WOLFPAC IN DA HOUSE!!!
Rappers nowadays should bring back the background track of random crowd noise
The only thing that the Wolfpac ever gave us of value was that theme song. Fun fact: the only wrestling shirt I owned as a child was a Black & Red NWO Wolfpac shirt.
There Can Be No Good Without Evil
Pro wrestling, especially North American pro wrestling, is built on the fundamental dichotomy within human nature: good and evil. While in the real world there are shades of grey & mitigating circumstances, pro wrestling magnifies the difference, like only it can, through outrageous angles and larger than life characters. Pro wrestling is not just limited to this black and white distinction of good versus. In fact, some of the best wrestling angles those that accentuate the more realistic elements of actual moral quandaries, but sometimes they can be the most confusing. Like anything in this world it is all about execution. At the end of the day like Big Sexy once so eloquently put it, "Who is going to make the comeback? That's your babyface". The beauty of wrestling is that anybody can be a babyfaces and heels depending on how they're presented. A monstrous man that mows down all his competition, always moves forward and is a supreme asskicker. Is that Vader or Goldberg? One was a wildly popular babyface and the other a villanous heel and it all depends on the presentation. I have seen a flamboyant British cross dresser get over as a babyface in 80s Alabama. Pro wrestling is what we all make it, but I am of the firm opinion you need good and you need evil. What drives the business is rooting for someone to get their ass kicked and to see someone kick ass. As my idol, "Diamond" David Lee Roth once perfectly captured the essence of pro wrestling "It is wish fulfillment". It all stems from good versus evil.
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| Truer Word Have Never Been Spoken |
In the spring of 1998, WCW had the most loaded main event roster since 1980s WWF and the argument could be made it was even more densely packed. It featured Hollywood Hogan, Sting, Randy Savage, Kevin Nash, Scott Hall, The Giant, Lex Luger, Roddy Piper, and Bret Hart. By July, you could add Goldberg and DDP to the main event mix. Even with the departure of Flair, WCW had a eleven bonafide main eventers. On paper this sounds magnificent for the year of 1998. Now recall how pro wrestling is driven, it is driven by babyfaces versus heels. At the end of Spring Stampede, WCW had a grand total of one main event heel (Hollywood Hogan). They had 8 main event babyfaces, 2 upper midcard babyface acts about to break out. The number two heel act is a toss up between Raven and Chris Jericho. What looked like an impressive main event infrastructure now looks horrible. I would lay the blame for WCW's underwhelming 1998 on its inability to cope with fundamentally poor babyface to heel ratio.
How can you have an impending Civil War in the NWO and keep all the WCW babyfaces occupied? Hollywood Hogan is only one man and that means one match per card. Between Februrary and October, Hollywood Hogan wrestled on 8 PPVs and only missed one. The previous year between Februrary and October, he wrestled on 5 PPVs and missed 4 PPVs. How was that possible? The heel infrastructure included Savage, Nash and Hall. The Hogan saturation effect will be investigated in the next quarter. Here he is involved in only a paltry three feuds: Savage, Piper and Nash. Here we will focused on how keeping a healthy ratio of babyfaces to heels caused the demise of WCW.
Bret Hart: Babyface or Heel?
A lot of critics of WCW in this time period specifically target the mismanagement of Bret Hart in 1998. After the Flair feud, it became apparent WCW did not have anything for the former WWF top main event act and probably the best US worker of the 90s. People were clamoring for the Hart vs. Hogan match, but Hogan had issues with Sting, Savage, and Piper and looked like an oncoming collision with Nash & NWO Civil War that superseded Hart's match. WCW took a new direction with Bret Hart and turned him heel joining NWO Hollywood as the promotion's number two heel. Given the state of the company and who they had, I actually think their hand was forced in a lot of ways. If you take Hogan staying heel, Nash turning babyface, and Savage out for the year after mid-June, there is really no sensible number two heel on the roster. There are some fantasy booking scenarios I would like better, but Bret Hart was definitely the best number two heel they had at their disposal. Now that they had selected a direction for Bret Hart, things did start to look up with a good PPV match against Savage and teaming with Hogan. The NWO Civil War would likely afford him opportunities to wrestle Nash, Luger and Sting in marquee, but as we will see in the next quarter WCW would become indecisive on how they wanted to utilize Bret and that would ultimately be his doom.
