Speaker 1: It's the Lapsed Fan Wrestling Podcast with Jack and carn
Speaker 1: s e O and JP Sorrow.
Speaker 2: He's a lapsed fan and all my years and wrestling,
Speaker 2: I never seen anything.
Speaker 3: And it's the laps fan name by the one in
Speaker 3: the ring.
Speaker 2: Forget about Slado.
Speaker 4: He the real king of swing.
Speaker 5: When the bell.
Speaker 3: Goes in and the kick like me throwing in the corner.
Speaker 2: But it's lash like stick.
Speaker 3: Even Jerry King can sake off the crowd.
Speaker 2: Nodded in his head like it. Steve low Brown, would
Speaker 2: you get low down?
Speaker 6: Go even high up?
Speaker 2: Flipp you on your head?
Speaker 7: But you know cool driver, you speak more now and
Speaker 7: dragon spits fire give you more shock than when head
Speaker 7: treats higher drop a more truth than the con of
Speaker 7: sniper unless you would a coconut.
Speaker 2: Roddy Piper, Jack a JP.
Speaker 7: He like j Y d drop the cupcakes and gold
Speaker 7: the brain Bob means the best podcast. Frost start the
Speaker 7: close cloud if you all it's a classic a pose.
Speaker 8: You know it's been it's been some time since we
Speaker 8: promised the Lapsed Fan Solar system. This week's episode buff Yes, yes,
Speaker 8: it happened. The untimely passing of Sid last year. It
Speaker 8: was perhaps easy to forget that we had promised listeners
Speaker 8: another show that we pulled it random out of the hat.
Speaker 8: We run a roll in that regard before we decided
Speaker 8: to go all in on SID And I don't know,
Speaker 8: did we forget what happened to World War three nineteen
Speaker 8: ninety six?
Speaker 2: Well, I don't think we forgot. I think, you know,
Speaker 2: it's actually been on the table quite a few times,
Speaker 2: but then just something's come up and it's like, well,
Speaker 2: we should probably do this first, and then well, you know,
Speaker 2: we'll do it after that. And then well, you know,
Speaker 2: we should probably do this first, and then we'll do
Speaker 2: it after that. And you know, I mean, hey, better
Speaker 2: late than never, you know, it is I guess we
Speaker 2: can always try to push World War three back. Isn't
Speaker 2: that a good idea?
Speaker 8: Yeah, we should probably uh prolong that as long as
Speaker 8: we can, not the war, but the arrival of it.
Speaker 2: Exactly after watching the show, I kind of feel like
Speaker 2: we should have waited another future. It's not that bad.
Speaker 2: We probably should have just said, you know what, we
Speaker 2: did it, you know, don't you remember.
Speaker 8: But it's so funny how like people are still every
Speaker 8: you know, so many days they just send a message
Speaker 8: to us, like it isn't gonna like day well, we
Speaker 8: say we're gonna do a show like there is a
Speaker 8: there is an hitch that needs to be scratched out
Speaker 8: of there.
Speaker 2: There is, there is, there is I mean, it's it's
Speaker 2: and then you know, it's funny that I mean, I
Speaker 2: guess this would be you know, in prime nWo era,
Speaker 2: So I understand that. But it's like, you know, it's
Speaker 2: just a fucking World War three, right is that?
Speaker 6: Other?
Speaker 8: Like we promised to do one of the most notable
Speaker 8: wrestling pay per views of all time, but here we are.
Speaker 8: It's back to nineteen ninety six w CW World War Three.
Speaker 8: We've done a few of these, the second World.
Speaker 2: War three and the chronology of the World War three
Speaker 2: pay per view. Shouldn't this be World War four?
Speaker 5: Then?
Speaker 2: If we've already had World War three, it would be
Speaker 2: funny if they did actually do that would be world
Speaker 2: you know, at world War three, then world War you know,
Speaker 2: obviously no World War one or World War two, but yeah,
Speaker 2: world War three, four or five. That would be really
Speaker 2: funny if they did.
Speaker 8: But I highly supported it, because all you're doing is
Speaker 8: invalidating what you called World War three. If the next
Speaker 8: one doesn't have to be next. But you know there
Speaker 8: are completists out there over ten years doing the show.
Speaker 2: And maybe, maybe maybe if it was World War four,
Speaker 2: that'd have to have four rings, a four ring Battle Royal.
Speaker 2: It'd be the World War format.
Speaker 8: Every time they add a year to it, they have
Speaker 8: to add a ring six men won, six rings one
Speaker 8: hundred men. It'd probably be just as easy to follow
Speaker 8: as three ring sixty men.
Speaker 2: It probably would at that point.
Speaker 8: What's the difference And we'll get into all that because
Speaker 8: we've done World War thres in the past, but completists
Speaker 8: have noted. I mean this about finishes nineteen ninety six
Speaker 8: WCW in the catalog.
Speaker 2: Wow, does it really?
Speaker 8: I think we're just about there done. Slam Burree is
Speaker 8: missing an other than that, maybe Slare and what a
Speaker 8: transformative year. We haven't done Halloween? Have we haven't done
Speaker 8: Halloween Havoc? No, Only so that there's two with Hogan
Speaker 8: and Savage and Piper Wan Svagy and the fucking the wig.
Speaker 8: Oh oh, that's gonna be a good moment we get
Speaker 8: to that. Hogan better be on cameo by then. I
Speaker 8: story behind that fucking hair piece.
Speaker 2: Yep. But Savage grabbing it and walking around like a
Speaker 2: goofball with it, and in so many ways, I got
Speaker 2: your fucking hair in so many ways. It explains a
Speaker 2: lot of this show.
Speaker 8: Piper comes in at the end, and here's the follow
Speaker 8: on the contract signing at World War three to set
Speaker 8: up the match between Hogan and Piper at Starcade. Yeah,
Speaker 8: we also have the contractual status of Randy Savage being
Speaker 8: way up in the air Halloween Havoc ninety six being
Speaker 8: his last appearance for some time in WCW. Like legit,
Speaker 8: legit contract, WWF was making a play. I'd invite you
Speaker 8: to consider Randy coming back in ninety seven and WWF,
Speaker 8: Oh my god, right in there with Austin and Hard.
Speaker 2: What a fucking could you a Hogan? I mean, in
Speaker 2: Austin Savage programs. Fuck my fucking that's insane. I mean,
Speaker 2: that's insane.
Speaker 8: But now WSW made it work, and Savage would soon
Speaker 8: enough being the nWo in his own right. But it
Speaker 8: was a fascinating time in WCW.
Speaker 2: It really was.
Speaker 8: The nWo was just starting to show signs of being
Speaker 8: a ratings behemoth. Because as hot as the hoganhel turn is,
Speaker 8: as hot as Hollannash coming in were it was still
Speaker 8: kind of neck and neck with WWF for a little
Speaker 8: while in terms of ratings, in terms of a sense
Speaker 8: of company momentum, certainly ww was closing the gap. But
Speaker 8: now by the fall as be under the Winner of
Speaker 8: nine ninety six and A ninety seven, it's becoming clear
Speaker 8: that they're running away with it. And then not only
Speaker 8: is WWF losing ground, they are losing the war, right
Speaker 8: it's because of the nWo, and one of the recent
Speaker 8: additions to the stable right before the show was indeed
Speaker 8: the Giant who of course Paul White triumphs in the
Speaker 8: World War three Battle Royal to secure a shot at
Speaker 8: the world title on this show, and that sets up
Speaker 8: that ill fated NWA sold out pay per view that
Speaker 8: we did in January nine ninety seven where awful, awful,
Speaker 8: truly awful. And what that signals to us is that
Speaker 8: a lot of what happens in WCW on this pay
Speaker 8: per view and all the nitros around it and the
Speaker 8: pay per views around it, is this blossoming idea which
Speaker 8: is ill fated from the start, which we've talked about
Speaker 8: for years on TLF, that the nWo starts to have
Speaker 8: to become its own program, with its own roster, its
Speaker 8: own announcers, its own television show, its own hour of nights.
Speaker 2: Stupid and stop stop it. So just stop it.
Speaker 8: On that pretense, Bischoff turns heel despite being WCW's executive
Speaker 8: vice president because WCW needs an announcer. Apparently, No, they
Speaker 8: don't with these guys going to wrestle.
Speaker 2: Exactly that. I mean, it always comes down to that.
Speaker 2: It always comes down to who the fuck are these
Speaker 2: guys gonna wrest.
Speaker 8: The nWo wrestles WCW ANDWCW shows, and WCW wrestles the
Speaker 8: nWo and nWo shows. Aren't they both the same show?
Speaker 5: Well?
Speaker 2: I think that's the whole idea. They weren't going to
Speaker 2: wrestle on oh my god, on on WS on nWo shows,
Speaker 2: the nWo versus nwos. That's great? How that work? Which
Speaker 2: how would that work? Sounds It's like, if you get
Speaker 2: a whole faction of guys who are teaming together, doesn't
Speaker 2: that kind of kind of make the whole point moot?
Speaker 2: If they're feuding with each other?
Speaker 8: What have we always said? Why was the nWo angle money?
Speaker 8: It's because WCW is eventually going to beat them. Yes,
Speaker 8: it's not because they become WCW.
Speaker 2: And and and the other thing is there's a big
Speaker 2: difference between between you know, loving to hate somebody and
Speaker 2: actually loving them, like you know, they weren't babyfaces. They
Speaker 2: were just guys you love to hate and you enjoyed
Speaker 2: them for sure. But even though they were cheered, there
Speaker 2: was no doubt in fans' minds they wanted them to
Speaker 2: lose eventually. It was just a cool moment, right.
Speaker 8: Any anybody you can point out in any audience at
Speaker 8: WW at this point in time who was channing nWo,
Speaker 8: And there were lots of them. I would bet donuts
Speaker 8: to dollars that if you pulled every single one of
Speaker 8: them aside and said, do you want the nWo to
Speaker 8: beat Sting when Sting finally wrestles, they would all say
Speaker 8: absolutely not right, because that would be fucking steamatch. Yes,
Speaker 8: I want someone to show up and defeat this invading force.
Speaker 8: But for now, it's such a hot angle and it's
Speaker 8: so cool and it's so unpredictable that we're gonna cheer
Speaker 8: for that because that's what's electrifying us right now. And
Speaker 8: so they really drank that kool aid and just felt like, Okay, well,
Speaker 8: no one cares about WCW because as soon as we
Speaker 8: did the nWo angle, that's when we actually started winning
Speaker 8: the ratings war. So now you know, nWo is the
Speaker 8: only thing that really matters. So we're in that really
Speaker 8: weird zone. It was funny when we covered the Who
Speaker 8: Killed WCW series last year that weiss did. Remember Brian
Speaker 8: Alvarez said, as far as he is concerned, w CW
Speaker 8: started making decisions that would harm instead of help when bishoff,
Speaker 8: turnheel and join the NBO, And that's right here, and
Speaker 8: that's so early in the nWo angle that it seems
Speaker 8: kind of silly to say that, like the die was
Speaker 8: cast at that point.
Speaker 2: He's not wrong. I don't know if he's right, but
Speaker 2: he's not wrong. Yeah either, you know, I don't know
Speaker 2: if that would have been a better choice or not.
Speaker 2: I can see I can see the idea that once
Speaker 2: you get somebody who's who's not a wrestler, who is
Speaker 2: the real, you know, executive vice president of the company,
Speaker 2: it kind of takes it kind of becomes a little
Speaker 2: goof hokey in a way. Yeah, yeah, you know, I mean,
Speaker 2: although you know it certainly the Vince McMahon heel idea
Speaker 2: before Vince micmahon turned heeling. You know, so there is
Speaker 2: there isn't him already doing it in nineteen ninety four
Speaker 2: in Memphis, right, and I don't Right of course, listen
Speaker 2: if I if I didn't see, it didn't happen. So
Speaker 2: that's the way it goes. Yeah, but you know, like
Speaker 2: there's there's they're like, it's it's weird. It's like it's great,
Speaker 2: but it's also like it's just like you said, it's
Speaker 2: o key, it's it's it. It kind of takes it
Speaker 2: because because then really it allows for way more plot holes. Yeah,
Speaker 2: in the scenario because now you've got a guy, you
Speaker 2: got the guy who runs WW so, like why doesn't
Speaker 2: he just shut WWS?
Speaker 8: Well where everyone has like a certain period of time
Speaker 8: to declare their allegiance, but it's like why would so
Speaker 8: what happens to the people who declare allegiance to WCW.
Speaker 8: They never made that clear. They just kind of laid
Speaker 8: that out. I said, you know, it's good drama, like
Speaker 8: Bagwell turns the Night after World War Three on nitro,
Speaker 8: but everyone agrees that the nWo started to kind of
Speaker 8: get goofy when they added too many people. Everyone's list, though,
Speaker 8: is different as to who represented one person too many,
Speaker 8: and for some it's Bischoff. I didn't feel that way
Speaker 8: at the time, but I mean, if you look at
Speaker 8: it with the benefit of hindsight, it was kind of
Speaker 8: the point where it's like, okay, so they're going to
Speaker 8: like be the company, They're going to be the promotion.
Speaker 2: Now, like right, no one wants that. No one. And
Speaker 2: when they tried it and NBO took over Nitro, the
Speaker 2: ratings took such a shit and the NBO sold out
Speaker 2: pay per view with such a piece of shit that
Speaker 2: it's abundantly clear that it's not going to work to
Speaker 2: tear down all the WCW signs and put nWo banners
Speaker 2: up that it is not it's money about this angle.
Speaker 2: It was so money that they were able to still
Speaker 2: realize incredible returns on this angle despite kind of that
Speaker 2: off center aim that they seemed to have Teddy Byassi
Speaker 2: was still in the mix. They were trying to, you know,
Speaker 2: foster the idea that it was Teddy Byassi who was
Speaker 2: bankrolling all of these ship jumps to the nWo like
Speaker 2: the Giant and others right, And they had a in
Speaker 2: mind for Teddybiyassi a role where he would be a
Speaker 2: color commentator for the nWo Hour of Nitro or the
Speaker 2: nWo television show Visa vis supposedly Eric Bischoff, who's talked
Speaker 2: about his role in his mind being more of a
Speaker 2: Gene Okerland like and he kind of does play that role,
Speaker 2: Like when the NBO swarms the ring and does a
Speaker 2: big promo, it's Bischoff holding the mic just like Gene
Speaker 2: Okerland would if it was right. So that was the concept,
Speaker 2: but eventually they learned, and it was wouldn't have took
Speaker 2: much research to know this ahead of time that Teddy
Speaker 2: Byassi is shit in the commentary position, like he's just oh, of.
Speaker 8: Course, there's no idea how to get anybody else over.
Speaker 8: He can't talk about others. He's about himself, which makes
Speaker 8: him an absolutely wonderful pro wrestler, which he is. But yes,
Speaker 8: not everybody's cut out to, you know, talk about others
Speaker 8: in ways that elevate them and get storylines across et cetera.
Speaker 8: It's not everyone's gift. They're making a play for mister
Speaker 8: Perfect as well, who was doing color on WWF at
Speaker 8: the time and who would be coming in quite soon.
Speaker 8: But this is that weird period where oh yeah that
Speaker 8: it was like he disappeared from WWF but he didn't
Speaker 8: show up in WCW for like six months.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that was that was so strange, wasn't it, Like
Speaker 2: he just didn't he just wasn't there, and like he
Speaker 2: was gone but he wasn't. Yeah, well, hey, you know
Speaker 2: you gotta milk that Lloyds of London as much. That
Speaker 2: was part of it.
Speaker 8: Yeah, And there was also this There was also this
Speaker 8: kind of showdown where McDevitt was sending legal letters saying, like,
Speaker 8: you know, he is not eligible to leave right now,
Speaker 8: you know, he's not out of his contract, and they
Speaker 8: were taking issue with the Lloyds of London. Somehow headig
Speaker 8: held it against WWF that they compromised his ability to
Speaker 8: collect the full amount from Lloyds of London by making
Speaker 8: some representation or the other that would make Lloyds of
Speaker 8: London thing that he actually wasn't as permanently disabled as
Speaker 8: the insurance payout that he was due to get were indicated.
Speaker 8: So he never had any love loss for them over
Speaker 8: that whole thing. Eventually, he came in, but there was
Speaker 8: some legal volleys before it could be consummated. But that's
Speaker 8: something else that could have taken full shape. Here at
Speaker 8: the end of nineteen ninety six, Roddy Piper comes in,
Speaker 8: shows up at the end of Halloween Havoc and here
Speaker 8: has the contract signing with Hogan and gets attacked by
Speaker 8: the nWo. A ton of stuff going on. I remember
Speaker 8: it very warmly because I was looking into WCW in
Speaker 8: a way I never had before. It was Halloween Havoc
Speaker 8: ninety six was the first ww pay per view where
Speaker 8: I like insisted on getting it. I was just like,
Speaker 8: I must get this, and really, yeah, it was. It
Speaker 8: was an odd feeling because I was like, why do
Speaker 8: I care so much about a WCW pay per view?
Speaker 8: Why am I so dialed in on pay per view night?
Speaker 8: And it was because, slowly but surely, the nWo stuff
Speaker 8: on Nitro was getting the lion's share of my attention
Speaker 8: on Monday nights.
Speaker 2: Sure, sure, yeah, that happens.
Speaker 8: And it's a fascinating time. But you know, World War three,
Speaker 8: We've talked about this when we did the nine ninety
Speaker 8: five edition and others. Well, there's only three of them right,
Speaker 8: ninety five, ninety six, ninety seven, and ninety eight.
Speaker 2: So ninety eight is the last one. Yeah, four total.
Speaker 2: It's it's a tough watch the Battle Royal itself. Oh,
Speaker 2: it's it's they're always hard. It's just it's not a
Speaker 2: good it's not good. You know, it's not a fun
Speaker 2: not a fun fucking event. It's because it's not a
Speaker 2: three ring battle. That's just tough shit. You know, it's
Speaker 2: tough shit to watch because you don't you can't focus
Speaker 2: on three and they always have the split screen and
Speaker 2: then they stop it for a little while and it's
Speaker 2: just not you just got to knock it off.
Speaker 8: Well, is there a better way to do it or
Speaker 8: is it just an irredeemable concept from a production?
Speaker 2: I don't know. I really don't know if if there's
Speaker 2: a better way to do it or not. I I
Speaker 2: want to say that there is, but I just don't
Speaker 2: know what it is. Yeah, I'm not sure either.
Speaker 8: They had three announced teams, one on each ring, two
Speaker 8: guys each, and they had you know, situations where you'd
Speaker 8: be having you know, three screens on at the same time,
Speaker 8: and like the announcers are like, oh he went out,
Speaker 8: he went out and you don't even see it. Like, right,
Speaker 8: most of the eliminations in a World War three Battle
Speaker 8: Royal you do not see. I don't have to say
Speaker 8: I don't have to see all of them, but how
Speaker 8: about I see more maybe half of them?
Speaker 5: Right?
Speaker 2: Is it really?
Speaker 3: Like?
Speaker 8: Why do we even care until the last ten minutes?
Speaker 8: If that's the way it's.
Speaker 2: Gone, I know, why do we care until they fucking
Speaker 2: have the last twenty men join the one ring?
Speaker 6: Yeah?
Speaker 8: Right, which is always a good moment because it's like
Speaker 8: clearing out, and from a live event perspective, if you're
Speaker 8: sitting there in the Norfolk scope, I'm sure it's kind
Speaker 8: of cool because you know, you can make the decision
Speaker 8: about where you cast your gaze and you can focus
Speaker 8: on three rings at once when you're there in person.
Speaker 8: But on TV it's just it's a non starter. And
Speaker 8: this drove it home all the more when I watched
Speaker 8: it again here for this for this episode, it was like,
Speaker 8: my god, like, you want full screen takeovers of whatever
Speaker 8: ring they choose to focus on. Nobody wants that three
Speaker 8: ring view. Not a soul alive that would select that.
Speaker 8: Besides apparently Craig Leathers and the ww production team of
Speaker 8: course demerit to them. Definitely a failure of imagination there,
Speaker 8: or you know what it is, It's it's imagination running
Speaker 8: rampant instead of doing it simply.
Speaker 2: Well, it's it's imagination running rampant. It's also it's also
Speaker 2: just I don't know how to say it. I really
Speaker 2: don't know how to say it. I mean, it's like
Speaker 2: it's it's lack of focus. It's lack of I mean
Speaker 2: in a wad way, it's lack of a lack of imagination.
Speaker 2: It's just like just just it's not the foresight.
Speaker 8: You have the foresight to realize and you're gritting out
Speaker 8: the production this way that this is going to kind
Speaker 8: of be a kind of going to be a pointless
Speaker 8: watch at home for a while, right, right, And we
Speaker 8: might just bite the bullet and have full screen takeover
Speaker 8: of whatever ring we choose to focus on it in
Speaker 8: a given time, running the risk, because the point is
Speaker 8: even with three screens, you don't you still don't even
Speaker 8: see most of the eliminations. If you're doing that so
Speaker 8: that the fan has eyes on everything, so that theory
Speaker 8: they don't miss anything, they miss so much more because
Speaker 8: the picture's so damn small. I mean, I'm looking at
Speaker 8: this on an HD television in modern times. I mean,
Speaker 8: can you imagine like watching this on a small screen.
Speaker 8: Oh my god, it'd be an nineteen ninety six, how small.
Speaker 8: Some of those views would have been absolute night man.
Speaker 8: So it's interesting because Tony Shavanni on his podcast with
Speaker 8: Conrad reviewed this show and they were talking about that
Speaker 8: criticism of the World War th reapproach of Shavanni, in
Speaker 8: addition to being the had announcer for ww was also
Speaker 8: the producer.
Speaker 2: I'm sure he didn't. I'm sure he didn't fucking care.
Speaker 2: Now there's he thought was I'm sure there, you know,
Speaker 2: if he didn't fucking like it, just didn't, don't watch
Speaker 2: the fucking show.
Speaker 8: It's always that's always a nice way to deal with criticism.
Speaker 8: If if only all of us had that option. Well
Speaker 8: we do, yeah, we do. So that's fine. We actually
Speaker 8: understand where he's coming from there. But here's I guess
Speaker 8: it's a box you always have to check when you
Speaker 8: review a World War three episode. Is this this this
Speaker 8: issue of how tough it is to watch at home?
Speaker 8: And here is Tony Savanni relative to the criticism of
Speaker 8: how they handled the nineteen ninety six production.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he took the commentary.
Speaker 9: I thought the commentary team did a pretty good job
Speaker 9: of throwing it around. I don't think we stepped on
Speaker 9: each other. We had six guys working, which was probably
Speaker 9: too much. I thought that Lee Marshall bump was pretty
Speaker 9: hilarious because we all love Lee and he sold it
Speaker 9: quite well.
Speaker 2: How are you doing over there?
Speaker 5: Lee?
Speaker 2: Not good?
Speaker 9: But the hell, you know, I just got hit and
Speaker 9: Zibisco was tremendous. Well, you know, it was too many people, Yeah, right, sure.
Speaker 9: I mean when you have sixty people, you are going
Speaker 9: to get a lot of guys who mean nothing and
Speaker 9: know nothing. And you know, with all these guys going
Speaker 9: out at the same time and all these different announcers,
Speaker 9: I think as an announced crew, we did probably as
Speaker 9: good as we could do with announcing all these guys.
Speaker 2: I mean, we're watching it.
Speaker 9: Look, we're all watching the same thing, and we've always
Speaker 9: did We've always done this. We're watching the same thing
Speaker 9: the fans were watching. We're watching the screen, the monitor,
Speaker 9: and we're watching three little boxes. So we don't know
Speaker 9: who was all going out. And you know, if we
Speaker 9: missed the guys, now, then what the fuck did that?
Speaker 2: Did that mean anyway?
Speaker 9: Was that important that we hit every guy who's going
Speaker 9: out that we talked about every guy that we gave
Speaker 9: a background of, every guy who went out. Oh here
Speaker 9: out goes Psychosis, and you know, Psychosis had his head
Speaker 9: stuck up his ass back in nineteen ninety five, pulled
Speaker 9: out by de Malenko and sniffed by Dave Meltzer and
Speaker 9: make sure it smelled right.
Speaker 2: I think I'm going back and listening to that.
Speaker 9: I think we did a good job of not talking
Speaker 9: over each other, and I think the finish of it,
Speaker 9: as Meltzer said, was good because it got over what
Speaker 9: we wanted to get over. And I think if you
Speaker 9: go back and you watch the end of that, the
Speaker 9: fans were pretty much into it at the end. They
Speaker 9: were all mixed up as we were. But if you're
Speaker 9: in the arena, you see sixty guys go at it.
Speaker 9: There's something pretty cool about that. I thought production wise,
Speaker 9: that we fucked up by just staying on that three
Speaker 9: shot all the time.
Speaker 2: I think that was one of the mess And of.
Speaker 9: Course basically they had to do what I guess because
Speaker 9: they didn't know who was going out and what to order.
Speaker 9: I mean, you kind of get a rundown of who
Speaker 9: you think's going out when, But will the guys actually
Speaker 9: pull it off? I mean, if we say that Diamond
Speaker 9: Dallas Page, for instance, is the first man going out.
Speaker 9: Suppose somebody else goes out and you miss that shot.
Speaker 9: So they probably had it with three rings do that,
Speaker 9: But I thought maybe they should have pulled off that
Speaker 9: three shot and taken maybe a one shot of you know,
Speaker 9: maybe a ring number one at one time, a ring
Speaker 9: number three. I agree, it was a big cluster fuck,
Speaker 9: no question. There were too many slots and not enough,
Speaker 9: not enough pieces of talent to fill that slot. So
Speaker 9: if we missed some of those guys, then it didn't
Speaker 9: matter to where we were going anyway. And that was
Speaker 9: further in the nWo angle.
Speaker 8: Yeah, that's what happens when you have to hit this
Speaker 8: artificial number at sixty entrants, right right, It's like, yeah,
Speaker 8: that's the point. If it didn't matter if they went out,
Speaker 8: why are they in the match?
Speaker 2: I know, it's not like you're going to fucking see
Speaker 2: uh uh, you know, I don't know, Alex right win
Speaker 2: the fucking Yeah, I know you need fucking you need
Speaker 2: dead wood in there for sure, But also you know,
Speaker 2: Shemney didn't say this, you know, he he failed to
Speaker 2: mention the fact that after uh uh uh, after Lee
Speaker 2: Marshall took the bump, there was just cocaine all over
Speaker 2: his mustache. Yeah, he took the bump, all right.
Speaker 8: I mean that is such a silver lining of this
Speaker 8: pay per view, Like this is the most Lee Marshall
Speaker 8: you're gonna get.
Speaker 2: Like, I know, it's so true.
Speaker 8: Because he's he's unleashed, because they need the announcing help
Speaker 8: and he's like third straight, you.
Speaker 10: Know, Tony, I'm here, Tony, I've got a nice bump
Speaker 10: of cocaine sniffing up my nose. And I'll tell you
Speaker 10: right now, I've got women waiting for me in the
Speaker 10: back already, pants down, pants down. I've got my pants
Speaker 10: down right now. In the arena of.
Speaker 8: Six times he was on all fours that night in Norfolk, Virginia,
Speaker 8: only one, however, in the arena he fucked. He after
Speaker 8: the show. I think that's been I think the history
Speaker 8: is established.
Speaker 2: Just imagine, just imagine, like Lee Marshall after like two
Speaker 2: hours of sex, just a sweaty, you know, like hair
Speaker 2: drenched from all the just the the rough houses, but
Speaker 2: not the slightest sign of fatigue on his face. None, none, none,
Speaker 2: and he's still fat. Right, that's the thing too, despite
Speaker 2: all that exercise, you know, just fucking loads of colm.
Speaker 8: Let's send him the week ahead to another college campus
Speaker 8: for nitro party. Right, he's ready, I mean, Lee Marshall, listen, listen,
Speaker 8: he listen. He has his way for a few nights
Speaker 8: and then and then you know what, right in the
Speaker 8: fucking plane, he's off to another one. He's ready to
Speaker 8: go to that next nitro party and start fucking again.
Speaker 2: Stop us the way to stop us lying?
Speaker 8: Yeah, exactly, Yeah, Lee Marshall and all of his glory
Speaker 8: on this show, not just holding a microphone backstage, but
Speaker 8: holding court in the commentary. Oh yeah, and he can't
Speaker 8: hear his colleagues, so he's just talking over people and
Speaker 8: he's making sounds and he's yelling at Larry's Abisco for
Speaker 8: doing nothing while he's being attacked by pro wrestlers. He's
Speaker 8: trying to sell and do commentary at the same time.
Speaker 8: He doesn't know how to do either, so that it's
Speaker 8: very challenging for him. Just a fucking mess, that's the thing.
Speaker 8: It's just a mess. It's not enough there's sixty guys
Speaker 8: in there, you know, throwing each other around. And remember,
Speaker 8: unlike a Royal Rumble, they don't enter at intervals, right,
Speaker 8: maybe sixty men entering at intervals to work. You might
Speaker 8: want to do that instead. It'd be a two hour match.
Speaker 8: But that's fine.
Speaker 2: I mean that might that might not be too bad. Honestly,
Speaker 2: you know, have something, have something different. I mean, I
Speaker 2: appreciate again the idea behind them trying to have their
Speaker 2: own version of the Royal Rumble, but it's like, I
Speaker 2: don't know how to do it. I really don't know
Speaker 2: how to do it, to make it. I mean I
Speaker 2: know that that even aw does literally does the Royal Rumble.
Speaker 2: They just call it, what is it, the casino, Yeah,
Speaker 2: the Gauntlet the yeah, yeah, you know, that is the
Speaker 2: exact same things. I mean, maybe they could have done
Speaker 2: it with sixty men doing that, and you know, that
Speaker 2: might have been interesting, but that would have a gain.
Speaker 8: You know, what you could do You could have like
Speaker 8: three men enter every two minutes and one goes to
Speaker 8: the ring. Yeah, you know, and that way the rings
Speaker 8: aren't so full that it's completely impossible for the production
Speaker 8: to zone in on a ring where something important is happening,
Speaker 8: But it sounds like to hear them tell it, like
Speaker 8: they were just so not like deep logistically in terms
Speaker 8: of like you know, organization, they probably couldn't do something
Speaker 8: that complex. They probably would have just fallen apart. I mean,
Speaker 8: it really sounds like the sixty is double what WWF
Speaker 8: does and let's just put him in there. Yeah, let's
Speaker 8: only book the last ten minutes of the thing. Other
Speaker 8: than that, it's just you know, a fly by the
Speaker 8: seat of our pants. And it's not enough that there's
Speaker 8: you know, they did put some things, but it's out
Speaker 8: of the ring extracurriculars like Ben wi right and Kevin
Speaker 8: Sullivan battling into the crowd and stuff.
Speaker 2: That's that's what they would do. They would do these
Speaker 2: extra little things way way way down the line.
Speaker 8: And it's like, eh, you know, like okay, some didn't
Speaker 8: even get in the ring because of that, right right,
Speaker 8: there's not enough we can't even follow what's going on
Speaker 8: in the ring. But you're going to add a fourth
Speaker 8: dimension in and around ringside where Lee Marshall shitting himself
Speaker 8: and Ben was beating the shit out of Kevin. It's like,
Speaker 8: you know, you're actually not doing yourself favors by adding
Speaker 8: more more dimensions where shit is happening that these cameramen
Speaker 8: directors have to follow. But it did give us a
Speaker 8: little bit of a nice glimpse because the way the
Speaker 8: rings were positioned, having three teams out there, we were
Speaker 8: able to see a couple of shots. You probably saw
Speaker 8: this where there's like a blonde woman at the end
Speaker 8: of the announced table with a headset on, kind of
Speaker 8: directing them.
