After seemingly swimming in an ocean of rapidly declining numbers across the board, World Championship Wrestling went to a strange pair of people as its life preservers--Eric Bischoff and Vince Russo.

In a decision that had been in the works for about one month according to company sources, Brad Siegel completed the circular back-stabbing game which wound up in, not almost, but actually a pro wrestling like tag team, of the two people, former enemies, with seemingly nothing in common, bound together by their hatred for common enemies. Already there are those within the company doubtful the two can remain a cohesive unit over the long haul, with the impression if things are successful, both will want full credit, and if they're not, it won't take long for fingers to be pointed. Of course, that fact will be exploited as the two will work the latter point to try and do a television angle with each other. In the game where political allies take precedence over economic realities, the group that pulled the coup to get rid of Bischoff in early September, headed by Bill Busch, Gary Juster, J.J. Dillon and Kevin Sullivan, and who, barely three months after a much ballyhooed hiring of Russo as head TV writer, eliminated him from power as well, saw the tables turn when they also, after barely two months in power, couldn't turn the declining economic fortunes around.

The problems literally started the moment Russo was relieved of his duties. The new Powers that Be, after doing more to begin restoring some credibility into the world title that had been decimated by the two previous regimes with the surprisingly good Chris Benoit vs. Sid Vicious match, and more so, announcing of the match and post-match interview by Benoit, killed it in less than 24 hours by bungling backstage politics which resulted in Benoit, along with several others, leaving the company without even being asked to drop the title in the ring. After being given unconditional releases to appear on the competition television show just weeks later, it made WCW the laughing stock of not only the wrestling industry, but looking foolish within the TV community as well. About the only right guessing they did in the political handling of that situation was the assumption that, made by people in the company who formerly worked for McMahon and knew him best, that due to his arrogance, WWF wouldn't rub the Benoit departure as champion in their face to embarrass them worse in the PPV community and would force Benoit to start out in the middle where his defection would mean less very quickly.

But after the Russo experiment went haywire when it became clear he desperately needed an editor for his material, Busch went with Sullivan, a morale mistake at a bad time, made worse because Sullivan totally failed to deliver any form of an entertaining product. While Russo and Bischoff purport to have just begun talking in recent days, other sources in WCW peg both working from the outside against the forces that banished each, just as Sullivan had done when he was passed over for the head creative position with the hiring of Russo. According to one source, at the same time Siegel demanded Busch and Sullivan come up with a plan to turn things around for the rest of the year and for Goldberg's return, Bischoff and Russo came up with their own plan, largely built around a storyline where they would be the two protagonists, with Bischoff representing the older wrestlers and Russo the newer wrestlers, feuding on television over power, presented to management as a new NWO type angle. After rumors started breaking, the working of the internet, which is the one thing both men have in common, began. Bischoff continually emphatically denied any interest in the job he'd been lobbying for, when it was clear his successors were doing nothing to reverse the decline started under his watch. Russo, even after the word had broken, was still trying to deny a connection between the two, with the idea they had just started talking, so they could break a big announcement of the connection, to start the angle, on Nitro on Monday. There were already problems among talent with the old vs. new angle, which Bischoff started once before last summer, only to have it fall apart in two weeks because with the exception of Ric Flair (who is politically back out of favor) and Roddy Piper, none of the older wrestlers were willing to be part of the angle that would label them old and force them to put over talent that had not established main event credibility.

The first order of business was to cancel TV tapings on 4/3 in Worcester, MA and 4/4 in Durham, NH, to give them until 4/10 to start fresh with new storylines. However, they didn't cancel the shows, which, given the competition of the NCAA tournament finals and the Raw the day after Wrestlemania, will almost surely lead to the lowest rating in Nitro history on 4/3. Of course, with careful manipulation, they can use that figure as a starting point and claim ratings went up a misleading percent since they started. The idea of shutting down for a few weeks and cancelling the 4/16 PPV show, is not the worst idea, to give the company a fresh coat of paint and start with all new ideas. But one week of a taped show isn't enough time to hold a grand opening, and having to rush to hype a 4/16 PPV show with every match announced and angled for up to this point now in question, only makes it worse.

