In the Fall of 1991, NWA World Heavyweight Champion Ric Flair left the NWA and WCW for the World Wrestling Federation. It was unprecedented! No one ever thought they would see Ric Flair in the WWF. What made matters even more interesting is that he showed up on WWF television with the Championship belt. Of course, it was blurred on television to prevent lawsuits. They never referred to it as the NWA Title and never mentioned the letters NWA or WCW. Flair was calling himself the real World Champion.
At the time, Flair had just about had enough with the new management at WCW. WCW Executive Vice President at the time, Jim Herd, was making many changes. It's still speculation but one of those changes allegedly was to have Flair become known as Sparticus, cut his hair, and wear an earring. I'm not in the business, don't claim to be, nor have I ever booked a wrestling storyline; but that is the dumbest thing I've ever heard! If that was true, Flair had similar thoughts. Flair was butting heads with WCW management and didn't generally like the direction of the company. Mind you, this is before Eric Bischoff took over.
There was a reason Flair and the WWF were able to present the belt on television. To counter the lawsuit against Flair for doing such a thing, he had a solid case that the physical belt belonged to him. That was partially true as Flair had paid the $25,000 deposit for ownership of the belt while he was champion. Flair claims he never got the deposit back, therefore not giving the belt back, as per the NWA's agreement at the time. Because it took such a long time for this lawsuit to be settled, WCW created a new interim physical Championship belt.
For weeks, Bobby "The Brain" Heenan had been promoting the arrival of the real World Champion, never mentioning Ric Flair's name. Rowdy Roddy Piper confronted Heenan about it, even spitting upon the NWA World Heavyweight Title. Finally, Flair showed up, confronting Piper and mentioning his intention on one day meeting Hulk Hogan in the ring, along with taking the WWF Title for himself. The seeds were planted and the thought of a match between Hogan and Flair caused fans to salivate. It was a dream match! Unfortunately, that dream match never to place on the big stage in the WWF and we had to wait to see that match on television until WCW did it at Bash At the Beach two years later.
To this day, I still don't understand why that match didn't take place at WrestleMania! I read something about Hogan/Flair matches happening in the House Show circuit and apparently didn't draw as well as they thought it could. I don't really buy that for some reason! Don't get me wrong, the match between Ric Flair and Randy "Macho Man" Savage was a classic and was one of two matches that saved a fairly lackluster card. However, many people wanted to see the main event of Hogan and Flair.
After two controversial Title matches between Hogan and the Undertaker, the WWF World Heavyweight Championship was held up. The new champion would be decided in the 1992 Royal Rumble match. 30 superstars had a chance to become the champion. It was an incredible event! The match itself contained former WWF Champions such as Hulk Hogan, Randy Savage, Undertaker, Sgt. Slaughter, and the Iron Shiek, along with former NWA Champions such as Kerry Von Erich and Flair himself.
Towards the end of the Royal Rumble match, the final 3 were Hogan, Flair, and Sid Justice. Everyone knows the rules of the Royal Rumble state it's every man for himself, therefore all is fair in love and eliminations! Sid took advantage of this and tossed Hogan out, to the shock of the crowd, as many pegged Hogan to win the whole thing. After all, he had won the previous two Rumbles. Uncharacteristic of Hogan, he threw a fit and after feigning shaking Sid's hand, he didn't let go and tried to pull Sid out. Flair took advantage of the opportunity and dumped Sid over, becoming the new WWF World Heavyweight Champion. Not only that, Flair had entered the match at number 3 and lasted nearly an hour. To quote a part of his victory speech, Flair said: "...with a tear in my eye, this is the greatest moment of my life!" I'll never forget that!
Despite implications of going into WrestleMania VIII with Flair as champion and Hogan as challenger, other things had developed, namely a new feud between Hogan and Sid. The crowd was audible in actually booing Hogan for his antics during the Rumble. It's not the first time he did such a thing and that's a whole new blog for the future so look for that. Gorilla Monsoon did his best on commentary to cover it up.
The WWF held a press conference that included new champion Flair, his Executive Consultant Mr. Perfect, and WWF President Jack Tunney. The panel included all the men Tunney deemed fit for a possible main event title shot at WrestleMania with Flair. Those men were Hulk Hogan, Sid Justice, Randy Savage, Undertaker, and Roddy Piper. As Tunney was about to make the announcement, he pointed toward what Sid thought was his way, only to decide the Hulkster was getting the title shot. You could see the way Sid's facial expression changed and it was clear what was to come next.
They teased tension between Hogan and Sid, while still going with Hogan vs. Flair. At Saturday Night's Main Event in February of that year, Hogan and Sid teamed up to take on Flair and Undertaker. During the match, like many tag team partners had done, he left Hogan to fend for himself. He took to the Barber Shop to defend his actions and physically assaulted Brutus "The Barber" Beefcake, Hogan's friend! Thus, Sid now turned heel. The storyline twisted towards a Hogan/Sid match while they now had to create a new challenger for Flair heading into WrestleMania. Savage was chosen and to make this title match a personal matter, a storyline was created with Flair claiming the lovely Miss Elizabeth was once his girlfriend. It got very personal and went pretty far for the time period.
In my opinion, it was a complete missed opportunity to do a WrestleMania main event of that caliber, even a match of that caliber! This was arguably the biggest match never to happen up until then. By the time it happened in WCW, not as many people cared. To rework WrestleMania around that match, I would have done a final match between Randy Savage and Jake Roberts, while placing Sid against the Undertaker. Were there other reasons why this match didn't take place? Hogan was about to leave for almost a year and perhaps they didn't want to have Hogan win the Championship on his way out. On the other hand, it's quite possible Hogan didn't want to lose to Flair, or at all! As much of a Hulkamaniac I was and still am, I wouldn't put that past Hogan. Those are somewhat valid points, at least points that make more sense than alleged House Show draws. However, I still to this day believe that Hulk Hogan vs. Ric Flair for the WWF Championship should have been the main event at that year's WrestleMania!
If you have any comments on the situation, let me know. Heck, let us all know on The WAR Report podcast, every Tuesday at 7PM EST, brought to you by TagMeADate.com, the first and only dating site for wrestling fans. Go to askthewarreport@gmail.com or #askthewarreport. For TagMeADate members, our Android app is vastly approaching so stay tuned!
No comments:
Post a Comment