Two Shakeups in 2002

[David Blazenwing 0]

I've been thinking about this for some time... there are 2 events from RAW in 2002 that, in my opinion, changed the face of WWE from what it could have been. My question is, what do you guys think would have happened had these events NOT happened?

 

1. Stone Cold Goes Home

Fresh off a win over Ric Flair, the following week's RAW would see Stone Cold bossing Flair around as his personal servant for the night. Of course, this never happened, as Austin left before the show started and did not return until February 2003.

 

The Repercussions

Alright. To cover the ass of Stone Cold (and quickly struggle to come up with a new program, as the Austin/Flair thing was set to take up several segments during the show), Vince McMahon came out and called out Flair. Later that night, he defeated Flair (with the aid of Brock Lesnar) to become the 100% Owner of WWE.

 

What Could Have Been...

I think that, had Austin not walked out, McMahon and Flair would not have battled and there would still be McMahon/Flair on RAW and SD, as I had not heard anything about merging into one owner until it happened that night. On another note, we might not have had General Managers, at least not at that point in time. So, I guess Eric Bischoff can thank Stone Cold for getting him a job.

 

2. And here comes Big Kev- *Quad Tear*

One of the marquee matches at Summerslam was set to be a heel Kevin Nash against face Triple H, after Triple H turns down the nWo invite at Vengeance. With Nash now injured, this ceased any chance of the nWo working, and the neutered version with HBK, X-Pac and Big Show was destroyed the following week by McMahon. As for Triple H... he moved to RAW, turned heel on HBK and began his first of many... many... reigns as their new World Champion.

 

The Repercussions

Triple H, the WWE's biggest face at the time (not counting Hogan), was forced to go heel and replace Nash with a face HBK in what ended up being one of the best matches of the year all while being moved over to RAW.

 

What Could Have been...

But had Nash not been injured, Trips would not have turned heel (at least not then) and likely would have remained on SmackDown! as one of their top faces. We also might have been spared his nine month title reign in 2003.

 

So yeah. What do you guys think? Had these two events not happened, would WWE be different today, and how?

[Guest jm29195]

I've got a feeling that had HHH stayed face they may well have brought Steiner in as a heel and that whole thing would have worked out much better....

[Art Sandusky 0]

Watching tapes from mid-2002 is weird as fuck.

[Richard 0]

So why couldn't they do face HHH vs. heel HBK?

[Art Sandusky 0]

Because HBK's return match couldn't have him as a heel, 'specially with his borning-again.

[Guest QUP2CME]

If only The Rock had never left....

[Guest Ransome]

I've been thinking about this for some time... there are 2 events from RAW in 2002 that, in my opinion, changed the face of WWE from what it could have been.  My question is, what do you guys think would have happened had these events NOT happened?

 

1. Stone Cold Goes Home

Fresh off a win over Ric Flair, the following week's RAW would see Stone Cold bossing Flair around as his personal servant for the night.  Of course, this never happened, as Austin left before the show started and did not return until February 2003.

 

The Repercussions

Alright.  To cover the ass of Stone Cold (and quickly struggle to come up with a new program, as the Austin/Flair thing was set to take up several segments during the show), Vince McMahon came out and called out Flair.  Later that night, he defeated Flair (with the aid of Brock Lesnar) to become the 100% Owner of WWE.

 

What Could Have Been...

I think that, had Austin not walked out, McMahon and Flair would not have battled and there would still be McMahon/Flair on RAW and SD, as I had not heard anything about merging into one owner until it happened that night.  On another note, we might not have had General Managers, at least not at that point in time.  So, I guess Eric Bischoff can thank Stone Cold for getting him a job. 

 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Maybe I'm remembering incorrectly, but wasn't Austin was scheduled to job to Brock Lesnar the night of his walkout (perhaps not entirely cleanly, I *think* Eddie Guerrero was going to be the guest referee)? In that event, I'm sure it would have strengthened Brock's push if Austin had gone through with the match, considering Brock was still only crushing midcard deadweight, like the Hardys and RVD, at the time.

 

Anyway, as for events from 2002 that had far-reaching effects, I'd personally say that Hogan's freakishly big pop at WM 18 had more long term significance than Austin's walkout. Not only did it directly lead to Hogan's excrutiating world title push, but it motivated them to bring back all sorts of relics from the past looking for that same quick fix (Steiner, Goldberg, Nash, Hogan's returns). In almost the antithesis of their 1998-2000 heyday, WWE was looking to their past stars to solve their problems, rather than developing new ones to fill their main events. If Montreal had booed Hogan, or even given him only a mild face reaction, we might have been spared it.

