Issue # 264
Date: Sunday July 4th, 1999
9:01 am
The Wrestling Booking Sheet
ECW will join TNN's lineup on
Friday night
Sunday, July 4, 1999
By
MIKE MOONEYHAM
Of The Post and
Courier staff
World Championship
Wrestling may have someone knocking on its door.
The hard-core,
Philadelphia-based Extreme Championship Wrestling is
going country and
national, and that could spell trouble for the
rapidly sinking
Atlanta-based WCW, whose freefall has put the
organization a distant
second to the World Wrestling Federation.
The Nashville Network
announced last week that ECW will join its Friday
night block of
programming this fall. The agreement between CBS Cable's
TNN and HHG Corp.,
producers of ECW, grants TNN the rights to release
the one-hour wrestling
series beginning Aug. 27. The show, which will
air from
8-9 p.m., will be one of the
key programs in TNN's Friday
night lineup targeted
to teens and young men. TNN's Friday night roster
also includes
RollerJam, Championship Rodeo and Motor Madness.
ECW managing director
Steve Karel, who helped cut the deal, sees ECW as
a major threat to the
Big Two in the not-so-distant future.
"I'm sure all the
talent managers in
America are enjoying us
stepping
up to the plate,"
Karel said Thursday. "Obviously we intend to increase
our revenue stream
significantly with the support of CBS Cable and TNN.
I'm not going to tell
you we're going to be able to compete
dollar-for-dollar with
the two big guys tomorrow. I will tell you that
Paul Heyman is the No.
1 character developer and storyline writer in
America. I don't think either
of the two big guys will deny that."
Karel said Heyman, who
is owner of HHG Corp. and the executive producer
of ECW, is the reason
behind the creative success of ECW. Heyman,
however, could not
keep pace with the increasing business demands of
the company. Thus
Karel, who has an extensive sports marketing
background, came on
board to run the business end.
TNN president David
Hall told The Post and Courier that he's very
excited about the
addition of pro wrestling to his network.
"I think anytime you
look at something that on Monday nights is pulling
10 ratings points out
of the television audience, there's a great
opportunity there. ECW
has a bunch of great athletic-type wrestling. I
think they can be very
successful in the one-hour format on TNN without
doing all that kind of
stuff."
The "stuff" Hall is
referring to, of course, is the brand of hard-core,
cutting-edge wrestling
that put ECW on the map. Hall, though,
emphasized that the
product would be toned down.
The ECW telecasts,
which will be taped every other week, will be rated
PG-TV-14. ECW will air
at least six two-hour pay-per-views per year in
addition to a series
of one-hour retros.
According to terms of
the three-year agreement, TNN will share in the
revenue of all ECW
activities, including its TNN telecasts,
pay-per-view events,
arena events, home video, magazines, CD
compilations and
merchandising. ECW action figures, produced by
Original San Francisco
Toy Makers, will be delivered to stores such as
Toys 'R Us this month.
TNN has the option to
have ownership interest, Hall said. No major
sponsors have signed
on as yet, but Hall said the ECW deal has created
great interest and
excitement.
Mike Mooneyham can be
reached by phone at (843) 937-5517 or by e-mail
at
mooneyham. More wrestling news with Mike
Mooneyham is available
every Monday on The Wrestling Observer Hotline.
The number is
1-900-903-9030. Calls
are 99 cents per minute, and children under 18
must get parental
permission before dialing.
===========================================
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===========================================
QUOTES FROM THE
PAST...
PHIL MUCHNICK ANALYZES
THE WWF
For the past eight
years, the WWF's harshest critic has been
New York
Post columnist Phil
Muchnick. Incensed by the content of the product
(in particular the
rampant drug abuse), Muchnick's editorials were a
factor in forcing the
WWF to adopt their short lived drug testing
program. While he is
reviled by many in the industry because of his
admitted dislike for
the business, his persistance has helped shed
light on a company
that is content in the dark. In a 1993 interview
with The Pro Wrestling
Torch's Wade Keller, Muchnick shared his
thoughts on the WWF:
Keller: "How does the
WWF's overall handling of media criticism
compare to other
organizations you
criticize?"
Mushnick: "its a
matter of degrees with the WWF's bend on these
things clearly being
the worst I've ever encountered.
