November 07, 1994
- Just want to brag for a second if that's okay. My favorite part about doing all these Observer posts is how much I've learned from reading them. Last night, it paid off as I participated in a Royal Rumble-style wrestling trivia competition at a bar here in Memphis and ended up beating 34 other people to win. And I owe it all to His Holiness, Lord Meltzer, praise be to the most high. Thanks Dave! (Also, shouts out to the guy at trivia who chose "Hepatitis O'Neil" as his gimmick name. Oh, how I laughed...)
- Preliminary numbers for Halloween Havoc show the PPV buyrate to be around 0.95 which is absolutely disastrous. WCW had been openly predicting that the show would do nearly double of what Bash at the Beach did and instead, it actually did less. Considering all the money they put into promoting this show, plus retiring Ric Flair, it's bad news all around.
- Hogan is currently negotiating extending his WCW contract but it's thought that he's angling for full, complete control of the company to stay, and at the very least, he won't settle for anything less than what he already has, which is complete creative control over his and his friends characters and storylines. The booking committee was also recently restructured, with Hogan and Jimmy Hart added so he has a say in everything in the company already. Hogan is obviously still a draw but he's not as big a draw as they hoped and now that the dream match storyline with Flair is done, the real test of how well Hogan can draw begins. Dave wonders if he's worth the money. They've built so much of the company around him and they're paying him truckloads of money, but he rarely works house shows and many of WCW's core fans resent him (as evidenced by him regularly getting booed). On the same hand, if WCW lets Hogan go, the company likely deflates like a balloon without him. Sting is the only other possible candidate and he's repeatedly proven to not be a significant draw, yet he's the best they've got. WCW doesn't have a star that can carry the company without Hogan but it might end up hurting them more to try to keep him.
- The AAA When Worlds Collide PPV next week is by far the most important Lucha Libre event ever in the U.S. and the success or failure of it will likely determine whether AAA can truly cross the border and become a legitimate promotion in America. Dave gives a long history of Lucha Libre's successes in America, dating back to the 60s and 70s with guys like El Santo, Mil Mascaras, Gory Guerrero and others and how it died off in the 80s and wasn't revived until AAA shocked the wrestling world in 1992 when they sold out several huge shows in California. Including selling out the same Los Angeles Sports Arena that WWF failed to sell out for 2 different Wrestlemanias. But crowds have fallen since then every time after. Now, WCW has financed this upcoming PPV, with English and Spanish commentary to try and cross it over to American audiences, but in typical WCW fashion, they totally dropped the ball by not promoting it at all. Dave spends over a page describing how WCW has screwed this up to the point of nearly sabotage and thinks it will likely flop on PPV because both sides failed to promote it properly.
- From here, Dave spends several pages explaining the differences in Mexican wrestling and then gives the background and storylines behind each match at the PPV. Dave seems to really want this PPV to succeed while resigning himself to the fact that it probably won't. He calls Rey Mistero Jr. the heart and soul of AAA and says he's the most incredible and creative high flyer in the world aside from maybe Great Sasuke. He notes that La Parka "wears a Skeletor costume" so it might be hard to take him as a serious worker at first glance, but don't make that mistake, he's awesome. Love Machine and Eddie Guerrero "are probably the best tag team in the world right now."
- New details on Missy Hyatt's lawsuit against WCW. During her employment, Missy alleges she was the victim of sexual harassment, discrimination, or retaliation by a number of people. The names included are Ric Flair, Jim Ross, Eric Bischoff, Mike Graham, Greg Gagne, Ole Anderson, Gene Okerlund and several backstage and office employees and range from people grabbing her breasts, continually asking her out for dates or sexual favors, making unwanted sexual advances, and threatening or intimidating her for reporting harassment. She also claims a full color photo of her, with her breast exposed when it popped out at Starrcade 93 was printed out and displayed around the office. Hyatt says she complained to Eric Bischoff, who did nothing, so she went above his head to Bob Dhue to report it. When Bischoff learned she went to Dhue, he fired her and Bob Dhue upheld her termination. She also alleges wage discrimination, saying she was paid less than men who did the same jobs and that WCW hasn't paid her for merchandising income. And finally, she claims that after breaking up with Eric Bischoff's friend Jason Hervey, he sent Missy's belongings to Bischoff. However, Bischoff refused to return the items to her until she signed over to Hervey the titles to 3 expensive cars she had in her name.
- UWA and AAA have restarted their working relationship, at least for now, which led to a couple of AAA stars working a UWA show last week and another joint show scheduled next week. Might be a little too late for UWA though.