[zyn081 0]

So why couldn't they do face HHH vs. heel HBK?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Cause the Holy Bible Kid no longer does heel anymore.

 

On another note, I think they were setting up Austin and Eddie, and then Austin and Benoit. But SCSA was an ass about it, took his ball and went home. I would have liked to have seen those matches. IIRC SCSA was going to be jobbed to Brock, but SCSA jumping ship resulted in Brock SD only. Brock as KotR was always planned.

 

Regarding Nash, this is news to me. It is interesting though. HHH was getting comeback face heat, cause the E hyped it up like we would never see him again. The HHH-HBK thingy did seem a bit rushed to set up SummerSlam. Would have been interesting cause that means that Steiner would have, from the looks of things gone to SD as a heel. I like the way HHH just draws big men to himself.

 

The short term effect of this was above average HHH-HBK and Brock-Rock matches at SummerSlam. The long term effect was bleh.

 

Btw, I too would have preferred Hogan-SCSA at WMX18, but who would have Rock faced? Its obvious that it was Rock-Hogan cause of the Hollywood connection, would have made even more sense if Rock-Hogan was in Hollywood though.

[humongous2002 0]

considering Brock was still only crushing midcard deadweight, like the Hardys and RVD, at the time.

RVD was the most over guy in WWE at the time, so I imagine he was more than midcard deadweight for Lesnar and was used as a stepping stone to get Brocky over.

[Angles Broken Fricken Neck 0]

didnt austin get offered the hogan match before rock, but he turned it down?

[TheDevilAndGodAreRagingInsideMe 0]

Did HHH get hurt again between losing the strap to Hogan and the mid summer? I don't remember this.

[Guest news_gimmick]

Yes, after his KOTR match with Undertaker he didn't wrestle again until just before SummerSlam. I vaguely remember what his problem was, I believe it had to do with one of his quads again possibly, he needed more time off was all.

[Shooting Star 0]

Yes, after his KOTR match with Undertaker he didn't wrestle again until just before SummerSlam. I vaguely remember what his problem was, I believe it had to do with one of his quads again possibly, he needed more time off was all.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I think it was his shoulder. Don't know if this was the real reason but WWE said it was because of a chairshot by UT.

[Black Lushus 0]

I'm sorry, but even the Rock was getting stale with his act being on a constant basis...he's best kept to small runs, one-shot appearances, etc. at this point...

[Shooting Star 0]

I remember when he came back for Vengeance and Summerslam and looking at his skits and thinking...WTF??they were getting really stupid.

[slimm44 0]

I think Vengeance 2003 was when everything changed. Had Michaels not changed HHH's mind s/l wise, HHH would have been on Smackdown and the Heavyweight title would have been given to someone else after Summerslam.

[Lil' Bitch 0]

HHH had to get surgery in mid 2002 to get some bone chips removed from his elbow or something like that. Its a shame about 2002, I wanted to see Austin / Guerrero too.

[Shooting Star 0]

Can you really blame Austin for not leaving in 2002?I mean it was unprofessional and all but they were going to job him out to someone who had been in the company less than 5 months.

[Spaceman Spiff 0]

He was upset they were wasting it on a Raw w/ hardly any buildup, as opposed to building up to the match at a PPV, not that Brock was new to the main roster.

[Guest *KNK*]

To an extent I agreed with Austin on that end but wasn't it going to be tainted anyways?

 

I still suspect that Austin knew his neck was damaged goods and left and used that as an excuse to see if his neck would recover and realized it wouldn't and figured he'd better do that last WM blowout career finale to end his career "right".

 

Still don't argree with his decision to leave at all.

[Guest Stunt Granny]

Austin's career was pretty much over after the abrupt end of his heel run. For the entire year he presented a fresh new and very entertaining persona and putting on kick ass matches only to give it up to be the "old" Stone Cold. That was pretty much the begining of the end for Steve-o.

[bobobrazil1984 0]

ON one hand, wrestlers should do what they're told.

