Ask 411 Wrestling: Why Was Austin’s Heel Run A Flop?

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Zeldas!

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The Trivia Crown

I am a match. Technically, I happened once, but the people involved in me have faced several times before me and after me. The participants in me have won the same championships in a specific wrestling promotion, except for one, and their biggest wins happened in the same manner against opponents who were, at a point in time, world tag team champions in certain wrestling promotion. The match was decided by a pinfall, it was a clean match and the babyface wrestler won, although the match didn’t really had a face-heel dynamic during and much less after the match, specially since a third wrestler was involved in a segment after the match invited them to do something. Both participants in me have had interests in other “careers” other than wrestling. I have a connection with PWG, but my participants don’t. One of the wrestlers in me has a connection with the number 10 and the other with the letter A, but both have multiple connections, including having managers who won the same championship. What am I?

So no-one got this, so let’s go to Maraviloso’s answer.

I am a match. Technically, I happened once, but the people involved in me have faced several times before me and after me. The participants in me have won the same championships in a specific wrestling promotion, except for one (Miz won the WWE Title and Ziggler won the World Title), and their biggest wins happened in the same manner (cashing in their Money In The Bank wins) against opponents who were, at a point in time, world tag team champions (Edge and Randy Orton) in certain wrestling promotion. The match was decided by a pinfall (Zig Zag on The Miz by Dolph Ziggler), it was a clean match and the babyface wrestler (Ziggler) won, although the match didn’t really had a face-heel dynamic during and much less after the match, specially since a third wrestler (Zack Ryder) was involved in a segment after the match invited them to do something (to party; at a WWE Fallout segment). Both participants in me have had interests in other “careers” other than wrestling (Ziggler as a caddy, Miz as an actor). I have a connection with PWG (The Battle of Los Angeles), but my participants don’t. One of the wrestlers in me has a connection with the number 10 (Dolph won tag team titles with the current Tye Dillinger, The Perfect 10) and the other with the letter A (Miz calls himself an A-Lister), but both have multiple connections, including having managers who won the same championship (Maryse, AJ, Layla, etc. who were Divas/Ladies champions). What am I?

THE BATTLE OF CLEVELAND

This week is a question that is about the trivia question. The last couple weeks, there’s been no answer given, and not any discussion about it. So, do we still want this section? I can easily cut it. Tell me below, yay or nay.

Getting Down To All The Business

Stromi starts us off with crowd reaction discussion.

Has a list ever been made in regards to the biggest crowd “pops” in wrestling history, and if not, what moments do you think would make the list? I’m thinking Hogan pinning the Sheik, Ultimate Warrior pinning Honky Tonk Man, Rocky and Tony upsetting the Samoans, Luger and Windham beating the Horseman, and of course, Stone Cold coming out to help Mick Foley beat the Rock on Raw.

Yes, I can say with some confidence that there have been many, many, many, MANY lists made of Biggest Pops In Wrestling. Some rightchere on 411mania! WWE did a video one, sort of, in two parts. Even I did one, sort of.

The list of the ‘generally accepted’ biggest pops of all time I got last time was:

Austin interferes to give Mick Foley his first ever World Title.
Canadian Stampede 10 Man tag
Rock V Hogan 1
Austin returns Backlash 2000
Warrior beats Honky
Goldberg Beats Hogan
ECW One Night Stand 2, Cena Loses
Money In The Bank 2011, Punk Wins

Maybe toss in Luger beating Hogan for the WCW Title, and the Luger/Windham tag titles to make it an even 10. Readers?

On a similar note, what are some of the greatest matches that had a sustained crowd (positive) rabid reaction throughout the entire match? I’m thinking the original War Games match, Rock-Hogan at Wrestlemania, Warrior-Hogan at Wrestlemania, Cena-Bryan, Cena-RVD and Cena-Punk, and Snuka-Muraco in the cage.

Canadian Stampede is up there too, as is every post-Mania Raw since the post-Mania Raw became a thing, depending how you define ‘positive’. The problem with this is that do you judge based on just level of noise throughout, or do you judge it on the peaks, is better to have a steady noise throughout or several big moments of loudness? I’d say your list is pretty solid, but I’m sure someone will disagree below.

Finally, what are some of the matches that the crowd has been so angry about the ending, either the result or the storyline? I’m not talking smart fans upset about the booking (like the Daniel Bryan royal rumbles), I mean when the crowd was actively IRATE. I’m thinking when Flair turned on Dusty in the cage, the Freebirds turning on the Von Erichs, Sgt. Slaughter beating the Ultimate Warrior, Savage having the snake bite his arm, and of course, David Arquette winning the WCW title.

