Wrestling Observer Rewinder

February 24, 1997

So before we start, I know a lot of people in the past have expressed interest in the MMA parts of the Observer. Sometimes I may toss in a little tidbit here and there but I've never been a hardcore MMA fan. So even though I'm always reading the MMA parts of the Observer, I don't always know the importance or historical significance of what I'm reading. So I usually don't include it. But Dave covers the early days of MMA with just as much detail as he does wrestling. So if you're interested in all that stuff, good news: u/BuddaMuta has been doing a similar series to this over in the MMA subreddit and it's phenomenal. It's basically a look back at the early UFC events, looking over the fights, the back stories and history behind each show, the aftermath, all the legal hurdles, and all that other interesting shit. It's not a daily post but it's a seriously awesome read and for those of you who are also MMA fans, it'll probably fill the void that I usually leave out of these posts. He just posted the latest one HERE. Hope everyone enjoys it like I did.
This week marked one of the strangest weeks in WWF history, with multiple big stories all happening over the course of the last 5 days, starting with Shawn Michaels vacating the WWF title due to a knee injury on Thursday that is said to be so bad it could be career ending. Michaels appeared on a special Thursday night episode of Raw and cut a teary-eyed promo before vacating the belt 3 days before the PPV. Dave says Shawn's problem clearly isn't a knee injury and basically said it seems like Shawn simply emotionally needs a break (I think Shawn has indeed said he was pretty much nearing a mental breakdown at this point). To their credit, WWF isn't pressuring Shawn to suck it up and keep working. Dr. James Andrews later said Michaels wouldn't require surgery at all and 4-6 weeks of rehab and he should be fine. But Shawn is now out of Wrestlemania and the plan is for him to maybe appear as an announcer before returning to the ring full-time in the fall. But needless to say, this has thrown Wrestlemania plans into chaos just 1 month before the show. With the title being vacated, the belt was held up at In Your House, and Bret Hart won the title, only to lose it a day later to Sid on Raw. And now, the plan is for Sid vs. Undertaker to headline Wrestlemania, and some say Bret Hart may be second-guessing his decision to re-sign with WWF at this point.
In his promo vacating the title, Shawn talked about the knee injury as potentially career ending and said he needed to go home and find his smile because he lost it. Shawn reportedly told WWF only the day before that he was taking time off and said his doctor in San Antonio told him his knee injury could be a career ender. WWF considered doing an angle with someone attacking his knee to write him off TV but instead chose to just do a promo and have him vacate the belt because they were concerned that if his knee really was hurt that badly, they could damage it further by filming the angle. After Brian Pillman spent a few weeks hobbling around the ring and getting involved in matches, only to re-aggravate his ankle injury, WWF was wary of the same thing happening to Shawn. That being said, nobody is really buying the knee injury as the real story. It's believed Shawn really does have a knee injury but as stated, it's not that bad and the real story seems to be an emotional breakdown. Dave says that just because someone looks like they live a charmed life, with money and good looks and fancy cars and all that doesn't mean they're any less immune to the same problems that everyone faces. In fact, for someone in his position, as the person carrying the company, the stresses are probably worse. Shawn is living his dream and has achieved everything he's ever worked for, but with all the focus being on TV ratings now days, people see him as a failure as champion (despite the fact that business is better than it has been in years aside from the TV ratings). Dave says Shawn is known to be a bit immature, especially when things don't go his way, and it was reportedly made worse when his buddies (Hall, Nash, 1-2-3 Kid) left. No one knows the full story, other than Shawn seems to have something personal going on and needs time away, and so be it. Dave mentions that this is the third time Shawn has lost a championship without losing it in the ring (stripped of the IC title in 1993 after walking out on the company, vacated the IC belt again in 1995 after the Syracuse beating, and now this).