Wade, let me make
something clear to you, I've covered some bad guys.
I've covered George
Steinbrenner. I'm not a big fan of Donald Trump.
I've covered some guys
who are tough to deal with like Reggie Jackson.
But Vince McMahon and
the World Wrestling Federation are off the
charts. They are
beyond anything I've ever encountered, anything I
could have in my worst
nightmare imagined would be out there. They're
it."
Torch Talk, conducted
on June 6th, 1993
To subscribe to The
Pro Wrestling Torch, send $36 for 20 issues to:
The Pro Wrestling
Torch
P.O. Box 201844
Minneapolis, MN 55420
===========================================
ROUNDING THE SQUARED
CIRCLE
"SIX DOWN, SIX TO GO"
OR
"IS THE YEAR HALF
OVER, OR IS THERE STILL HALF LEFT TO GO?"
BY
SAMJERRY
Visit my Home Page:
http://members.aol.com/samjerry
With 1999 at its
midpoint, it seems like a good time to step back and
look at the way things
are going for the three major federations.
The WWF is in the
midst of its most popular period ever. They have won
the Monday Night
Ratings every week for more then six months and doing
so by significant
margins. They are selling out an unprecedented number
of House Shows, and in
some cases, within hours after tickets go on
sale. An example of
this is the more than 10,000 tickets sold the first
day for the first ever
RAW to be held in The Georgia Dome. What makes
this so much more
impressive is that
Atlanta is the home of WCW,
and
The Georgia Dome
considered WCW's "home court." At the same time
tickets for the next
NITRO at the Georgia Dome are languishing. They
are also scoring well
with their PPV buy rates. It appears that their
"Sports Entertainment"
style is working.
However all is not
rosy. The WWF is currently involved in three high
profile lawsuits: one
involving the death of Owen Hart, one involving
Sable and the other a
TV personality from
Kuwait. The one involving
Hart has the potential
to be the most damaging to the WWF. Another
problem is the
continued criticism of their "adult" style programming.
While this writer
thinks most of this criticism is without foundation,
it is a concern that
the WWF must face. Yet another area of concern to
some is the lack of
talent, especially Main Event / WWF Champion
competitors. The Title
scene has revolved around Stone Cold Steve
Austin (SCSA), The
Undertaker, The Rock and Mick Foley (Mankind) for
much of the past two
years. While there are others on the horizon
(i.e., The Big Show
and Triple H), their progression leaves a hole in the
Intercontinental Title
field.
One of the WWF's
strongest areas is their abundance of young talent.
Along with The Rock
and Triple H, there are others like Edge, Gangrel,
Christian, Mr. @$$,
X-Pac, The Hardy Boyz, Val Venis, D-Lo Brown, Ken
Shamrock and Meat. It
is conceivable that most of them will progress to
Main Event status over
the next few years. The strong possibility of
signing Chris Jericho
adds to this solid base.
Add to this repeated
reports of a happy locker room and you have the
ingredients of a
successful company.
The WWF must guard
against things like allowing their story lines to
grow old and to
continue others that may not be that popular. There are
rumbling that the
McMahon / SCSA feud is starting to bore some,
although others report
they enjoy seeing it progress. There are many
who think The
Corporate Ministry angle is a waste of time and of The
Undertaker's talents.
They must also be
careful of over saturation with the addition of
SmackDown on UPN this
fall. WCW ran into this with the advent of
Thunder which has come
to be viewed as a showcase for the second and
third tiers of talent.
Above all, the WWF must remember what goes up
must come down.
Now for WCW. There are
many who feel I am anti-WCW. I live in what was
always traditional NWA
/ WCW territory and for many years the only
wrestling I saw on TV
or at house shows was WCW and Wrestling From
Florida, which was closely
allied with WCW in Atlanta. I have strong
feelings for Ric
Flair, Dusty Rhodes, Blackjack Mulligan, et al. Of
course there were many
I didn't like; The Anderson's immediately come
to mind. I mention
this because I would like nothing better than for
WCW to improve and
prosper. It is the healthy competition between WCW
and the WWF that has
given us the type matches on TV that we once saw
only on PPV's
WCW is in a severe
slump at this time. They are selling out a lower
percentage of house
shows now then they did a year ago. They have had
to cancel house shows
due to slow ticket sales. Their most recent PPV
drew the third lowest
buy rate in their history. NITRO went from an 82
week run as the top
show on Monday to its current status of losing to
RAW each week for the
past six months.
