November 13, 1995
- WCW will be doing a Hulk Hogan vs. Sting match on next week's Nitro, along with an Eddie Guerrero vs. Ric Flair match. Hogan was stripped of the title due to the finish of the Halloween Havoc match (and the winner of the World War III battle royal will win the belt and Dave predicts either Luger or Giant) so it won't be a title match. WCW is doing this to combat WWF in the ratings. WWF will be coming off the Survivor Series PPV, which usually gives them a ratings boost, so WCW is throwing everything they have at them next week to try and steal some of those ratings.
- Dave analyzes the PPV business for both WWF and WCW and talks about how both groups routinely lie about buyrate numbers and how independent sources always show them to be lower than what they claim (same with attendance figures). The bottom line is that WWF buyrates for the last few In Your House PPVs have been bad and bordering on disastrous. As for WCW, their buyrates look good on the surface, but once you factor in Hulk Hogan's enormous cut of the profits, it doesn't look great for WCW either.
- WCW is currently taping 3 months worth of shows at Disney. Several NJPW stars debuted and WCW will be trying to get them over with American crowds before the Starrcade PPV. Sonny Onno "bought" 50% of WCW and ran the show with NJPW wrestlers and will eventually become the evil heel manager for all of them leading into Starrcade. There was some issue with the Japanese guys who were upset about the months of advance tapings, feeling it exposed the business but they went along with it. There were also issues with some of the WCW wrestlers (mostly the American Males tag team) not wanting to put over the NJPW guys and photographers were banned from ringside because NJPW didn't want pictures of their guys jobbing to WCW guys appearing in Japanese magazines or making the news in Japan.
- Warlord and Barbarian also debuted at the Disney tapings as a team called the Super Assassins. And One Man Gang debuted as a member of the Dungeon of Doom. And Brian Pillman and Chris Benoit (both members of the 4 Horsemen) were working as a new tag team.
- The Pennsylvania State Athletic Commission has scheduled a meeting regarding the recent ECW show after all the complaints of the fire spot going out of control. The commission hasn't really been regulating wrestling for many years in the state but they can still crack down on it if they want to. They banned blading a few years ago, but they don't enforce the rule and everyone (especially ECW) still does it. As for what happened at the show, the word is a towel drenched in lighter fluid that was on a chair and on fire flew off the chair and landed in the crowd, causing a decent-sized fire and burning some fans. As they were trying to spray it with a fire extinguisher to put it out, fans started choking on the fumes and at that moment, the lights in the building went off because they were doing an angle with Raven and Tommy Dreamer (where Raven crucified Dreamer....turns out the famous Sandman crucifixion wasn't the first time that happened). So with the lights off, a fire burning in the crowd, and no one able to see or breathe from fire extinguisher fumes, people naturally panicked.
- Awards time. Dave opens the voting for the year end awards and explains each category. Readers will vote, results will be revealed in mid-January.
- The Mexican peso took another economic hit this week, dropping over 20% in value and Dave says this is probably going to be a huge story for the wrestling business there. It will definitely make it harder to bring in American wrestlers because they have to be paid in dollars and the dollar is now worth so much more than the peso. There is fear that the peso crisis isn't over yet and could be leading to a depression.
- Konnan has been running his own weekly shows at an arena in Tijuana and is doing them like ECW shows, trying to turn the arena into a Mexican version of the ECW Arena. Many of the angles are directly lifted from ECW and they even got the fans to start chanting "Triple A!" after big angles and matches. They've started using tables and things like that also. Perro Aguayo Jr. who was severely injured last week and was supposed to miss a month of action was already back in the ring after only 7 days and did a bladejob during his match. Dave is uncomfortable with a 16-year-old kid working injured and carving up his forehead.
- Jim Cornette and SMW have been hyping up a mystery wrestler for an upcoming show. It was originally supposed to be Stan Lane, but Lane has to have eye surgery and cancelled. Cornette's next plan was to try to bring in an actual wrestling bear, but then he found out that is against Tennessee state law, so that won't happen either. As of press time, Cornette still doesn't know who it will be (time is running out quick on SMW).