Officially, Bischoff was hired on 3/22 as the head of the creative end of WCW. Because his deal making was largely responsible for the company running so deeply in red ink in 1999 before he was relieved of his duties on 9/9, he was given no control over the business end of the company. Busch apparently told Siegel that if Bischoff was brought back, he'd quit. Siegel, apparently believed it as much as Busch believed Benoit when, before being given the title, he said he refused to work if his career was in Sullivan's hands, and hired Bischoff. He planned to keep Busch in charge of the business end of the company. Busch then quit, resulting in Siegel having to work half-days at the wrestling office until a successor could be found from outside the wrestling company. Bob Mould, a somewhat legendary progressive rock artist, who was brought in by Juster because of his creative mind for wrestling, and came with strong recommendations from those who talked with him about the business but who many wrestlers didn't like getting ideas from because he himself had never wrestled, and who resigned the first time Russo was given power because Russo didn't listen to his input, resigned that day a second time. The next day, Siegel called a staff meeting at the offices in Smyrna, GA to officially announce the changes. On Friday, Sullivan was told he was basically being put on ice, pretty much put in the same position Russo had been put in. He was still under contract for another two years, but he was being sent home. Dillon remained in his same position and was at the TV tapings in Texas. At this point Juster is still with the company with the word being he is expected to keep his job, but his power will be limited to booking buildings for arena shows. Terry Taylor, who quit WCW because he was tired of being Bischoff's whipping boy, but returned with Russo, Jeff Jarrett, Ed Ferrara and Bill Banks in the WWF exodus in the fall, is expected to stay as well.

On the 3/27 Nitro, announcers Mark Madden and Tony Schiavone, at the expense of calling the matches and hyping the angles for the 4/16 PPV, spent the entire show trumpeting first the angle of whether Russo would agree to work with Bischoff, although neither appeared on camera, and then, hyping the two up as if they were two of the three geniuses, those exact words being used, that created the pro wrestling boom. The third name was never mentioned, although I suppose the name Vince McMahon may have been implied. Russo was hyped as the guy who turned the WWF around and Bischoff as the guy who turned WCW around. There is no questioning the latter statement, as Bischoff took a company that was grossing $30 million a year in 1993 and averaging about $6 million per year in red ink, to where in 1998, the company grossed approximately $200 million and garnered a $55 million profit. But even when the company was at its peak, its future, or lack thereof, was clear. He built around wrestlers past their prime. Having the mind set where Bischoff was brainwashed into believing, perhaps by the established stars looking to keep their gravy train (in the history of the industry, the big names never made so much money working so few matches), or truly believed, the younger wrestlers with the exception of Bill Goldberg (who himself was a career that at one point looked like he could be the hottest star ever curtailed) couldn't be top stars pointing to whatever weakness the veterans could exploit led to the current situation. It created a situation where it opened the door for the WWF to turn the tables around with an entire cast of characters of either new stars created in the past few years, or former WCW wrestlers thought of as not being marketable as headliners that wound up being some of the biggest money draws in the history of the industry. WCW also, by and large, produced an incredibly bad year of television, PPV and arena shows in 1999 as morale dropped and income plummeted, with the company losing in excess of $15 million by the end of the year. Bischoff's track record was hardly strong by the time of his departure, and his business judgement was very questionable after the Master P, KISS and Megadeth fiascos, paying big money to bring back Dennis Rodman after a point where he meant nothing, and losing Chris Jericho largely due to a lack of effort in maintaining him and being brainwashed with the idea that he couldn't be a top star.

Although Russo has been prone to exaggerate statistics greatly, as he garnered more creative power in WWF, the company went from a company that grossed $81.8 million, and suffering losses of $6.5 million in 1996-97, to when he left in 1998-99, the company grossed $251.4 million and had a pre-tax profit of $56.0 million with TV ratings starting out at about a 2.4 clip on Mondays to 6.1 average when he left.

Russo, when leaving, protested that he never got his full credit for his part in turning the company around. He did such a great job of media relations that when he left, the big question in and even out of the industry was which Vince deserved the credit for the amazing success of the WWF. Unfortunately for Russo, the next few months seemed to answer the question that it was the other Vince. WWF never missed a beat, and TV ratings, house show revenue and all forms of income have increased, in some categories greatly, since Russo left, and that's during a period WWF was without its biggest stars of the previous year, Steve Austin and Undertaker, and during a period where McMahon kept himself off television in order to establish Stephanie McMahon and Hunter Hearst Helmsley as superstars.

To their credit, Bischoff did take a company that was one Ted Turner vote away from being closed down, to the company that revitalized the industry and through the implementation of Nitro, made Monday pro wrestling night among a peak at one point of 12 million Americans each week. Russo did play a big part in the decision making process of the WWF dropping a failing family entertainment context, and largely copying the strip club Paul Heyman formula of sex and violence which turned the company around.