What is wrong and what
can be done to turn things around? WCW has a
vast list of stars on
its roster and they keep signing more. The recent
signing of Sid and the
expected signing of Shane Douglas enhance this
list. While having so
much talent to draw upon sounds great, it could
be part of the
problem. Trying to keep everyone happy is not easy and
each new ego you add
the mix makes it that much harder. A perfect
example is Bret Hart,
who went from being one of the top three in the
WWF to being lost in
the crowd in WCW. Bam Bam Bigelow came to WCW and
was immediately put
into a feud with Goldberg that didn't go anywhere.
After that he slipped
into the background until surfacing as a tag team
partner of Dirtbag
Doophus Page.
They need to address
the problem of poor story lines. There is too much
of an angle starting
and then just disappearing without resolution or
explanation. They have
many feuds starting at the beginning of NITRO
and leading to a match
later that night with no basis for them. They
need to be thought out
a little better than that. Having wrestlers
doing some of the
booking is akin to allowing the inmates to run the
asylum. While talented
people like Chris Benoit struggle for
recognition, other
less deserving people enjoy pushes because of their
friendships with the
bookers.
They need to get away
from bringing in celebrities and giving them Main
Event status (Leno,
Rodman, Malone). They should be using them as
window dressing in
roles such as Guest Time Keeper and Ring Announcer,
not as wrestlers.
Putting them in the ring cheapens the whole match and
card. The current use
of Master P is a total failure and yet there are
rumors of bringing in
other rap stars.
There is the problem
of having many older superstars taking up the top
spots and getting most
of the TV time while the younger ones suffer.
Besides Benoit, there
are people like Kidman, Booker T, Buff Bagwell
and Raven, who don't
seem to have a ghost of a chance of winning the
WCW World
Championship. its time to give them their day in the sun.
There are repeated
reports of arguments in the locker room over booking
and of some being
unhappy with their contracts. Goldberg, one of (if
not the) WCW's
brightest stars, is reportedly unhappy with the amount
he makes. While I
don't condone employees dictating the salary
structure, he is the
future of WCW and should be adequately
compensated.
As I said earlier,
what goes up must come down. WCW has gone full
circle. If they
honestly address their problems, there is every reason
to believe they can
return to the top. We the fans win when every
Federation is doing
well. I saved the best for last. It is my solemn
feeling that Eric
Bischoff must be replaced. He took an idea he saw in
Japan and created the NWO.
The NWO angle was arguably the most
successful angle in
wrestling ever. However, since then it has been
downhill. When the CEO
of a major corporation fails to meet goals and
objectives, it is he
who takes it in the neck. He is currently
advocating the concept
that Sponsors are what count, not Ratings.
Funny, when WCW was
No. 1, Ratings weren't everything, they were the
only thing. Besides,
the WWF doesn't appear to be having any problem
enlisting sponsors.
Finally we have ECW.
ECW is the most action packed of all the major
Federations, with as
loyal a fan base as you could ever hope for. Where
else can you hear the
fans chant for the organization? They are in the
midst of two major
crises: first the erosion of talent as many have
left, mostly for WCW
(i.e., Sandman / Hak, Bigelow and Douglas). The
other is financial as
they are having cash flow problems. They have
just signed a TV
contract and will be appearing weekly on TNN, and are
scheduled to begin in
late August. It is expected that they will have
to tone down their
violence and language for TNN. Only time will tell
how this will affect
them.
Their roster is small,
but they have some of the most talented
performers there are
(i.e., Rob Van Dam, Sabu, Taz, Lance Storm, The
Dudley Boyz). If
allowed to present their unique Hardcore style of
wrestling, there is
every reason to believe we will have three major
Federations on TV.
From the standpoint of
a fan, the first half of 1999 as been
Fan-F'N-tastic. the
second half can only be better.
===========================================
ONLINE VALIDITY
Written by reader:
madspector
Have some of you
gotten confused between the words "news" and "lies"?
