September 13, 1999
- As the year 2000 approaches, publications all over the world keep putting out their "Best of the century" lists for different things so hey, why not wrestling? Of course, that's problematic because as times change, so does the business. Basketball in 1999 is fundamentally the same as it was in 1949, but there's still been a lot of changes, so it's not really fair to compare Michael Jordan to Bob Cousy or whatever because things are just so different. Wrestling has re-invented itself even more throughout the years. So comparing Steve Austin to Strangler Lewis is basically impossible to do fairly. It's not even comparing apples to oranges. It's like comparing apples to pizza or oranges to Ford trucks. So anyway, Dave decides the only fair way to do it would be to pick the best performer for each decade. So that's what he does, giving each wrestler a paragraph to explain why he picked them. Also, Dave notes that this article isn't just for the Observer, he wrote it for Gannett News Service, which is a company that publishes major newspapers around the country and so you can find this story in newspapers throughout the country this week. Anyway, TL;DR...
- 1900s - Frank Gotch
- 1910s - Frank Gotch again. Even though he retired by 1913 and died a few years later, no one else for the remainder of the decade even came close to matching his drawing power and star-power that he still had during the first 3 years of the decade.
- 1920s - Ed "Strangler" Lewis
- 1930s - Jim Londos
- 1940s - Dave doesn't seem to have a pick here, saying the 40s were one of the weakest decades ever for the business. Lou Thesz is in the discussion, along with Bronko Nagurski, French Angel, and Bert Assirati but Dave doesn't really settle on any of them. But he seems to be leaning towards Thesz.
- 1950s - Lou Thesz gets this decade again, but Dave also notes that this was the biggest decade ever for El Santo as well.
- 1960s - Bruno Sammartino was the biggest star in America. Giant Baba was the biggest in Japan. Ray Stevens was the best in-ring performer. Gene Kiniski is in the discussion also.
- 1970s - Andre The Giant was the biggest drawing star of the era. Sammartino ruled again in America. Inoki becomes a huge name in Japan.
- 1980s - This obviously comes down to 2 people: Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair. As far as overall star power and being a top draw, Hogan is the obvious choice. As far as best in-ring performer, it's Flair no question. Basically, the answer here simply depends on what your criteria is.
- 1990s - Mitsuharu Misawa was by far the best in-ring performer of the decade. Shawn Michaels was the best in America. Steve Austin became the biggest star in the world but that only happened within the last 2 years. Prior to 1998, he was just another guy. But his 2 years on top have been the most successful of basically anyone ever, so it's hard to argue against Austin.
- Brian Hildebrand's battle with stomach cancer has become nearly fatal. He suffered 2 stomach blockages last week and the surgeon has ruled the condition inoperable. He remains hospitalized at press time. Hildebrand was referenced on both Nitro and Raw this week. On Nitro, Tony Schiavone and Bobby Heenan both talked about him using his referee stage name "Mark Curtis" and wished him well and talked about how they hoped to have him return to Nitro as a referee soon. On Raw, Mick Foley talked about "Brian" without mentioning that he's a WCW referee and told him to keep fighting and that everyone in WWF is praying for him. Following a house show on Sunday in New York, Foley caught an overnight flight to Tennessee where Hildebrand lives to visit him the next morning, before flying back to Hartford that night for Raw. Shane Douglas also visited Hildebrand this week. Foley, Douglas, and Hildebrand all broke into the business together, training at Dominic DeNucci's wrestling school and are longtime friends.
- In a follow-up to the story about Dr. Joel Hackett who is under investigation for illegally distributing drugs to wrestlers, it has been confirmed that the Somas that Louie Spicolli died from were prescribed by Hackett. Hackett also provided drugs to Brian Pillman. When Pillman was found dead in 1997, police found 8 different prescription bottles in his possession, though his death was not ruled an overdose. Pillman heavily used HGH (prescribed by a different doctor) but quit taking it when he could no longer afford it. There's also a 3rd dead wrestler who reportedly received drugs from Hackett, though it's still unknown who that was. At the scene of Spicolli's death, they found Somas as well as steroids prescribed by Hackett.
