April 24, 2000
- WWF's new TV deal announcement has been delayed because the USA Network has filed a lawsuit against WWF, Viacom, and CBS. This gets complicated so bear with me. Or just skip down to the Mike Awesome story if you want. It's your life man, don't let me tell you how to live it. By the terms of their current agreement, USA has the right to match any offer that WWF gets from another network, which would allow them to keep WWF for another 5 years. Last week, USA announced that it plans to match the offer that CBS/Viacom is making. But here's the catch: USA's right to match the offer only applies to the 4 wrestling shows (Raw, Heat, Superstars, and Livewire). The CBS/Viacom offer is for all of that, plus several other things such as XFL broadcasting rights, a $500,000 movie development fund, a 1-hour weekly drama series on UPN, a publishing joint venture with Simon & Schuster (which Viacom owns), radio specials, hosting theme park events, an equity investment in WWF stock, and more. So basically, the CBS/Viacom offer is for a lot more money, which USA doesn't want to match because they don't want all those other things. USA's lawsuit says "By tying the right of first refusal with respect to the (television series) to rights to different properties that Viacom and CBS wish to exploit. . . the 'offer' represents a transparent and unlawful attempt by WWFE, Viacom and CBS to frustrate USA's contractual rights." USA has been publicly preparing itself to lose WWF and even when they do, they will still remain the top rated cable network. But it's thought that USA may just be filing this lawsuit in order to throw a wrench into the CBS/Viacom deal. Time is ticking because fall season TV advertising sales will be starting soon and WWF and CBS/Viacom need to get this deal finalized so they can start selling ad-space. By stalling the deal at the last minute, USA might just be angling for a big cash settlement to make the lawsuit go away. Either way, doesn't sound like USA is particularly thrilled about losing WWF.
- The situation with Mike Awesome and the ECW title took a bunch of crazy twists and turns this week and ended with a WCW wrestler facing a WWF wrestler for the ECW title in an ECW ring. As mentioned last week, ECW and WCW initially came to an agreement where WCW would pay ECW a 6-figure settlement in order to get Awesome released from his contract and there were several stipulations WCW had to follow in order for Awesome to appear on Nitro (such as him not bringing the ECW title on TV with him), and things he would do and say and what the announcers would do and say. But according to ECW, 2 of the stipulations were violated. When Awesome appeared, the WCW announcers were supposed to say that he is the ECW champion and that he had a title defense scheduled that would air Friday night on TNN. They mentioned he was ECW champion but they never plugged the TNN show. There was exact scripting for what the announcers were supposed to say and Dave has seen it. In fact, it appeared that Scott Hudson began reading from the script as he was supposed to but he was then cut off midway through by Tony Schiavone, and thus never got to the part where they plug the TNN show. Word is that was a purposeful call from someone in WCW, with those in the company saying that there was simply no way WCW was ever going to plug ECW's show on the air, especially not during the first show of the new Bischoff/Russo-era. The other stipulation is that Awesome wasn't supposed to cut a promo, which he did. All of this led to more legal threats the next day which resulted in Awesome being pulled from the Thunder tapings.
- As for Awesome dropping the title, Heyman came up with the idea of bringing in Tazz as a surprise opponent to win the belt. Heyman called Vince McMahon who accepted the proposal Heyman laid out, which was for Tazz to win the ECW title from Awesome and then drop it a week later at another ECW show to Tommy Dreamer. Heyman even pitched the idea for Perry Saturn to do a run in during the Tazz/Dreamer match so that Tazz (a WWF guy) wouldn't have to lose clean to an ECW guy and Heyman even offered to let WWF use the footage on TV to help further the Tazz/Saturn angle they're doing. No word if that's going to happen but reportedly WWF has no issue with Tazz losing clean to anybody in ECW.
