January 22, 1996
- It's time for the Year End Awards for the best and worst of 1995, as voted on by readers of the Observer.
- After last week's Billionaire Ted skit suggesting WCW doesn't have a legit steroid policy, WCW first responded with threats of a lawsuit. But that would have little chance of success due to the skit being labeled satire and due to Hogan and Savage being public figures with an admitted history of steroid use. Eric Bischoff then claimed that 3 of WWF's current headliners failed steroid tests while they worked in WCW. He doesn't name names but Dave is pretty sure he knows who it is (Sid Vicious being the most obvious one. Dave doesn't name the other two, but I assume Diesel and Razor). He also says that argument doesn't work because even if they failed tests in WCW, they were never punished and in fact, went on to work WCW PPVs after failing those tests. So that just puts WCW's steroid policy into even more question. So the latest response from WCW has been....silence. On this week's Nitro, Eric Bischoff didn't say a word about WWF. Dave says it's a good thing because Bischoff had spent too much time on TV lately burying WWF and not worrying about the product WCW was presenting and it came off childish. Plus, until WCW's drug testing policy can stand up to scrutiny, they're better off not fighting this battle.
- WWF continued to air the steroid skit all weekend on syndicated TV, so they clearly weren't worried by the lawsuit threats. They aired another new skit on Raw this week, implying Ted Turner wanted to buy WWF and that WCW wished they had Shawn Michaels instead of Hogan. The skit also called Gene Okerlund a con-man, Randy Savage disloyal and Hogan a has-been from the 80s.
- Expect Randy Savage to regain the WCW title soon, possibly as early as next week's Nitro. Dave says WCW is known for leaking false information, plus they change their mind on an hourly basis, so it's difficult to ever say anything is etched in stone, but as of now, the plan is definitely for Savage to win the title back. Apparently Savage has been throwing a fit about having to put over Flair in the past so this is basically a way to placate him, since Flair is evidently willing to put over anybody at any time.
- In WWF title plans, 1-2-3 Kid and Sid were being groomed for a tag title run, but Sid is out with a neck injury (more on that later) so that's out the window now. The recent plan has also been for Goldust to win the IC title at Royal Rumble, but that's up in the air now also because the Kliq hates the Goldust gimmick and they want one of their own (Hunter Hearst Helmsley) to win the belt from Razor instead and are pushing to get Goldust out of the picture.
- The situation between Sabu and WWF regarding a Royal Rumble appearance got stranger this week and left WWF totally frustrated. WWF had actually agreed to bring Sabu in and were even going to let him do the table spot he came up with. But it was thought to be a dead issue last week after Paul Heyman convinced Sabu not to work the show. But later in the week, other friends of Sabu convinced him not to listen to Heyman and to do the show. Sabu discussed it with his uncle The Sheik and so the Sheik got in touch with WWF and negotiated a deal for it to happen, with Sheik accompanying Sabu to the ring. WWF taped Royal Rumble promos with Sabu's name being mentioned and even announced on the WWF Hotline that "Sabu from ECW" would be in the Rumble. In return, WWF offered Paul Heyman several wrestlers to work an ECW show, but Heyman told them he wasn't interested. Heyman then pressured Sabu to pull out of the Rumble again, and Sabu once again backed out of the deal, leaving WWF officials irritated and having to redo the Rumble promo video packages that had already been made. Heyman is wanting to do an ECW PPV this year and wants to avoid the perception that ECW is just a minor league feeder system for WWF, so he doesn't want any of the ECW stars working for them, even for one night, especially if they're losing.
- WWF also attempted to get boxer Peter McNeely in the Rumble. McNeely is famous for getting knocked out by Mike Tyson last year in 89 seconds in Tyson's first fight back after being in prison. McNeely is most well-known these days for getting knocked out by a slice of pizza in a Pizza Hut commercial. Anyway, the plan was for McNeely to enter the Rumble and get eliminated in 89 seconds, just like the Tyson fight. But when WWF offered him $5,000 to do it, McNeely's people never called them back so that won't be happening.
- AAA and Televisa settled their issues this week. Televisa wanted AAA to tape all their shows in Mexico City but AAA didn't want to because they worried it would burn out the market. So AAA pulled their show off Televisa. In its place, Televisa ran 3 hours of EMLL shows, which resulted in ratings so dreadfully low that Televisa came crawling back to AAA and worked out a deal. No word on the terms yet but it's believed AAA probably got what they wanted and as a result, EMLL has been left in the dust again.
- Don King is promoting an Oscar de la Hoya vs. Julio Caesar Chavez boxing match later this year and has decided to pull it off PPV and go back to closed-circuit TV like they used to do in the 70s and 80s. The issue is due to the PPV split of the money. The promoters get about 45% of the revenue with the PPV and cable companies getting the rest. This is a power move by Don King in an attempt to get the PPV companies to give a bigger cut to the promoters. They're attempting to change their cut from 45% to 60%. If it works, it might signal a change in the business and the wrestling promotions would follow suit. WWF tried this same stunt back in 1989, threatening to pull Wrestlemania from PPV if they didn't get a bigger cut, but it didn't work and Vince eventually backed down.