But their last period on their respective jobs did nothing to help their reputations. Even after the numbers started free-falling and well past the point anyone could see changes needed to be made, Bischoff never planned for the future, spent ridiculous amounts of money for ratings destroying skits with helicopters filming or rock bands playing, and never made the necessary changes to produce good television, arena shows and PPV shows which the competition began dominating in. Regurgitating the same people who were the big stars of the industry clearly was going to have a shelf life under the best of circumstances and all the indications it was time to cut losses were ignored. It isn't as if anyone with half a brain even during the golden era of WCW couldn't see what was going to happen two years later. By the end, Bischoff had turned the creative over to Nash, who seemed only interested in pushing himself and his own program and a few friends like Luger and Scott Steiner, along with Hogan, because he recognized Hogan turning against him would cost him his power. As much as Sullivan can't be blamed for the mess he inherited, the fact is, he did nothing to make the necessary changes to start a rebuilding process either, attempting instead because of the nature of the beast to play the political game of pushing the most powerful backstage player, Hogan, probably smartly knowing that doing the right thing for the long-term would result in a terrible short-term income drop, result in Hogan turning on him, and him losing his power. It's the same philosophy that Russo, whose contract specified being tied to ratings increases, knowing the short-term pressure he'd be under, likely will be politically forced to take. Nevertheless, the short-term income drop was terrible even with pushing the names from the past, who each week were looking more and more like the past than ever before. Sullivan can claim he was terribly handicapped, in particular with injuries to Bill Goldberg and Bret Hart, who the original plans were to build 2000 around in a world title chase scenario, leaving no alternative but to push Sid Vicious, a total failure as champion, Jeff Jarrett, a good hard worker with no main event charisma, Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair, Sting and Lex Luger, all of whom the public has tired of in their dated roles, and most questionable of all, The Harris Twins. But the only new talent even tried to be pushed was the laughable Wall, the uncharismatic Artist and Vampiro, who was the only newcomer who showed even signs of being accepted by fans, and until this week with Wall in the Hogan angle, only Vampiro was allowed to mix with the top stars, and even he was never actually allowed to win and was portrayed as Sting's weaker half.

Russo appeared when he took over in October to make the cosmetic changes of working his angle with Hogan, which looks even dumber in hindsight given the resultant effect on subsequent PPV buy rates with the finishes of the Havoc and Starrcade shows, and sending Flair packing for a few months with a storyline with so little credibility that was forgotten completely upon his return. He did try to push Bagwell, Benoit and Jarrett. But it wasn't long before he panicked, was bringing back Piper, and even worse, in a desperate attempt for a rating, the likes of George Steele and Jimmy Snuka, and commissioned dangerous angles which resulted in injuries to Goldberg and Jarrett. Russo's ability to hype himself was strong enough that ratings were up his first few weeks on the job, and Havoc, largely due to that momentum, did nearly double the buy rate of Fall Brawl. But things declined from there. The Hogan-Sting screw-job at Havoc led to a worse buy rate for Mayhem. A world title tournament consisting of terrible matches, nearly everyone with interference, and the joke of bringing Madusa into the tournament twice, killed the title that Hart won, and whatever was left of that title was destroyed with a tired 1997 Survivor Series reprise at Starrcade. Because of poor shows and unsatisfying endings, subsequent buy rates this year reached unheard of lows, as WCW with its huge talent payroll and six hours of weekly cable TV fell behind ECW in that department. House show business plummeted due to the television product context that the wrestling itself wasn't important.

In October, Russo's first month in power, the attendance averaged 4,628 per show for a product already destroyed by the Nash regime, the Nitro rating averaged 3.08 and the Havoc buy rate was 0.52. By January, the last month under his watch (Russo was in power through 1/14, but live show attendance were tickets bought largely in December and the entire PPV hype was completed before he was done), attendance was averaging 3,593, the rating of 3.10 due to the switch from three hours to two was the equivalent of about a 2.9, and the buy rate was down to 0.26. His style of writing resulted in ratings declining at a slower rate than before, but they still declined, but devastated the other two business categories. Just six weeks later, the ratings have declined at an even faster rate, house shows are falling at a slower rate, and the fiasco from January, which is more Busch's fault than anyone's (although a Battle Royal with Tank Abbott ending up as world champion wouldn't have been a positive either), have resulted in the already anemic buy rates being cut in half.

