10. “Too Much TV Led To WCW’s Demise” – Buff Bagwell
During a recent interview with WrestlingInc, WCW Veteran Buff Bagwell talked about WCW doing too much TV and how it became one of the reasons behind the demise of WCW. Below are the highlights:
On WCW doing too much TV:
“I think everything you said; the changes, the background of one week it was Russo, one week it was Bischoff, you never knew who was running the shows; so I think some of it was that, but I think we just killed it. We did three hour Nitros; I can’t watch wrestling for three hours. Nobody can watch wrestling for three hours; then you had WCW Thunder on Thursdays; it was just too much for the fans; just too much. Serious human mind; we’re Monday Night Nitro, making millions; everyone is happy and Eric Bischoff comes up with the Thunder idea, and we were like, Eric, don’t do that; that’s too much TV, it’s too much. He said that it would be a side show so we wouldn’t work it; it’d be like another group, kind of like what Raw and SmackDown is now; there’d be an A and a B show. That was his plan was, but he put Thunder out there the first week and it didn’t do well, so suddenly you had Bill Goldberg, Scott Steiner, all these guys get on Thunder, so it just added more work for us. I think it was just too much TV. That is the honest truth. I think we watered it down. I have a picture where we have the black and white nWo on, and the other side red and black and I couldn’t tell you why. I can tell you kind of, but the ones who were wearing the red were figured in. There was so much turmoil backstage; it was supposed to be Wolfpack, about 5-6 guys to get rid of the nWo, and become the next move, to keep an Elite Wolfpack group.”
On if he was on the final Nitro:
“I actually was believe it or not, on the final Nitro, but I never watched it. 100% I was on it, I did an interview with Luger. It’s not good on the very last night you’re not on the crowd. I’m trying to leave and go home and realize that my career is over. Half my way driving home my dad calls and asked if I was going to be on TV, I said no. He said, well, they just mentioned five names and you were one of the five. I said, what? He said, believe it or not, I’m not just saying this as your dad, because I went back and listened to it as well, but it’s probably the second, maybe the third biggest pop of the names mentioned.”
On being fired from the WWF:
“Then to be fired two weeks later, how do you explain that? I still don’t know what happened. No matter what thought you come up with, drugs, whatever you want to come up with, hey Mark, quit it, or we’re going to fire you. No warnings, still don’t know what happened. They said that we were going to chill out for about three months and then bring you back afterwards, but of course that wasn’t true. I shook their hands and thanked them and then went on my way.”
