THE FALL OF WCW IN 2000
Episode 3 of “Who Killed WCW” focused on the company’s plunge throughout 1999 and 2000 under the creative leadership of Vince Russo.
In August 1999, WWE received two hours of additional programming with the advent of SmackDown in August on UPN while ECW launched on TNN and WCW’s creative direction focused on running toward the past with the “red and yellow” Hulk Hogan, a heel version of Sting, and ideas falling flat on a routine basis.
For those following closely, the names Vince Russo and Ed Ferrara were often cited for WWE’s explosion in popularity, taking quantum leaps into adult-themed storylines, and ingratiating WWE into popular culture through Steve Austin, The Rock, DX, and Sable among the top characters. But when SmackDown was thrown onto their laps with no pay increase, Russo’s breaking point was met, citing a near nervous breakdown leading to back-channel talks to meet with WCW brass.
The idea that Vince McMahon’s top writers were contractually free to walk is astounding and led to a change by getting their writers “on paper” and never allowing its creative division to get anywhere near the pub that Russo commanded for himself and becoming a commodity in the wrestling war. Russo’s exit from WWF was well publicized. He even did media rounds to promote his arrival in WCW, scheduled for October 25 – the night after Halloween Havoc – before being bumped up a week to October 18.
However people choose to view Russo today, there was unquestionable intrigue and hope that the two writers credited with “updating” the WWE product could wave their magic wants and apply the same changes to WCW.
Guy Evans ran the data in his NITRO book, the thirteen episodes of Nitro under Russo and Ferrara averaged a 3.21 rating compared to a 3.24 for the previous thirteen under Kevin Nash. Thunder averaged a 2.25 rating over ten episodes and a 2.24 for the previous ten. Russo and Ferrara were responsible for three pay-per-views during this phase with Halloween Havoc (Hogan vs. Sting), Mayhem (WCW title tournament), and Starrcade (Bret Hart vs. Goldberg) averaging a 0.43 buyrate compared to a 0.41 for Bash at the Beach (Kevin Nash & Sting vs. Randy Savage & Sid), Road Wild (Hogan vs. Nash, Savage vs. Dennis Rodman), and Fall Brawl in 1999 (Hogan vs. Sting).
While a lot of emphasis has been placed on the restrictions imposed by WCW’s standards and practices (to the point, that The Harris Twins were rebranded as “Creative Control” as a spoof), Brad Siegel gave more leeway by allowing Nitro to become TV-14 when Russo and Ferrara arrived. This came with caveats that didn’t allow blood, swearing without approval, male-on-female violence unless within the context of a match, no guns, no death, no nudity, and “no urination or defecation”, per NITRO by Guy Evans. Insert your own joke about whether WCW’s booking violated the final stipulation.
By January 2000, Russo’s rope had shrunk dramatically, and he was in a pinch heading into the Souled Out event in Cincinnati. The show was built around Bret Hart defending the WCW title in the main event and Jeff Jarrett involved in a three-match series with Chris Benoit. Hart and Jarrett were both diagnosed with concussions and off the show with days to rebook it. One pitch was for David “Tank” Abbott to win the vacant WCW title which led to the dominoes falling and ending with Bill Busch proposing Russo allow for a committee to book the show and Russo becoming a cog in the wheel, which he turned down noting the language in his contract.
Russo went home to be paid and led to the committee led by Kevin Sullivan, which was the death blow to the core of WCW’s mid-card as it spurred multiple talents to exit. Chris Benoit, Perry Saturn, Eddy Guerrero, and Dean Malenko were let out of their contracts without any restrictions a scenario where Benoit won the WCW title on January 16, never lost the belt, and appeared on WWF Raw on January 31. It is not discussed in the episode, but WCW agent Mike Graham allegedly threatened Benoit and gave the disgruntled unit plenty of leverage if they opted to respond legally to the threat.