- Vampiro landed the starring role in a Mexican soap opera that also stars Gloria Trevi, who is a big pop star in Mexico. So now EMLL's plan is to give Vampiro a big push as heartthrob babyface. Konnan also has a role on the show (I googled this and I believe the soap opera was going to be called Angels but they cancelled plans for it because Gloria Trevi's manager got cancer or something and she retired from performing and acting to care for him. Then a year or two later, she was tied to a crazy sex scandal with that same manager. It's a nutty story if you're interested. Nothing to do with wrestling but here, enjoy).
- Paul Heyman has threatened to sue WCW because of something Terry Taylor said on the WCW Hotline where he claimed the ECW champion (Sandman, although Taylor didn't mention him by name) is a drug addict.
- Antonio Inoki held a press conference in Los Angeles to announce his planned multi-promotion super show in May. Inoki has invited EMLL, AAA, All Japan, New Japan, WWF, and WCW to all participate and said there would not be any inter-promotional matches to avoid politicking and disagreements on who should win. AAA president Antonio Pena was in attendance and has already agreed to participate. Word is the AAA match on the show would be an 8-man barbed wire match. Toys R Us and Nintendo have already signed on as sponsors for the show.
- A show took place at the Dallas Sportatorium and the main event was a match that took place under "football rules." The match lasted an hour. A pinfall counted as 7 points, a DQ as 3 points, etc. It was supposed to be Jake Roberts' team of babyfaces against Scandor Akbar's heel team, but Jake no-showed due to a family emergency. There was even a 40-minute "halftime" in the middle of the match (basically intermission) which totally killed the crowd heat. The match ended as a 20-20 tie and went into sudden death overtime, with the babyfaces winning.
- The ABC show Step-By-Step did a wrestling storyline on a recent episode where Patrick Duffy and his son wrestled against 2 women wrestlers for SuperBowl tickets.
- More details on the Hulk Hogan extortion lawsuit. The woman is claiming she was sexually assaulted by Hogan. She and her lawyer sent him the letter agreeing to settle the case financially before making it public and, sensing he was being extorted, Hogan sued both of them and went public with it first in order to get ahead of it.
- Dan Severn was in Atlanta last week and had a meeting with WCW but no serious negotiations have taken place yet.
- WCW is ordering all wrestlers to leave the belts with company officials after TV tapings rather than carry the belts with them. After the Madusa situation, Eric Bischoff is reportedly paranoid of karma catching up and someone going on WWF TV with one of their belts and retaliating.
- Hulk Hogan and Randy Savage are teasing a "secret weapon" will be with them for their match at the upcoming Clash of the Champions. Dave has no idea who it is. He knows Roddy Piper recently contacted WCW about coming in, so it could be him, but he admits that's just a guess at this point (Dave was wrong).
- On Raw this week, Vince McMahon read a statement, which sounded like it was forced by lawyers, saying that Goldust doesn't represent the gay community (THE GAY COMMUNITY?!). Goldust also cut a promo that has to be seen to be believed. There were also skits throughout the show with Sunny playing up sex appeal, in a bathtub implying she'd just had sex (the Attitude Era is beginning...)
- Sid suffered a neck injury at a recent show but had continued to work as it got progressively worse. Sid was moved down to an opening match and was asked to put over his friend Bob Holly, which he did. Sid then left, and many in the locker room have said they think he's faking the injury and left because he was upset at being asked to put over Holly in a prelim match. He's expected to be out 8 weeks. (I know Bob Holly talks about this in his book but it's been awhile so I can't remember the details. But I do know that Holly defends him and says Sid was fine with putting him over).
- Jacques Rougeau is continuing to try to hurt WWF. He's been wanting to make a deal with WCW to go work there and he was trying to time it so that the deal would be done around the same time as the WWF house show in Montreal, with the idea that the story of him coming out of retirement and going to WCW would take all the thunder away from WWF's show in the local media. But the deal didn't get done in time. Rougeau's former tag team partner Pierre Lafitte has been rumored to be heading to WCW also. Pierre told a Montreal newspaper that his WWF contract expires in July and even though he'd prefer to stay with WWF, he has to look out for his family and WCW is offering guaranteed contracts.
- At that WWF Montreal house show, a member of the Montreal Canadians hockey team who is currently on the disabled list due to an injury was in attendance (Dave doesn't know which player). Reportedly, he kept trying to hit on Sunny backstage. After she turned him down twice, the player got very vulgar and crude with her. Diesel overheard and stepped in and told the player he'd be on the disabled list a lot longer if he didn't leave her alone and basically ran the guy off (There ends up being a little more to this story in a day or two. I wonder who it was. Any hockey fans wanna research and see who was on the DL list in Jan. 1996?).
- Shawn Michaels recently taped an episode of the Jenny Jones show where a wrestling fan gets to meet him because he's his favorite wrestler (I dunno about that, but it gets out of control at the end with women rushing the stage).
- Also, Razor Ramon taped a Jerry Springer episode, doing a Make-A-Wish type thing for a fan.
- The New York Daily News gossip section reported that Ted Turner is upset about the Billionaire Ted skits because he was angry at being portrayed as a hillbilly and that Ted "is a little sensitive."
- Letters section is people writing about the Billionaire Ted skits. Some people find them hilarious, others think it's a sign of how desperate WWF is.
- There have been lots of complaints in the letters sections lately about ECW over-selling shows, to the point where people buying tickets literally have no place to sit or even stand and can't see the show because there's so many people. It's a fire hazard and it makes it unenjoyable for fans and people are calling ECW greedy for trying to overpack the venues.