Speaker 2: Yes, yea, hear from her.
Speaker 8: But that's a rare glimpse at a woman by the
Speaker 8: name of Annette Yothera who's a fascinating little story in
Speaker 8: her own right. It's been mostly like backhanded comments and
Speaker 8: things on podcasts, of course, so we don't know what
Speaker 8: a ton but Bobby Heenan went in on her, not
Speaker 8: by name, but.
Speaker 2: It's pretty clear that's what he was talking about.
Speaker 8: In his book, Chavani said at one point she and
Speaker 8: Craig Leathers, apparently they were together even though Craig Leathers
Speaker 8: was married, thought that they could make a play to
Speaker 8: take over WCW entirely, that they had designs on somehow
Speaker 8: grabbing the reins of OW. I have no idea, I
Speaker 8: guess talking the head of TNT Sports and Entertainment, you're
Speaker 8: Harvey Schiller. Brad Siegel types into giving them the ball
Speaker 8: just like you know, the same way you know, guys
Speaker 8: like Bill Bush and.
Speaker 2: Stuff got the ball. So that's insane.
Speaker 8: So that created an interesting challenge there. But Bobby Heenan
Speaker 8: from his book, after production meetings in the WWF, Vince
Speaker 8: McMahon would say, let's go have some fun. After WCW
Speaker 8: production meetings, we'd say, let's go see if there's any
Speaker 8: free food left life in the announcement here from the Brain.
Speaker 2: Well, well you know he doesn't. I mean they also
Speaker 2: said that in W two. Yeah, especially Jim. You'd go
Speaker 2: there and it would be all gone. People from production
Speaker 2: would walk by you and they would never say hello
Speaker 2: or talk to you. There was this makeup girl who
Speaker 2: was promoted to executive producer because she was taking it
Speaker 2: from one of the other producers.
Speaker 5: Right.
Speaker 8: She looked like Rushmore and smelled like gray poupon. She
Speaker 8: couldn't put her own face on. What she was gonna
Speaker 8: make you look like Mount Rushmore. I guess big tits.
Speaker 8: And she smelled like gray poupon. And it's not a
Speaker 8: good smell, right, I mean, well.
Speaker 2: Listen, I don't I don't mind the smell of gourmet,
Speaker 2: you know, the Dijon mustard, but like not in a person.
Speaker 2: You know, I don't want to like get near a person.
Speaker 11: Really.
Speaker 8: It's a strange thing, though, to say someone smells like
Speaker 8: that as a knock, Like, yeah, no one wants to
Speaker 8: smell like mustard, except except Kendrick Lamar. But you know,
Speaker 8: it's it's it's it's like it's also not like a
Speaker 8: universally reviled thing. It's a condiment people put our food
Speaker 8: to enjoy, right, you know, we've all had that. We've
Speaker 8: all dripped it on ourselves. You know, at some point
Speaker 8: hot dogs fallen off or whatever.
Speaker 2: You know, you like a little spice in the hot
Speaker 2: dog mustard, you know, like just straight yeah, yeah sometimes
Speaker 2: sometimes you know, I mean I'm in the mood for that.
Speaker 2: That's kind of the that's the that's the New York
Speaker 2: Street why, I'll tell you solutely. They put on the
Speaker 2: they put on the spicy, not the not dijon per se,
Speaker 2: but they they put on the.
Speaker 8: Little texture in there, the brown mustard. Yeah, sure, absolutely.
Speaker 8: She couldn't put her own face on. She was gonna
Speaker 8: make me look good. There was another girl that worked there,
Speaker 8: whom we called Mondy Turnbuckle was another person.
Speaker 2: She was just a slob.
Speaker 8: She was clumsy and always spilling water. She'd grab a
Speaker 8: rag to clean it up, and she'd pull our headsets off.
Speaker 8: One day I saw it. One day I saw at
Speaker 8: the airport. Apparently Wendy was a diabetic. She was lying
Speaker 8: on the floor of the terminal and gave herself a
Speaker 8: shot and her ass through her genes. Of course, there
Speaker 8: was a croissant from Burger king Line next to her.
Speaker 5: Rain.
Speaker 2: Don't fucking cross him, man, No, listen exactly, don't don't.
Speaker 10: Don't.
Speaker 2: He will fucking come for you. Were you all right?
Speaker 2: Like he the moment you cross him, he is on
Speaker 2: the hunt, all right. He will find you, and he
Speaker 2: will take you down. Picture a big pig, he writes,
Speaker 2: lying on the floor with a needle sticking out of
Speaker 2: her ass. I leaned over to the guy sitting next
Speaker 2: to me and said, usually when they use those dark guns,
Speaker 2: they'll take the tusks right off of roll fuck interminal
Speaker 2: o' haair, you know, like fucking like leaning over to
Speaker 2: some stranger and like leaning over to Steve Martin in
Speaker 2: plain strange.
Speaker 8: Everybody hated their jobs. He writes, it was the funniest place.
Speaker 8: For example, if someone was in charge of tapes and
Speaker 8: someone was in charge of pens, the person in charge
Speaker 8: of tapes would say, don't touch that tape. I'm in
Speaker 8: charge of it. I have to move that. The person
Speaker 8: in charge of pens would say, would you like to
Speaker 8: use my pen? The tape person would say, I don't
Speaker 8: want to get involved in that. They would only do
Speaker 8: what they had to. No one would ever help anybody.
Speaker 8: So yeah, I bring that up because that would also
Speaker 8: add a challenge to producing something like a World War
Speaker 8: three three ring battle Royal. If nobody can stand each other,
Speaker 8: you know, they're not going to get together and game
Speaker 8: plan how to do this thing perfectly.
Speaker 2: They're going to show up by.
Speaker 8: The seat of their pants and do as little preparation
Speaker 8: as possible because they don't want to be accused of
Speaker 8: trying too.
Speaker 2: Hard because that would be ridiculous. And there we go.
Speaker 8: Yeah, but yeah, so I Fannie had a lot to say,
Speaker 8: not a lot, but he had things to say that
Speaker 8: earlier interesting strings to pull on. He said that the
Speaker 8: other and Craig Leathers wanted to run WCW, that they
Speaker 8: got Kevin Sullivan fired at one point in time and
Speaker 8: had Eric Bischoff's ear and were political animals. He was
Speaker 8: quick to point out that he couldn't confirm that they
Speaker 8: were dating, but people always said that of course Craig
Speaker 8: was married and she was not, so that was probably
Speaker 8: probably if it was true, not something people were volunteering necessarily, right.
Speaker 8: But as for Craig Leathers, who, you know, if we're
Speaker 8: going to talk about production in WCW, world War three
Speaker 8: is probably a good time because that's like the ultimate challenge,
Speaker 8: the ultimate test is trying to produce one of these
Speaker 8: battle royals. And he's like, you know, the what the
Speaker 8: Kerwin Sylphie's or the Kevin Dunn of WW him and
Speaker 8: sure the other guy Keith Mitchell who works for aw
Speaker 8: now and came from World Class originally. But I love
Speaker 8: this because I was you know what about Craig Leathers.
Speaker 8: Can we say anything more than that? I know, it's
Speaker 8: really yeah, there's never a lot said there. And he's
Speaker 8: got he's got a Wikipedia that I have to say,
Speaker 8: looks like he edited it. Do you ever have you
Speaker 8: ever read a Wikipedia entry where you feel like the
Speaker 8: subject of the Wikipedia has been in the weeds.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, yeah, like somehow he like knows somebody who
Speaker 2: has a connection at fucking Wikipedia. Well yeah, I mean
Speaker 2: anybody can edit a Wikipedia. You can edit your own Wikipedia. Yeah,
Speaker 2: but you can't get like why, like he doesn't need
Speaker 2: a fucking p.
Speaker 8: In the first place, you know, right, Yeah, he created
Speaker 8: it and then edited it, but it says Nitro brought
Speaker 8: an intense rivalry between w CW's Monday Night program and
Speaker 8: the World Wrestling Federation's Monday Night Raw program. This rivalry
Speaker 8: is known It's the Monday Night War, directed by Leathers
Speaker 8: and produced by Eric Bischoff. Okay, like anyone is ever,
Speaker 8: but anyone is ever when talking about the Monday Night
Speaker 8: Wars brought his name up, Craig Leather's name Never Never,
Speaker 8: directed by Leathers and produced by Rick Bishoff. W W
Speaker 8: Nitro started surpassing Raw in the television ratings and held
Speaker 8: the highest ratings and cable for eighty three consecutive weeks. Bischoff,
Speaker 8: along with Leathers and Nett Yoder in there, Kevin Salt,
Speaker 8: another person no one's ever said the name of Kevin
Speaker 8: Sullivan and Terry Taylor wrote the majority of the storylines
Speaker 8: and content for Nitro.
Speaker 2: And ww pay per views.
Speaker 8: Bishoff and Leathers came up with the idea that many
Speaker 8: commercial break should be taken during live matches. This is
Speaker 8: not this. This is not cited anywhere. There's no citation
Speaker 8: like this has just stated as if it's like common knowledge,
Speaker 8: and it's like, I've never heard that before. So Tim
Speaker 8: in there like trying to put his little resume points
Speaker 8: in his Wikipedia is my.
Speaker 2: Because the first one, the first the first pair I'm
Speaker 2: looking at right now, the first paragraph has cited us.
Speaker 2: There's a Eric Bischoff chat from Prodigy. Oh my god,
Speaker 2: from like nineteen ninety five. There, I got to see that.
Speaker 2: The fuck. This is the following. The following is an
Speaker 2: exclusive Prodigy chat Triumph.
Speaker 8: The following announcement is a transcript by the Prodigy World Order.
Speaker 2: Brings Shah, Yeah, they get a whole fucking thing here.
Speaker 2: And there's a moderator. Eric Bischoff, VP of ww is
Speaker 2: now currently with US answering your case. I do that
Speaker 2: every month like WWF would do on their AOL channel. Hey, Eric,
Speaker 2: did you purposely bid up Brett Hart's contract causing the
Speaker 2: wwe to offer him an insame amount of money and
Speaker 2: hopes that that he would it would result in other
Speaker 2: workers getting upset and leaving. Somebody asked, no, no, not
Speaker 2: at all. I offered Brett a deal. Whoa, he offered
Speaker 2: Brett a deal? Now he says it here. Oh, I
Speaker 2: offered Beretta deal that I could make work financially for
Speaker 2: both him and my company. God no, he actually can
Speaker 2: never happen. That's something. Uh huh, that's right. There must
Speaker 2: be some legal shit there.
Speaker 5: Yeap.
Speaker 2: Oh, he says. Have you talked to Sean Michaels at all?
Speaker 2: He says, I haven't talked to Sean since sometime in
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty eight, when Sean and I were both working
Speaker 2: for Verne Gagne. He might have been eighty seven. Since
Speaker 2: that time I had I haven't had any conversations with
Speaker 2: Sean Michaels. Based on what I've heard and the information
Speaker 2: out there has been presented by Dave Meltzer and Wade Keller.
Speaker 2: Based on the inaccuracy of Wade's information about the Roddy
Speaker 2: Pipe Kevin Nash incident, I don't think any of us
Speaker 2: can tell if the Heart Michael's incident was real or illusion.
Speaker 8: All right, So this is post Montreal screw job or
Speaker 8: or or post their fight in a.
Speaker 2: Their fight, Rodford, I feel like it's that, all right.
Speaker 8: So it keeps intact my point that he's making reference
Speaker 8: to a ninety six play for Brett and not the
Speaker 8: ninety seven.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 8: Let's see here, let's get Yeah, the Piper Nash fight
Speaker 8: was backstage at a Nitro in Boston and June or
Speaker 8: ninety seven. Yeah, yeah, so that would be it was June, right,
Speaker 8: It's definitely mid ninety seven. It was definitely before Brett came.
Speaker 8: What made you think of the idea for the New
Speaker 8: World Order rather, I really don't remember anymore. It was
Speaker 8: just something I knew people would like. People like renegade
Speaker 8: organizations and renegade people. Funny enough, they didn't like the renegade.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that was the last person they wanted to see.
Speaker 2: In my mind, that's what the NWOR represented, people who
Speaker 2: would rewrite the rules. That was really the idea going in. Yeah,
Speaker 2: that was the idea. Okay, that's funny.
Speaker 8: I so how you know it's always been like, oh,
Speaker 8: I didn't copy it from the japan UW A fine
Speaker 8: invasion angle. But then like I saw something recently where
Speaker 8: he was like totally talking about Yeah, he's in his
Speaker 8: book and his uh contvers creates cash. He's talking about
Speaker 8: getting the idea from Japan. And WWF always insists on that,
Speaker 8: like when they do a documentary.
Speaker 2: Controversy creates cash. Isn't that a line in that uh
Speaker 2: in that movie that's out right now?
Speaker 8: Then that's right. Your co chairman saw Queen of the Ring.
Speaker 8: If you're wondering the movie about Mildred Burke, and you
Speaker 8: probably won't get a chance to see it if you
Speaker 8: haven't seen it yet, because it'll probably out of theaters,
Speaker 8: but it'll be streaming.
Speaker 2: Soon or notough, and you probably don't want to either.
Speaker 8: There's a moment where they force and it's supposed to
Speaker 8: be nineteen fifties pro wrestling one day looks then another
Speaker 8: promoter and says, controversy creates cash. I mean, dude, and
Speaker 8: they say shoot match like.
Speaker 2: They say shoot does this mean? What does this mean?
Speaker 5: Billy?
Speaker 2: Shoot beach and and and and the entire movie. You
Speaker 2: could have a drinking game with how many times they
Speaker 2: say is that in the script? Is this part scripted?
Speaker 2: What's the screen? Yeah?
Speaker 8: She leans over the milderd Berg character and like goes
Speaker 8: up to the promoter to the ropes and goes, what's
Speaker 8: the script? I mean, that's the the dialogue is the downfall.
Speaker 8: It's actually pretty. It's a pretty movie. The performances are
Speaker 8: really good. But well she's good, yeah, Mildred, Yeah she's good,
Speaker 8: Josh Lucas is, Yeah, that's true. Well, they the Billy
Speaker 8: Wolf character like is not even anywhere near and they
Speaker 8: keep calling him Billy do Wolf, like he's the fucking
Speaker 8: magician in the Frosty cartoon. Billy d Wolf's a different guy.
Speaker 8: I don't know if my years were deceiving me, but
Speaker 8: at some point I was like, they keep calling him
Speaker 8: Billy de Wolf. It was Billy Wolf. Really yeah, I
Speaker 8: don't know, so I have no no fucking idea, but
Speaker 8: it was a dialogue, just so like if.
Speaker 2: You and then and then there's this, there's this moment
Speaker 2: they have this bizarre press conference at the end, and
Speaker 2: and Josh Lucas stands up and gives the end the
Speaker 2: final line of Scott Hall's Hall of Fame induction speech.
Speaker 8: So like word for word, I watched YouTube for six
Speaker 8: hours before writing the script, right, like what the fuck?
Speaker 5: Uh?
Speaker 2: It's bad times don't last, but bad guys do right, right, Yeah, exactly,
Speaker 2: but awful. It made these like nineteen fifties press conferences
Speaker 2: seem like you're like standard modern wrestling, like, you know,
Speaker 2: here's here's your ten minutes to speak promo time, when
Speaker 2: there's like no indication that that's how they went at all.
Speaker 2: It would just they would take questions the press conference.
Speaker 2: They would take any questions. They just like cut promos right.
Speaker 2: Everyone just like writes down what they're saying. Let me
Speaker 2: give me a break.
Speaker 8: I don't know, it's just it's weird to make a
Speaker 8: movie about nineteen fifties pro wrestling and kind of not
Speaker 8: adjust the portrayal of the business to that day and
Speaker 8: kind of kind of make it seem like how modern
Speaker 8: wrestling works, you know, and how modern matches play out.
Speaker 8: You know, the clips they showed, it's of the actual
Speaker 8: archival footage. It's like they did not do all these
Speaker 8: spots and all that shit not at.
Speaker 2: All right exactly. It didn't seem that hard to get right.
Speaker 2: But you know what wrestling movies can't get right is
Speaker 2: like explaining if it's real or not, like right, they
Speaker 2: want to say it's fake, But then they don't. They
Speaker 2: leave the audience that doesn't know or care clueless as
Speaker 2: to whether this is supposed to be a real fight
Speaker 2: and this one isn't. Well, it's like they can't really
Speaker 2: get understand the drama behind the scenes at times, right
Speaker 2: like that that's where that's where the real interest is.
Speaker 2: That's where the real drama happens. You know, it's like
Speaker 2: they're either unwilling to accept that or they just can't
Speaker 2: fathom how crazy it actually is. Yeah, I mean, all
Speaker 2: you have to do is whoever the main character is,
Speaker 2: when he or she has their first training session, you
Speaker 2: have the trainer explain to the main character what is
Speaker 2: and isn't real in the ring, and you do the
Speaker 2: rest of the movie from there. It's iron Claw. You know,
Speaker 2: you got Fritz subwhere to win the world title like
Speaker 2: and then in the next breath, every match is pretty
Speaker 2: tarb It's awful, So not that hard to get, right,
Speaker 2: I don't think maybe it is, but that's always tough
Speaker 2: when you're watching, like a mainstream attempt at a wrestling
Speaker 2: movie is it's like, you know, the people in the
Speaker 2: theater watching it with you have no earthly idea if
Speaker 2: this is supposed to be real or not the matches
Speaker 2: when they shut are showing the matches themselves. I mean,
Speaker 2: Darren aaron Off, you got it right, he did. That's true.
Speaker 2: There's not one moment in there that that that you
Speaker 2: think it's real. But I mean, I don't understand. I
Speaker 2: don't know say why it's so hard, bi chef, But
Speaker 2: I will, I will. I want to say here I
Speaker 2: did find the the Craig Leathers part here, So it's
Speaker 2: not that whole paragraph, it's the last phrase.
Speaker 12: This is what.
Speaker 2: Uh, this is what Bischoff says. He says right now,
Speaker 2: Terry Taylor, Craig Leathers, and a nette author work together
Speaker 2: with me to lay out to lay out our television
Speaker 2: and pay perviews. I have the final say on everything
Speaker 2: that goes on television, good or bad. But it is
Speaker 2: sincerely a team effort and all the people I mentioned
Speaker 2: contribute to the final product. The same will be true
Speaker 2: when and if Kevin Sullivan returns to w CW fascinating.
Speaker 2: So there we go.
Speaker 8: Yeah, then who's gonna who's going to remember that and
Speaker 8: find that and put it in a Wikipedia besides Craig himself.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 8: Maybe I'm off on an island tiers aulating.
Speaker 2: But sorry to keep on this, but this is fascinating,
Speaker 2: this little chat. But someone asks whose name is hbk rissas.
Speaker 8: That sounds like a nineteen ninety six screen name if
Speaker 8: I've ever heard once or ninety seven?
Speaker 2: Eric, how do you feel about Nash and Sean doing
Speaker 2: the click nWo sign on TV to say hi to
Speaker 2: each other? And he says, I don't have a strong
Speaker 2: feeling one way or another. I know it bothered some
Speaker 2: people in my company, but honestly, I don't think it's
Speaker 2: that big of a deal. I suppose I wouldn't want
Speaker 2: it to happen on a regular basis, wouldn't it happen
Speaker 2: on a regular bass But it really didn't register with me.
Speaker 8: That became like the signature thing in WCW for a
Speaker 8: year wolf Pack's eend sign. Bischoff and Leathers came up
Speaker 8: with the idea that many commercial break should be taken
Speaker 8: during live matches. While some fans at the time found
Speaker 8: it distressing, this gave the matches it reads here an
Speaker 8: unpredictable feeling to the show. Many times Nitro would go
Speaker 8: overtime when ratings were high sometimes even up to fifteen
Speaker 8: minutes past their schedule time slot. Yeah, this happened at
Speaker 8: World War three. Rare on the time that WWF I
Speaker 8: think started going to eight fifty seven at the three
Speaker 8: minute jump. That this is when they were like moving
Speaker 8: the time slots around to figure out how to compete.
Speaker 8: A few interesting shots from the ninety five ninety eight
Speaker 8: Enter telecast include a station this is definitely him, a
Speaker 8: stationary camera with surrounding crowd high in the rafters giving
Speaker 8: a wide, panting view of the arena. A jib camera
Speaker 8: framed on props, Oh my god, in pieces of equipment
Speaker 8: on the set that would boom or whippan onto the entranceway.
Speaker 8: Oh yeah, all fans definitely definitely writing that in his
Speaker 8: Wikipedia yeah exactly. And various steadycam shots following wrestlers to
Speaker 8: the ring, with the jib and steadycam both having wide It's.
Speaker 2: Like, it's like he found out I bet there was,
Speaker 2: Like I bet he found out that there was a
Speaker 2: page that was dedicated to him, you know, because they're
Speaker 2: I don't know, they seem to be always added at random,
Speaker 2: and you never know who the fuck and and he's
Speaker 2: just like freaking out.
Speaker 13: Like Oh, wait a minute, Wait a minute, that's not
Speaker 13: that's not right. I gotta tell him what I did exactly.
Speaker 13: This revolutionary shit starts talking the inside lingo with no
Speaker 13: citations about jibcams and steadycams and wide angle length.
Speaker 2: Oh my god, look at home. My hold on, I'm
Speaker 2: reading this thing now, and with the jib instead, He
Speaker 2: describes his techniques. Yes, with the jib, nobody else. Having
Speaker 2: wide angle lenses right in there, right, and in close
Speaker 2: proximity on the set, there was a high risk of
Speaker 2: one camera capturing another. Depending on the position of the jib.
Speaker 2: Leathers would sometimes have the steadycam frame a shot on
Speaker 2: the ground. When cross dissolved to the steadikam, the operator
Speaker 2: would tilt up and quickly move towards the subject. Yeah,
Speaker 2: this would prove to be a stylish wipe sequence between
Speaker 2: both cameras, and it gave the effect, and an effect
Speaker 2: gave the jib move more time to swing out of view.
Speaker 8: Wow, I mean, that's just that's what you'd expect any
Speaker 8: TV producers wikipedia to sound like. When Bischoff was removed,
Speaker 8: it further says from Power in September ninety nine, Leathers
Speaker 8: would continue to direct the show for the remainder of
Speaker 8: the year, but with creative restrictions put upon him. With
Speaker 8: the new management in charge, they wanted to change ww's
Speaker 8: format to resemble WWF nowww style of broadcast. Changes in
Speaker 8: production included tinkering of camera angles, such as the removal
Speaker 8: of the steady cam from the entranceway to be replaced
Speaker 8: by a standard hendheld camera zoned zoomed in from ringside.
Speaker 8: Although that change and angle may not have been as
Speaker 8: visually pleasing to some, the new management did so to
Speaker 8: better ebulate the look to him.
Speaker 2: Some not as visually pleasing to him.
Speaker 8: It's almost like, you know, his signature's got taken away
Speaker 8: and he's like explaining it here, you know. On the
Speaker 8: Februy nineteen, two thousand and one, Nitro Broadcast, Leathers resumed
Speaker 8: position of television director, around the time Bischoff regained some
Speaker 8: control of the company. I didn't know that interesting. With
Speaker 8: WWF for sale, Bischoff and this investors deal to purchase
Speaker 8: the company failed when Turner executives canceled ww's timeslots. Eventually,
Speaker 8: WFWWWE would go on to purchase several assets of WCW
Speaker 8: In late March two thousand and one, forcing many employees,
Speaker 8: including Leathers, to be laid off.
Speaker 2: Where you at, Craig, Where are you at right? Testify?
Speaker 2: We'll do a podcast with you find us? Yep, Why
Speaker 2: are you afraid? Why aren't you talking? Where's a net?
Speaker 11: Mmm?
Speaker 8: You ready for a list of everyone in the Battle
Speaker 8: Royal or at least?
Speaker 2: Uh? This is the first report in.
Speaker 8: The Observer of who is going to be in the
Speaker 8: nineteen ninety six World War Three Tony Rumble? Did you
Speaker 8: see him in the fucking Bledsoe jersey?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Behind the Patriots jersey coming to the ring? Yeah, unbelievable.
Speaker 8: I mean, I thought we would have a reason to
Speaker 8: talk about the Boston bad boy indie legend Tony.
Speaker 2: Rumble, No fucking idea. Who's We'll get to it. Luger Anderson,
Speaker 2: Arn Anderson, Ben wah D DP, Steve McMichael, Chris Jericho,
Speaker 2: Eddie Guerrero, Jim Powers, Jeff Jarrett, Dean Malenko, Conan Bubba
Speaker 2: that is uh, who's Bubba? That must be? It must
Speaker 2: be uh Ray Trailer. But he was was he big
Speaker 2: Bob at the time? Yeah? He probably was. Oh yeah,
Speaker 2: he was bout yeah, yeah, Carlan Heat French Canadians. Jack Boot.
Speaker 2: Do you know what jack boot is? No fucking jack boot.
Speaker 8: That was one of many names that Buddy Lee Parker
Speaker 8: used in WCW. We're named Dwayne Bruce. So when you
Speaker 8: see Buddy Lee Parker come out to the to the
Speaker 8: World War three, know that that is jack Boot and
Speaker 8: not Sergeant Buddy Lee.
Speaker 2: All right, well, thank you. I was I was confused.
Speaker 8: Both American males Buff Bagwell and Scottie Rigg, Steve Regal Hove,
Speaker 8: Entude Guerrera humorous. Did you see Big Ron Studd in there?
Speaker 8: Aka Ron Reese aka the Yeta?
Speaker 2: I did see.
Speaker 8: I did see Ron goofy Ass, Roadblock, La Parker, David Taylor,
Speaker 8: Disco Inferno, Jim Duggan, Bobby Eaton, Meng Barbarian, Joe Gomez
Speaker 8: is in World War Three.
Speaker 2: You didn't even remember these people. This was like an
Speaker 2: exercise on payroll. Joe Gomez. I do remember being such
Speaker 2: a regular on Nitro at the time. Oh yeah, all
Speaker 2: throughout like the the the Yeah, probably like summer to
Speaker 2: the round this time in ninety six. He was all
Speaker 2: over doing jobs all the time. Yeah.
Speaker 8: He went on to sue WW for his portrayal as
Speaker 8: a Native American idiot. No that they didn't have to
Speaker 8: portray anything to get that across Sullivan High Voltage. Both
Speaker 8: members of the team Ice trained Prince Akaia Johnny Grunge
Speaker 8: from The Public Enemy Renegade was in the World War Three.
Speaker 8: Mike Enos Mikey knows is a good trivia question because
Speaker 8: he was wrestling when Scott Hall hit the ring on
Speaker 8: that first time on Nitro. Is Mike Enos in the
Speaker 8: ring against two? I don't recall, but I do remember
Speaker 8: his mike Y knows. Yeah. We also have Luscious Luther. No,
Speaker 8: but that was of course I put that in there
Speaker 8: because it was in the Observer with a question marked
Speaker 8: next to it. Even Dave Meltzer, covering the business as
Speaker 8: closely as he did back then, did not know who
Speaker 8: Luscious Luther was supposed to be. And I'm pretty sure
Speaker 8: he does not actually come out, because we're going to
Speaker 8: read you next the fullest who actually was in the
Speaker 8: match and see if it compares bunkhouse Buck, Michael wall Street,
Speaker 8: Alex Wright, Mark Starr, Ceclope, Galaxy super Low, Who doesn't
Speaker 8: who doesn't end up making it? Felino Felina was listed
Speaker 8: and wasn't there. Now Fellini wasn't there either.
Speaker 2: Craig. You know, the way he talks about his work.
Speaker 2: Could a cool fool? Honestly I think he. Yeah, I
Speaker 2: wouldn't doubt that he thinks he is Felleenie about Jimmy Graffiti.
Speaker 2: How about not? Who was Jimmy Graffiti, Jimmy del Ray
Speaker 2: Oh get yes, yes, he's in a painter's cap.
Speaker 8: When he comes to the ring. Fucking Christ Raymond, Stereo,
Speaker 8: Junior Ultimore, Dragon, Scott Norton, Craig Pittman, j L.
Speaker 2: Buck.
Speaker 8: I don't even know who that was. I think it's
Speaker 8: supposed to be Oh no, excuse me, let me let
Speaker 8: me rewind that j L is one wrestler. That was
Speaker 8: Jerry Lynn Jerry and then Buck but they had already
Speaker 8: but they already listed him earlier in what I just read,
Speaker 8: so they listed him twice on parallel unless there was
Speaker 8: a wrestler named Buck was supposed to be in at
Speaker 8: one point, Mike Winner, Vic Steamboat who wasn't in there,
Speaker 8: and Kevin Nash and in the Vic Steamboat brother, Oh
Speaker 8: my god, Steamboat and indeed you heard it right, No
Speaker 8: giant in the original lineup that was circulated and Giant
Speaker 8: goes on to win the thing.
Speaker 2: So that's wild. And apparently there was advertising out at
Speaker 2: one point that Sting was going to be in the
Speaker 2: nineteen ninety six World War three. Yeah, I can imagine that.
Speaker 8: They were still in that weird place and we'll get
Speaker 8: to it where they knew Sting was going to be
Speaker 8: this brooding, you know, rafter dwelling character who is going
Speaker 8: to do mysterious things and attack people for reasons that
Speaker 8: left you scratching your head. But the idea that he
Speaker 8: wouldn't wrestle until December of nineteen ninety seven was not
Speaker 8: necessarily set in stone. Yet he was doing matches on
Speaker 8: television tapings as crow Sting. He is really yep, he's
Speaker 8: a playable character in that gear in the first video
Speaker 8: game WCW Versus the World that they came out with
Speaker 8: in this era for the PlayStation.
Speaker 2: No shit.
Speaker 8: Here he is in like a black cut off top
Speaker 8: with the scorpion on it, in black long pants and
Speaker 8: just that almost entirely white face like the Marcel Marceau
Speaker 8: look he's got going this before he got much more
Speaker 8: detailed with the black stripes on his face, and he's wrestling.
Speaker 8: I mean, I just God, those guys at the ww vault,
Speaker 8: this YouTube thing, that's your challenge. You got to find
Speaker 8: me a match. Sting working in the gear he was
Speaker 8: wearing in.
Speaker 2: The fall of that. Yeah, gotta see it.
Speaker 8: There was a worldwide taping he wrestled. Will detail it
Speaker 8: in a moment. There was several house shows that he
Speaker 8: wrestled as this sting. I'm completely obsessed with, like how
Speaker 8: he presented himself, you know what I mean, Like was
Speaker 8: he doing the old move set? Was he was he
Speaker 8: still howling or was he just acting like a brooding
Speaker 8: kind of emo guy. I have no idea, but I
Speaker 8: must know, must Yeah, that is that is crucial. So yes,
Speaker 8: very interesting. And they added the Canadians Versus Harlem heat
Speaker 8: match quite late in the running, and as we know,
Speaker 8: ultimately the lineup doesn't differ tremendously. I'm just gonna try
Speaker 8: to hear point out anybody who came out that wasn't
Speaker 8: in that lineup, although it does note here in The
Speaker 8: Observer that Ron Studd was called John Studd several times
Speaker 8: by Dusty Rhodes on commentary. Yes he was, Yeah, John
Speaker 8: Studd was definitely not in the nineteen ninety six World
Speaker 8: War three Battle Royal.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I missed that one. Was he dead or as.