In 2000, Benoit’s website was run by Thindata, a company that oversaw multiple wrestler websites and the Live Audio Wrestling outlet. The LAW’s Jeff Marek did regular podcasts with Benoit and was the conduit for the Radicals to get into the WWF. Marek played the intermediary by contacting referee Jimmy Korderas to see who they could speak with to gauge interest in the four. It opened the door for Bruce Prichard to be contacted and the Radicals kept their cards close to the vest as they met with WWF officials to hammer out a deal including ghosting Shane Douglas, who had pledged his desire to leave with them but would not be part of the jump.
WCW was in a freefall as the Souled Out event drew approximately 115,000 buys, a decrease of 65 percent from the same show in 1999. In February, the SuperBrawl buys decreased by 86 percent, and the March Uncensored show saw a drop of 82 percent in buys. (Data: Wrestlenomics)
The committee was short-lived and by mid-March, Brad Siegel was already negotiating for Russo to return as he was making a large amount to sit at home while also negotiating a new deal with Eric Bischoff. Bischoff and Russo were each under the impression they were running creative when they returned together in April 2000 and it’s very plausible they were given conflicting marching orders. Russo and Bischoff were both being paid handsomely to sit at home, so the leverage was on their side. Bischoff was bought out of his old contract and presented a brand new one to return as a consultant with other perks worked into the deal.
Russo was also returning under the old terms of his deal but technically had less television to produce as Nitro was reduced from three hours to two in January. The idea of dropping an hour of Nitro was in theory, to bolster the two-hour average, but instead, ratings didn’t improve and they lost an hour of highly-rated cable programming even as WCW’s numbers were falling.
From April 2000 onward, it’s a runaway train and the episode highlights the promotion’s “death by one thousand cuts” mentality. David Arquette winning the WCW title, Bash at the Beach 2000, and Vince Russo winning the title are all awful but it was the collective that amplified the freefall. It was a salvageable company in the fall of 1999 but by the summer of 2000, there was no turning back and the company was a parody of the one it once resembled.
By October 2000, Russo is gone and there are active discussions to sell WCW including the first time that Vince McMahon kicks the tires. The final episode will be the most interesting to see how the sale of WCW is characterized and the roles of Brad Siegel and Stu Snyder, who brokered the sale to the WWF for a fraction of its worth.
POST SCHEDULE
Tonight: Rewind-A-Dynamite with John Pollock & Wai Ting
Thursday: Rewind-A-Wai – WrestleMania: The Album (POST Wrestling Café)
Friday: MCU L8R – X-Men Origins: Wolverine (POST Wrestling Café)
Friday: Rewind-A-SmackDown with John Pollock & Wai Ting (FREE)
Saturday: Collision Course with John Siino & Kate from Montreal (POST Wrestling Café)
WRESTLING/MMA NEWS
**Monday’s episode of WWE Raw averaged 1,747,000 viewers and 725,000 (0.55) in the 18-49 demographic, which was tremendous airing against Game 5 of the NBA Finals. The Boston Celtics vs. Dallas Mavericks averaged 12,224,000 viewers and a 3.65 rating for the demo on ABC, yet Raw increased its viewership by four percent to its highest amount since April 15. In the 18-49 demographic, Raw’s audience increased by 10 percent due to the female audience growing. Women in the demo improved from 186,000 last week to 253,000 this week. Males in the demo only grew by two percent. (Wrestlenomics)
Raw averaged 1,858,000 and 0.53 in the 18-49 demo in the first hour, it dropped to 1,731,000 and 0.56 in the second hour, and down to 1,651,000 and 0.53 in the third hour. (Programming Insider)
**Raw also performed well in Canada averaging 284,300 viewers and 99,800 in the 25-54 demographic on Sportsnet 360. It was Raw’s largest audience in Canada since April 29 and increased by 72 percent from last week when Raw aired against the NHL. The top sports programs were the Toronto Blue Jays vs. Boston Red Sox, Austria vs. France in a Euro 2024 game, the NBA Finals, Belgium vs. Slovakia in another Euro game, and Raw ranked fifth.