- Anyway, the Awesome/Tazz match was nothing as a match but the back story is about as crazy as it gets. Awesome showed up to the arena with WCW head of security Doug Dillenger and never went to the ECW locker room due to concerns that he almost certainly wouldn't be welcomed kindly. When Awesome came out, he got a massive "you sold out!" chant, and then Tazz came out to a huge pop, using his full WWF gimmick. WWF music, two Z's in his name, WWF version of his nickname, etc. Tazz beat him in about 1 minute and, without selling the finish at all, Awesome jumped up, climbed over the guardrail and left the building immediately. A lot of people were surprised WCW would agree to allow Awesome to lose to a WWF wrestler, but Heyman pretty much had them by the balls here. Dave doesn't know that it was a great idea. A WWF guy now holds the ECW title, plus Tazz didn't even beat Awesome clean, Dreamer had to help, so it didn't even do a good job of burying Awesome (although that may have been something WCW insisted on). Anyway, when the match aired on TNN 2 nights later, all the internet buzz and hype didn't amount to shit in the ratings, as the show did about the same rating it's been averaging for months.
- WATCH: WCW's Mike Awesome faces WWF's Tazz in an ECW ring for the ECW championship
- The same night the match happened, Tazz was on the pre-taped Smackdown show getting beat by Crash Holly. Then he jobbed to Eddie Guerrero at multiple house shows (in New York and Pittsburgh, 2 big ECW cities) in opening matches. This week, Tazz came out with the ECW title on Raw, while J.R. explained it by saying he won it "on his day off" and never mentioned Mike Awesome. Tazz then lost a match on Raw (although he wasn't pinned). But then, the big kicker: Smackdown, in a champion vs. champion match, in Philadelphia no less, Tazz jobbed to Triple H. Not only that, Triple H broke Tazz's submission and won even with Tommy Dreamer coming out to try to help Tazz, pedigreeing them both (in the years since, even Vince has kinda half-way apologized for that one). Yes, ECW got lots of national TV exposure this week but at what cost? WWF portrayed the ECW title as not even on par with their joke of a hardcore title and then had Triple H absolutely bury Tazz and the ECW title in general on Smackdown. Tazz will eventually drop the belt, and it will probably never be acknowledged on WWF TV, and Dreamer is not expected to ever return to WWF to get revenge on Triple H, so pretty much nobody from ECW came out ahead here. It's expected that Dreamer will win the title, only because he's the most loyal guy Heyman has and he can trust him not to fuck over the company and jump ship like Awesome did. Dave says it reminds him of the last years of AWA, when all the champions kept getting swooped up by WWF and eventually they put the title on Larry Zbyszko (who nobody bought as a world champion) simply because he was Verne Gagne's son-in-law and they trusted him not to leave. In Dave's opinion, this whole debacle has positioned ECW in the eyes of fans as a second-rate promotion who's stars aren't even remotely on the same level as WWF stars. And perception is important. Nobody wants to feel like they're watching the minor leagues of anything.
- WATCH: ECW champion Tazz vs. WWF champion Triple H
- Spring Stampede, the first PPV under the Bischoff/Russo regime, is in the books and it wasn't bad. In fact, it was probably the best WCW PPV in about a year, but that's still not saying much. Since they're still in the reboot phase, the show featured a ton of angles to make sure the New Blood group got over as heels, with the heels winning every vacated title. The matches were mostly bad and there were tons of screwjob finishes, but since they're starting fresh, Dave is willing to excuse that for now, since they're trying to build brand new storylines and it's kind of necessary. A lot of it felt like a 2nd rate WWF imitation. There was a ton of swearing, even by the announcers, and that felt forced and reportedly the announcers weren't super comfortable with it either.
