September 25, 1995
- The second round of the Monday night wars was basically a ratings draw, but WCW had the stronger show. Dave breaks down how ratings work, what "shares" mean, how the replays of each show affect the ratings, total viewing audience, and all that boring stuff. Raw was taped once again so next week's Raw and Nitro will be the first time both shows have aired live against each other. Word is WCW security confiscated plenty of pro-WWF and anti-Hogan signs from fans during the show.
- Despite rumors, WWF is not currently discussing going live for Raw more often. The production costs of going live every week would be astronomical compared to the return on investment that they get now by doing 3 weeks taped/1 week live. WCW doesn't have that problem since they're owned by a TV company and since beating Vince McMahon seems to be WCW's primary goal, they're willing to operate at a deficit to do it. (WWF would change their mind on that in 1997).
- WWF is now claiming that Lex Luger had a valid contract through January. WCW and Luger himself have claimed that he was working in WWF without a contract and was free to jump ship at any time. Luger is now saying WWF literally put Wite-Out on his original contract and filled in a new date in order to make this claim (that seems like a hell of an accusation since I would assume that to be, I dunno, incredibly illegal). WWF hasn't filed a lawsuit yet but lawyers are reportedly involved. Word is Vince McMahon found out about Luger joining WCW at the same time everyone else did, when it happened on TV. From here, Dave goes into all the legalities of how standard WWF contracts work. It's all very technical but interesting. Luger reportedly began negotiating with WCW in August, with WWF's permission. But those negotiations fell through and so WWF believed Luger was staying. Luger and WCW reached a secret agreement on 8/31 and Luger reportedly talked to McMahon the next day but never told him that he had resumed negotiations with WCW and agreed to a deal. Luger worked WWF house shows all the way up to Sunday night before appearing on Nitro the next day.
- Vader is still suspended but hasn't been fired yet. WCW has already sent a letter to WWF informing them that Vader is still under contract and any discussions with him would be considered contract tampering.
- WCW fired Steve Austin this week. Austin has been widely considered as possibly the best young wrestler in the U.S. but his career stalled in the last year or so because WCW doesn't know how to make new stars. Austin has also been in the doghouse with WCW management for the last year due to a reputation for not exactly keeping quiet about his discontent with how he's been used. Austin tore his tricep in June in Japan and has been out of action since. He was about 6 weeks away from returning when he was fired. Dave thinks firing him while he was out injured was pretty classless. Austin has reportedly been upset over the cliquish nature of WCW and wasn't in good favor with Hogan and his buddies, who feel Austin has no charisma and can't draw money (fuckin' LOOOOOOOOL) and since Austin wasn't really in the Flair clique either, he didn't have anyone in power on his side. Dave thinks Austin will likely end up in ECW since he's good friends with Paul Heyman, but it would be a significant pay cut. He also thinks Austin could do well in All Japan because they need a new foreign star and Austin is the kind of worker who can get over there. WWF is always an option of course, and even WCW might take him back if he's willing to take a pay cut but after the way they fired him, Dave thinks there will probably be some bitter feelings there (sadly, Steve Austin drifted into oblivion and was never heard from again).
- Gene Okerlund has signed a new deal with WCW, which is said to be an even better deal than his previous one, which was already for $250,000 plus incentives (far more than most of the wrestlers make). Between Okerlund getting a raise and Austin getting fired while he's injured, several WCW wrestlers are pretty pissed off about the whole thing.
- WWF is claiming the buy rate for Summerslam was 1.0 but other sources say it was slightly below that. Regardless, it's about a 30% drop from last year's Summerslam.
- In AAA, 16-year-old Perro Aguayo Jr. is getting a monster push despite only wrestling a handful of matches in his career. Being the top star's son has its benefits. That being said, he's very good for a rookie and some within AAA think by the time he's 17, he'll be anther Juventud Guerrera (who is only 20 and is probably one of the top 15 workers in the world). He's also got a look that female fans have been going crazy for.
- The war between AAA and EMLL has gotten more heated in recent months, with tons of wrestlers making the jump from one promotion to the other. Both companies are seemingly in a competition to see who can steal more top stars from the other.
- Someone stole Jushin Liger's ring costume at a show recently, forcing him to wear El Samurai's outfit for a match.
- Tatsumi Fujinami held a press conference to announce he is starting his own promotion, with the first show happening next month. I don't think much ever came from that, since he stuck around NJPW forever.
- Update on the Bill Dundee/Wolfie D backstage fight in USWA: in the argument, Dundee reportedly pulled a knife on Wolfie D, which is why he was suspended and Wolfie D wasn't. It was only supposed to be a 2 week suspension, but Dundee immediately went and started working for a rival local promotion in Arkansas, so he's probably done with USWA for now.
- Mustafa of The Gangstas was involved in an incident at a hotel before an ECW show where he apparently went nuts at the hotel and police had to come and drag him out, so he missed the show.