NWO Wolfpac: Wrestling's Motley Crue
Kevin Nash, Randy Savage, Konnan, Lex Luger and Sting. Has there ever been a stranger, more disparate collection of wrestlers? Once again, looking at how the main event roster is structured, their hand is forced. Nash and Savage would need reinforcements to wrestle the Black & White and they needed to establish they were the babyface group. Sting was directionless since failing as the Champion and Luger was also directionless since the Savage feud. By bringing in Sting and Luger, you immediately bolster the Wolfpac with top babyfaces, establish them as a top babyface act and have cache with the fans. The only problem is what ties them together. Nash wanted Konnan because Konnan makes the group seem cool and hip. Sting and Luger are buds, but Sting and Luger should hate Nash. Now it is not really a Civil War, but just a hodgepodge of wrestlers thrown together wearing the same shirt. That was the problem with the NWO Civil War. Due to the poor babyface:heel ratio and weak management, the wrestlers were not given proper motivations for joining these groups. So it just became about what t-shirt you were wearing.
Thankfully, DDP, the best working main eventer on the roster, never joined the Wolfpac. He would have made way more sense than Luger/Sting as he is old Nash friend and he speaks and acts more like Nash. Wolfpac was where careers went to die. Backstage politics killed the Wolfpac, but that is for next blog. In kayfabe, DDP is a self-made man who does not need anyone's help. Backstage, he saw the Hogan versus Nash war and he saw the opportunity to be a main eventer by being Hogan's opponent in turn he main evented 5 straight PPVs including the WCW 1998 main event of the year against Goldberg at Halloween Havoc.
NWO Hollywood: Warm Bodies
What would eventually become the NWO B-Team, NWO Hollywood was supposed to be the supporting heel infrastructure to absorb the babyface-laden roster and through June it looked like a strong opposing force. The Giant turning on NWO Hollywood may have not been explained properly, but on paper was the most sensible of the Spring Shuffling. He hated Nash and had fought Nash on 4 of the 5 first PPVs of the year and had neck broken by him. It only made sense for him to join the faction that was going to war with Nash. In June, he main evented the Great American Bash against Sting in one of the better Sting matches of the year. Joining the Giant was Scott Hall after shockingly turning on Nash. You can argue whether or not a proper Nash vs Hall match is something people wanted to see, but at the end of the day WCW needed heels. Turning Luger would have made even less sense and the Hall turn had the hook of a Nash vs Hall feud. However, Hall's personal demons derailed the feud and one of the the two primary drivers (the other being Hogan not wanting anything to do with them) that derailed the Wolfpac.
Wolfpac Is DOA: Civil War Is Over Before It Began
In the following blog, named Hogan Doen't Need Your Civil War, we will discuss why the NWO Civil War went nowhere from a backstage perspective. However, even looking at the buildup, you can see that it was really no motivation. The crux of the issue should stem from the fact that fissures in the NWO have opened up because Hollywood lost his stranglehold on the title. This opens his once unquestioned leadership to the two strongest possible claimants, the Macho Man and Big Sexy. However, inside of the NWO imploding from within, Sting and Luger are shoehorned to the Wolfpac to fill out its ranks. While Bret Hart, The Giant and Scott Hall fill out NWO Hollywood. Since there is no common bond between these men, there is no motivation to feud and thus no heat. The future booking does it no favors, but the setup was piss poor and was hasty solution to rectify the the heavy babyface roster.
