March 25, 1996
- Hulk Hogan has decided to change the main event of the upcoming WCW Uncensored PPV. The original plan was for Hogan to face 4 heels in a 4-on-1 handicap match. Hogan decided to add Savage to his team and 4 more heels to the other team and make it a triple-decker cage match. So now it's an 8-vs-2 match inside a 3-story tall steel cage. The original plan for Randy Savage on the show was for him to face Chris Benoit, but that idea has now been scrapped since Savage will be on Hogan's team. The new guys being added to the heel side are Tiny Lister (an actor who briefly wrestled as Zeus in WWF), One Man Gang, and a large muscular wrestler named Jeep Swenson who used to wrestle for World Class in the 80s and was awful. The 4th additional heel is expected to be either Warlord or The Shark. So you can just imagine the in-ring classic this match will be.
- Dave notes that Hogan is basically the head booker, even though that title technically belongs to Kevin Sullivan. But truth is, Hogan makes all the decisions and Sullivan has to do all the dirty work that Hogan doesn't want to do. Hogan's frequent booking changes are a headache for everyone in WCW and with the Saturday night show doing big ratings without him and recent house shows without Hogan also doing good business, it's making the company consider if Hogan is still worth all the money they're paying him. Dave also mentions that both Hogan and Savage were strongly opposed to Bischoff's decision to bring in Kevin Nash and Scott Hall with big-money contracts.
- Tiny Lister will be using the name Z-Gangsta because WWF still owns the trademark on Zeus. As for Jeep Swenson, on Nitro, they called him "The Final Solution" but WCW then received complaints from Jewish groups because the term "final solution" was a Nazi term for exterminating the Jews during World War II, so his name is expected to change.
- After seeing the huge reaction Brian Pillman got on last week's Nitro for showing up in the crowd, Hogan has apparently told WCW to bring Pillman back immediately so Hogan can work an angle with him. Pillman returned on the 3/18 Nitro and joined the Dungeon of Doom in attacking Hogan and Savage, which completely kills the unique shoot-style angle that Pillman has been doing. WCW went to laughable extremes to convince people Pillman was no longer with WCW and having Hogan come in and insert Pillman into his dumb Dungeon of Doom storyline totally derails that. For what it's worth though, at least Pillman kept up the crazy act. Not only did he attack Hogan and Savage (giving Savage a legit black eye) but he also went after fellow heel Kevin Sullivan at one point and then disappeared back through the crowd during the post-beatdown promo all the heels did.
- Speaking of Pillman, he officially quit ECW during a 4a.m. phone conversation with Paul Heyman, after issues regarding the Pillman 900-hotline that ECW set up for him. ECW sent Pillman a bill for $7,600 for producing the hotline and the argument got so heated that Pillman vowed to never work for ECW again. Pillman is in negotiations with WCW about a new contract because they apparently legitimately released him as part of the effort to convince people he had really been fired. WCW is offering a contract in the $225,000 per-year range, but Pillman is asking for $500,000.
- WWF sold out Madison Square Garden last week, the first time they've managed to draw a sellout for a non-PPV event there in so many years that no one can even remember the last time it happened. Dave says the last time was probably in the mid-80s. Because of higher ticket prices, it's also the largest gate WWF has ever drawn there for a house show. The show saw Diesel finally turn heel on Shawn Michaels, which was shown on Raw the next night. The plan is for Shawn to feud with Diesel and beat him every night until he leaves for WCW. As for Razor Ramon, when he returns from suspension, he's expected to be "punished" by doing jobs to Goldust until he leaves, because Ramon hates working with Goldust due to his gimmick.
- Tank Abbott was suspended by UFC for a series of out-of-the-cage incidents. He got into a fight in the crowd at the last UFC show and also apparently got into an argument with the wife of UFC referee John McCarthy and made some sort of threats to her. Abbott is one of UFC's most popular fighters, despite mostly being an untrained brawler (and he'll eventually be a WCW wrestler, so that's why I include it).
- Rey Mistero (the older one, not Jr.) did an interview in a Mexican newspaper where he threatened to sue Konnan for slander and gave away the result of a planned mask vs. mask match taking place in AAA the next day. Misterio revealed that Ultraman would be losing his mask to Psicosis and called Ultraman a prostitute for selling his mask to AAA. Dave doesn't really clarify why he'd threaten to sue Konnan.
- Legendary Japanese heel wrestler Umanosuke Ueda's career is finished after a car accident last week left him paralyzed from the waist down. Ueda is 55 and his career had mostly wound down already and was mostly only used for his remaining name value. He was hit by a truck while driving home from an IWA show. The driver of the truck was killed and Ueda was left paralyzed.
- Pentagon is still in the hospital following the match that left him clinically dead in the ring for several minutes last week. Dave still says that it was from a mixture of pills and alcohol causing him to collapse but offers no info to back that up and I can't find anywhere else that says that (although I can't find much info about it at all beyond what it says on Wikipedia so who knows). The plan in AAA had been for Pentagon to face Octagon in a mask vs. mask match in one of the Triplemania main events in May but that's likely off now.
- Harlem Heat is currently working in New Japan and it's not going well. They were initially brought in from WCW in order to build them up for a tag title match at a big upcoming show. So the plan was to have them beat a bunch of other teams before the show to help get them over. But Harlem Heat have been so unimpressive in their matches that NJPW has had them do several jobs recently because they simply can't hang with most of NJPW's teams.