- Two more Dudley Brothers have debuted in ECW. One of them is a guy doing an Indian gimmick using the name Dances With Dudleys and the other is a big guy named Chubby Dudley. Also, The Eliminators debuted, and contrary to rumors, they're not changing gimmicks.
- Cactus Jack has been cutting the best promos in the business lately in ECW.
- Rey Misterio Jr. and Psicosis debuted for ECW and got over huge with their match.
- ECW may be filing a lawsuit against Global Distributions, which is the company that handles their merch, saying Global owes ECW money. In the meantime, Paul Heyman has apparently secured a deal to put out ECW merch himself now.
- Here's the latest news from the Incredibly Strange Wrestling promotion that has been running shows on the Lollapalooza tour. I'm just going to copy and paste because, I mean....fuck, man: "The Abortionist & Cletus the Fetus have become a tag team known as Pro Life & Pro Choice. The two attempted to give female wrestler Jenny X an abortion in the ring with a coat hanger even though she isn't pregnant. The Klu Klux Klown, managed by Harley Racist debuted against Yom Ripper. Mondo Garcia, billed as the son of Jerry Garcia, faked a heart attack in the ring. Anyway, the show ended with J.R. Benson being knocked out by The Rapist and being revived when his valet, after failing to revive him by rubbing her panties under his nose, peed on him to revive him. Kids, don't try that maneuver at home. Mom will get mad. Hey, some of that stuff must have been done before somewhere but I can safely say I'm glad whoever did it before didn't tell me about it. Listen, I wouldn't believe this actually stuff goes on either except they send me the tapes after the show."
- Ric Flair is having some type of eye surgery and will miss a few weeks.
- Speaking of Flair, his Gold's Gym in St. Maarten was destroyed by a recent hurricane and was apparently uninsured (ffs Ric...) and will be a major six-figure loss for him.
- Sabu is expected to face Jerry Lynn at Halloween Havoc in Detroit. Sabu will have his uncle The Sheik in his corner and so WCW attempted to get Bobo Brazil to be in Jerry Lynn's corner. Bobo Brazil and The Sheik had the biggest feud ever in Detroit during their heyday. However, Brazil now uses a walker to get around and he turned WCW's offer down, saying he's retired from the business.
- Ted Turner was reportedly overheard in an elevator talking to Jimmy Hart about how they "really kicked Vince's ass" with the 2nd week Nitro ratings, which Dave says shows where WCW's priorities lie. More concerned about WWF than they are about keeping their own house in order.
- WCW has bought tons of advertising time on rock radio stations around the country to promote Nitro and even bought ad-time on Howard Stern's show in New York, which is the most expensive radio time in America.
- WCW is having a PPV in November called War of the Worlds and there will be some sort of 3-ring gimmick match with a bunch of outside talent being brought in (that ended up being the World War 3 PPV). Hulk Hogan is expected to take a hiatus after this to film a movie.
- A Montreal house show with Diesel defending the WWF title against Jean Pierre (formerly of the Quebeccers) turned into a clusterfuck because Pierre refused to do the job to Diesel. After being told that Diesel was going to pin him clean with the jackknife, Pierre refused because he thought it would hurt the Montreal market (he's the biggest star in the area since Jacques Rougeau retired) and would hurt his drawing power there in the future. Pierre said he would walk out and was willing to get fired rather than eat a clean pin from Diesel. Finally, someone called Vince McMahon at home and after a 15-minute conversation, Pierre and Vince agreed to a double count-out finish. Diesel and Shawn Michaels were furious about it, saying Pierre should be fired. Dave notes that Pierre and Shawn have had heat for a long time and that Shawn Michaels isn't very well liked in the WWF locker room (which is the first time I've seen that acknowledged here). Anyway, Pierre said he would do the job for Diesel anywhere else but Canada (sounds familiar). Anyway, they did the match, it ended in a count out, and afterwards, Shawn came out from backstage and got into Pierre's face, cursing him out and they had to be kept apart in the locker room afterward (this is kind of a famous story and I think both Nash and Pierre have talked about it in shoot interviews which I'll try to find for Monday because there's more on this in the next issue).
- WWF's tour of Florida was one of the most disastrous tours in company history. None of the shows drew more than 1,000 people and two of them were cancelled for low ticket sales. Goldust was cheered in most cities because when he took off the wig, everyone recognized it was Dustin Rhodes and you can't boo a Rhodes in Florida. It's a felony I think.
- Tony Norris has signed a 2-year WWF contract but Dave thinks they should send him to SMW for 6 months or so to get better (SMW wouldn't be around in 6 months). No word on what his gimmick will be (Ahmed Johnson).
- Tatanka's suspension is likely going to turn into a firing. Apparently there was an incident at a hotel back in December involving Tatanka and a woman and she's threatening a lawsuit against WWF and Tatanka.