- Other notes from the PPV: Chicago radio DJ Mancow had a match with Jimmy Hart and considering he's unknown to most of the country and the match was never hyped on TV, imagine the confusion for fans watching this on PPV. It should have been a dark match for the live crowd only. Jimmy Hart played a heel in the match, despite being a babyface and Hogan's manager all the other time. "I've seen worse celebrity matches, which is about the nicest thing I can say about this one." Mike Awesome made his in-ring debut and was fine but not great, and the crowd chanted ECW at him, but WCW never acknowledged his ECW ties. Hogan got his heat back by beating the shit out of Kidman "to the point because of the size difference and the manner it was done, it actually looked like child abuse." Then Hogan went after Bischoff in the locker room, but Russo brought out cops who actually pulled guns on Hogan and arrested him. Terry Funk took a bunch of chairshots to the head from Norman Smiley and Dave doesn't like it and wishes Funk would stop allowing his brains to be smashed to mush. Russo "fired" Dustin Rhodes, saying the only good character he ever had was Goldust and claimed he wrote all the lines for Goldust to say in the first place. Yay 4th wall breaking, a timeless Russo classic. Tammy Sytch debuted, helping Chris Candido win the cruiserweight title. It wasn't caught on camera, but Tammy fell right on her ass on WCW's terrible entrance ramp during her run-in. And of course Jeff Jarrett won the WCW title. If you're wondering about all the signs in the crowd that were promoting DDP's book, well, that wasn't fans. DDP, smart self-promoter that he is, made the signs himself and littered the building with them before the show (always a hustler, that guy).
- More Hart family drama, as Stampede Wrestling announced they would be running an 85th birthday celebration show for Stu Hart....in conjunction with WWF. The next day, Stu Hart said he wouldn't be attending. Bruce and Ross Hart, who run Stampede, originally wanted to do an Owen Hart tribute show since we're approaching 1 year since his death but sorta masking it as a Stu Hart celebration show, since his birthday is also in May. Bruce contacted Vince McMahon and Jim Ross, asking to use some wrestlers and it was approved by WWF (who were apparently under the impression that it was only a Stu Hart show). Dave says several Hart family members have been in regular contact with WWF including Ellie and Diana, the wives of Jim Neidhart and Davey Boy Smith, who are expected to testify against Owen's wife Martha in her wrongful death lawsuit against WWF. The show comes on a day off for WWF stars so pretty much all the Canadian wrestlers (Jericho, Benoit, Edge, Christian, Test, Venis, etc.) all signed up to go work the show for free, believing everyone was on the same page and that it was all good. But the day after it was announced, Stu Hart said he wouldn't be attending, feeling it was in poor taste. In a Calgary Sun newspaper article, Bret Hart was quoted saying that Stu was unaware that the show had even been planned in his honor. Martha Hart was quoted saying WWF is just trying to score PR points and she won't be involved either. Bruce has been trying to change Stu's mind but no dice. When all of this came to light, many of the WWF wrestlers wanted to pull out. Benoit in particular said he was misled about what the show would be and doesn't want to go anymore. But Vince McMahon won't let any of them back out, saying that unless the show is cancelled, they're already advertised and have to go. As of press time, the show is still scheduled (it ends up not happening).
- WATCH: Sangre Azteca spikes himself outside the ring (7:52 mark, with replays after)
- More news on New Jersey attempting to regulate "extreme" wrestling. WWF, WCW, and seemingly ECW will be exempt from the rules because they aren't classified as extreme (even though 90% of the stuff in the bill, such as blading, barbed wire, etc. have been used in those companies regularly, although you can't expect stuffy politicians to actually grasp the nuances of what they're voting on). A lot of this stems from indie company Jersey All Pro Wrestling which runs death matches regularly. It was made even worse this week when a female JAPW wrestler was seriously injured in a match, fracturing one of her vertebrae. When the media confronted him about it, AJPW president Frank Iadavaia told them that it was angle and that she's fine and she backed it up, claiming she wasn't really hurt. But then the media investigated it deeper and confronted the woman at her home and found out she really is injured with a broken neck and that it's not an angle. She then admitted that she and Iadavaia agreed to lie and tell people it was fake due to the political issues and admitted that, yes, she's really seriously hurt. So yeah, they got busted. Needless to say, this didn't help their case and just strengthened the calls for regulation.