My Recommendations & Solution
There was one fundamental booking tenet WCW needed to be followed better was the use of logical and well-motivated turns. In the Spring of 1998, it feels like they reshuffled because they were compelled to rather than thinking it out and this results in a piss poor summer. The other recommendation is one that is unique to WCW and that is to maximize the potential of their large roster size by cycling people in and out.. In reality, there are so many top spots (in my opinion, 6-8 spots, at any given time) so give people some rest and write people out using injuries and firings to develop other characters and further existing storylines. If you realize, well fuck I really don't have anything for Lex Luger why don't I have Bischoff go on a firing spree or maybe Scott Steiner could take his ass out. Now you are putting heat on someone existing and building sympathy for Luger's return instead of Luger just randomly wrestling people in a different color shirt. While I tend not to try to bore people with my fantasy booking, I think in this scenario it is appropriate for me to offer a solution.
Now, there are some caveats, if the Hogan vs Nash backstage heat was as bad as it seems then there is really nothing that can be done to remedy a NWO Civil War. So if you take the egos out and allow me to start booking after Starrcade 1997. I say you build to Hogan vs Nash at Bash At The Beach 1998 as it is the two year anniversary. The crux of the feud is the MegaPowers vs The Outsiders, but it is presented as the NWO is in flux. All four wrestlers are still NWO, but the Outsiders are the babyfaces challenging the established system. The underlings don't really know who to commit to in the war and their allegiance sways as the war goes on. I think the most crucial difference is that WCW guys are happy about in-fighting, but still need to interact with the NWO because of championship matches and personal feuds. My special twist is that I would have Goldberg turn heel and join the NWO as Hogan 's mercenary. This is especially useful once Savage has his injury. Goldberg turns on Hogan at Bash at the Beach and Nash, Hall and Goldberg make up the core of the new NWO. The mission of the NWO is destroy WCW and now they will use of their homemade wrestlers as the weapon to finally kill it. The next blog will look at why I think Goldberg would have better utilized early in his career as a heel as opposed to a heel.
It is clear in April of 1998, WCW had a babyface to heel imbalance and the steps they took to rectify caused for a very bad summer on top of the company. Had they taken well thought out steps using the wrestler's history and motivations they could have taken these months as shuffling months, but rebuilt to something better. Furthermore, cycling main eventers in and out would have prevented overexposure and cooling off main eventers from lack of direction.
Recommended Matches:
Randy Savage vs Bret Hart - Slamboree 1998
Sting vs. The Giant - WCW Great American Bash 1998
Bret "Hitman" Hart vs Chris Benoit - Nitro 6/22/98
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WCW World Heavyweight Champion Sting vs Randy Savage - WCW Spring Stampede 1998
Fun fact: This is the first PPV I ever begged my parents to order because my favorite wrestler, Randy Savage was challenging for the World Title. Oddly, I had no recollection of this match until the end when all the memories came flooding back. It is weird because I still vividly remember the Hogan vs Savage match on Nitro the next night that royally pissed me off as a child. Crazy what sticks with you.
I don't know if it is the face paint, but Sting is just so frigging lame. The complaint seemed to be that Hogan took most of the SuperBrawl match and that is why it sucked, but as I expected Savage would be more giving, but still Sting did not look he gave two fucks. He was just going through the motions and his selling was just dogshit. Savage looked like a car wreck with the huge knee brace and the taped arm. Sting really needs to ditch the trench coat that's the second time sometime has attacked him before he could get it off. I loved Savage selling the punch and then punch through it. That's not someone no selling that is selling how fucking nutzo he is. Savage does his best to wrestle for one between taking bumps over the top rope, selling the arm and then taking back over on offense with good heel offense. Tony gets in one of his more infamous lines about the bales of hay being abrasive and the particulates getting into respiratory tract. He has a point, but man did it sound fucking lame. Sting just randomly stops selling, but not in the way that elicits a crowd reaction because he is hulking up. He will literally just stand up and stand there. It happened at least twice, It is honestly like he forgot how to wrestle. Liz gets in the ring and gives him a chair shot and then all the memories come rushing back. I know something big is going to happen BOOM! Liz takes a Stinger Splash. WOW! Savage is like kthxbai and looks to use the distraction to elbow Sting on the chair, but Hogan interferes. Sting hits the Slop Drop, but here comes Big Sexy to hit the Jacknife and pulls Savage to win.
