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| =Early History= | =Early History= | ||
| It was purchased by Turner in 1988 from ], which were several different NWA territories, after Vince McMahon refused to sell Turner the WWF. Turner then named it NWA World Championship Wrestling. | It was purchased by Turner in 1988 from ], which were several different NWA territories, after Vince McMahon refused to sell Turner the WWF. Turner then named it NWA World Championship Wrestling. | ||
| WCW became a separate group in ], when the NWA would not recognize the creation of a ]. However, the federation was, by most measures, running a clear #2 to ]'s WWF (now ]). | WCW became a separate group in ], when the NWA would not recognize the creation of a ]. However, the federation was, by most measures, running a clear #2 to ]'s WWF (now ]). | ||
Revision as of 05:01, 15 February 2004
WCW, or World Championship Wrestling was a professional wrestling promotion that existed from 1988 to 2001. It was owned by Ted Turner, then AOL Time Warner. The formation of this group was confusing. WCW was a former member of the National Wrestling Alliance.
Early History
It was purchased by Turner in 1988 from Jim Crockett Promotions, which were several different NWA territories, after Vince McMahon refused to sell Turner the WWF. Turner then named it NWA World Championship Wrestling.
WCW became a separate group in 1991, when the NWA would not recognize the creation of a WCW World Heavyweight Title. However, the federation was, by most measures, running a clear #2 to Vince McMahon's WWF (now WWE).
WCW Under Eric Bischoff
This began to change under the management of Eric Bischoff, after he began recruiting high-profile WWF stars like Hulk Hogan and Randy Savage, around 1995. Hogan defeating 14 time WCW World Champion Ric Flair at Bash at the Beach '95 can perhaps be seen as the birth of a new era in North American pro wrestling.
Monday Night Wars
The other bold step by Bischoff was the launch of the weekly show WCW Monday Nitro. The newly launched Nitro, WCW's flagship show, competed head to head with the WWF flagship show Monday Night Raw, which then screened on the USA Network. Nitro, which aired on Turner's TNT cable network, made its debut from the Mall of America, and featured the shock appearance of then WWF wrestler Lex Luger on a week where Raw was off the air. In the head-to-head ratings the following week, Nitro managed to defeat Raw.
However, for most of the following year, the ratings battle between the 2 federations would be close.
WCW vs. nWo
This changed in 1996, when WCW became the hottest promotion in North America. It did this with the groundbreaking WCW vs. nWo Feud. This feud kicked off with WWF wrestler Scott Hall walking into the ring, unexpectedly, during the middle of a match, where Hall 'declared war' on the whole federation. At the end of a Nitro episode a few weeks later, he was joined by another former WWF wrestler in Kevin Nash, who set out a challenge to any three wrestlers on the WCW roster, against Hall, Nash, and their mystery partner.
At a WCW Pay Per View special named Bash At The Beach '96, the wrestling world saw Hulk Hogan shockingly 'defect' from WCW to the nWo faction. Hogan, as a bad guy, leading the (fictional) nWo (or New World Order of Wrestling) faction in their attempt to "take over" WCW and run the WWF out of business was a compelling, original storyline. Off the back of this, WCW Nitro managed a string of wins against WWF Raw that lasted from mid '96 to early 1998, that included a popular feud between nWo leader Hulk Hogan, and 'on camera' WCW leader Sting.
In late 1997, Bischoff even went as far as attempting to rebrand Nitro as nWo Nitro one week before Starrcade.
This feud was credited to WCW president Eric Bischoff.
Post-nWo
However, after WrestleMania in 1998, the WWF regained the lead in the Monday Night (ratings) Wars with its new WWF Attitude brand, and the classic feud between Vince McMahon and Stone Cold Steve Austin. WCW attempted to counter this by breaking the nWo into the Hogan led, heel nWo Hollywood faction and crowd favourite nWo Wolfpac faction, but many felt that it was a poor rehash of the original WCW vs nWo feud.
WCW's other attempt at ratings supremacy was marketing newcommer Bill Goldberg as an invincible monster. But business quickly fell off for WCW, while the WWF was on the rise. It won the ratings war for the last time in late 1998.
The WCW slowly slid into a period of decline, blamed both on the fact that Kevin Nash was writing the scripts, the tremendous popularity of Attitude era WWF, and the seeming inability for the federation to promote any wrestlers under 40 years old.
"Wheel Chair Wrestling" became a common catch-cry amongst wrestling fans when describing why they stopped watching WCW. Despite having talented younger wrestlers like Chris Jericho, Chris Benoit, Billy Kidman, Chavo Guerrero, Jr., Eddie Guerrero, Scott Steiner, Perry Saturn, Raven, and Booker T on its roster, it seemingly never promoted them beyond the midcard, and if it did, scripted those wrestlers to lose to its older, main event stars. Many of those stars ended up defecting to the WWF.
Bischoff was eventually removed from power in 1999.
WCW After Bischoff
While Eric Bischoff would return for a brief stint in 2000, his replacement (former WWF head writer Vince Russo) wrote lowsy scripts that killed any hope for WCW under Turner.
In late 2000, Bischoff and a group of investors, called Fusient Media Ventures, tried to buy WCW, but no deal could be put into place. WCW was then sold to the WWF, which soon became World Wrestling Entertainment. Despite rumours of a WCW ressurection at the hands of McMahon, the ill-fated Invasion angle (a lame rehash of the WCW vs nWo feud several years earlier) signalled the end of WCW.