Wrestling Observer Rewinder

February 17, 1997

WWF and USA Network officially confirmed that Monday Night Raw will be expanding to 2-hours and going live each week. After Raw, they will tape a 1-hour Superstars show to air the following Sunday. This will also affect Shotgun Saturday Night, which is rumored to be undergoing a format change, possibly becoming more of a recap show interspersed with pre-taped skits. The live shows in NYC nightclubs has been a huge flop so far. Last week's episode, taped at Penn Station, had crowd chants of "boring!" that were so loud that even Vince McMahon had to acknowledge it on commentary. As for the Monday night wars, Dave thinks in the short term, it will make both companies more competitive, but he says the long-term costs and stresses on everyone's sanity have to be considered, and talks about how the 2/10 episode of Nitro was an aimless mess and no one seemed to have a clue what they were doing. He also cryptically says, "Some people have some nasty habits that they better get in check or far bigger problems than losing in the ratings are ahead." He doesn't specify who he's talking about, but if I was a betting man, I'd guess Shawn.
Dave goes into a loooong recap of UFC 12, from the ridiculous court battle in New York that forced them to move the show at the last minute, how it almost all fell apart, the middle of the night flight from NY to Alabama to get everyone to the show on time, the fights themselves, and Mark Coleman's breakout performance. As always, really interesting and insightful stuff if you're an MMA fan.
AAA president Antonio Pena filed a lawsuit against La Parka, with Pena claiming he owns the rights to the La Parka name and gimmick (this of course turns into a huge legal mess in the coming years).
In New Japan, they're doing an NWO angle there as well, with lower level NWO guys like Scott Norton and Marcus Bagwell trying to recruit Japanese wrestlers for the group. They've started an angle where Masa Chono is trying to decide whether to sign with the NWO or with NJPW. They're also doing an angle similar to the Sting thing, where Keiji Muto (Great Muta) is basically playing the lone wolf and no one knows who's side he's on. NJPW is also interested in bringing in Hall and Nash for some shows.
Lance Russell returned to USWA to handle announcing duties in the wake of both Dave Brown and Corey Maclin leaving. Russell has agreed to do the show for the rest of the month and would be willing to continue to do it periodically afterward, but he refused to commit to doing the show on a weekly basis because he's mostly retired and spends a lot of time vacationing. He acknowledged Dave Brown having left the promotion and spoke as if they were trying to convince Brown to change his mind and return.
Brian Pillman also made an appearance in USWA this week, cutting a total heel promo, saying Lance Russell has Alzheimer's and saying his "close personal friend" Dr. Jack Kevorkian could fix Russell's problems. Sunny is expected to appear on the show next week (this Pillman promo is absolutely tremendous and he's on commentary for the next match too).
ECW is planning to add more bleachers to the ECW Arena for the PPV in April and claim they will be able to put 2,300 people into the building. Dave finds that hard to believe since the building is usually already packed to the gills as it is, and with the PPV, they'll need more equipment running inside than ever before and that will take up room also. For now, the plan is to run a 2nd PPV in August and perhaps a 3rd in November (yup).
Billy Jack Haynes and Matt Borne both have radio shows in Portland and seem to have developed a problem with each other. On his show, Haynes talks about how wrestling is a work and seems to be trying to goad Borne into admitting it also. Haynes challenged Borne to a $10,000 winner-take-all shoot-fight and at one point, Haynes accused Borne of being on cocaine and Borne responded by saying something about Haynes "being propositioned by homosexuals when he was in the WWF." Haynes then responded by saying Borne got fired by WWF for failing piss tests or something. So far, that's all it has amounted to, just a bunch of weird shit-talking at each other on the radio.
Don Harris, of the Harris Brothers team, recently sued a plastic surgeon in Nashville for malpractice regarding scars on his chest that the surgeon apparently botched or something. The case went to a hung jury.
Sylvester Stallone's son Sage Stallone did a run-in at a recent Incredibly Strange Wrestling show. Fun fact, as a child, Sage Stallone also made an appearance in GLOW because his grandmother was the promoter.
On Nitro this week, Kevin Sullivan "delivered one of the nuttiest interviews in pro wrestling history." It was mostly a shoot, with Sullivan talking about having conversations with "one of he and Nancy's best friends, Paul E." and a whole bunch of other nonsense. Basically the whole thing made no sense and Dave says Kevin and Nancy are going to extreme lengths to convince everyone that they're separated, even backstage. Dave seems annoyed that Sullivan seems to find it so important to work the wrestlers along with the fans (Dave was so far out of the loop on this one).
On the same show, Roddy Piper cut an ill-advised promo, saying Hulk Hogan should move to San Francisco (implying that he's gay) and also made a crack about NBA player Dennis Rodman being gay, which was probably ill advised since WCW is battling WWF in negotiations with Rodman to get him to come in and work an angle.
There had previously been discussions about Harlem Heat going to WWF but that seems to be a dead issue now and they're staying with WCW.
Jacques Rougeau held a press conference in Montreal to promote WCW's show there in April and it featured appearances by Hogan and The Giant as well. The press conference got more media coverage than any wrestling show in the history of Montreal, with every TV outlet, radio, and newspaper all giving it heavy coverage, much of it making front page news. They're hoping to sell-out the 24,000 seat Molson Center, which if it happens, would break the all-time indoor attendance record in Montreal.
Dave says to expect both Randy Savage and Sting to be back in the ring soon (Savage, yes. Sting, not until December).
On a radio show in Chicago this week, Vince McMahon and Jim Ross were the guests, there to promote the upcoming Wrestlemania 13. A caller asked them about the Road Warriors and apparently Vince talked about them as if they might be bringing them in soon (yup, literally the very next week).
Yokozuna is said to have lost 310 pounds, which Dave says would have to be due to some sort of surgery if it's true (wasn't true. Yoko pretty much continued to gain weight until he died).
Steve Austin appeared on MTV's Idiot Savants show this week (I can't find video but apparently he read the following poem):
I've traveled the world the last few years
Sometimes I think of home
and even Stone Cold has to fight the tears
Another car, bus, or plane takes me to far away places
But what I remember most is all the smiling faces
Short people, tall people, people with glasses
The bottom line is I'll whip all your asses.
Steve Austin and/or some MTV writer
On the most recent (and last) live Shotgun Saturday Night show filmed at Penn Station, Undertaker tombstoned Hunter Hearst Helmsley on an escalator and the Godwinns slopped Pat Patterson who then tried to kiss Sunny. Speaking of Sunny, Entertainment Tonight was there filming something with her before the show.
Al Snow is expected to get a new gimmick soon where he'll be in a mask and feud with the AAA wrestlers (never happened, since the AAA partnership didn't last much longer and Al Snow was back in ECW soon after with a much better gimmick...)
Letters section is just an interesting mish-mash of people's thoughts on the Monday night wars. Some say WCW's success seems to have gone to Eric Bischoff's head and he seems too arrogant and cocky and needs to wake up if he thinks WWF is dead. Others say WWF is quietly coming back, with guys like Austin, Bret, Michaels, and Undertaker doing great work. Another guy says NWO is getting worse and worse by the week and the angle is getting stale. So on and so forth. Point being, WCW is still winning the war, but people are beginning to see tiny cracks in the ship.