RIP "Macho Man" Randy Savage

[MattFancy]

Pretty good story from Bill Simmons

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/110524

[Lombardi's_kid_brother]

Pretty good story from Bill Simmons

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/110524

I like Simmons, but I really wish he didn't think that if he didn't see something, it never happened. He does this all the time.

This is me being a complete nerd, but Savage did not invent the concept of the female manager/valet. Gorgeous George had them in the 50s. More importantly, Jimmy Garvin and Precious/Sunshine were burning down Dallas years before Elizabeth showed up. Same with Kevin Sullivan and Fallen Angel (Woman/Nancy Benoit) in Florida. Same with Exotic Adrian Street and Miss Linda in Memphis.

Here is a great story from Deadspin:

Now time for our email of the week. It comes from reader Adam, who was Randy Savage's second cousin. He offers this tribute:

Adam:

When I was a kid, Randy's Mother (aka Macho Mom) would always make sure that Randy would put aside tickets for when the WWF or WCW would come to Chicago. During a show in 1992 or 1993, me and my brother were actually granted the opportunity to go backstage. For the 6-year-old me, this was the most awesomest thing possible.

I don't remember what happened during the show, but I do have a vague memory of what happened when I was able to go backstage. I'm not sure of what my expectations were of going backstage, but at that point in my life I was sure of 3 things: Wrestling was 100% real, there were Good Guys who were super heroes, and there were Bad Guys that were super villains.

We were met backstage by some WWF people who were leading us into the locker room area, and we were brought to Randy to say hello. There were a bunch of other wrestlers around, which was really cool but there was one problem: the good guys were hanging out and being cordial to the bad guys! Seeing good guys like Brett Hart sharing laughs with bad guys like Jake "The Snake" Roberts was almost traumatic to see; like seeing your Dad french kiss your aunt. It simply wasn't supposed to happen.

I was sad, scared and confused. I gathered up the courage to ask why the Good Guys were friends with the Bad Guys. Randy said, "We're not. We're just tricking them. You'll see."

After this, a WWF rep was showing us some other areas of the backstage. I don't remember what we saw, but I know when we circled back to the area where Randy was, all of the wrestlers I had seen before were back in character. Bad guys were yelling at Good Guys about how they were going to kick their butt and Good Guys were holding each other back from attacking the bad guys.

This. Was. Awesome. It IS real! Of course it is!

Randy didn't know me too well, but he cared enough about a young fan and professional wrestling to keep the illusion and innocence alive.

While, as I said earlier, I cannot claim that we were particularly close, I do send my condolences to those in our family who were. He made a lot of people happy.

http://deadspin.com/5805095/an-in+depth-examination-of-dad-strength

[Homercles82]

If you haven't watched Beyond the Mat you need to. It details Jake The Snake Roberts life after reaching the pinnacle of his career in WWF. It is old, made in 1997 I want to say, but he obviously has not changed his lifestyle since then.

Also, you need to watch The Rise and Fall of WCW. Great backstory and you get to see how Kevin Nash, Scott Hall and Hogan basically ran WCW in the mid-90's, and eventually ruined it.

[Lombardi's_kid_brother]

If you haven't watched Beyond the Mat you need to. It details Jake The Snake Roberts life after reaching the pinnacle of his career in WWF. It is old, made in 1997 I want to say, but he obviously has not changed his lifestyle since then.

Also, you need to watch The Rise and Fall of WCW. Great backstory and you get to see how Kevin Nash, Scott Hall and Hogan basically ran WCW in the mid-90's, and eventually ruined it.

Keep in mind Rise and Fall was a WWE production, and therefore, unbelievably biased.

WCW was a money loser with bad booking from its birth. It could have survived Bischoff, Nash, Hogan, and everything else. What ultimately killed it was the fact that Jamie Kellner took over TBS and he wanted to completely remake the Turner networks. He saw WCW as a link to TBS's hick past and wanted to sever those ties.

When it died, WCW was still producing really great ratings. They could have cut costs to the bone and still produced a worthwhile number. But the network wanted to move as far away from wrestling as possible. And Ted Turner - who was a wrestling fan - no longer had a strong enough voice in the company.

You are probably too young to remember, but in the late 70s and early 80s, Channel 17 in Atlanta became WTBS - one of the first superstations. It was really just a local hick station, showing old movies and Andy Griffith re-runs. But it had one program that no one else had - Georgia Championship Wrestling. That show drew monster ratings and really carried the station in the early days. In fact, Vince McMahon bought that show early in his bid to go national and faced a huge backlash because the TBS audience was an NWA audience. He eventually sold the show to Jim Crockett, who was the precursor of WCW.

[Homercles82]

I am too young to know any of that but the program did go over that. It also went over how in the early to mid 80's when WCW was making money hand over fist it was spending money even more than that. It did go over Vince buying them early on then selling them basically so he could finance the first Wrestlemania. I felt it was fair, and despite some of the crap WCW pulled in the late 90's I still enjoyed their program.