Speaker 8: Wattley was in the World War Three and he wasn't
Speaker 8: in that initial lineup? Steve McMichael, Let's see, how about
Speaker 8: the Galaxy made it? But yeah, the Giant was actually
Speaker 8: in there, Jack Boot Okay, check that box, and uh,
Speaker 8: that's pretty much reck Steiner was in there. Scott was hurt.
Speaker 8: Pardon me, Scott Steiner was hurt at the time. Even
Speaker 8: that doesn't stop Lee Marshall from one point telling us though,
Speaker 8: that Scott Steiner was just eliminated.
Speaker 2: That was hilarious. I'm like, Scott Steiner wasn't even the match.
Speaker 2: What is he talking about?
Speaker 8: Sure enough he called somebody else Scott Steiner, Yeah, of course,
Speaker 8: who wasn't. Meltson noted at the time the lineup changed
Speaker 8: in the last week as they added most of the
Speaker 8: nw WILL members, including Giant who ended up winning, that
Speaker 8: weren't scheduled originally to be part of it. Even though
Speaker 8: Sting was in all the advertising as a participant, the
Speaker 8: decision was made weeks ago against him being in it.
Speaker 8: I mean, that's crucial. If they put Sting in this
Speaker 8: thing after launching the Crow Death disaster to tell us why.
Speaker 8: I mean, I think it's intuitive, but why would it
Speaker 8: be a disaster? Because I mean, the whole idea is,
Speaker 8: why would you the character? You know, why would he
Speaker 8: come into this match after he just said he doesn't
Speaker 8: trust anybody? You know, why would he Why would he.
Speaker 2: Get in the ring with sixty guys or fifty nine
Speaker 2: other guys? How would that be a fight he'd been
Speaker 2: interested in having right now, right he'd already did the
Speaker 2: you know, the only thing that's for sure about Sting
Speaker 2: is nothing for sure. And line walking out on Team
Speaker 2: WCW with the Fallbrell war games as if it's the
Speaker 2: fucking first time you ever said that, it's then a
Speaker 2: million guns.
Speaker 8: Well this time it actually resonated, right, and he had
Speaker 8: stopped talking, and he shows up during the match between
Speaker 8: the Giant and Jeff Jarrett for the US title earlier
Speaker 8: in the show and reverse DDT's Jeff Jarrett, and that
Speaker 8: was like, oh my god, he's in the nWo. He
Speaker 8: just did that to Jeff Jarrett. He's in the nWo.
Speaker 2: But he would walk.
Speaker 8: Away, He wouldn't stand shoulder to shoulder with the nWo.
Speaker 8: They had yet to bring out the nWo Sting. I'm
Speaker 8: pretty sure they hadn't done that that thing of agg yet.
Speaker 8: Oh yeah, no, yeah, wait you have they had they had, okay,
Speaker 8: because they did it at Fall Brawl. He just isn't
Speaker 8: on this show. So I felt like he hadn't debuted yet. Look,
Speaker 8: that's what started the whole thing. Yes, they they thought
Speaker 8: he was Sting and then Sting came out.
Speaker 2: That's right, Yep, that's right.
Speaker 8: Yeah, yeah, and then you know what though, I think
Speaker 8: while they did do that, I don't think they introduced
Speaker 8: nWo Sting as a weekly character yet. I was like,
Speaker 8: you know, and they're all like grouped together, they are
Speaker 8: like making faces at the camera like he's not in
Speaker 8: there yet. He definitely didn't come before well, I'm almost
Speaker 8: certain he didn't come before Buff Marcus Bagbell joined, which
Speaker 8: was the night after on Nitro he turns on Scottie
Speaker 8: Riggs and he wasn't in the ring for that. So
Speaker 8: I think NBO Sting making another appearance and actually wrestling
Speaker 8: for the nWo and Black and White was still on
Speaker 8: the cover, because I think he was there when wall
Speaker 8: Street joined and Virgil, well, Virgil was already there they
Speaker 8: already had Virgil, which is a good deal.
Speaker 2: I like that.
Speaker 8: I forgot all about that that like Tedy Biassi brings
Speaker 8: Virgil and Teddy Biassi's the money man in the nWo.
Speaker 2: That made a lot of sense to me, totally did.
Speaker 2: I was a fan of that.
Speaker 8: TBIASI had more uh to contribute as a manager as
Speaker 8: opposed to this, sure this television announcer idea they had
Speaker 8: for him, and but that by ninety seven he's like
Speaker 8: a baby face manager managing the Steiner brothers, Like.
Speaker 2: What is going on here? So fucking weird, so weird.
Speaker 8: Tobiasci was one guy you could convince what was key
Speaker 8: to THEWO besides the giant that which was kind of
Speaker 8: a weird one. You could convince yourselves that these guys
Speaker 8: had loyalty to do. At the end of the day,
Speaker 8: they were Wolfson Sheep's clothing on the WCW.
Speaker 2: They were actually the like kind of the big ones
Speaker 2: at least for sure. And then you can start recruiting
Speaker 2: goofballs like Bagwell and stuff.
Speaker 8: Right, So it's it's a fascinating time in WCW and
Speaker 8: it's it's a quite nice flip side of the coin
Speaker 8: having just done the nineteen ninety six WWF Royal Rumble. Earlier,
Speaker 8: we get to take a look at WCW's Battle Royal
Speaker 8: pay per view from that same year. It's it's definitely
Speaker 8: nineteen ninety six vibes around here for some reason this
Speaker 8: year on.
Speaker 2: I know it's been all over. Seriously, we had so
Speaker 2: many ninety six shows last year, thirty six or eighty six, right,
Speaker 2: you take your pick. Yeah, right, seems to be that six.
Speaker 8: It is Sean Waltman included, and we're finally getting here
Speaker 8: to World War three, and we're finally getting to the
Speaker 8: opportunity to let you know that once again, you're co
Speaker 8: chairman TLF are partnering with the folks at Dark Side
Speaker 8: of the Ring. You probably have seen by now the
Speaker 8: announcement for season two of Unheard, the Dark Side of
Speaker 8: the Ring companion podcast that will be rolling out weekly
Speaker 8: along with Season six of Dark Side of the Ring,
Speaker 8: which premiere is here at the end of the month
Speaker 8: on Weiss. Hopefully you tuned in last time. It was
Speaker 8: a smash as we go through the deep archives of
Speaker 8: Dark Side interviews with people in and around the wrestling business,
Speaker 8: so many fascinating subjects that they've sat down with and
Speaker 8: just try to pick out little nuggets that didn't make
Speaker 8: the show or just didn't fit the theme of the show,
Speaker 8: but deserve to be surfaced. Wrestling fans deserve to hear
Speaker 8: some of these insights from some of these folks.
Speaker 2: You may have.
Speaker 8: Yeah, by the time this dropped, heard our interview with
Speaker 8: Josh Nason on the Wrestling Observer side about this project. Yes,
Speaker 8: but definitely a pleasure. You do want to check it out.
Speaker 8: It's going to be video two, so your co chairman
Speaker 8: are on camera, unlike last season, which was audio only.
Speaker 8: My gosh, this is something they tell us, boss, we
Speaker 8: must do, right, isn't that the current wisdom and podcasting?
Speaker 2: And that's what they say you must do it. But
Speaker 2: I'll be the judge of that. Thank you very so.
Speaker 8: Waiting to meet the person who watches a podcast instead
Speaker 8: of listens to it while he's doing other.
Speaker 2: Things, you know, that's the thing. That's one thing I
Speaker 2: don't understand that logic. I mean, I know, obviously people
Speaker 2: do because everyone's doing their podcast on camera and stuff
Speaker 2: like that. I just don't. It's just not something that
Speaker 2: I'm interested in doing. Yeah, I'm just I gotta see
Speaker 2: these people. I want to watch real shows, yeah right,
Speaker 2: but I want sitting down. Yeah, I don't want to
Speaker 2: watch a podcast. I want to watch fucking uh you
Speaker 2: know whatever.
Speaker 8: And I'll let you know, by the way, if you
Speaker 8: put YouTube on in the car and you listen to
Speaker 8: a two hour podcast via YouTube in the car, I
Speaker 8: don't care. If the video's on, that doesn't count as video.
Speaker 8: And if that's what all this.
Speaker 2: Right, you didn't watch it.
Speaker 8: And if that's what all this hooplab about video is
Speaker 8: about and podcasting all of a sudden, not knowing the
Speaker 8: difference between someone watching it on YouTube and not watching
Speaker 8: the video, just using it for the audio because it's easy,
Speaker 8: versus actually watching the video, then I don't know what
Speaker 8: to tell you. Yeah, but I do know that advertisers
Speaker 8: struggle to understand anything but video. And so if they
Speaker 8: say video is it, all of a sudden, everyone says
Speaker 8: video is it?
Speaker 2: So here you go.
Speaker 8: You get what you asked for, and we're excited to
Speaker 8: do it, and it's going to be a really nice
Speaker 8: companion piece to the next season, A dark side of
Speaker 8: the Ring, which you know, yeah, for sure, Chairman have
Speaker 8: played no small part in helping along the way certain
Speaker 8: dedicated episodes that we had expertise in because of the
Speaker 8: stuff we've been able to do here on the main
Speaker 8: feed for everybody. So it's it's a wonderful deal, So
Speaker 8: do check it out. I think it's going to be
Speaker 8: every Wednesday on the Vice TV and Dark Side of
Speaker 8: the Ring YouTube channels and let us know what you think.
Speaker 8: It's also going to be available in audio form and
Speaker 8: all your typical podcast catchers like the one you used
Speaker 8: to listen to this show, So no excuses as far
Speaker 8: as that goes. But we're gonna have some fun and
Speaker 8: we do hope you joined us. And thanks to the
Speaker 8: folks at Vice TV and Dark Side of the Ring
Speaker 8: for deeming the twenty five wrestling podcast of the year worthy.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, I mean it's a it's we're worthy and we're deserved.
Speaker 5: Ye.
Speaker 8: Doubters are going to have to go quiet for another
Speaker 8: twelve months. Sorry, Ye, So that's worth checking out. You
Speaker 8: also want to know that Patreon's rocking and rolling here
Speaker 8: in WrestleMania season pion dot com slash elapsed Fan not
Speaker 8: just for those live calls as we head into the
Speaker 8: big one to night live call coming your way on
Speaker 8: Easter weekend as we hive at WrestleMania, but also of
Speaker 8: course under the cinemat where we just see we can
Speaker 8: see the peak, Yeah, yes we can.
Speaker 2: And there are two of them, and uh we are
Speaker 2: you know, listen, it's been uh, just scheduling in life.
Speaker 2: I'll just say that has been in the way and
Speaker 2: it'll be wrapping up of course, are our twin peaks.
Speaker 2: David Lynch tribute with a nice look and also you know,
Speaker 2: a look beyond. You know, we kind of it's it's
Speaker 2: gonna be a real a real uh uh uh coming
Speaker 2: like a real great conclusion to to David Lynch. And
Speaker 2: I'm sure we'll be able to revisit him at some point,
Speaker 2: but you know, it's it's really amazing the longevity that
Speaker 2: he did have, and uh, it's it's gonna be fun
Speaker 2: to be fun to to to get there.
Speaker 1: I agree, it's the lawn Wrestling Podcast, the wrestling podcast
Speaker 1: that knows the boys need their candy. It's the Lapsed Fan.
Speaker 1: He's the Lapsed Fan Wrestling Podcast with Jack and Cano
Speaker 1: m JP SOROW.
Speaker 8: I agree, it's been a wonderful introduction to David Lynch,
Speaker 8: and now every time I see you, I make you
Speaker 8: do David Lynch, and that's a good thing. Last time
Speaker 8: we heard from him, he was commenting on the John
Speaker 8: Cena Hill Turn and we had a hell of a
Speaker 8: chat when putting one hitting the road to film unheard
Speaker 8: about the scene of heel turned. And you know, I
Speaker 8: was hoping that it wouldn't be too late to quickly
Speaker 8: surface this because by the time people listen to this,
Speaker 8: I think Sena is scheduled to make his first appearance
Speaker 8: since turning heel on raw, so the presentation will be
Speaker 8: pretty clear. But man, we got you remember that episode
Speaker 8: we did after Star K ninety eight, how the nWo
Speaker 8: should have ended? We did that with how the scene
Speaker 8: of heel turn should go right? I mean, this was
Speaker 8: like what we were doing was was was classic din
Speaker 8: dining hall booking. Yes, that we would do in college.
Speaker 8: We booked how you know Goldberg should come into WWE
Speaker 8: after WSW was folded and all that, and how to
Speaker 8: do the invasion angle perfectly? But here, I mean we
Speaker 8: landed on a million money ideas, but just what's what's
Speaker 8: most important if they're doing it right, which is how
Speaker 8: we think they should do it. What should Seenea do?
Speaker 8: What should he emphasize the main thing. And and I
Speaker 8: don't think I don't think he should show up until
Speaker 8: Russell Mate. Yes, I never thought of that until you
Speaker 8: said it. That is the absolute thing to do, especially
Speaker 8: if he's winning and his title reign is going to
Speaker 8: be something that takes you through four or five months.
Speaker 8: I see him rain until SummerSlam at least. I agree
Speaker 8: he should not show his face until he makes he
Speaker 8: parts that curtain in Vegas.
Speaker 2: What I am hoping I know that, I've even seen
Speaker 2: that he's supposed to be on TV on Monday. What
Speaker 2: I am hoping happens. What I am hoping happens is
Speaker 2: that they and it'll be all over by the time
Speaker 2: you listen to this. Is that is that you know,
Speaker 2: they say he's going to come out, but it's Rock.
Speaker 2: Instead Rock comes out, and that's what happens. There are
Speaker 2: these like every time John Seene is supposed to make
Speaker 2: an appearance, Rock says no no no no.
Speaker 12: No no no no no no no no no.
Speaker 2: Cotins it's not time. Wow And what is that a cone?
Speaker 2: It just it's like it drives people crazy. It makes
Speaker 2: you want to see him more, you know, it makes
Speaker 2: you want to say, see because they because what's what's
Speaker 2: gonna be money, and what people are interested in is
Speaker 2: how he looks. That's the key. And we we thought,
Speaker 2: because to me, what you have to do is go
Speaker 2: completely opposite of everything we've ever seen of John c.
Speaker 8: Yeah, I was I had in my mind black shorts
Speaker 8: that go past his knees, like almost to his shins,
Speaker 8: like capri almost pants. But you were like, no, he
Speaker 8: shouldn't even wear shorts. And I was like, I don't
Speaker 8: know what to do right now, because.
Speaker 2: That's the thing. It's very hard. You don't know how
Speaker 2: to dress him. But I think he should go bald. Yeah,
Speaker 2: number one, I think he should grow a beard. My god,
Speaker 2: And like I want to see John Cena the first time.
Speaker 2: We like in a way, like we see him come
Speaker 2: out at WrestleMania the first night and the first time
Speaker 2: he comes out to talk. He walks out again, shaved head,
Speaker 2: full beard, sunglasses, three piece suit, and he comes out
Speaker 2: with the World Championship on the night after Wrestleman.
Speaker 8: And I think it'd be a nice touch if it
Speaker 8: was one of those three times too big for him
Speaker 8: suits that he used to wear in Total Divas, which
Speaker 8: is the heel, right there. I mean, the way he
Speaker 8: behaves on that show is what he has to bring
Speaker 8: out of himself right now. Why does he have to
Speaker 8: be bald? Why is that important to you? Because the
Speaker 8: hair is a problem. We've been saying it.
Speaker 2: That doesn't help him. He has problematic hair if he's
Speaker 2: a heel. No, I don't think so, I don't think.
Speaker 2: I don't think seeing healed John Cena with his hair
Speaker 2: parted and the bald spot, it does not work. It
Speaker 2: does not work. He still looks goofy. So you want
Speaker 2: like a buzz cutter, you want all the way down
Speaker 2: to the skin, like Steve Austin. He can do either one,
Speaker 2: either one like maybe the buzz cut that he had before.
Speaker 2: I think the facial hair is crucial. How long of
Speaker 2: a beard? I mean, at a certain point, if I
Speaker 2: picture him with like a mountain beard, I actually started no, no, no, no,
Speaker 2: no no, not like not like a fisherman beard, like
Speaker 2: going you know, like hanging off, not like trying wants in,
Speaker 2: you know, castaway. No, I mean it's gotta be a
Speaker 2: I think a full beard maybe just now, it's gotta
Speaker 2: be a full beard. But it's like clean, it's very clean,
Speaker 2: you know, like it's it's very very well like stubble.
Speaker 2: No no, no, no, full beard like full beard like
Speaker 2: you can yeah ish sure again, I don't think it
Speaker 2: needs to be as bushy. I think it can be.
Speaker 2: It can be very well like groomed, but it needs
Speaker 2: to be a full beard. And uh, you know, if
Speaker 2: I'm gonna be completely honest, I was. I I took
Speaker 2: some time over the weekend to kind of tinker with
Speaker 2: what Johnsena would look like in uh video, sure, because
Speaker 2: you can change their costumes and stuff. Now, unfortunately, you
Speaker 2: can't change their hair, which I don't understand at all.
Speaker 2: I think that should be one of the prime features
Speaker 2: in any wrestling game. You should be able to change
Speaker 2: their hair because their hair changes all the time, you know.
Speaker 2: Like that Why you can't change hair ad phasian la
Speaker 2: or take it away makes no sense to me. But
Speaker 2: I think but I took off, you know, I like
Speaker 2: put him in a number of outfits and I'll tell
Speaker 2: you you know what, he actually did not look bad.
Speaker 2: And I had him with plain old black trunks, black
Speaker 2: knee pads, black boots, black elbow pads, and he didn't
Speaker 2: look awful. See.
Speaker 8: I think if he looked like the gear he had
Speaker 8: when he first came in as ruthless aggression with just tights.
Speaker 8: I just I just don't see that as as heel.
Speaker 2: I also tried. I also tried with with with Hogan's
Speaker 2: Hollywood Hogan long tights also worked. It works. That makes
Speaker 2: me so nervous because he's gotta wear boots. He can't
Speaker 2: wear sneakers anymore. Yeah, I can't wear sneaks. It can't
Speaker 2: be any John seens. It's gotta be real. I mean,
Speaker 2: but it's not actually awful because he could wear like,
Speaker 2: you know, like Kurt Angle's wrestling boots. They're so short,
Speaker 2: like real wrestling boots.
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 2: These are huge questions. Yeah, I mean I assume it'll
Speaker 2: be questions will be answered by the time you hear this,
Speaker 2: but I will be disappointed. Yeah, he shouldn't show up
Speaker 2: do Mania. I totally agree. I just don't think he should.
Speaker 2: I think that would be just an amazing thing that
Speaker 2: he because then it also gives you the chance to
Speaker 2: really change his look like you know you can. You
Speaker 2: can make it go crazy like you can, because because
Speaker 2: it'll be it'll be so weird to see.
Speaker 8: He's like big leaguing Cody by not showing up exactly,
Speaker 8: it's Hollywood. Why is Hollywood important here? Because that's the
Speaker 8: thing you screamed when we did a live call of
Speaker 8: the Heel Turn available now in Patreon.
Speaker 2: Hollywood. Yes, yes, that's because that's like you got Rock,
Speaker 2: you get Sina, that's your Hollywood connection. You know, it's
Speaker 2: it's great, it's great, it's great.
Speaker 8: Let me tell you something. That's the way you should
Speaker 8: do organic phenomena for the ages. It's organic phenomena.
Speaker 2: I love it.
Speaker 14: I sat around the house, I drank coffee, and I
Speaker 14: decided exactly how John Cena should look as I heal.
Speaker 2: He should dress like Frank Silva as Bob and.
Speaker 8: He comes out with sunglasses and he what he does
Speaker 8: he talk to the people? Does he talk down to them?
Speaker 8: Does he does he have like a serious voice or
Speaker 8: does he kind of talk street again?
Speaker 2: No, I mean he's got to just talk normal but
Speaker 2: very very very money.
Speaker 8: Tell That's where I was going, kind of like I
Speaker 8: think of, uh, what's like he's kind of in a
Speaker 8: trance almost.
Speaker 2: Like like like like Jericho did when he was wearing
Speaker 2: the suit, you know, like just uber serious, wow, uber
Speaker 2: serious Johns. What does that belt look like on his shoulder. Oh,
Speaker 2: it's got to be the Spine belt because that's the
Speaker 2: real that's for him, the real championship. That was his championship.
Speaker 2: And he can say that, he can say he can say,
Speaker 2: you see what I did, Cody, I got my belt. Hack.
Speaker 2: You had yours for like a little you know, a
Speaker 2: little whatever, a little playtime at the Saturday's main event.
Speaker 2: But this is mine that it's going to be here, you.
Speaker 8: Know, with a suit, sunglasses, beard, spinner belt on his shoulder.
Speaker 2: I think me fucking money, huh. I hate the Spinner belt,
Speaker 2: but I hate it my least favorite championship. All. I
Speaker 2: kind of like that, you're kind of but I like
Speaker 2: the idea of having it happen like he's right exactly,
Speaker 2: you're doing exactly. I mean, they've done I'll say this,
Speaker 2: they've done well enough having him off TV for now.
Speaker 2: I think that was that's good.
Speaker 8: It's worked out. That's why I believe in the idea
Speaker 8: because it hasn't hurt. It's actually increased interest in him.
Speaker 5: Right.
Speaker 8: And I I don't know if he hasn't been on
Speaker 8: TV because that's strategic, or if it's just you know,
Speaker 8: he wasn't available but this is how you do it.
Speaker 5: You know he does.
Speaker 2: You don't see him UNTI WrestleMania. You heard it here first,
Speaker 2: I mean it's it's Hogan, Hogan turning heel. I mean
Speaker 2: they did there. He didn't show up for like a
Speaker 2: week or two himself.
Speaker 8: And I had a suggestion for that week one or
Speaker 8: two maybe, where he's in the ring and carrying on
Speaker 8: and Rocks there and they're acting like huge big shots
Speaker 8: and who comes to the ring Nikki Bella, Yes, oh my,
Speaker 8: oh my god. And you give her license to say
Speaker 8: everything to his face that ever bothered her when they
Speaker 8: went out, and why she ultimately couldn't marry him. And
Speaker 8: that was enough for me to be an electrifying segment.
Speaker 8: But you took it a step further, which had seem
Speaker 8: to do from there.
Speaker 15: I.
Speaker 2: Said, to really to really make himself to be a
Speaker 2: crazy ass heel. She's done, she's done talking. She says,
Speaker 2: you know, what do you have to say for yourself?
Speaker 2: And he just stares at her for a while. Keep
Speaker 2: mine still sunglasses on, it's not taking them a nice touch.
Speaker 2: Still get sunglasses on, just like rock And after a
Speaker 2: few a few yep, after a few moments, grabs her
Speaker 2: by the fucking oh my god, grabs her by the hair,
Speaker 2: pulls her into his face. The microphone drops. It's gonna
Speaker 2: one of those classic moments where he's talking to her,
Speaker 2: but we don't hear it. We just see him like
Speaker 2: he's pointing a finger, pointing a finger, you know, like
Speaker 2: kind of you know, almost ragged all on her by
Speaker 2: the by the head. And it probably can't happen in
Speaker 2: twenty twenty five, but I was like, you have to do.
Speaker 2: He's got to go jake on her and paintbrush across
Speaker 2: the face and knock her to the ground right across
Speaker 2: the face.
Speaker 8: And you want to be a heel, I think that
Speaker 8: would want to be. I think you want to cook
Speaker 8: with gas. I don't say we didn't tell you how
Speaker 8: to do it, just telling you. I think that would
Speaker 8: be an absolutely absolutely lose money. Yeah, they would be
Speaker 8: hot on the rail.
Speaker 2: They would I mean it would be it would be Yeah,
Speaker 2: it would be just classic heel heat from like Puerto Rico.
Speaker 2: Heel just stands over her. She is she's stunned, she's
Speaker 2: not knocked out. She's holding her face. Yeah, yeah, and
Speaker 2: you know, tears and stuff like she's just bawling. I
Speaker 2: think it'd be money. I think that would be I
Speaker 2: think you'd you'd have a fucking game. Yeah you would.
Speaker 8: That's accelerant right there, That is accelerant. And then of
Speaker 8: course I'd take a step further, didn't I. I said
Speaker 8: to him, what about this? We're riding in the car,
Speaker 8: coming back from taping on her, what about this?
Speaker 2: Just like you said?
Speaker 8: I replayed to JP everything he just said, right up
Speaker 8: to the point grabs her, pulls her in and then
Speaker 8: takes out a nine milimeter and shoots her in the head.
Speaker 2: Gets so dark, and then and then and then I added,
Speaker 2: yes that he looks to the hard camera, he's got
Speaker 2: this a crazy face on. There's blood all over him.
Speaker 2: And then he puts the gun of his head and
Speaker 2: he shoots himself, and you're just and then you just
Speaker 2: sit on the hard camera for like longer than it
Speaker 2: should be, to the point that it makes people uncomfortable,
Speaker 2: Like everyone is silent, like nobody's moving, Like what did
Speaker 2: we just fucking see two dead blood in the fin
Speaker 2: and the camera just like that medium that not the
Speaker 2: full wide but the one that kind of is like
Speaker 2: just a little bit shorter than the ring you're waiting
Speaker 2: from Craig Leathers Wikipedia again, Yes I am. Yes, we
Speaker 2: use the jib and we'll dissolve into the steady cam. No,
Speaker 2: but we like and just hold it and then you
Speaker 2: cut the black w B Entertainment. Hey, bring that back,
Speaker 2: just for that. I haven't seen it in like ten years.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's amazing, it's amazing. Oh my god.
Speaker 8: Like he's like the next week he comes out, I
Speaker 8: don't care what you think of me for doing that
Speaker 8: to her. She deserves it and not you know whatever
Speaker 8: you have to say to like double down, and this
Speaker 8: is if we erase the suics the murder suicide.
Speaker 2: Yeah, of course, yes, of course that was just a
Speaker 2: that was just a what if modernism in a box.
Speaker 8: And he's like, you know, I treat women, you know,
Speaker 8: the same way I treat anybody else. If you don't
Speaker 8: respect me, blah blah blah, and he's going off. He's like,
Speaker 8: who's gonna stop me?
Speaker 2: Anyway?
Speaker 8: I got the rock right here, he's the boss man,
Speaker 8: triple H, gonna do shit.
Speaker 5: And then.
Speaker 2: No chance, no chance, Oh yeah that's right. Vince comes out.
Speaker 2: You don't have what it takes. Ah, you don't have
Speaker 2: what it takes no that that would be a bad idea.
Speaker 8: But I did find myself, you know, we thought Brock yes,
Speaker 8: and then Brockwinn did think, but yes, because Brock should
Speaker 8: come back and ruin his moment, like he ruined Brock's
Speaker 8: moment by beating him in extreme rules, right, he came back, Yeah,
Speaker 8: and Brock would be the guy that's absolutely like so
Speaker 8: like sick of the of what sick to his stomach?
Speaker 8: What scena did you could be you know, it could
Speaker 8: he could be the lesser of two evils in this
Speaker 8: scenario because you know, Brock did a lot for Cody,
Speaker 8: shook Cody's hand like when he lost to him at SummerSlam.
Speaker 8: He he has equity in Cody, and he'd endorsed Cody,
Speaker 8: and to see what Sina did to Cody would make
Speaker 8: sense that Brock would come back and kill Sina. And
Speaker 8: that'd be a hot program because that would be the flip.
Speaker 8: I'd be the inverse of the two thousand and three
Speaker 8: when Brock was the face you know, or that'd be revisioning.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, that dynamic. Yeah, I mean think about this
Speaker 2: one thing. Think about there that that Brock and scene
Speaker 2: a go way back to two thousand and three back
Speaker 2: in Let's book, Let's book, Baby Brother, Brother, that's it.
Speaker 2: That's exactly right. I know that's right.
Speaker 8: And I got another idea too, one more on this. Yeah,
Speaker 8: if you're running out of things for seeing it to say,
Speaker 8: you know, week ten, all you got to do go
Speaker 8: back on his Twitter, go back on his Twitter and
Speaker 8: have him read those obnoxious, faux faux motivational tweets that
Speaker 8: would be in a heal voice like he did, like
Speaker 8: you know, like I didn't mean any of it, or
Speaker 8: I meant it to the point that it's completely obnoxious.
Speaker 8: And he's still giving us life advice even though he's
Speaker 8: doing like the absolute least ethical things in the world.
Speaker 8: He's still giving us life advice. He still doesn't get
Speaker 8: that we don't turn to him for motivation and we
Speaker 8: have no idea why he anointed himself motivator in chief.
Speaker 8: But apparently that's part of the of the of the
Speaker 8: grift these days is you also have to be motivator
Speaker 8: in addition to being a multimillionaire movie star. So, uh,
Speaker 8: that would be great. Well, he's a you know, he's
Speaker 8: a lot of people look up to his people look
Speaker 8: up to me.
Speaker 2: He's a role Model's let's get people going to work
Speaker 2: at the mina key because they read a scene of
Speaker 2: tweet and felt motivated to get up. Yeah right, get
Speaker 2: motivated and fucking change of muffler speaking of the Rhodes family.
Speaker 8: But you're welcome for all those ideas, and I look
Speaker 8: forward to them subtly turning to them as the as
Speaker 8: the well runs a bit dry and pretending they never
Speaker 8: heard us.
Speaker 2: They're gonna say, you know, they'll, they'll, you know, he'll
Speaker 2: come out on Monday and then but you know, like
Speaker 2: what if we don't have him come out again? Oh man,
Speaker 2: that's good stuff.
Speaker 8: So that's the kind of thoughts starters that uh, some
Speaker 8: of these Patreon live calls can can birth. So you
Speaker 8: want to be with us for the whole evolution through
Speaker 8: Wrestle maybe that, and of course also for the moat tier,
Speaker 8: the tip top tier, the one that we know is
Speaker 8: rich for a lot of people's blood, and we respect
Speaker 8: and understand that. But for those who can't afford, we
Speaker 8: give them Wrestle. Mamia every Monday, back to the living
Speaker 8: room carpet with Boss Man and Mama Sorrow.
Speaker 2: We do, we do, indeed, and you know, WrestleMania season
Speaker 2: is upon us, and uh so you know we're we're
Speaker 2: we're doing that with with wrestle Mamia as well. We
Speaker 2: keep that ship moving along because I believe I believe
Speaker 2: in a good theme. I believe in a good theme.
Speaker 2: And uh, coming up, let's see here, what do we got?
Speaker 2: What will be coming up?
Speaker 3: Is?
Speaker 2: Oh? Oh wow, really wow? Yeah, I guess wow, I
Speaker 2: guess it hasn't really happened. Hogan versus under the giant.
Speaker 2: Holy shit. Yeah, that's a spot on. This is a
Speaker 2: giant coming up. So that's what you're here next. Big ship,
Speaker 2: big ship there.
Speaker 8: Definitely check all that out for your Patreon dollar. Of course,
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Speaker 8: the lapsed fan. All those things help this flywheel. We
Speaker 8: call that fucking cast that we turn our attention back
Speaker 8: to World War Three in nineteen ninety six. It was
Speaker 8: a time when Hollywood was trying to come to terms
Speaker 8: with Hollywood.