**AEW Dynamite is at the EagleBank Arena in Fairfax, Virginia tonight and will begin the show with a commercial-free match between MJF and Rush. This will be MJF’s first match since December 30, 2023, when he dropped the AEW title to Samoa Joe at Worlds End. The last update from WrestleTix states there are approximately 3,400 tickets distributed. Below is what has been advertised:
*Commercial-Free: MJF vs. Rush
*Title Eliminator: The Young Bucks vs. The Acclaimed
*Owen Hart Foundation Cup: Claudio Castagnoli vs. PAC
*Owen Hart Foundation Cup: Nyla Rose vs. Kris Statlander
*Orange Cassidy, Dante Martin, Kyle O’Reilly & Mark Briscoe vs. Roderick Strong, Konosuke Takeshita, Kyle Fletcher & Zack Sabre Jr.
*Face-to-face between Swerve Strickland and Will Ospreay
*Contract signing between “Timeless” Toni Storm and Mina Shirakawa
**TNA launched on this date in 2002 with its pay-per-view from the Von Braun Center in Huntsville, Alabama. The concept avoided death within its first few months when a sizable portion of its funding was gone and by chance, a publicist working with the group by the name of Dixie Carter was able to save the project by pitching it to her father Bob Carter of Panda Energy and giving the company a new life. The idea of running weekly pay-per-views was born out of the idea that professional wrestling fans were buying upwards of three shows per month in recent years between the WWE, WCW, and ECW and were spending less money after the death of the latter two promotions. Additionally, the pay-per-view distributors were looking for more sellable content after the loss of WCW and ECW with WWE being the only consistent revenue driver when big boxing fights were infrequent, and UFC was barely chugging along. It was a flawed idea to expect fans to spend $9.99 each week and it became clear they needed stronger distribution. In 2004, they landed on Fox Sports Net on Friday afternoons and cut out weekly pay-per-views in favor of monthly Sunday shows beginning in November. The core of the product was its X Division with a new era of performers led by AJ Styles with Low Ki, Christopher Daniels, Samoa Joe, Petey Williams, Elix Skipper, Frankie Kazarian, Chris Sabin, and others that showcased a style WWE was not going to lean into. It was a push-and-pull of feeding its audience something unique while also going after recognizable names and having a balance between big names and not becoming a haven for ex-WWE stars. In 2005, they broke through with a huge deal with Spike TV after the network dropped its negotiations with WWE and built their programming around UFC which was complimented by pro wrestling on Saturday nights. It grew from a one-hour slot on Saturdays, a move to Thursdays, an expansion to two hours, moving to Mondays for a brief head-to-head period, back to Thursdays, bouncing around nights of the week and continually posting very respectable numbers by failing to monetize those fans through pay-per-views and live events in sizable numbers. It is impossible to watch the “Who Killed WCW?” series and explain to someone that TNA took all the main players from that era and placed them in positions of power both behind the scenes and on-screen and expected different results. In 2014, Spike dropped the programming and TNA has never been the same exposure-wise. They struggled from network to network but under the ownership of Anthem Sports and Entertainment, they will be safe as long as they are viewed as a valuable asset to its parent company’s portfolio.
**Bill Goldberg appeared on Busted Open Radio and spoke about his desire to have one more match. Goldberg revealed that he blew out his rotator cuff in October 2016 on the night he returned to WWE on an episode of Raw in Denver, Colorado. Goldberg didn’t disclose the injury and never got it fixed but said he’s not entertaining a match until he gets that taken care of. He added that he’s going to be getting stem cell treatment and then determining if he needs surgery for the rotator cuff. Goldberg’s last match was in February 2022, losing to Roman Reigns at the Elimination Chamber card in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
**The Edmonton Oilers have extended the Stanley Cup Finals to a sixth game, which will be played on Friday night head-to-head with SmackDown in Chicago. If the Oilers beat the Florida Panthers on Friday, Game 7 will be on Monday night against Raw.