- The second week of the Bischoff/Russo era did not bring good news in the ratings, as Nitro did its lowest rating since the earliest days of the show back in 1995, doing a 2.47. That's even lower than the lowest rated Kevin Sullivan-booked episode. Can't blame the low rating on Raw either because that show mostly sucked this week. So yeah, looks like they didn't make a very strong first impression last week.
- XPW held their big show at the LA Sports Arena, drawing 1,200 people. Shane Douglas was there and cut a promo trashing WWF, WCW, and Flair. The crowd chanted "you sold out" because they knew he had returned to WCW. Douglas called XPW owner Rob Black's wife a "porno whore" and slapped her, which led to an angle with Sabu making a surprise appearance, turning the main event into a three way with Sabu, Douglas, and Chris Candido.
- Sabu was scheduled to work on Insane Clown Posse's upcoming JCW tour as the headline star but Paul Heyman successfully blocked it via legal threats. Sabu DID work XPW's recent show despite Heyman's legal threats and the way they're trying to get around it is by saying that Sabu did the show for free and wasn't paid ("wink wink," Dave adds). Basically, XPW is calling Heyman's bluff on this one (considering Heyman was struggling to keep ECW afloat at this point and XPW was funded by massive amounts of porn money, this was probably a safe bet that Heyman wasn't going to waste resources suing them. Probably the same reason WCW didn't hesitate to steal Mike Awesome, despite a valid contract. ECW was just powerless against people with more money).
- Lance Storm went on his website this week and basically said the same thing Dave said about the Tazz/Mike Awesome match, that Awesome not losing cleanly and dropping it to a WWF guy didn't help out ECW at all and makes them seem minor league. He got some heat for it in the ECW locker room so he removed the post. Anyway, he's expected to be sitting down with Heyman this week to discuss a contract extension.
- Notes from Nitro: the show opened with Russo and Jarrett and a bunch of other New Blood guys having a big balloon and confetti celebration, with them cutting a promo trashing Jim Ross, which was lost on 95% of the people watching. Dave thinks Jarrett should probably wait to see if he draws TV ratings or PPV buyrates as champion before he starts talking too much shit (spoiler: no). Then DDP did a run-in and they showed him coming through the backstage area, and showed Curt Hennig and Stasiak going over their match for later that night. Stone Cold Hulk Hogan showed up and the cops tried to keep him at bay but he gave them all a dirty look and they backed down, which leads Dave to quip that he's glad he doesn't live in that city. 800-year-old Terry Funk practically killed himself in a hardcore match to get The Wall over. Brian Adams and Bryan Clark debuted under the team name Kronik. Sting came down from the ceiling for the first time since Owen Hart's death and Dave is appalled that WCW would do that again. Even the NBA banned mascots from being lowered from the ceiling and haven't done it since Owen's death and for WCW, the company that still employees Bret Hart, to do it is absolutely mind-boggling. WCW is running a show in the Kemper Arena in Kansas City soon and Dave just hopes they don't do it again there but who the fuck knows with this company anymore (WWE has still never done it since, in the 21+ years since it happened). DDP faced Mike Awesome and during the match, announcer Mark Madden was going on and on about how this is a new WCW and they will have winners and losers and the refs won't be calling DQs and no contests the way WWF does. Literally seconds later, the DDP/Awesome match ended in a double-DQ. WCW, folks. The show ended with Bret Hart showing up with a chair and swinging it at Hogan and Bischoff, but the show cut to black before you could see who Bret actually hit. Dave thinks it was a decent cliffhanger, but if you're wondering what the live crowd saw....he hit Hogan (of course, Bret was already retired so this led to nothing).
