wrestling / Columns

Ask 411 Wrestling: What Were the Good Things Russo Did?

July 20, 2016 | Posted by Mathew Sforcina

Well heya, how you doing? This is Ask 411 Wrestling, the only wrestling column not talking about the Draft this week! I am your host, Mathew Sforcina, and lots of non-draft stuff to talk about this week, so let’s dig in, shall we?

If you’ve got a question, and especially if you’re new to the column (welcome by the way!), just a reminder that I don’t usually take questions in the comments or via other means, if you got a question you want answered, email it to [email protected] and it’ll get answered! At some point. By someone.

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Zeldas!

Check out my Drabble blog, 1/10 of a Picture! I’m not just a pretty acceptable face, after all.

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Byron Saxton as the FNG: Wrestling is a very cliquey place at times, and even if you’re with a specific company for a long time, certain people can and will rib you mercilessly once you get to a new, higher level under the FNG principle. I will however amend my statement from last week to add in that Saxton bombing so badly in Vince’s eyes on the Raw after WM where Brock took out Cole and that really doesn’t help his chances of not being put upon by the guy who Vince likes and the guy Vince talks through.

RPS Wrestling: Some good suggestions in the comment section, well done, Hogan/Vader/Sting is a pretty sure bet there, but several other good ones.

The Trivia Crown

Who am I? A Wrestlemania veteran (multi-time if you include dark matches) and a Slammy winner, I had a decent run in WWE, although I never main evented a PPV. My finisher name finally made sense when I changed my name for a short while. I’ve gone after the IC title and the WWF title, I’ve wrestled in ECW, I’ve been a scab, a dual sports star and both working for and against the McMahon-Helmsley Regime. A free agent, I am who?

Zach Brinkley has the answer for us.

Who am I? A Wrestlemania veteran (multi-time if you include dark matches) (at V, and X-7) and a Slammy winner (worst idea for going on strike) I had a decent run in WWE (33 years) although I never main evented a PPV. My finisher name finally made sense when I changed my name for a short while (Boston Crab, billed as the Boston Brawler in 2004). I’ve gone after the IC title and the WWF title (In battle royales where the winner got the title shot) I’ve wrestled in ECW (WWECW, against Kurt Angle) I’ve been a scab (was a referee during a storyline strike in 1999) a dual sports star (Abe ‘Knuckleball’ Schwartz) and both working for and against the McMahon-Helmsley Regime (picked up a win against Triple H, worked behind the scenes) A free agent, I am who? Brooklyn Brawler/Steve Lombardi

What am I? I’m an event, live on PPV, where every title in the company was defended and retained. It was a bad night for people with corner people, as only two wrestlers with people in their corner won their matches (one of them over someone else with a corner person). One person wrestled two matches, both of which ended the same way, albeit reversed. One match was patriotic, one match was hyped, and another was mostly based around a single hold. A PPV that featured The Rockers, one third of The Orient Express and a guy you’d expect to beat math doing just that, I am what?

Getting Down To All The Business

HBK’s Smile starts us off with a follow on from last week.

Hi, Mat. Great to have you back.

Your discussion of WWF Radio included a detailed account of the Savage-Hogan-Liz triangle from Randy’s interview. My questions regarding that are;

1) What, if anything, was the WWF audience told about Hogan’s black eye at WrestleMania 9 or afterward?

There’s two official stories, the official official one that was given on TV, and the official one that agents and such gave in interviews and such.

On TV, it was said by commentators that Hogan got it from random thugs that Ted DiBiase hired to rough Hogan up to try and soften up before their big tag team match at the show, and/or Money Inc attacked Hogan in the gym and used the same brick they used on Beefcake’s face on Hogan’s face. The official reason was that he had a jet-ski accident, that he was riding a jet-ski and he fell off and it hit him in the face.

The rumored ‘truth’ the internet believes is that Savage clocked him one. Speaking of…

2) Under what specific circumstances did Savage give Hogan a black eye? Was it on the set of Mr. Nanny as alluded to in the interview?

Well again, according to Hogan, it was a jet-ski accident.

The rumor mill version is that it was the day before WM, or near about, Savage had a confrontation with Hogan over Savage thinking that Hogan was out to ruin his life, that Hogan had slept with Liz back when she and Randy were married and was now helping her see her new beau, one version of the story being that she was hiding in Hogan’s dressing room when this fight occurred.

The specifics are up to whomever is telling the story.

3) After all that, how did Savage make peace and follow Hogan to WCW and work closely with him, and how was Elizabeth accepted later? Is it as simple as “Money talks”?

Savage and Hogan have always had a love/hate relationship, where they hate each other most of the time, but if they see a chance to work together and make money, they’re all buddy buddy again. Savage in WCW was that, as well as all the other perks of being paid big money to wrestle and all that, WCW clearly were planning at some point to run Hogan/Savage again because it was one of the biggest money making programs in history, why wouldn’t you? So Savage and Hogan got on in WCW most of the time since they saw money to be made.

