Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

[ QUOTE ]
Oh yeah. The Shawn Michaels heel turn where he threw Marty Jannetty through the (plate glass!!!) window.

(Edit: Obviously, the time period from 1991-93, when I was most into pro wrestling, sticks in my brain most vividly, even though I watched just about every week until about three years ago.)

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Piper's Pit!!! I think that traumatized as a kid because I loved the rockers.
~Justin

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

I don't know if this is what you are looking for, but I thought it was really cool when the Million Dollar Man tried to buy the championship belt. That was against the rules so thye had a huge tourney which was fun to watch.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

Was that the original King of the Ring tourney that decided it, I remember the 1st King of the Ring PPV being unreal, and well put together in a marketing sense.
~Justin

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

No, this is the tourney that took place at Wrestlemania IV, in which Randy Savage won the title. (I believe Hogan and Andre the Giant were double DQed in their match, allowing Savage to cruise to victory.)

This led to the great main event at Wrestlemania V, Savage vs. Hogan, another well done feud that hasn't been mentioned yet.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

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I don't know if this is what you are looking for, but I thought it was really cool when the Million Dollar Man tried to buy the championship belt. That was against the rules so thye had a huge tourney which was fun to watch.

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That was a very good angle, with an evil twin referee to boot.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

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This led to the great main event at Wrestlemania V, Savage vs. Hogan, another well done feud that hasn't been mentioned yet.

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Good one, The Hogan, Savage, Elizebeth triangle of jealousy where Savage played the paranoid champion perfectly was an excellent angle.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

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I don't know if this is what you are looking for, but I thought it was really cool when the Million Dollar Man tried to buy the championship belt. That was against the rules so thye had a huge tourney which was fun to watch.

[/ QUOTE ]

That was a very good angle, with an evil twin referee to boot.

[/ QUOTE ]
Perhaps one of Hulk Hogan's best promos, on "Saturday Night's Main Event", punctuated by the immortal line "How many millions for the plastic surgery, brother?"

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

Yeah, and Hulk and Savage were a tag team for a while. That was good fun.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

For some reason I keep getting drawn back to this thread. I maybe watched wrestling somewhat for a year or so on and off. One night when I was getting all the cable channels (and PPV) for free for some reason there was a PPV (WCW I think) on.

Hulk Hogan was supposed to be fighting Jeff Jerret (sp?) for the title (this was six months or a year after Owen Heart died, and Jeff bailed to the WCW). At any rate, Jeff lays down (litterally) and gives up the title, Hulk gives a speach about how pathetic the WCW is now, and leaves.

The owner of the WCW (Russo? I never really wathced WCW and I had stopped watching wrestling all together by this time) comes out and goes on a tirade about Hulk Hogan then has an impromptu match between Jeff and Booker T. I think he (Russo) knew he was going to do that, and maybe Jeff Jerret did, but I don't think anyone else did. It looked genuinely spontaneous, and if Booker T knew it was coming and that he was going to win, he is one hell of a good actor. There were tears of joy in his eyes after the match, which IIRC didn't have either wrestler pulling an heel cheep shots.

I thought that was a pretty good angle, and I think the reason it worked so well was that most of what was going on was not really acting.

One of the funniest things I remember was there was some dialog between Ken Shamrock and his "sister" and at on point, clear as day, he sais "slap me" to her and she does. Apparently she forgot about that part and Ken (or was it Kent) had to give her some not too subtle cueing.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

Any angle involving Ric Flair or Big Poppa Pump.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

[ QUOTE ]
For some reason I keep getting drawn back to this thread. I maybe watched wrestling somewhat for a year or so on and off. One night when I was getting all the cable channels (and PPV) for free for some reason there was a PPV (WCW I think) on.

Hulk Hogan was supposed to be fighting Jeff Jerret (sp?) for the title (this was six months or a year after Owen Heart died, and Jeff bailed to the WCW). At any rate, Jeff lays down (litterally) and gives up the title, Hulk gives a speach about how pathetic the WCW is now, and leaves.

The owner of the WCW (Russo? I never really wathced WCW and I had stopped watching wrestling all together by this time) comes out and goes on a tirade about Hulk Hogan then has an impromptu match between Jeff and Booker T. I think he (Russo) knew he was going to do that, and maybe Jeff Jerret did, but I don't think anyone else did. It looked genuinely spontaneous, and if Booker T knew it was coming and that he was going to win, he is one hell of a good actor. There were tears of joy in his eyes after the match, which IIRC didn't have either wrestler pulling an heel cheep shots.