- Atsushi Onita held a major party to celebrate passing the 1,000 stitches mark on his body. He's trying to get into the Guinness World Records book for person who has had the most stitches. Everyone needs to have a goal, I guess.
- Terry Funk recently cut ties with Onita's FMW and is planning to work for IWA, which is a smaller but similar deathmatch promotion in Japan. Funk challenged Onita to a winner-take-all $1 million dollar match. Onita responded saying that he has no animosity towards Funk for jumping ship and that he'd love to come over to Funk's house and eat a steak with him. Funk responded by making the challenge again and saying Onita lied to him because he promised Funk a rematch after Funk put him over in 1993 but never gave him one. Funk then said if Onita came over for steak, he'd make sure he poisoned the steak.
- Vince McMahon filmed another promo as a heel for USWA this week, but it was mostly just to hype a benefit softball game that Lawler is involved in. Vince strongly hinted that he would be in Memphis for the game, but never outright said it. Although Vince was great as a heel in promos he filmed last year, Dave says he was really over-acting in this one (can't find this one).
- Dave has finally seen enough SMW footage to declare that The Gangstas gimmick isn't working. Most times when a company tries to cross a line and be controversial, it usually turns off more fans than it turns on and that seems to be the case here. The crowds have dwindled and the Gangstas matches are mostly greeted with silence from the fans. New Jack cuts good promos, but nothing that sells tickets and in the ring, the team is awful, with Mustafa in particular not even being ready to work opening matches, much less main events.
- WCW settled the "When Worlds Collide" PPV name issue with ECW and as a result of the settlement, a couple of WCW wrestlers will work on an upcoming ECW show. No word on who it will be yet, although ECW has been desperately trying to get a Brian Pillman vs. Sabu match, but WCW has repeatedly refused to let them use Pillman. After this agreement is done, WCW has made it clear that they will no longer have any relationship with ECW.
- In a recent issue of Sports Illustrated, they listed "Muhammad Ali handing Hulk Hogan the belt at Halloween Havoc" as that week's Sign of the Apocalypse (a weekly feature in the magazine). In the same issue, someone wrote in to the letters section about SI's recent article about the 40 most annoying people in sports and wrote, "No list would be complete without including all pro wrestlers who dare to call their chosen profession a sport."
- Jim Crockett ran his first NWA show at the Dallas Sportatorium, with mixed results. Some people said it was better than the GWF shows ("what praise, huh?") but others said it was worse. It's expected that former GWF star Moadib (Ahmed Johnson) is going to be pushed as the promotion's top star.
- Cactus Jack and Sabu had a crazy match at a casino in Las Vegas, including a spot where they did a piledriver on a blackjack table in the casino in the middle of an ongoing game (this appears to be the match and at about the 8:50 mark, you see them heading into the casino, but then the video cuts back to the ring, so whatever happened on the floor of the casino apparently wasn't filmed).
- Indie wrestling promoter Cliff Bartz was arrested by the FBI in Florida this week where he was living under a fake name. Bartz had a reputation as a snake indie promoter and was on the run from charges that he masterminded armed robberies and intimidated witnesses.
- Movie director Steven Spielberg is refusing to allow his new movie Schindler's List to air on PPV because he says he doesn't want it to be associated with things like pro wrestling.
- Vader was scheduled to face Hogan at Starrcade, but Hogan nixed the idea. Vader then filmed promos teasing challenging Hogan down the road at some later date, but somehow, those interviews got scrubbed from TV also and never aired.
- Speaking of Hogan politics, after Steve Austin lost the U.S. title to Jim Duggan in 28 seconds, Austin was reportedly promised that he would get the belt back at Halloween Havoc. But Hogan overruled the booking committee, so his friend Jim Duggan is still champion.
- On TV this weekend, Eric Bischoff was doing commentary and claimed the last PPV proves WCW is the #1 company. He then told fans to "check out the competition and when you're done laughing at the clowns, come back, we'll still be here." Dave mentions the rocks and glass houses saying.
- Brian Blair and Warlord, two more of Hogan's friends, may be headed in to WCW soon.
- Dave is hearing that Bob Backlund will be winning the title from Bret Hart at Survivor Series, "for better or worse," he says.
- Bull Nakano is expected to win the WWF women's title from Alundra Blayze at the All Japan Women's Tokyo Dome show later this month.
- Dave gives 4.5 stars to a Diesel/Shawn Michaels vs. 1-2-3 Kid/Razor Ramon match that aired on Action Zone and says it's the best WWF TV match in more than a year (yeah I think this match is kind of famous for being the first time the Kliq all got to work together on TV and they tore the house down on a throwaway Saturday morning show).