Things that were supposed to happen but didn't

[Guest HTQ's Personal Bitch]

He was scheduled to win in there, but Luger's big mouth got him in trouble the night before when he was out bragging that he'd be winning the title the next day. Word got around and Vince quickly changed it to Bret winning the title.

Myth.

[Cheech Tremendous 0]

He was scheduled to win in there, but Luger's big mouth got him in trouble the night before when he was out bragging that he'd be winning the title the next day.  Word got around and Vince quickly changed it to Bret winning the title.

Myth.

I was about to say the same thing. I remembering reading somewhere (Observer maybe?) that the plan was always for Bret to leave that night with the title. There is debate to whether or not Lex would transition that night, but if memory serves me he was supposed to lose to Yoko and start feuding with Hennig (never winning the title at all).

[Guest LooneyTune]

I remember the WWF pimping the "Wrestlemania Revenge Tour" at my local area (shows for MSG, Nassau Coliseum, etc.) and featured hype of Lex Luger vs. Mr. Perfect. Was Hennig still unable to physically compete, or did he do something to piss Vince off enough to just have the program dropped?

 

The matches ended up being Luger vs. Crush in a serious dip in quality.

 

 

Also, I heard the Yokozuna/Bret match at Wrestlemania IX was suppose to go around 15:00 or so, but Yokozuna was too winded to half way through and they finished the match early. Is this true or BS?

[Hunter's Torn Quad 0]

Perfect dropped out citing a foot injury, but I believe it was actually a contract dispute.

[cawthon777 0]

Also, I heard the Yokozuna/Bret match at Wrestlemania IX was suppose to go around 15:00 or so, but Yokozuna was too winded to half way through and they finished the match early. Is this true or BS?

According to Bret, that's true.

[cawthon777 0]

He was scheduled to win in there, but Luger's big mouth got him in trouble the night before when he was out bragging that he'd be winning the title the next day.  Word got around and Vince quickly changed it to Bret winning the title.

Myth.

I was about to say the same thing. I remembering reading somewhere (Observer maybe?) that the plan was always for Bret to leave that night with the title. There is debate to whether or not Lex would transition that night, but if memory serves me he was supposed to lose to Yoko and start feuding with Hennig (never winning the title at all).

Here is the article in question, taken from the NY Daily News.

 

GRAPPLERS ARE TATTLERS ABOUT WRESTLEMANIA

Linda Stasi

 

We always wondered why athletes get stripped of their jobs/titles/houses/freedom if they: bet on games/take steroids/fix sporting events, while wrestlers get rich from all of the above right in front of everyone. Well, in the spirit of shocking, big breaking news we have to tell all of you obsessive fans who'll be attending this afternoon's Wreslemania competition at the Garden that we already know who's gonna win. We know this because about 12 of the bulked-up boys have been in town all week and several of them can't keep their traps shut. A huge contingent of them - including Bret Hart, Lex Luger, Stan Lane, Johnny Polo and Crush - plopped down for a few 32-ounce porterhouse steaks at Charlton's steak house Thursday night and our source caught it all.

 

Turns out perennial good guy Luger will meet and beat perennial bad guy Yokozuna for the World Wrestling Federation championship title. But, we understand, Luger will only own the belt for about an hour. At that time Hart is supposed to climb into the ring and, with the help of guest referee Mr. Perfect, lay a big beating on Luger and be declared champion. But don't let us stop you from getting drunk in front of your children and cheering for your favorite actor, er, wrestler.

 

And after the show ...

 

SWITCHEROO

Linda Stasi

 

Just the other day, we reported the outcome of Wrestlemania X several hours before the huge pay-per-view event unfolded before a live Madison Square Garden audience. We told you that Lex Luger would defeat Yokozuna before losing the championship belt to Bret Hart. Long story short, we were right. The only thing is, Vince McMahon was not about to stage that scenario after we found it out and reported it. To make matters worse, obsessed World Wrestling Federation fans were milling around the lobby of the Doral Court Hotel and congratulating Hart a full 10 hours before he actually won.

 

Our sources say that McMahon called a last-minute meeting to pull the old switcheroo. He stuck with keeping Hart as champion, but he had him fight Yokozuna instead of Luger. To follow up, he had his publicist - former NBC entertainment flack Curt Block - fax us a note that read in part, "[your reporting] proves once again that nothing is as exciting of unpredictable as the WWF." Yes, especially when good reporting and reliable sources blow the lid off carefully staged entertainment and force people to get very creative on the fly.