- While WWF has publicly talked about how they banned Dr. Hackett from their shows and warned wrestlers to stay away from him, the fact remains that the company still indirectly encourages this sort of thing and the culture that causes these issues still exists. To continue being pushed and to make money, wrestlers are expected to look a certain way, often unattainable through natural means, and they're encouraged to work through minor and often not-so-minor injuries, which inevitably leads to pain pill use. In Pillman's case, he should have never been allowed back in the ring to begin with after his ankle injury. And Spicolli was repeatedly told in the WWF that he wasn't big enough and didn't have the right physique to be a top star. Spicolli had been often used as a paid-per-appearance jobber, but then he started heavily using steroids and added a ton of extra muscle mass and immediately after, WWF signed him to a full contract. At the time, Spicolli was specifically told that he got the job because he had improved his physique. But at the time, WWF was stringently testing for steroids (McMahon had just recently been acquitted and they were still feeling the heat) and naturally, Spicolli was unable to maintain his physique without steroids after he signed and got out of shape again. His serious pain pill addiction began around this same time, because he was afraid to take time off to rest his numerous injuries for fear of losing his spot. Anyway, Dave says just a quick glance at the TV will show you that in both WWF and WCW, steroid usage is back up to probably the same level it was before Dr. Zahorian in 1991. Neither company tests anymore and the bodybuilding drugs have quietly made a comeback.
- This week's episode of WWF Smackdown saw the ratings drop half a point from last week's debut. It's interesting because Raw is always the #1 rated show every week on cable. But on network TV, Smackdown was ranked 73 out of 122 shows in prime time. It goes to show that despite the surging popularity, among the masses, wrestling is still somewhat of a fringe thing for casual viewers but it's also worth noting that UPN isn't on the same level as NBC, ABC, FOX or CBS so there's that too. WWF had planned to keep Steve Austin off TV until after the next PPV but the ratings drop was enough of a concern that they brought him back for the 3rd Smackdown taping and heavily advertised his appearance on Raw which Dave thinks was a bit of an overreaction to a relatively minor ratings drop. They still destroyed WCW Thunder, which set an all-time record low rating. On the flip side, the 2nd episode of ECW on TNN did a slightly higher rating than the debut which is good but still only half of what TNN was expecting it to do, so not anything to celebrate yet. Heyman is aware that the ratings can't stay this low, but says he expects them to slowly rise over the next few months. And hey, for what it's worth, even though the ratings are lower than what TNN wants, having 700,000 people watching ECW on TV is far more viewers than they've ever had before in company history.
- Things aren't looking good for Jerry Lawler's mayoral campaign. A poll conducted by the Memphis Commercial Appeal newspaper showed Lawler in a distant 3rd place out of 15 candidates, with only 6% of the likely votes. Incumbent mayor Willie Herenton is in the lead (he won). For what it's worth, leading up to his election, Jesse Ventura was also trailing in the polls and made a big come from behind win. But Ventura was usually in the 15-20% range and slowly closed the gap. That doesn't appear to be the case for Lawler, as most Memphians don't appear to be taking him seriously as a candidate. The Rock came to Memphis to campaign for him, first at a lunch fundraiser, which went fine, and later at an appearance at the University of Memphis, which didn't go so well. At the U of M speech, Rock talked about the newspaper's poll putting Lawler in 3rd and decided to cut a promo about it, saying, "You can take the newspaper, the Sunday edition, and roll it up. Keep rolling it, turn it sideways, put some of that famous Memphis barbecue sauce on top and stick it straight up their candy asses!" Many of the students who saw it loved it, but others who are involved in politics and aren't wrestling fans found it silly and crass and criticized him for it. Rock also had this to say about Lawler: "If it weren't for Jerry Lawler and the USWA that he ran, that really gave me my start, I wouldn't be where I am today. If he runs this city like he ran his company, he'll do a pretty damn good job." Dave finds that line absolutely hilarious, considering, well, USWA is dead and even when it was alive and thriving, the business side was handled by Jerry Jarrett because Lawler is notoriously a terrible businessman. There's also been a lot of criticism over the demise of USWA, in regards to Larry Burton (the guy who basically defrauded everyone and killed USWA, who was a well-known snake with a history of defrauding people) and saying that even if Lawler was innocent in all that, if he's foolish enough to get tangled up with guys like that, why should he be mayor?