For those who save issues, re-read the lead story in the 9/27 Observer, just after Bischoff was dumped and just before the decision was made to hire Russo. We reported that if things don't change, six months from now, which would be today, "they won't be able to give those tickets away" and talked about 3,000 paid attendance per show and 2.5 ratings, which is the point we're at now. We noted that the fad fans had already checked out and WCW was left with a very loyal audience that was tired of having its intelligence insulted. It was obvious then what changes had to be made, almost none of which have been in the past six months. Russo, to his credit, understood some of them, such as the major league look and feel as it pertained to music and ring entrances and even costuming, but didn't understand the product context, thinking the wrestling industry was driven by the writing of television, as opposed to numerous factors, one of which is the workrate and cohesive context of the storyline of the product. In comparison to those who followed him, who did nothing for the look and feel of a minor league looking production attempting to save money not understanding what the consequences would be to income at the other end, and still made the context laughable, he does look better in comparison. Maybe, in the mess that WCW is in today, that's all that can be hoped for.

But if neither had learned anything about why they were gone, and instead blames their problems on people like Dillon, Juster, Busch or Sullivan, we're in for a cruiserweight feud with Madusa vs. Oklahoma, pinata matches and more food fights with the Nitro girls, and that was all worse them what followed. With the political realities of people in power looking to protect their power and wrestlers having no respect for authority with the knowledge it's going to be gone quick enough anyway, no matter how silly it looks to fans watching and attempting to enjoy a product that just hasn't been enjoyable consistently for two years, and now pay to bring signs that say, "I'd rather be at Smackdown," any hopes for improvement may be unrealistic. WCW is a divorced woman with kids (this works with guys too, it's not meant as being sexist), desperately going from one man to another every two months looking for a father for them and a husband for her. It becomes an endless cycle, and the kids quickly learn to not get emotionally involved, so its doomed almost before it starts, figuring they'll be gone in their two months anyway. Because of that, it can almost never succeed in creating a family atmosphere.

Paced by a strong main event involving Vince McMahon in the ring, Raw drew a 6.64 rating (6.51 first hour; 6.76 second hour) and a 10.3 share in the Wrestlemania go-home week. Nitro drew a 2.60 rating (3.11 first hour; 2.15 second hour) and a 3.8 share for its annual spring breakout show from South Padre Island.

Raw's main event of Vince & Rock vs. Shane & Show beat out the numbers for Rock putting his career on the line, and for the originally advertised Wrestlemania main event two weeks early, doing a 6.90 final quarter and 7.56 over-run. Nitro's main event of Hogan vs. Wall did a 2.27 rating. The combined wrestling audience hit 10 million viewers for the first time in months.

Head-to-head quarters saw Raw at 6.10 (opening monologue with McMahons & HHH) to 2.38 (Sting & Vampiro vs. Luger & Flair), Raw at 6.89 (continuation of open with brawl) to 1.88 (Meng vs. Parka, Bif Naked video), Raw at 6.35 (Chyna & Jericho vs. Benoit & Guerrero, Crash vs. Bob Holly) to 2.20 (Funk vs. Morrus) and Raw at 6.42 (Rikishi vs. Dogg) to 2.08 (Jarrett & Steiner vs. Hennig & Bagwell).

Smackdown on 3/23 drew a 4.76 rating and a 7.0 share. Thunder on 3/22 drew a 2.09 rating and 3.3 share. As usual, the open of the show because of the strong lead-in, did a 2.63 and the rating declined almost continually as the show went on, which is a horrible sign for an unopposed wrestling show, ending at 1.91 for Hogan vs. Rhodes, which was the lowest point of the show.

All the weekend numbers were down as Livewire did a 1.3 (its first time under 1 million homes in years, Superstars did a 1.6 and Sunday Night Heat fell to 2.76. Heat also had a big chunk bitten out of its usual rating on Oscars night last year. WCW Saturday Night did another 1.3, tying its all-time low mark that the show has hit numerous times over the past few years.

ECW on 3/24 drew an 0.76 rating and 1.3 share, its second straight disappointing week and not all that far off its record low. RollerJam dropped as well to an 0.52 paced by that stupid angle where the same actor was clearly playing himself and his twin brother.