… Should there be a Chandler there? Because Arquette winning the title got a pop. Sadly.

Make sure you go to this alternate universe and subscribe to the ECW Network before watching that.

Anyway, off the top of my head, Heel Shawn teasing Montreal with Bret and Hogan, The Dudleyz in ECW, Right To Censor, everything in Puerto Rico, and the riots in wrestling, like when Flair was stuck in a steel cage for an hour, and Vader’s debut where he beat Inoki in 4 minutes and caused a riot that got New Japan banned from the Sumo Hall for a couple years.

Stay in this universe, get NJPW World, then you can watch that.

I read an article about the ECW “crucifiction” of Sandman match and how the crowd was absolutely silent at the end. Besides that match, and the end of Lesnar-Undertaker when he broke the streak, can you think of any other times when a match or angle makes the crowd go completely silent?

Most Raws these days.

*1/4 Chandler*

Crowds going silent from shock… I’ll admit, that’s not ringing too many bells. Readers, if you’re not too busy arguing about pops, got any for this one?

(And yes, I am fully aware that I didn’t really answer these ‘properly’. But these are either subjective to hell or you’re stuck measuring decibels…)

Ed helps me out by asking a straight up facty one.

We call cena a 15 time world champ, combined wwe and whc. Could you put together a list of the top 10 most reigns as a midcard champion- combined us and ic title? I suspect kofi, miz and the hitman are up there.

OK, I’m only counting WWE’s US title reigns, so starting with Eddie’s revival of the title. The combined US/IC reigns.

1 Reign: Albert, Kurt Angle, Curtis Axel, Big E, The British Bulldog, D’Lo Brown, Cesaro, CM Punk, Diesel, Dean Douglas, Finlay, Ric Flair, The Godfather, Billy Gunn, Matt Hardy, Luke Harper, The Honky Tonk Man, Ezekiel Jackson, Marty Jannetty, Ahmed Johnson, Orlando Jordan, Mr. Kennedy, Bobby Lashley, Drew McIntyre, Marc Mero, The Mountie, Randy Orton, Ken Patera, Pat Patterson, Roddy Piper, Roman Reigns, Rikishi, Road Dogg, Seth Rollins, R-Truth, Rick Rude, Ryback, Randy Savage, Ken Shamrock, Ricky Steamboat, Lance Storm, Jack Swagger, Test, The Texas Tornado, Greg Valentine

2 Reigns: Dean Ambrose, Stone Cold Steve Austin, Big Show, Daniel Bryan, Carlito, Chyna, Alberto Del Rio, Owen Hart, Kalisto, Kane, John Bradshaw Layfield, Pedro Morales, Don Muraco, Rey Mysterio, Kevin Owens, Mr. Perfect, Montel Vontavious Porter, William Regal, Cody Rhodes, The Rock, Rusev, Zack Ryder, Tito Santana, Sheamus, The Ultimate Warrior, Umaga, Val Venis

3 Reigns: Goldust, Eddie Guerrero, Bret Hart, Santino Marella, Shawn Michaels, John Morrison

4 Reigns: Shelton Benjamin, Booker T, Christian, Jeff Hardy, Razor Ramon

5 Reigns: Bad News Barrett, John Cena, Edge, Triple H

6 Reigns: Jeff Jarrett, Rob Van Dam, Dolph Ziggler

7 Reigns: Chris Benoit, Kofi Kingston, The Miz

9 Reigns: Chris Jericho

So there you go.

Michael has a few questions.

When will Cena turn heel? Why doesn’t he ever lose clean? Why isn’t Zack Ryder world champ? When is CM Punk returning? Isn’t Daniel Bryan just the best?

When WWE has a replacement that is working. He loses as clean as faces do nowdays in WWE. Because Vince didn’t make him himself. Whenever he runs out of options. And he’s certainly up there.

Sorry, I couldn’t resist. Now my real questions:

Oh. Well there’s quite a few, so let’s do a few a week..

1) I’m watching “The Rise and Fall of WCW” dvd(there’s a used disc store by me so I’m loading up) and noticed that Chris Jericho’s theme song was a blatant rip off of “Even Flow” by Pearl Jam and DDP’s song was a rip off of “Smells Like Teen Spirit” by Nirvana. How did WCW get away with this? Were there royalties paid to these bands or did WCW alter them just enough that they could claim they weren’t ripping them off?

