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The monumental IYH "It's Cold!" IC title switch

Hi Scott I'll just quickly get the "cuz you're simply the best/better than all the rest/ better than anyone/anyone i ever met" stuff out of the way...

What was the ORIGINAL plan for the monumental IYH Winnipeg Shawn-Dean-Douglas-Razor switch? Was Shawn going to drop it to Dean? If so, how would they have gotten the title to Goldust?

So many questions...

But what a great show. Billy's haircut and all.


​Shawn was always dropping that title to Dean Douglas, yes.  They had a battle royale on RAW the next week (which I just covered) and Owen won it, but you could just as easily have seen Razor win it and get the title shot instead, which is how I think they would have done the transition if not for stuff happening.  The forfeit just sped up the process by doing the Shawn-Dean-Razor sequence on the night of the show to keep fans happy and put a babyface over.  

Now, [Vince mode] NOTWITHSTANDING THAT [/Vince mode] , what are the chances of Shawn actually doing that job in the ring if he was healthy?  I dunno.  But certainly the plan and belief was that Shawn was dropping the title that night.  

Comments

  1. Shawn Michaels vs Shane Douglas in a match given plenty of time in 95 minus any politics would have probably been a really good match.

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  2. Vince McMahon Mode or Vince Russo Mode?

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  3. Shawn Michaels vs a broomstick in a match given plenty of time in 95 regardless of any politics would have probably been a really good match.

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  4. McMahon. Go back and watch the first five episodes of SNME sometime, and do a shot every time Vince says "notwithstanding". You'll be more incoherant than Ric Flair endorsing the Shield.

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  5. Would they have know before his debit Goldust would be getting the IC title in January?

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  6. It's hard to say, but WWF were pretty good at booking long term during this period and normally had the next 6 months planned in advance.

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  7. Goldust was getting the IC belt regardless. It was obvious. I have an issue of WWF Magazine from December that has the predictions for 1996 and they predicted he was getting it. In those days, that was pretty much straight from the mouth of God on the subject.

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  8. I've been coming here for years and we've exhausted a ton of topics, but we never talked a lot about early Goldust. Anyone else think that Goldust/Ramon and Goldust/Ahmed was some groundbreaking stuff? Not just for the business but as far as tv.

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  9. Well HK09 did say before his debut. I'm sure WWF planned for GD to get the IC title by November. It's harder to say if they planned it before his debut, just because it was a weird gimmick and it so easily could have flopped.


    I'm sure they were planning to give Goldust an IC title push before his debut, but I think they also had a plan B incase the Goldust thing didn't work out and they'd give another wrestler who was at a similar level the same push, maybe with HHH.

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  10. Late 90s. I think Goldust debuted for that.

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  11. You're right that he did say before his debut, but if you remember the timeline you would realize that the dude only had like 2 matches prior to the issue of the magazine coming out. Sounds to me like they definitely knew before the debut.

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  12. Now I'm wondering how long Douglas would have stuck around had he had a proper, longer than 12 minutes, run as IC champ, or was he always going back to ECW at the beginning of 1996

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  13. Vince always invests heavily in whatever his current "project" is, so the Goldust character was in line for a big push regardless... before the Clique ruined the character resenting Kids role as Dean's sidekick Dean Douglas was Vince's project character and was in line for a huge push... after Goldust was up and running it was Ahmed... then Austin

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  14. Correct. Oz started in 1997 and Goldust was either 1995 or 1996.

    As a sidenote, Oz is probably my third-favorite drama ever behind The Shield and Mad Men, barely ahead of Breaking Bad.

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  15. So nothing ever changes everytime Vince has a new toy to play with.

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  16. then with less promotion and a goofier opponent Bret Hart would have a better match earlier on the card

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  17. Up voting, because I feel like way too little was discussed about how hammered it sure as fuck seemed like he was, slurring his way through that goddamn burning school bus of a promo. Holy lord, that was painful.

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  18. It seems like they always had it in for him. He wasn't going to stick around too long.

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  19. Oz was damned good but it really went off the rails the last season.

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  20. He didn't help his cause to be honest

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  21. The Luke Perry storyline is went it started going off the rails.

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  22. Well, I'm sure once the Undertaker starts to tape his fists up menacingly in front of Shawn....

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  23. Douglas was going through the motions as the Dean, and I don't know if a proper IC title run gets him to stick with WWF long enough to be part of Austin's rise and the Attitude era.

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  24. I don't think Shawn would have had much of a problem dropping the IC belt when he knew he'd be getting the World Title in March. I mean, he can't hold both belts.

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  25. Then you miss out on those who don't have $60 extra in there monthly budget, myself included. $10 is far more manageable.

    There is no perfect way to do it. The number for HIAC will be interesting. Assuming 600,000 it the lowest it will go, 600,000 to 800,000 for B-shows, and 1 million+ for the 3 big shows is doable. Then they hope the product gets hot again.

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  26. Yeah, the last two seasons got really silly, but I think they pulled it together by the last few episodes to give it a decent enough ending.

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  27. Better to lose the 5-10% who can't come up with $60 every 6 months than lose 20-25% who decide to "force unsubscribe" after 2 months.

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  28. I was really disappointed that match didn't take place. I enjoyed the Dean character and was looking forward to it.

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  29. How many of those 20-25% who decide to "force unsubscribe" never subscribe in the first place?

    Your just guessing on the percentages. I would bet you anything WWE has the correct percentages of those who can not come up with $60, but then agian they did come up with that 60 million people with an affinity number.

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  30. Of course I'm just guessing... aren't we all at this point?

    But I think I can fairly say that the percentage of people who can't afford a 1-time purchase of $60 every 6 months is less than the number of people who will "force unsubscribe".

    In any event, saying it's "unenforceable" is untrue, and clearly the amount of people who dropped off by nefarious means was not a good number.

