WCW's end

[GD]

I know that Vince bought it from Turner and they even did a segment on the last episode of Nitro where Shane acknowledges the fact that he bought the company from under Vince's nose (kayfabe).

Did they ever consider keeping Nitro as a separate brand? Did Nitro air simultaneously with RAW on Monday nights after Vince bought it? How did it all go down. A decent detailed answer shall be rewarded with my humble rep.

[Indifferent Clox]

On the episode following shane purchase of nitro they ran a match with nitro logo's. Booker t fought buff bagwell outside the arena, where he remains to this day.

[Destor]

there was an effort to make WCW the second brand (how SD! and RAW now are) but the decided against it for reasons i cant remember

[GD]

On the episode following shane purchase of nitro they ran a match with nitro logo's. Booker t fought buff bagwell outside the arena, where he remains to this day.

A little more discrete?

[Juan]

The original plan was for the WWF-owned WCW to be a babyface group, led by Shane McMahon (who was the owner of WCW in the angle) to go against the heel owner of the World Wrestling Federation Vince McMahon. During May and June 2001, wrestlers identified as being "under contract to WCW" (such as Lance Storm and Hugh Morrus) "invaded" World Wrestling Federation programming, by making several run-ins. The ultimate goal, reportedly, was for WCW to "take over" one of the WWF's two primary programs, either Raw or SmackDown!, and rebrand it as its own separate entity. To test the waters for this, the final twenty minutes of the July 2 Raw telecast was given over to WCW, which brought in its own commentators (Scott Hudson and Arn Anderson), ring announcer (Stacy Keibler), referee (Nick Patrick), ring apron, and Chyron graphics, to present a match between Booker T and Buff Bagwell for Booker's WCW Championship (which he had won on the final episode of WCW Monday Nitro). This continued on SmackDown!, where Gregory Helms lost the WCW Cruiserweight Championship against Billy Kidman and Booker defended the WCW Championship against Diamond Dallas Page.

The Booker/Bagwell title match, however, was very poorly received both by television viewers and the live crowd in the arena, with the two other WCW matches receiving a similar reaction. The decision was thus made to make WCW a heel group who was out to destroy the WWF. On July 9 on Raw, when then-face WCW owner Shane was scheduled to face Page in a street fight, the two instead attacked The Undertaker, turning Shane heel (Page had already debuted in WWF as a heel, as part of a stalker angle with Undertaker and his wife).

[Juan]

Also, the Nitro where Shane revealed he had "bought" WCW was the very last Nitro ever.

[Rammsteinmad]

I was such a huge WCW mark back in the day, I remember reading 'reports' on here that WCW would be 'back soon' etc, and being really excited to see it. I'm still waiting... :(

[Emperor Smeat]

I know there were some attempts to get Ted Turner back into funding a rival promotion (maybe TNA at the time or buy back rights to WCW) but he lost interest in wrestling due to how badly Bischoff and co messed up WCW and the sour result from the AOL-Time Warner merger.

Also remember the WWF had big plans to make Buff the #1 heel for the Nitro segments until the bigger WCW stars would arrive once their contracts ended. He ended up constantly complaining about almost everything backstage to the point the WWF just gave him the boot after 1-2 weeks.

[BollywoodSingh]

Bagwell was so out of shape in that match with Booker T that it killed any momentum the invasion angle had. If that was a strong match, who knows what would have happened. I believe at one point, the plan was for WCW to take over Raw, and WWF would have Smackdown.

[Juan]

Word is that Bagwell faked an injury after a spot with the APA and had his mom call WWE Headquarters to request time off for him lol

[Hanso Amore]

Buff is the biggest self mark ever.

[Destor]

Buff is the biggest self mark ever.
*excluding bret hart

[The MAC]

best there is,was, and ever will be.

[St. Jimmy]

*excluding bret hart

This is what I came here to post.

[whiteyford]

Bagwell was so out of shape in that match with Booker T that it killed any momentum the invasion angle had. If that was a strong match, who knows what would have happened. I believe at one point, the plan was for WCW to take over Raw, and WWF would have Smackdown.

