Vince McMahon definitely wanted to bury all competition, regardless of the financial standings of other promotions. When the AWA put on their first PPV in 1988, the WWE tried to prevent it, by bringing up an obscure Illinois state law regarding boxers/wrestlers with amputations (Kerry Von Erich's foot had been amputated in 1986). The AWA by 1988 was on it's death bed, and was not a threat to the WWE.
I think putting your undefeated guy in as your champion ends up being an "all your eggs in one basket" type of deal. The belt and undefeated streak become linked in a way that doesn't always make for strong, organic booking. Having special attractions like Undertaker, Ultimate Warrior, and some of these other guys work because it's a spot on the card where you can put them and it feels important without necessarily requiring the involvement of a title.
They were on their deathbed, but I think Vince wanted to make sure it ended that way.
The problem with the first WWE run was, post Rock match up it just became bogged down with HHH.
He didn't go after HHH until the summer - The point was for HHH to put him over at Summerlam, they even done a press conference building a singles match. It unravelled for a variety of reasons - HHH getting hurt and Goldberg not agreeing to do the European tour.
jCP was nearly bankrupt, and if it was not for Ted Turner buying out the company, most of the stars would have tried defecting to the WWE.
Yes I agree, certainly by 89 they were basically finished, even still there was a lot of talent on the Indies and free agents who they could have built around had they had the funding.
In 1986, AWA was definitely NOT the #3 promotion. Bill Watts UWF/Mid South Wrestling was far more popular than AWA by 1986. In fact, Watts came dangerously close to landing an exclusive deal with Turner in late 86. If it were not for the collapse of the oil boom, and not getting the TBS deal, Mid South would have been the rival to WWE through the 90s.
AWA in 86 had Curt Hennig, Scott Hall, Shawn Michaels, Marty Jannetty, Sgt Slaughter, King Kong Bundy, Kamala, Stan Hansen, Vader, Jimmy Snuka.
WCW was hanging in there through 1988, drawing reasonably well and with a fairly large roster. The challenge was that JCP overspent behind the scenes and put themselves into a deep financial hole, with the Crockett family itself wanting to divest. But even here, I would put the the NWA at the same level that AEW is now in comparison to WWE.
Scott Hall was relatively green, and not the star he became in the 90s. Same with HBK.
The Wrestlerock 86 event was heavily papered. Plus it was in the 65,000 seat Metrodome, so the optics looked terrible. This was a time when the AWA, which used to sellout the 19,000 seat St Paul Civic Centre, was lucky to get half that number by 1986.
I fully understand what you're saying.
I don't necessarily agree about Goldberg. Even after he lost to Nash, he was still over huge. You could have had him lose the occasional match here and there as long as you protected him in the loss, not unlike how other big dominant babyfaces like Undertaker and Batista were generally been protected when losing.
Doubtful. Those names sound intriguing in hindsight because we're familiar with them after years of exposure and development on national stages in mainstream wrestling companies. Watching Malenko fight Hall without any name value attached in their basic ring attire with their AWA gimmick is just watching two generic white guys work a match.
The Malenkos had been tagging in Japan for a few years at this time. Mondo, Hector and Chavo Guerrero had worked in AWA before, bring them back and there's the possibility of Eddie further down the line.
He was OVER...my point is, he was booked terribly. The build up to Hart v Goldberg should have been equivalent to Rock/Austin but it was crap.
"Someone with a bit of a clue could have turned it around."
If WCW was still pulling in crazy good ratings and lots of money, they weren't going to be in any danger of being cut. They lost over $60 million dollars in 2000. Why wouldn't a new company overseeing them axe them? Bischoff has been trying to spin this stupid yarn for 20 years. He had no plan of life after the NWO. He pretended like WWF going uber sexual stymied him into not being able to do the same, even though WCW wasn't overly sexual at all during their 83 week run. His stupid decisions and ludicrous contracts he gave out totally crippled WCW into 99/00 when his main guns stopped drawing, but WCW still had to honor all of those contracts that he ok'd. For example: he gave Master P $2 million dollars to do an angle no one cared about