Speaker 2: That is to say, indeed, we all know.
Speaker 8: The big hold up about turning heel is what happens
Speaker 8: to your baby face, press appearances and merchandise sales to
Speaker 8: the kids. And you know, do Regis and Kathy Lee
Speaker 8: want to have you on if you're not the red
Speaker 8: and yellow superhero anymore? But you're a dastardly bad guy.
Speaker 8: And Hulk navigated those waters masterfully because I can't think
Speaker 8: of a single thing he missed out on at the
Speaker 8: end of the day.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, I agree, I think he was. He was
Speaker 2: as That's the thing right there, You could You don't
Speaker 2: You don't really lose out. You know you're not gonna
Speaker 2: There are enough people who probably don't watch wrestling who
Speaker 2: still know who you are, and you know who they
Speaker 2: won't even know that you're a bad guy.
Speaker 8: You know, he'll turn happening in July and by November
Speaker 8: when World War three happened. I think it's becoming pretty
Speaker 8: clear now the returns are coming in. In fact, people
Speaker 8: are leaning in. People want Hulkogan on the cable Ace
Speaker 8: Awards on Entertainment tonight on Readis and Kathy Lee. They
Speaker 8: want to earn what this whole thing is about. He
Speaker 8: went on QVC, I remember, shortly after turning heel and
Speaker 8: he did perfectly fine, just explaining to the host that
Speaker 8: he's now, you know, singing a different tune, but he's
Speaker 8: still Hull Kogan. He's still the legend. Who's to say,
Speaker 8: maybe some endorsement came along, But what was so key
Speaker 8: is a lot of that well had run dry. It
Speaker 8: wasn't like it wasn't like there was like right in
Speaker 8: front of him. You know, six clients, let's say, six
Speaker 8: people who bought into the superhero Hull Coogan, who were
Speaker 8: going to be suddenly faced with an existential decision. It
Speaker 8: was already over and seeing this case, it's not too
Speaker 8: dissimilar in that, you know, since he's been gone so
Speaker 8: long and intermittently involved, the WWE has moved on from
Speaker 8: a merchandise standpoint, It's not like right, that was always
Speaker 8: the big hold up when you know Vince was in
Speaker 8: power and seen it was on top for so long,
Speaker 8: even though crowds were rejecting him. It was like he
Speaker 8: was far and away the number one merchandise seller, and
Speaker 8: that is real revenue. You would compromise, would you? I
Speaker 8: don't know, I mean would less people would probably buy,
Speaker 8: like the kids wouldn't buy John Cena merchandise if he
Speaker 8: turned heel back. Then now it's Cody merchandise, it's punk merchandise,
Speaker 8: it's Roman and Bloodline merchandise. It all takes care of
Speaker 8: itself there. You know, they're not as relying on seen
Speaker 8: as once a year new T shirt. So it's a
Speaker 8: perfect time from that perspective. You're not even sacrificing anything,
Speaker 8: which one wouldn't expect to be able to say about Sina,
Speaker 8: But here we are. And so this is instructive in
Speaker 8: that context to go back and look at what November
Speaker 8: nineteen ninety six was like for hul Kogan. He had
Speaker 8: appeared on Entertainment Tonight and a Regis and Kathy early
Speaker 8: in the month of November because he's on the road
Speaker 8: too at the same time building up what Boss what
Speaker 8: comes out at the end of nineteen ninety six, Oh,
Speaker 8: Sandwar's Muscle with Muscles, the very first movie ever to
Speaker 8: get the under the cinemat treatment. That is correct, the
Speaker 8: movie that inspired the whole concept in so many ways,
Speaker 8: and indeed indeed it was you know, kicking it off
Speaker 8: with a Christmas season right now, tell the people kind
Speaker 8: of how the nWo angle was stitched into your coverage
Speaker 8: of that movie.
Speaker 2: Well, the the angle. It's interesting because the the the
Speaker 2: angle itself wasn't almost as involved. Well, the there were
Speaker 2: a couple of things, there was the mustache and there
Speaker 2: were but mainly that's where it was on set that
Speaker 2: Bischoff came and said, you know, and Hogan did the
Speaker 2: brother who's the third guy. Yes, that's where it all. Yeah,
Speaker 2: in reality, it happened on set, like he called him out.
Speaker 2: Michell flew out the right, Bischoff flew out to meet
Speaker 2: to meet with the Hogan and it was on It
Speaker 2: was on that fucking uh movies.
Speaker 8: But he also sent in videos, didnting out that they
Speaker 8: played on Nitro from the Santa with Muscles future movie
Speaker 8: sets right where he's.
Speaker 2: Talking or is that is that one of the that's
Speaker 2: I think that's later, that's one of his later ones.
Speaker 2: I don't think he did. I don't think he did that.
Speaker 8: Yes, that's what played into the Hollywood thing is yeah,
Speaker 8: I'm not even on Nitro this week, I'm on set,
Speaker 8: you know.
Speaker 2: And it was legit.
Speaker 8: He wasn't a movie set by a movie that he
Speaker 8: booked before he decided to turn heel. And they just
Speaker 8: leveraged it.
Speaker 2: Right right. I think they they they they they leveraged it.
Speaker 2: I yeah, it was later on that they would do
Speaker 2: sulta Devil's Island kind of movies. Yeah. Specifically, the one
Speaker 2: that I remember that we that we uh we definitely
Speaker 2: used was when he was filming McKinsey's Islands Island. That
Speaker 2: was it with with what's this fucking uh Vaughn Robert
Speaker 2: Voss jo. Yeah, that was that was.
Speaker 8: What was one of the surprising things about Hogan going
Speaker 8: out into the wider entertainment world now as a heel
Speaker 8: is that there were celebrities who were kind of into
Speaker 8: the idea of like a bad guy wrestler rubbing shoulders
Speaker 8: with him and like being in the nWo was like funny,
Speaker 8: like not funny but like it was kind of a
Speaker 8: cool thing to do. And you look back now and
Speaker 8: all this nineties Instalgia, the nWo T shirts coming back
Speaker 8: a few years ago and like everyone like loving that
Speaker 8: as like an icon their childhood.
Speaker 2: Because and it's kind of interesting because the movie would
Speaker 2: have and I do remember them hyping this movie up
Speaker 2: too around this time because it happened in November is
Speaker 2: when it came out. Yes, it came out in November,
Speaker 2: and it was you know, it's only in theaters for
Speaker 2: two weeks, Santa's muscles. It's fucking horrible two weeks. And
Speaker 2: then he did he also did uh the fucking thing. Oh,
Speaker 2: I know he did do a like a there wasn't
Speaker 2: like an ap video piece about it, Like there's video
Speaker 2: if you go onto YouTube. I remember finding it like
Speaker 2: they actually they had people on set, like they had
Speaker 2: video and like news reports on set. It's such fucking bullshit,
Speaker 2: but it's there. They're they're covering him turning heel or
Speaker 2: they're covering the movie. No, covering him the movie because
Speaker 2: he hadn't turned here yet. This would have been in
Speaker 2: May May of ninety six, when he was filming the movie.
Speaker 2: That's like so weird.
Speaker 8: It's like an anacron It's like, Wow, no, that's not
Speaker 8: Hall Coogan anymore. Guys, you're showing me something that's dead
Speaker 8: to me.
Speaker 2: And uh but yeah.
Speaker 8: So by the time this came around, as fate would
Speaker 8: have it, Hulks got all these promotional obligations for this
Speaker 8: movie that, to your point, was shot before the Heel
Speaker 8: Turn and now he's got to go around and be
Speaker 8: Hollywood Hogan in these formats and it's it's fascinating to
Speaker 8: see play out. The Cable Ace Awards were in its
Speaker 8: second to last year. Do you remember the Cable Ace
Speaker 8: Awards at all?
Speaker 2: What those were?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 2: I do, I do, vaguely. I remember them having them,
Speaker 2: But I mean, was it just for ta cable programming
Speaker 2: or was it exactly? It was celebrating the best in
Speaker 2: cable and it was a it was a Turner production,
Speaker 2: but it was involving HBO and everything in cable as
Speaker 2: opposed to the Emmys, which you know, the EM's doesn't
Speaker 2: have anything but against cable, but it's you have to
Speaker 2: compete against network shows as well, right in the Emmys,
Speaker 2: I mean at the time, Yeah, yeah, you have to
Speaker 2: compete against network shows. Yet so here, you didn't have
Speaker 2: to compete. Nothing was yeah. Yeah, so because nothing was
Speaker 2: really that, you know, like it wasn't that cable shows
Speaker 2: weren't as hot as they are now, obviously, and at
Speaker 2: the time, what was the hottest showing cable It was
Speaker 2: Nitro and right it was wrong. It is because you
Speaker 2: you know, when you exclude network, you exclude the big
Speaker 2: network hits, but you also exclude a lot of the
Speaker 2: sports that would be on the big networks. There were
Speaker 2: some cable sports, but you know, all of a sudden,
Speaker 2: ninety six ninety seven, wrestling is the toast of the
Speaker 2: cable world. And yeah, certainly if you know it's a
Speaker 2: Turner production, the Cable Ace Awards, they're going to celebrate
Speaker 2: what they particular in TN T and TBS have on
Speaker 2: cable that that's a hit, and that is Hull Cogan,
Speaker 2: and that is Kevin Nation, Scott Hall, that is the nWo.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So there's a period of time in November nineteen ninety
Speaker 2: six where like, you know, the Turner itself was saying,
Speaker 2: here are our wrestling stars. Here, here's the heart of
Speaker 2: why we're doing such incredible ratings on Monday nights. Yeah,
Speaker 2: so here's a piece that aired on E Entertainment Television
Speaker 2: that kind of looks at, you know, the nWo such
Speaker 2: as it was in November nineteen ninety six, along with
Speaker 2: the Sandal with Muscles and kable Ace Awards hype. It's
Speaker 2: fascinating to think about just the mainstream media covering this
Speaker 2: heel Hogan. You know, probably where they wouldn't have covered
Speaker 2: the baby face Hogan. They probably wouldn't given a shit
Speaker 2: if he stayed babyface to do a piece like this.
Speaker 12: Well wrestling champ Hulk Hogan's career could now be aptly
Speaker 12: titled the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. All our
Speaker 12: E cameras caught up for the New Hollywood Hulk Hogan
Speaker 12: and his band of vigilantes who call themselves the nWo
Speaker 12: or the New World Order as they crashed last month's
Speaker 12: kable As Awards here in Los Angeles.
Speaker 15: All these people here, along with Ted Turner, got a
Speaker 15: lot of gold Man. We are the heartbeat of honors
Speaker 15: cable show on TV today. They call it w CW
Speaker 15: Monday Nitro soon to be nw OH Life for Life.
Speaker 15: So tonight we decided they're playing man. They know the
Speaker 15: deal going going the back door hunk a few guys
Speaker 15: pushed him out of the way and grabbed ted Turner
Speaker 15: by a skinny little neck and take What's.
Speaker 12: Hard Spinner Broadcastings WCW Monday Night Nitro has become one
Speaker 12: of the hottest two hours of live programming each week
Speaker 12: on cable television.
Speaker 3: And once again w c W.
Speaker 2: Shut the world.
Speaker 12: Executive vice president and producer of WCW Monday Nitro, Eric Bishaff,
Speaker 12: brought wrestling out of the doldrums and into the mid
Speaker 12: nineties by taking the beloved Holster and turning him bad.
Speaker 2: I'm not surprised at all at the popularity of the nWo.
Speaker 2: You know it all started with Scott Hall and Kevin
Speaker 2: Nash came along, and then hul Cogan abandoned that red
Speaker 2: and yellow stuff that he.
Speaker 5: Was doing for so long.
Speaker 2: I did everything for the kids in the recept.
Speaker 16: I got why I came out here.
Speaker 2: You fans him, decad brother.
Speaker 12: This from the man who's soon to be seen portraying
Speaker 12: Santa at Christmas time now says, spits defiled and beats
Speaker 12: up anyone in his path.
Speaker 5: Hogan has his own unique.
Speaker 2: View on his dual career, So you don't wander. The
Speaker 2: kids are so much smarter.
Speaker 15: Than you people here at ETV, man, I mean, give
Speaker 15: me a break.
Speaker 2: The kids know the nWo is cool.
Speaker 15: They know what it takes to get by. But then
Speaker 15: when it's time to take care of business, you step
Speaker 15: in the rain, you make the first move. When it's
Speaker 15: time to be Santa, you step up to the mark
Speaker 15: and chop down the first tree. We just got them
Speaker 15: body slam and Turners organizations, big high rise in Atlanta
Speaker 15: and the whole WCW. Now the nWo, we're gonna bodyslam
Speaker 15: Beverly Hills and then we'll click around here just like
Speaker 15: we did the whole wrestling world.
Speaker 17: Man, we make a garn with a win.
Speaker 15: You do, guys, and Samson, maybe you could be Caesar,
Speaker 15: I mean, rankly, I don't give a.
Speaker 2: Darn Scott Off.
Speaker 8: Hogan just bow guarding the whole thing, like, oh yeah,
Speaker 8: as much of that swags as Holland Nash gave to
Speaker 8: the nWo before, well it wasn't even called the nWo
Speaker 8: yet before Hogan turn heel.
Speaker 2: He just took up all the oxygen.
Speaker 8: That was one of the cooler the things that Bishops
Speaker 8: had in his book. I thought was that you know
Speaker 8: the reason those black and white videos with those jump
Speaker 8: cuts with Hogan halland National Studio. Remember the one where
Speaker 8: they're holding up an inflatable globe and all that. Yeah,
Speaker 8: the reason that's so jump cutty and like so stylized
Speaker 8: is because they just couldn't get a cut where Hogan
Speaker 8: it was ho guarding the whole conversation, right, It's like
Speaker 8: they had to cut it up because otherwise it would
Speaker 8: be ninety percent Hogan and the stuff they did have
Speaker 8: from Holland Nash wouldn't have wouldn't have been able to
Speaker 8: get a word in edgewise. So they ended up with
Speaker 8: this really cool, like stylized thing when it was really
Speaker 8: just a way to break up Hogan's filibuster and here
Speaker 8: grabbing the camera and taking over, and you can kind
Speaker 8: of see like if they're getting that kind of attention,
Speaker 8: like an epiece, like yeah, yeah, let's let's keep this
Speaker 8: grave of train going. Let's not just let the WSW
Speaker 8: come back anytime soon, because the right guys are making
Speaker 8: the right money.
Speaker 2: You know, right, I mean, hey, it makes it makes
Speaker 2: a little sense. It does.
Speaker 8: So you have Hogan there kind of talking to America man.
Speaker 8: That brings back memories like that whole I was talking about,
Speaker 8: like the kids think it's cool that he's so right,
Speaker 8: like yep. It was like, no one thinks it's a
Speaker 8: bad thing that he turned heel. It's fucking awesome, yeah right,
Speaker 8: And and the mainstream media was like coming to terms
Speaker 8: with that, like this, the scene of reaction has been
Speaker 8: so different because people now enough generations have turned. They know,
Speaker 8: like turn heel is just like a big moment in wrestling.
Speaker 8: It's not like it's not like kids are crying anywhere,
Speaker 8: although I'm sure some did, and we've seen videos of
Speaker 8: kids crying, but that's not the focus. The media is
Speaker 8: like glad to cover it as a heel turn. You know,
Speaker 8: they're asking Nikki Bella on the red carpet what she
Speaker 8: thinks about her ex's heel turn, and she's saying it's great.
Speaker 8: She said, you know, I think it's a gift he's
Speaker 8: giving to his fans because now he actually can do
Speaker 8: it without any you know, give them that what what
Speaker 8: a scene of heel heel seen it would look like
Speaker 8: before he says goodbye, And they're like, you know, Rock's
Speaker 8: doing a press conference talking about it as a creative decision.
Speaker 2: You know, oh my god, what a fucking phony.
Speaker 8: Where was you know, where was Hogan out there doing
Speaker 8: a breast conference about how they you know, decided for
Speaker 8: storytelling purposes this was the best option available to them
Speaker 8: and an immediate climate that come on, No, we didn't
Speaker 8: do that. We just looked at the camera and we
Speaker 8: talked like a fucking right bastard.
Speaker 2: Right right, that's what you do. And Drew Carrey made
Speaker 2: people believe.
Speaker 8: Drew Carey was big too at the time in cable
Speaker 8: and he did the This Drew Carrey Show, right if
Speaker 8: we have a channel it was on Yeah, okay, so it.
Speaker 2: Was network, wasn't Cable?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 2: No, no, yeah, his show isn't it.
Speaker 8: He was hosting and he was the host, I should say,
Speaker 8: of the Cable Ace Awards the year that this all
Speaker 8: was going down, Gary Shannling won for the Gary Channeling Show.
Speaker 8: I think it was best show or whatever. The no
Speaker 8: for Larry Sanders, not for the good that's what he said,
Speaker 8: right for his show, the Larry Sanders Show, which I'm
Speaker 8: sure Kevin Nash took close notes.
Speaker 2: You know, oh absolutely, he was all over that.
Speaker 8: Try to do Gary Shandling in WCW. When he would
Speaker 8: get the book infamously in nineteen ninety nine, and they
Speaker 8: actually showed during the course of the Cable Ace Awards,
Speaker 8: Roddy Piper in the audience scowling in a tuxedo. Wow,
Speaker 8: no shock, the nWo is getting all this attention. The
Speaker 8: idea was that, like the nWo showed up and I
Speaker 8: love how they used the Turner thing there. That's so
Speaker 8: great because they're supposed to be the WWF guys. They're
Speaker 8: supposed to hate Ted Turner. They're supposed to be here
Speaker 8: to tip over Ted Turner's apple cart and fuck up
Speaker 8: his day, and they call him billionaire Ted. I mean,
Speaker 8: that's so brilliant. They take WWF using billionaire Ted and
Speaker 8: they just use it.
Speaker 5: Oh.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's also amazing that it's it's really amazing
Speaker 2: that I mean that that Turner allowed, yeah, them to
Speaker 2: kind of run rampant on a major program. Well, Turner
Speaker 2: was a maverick man. He got it.
Speaker 8: He did he he loved Ric Flair, you know, it's
Speaker 8: like he loved babyfaces. He understood like that edge, that
Speaker 8: wrestling broad and that's what he would do. He would
Speaker 8: go in the press and call out somebody like that's
Speaker 8: so perfect because they had just done the billionaire Ted skits.
Speaker 8: In the spring of ninety six, we just started talking
Speaker 8: about him. We did the Royal Rumble. Yep, they'd just
Speaker 8: done those. And and then Hall comes right away and
Speaker 8: Nash come right after him. Yeah, and it's like you
Speaker 8: could believe that these guys were over there helping the
Speaker 8: company that created these billionaire ted skits and then went
Speaker 8: over there and tried to you know, that's the new
Speaker 8: front in the battle right now, right And it was
Speaker 8: a shame for years because there was a lawsuit that
Speaker 8: they would downplay Bishoff in particular, would downplay the idea
Speaker 8: that these were supposed to be WWF invaders because it
Speaker 8: was legally sensitive because there was a lawsuit over whether
Speaker 8: WCW was really practically using WWF's intellectual property to get
Speaker 8: an angle over by pretending this is Razor Ramone and
Speaker 8: Kevin Nash. And we know how ridiculous that got when
Speaker 8: they brought back Razor and Diesel and w I know,
Speaker 8: another piece of nineteen ninety six we've touched on recently,
Speaker 8: But so the Cable Ace Awards, Drew Carrey's there and
Speaker 8: the nWo, Hogan, holland Nash are doing segments with Kathy Kinney,
Speaker 8: who was Mimi on the Drew Carry Show. Yeah, she's
Speaker 8: there too in character and just throughout the course of
Speaker 8: the awards. It's not like they're there just for, you know,
Speaker 8: to present an award. They do like an angle through
Speaker 8: the whole Cable Ace Awards where they're trying to get
Speaker 8: into the building and they're not supposed to the end.
Speaker 8: That's so crazy that the larger organization and cable television
Speaker 8: written large was taking notice of what the nWo angle was.
Speaker 8: Not just that these guys were a stable of wrestlers
Speaker 8: and Hogan it's a bad guy. They got into like
Speaker 8: the idea that they were an invading force and built
Speaker 8: the Cable Ace Awards in some ways that year in
Speaker 8: nineteen ninety six around them. So here's a compendium of
Speaker 8: all the stuff that the nWo trio did in November
Speaker 8: nineteen ninety six ahead of World War Three on the
Speaker 8: Cable Ace Awards. Let this take you back.
Speaker 15: Oh this is bad, I know, television outsider and we're
Speaker 15: on being at let us.
Speaker 2: Set billionaire pet open up.
Speaker 18: We know you're in there.
Speaker 17: We got this a new world, or pumping out they
Speaker 17: do because we're new.
Speaker 5: Or let us.
Speaker 11: We're taking over the one and attainment orders because we
Speaker 11: get yours and we want our cable Ace award.
Speaker 5: And what do we do?
Speaker 11: What do we do?
Speaker 5: I'll tell you what.
Speaker 11: It's all round back by the stage door, talk a
Speaker 11: few people, get him out the way, then we'll get
Speaker 11: our hands on Ted Turner.
Speaker 15: Hey, that's a perfect plan.
Speaker 17: We are the hottest thing on cable and the cable
Speaker 17: Ace ghost.
Speaker 2: To the world going forward with those accents, Why don't
Speaker 2: we wow Gerry Shanley two percent? No, no better yet?
Speaker 2: That nonother talk show? Who's that done? The don King died?
Speaker 18: Larry King, Larry King, I'm taking him?
Speaker 2: Then, let's do it. Come on, they're down GM, I'm
Speaker 2: up in this place, a.
Speaker 17: New world Order in the he's ol.
Speaker 11: Hey, well what we got a program here?
Speaker 2: Hey, they're billionaire Ted right on.
Speaker 17: The gallow Where's where's our picture?
Speaker 5: Man?
Speaker 18: Were in there?
Speaker 2: And then we weren't invited.
Speaker 5: We weren't invited. Who's in this thing?
Speaker 10: Well?
Speaker 15: Coming up, there's Mark Harmon, Eric will Sell, a couple
Speaker 15: of Woolsey, Doc.
Speaker 5: Steve Webber, Jeffery Damn, who's that TAM's that ball guy?
Speaker 2: And it was in some kind of whim Convention. We
Speaker 2: have Rita Wilson, sheryl A.
Speaker 15: Leyla Shawn, many lead Thoms and Laylah or Sean whatever
Speaker 15: they're all. There's baby who ram I had, Walter crock Hey,
Speaker 15: I want to meet Walter cronk.
Speaker 19: Water, but he could get away from me by doing
Speaker 19: Cable what four?
Speaker 15: Oh yo yo yo, it's Hollywood's favorite damseling distressed much
Speaker 15: for me?
Speaker 3: Me?
Speaker 17: Hey, Sugar, Britzy's looking good?
Speaker 5: Look sweet?
Speaker 10: Oh no, don't tell me the w.
Speaker 20: Is here to do some butt kicking you guys for
Speaker 20: the reason that I watched Cable. I even have an
Speaker 20: NW tattoo on.
Speaker 5: Well when I get to.
Speaker 13: Know you, wow.
Speaker 18: School.
Speaker 17: But how do we get in there?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 20: Well that's easy.
Speaker 19: First you need one of one of these where we're gonna.
Speaker 5: Pick one of those.
Speaker 17: Hey, bridey, come here the slim.
Speaker 19: Thanks, smooth, very very smooth, and next to any of
Speaker 19: these because you don't want to, you know, get any
Speaker 19: makeup on. And if anybody comes up to you and
Speaker 19: you know what here just pretends to speak English and
Speaker 19: you don't say slay.
Speaker 5: Oh it's my bred band of LA.
Speaker 21: I don't know George Hamilton tan Man, This surface to Sola,
Speaker 21: come on your birthday.
Speaker 17: A little live like, Hey.
Speaker 3: That was pretty fun.
Speaker 2: This is the very end of the show. Andrew Carey
Speaker 2: is coming off stats.
Speaker 20: Hey, porkmeister, these guys didn't get their awards yet.
Speaker 12: What's up?
Speaker 3: I'm I don't vote on any awards or anything.
Speaker 15: William no billionaire, Ted says, you choose each and every
Speaker 15: single award or well, yeah, I know where he is if.
Speaker 19: You want to go to his house right now.
Speaker 2: I know that Todo was gating everything.
Speaker 8: Thanks for watching the Cable Ace Awards tonight. That'sn't that fuck?
Speaker 8: Oh my god, I feel so I reach for the
Speaker 8: mood of the time. I want it so bad, just
Speaker 8: that that was just like, you know, so innocently, like
Speaker 8: presented in a way just I just love it. I
Speaker 8: just love going back and watching.
Speaker 2: That kind I mean yeah, because it's I mean, and
Speaker 2: the fact that that that they were able to kind
Speaker 2: of cross into that world so easily, you know, that's immediate.
Speaker 8: You know, it's like they just did the angle in
Speaker 8: July and by November. They would never put w CW
Speaker 8: wrestlers on the Cable Ace Awards before this, no way,
Speaker 8: of course, not no, never, Why such cool stuff happening.
Speaker 8: So yes, In fact, the giant had recently turned heel
Speaker 8: and joined the nWo. He was like the big fourth
Speaker 8: member and it was it was fascinating. There hasn't met
Speaker 8: a lot from Paul White over the years about this.
Speaker 8: One thing he did say on the Monday Night Wars
Speaker 8: documentary is it seemed like that there was one or
Speaker 8: two options. Either he joined the nWo or he starts
Speaker 8: chopping down the nWo one by one on behalf of WCW.
Speaker 8: And he called it a political move really that caused
Speaker 8: him to join the nWo instead of WW because you know,
Speaker 8: the other scenario would be him, you know, forcing the
Speaker 8: nWo guys to lose, and they weren't there for that.
Speaker 8: So as much as we can criticize it a Bischoff
Speaker 8: or whatever for leaning into an nWo concept that was
Speaker 8: kind of doomed to fail vsavwcw's viability, he also can't
Speaker 8: forget that the big money owners in the nWo had
Speaker 8: all the incentive in the world to make everything nWo
Speaker 8: and nothing WCW.
Speaker 2: It was kind of real in that sense. It really was.
Speaker 8: It was like, yeah, I believe that it didn't have
Speaker 8: a lot of the nWo guys didn't have a lot
Speaker 8: built up in how strong WCW was. They didn't really
Speaker 8: care because all they had to do was show up.
Speaker 8: And they're getting invited to Cable Ace Awards to show
Speaker 8: up on Nitro, you know, and kick some ass, right,
Speaker 8: you know, the traditional like okay, where's the heat and
Speaker 8: what are they going to get there? It's like we
Speaker 8: can we can worry about that later.
Speaker 2: Right now.
Speaker 8: All we do is show up and talk and look
Speaker 8: cool and beat some people up. And I mean you
Speaker 8: show up, you talk, and you get heat beating WWF,
Speaker 8: which you no one thought we'd be able to do
Speaker 8: six months ago. So it's it's something to remember as well.
Speaker 8: Giant had recently shown up in Jingle all the Way
Speaker 8: with Arnold.
Speaker 2: Yes, yep, that that happened as well. I mean again,
Speaker 2: it would have happened, not necessarily right right there. I
Speaker 2: mean happened earlier as well.
Speaker 8: You know, so he was also Hollywood adjacent. He's in
Speaker 8: Santa with Muscles as well. Right, No, it's in Sanda
Speaker 8: with Muscles. I'm thinking of, No, that's Jingle all the Way.
Speaker 8: I'm thinking of, yeah, yeah, Jingle all the Way where
Speaker 8: he comes in.
Speaker 2: But yeah, like he yeah again that would have been done,
Speaker 2: is he? Like, can fine when I'm gonna take my
Speaker 2: notes here from when we did jingle? Sure, when they
Speaker 2: filmed the actual movie, you.
Speaker 8: Know, of course he'd come in in ninety five and
Speaker 8: wrestled Hogan. I'll even happened and Hogan's andre right, and
Speaker 8: he was still red and yellow.
Speaker 2: He's still gonna do the fucking same things all over again.
Speaker 8: It already won the world title from Rick Flair in
Speaker 8: April of nineteen ninety six, so we'd already been a
Speaker 8: top guy when this happened. But yeah, he suddenly choked
Speaker 8: slams WCW guys one night on Nitro when the ring
Speaker 8: is absolutely filling up with garbage. This is before even
Speaker 8: Bishoff returns, and Bischoff delivered the no no no, no, no, no,
Speaker 8: no no no as Giant actually choke slams at WCW
Speaker 8: guy I think was barbarian instead of an nWo guy.
Speaker 8: But you thought he was hitting the ring to save
Speaker 8: WCW from the nWo menace because they were making over again,
Speaker 8: and that was a big one. That was like, oh
Speaker 8: my god, like they're going to start picking off WCW
Speaker 8: guys too. It's not just x WWF guys we got.
Speaker 2: To worry about. And so now why won't Sting join?
Speaker 5: You know?
Speaker 2: That was part of it. It's like Giant did it? Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 8: So in this world where people are literally turning on WCW,
Speaker 8: not just joining NBO, turning on ww to join the nWo,
Speaker 8: now everyone's fair game and everyone's under suspicion. So he
Speaker 8: does that, and it sets up this convoluted scenario because
Speaker 8: of course, the winner of World War three is to
Speaker 8: get a world title shot. Giant wins haul Cogan is
Speaker 8: the champion. House is going to get worked out. So
Speaker 8: as the weeks go, Hogan kind of makes intimations that
Speaker 8: they really don't expect the Giant to go for the belt.
Speaker 8: They expect them and him to just take one for
Speaker 8: the team, right, I remember that and just not actually challenge,
Speaker 8: And that pisses him off, and so he leaves the
Speaker 8: NABO as quickly as he joins it and wrestles Hogan
Speaker 8: and the January nine ninety seven sold out where he
Speaker 8: hits some of the choke slam and then Nick Patrick,
Speaker 8: who is already as you can see on this show
Speaker 8: as well, the evil what referee doing things that were
Speaker 8: very questionable that favored the nWo. He would eventually become
Speaker 8: the NBO's official ref again towards this idea that we
Speaker 8: need a whole crew announcers, wrestlers to be nWo guys
Speaker 8: for an NWOTV shows. So dumb, just every time I
Speaker 8: say it, I can't believe they thought that that was
Speaker 8: the direction to go in. And I lived through it.
Speaker 8: I remember, I remember what I watched Nitro Ford.
Speaker 2: It was not for that.
Speaker 8: It was not for the nWo to become WCW. So
Speaker 8: Nick Patrick doesn't do the count that sold out, and
Speaker 8: then nWo hits the ring and attacks him. He chokes
Speaker 8: lams all of them, and then Hogan hits him of
Speaker 8: the guitar and no contest. Hogan retains the title. And
Speaker 8: it's after that the Bischoff does his big heel thing
Speaker 8: where he fires Randy Anderson on TV. And that's that
Speaker 8: as far as the set up here and the prelude
Speaker 8: to Paul White winning the World War three. He also
Speaker 8: would go on to say that there was a moment
Speaker 8: where he kind of went to Bischoff and was concerned
Speaker 8: about how much less he was being paid than the
Speaker 8: other guys in the nWo and just didn't really like,
Speaker 8: this is the way Paul White is kind of characterized it.
Speaker 8: Just didn't really like the lack of urgency and trying
Speaker 8: to match what WWF might come up with for his services.
