I grew up a wrestling fan in the 1980’s, during the height of Hulkamania. I rode the wave of wrestling popularity until it came to an abrupt halt in 1992. Suddenly I found that no one wanted to talk wrestling with me, it wasn’t “cool” anymore. I chose to trudge on, silently, watching such stars as Bret Hart, Yokozuna, Diesel, and Shawn Michaels take a run on top of the World Wrestling Federation. I also checked out WCW whenever I could, especially when the Hollywood Blondes were on TV, or even when Hulk Hogan “jumped Ship” in 1994 and joined World Championship Wrestling.

I can recall, quite vividly, hearing the news that WCW would be starting a Monday Night program to go head to head with WWF Monday Night RAW. What a stupid move by WCW, I thought. Well I was wrong (first time for everything!) and the Monday Night Wars were born.

I’m not going to recount the entire War here. That story is readily available. The key point is the in 1996 with the nWo, WCW took over the Monday Night Wrestling scene for 83 straight weeks. The other thing to know is that in 1997 RAW was generally considered the better show most weeks and that WCW was enjoying the benefits of the momentum that they created by turning Hulk Hogan heel and having the nWo.

Fast forward to late 1997. RAW was on a roll, with Steve Austin ready to break through to all time great status, and DeGeneration X pushing the envelope of good taste. Oh ya and this guy named the Rock was the Intercontinental Champion. Vince McMahon screwed Bret Hart and set the stage for a perfect foil to the anti-authority Steve Austin.

This was also the announcement that WCW Monday Nitro was going to 3 hours starting January 26, 1998.

What followed was a one year debacle that consisted of various attempts to make the three hours work for wrestling fans. We had Kevin Nash booking all talking and no wrestling for the entire first hour. Yes you read that right: No wrestling on the wrestling show! Then they went to all wrestling. This experiment was mercifully ended after one year and Nitro returned to 2 hours.

WHY?

The Product couldn’t handle it.

The WCW product and the booking team was unable to properly hold the attention of an audience and book enough angles/stories to fill up two hours let alone three. Sound familiar? The news has been leaked that WWE will be moving to three hours PERMANENTLY come July. I am generally an optimist but my first thought was Holy Crap Why? For the past few years I have enjoyed my PVR as it has allowed me to fast forward through much of the “garbage” of RAW, in fact there was a time where I would brag to Mo how short it would take me to watch the show.

While I’m sure this decision was made before this was known, RAW this past Monday did a 2.9 in the ratings. In reviewing the quarter hour ratings pattern, there were many segments that did 2.5 and 2.6 which is scary. Now is hardly the time to be adding a third hour. At least in the case of Nitro, they were still on top of the wrestling world. Today’s WWE is hardly a pop culture phenomenon. They have not created any new stars in a long time nor have they been able to capitalize on “hot” characters (CM Punk and Daniel Bryan come to mind). While in 1998, people were getting ready to leave WCW for WWE, nowadays people are just leaving WWE altogether. I am watching WWE enter a negative trend in show quality and would feel a little better about this move to three hours if at least the show was clicking and of consistently good quality.

I realize that this means WWE will be getting more money for television rights fees and that is a good thing…..for now. This just has the look and feel of a short term cash grab to me and that’s what scares me. I am in no way predicting that what happened to WCW three years after moving Nitro to three hours will happen to WWE, but I don’t see this as a good move. The argument can be made that they can always abort this move and go back to two hours. WCW did that and their ratings didn’t recover. Sadly I see the same result for WWE given their current ratings pattern. It’s too bad really, but then again those who don’t learn from history…

ARE DOOMED TO REPEAT IT!

Agree or disagree? I`d love to hear from you! Email me at addie@wetalkwrestling.com