Wrestling Observer Flashback – 10.13.96
This week, it’s the BRET HART SWEEPSTAKES!
– In our top story, Dave notes that the “Bret Hart Sweepstakes” have reached the 11th hour and no one is really sure where he’s ending up. Although current plans are for Bret to be at Survivor Series, WCW has countered with an offer that is “three times what Bret has ever earned in the business”, guaranteed cash money. The assumption is that the storyline kicking off in the WWF would lead to Bret regaining the WWF title at Wrestlemania, because Bret has been very open about any potential deal hinging on him getting that title back. (Well hell, he’d end up getting that title TWICE more, so I’m sure everything will be great!)
– Bret is actually in one of the best bargaining positions in wrestling history right now, one of the most popular and marketable stars worldwide during the thick of a wrestling war. He should be able to easily turn this into a million dollar per year payday if he plays his cards right. And yet, even those close to him don’t seem to know which way he’s going at this point.
– Bret himself is telling people that he hasn’t signed with the WWF yet, despite the direction on TV clearly building to himself against Steve Austin at Survivor Series. Sources in the WWF say that Bret and Vince have already agreed on all the major points in the contract based on a visit that Vince made to Calgary in July, however.
– Concern has been building within the WWF in the past week that WCW made an offer to Bret reportedly worth $9 million over 3 years, which the WWF couldn’t possibly hope to match.
(And that’s AFTER PPV revenues came in that year!)
– For what it’s worth, even people inside WWF think Bret would be crazy to turn down that kind of money from WCW, belt or no belt.
– Meanwhile, others close to Bret are pretty sure that if he got the right acting gig, he’d leave the wrestling business behind in a heartbeat and go do the acting thing instead. Besides, Dave notes, worst case scenario he’d be able to give the WWF three months’ notice and leave whenever he wanted, right?
(Right?)
(RIGHT?)
– IWA Japan owner Kishu Asano announced that the group would close up shop after the 10/12 show, after debuting in 1994 and drawing a gigantic crowd to a stadium for the “King of the Deathmatches” tournament in 1995. The oversaturation of indie promotions in Japan seem to be the culprit for the death of the group. (The bath house match was still a favorite among tape traders for years to come, though.)
– Ric Flair is expected to take the rest of the year off after rotator cuff surgery, which explains the storyline of him getting destroyed by the nWo and taken off TV. (It doesn’t explain all the other times that exact same thing happened to him, but whatever). Although he might return later in the year, Dave notes that he’ll have to heavily protected from now on and can no longer work a full time schedule, acting mostly as the manager of the Four Horsemen and wrestling sparingly, perhaps on every few PPV shows, with Jeff Jarrett probably taking his spot in the Four Horsemen. (When you’re right, you’re right!)
– And now, Dave would like to talk about the New World Order a bit. Sure, everyone seems to think that it’s the thing that has set WCW on fire and led to them overtaking the WWF for the first time in history, but is it REALLY?
– In fact, notes Dave, lord of the house show numbers, average attendance for WCW is actually DOWN since Scott Hall debuted, dropping from 3500 paid to 3000 paid. But that doesn’t mean that the angle was a bad idea, even though it’s “fallen apart” in recent weeks. (Keep in mind that this was written in 1996!) In fact, as far as drawing interest in people wanting to see WCW, it’s not even at the level of Flair-Savage yet.
– Next up TV ratings, which went from an average of 2.20 to an average of 2.23, because for every viewer gained on Nitro, there was a viewer lost on Saturdays and it kind of averaged out. So that’s kind of a wash. But everyone seems to only look at TV ratings on Mondays as a barometer of success these days, so by that metric it’s a huge success. (Whew.)
– Also PPV numbers have mostly been flat, going from 0.62 to 0.66 in the nWo era, so that’s mostly a wash as well. So basically, Dave sums up, while signing Hogan led to instant and lasting increases in ratings and buyrates back in 1994, the signing of Hall and Nash hasn’t led to much of anything. (Harsh.)
– Sandman regained the ECW World title from Raven in a tag team match on 10/5, in what was apparently a very last minute decision. Raven is apparently dealing with “personal problems” which will be keeping him out for an extended amount of time and forced him to miss the show. So Paul Heyman changed the booking to Stevie subbing for Raven and taking the fall, thus losing the title on his behalf. To explain the switch, they did a “press conference” with Sandman as new champion, where Stevie Richards interrupted and claimed that Raven has kidnaped Tyler Fullington and fled the country with him.
– Also on the same show, the Rock N Roll Express no-showed for unknown reasons, although they were never actually advertised in the first place and instead were just listed as a “mystery opponent” for the Gangstas in the buildup to the show.