Speaker 8: Definitely kind of felt slighted by that, and Bischoff would
Speaker 8: say it is and has said it, as you know,
Speaker 8: I said, absolutely the amount of money they're offering you,
Speaker 8: I'll fly you there go. You got to take that offer,
Speaker 8: whereas Paul White talks about it like they were just
Speaker 8: blowing him off and big leaguing him and perhaps not
Speaker 8: even believing that WWF would make that kind of a
Speaker 8: play for him. But they had strengthened considerably in nineteen
Speaker 8: ninety eight and he comes in there in nineteen ninety nine,
Speaker 8: Does Paul White becomes the big show?
Speaker 2: And that is the end of that.
Speaker 8: They had signed Roddy Piper right before Halloween Havoc, Yeah
Speaker 8: d being he would to work four or five matches
Speaker 8: a year, fifteen interview appearances throughout the year, And there
Speaker 8: was also this idea of in the deal, which I
Speaker 8: don't think anything came of it, where Turner would be
Speaker 8: developing a syndicated TV show for Piper as part of
Speaker 8: the deal, much like Thundering Paradise. Yeah, much like Bolstering
Speaker 8: thunder and Paradise. It's part of Hulk Steel.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he'd be a bounty bounty hunter or something. Was
Speaker 2: the idea of this TV show. That nothing ever happened.
Speaker 8: A big money contract, and I'm sure part of the
Speaker 8: big money was whatever he would be paid from off
Speaker 8: WCW's books for the Turner television show. There's always that
Speaker 8: component to make that numbered flame. Remember Brett was gonna
Speaker 8: get movies. Remember that.
Speaker 2: They got loads of dob Well, this is w'sw.
Speaker 8: Contract and nothing happens, you know, but you just always
Speaker 8: hear that, like there's movies in the deal, and it's
Speaker 8: like nothing consummates. We've read Hogan's contract. It's all there
Speaker 8: for wrestling. It's there's nothing in there with movies. But
Speaker 8: I maybe it's probably separate paper. But yeah, Bischoff had
Speaker 8: just turned as well. This is a part of the
Speaker 8: stipulation of Fall Brown ninety six where w CW face
Speaker 8: the nWo and the War Games, was that they would
Speaker 8: get an hour of Nitro. They had said that, and
Speaker 8: they didn't quite get around to doing it for until
Speaker 8: December of nineteen ninety seven, but that's fine. They were
Speaker 8: toying with it, and they had plans on doing it
Speaker 8: and accelerating in that direction. And Bischoff ends up playing
Speaker 8: a key role in the Piper thing because when Piper
Speaker 8: comes in, he's demanding audience with Hulk Hogan. He's demanding
Speaker 8: a match with Hulkogan. And on the Nitro, I think
Speaker 8: it's November eighteenth, nineteen ninety six where Bischoff turns heel.
Speaker 8: It's in the ring with Piper in a segment not
Speaker 8: unlike what we see in the ring at World War Three,
Speaker 8: except by that point Bischoff is freshly in the nWo category.
Speaker 8: But you can see Bischoff is still kind of jittery
Speaker 8: about playing the heel, so you know it's he's kind
Speaker 8: of finding his voice here in this segment that took
Speaker 8: place on Nitro. This is where the world came to
Speaker 8: realize that the WCW boss was in the nwo's pocket
Speaker 8: as well.
Speaker 6: What airline?
Speaker 2: Throw it airline. He's in his face about the contract terms,
Speaker 2: and you have.
Speaker 3: To go on up to my ranch.
Speaker 16: When you come up to my ranch, tell me is
Speaker 16: a road crooked or if the road straight, tell me
Speaker 16: it's a road crooked.
Speaker 2: I don't remember.
Speaker 17: I don't remember.
Speaker 4: Your piece, I said, nor.
Speaker 2: So Bishop still with w W at this point. Ye oh.
Speaker 16: Now now that everybody realizes who everybody's working.
Speaker 4: For, I mean, my god, this guy here was the
Speaker 4: foundation of the w c W. Now he works for
Speaker 4: the nWo.
Speaker 17: I'll tell you what.
Speaker 16: Stand him up, but watch him, watch him real close. Hey,
Speaker 16: you know something, Piper. You're a loser fighting a losing battle.
Speaker 16: You have never been anything in the wrestling business. And
Speaker 16: until you wrestled me, Piper, nobody even knew your name. Now,
Speaker 16: rowdy Roddy Piper is such a coward he won't even
Speaker 16: sign a contract to wrestle me. And since you won't
Speaker 16: get in the ring with me, Piper, you will never
Speaker 16: be anything. My man, I think it's time to teach
Speaker 16: you who will respect Piper?
Speaker 12: Mm hm hm h.
Speaker 11: H h h.
Speaker 2: Listen to all those nWo as opposed to w c
Speaker 2: W fans. Yeah right, mm hmm deebs, Are we on?
Speaker 3: Are we on?
Speaker 2: Today? I think I don't even know if they're on
Speaker 2: the air or not. Did you see what I saw?
Speaker 5: Was that?
Speaker 2: Now they don't have Bischoff. Now they're like rudderless. They
Speaker 2: don't know what to do in the announcement, it's so
Speaker 2: good association. I'm gonna go crawl off.
Speaker 8: Oh my god, I just throw up because remember bish
Speaker 8: Off was lead an answer for hour two of Nitro,
Speaker 8: so Shivanni is not even there.
Speaker 2: He leaves after hour one. I just can't believe what
Speaker 2: I'm saying.
Speaker 21: I can't eat this.
Speaker 10: We gotta go, we gotta go.
Speaker 2: We'll see everybody next Monday.
Speaker 13: Sick ning.
Speaker 17: It's a sick excell.
Speaker 6: Did did.
Speaker 2: Did little, did didn't North Virginia.
Speaker 16: I'll have a contract in my cake, no surrender, no drat.
Speaker 1: Hey, well they.
Speaker 8: Slaps his ass, I kiss my ass. Oh man, that
Speaker 8: combination of like enthralling, that's they're ending with a hot
Speaker 8: angle and that you have to go to bed for
Speaker 8: school the next day.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Music is triggering for me in that way. Yes, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: it's like you know, because you're also on a HT
Speaker 2: you know, it's not like they you know, back in
Speaker 2: the day, they kept they let you. They left your
Speaker 2: wanting more.
Speaker 8: Imagine that, yeah, not wishing it not hard, not wishing
Speaker 8: it was over, which it tends to be more often
Speaker 8: than not. Now by the time you get to the end,
Speaker 8: the lapsed.
Speaker 1: Fan wrestling podcast, the wrestling podcast that knows the boys
Speaker 1: need their candy, it's the Lapsed He's an lapsed fan
Speaker 1: wrestling podcast with Jack and Carnacio and JP Sorrow.
Speaker 8: But my god, the Piper there obviously calling out Hogan
Speaker 8: for this very pay per view World War three and
Speaker 8: the contract signing, and he's ready to do the damn thing.
Speaker 8: Piper would do a lot of that at the end.
Speaker 8: He would like go longer than the TV times allow,
Speaker 8: and unfortunately he was able to get in the key
Speaker 8: points there at the very end.
Speaker 2: But that's it.
Speaker 8: That's Bishoff turning there on on WCW in the Whole Company,
Speaker 8: and you heard the discuss in Bobby Heenon and Mike
Speaker 8: Today's voice. He did an absolute MVP like, oh yeah,
Speaker 8: if we did an nWo journey, like Bobby Heenan be
Speaker 8: the hero because he's the guy that makes those Shawanni
Speaker 8: does a wonderful job as well at this. I mean,
Speaker 8: you know, of course, I'll Coogan can go to hell
Speaker 8: all those lines.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but what's he doing Heenan because because this what
Speaker 2: what makes Heenan stand out in this situation is Heenan's
Speaker 2: a heel, he's a steal and he's against the and he's.
Speaker 8: Been right all along about Huld Cogan, So it's like,
Speaker 8: you know, he's the heel that like everyone has to
Speaker 8: kind of shut up and listen to. Now, that was
Speaker 8: the greatest, greatest element that they did was to also
Speaker 8: make Heenan be against the LU because it added it
Speaker 8: added a whole different layer to it, because if Heenan's
Speaker 8: against the nWo, Holy YEA. Logically you would say Heenan
Speaker 8: would have to support the nWo because he's a heel, right,
Speaker 8: But thereafter his job, he's too good, he's too good
Speaker 8: to to go that way. Because I'm sure he had
Speaker 8: quite a bit of leeway and what he said out there,
Speaker 8: I'm sure he's set the tone. I mean, I'm sure
Speaker 8: they didn't expressly tell him to support the nWo and
Speaker 8: he went against it. But at the same time, he
Speaker 8: gave texture to what it would sound like if he
Speaker 8: was against the nWo, and it was money from the beginning,
Speaker 8: so you would never second guess it.
Speaker 2: And that was his instinct.
Speaker 8: He was dead on. It's like I have to be
Speaker 8: I have to feel under siege. And Heenan's good at that,
Speaker 8: especially because he had that next surgery, and he was
Speaker 8: horrified of even being touched. And everybody knew that, at
Speaker 8: least in the inside of the business and the famous
Speaker 8: Brian Pilin thing in the clash where he drops the
Speaker 8: F bomb because Pillman goes into business himself and grabs
Speaker 8: Heenen's headset, and Heenan was very persnickety about his neck.
Speaker 8: I was really worried that it could reaggravate an injury.
Speaker 8: And so there's that too, Like there's this frailty about
Speaker 8: Bobby Heenan that the nWo just absolutely could exploit, Like,
Speaker 8: you know, if they did rough him up, if they
Speaker 8: did smack his head. That's a serious situation for Bobby Heenan,
Speaker 8: way more so than anybody else. They were attacking in
Speaker 8: a lot of ways, so you almost could you could
Speaker 8: believe the fear he had over and above just what's
Speaker 8: the right play here as an announcer to get this
Speaker 8: angle over r But for his personal safety, they would
Speaker 8: show up and just you wouldn't know where it was going.
Speaker 11: You know.
Speaker 8: It's not like these guys were included on very much.
Speaker 8: They didn't know who was going to win the pay
Speaker 8: per view matches and stuff. Shavanni's talked about this, so
Speaker 8: they don't know what Dannabal is going to do when
Speaker 8: they're out there and they're invading the announced desk. Wonderful,
Speaker 8: wonderful stuff. Heen and heen and heen and heen and heenan.
Speaker 2: It's it's kind of a thing, you know when I
Speaker 2: when when I probably mentioned it when we were doing
Speaker 2: the ninety seven shows, but I I uh, I actually
Speaker 2: thought that that would that that would be what made
Speaker 2: the Heart Foundation in ninety seven be like the nw
Speaker 2: ROW because I thought there was no way once they started,
Speaker 2: once they turned Brett hard heel, there's no way Jerry
Speaker 2: Lawler can be a fan right the history they have
Speaker 2: him insulting the family, like he would have to turn it,
Speaker 2: like Lawler would have to be against the Heart Foundation.
Speaker 2: He didn't. It kind of wasn't. I was going to say, no,
Speaker 2: he didn't, he didn't. It was what I thought they
Speaker 2: would they would do, but they didn't do it. I
Speaker 2: was kind of bummed. I was really bummed about that.
Speaker 2: I thought I thought that would have been a great
Speaker 2: another added element. I mean, I know probably now they
Speaker 2: didn't want to like copy the nWo too much, you know,
Speaker 2: because it's always funny how everyone equates d X as
Speaker 2: being the nWo kind of mirror the W's because it
Speaker 2: was that was never it for me. I mean, it
Speaker 2: became it eventually, but in reality, for me, it was
Speaker 2: the Heart Foundation. The Heart Foundation was that they were
Speaker 2: the nWo for me in every stable that I formed
Speaker 2: in the business after the WO was compared TOWO. So yeah,
Speaker 2: I remember people talk about that ANNWO ripoff. Yeah, but
Speaker 2: like the Hart Foundation symbolized the major baby face turning
Speaker 2: the heel and forming and bringing together his family, and
Speaker 2: that's what I always thought was kind of what made
Speaker 2: it different, what made it more nWo like then, say
Speaker 2: the Nation Domination, where that was just a bunch of
Speaker 2: guys coming in.
Speaker 8: Can I revisit Can I revisit something we talked about
Speaker 8: a little earlier. It just occurred to me, you know,
Speaker 8: the night after WrestleMania fourteen, when Steve Austin finally wins
Speaker 8: the championship. We know at the tail end of that,
Speaker 8: dude Love comes out like a maniac in attacks Austin.
Speaker 8: Thus Austin's first Programs champion is set in stone against me. Fully,
Speaker 8: I do invite you to consider a world where instead
Speaker 8: of dude Love attacking Steve Austin on that raw, it's
Speaker 8: macho man, Randy Savage.
Speaker 2: Oh fucking me, I've been amazing. That would have been
Speaker 2: amazing if they fu uh just punching him in the
Speaker 2: head like a madman on the table, yeah, and drop
Speaker 2: on the elbow and it was like, you know, like
Speaker 2: like he doesn't he just comes out of no well way,
Speaker 2: he comes out of the crowd and he starts fucking
Speaker 2: wailing on him. That would have been amazing.
Speaker 8: Oh what a time to be a wrestling fan when
Speaker 8: like you could dream up things like that and it
Speaker 8: might happen.
Speaker 2: Right, because it could happen. I mean they would, they
Speaker 2: would kind of tease shit like that.
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 2: We talked to you know, fucking XPOC coming out the
Speaker 2: night after wrestling Hea fourteen and saying that Hall and
Speaker 2: Nash would be here if they weren't locked up in
Speaker 2: their contract. It's like, oh, yeah, you actually thought that
Speaker 2: was just a pretty a prelude to them coming. I
Speaker 2: thought by the summertime they were going to be in
Speaker 2: the company. Uh, those were those were the days. No question.
Speaker 8: They made a note in The Observer that the only
Speaker 8: hint of a turn that Bischoff had before doing that,
Speaker 8: and that Nitro was Mike Today the first hour, asking
Speaker 8: Bischoff why would he ever make a deal before wargames
Speaker 8: to give the nWo their own TV show if they won,
Speaker 8: Like to your point earlier, like you're the president, Like
Speaker 8: why would you even make that offer? And now it
Speaker 8: became clear why? Yeah, And Meltzer notes the angle came
Speaker 8: off good on television and probably could be used to
Speaker 8: answer lots of questions about why nWo was able to
Speaker 8: do whatever it wanted, but also makes no sense and
Speaker 8: that the entire idea of the feud was because of
Speaker 8: Bischoff's remarks, and it was Bischoff who was attacked to
Speaker 8: start the feud. Of course, they could say that was
Speaker 8: all the work, right, They didn't. They didn't talk about that.
Speaker 8: They never talked about like, well, were you in on
Speaker 8: it when Kevin Nash powerbombed you with Great American bash?
Speaker 8: You know, were you already nWo for life?
Speaker 5: Then?
Speaker 2: I feel like didn't we kind of maybe maybe this
Speaker 2: was our hypothesis that it was that that that that
Speaker 2: he wasn't nWo at that time, but he was nWo
Speaker 2: after that, and Mike was like, you know what, I
Speaker 2: got to join up with these guys. They're fucking you know,
Speaker 2: they're too much.
Speaker 8: Now I think that's probably it. But they didn't make
Speaker 8: that abundantly clear and a memorable promo like you would expect.
Speaker 8: There wasn't like one of those unless I'm forgetting it,
Speaker 8: and I don't think I am. There wasn't one of
Speaker 8: those like why Eric, why moments. He just kept coming
Speaker 8: out with them and holding the mic for Hogan, you know,
Speaker 8: and making the face and everything. But there was never
Speaker 8: like an explanation as there's a lot of holes in
Speaker 8: it because he still has to be the president. We're
Speaker 8: going to talk here about how you talk about Hogan
Speaker 8: having like this awkward position of going on QVC and
Speaker 8: Entertainment tonight and Regis and Kaffe as a heel. Bischoff
Speaker 8: is the fucking real legit president WCW, budget authority, corporate
Speaker 8: officer at Turner Broadcasting, and now he's got to go
Speaker 8: out into the world after having just you know, said
Speaker 8: WCW sucks death to WCW on Monday Night and now
Speaker 8: cut deals as the WCW head man. You wouldn't think
Speaker 8: it would be that big of a deal, but it
Speaker 8: did put people like Harvey Schiller in an awkward position,
Speaker 8: as he talks about here from Controversy creates cash. I
Speaker 8: think we're going to hand this over to the boss
Speaker 8: Man for a little bit of reading from Eric's book,
Speaker 8: which always makes for fascinating compare in contrast to what
Speaker 8: he says now about the same events on his podcast.
Speaker 2: So here we go. Finding my inner thrill a gradual thing.
Speaker 2: Often in life, there aren't really clear defining moments or transitions.
Speaker 2: A lot of times, concepts are the amalgamation of days
Speaker 2: or weeks or months of conversation and collaboration. It's always
Speaker 2: difficult for me to look back and pinput exactly where
Speaker 2: or how a certain storyline or angle was born. They
Speaker 2: have all over time. You'll be at a meeting and
Speaker 2: someone will throw out the kernel of an idea, and
Speaker 2: someone else throws out something that changes the idea, which
Speaker 2: is how I, or rather my on screen character, joined
Speaker 2: the New World Order. I can be dishonest about it
Speaker 2: and blow smoke up my ass like so many other
Speaker 2: people do, and make up a story, but the truth is,
Speaker 2: I don't remember where the decision was. That's not so
Speaker 2: fucking that's so fucking bus He doesn't stopped using I
Speaker 2: don't remember where the decision was made or how it
Speaker 2: came about. And you know, I don't doubt him, but
Speaker 2: I also always have to wonder he might know exactly
Speaker 2: where it came from. It doesn't want to give that
Speaker 2: person credit. We always have to consider that possibility too,
Speaker 2: as to when he has these memory holes. You know,
Speaker 2: maybe Kevin Sullivan came up with it and he didn't
Speaker 2: like him. You know, I was gonna say, and doesn't
Speaker 2: want to give someone credit, right, or it doesn't doesn't
Speaker 2: want to have give them credit, but it also doesn't
Speaker 2: want to have a battle when they if they if they,
Speaker 2: you know, backlash waiter. That's my idea.
Speaker 8: I think have Biscotti something that I understand when he
Speaker 8: says he doesn't remember some storyline six matches down, you know,
Speaker 8: but it's his heel turn, and he doesn't remember who
Speaker 8: put that on the table, his own heel turn.
Speaker 2: I don't. I don't remember, and I didn't I don't
Speaker 2: know that The second half is the truth. Yeah, right, Uh.
Speaker 2: We were looking for a plot twist, something that would
Speaker 2: shock the so you do remember you're looking for a
Speaker 2: plot because don't remember whether it is in a game. Well,
Speaker 2: you're looking for a plot twist. That's you. That's a
Speaker 2: nice who, something that would shock the audience a little bit.
Speaker 2: Up until that point the camera. Up until that point
Speaker 2: on camera, my character represented the traditional pro wcw faction.
Speaker 2: I was AGAs at the nWo invasion and everything the
Speaker 2: outsiders did and represented. I was trying to fight them off.
Speaker 2: When I revealed myself to be part of the nWo
Speaker 2: in November nineteen ninety six, the thinking was that this
Speaker 2: nWo cancer had gotten so deep inside the executive structure
Speaker 2: that they'd finally gotten to me. As the head of WCW,
Speaker 2: I was the ultimate turncoat, the boss who turned out
Speaker 2: to be part of the evil invasion. In some ways,
Speaker 2: though it was a very natural move for the character,
Speaker 2: the audience didn't like me that much anyway. I was
Speaker 2: the outsider, the guy who hadn't paid his dues. The
Speaker 2: decisions I made in power were counterintuitive and against conventional wisdom,
Speaker 2: so the fans who claimed to be insiders are purest
Speaker 2: despised me. I embraced that, turned up the volume on it,
Speaker 2: and made it work for us. I found my inner heel.
Speaker 2: I knew people would say things like, oh, Bischoff just
Speaker 2: wants to be in the limelight and part of something successful.
Speaker 2: I it's kind of funny that I never thought that
Speaker 2: about Bischoff. Maybe I was the only maybe I was
Speaker 2: naive about it, but I never thought that, you know,
Speaker 2: like the whole Ken Doll wanta be thing like, Yeah,
Speaker 2: I just didn't see him as being this kind of
Speaker 2: guy who needed the attention. Yeah, well up until this
Speaker 2: I mean like back and I'm talking about when he
Speaker 2: first came to the company and up until this point. Yeah,
Speaker 2: well it's.
Speaker 8: It's kind of curious that he even put himself in
Speaker 8: the announced position on Nitro in the first place. You know,
Speaker 8: I think it kind of goes back to that, like
Speaker 8: why do you have to be the lead voice? You know, like, no,
Speaker 8: to me, he was the lead. Why does Vince sig
Speaker 8: Man against it? But he would he would want to
Speaker 8: be on TV when Vince was on TV. That was
Speaker 8: a big thing for him to be able to say
Speaker 8: what he needed to say to counteract what was going
Speaker 8: on on television, but on the WWF TV if that
Speaker 8: became necessary. But I think that's maybe where it started
Speaker 8: people saying like he's just thrusting himself into the into
Speaker 8: the forefront. Not against it, not say it's a bad idea.
Speaker 8: I'm just trying to figure out why people would say
Speaker 8: that about him before he turned heel.
Speaker 2: It was he didn't do commentary beforehand, and he was like,
Speaker 2: he wasn't on TV before here he was, I know,
Speaker 2: but he was.
Speaker 8: He was much more running the show behind the scenes
Speaker 8: than he was. He wasn't first string, It wasn't on
Speaker 8: pay per views for example, as a lead commentator. And
Speaker 8: then they do Nitro and he's right there in the
Speaker 8: center of the desk. It seemed like abrupt. It seemed
Speaker 8: abrupt that he would be now the lead voice of
Speaker 8: the whole company as the boss, right, I mean Rob.
Speaker 2: Bartlett wasn't you know, you know when they put him
Speaker 2: fucking front, Steve mcmongo, Steve mcmongoe, Steve m Bartlett for sure,
Speaker 2: those early Nitro days. Oh absolutely absolutely was.
Speaker 8: But yeah, he's saying, you know, because it's true, like
Speaker 8: he's the nWo absolutely catches fire and like he's got
Speaker 8: to join him. Really You're like why, yeah, yeah, I
Speaker 8: mean because it'll annoy people. You know, Yeah, that's Bishop.
Speaker 2: I knew there'd be personal attacks and barbs from the
Speaker 2: from the dirt sheet writers and read and never pays
Speaker 2: attention to. He brought him up three times and one
Speaker 2: paragraph who were quite frankly jealous. I didn't care, because
Speaker 2: to me, it just made sense. My career was going,
Speaker 2: was going. I wasn't going to be defined by my
Speaker 2: character but by how the company, but by how the
Speaker 2: company did so I had nothing to lose, and every
Speaker 2: the game. You can't have babyfaces without people. The fans
Speaker 2: really hate, and they hated me blowing the line I
Speaker 2: was in fairly. I was in a fairly unique position
Speaker 2: for a character in pro wrestling or any entertainment medium. Frankly,
Speaker 2: I was Eric Bischoff, the president of a high profile
Speaker 2: division of Turner Broadcasting and the executive producer of one
Speaker 2: of the most successful shows on cable television, playing Eric Bischoff,
Speaker 2: the evil, self serving bastard. I was running the real
Speaker 2: company and the fictional one. It was confusing for people.
Speaker 2: It was certainly confusing for the limited intellectual bandwidth of
Speaker 2: the dirt sheet community. It brought them up, but it
Speaker 2: was again again, But it was equally confusing for people
Speaker 2: who thought they knew what was going on and in wrestling,
Speaker 2: but weren't quite sure. That included a lot of executives
Speaker 2: at Time Warner. There were definitely people walking around who
Speaker 2: thought an absolute lunatic was running the company. They couldn't
Speaker 2: distinguished between reality and the fiction we had created. It
Speaker 2: can still be a problem these days when I deal
Speaker 2: with entertainment executives on non wrestling projects, but I've learned
Speaker 2: to accept it and sometimes use it to my advantage.
Speaker 2: Even in business. When I sense that I may be
Speaker 2: in the room with someone who may be confusing the
Speaker 2: character Eric Bischoff with the person Eric Bischoff, I point
Speaker 2: out in a fun way that there's a big difference
Speaker 2: between the guy on television.
Speaker 8: And the guy in the wa I wish whatever someone
Speaker 8: called me out in a professional setting for bullshit, I
Speaker 8: could just say that was my character.
Speaker 2: Right, Well, confusing, that's that's the character on television. This
Speaker 2: is I'm the guy in the room. Different.
Speaker 8: Me is the one that has never offended you, and
Speaker 8: we'll always do what you want. Yeah, right, So so
Speaker 8: pick and choose the things that I that didn't offend you,
Speaker 8: that me right, No, No, that didn't offend me. The
Speaker 8: things that are real, the things that offended you.
Speaker 2: That's that's the character. That's what I am on A
Speaker 2: nice option to have huh until I leave the house? Brother?
Speaker 2: What that really?
Speaker 8: That really started freaking him out when they started doing
Speaker 8: zoom because he couldn't you, brother, I'm in the house, Like,
Speaker 8: but I want to be hul hoging, but I'm in
Speaker 8: the house.
Speaker 2: Well, I don't want to be hul Hogan. I'm the house,
Speaker 2: but you need me to be hul Hogan. Well, I'm
Speaker 2: in my house. Brother, This just can't happen. Dude, Dude,
Speaker 2: I can't zoom. Dude, he has to zoom outdoors so
Speaker 2: that so we can he can keep the delineation clear.
Speaker 2: Mad him on his front, stupid. He kind of fucking
Speaker 2: sneaks out, like making sure no one's there, so does
Speaker 2: not that fucking hulk up for everybody else. Like you know,
Speaker 2: anytime Rick Flair got in trouble with the ladies, that
Speaker 2: was Ric Flair, that was not Richard Fleer. That's right,
Speaker 2: no one's actually seen Richard Flair. We were joking about
Speaker 2: that too.
Speaker 8: It's like how many documentaries there had to be at
Speaker 8: least six of them that that hinged on. I don't
Speaker 8: even think Rick Flair knows who Richard Fleeer is such
Speaker 8: a tired concept, you know. How about that the same person?
Speaker 5: You know?
Speaker 2: How about that?
Speaker 8: How about everything Rick Flair is guilty of? Richard Fleer
Speaker 8: is too?
Speaker 2: How about Richard Fleer is dead? How about it's just
Speaker 2: talk about it exactly? How about your fucking shut up?
Speaker 8: You get Sean Michaels like sitting at a bar on
Speaker 8: like ESPN thirty for thirty. I don't think Richard. I
Speaker 8: don't think Rick even knows where Richard Fleer begins. And
Speaker 8: Rick clare I'd like to meet, I like to meet.
Speaker 2: Oh he said that, he said that, Oh god stop,
Speaker 2: please stop. Such an idiot. Sewn Michaels, this guy whose
Speaker 2: own family calls him Sewan even though it's not his
Speaker 2: birth name. Yeah right, yeah, Michael, what's up? Mike hick
Speaker 2: and Bottom. You see, I understand what's happening here. You're
Speaker 2: not able.
Speaker 8: You're not distinguishing the character from the real Eric Bischoff,
Speaker 8: and I.
Speaker 2: Get Look, I get it. He's in a leather jacket,
Speaker 2: you know, and I get it. Yeah. Hey, the conference
Speaker 2: table water water picture on it. Oh god, oh, oh
Speaker 2: fucking leather. He's you know, he's standing up at the
Speaker 2: head of the table. I get it, I get it,
Speaker 2: But we have an opportunity confusing. What you're doing is
Speaker 2: you're confusing the Eric Bischoff on Television's the Eric Bischoff
Speaker 2: in the Yeah, I guess that's what I'm doing. Can
Speaker 2: we just figure out who you are and get on
Speaker 2: with it, please, I got six more meetings today. Just
Speaker 2: fucking tell me which one you are and I'll believe it. Exactly.
Speaker 2: Let's get past this point. Can we just agree which
Speaker 2: one I'm talking to? No, not really because I have to,
Speaker 2: I don't. I don't really care which one I'm talking to.
Speaker 2: I just want to fucking talk to him and get
Speaker 2: the fuck out of here. My daughter is a graduation party,
Speaker 2: you know. Oh does your daughter have a graduation party?
Speaker 2: Or does your daughter's character have a graduation.
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 2: I'm out of here, Thank you very much. This has
Speaker 2: been a great fucking meeting.
Speaker 8: FU meaning one of those dict Cheatham types is like
Speaker 8: people who are forced to deal with ww TRU exactly.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm done here.
Speaker 5: Wow.
Speaker 8: Whatever it is, just the toy Bis deal is going
Speaker 8: to be massive yeah, right, we are in control. Fish
Speaker 8: off tremendous with the black hair Jet black.
Speaker 2: Oh for sure, that's just in big fucking shitty grin.
Speaker 2: So we finished that.
Speaker 8: That's it right, Yeah, there's a big difference between the
Speaker 8: guy and television and the guy in the room. So
Speaker 8: Nitro is riding high man twenty three weeks running. Let's see,
Speaker 8: they replayed the Hogan Piper World War three angle the
Speaker 8: next night on Nitro and almost its entirety interestingly enough, really,
Speaker 8: and that did the peak number in the second hour,
Speaker 8: four point zero for a tape that used to really
Speaker 8: work for them at WCW. Remember the showing the Goldberg
Speaker 8: DDP holloween havoc match that everyone lost out on. Yep,
Speaker 8: not everyone, but that was the last time they ever
Speaker 8: won the Monday Night Wars. It's a fucking tape of
Speaker 8: the main event of a pay per view airing. They
Speaker 8: should have just done that. Wow, I'd hurt their pay
Speaker 8: per view bys But man, that was always great when
Speaker 8: people could get a full kind of unadulterated glimpse at
Speaker 8: what happened on the pay per view. They would watch
Speaker 8: that shit, they would soak that up. So the way
Speaker 8: it was going at the time. Let's see Ra's numbers,
Speaker 8: Meltzer reported continued to be disappointing since the show featured
Speaker 8: Brett Hart's first television match against Owen. That's after, of course,
Speaker 8: he announced he was staying. All right, all right, yeah,
Speaker 8: all right, that's a live interview with Michael's head to headquarter.
Speaker 8: Nitro open two point five to two point one edge,
Speaker 8: but increased its lead to three point Oher to one
Speaker 8: point nine Nitro three point zero Raw one point nine
Speaker 8: during a Bischoff interview angle. The gap narrowed after that,
Speaker 8: but Nitro never had less than a point five lead.
Speaker 5: Again.
Speaker 8: This is the night after World War Three. Nitro's peak
Speaker 8: in the second hour was four point zero for the
Speaker 8: tape of the Piper Hogan angle from the pay per
Speaker 8: view the night before, and the Mysterio Junior Varsity Coosis match,
Speaker 8: dropping to a three point four for Jeff Jarrett versus
Speaker 8: Alex Right and minging the Barbarian versus Harlem heat and
Speaker 8: the ending angle. And I think that's the Nitro hour unopposed,
Speaker 8: I think at that time, because Rob wasn't two hours
Speaker 8: yet that started until the night Sid won the belt. Right,
Speaker 8: that was the first two hour raw.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, and then replay of Nitro even would do
Speaker 2: good numbers. That was cool.
