Rewatching WCW

[BomberPat]

Stuff like Big Bang, and talks of how Bischoff would have run it differently by having it all really self-contained, with a new look, new presentation, all these grand new ideas, don't really hold up when you consider how many reboots and reimaginings they'd attempted in the previous couple of years, and how if they'd remained under the Turner banner they wouldn't be free from the management oversight that forced so many changes on them, or if they managed to run as a self-sustaining promotion, they'd probably be subject to even more chaos. 

It's like Paul Heyman saying how if ECW had carried on, he'd have definitely built it around wrestlers like Bryan Danielson, and he'd have made it look more like UFC, and all of these other things that sound really forward-thinking and prescient - until you remember that they never happened, and he's talking about what he would have done with the benefit of twenty years of hindsight. 

Anyone can talk about how they would have made a promotion work, because it's all in the abstract - it's when you actually have to do it, with the pressures of TV networks, sponsors, wrestlers' egos, injuries, contracts, and everything else getting in the way that it becomes an issue. If Bischoff was going to continue to run WCW after 2001, there's absolutely no reason to believe that he would have done anything differently from what he'd always done, bar a change of window dressing - talk was that he was looking at bringing in Joey Styles, Don Callis and Jerry Lawler as potential commentators, and already there you've got "what worked somewhere else?" as his guiding principle, rather than any new ideas. In terms of what kind of talent he'd bring in, how he'd book, the best case study we have for that is when he got involved in booking TNA - and the answer there is "the same fuckers he'd have booked anywhere else, especially if he was riding Hogan's coattails". 

Unless there was someone else with a significant role to play in creative, there's no way WCW would have brought in half the talent that eventually made their name in TNA or ROH, and little reason to believe that, even if they did, they'd have done anything meaningful with them, because they'd have made all the same mistakes that Bischoff always made, and because they already had the guys coming out of the Power Plant to fill the "young up-and-coming wrestler" spots, without having to worry about scouring the indies for anybody else. 

Not to mention that, in a world where WCW continues, you'd never get TNA anyway, because the Jarretts wouldn't see a gap in the market for WCW's audience. You'd probably still get ROH, as Feinstein still needed video content (quiet, you) to keep RFVideo afloat after ECW closed, but a lot of wrestlers we saw rise up through the ranks in those promotions probably never would have made an impact, because the WWF wasn't interested, and WCW was unlikely to take much of a gamble on anyone untested anyway. Someone like Eddie Guerrero or Jerry Lynn, who helped get eyes on the first few ROH shows, likely wouldn't have been released by the WWF if there was still WCW around waiting to pick them up, so ROH might not have taken off the way it did anyway. 

WCW was doomed, regardless. They sold for a relative pittance, and couldn't get a TV deal even with the weight of the WWF at the height of their powers behind them. They'd be worthless without a TV deal, and what are the odds Bischoff would have succeeded where Vince didn't in securing them one? 

[Loki]

Bischoff, had he succeeded in buying WCW with TV, would have done exactly what Jerry Jarrett did.  He'd have raided the RoH-era indy wrestler pool for some young talent, pushed whichever upper mid carders he inherited, and waited for any big WCW stars under Turner contracts to come free, and then compete with WWF for them.

So absolutely you would have had Christopher Daniels, AJ Styles, Low Ki, Danielson, Elix Skipper, and then later Joe and ultimately the possibility exists that some of them would become main event stars a lot SOONER than they did because I think the Fusient Media WCW would have struggled to either re-hire the Turner-contract stars or keep the Bookers et al.

The continued existence of RoH and TNA/Impact suggests that there WAS still a large enough market for a big 2nd US wrestling company.  TNA got onto Spike for a while there!  Plus the international market was ripe for the picking.

Edit: the fallout from the collapse of WCW really fascinates me.  The WAW international tours, XWF out of Universal Studios, and little things like Live Action Wrestling - 

http://wrestlingepicenter.com/cart/product_info.php?products_id=378

 

Edited March 17 by Loki

[air_raid]

30 minutes ago, Loki said:

So absolutely you would have had Christopher Daniels, AJ Styles, Low Ki, Danielson, Elix Skipper, and then later Joe and ultimately the possibility exists that some of them would become main event stars a lot SOONER than they did because I think the Fusient Media WCW would have struggled to either re-hire the Turner-contract stars or keep the Bookers et al.

The continued existence of RoH and TNA/Impact suggests that there WAS still a large enough market for a big 2nd US wrestling company.  TNA got onto Spike for a while there!  Plus the international market was ripe for the picking.

The TNA of 2005-08 was absolutely the closest we ever came in my heart to a true recreation of WCW as a viable alternative product in my affections, in terms of a product enjoyable to watch with a completely different aesthetic to WWE and the aforementioned smorgasbord e.g. highlighting talent and styles that WWE had given up on as opposed to just diluting guys' uniqueness to suit their style. I would have put 05-06 but after a bit of a rocky spell 2008 delivered Joe vs Angle at Lockdown and the absolutely belting first UK tour (which I was lucky enough to go to three shows out of the four) - which was probably the most excited I'd been about "the landscape" since WCW died, and the most I would be for many more years, if ever.

[Gay as FOOK]

I do remember the early Ruthless Aggression/Wrestling Channel years having this real wild west vibe that a major second promotion not being around was just a sort of passing fad, and the next boom - based on booking as much like 96 - 98 as you possibly could - was right around the corner. Anyone who didn't get a contract with WWE was showing up all over the place in the exact same gear they were wearing on 2001 Nitros. It was desperate stuff, but I remember it being fun.