Flashback Friday: Thunder (No Lightning)

The late 1990's served as a boom for the wrestling business.  In 1995, Eric Bischoff who was leading the charge for WCW started the so called Monday Night Wars when he and others within the Turner company created Monday Nitro to compete with the WWF's Monday Night Raw.

After much success with that formula and a growing talent pool, it was time to expand.  WCW would launch "Thursday Night Thunder" in January 1998.  The first episode aired on January 8th of that year.  It's live format offered fans another two hours of wrestling action each week.

Probably the biggest shocker (no pun intended) from that first episode was "Gentleman" Chris Adams pinning "Macho Man" Randy Savage.  Of course, there was interference from Lex Luger that night, and the decision was eventually reversed.

The show stayed on the air through the Monday Night Wars which also became Thursday Night Wars when WWE added Smackdown! to its schedule.  I think when the E took the upper hand in the war, WCW executives moved Thunder to Wednesday nights.  It stayed on air until WWE bought the company in 2001.

Me & the Brain circa 1998.

I wasn't a regular Thunder watcher, but I did check out the show.  About 3 weeks into the show, I actually attended a live edition in Hunstville, Alabama.  I was a young reporter at the time working in nearby Florence.  Because of my job, I was able to get a media pass and interview several of the stars of the day.

Buff Bagwell, Goldberg, Ray Traylor, and Bobby "the Brain" Heenan all joined me for a few minutes to talk.  It was a very memorable experience.  You can see the clips on My 1-2-3 Cents on YouTube.

That night was interesting, because when we arrived at the arena in Huntsville we were greeted by the WCW staff.  They were all very nice to us.  Then they brought over our first interview, Goldberg.
The interview wasn't very eventful though.  Goldberg had just started with his winning streak.  This was still about 3 months before he was red hot.

Then there was a lull in the activity.  There were 3 other TV stations there at the time, and the wrestlers were just hitting us one at a time.  So in the downtime, I decided to shoot some video of the ring as the crew was setting it up.  This turned out to be a huge mistake.  Doug Dillinger, who was WCW's security guy (sorry I don't remember his exact title), approached me and asked what I was doing.  I told him getting "b-roll" (video) to go along with the story.  He proceeded to yell at me and tell me I had no right getting shots of the ring.  Keep in mind NO ONE said getting video of the ring was off limits.  Then he demanded my tape.  I assured him that I would not use the material, and I didn't want to give him my tape because my interview with Goldberg was on there.  He insisted and took the tape and said they'd erase only the footage of the ring and "try" to save the interview.

Me & Buff Bagwell

Dillinger gave me the tape back a short time later, but the interview with Goldberg was gone.  I was disappointed by that.  The only thing I can think that set him off was the fact that the Giant (aka the Big Show) destroyed the ring that night as the Outsiders stood inside it.  My guess is that the crew was rigging it to make it collapse easier.  I didn't have a problem with being told not to shoot the ring, but the way Dillinger came at me, yelling and embarrassing me in front of everyone else indicated to me that he's a class a douche.

The rest of the night went well.  The interviews were entertaining, especially the Bagwell and Heenan ones.  I was young and nervous and trying not to mark out the whole time.

Those are my memories of Thunder, which entered our world 13 years ago this week.

My Main Man(ager)

Jimmy Hart and me at Wrestlemania 22

In previous posts I've talked about the death or at least the dying out of tag team wrestling in the WWE.  If it were a person, it would be on life support.  That's a shame, but I'm not going to get into that discussion again today.

Instead, I'm focusing on another dying (or dead) aspect of wrestling that I thought added to the entertainment: the manager.

Now that Paul Bearer is "dead" again, are there really any managers in the WWE?  Alex Riley is more of  protegee.  Maryse, Eve, and Tamina are more valet than manager I would argue.

I definitely think managers should be brought back to the business, but it's not just the WWE that has stopped using them.  When I was growing up and watching wrestling in the 1980's, there was Slick, Bobby Heenan, Jimmy Hart, Elizabeth, Oliver Humperdink, Fred Blassie, Capt. Lou Albano, Mr. Fuji and the list goes on.  These men (and woman) added something to the product.  Most of the times they provided the voice for their talent.  Back then wrestlers didn't need to talk, they had their manager do it for them.

I always thought Bobby Heenan was the best at this.  He could talk all kinds of crap.  Build his men up and then usually himself end up on the receiving end of a butt kickin'.   He never seemed afraid to jump in there and put himself at risk.  That's what I loved about the Brain.  And he was funny too.

The E has experimented with other managers in recent years, Matt Stryker and Armando Estrada come to mind.  Personally, I thought they both did a good job.  I was disappointed when they released Estrada.  He and Umaga worked together perfectly I thought.

My tribute to Capt. Lou

There are Hall of Famers and legends who could move into the role of manager.  I'm sure there are even some up and comers in the developmental area who may not have the right stuff to make it in the ring, but could still make a contribution to the business. I thought Ric Flair was doing just fine when he was still in the WWE before Evolution really evolved.  It's a role he continues in TNA.

But I prefer it when managers only manage and don't wrestle.  Even if they wrestled in the past.   You knew most of the time that the manager would end up doing the job.  Of course the exception there was Wrestlemania 4 when Bobby Heenan pinned Koko B. Ware in that six man tag team match.

Maybe my desire for managers to make a come back has more to do with missing the way things used to be.  Times have changed, and maybe the manager, like the tag team division need to be put out to pasture.   Nah, they need to make a comeback.

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