The booking fucked up Sting, yes, but he did not do himself any favors. He was shitting the bed in the ring. Resetting to Hollywood to transition to Goldberg was actually a pretty gutsy and intelligent thing to do. I am going to give WCW kudos for that. Savage tried as he might, but was too banged up to salvage this match. This is neck and neck with the SuperBrawl VIII for shittiest main event match of '98, but I think this one takes it because there was more Sting offense and Hogan's effort in SuperBrawl VIII is to be praised.
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WCW World Heavyweight Champion Randy Savage vs Hollywood Hogan - WCW Nitro 4/20/98
The match I hated the most as a child, fresh off seeing my hero win the World Championship at Spring Stampede he faces Hogan in what is basically an extended squash.When you add together that Savage prefers taking heat when he is a face, that he was injured and Hogan loves working on top it really was not to be unexpected. At first, Hogan looked a little bit more plodding than he had in the other matches I had seen from this year. The badmouth was still there, but the same energy was not there. Savage was on top of his game acting like wounded animal that would occasionally lash out, but the pain would overwhelm. Not often you get to see Hogan work over a body part and it is admirable. Savage is great at peppering in heated hope spots that get the crowd to pop like using the belt and the Big Elbow, but he lands on the injured knee! Hogan goes back to the knee, spinning toe hold and a figure-4. This has been a great story in terms of Savage being too banged up and defending his title the next night and Hogan is just licking his chops. Savage going crazy and choking Hogan draws a big pop. The finish goes into overdrive with The Disciple attacking the ref. Beefcake has one of those faces that just can never recognize him when he changed gimmicks. Nash coming in powerbombing Hogan got a massive, massive pop. This makes the Goldberg title victory all the more intriguing because I am surprised they did not put the belt on Nash. Hart nails Nash and puts Hogan on top. It is not going to blow you away, but on WCW main event sliding scale this was pretty good. The novelty of Hogan working a body part was cool. Savage doing his crazed wounded animal selling keeps the match entertaining throughout. I have seen better Hogan performances on the year though.
Resetting to Hogan makes complete sense now that I have seen the Sting title reign. He was in no shape to carry the belt. Savage as a one day champion is a fine transitional champion because he will be on the shelf soon and it sort of puts to bed the Hogan/Savage issue shifts to Hogan/Nash and Savage/Hart, which is not a bad one-two punch, but Nash is so interested in hanging out with his buddy, Hall in that miss their window to pop a big buyrate with Hogan/Nash on top. Bash at the Beach 1998, the two year anniversary of the NWO, Nash vs. Hogan on top would have been huge. Alas. I understand the reset to Hogan and I think they went with gutsier move to put it on Goldberg. I would have probably played it safe and put it on Nash. WCW just when you think you have them figured out they keep you guessing even all these years later.