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  31. Plus, they really should be doing "tiered" pricing like pretty much everything with a monthly plan ever:


    $9.99/month, no commitment
    $8.99/month, 6-month commitment, paid up front
    $7.99/month, 12-month commitment, paid up front


    (Actually, the prices should have been $11.99, no commit, $9.99, 6-month paid up front, $8.99, 12-month paid up front, but that ship sailed)

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  32. Yeah I'd agree with this, although I think they actually kinda copped out a bit on the character when they added Marlena and went with the "he's just playing mind games with Razor" bend on the angle.



    Gay heels are old hat of course, but they were usually played up to be very camp, with lots of flamboyance, so I suppose Goldie was new to wrestling --- smarter, darker, and weirder than your the typical comedy roles that character is usually destined for.

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  33. Also "quite frankly". That's a huge McMahon staple.

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  34. The closest you'll get is the Survivor Series the next month.

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  35. I think Goldust was playing the gimmick similarly to Gorgeous George, where he played the character with gay tendencies, but at the same time made you ask yourself if he's really gay or not.

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  36. The thousand plus comments on the .com announcement were certainly not laughter!

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  37. How is it un unenforceable, if so many people were allowed to walk away. It was unenforceable the way they set it up. You would also lose out on a majority of those that canceled early with up front payments.

    It does blow my mind that teired pricing wasn't offered.

    The main problem with 9.99 for a month is more often than not there are 2 ppvs in 30 days.

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  38. I guess what I mean is that it shouldn't have been unenforceable.


    But yeah, the way they chose to do it was pretty damn unenforceable, which is part of the reason why they're in the world of hurt they're in now.

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  39. UK exclusive joke ftw

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  40. Well, I signed up yesterday using unblock.us out of annoyance and watched WWE Countdown and an episode of ECW from 1993. It works on my laptop but not on my Roku box, so I am hoping they get it sorted properly asap so I can watch properly. I'm really not sure what's going on with WWE. There was no scheduled date forever, and then with just a few days notice they announced Monday's date, then pulled it with twenty minutes to go. Bit of a shambles.

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  41. I can't understand it. Why announce that sudden date out of nowhere? They only said it was coming on Monday on like the 30th of October. Weird.

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  42. I think we're gonna be looking at either a PPV-less network, or no network at all. I don't see a way round this for WWE if it is the contract with Sky Sports that is quite understandably causing the problems.

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  43. Exotic Adrian Street

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  44. A PPV less network would go down like a lead balloon. You'd be paying solely for the archives with no current product. Including the PPV's I'd pay. Otherwise not a chance

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  45. 1963 - WWWF
    1979 - WWF
    2002 - WWE

    Somewhere in there, they were using WWFE (around 2000/2001) as the legal name for the corporation, but on-screen they were still just the WWF.

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  46. some of the feuds he had were weird for me even back then: prime example is the program with Ahmed Johnson. I thought the latter looked like an idiot for freaking out over that fake-cpr like that.

    (the original commentary, which we didn't get here at that point, was even adding to that: "that's the most revolting thing I've seen in my life!" really?!)

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  47. It may not have been pc but it represented what a lot of people felt at the time and still feel now. The flip side, as you state, did Ahmed (and others) flip out? It's really an angle that challenges you which is something wrestling ever does.

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  48. If your router is capable of it, explore the option of setting up "routing tables" for the unblock-us.com DNS servers.

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  49. no the gimmick became "gay" when the original slant (guy dresses as an Oscar award quoting movies) bombed, IYH 5 Goldust has his letter delivered to Razor and from there it was taking off his clothes to reveal Razor tattoos and "is that a microphone in your pants Mr.Announcer or are you happy to see me?"

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  50. Bill Watts left WWF because he warned Vince that Shawn was "too scrawny" to draw as a babyface world champion... and the "12 year old boyhood dream cocky boy toy" drew zero money and wrapped up his title reign by being booed out of MSG... the rematch only partly filling a heavily papered Dome event at Rumble 97... and then lost his smile due to a knee injury that somehow prevented him from dropping the title to Bret at WM13 but didn't prevent him from instead doing his stripper dance at the show instead


    "Shawn Michaels" is remembered a lot more fondly in retrospect by fans that didn't have to sit through his bomb of a babyface run for 2 year


    a little guy that wrestles a quasi lucha style... who would of guessed New York would crap all over it

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  51. Man, I'm stumped. I can set up my Roku to think it's American, and it actually loads up the WWE Network, but once I actually click on any show it says that it's blocked in my country. So I'm fooling the Roku, kinda, but not fooling the network. Same with trying to get US Netflix up instead of UK Netflix, which is poor in comparison.

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  52. lets watch that classic Iron Man match when Shawn won the title... but no one likes it


    lets watch his no hold barred match with Nash that wasn't as good as Nash's one with Bret at Series 95


    lets watch either of his two main events with Bulldog that drew no money and no one remembers


    lets watch his PPV main event 6-man tag that drew no money and no one remembers


    lets watch his SSlam main event with a contrived finish because Shawn refused to drop the title to Vader the day of the show


    Mind Games vs Mankind was a great match but no one ordered that show so it made no money


    he skipped IYH Buried Alive


    was booed out of MSG in 96 after a crappy match with Sid


    what a legend

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  53. I remember on the Bret vs Shawn DVD, Bret himself said he thought Shawn got a wrong deal for his title run, pointing out that no matter who was champ, WCW would still have been winning with the NWO.

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  54. I remember the Dusty DVD, Dustin himself sums up that "it was just way ahead of its time" and that's true, was a real envelope pushing thing for a still cartoonish WWF and he enjoyed it a lot so nice it worked out.

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  55. Apparently hbk banged somebody's mom and never called.

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