Official WWE/TNA/ROH Thread

[Mach]

Here's the little summary blurb from Wiki, but it ties to memory.

Some of the WCW wrestlers' absences were out of the WWF's control. Many of WCW's top wrestlers had contracts with AOL Time Warner, WCW's parent company, and were willing to sit at home rather than wrestle for less money; Booker T, the reigning WCW Champion at the time of WWF's purchase, was a notable exception, agreeing to a buyout of the remainder of his contract with AOL Time Warner in order to wrestle for the WWF immediately. McMahon had the option of taking on any contract he wanted with his purchase, but chose to let AOL Time Warner continue to pay out what were considered bad deals. Ric Flair and Rey Mysterio were not signed until the end of the Invasion because they were tied to their contracts, and therefore their absence was out of the WWF's control. In addition, Scott Steiner was recovering from an injury. Others, such as Hulk Hogan, Kevin Nash, Scott Hall, and Goldberg, were not signed until well after the storyline finished. As for WCW's other top superstars, Sting has for many years had avoided joining the WWF and was still under contract AOL Time Warner, while Lex Luger and Randy Savage would never reappear in the company on TV (in May 2011, Luger rejoined WWE in a backstage role related to the company's Wellness Program, while Savage died from a sudden heart attack shortly after Luger rejoined WWE). Fans were confused by McMahon's decisions seeing as the WWF would make more than enough to cover all these wrestlers contracts in 2001. Because of this, the WWF's opponent allegedly lacked the strong identity of WCW. In correlation with WCW, ECW was also missing most of their key superstars such as The Sandman, Sabu, Balls Mahoney, Little Guido and Tony Mamaluke (all of whom would later join WWE's relaunched ECW). Other wrestlers such as Shane Douglas, Masato Tanaka, Terry Funk, New Jack, 2 Cold Scorpio and Mikey Whipwreck would also be missing from the storyline.

[Slyder]

It's still sad that Savage never reappeared on WWF tv before he died. I grew up idolizing the Macho Man. One major thing I've heard some say would have made more sense if they were deadset on the invasion angle (almost immediately) was instead of Stone Cold turning have it been Jericho and tried to elevate him further.

Like I said I would have tried to stretch out WcW somehow as a seperate brand and when those bigger fish became available THEN you strike with the invasion. Gives you a chance to expose some of those lesser established low 1st/high 2nd tier guys like Booker T, like Lance Storm, like RVD, like Gregory Helms (although he made a pretty good run as the Hurricane) and maybe make a couple more stars (on WWF tv) making the Invasion side look that much stronger. I still would have LOVED to seen DDP vs Rock at a Wrestlemania (and yes I agree Rock winning would have been the right call) but that match would have been something I could see as a semi main event with the right planning.

[Slyder]

That PPV has negative value with the inclusion of 2001 Rick Steiner in any capacity.

What do you have against the Dog Face Gremlin? Fine take that card and throw Harlem Heat in there in place of the Steiners if you want :P.

[Slyder]

Rock v. DDP : People's Champ v. People's Champ might have worked.

Rock/Booker is another option.

Oh it would have worked, Rock winning would have been logical (younger, wwf guy, etc) but it would have been a great feud with the promos.

[Mach]

It's still sad that Savage never reappeared on WWF tv before he died. I grew up idolizing the Macho Man. One major thing I've heard some say would have made more sense if they were deadset on the invasion angle (almost immediately) was instead of Stone Cold turning have it been Jericho and tried to elevate him further.

Like I said I would have tried to stretch out WcW somehow as a seperate brand and when those bigger fish became available THEN you strike with the invasion. Gives you a chance to expose some of those lesser established low 1st/high 2nd tier guys like Booker T, like Lance Storm, like RVD, like Gregory Helms (although he made a pretty good run as the Hurricane) and maybe make a couple more stars (on WWF tv) making the Invasion side look that much stronger. I still would have LOVED to seen DDP vs Rock at a Wrestlemania (and yes I agree Rock winning would have been the right call) but that match would have been something I could see as a semi main event with the right planning.

There was a fantastic revisionist history series of posts a decade ago I think now. Highly recommended read.

The thing with the main WCW guys is they were all old and breaking down and not worth the money. Absolutely they should have been used to pass the torch to your Jerichos, Benoits, Guerreros, etc and what WCW SHOULD have done would have actually happened in the WWF with those guys carrying things.