 At this point, every angle that was done on TV this week was meaningless because everything starts anew in two weeks. There isn't one match certain for Spring Stampede nor will there be until 4/10. The only major angle they are pushing is to build toward Bischoff vs. Russo but nobody knows where the chips fall from there. Russo will be doing most of the writing and one thing he did say in an interview at 1wrestling.com that was a shoot is that he hadn't even watched one WCW TV show from the time he was axed until this past week, which you can take however you'd like

Nitro on 3/27 from South Padre Island, TX was the annual spring breakout show. The positive is with all the cut-ins from beach parties, it seemed like everyone was having fun, which is usually not the case when one watches WCW. The audience consisting of spring breakers didn't seem as burned out by the bad wrestling as a crowd that had paid money to see it. Still, whatever atmosphere improvements there were, was already killed early in the show with the "I wish I was at Raw" sign, right in front of the camera, flashed throughout the show, which firmly established the product as bush league. Show opened with a woman flashing Gene Okerlund. Kimberly then came out, looking absolutely nothing like the woman in the "first date" photo in DDP's book. To say she looked incredible would be a major understatement. She introduced Page, who pushed the movie like crazy. The rest of the show consisted of Mark Madden and Tony Schiavone constantly pushing that Russo & Bischoff were coming. They showed the angle to set up the Mancow vs. Jimmy Hart match at Spring Stampede where Hart attacked Mancow, seemingly for no reason. As the angle was explained to me ahead of time, Mancow was going to bury WCW for being so bad, but they didn't make it clear what it was, and people in the company were very disappointed with the lack of pub in Chicago doing the angle got. Artist did a skit with three unknowns where Paisley picked his opponent, picking Michael Modest. Don Harris was shown at the pool with his arm in a sling. They announced that Sid, who wasn't there because he suffered a shoulder injury (okay, I can see not wrestling with a shoulder injury, but if you're the world champion, I can't see not showing up to television to at least cut promos) so to cover for it they announced he had put up a $500,000 bounty on Hogan's head, as if anyone could possibly believe that. Sid is off the house shows this weekend in Baltimore and Pittsburgh where he was scheduled to main event. No idea who will replace him. Modest beat Artist with the emerald erosion in 3:40. Candido was there, ending rumors of his departure. The announcers totally ignored the match. Madden was instructed to play dumb and not even know who Modest was for storyline purposes which was hilarious because he had talked about "Beyond the Mat" just the previous week on Nitro, which I don't believe he actually has seen, but it's hard to see that movie and not know Modest. Of course, with that storyline being handed to them, they ignored it. This wasn't 1% as dumb as taking Hart off television for several weeks after Shadows aired on A&E, but conceptually it's the same thing. The announcers, by instructions, totally ignored the storyline the two wrestlers were supposed to be telling of the unknown beating the champ in a non-title because all they were allowed to do was push Russo and Bischoff. Guerrero Jr. also came out with Candido. Artist collided with Paisley leading to the finish. They barely even acknowledged the finish. Modest looked good on his debut. Even though it was a non-title match, Artist was booked to go over clean until Mike Graham, for whatever reason, spoke up for how stupid him losing his debut in a non-title would be if they would ever have plans for him. That may not be good for Modest, because Russo and Graham don't get along and someone thought to be favored by Graham isn't necessarily good this week. Ron Harris beat Booker in 1:39 when Don took off his sling, interfered, and they did the H-bomb. The only notable thing is that Booker hit a uranage on Ron that didn't look half bad. After the match, the new Heat came down and Booker was holding his own until Cash squashed him. Kidman came out for the save, but of course, he got creamed as well. Vampiro did an interview telling Hogan someone had placed a bounty on him for a half mil. He said he didn't know who did it. That was funny since the announcers already told us that Sid did it. Hogan didn't know about the bounty until Vamp told him, but as he continued his interview, he acted as if he knew it was Sid as well. Hogan did an interview. Hogan got a very disappointing pop. He put over Vampiro as the wrestler of the future, since he's at least told people he wants to work with him in the tag team break-up angle at some point. He went so far as to put Vampiro over as being possibly the next Hogan. Wall was on the roof of the hotel. Hogan had to go impromptu for a long time because the person who was supposed to tell Wall to go to the roof forgot, and by the time this mistake was figured, Hogan had to stretch a long time. Jung Dragons beat Disco & Vito & Johnny. Dragons did a funny Three Count imitation singing the song in Japanese. They stopped just before it could actually get a crowd reaction. Fast paced with some good moves but rough around the edges. Jamie-san pinned Disco in 4:27 after a tidal wave type double splash. The Harris Twins then came out and beat up both teams, including no selling the Dragons to make them look totally foolish. And they wonder why their young babyfaces never get over. People won't cheer for fools. Sting & Vampiro beat Flair & Luger in 5:29 when Sting pinned Luger in the Gulf of Mexico. Luger ended up taking a bump in the pool, he threw a waiter in the pool, Sting threw sauce all over him. They wound up brawling on the beach and Luger took a backdrop and a piledriver in the gulf. Liz went to throw something at Sting, totally missed, and turned to the camera and starting laughing. She's got 18 years in the business and still has no poise under pressure. Supposedly Flair and Vampiro worked really well together in the ring, but nobody saw it. The original finish was Vampiro pinning Flair, but while Flair didn't refuse it, he wasn't happy either, and they adjusted. Meng pinned Parka in :51 with the death grip. Fans didn't care about Parka. Madden said Meng had an Angela Davis haircut. I seem to remember Angela Davis as a school teacher at the University of California about 30 years ago. Abbott and Finlay wound up brawling at ringside. A commercial ran for upcoming dates, which still plugged getting tickets for Worcester and Durham, both of which are canceled. They aired a Bif Naked music video to push "Ready to Rumble," which was a ratings killer. Funk NC Morrus in 5:07. Morrus power bombed Funk on the floor and he was hurting really badly legit from that as there was little give. Funk took a terrible amount of punishment in this match. At least it told a story, but that's a lot of pain to go through for a match not designed to get over or mean anything. Rhodes did a run-in, hitting Funk, Morrus and ref Mickey Jay with a chair shot. Morrus moonsaulted Jay after the match. Morrus moonsaulted Funk just before Rhodes' run-in. Hogan did another interview. Steiner & Jarrett beat Bagwell & Hennig in 4:26 when Jarrett hit Hennig with the guitar and Steiner put him in the recliner. Bagwell didn't make the save because he was trying to pick up on the women. Midajah picked up some brownie points over the weekend since she accompanied Jarrett at the house shows, while the other two didn't seem all that interested in working on the road. Finally Wall beat Hogan via DQ in 4:40. To Hogan's credit, at least his chair shots are to the back where you can hit hard without rattling the brain. Hogan got up from the choke slam, but allowed Wall to get up from the legdrop. Did I mention that Hogan put up $500,000 so this match was supposedly for $1 million. The original finish was Hogan winning clean, but he vetoed in and instead booked where Wall popped up from his finisher, Vampiro came in to help him for the DQ, they both put Wall through a table, but he got up from that as well

