If Bischoff managed to pull off his purchase of WCW in 2001, how well do you think it would've went?

[Prince Akeem]

They've would've brought back the NWO and had Flair,Nash, Savage,Goldberg and Hulkkk Hoegan in main event scene. Rinse and repeat.

Nah...Hogan and co would have went home to WWE regardless of WCW living or not. Only people I see staying would be Flair and Goldberg. If WCW lived, they would have had no choice but to rebuild with new faces.

 

[John Reena]

Tony Schiavone discusses this on his podcast, I gotta agree with him....WCW was a coffin on roller skates, even if Eric restarted it.....it woulda still went outta business eventually.

 

[NYChase718]

A.J. Styles
Air Paris
Alex Wright
Animal
Bam Bam Bigelow
Billy Kidman
Big Vito (Vito)
Booker T.
Buff Bagwell
Cash (Kid Ka$h)
Chavo Guerrero Jr.
Chuck Palumbo
Crowbar
Curt Hennig (Mr. Perfect)
Dewayne Bruce
Diamond Dallas Page
Disco Inferno
Dustin Rhodes (Goldust)
Dusty Rhodes
Elix Skipper
Ernest Miller
Evan Karagias
Goldberg
Hacksaw Jim Duggan
Harris Brothers (Ron et Don)
Hugh Morrus
Hulk Hogan
Hurricane Helms (Gregory Helms)
Jamie Knoble
Jason B.
Jason Jett (E.Z. Money)
Jeff Jarrett
Johnny The Bull
Kaz Hayashi
Kanyon
Kwee Wee (Alan Funk)
Kevin Nash
Kid Romeo
Konnan
Kronik (Brian Adams et Brian Clark)
Lance Storm
Lash LeRoux
Lex Luger
M.I. Smooth (Ice Train)
Mark Jindrak
Meng
Mike Awesome
Mike Sanders
Norman Smiley
Reno
Rey Mysterio Jr.
Ric Flair
Rick Steiner
Scott Steiner
Scotty O
Sean O'Haire
Shane Douglas
Shannon Moore
Shawn Stasiak
Sid Vicious
Sting
Terry Funk
The Demon (KISS Demon)
The Wall
Yun Yang

Roster looks thin, but they could’ve done something with it with the right direction.

lol@the kiss demon

Thats basically wwe velocity roster minus a few

 

[The Intergalactic Koala]

I mean, they were pulling alright ratings before it's demise. WCW under Bischoff would lead to the following:

• A smaller network
• Indy feel which would stay in its own lane (Kinda like how WCW used to be before the Turner checks)
• The promotion would take full advantage of live streaming (Since technically WCW started the interactive approach to the web)
• A lightweight wrestler would somehow become larger than life for the promotion
• Sean O Haire would be heavyweight champion

Basically what the promotion should had focus on from the get go before Hoegan and co fukked it all up.

 

[The Intergalactic Koala]

Tony Schiavone discusses this on his podcast, I gotta agree with him....WCW was a coffin on roller skates, even if Eric restarted it.....it woulda still went outta business eventually.

While this is true. With that focal point, ROH would had been dead last year. Yeah, WCW was a mess and a half from the front end to the back, but with the right heads and lack of micromanagement, it would had still somewhat thrive during the Indie period of wrestling.

 

[Homeboy Runny-Ray]

Nah...Hogan and co would have went home to WWE regardless of WCW living or not. Only people I see staying would be Flair and Goldberg. If WCW lived, they would have had no choice but to rebuild with new faces.

the "home" thing is a myth brohski.

i could see hogan leaving for the WWF.
WWF wasnt "home" for the outsiders. and they spent more time in TNA after the buyout.
obviously savage wasnt going back to the WWF.
none of them were really factors in WCW at the time anyway, except maybe nash.

so whos all these people that wouldve been going "home"?? sting, booker, steiner, DDP, luger, jarrett, mysterio, bagwell, storm, etc?? the WWF certainly wasnt their home.