Rocky Maivia, after being a pro wrestler for less than a year, was given the IC title last week and it backfired big time. There has been concern since he debuted that WWF was pushing him too fast and that the crowd would reject him and sure enough, even before he won the title, during the match, the crowd was chanting "Rocky sucks!" at him. Dave worries that this will become a Erik Watts/Van Hammer situation where the crowd totally rejects someone who is over-pushed too fast (I suppose it worked out okay in the end).
The ECW/WWF working relationship is back on. Well, it never really stopped, as the two sides have been working together behind the scenes for awhile now (Heyman helped in the development of Shotgun Saturday Night, for instance). This time, the plan is for ECW wrestlers to invade Raw next week, although they may not be coming in as heels this time and instead, it may be more of a relationship like the AAA deal, where they simply work alongside WWF and have their talent work WWF shows. All of this is to help promote ECW's first PPV in April, which will surely help them do a good enough buyrate for the show to be a success. This week, Jerry Lawler cut an anti-ECW promo on the show during a phone call with Paul Heyman, which basically was done to set up ECW's invasion as an ECW vs. Lawler deal. It's actually fortunate that all the ECW talent will be on Raw next week because most of the WWF crew will be on a tour of Europe so they're running with a skeleton crew and need as many warm bodies as they can to fill a 2 hour show (Heyman with the "neighborhood watch" line about Lawler is hilarious).
WCW and TBS have decided to begin airing another live, 2-hour prime time wrestling show sometime in the near future. All the decisions haven't been finalized yet, but it will likely be a Thursday night show. TBS would largely fund the show so it would guarantee a massive influx of new money into WCW without them having to fund it out of their own budget. Of course, this brings up the question of over-saturation. Many people, Dave included, thought WCW starting Nitro and both companies increasing to monthly PPVs would over-saturate the market, but it turned out to be the opposite and business has been revitalized. The competition between WWF and WCW has changed the entire face of pro wrestling. The idea of long-term booking gave way to surprises, shock factor booking, and constantly changing plans to stay ahead of the enemy. After losing the ratings war for the last 30+ consecutive weeks, WWF expanded Raw to 2 hours and began going live every week. And now WCW is apparently responding by adding a new 2-hour show. Dave admits he was wrong before, but in every entertainment industry, there is a saturation point and he worries that this may be approaching that line. As for reaction within the company, when they learned about the new 2 hour show, the general response from most people was "How the hell are we going to pull this off?" (of course, this ended up being WCW Thunder but it didn't end up happening until early 98. Still nearly a year away but discussions are already happening).
New Japan has been in serious negotiations with Ken Shamrock for the last week to set up a match with Shamrock challenging Shinya Hashimoto for the IWGP title at the Tokyo Dome. Shamrock is still under contract to Pancrase for 4 more fights but it's thought NJPW may have offered to buy out his contract. Shamrock hasn't fought for Pancrase in over a year due to some disputes over his contract. Before gaining fame as a shoot fighter in UFC and Pancrase, Shamrock actually worked as a pro wrestler and even did a tour with All Japan at one point (spoiler: this whole story changes dramatically in the next issue).
Vince McMahon took himself off commentary this week on Raw to focus on running the show from backstage. Jim Ross and Jerry Lawler became the main duo announcing the show (this isn't quite a permanent change yet but it will be soon and of course, they became one of the most legendary commentary duos ever).
As mentioned, the latest In Your House PPV took place and was mostly uneventful aside from the title change forced by Shawn's forfeiting the belt before the show. Random notes: Sable has a new look, which is basically a carbon copy of Pamela Anderson from the movie Barb Wire. Hunter Hearst Helmsley carried Rocky Maivia through their match and Maivia's lack of experience was evident as he missed some spots. He's got potential, but they're really rushing his push too fast. After the match, Helmsley and Goldust looked ready to go at it, when a female "fan" began choking Marlena at ringside. The "fan" was actually female wrestler and bodybuilder Joanie Lee (Chyna) who has wrestled for and was trained by Killer Kowalski. It's believed she'll go under the ring name Joan and will be paired with Helmsley. As for Helmsley's previous bodyguard Mr. Hughes, he's already gone. Word is he was dealing with some health problems which started with high blood pressure and led to him being hospitalized in ICU last week with heart and kidney problems that were thought to be life-threatening. The 4-way main event was turned into an over-the-top rope elimination style match at the last minute in order to satisfy everyone's egos because none of them wanted to do a real job and be pinned.