Speaker 8: Bischoff always talks about that, like they would they would
Speaker 8: wrap TV and they'd go to the bar at the
Speaker 8: hotel and they'd watch the replay and like kind of
Speaker 8: you know, game plan, like a tape review.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I thought that that.
Speaker 8: I can picture all the guys being in a bar.
Speaker 8: They have it to themselves. It's a Monday night at like,
Speaker 8: you know, eleven thirty, so it's not like anyone's around
Speaker 8: and everyone's watching their shit back and making comments and
Speaker 8: oh that actually got over, and everyone's eating and drinking.
Speaker 8: I like to picture that. It was simply that the
Speaker 8: Nabour of Nitro be the first hour. Okay, yeah, this
Speaker 8: is what's going on in the newsletters at the time
Speaker 8: around the idea of the nwo's own television show or
Speaker 8: their own hour of Nitro.
Speaker 2: Yeah, go ahead, I want to hear what peop want
Speaker 2: to say.
Speaker 8: It was simply that this is reporting on it. It
Speaker 8: was simply that the nWo hour of Nitro will be
Speaker 8: the first hour. Because the theory at WCW, and we'll
Speaker 8: certainly find out if it's correct, is that people watch
Speaker 8: the shows now mainly for nWo. Judging from the reaction
Speaker 8: of the arenas, I'd guess it's a logical assumption. So
Speaker 8: they wanted to put nWo head to head with RAW,
Speaker 8: and Eric Bischoff wants to be on the air at
Speaker 8: the same time as Vince McMahon. It's that simple and
Speaker 8: there's nothing more to it than that. So in the
Speaker 8: nWo hour starts, which should be in a week or two,
Speaker 8: which did end up happening, Bischoff and Larry's Obisco will
Speaker 8: do that hour and the second hour will be Tony
Speaker 8: Shavanni who walked off the first hour this week after
Speaker 8: an argument with Zibisco, Bobby Heenen and Mike today. So
Speaker 8: they're saying that the head to head hour, which is
Speaker 8: nine to ten, because they were on an hour after
Speaker 8: Raw was during nine to ten they wanted to have
Speaker 8: Bishoff on the air, and so that's the because WWF's on,
Speaker 8: and so that's the reason the nWo would have gotten
Speaker 8: hour one instead of hour two. I think great stuff
Speaker 8: didn't happen. Wonder why, I know why, because this is
Speaker 8: a stupid idea. Yeah, I mean, it's not a company,
Speaker 8: it's a fucking it's a stable. How hard is that
Speaker 8: they want their own television show? They just want to
Speaker 8: fuck with people? Why do they want their own television show?
Speaker 8: This didn't make any sense.
Speaker 2: It makes no sense, and it starts.
Speaker 8: This is the beginning of basically a year of this shit.
Speaker 8: Like his nWo show going to start soon. It just
Speaker 8: would go on week after week. The date would be
Speaker 8: pushed out. This reads the word we got this isn't.
Speaker 8: The observer was the nWo R of Nitro would start
Speaker 8: on December second. However, on the November twenty fifth show,
Speaker 8: there was no mention of that happening next week. The
Speaker 8: last word was that Dbias and Bischoff would announce the
Speaker 8: first hour. And this is of course the plans that
Speaker 8: fell to the wayside. Bishoff on his podcast, talking about
Speaker 8: how Ted DIBIASI just was not comfortable in the role
Speaker 8: of nWo color commentator, Bishoff remembers DBAs as being awkward
Speaker 8: as part of the nWo. Originally, Bischoffs had his intent
Speaker 8: in bringing him in was to do color commentary, and
Speaker 8: he felt that Debisi was kind of so so in
Speaker 8: that role, and then he thought he'd be part of
Speaker 8: the nWo, So it was not that day one Dbisi
Speaker 8: would be nWo, but that.
Speaker 2: He'd be color.
Speaker 8: And he said, yeah, he hate a great voice and
Speaker 8: a great look and all the credibility in the world.
Speaker 8: And he could have been the mouthpiece because he could
Speaker 8: cut great promos. So they figured he could be a
Speaker 8: WO mouthpiece, but it just wasn't something he was comfortable doing.
Speaker 8: So I guess to be the mouthpiece of the nWo
Speaker 8: just wasn't a role. Debis had just found God and
Speaker 8: all that too.
Speaker 2: There was that I.
Speaker 8: Remember, right, it came out about you know, Jesus saving
Speaker 8: his life and all that shit. So so maybe that
Speaker 8: that played into it too, So it didn't end up happening.
Speaker 8: But that's kind of the the lot the dynam dynamism
Speaker 8: of what's happening at the time in WCW around World
Speaker 8: War Three. Here's Bishoff on his podcast talking a bit
Speaker 8: more about it.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean there was a dual purpose. I think
Speaker 3: my role in the nWo, at least on paper, and
Speaker 3: I think, you know, trying to be as subjective as
Speaker 3: I can or objective as I can. I think I
Speaker 3: did a pretty decent job and it was a necessary role.
Speaker 3: nWo needed their version of Gene Oakland, which is really
Speaker 3: all I was. But I was the president of the company.
Speaker 3: The underlying storyline is the outsiders nWo were coming in
Speaker 3: to take over WCW. What better way to take over
Speaker 3: WCW than to, you know, have the owner or excuse me,
Speaker 3: the president of the company betray the very company he's
Speaker 3: president of inside with nWo. So I think from a
Speaker 3: storytelling point of view, it made sense. From a functional
Speaker 3: point of view, nWo needed their gene Oakland, and that's
Speaker 3: really what my role was. And I think moving me
Speaker 3: away from commentary, the only way that that role would
Speaker 3: have been effective would be for me to leave commentary.
Speaker 3: The other part of the and I'll be honest about it, is,
Speaker 3: you know, doing commentary while.
Speaker 2: Yeah, was tough.
Speaker 3: Yeah, there was a lot of other things going on
Speaker 3: that needed my attention.
Speaker 5: So it was.
Speaker 3: It was kind of a necessary move in some respect.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 8: So he also kind of says that he was getting
Speaker 8: tired of, you know, announcing on Nitro while backstage a
Speaker 8: million things are happening that kind of require his sign
Speaker 8: which I can see is it got live and more
Speaker 8: dynamic and live every week, and all the things that
Speaker 8: happened with Nitro is they did all kinds of experimental
Speaker 8: stuff and risky stuff. One thing that doesn't get talked
Speaker 8: about a lot in this context at this time period
Speaker 8: is that Gene Okerland's WCW contract had come due. He
Speaker 8: had made his last appearance in I think November of
Speaker 8: ninety six. Obviously he's on this pay per view, but
Speaker 8: that was kind of like a return. He had been
Speaker 8: kind of in contractual limbo for a little while in
Speaker 8: late ninety six. It wasn't clear if he was going
Speaker 8: to resign with WCW. So my kind of theory is
Speaker 8: that what happened is they're all sitting around trying to
Speaker 8: figure out what they could do if Gene Okerland leaves WCW,
Speaker 8: and they start talking about, well, maybe Bischoff could be
Speaker 8: the stick man, be the Oakreland. Not for the nWo,
Speaker 8: but just you know, he'd have to be the Oakreland
Speaker 8: of WCW because Oakland was going to be gone, right,
Speaker 8: So it wasn't just a question and he'd done that job,
Speaker 8: you know, he had done the Genie Oakerland backstage interviewer
Speaker 8: job before at WCW. And then I bet what happens
Speaker 8: is not I bet, but I can imagine what happens
Speaker 8: is as time goes and it becomes clear that Jean's
Speaker 8: sticking around, someone says, what about if you were the
Speaker 8: nwo's guy that did this, and it goes from there,
Speaker 8: but no one seems to mention that, you know, gene
Speaker 8: Oakerland When Eric Bischoff says he was going to be
Speaker 8: the NWOS Gen Oakland, that at the time they would
Speaker 8: have been discussing this, Gene Oakland would have his status
Speaker 8: would have been up in the air anyway. Yeah, so
Speaker 8: that's going to be part of it. And another part
Speaker 8: of dealing with the heal, Eric Bischoff, is that it
Speaker 8: kind of makes the WCW higher brass. I'm talking about
Speaker 8: the Turner executives looked like morons because if yeah, right,
Speaker 8: if like you just said, the guy who runs ww
Speaker 8: turns on the group, shouldn't you fire him immediately?
Speaker 5: Yes?
Speaker 8: Why would he be allowed to continue as WCW president
Speaker 8: if he did this? It kind of boxes in a
Speaker 8: Harvey Schiller in his Whole Division here, Beschoff talks a
Speaker 8: little bit about that dynamic.
Speaker 2: It did create some.
Speaker 3: I don't want to say chaos, but there were different
Speaker 3: opinions of it. You know, I think there were Internally
Speaker 3: it was like, Eric, are you going a little too
Speaker 3: far with this?
Speaker 5: No?
Speaker 3: I mean, really, you are the president of the company.
Speaker 3: Do you think it makes sense for you to take
Speaker 3: on this particular role? Might be a little too much.
Speaker 3: There was a lot of that. Harvey Shuler was a
Speaker 3: little concerned about that because I was literally the guy,
Speaker 3: you know, when we weren't doing nitro, right, we weren't
Speaker 3: at a pay per view.
Speaker 5: I was.
Speaker 3: I was the guy out an airplane meeting with advertising executives,
Speaker 3: or a meeting with potential sponsors, meeting with the head
Speaker 3: of EA Sports, for example, and walked away with a
Speaker 3: ten million dollars check hand when I did. But it's
Speaker 3: a little challenging to play a character like I was
Speaker 3: playing and then put on a different hat and go
Speaker 3: out and conduct business in the real world without creating
Speaker 3: a little bit of confusion. So there was some concern,
Speaker 3: but it was worth the risk to me. Really didn't
Speaker 3: understand wrestling. You've got to remember that there were a
Speaker 3: lot of people, including you talk about people in a
Speaker 3: North Tower that were concerned.
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 3: I would go back to the scene where I fired
Speaker 3: Randy Anderson in front of his wife and kids, and
Speaker 3: I looked down at his kids and tell your daddy,
Speaker 3: he still fired. You know, I actually got a phone
Speaker 3: call from Harvey, who was concerned because he thought, or
Speaker 3: people in a North Tower thought that I actually really
Speaker 3: did fire Randy Anderson on national television. I thought it
Speaker 3: was going to be a pr human resource nightmare because
Speaker 3: even people within Turner became confused as to whether or
Speaker 3: not I was really the president of the company acting
Speaker 3: in such a way, or if I was the president
Speaker 3: of the company playing a character. So you can I
Speaker 3: have to assume that if people with in Turner Broadcasting
Speaker 3: were confused, people probably outside of the company might be too.
Speaker 3: And that was Harvey's concern. But again, Harvey was a
Speaker 3: great dude man. He was a good leader. He expressed
Speaker 3: his concern. He wanted to make sure that I knew
Speaker 3: what I was doing and that I was prepared for
Speaker 3: the fallout if there was any. He laid out his concerns,
Speaker 3: I laid out my position, and I carried on Harvin's
Speaker 3: That's right. I mean, let's be clear about that.
Speaker 2: Harvin.
Speaker 8: Remember Harvey Schiller, he would actually kind of do what
Speaker 8: we were just suggesting and come on television. First, they
Speaker 8: did JJ Dillon. He was like the commissioner who'd come
Speaker 8: out as the guy above Eric's head and funck with
Speaker 8: him but not fire him, kind of like resolved to
Speaker 8: torture him instead of fire him, and they had Schiller
Speaker 8: himself come out. He was later replaced by Brad Siegel,
Speaker 8: of course, and that's when a lot of things change
Speaker 8: to WCW and kind of tongue lash Eric Bischoff as
Speaker 8: well as for Tony Shavanni.
Speaker 2: He loved this angle. Do you know why what I'm on? Nitro?
Speaker 5: Oh?
Speaker 2: Right about that?
Speaker 8: Right now Eric is no longer in the announced position,
Speaker 8: and we go on to think if Tony Shavanni as
Speaker 8: the indelible voice of Nitro, And that wasn't the case
Speaker 8: for the first year of the program. He was just
Speaker 8: the second hour announcer, and now the whole show is his,
Speaker 8: even when it expands to three hours. So that was
Speaker 8: that was a plus for him, as he's talked about
Speaker 8: on his podcast, and he thinks eventually, actually a bit
Speaker 8: of overexposure hurt him too much, because it hurt him
Speaker 8: a bit because he was doing too much. But yeah,
Speaker 8: that's that's that's a Shavanni's perspective on it. Let's also
Speaker 8: remember well, I should also note I should say that
Speaker 8: Bischoff said on a podcast with Conrad that this was
Speaker 8: this heel turn was planned two months out. So yeah,
Speaker 8: that puts me pretty much right where they were worried
Speaker 8: about Gene Okerland in his status and whether he wou returned.
Speaker 8: So he's out there doing interviews now. And not only
Speaker 8: is Hulk Hogan out there trying to figure out how
Speaker 8: to navigate the public as a heel, Bischoff's got to
Speaker 8: worry about that too. And here's an article that I'd
Speaker 8: like you to share with the Solar System Boss where
Speaker 8: Eric Bischoff kind of tries to wear a new skin
Speaker 8: in doing a media interview. This is from the posting courier,
Speaker 8: Oh Boy, Mike mooneyham over in Charleston, South Carolina.
Speaker 2: This is from November twenty fourth, nineteen ninety six. So
Speaker 2: I believe World War three day. Indeed, here he is
Speaker 2: as a heel doing a press interview. WCW Executive vice
Speaker 2: president Eric Bischoff took the NW angle one step further
Speaker 2: Monday night in Florence. Bischoff's done the Monday nitro audience
Speaker 2: by joining forces with the Hulk Hogan in the New
Speaker 2: World Order. The move sets up the nwo's upcoming quote
Speaker 2: takeover unquote of Nitro's First Hour, which will feature Bischoff
Speaker 2: and Teddy Biassi in the heel announcing roles. Ww's philosophy
Speaker 2: of rapid fire hotshot angles, however, has produced a dilemma
Speaker 2: with his latest development. How will Bischoff, long acknowledged on
Speaker 2: areas WW Boss, ever regain his credibility as a legitimate executive.
Speaker 2: Why isn't he fired by WCW owner Ted Turner. Those
Speaker 2: these and other important questions may never be answered as
Speaker 2: WCW continues to look for short term ratings victories over
Speaker 2: the World Wrestling Entertainment. But make no mistake about it,
Speaker 2: Bischof's main real life rival is WW owner Vince McMahon.
Speaker 2: W CW, behind the expanded two hour Nitro show in
Speaker 2: the successful NW angle has thumped the WWE twenty three
Speaker 2: straight weeks in the Monday Night ratings war. The credit,
Speaker 2: in large part goes to Bischoff for his aggressive style
Speaker 2: and risky but successful initiative to go head to head
Speaker 2: with the once dominant WWE. Ironically, Bischoff once interviewed for
Speaker 2: a job with the WWE, but McMahon maintains that he
Speaker 2: never even remembers Bischoff. I really don't know him, McMahon said.
Speaker 2: I'm told I met him when he came up here
Speaker 2: for an audition as an announcer. I don't even remember
Speaker 2: that Bischoff. However, an interview earlier this year often offered
Speaker 2: a different account of that meeting in June of nineteen ninety.
Speaker 2: I was down there for an interview and audition and
Speaker 2: talked to Vince for probably half an hour. If he
Speaker 2: doesn't remember it, perhaps he was engaged in some of
Speaker 2: his admitted chemical activity during that time.
Speaker 5: But I was there.
Speaker 2: He was there. What is clear is that McMahon didn't
Speaker 2: know Bischoff, then he certainly does now. Bischoff, key behind
Speaker 2: key talent hirings and innovative measures, has been the driving
Speaker 2: force behind ww's phenomenal success during the past year. The
Speaker 2: forty one year old Eric Bischoff is candid to the
Speaker 2: point of being brutally frank when discussing the opposition the
Speaker 2: nonsense of perception of reality that Vince mcman, a guy
Speaker 2: who has admitted using steroids to try to beef up
Speaker 2: what was otherwise a scrawny, frail little individual. I think
Speaker 2: when he wakes up in the morning, he looks in
Speaker 2: the mirror and sees that eighty pound bird face punk
Speaker 2: that nobody wanted to play with, and he has to
Speaker 2: deal with that every day. And the way he's trying
Speaker 2: to deal with it with is trying to create this perception.
Speaker 2: And I just hope people are smart enough to see
Speaker 2: through this nonsense and deal with Rich War. This was
Speaker 2: war Bischoff's views on the other assorted issues and personalities.
Speaker 2: Bischof's future in the business. I'm pretty happy where I am.
Speaker 2: One of the neat things about w W is that
Speaker 2: I can stay here and grow this business in ways
Speaker 2: that no one is even thinking about. I've gotten offers
Speaker 2: to do other things for more money, but it's not
Speaker 2: the money they keep that's keeping me here. It's a
Speaker 2: love for what I do, and also the people I
Speaker 2: work with. Paul Orendorf, Kevin Sullivan, Jimmy Hart, and Arn
Speaker 2: Anderson stand out in my mind a lot. The booking
Speaker 2: is one thing, but the thing that I've grown so
Speaker 2: attached to is the people in the office. Craig Leathers
Speaker 2: David Crockett, Tony Shavani. There are people there there who
Speaker 2: have been there since nineteen eighty nine, have suffered through
Speaker 2: the reigns of Bill Wats, Jim Hurd, keep Fry, and
Speaker 2: Dusty Rhodes and others. Bishop's vision for the future. I
Speaker 2: don't have a wrestling background. I understand wrestling. It's not
Speaker 2: rocket science, despite what people think. But I've always looked
Speaker 2: at wrestling as one of the purest forms of entertainment
Speaker 2: on the planet. I've always looked at wrestling as just
Speaker 2: the tip of the iceberg. WCW is not a wrestling company,
Speaker 2: Oh god, Oh my god. Our mission statement says that
Speaker 2: we aren't action based, oh character driven entertainment company. Fucking hell,
Speaker 2: and that means a whole lot more than a whole
Speaker 2: lot less than wrestling. Yeah right, I know Vin snick
Speaker 2: Mahn talks about them being an entertainment company, but we're
Speaker 2: actually executing my vision. Bishop's response to critics who claims
Speaker 2: he's using ww as a springboard for more lucrat positions.
Speaker 2: When people say I'm just using wrestling to get somewhere
Speaker 2: else in turner, that's bullshit. There's nothing else I'd rather
Speaker 2: there's nowhere else I'd rather be. I have more freedom
Speaker 2: of WW than probably one percent of the people at
Speaker 2: my level of turn want to work somewhere else in Turner,
Speaker 2: I'm not working somewhere else than Turner, and I wouldn't
Speaker 2: want to work somewhere else other than the Turner. The
Speaker 2: competition between WW and WWE. I love competition. I like
Speaker 2: having someone to fight with. This would be a really
Speaker 2: boring situation if it were not for the opportunity to
Speaker 2: beat the incumbent, to prove to the world that this
Speaker 2: guy everybody thinks is a genius is basically an insecure
Speaker 2: person who was in the right place at the right
Speaker 2: time and quite frankly, took some very big risks and
Speaker 2: were good risks. But he's not the genius people think
Speaker 2: he is. I love it.
Speaker 8: I love it so much. I mean gloves off, and
Speaker 8: Vince was not ready for that. Vince was not accustomed
Speaker 8: to being called out as the owner like that. I mean,
Speaker 8: not newspapers.
Speaker 2: You know, I believe that, you know, we as a
Speaker 2: as a as an entertainment organization, have the obligation to
Speaker 2: do just that. Entertainment and the personal attacks of one
Speaker 2: Eric Bischoff I don't know what his beef is, but
Speaker 2: I can tell you right now that as an individual
Speaker 2: who has prospered in the field of entertainment and on
Speaker 2: a global level with global ramifications, that I do believe
Speaker 2: that with global ramifications, that we will continue to strive
Speaker 2: to do exactly what we do best, which has put
Speaker 2: smiles on faces in and around the world great response.
Speaker 8: Talk about a clap back, I mean, that's basically like
Speaker 8: Eminem's closing wrap in eight mile. That's how much of
Speaker 8: a a mic drop that was global impact wherever you
Speaker 8: said global consequence. But at the end of the day,
Speaker 8: we can thank Bischoff for forcing WW to change and
Speaker 8: you know, laying that groundwork for the heel Vince.
Speaker 3: Again, we didn't know, None of us knew that the
Speaker 3: end of you Want a storyline was going to become.
Speaker 3: When it became, we thought it was a pretty cool idea.
Speaker 3: We thought it would last six months or so, three four, five,
Speaker 3: six months. We thought it was a hot angle. Obviously,
Speaker 3: Hogan turning was a big deal, but none of us
Speaker 3: saw it coming. And then as it got bigger and
Speaker 3: bigger and bigger and more and more powerful, more successful
Speaker 3: crowds were going up. Television ratings were going up, pay
Speaker 3: per view by rates were going up, merchandise was flying
Speaker 3: off the shelves.
Speaker 2: It was like, whoa wait a minute. We didn't see
Speaker 2: this coming. How do we keep it going?
Speaker 3: How do we continue to build this? So I would
Speaker 3: say to answer your questions succinctly as I can, probably
Speaker 3: about two months it would be my guests, because we
Speaker 3: did have to plan. We did have to think about, Okay,
Speaker 3: if I do this, what happens next? How do we
Speaker 3: handle broadcast? How do we handle certain things? What's the
Speaker 3: role really going to be? David McClay says, why is
Speaker 3: it that nobody really talks about how you came up
Speaker 3: with the heel real life boss persona a year before
Speaker 3: Vincement ran?
Speaker 2: Oh, I don't know.
Speaker 3: You know, revisionist history, you know, bullshit, dirt sheet, narrative,
Speaker 3: biased coverage, all kinds of reasons.
Speaker 2: But it really doesn't matter.
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 2: It used to bug me a little bit, but I'm
Speaker 2: over it.
Speaker 3: It's just another example of the things that WCW did
Speaker 3: first and did better. Then eventually the wwe had to
Speaker 3: follow our pattern.
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 3: Somebody asked me recently, very recently, what am I most
Speaker 3: proud of. And that's a hard question with regard to
Speaker 3: my career in wrestling, and particularly during the Monday night work.
Speaker 3: And there's a lot of things, some of them really little,
Speaker 3: some of them probably don't mean anything to anybody but me,
Speaker 3: and some of them very big. But at the core
Speaker 3: of it, I would say it's because I forced WWE
Speaker 3: and Vince McMahon to change the way they did business.
Speaker 3: And anybody that knows Vince McMahon or worked for Vince
Speaker 3: McMahon knows that that's not an easy thing to accomplish.
Speaker 3: And not only did I get vincemicmahon to sell and
Speaker 3: to react when everybody told me for so long, you know,
Speaker 3: Vinch will never sell anything. He'll never acknowledge the competition.
Speaker 3: It's not the way Vince McMahon does business. Well, it
Speaker 3: wasn't the way Vince McMahon did business until I forced
Speaker 3: him to change. And I'm proud of that because it
Speaker 3: made WWE a better place, a stronger company, a more
Speaker 3: successful product in the audience benefit as a result. That's
Speaker 3: why you saw vincmacman become the evil boss that I
Speaker 3: had done a year sooner. That's why you saw the
Speaker 3: DX in the Attitude era, which was nothing more than
Speaker 3: a derivative, and I'm being behind of the nWo and
Speaker 3: it was nothing.
Speaker 2: I mean, look at he forced him to go live
Speaker 2: each and every week.
Speaker 3: All of those things were things that I did and
Speaker 3: I was solely, in many respects responsible for. And it's
Speaker 3: not because on a personal level, I was proud that
Speaker 3: I've forced Vincent Man to react to me. I'm proud
Speaker 3: because I forced them to react to me, and it
Speaker 3: improved the industry. That's what I'm proud of. It made
Speaker 3: it a better product. It made wrestling during the Monday
Speaker 3: Night War era probably still today the most talked about
Speaker 3: thing in the wrestling industry on an ongoing basis. It's
Speaker 3: the reason why there are there's an nWo merchandise out
Speaker 3: there that is some of the top selling merchandise in
Speaker 3: the wrestling industry today twenty five years after the fact.
Speaker 2: All of that was because.
Speaker 3: Nitro changed the industry and forced the WWE to change
Speaker 3: their approach, and I think everybody benefited benefited from It's
Speaker 3: not an ego thing. The industry is a better place
Speaker 3: as a result of it, and I'm very proud of that.
Speaker 8: Certainly, the hell off was some of the groundwork for Vince.
Speaker 8: The Vince thing is weird because he was the He
Speaker 8: was the actual final boss, you know what I mean,
Speaker 8: you didn't have anybody above him.
Speaker 5: Who wha whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa.
Speaker 8: You can create this kind of you can believe more
Speaker 8: when Vince went nuts trying to stop Steve Austin, but
Speaker 8: he didn't. It's not like one night Vince like kicked
Speaker 8: the top, baby face and the balls and joined a
Speaker 8: heal stable.
Speaker 5: Well.
Speaker 2: Also, I mean there is a difference, Like I think
Speaker 2: people people have always wanted to hate Vince nick Mann,
Speaker 2: you know, I think that's especially in the in the
Speaker 2: in the in the nineties. Throughout the nineties, people really
Speaker 2: really wanted to hate Vince pick Mahn. So it's a
Speaker 2: little bit not sure they had hatred for Bishoff. You know,
Speaker 2: he talks about the dirt sheets and stuff. Right, Well,
Speaker 2: I don't think he had enough. I mean, yeah, dirt
Speaker 2: sheets might have had, but but fans didn't. Fans I
Speaker 2: don't think cared nearly as much anything to him. You know,
Speaker 2: he was just like right right, Carnival Barker guy on Nitro, Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: he's not like he could be annoying, but he wasn't.
Speaker 2: I think people had some deep issues with Vince McMahon. Yeah,
Speaker 2: that helped make that be a much bigger deal than
Speaker 2: Bischoff turning joining with the NW. I do wonder two
Speaker 2: because when Vince joined, when Vince turned on on Austin
Speaker 2: and became a heel, they had already done, you know,
Speaker 2: a year plus worth of television. That made it abundantly
Speaker 2: clear to the people watching that the announcer, Vince McMahon
Speaker 2: was the actual boss and owner of the company. Right.
Speaker 8: I do wonder if the average WCW fan that was
Speaker 8: watching that Nitro even knew that Bischoff was more than
Speaker 8: just the ww announcer and that he was the owner.
Speaker 2: And well I knew because his his name came up
Speaker 2: with the Crows what it was. Yeah, I knew there
Speaker 2: was that there was more to meets the eye with him.
Speaker 2: When because I remember seeing you know, executive producer Eric
Speaker 2: It's interesting, or executive vice president of whatever it was,
Speaker 2: what the fright you was the executive.
Speaker 8: Of That's that's that's a good point. I never thought
Speaker 8: about that. I just never watched the credits back then.
Speaker 8: But or paid punch attention. Well I needed to. I
Speaker 8: needed to to get the whole thing on tape.
Speaker 2: Oh so you're sitting there waiting to press stop. That's
Speaker 2: huge too. You just time that.
Speaker 8: You had to time that perfectly, Like if you got
Speaker 8: a second of the next thing, it was a failure.
Speaker 2: Oh, I'd be fucking miserable, Like, oh, you.
Speaker 8: Wanted to start on black screen and end on black screen? Yep,
Speaker 8: so that so that the next show could like just
Speaker 8: pick up. And it was like, see, God, never was
Speaker 8: the case.
Speaker 5: Never was.
Speaker 2: I never stopped trying. I tried to the day I
Speaker 2: fucking stopped the truth.
Speaker 5: Yea.
Speaker 8: So as far as like you know, the kind of
Speaker 8: business transformation is talking about it, it was a real thing,
Speaker 8: of course. WW year over year stats we have here
Speaker 8: when from an estimated average attendants in November of nineteen
Speaker 8: ninety five of two thousand and seven fifty by November
Speaker 8: ninety six, thirty six, a forty six point eight percent
Speaker 8: increase year over year in their live attendance, to say
Speaker 8: nothing of the gate, which was up one hundred and
Speaker 8: ten percent from an average gate of twenty four thousand
Speaker 8: bucks in November ninety five to fifty thousand bucks. In
Speaker 8: November of ninety six, house shows sold out one from
Speaker 8: zero to twenty percent, and the cable television rating bumped
Speaker 8: up ten percent, not as much as you might think
Speaker 8: November ninety five two point zero November ninety six two
Speaker 8: point two, but still going in decidedly one direction.
Speaker 2: The pay per view haul also up.
Speaker 8: The nineteen ninety five World War three did a one
Speaker 8: point one to one million dollars in overall revenue. The
Speaker 8: nineteen ninety six World War three did one point three
Speaker 8: seven million dollars in overall revenue, with a point five
Speaker 8: to five by rate in ninety six compared to a
Speaker 8: point four to three in nineteen ninety five, So we're
Speaker 8: looking at twenty thirty percent increases year over year. Ww
Speaker 8: begins to climb. WWF is also improving in ninety six.
Speaker 8: Big and important to remember, of course, ninety five was
Speaker 8: the absolute doldrums for them. Doesn't get much worse than
Speaker 8: ninety five, so to say that numbers were up in
Speaker 8: ninety six isn't saying all that much. But it's looking
Speaker 8: pretty good. The TV ratings, though, we're we're kind of
Speaker 8: getting hit from ninety five to ninety six, as they
Speaker 8: went from an average cable rating in November of ninety
Speaker 8: five of one point seven between average cable rating and
Speaker 8: November tow eighty six of one point three, which is
Speaker 8: Meltzer notes at a twenty three percent decrease is an
Speaker 8: all time low monthly average for the promotion cable, So
Speaker 8: they are definitely feeling it. It's not like both ships
Speaker 8: are going up and nitros going up a little more.
Speaker 8: It's that WWW's going way up in WWF's going way
Speaker 8: down in rating, So there's no no games you can
Speaker 8: play to try to pretend that that's not the case.
Speaker 8: But some REVERER series was up for them year over
Speaker 8: year as well, so bright spots. I guess on both
Speaker 8: sides of the ledger. As form World War Three, it
Speaker 8: goes from and its short existence, a one point one
Speaker 8: one million dollar haul to a one point three million
Speaker 8: dollar hall. By nineteen ninety seven it's one point eight
Speaker 8: four million dollars. The wiring continues to climb and by
Speaker 8: ninety eight, the final World War three, which was the
Speaker 8: cold revenue year for WCW two point eight million dollars,
Speaker 8: no ship making one point one million. On World War Three,
Speaker 8: the first one to two point eight in just four years.
Speaker 2: Well, it's it's the only one. It never went never
Speaker 2: went down. That's amazing. We mentioned Sting. He was in
Speaker 2: a weird place too, mentioned Gene Oakland. One of the
Speaker 2: reasons the Observer reports that this whole angle with the
Speaker 2: Sting is going on where he's showing up mysteriously in
Speaker 2: the white paint is because apparently Sting had a specified
Speaker 2: amount of dates that were max in his contract, and
Speaker 2: ww ON had a few dates left and they needed
Speaker 2: him for some major house shows, so they had to
Speaker 2: get him off of television. So you know, necessity is
Speaker 2: the mother of invention. Yeah, I don't remember who suggested it.
