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Bruce Prichard On Sting Having Talks With WWE In 1988, His Decision To Stay In WCW, Vince McMahon’s Commentary
In a recent edition of Something to Wrestle, Bruce Prichard discussed Sting having talks with WWE in 1988, Vince McMahon as a commentator, and much more. You can read his comments below.
Bruce Prichard on his thoughts of Vince McMahon as a play-by-play announcer: “Vince was terrible. Vince never called shit. Vince just used cliches and would take you on a ride. However, emotion-wise, I think you would be hard-pressed to find anybody that could match the emotional roller coaster that Vince would take you on. Sometimes it was hyped up a little bit over the top, but there were a lot of Vinceisms back in the day. And I don’t think Vince ever fancied himself as a great play-by-play guy……in the beginning, without a doubt it was out of necessity because his dad’s play-by-play man just walked off the job one day. So, that was why Vince had to do that job, never having done it before. Later on, he was the face that had done it so long that he continued to do it. When I came in 1987, there was always a search for the right play-by-play guy. He didn’t want to do it. He wanted to find the right guy to come in and do play-by-play.”
On who WWE could have considered instead of Bret Hart as the company’s face of the mid-90s: “There was discussion about Tito. I wonder, had we had our backs against the wall, whether or not we would have just said, ‘Let’s go with Shawn.’ Shawn was creeping up there, and we might have gone with Shawn at that time had we not gone with Bret.”
On WWE moving away from traditional Survivor Series matches in 1992: “The feeling was that attractions were what sells and personal issues – getting back to championship matches and having a featured match. The feeling was by marketing, promotions, and Vince, unanmiously, with the exception of Pat and myself, they felt we needed more than just this concept. I would say until the very end, Pat liked the concept matches, as did I.”
On whether WWE considered signing Sting before he eventually joined the company in 2014: “We had talks in 1988. We had talks at different times about, ‘Hey Steve, would you be interested in coming over?’ They just never got further than talks, and they never really materialized beyond that. At the same time, we had Warrior, and I believe that Vince looked at it as, ‘Well, I’ve got Warrior. What do I need another Warrior for?’ And I think Sting kind of looked at it like that – ‘Warrior’s doing our gimmick up there, I’ll do it down here.’ There was a comfort with WCW and Sting.”
If using any of the above quotes, please credit Something to Wrestle with an h/t to 411mania.com for the transcription.
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