I thought that was a pretty good angle, and I think the reason it worked so well was that most of what was going on was not really acting.



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Nope that wasn't an angle but simply the result of the WCW back stage politics AKA the biggest joke in wrestling at the time.

Russo was basically the writer for WCW, and he wrote to have Hogan lose the jarret. But Hogan had a creative control clause in his contract and basically said no I'm not going to lose. Hogan was really holding WCW back in during this time. So Russo had Jarret just lay down for Hogan, basically making it clear what was going on and showing Hogan for the ass that he was. Russo then created another World Championship and had Jarret and Booker T wrestle for it. It was a suprise to everyone that Booker T was picked and that he won. He was known as a great worker but had never really been a maineventer at all.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

One angle which was awesome was the Terry Funk/Ric Flair angle in 1989. Flair had just beaten Ricky Steamboat with Terry Funk as a "celebrity judge." Funk had been out of wrestling for a while. After Flair gets the belt, Funk comes in and asks for a title shot. Flair refuses and disrespects Funk, so Funk goes nuts on him and piledrives him onto the judge's table on the outside of the ring, and it was one of those old-school tables that didn't break. Flair was out with a 'broken neck' for a while. Once he came back, Flair and Funk had a couple awesome matches resulting in an "I Quit" match that Flair won.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

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Also, the Survivor Series tournament where The Rock became the Corporate Champion was a booking masterpiece that set in motion the greatest 6 month run of television that I can recall.

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I agree 100%.

How is Bret Hart's name not mentioned in this thread? He was by far my favorite wrestler. It was sad to see him get screwed over by Vinny Mac.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

Because that wasn't a work and as such doesn't count as an angle?

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

When he left the WWF after getting the Sharpshooter put on him was the point when I stopped watching WWF. Brett Hart was in my top 3 favorite wrestlers.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

The best angle ever was the storyline in which Undertaker and Kane were brothers. They played with matches as kids and the mortuary that they lived in burned down (Undertaker's fault). Undertaker thought his entire family had died in the fire and he was psychologically traumatized. Paul Bearer adopts Undertaker as his son.

But little did Undertaker know that Bearer knew that Kane survived and lived elsewhere and that he was training him to kill Undertaker at a later time for the sake of revenge. So getting back to the present (1997), Paul Bearer breaks ties with Undertaker and presents to him his long lost brother Kane.....

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

[ QUOTE ]
The best angle ever was the storyline in which Undertaker and Kane were brothers. They played with matches as kids and the mortuary that they lived in burned down (Undertaker's fault). Undertaker thought his entire family had died in the fire and he was psychologically traumatized. Paul Bearer adopts Undertaker as his son.

But little did Undertaker know that Bearer knew that Kane survived and lived elsewhere and that he was training him to kill Undertaker at a later time for the sake of revenge. So getting back to the present (1997), Paul Bearer breaks ties with Undertaker and presents to him his long lost brother Kane.....

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As [censored] mentioned earlier. People who liked [censored] like this are basically responsible for A- wrestling being horrible now B- the fact that HHH [censored] a "corpse" on TV.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

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B- the fact that HHH [censored] a "corpse" on TV.

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WTF triple H banged a corpse on TV? Man, I must have been away from watching wrestling for a while if stuff like this is happening

this sounds brutally funny though, can somebody give a brief idea of how this actually happened? And did JR get to call the action?

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

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B- the fact that HHH [censored] a "corpse" on TV.

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WTF triple H banged a corpse on TV? Man, I must have been away from watching wrestling for a while if stuff like this is happening

this sounds brutally funny though, can somebody give a brief idea of how this actually happened? And did JR get to call the action?

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It was far from funny. It was the biggest WTF moment I've ever witnessed.
What is funny to me is that Wikipedia has a summary of it. link

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

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B- the fact that HHH [censored] a "corpse" on TV.

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WTF triple H banged a corpse on TV? Man, I must have been away from watching wrestling for a while if stuff like this is happening

this sounds brutally funny though, can somebody give a brief idea of how this actually happened? And did JR get to call the action?

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It was far from funny. It was the biggest WTF moment I've ever witnessed.
What is funny to me is that Wikipedia has a summary of it. link

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www.

Wrestlecrap.com is such an awesome site.