Speaker 8: Yeah, you don't remember who suggested it, because the whole
Speaker 8: reason you did it was because you fucking maxed out
Speaker 8: his contract.
Speaker 2: I don't remember who. Who's the disident, Yeah, just like.
Speaker 8: He can't remember why they took the TNA title off
Speaker 8: Van Damn so quickly when he's because this contract had
Speaker 8: reached the maximum dates and people weren't paying enough attention.
Speaker 2: Now that that's too much for me.
Speaker 8: That one of the great, one of the great gimmicks
Speaker 8: everyone wrestling, and particularly the Mondy A War's era, Sting
Speaker 8: happened because they didn't have dates on him anymore, so
Speaker 8: they needed a storyline reason that he would not be
Speaker 8: at Nitro every week full of stuff. But yeah, the
Speaker 8: history of WWWW website and the ww section does have
Speaker 8: Sting working a television taping. They went to Disney MGM
Speaker 8: as they used to do for you know, three four
Speaker 8: nights of taping and they would tape syndication for like
Speaker 8: two months in just those days. So November seventh, eighth, ninth,
Speaker 8: and tenth of ninety six there they were in on
Speaker 8: the tenth and I think other nights as well. The
Speaker 8: results aren't really in for those tapings. These were the
Speaker 8: free tapings opened to park goers. It wasn't like people
Speaker 8: were taking very close notes on winners and losers. They
Speaker 8: were just randoms walking into the park. Occasionally though, someone
Speaker 8: would you know, go in who was a fan and
Speaker 8: send results to the newsletters.
Speaker 2: And we do have that. On November tenth, nineteen ninety six, okay,
Speaker 2: at the Disney MGM studios, Sting wrestles and beats Hu
Speaker 2: Morris on these tapings. Watch exists on tape find it
Speaker 2: vault now now is it that number? Tenth ninety six
Speaker 2: Sting is Wrestling Boss three months almost three months after fall, bro,
Speaker 2: I need to see it. What's he wearing, what's he doing? Yeah,
Speaker 2: it's his mannerisms. What's his finish? What's his music? That's
Speaker 2: a question. What still a man called Sting? Well, let's
Speaker 2: talk about it. What's what should see his music be?
Speaker 2: That's one piece we didn't touch. I've seen his music
Speaker 2: should be. Oh shit, did you have like a slow
Speaker 2: violin idea or something?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Well, oh yeah, I did have kind of like a
Speaker 2: classical music type thing, something very very different. Or I
Speaker 2: was thinking that it could be like, yeah, like a
Speaker 2: violent version of his theme. You know, that could be
Speaker 2: kind of a question, you know.
Speaker 8: Of course, he had this heel track that he had
Speaker 8: created in case he went heel against the Rock and
Speaker 8: that back to back Wrestling Ania series they did, which
Speaker 8: was an idea that was being considered, and I guess
Speaker 8: it got leaked this and I don't know, I listened
Speaker 8: to it. I guess it sounds like it's just like
Speaker 8: a more aggressive rap. It's not like a departure from
Speaker 8: the rap theme, which I'm not saying it has to be,
Speaker 8: but I do.
Speaker 2: Feel like the rap. I feel like the rap is
Speaker 2: going to be too close familiar.
Speaker 8: Yeah, okay, all right, that's established something else that's going
Speaker 8: on in this whole vein of like you know, Hogan
Speaker 8: turns heel and has to still do media bishof turns
Speaker 8: heel and still has to do business deals. Sting has
Speaker 8: to pretend to be a fucking recluse and he still
Speaker 8: got obligations based on when he wasn't a recluse, including
Speaker 8: this appearance here. This is from October second of nineteen
Speaker 8: ninety six. Sting races the nWo Threat at the All
Speaker 8: Pro Bumper to Bumper three hundred. Okay, this is what
Speaker 8: Stings up to. Wrestling Action hits top speeds at the
Speaker 8: racetrack on Saturday, October fifth, as former World Championship Wrestling
Speaker 8: w W number twenty nine car driven by Elliott Sadler
Speaker 8: becomes a new Sting car with a signature face paint
Speaker 8: design at the Busch Series All Pro bumpered of Mumper
Speaker 8: three hundred at the Charlotte Motor Speedway. The new number
Speaker 8: twenty nine Sting car design will be seen for the
Speaker 8: remainder of the Bush season season. This I think is
Speaker 8: the black and white Sting. They changed the car to
Speaker 8: look like the new Sting. This radical look is a
Speaker 8: defiant challenge to the Kyle Perry Kyle Petty driven number
Speaker 8: forty nine Champion Motorsports Monte Carlo sponsored by the New
Speaker 8: World Order that will compete at the Busch Series All
Speaker 8: Pro Bumper of Bumper three hundred. The NWOL led by
Speaker 8: Hollywood Hulkogan, along with the Giant Kevin Nash and Scott Hall,
Speaker 8: have threatened World Championship Wrestling with a hostile takeover by
Speaker 8: challenging WCW superstars Macho Manraady Savage, Sting, Lex Luger and
Speaker 8: Rick Flair. Sting, who will be in the number twenty
Speaker 8: nine pits on race day so he showed up at
Speaker 8: the Charlotte Motor Speedway to make a promotional appearance as
Speaker 8: Sting after becoming the Crow Guy in October. Yeah welcomes
Speaker 8: the nWo challenge. Bring it on hard and fast, said Sting.
Speaker 8: The Numberumber twenty nine car is out to win the race.
Speaker 8: Beating the nWo will take care of itself. W SEW
Speaker 8: superstar Marchumin Ready Savage will also be at the October
Speaker 8: fifth race representing the number fifty seven slim gym car
Speaker 8: driven by Jason Keller. The number twenty nine WCW car
Speaker 8: has experienced solid success in ninety six with two Busch
Speaker 8: Series victories at the Goodies three hundred and Daytone and
Speaker 8: thirty eighteenth and the Hummingbird fish Finder five hundred K
Speaker 8: in Talladay Go on July twenty seventh. Diamondridge Motorsports and
Speaker 8: World Championship Wrestling are a powerful tag team on the
Speaker 8: NASCAR Busch Series circuit. World Championship Wrestling, where the Big
Speaker 8: Boys play, produces in markets, television program markets, television programs,
Speaker 8: and live events featuring wrestling superstars, and is operated by
Speaker 8: Turner Sports, a subsidiary of Turner Broadcasting System Incorporated. WCW
Speaker 8: programming can be seen in ninety four percent of the
Speaker 8: US television households each week on TBS superstation TNT and
Speaker 8: in syndication. Howry l language use couple big fucking thumbs
Speaker 8: up up there to the press release. Big fucking thumbs
Speaker 8: up to the Alan Sharp press release. Alan Sharp, by
Speaker 8: the way, the WBPR agent who also plays the lawyer
Speaker 8: in the Nick Patrick Chris Jericho stuff. Yes, in between guys,
Speaker 8: so you know, reading the riot Act of Chris Jericho
Speaker 8: for various misdeeds.
Speaker 2: Of course.
Speaker 8: This is also nWo World Tour Day's Baby WCW versus
Speaker 8: nWo World Tour and n sixty four changed to Everything
Speaker 8: the Prey concursor to No Mercy in so many ways.
Speaker 2: Oh for sure.
Speaker 8: I remember playing WSW Versus the World on PS one
Speaker 8: with a Stark ninety six hype on.
Speaker 2: In the background.
Speaker 8: I remember that Nitro wow I trose before Stark ninety
Speaker 8: six and I'm another TV we had in the living room.
Speaker 8: We had the PlayStation on which we rented, so it
Speaker 8: was like vital that you get as much time in
Speaker 8: playing as you could. I believe WW versus the World
Speaker 8: with that's amazing nitrol on in the background behind me.
Speaker 8: This is from the Business Wire, also from this time period.
Speaker 8: I remember seventh, nineteen ninety six, Nintendo signs THHQ as
Speaker 8: newest Nintendo sixty four member World Championship Wrestling Stars to
Speaker 8: be found on N sixty four. Nintendo of America Thursday
Speaker 8: announced that THHQ Inc. Is the latest member to join
Speaker 8: the team to develop or publish video games for the
Speaker 8: company's mega hit Nintendo sixty four home video game system.
Speaker 8: Well over one half million units of Nintendo sixty four,
Speaker 8: the world's first true sixty four bit home video game machine,
Speaker 8: have sold in the United States since its debut on
Speaker 8: September twenty ninth, selling a new industry record, setting a
Speaker 8: new industry record, you believe n sixty four came out
Speaker 8: in nineteen ninety six, Like it was way after that.
Speaker 2: God, well, not way after that, because I was definitely
Speaker 2: playing in high school and that was ninety eight or something.
Speaker 2: But in sixty four, No, yeah, it was like ninety seven.
Speaker 2: You need it? Do you remember getting excited about it?
Speaker 4: Umm?
Speaker 2: No, no, because you know, my mindset was I'm not
Speaker 2: going to get it. My parents are any going it
Speaker 2: for me?
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 2: I never fucking got Yeah, never got the new thing.
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 2: I was always you know, Nintendo came out and what
Speaker 2: ninety five eighty five the original Nintendo. Yeah, I got
Speaker 2: my Nintendo right before the SNS came out. It's like,
Speaker 2: you know, I was always the very fucking end of
Speaker 2: the of the road before I got a new incredible
Speaker 2: and yeah. So but I do remember that, I I
Speaker 2: forget it was for my birthdays when my mom they
Speaker 2: gave me a PlayStation PlayStation one and I liked it,
Speaker 2: but I was like, you know, if it's all the same,
Speaker 2: can we bring this back and get an N sixty four?
Speaker 2: And we did because I had all my friends were
Speaker 2: playing gold Mine, you know, and GoldenEye was the fucking thing,
Speaker 2: like everyone was doing that, and they didn't have that
Speaker 2: on PlayStation. Was only on N sixty four, and I
Speaker 2: really wanted to get GoldenEye, and so we did. We
Speaker 2: brought it back, and you know, I got the N
Speaker 2: sixty four, but I and the first wrestling game I
Speaker 2: got on that was Attitude. Oh my god, Yeah, claims
Speaker 2: coming back? Did you hear that? Worse? I did hear
Speaker 2: that Jeff Jarrett is involved in financing it? Somehow? That's
Speaker 2: insane as coming back? Why? I don't know, like what
Speaker 2: does that do for anybody?
Speaker 8: But I know I can tell you that ww VERSW
Speaker 8: World Tour is a huge reason why nitro ratings started
Speaker 8: blowing up and why WCW's business started going through the roof,
Speaker 8: because people were discovering that WCW was a hot brand
Speaker 8: and had the best wrestling game. It wasn't just necessarily
Speaker 8: the case that WWF was going to have the best
Speaker 8: marketing collateral. All of a sudden, maybe ww was worth
Speaker 8: looking at. I remember friends down the street, and one
Speaker 8: guy in particular was like, he did not believe me
Speaker 8: when I told him that this nWo that everybody was
Speaker 8: talking about was not a WWF angle because he couldn't
Speaker 8: wrap his head around the idea that WCW would do
Speaker 8: the highest thing in wrestling.
Speaker 2: Nobody could, unreal, nobody could. That shit's fucking you know,
Speaker 2: he can't be. It can't be. There's no other wrestling
Speaker 2: federations all out.
Speaker 8: No, it's just getting started here right around this time,
Speaker 8: just reving up the video game side. Well over one
Speaker 8: half million units of Nintendo sixty four, the world's first
Speaker 8: true okay, have been sold since debut Setember twenty ninth.
Speaker 8: Many stores still earned short supply of the product as
Speaker 8: consumers wait for new shipments to arrive. Thhq's game for
Speaker 8: the n sixty four system will be an exclusive version
Speaker 8: of World Championship Wrestling, one of the top ranked syndicated
Speaker 8: television programs according to October Nielsen reports. The game will
Speaker 8: incorporate signature moves and voices of wrestling superstars including Nature Boy,
Speaker 8: Rick Flair, Rick Sting, Lex Luger, the Giant in Hollywood, Hulkogan.
Speaker 8: THQ has been a strong supporter of Nintendo for many
Speaker 8: years at Howard Lincoln Sherman, Nintendo of America were thrilled
Speaker 8: to have them join the Nintendo sixty four team. This
Speaker 8: license confirms THHQ as a select publisher of games for
Speaker 8: all game console platforms, said Brian J. Ferrell, President and
Speaker 8: CEO of THHQ. Our success has and will continue to
Speaker 8: be based on publishing strong game content for hardware systems
Speaker 8: with an established customer base. World Championship Wrestling, our first
Speaker 8: release for the Nintendo sixty four, is another example of
Speaker 8: our commitment to enter a new market with a major title.
Speaker 8: World Championship Wrestling, a subsidiary of TBS Incorporated, produces eight
Speaker 8: hours of original television programming each week broadcast What's this?
Speaker 2: What's that? I heard? Eight hours and multiple We are
Speaker 2: writing this year down right down numbers and we get it,
Speaker 2: write down market stats. What we have is we provide
Speaker 2: colorful characters in a multitude of platforms across varying countries
Speaker 2: in about say, we put it in maybe five thousand languages.
Speaker 8: A multitude of characters that we produce a multitude of characters,
Speaker 8: not television shows it's the characters. We produce the television
Speaker 8: and just follows on naturally. But at its heart, what
Speaker 8: we do is create those characters.
Speaker 2: That, oh, you know, the television is created with a
Speaker 2: sense of pride and dignity that I think translates into
Speaker 2: an outcome that is visible and viable from a multitude
Speaker 2: of individuals watching television, watching entertainment, watching vehicles that create characters,
Speaker 2: tell stories, and they love it to integrity. You say
Speaker 2: that they have integrity? Is that what he said? I said, well,
Speaker 2: you know, I do believe that I have integrity. So
Speaker 2: how many countries worldwide? I believe we are currently in
Speaker 2: eight thousand.
Speaker 8: WW as it says right here, broadcast throughout the United
Speaker 8: States and more than twenty five countries worldwide.
Speaker 2: Oh no, no, eight thousand. Easily we have you know,
Speaker 2: we are.
Speaker 5: What we do.
Speaker 2: Is what we do exactly, and what we do and
Speaker 2: we do it better than what anyone else can do.
Speaker 2: In a very diplomatic, dimatic diplomatic sense. Yeah, I mean,
Speaker 2: I mean eight thousand countries has to be diplomacy involved. Yes, yes,
Speaker 2: we we we involved diplomacy when it comes to producing entertaining.
Speaker 8: Telephone As somebody who didn't get the sn E S
Speaker 8: during its you know, height of relevancy, did it? Did
Speaker 8: it hurt to see the Royal Rumble on the shelf
Speaker 8: with Hogan on it? It hurt to see money?
Speaker 2: Well, I got the Genesis later though later if I
Speaker 2: got the if I got the Nintendo in ninety one,
Speaker 2: I probably got my Genesis in like ninety four. Right
Speaker 2: like when I after I got the Genesis, Segacy D
Speaker 2: came out, it was it was paid until you got
Speaker 2: that Genesis. Yeah, absolutely, listen. It was awful because I
Speaker 2: wanted you know, they had the uh, the Royal Rumble
Speaker 2: with Hogan only on That's what I wanted because because
Speaker 2: that's why I I when when it came time that
Speaker 2: the Hogan was only on the s n E S four, No,
Speaker 2: the Genesis version, right, so that that that right, So
Speaker 2: when it came time and I was able to get
Speaker 2: an upgrade, I wanted. Yeah, I wanted the Genesis because
Speaker 2: the Royal Rumble game for Genesis had Hogan in it,
Speaker 2: and as opposed to the the and the and for
Speaker 2: that matter, the uh, the Super WrestleMania game for Genesis
Speaker 2: had Warrior in it, Christ, which was different than both
Speaker 2: of course I didn't get the natural disasters, you know
Speaker 2: they were in and the Super that's right, exact amazing stuff.
Speaker 2: So you know they're given to you. You remember these things.
Speaker 2: It's so fucking much. Oh yeah, I mean, and then
Speaker 2: this is the reason why I fucking took them. I
Speaker 2: needed I needed Hogan and it was hard to buy Raw.
Speaker 2: When the Raw game came out, that was hard to buy, Yeah,
Speaker 2: because Hogan wasn't it because he was in the other
Speaker 2: company at the time, to be Super Brawl. Oh that
Speaker 2: what They didn't have Hogan in it either, exse that
Speaker 2: came out before. No, I didn't even know that existed. Honestly,
Speaker 2: I just like I later on my sixteen bit game
Speaker 2: system era. Man, good luck ever getting back there.
Speaker 5: You can't.
Speaker 2: That's the whole that's the whole.
Speaker 8: Fucking combat, you know, like all these games breaking the mold.
Speaker 8: Every two months something came out that broke the mold.
Speaker 8: He just scrambled to find a friend who had it.
Speaker 2: And oh yeah, i'd you rented out.
Speaker 8: You'd go to a Blockbuster or eight weeks in a
Speaker 8: row wouldn't be there, fucking hell, and then it would
Speaker 8: be and that would be the greatest weekend of your
Speaker 8: life and that's gone.
Speaker 5: You have it.
Speaker 2: And then I rented I rented King of the Ring.
Speaker 2: The only the only, yeah, I rented the was awful.
Speaker 2: The w King of the Ring game terrible play. That
Speaker 2: was absolutely awful. They had like the.
Speaker 8: Other one that had the ring at like a if
Speaker 8: a perpendicular angle, like you were looking at it like
Speaker 8: it's a diamond instead of.
Speaker 2: I know that, uh, WrestleMania Challenge, have that steel Cage Challenge,
Speaker 2: don't know? Steel Cage Challenge was Regular, which, honestly the
Speaker 2: worst fucking steel cage match you could possibly have where
Speaker 2: you win by climbing to the top of the cage.
Speaker 2: You don't climb to the floor. You stand on the
Speaker 2: top of the Yeah, on the top of the cage,
Speaker 2: and you raise your arm in victory. It's so fucking dumb.
Speaker 21: Oh.
Speaker 2: Now I had King of the Ring for Game Boy.
Speaker 2: I didn't have it. Wow, even worse, even worse.
Speaker 8: It's right, It's like they were like they were trying
Speaker 8: to get comfortable putting Brett on the on the cover
Speaker 8: of the game instead of Hulk, you know, right right right?
Speaker 13: Was it?
Speaker 2: Luger and King of the Ring? Yeah, I remember that Yeah,
Speaker 2: he was weird roster for King of the Ring if
Speaker 2: I remember correctly.
Speaker 8: So one more thing about World War Three that comes
Speaker 8: to mind, and this isn't because the match itself that
Speaker 8: happens in Norfolk, Virginia is emblematic of this, but it's
Speaker 8: it happens during the time period, and it's probably the
Speaker 8: only opportunity we're going to get to look at this
Speaker 8: dynamic because it's the only pay per view match really
Speaker 8: that that would count for. It is the saga between
Speaker 8: Jerry Saggs and Scott Hall. Do you do you know
Speaker 8: or remember any of this?
Speaker 2: Ah, I know a little.
Speaker 8: I don't know, always touched on it before in the past.
Speaker 8: I'm not sure exactly in which context to tell you
Speaker 8: the truth, but some of this will be a little
Speaker 8: bit of a visiting. But I look more deeply into
Speaker 8: it because it was during this era when the Nasty
Speaker 8: Boys would mix it up with the Outsiders, because the
Speaker 8: Outsiders were WCW Tag Team champions and were working the
Speaker 8: Faces of Fear and working the Nasties and other tag
Speaker 8: teams on the house show circuit. Something that's always so
Speaker 8: important to remember about those early nWo days that after
Speaker 8: Hogan turned heel and won the world title. Like the
Speaker 8: outsiders were just going to be like mid card guys.
Speaker 8: You know, they were important right, characters for sure, but
Speaker 8: when it came time to wrestle, their match was not
Speaker 8: going to be the main event, right. They were just
Speaker 8: going to be the tag They were just going to
Speaker 8: be the guys that held down the tag team titles
Speaker 8: while Hogan held down the World Giant or whoever held
Speaker 8: down the US six held down the cruiserweight. It was
Speaker 8: never that Hall and Nash were of equal stature to
Speaker 8: Hogan as it regards the position on the cards. Crucial
Speaker 8: to remember that. So here they are mixing it up
Speaker 8: with all these WCW tag teams because that's how they
Speaker 8: were slotted, and among them were the Nasty Boys. And
Speaker 8: there was an incident. It all starts, actually, now that
Speaker 8: I looked closely at it, on the same nitro that
Speaker 8: we just heard We're Bischoff turns Heel. At the very
Speaker 8: top of that episode, they jumped right into action and say,
Speaker 8: ladies and gentlemen, we're live here in Charleston and it's chaos.
Speaker 8: Hall and Nash have hit the ring and started attacking
Speaker 8: people with chairs. This is during like a Luca six
Speaker 8: man tag match, and for some reason the Nasties come
Speaker 8: out as well, and Hogan Hall hits the ring and
Speaker 8: absolutely cracks Jerry Saggs in the back of the head with.
Speaker 2: A steel chair. You know, there's a huge goose egg.
Speaker 8: On Sags's head, and there was real concern that he
Speaker 8: suffered like a very serious concussion and like a career
Speaker 8: altering injury. And that was kind of you know, the
Speaker 8: first shot across the Bow and what would become a serious,
Speaker 8: a serious series of disputes and even a lawsuit involving
Speaker 8: these parties. He claims SAgs does to have suffered a
Speaker 8: concussion and a spinal injury in that in a subsequent situation.
Speaker 8: So what happens here World War three is between that
Speaker 8: one nitro first fire across the Bow and the fateful
Speaker 8: January nineteen ninety seven WW House show in Shreveport, Luisiana
Speaker 8: where things got so out of control that Jerry Saggs
Speaker 8: beat the shit out of Scott Hall and punched a
Speaker 8: tooth out of his face. Wow, Because he felt like
Speaker 8: despite the prior warnings about avoiding Jerry Sagg's neck and
Speaker 8: despite the prior instances where he was hurt like by
Speaker 8: a Scott Hall attack and then perceiving that Nation Hall
Speaker 8: were laughing about it backstage, although certainly a National Hall
Speaker 8: would dispute the characterization of them laughing at the fact
Speaker 8: that Jerry Saggs was hurt, but more laughing at kind
Speaker 8: of the circumstance overall. But that led to SAgs getting
Speaker 8: really you know, harboring deep resentment and just straight up
Speaker 8: attacking Scott Hall. And it was kind of the talk
Speaker 8: of the business for a little while, and it caused
Speaker 8: Jerry Saggs to just sit out to try to claim
Speaker 8: career ending injuries and try to sue the pants off
Speaker 8: Scott Hall on WCW for this whole you know, workplace situation.
Speaker 8: So we do see several moments, I don't know if
Speaker 8: you if you would agree, of course, at World War
Speaker 8: three it was Nation Hall versus the Barbarian and Meng
Speaker 8: and the Nasties and a triangle tag team match for
Speaker 8: the titles. Yeah, and do you feel like there are
Speaker 8: several moments in this match where these guys are just
Speaker 8: throwing way too recklessly and it's getting like really out
Speaker 8: of control.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it did feel a little bit like that.
Speaker 8: It had me like do a double take on like,
Speaker 8: is this the match that all this shit stemmed from?
Speaker 8: Because people talk about it like it was on TV?
Speaker 2: Really it it?
Speaker 4: It?
Speaker 2: It also felt very sloppy, right, you know, And and
Speaker 2: to me, if it's sloppy, something's up, I think unless
Speaker 2: you're just really really bad. And the thing is, well,
Speaker 2: none of these guys are, you know, excellent workers. They're
Speaker 2: all seasons the typically I've you know, I've seen good
Speaker 2: and bad Nasty Boy matches, I've seen good and bad
Speaker 2: Barbarian mag matches. I've seen good and bad Outsiders matches,
Speaker 2: but I've never seen them really sloppy. And that's what
Speaker 2: I noted was that it was very, very sloppy.
Speaker 8: There are several moments where the match kind of devolves
Speaker 8: into one guy cornering another guy and just throwing, and
Speaker 8: then two other guys get involved in just fists are
Speaker 8: flying like it's a bar fight, and it's pretty intense.
Speaker 8: But it also seems against type, like you're saying, for
Speaker 8: all these guys, it seems like something's a miss, like
Speaker 8: they're lost or something's going wrong. And it's interesting to
Speaker 8: know that there had already been that initial conflagration between
Speaker 8: Scott Hall and Jerry Sag. So maybe we are seeing
Speaker 8: a little bit of live rounds being thrown. Maybe we
Speaker 8: are seeing a little bit of a preview of what
Speaker 8: was to happen in January at that house show that
Speaker 8: blew this whole thing up. But watch this one closely
Speaker 8: at World War three because I think you see a
Speaker 8: little bit of a hint at wants to come as
Speaker 8: they kind of test each other's limits a bit. And
Speaker 8: here we're going to go through it and what the
Speaker 8: parties have said about it over the years. Here's Scott
Speaker 8: Hall in a shoot interview on RF video and he's
Speaker 8: describing an incident that I'm pretty sure is the aforementioned
Speaker 8: November nitro where that chair shot cracked SAgs in Duscott
Speaker 8: Hall as only he can takes us from there.
Speaker 17: I mean you and Jerry SAgs and wcw In in
Speaker 17: the matter up.
Speaker 5: Well.
Speaker 21: One of the things that happened that started to out
Speaker 21: the grief was Kevin and I got paid real well
Speaker 21: when we came in and a lot of guys were
Speaker 21: there took pay cuts and not because of us, and
Speaker 21: we didn't know anything about it, but some guys were
Speaker 21: making like three hundred and fifty grand a year, and
Speaker 21: they came to and they weren't working. Back then, they
Speaker 21: didn't even run housees because they couldn't they couldn't draw,
Speaker 21: and so they said, we can't give you three fifty,
Speaker 21: but we'll give you three hundred. So a lot of
Speaker 21: guys agreed to it. Apparently the Nasty Boys agreed to
Speaker 21: take a pay cut. And when they bitched about it.
Speaker 21: By the way I heard it was Terry chefs. So
Speaker 21: we had a hall of dash gin all the money.
Speaker 21: So right away we get heating. Wow, it's just I
Speaker 21: get heat anyway.
Speaker 3: I don't care, you know, I like it, of course not,
Speaker 3: you know, but sciat.
Speaker 21: Seeing because we're obnoxiously happy, you know we are. We're
Speaker 21: walking around smile and laughing because we getting paid and
Speaker 21: we don't care.
Speaker 5: Who knows it?
Speaker 2: All right?
Speaker 8: So word again heat in other words, like everyone hates us. Okay,
Speaker 8: So that's necessary precondition Terry Taylor walking around. That's the
Speaker 8: way telling people they're making real money. So that's why
Speaker 8: they really pissed the Nasty Boys, at least to hear
Speaker 8: Hall tell it.
Speaker 2: So here's some more.
Speaker 17: We were told to hit the ring.
Speaker 21: We're somewhere and they're wrestling some Mexican wrestlers and me
Speaker 21: and Ken are supposed to hit the ring and lay
Speaker 21: them out with chairs.
Speaker 17: Go first and faster than cav So I slide in
Speaker 17: with the chair.
Speaker 21: I straddled one of the Mexican guys who was down,
Speaker 21: and I waffled sacks with a chair and swing a chair.
Speaker 17: I swim to me.
Speaker 21: It's like, don't ask me to hit you with a
Speaker 21: gimmick because I'm gonna hit you. I'd rather not do it,
Speaker 21: or I'm gonna do it, and I'll take it the
Speaker 21: same way.
Speaker 5: I don't.
Speaker 17: I don't do that, I said it. So I hit him.
Speaker 21: I didn't know that I potato them. He rolled out
Speaker 21: of the ring and he had his back like this,
Speaker 21: and I thought he was feeding me. I almost hit
Speaker 21: him again from inside the ring to the fore because
Speaker 21: I thought he wanted another one, because before we went
Speaker 21: out and I was.
Speaker 17: Let make sure you lay it in, la it in.
Speaker 21: So what happened was now he comes back and he's
Speaker 21: got a big goose egg on his head, and as
Speaker 21: he's like turning the corner and I'm sitting there talking
Speaker 21: to Ken, and I said.
Speaker 17: Oh, Ken man, I said, I potatoed SAgs.
Speaker 21: Man, I said, I am so happy because I guess
Speaker 21: he was delirious and I thought he was feeding me
Speaker 21: for a second one. But I didn't do it, And
Speaker 21: I said, man, I am so happy I didn't hit
Speaker 21: him again. I said, I almost hit him again. I
Speaker 21: was kind of doing a nervous laugh. And at that moment,
Speaker 21: SAgs turned the corner with a big goose egg and
Speaker 21: he sees me and kid going out, and he's thinking,
Speaker 21: they're taking my money now, they're taking the liberties with me.
Speaker 21: They got potato me on purpose, and he thinks it's funny,
Speaker 21: is the way I perceived that. He perceived it because
Speaker 21: I've known him a long time.
Speaker 8: And they knew each other back from the AWA days. See,
Speaker 8: so you get that, like he's saying, like him and
Speaker 8: Kevin are like laughing, Man, I'm just glad I didn't
Speaker 8: hit him, you know, harder or anything like that. And
Speaker 8: Sag sees that and thinks they're laughing about the fact
Speaker 8: that they hurt him, which, of course, Kevin Ash Scott
Speaker 8: Hall wouldn't do that.
Speaker 2: They wouldn't laugh about that at all. No, never, I mean, listen, there,
Speaker 2: they're great guys and they're very considerate of others or
Speaker 2: you know, they would never ever make forgot anybody very good.
Speaker 2: Here's Brian Knobbs talking to Hannibal about the whole episode.
Speaker 2: See if we can detect any overlaps or contradictions here.
Speaker 6: You know, it was you know, it was what issue
Speaker 6: where you know, it was all done before cameras were
Speaker 6: even coming on. You really ain't even have to get
Speaker 6: hit that hard. So when he got hit, he cracked
Speaker 6: a couple of his vertebrae in the back of his neck,
Speaker 6: and you know, from then on, and Sag came back
Speaker 6: and he was there with Kevin Suloman and and Kevin
Speaker 6: Nash and out we're there and they were laughing, but
Speaker 6: I don't think they were laughing about that. And then
Speaker 6: Sag took it because he had a big a I
Speaker 6: mean his neck, there's a big I mean goose egg
Speaker 6: like a sawtwaterback, So Sag didn't know how to take it,
Speaker 6: like did they do that on purpose? So that kind
Speaker 6: of kind of stirred it up. And then after that
Speaker 6: everything was calmed down to they put us back on
Speaker 6: the road again where we were supposed to wrestle. So
Speaker 6: that situation was totally w CW's fault.
Speaker 2: But Kevin and.
Speaker 6: Scott, I mean especially Scott. Scott's been friends of ours
Speaker 6: since way back Awa. I mean, we were good friends.
Speaker 6: He was one of the guys with Austin, Marty and
Speaker 6: Sean and you know Kurt, so we were all a
Speaker 6: little crew ourselves. So and Kevin never had a beef
Speaker 6: with him in my life. So it's all good, man.
Speaker 6: I mean, things happen, and you know, that's life.
Speaker 1: He's a weft fand wrestling podcast, the wrestling podcast that
Speaker 1: knows the boys need their candy. It's the lapsed Fan.
Speaker 1: He's the lapsed Fan wrestling podcast with Jack and Carnaco
Speaker 1: and JP Soorro.
