I wasn't a fan of Luger's initial heel turn when hewon his first world titlebut ityad nothing to do with Flair. No one was overthinking things so deeply that seeing heel Flair in WWE and heel Luger in WCW was going to cause a disconnect of any kind.
I do understand the reasoning because they lost their top heel and needed someone to fill that vacuum. I just think itcould have been handled much better. That being said, once Luger was fully ensconced in that role it started to work for him. He worked really well as the ego driven, scumbag heel with Harley Race as his manager and Mr. Hughes as his bodyguard. I even liked his racist feud with Ron Simmons where he offered Ron a job as his driver.
The only thing that could be seen as possibly causing his status to suffer was his contract issues with WCW near the end of his run there. Dude was barely making appearances leading up to his losing the belt to Sting and jumping ship to WWE.
luger was awful in the heel role as hw champion in nwa/wcw.
it was the beginning of wcw/nwa being awful in quality that signaled the end of the impending end of the nwa, as s tv draw.
it is the catalyst that allowed turner to gain the nwa talent to spin wcw off, into its own entity.
luger as a heel was the dumbest move you could have made, EVER!!
as everyone knew flair would eventually come back to nwa, or the wcw entity.
over time,...all nwa had to do was book luger as a bf,....and put on squashes via rack submissions every week and luger would have drawn hugely.
luger was the best single first year bf promotional star.
after the loss of nwa's version of the higher quality hogun, magnum TA.
all every kid wanted to see was finally a hogun like bf best flair.
or at least get the title someway off flair. ala, the booking of the title change match thst never happened between flair/luger. where if flair was disqualified luger got the title.
when that match never happened and luger turned heel. they upset the direction of the promotion and disturbed the braintrust of the fans.
so profoundly,...it became the catalyst of why no one remembers the nwa. after wcw came about,....
originally nwa was the best quality wrasslin in all of north america domestically.
when herd's inept ass booked luger as a heel over windham of all people.
he killed the promotion in one fell lethal swoop.
that is also,...why luger is blamed erroneously for the death of the nwa.
when herd shouldn'tl have been blamed for such a poor errant choice in booking and luger's character.
all herd had to do was have luger get awarded the title,..from a flair no show.
it was a simple booking decision,....you play ric's music,..he doesn't show, through the curtain...
disqualifying flair and awarding luger the title...herd over thought The entire elegance of years of nwa continuity and even luger/flair.
that is why the nwa is never recognized by attitude era/nwo fans.
as nwo/attitude era fans never saw the greatness of the nwa as a promotion.
or the classic feud of luger as a bf, versus flair.
luger was in five star tv matches with flair
not to mention,..... imo,..one of the best all time psychology workrate endings ever in a five star match as well.
plus arguesbly the best actual consistent hw psychology workrate feuds of my childhood.
that easily eclipse any wwf matches or feuds i have ever seen.
plus on top of that chemistry,..the continuity of their encouters always added on to the classic greatness of luger in chase of flair.
that simple chase formula fueled the numerous classic flair encounters.
plus the endings were the stuff of legend, workrate and psychology.
very few will ever really match or outdo,..when it came to a high quality long term chase feud for the hw big gold belt.
when luger turned heel,..herd's overthought decision damaged the beautiful continuity of the entire promotion.
leading it to the poor house and eventually in turner's hand on a cheap paper plate.
art barr
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