Here's what boggles my mind about so much of the crap. take the jarret v. sting match. All they have to do is announce this match and it sells itself. You have the Franchise of WCW vs. "The Chosen One" who is trying to make his mark on WCW. You give them a couple of interviews each and then put them in the ring and let them do what they do. Everyone will be happy. But no instead we get a balding sting. what a joke. Halloween Stingers

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

[ QUOTE ]
Here's what boggles my mind about so much of the crap. take the jarret v. sting match. All they have to do is announce this match and it sells itself. You have the Franchise of WCW vs. "The Chosen One" who is trying to make his mark on WCW. You give them a couple of interviews each and then put them in the ring and let them do what they do. Everyone will be happy. But no instead we get a balding sting. what a joke. Halloween Stingers

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Wow. I have absolutely no recollection of that feud, which I apparently should be thankful for. Funny writeup though.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

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I'd say the three most successful were:

1. Hulkamania (WWF, 1984-1987): Hulk Hogan as the all-American hero who conquered all obstacles worked very well in it's early years. When he beat Andre the Giant at WrestleMania III, it was a great moment.

It's truly amazing that Vince McMahon made such a great choice for his "chosen one". Hogan had gained popularity in the midwest AWA region due, in part, to his appearance in Rocky III. But, for McMahon to annoint him as champion immediately upon his entrance into the WWF in January of 1984 and for Hogan to take off like he did seems almost magical. Within half a year, wrestling went from a saturday afternoon TV show to something which was being show live on MTV (Moolah vs. Richter & Hogan vs. Piper) and then to great success in close-circuit TV and Pay-Per-View.

2. New World Order (WCW, 1996-1997): The invasion storyline had been done before in Japan. But, it was completely fresh in the U.S. Scott Hall's and Kevin Nash's early appearances in WCW, pretending to still work for the WWF, was a completely unique way to introduce new performers- especially since they were now using their real names. When Hogan made his long overdue heal turn, it sealed the nWo's future.

3. Stone Cold Steve Austin vs. Vince McMahon (WWF, 1998): Austin portrayed the anit-hero perfectly. More importantly, he had the ultimate villian in Vince McMahon. McMahon had been on WWF TV for more the two decades. By 1998, all fans knew he actually owned the company and wasn't just a broadcaster. McMahon was probably the only guy who had the credibility to pull off that role. Austin vs. McMahon was a great "regular guy vs. the system".

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I just stumbled upon this thread so I haven't read all the replies but I think Austin/McMahon really needs to be #1. I think Hulkamania was kind of like Moneymaker's win in the WSOP. It didn't really matter who won it, that person was going to get a lot of credit for creating the "boom".

Austin/McMahon was such a great storyline for so many reasons. Wrestling was starting to fade and WCW was really starting to take the lead over WWF. I think without Austin/McMahon, things would be a lot different. There are SO many memorable moments and it's amazing they were able to keep that storyline going for so long, some of which were shown in the special RAW from a few weeks ago.

NWO has got to be #2. Despite being a "smart" at the time, I was totally blown away by the first appearance by Scott Hall on Nitro. Unfortunately, Bischoff's lack of creative talent and the ridiculousness of the egos involved eventually killed the angle.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

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When he left the WWF after getting the Sharpshooter put on him was the point when I stopped watching WWF. Brett Hart was in my top 3 favorite wrestlers.

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Bret Screwed Bret

What about the heel reaction HBK got in Montreal before SummerSlam? That was flat-out amazing and he had every single person in the building in the palm of his hand. Greatest heel interview ever.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

Others:

- Shane Douglas throws down the NWA title
- Madison Square Garden Hug
- nWo mocks Anderson retirement speech ("Not my liver spot")
- Owen Hart dies in the ring, McMahon says "show must go on"
- Austin/Pillman home invasion

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

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How is Bret Hart's name not mentioned in this thread? He was by far my favorite wrestler.

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First, he was my favorite as well.

However, let's remember why he was good. Some guys make their name because they can cut one hell of a promo, others because they work awesome matches. Very few guys are top-notch at both. Hart was more of a guy who simply wrestled awesome matches. He wasn't much better than average with a mic, I think (Don't take this to mean I think he sucked. I just don't think he was great).

That may be why, when all of us are remembering certain angles, Hart isn't being mentioned a lot. If this was a "best matches" thread, I'm sure he'd be all over it (I'd list matches with Perfect, Piper, Bulldog, Michaels, Owen, Austin and Benoit, for sure).

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

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- Owen Hart dies in the ring, McMahon says "show must go on"

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Clearly not an angle, for the same reason the Hogan/Jarrett laydown and Hogan quitting wasn't an angle (not a planned storyline).

