to do away with the guaranteed contracts, something that plagued WCW till the end. But you can't please everybody and obviously, Watts didn't please anybody with his decisions.



But, I guess his biggest problem was that he was stuck in the 80s and the business had passed him by. Not to mention, he was far from politically correct and working under a parent company like Turner wasn't going to work out good for him regardless. In my opinion, WCW needed a guy like Watts, who wouldn't take no shit and from his own personal experience, knew how to run on a budget and make for entertaining TV. But, when you ain't got anybody on your side, you're doomed.



I also heard that he was planning to turn Scott Steiner heel but Scott refused. And along with everybody else, wanted to cut their contracts (in the case of the Steiners, based on how often they were to work, they would be paid half of their original deal). One thing lead to another and Scott attacked him, Watts supposedly had a gun in his boot and the Steiners jumped ship. Not sure if the details are true but Rick confirmed in a shoot that Scott attacked Watts.

Also hated how he would force commentary to put over Erik Watts. No different than what Dusty would do with Dustin, other than the fact that Dustin was actually pretty good, while Erik was, well, Erik sucked.
 
#3 ·
Honestly, Watts was done in WCW before he even got there. They knew what kind of personality he was, but they hired him anyways. I think it was a plot by the Turner executives to try and get WCW to fall. They could bring a guy like Watts in who they knew wasn't politically correct and who would be an asshole if he had to be, just to give everyone a bad taste about wrestling, so that they could drop it. The biggest criticism I always hear about Watts is the off the top rope deal. I can understand Watts reasoning with it. If you have everyone coming off the top rope, then it doesn't mean anything when it actually happens. I mean, you have a guy like Vader (which is very impressive) come off the top rope, and then you're going to see a small little guy come off the top rope...well of course the small little guy coming off the top rope isn't going to mean nearly as much as a mammoth like Vader doing it. I personally think the restriction added psychology to the match and gave another way that the heels could draw some heat. Overall though, I think Watts was a great booker for WCW, and had he been given the reigns to run with it, could've made it just as big of a success as Bischoff did.
 
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