 

 

I don't agree with the implication in the first article that Bret would turn heel but everything else seems to hold up.

[Guest fanofcoils]

Survivor Series replacements were mentioned earlier.

 

87 - Don Muraco for Billy Graham

 

88 - JYD, Blair, Muraco were replaced...one was Scott Casey, not sure who the others were

 

89 - Bobby Heenan for Tully Blanchard, Earthquake for The Widow Maker, Bad News Brown for Akeem

 

90 - Boris Zhukov for Akeem, Haku for Rick Rude

 

91 - Sgt. Slaughter for Jim Neidhart, Tito Santana for Rick Steamboat, Hercules for Big Bully Busick

 

92 - Nasties for Bushwhackers

 

93 - Michaels for Lawler, UT for Tatanka, Crush for Quebecer Pierre, Savage for Perfect

 

96 - Roberts for Mark Henry

Where did you hear the Bushwackers were replaced by the Nasty Boys and do you know why?

[alfdogg 0]

I posted a link in the WWE tidbits thread. It's on that page. They didn't say why, they just cited the replacement.

[Guest HTQ's Personal Bitch]

It is a MYTH that Luger was supposed to win the WWF title at WMX but it was changed. A MYTH that many people believed then and believe now.

[cawthon777 0]

I posted a link in the WWE tidbits thread. It's on that page. They didn't say why, they just cited the replacement.

I don't know the backstage reason but the on-screen reason was that the Nastys had just turned babyface and wanted revenge against Money Inc and Jimmy Hart for denying them a title match with the Natural Disasters.

[Hunter's Torn Quad 0]

While Luger was meant to win the WWF Title at WM X, the most credible information I've heard as far as when the decision was changed has it changed just after the Rumble, when Luger's announced win got him booed out of the building, and Bret's announced win hot thunderous cheers. From what I remember, that really shocked Vince, and a few days later, he pretty much decided not to put the belt on Luger. I'm guessing he hedged his bets somewhat, though, as at the last TV tapings before WM X, they ran a dark angle, where Cornette was doing an in-ring promo holding the WWF Title belt, was badmouthing Luger, who came out, and Cornette dropped the belt and ran off. McMahon then asked the crowd, "Wouldn't it be nice if Luger was announced as the WWF Champion ?", to which the crowd cheered, and Luger took the belt and went to the back, and McMahon then introduced Luger as the WWF Champion. Because this was at the final taping before WM X, the speculation was that it was taped for airing after, and that Luger was indeed going to walk out of WM X as champion, but of course the angle never aired, and wasn't even taped.

[bob_barron 0]

So was it supposed to go:

Yoko-Luger-Bret

or just Yoko-Luger (Luger beats Bret)

or was it always meant to be: Yoko-Bret (Yoko beats Luger)

 

Having Yoko go over Lex makes no sense and I think the only reason they did it was b/c of Lex being a bigmouth

[Hunter's Torn Quad 0]

I just think whatever impact that article had, if any at all, was minimal. I think it more likely that Vince had already planned things out for either Luger or Hart coming out of WM X as champion, as faces, and what finally caused him to go with Bret was the reaction Luger got at the Rumble.

[Guest LooneyTune]

I've heard from all types of people that Yokozuna was suppose to drop the title to Luger, and have Luger retain against Bret. Bret would then beat Owen most likely, because losing twice at Wrestlemania isn't the best way to book someone.

 

However, I doubt keeping the title away from Bret was going to be another long wait, since he was obviously the most popular person. There could've been a change in booking before WM where Bret would beat Luger for it after Luger beat Yoko, but I've never heard of such rumors.

 

Then of course, is the "Luger got drunk, told everyone, and the news media reported it thus having McMahon change the results the same day" kind of like Billy Gunn blabbing about his IC Title win at RRumble 99 (where Shamrock ended up retaining because of it.)

[Hunter's Torn Quad 0]

The only talk I head in regard to Luger and Bret facing each other, was when Luger was still planned to come out of WM X with the WWF Title, and that he'd be facing Bret at Summerslam in a face v face match.

 

As for the Billy Gunn story, that's almost certainly false. IIRC, the actual story is that he was originally going to lose due to some sort of interference from Bossman, but he pissed someone off, and the finish was changed to him tapping out clean.

