Hey, Scott. Question for the blog...
of weird. Then we get a screwjob finish in the title match with Hogan and Taker, only to be teased for their rematch, "this Tuesday night in Texas." And they don't even announce that the show will be available on PPV until much later in night.So my question is, what was the point of that? Just to simply milk more money from the PPV buys? I remember it was much shorter, and I would assume didn't cost as much to order. Was this their first try at what would later become In Your House? And I've also heard that after the lame finish to Team Piper vs Team Flair at Survivor Series, that the two had a singles match un-televised before the Tuesday in Texas PPV went to air. Why not put that on the actual PPV, instead of giving us Bulldog vs Warlord?
Yeah, this was a pretty big experiment at the time, trying to see if something like what became TNA's weekly PPV idea would fly. They basically did the show on a shoestring budget with no advertising just to see if they COULD milk another few million dollars out of the top programs. And the answer proved to be "yes, sort of" because it kind of annoyed the cable companies and they abandoned the concept until In Your House.
As for the Flair-Piper match, I'm assuming they didn't want to kill the house show business that the match was doing at the time, especially on a show that was only 90 minutes and didn't have any advertising anyway. That being said, a three-match show with Hogan-UT, Savage-Roberts and Flair-Piper would have been pretty killer, so it might have been a better idea to just run it there.
I recently watched both of these shows, and when they happened at the time, I remember being so mad that Hogan lost at Survivor Series, and was glad he got the belt back. But then he was stripped of it and Flair got it at the Rumble. That rumble is still the best ever, and I was happy Flair won. Still wish they would've done Hogan vs Flair at Mania though.
ReplyDeleteI think what hurt Tuesday in Texas was being in the middle of the week. The show would have been a straight up success if it took place the following weekend. I was 10 at the time and if I couldn't stay up to watch all of Prime Time Wrestling on a school night then a ppv was not even an option.
ReplyDeleteMy Hogan love was waning thin at that point as I was adamant that Warrior was still the rightful champion as I never got over the miscarriage of justice that took place at the Rumble earlier that year.
ReplyDeleteGod, the blood feud between Jake and Savage is still almost 25 years later one of the best ever. I love Savage's title win because of the redemption arc from mania 4-8, but if they could have done Hogan-Flair, Jake-Savage, and Taker-Sid, I think that's a slightly better Wrestlemania. Then at some point you get the title on Savage and have him put over Bret at 9.
ReplyDeleteI find it funny that Vince now gets off on pissing cable companies off.
ReplyDeleteI just watched SS'91 again, and was amazed at how it was an infomercial for TTIT. If I had ordered/attended that show, I would've been none too pleased with a main event of LOD/Bossman vs. I.R.S./Natural Disasters, and no Macho Man. It's funny because two years earlier, the same thing kinda happened at Survivor Series because of No Holds Barred: The Match/The Movie. Three of the five matches' winners were determined by keeping the next ppv's main eventers strong.
ReplyDeleteIf Jake wasn't such a fuckup, you could have had Savage/Jake carry the post WM shows.
ReplyDeleteRandy Savage-Jake Roberts might be my favorite Federation era feud. God they were just made for each other, just old fashion pro wrestling shit.
ReplyDeleteJake almost certainly would have gotten a title run, or at the very least a run on top against Savage or Bret, if he hadn't been so damn stubborn and prideful.
ReplyDeleteSurvivor Series '91 was really hurt by them making it a hype show for Tuesday in Texas. It's like "Hey, we know you bought this show expecting to see all this stuff, but you need to buy ANOTHER show in a couple of days to actually get it!"
ReplyDeleteJake versus Savage at SummerSlam could have been a red hot match for the title. It's a shame his demons came at him when they did, because 92 could have been his year.
ReplyDeleteWas it even demons? I thought he left because he was pissed he didn't get Pat Patterson's job when Pat was forced to leave. He didn't know that Pat was just laying low and would be returning. Instead Jake thought he was being intentionally passed over for an open job that he had already expressed interest in, so he left.