- There's a section in every issue where Dave lists results for all the random indie shows in the world. I mean, every show. Every little podunk, no name indie company that holds a show at a VFW hall in front of 30 people usually has their results listed. Anyway, on Sept. 1, 1999 in Du Quoin, IL there was a wrestling show at the local fairgrounds. The opening bout saw Haystacks Ross win a handicapped match by defeating Adrian Lynch and some kid who goes by the name CM Punk.
- Dave reviews the recent Great Muta vs. Great Nita (Atsushi Onita) exploding ring barbed wire match from NJPW and calls it unbelievably bad, a strong candidate for worst match of the year, and up there with Hogan vs. Warrior from last year. Negative 2 stars! This was linked in the last issue, but here it is again.
- Dave got to see some tapes of Ohio Valley Wrestling, the WWF developmental promotion that Jim Cornette is now running in Louisville. It's every bit a Jim Cornette show, full of early-80s southern angles and structure, but using a bunch of young wrestlers who have probably never seen any of that stuff. The promotion's top star is a guy named Flash Flanagan, who's a really good worker. His gimmick is that he's pissed off because he knows he's good but he hasn't gotten a contract offer from WWF or WCW. Dave says the guy may have a point because he's light years better than a lot of the people signed to both companies but he doesn't have a good look which is likely why he's still slumming it in OVW. The top babyface is a guy named The Damaja (later became one of the Basham Brothers in WWE). Nick Dinsmore (later Eugene) is also there. Cornette does commentary and is great at it. Cornette has also brought in some of the old Smoky Mountain guys like Rock & Roll Express and Buddy Landel to work shows. It's really similar to Cornette's old SMW promotion.
- The future of UFC looks bleaker than ever due to even more financial cutbacks and no signs that PPV providers are going to take them back any time soon. UFC owner Bob Meyrowitz seems more focused on his new internet radio startup (eyada.com) than he does on UFC these days. There are people who are interested in buying the company and even the WWF has made inquiries about it, but nothing even remotely serious. WCW has shown interest in MMA in the past, with Bischoff attempting to co-promote K-1 and PRIDE events from Japan without success. Dave recaps how bad, often unfair publicity has crippled UFC.
- ECW's upcoming Anarchy Rulz PPV will likely end up being the first ever $200,000 gate the company has ever drawn. As of press time, over 5,000 tickets have already been sold which is also a company record.
- WCW recently released several wrestlers and Paul Heyman is said to be interested in a few of them, especially Super Calo. He's also willing to use Mikey Whipwreck again on a part-time basis but said he doesn't want to bring him back as a main star again because he doesn't want to send a message that people can just leave ECW, go to WCW or WWF, flop, and then come crawling back and have a guaranteed spot. Sandman is also interested in coming back to ECW but Heyman has flat out said he doesn't want him back because he was upset that Sandman basically quit ECW without notice and didn't even have the courtesy to give Heyman a phone call to let him know he was gone. They also had some legal issues over money after Sandman left so there's some bad blood there. Heyman says he has to set a precedent that you can't just walk out on ECW and then come back like nothing happened (spoiler: Sandman returns very soon). Heyman also said he was done with Chris Candido and Tammy Sytch. Candido is no longer under contract anyway, but Sytch still is, though Heyman said he would gladly release her if she can get a job anywhere else and he doesn't intend to stop her from working elsewhere.