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Randy Savage vs Bret Hart - Slamboree 1998
Man, this show was in Worcester, c'mon Dad, why didn't we go? Can't bitch too much he did take me to Boston Brawl in January that year and that was one helluva show. On paper, this show does not seem like much, but hell this was pretty entertaining. It was not as good as their SNME 1987 match, but compared to pretty much all the other main eventer vs main eventer matches this was a MOTY. Savage's knee is clearly messed up as he has a giant brace and his usual mobility is gone, which means that chaos is lost in a match that really needed that to take it over the top. I liked the both of them using heel tactics early and was glad that Savage did not do his usual babyface match where he takes heat immediately. The brawling was not the best ever, but it is good stuff. What worked so well was that Hart's formula meshes so well with Savage's babyface formula. Hart works on top in such a compelling fashion and Savage is so great at selling the knee. Hart looked so crisp with his strikes and that piledriver. I loved Savage's comeback with the one legged suplex. Then hitting the elbow drop, but injuring the knee. That was a great nearfall. I was surprised that the Northeast was not more into Hart. Things went into overbooking hell with Elizabeth (WTF) and Hogan (well at least that makes sense). Piper sucks. Hart wins by submission or maybe DQ, who knows, but finishes aren't that important in 98 WCW. The match was pretty good thanks to both's just natural charisma. ***1/2
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Hollywood Hogan & Bret Hart vs Randy Savage & Roddy Piper
WCW Great American Bash 1998
WCW has lost any sort of direction as Hogan is fighting his two least interesting opponents of the six different matches/feuds he has on his plate. Hogan has the Nash/Wolfpac, Savage, Piper, Hart (frenemy), DDP and Goldberg all gunning for him in one form or another within a month of this PPV. I don't mind running everything through Hogan, but they need to use him to spin matches off of him and creating a buzz for that. Instead we have Nash & Wolfpac spinning their wheels until Hogan finally leaves in October, Bret Hart as Brutus Beefcake's more proficient twin, and Goldberg wrestling squashes as champion. I will say DDP was minted as a main eventer thanks to Hogan so I don't begrudge him that. Still, c'mon Hogan/Piper and Hogan/Savage is so played out at this point. Savage being the catalyst for causing the NWO Civil War is fine, but they needed to transfer the heat to Nash now for the fresh match, but egos got in the way. Piper just needs to go away.
The match is surprisingly fun, but it has a throwaway Nitro main event feel. Hogan was great in the babyface shine stooging for Piper and Savage. It is painful seeing Savage basically wrestle on one leg. You could see how much more he wanted to give. Piper was just awful and seemed blown up like two minutes into the match. Hogan did the best he could with two lame opponents (one literally and one figuratively). Brother Bruti hits Piper with the title belt as he is running the ropes. Hart is great in heat segment and Hogan is also great at cheating. I love them riling up Savage on the apron. It was definitely the most exciting part of the match. Savage sliding the chair onto Piper's abdomen when Hart goes down for his trademark headbutt was genius.Savage gets the tag and Hogan cowers and the crowd goes wild. Savage just can't move like he needs to capitalize on the heat. Savage goes up top for the elbow, but Piper is whipped into the ropes and Savage falls and wrenches his knee. The announcer blow this call so bad. Hart applies the Sharpshooter to give NWO Hollywood the victory.
Hart is sure working towards the match with Hogan, eye-roll. If they replaced Piper with someone worth a damn, this would have been decent. Hogan is actually a pretty good worker in 1998, he is just working with shit usually see Apathetic Sting, Injured Savage and Shitty Piper. I'd love to see him against DDP or Luger this year. Instead we have shitty celebrity matches and the fucking Ultimate Warrior to finish his year.Maybe the Goldberg match will be good.
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Randy Savage vs Roddy Piper - WCW Great American Bash 1998
The last match should have been main event of a Nitro and this singles match should have stemmed from all the confusion at Slamboree 1998. Hogan & Hart vs Wolfpac (Nash & Luger) would have made a lot more sense or even Hogan vs DDP World Title match would have been incredible. If only I could have booked WCW 1998 and people listened to me, it would have been a field day. First order of business, fire Roddy Piper, a shitty promo and even shittier wrestler. Piper does not want to fight Savage after his knee has been destroyed. Savage hits the world's worst clothesline and hits the elbow and fucks up his knee. We at least get one last random act of violence towards a ref as Lil Naitch takes a great bump off a bump. I'd love a wrestler crib Savage's random act of violence against refs character. Piper applies the figure-4 and Savage never comes back. Team Madness never happened...Team Madness never happened...Team Madness Never Happened. Piper needs to go the fuck away too!