Thunder on 3/28 in Houston which drew about 1,700 paid coming one day after WWF sold out the same city for Raw. Bobby Heenan still announced, which came after nearly tons of web sites had reported his being fired from the company. They also reported Tony Schiavone being off Nitro, which also isn't the case, at least at press time. No interviews were cut except more of those "What do you think of Bischoff and Russo working together?" things, since nobody had any idea where their storylines were going. Said to be a bad show. For World Wide, Lane & Rave beat Villanos, Finlay beat Chuck Palumbo and Morrus pinned Smiley. For Thunder, Candido beat Guerrero in a match which included interference from Modest and Artist. The interference messed up what was a decent match. Duggan pinned Barbarian. Rhodes pinned Mr. Jones. Funk interfered but Rhodes still won. Silver King & Dandy beat Helms & Moore. The story was that Evan Karagias was hitting on Miss Hancock and Helms & Moore were distracted trying to get him to pay attention to the match, causing their demise. Said to be the second best match on the show. Abbott destroyed Disco. Story here is Vito & Johnny booked Disco into a match with Abbott because they were mad Disco hadn't been able to get them a tag title rematch. Booker beat Jarrett via DQ in the best match on the show when Harris Twins interfered often. Vito & Johnny beat New Heat via DQ in the worst match on the show. Told you'd have to see it to believe how bad it was. Ron Harris pinned Kidman when Don, still doing the arm in a sling gimmick, interfered. Knobs beat Dog. Now that Knobs and Dog have turned on each other to start a heated feud, Dog is being walked to the ring by the referee. Bagwell pinned Parka. TV main was Vampiro NC Wall in a match described as very sloppy