 

On the other, it was a monumentally stupid decision (Austin v Brock was a WRESTLEMANIA main event worthy matchup), by a crew of writers and bookers who, for almost FOUR STRAIGHT YEARS have made awful decisions after awful decisions, fucking up every single storyline possible. I know at the time Austin somehow felt he was getting buried with the first round KOTR job, as opposed to Rock and Undertaker getting big PPV showdowns with Brock, but I think its simply typical WWE stupidity.

[SuperJerk 0]

Watching tapes from mid-2002 is weird as fuck.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Indeed.

 

2002 was probably the most fucked up year in WWE history.

[Enigma 0]

I was at the show where Austin was supposed to start bossing around Flair. Imagine how shocked we were to get Flair vs. McMahon for control of everything...especially after they had Flair vs. McMahon in the same arena 5 months earlier for Royal Rumble 2002.

[zyn081 0]

I was at the show where Austin was supposed to start bossing around Flair. Imagine how shocked we were to get Flair vs. McMahon for control of everything...especially after they had Flair vs. McMahon in the same arena 5 months earlier for Royal Rumble 2002.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

That was 1 of the most stupid booking decisions IMHO.

[SuperJerk 0]

One good thing about the Austin walk out was that it spared us the "Flair as Austin's assistant" storyline.

[cabbageboy 0]

2002 was a truly horrible year for wrestling, it really was. Not totally worthless type bad like WCW 1999-2000 but really bizarro world level bad. I mean the company did the roster split, lost its name, hired GMs, pushed guys from nowhere, jobbed out very over guys, brought back hasbeens to boost business, had necrophilia. It was a mess.

 

Humongous, thank you for setting the record clear on RVD/Brock. The idea that RVD was midcard deadweight in 2002 is fucking retarded. Jesus, he was the most over guy in the fed back then. In fact of all the things the WWF/E did badly in 2002 the one thing that constantly sticks in my mind is them jobbing RVD to Brock. The 2002 KOTR was a disaster of a PPV, hell it KILLED the KOTR PPV!! All they had to do was give RVD that little boost and he'd have been a solid main eventer. He could have gone against the Rock in a fun match, taken the title, and the whole direction of the company would have been much different. Instead Vince tried to push a vanilla, charisma free rookie in Lesnar in some pathetic, desperate attempt to create The Next Big Thing. Given the way Lesnar flaked out, and how little actual money he drew as champion, I don't see how anyone can defend this stupid as fuck booking decision. Lesnar was gone from the promotion 2 years later, and it sent Van Dam on a downward spiral that he's never really recovered from.

 

Stuff like Flair/McMahon I'd honestly forgotten about and frankly it never bothered me because it was clearly something they felt panicked into doing due to Austin leaving. I also never worried about the ramifications of Nash being injured since that match with HHH would have sucked anyway. But that Lesnar/RVD match at KOTR? Single stupidest 1 match booking decision of the post Invasion era.

[Art Sandusky 0]

I think that 2002 provided us with the most unintentionally funny soundbites of any year is a nice way to prove it was the weirdest year ever for the WWF and then WWE.

 

"I'm going... bye..."

[Hunter's Torn Quad 0]

Humongous, thank you for setting the record clear on RVD/Brock.  The idea that RVD was midcard deadweight in 2002 is fucking retarded.  Jesus, he was the most over guy in the fed back then.  In fact of all the things the WWF/E did badly in 2002 the one thing that constantly sticks in my mind is them jobbing RVD to Brock.  The 2002 KOTR was a disaster of a PPV, hell it KILLED the KOTR PPV!!  All they had to do was give RVD that little boost and he'd have been a solid main eventer.  He could have gone against the Rock in a fun match, taken the title, and the whole direction of the company would have been much different.  Instead Vince tried to push a vanilla, charisma free rookie in Lesnar in some pathetic, desperate attempt to create The Next Big Thing.  Given the way Lesnar flaked out, and how little actual money he drew as champion, I don't see how anyone can defend this stupid as fuck booking decision.  Lesnar was gone from the promotion 2 years later, and it sent Van Dam on a downward spiral that he's never really recovered from.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I don't have the numbers at hand, and I'll find them if I have to, but Brock was one of the company's better draws when he was there, and for non-gimmicked PPV's, he outdrew everyone else in either 2002 or 2003.

 

Scratch the last part. I was thinking of Goldberg, who happens to also get hated for mostly irrational reasons.

[SuperJerk 0]

Besides, its not like RVD jobbed to Brock clean.