It is a shame there isn't a true competitor to WWE right now. Wrestling from both programs in the 90's was great.

[tone_dubbz]

I remember being sooooo mad at the Macho Man for jumping off the 3rd turnbuckle and smashing the bell on Ricky Steamboats throat, after the Macho Man already won the match by count out.

I thought he was seriously injured, especially when they made the Steam Boat act like he had to go through speech therapy because his larynx was crushed.

Quite honestly, I don't think I ever forgave him for that :pfft:

RIP to one of the legends in the sport....Macho Man Randy Savage.

[Lombardi's_kid_brother]

I am too young to know any of that but the program did go over that. It also went over how in the early to mid 80's when WCW was making money hand over fist it was spending money even more than that. It did go over Vince buying them early on then selling them basically so he could finance the first Wrestlemania. I felt it was fair, and despite some of the crap WCW pulled in the late 90's I still enjoyed their program.

It is a shame there isn't a true competitor to WWE right now. Wrestling from both programs in the 90's was great.

There was no WCW in the early 80s.

If you are thinking of Crockett, I don't think Crockett ever made money hand over fist. It was certainly a very profitable territory for decades. And it certainly was popping big shows in the mid to late 80s. But no territory - even WWF - was making buckets of money then.

The idea that Wrestlemania I was a huge gamble for Vince has became a bit of an urban legend, and no one knows how true that is. I know Vince has tried to sell that story to make him sound like a brave corporate warrior. The risk was that had it failed, Vince's vision for a national company were probably dead for a decade. But WWF had the best cities and the best syndication deals already at that point. It was never going to "die," because if worst came to worst, it could always stick to MSG, the Spectrum, Boston Garden, and Maple Leaf Gardens. As Dave Meltzer wrote a million years ago, those four beat all the Rome, Georgias and Greensboro, North Carolinas in the universe put together. Just by virtue of owning the New York market, Vince was seen as "big-time" while the Crocketts - based in Charlotte - were seen as minor league.

I don't know if I agree with Ric Flair and Jim Cornette that the Crocketts could have survived by remaining regional. The UWF deal and moving the offices to Dallas certainly guaranteed that they were going to go out of buisness a lot sooner than otherwise would have happened, but eventually Turner would have wondered why are we letting these small-time promoters create all this programming for our network? And business for the Crocketts was really bad in '88 and '89. Even if they weren't spending hundreds of thousands on jets, they were never going to be able to match Vince's pockets on contracts.

Do you want to know what really changed the game for Vince? Saturday Night's Main Event.

Not because of exposure or ratings - though that certainly helped - but because WWF basically got Olympic-quality tv production facilities for free. Even in its best days, WCW's tv shows looked like amateur videos compared to the WWF.

[Homercles82]

In the movie the Crockett son said they were making so much money that they were buying personal jets, and flying all over the place. He told a story about how his accountants called him one day telling him they were millions in the hole after operating on a profit.

And it was Crockett who said Vince needed the money from the sale to put on Wrestlemania, so unless Vince paid him off, I'd say it was true.

[DM72]

There was no WCW in the early 80s.

If you are thinking of Crockett' date=' I don't think Crockett ever made money hand over fist. It was certainly a very profitable territory for decades. And it certainly was popping big shows in the mid to late 80s. But no territory - even WWF - was making buckets of money then.

The idea that Wrestlemania I was a huge gamble for Vince has became a bit of an urban legend, and no one knows how true that is. I know Vince has tried to sell that story to make him sound like a brave corporate warrior. The risk was that had it failed, Vince's vision for a national company were probably dead for a decade. But WWF had the best cities and the best syndication deals already at that point. It was never going to "die," because if worst came to worst, it could always stick to MSG, the Spectrum, Boston Garden, and Maple Leaf Gardens. As Dave Meltzer wrote a million years ago, those four beat all the Rome, Georgias and Greensboro, North Carolinas in the universe put together. Just by virtue of owning the New York market, Vince was seen as "big-time" while the Crocketts - based in Charlotte - were seen as minor league.

I don't know if I agree with Ric Flair and Jim Cornette that the Crocketts could have survived by remaining regional. The UWF deal and moving the offices to Dallas certainly guaranteed that they were going to go out of buisness a lot sooner than otherwise would have happened, but eventually Turner would have wondered why are we letting these small-time promoters create all this programming for our network? And business for the Crocketts was really bad in '88 and '89. Even if they weren't spending hundreds of thousands on jets, they were never going to be able to match Vince's pockets on contracts.

Do you want to know what really changed the game for Vince? Saturday Night's Main Event.