Oh come on, you honestly think this:

Sounds anything like this?

Jericho’s one has no lyrics!

Anyway, the songs are just different enough that WCW can, and did, claim them as ‘unique and different’ songs. You move enough chords around, even though it sounds almost identical, it’s different enough for legal differentiation.

(A common question is, since WCW was owned by Turner, and Turner owned Warner Music, why WCW didn’t just use songs from them? The problem with that is that WCW would still have had to go through the usual licensing channels, there was no quick and easy form for companies under the same umbrella, and secondly, even if there was a song Warner ‘owned’, it was still cheaper to get Jimmy Hart to knock out a rip off than it would be to licence a pre-existing one.)

2) Also, what WCW’s rationale for having some of their luchadores(Mysterio and Juventud) remove their masks? I mean, they basically ruined a lot of these guys mystique and I don’t really recall why they did this. Not like people look upon the maskless Rey Mysterio as the highlight of his career. Did the wrestlers propose this perhaps or was it all on management?

10000000% Management, and by Management I mean Bischoff. Bischoff believed that masked wrestlers didn’t work in America, that you needed to see faces for expressions and such. He felt that a masked wrestler wasn’t marketable. Now, the fact that Bischoff didn’t do anything with them afterwards anyway is besides the point…

(While looking this up, I found this neat explanation as to how Mysterio got around the laws in Mexico that luchadores aren’t supposed to be allowed to remask once they lose the mask: Rey Mysterio Jr was unmasked, but the original Rey Mysterio, his uncle, never unmasked, and by giving his permission for Rey Jr to drop the Jr from his name and go by Rey Mysterio, that technically means he’s using the mask of his uncle and thus it’s ok for him to put that mask on. Clever work around there. Although it helps that the Mexican Athletic Commission hated Bischoff for doing what he did and thus was helpful in letting Rey remask.)

3) Who do you think was the worst King of the Ring ever? I’m not talking about what happened after said wrestler won but the very night where it happened and you said “They picked him to win??”

Out of all the King of the Rings that I was watching/around for, 99 and Billy Gunn. Of all time, 95 and Mabel. In both cases I can see what they were going for, like with most perplexing booking choices, I can see the logic, I just fundamentally disagree with it.

Ray asks about wrestlers’ faces.

Ok so I may be unobservant or something, but I just recently noticed that a large amount of wrestlers have their eyebrows shaved off. Is this done for aesthetic purposes, or does this aid in the matches?

They do? I mean, some wrestlers have very small or blonde eyebrows, I know sometimes wrestlers do it to look weird/monstery, like with Gene Snitsky and Kane, and sometimes guys do it because of ribs…

But there’s no benefit to my knowledge in matches. I mean, if anything it might make things worse, in that sweat doesn’t have anywhere to stop before it gets in your eyes. Maybe wrestlers will thin it out a bit, but it’s not like underarm hair, there’s no wrestler rule that says you should shave your eyebrows.

Stuart asks why Austin’s heel turn didn’t work.

Why was Austin Heel Turn consisted such a flop? Looking back at some of the videos from that time he was getting genuine heel heat from almost all of the crowd. In particular when he was belittling Torrie Wilson and attacking Spike Dudley. At what point did he go from true heel to the turn falling on its ass?

When discussing the Austin Heel Turn, the problem is rarely about the work he did. The ‘My Name Is Stone Cold Steve Austin’ character was, in my mind, one of the best character runs in wrestling history, in terms of skits and TV and logical booking, although I know some people disagree with that one. But certainly I feel the fact that he’d only won the Rumble by the skin of his teeth over a tired guy with a steel chair, and then he’d lost the big match against the guy who organised him getting hit by a car, him needing to be champion, doing whatever it took to get it back, and if that meant aligning with Vince, so be it… The booking was solid, and Austin’s work was good in the role.

But everyone also agrees, that Austin should have taken the belt and then Stunned Vince and been done with it. Because as good as Austin’s work was, the fact is, after Wrestlemania X7, WWF had won the war, WCW was dead, ECW was dead, and WWF was now set to get all the wrestling money, all the viewers, all the attention, all the fans now had to watch WWF, and Austin was so loved, now that he’d turned heel, he’d be the hottest heel of all time and people would line up to see his ass beat, like they did with Hogan, right?

