Hey Scott. I was wondering if you knew how far in advanced the WWF feuds were booked in the early 90's? Did they plan out the WrestleMania main events months in advance or did they just kind of wing it? Also, how come Roddy Piper and Rick Rude never had their big match that was being built up well into WrestleMania VI? Instead they stuck Rude with Snuka and Piper and Bad News. Thanks and keep up the great work! It must be horrendous to have to sit through 3 hours of RAW every Monday. Which do you think was worse...3 hour RAW's or when Nitro went 3 hours for a little while?
In the early 90s? They planned the feuds and Wrestlemania main events in particular WAY in advance. Like usually a year, or sometimes more. The whole "make it up as we go along" thing didn't start until the Monday Night Wars era, in particular with the rise of Russo. They knew Slaughter was getting the World title as soon as he came in, for instance, and of course the Luger push was planned well in advance as well.
Piper and Rude did have their big match, but it was at MSG in a cage match. It didn't happen at Wrestlemania because they were giving Rude a renewed push and a new look and it would have been counterproductive to have Piper beat him at the point where he was supposed to be going back to the main event again.
And we didn't get the 3 hour Nitro here in Canada, they were edited down to 2 hours or sometimes less by TSN. Occasionally if there was a block of time open on the Wednesday following they'd show the whole thing in full, but that was never a rule. Honestly, the Monday Night Wars were barely a factor in Canada because the WWF was here first and were given preferential treatment by the only station with the rights to both shows. If Sportsnet or the Score (the two alternative sports stations) had been around in 1997 then one of them might have bought the WCW rights and made a fight out of it. But they didn't, so I never really had a chance to watch Nitro.