- Notes from Thunder: David Arquette was on the show to promote the movie and it looks like they're going to do some kind of angle with him in the coming weeks. (...............) Anyway, Dave just trashes this show for not making sense. This is still early on in the new Russo era so there's 500 angles/matches per show thrown at the screen as fast as possible and logic just went out the window. Tag team partners were pinning each other in matches with no explanations given, people were DQ'd in No DQ matches, guys who lost tournament matches still advanced somehow, etc. Just peak WTF-WCW going on at this point.
- Speaking of David Arquette, Ready To Rumble did $2.68 million in its 2nd week (53% drop from last weekend) and after the first 10 days, it's at around $9 million total and sitting at #10. Not great news (yeah it finishes up as a HUGE financial flop and only made back half of its budget).
- Eric Bischoff met with MMA fighter Mark Kerr and there are apparently plans to bring him in as part of a group called Fight Club which they also plan to include Mark Coleman, Don Frye, Tank Abbott and....Rick Steiner. Okay then (never happened).
- Announcer Scott Hudson's father passed away from a heart attack while Hudson was doing Nitro this week. In fact, his parents were watching the show when it happened.
- Notes from Raw: the show opened with a "Dusty Finish 2000." Jericho seemingly beat Triple H for the WWF title after a fast count from Earl Hebner in a fantastic match. Jericho "winning" the title got a monster pop from the crowd but of course, it was reversed soon after. And of course, Triple H made sure to refer to Jericho as a "sawed off midget" at one point and in the main event later that night, on opposite sides of a tag match, Triple H pinned Jericho clean to make sure nobody gets the crazy idea that Jericho is on his level or anything. God forbid. Also, Kurt Angle did some hilarious skits basically being a nerdy guy preaching abstinence to college kids. Dave thinks it was funny but also feels like Angle has too much star potential to be doing a goofy comedy gimmick.
- WATCH: Chris Jericho "defeats" Triple H to win the WWF title - Raw 2000
- Notes from Smackdown: Tazz came out, wearing the ECW title, to challenge Triple H, which led to Triple H saying that ECW sucked and of course, they had the match later that night and we all know how that went. It's not hard to see how Triple H was beginning to gain a reputation that would haunt him for the next decade.
- The wrestling restaurant business is not booming. WWF New York is empty most days and they've stopped promoting it on TV and word is they're in the process of revamping their plans for it. WWF is blaming the bad business on the management group they brought in to run it. WCW's Nitro Grill in Las Vegas isn't doing well either, and part of the staff was recently laid off and they stopped serving lunch.
- Various WWF Notes: depositions in the wrongful death trial for Owen Hart began this week. WWF The Music Vol. 4 recently passed 1 million sales, thus certifying it platinum. Gangrel is out of action for at least a month due to a separated shoulder. Mick Foley will be taping an episode of "Now and Again" on CBS.
- WWF.com posted an article about the recent Court TV show that focused on deaths of children imitating wrestling moves (in which Linda McMahon was interviewed and came off poorly). WWF claimed the Court TV producers told them the show was about something else and that Linda had not prepared to be asked questions about that topic. Dave says he's done hundreds of media interviews and not once has he ever been given anything more than an occasional broad outline of what might be asked, so he doesn't buy that excuse. WWF also had footage of Linda's full unedited interview with the show, as opposed to the edited footage that aired on Court TV, and they put that online, basically accusing Court TV of editing her comments out of context. Dave thinks the unedited footage actually makes Linda look worse, as she repeatedly tried to dodge questions or change the subject when pressed. There was also the part where Linda claimed WWF doesn't spend a single dime marketing to children, which led to the host pulling out a whole box full of WWF merch from Toys R' Us (action figures and whatnot), and Linda responded by calling them "adult collectibles." They brought up Vince Russo's quote from a couple years ago, saying the WWF motto is to basically do as much as they can get away with. Linda responded saying Russo doesn't work there anymore and insinuated that he was fired for having that kind of attitude, which of course isn't remotely true. Just stuff like that.