 

[Ya' Cousin Cleon]

reading about WCW really makes me fukking hate Hoegan, especially cause he and Bischoff did the same shyt with TNA

 

[Prince Akeem]

the "home" thing is a myth brohski.

i could see hogan leaving for the WWF.
WWF wasnt "home" for the outsiders. and they spent more time in TNA after the buyout.
obviously savage wasnt going back to the WWF.
none of them were really factors in WCW at the time anyway, except maybe nash.

so whos all these people that wouldve been going "home"?? sting, booker, steiner, DDP, luger, jarrett, mysterio, bagwell, storm, etc?? the WWF certainly wasnt their home.

Did I say that? I was mainly referring to Hogan/Hall/Nash. Savage would have been done either way so it doesn't matter.

 

[Elim Garak]

They had good young talent when the big contracts left it's possible they could of had a resurgence impossible to say for sure.

 

[raw613]

They probably would’ve been fine.

People love to shyt in the last years of WCW and act like it’s the worst thing in the world but the last years of WCW was better or if now on par with the last 10 years of WWE


They’d probably be around still today

People remember the missteps of 2000, but funny thing is 2001 was actually off to a solid start , I always maintain this, business wise it was too late, but those few months before shutting down weren't bad imo

 

[Reality Check]

Surprised it took this long to actually bring up what plans were shaping up to be. Bischoff talked somewhat about some general plans for the new WCW a few years ago on the WWE website

But major changes needed to be made to the brand with the pending marriage between WCW and Fusient. The couple even had a honeymoon spot picked out. No longer under the Turner umbrella, aside from the TV shows continuing to appear on Turner networks, the Atlanta-based promotion was heading west.

“The plan was that WCW would move to Las Vegas and do weekly tapings out of the Hard Rock Cafe, which was building a 3,000-square-foot arena at that time,” John Laurinaitis, formerly of WCW Creative and Production, revealed. “Part of the company would be based out of Los Angeles.”

WCW once packed the Georgia Dome for an episode of Nitro, but December’s Starrcade pay-per-view didn’t top 7,000 in attendance. That played a major part in a move to Vegas.

“We weren’t able to fill arenas like we had,” Bischoff said. “Elvis Presley once said, ‘The most interesting part of any show is the audience.’ Take the main event of WrestleMania and put it in front of 75 people and it will dramatically affect the way everyone watching feels about it. That was very true with WCW. We knew we were having a problem.”

The creative needed to take a 180-degree turn, too. From competitors lying down for pinfalls at Bash at the Beach to a match where Buff Bagwell’s mom was up for grabs, 2000 featured some of the wackiest stories in sports-entertainment history.

“We were going to shut it down for a period of time, then relaunch,” Bischoff said. “We needed a clean piece of paper to draw on. We couldn’t reach into the trash, pick out the crumbled and trampled creative — that had been WCW for the last year-and-a-half — and try to make people feel good about that again. In order for the relaunch to feel like one, it had to go away. The thinking was, let’s get people talking about the new WCW and what it was going to look like and feel like.”

While Bedol and Greenberg continued to work on the legal side of the deal, Bischoff visited confused and panicking employees at WCW’s office and focused on the future of WCW, which included the first pay-per-view under Fusient, WCW Big Bang on May 6.

“We had to plan six months in advance — minimum — with a lot of the creative,” he said. “The branding and the location of the event — the big ticket items, if you will— had to be planned six months out. Big Bang pay-per-view ads were probably pretty generic because I doubt we had it figured out at the time.”

At the same time, over in Philadelphia, Extreme Championship Wrestling was coming to its end. The Voice of ECW, Joey Styles, refused to abandon the ship, but with no ECW Hardcore TV tapings scheduled after the Guilty as Charged pay-per-view on Jan. 7, 2001, Styles began to talk with Bischoff.

“Eric sent me to meet with Brian Bedol in Manhattan to talk about what I would do for WCW,” he said. “I would be the lead announcer and I would work in digital media. I did not agree to do this with Eric until it was obvious that ECW was finished.”

Styles and Bischoff even talked about who would join him at the commentary desk.

“I suggested Don Callis, who was my color commentator for ECW pay-per-views, to Eric,” Styles said. “He and I were a very good team. I heard rumors that my other announcer was going to be Jerry ‘The King’ Lawler, who at the time was not with WWE.”

Revealing details about the WCW relaunch that almost happened