Ratings went down.

Attendance went down.

Buyrates went down.

Merch sales REALLY went down.

Every possible metric that leads to money coming into Vince’s pockets, into Austin’s pockets, went down after the Austin heel turn. Yes, Austin got booed, but less people came to shows to boo him. Less people paid money to watch him be booed on PPV. Fewer t-shirts of his were sold for people to boo in the comfort of their own homes, Austin didn’t draw as a heel. People may have been tired of him as a face, maybe, but people didn’t want to boo him either.

Now by all means, you can argue that it wasn’t his fault, wasn’t the character’s fault, it was people drifting away from wrestling because the war was over, maybe, but the fact is, a lot of fans came to see Austin, and him turning heel sent those fans away.

That’s why the turn was a flop. Getting strong reactions is always a nice thing, but at the end of the day, a turn of that magnitude needed to pay off big time. And it didn’t.

Brendan asks about title changes.

What was the logic of having Bret Hart as well as Diesel win the Title at house shows? I understand a reason could be to drive house show attendance since fans would be more likely to buy a ticket if they have a chance to see something important. But in these two instances, the WWF was trying to establish the next face of the company, so wouldn’t it make sense to put these wins on a bigger stage?

Two different title changes, two different logics.

As far as Bret Hart, it was a conflux of issues. Flair was working hurt, and they didn’t have time to wait for a big show, Vince wanted a new champ ASAP, and by putting the belt on Bret suddenly, it prevented too much backstage politicking to get the booking changed. But the main thing was, it wasn’t meant to be ‘just a house show’ change. The match was filmed, and was supposed to, supposedly, air on Prime Time Wrestling.

But the match wasn’t up to snuff, the scuttlebutt says, so it got ‘bumped’ to Coliseum Video. The fact that it might help house show attendance was an added bonus. Bret himself doesn’t know why it was only on Video.

Diesel, on the other hand, was simple. Diesel was meant to be the new Hogan, and thus he was to win the title like Hogan did, quickly, easily, in MSG, over a heel who had won the belt a short time prior via a submission victory where the face champ didn’t give up. Hell, even Diesel’s head bobbing after he won the belt was pretty much identical to Hogan’s. That was the logic there, recreate, as closely as possible, the Hogan title win.

Second related question; Why did these title wins come out of the blue? Bret had just lost the IC Belt and Diesel had been a heel and wasn’t a complete babyface. Why didn’t they go the normal route of having them built up and win at a PPV?

Because Flair was hurt and thus had to drop the belt ASAP, and they wanted Diesel to be the champ ASAP as well, plus they had no faith in Backlund as champ, alas.

YTR has a simple enough question.

Was “brass ring“ a real term before the CM Punk Chicago promo?

The term has been around since the late 19th century, so overall, yes.

But in terms of wrestling? I think so, but I can’t prove it. It was never mentioned on-air, certainly, but the idea, the concept, that was certainly there for years, and it’s the sort of term I would see Vince McMahon use, and I’m fairly certain I heard of it back in the day, but I can’t prove it. But I’m fairly sure it was a backstage term for years before Punk worked-shot it on TV.

Jeff wonders if this is the year of gold.

So far in 2016 we’ve seen WWE create, in order, the Raw Women’s, Universal, SmackDown Women’s, SmackkDown Tag Team, and Cruiserweight Championships. We’ve also seen TNA establish the Impact Grand Championship, and ROH is supposed to crown their first Six-Man Tag Team Champions by the end of the year. My question is this: has 2016 seen more new titles created in the major promotions than any other year? Counting the Six-Man Title, we’ll have had seven new championships this year. The next closest year I could come up with was 1997, when the WWF created the European and Light Heavyweight Titles (and the LW Title wasn’t even technically new) and WCW created the Women’s Cruiserweight Championship (which they immediately shipped off to Japan and forgot about).

You could argue 2001, maybe, if you say that WCW titles in WWE were ‘created’. But yeah, this year would have to be the winner, if only for WWE’s flurry of new titles. Unless a dear reader has a suggestion.

Stupid Guy asks about a clean sweeping.

This one for the Survivor Series Team DX vs Team Rated RKO match. Is it really the original plan to have this as a clean sweep? CM Punk ate an RKO, and HBK broke the pin. Can’t help thinking they changed it on the fly for Punk not being eliminated because of the crowd reaction. The reason I was wondering was Punk’s position with WWE during his early days and he is not ‘established’ compared to DX and the Hardy Boys. And correct me if I am wrong, he was the only member who ate a finisher..