Thunder on 3/21 from Orlando had its ups and downs. Abbott NC Finlay in 1:41 in what was probably the most entertaining Abbott match up to this point. Finlay was taking him down and seemed like he was blowing him up on the mat. Abbott threw the KO punch when Meng came out. Hogan and Sid were fighting backstage. Finlay did an interview saying Abbott is green and didn't have it when Hogan and Sid brawled into the ring and Finlay, after being the first person who could carry Abbott, got as his reward, the ability to do an interview and get choke slammed by Sid like a jibroni. At this point there was a sign in the crowd saying "I'd rather be at Smackdown." Even the people given free tickets have turned on these guys. Sid did an interview and said when Hogan left, he was the one who carried the company. That's nothing one would want to put on their resume. Can you imagine in a real entertainment job, I was the top attraction for a record company when people stopped buying all our records. Three Count beat Jung Dragons in 3:28 when Shane Helms pinned Yong Yang with a frog splash. Hayashi looked fantastic. Where did Yang come from? He's really talented. This was really entertaining. These teams, with the right push, can both get over strong simply because they are entertaining, particularly in a pushed feud against each other building to the right kind of gimmick matches and stips with background talk and storyline. Of course, they won't be given any of this, be given any credibility and won't be booked in a manner to get any, so fans know enough not to care. Chavo Guerrero Jr. pinned Candido in 4:04 when Artist hit Candido with the WORST DDT ever in wrestling. Even though Guerrero is one of the most underrated and underpushed performers in the U.S., it shows that WCW wanted to make sure Candido was never taken seriously by having him job on his second TV. It doesn't matter how funny his interviews are or aren't when you're booked in that way, although it appears all that is a moot point now. Los Fabulous beat XS in 2:37 when Dandy pinned Lane with La Magistral, which ten years ago in Mexico when it was invented was actually called the Dandina. Rave is an example of the Peter Principle in WCW. He had great charisma at ringside carrying the signs and had potential to be a great manager. He's totally awful at working a match. So what role do they have him in? Scott Steiner beat Chuck Palumbo in 4:00 with the recliner. Palumbo showed potential, so of course, they introduce him as a jobber. He should be kept off TV until he's ready and be given a minor push up to a level he can hang and make an impression rather than give people the jobber first impression. Vampiro pinned Disco in 4:23. Luger and Flair attacked him afterwards until Sting made the save. Cat (Miller) beat Dog in 3:07. Mike Jones, a few weeks after doing an interview saying he wasn't going to be playing any more demeaning characters, is now Mr. Jones, basically acting as Cat's valet. Totally horrible. After the match, Knobs found Dog eating his socks. He drove him away with Dog's head out the window before abandoning him. Hopefully that means the gimmick is dead. I mean, it's dead either way, just hopefully we don't have to watch that specific dead gimmick. Morrus pinned Demon in 2:46 with a moonsault. Buff tried to pick up on a women in the technical crew and she blew him off bad. I think it's going to come out that somebody has told all the women nasty rumors about him so nobody wants to have anything to do with him. Actually, I think now it's just going to be dropped and forgotten. But he does have the worst pick-up lines of anyone on weekly television, which is not exactly a babyface characteristic for a pretty boy. Bagwell beat Jarrett via DQ in 2:48 when Steiner interfered. Bagwell was holding his own against Jarrett and the Twins. Hennig made the save, but Jarrett clocked him with a guitar Steiner put Bagwell in the recliner. Finally Hogan pinned Rhodes in 6:20. Terrible. Rhodes first got DQ'd for hitting Hogan and ref Nick Patrick with the ring bell. Patrick ordered the match to be re-started, and Hogan immediately legdropped him for the pin. Backstage Sid choke slammed Jimmy Hart through a table with all kinds of mats underneath. The least they could have done is put a cloth on the table so every fan couldn't see just how gimmicked the stunt was. Sid then hit Hogan with a weak chair shot and that was it

Michael Modest had his try-out match against Elix Skipper which was said to have been a great match. His timing couldn't have been better, since he came in looking like the son of Kevin Sullivan and got the try-out from people whose power looks to be nil. After the live show was over, local indie wrestler Classy Chris Nelson faced local DJ Russ Rollins with the DJ going over

Hogan was on WJRR in Orlando on 3/21 promoting Thunder later that night. Besides hyping his angle with Sid, he ran down a lot of WCW, saying Bret Hart was up in Canada and couldn't remember what WCW was, that DDP was out with a broken fingernail and that WCW needs guys that will crawl through broken glass with one arm in a sling to sacrifice and get in the ring. Hogan praised Vampiro and said Kidman should train like Torrie. When someone asked him about Perry Saturn's comments, he said those guys were just making excuses for their failures and they should have moved him out of the way. Bill Banks on WCW live said that not only does Hogan have creative control, but he still has guaranteed six PPV main events for each of the next two years. We asked about Hogan's deal and were told it was six PPV main events in total remaining but that's not to say which story is the true one. Hogan had been telling people he had four PPV matches left on his contract. Hogan did p.r. work for the 4/16 PPV in Chicago which resulted in 4,000 tickets sold for $160,000 the first day they were put on sale on 3/24. While that figure would have been a major disappointment as recently as a few months back, after the recent gates, it was considered a positive