- Next week's ECW show on TNN will air footage of a match from Rob Van Dam vs. Jerry Lynn that happened last week. The TNN people were upset about it because the match wasn't filmed with the TNN crew and doesn't have the production values that they want from ECW. But Heyman argued with them that the match should air and TNN finally relented and let him have his way. Many people who saw it live are saying it's one of the best matches in company history.
- WATCH: RVD vs. Jerry Lynn - ECW on TNN 1999
- Shane Douglas recently claimed that ECW owes him $140,000. Heyman says that's exaggerated and says the real number is actually less than $40,000 and that ECW is making payments to Douglas on a payment schedule that both sides agreed to. He said Douglas claiming $140,000 is false and slanderous.
- Despite being the new tag team champions, neither Raven or Tommy Dreamer are in any shape to be wrestling right now and are mostly just doing quick spots with DDT finishes at house shows. Dreamer still has back issues but decided against surgery and Raven, during the late 90s, was pretty much always just one big walking injury.
- ECW and AJPW are still negotiating on working together. Heyman is trying to bring in Mike Awesome and Maunukea Mossman. He's also interested in bringing in Kenta Kobashi, but AJPW said they couldn't do it in the next month or so because Kobashi's schedule is so busy but it still may happen in the future (never did).
- Raven's 1-year contract with ECW is for $150,000 which is about half of what he made in WCW. But there are upsides because the contract also gives him full medical coverage and cuts of other revenue like merch sales. Plus he's only booked to work 12 shows per month, so it's less demanding than the WCW schedule.
- WWF is planning to send developmental signee Vic Grimes to ECW for more experience and Heyman thinks Grimes can probably do well in ECW. But on the same hand, now that ECW has their own national TV show, he's hesitant to make deals like this with WWF, for fear of being portrayed as just another developmental promotion of WWF.
- Notes from WCW Nitro: the show only drew 3,818 paid fans, which shows you just how far and how quickly this company has fallen. There were another 4,600+ fans who got free tickets. Add it up and it's a little over 8,000 fans, but it was an arena that holds more than 16,000. Sooooo....not good. It was also the 4th anniversary episode of Nitro and it was one of the worst episodes ever, and Dave says watching it felt like 4 years. They did a cage match with Hogan/Sting/Goldberg vs. Sid/DDP/Steiner. Late in the week before the show, they had decided to make this a War Games match, given away for free on Nitro. But they had already sold tickets for the show based on a one-ring setup and deciding to do a War Games match just isn't something you can do at the last minute because the arena has to be configured for it and available tickets have to be planned accordingly. "Some day this company will get someone in charge who can plan things out in advance," Dave says. In the lone good spot of the show, Goldberg came out to his old music again. You see, for some reason, for the last 3 or 4 weeks, someone in WCW decided Goldberg should have new, very bad music and it killed him. So he finally got his old music back and the crowd popped huge for it. And that's the only good thing Dave has to say, and I'm leaving out a lot of the bad stuff. Because he rips this episode of Nitro apart.
- Scott Putski, 4x4, Swoll, Chase Tatum, Damian, Ciclope, Mikey Whipwreck and Super Calo were all released by WCW this week.
- Jimmy Hart is now in charge of running WCW Saturday Night and is hoping to make it more of a Memphis-wrestling style show. He has a lot of changes in mind, but given how all this stuff is filmed weeks in advance and because WCW has no long-term planning, and titles change constantly, it's going to be hard to make any real changes. Hart is hoping to make the show its own separate thing, apart from Nitro or Thunder and possibly even with its own titles, with all the young guys who aren't being used on the main shows (basically the WCW version of NXT. Never worked out of course).