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

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I think Hulkamania was kind of like Moneymaker's win in the WSOP. It didn't really matter who won it, that person was going to get a lot of credit for creating the "boom".

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Whoa. You really think that anyone could have been in that spot and have near the impact that Hogan did? That's insane. Who? Piper? Big John Studd? I'm not a huge fan of his, but you are seriously selling short his talent. He was larger than life in both charisma and stature, no one could have come close. Workrate was not a factor in those times, at least in the WWF world. I seriously doubt anything would have taken off to even close to the degree it did without Hogan as the centerpiece.

As for Austin/McMahon, I guess I agree. Not that I was a huge fan of the angle in and of itself, but the great thing is that the entire company essentially revolved around the angle. New characters were brought into it and new stars were created in the background of that angle. Unlike the nWo, where it was basically the same guys doing the same stuff each week. Don't get me wrong, I loved every second of the early months, but it was stagnant and they did little to breathe any life into it. It created zero stars, and had no real long-term plan other than the Hogan-Sting clash. And even then they messed that up terribly. But the nWo made wrestling cool again and for that might just deserve to be placed ahead. It's possible the entire Austin-McMahon story might not have come to pass without the nWo jump-starting the industry.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

does anybody remember the Hey, Dude! episode where Captain Lou Albano had a match vs. Mr. Ernst?


talk about a classic.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

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When he left the WWF after getting the Sharpshooter put on him was the point when I stopped watching WWF. Brett Hart was in my top 3 favorite wrestlers.

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Bret Screwed Bret

What about the heel reaction HBK got in Montreal before SummerSlam? That was flat-out amazing and he had every single person in the building in the palm of his hand. Greatest heel interview ever.

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't remember much about that. All I know is as degeneration-x was getting more popular the hart foundation were becoming bad guys. I did not like it at all. Brett Hart left and so did I.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

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Whoa. You really think that anyone could have been in that spot and have near the impact that Hogan did? That's insane. Who? Piper? Big John Studd? I'm not a huge fan of his, but you are seriously selling short his talent. He was larger than life in both charisma and stature, no one could have come close. Workrate was not a factor in those times, at least in the WWF world. I seriously doubt anything would have taken off to even close to the degree it did without Hogan as the centerpiece.

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No it would not have taken off with someone else, but it was Vince who wanted to take the WWF national, and he basically needed "someone" to be "the guy", and that person was Hogan.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

Wrestling is fun to see two clowns in the ring - and sad to think people actually watch them.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

I'm a sucker for early 90's WCW

Sting vs. The Black Scorpion

Early 90's WCW Champion Sting is being tormented by a masked villan that knows his past. They eventually wrestle in a cage at Starcade, and the Scorpion is unmasked as Ric Flair

Sting and the Mystery Boxes

Sting keeps getting large mystery packages delivered to him at ringside. The first one contains Abdullah the Butcher, the 2nd Cactus Jack. Sting and Cactus start a very good fued. Medusa appears in the 3rd box and Sting is injured causing him to lose the US title to Ravishing Rick Rude. The Dangerous Alliance begins to form and Sting is their main opponent. This can probably be broken down to mulitiple angles, but it was very entertaining and some good matches mixed in concluding with one of my favorite matches ever, War Games '92 (Sting, Steamboat, Kolof, Windham & Dustin Rhodes vs. Steve Austin, Rude, Arn Anderson, Zybysko & Eaton) .

The Yellow Dog
Brian Pillman is pinned in a loser leave WCW match. The masked Yellow Dog appears in many matches, and it's obvious it's Pillman. A bounty is put on taking the mask off the Yellow Dog. Every time he's unmasked, it's not Pillman. Not bad for a mid-card angle, and Pillman wrestling at his best.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

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What about the heel reaction HBK got in Montreal before SummerSlam? That was flat-out amazing and he had every single person in the building in the palm of his hand. Greatest heel interview ever.

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I don't remember much about that. All I know is as degeneration-x was getting more popular the hart foundation were becoming bad guys. I did not like it at all. Brett Hart left and so did I.

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He's talking about just a few months ago (I think). It was pretty great. Easily my favorite moment of the past few years.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

[ QUOTE ]
I think Hulkamania was kind of like Moneymaker's win in the WSOP. It didn't really matter who won it, that person was going to get a lot of credit for creating the "boom".

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First, I was putting them in chronological order. I didn't try to rank them.

But, you're definitely wrong. Hogan was absolutely necessary. McMahon's expansion of the WWF out of the northeast was underway for more than a year before Hogan was signed. In a sense, McMahon gave then-WWF champion Bob Backlund a chance to be the guy (though I'm sure McMahon never expected Backlud to have any mainstream appeal).