The booking plan was for Tammy Sytch to debut on the 4/16 PPV attacking Paisley when she tried to interfere in a Chris Candido vs. Artist cruiserweight title match

Variety ran a story on WCW revamping its PPV department, talking about the elimination of Jay Haseman as head of PPV and that next month Aaron Blitzstein, an executive at artist-management company G.A.S. entertainment will take over the department as WCW Vice President of Marketing. Also in the department will be Tom Hunt, who ran the hotline business, left for the Cartoon Network, and returned as Director of PPV marketing and promotions. Hunt said the key is that WCW will decrease the amount of money it spends on advertising while increasing money on direct marketing. This new strategy will start with the promotion of the 7/9 Bash at the Beach show. WCW will promote contests tied to the event with the winner escorting Bill Goldberg to the ring. They will also follow in WWF's lead, as everyone who sends a copy of their cable bill will get a Goldberg doll. The announcers will also be instructed to plug the PPV more often during the television shows. Nowhere in this strategy did they mention presenting shows the audience enjoys and booking finishes that don't leave fans feeling like they've wasted $29.95. They don't need marketing executives to come up with ways to turn it around. Book matches that going in, look good on paper rather than simply throwing matches out there to fill up a show even though on paper they don't look to have a prayer of being entertaining. Book finishes not to leave fans frustrated, but to leave them feel like what they saw was important and not something the results of which won't matter by the end of Nitro the next night (granted, WWF does the same thing, but since their PPVs aren't a sinking ship, they can screw their audience right now with impunity, not that they do regularly, but they can, just as WCW could two years ago). When the shows are good, and the finishes are satisfying, and they string together three or four in a row, word will get around and it'll turn around. Repeating all the same mistakes and trying to come up with new marketing plans after the fact will yield negative results

Brad Armstrong will be out of action for several months with a knee injury. Armstrong was in the parking lot when Juventud Guerrera and Psicosis' were driving in their rental car goofing off and accidentally injured him while reprising a wrestling angle of running him over. Armstrong had some sort of a blow-up with management at a recent TV taping about how he was being used, which isn't relevant to this story

Les Thatcher and his Heartland Wrestling Association have signed a two-year minor league deal with WCW. Thatcher had been negotiating with both WWF and WCW and WCW made the better offer. Thatcher will do basically graduate course training for some of the Power Plant wrestlers and he'll also start running six shows per month with WCW sending younger wrestlers to work on his shows to gain experience performing in front of a crowd

Bret Hart was on the Vicki Gabreau show in Canada which aired on 3/28 with Roddy Piper. Piper started talking, in detail, about this classic match the two had at the Toronto Skydome, which, of course, never took place. Apparently in the original copy of the current book on Hart that's out, Piper, who wrote an introduction chapter, talked about the same Skydome match, but the editors changed it to taking place at the Market Square Arena in Indianapolis, which is at least closer in that Hart and Piper did wrestle at the 1992 Wrestlemania at the Hoosier Dome

On UPN 9 in New York, doing their hook to keep wrestling fans after Smackdown ends, on 3/23 talked about the new wrestling movie ("Ready to Rumble") and said, "Hey WWF fans, there's a new movie out with some of the WWF's biggest stars" and never mentioned WCW

The local Tijuana newspaper La Frontera ran a story about Halloween and Damian joining Sonny Onoo's lawsuit against WCW. Damian and Halloween were both fired with one year remaining on their contracts while being out with injuries. Lizmark Jr. and Hector Garza are also involved. Of course with Bischoff in charge, it's expected this will quickly disappear

Christopher Daniels is expected to start on 4/10. I just saw him on a tape from Jim Kettner's Super 8 tournament a few weeks back in Wilmington, DE and he's got a new look which makes him look more like a star, and in the ring, the guy has improved a lot over the past year doing the Michinoku tours

A correction on the thing about Chris Kanyon getting his gimmick from Marty "Cham Pain" Garner. According to Raven, he came up with the gimmick and name Chris "Champagne" Kanyon and the look. Garner used the name but it was a different gimmick. I believe Kanyon called Garner about usage of the name, not the gimmick

There are forces trying to now open the door for a return of Shane Douglas

Konnan's suspension ends on 4/1 so he should also be back imminently

Thunder tapings on 3/21 in Orlando, FL at Waterhouse Centre drew 2,443 paid and 4,298 comps for a $51,785 house. 3/25 in Abilene, TX for a house show drew 2,945 paying $53,256.