Likewise with Liz, both Savage and Hogan reached out to Liz, as WCW wanted everyone older ex-WWF fans knew, and she was on speaking terms with both of them at the time, and she got paid a lot…

So yeah, money talks, pretty much.

Manu Bumb wants to talk the CWC.

So I’m watching the first episode of the CWC, and the first thing I noticed is that the turnbuckle pads aren’t the standard WWE pads. Instead, they are the ones (seemingly) every other company uses. As a wrestler (do you drink for that, or me?),

is there something about this style of pad/cover that you’ve heard benefits cruiserweights? From the looks, I feel like it would be easier to stand on than the normal WWE pad/cover, but I’m not a wrestler, so I bow to your expertise. Seems odd that WWE/HHH would opt for something different, unless there was a reason behind it.

Not that odd if the whole point is try and look totally different to the usual WWE style so as to look and feel different and thus appeal to a wider audience of wrestling fans. Most everything in the CWC is designed to be different from the usual WWE look and feel (Full Sail’s crowd notwithstanding), so is this just another case of that?

As someone who is as much a cruiserweight as they are a fully functional human person who’s dreams match their ability guy who can’t think of a way to end this joke person who weighs a small amount, I obviously am not speaking from experience, but yes, there is some advantage to that kind of pad, in that a larger area allows you to place more of a foot on the turnbuckle which is, to my understanding, a good thing for jumping.

Plus, in a more subtle way, the ring that they are using for this is a standard WWE ring, which is larger than most anyone else’s ring, and thus these guys are having to get used to such a new space. Trust me, an extra step or two to the ropes makes a huge difference in your positioning, your lining up, everything. So any way to make the ring a little more familiar, a little less unusual? You’d do it.

Don’t get me wrong, this is certainly just a case of looking different while maybe giving them a help for jumping, but the fact it might ease them into the new environment a smidge doesn’t hurt at all.

Also – what was the logo in 2 of the corners of the mat? Not the CWC logo, the other one.

Manu told me not to worry as he worked it out, but in case you saw it and were confused, it’s the new Tapout logo.

Own Tapout gear before… watching that?

Jack asks about Dean Ambrose’s pants.

I’m watching raw and I just… I can rip the crotch of my jeans just getting on my bike, so… are Ambrose’s blue jeans gimmicked wrestling tights? Jorts are one thing, but a full fitted jean seems uncomfortable to wrestle in, no?

Not if they’re CHUCK NORRIS ACTION JEANS!!!

Actually Dean’s gone through a couple of jean makers, but he now uses a brand called Relentless Jeans, which he shills here.

The hook is that they’re designed for active guys with big legs, and they are stretchy. So yes, the jeans he wears aren’t straight classic denim, but rather stretch denim, which is denim with an added component (spandex usually) that gives more than usual denim. I have jeans like that.

Uh… Eat?

Jesse has some questions that should instigate some lively discussion.

1. I saw a shoot where Piper said that he was supposed to do a vignette with Nova and Nova was disrespectful and they ribbed Nova and then fired him over it- is that true? Was Nova moved to the office and then let go because of that- if not, then why was Nova released and did he have heat with the office?

Not exactly, at least that’s not exactly how it was explained in the ‘Timeline: History of the WWF 84 with Roddy Piper’ shoot that I assume you saw.

To whit, the basic story Roddy gave was:

Simon Dean aka Super Nova worked some house shows with Piper doing Piper Pit’s segments. Dean suggested some ideas to Piper and Roddy saw this as disrespectful and the boys took all of Dean’s belongings and soaked them in the shower. Piper takes credit for Dean being shunted out of the WWE soon after.

According to the rules of wrestling, Piper is in the right here, as the pecking order says that if you’re working with someone more veteran than you, you only suggest stuff if they ask you for ideas, and then only in the ballpark they give you. You don’t tell your superior all these crazy cool shit you got unless they ask you if you have stuff that is crazy and/or cool and/or shit. Plus according to Piper he didn’t know the ribbing occurred until he was told about it afterwards.

As for Dean’s leaving, Nova disputes that, in his shoots he says that Vince offered him the spot as running developmental because he was smart, went through it and had a college degree, and since he decided to retire anyway, why not? He didn’t last long and hated it anyway, and Nova is certainly a guy who hates ribbing and bullying and such, so I can see Piper’s viewpoint there, but it’s not like Piper campaigned for Nova to be fired.

2. Why was Bruce Prichard fired by WWE and why does everyone think he’s an idiot?

Like any sort of story involving firings and WWE, there’s a good half a dozen different takes, so you can probably construct any theory you like.