- WCW is still planning to do a PPV on New Year's Eve co-promoting it as a full KISS concert. WCW already has a PPV 11 days before that, and Dave thinks this is the dumbest idea ever. A few years ago, Howard Stern hosted a PPV on New Year's Eve that did a big buyrate, but it also got months of hype and tons of mainstream publicity. WCW isn't going to get that, nor is KISS, neither of which are exactly lighting the world on fire these days.
- Rey Mysterio Jr. missed Nitro because something happened backstage leading to him accidentally getting poked in the eye.
- On Thunder, Sid Vicious lost a match to Perry Saturn by DQ. When Eric Bischoff found out (he wasn't there and didn't book the show), he blew a gasket, because they've been doing the whole Sid Vicious undefeated streak angle and someone apparently didn't get the memo. Mike Graham ended up taking the blame, since he was basically the agent for the show and came up with the finish. Dave says even by WCW standards, this was jaw-droppingly stupid. Anyway, on Nitro the following week, they just didn't acknowledge it and are pretending that Sid is still undefeated (which, as previously reported, is already total bullshit anyway but whatever).
- Now that he's in WCW, Shane Douglas is pushing for he and Ric Flair to finally have a match. Douglas also said he'd be willing to bet his entire yearly salary that if he and Flair were both given interview time to build up to a match against each other on Nitro, their match would beat Raw in the ratings. Dave hopes nobody takes that bet for Shane's sake.
- ICP member Violent J is no longer doing a moonsault after being confronted by Hugh Morrus about using his move (I think Violent J wrote about this in his book. Said he came backstage after doing it and Hugh Morrus was throwing a fit, kicking over trashcans and stuff, and Bischoff came up to them and said "don't do the moonsault anymore, Hugh Morrus is the only big guy that does moonsaults.")
- Notes from Raw: Tori vs. Ivory in the first women's hardcore match was basically just an excuse to get the two women soaking wet in their underwear. Dave doesn't mention it, but that match has a great moment with Ivory burning Tori on the back with an iron. The match with Jeff Jarrett against Jacqueline was brutal because Jarrett was extremely stiff with her. The two go back a long ways to their Memphis years and she probably wanted him to lay it in on her and there's no doubt she can take it, but if you're not into men beating up women, it might be hard to watch. The Dudleys were recognized as former 8-time tag team champions. Dave says if WWF had been willing to recognize what happened in other companies back in 1991, they could have made a lot more money with Hogan and Flair. In reviewing other parts of the show, Dave says the WWF writers clearly faced a lot of female rejection growing up and are trying to get back at the whole gender. Yeah, that pretty much sounds like Russo's writing. Triple H is working hard but just isn't over as a top star like they want him to be. And Lillian Garcia is still the worst ring announcer ever.
- Undertaker's pulled groin injury is so bad that he's having trouble walking and even putting clothes on, so he was given the weekend off house shows.
- Bulldog is scheduled to re-debut in WWF at the October UK PPV. Still no word on whether or not WWF will air the footage of the interview they filmed after re-hiring him. There's been concern over the stuff he said in the interview due to the ongoing Hart lawsuit (I've seen a few people say that they eventually aired some of the footage from this on a 2003 episode of Confidential but it never aired at the time in 1999. I'm sure the full footage is still sitting in the WWE vault somewhere).
- X-Pac is being sued for $500,000 by a man in Wisconsin who claimed he was attacked by X-Pac for asking for an autograph.
- WWF tried to get Shawn Michaels to renegotiate his contract with them but it didn't work. Michaels is still collecting his $750,000 per year guarantee, despite not wrestling in a year and a half and only appearing on TV periodically since then. But Michaels feeling is that he was injured in their ring, thus he didn't feel he should have to renegotiate new terms, so he refused and WWF is stuck paying him (to be fair, he was injured in mid-air, technically outside of the ring).
- Follow up to the prank Al Snow pulled on Val Venis a couple weeks ago, where he put Venis' number on the missing dog posters that were shown on TV. As you can imagine, Venis got a billion prank calls and has since had to change his phone number.
