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Imagining WCW 2001 under Shane McMahon


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Hi everyone. Long-time TEW 2020 player here, but a newbie here in the Grey Dog forum.

 

I'm thinking of starting a YouTube channel that journals my TEW 2020 game, with me imagining a separately-run WCW under Shane McMahon in 2001. The game will start after Wrestlemania 17, with WCW looking for a new network to air on.

 

I'm looking for thoughts and suggestions, as well as expectations. Thanks guys!

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<p>Cool do it</p><p> </p><p>

Will you be starting with just the wCw roster or are you taking some WWF wrestlers like Big Show, Malenko, Benoit, Saturn, Guerrero?</p><p> </p><p>

I love this era which is weird as it was the end of one but it was when I got into EWD so always feel strongly towards it.</p>

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Cool do it

 

Will you be starting with just the wCw roster or are you taking some WWF wrestlers like Big Show, Malenko, Benoit, Saturn, Guerrero?

 

I love this era which is weird as it was the end of one but it was when I got into EWD so always feel strongly towards it.

 

I'm challenging myself so I'll be working with the 2001 WCW roster and directly pick up from Wrestlemania 17. I'm starting to prepare my materials, and very excited to start!

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I'm a huge AJ Styles fan so I'd say sign AJ (if he's not already signed to WCW at that point, as I believe that AJ was with them for a very short time) and see if you can turn him into the AJ Styles we saw become the face of TNA.

 

I'm planning to book from May 2001 to Starrcade (December 2001) as the show's "Season 1," but yes, I plan to see how far AJ Styles can go and where he would fit in the vision.

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I realize I was a little vague last night when I advised you to "change literally everything". My main critique of late-stage WCW is that the company could reasonably be promoted with this statement:

 

"Hey, all you wrestling fans! Remember when we were kicking the WWF's butt in the Monday Night Wars, thanks to exciting midcard matches & big stars in the main event? Here we are four years later, and we have none of the good midcard wrestlers, only a few of the stars, & those remaining stars can't work, can't draw thanks to bad booking, and are now four years older. Don't forget to buy our pay-per-view!"

 

Blech. So as you can see, WCW strongly needs a specific direction. I can see you going one of these directions.

 

(1) Wrestlers' Paradise. Make ROH irrelevant before they even start by taking their spot as the pure workrate company. Don't bring back any of the big names like Hogan, Nash, or Goldberg, because they can't keep up with the level of wrestling. If you bring back Flair, don't have him wrestle. Just make him the authority figure. Personally, I would rather put Arn Anderson in that spot instead. I think he has just the right promo style to be a good Jack Tunney-like "deus ex machina" authority figure.

 

Sign all the good wrestlers from the independent scene, like Styles, Punk, Danielson, RVD, etc. If you're taking certain WWF guys, take guys like Jericho & Guerrero, who you know are great workers but might have trouble standing out in the WWF. Book different tournaments with fun prizes to get a lot of good match ratings. Here's one idea: make a round-robin tournament with singles wrestlers and have the winner earn a title match at Starrcade.

 

(2) Golden Age Nostalgia. Go full hog into the patriotic, hoss-heavy product WCW and the WWF had in the 1980s. Bring back all of the big names when their contracts come up; heck, bring back the Road Warriors to dominate your tag team ranks. Sack the cruiserweights, unless you think Rey is marketable enough to be a fun enhancement talent. Don't hire the indy kids; they can't draw. If a worker is smaller than Light Heavyweight, they better have a strong gimmick to keep them from the bottom of the card. Instead of Jericho & Guerrero, bring wrestlers like The Big Show in from the WWF for that extra star power. Simply put, make USPW in the real world.

 

Whichever one of these sounds more appealing to you, go for it. All I can ask is that you try your best to stay true to the the vision, and avoid mixing both together too often.

 

This is quite insightful! I'm trying to imagine everything based on what we know about Shane McMahon's wrestling preferences and philosophy -- which may be a younger POV, more gritty balance of story and in-ring with "McMahonisms" still in place.

 

I am trying to imagine it realistically, or at least as close as possible to an alternate reality -- the ex-WCW wrestlers that are now valuable to the WWF (e.g. Benoit, Guerrero et al) will only be allowed to appear from time to time, but not exclusively signed to WCW. So I'll be working with the Talent Trade system a lot. Shane would have to make do mostly with what he's got, plus the WCW stars they can pull (e.g. Hogan, Flair, Nash, Goldberg, DDP, Steiner, Booker T) while he's building new ones.

 

Angle-wise, I'm trying to imagine that even though this version of Vince McMahon decided to have WCW run mostly independently and the big Invasion angle won't fully take over WWF TV, there still has to be an element of rivalry and cross-over between the two promotions, picking up from the Vince-Shane feud aftermath. (Just trying to incorporate this one for continuity's sake, and will not focus on it once I divert the attention)

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How are you playing out the ECW workers, remember they went out of business at the same time that WCW did. I have never played that scenario but I would raid ECW's roster before WWE did.

 

Based on where the WWF storyline went, I activated ECW and gave it to Stephanie McMahon. As Shane's WCW, I can trade talent with ECW and WWF to create cross-promotion storylines from time to time.

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  • 3 weeks later...
Wouldn't you just start on a smaller network? McMahon or not, I heard one of the reasons Nitro was never brought back was because no network wanted any part of it (even under the WWE umbrella). Not that you would need it to succeed, but it seems to me that Shane would secure *something* for distribution. Then against, you could go the WWA route to start, with just the PPVs.
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Wouldn't you just start on a smaller network? McMahon or not, I heard one of the reasons Nitro was never brought back was because no network wanted any part of it (even under the WWE umbrella). Not that you would need it to succeed, but it seems to me that Shane would secure *something* for distribution. Then against, you could go the WWA route to start, with just the PPVs.

 

USA Network accepted WCW Nitro... but on a late night slot, so it doesn't go head-to-head with Raw. I find this situation interesting, so I went for it.

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Episode #1: Ric Flair Appointed As WCW Commissioner? // Booker T Defends WCW U.S. Title -- WCW 2001

 

 

Please tell me what you think of the format and booking. Had fun with this one!

Good start, I really enjoyed the format! One small thing, could you show the results for each match just a few seconds longer? A couple of them were really short, and I think there was one you didn't even show.

 

Apart from that though, your format was really smooth and I thoroughly enjoyed your first Nitro!

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Good start, I really enjoyed the format! One small thing, could you show the results for each match just a few seconds longer? A couple of them were really short, and I think there was one you didn't even show.

 

Apart from that though, your format was really smooth and I thoroughly enjoyed your first Nitro!

 

Thanks so much! Will show the results longer for the next episode. Still trying to get the hang of the flow, but it's really fun to make!

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