More notes from WWF's Thursday night Raw special. The atmosphere was basically an ECW-type crowd, with them chanting for Sid during Shawn's big lost smile speech and also chanting "You both suck!" at the dark match indie guys.Sid ended up winning the title from Bret after interference from Austin, which sets up Sid/Undertaker and Austin/Hart for Wrestlemania. There are also plans for Ahmed Johnson to face Faarooq in a Chicago Street Fight at Wrestlemania.
AAA is running their first major show of 1997 and the plan is for Vince McMahon and Bruce Prichard to attend in order to set up the future plans for WWF/AAA shows. In particular, AAA wants top WWF stars (specifically Bret Hart) to work the Triplemania shows this year and actually plan to try to run a WWF vs. AAA angle at the event (the working agreement falls apart before then and no WWF guys ended up worked Triplemania).
Dave finally got around to seeing the match with Misawa winning the Triple Crown title from Kobashi from AJPW which he had heard was one of their best matches ever. I guess he doesn't agree, because he only gives it 4.75 stars but he does say it's easily the best match of the year so far for 1997. But we're only a month and a half in, so, yanno...
Puerto Rico company WWA recently ran their latest TV taping in a gym with less than 50 fans. They did previously have some kind of working relationship with WWF and Savio Vega is their champion. The promotion claims Shawn Michaels and Undertaker will be working shows for them soon but Dave is skeptical (never happened).
The NWO angle in NJPW seems to be getting over pretty well, with every show for the last week sold out with Scott Norton, Marcus Bagwell, and Masahiro Chono headlining. NWO merchandise is also selling like crazy in NJPW, even more than they do in WCW. This week, Chono cut a promo promising the NWO would win all the titles in New Japan, saying Hall and Nash would come in and win the tag titles and that Syxx would win the J-Crown.
A lot of newspapers in Japan are reporting that Olympic judo star Naoya Ogawa will become a pro wrestler and sign with NJPW. Neither side has confirmed it yet but it's getting a ton of press (Ogawa indeed became a wrestler and became a multiple time NWA champion and had a pretty famous feud with Shinya Hashimoto).
WWF sent in several talents to work the latest USWA show. Sunny did commentary with Lance Russell. And a newly signed group called The Truth Commission was sent to the promotion to test out the gimmick. The team consists of Barry Buchanan (formerly The Punisher in SMW), Mike Hallick (formerly Mantaur), and a manager. Anyway, they eventually added a couple more people to the group and turned it into a faction and they were in WWF for a little while in 97.
The talk of the most recent ECW house shows have been the 6-man tag matches featuring Michinoku Pro wrestlers Great Sasuke, Gran Hamada & Gran Naniwa vs. Taka Michinoku, Dick Togo & Terry Boy. The matches have been stealing the show and earning the participants long standing ovations afterwards. The heel team (Michinoku, Togo, Terry Boy) also joined the BWO as BWO Japan. Several other new guys debuted in ECW this week also. Bobby Duncam Jr., Lenny Lane, and Beef Wellington all worked the shows.
Shane Douglas blew out his knee and had surgery this week. He came out on crutches at the ECW show and said he had torn his groin "working out" (wink wink) with Francince. No word on when he'll be back in the ring.
Indie wrestler Scott Taylor (later known as Scotty 2 Hotty) has offers on the table from WWF, WCW, and ECW. He's worked off and on for WWF through the years as a jobber but now all 3 companies are interested in actually signing him. He worked the 2 recent ECW shows, putting over Taz both nights.