It would appear not
and a good portion of these alleged online
reporters are blurring
the lines between actual news and groundless
reports that aren't
usually supported by very much evidence.
Example number one,
"Scott Steiner may be headed to the WWF!"...when I
heard
this one a couple of
weeks ago I thought to myself "what idiot posted
this garbage and were
did his info come from?" Had this so called
reporter done any
research at all he would have come to the realization
that Steiner is out
with a career threatening back injury and even if
he wasn't, he is under
contract until 2001, but because alot of these
"reporters" have a
friend who either owns the newsletter or newsboard
they figure they
aren't required to tell the truth...just what sounds
good.
Example number two
"Raven demands his release from WCW". How much
research was done on
this one?....almost none, every employee that was
contacted about this
one knew nothing about it. Kevin Nash came on-air
and said it was
bull!@#% and WCW Live confirmed that is was bull!@#$.
Once again, if the
person who had started this had done his homework he
would have found out
that Scott Levy, aka. Raven, is out with a severe
shoulder injury and
that is why you haven't seen him on TV or PPVs.
These are just a
couple of examples of some of the BS I see on a daily
basis. I spend alot of
time on my computer and believe it not, while I
do value the online
newsboards, what does it do to the credibility of
online reporting if
some are required to report the truth and some
aren't?
Another
thing...wrestling fans when you see some of this stuff do
some
research of your own
and if you find that one of these reporters is a
"mark" and not calling
down the middle than don't be afraid to email
him or her and tell
them they are full of $#!+ because all they are
doing is taking away
from the online reporters who do take their time
to put out a good
story.
===========================================
BEWARE OF THE
NET
Written by reader:
Muttley97
First off, welcome
back and its good to see you back in action...
Now onto the PPV. I
have to believe that the WWF spent the last couple
of weeks scouring the
net, looking at the boards trying to get a read
on how the PPV was
going to go. Why else would there be a posting about
Paul Wright "going
through 8 men to be King of the Ring"? It was more
likely a plant by the
minds at the WWF in order to throw everyone off,
since the net had been
speculating that Mr. Ass would win.
The day the ad for the
Big Show was found on the net, message boards
were burning up that
the WWF had given away the ending. Also, the
speculation the they
were going public with their stock had fueled the
notion that SCSA would
beat the Macs. There was even a reference made
on the PPV by JR about
how the internet was alive with messages about
who would win. So, I
think that the message here to everyone
is to take what you
read with a grain of salt, and if you take it as
gospel you're on your
own.
===========================================
NWA East Presents
Friday, July 2, 7:30 Belltime, North Versailles Pa.
15132
Summer Series Round 2
*******************************
The matches are
starting to come in so far
***************************************
NWA East/
PWX Heavyweight Champion
Shane Douglas
vs NWA East
PWX TV Champion Bubba The
Bulldog
***********************************
Former WWF Tag Team
Champion Samu
vs NWA East/PWX
Number 1 Manager Dylan Dean
Their is more coming
in keep checking
===========================================
The staff of The
Wrestling Booking Sheet
Editor: Steve
Appy
Columnist:
Mark George
Columnist: SamJerry
Columnist: Fritz
Capp
Columnist: Rick Phelps
Columnist: Cindy
Barnes
Columnist: Josh Hewitt
Columnist: Swami
Columnist: Tom Misnik
Columnist: Nate Pelley
Columnist: Robert Troy (Osiris)
Columnist:
Tom
Kirkbride
Columnist: Ryan S. Oaks
Columnist: Darren Kramer
Any submissions sent in by readers or columnists become the
property of The Wrestling Booking Sheet, and are subject to
editing due to grammar, spelling, or content. Any
information taken from The Wrestling Booking Sheet must be
credited properly, with our E-Mail address listed. We have
no problem if you want to use our stuff; just credit it
properly.
Copyright- Steve
Appy of The Wrestling Booking Sheet ©1998, 1999, 2000
"When you're young and you
pick up a guitar, it feels so powerful. It feels
like you pulled the sword from the stone. I used to believe
that it could save the world. But I don't really believe
that anymore." - Bruce Springsteen
"The greatest challenge of
adulthood is holding on to your idealism
after you lose your innocence and believing in the power of
the human
spirit after you come crashing into the limits of the real
adult
world." - Bruce Springsteen
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