Maybe even guys with completely worked barfighting gimmicks. I don't think they necessarily had to be MMA, just clearly guys that were "tougher" than the regulars. WCW production probably couldn't pull this off without it looking hokey, but a fan sending in shaky footage of a Goldberg bar fight, with Goldberg having a shiner and not wanting to talk about it, would be an interesting angle. Tough Guy Who Gave Goldberg A Shiner would come out of the crowd one week and take credit for it. They'd have a pull apart and eventually a match. Maybe he beats up someone expendable to hype up the match a little bit. Maybe he has buddies that joined him. Anyway, building the promotion around Goldberg's strengths is the key.

So guys like Meng, the Giant, etc?

Meng was a cartoon character who used a Tongan Death Grip where he shook his own head for no real reason. But Tonga Fifita as a no-nonsense asskicker? Why not?

Let's not forget that there was a lot of interest in Goldberg vs Bigelow as a Tough Guys Fighting feud until all the late '98/early '99 nWo nonsense got in the way. That could easily have been another title defense feud for Goldberg if he beat Nash. Then do Hogan/Nash fingerpoke of doom as a #1 contenders match, turn Luger, and you'd get Hogan and Luger defenses to milk a couple more months. Keep Wrath's streak going and you'd have him in there too. Really not hard to give Goldberg interesting PPV defenses if they actually tried.

Severn is the Double Crown winner, Goldy feud with Shamrock in matches that involves blood, stiff kicks and cages while Severn defends his title against Big Poppa Pump in matche involving cool mat wrestling, suplexes and slapping around (and cheats to win, of course). Then we eventually get the big rematch and Goldy wins the Double Crown obviously. Shit, I would love my WCW.

I love this as fantasy booking until I remember how wretched Dan Severn was.

 

I thought Severn was awesome.

Used and presented the right way, I still believe Severn could have been awesome. Dan Severn vs Tarzan Goto from the IWA Death Mtach Tournament for the NWA title remains one of my all time favourite match in term of pure fun. Plus Severn could have been good on the mic in a very menacing low-key character (his shoot interview is actually pretty awesome and shows how much character the guy really has). He just had to be directed the right way.

Severn sucked in the WWF but it was the WWF, why wouldn't he. I haven't seen enough of him elsewhere to judge.

But why put all that effort, money and time into a guy who is going to get squashed, won't be known and won't appear again?

Zeus pulled a great SummerSlam buyrate against Hulk Hogan in a tag match as pretty much a one and done heel. You build monsters up for Goldberg to slay, just like they did in the days of Bruno and Hogan. To a certain extent even WCW got that, but they half-assed it.

Because there were enough wrestlers in the WWF that did not suck in the time Severn was there. It was Severn's fault he sucked, not the WWF's.

Severn was a bad fit for the WWF, but he was also booked to fail, as everything involving Jim Cornette in 1998 was.

Of course it was the WWF's fault, they sucked at presenting him and booking him in any way that would make him seem special or different. Plus Severn got there when the WWF got really fucking horrible really quick. I swear there was something to do with Severn so that he would be fun. A guy that can be fun as hell working Tarzan Goto in 1995 (well, Tarzan Goto is awesome mind you) in a sleezy japanese fed can't suck that bad. But yeah, he was a miscast in WWF anyway, they couldn't even book Ken Shamrock the right way, and he had the WWF body. I would have loved to see these guys thrown at Goldy. Well, loved is a big word as I never cared for Goldy one way or another, but as far as building a promotion around him and making it different from the competition, it would have been interesting to me.

Let's not forget that there was a lot of interest in Goldberg vs Bigelow as a Tough Guys Fighting feud until all the late '98/early '99 nWo nonsense got in the way. That could easily have been another title defense feud for Goldberg if he beat Nash. Then do Hogan/Nash fingerpoke of doom as a #1 contenders match, turn Luger, and you'd get Hogan and Luger defenses to milk a couple more months. Keep Wrath's streak going and you'd have him in there too. Really not hard to give Goldberg interesting PPV defenses if they actually tried.

Bigelow wasn't that tough. He got his ass handed to him by Major Payne (even if it may have been a work).

The way they introduced Bam Bam really wasn't that bad, to be honest.

I was told by a friend that a few months ago in a Lance Storm podcast (of all things) Bryan mentioned that Dave used to get luchador names in the 80s and early 90s from ring rats that would fuck them (in their mask) but would take a peek into their wallet when they were in the shower (in their mask) to get their name from their driver's licence. That's classic.