Depends on how far back you consider ‘original plan’ means. They didn’t call an audible in the ring, beyond Hunter getting Punk on the mic during his DX intro. But the original booking of the match was changed, yes.

According to the scuttlebutt, the original booking had the survivors for the DX/Hardys/Punk team being just The Hardys. DX, along with Punk, were to be eliminated during the match. But then, the story goes, Hunter got that nixed, and since at that point they were forced to have 4 survive, the writers just shrugged and had them clean sweep the board. So there was a change of plans, but not in the ring.

Eric has a bit of fantasy booking that’s obviously been on the list for a bit, given the subject.

What it do, MQ? Just fantasy-booking-curious as to what you thought about this idea I’m putting to use in EWR and how well you think it would translate in reality. The WWE has Hulk Hogan for shits and giggles at the moment, why not use Hulkamania to get an NXT guy over? Use Hogan as a mentor, a mouthpiece. Say this guy called up from NXT gave him a reason to believe again, that Hulkamania will never die. The NXT talent will be the ultimate Hulkamaniac, following Hogan’s grooming, but careful not to carbon copy Hogan, and still be his own name and persona. Build him up as Hogan’s protege. A kid Hulk picked up off the streets, gave him a place to stay, three hot meals a day and a place to train. Give him a scrappy back story how Hulk took him to the Performance Center, and HHH took one look at him and said, “No Thanks.” Give him a harsh upbringing, where he was constantly abused at home and ran away and Hulk found him lifting old paint buckets behind some old warehouse. Soon the inevitable heel turn would come, and we’d AUTOMATICALLY have a hot heel in the company. I just remember Hogan’s emotions as a kid when a buddy would turn on him, and he now, as a broken down old man, the emotions are even edgier and more real than ever cuz at one point Hulk loved the kid more than his own son Nick Hogan himself. I’m just saying. You got Hulk. Use the old bastard and make something more meaningful than a throwaway Flair protege (Miz) and Piper protege (O’Haire) angle. Hogan’s star power is still big enough, and more so always than piper or flair as much as I don’t like to admit it. What do you think, and who would you use from NXT or indies to play the kid?

So, redo the Hogan/Abyss thing from TNA, but have it not suck?

I used to say that you should own the WWE Network before clicking on videos, but then I realised that was the wrong thing to say, since you had to subscribe, not ‘own’ the network. But in this case, you probably could own the TNA company before you click that.

Anyway, sure, that could work, used to be done a lot, in terms of older guys working with a younger guy for a while in a team and then one turns on the other, the angle is fine. Hell, WWE’s running it now with HHH/Rollins! But the slight problem, beyond the whole ‘WWE isn’t admitting Hogan exists just yet’ aspect, is that Hogan’s not able to get in the ring, so there’s no real payoff, unless the guy is allowed to be the one who beats down Hogan so badly he never comes back, which is a hell of a rub to give, but not one I see anyone actually ever getting.

So instead you should be looking at the guys WWE has under contract anyway, but could go once or twice more. Guys like Ricky Steamboat and Adam Pearce, and gals like Sara Del Ray and Sarah Stock, they could totally run a mentor/mentee angle. Steamboat especially, toss in how his own son couldn’t do this anymore, so this new guy is able to carry on his legacy and do what his son couldn’t, and how he’s very proud of him and then of course the guy turns on him and we run Steamboat/whoever.

If there was a magic wand, and after I’d waved it all the times I needed to duplicate Victoria a few hundred times and give myself a lifetime supply of nachos and cider and all that, and I then healed Hogan in both mind and spirit, so he was back and able to run the angle to the conclusion of a match, who’d I pick? I’d want someone totally unknown to the WWE, in terms of not being on TV before. Brennan Williams has his own thing going on right now, and I’m not sure about the rest of the non-NXT show guys just yet… I mean, hell, Hogan should have a say, he should be brought in to look everyone over, take a class or two in promos, then have a say in who he takes, but in terms of guys out there… Brian Cage maybe? He seems the best option, although dear Victoria does WWE have an over-abundance of talent right now. They probably shouldn’t hire anyone else until they lose a few guys…

And on that note, did you know I’m a wrestler?

See, I wanted to include that video, but none of the questions were about me as a wrestler so… Well anyway, that’s all for this week, lots to discuss, get to it, see you all next week!