Not because of exposure or ratings - though that certainly helped - but because WWF basically got Olympic-quality tv production facilities for free. Even in its best days, WCW's tv shows looked like amateur videos compared to the WWF.[/quote']

You know your stuff. I like that. Only one thing. You didn't mention the NWA once.

[Lombardi's_kid_brother]

In the movie the Crockett son said they were making so much money that they were buying personal jets, and flying all over the place. He told a story about how his accountants called him one day telling him they were millions in the hole after operating on a profit.

And it was Crockett who said Vince needed the money from the sale to put on Wrestlemania, so unless Vince paid him off, I'd say it was true.

It's not true. I don't care what he says.

The Crocketts were buying a lot of stuff on credit under the idea that to be "big time" you had to appear "big time." They jet stuff was part of the problem. The bigger problem was that they bought the UWF and moved their corporate offices to Dallas, despite the fact that the heart of their territory hugged the coast from Baltimore to Atlanta.

Actually, the bigger problem was that they bought the UWF, Central States, etc.

Jim Crockett was operating under the old rules of the game. He - for some reason - believed that in order to run a show in New Orleans or Houston, he either needed Bill Watts' permission or he needed to buy Bill Watts' territory. Watts saw the writing on the wall and sold his territory, walking away with a nice profit. What the Crocketts should have done is just let Watts' go out of business and sign the wrestlers for pennies on the dollar.

The sad thing in all of this, is that Crockett had better wrestling than Vince from about '84 through '87. He had Dusty's booking which could kill towns faster than nuclear war, but he still had the Horsemen and the Rock and Roll Express and the Midnight Express and Nikita Koloff.

By '88, though, the territory was dead as well as bleeding money.

I think ultimately three things killed the Crocketts:

1. Keeping Flair as champ. This is not going to go over well, but having a heel at the top of the territory could not work for a national company in the 80s. An NWA champ had to be a heel so he could go up against the local babyface every three months or so. But fans don't want to get blueballs watching the bad guy win every week on national tv. Maybe if Magnum TA had not had his accident, things would have gone differently. But the WWF had Hogan winning with a pinfall every week while Flair was getting himself disqualfied to hold onto the belt. The number one rule of wrestling is send the fans home happy. NWA/Crockett/WCW was never good at that. Vince always was. (I think a heel has won the main event at Wrestlemania once).

2. Buying the UWF. They went deep in the red for no reason.

3. Their syndication deal. Having TBS being their only real outlet made them look like a southern-fried, small town deal. Vince was on USA of course. But he had great syndication and a partnership with NBC.

---------- Post added May-25th-2011 at 10:15 AM ----------

You know your stuff. I like that. Only one thing. You didn't mention the NWA once.

The NWA died in 1983 and nobody bothered to tell it.

I get into the NWA in the post after this. Crockett's allegiance to the old order of the NWA really hurt him in two ways: 1. He felt obligated to work with other promoters and buy them out. 2. He kept the NWA tradition of a heel champ in place.

Fans want to cheer the champion. I was a big NWA fan and my dad would take me to their cards once or twice a year. Flair always headlined and he always gave you a great 30 to 45 minute match. But at the end of it, you found yourself thinking, "Well....that sucked" because there was either a Dusty finish or a DQ or a countout. The show inevitably ended with a frustrated babyface standing in the ring looking confused.

Hogan gave you ten minutes, the big boot, the leg drop, and ten minutes of celebratory posing. People left WWF live shows happy.

PS....the one territory that could have gone national and could have beaten Vince was not Crockett. It was Fritz Von Erich and World Class. In '83 and '84, they had a national tv deal with CBN. They had interest from ESPN. They had great tv production, even better than WWF at that point. They were from Dallas, which was not New York but was a hell of a lot better than being based out of Charlotte. They had good workers. And they had the three prettiest, most over babyfaces that God could have ever created in David, Kerry, and Kevin.

If Fritz had not been so loyal to the old NWA rules, he might have been able to break out. Granted, his locker room was a morgue within three years so who knows how that would have played out...but....he had a chance.

There is another factor here: Vince liked the Von Erichs. It's possible that Vince would have bought them out or somehow merged with them at some point.

Anyway, the NWA was just an organizing body; it was not a promotion. Vince, Sr. was kind of/sort of part of the NWA even in the early 80s. It was never Vince Jr's competition. Other promoters were the competition. And only three really had a shot of competiting with him:

1. Crocket

2. Von Erich

3. Watts - maybe

Bill Watts was a tremendous booker, smart businessman, and a great finder of talent. Watts' problem was that his territory was limited to dirt poor states. I just don't see how you go national out of swamp towns in Louisiana.

In a way, Vince won the wrestling war before it started. He had New York, Boston, and Philly. That meant he had the biggest tv and media markets. When Sports Illustrated wanted to do a story on wrestling, it wasn't flying a reporter to Dallas. It was having a reporter walk to MSG.