– To Memphis, where we continue asking the question “Is there a bottom that we can hit?” and each week we keep finding out that the answer is apparently “No.” The weekly show at the Big Flea Market fell to just 372 fans, the smallest crowd in the history of the show. Dave is now asking what exactly the future of the promotion can be with Randy Hales gone from the front office and the weakest talent pool in their history.
– Correction from last week: The MSG show was actually a paid attendance of 6747, which is still HORRIBLE, but not at the level of number previously thought, at least. It appears that the idea of doing a late night “hardcore” show from a New York venue in order to rebuild the market is back on the table, however.
– To AAA, where issues over pay for the WCW luchadors could be building to a split between Konnan and Pena, with Konnan threatening to take his guys and jump to PROMO Azteca in the near future if they can’t work it out. The group has been throwing money at big names in Mexico, like El Hijo del Santo and Lizmark Jr, so don’t be surprised to see it happen.
– Dave notes that you should probably expect this Joel Gertner act to get an even bigger push moving forward.
– Dave also notes that ECW’s Erotic Experience are doing a “chicken act” and not a “gay act”.
(Right, just like that!)
– Bruno Sammartino recently read Lou Thesz’s autobiography and was said to be fuming about it, not because of anything Lou said about Bruno in there, but because Lou claimed that their proposed 1965 title unification match would have been an easy win for Thesz if it turned into a shoot. THAT WILL NOT STAND WITH BRUNO! (Better sign a match for Saudi Arabia between them to settle things!)
– To WCW, where Harlem Heat regained the tag team titles on 10/1 at a WCW Saturday Night taping, ending Public Enemy’s epic reign. Match was really bad, apparently.
– Meanwhile on Nitro, Randy Savage spent all of his promo time putting over the Slim Jim racing team finishing 10th in a NASCAR race. Instead of, say, clarifying the complicated storyline with his ex-wife “that only the bookers understand” or talking about getting destroyed by the nWo a million and one times.
– Despite the WWF buying commercials before Nitro imploring fans to “Make the switch to RAW”, the fans did not, and Nitro destroyed the WWF yet again. The beating was so epic that the gap had reached 3.7 to 2.0 by the final quarter.
– Kurt Angle was in talks with WCW but has pretty much decided against doing pro wrestling. (Man, there’s a “What If” for you! Talk about wasted potential.)
– Next week is going to be “NWO Saturday Night”, with a match taped in an empty gym featuring Hall and Nash beating up jobbers while taking turns on commentary, with no fans but lots of fake crowd noise. Dave notes this is supposed to be a spoof on the current WWF situation. (Man, can you imagine a time when we have to watch empty arena matches with fake crowd noise piped in?)
– JJ Dillon will not have a role in front of the camera for WCW. (Good to know.)
– Dave gives “decent odds” that after Randy Savage is destroyed by the nWo yet again at Halloween Havoc, he’ll be done with the company, although Dave is incredulous that he’d go through with this kind of humiliation every week if he wasn’t at least getting the belt for a few weeks in return.
– To the WWF, where Vince McMahon appeared on the Live Wire show after a ton of hype, and ended up saying nothing. He basically just recapped his usual list of grievances at Ted Turner, using Dok Hendrix as his proxy to say the stuff he didn’t want to. Also he claimed that Jim Ross was never actually fired either time he was fired and blamed it all on “stupid dirt sheet writers”, although again he made sure Dok was the one who said that and not himself. Oh also, the show introduced a new character named “Vic Venum”, who is being played by magazine editor Vince Russo, doing a “real journalist” gimmick. Also on the show, Paul Heyman called in as “Bruce from Connecticut” and yelled at Vince for stealing all his ideas. The show is really kind of a dumpster fire.
– They’re really hyping the return of Mr. Perfect on the 10/21 RAW to be like something akin to Michael Jordan returning to whatever sport he plays. They’re trying to negotiate out of his insurance policy so they can have a top babyface ready if Bret Hart goes to WCW.
– And finally, the WWF did some impressive numbers in Alberta, and the Calgary show featured a special tag team match to pay tribute to the late Matthew Annis, Bret Hart’s nephew who died over the summer. The match featured Matthew’s brother Ted Annis (16 years old) teaming with Harry Smith (11 years old), beating TJ Wilson (16 years old) and Andrew Picarnia. And they ran long and got cut for time, resulting in a finish that didn’t make any sense. “Some things never change”, notes Dave. (I don’t know who Picarnia is, but the other three certainly ended up doing pretty well in the business.)
And that’s the news and I’m OUTTA HERE!