History Headscratchers / WCW

* One of WCW's trademarks was doing very unique looking outdoor shows where everyone got in for free. ''Bash at the Beach'' was held on an actual beach in 1995, all of the ''Road Wild'' shows were held at the Sturgis motorcycle rally in South Dakota, and several episodes ''Nitro'' were shot at Club La Vela in Florida.[[note]]Nitro also had a brief residence at the Universal Studios theme park in Orlando (with admission to the wrestling show included in the theme park ticket) in the summer of 1996, but in that instance it was thanks to just about every piece mobile broadcasting equipment in the Southeastern U.S. being commandeered for the 1996 Summer Olympics.[[/note]] Could you imagine Vince [=McMahon=], or any other promoter for that matter, doing a PPV that's guaranteed to do a $0 gate? Not to mention that tapings of ''WCW Saturday Night'' and the syndicated shows[[note]]Taped at Center Stage in Atlanta and the Disney studios in Orlando, respectively[[/note]] were always freebies, a common practice everywhere in wrestling outside of the WWF/E in the territory days but one that definitely should have been abandoned around the time ''Nitro'' started airing.

* Whose bright idea was it to let celebrities like ''Creator/DavidArquette'' and Music/MasterP actually participate in full-length wrestling matches, anyway?[[note]]They also had Creator/JayLeno of all people wrestle a match, but since this actually drew decent money (the 365,000 buys made it the 9th highest PPV buyrate in the promotion's run, unfortunately it was Road Wild so there was a $0 gate) and got WCW a lot of mainstream press that wasn't completely embarrassing for once, it only gets trashed in the "That was really rotten match" sense rather than the "Shit like this is why they're out of business" sense.[[/note]]

* Whose bright idea was it to let celebrities like ''Creator/DavidArquette'' and Music/MasterP actually participate in full-length wrestling matches, anyway?

* One of WCW's trademarks was doing very unique looking outdoor shows where everyone got in for free. ''Bash at the Beach'' was held on an actual beach in 1995, all of the ''Road Wild'' shows were held at the Sturgis motorcycle rally in South Dakota, and several episodes ''Nitro'' were shot at Club La Vela in Florida.[[note]]Nitro also had a brief residence at the Universal Studios theme park in Orlando (with admission to the wrestling show included in the theme park ticket) in the summer of 1996, but in that instance it was thanks to just about every piece mobile broadcasting equipment in the Southeastern U.S. being commandeered for the 1996 Summer Olympics.[[/note]] Could you imagine Vince [=McMahon=], or any other promoter for that matter, doing a PPV that's guaranteed to do a $0 gate? Not to mention that tapings of ''WCW Saturday Night'' and the syndicated shows were always freebies, a common practice everywhere in wrestling outside of the WWF/E in the territory days but one that definitely should have been abandoned around the time ''Nitro'' started airing.

*** Of course, it's likely ''because'' of Rude's appearance and trashing of WWF that the no-compete clause was added to contracts for WWF stars - the management learned from their earlier mistake[[note]]Rude wasn't actually under contract, as a non-wrestler he was working under a per-appearance deal[[/note]].

*** In December 1997, Shawn no longer had that kind of pull. However, Vince [=McMahon=] was fully committed to Steve Austin and was well aware of how Hogan would have ruined everything. So still, no dice.[[note]]Vince actually ''did'' try to bring Hogan back around this time, he didn't really have any concrete plans for Hulk, he just wanted to steal his competition's top draw. And if he doesn't sign but uses his leverage in the negotiations to make sure the competition has to spend a ridiculous amount of money to keep him? That works too. Vince would often tell people he was trying to hire "Even if you don't want to sign with ''me'' make sure you use this as leverage to get more money from ''them''.[[/note]]

*** In December 1997, Shawn no longer had that kind of pull. However, Vince [=McMahon=] was fully committed to Steve Austin and was well aware of how Hogan would have ruined everything. So still, no dice.[[note]]Vince actually ''did'' try to bring Hogan back around this time, he didn't really have any concrete plans for Hulk, he just wanted to steal his competition's top draw. And if he doesn't sign but uses his leverage in the negotiations to make sure the competition has to spend a ridiculous amount of money to keep him? That works too.[[/note]]

*** In December 1997, Shawn no longer had that kind of pull. However, Vince [=McMahon=] was fully committed to Steve Austin and was well aware of how Hogan would have ruined everything. So still, no dice.

*** Ed Ferrera, the guy who played Oklahoma, doesn't even try to defend himself when he's confronted on it. He openly admits that it's the worst thing he did in his entire career and that he deserves whatever he gets.

*** Dallas Page beat Curt Hennig for the U.S. title. Pretty much the only good thing they did all night.

*** Raven is booked against Chris Benoit. Raven undergoes an emergency appendectomy a couple weeks before ''Starrcade'' and has to be pulled. WCW acts like Raven will work right up until the match is about to start and he grabs a mic and says he doesn't feel like wresting. Perry Saturn takes his place and defeats Benoit by submission.

*** Raven is booked against Chris Benoit. Raven undergoes an emergency appendectomy a couple weeks before ''Starrcade'' and has to be pulled. WCW acts like Raven will work right up until the match is about to start and
he grabs a mic and says he doesn't feel like wresting. Perry Saturn takes his place and defeats Benoit by submission.