Dave didn't write a lot about lucha in the 80s and very early 90s, really only to start to write more as AAA opened up. Also don't know that he had a lot of sources among Lucha Rats. One would assume they would have had to be wrestling fans he came in contact with, and who called him up. I can't remember a *single* fan that Dave talked to at any lucha show that we went to (which wasn't an insignificant number) who happened to be a woman. The fans he talked to almost always were gringos going to the shows. The other people he talked to were the wrestlers.

 

Maybe Dave had a network of Lucha Rats here in the US who banged lucha stars when they came to the US, were WON readers and sent Dave the info...

 

"Does this make logic?"

-Carlos Espada

 

"But Carlos: the finish was a DQ!"

-Steve Yohe

 

I think something is lost in Alverez Translation. But what he heck... if Dave had a network of lucha rats, more power to him. One wishes perhaps instead in the 80s and early 90s that he'd instead developed a network of Lucha Fans and Lucha Reporters so that he had more coverage of Lucha in those years, since that would have been more historically valuable than the real names of some dudes under masks.

 

John

I heard Meltzer himself tell the story on another podcast some time ago. Who knows what truth there's to it, but the story is pretty glorious.

Who cares about the truth when it's such a great story??? I thought the story was a bit odd but it's hilarious.

 

And John, agree with you 100% on your last paragraph. Dave never really outright replied to me but I asked him a couple of times about the historians voting on the WON HOF on the lucha section. I never really believed there were a lot of people from Mexico, though I'm talking about 10 years ago. I'm pretty sure that if you got a lot of old timers from Mexico, some referees, a few promoters and some long time magazine writers, you'd have people like Fishman (who isn't actually a bad candidate at all but people only know him for AAA) getting in very easily as first ballot or second ballot candidates. I can't imagine such a voting group not getting Villano III or Cien Caras with a ridiculously high percentage (Villano easier than Caras). I didn't even try to get a conversation started to at least discuss the merits of Misioneros de la Muerte (Signo, Navarro and Texano, who IMO should be in) or the first three Brazos.

 

That, along with anybody from WWF/WWE seemingly getting in just by virtue of being there long enough, is what kind of disenfranchised me from the HOF, and as I wasn't watching much wrestling at all anymore I stopped voting just because it wasn't worth to me putting so much effort on studying the candidates anymore. At this stage of my life I'd probably not care too much but back then it was very frustrating. (Rant over)

By the way a lot of other real names came from Steve Sims, who got them in the early 90s from the Weekly Gong yearbooks. The Japanese simply didn't care and reported a lot of them for people like Mil Mascaras. That's also why a lot of names back then were misspelled. It's difficult to translate foreign names from Japanese katakana language unless you know exactly what are you translating. As a somewhat related example, "giro" (twist) and "hilo" (thread) are written the same in Japanese, hence people calling "tope con hilo" to a tope with a twist.

If that's Dave's story... that's really freaking odd. Again, given the amount of lucha coverage in the WON in the 80s (next to none) and pre-AAA (very little in 1990, bit more in 1991, then increasing with AAA)... it's really odd to ponder Dave having a network of Lucha Rats.

 

Maybe he knew just one or two good Lucha Rat sources.

 

John

And I tend to agree with the Sims related response.

 

John

I really like the idea that whenever Meltzer writes something absurd about lucha, his sources are ring rats.

But Cien Caras got virtually no support among ring rats in Mexico, with the feeling he was always on top with people like Mil Mascaras, Dos Caras, Canek and Konnan because he was a rare tall heavyweight with a good body. He was absolutely a star, but not that charismatic or much of a worker.

Is there a site out there that has RAW vs. Nitro quarter hour breakdowns for 1998 (or the whole Monday Night Wars)?

But Cien Caras got virtually no support among ring rats in Mexico, with the feeling he was always on top with people like Mil Mascaras, Dos Caras, Canek and Konnan because he was a rare tall heavyweight with a good body. He was absolutely a star, but not that charismatic or much of a worker.

Or:

 

"Cien Caras got virtually no support among ring rats in Mexico, with the feeling he was always was a family man who didn't show interest in the rats."

 

John

Well if that's the case then Mascara Ano Dos Mil should've been a first ballot HOFer

I've heard the ring rats/driver license story before, but it was for US masked guys in the territory days and was "hardcore fans" rather than Meltzer specifically.