McMahon has tried to create other superstats in Hogan's mold and failed. The Ultimate Warrior and Lex Lugar couldn't carry the WWF the way Hogan did.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

haven't check the thread yet, but a great one was when the horsemen chased down dusty and jumped him outside of the TV studio. I think it was JJ Dillion behind the camera giving the narration and tully was driving. They followed dusty over town and when the moment was right they all jumped out and handcuffed him to the TV van. they then proceeded to beat dusty down and IIRC Flair took a hammer to dusty's hand and "broke" it. THey then left him in a bloody mess. One of the best angles that I have ever seen

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

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Yeah, and Hulk and Savage were a tag team for a while. That was good fun.

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For bonus pts., name that tag team.









The Mega Powers

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

Most of the good ones were hit... but here are a few from my childhood that might be considered cheesey but made me beg for my parents to rent a cable box just so I could see PPV.

Jake the Snake v. Ravishing Rick Rude/Rick Martel/Randy Savage
I loved all of these guys...the Cobra biting Savage, Rude with Jake's wife on the ass of his tights, Jake going blind at the hands of "Arrogance".

Undertaker
I was not a big WCW guy since I did not have cable growing up so the Undertaker was a big "whoa" to me since I had know idea who Mean Mark Callous was. Had a great fued with Hogan right off the bat which involved Ric Flair briefly. That only made me like Flair more when he slid the chair into the ring at Survivor Series for the Mega-Tombstone and the first of many deaths of Hulkamanaia. I remember counting the 3 of Undertaker winning on the floor of my TV room with my friend Cameron.

And speaking of Flair..

"The Real World Champion" Ric Flair in the WWF(E)
He had a belt that he stole from WCW! His angle and interviews were great as he went on to win the vacated WWF Championship (thanks to the screwy ending of the "This Tuesday in Texas" rematch between Hogan and UT) when he won the Royal Rumble dispite being the 3rd person to enter!

Nerding out,
tpir

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

[ QUOTE ]

"The Real World Champion" Ric Flair in the WWF(E)
He had a belt that he stole from WCW!

[/ QUOTE ]

Actually, that belt was Flair's personal property since he paid to have it made. The situation was settled by Flair selling the belt back to WCW.

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

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[ QUOTE ]

"The Real World Champion" Ric Flair in the WWF(E)
He had a belt that he stole from WCW!

[/ QUOTE ]

Actually, that belt was Flair's personal property since he paid to have it made. The situation was settled by Flair selling the belt back to WCW.

[/ QUOTE ]


not completely. WCW/NWA at that time still had an old school rule regarding the top belt and the wrestlers holding it. It was never the wrestler's property per se, but they always took out a 25K bond on it, and it was their job to carry the belt with them wherever they went.

Well, During the contract dispute between Jim Herd and Flair, herd forgot to give Flair the 25K bond back to flair before flair jumped. So the belt was still in flair's posession when Vince signed him. The bond was finally given back to flair, so, he was obligated by the contract to give back the NWA/WCW title

Re: Wrestling Angles that worked
 

Some of my favorites:

The bushwhacker brothers. My brother and I were probably 4 and 6 when we saw them, and they were IT to us. and we used to do the distinctive arm pump and even the forehead lick.

Sting. The dude was like the phantom of the opera. He was the mysterious guy always gliding down from the roof to kick someone's ass.

Brett "the hitman" Hart. My all time favorite.

Tatonka. Someone would put him in a submission hold and the ref would pick his arm up and it would fall. Pick it up again, fall. Third time, it would almost fall, then he would make a fist, and bust out of the hold doing an indian dance and proceed to kick the guy's ass. It was so sweet, you had to see it.

The old school Royle Rumbles. I would go to the corner video store with my dad and rent those and love every minute of them. It was so chaotic at first, then the drama would build and you would find yourself pulling for an underdog who would evade elimination many times to come back and win. Shawn Michaels was great at these.

Mankind vs. undertaker in the cage. One of the best ever. Undertaker choke-slammed Mankind off of the cage, he fell like 30+ feet onto a table. Then they take him off on a stretcher and he gets up and goes back in, all bloody, and for once I'm not sure it was fake.

Man I miss wrestling. About 4-5 years ago the combination of me getting older and the storyline getting worse made me lose interest completely. Maybe I'll watch a show or two just to see where it's at now. What night/time/network is it on?