Scott,
Just finished re-watching Rumble 93 (haven’t seen it in years), and man do I have tons of questions:
Yay! Let’s answer ’em.
1) Going in, who would have been considered the favorite to win the thing? Flair? Perfect? Savage would have been too old, and I can’t believe that Yoko was over enough yet. I guess that leaves Taker by default, but would anybody have been expecting a Taker-Hart main event at WM?
Literally everyone in the world knew Yokozuna was winning. You could ask newborn babies at the time and they would tell you that he was the only one with any chance. Yoko was absolutely the favorite.
2) When the decision was made to have Yoko win, was the "fix" already in to do the title switch to Hogan at WM? Or did that decision come later?
Dave was just asked about this on the radio show, and to this day he doesn’t know when the decision was made. It wasn’t until very close to WM, however. The only thing we DO know for sure is that as of a week before WM, Bret was still under the impression that he was winning the match, and he was informed the day of the show that he was losing and all the Hogan stuff that was following.
3) If the plans for Hogan came later, then what were the original plans for Yoko-Hart? Was Yoko just being set up as another challenger for Hart to beat? If so, how long do you think Hart would have had it? Would he have spent that whole summer defending the title? Feuding with Luger, maybe?
Bret seems to think that this is the case, yes. No one else has a really firm answer on what was supposed to happen.
4) I just don’t get Yoko’s involvement at all, really. What made him so different than all the other big fat guys that Vince had used before? Do you think Vince was influenced by WCW using Vader as their champ? Was Yoko really being groomed to be a long term champion or did that just sort of happen?
He was big and could work to a certain degree and fit with Vince’s vision of a monster for Luger to slay.
5) And as for Ramon, was that his only shot at the title? If so, that’s kind of amazing, isn’t it?
That was indeed his only shot. Can’t blame him for leaving in 96 in a lot of a ways.
Thanks,