[Mach]

the thing about the separate brand though was that there was no desire from anyone for it. Networks didn't want it, fans shat on (I guess mostly because of how they were booked) there's no way they could have done a WCW show to build things up. It'd have to be all integrated, perhaps those guys winning and looking good, but never getting a shot creating grudges and tension and then a BOOM whole bunch of people turn for putting their company out of business.

But instead we had to have the McMahon family circus.

[Slyder]

I still think they're going to end up screwing the pooch and missing the ceiling that Bray Wyatt has. Much like they did with the reign of terror of HHH, RVD, Kane vs DX, Cena vs Nexus, the alliance angle, aforementioned Sandow, and others. I hope and pray I'm wrong but history has not been kind.

[Hammer]

i guess its kinda tough to end the show around cena/lesnar when neither of them are actually there, but do they really have that much of an ego to think that people care enough about steph/brie that they ended the show at least twice with a brie and steph altercation? i guess theyre doing a good enough job during the show to build reigns/orton, wyatt/jericho and rollins/ambrose. come to think of it, the other 3 matches on the card, all have a backstory too... which is intriguing unto itself, even if i dont care for any of the potential matches themselves because of my own perceived outcomes [cant see miz or rusev losing, dont care about the divas]. outside of cena/lesnar though, all the matches seem pretty well determined... reigns, wyatt and rollins go over [maybe rollins and ambrose have a screwy finish to keep that moving along a bit longer, since its too early for the rollins cash in], and id say brie is definitely beating steph, but... steph is a mcmahon AND a helmsley, so that throws kayfabe logic out the window.

cena/lesnar is the only one i cant really call... lesnar has limited dates, so it would seem like a stupid idea to put your top title on him. on the other hand, hes a legit monster, it would only add credibility to whoever finally knocks him off and takes the belts... and him/heyman making sporadic appearances til the rumble, would allow you to put more of a focus and add credibility to the us and/or ic titles for a while. on the other hand, throughout making this post, i already forgot who the us champ was. i could go look it up, but id rather make the point that while i hate the miz and everything about him, at least hes force fed to me enough that i know hes facing dolph for the ic title at your 2nd or 3rd biggest event of the year.

and as for the case for cena winning... hes john cena, whats another boring 6 month title reign for him?

[Hammer]

I still think they're going to end up screwing the pooch and missing the ceiling that Bray Wyatt has. Much like they did with the reign of terror of HHH, RVD, Kane vs DX, Cena vs Nexus, the alliance angle, aforementioned Sandow, and others. I hope and pray I'm wrong but history has not been kind.

wyatt is what he is. he hit his peak in the company, hes gonna be an upper card heel that the next big face can use a stepping stone to that golden plateau. once he lost that feud to cena, the writing was on the wall.

[Slyder]

i guess its kinda tough to end the show around cena/lesnar when neither of them are actually there, but do they really have that much of an ego to think that people care enough about steph/brie that they ended the show at least twice with a brie and steph altercation? i guess theyre doing a good enough job during the show to build reigns/orton, wyatt/jericho and rollins/ambrose. come to think of it, the other 3 matches on the card, all have a backstory too... which is intriguing unto itself, even if i dont care for any of the potential matches themselves because of my own perceived outcomes [cant see miz or rusev losing, dont care about the divas]. outside of cena/lesnar though, all the matches seem pretty well determined... reigns, wyatt and rollins go over [maybe rollins and ambrose have a screwy finish to keep that moving along a bit longer, since its too early for the rollins cash in], and id say brie is definitely beating steph, but... steph is a mcmahon AND a helmsley, so that throws kayfabe logic out the window.

cena/lesnar is the only one i cant really call... lesnar has limited dates, so it would seem like a stupid idea to put your top title on him. on the other hand, hes a legit monster, it would only add credibility to whoever finally knocks him off and takes the belts... and him/heyman making sporadic appearances til the rumble, would allow you to put more of a focus and add credibility to the us and/or ic titles for a while. on the other hand, throughout making this post, i already forgot who the us champ was. i could go look it up, but id rather make the point that while i hate the miz and everything about him, at least hes force fed to me enough that i know hes facing dolph for the ic title at your 2nd or 3rd biggest event of the year.

and as for the case for cena winning... hes john cena, whats another boring 6 month title reign for him?