It was supposed to be Lance Storm in Bagwells place but it was decieded Buff was the bigger star of the two so they put him in the match instead. Can't remember if that was from someones shoot inteview,but the same interview said the same thing about Raw being replaced with Nitro.

[MoFo]

In fact, it was originally the plan to operate the WCW brand under WWE ownership when Vince McMahon first purchased WCW, but the WWE failed to get the extra TV timeslot they wanted to air the WCW programming in. They later did get the timeslot, but by this time they scrapped the idea to keep running WCW under WWE ownership and thus used the timeslot for what you see now as Confidential and Velocity on Saturday nights.

[Steveviscious89]

Vince never ruled out keeping the WCW brand alive, but yeah, as the report said, that match on RAW between Booker T and Bagwell did not go over well with the crowd. I remember constant booing and thank goodness they had Austin interfere just to get something going in that segment. I'm glad they gave Buff the boot because he obviously didn't know that they wouldn't take his crap in the WWF like they did in WCW.

[Sting Fan]

Wasnt there a match with Kronik stinking up the place too? Maybe vs. Taker and Kane...

[Mister Sinister]

That was during the InVasion, which was like 3 months afterwards.

[Jordan]

To be honest, all of the guys from WCW sucked during the Invasion compared to WWE wrestlers, except Booker T, Kanyon, Storm, Awesome, and Helms.

[Xero]

And none of those names were actual big names, other than arguably Booker T, and he was bottom of the "big name" pot.

[BollywoodSingh]

Kronik vs. Taker & Kane was at the September 2001 PPV (Unforgiven?) and the match was so bad that WWE wanted to send Kronik to OVW (or whatever the farm league was at the time) and one of the member refused, so they both got released I think.

Booker T and DDP were the only guys that could immediately come into WWE and main event. They turned Booker T into a comedy character and they completed buried DDP. The WWF vs. WCW feud became more of a McMahon family feud.

[LuigiD]

I remember that match.
I remember a slight build up for it. The PPV came around and I am pretty sure Kronik were never seen afterwards.

[Savio]

Booker T and DDP were the only guys that could immediately come into WWE and main event...... and they completed buried DDP and Booker T.

[GD]

So after the match between Booker and Buff, was the whole WCW segment thingy on RAW was dead? Did they ever mention it after that night?

[James Steele]

So after the match between Booker and Buff, was the whole WCW segment thingy on RAW was dead? Did they ever mention it after that night?

They did one on SmackDown! that week also, but it wasn't in the main event and it was a Cruiserweight Championship match.



Here is the WCW RAW match:

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/QyC74s5oTD8" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Here is the WCW SmackDown! match:

<iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/jJumiIrhdbg" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

[DrA]

Kronik vs. Taker & Kane was at the September 2001 PPV (Unforgiven?) and the match was so bad that WWE wanted to send Kronik to OVW (or whatever the farm league was at the time) and one of the member refused, so they both got released I think.

I imagine they had other things on their mind that month.

[Rollermacka]

Kronik vs. Taker & Kane was at the September 2001 PPV (Unforgiven?) and the match was so bad that WWE wanted to send Kronik to OVW (or whatever the farm league was at the time) and one of the member refused, so they both got released I think.


I read it was Byran Clarke (Wrath) that said he wasn't going to OVW. I read he had a pinched nerve in his back and Kane was comming back from a staff infection and wasn't in good health. Basically, I think Undertaker was the only one that was actually ready for the match (I think Brian Adams had something wrong too) and WWE pushed for it anyways

[The Mackem]

They should have spent the extra money on some of the bigger wrestlers like Sting, Goldberg, Flair, Nash or even Steiner to get the fans slightly more interested. Nobody had cared much for the likes of Bagwell in years.

The main issues came from how poorly managed WCW the company was in the first place.

Still, some good memories. The pop for the DDP reveal was intense.

[DLVH84]

Kronik vs. Taker & Kane was at the September 2001 PPV (Unforgiven?) and the match was so bad that WWE wanted to send Kronik to OVW (or whatever the farm league was at the time) and one of the member refused, so they both got released I think.

Actually, Bryan Clark refused to go to OVW, so he was immediately released. Brian Adams, meanwhile, did go to OVW, before being released a couple months later.