Let's examine the facts. I'll start slow and work towards the bigger picture so I can be sure that you are following my train of thought.
Hulk Hogan, Roddy Piper, Ultimate Warrior, Randy Savage, Bret Hart, Kevin Nash, Scott Hall, Goldberg, and The Giant. These are all BIG names that garner attention. They all also happen to be in WCW. The household names here, even for those non-wrestling fans, include Hulk, Piper, Savage, and even Warrior to a smaller extent.
Steve Austin, Undertaker, Kain, Mankind, The Rock, HHH, and Shawn Michaels when he is healthy. What do you have here? These are the people that the WWF can call their key players. In Austin you have the hottest thing going since Hulk in the 80's and in Foley you have the most insane and exciting wrestler this side of Shawn Michaels. But do we have any household names here? Not really, although Austin in beginning to get there and Foley is a legend in various places around the world.
As long as you are a fan with a sense of intelligence about him you'll look up and realize that the WWF has the more talented roster in pure wrestling sense and excitement. I'm sorry WCW lemmings but Hogan is completely boring to watch and Piper has one bad hip but "wrestles" as if he got 4 of them that are gone. But whoever says that talent alone will get you to the top of the world obviously never studied the crazy world of pro-wrestling. WCW has the names, the deeper pockets, and the TV stations to promote their product to no end. What does the WWF have? Well, I think you can sum it up in two words: Vince McMahon.
Vince works with a station that preempts him for a tennis tournament and a dog show. Vince works with a budget probably only half that of WCW (speculation on my part, but it IS significantly less). Yet what does Vince do in the face of all these adversities? Simply put, he excels. Week after week Vince McMahon treats us to a Monday Night show that is laced with angles and a soap opera like feel to it. It is great TV and doesn't center around just 1 guy and 1 angle. Sure, Steve Austin gets his time on camera but unlike the Hulkster he doesn't take up half the show with 8 interviews where he basically says the same thing each time. Austin is funny, Hogan is not. McMahon runs an efficient business, Bischoff does not.
HHH, X-Pac, and The Rock are on their way to great things with the WWF. HHH is well on his way to main-event status as is Maivia. X-Pac was a key in the ratings shift over to the WWF. After the ladder match of last night I fully expect HHH to be headlining against Austin within a few months. Yet HHH was a nobody in the WCW...hmmm, go figure. With Michael's future uncertain the WWF has shown great patience with HHH and Rocky. Not pushing them too much and shoving them down our face. Vince marinated them to the fans and has slowly but surely built them both up to main event status.
You can look up and down the mid-carders of both companies and see that WCW has the advantage in that department as well. They have some of the most exciting wrestlers in the world in Chris Benoit, Eddy Guerrero, and Ultimo Dragon. Problem is that Hulk doesn't want the world to know about these guys. So, in what has become a characteristic of WCW, Bischoff bows to the will of Hogan.
You can make the argument that the WWF is building towards the future while WCW is only concerned about the present. It really doesn't matter as long as Bischoff lures away the top talent of the WWF again. Why should he build characters when he can buy them? Makes sense I suppose. However, at some point someone higher up than Bischoff is going to see that the bottom line could be a helluva lot better if someone who actually knew a little about the business was in charge. Bischoff isn't doing a great job making talent or gimmicks or even angles. Bischoff IS, however, doing a great job shopping for key personnel in this business.
Let me know what you think.HellHound