- Really funny letter written by comedy writer Desmond Devlin that I'm just going to copy and paste in full:
- I must turn to you for answers.
- They say that if you made 10,000 monkeys type at 10,000 typewriters for 10,000 years, one of them would eventually come up with "Hamlet." If WCW let 10,000 wrestlers compete in 10,000 matches on 10,000 Nitros, would one of them eventually end with a clean pinfall?
- How can Hulk Hogan be considered the wrestler of the century when he didn't get started until at least 1930?
- Is it true that Hogan went back to the yellow trunks because he's getting to that age where embarrassing yellow stains sometimes pop up?
- If 56-year old Harley Race changed his last name to Davidson, would Eric Bischoff get all giggly and give him a big push?
- In order to be eliminated from the WWF Royal Rumble, you have to have both feet touch the floor. So looking back, how was Kerry Von Erich ever eliminated?
- Would you agree that Marc Mero is having a BAAAAD career?
- What terrifying image haunted your nightmares the longest, seeing Vince McMahon's teddy bear on fire, the ghostly image of Warrior in Hogan's mirror, or hearing Madusa with a live mic?
- When Mean Gene is in bed with his wife, does she have to press 4 for other options?
- Do you think the coast is clear for David Flair to stop watching over his shoulder for Chuck Zito?
- Has Goldberg read the FDA's medical report on inhaling second hand pyro smoke?
- Is it true that the members of KISS met the Nitro Girls and said, "Whoa, that's a lot of makeup?"
- Considering all the guest singers on Mondays and WWF Week on MTV, wouldn't it be a good idea for the following rock-and-wrestling connections to happen? David Flair and White Zombie. Ken Shamrock and Primal Scream. Jerry Lawler and the Cherry Poppin' Daddies. Blink 182 and any Sid interview. The Nitro Girls and the Barenaked Ladies. Pat Patterson and Boyz II Men. Whoever keeps track of WCW's storylines and Erasure. Spike Dudley and Too $hort. Scott Steiner's diction coach and Chumbawamba. Dusty Rhodes and Cake.
- Were you surprised last week when Hurricane Bret didn't swing North to viciously attack San Antonio?
- Isn't is risky for DJ Ran to instruct Nitro crowds to "throw their hands in the air and wave 'em like they don't care," when in fact, most of the fans really don't care?
- Now that pro wrestling's on The Nashville Network, do you think it'll turn out that it was George Jones who drove the hummer?
- Do you remember way, way back when bookers would actually let a character appear on television more than one time before "shocking the fans" by "turning them heel?"
- You now he's out there somewhere. The same people who film him are the ones who hate and fear him most. His personality hovers over everything, but they never let you see him. The Flair Witch Project?
- Since Rey Misterio Jr. stole X-Pac's bronco buster, do you think Hunter Hearst Helmsley should retaliate by using Chris Benoit's snot blowing spot? And if HHH does empty his nose on an opponent, do you think that wrestler might drown?
- If Mr. Bob Backlund was locked in a bare room with Jim Hellwig, and they started having an excogitative conversation imbued with contemplative apperception, cogency of percipience, and lambent sagacity, who do you think would reach for the gun first?
- Hulk Hogan currently owns the WCW belt. But to be the man, you've got to beat the man. So doesn't this mean Jay Leno (1-0 record) is the true uncrowned heavyweight champion?
- Now that WWF stock is available to purchase, does that mean "selling short" won't mean tapping out to Taz?
- Isn't it nice that Hulk Hogan tells fans to "say prayers" before starting his matches? After all, the audience should always pray just before falling asleep.
- Scientists have used a supercollider to develop a subatomic neutrino that exists for just 0.000143 seconds before disappearing forever. Do you think they should name this discovery a "Malenko push?"
- Desmond Devlin
- Northwest Dudleyville