If I had to guess right now:
Lesnar beats Cena and its probably been the case ever since Lesnar beat Taker, he was getting the belt at some point. I still think it should be Cena not Lesnar who crowns Reigns (whenever that may be) but I'm sure WWE want to protect that boring ass fruity pebble.
AJ retains vs Paige (or dq screwyness)
I actually think Swagger might beat Rusev or another countout/double DQ finish. Although Rusev is probably being built to be fed to Super Cena at some point.
Brie gets shafted by Nikki and we get the one divas match that EVERYONE IS DIEING FOR! *end sarc*
Miz gets a nice win vs Swagger (another guy you could almost put into the Cena golden shovel club).
Orton is the present but Reigns is the future. Reigns wins clean unless he does whatever Kofi did to Orton to get the shovel!

The only one I really have a hard time calling is Ambrose/Rollins. I could see a case for both of them (I'm assuming its going to be a ladder or TLC match for the breifcase to give it a uniqueness at a big 4 ppv.

[Slyder]

Oh yea HEATH SLATER FTW!!!!!!

[HollywoodLeo]

Oh I know, that's why you do a better job trying to keep its own brand than have Buff Bagwell in the first WCW match that got boo'd out of the f'ing building. I probably would have brought Rey Mysterio or a couple of the other cruiserweights to have a feud with Jericho, X Pac, Eddie, etc and try to keep WCW a little pure of what it meant to the fans. Then when the big fish started becoming available (at the end of their Time Warner contracts) you do the Invasion angle right with the dream matches everyone would love to see over the course of a year and buy your own printing press.

I think that sounds like nWo (Hall, Nash, Hogan) and Luger. Sting didn't come because he didn't want to risk his character (and he saw what they did to Booker T). There was still bad blood with the Hart family, I think Vince would rather have the entire thing go belly up than ever deal with Jarrett again.

You can't really discuss that farce of a match with Buff Bagwell when discussing the invasion.

In fact, that farce is probably part of what prompted the Invasion idea because they were first trying to play WCW and Shane as the faces being held down by greedy Vince. Remember how they played the purchase? Vince was out there gloating about how he just beat Ted and then suddenly Shane shows up on Nitro with face heat saying he bought them.

That stupid Bagwell match was supposed to be the poor downtrodden WCW wrestlers actually getting screen time to Vince's chagrin, who in character wanted to shelf the whole bunch.

When that didn't work they turned the whole lot into an "invading" bunch of heels.

[Slyder]

You can't really discuss that farce of a match with Buff Bagwell when discussing the invasion.

In fact, that farce is probably part of what prompted the Invasion idea because they were first trying to play WCW and Shane as the faces being held down by greedy Vince. Remember how they played the purchase? Vince was out there gloating about how he just beat Ted and then suddenly Shane shows up on Nitro with face heat saying he bought them.

That stupid Bagwell match was supposed to be the poor downtrodden WCW wrestlers actually getting screen time to Vince's chagrin, who in character wanted to shelf the whole bunch.

When that didn't work they turned the whole lot into an "invading" bunch of heels.

They jinxed it by relying on Buff Bagwell to have a match WWF fans wanted to see. If they had (for example) Lance Storm vs Booker T (and rumored was an idea bandied about) and put on a better match you might have seen a better opportunity for further uses of wCw talent.

[HollywoodLeo]

They jinxed it by relying on Buff Bagwell to have a match WWF fans wanted to see. If they had (for example) Lance Storm vs Booker T (and rumored was an idea bandied about) and put on a better match you might have seen a better opportunity for further uses of wCw talent.

You're probably right, but the point is they originally tried to play wCw as the faces with Vince as the greedy heel trying to shelf them and that match was Shane giving them a chance. When that flopped quickly they switched gears.

So that's not really relevant subject matter to the success or lack thereof of the "Invasion".

[Slyder]

One other dream idea around that "Invasion" angle. How well do you think Good Ole JR and Bobby Heenan would have worked together during that time? Or even add Heel King (his best self IMO) to that.

I don't know when Bobby started his chemo but when he left wCw announcing booth I lost some interest in the entire product because they brought that fat worthless slob Mark Madden in and he just got the *click* from me. I just wanted someone to duct tape & super glue his mouth shut, throw him in the crazy house with Ric Flair just so I'd never have to hear him again.