[Jericholic82 0]

well it made more sense for luger to work twice as opposed to the big yoko. of course the yoko-luger match at wm 10 was horrible unlike the ss93 match which was imo very good. the only good thign about the wm 10 match was Luger going outside the ring and slipping and falling right into the barricade and vince tyring to cover it up by saying something about mr fuji and lawler just clowned him saying "hes just a little clumsy"

[Austin3164life 0]

Hogan was scheduledto be at Starrcade 1983 they even announced him on the Mid-Atlantic TV show as one of the participants on the card. (This is true for a fact)

 

Harley Race was offered $250,000 by Vince Jr. to no-show Starrcade and go northeast, but Race refused, in a bathroom with Vince.

[algrim 0]

Wasn't Hogan supposed to job the title to Bret at Summerslam '93? I remember Meltzer making a few comments about it.

[cawthon777 0]

There was talk of that being the main event. PWI went as far as to print an article in which Bret and Savage talked trash about Hogan not defending the belt as much as he should, and certainly not as often as Bret defended it.

 

The consensus is that Hogan didn't want to make himself look bad against Bret and so he opted to lose to Yoko instead.

 

According to Bret's 2nd RF shoot, he wasn't aware that the match was ever scheduled.

[Guest HTQ's Personal Bitch]

Depends on who you ask in regards to Hogan-Hart at SS 93.

[strummer 0]

Hogan thought Bret was too small and thus wanted to job to a much bigger Yokozuna, which would make him look less weak in his eyes

[1234-5678 0]

Owen Hart was supposed to main event a PPV against Shawn Michaels when he returned after the Montreal screwjob, but was phased out instead onto a feud with Triple H.

[JoeDirt 0]

Owen Hart was supposed to main event a PPV against Shawn Michaels when he returned after the Montreal screwjob, but was phased out instead onto a feud with Triple H.

Yeah they decided they'd rather to HBK/Taker at the Royal Rumble over HBK/Owen.

 

As far as the Wrestlemania 10 stuff, maybe the columnist just wanted to cover up looking bad, so she said that Vince must have changed the booking because of her. I just don't see a heel turn in the main event or anything like that.

 

It would have been interesting to see where they went with the Luger/Perfect feud after WM10.

 

EDIT: Now that I think about it, I'm sure Bret must have been booked to win the title earlier than the day of the show. Bret lost to Crush on the Road to Wrestlemania 10 show, and that seems like something they would only book if Bret was going to come out of WM with the title anyways. The match was taped on February 23. Not definitive proof or anything, but interesting.

[MikeJordan23 0]

Oh and I read Meltzer's tribute to Yokozuna today, and Luger indeed was supposed to win the WWF title at SS 1993, but they wanted to wait until WM X but by then his heat had faded.

[Guest HTQ's Personal Bitch]

It would have been interesting to see where they went with the Luger/Perfect feud after WM10.

That reminds me! I was at one of (if not the) first tv tapings after WMX. Perfect was on HBK's new interview show the Heartbreak Hotel talking about Luger. He said that he was an impartial referee and was not bitter about being knocked out by Luger 368 days previous (or something to that effect). Pretty funny stuff. I also got to see the beginning of a Tatanka-IRS feud that went nowhere and Yokozuna vs. Mabel.

[Guest Astro]

Also, I heard the Yokozuna/Bret match at Wrestlemania IX was suppose to go around 15:00 or so, but Yokozuna was too winded to half way through and they finished the match early. Is this true or BS?

According to Bret, that's true.

In the WWF magizine listing results, they mention the match going 30 plus minutes IIRC. (Just pointing out the WWF's spin)

[Betty Houle 0]

I was supposed to get laid last night but I didn't.

[MillenniumMan831 0]

It would have been interesting to see where they went with the Luger/Perfect feud after WM10.

That reminds me! I was at one of (if not the) first tv tapings after WMX. Perfect was on HBK's new interview show the Heartbreak Hotel talking about Luger. He said that he was an impartial referee and was not bitter about being knocked out by Luger 368 days previous (or something to that effect). Pretty funny stuff. I also got to see the beginning of a Tatanka-IRS feud that went nowhere and Yokozuna vs. Mabel.

Was that the Yoko/Mabel match where they bodyslammed each other?

[TheFranchise 0]

I was supposed to get laid last night but I didn't.

MYTH.

[Hunter's Torn Quad 0]

Bret v Hogan was definitely planned for SummerSlam '93 at one point, because they shot photos for the event poster.