- ECW tag team Public Enemy had a meeting with Vince McMahon recently. No deal has been signed yet but it's believed both sides were happy with the meeting and it's now a question of when rather than if. Paul Heyman actually set up the meeting because WWF has told Heyman that they don't want to hurt ECW or go behind his back. Public Enemy will likely finish up with ECW in January and probably be headed to WWF after that. Dave notes that Paul Heyman is basically a master manipulator because he's the only guy in the industry that has been able to successfully create new stars in recent years and that Heyman is so good that even WWF and WCW don't seem to realize that many of the stars Heyman has created got over because of how Heyman booked them rather than their own talents. None of the things that Public Enemy have done in ECW to get over will be allowed in WWF or WCW.
- Steve Austin was the most talked about wrestler on TV this week in ECW. He took over the Beulah's Box segment, wearing a black wig, impersonating Eric Bischoff and talking about "Monday Nyquil, where the big boys play with each other." Austin got in tons of funny lines at WCW's expense. He also called Woman a "$5 piece of ass" and said she married a midget (Kevin Sullivan). As you can imagine, several people in WCW weren't thrilled about this. Dave gives Woman credit for being professional enough to go along with it.
- At least 2 other ECW names are said to be close to jumping ship to WCW, close enough that WCW has already started preparing storylines for them. No names given.
- Former WWF star Crush was sentenced to 5 years probation and a $10,000 fine from his drug and weapons charges from a few months back.
- The NWC promotion in Las Vegas that Ultimate Warrior was co-owner of seems to be shutting down after Warrior flaked on it and left everyone high and dry. Their local TV show hasn't aired in weeks and the wrestlers who worked the last show didn't get paid and were told the company is bankrupt.
- Grizzly Smith has been running shows at the Dallas Sportatorium lately and they're drawing pretty well. They're using a fake Konnan which has been getting booed heavily by the Hispanics in the crowd. Jake Roberts (Smith's son) is expected to come in and be in someone's corner at the next show, which will be Jake's first wrestling appearance since retiring last year.
- Renegade is being written off TV in WCW and will be sent back to wrestling school. He has lost a ton of muscle mass since debuting and nobody is mistaking him for Ultimate Warrior anymore.
- Randy Savage is supposed to have surgery soon to repair a torn tricep and will be out of action 3 months. Not quite...
- Vince McMahon had a surprise meeting with the wrestlers at a house show last week, mostly to boost the recent poor morale and reassure everyone. With house shows being cut, a lot of the talent is justifiably paranoid, especially the lower and midcard guys. WWF stars only get paid when they work a show and with a lot of the recent house shows being cancelled, some of the guys have seen their overall income drop by 60-70%.
- The plan is for Bret Hart to win the title from Diesel at Survivor Series and from there, Shawn Michaels will likely win the title from Bret at Wrestlemania.
- Dean Douglas is still coughing up blood from his larynx injury but is back on the road this week. Shawn Michaels is also back in the ring after recently getting beat up in Syracuse.
- Waylon Mercy (Dan Spivey) has quit WWF. They had high hopes for his gimmick and gave him a big push initially, but physically, he just can't go anymore. Injuries over the years have caught up with him (yeah, he just straight up retired after this. His knees were shot).
- A lot of WWF guys are talking about leaving, but most of them wouldn't be able to make a living in wrestling anywhere else if WCW didn't take them. Bam Bam Bigelow is probably the only one who could go to Japan and be a big star. In fact, Dave says he probably should go since he's been reduced to jobber status in WWF after main-eventing Wrestlemania just 8 months ago.
- WWF signed a 2-year contract extension with the USA Network that will run through the end of 1997.
- Adam Bomb is at a legal impasse with WWF. They won't release him from his contract but have no interest in using him, so he's just sitting at home right now, unable to negotiate with WCW or anything, although he is allowed to work indies.