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Sting vs. The Giant - WCW Great American Bash 1998
Surprisingly, The Giant was one of the better booked wrestlers of 1998 for WCW. He had his issue with Nash, had his neck broken, came back and then proceeded to try new ways to exact revenge. At first, it was teaming with Piper against Hogan & Nash and then finding a tag partner to rob Nash of the tag titles. It did not feel super heated from the promos I watched because nothing was super focused, but hey match-to-match it was pretty good. Giant joining NWO Hollywood makes sense from a babyface:heel ratio perspective more than anything else, but hey he hates Nash so that makes sense! Sting joining the Wolfpac is just the lamest thing ever. Sting is just not cool.
Best Sting match of the year as he actually wrestled like a normal wrestler you know trying to execute exciting offense and selling well. Giant is just an athletic freak of nature. Watching him yesterday move around at Survivor Series last night and then watching him rock it 16 years earlier was incredible. He started by rushing into the corner and laying out on the corner for Sting to kick him around. Stinger Splash eats a big boot. Giant's heat segment is actually pretty good. Sting's finish stretch was actually exciting and fun. He dropkicks the knee, but cant get the Scorpion Deathlock because Giant is just too big. Three Scorpion DeathDrops with teases of Giant chokeslam and had my house rocking on Thanksgiving with my Dad and Mom getting into it. Just a touch better than DDP match as they keep it short and sweet. ***
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Bret "Hitman" Hart vs Chris Benoit - Nitro 6/22/98
In 1998, Bret Hart is the opposite of Sting in terms of his effort and his opportunities. Sting was the WCW World Heavyweight Champion and consistently in the main events of PPVs even after the fact. From what I have seen from Sting at SuperBrawl and Spring Stampede, he looked out of shape, bored and just generally disinterested. Whereas since the Hart/Flair feud, Hart pretty much disappeared from the company until his direction became Hogan's lackey when he by and away the most versatile main event wrestler they had. He has shown already this year that he can work convincingly as a babyface or heel and against fellow main event talent or against the new breed of talent like a Benoit.
The famous match is the Owen Hart tribute match the following year, but this was a really fun TV match nonetheless. Benoit is just a pugnacious pitbull the entire match and Hart is just so amazing as the cocky heel cutting him off at very corner with dubious tactics. They work the typical opening of Benoit outwrestling with Hart because of his quickness and sheer effort. Benoit's work was just dripping with determination, which is so refreshing. I am actually going to go back and watch the DDP/Benoit/Raven feud and Benot/Booker/Finlay later. I am especially intrigued by DDP/Benoit because they seem to be two wrestlers trying the hardest in the promotion. Hart takes back in the corner and starts unloading. What I really love about this match is how much Benoit is trying to hit through this. It is not that he is not no selling. It is that he is just not backing down and he is fighting Hart every step of the way, but Hart is always one step ahead. Finally, it is Hart hotshotting Benoit that stymies Benoit. I love that it is not an abrupt transition to the heat segment. It is a work in progress to get Hart fully in control. Like I have said before, Hart is so good from his body language and facially expression how he thinks Benoit is below him, but then also Hart sells Benoit's hope spots with a slight bit of shock. The finish run is a fun bomb throwing fest by Benoit who is just relentless. Yes, the selling like after the missed Diving Headbutt should have sold bigger by Benoit, but instead he was focusing on just keeping everything going and the crowd popping with big spot after big spot. It was fun watching him challenge Hart with suplexes including the Dragon Suplex and a wicked almost snap superplex. Benoit traps Hart in the Cripple Crossface, but Stevie Ray distracts him and Hart blasts him with a foreign object in the back of the head. Hart actually bothers to sell it to the ref by putting Benoit on top of him then "kicking out" and putting him into the Sharpshooter.
It was fun for Hart to be really be tested for the first time since Souled Out. Benoit was making the most of his opportunity against Hart. I am sure was excited to wrestle Bret Hart. I just loved his character as this relentless force that only knew forward and no reverse. Hart was the perfect heel foil. There were some selling issues, but the layout put over Benoit huge and the finish run was very fun. ***3/4
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