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What if?


tiger_rick

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What if Summerslam 1992 emanated from Washington DC instead of Wembley? 

Would England eventually still receive a big PPV if the WWF had not of ventured over here when they did? 

Would the landscape of the WWF change with the original rumoured matches, Bret Hart vs. Shawn Michaels, Warrior vs. Shango etc. or would it have just been the same. 

 

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21 hours ago, Abe_Knuckleball_Schwartz said:

Would England eventually still receive a big PPV if the WWF had not of ventured over here when they did? 

No, and no.

The whole point of doing SummerSlam where they did and when they did was that Bret was going to lose the I belt and he suggested they'd do a monster gate if they went back to England and dropped the title to Bulldog, as European business was doing so well. Any later than SummerSlam and Davey's not around to draw the gate with and it's not a consideration.

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Even it they hadn't gone in 1992, it would still have been tempting for them to go later when they were super hot, especially as they wouldn't have that "we can't do ppv's in England because of the time zone difference" excuse which stopped them from going later. How was their business in Europe and Bulldog's popularity in 1997 compared to 1992? 

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Wasn't wwf in 92  bigger in Europe at that point than the US?  I seem to remember the UK tabloids were all over WWF back then.

Bret was HUGE in Germany if I remember + factor in Daveys massive popularity and Warriors (think I read Warrior merch outside Hulks over here) & I think it was a no brainer. 

I was 11 in 92 and didn't have Sky so had to rely on: wwf magazine, Silvervision releases and my m8 who had (knocked off nynex) cable taping it on VHS for me. To keep upto date. SS coming to the UK felt Massive at the time. Think its easy to miss just how over Davey was in the UK at this point and how as the only UK guy in WWF he got exposure for it over here. 

Davey winning the IC belt got National media coverage over here in the only 2 outlets we had tv and newspaper!

This boom also massively boosted the domestic scene here (often to the exploitation of the punter by All 'We'll Advertise an American star and then say at the event that their was an issue' Star) 

 

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Sorry to bump this thread but I was skimming through KOTR 98 for some reason earlier and naturally got to thinking about the Undertaker vs Mankind series.

I guess my thought is ‘what if’ Foley never came in when he did in 96? If you look at Undertaker’s 1995, he’s fucking about with King Kong Bundy, IRS, Kama and Mabel. He wrestled Bret for the belt at Royal Rumble in 96 but the direction was always going to be Bret vs Shawn after that. And even the Diesel thing was always going to be short lived because Nash and Hall obviously pissed off to WCW not long after WrestleMania. The Mankind feud really came at the perfect time for Taker, didn’t it? With hindsight it seemed like it really positively effected his next few years going forward, gave his character something to bounce off and allowed him to become more aggressive, faster paced in the ring. Without the Mankind thing, we wouldn’t have had the Taker and Paul Bearer breakup (at least when it happened anyway) and he’d have probably carried on going through the motions with nothing meaningful to do in 96 like he was in 95, and wound up feuding with shite like Justin ‘Hawk’ Bradshaw and The Sultan or something. Another year of that cack could’ve really seen him go stale, I reckon. Of course, they’d still have plugged him into some bigger matches but they were obviously going with Shawn as top babyface at the time and without that Mankind rivalry in 96, Taker probably never gets the title run in 97. How does it effect the Kane thing? Do we get the Hell In A Cell with Shawn? Obligatory UKFF ‘fuck Foley’ and all that, but Christ, Taker could’ve really been floundering if not for him coming in when he did. He was the ideal foil for Undertaker at a time when one was badly needed. 

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Mankind absolutely rejuvenated Taker. He's crucial for him at that stage of his career, and where he would eventually end up over the next year or two. I wonder does he feud with Vader in the Summer of 1996 instead of early 97? Which brings Sid/Michaels forward as well?

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That’s another ‘what if’, didn’t they only bring Sid in that summer because the Warrior thing went tits up? Where the hell was that even going if Warrior had stayed? I doubt he’d have been happy playing second fiddle to what he probably still saw as Rocker Shawn for long. 

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I can't think where that would have ended, other than in the same ditch, just a little bit further along the road. You can feed him another mid card or upper card heel, but the second you have a different plan for Warrior, than what he has in his head, he's going again. What was his reasoning supposed to be for leaving that time, just before International Incident?

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@WeeAl Something to do with his comic book/Warrior University wasn’t it? Like you say, if it wasn’t that it’d have been something else. Although Shawn vs Warrior intrigues me. Even if it most likely would’ve ended up with a sulking Shawn turning it into a pisstake oversell-fest like the Hogan match years later. Still would’ve been a cool match to watch as a one off, just because they were so different and Shawn probably could’ve dragged something good out of him like Rude and Savage did a few years earlier. It’s a weird one to think about though. 

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27 minutes ago, WeeAl said:

I can't think where that would have ended, other than in the same ditch, just a little bit further along the road. You can feed him another mid card or upper card heel, but the second you have a different plan for Warrior, than what he has in his head, he's going again. What was his reasoning supposed to be for leaving that time, just before International Incident?

Vince story is that Warrior used his dad dying as an excuse to. No show events. 

Warriors is that Vince reneged on his promises and separation of interlectual properties. 

Prob never know the exact deal. There's a 83 weeks podcast where Bischoff discusses warrior at length. 

The common narrative if you look at all the interviews etc seems to be that warrior saw his character transcending wrestling and becoming a cartoon, comic, video game film character, and when this didn't come to fruition things didn't go well. 

It's all a matter of perception, however as much as I love the Warrior, he didn't have any success (outside the obvious financial gain) after 91. His 1992, 96 and 98 runs were all a bust. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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