**The Lapsed Fan has a great discussion on the demise of WCW with host Jack Encarnacao (who served as a researcher on the current VICE series) interviewing Kris Zellner from Between the Sheets.
**Pollstar reports that TNA’s recent tapings in Newport, Kentucky had 262 tickets sold on May 18 for a gross of $11,452. The second night in Newport sold 199 tickets and grossed $8,887 on May 19 at the MegaCorp Pavilion.
**TNA’s next tapings are June 28 & June 29 at the 2300 Arena in Philadelphia, and they have announced Jeff Hardy will be part of the tapings. Hardy returned to the company this past weekend at the Against All Odds show at Cicero Stadium.
**Atlantis Jr. and Okumura will be part of MLW’s Opera Cup, which begins on July 12 at Blood & Thunder. The two will meet in the opening round as the representatives from CMLL. Blood & Thunder will stream live at 9 p.m. ET on YouTube from St. Petersburg, Florida.
**Jake Paul’s fight with Mike Tyson has been moved to November 15, but Paul is going to take another fight in July. Paul is going to fight BKFC’s Mike Perry on July 20 at the Amalie Arena in Tampa, Florida. Perry competed in the UFC from 2016 until 2021 and has gone 5-0 since joining BKFC. Perry has become the top star for Bare Knuckle’s promotion with wins against Michael “Venom” Page, Luke Rockhold, Eddie Alvarez, and Thiago Alves. Paul and Perry are scheduled for an eight-round boxing fight in the Cruiserweight division (200 pounds). Paul said that despite the Tyson fight being moved he wanted to fight on the original July 20 date, and this is easily one of Paul’s toughest opponents. The card will also feature Amanda Serrano competing at super lightweight against Stevie Taylor. Serrano is scheduled to fight on the November 15 card underneath Paul and Tyson in a big rematch with Katie Taylor. The July 20 card will be available on pay-per-view through DAZN.
**John Nash is interviewed by Luke Thomas regarding the UFC antitrust cases:
**The TKO closed at $104.52 on Wednesday.
**The UFC has released its International Fight Week schedule for Las Vegas next week. The UFC 303 press conference will take place next Thursday at 6 p.m. ET followed by the Hall of Fame ceremony at 10 p.m. This year’s Hall of Fame class includes Wanderlei Silva, Frankie Edgar, Mauricio “Shogun” Rua, and Joanna Jędrzejczyk. The UFC 117 fight between Anderson Silva and Chael Sonnen will be added to the Fight Wing and Beneil Dariush will receive the Forrest Griffin Community Award.
**The ceremonial weigh-ins for UFC 303 are next Friday at 8 p.m. ET at the T-Mobile Arena and are free to attend.
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POLLOCK & THURSTON
John Pollock and Brandon Thurston chat about WWE’s Clash at the Castle in Scotland, and a curveball is thrown regarding UFC’s antitrust suit.
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upNXT
Davie Portman and John Siino review WWE NXT featuring a Battle Royal to determine Trick Williams’ opponent at NXT Heatwave!
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THE DOUBLE SHOT: “Who Killed WCW? Ep. 3
John Pollock & Wai Ting share their thoughts on Who Killed WCW? Episode 3: “New Blood”, documenting the arrival of former WWF head writer Vince Russo.
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THE WELLNESS POLICY: Growth Mindset
The Wellness Policy returns this month with special guest, Chardelle Moore, to explore the topic of cultivating a growth mindset.
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REWIND-A-RAW: Wyatt Sicks Arrive
John Pollock and Wai Ting review WWE Raw as the Wyatt QR Code mystery concludes. Plus, fallout from Clash at the Castle and this year’s first MITB qualifying matches.
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THE N.W.A. PODCAST
This month, the Advocates are back to discuss the fallout from Clash at the Castle, make some early Forbidden Door predictions, and opine about Ricochet leaving WWE.
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