The prevalent theory is that Bruce was fired as a power play by Stephanie. Bruce had been with the company a long time and worked closely with Vince for a long time and thus, the story goes, Steph wanted to get rid of him, as him being Vince’s biggest Yes Man stood in her way of ultimate power and glory and riches and what have you. The fact he had a big contract and thus she could argue he was overpaid was a bonus. This is one of those ‘scorpions in a bucket’ situations, according to the IWC, as two people the IWC doesn’t like fight, and one wins, so yay?

Bruce’s own words?

“I was fired: plain & simple. I was let go, and we had some differences and I was let go. That was it. We just had differences, and it was time to part ways, and after 22 years, you can’t look back and listen to guys who are so bitter about their experiences after they’re gone. To be bitter about something after doing it for so long, you gotta look at yourself in the mirror and say ‘Who’s the dumbass?’ I was there for 22 years, and I had a fabulous run, and I wouldn’t trade it for the world. When it was time to part ways, it was time to part ways, and we did.”

As for why people think he’s an idiot, you should ask them. And they’ll tell you they think that because he’s an idiot.

I can’t speak for everyone, I can barely speak for myself at times, but the thing I’ve noticed is that people who really get close to Vince McMahon rarely end up with good inter-personal skills with other people. It seems that if you end up working with Vince in a position of power, you rarely come out with glowing references from other people. Maybe working for a guy like Vince tires you out and makes it hard to deal with Non-Vinces. Maybe living in Vince’s bubble warps your view of the world. Maybe people get jealous. Maybe only people who are dicks can get to the point where Vince rewards said dickery. Maybe it’s all of the above and none of it.

Pritchard is said to be two-faced and manipulative and lying and all that other stuff everyone in wrestling has to be at some point. He just seems, the argument goes, to be it more often than he should.

3. I know the consensus about Vince Russo is that he had good ideas but needed an editor in Vince McMahon, but is that even true? What I mean is, that what good idea’s did Russo even have? I really only started watching WWF/E in 99 so I missed most of 97-98, but it seems to me that the screwjob plus Austin/Rock are what pushed WWE over the edge. Russo talks about how the “Rock this is your Life” had a high rating, but weren’t people watching just for the personalities? They say that he made every character important but the character’s were stupid! Val Venis? Kai en Tai? The performer’s were great, but the actual writing was stupid. I feel like anything that these guys were doing would be successful- so my question is, what are the actual good skits/gimmicks that Russo even came up with? He has failed everywhere else, which leads me to believe it Austin/Rock/McMahon would have been hot without him

You ask Vince Russo, everything ever good in wrestling from 1996 onwards was his idea.

You ask Jim Cornette, Vince Russo isn’t capable of having a good idea if you spotted him a great idea and gave him a million monkeys with a million typewriters and a billion editors.

The truth is somewhere in the middle, with two variations on a theme.

In terms of actual content he can claim, the most iconic image he can claim is the Austin beer truck attack on the Corporation.

Austin was originally just going to drive a pickup truck, Russo thought up the beer truck. Other stuff Russo can claim is the Deadly Games tournament at SurSer 98, a lot of early movie loving Goldust, the start of Demonic Undertaker, This is Your Life (which should have had a payoff, it’s just Rock didn’t deliver the set-up during it) and a chunk of Sable. In WCW, there’s the Booker T and Lance Storm pushes, the start of the New Blood angle, the Flair V Flair angle.

But the main thing that Russo has in the plus column is less about individual angles and more the overall attitude to the product. For while he has plenty of negatives, don’t get me wrong, wrestling did need a bit of a sprucing up at the time, WWF especially. You talked about how the gimmicks of Val Venis and KaiEnTai sucked. Thing is, you remember them. You know what they are. Clear as a bell.

Russo treated every part of the show as being important. Everyone had a gimmick and a storyline, or at least could be tangentially related to one. And with shades of gray, as rightfully maligned as it is, there was a refreshing lack of “We’re both bad now so we’re buddies” as well as an ability for you, the fan, to decide who to support, which compared to what came before was a breath of fresh air.

Now you may well disagree, and think that he’s overrated and all that, and that’s fair and reasonable. And yes, a lot of stupid stuff is in his name, moreso perhaps than positives. But the overall attitude Russo had to midcarders, his dedication to making you care about everyone on the show? That I’ll defend.

*awaits usual storm in comment section*

4. Same with Bischoff, besides coming up with the NWO angle, which is admittedly huge- what good business decisions did he ever make? He goes on and on about how successful he was, but he just brought in a bunch of hot stars and let them improv. How can he take credit for the luchadors when he never let them talk and just brought them on to kill time? From what I can remember even the announcers never put those matches over and would just talk about NWO during Mysterio/Malenko matches. So, also, is Bischoff even responsible for the success WCW had?