There was some controversy over an ECW show that took place in Webster, NY because a local priest confused ECW with shoot-fighting promotion EFC (Extreme Fighting Championship) and made a big public stink, saying that ECW was banned in New York and tried to get the show stopped. Dave says that isn't the first and probably won't be the last time that happens.
PPV channel Viewers Choice was quoted in a news story saying they would be willing to carry future ECW PPVs as long as ECW fixes the issues they had problems with before. Viewers Choice declined to carry the upcoming Barely Legal show because they had concerns over the angle with Raven and Sandman's son. But that angle has pretty much been dropped so if Barely Legal does a good buyrate on Request TV, then Viewers Choice will likely be carrying future shows.
At a recent Clemson vs. Wake Forest game, Ric Flair was the honorary coach for Wake Forest. The game got a ton of mainstream attention and Wake Forest star (and top college player in the country) Tim Duncan attended Nitro and hung out with Flair and other stars. Flair also filmed a skit for the game with Dick Vitale. Dave thinks it's funny that Flair gets more mainstream press and is treated like a legit celebrity more now (at 48 years old) than he ever did during his heyday as the top wrestler in the world.
A new guy named Ernest Miller debuted for WCW at the latest Saturday night tapings. Dave says he's a former New England Patriots football player (he went to the training camp but never made the team) and will be doing something with Glacier. Speaking of Glacier, everyone in the company pretty much agrees that the gimmick is a flop, but they spent a lot of money on it and it's Bischoff's brain child, so the character isn't going away any time soon.
Arn Anderson will probably need surgery for the hand injury he's dealing with.
Ted Turner is expected to appear on the March 3rd episode of Nitro in an angle where he fires Eric Bischoff. The plan was supposed to be kept secret but pretty much everyone already knows. In fact, Mark Madden revealed it on the WCW hotline, which upset several people in WCW. When WWF found out, they managed to get a story planed in the New York Daily News saying that Turner is frustrated because he's been unable to overtake Vince McMahon in house show attendance and PPV buys and is getting desperate enough to start appearing on pro wrasslin' shows.
Sting reportedly wants to return to the ring, but the plan is to keep him out for awhile longer (literally the rest of the damn year).
The Giant got married on Valentine's Day last week (that one didn't last).
Shawn Michaels reportedly asked Scott Hall about coming to WCW. Michaels is under a long-term contract with WWF so it's highly unlikely he's getting out of that deal easily so don't look for Shawn in WCW anytime soon.
Ahmed Johnson is out with an infection in his arm. Awhile back, Faarooq hit Ahmed with a board in the match and the board splintered and the splinters got into Ahmed's arm, causing some kind of infection. It eventually got so painful that he went to the hospital and ended up being hooked up to an IV and was there for 5 days. No word on when he'll be back in action.
On Raw, they had Goldust and Marlena cut a promo to emphasize that Goldust isn't gay and that is act is just mind games. The reason is that ever since he turned babyface, he hasn't been getting cheered because crowds still think he's gay and, well, yanno....the 90s. Afterwards, Helmsley and his new valet/bodyguard "Joan" came in and attacked Marlena.
On the same Raw, the Headbangers beat a team called the Hardy Boys in a squash match but it was still the best match of the show and Jeff Hardy in particular took some great bumps.
The Fake Razor and Fake Diesel gimmicks have been dropped in WWF, but they're still using the gimmick for AAA in Mexico. Basically, the gimmicks sucked and didn't get over but you would think it wouldn't have taken them this long to figure it out.
Brian Pillman is hoping to be back in the ring by April. His ankle recovery is finally making good progress.
Vader was sent to the Duke weight loss clinic (same place Yokozuna was sent) and has reportedly lost close to 40 pounds.
Former NFL player Darren Drozdov is being trained by WWF's Tom Prichard and will probably be brought in sometime in the future.