So I was watching Sting’s segment in “Greatest Stars of the 90s” and seeing his “surfer” gimmick again made me wonder: how do you think his career would’ve gone if he started with Vince first in the 80s? Question,
Was there ever a point pre-Monday Night Wars and possibly even pre-nWo
that Vince McMahon (or someone else in the WWF) talked to Sting about
possibly jumping ship? Otherwise, was there ever talk about Sting
contacting WWF (even if it was solely for contract leverage) about
jumping ship? One missed opportunity seems to be when the Ultimate
Warrior won the WWF Title. They broke in together and had some history
that could have been played up. And Vince could have had the added
benefit of burying an NWA/JCP star in the process.
As to the first question, I think he would have become a gigantic star and made shitloads of money, but not been anywhere near as good a worker. Since there wasn’t a Ric Flair around at that point to really elevate him, it probably would have left him stuck in the midcard for a long while before the descent of Hogan in 92 opened up a slot. Then with them needing a new guy to carry the belt in 92, he could have filled the Bret Hart role of the smaller non-roided guy and probably would have ended up being one of the biggest stars in the business anyway. And yes, Vince tried to get Sting to jump ship several times, but he always refused. And really, once Hulk came into WCW in 94, that was where Sting should have seen the writing on the wall and escaped if he was going to. I guess he was just always faithful to JCP/WCW for some strange reason.