by Tom the Actuary

We all know the story:

- Overage, overpriced talent

- Guaranteed contracts

- An nWo storyline that dragged on too long

- Backstage politics by the so-called "big names"

These were the mistakes WCW made during their period of ascension, and these mistakes eventually brought the promotion down. And they should have known better.

But maybe not.

With talent acquisitions of the mid to late 1990's, WCW was regularly besting the WWF in ratings, and the company was making a profit. How did this come to be?

To sign away the talent that made WCW look big-time to much of the world, they offered something the WWF wouldn't: guaranteed contracts. As a result, they got just about every piece of proven talent the North American wrestling world had to offer.

With some of the first of this talent, they had launched the nWo angle, which took the most familiar site in wrestling at the time (and possibly all-time) - Hulk Hogan and his superhero act - and stood it on it's ear. The newly heel-turned Hogan was coupled with Hall and Nash, the Outsiders, who were WWF-proven champions of a new generation - well, sort of. Because the whole storyline was a bizarre pseudo-breaking of kayfabe on an organization-wide angle, it blossomed in every direction and eventually was the angle for virtually every storyline in WCW.

And it worked, too. People watched in droves, Monday Nitro and Monday Nitro parties became the rage, and WCW sold merchandise like never before.

How could the WWF of the time compete? All the old-school stars were in WCW. The top-name stars (with three notable exceptions) were in WCW. The best of the new young North American talent, as well as exciting puro and luchadore wrestlers, were all in WCW. Little in the WWF of the day could come close to matching matches being put on by WCW undercard wrestlers.

The older talent was a necessary part of the puzzle. The guaranteed contracts got all the talent there. The nWo storyline was a success, and was for an incredibly long period of time. All of these things were necessary pieces in WCW's success.

As for backstage politics: If I am Eric Bischoff, with the little amount of wrestling experience I have had, who am I going to listen to: the older WCW bookers from the days where it was filmed in a little TV studio, or the ex-WWF guys who have seen big crowds and sky-high PPV ratings? When Bischoff talked about Hogan and Piper "putting asses in seats", he was talking about two guys who were on the crest of the eighties wrestling boom and who had a lot of knowledge about success and what it takes to get it.

And yes, I know, that Flair had played in front of huge crowds, in Dallas and elsewhere. But his federations weren't making money like the WWF had, and like it or not, to much of the country he was small-time.

So they get name-brand talent using the advantage that guaranteed contracts gave them over the WWF, then put them in an all-encompassing storyline, while trying to mine the knowledge of the most successful wrestlers they had. Using this, they reach heights of popularity never before reaches by them.

Yeah, in retrospect, they sure seem like idiots.

So, Mister Actuary, you say, what DID bring WCW down? You know so freakin' much! Huh? Huh?!

There were a number of factors, and here are some I'm aware of, in order of decreasing importance:

- Company Culture. Some of you may know that then-owner Ted Turner kept his wrestling federation alive for years while it operated at a loss out of loyalty to the one product that made his "Superstation" money in the early days. Having top management set a tone that they don't care whether or not a company makes money is probably a guaranteed recipe not to. WCW had operated for years indifferent to profits and losses and couldn't be expected, in a sudden time of plenty, to suddenly use their resources judiciously.

- Ted Turner's Absence. Hey, if you don't care if you operate a company at a loss, and you can absorb the losses, you can operate forever, and WCW did for years. They could still be doing it, but, due to a string of circumstances having nothing to do with wrestling, he was not there anymore. So now the salad days of operating without concern for profitability couldn't continue.

- Failure to use the Bret Hart angle. He should have been brought in as a competing "real" world's champion. I firmly believe that WCW could have made even more hay out of the angle than the WWF ended up doing, it was so polarizing. The WWF is still mining gold from that vein via the "Mr. McMahon" character.

- New character development. Goldberg could have been (and may still be) as good as the guys the WWF was bringing along. He was failed to develop his persona like Austin and Rock did. Not all of that is booking; he didn't use the chances he had.

- Mishandling firings. Austin and Foley, two major cogs in the WWF's resurgence, had an undying hatred for WCW for how they were treated there while injured. Those firings never had to happen - WCW carried an incredibly huge roster of wrestlers at one time. As it was, two of the most talented guys in the business had that much more incentive to beat WCW.

And my all-purpose last one:

- WCW couldn't convince Vince Russo to stay at the WWF until he sunk that promotion.

These are things that were either (a) out of the control of the day-to-day management of WCW (the first two), or (b) done recklessly. There may have been compelling reasons for doing the things that were done on the normal list of why WCW failed, but there was no excuse for not taking advantage of the championship wrestler from another fed, firing people gratuitously, or not pushing wrestlers to get every dime out of them you can.

And there's certainly no excuse for ever hiring Vince Russo.