- Terry Funk talked to his brother Dory Funk Jr. about trying to get Sabu into AJPW to form a tag team with Rob Van Dam but it seems AJPW isn't interested. So for now, Sabu is working for Big Japan Pro Wrestling, which is a smaller death-match promotion.
- Mankind (who hasn't debuted on WWF TV yet) worked a USWA show this week. He wears a mask similar to Vader's strap mask. It was never acknowledged that he was Cactus Jack even though he worked in this promotion a few years ago so all the fans recognized him (here's the first video, but there's actually 4 of them. They autoplay in order after each video ends, so enjoy).
- At an ECW show in Jim Thorpe, PA, the fans got a little out of control. Taz was involved in incidents with 2 separate fans who were later ejected. Rob Van Dam faced Damien Stone (Little Guido/Nunzio) and the crowd chanted "You both suck!" at them as soon as they locked up.
- Raven has a guest spot on the UPN show Swift Justice airing this week (same as the Mankind/USWA video, this is part 1 of 5 videos of that episode, just let it autoplay if you care. Raven is scattered throughout in a small role).
- Antonio Inoki had a press conference officially announcing his multi-promotional event happening in Los Angeles in June. Antonio Pena (AAA) and Eric Bischoff (WCW) were in attendance. Inoki said that aside from those promotions, WWF and EMLL had also agreed to participate. Everyone involved talked about not allowing wrestling politics to get in the way, but since WCW's and AAA's main competition didn't send representatives to the press conference, that's obviously not the case. Eric Bischoff said the show wouldn't be on PPV but said there was a slim possibility that it might end up airing on TBS or TNT. Dave says he can't imagine WWF allowing its wrestlers to work on a show that would air on TBS or TNT, so if it happens, then Antonio Inoki would have to be considered the most powerful man in the wrestling industry.
- On Nitro, Eric Bischoff made a reference to the "World Whining Federation." Also on the show, Hogan put Kevin Sullivan in the "worst figure four in history" because Hogan is tall with long legs and Kevin Sullivan is basically a drawf with short legs and Dave thinks it was hilarious. Bischoff also talked about an Olympian joining WCW soon. The Olympian will be Chip Minton, who placed 14th in bobsledding in the 1994 winter Olympics (yeah, I think WWF won the who-can-sign-a-better-Olympian battle).
- Nitro scored its best rating ever in the head-to-head battle with Raw. It's even more significant because you would think WWF should be riding some momentum only 2 weeks away from Wrestlemania, but nope. WCW spanked them.
- Ric Flair's arrest was mentioned on Court TV this week. Flair and his wife and friends were all out drinking after a Charlotte Hornets game. Flair's wife went home early and Flair asked the 20-year-old woman to drive him home because he was too drunk to drive. Flair says he didn't know she was drunk and if he had, he never would have allowed her to drive his $100,000 car. Flair is said to be furious with news reports that incorrectly said he was charged with a DWI.
- Brian Pillman had throat surgery this week at Vanderbilt University Hospital. On the WCW Hotline, Gene Okerlund reported that Pillman was lying and didn't actually have the surgery and said they called the hospital to verify it. Pillman's lawyers sent Okerlund and WCW a threatening letter with Pillman's patient discharge sheet from the hospital to prove it and told Okerlund to make a correction and apology. But Okerlund then missed the next few days with the flu and wasn't on Nitro, so no apology yet.
- The March/April issue of Playboy's Book of Lingerie has a 2-page spread of the Diamond Doll (Kimberly Page). Google probably has what you're looking for. I'm at work.
- Kid Flash (Billy Kidman) signed with WCW this week after a very impressive tryout match last week.
- Many in WCW are upset that the company lost Johnny B. Badd because he has improved tremendously in the ring in recent years and was also known as a great company guy. There's belief that he's the type of guy who might actually make it big in WWF and some are saying WCW is kicking themselves for letting him get away.
- This week's Billionaire Ted skit was a mock FTC hearing claiming that Ted Turner's #1 agenda is to destroy the WWF. The skit ended urging fans to write in to the FTC (it's hilarious because of how much every single negative thing they say about "Billionaire Ted" in this skit applies to Vince in real life. He wants to create a wrestling monopoly, accuses Ted of "systematically eliminating the competition," how he determines who works and who doesn't, etc. Billionaire Ted cuts a promo in this bit that is 100% real-life Vince McMahon. Of all the Billionaire Ted skits, this one is by far the most hilarious in its hypocrisy).
- Rupert Murdoch of the Fox network also trashed Ted Turner recently, saying at least Fox doesn't air professional wrestling. Dave says it's hypocritical because Fox has aired wrestling shows in the past and Murdoch was even recently negotiating with Vince McMahon to air WWF events on Fox not too long ago but the talks fell through.
- Ultimate Warrior is releasing a "Warrior" comic book.
- After the German tour (after Wrestlemania), Bret Hart is expected to take an extended hiatus from wrestling to concentrate on acting. He'll be filming more episodes of Lonesome Dove.
- The letters section, as usual, is about the Monday night wars. One person writes in to say that while McMahon's complaints might be hypocritical, at least he isn't just rolling over and dying like Bill Watts and Verne Gagne did in the 80s when Vince came for their territories. Dave disputes the notion that Watts just rolled over and died, saying Watts fought as hard as he could until it was evident that he was burning money and simply couldn't survive. Someone else writes in and says Ted Turner doesn't care about wrestling, he just wants to put Vince out of business and when he does, he'll probably shut down WCW and ride off into the sunset. Dave responds and says you're being worked by Vince's storyline if you believe that.