The good decisions Bischoff made were to copy Vince from the 80’s.

Chandler’s getting a work out.

Anyway, there’s a certain amount of retroactive dismissal in that recap, because like Russo, you can forget how much Bischoff revolutionised the business. Mid 90’s wrestling really sucked, and Bischoff’s rise to power and the WCW rise is pretty incredible. And yeah, Bischoff kinda deserves some of credit. While long term he failed, short term his moves were all spectacular.

He paid big for the starpower to bring fans to the product, guys like Hogan and Piper and Savage had fans and they had drawing power. He got them, and then got blowaway wrestling that was not available anywhere else in the USA with the luchadores and all the other technical wrestling. Sure, nowadays you can dismiss that, but at the time? This was mind-blowing.

Bischoff found a good balance, for a while, of the star power and the storyline of the nWo to draw attention, and then fantastic wrestling to keep it. And sure, he didn’t let luchadores talk much. We still got Conspiracy Victim Jericho and such out of the deal.

It’s all well and good to say that he just brought in good talent and let them improv, but Scott Hall and Kevin Nash, when they came into WCW, were a solid upper midcard guy who’d never sniffed the main event and the worst drawing world champion in WWF history. And he made them into two of the biggest stars in wrestling history, and the center of arguable the biggest wrestling angle of all time as the Outsiders.

It all fell apart, of course, when Bischoff stayed too long on the same hand, but that hand ran hot for a very long time. And he deserves some credit for that.

*awaits bigger storm in comment section*

Dan has an idea.

“Goldberg vs. Jericho. Nobody’s next. WMXXXIII.” Double retirement match, because I’m sure Goldberg is a one and done if he ever gets in the ring again and by this point nobody will want to see Jericho again, but if anyone could make delicious chicken salad out of whatever Goldberg is at this point, it’s Jericho. It’s also the WCW match I wanted the most that never happened. Wishful thinking on my part? Most likely, but it’d be cool. Ralphus is long overdue for a return.

I dunno, Ralphus kinda got an ego at the end there. And Jericho I’d kinda like to keep around, in case he hits upon another “Best in the World” level transformation.

But if Goldberg came in for one last match, as he said he’s willing to do as seen here on 411mania, who should it be with?

Part of me says Brock, just to be full circle and all that, get it right this time round, plus I’m sure Brock would love his win back, but nah.

Roman is the obvious “You Stole My Spear!” thing, and if we’re pulling back on Roman… Eh.

Honestly? Goldberg has always had a certain level-headedness to the business, at least most of the time. While he looks after himself, which is fair enough, he does see on some level the need for the business to keep going. So I’d probably want him in there with someone like Finn Balor or Owens or even Nakamura, and put them over. You’d have to pay him more, but a big win over a guy like Goldberg… Can’t hurt, right?

Never happen of course, but still.

Speaking of the topic though, Joseph?

In terms of a willingness to pass the torch, accept that time has passed, and willing to put new people over, who was most illing to do those things and change with the times? It seems like Macho Man asking Vince to take him off the commentary booth and put him IN matches so he could put people over. Is he the grand champion?

He’s certainly up there, especially given his original WWF retirement plan was the 2 year epic feud with Shawn Michaels that would end at WMX that would put him on the map. Instead, Savage helped put over DDP in a big way in WCW.

That said, I think Sting has to be the guy who has been the most selfless, in terms of what he’s taken and given in TNA, Savage put over a few people, Sting put over an entire company for years. The fact that TNA still exists today is, in no small part, thanks to Sting, for better or worse.

Mike asks if DX was ever going to get a little more Sunny.

Is it true that just before she was let go by the then WWF, that there was a story line planned to have Sunny who was managing LOD 2000 at the time to turn on them and join DX as the DX chick to complement Chyna as the muscle. Based on her past as a tag team manager and her affair with Sean Michaels that they wanted to give her more of an on screen role and get her more involved in matches especially with an aging LOD near the end of their careers. She was still popular at the time so I can see why this could’ve happened.

Not to my knowledge. I’ve seen a few people say that it would be a good idea, but I never saw any indication of that being a possible angle. MAYBE after Rude jumped to WCW, I can see an argument to having Sunny be the replacement as the annoying bitch rather than the silent muscle, but the thing is, Sunny and HBK didn’t get on.

They got on, and off, then on, then switch positions, then on and…

Sorry.

Anyway, Sunny always seemed to be more on Bret’s side of the coin, in terms of who she supported and looked up to, and while on some level Coked Up Shawn would love to take Sunny from Bret and such, I’m not sure he would have.

Either way, I never heard of the idea as anything other than a “Wouldn’t it be cool if…” scenario.

And on that note, I bring this edition to a close. I’ll be back next week, perhaps with more questions. Because why not?