WCW: Just a Tiny Look at the Promotion's Many Contributions to Wrestling

With this upcoming Survivor Series being 10 years removed from the Survivor Series that effectively killed the WCW brand, I thought this would be a great opportunity to look back at what are just a few of the contributions World Championship Wrestling made to the wrestling industry.

The promotion that emerged from the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA) and ran from about 1988-2001 was an innovation in the wrestling world.

Unfortunately, many still do not give WCW its due credit.

Many wrestling fans often use the term "attitude era" to the refer to the entire 1990s wrestling boom. The "attitude era" refers to a time period in the WWE which dates from 1998-2001.

The 1990s wrestling boom or Third Golden Age of Wrestling is generally dated from 1996-2001. During the first two years or so it was WCW that dominated in the ratings and ticket sales.

The WWE continues to view the now-defunct promotion as inferior—not just compared to itself.

The 2004 WWE-released DVD The Monday Night Wars was completely one-sided, blatantly depicting WCW in a negative light. At least in the 2009 WWE DVD The Rise and Fall of WCW Jim Ross remarks that WCW was never a bad company—that they (WCW) were the competition.

Here are just five things that made WCW great.

Big-Time Sporting Event Feel

Although WCW announcer Tony Schiavone was often criticized for over-hyping WCW telecasts and presenting it as a real sport, WCW, whether Nitro, Thunder, or PPV, always had to it a real sporting-like atmosphere feel.

With Nitro being live of course the show seemed less predicable than its then counterpart, RAW.

Having the announcers say things like the WCW board of commissioners whatever or this bout is sanctioned by whoever was amusing, but it brought on the feeling that WCW was serious about their product and really wanted to give the fans the best show possible.

Having Michael Buffer do the introductions made PPVs extra special. While his introductions were sometimes a little long, they made a WCW main event feel bigger and better than a heavyweight boxing championship bout.

Cruiserweight Division

For some reason the WWE never had much success with its Light Heavyweight division, even though it did have the talent.

The Cruiserweight division was crucial to WCW's early success.

Often the first matches on the card, cruiserweight matches were not just appetizers, they were full-course meals.

Men like Rey Mysterio, Dean Malenko, Juventud Guerra, Psychosis and Billy Kidman, just to name a few, brought a whole new style never before seen by US audiences. Their acrobatic performances dazzled fans.

Mysterio's accomplishments in WCW's Cruiserweight division alone make him a hall of famer.

A joke can be made that the NWO provided the entertainment while the cruiserweights provided the actual wrestling. That is how WCW was seen as providing a little bit of everything and attracting a wide audience.

Again just joking about the NWO being only entertaining and not providing good matches.

Older Stars Became Bigger Stars

Who says old people cannot serve a purpose?

No doubt that if not for their tenure in the WWE, men like Hulk Hogan and the Macho Man (and the wrestling industry for that matter) would not have existed and become the massive stars that they did.

However, just when the WWE thought that these wrestlers were too old and washed up, WCW signed them and turned them into arguably bigger stars.

One can argue that Hogan in WCW was bigger as the heel Hollywood Hogan and a bigger draw than a baby-face Hulk Hogan was in the WWE.

Despite what Chris Jericho says, WWE main events involving the younger Shawn Michaels and Bret Hart may have been better "wrestling" wise, but the WCW main events of Hulk Hogan vs. any 40-year-old wrestler were the hotter tickets.

Although Scott Hall and Kevin Nash became famous in the WWE, it was their involvement with the NWO in WCW that made them endearing.

To be fair, WCW did have lackluster results with Bret Hart and Roddy Piper.

New Stars Were Born

Contrary to belief, WCW did in fact create its own stars.

Wrestlers like Goldberg, Diamond Dallas Page and to a lesser extent, the Big Show (then known as the Giant), were milestones for WCW in that they were proof that WCW capable of producing its own household names instead of just using WWE talent.

Even if only for that one Nitro when he won the title (I say longer but many won't admit it), Goldberg was bigger and more popular than the other bald tough guy beating up everyone in the WWE.

DDP was the original people's champ before the Rock.

Ric Flair who despite his success in the WWE will always be known as a WCW wrestler. His career in WCW, though, goes back to when WCW was part of the NWA.

Other wrestlers like the Steiner Brothers, Booker T., and Lex Luger had runs of varying success in WWE, but are still largely identified with the WCW product.

Then there is Sting who is known as the franchise of WCW. Arguably the most famous wrestler of the modern era to never step foot in a WWE ring in the late 1990s Sting sold more merchandise than any other wrestler except for Stone Cold.

NWO

It was probably the greatest thing to ever happen in wrestling.

The NWO was not just a stable—it was a storyline that propelled WCW ahead of WWE in the ratings.

Yes, Eric Bischoff borrowed the idea from New Japan Pro Wrestling, but like they say: It doesn't matter where one gets an idea, but where one takes it. The NWO certainly took WCW to new heights.

The group was very much like a gang: scared and weak individually, but tough and strong as a group.

The NWO eventually split in two creating the rival Wolfpac. This was a dynamic twist in the storyline.

The stable and storyline eventually got stale and dissolved, only for it to reform numerous times to poor fan reaction, but a for lengthy amount of time it was the hottest ticket in wrestling.