Speaker 2: That's life.
Speaker 8: So yeah, he's speaking the point that that chair shot
Speaker 8: didn't have to land that hard because they weren't even
Speaker 8: on TV yet. They were, however, filming it to show
Speaker 8: as what happened before we went on the air, and
Speaker 8: it's weird. If you watch that Nitro at the beginning,
Speaker 8: Hall runs in swings a chair and then they freeze
Speaker 8: frame it and you can hear the crack, but they
Speaker 8: don't show the impact. I don't know if that was
Speaker 8: like a decision made on the fly, like he just
Speaker 8: really hurt SAgs. Let's show but let's not show it
Speaker 8: kind of thing, or if maybe when they went back
Speaker 8: and edited that episode of Nitro, if it wasn't freeze
Speaker 8: framed initially.
Speaker 2: I think it was.
Speaker 8: It's based in the commentary that you hear Shamanei and
Speaker 8: Zubisco doing. But yeah, it starts with total chaos as
Speaker 8: if like before cameras went on the nWo hit the
Speaker 8: ring in the match they had nothing to do with,
Speaker 8: and somehow Jerry Saggs gets caught in the crossfire. And
Speaker 8: Knobbs's point is, you know, if it's not going to
Speaker 8: be on television, why do you have to crack him
Speaker 8: that hard. I mean, it's not even like anyone's.
Speaker 2: Going to see it.
Speaker 8: But you know, all's good in the hood there as
Speaker 8: far as Knobs Knobs, they talk about him as just
Speaker 8: being like trying to reconcile and say, you know, this
Speaker 8: is a my deal and trying to say, like you
Speaker 8: don't want to come after me Kevin and Nash was like, no,
Speaker 8: it's it's on everybody. I'm coming after everybody. Because Nash
Speaker 8: gets really pissed off about this whole thing, and grabs
Speaker 8: a baseball bat and all that. When Hall gets attacked
Speaker 8: in the middle of that match in January ninety seven. Yeah,
Speaker 8: so here's Kevin Nash on KFAB commentary is talking about it.
Speaker 5: Hey, Suberry a friend. But there was a spot for
Speaker 5: Sean Waltman to come in on a run in and
Speaker 5: he was in Shawn's defense. He was blind, so the
Speaker 5: run in was misceued. And uh, there was also a
Speaker 5: ming and Barbarian were also. It was a six man
Speaker 5: tag match, so it turned into a cluster and SAgs
Speaker 5: did SAgs did something. SAgs threw the chair into the ring,
Speaker 5: and if I'm not mistaken, it was like a Brunswick
Speaker 5: bowling chair. It wasn't a folding Yeah, it wasn't a
Speaker 5: folding chair. So when Scott you know, and the way
Speaker 5: they used to light back then, wasn't you know, some
Speaker 5: kind of a trust situation. It was basically the ring
Speaker 5: was lit and then outside of that it was sickly
Speaker 5: dark space. So to take an object and throw it
Speaker 5: from that light down to somebody, it was like once
Speaker 5: it came through that light and the chair hit Jerry
Speaker 5: like if this was the seat of the chair, it
Speaker 5: hit him like almost like that. So he slid back
Speaker 5: in and I was in the corner and you know,
Speaker 5: and things are getting elevated in physicality and Ming's starting
Speaker 5: to lay it in and I'm like, I'm thinking, like
Speaker 5: like like starting to get pissed. And I said to him,
Speaker 5: I said, hey, easy, like, you know, like, what are
Speaker 5: we doing here? To me?
Speaker 2: Yeah, to Ming, and you know, and now.
Speaker 5: It's one of those situations of we have to So
Speaker 5: I'm trying to get loose from Ming and barb in
Speaker 5: the corner, and then sat our knobs peeled a barb
Speaker 5: off and I'm just turning to the referee and going,
Speaker 5: fucking deq it. You know, it's turned into it. It's
Speaker 5: like this is would be a DQ fucking DQ the match.
Speaker 5: So in the meantime, SAgs comes under the bottom rope
Speaker 5: and I see him in Scott exchange and blows in
Speaker 5: the middle of the ring, and finally, you know, I
Speaker 5: got I went outside outside, folded at the announced table,
Speaker 5: came in and pick opened it up and picked the
Speaker 5: announced table up over my head and they all bailed
Speaker 5: on it. And I turn around and Scott is just
Speaker 5: pouring blood out of his nose and his mouth.
Speaker 2: It's eesus.
Speaker 5: I mean, I was living and I went in the
Speaker 5: locker room. I grabbed a bat, and I think it
Speaker 5: was Knobs or SAgs was sitting there, and I swung
Speaker 5: the bat like right above their head, like that far
Speaker 5: above their head. And I was gonna fucking mean, I
Speaker 5: was gonna kill him, and because it's my boy, and
Speaker 5: Scott said, no, man, He said, he thinks he's right,
Speaker 5: you know. He said, that's one thing about Scott, you know,
Speaker 5: he's just like he thinks he's right. So Scott went home,
Speaker 5: he had to get donal work done because he busted
Speaker 5: some teeth and shit. And so then I kept the bat.
Speaker 5: And then the next night we were in maybe Alexandria
Speaker 5: or someplace else. I remember that Dugan walked the nasty
Speaker 5: boys in the back and I was sitting on a
Speaker 5: car with the baseball bat and what Doug looked at
Speaker 5: me and said, he said, I'm not a part of this.
Speaker 5: I said, fine, I get out a part of it.
Speaker 5: And I just looked the other two motherfuckers. I just
Speaker 5: just looked at him. And then Knobs, who wasn't involved
Speaker 5: in the situation, came up to me later and said,
Speaker 5: any way, we've been friends for a long time. You
Speaker 5: know this is between those guys. That's about it. Man, Yes,
Speaker 5: that's the same. So then we went to New Orleans
Speaker 5: for Nitro and Eric was going to fire the Nasty
Speaker 5: Boys on the spot, and it was basically Scott's call,
Speaker 5: and Scott said no.
Speaker 2: So there there, you got got real serious.
Speaker 8: There is Nash the bat and uh and Hall has
Speaker 8: a bit of a same recollection about this, this generary
Speaker 8: house show.
Speaker 17: So then now we're in some other town.
Speaker 21: We're in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, stuff like that, and it's
Speaker 21: it's it's ming and Barbarian nasty boys and me and
Speaker 21: keV and a like one of those cluster six man.
Speaker 17: Three three acting deals.
Speaker 21: Yeah, and the finishes kid who'd wrestled earlier, are supposed
Speaker 21: to run down, throw us a gimmick. We're supposed to
Speaker 21: knock everybody out and keep the belts that kid got.
Speaker 21: He doesn't come down. So now it's time to go home,
Speaker 21: and there's no kid. So we're going, what is going
Speaker 21: on now?
Speaker 17: It's really getting out of control.
Speaker 21: So the Nasty Boys start throwing furniture in the ring,
Speaker 21: so they throw SAgs, goes stomping down the steps. Those
Speaker 21: are plastic chair in the ring. Go stomping back on
Speaker 21: the steps. Now I pick up the chair. You slew
Speaker 21: it in a ring yet, dumby, So I pick it up.
Speaker 21: He comes walking in, looks right at me. I got
Speaker 21: the chair like this, and I did like like Saboo does,
Speaker 21: like Kevin Salomon does. It's a plastic chair. He's looking
Speaker 21: right at me. I think he's paying attention. So I
Speaker 21: pushed the chair at him like that and it hits
Speaker 21: them and it rattles when people go oh. By this time,
Speaker 21: now Ming is hitting me, you know, because we're the
Speaker 21: heels and now there are other two teams are like bayfas.
Speaker 17: So Ming's hit me with working shots and SAgs is
Speaker 17: drilling me with live rounds. But see he's stiff anyway.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't think I'm sorry. He's drilling him with
Speaker 2: live Jesus Christ.
Speaker 5: Wow.
Speaker 17: Finally look at him and I realized he's raging. He's mad.
Speaker 17: He's seriously mad. So I just pushed him away, like
Speaker 17: what's your problem.
Speaker 18: He knocked my tooth out, even lost the tooth when
Speaker 18: he knocked it out into the fifth row, and it
Speaker 18: punctured my cheek, and you know, your mouth is so
Speaker 18: filled back to here that my face was like this
Speaker 18: and instantly, so I turned back around.
Speaker 17: You know, now blah blah blah, it's over.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 21: They finally get them out of the ring. I'm standing
Speaker 21: at me and keV got the staff or stay out.
Speaker 21: I turned around to Kevin. Kev's my face all messed up.
Speaker 21: He goes, what the F And I said, his SAgs.
Speaker 4: Man.
Speaker 21: keV goes marches back in the locker and picks up
Speaker 21: Stink's baseball bat and he goes say the word he's dead.
Speaker 21: That's your keV. He thinks he's right, man. He thinks
Speaker 21: he's right because he thought that I.
Speaker 17: Was doing that.
Speaker 21: I was taking liberties with him again because Ken was
Speaker 21: going to kill keV walked in there and just swum
Speaker 21: the baseball that right above.
Speaker 17: His head and said, you want to find out who's
Speaker 17: got stroke around here?
Speaker 5: You?
Speaker 2: And oh God.
Speaker 17: So I go to the hotel.
Speaker 21: We're all going to go out party bat Rouge that night,
Speaker 21: because this is a sweet little party town.
Speaker 17: All the Mexican boys, Braver Stei On.
Speaker 21: Hoovie and Cone and they all come in my room
Speaker 21: with keV and I'm sitting there with this my face
Speaker 21: was sow and I can't laugh as it hurts.
Speaker 17: And they'll go, come on, let's go out, and and skew.
Speaker 21: You ain't going anywhere like this, you know, you know,
Speaker 21: And they so Bishoff called my room that night and
Speaker 21: he goes, hey, hear what happened? You know?
Speaker 17: My god? He goes, you know, he's fired. He's fired.
Speaker 17: I'll fire him instant, I said, I I'll fire him.
Speaker 17: I've known twenty years. Said he's got kids. I said,
Speaker 17: I don't want to work with it anymore. But I said,
Speaker 17: fire him.
Speaker 21: And you know that was and I think what happened
Speaker 21: was he ended up sitting at home for a long
Speaker 21: time and he got paid. And I mean i've seen
Speaker 21: him since then, you know, And it was just it
Speaker 21: was it's just something to happen, you know, it was.
Speaker 21: And I didn't intend for that to happen to him.
Speaker 21: And he intended to hurt me, which is wrong. I mean,
Speaker 21: the way I look at it is, if you had
Speaker 21: a problem with me, you.
Speaker 17: Should have took it.
Speaker 21: You should have fought me in the locker room. Don't
Speaker 21: don't hit me live rounds in the ring when I'm
Speaker 21: giving you my body. I mean I'm leaning my face
Speaker 21: out there and he's hitting me with everything he has.
Speaker 21: And when you're supposed to be that man like you
Speaker 21: can lift their car off a baby itself. One thing
Speaker 21: I'm proud of this dude's hitting me with everything he got.
Speaker 2: He can't even knock me out, still taking shots at
Speaker 2: him after all this making up and everything knock me out.
Speaker 2: I do love Scott saying he thinks he's right, and
Speaker 2: what I mean, I don't even know what that means.
Speaker 8: That he thinks he's in the right for attacking me
Speaker 8: like that because I hit him with that chair and
Speaker 8: hurt him. He's paying me back. But it's this happens
Speaker 8: after World War Three, so it's hard for me to
Speaker 8: like watch this magic World War three and figure out
Speaker 8: if what I'm watching is like the first draft of
Speaker 8: what he would do to him in January and Louisiana
Speaker 8: or right if it escalates from there. Here's another perspective
Speaker 8: we like to get all uh, you know, Carosawa on
Speaker 8: you here. Yes, here's a barbarian on the Wrestling Shoe
Speaker 8: Interviews channel show.
Speaker 22: The deal was Nesty Boy was working some guys in
Speaker 22: the ring and Horror Nest supposed you know, you know,
Speaker 22: supposed to you know, slide in and in the field.
Speaker 22: So what happens Scott Hall great a chair, great a chair.
Speaker 5: And hit the.
Speaker 22: Sacks, says Cherry. Cherry in the bag of the brada.
Speaker 22: You don't come with the and hit the guy in
Speaker 22: the back of the head. You don't do that, you know,
Speaker 22: hit him in the front so he can protect himself.
Speaker 22: You and he hit him so hot, brother.
Speaker 4: Man.
Speaker 22: The thing swallow like a grapefruit, like a grape foot
Speaker 22: the bag. So they rush from the hospital concussion. So
Speaker 22: it peeled up the you know up the build them
Speaker 22: up and until we do the you know, the the
Speaker 22: day team eliminate show what happened?
Speaker 5: Me and Ming?
Speaker 22: So those four so those two guys, they tumbled team Scott, yes,
Speaker 22: Scot Scott all outside, Cherry and Brian of state up date.
Speaker 22: They beat They beat him up so bad, you know,
Speaker 22: I mean for real, not to work for real. They
Speaker 22: beat them bloody. I mean, so and me and Ming
Speaker 22: we are working on the big guy Kevin on the corner.
Speaker 22: I said, I said, guys, guys, guys, please please stop
Speaker 22: stop so so our pack, our our pack to them
Speaker 22: so but nest his face. He short the whole thing.
Speaker 22: I said, guys, guys, please stop, I do help you.
Speaker 22: I said, what do you mean, brother? They beat here
Speaker 22: are so bad? Yeah, yeah, we were there. We were
Speaker 22: there in the ring with them, and we were there
Speaker 22: and there, and what happened The giant what's your name?
Speaker 2: Paul?
Speaker 22: Yeah, yeah, Paul, Yeah, he came and they gave it
Speaker 22: nasty somehow. He grabbed a baseball bed. He wanted to
Speaker 22: kill the nasty boy. So so me and Ming, Me
Speaker 22: and Ming we you know, we grabbed him. We talked
Speaker 22: to him. You know, everything was good, you know, finally
Speaker 22: they share a done and but yeah, well what a night,
Speaker 22: what a night? You know, the people start it's a
Speaker 22: big house. The people start leaving because they knew all
Speaker 22: this for real, so they start leaving, you know instead yeah,
Speaker 22: instead of entertained them for let's start leaving. I mean
Speaker 22: they yeah, I mean, yeah, I like Scott, I like
Speaker 22: I like their love letty boys, but I don't want
Speaker 22: to see, you know, and anything happened, you know like that.
Speaker 2: You know, I was with him until he said people left.
Speaker 8: It got real. I don't understand then, Yeah, well does that.
Speaker 8: But yeah, there's barbarians perspective on all that went down.
Speaker 8: They were in the ring as well, and finally we
Speaker 8: hear from at least in SoundBite format here. Finally, Kevin
Speaker 8: Nash further on the KFABE commentary's interview about this, taking
Speaker 8: us back to the the aforementioned March ninety six night
Speaker 8: Pardon Me November ninety sixth Nitro where Hall cracked SAgs
Speaker 8: with the chair.
Speaker 5: It was an incident that happened earlier with Scott had
Speaker 5: thrown a chair at him in another televis of that
Speaker 5: and hit Jerry in the head and Jerry we were
Speaker 5: like it was the next TV. Jerry looked right at
Speaker 5: JJ and said, I can't work man, my next bad
Speaker 5: and fucking JJ said to him, just fucking go out
Speaker 5: there and work, uh like, basically forced him to whoa.
Speaker 5: And I was I witnessed that. I mean I witnessed that.
Speaker 5: And I when when all this shit went down and
Speaker 5: they sued and everything else, I said, you stupid motherfucker.
Speaker 5: I said, you put us in a lawsuit. I said,
Speaker 5: if you just would have went after the company, the
Speaker 5: guys that were involved in the incident, one of them
Speaker 5: would have said, oh, by the way, he should have
Speaker 5: never been in either of those two. Had he been
Speaker 5: pulled at that point with the neckidge, you can recount
Speaker 5: what you heard, yes, and I would have it would
Speaker 5: have deposed me. I mean, it's a never fucked the boys,
Speaker 5: you know, sue the boys. You don't fuck the boys.
Speaker 5: It's the boys versus the promoter. That's the way it's
Speaker 5: always been. They broke the golden rule. I think fucking
Speaker 5: SAgs gotta fuck it, didn't work for fucking three years
Speaker 5: and got a twelve dollars settlement. You know, so nice,
Speaker 5: nicely fucking played match.
Speaker 8: Nice nicely fucking played so point there is that part
Speaker 8: of the reason there was such a blow up about
Speaker 8: Hall hitting SAgs in the neck was not because it
Speaker 8: was an honest mistake, but because it was known beforehand
Speaker 8: that SAgs was having real tenderness in the neck and
Speaker 8: was telling people that he didn't even think he could
Speaker 8: go out and work with the neck problem. He was having,
Speaker 8: let alone take a blindside chair shot to the neck.
Speaker 8: And so you know, it gets all legal about like, well,
Speaker 8: if Dylan told him he had to go out there,
Speaker 8: whose fault is it?
Speaker 2: Really?
Speaker 8: You know, there's all that wrapped up in it. Sas
Speaker 8: has never talked as far as I can tell on
Speaker 8: camera about this, but there is an interview that he
Speaker 8: did with a website called wrestlshark dot com that used
Speaker 8: to exist where he talks just a little bit about it,
Speaker 8: and he says Scott was different when he came down
Speaker 8: to WCW. I don't know if it was chemically altered.
Speaker 8: Everyone changes when they come out of that pressure cooker
Speaker 8: in WWF. It's stressful. Some of the guys turned into backstabbers.
Speaker 8: Some guys deal with the pressure in different ways. We
Speaker 8: were doing a thing at a house show. I felt
Speaker 8: this blow to the back of my skull that way
Speaker 8: in the house show.
Speaker 2: That was the nitro.
Speaker 8: I felt this blow to the back of my skull
Speaker 8: and knocked me out at a concussion the whole nine yards.
Speaker 8: I was mad about it, almost the kind of thing.
Speaker 8: I was going to fight him then, but I let
Speaker 8: it go. JJ called me and said, we just need
Speaker 8: you to make the rest of these bookings. You're on
Speaker 8: the marquee. So we get into the match. I tried
Speaker 8: to stay out as much as I could. It got
Speaker 8: all screwed up because six Pack was supposed to run
Speaker 8: down and do something, but he never showed up suddenly.
Speaker 8: I didn't know what hit me and went down. I'm
Speaker 8: seeing stars. I felt like there was a cut on
Speaker 8: the back of my neck, but I'm feeling back there
Speaker 8: and there's no cut. I look around and I didn't
Speaker 8: know who hit me from behind. I see Scott with
Speaker 8: a chair and he throws it in my face.
Speaker 2: I go, that's it.
Speaker 8: So that's kind of like what they leave out on
Speaker 8: the whole, you know. There was another provocation in the
Speaker 8: body of this match. The match where SAgs attacked Hall,
Speaker 8: there was another moment where SAgs thought, the son of
Speaker 8: a bitch hit me again in the back of the head. Jesus,
Speaker 8: I walked in the ring and just started hitting him
Speaker 8: with punches, knocked him out. It just happened like that.
Speaker 8: I didn't want to fight him, It just happened. Something
Speaker 8: was building up there from the first time he hit me.
Speaker 8: Then it happened again. I heard this noise from the shower.
Speaker 8: Kevin Nash comes in the locker room with a back
Speaker 8: and he was saying, we'll see who has the stroke
Speaker 8: in this company. That was pretty much him telling us
Speaker 8: we were getting fired. At the time, they were practically booking,
Speaker 8: and I've just knocked the booker's teeth down his throat.
Speaker 2: When we watch the.
Speaker 8: Tape back, we see, oh my god, it wasn't Scott
Speaker 8: with the chair, it was Kevin Nash with the tag belt.
Speaker 8: So that thing, according to SAgs, that set him off
Speaker 8: to attack Scott halland knock his teeth out of his
Speaker 8: face was not another blind side cheer shot from Scott Hall,
Speaker 8: but in fact a belt shot from Kevin Nash. Thus
Speaker 8: why there was probably a bit of confusion when he
Speaker 8: absolutely went completely crazy there. So that's that's that. Hall
Speaker 8: has also said, you know, I think we heard it.
Speaker 8: When I swing a chair, I swing it. Don't ask
Speaker 8: me to hit you with something because I'm gonna hit
Speaker 8: you with it. I'd rather not do it, but if
Speaker 8: I'm gonna do it, I'm gonna do it, and I'll
Speaker 8: take it the same way. So that whenever I see
Speaker 8: the outsiders mix it up with the nasty boys, I
Speaker 8: cannot help but think about this story in this history.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, that's that's the truth. I mean, Jesus Christ,
Speaker 2: and you know, like.
Speaker 8: He says, they are Jerry Saggs, Hall and Nash were
Speaker 8: already making a reputation for themselves in WCW in the
Speaker 8: locker room as people that would throw their weight around,
Speaker 8: throw their salaries around, and throw their influence around. Here's
Speaker 8: another snapshot of that from the same time period. WCW
Speaker 8: did a show in tupeloam Misissippi on October thirteenth, nineteen
Speaker 8: ninety six, and in the main event, National Hall beat
Speaker 8: Harlem Heat via dq Dave Penzer, in his recently released
Speaker 8: book with Guy Evans, Friend of the Show, talks about
Speaker 8: this night, and I think it says a lot about
Speaker 8: the outsiders at this particular point in time and kind
Speaker 8: of how they were conducting themselves in WCW. I remember
Speaker 8: one meeting that happened after house show in Tupelo, Mississippi.
Speaker 8: Penzer writes a little backstory. First, I was in charge
Speaker 8: of overseeing the music for the show, and as we
Speaker 8: previously established, it was all triggered via cassette tapes. A
Speaker 8: lot of times the cassette machine was up in the
Speaker 8: sound booth near where the suites were located, and as
Speaker 8: a result I didn't always have full control over it. Nonetheless,
Speaker 8: we typically had individual tapes queued up with individual entrance themes,
Speaker 8: so sting song would be on one tape, while another
Speaker 8: would have Randy Sabas just theme.
Speaker 2: You get the idea.
Speaker 8: As long as the tapes were round correctly, the sound
Speaker 8: guy just had to press play and the song went
Speaker 8: off without a hitch. Well, on this night, Kevin National
Speaker 8: Scott Hall wanted to come out to the Fuji song
Speaker 8: Ready or Not. Okay, they would come out to Ready
Speaker 8: or Not on house shows. I don't know if you
Speaker 8: know this as opposed to the nWo theme.
Speaker 2: No, I did not know.
Speaker 8: Later, when Hall made one memorable appearance in ECW, this
Speaker 8: is like a viral clip. He came out to Ready
Speaker 8: or Not.
Speaker 2: As well.
Speaker 8: As WCW didn't have an official license to use the
Speaker 8: music Penzer rights, we didn't have a tape with that
Speaker 8: specific song prepared. Instead, we had to purchase the actual
Speaker 8: retail album that Ready or Not was featured on the
Speaker 8: score and have the tape queued up in the right position.
Speaker 8: Imagine setting someone to the music store at the mall
Speaker 8: in Mississippi so they could have their song. That's just
Speaker 8: It was the third song on saide A. I'll never
Speaker 8: forget it. Unfortunately, while I was in the ring to
Speaker 8: introduce Kevin in Scott's match, the sound guy put the
Speaker 8: tape in the wrong way. If you know anything about
Speaker 8: cassette tapes, that obviously meant that we were now playing
Speaker 8: side B the wrong side. Once you start doing that,
Speaker 8: it's not so easy to get your Q point back,
Speaker 8: especially in a live environment, and the sound guy had
Speaker 8: no idea year where the song was located. Meanwhile, Kevin
Speaker 8: and Scott were still backstage, refusing to come out until the.
Speaker 2: Error was resolved. Refusing boss, refusing to come out until
Speaker 2: this song. That doesn't make sense. I don't see the problem.
Speaker 8: In turn, that led to five of the most uncomfortable
Speaker 8: minutes of my life as I tried in vain to
Speaker 8: stall in the ring for time while simultaneously getting on
Speaker 8: a headset and attempting to fix it. At some point,
Speaker 8: I guess Sting finally turned to those guys and said, dude,
Speaker 8: just go out there. How long are we going to wait?
Speaker 8: We need our music.
Speaker 2: Kevin and Scott shot back, Wait a minute, how long
Speaker 2: are we going to wait? We need our music?
Speaker 8: Kevin and Scott shot back, you know what, Sting respond
Speaker 8: Sting responded, it's only two below. This is the yeah
Speaker 8: that would go on to be a thing, a phrase
Speaker 8: as Penzer explains in WCW to typify at the times.
Speaker 8: This is the reason, he writes, by WCW is where
Speaker 8: it's been, has been, where it's been, they said, you
Speaker 8: don't value a town like Tublo, Mississippi. For the next
Speaker 8: Nitron Monday, Era called a meeting with all the boys.
Speaker 8: I want you to know, he began, that I brought
Speaker 8: Kevin and Scott in for more than just their talent.
Speaker 8: We've not had a history of being successful in this company,
Speaker 8: and for the most part, if we drew a thousand
Speaker 8: fans that was considered a good house, that can't be
Speaker 8: he continued. These guys have sold out Madison Square Garden
Speaker 8: and they come from a machine that knows how to
Speaker 8: do it right. I don't have all the answers, he said,
Speaker 8: but we've got to take from their knowledge to grow
Speaker 8: as a company. That's all they're doing, Boss, They're just
Speaker 8: in parting home works in New York. That's all these
Speaker 8: guys are doing. They're not trying to stir shit up.
Speaker 8: They're not trying to be prima donnat. So everyone was
Speaker 8: just you know, everyone's just making a big y. Know
Speaker 8: how it works in New York as evidenced by the
Speaker 8: remarkable returns in nineteen ninety five when Kevin was on top. Yes,
Speaker 8: I don't have all the answers, he said, but we've
Speaker 8: just got to take from their knowledge as a company,
Speaker 8: and Bishoff is get in liney. We got to be
Speaker 8: like WWF. You know, mister, I'm taking it to vince
Speaker 8: what we did in the past didn't work. In essence,
Speaker 8: what Eric told us had some validity. Kevin and Scott
Speaker 8: really did a lot add a lot to our company.
Speaker 8: They helped us in areas people wouldn't even think of,
Speaker 8: such as public relations or helping Zane Breslov with first
Speaker 8: day ticket sales. They provided a lot of assistance and
Speaker 8: in that sense Eric was right. But then, of course,
Speaker 8: with Eric being Eric, he had to add a parting shot.
Speaker 8: And by the way, he said, if I ever hear
Speaker 8: it's only two below again, I'll fire that person on
Speaker 8: the spot. He's usually a very laid back guy. You
Speaker 8: could see the steam coming out of Sting's ears. I
Speaker 8: don't even think he meant the initial comment in the
Speaker 8: way it was received. He's basically saying, what are we
Speaker 8: going to sit here all day while they flip a
Speaker 8: casseet tape? Back and forth at some point, as they say,
Speaker 8: the show must go on. But when Eric made that statement,
Speaker 8: I'll fire that person on the spot. Sting got hot.
Speaker 8: He left the room, and I can only assume that
Speaker 8: there was a conversation or two thereafter. More than anything,
Speaker 8: the incident underscored the fact that it was a new
Speaker 8: day in WCW. The mainstays of the company like Staing,
Speaker 8: lex or Rick, Flair and the Four Horsemen had been
Speaker 8: used to doing business in a certain way, but now
Speaker 8: Kevin and Scott had returned from up north saying yeah,
Speaker 8: there's some things that could be improved down here. At
Speaker 8: the time, I think some feelings were definitely hurt, and
Speaker 8: the incident may have started some of the tension between
Speaker 8: the various factions backstage. Adding fuel to the fire was
Speaker 8: the fact that the nWo were getting cheered as if
Speaker 8: they were babyfaces. In the meantime, though, it only served
Speaker 8: as for a popular joke at the bar. Hey, someone
Speaker 8: would say, if a guy was looking down, it's only
Speaker 8: two below. That's only two below. Indeed, it is only
Speaker 8: two tenser. So that is the table being set for
Speaker 8: a World War three. For the ages, it's the nineteen
Speaker 8: ninety six installment.
Speaker 2: That's for sure. To deep dive this thing. Now, I
Speaker 2: don't know what a death toll would look like. You
Speaker 2: had a lot of names to go through. My friends
Speaker 2: there there are. It's not it's not awful. I mean
Speaker 2: it's bad, but it's not awful. Nineteen that's nothing out
Speaker 2: of sixty participants, I know, out of sixty's nineteen and
Speaker 2: you know, including everybody who's not even in the match.
Speaker 2: So there's very Todnight.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Randy Anderson, Mark Curtis, Bobby Heenan, Dusty Rhodes, Lee Marshall,
Speaker 2: gene Oakerland, Sister Sherry, Scott Hall, Ben Wah, Bubba, Bobby Eaton,
Speaker 2: Jimmy Graffiti, Oh my God, Johnny, Johnny Grunge, Eddie Guerrero,
Speaker 2: Ice Train, the Rene God, Tony Rumble, Mark Starr, and
Speaker 2: Pez that's nothing. Yeah. W CW. You know the surprising thing.
Speaker 2: W CW never really has a crazy ass. Yeah. I've
Speaker 2: always been surprised about the.
Speaker 8: No adults died In two thousand and one was Jerry
Speaker 8: Sagg's lawsuit against World Championship Wrestling Scott Hall BACKUS, so
Speaker 8: he sued them all. The lawsuit was filed in November
Speaker 8: of nineteen ninety seven, so a year after this, and
Speaker 8: you know what, eight months after the January ninety seven
Speaker 8: house show incident. And it was in the courts from
Speaker 8: nineteen ninety seven till two thousand and one, till two
Speaker 8: thousand and one, at which point it was, uh, it
Speaker 8: was dismissed. Nash made the comment that he got a
Speaker 8: two dollars settlement or whatever.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 8: It's clear that it's dismissed as of August of two
Speaker 8: thousand and one, and the case file has been destroyed,
Speaker 8: so we don't have any more detail than that as
Speaker 8: to how it played out down there in Florida. But yeah,
Speaker 8: I mean, this thing, this thing would not die. They
Speaker 8: took depositions from Harley Race, Dory Funk, the position of
Speaker 8: Eric Bischoff, the company was deposed, Nash and Hall were deposed.
Speaker 8: Let's see who else. I don't know, if there's a
Speaker 8: way to well, I don't know. Bischoff's deposition may have
Speaker 8: been canceled according to the record. I think at one
Speaker 8: point he was scheduled to do it and then they didn't.
Speaker 8: Steve Kern was deposed. Yeah, Dorry Funk is mentioned a
Speaker 8: doctor who apparently was the doctor who examined, examined, Jerry Saggs.
Speaker 8: Just man, well, those must be some depositions, man.
Speaker 2: Of a lifetime.
Speaker 8: I don't know what the fuck Dory Funk and Harley
Speaker 8: Race would get deposed for, but there it is in
Speaker 8: black and white. So yeah, that's the legacy of the
Speaker 8: SAgs haul Heat. And with that now behind us and
Speaker 8: the death toll rendered, we will take a break and
Speaker 8: come back. And when we do, it's the deep dive
Speaker 8: into your WWE Peacock archive. WCW World War three nineteen
Speaker 8: ninety six is on the docket, boss, and we're gonna
Speaker 8: fill these three rings up.
Speaker 2: Let's fucking do it.