ReplyDeleteThat 3 match card should have happened, and the fact that it didn't is one of the biggest missed opportunities in the company's history, for sure. Add to that Bret/Piper still happening, Warrior still returning to help Hogan at the end, and Jesus christ if'n that ain't the greatest Mania of all fucking time.
ReplyDeleteWell whatever the reason why he left the WWF, I wish they'd been able to come to an agreement to keep him around. Because Jake as a killer heel versus Savage, Bret, Hogan, a returning Warrior, and even Flair if you wanted to have Flair do a tweener thing could have set them up for a year of great stories.
ReplyDeleteDid they announce a proper card on the synicated shows the weekend between the Survivor Series and Tuesday in Texas?
ReplyDeleteYeah, exactly. If anything, his shit run in WCW coupled with the fact that he could have been on top the whole year in WWF probably led him to more self-abuse.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I remember them announcing all 5 matches on Superstars. In fact, one announced match was Barbarian vs Bret for the IC Title (announced during a Barbarian squash) and it was changed to Skinner by the time Tuesday rolled around.
ReplyDeleteThat Survivor Series that hyped TTIT was on a Wednesday.
ReplyDeleteI don't think there were any plans to run weekly PPVs--in the span of about a week, the WWF scheduled an extra PPV, slashed the front office, and re-organized the travel schedule into something less insane, all in an effort to increase profits for the year. That's all there was to the PPV.
ReplyDeleteYep, that's it.
ReplyDeleteAnd, unfortunately, the Jake-Savage feud was a colossal bomb at the gate, setting many all-time low attendances. Granted, business as a whole was doing poorly, but even in comparison to what else the WWF was running it just didn't work financially.
TTIT....I didn't know Vince Russo was booking back then too.
ReplyDeleteWhat do you mean you were 'maybe' 13? Do you not know your own DOB?
ReplyDeleteI never even thought of Jake vs Bret, but that could have been amazing. Mind games vs technical mastery, kind of a prototype for Bray Wyatt vs Daniel Bryan.
ReplyDeleteJake's promo, describing hitting Elizabeth as a sexual/drug experience, was fucking amazing. He says "I would pay MONEY!- to feel that!", then BEGS Macho Man to bring her back for their next fight. THEN he suggests he'll be able to turn her "into something that even *I* would want!" Just an absolute scumfuck, evil villain.
ReplyDeleteThen Macho basically says he's going to in fact MURDER Jake Roberts, but tells them carefully that he's NOT insane... only to go back on it by the end of the promo, going "you know what- maybe I AM insane!" and tells Jake that he's going to find out just HOW MUCH. And runs off screen, screaming incoherently the entire time.
Absolutely magnificent stuff.
the team roberts-team justice match was not the main event for crying out loud i don't care if it was last the main event was hogan-ut for the title.
ReplyDeletethat wasn't the main event hogan-u
ReplyDeleteyes the day before thanksgiving though
ReplyDeleteI love the pre-match Savage interview too when he hears Jake's music playing, that look he gets in his eyes is fantastic and then he runs him down in the aisleway.
ReplyDeleteOverall the SS / TIT thing was a really bad move I think. The Survivor Series wasn't a huge PPV in terms of buys at that point but that was easily the worst major WWF PPV to that point and likely damaged the brand, all in the name of hyping some one-off PPV that a lot of people didn't even order.
ReplyDeleteAs a fan of the traditional Survivor Series model, the 1991 Series annoys the hell out of me. Not only because it feels like a This Tuesday in Texas pre-show, but because the booking of the card is so lopsided. Rather than spreading the talent out across the card, you've got one match with all the upper-midcarders (Piper/Flair teams), one with all the jobbers (Duggan/Mustafa teams) and one with all the midcard tag teams. Only the Sid/Jake teams feel like proper SS teams, but they then ruin that by holding off Savage until TTIT making it 3 v 3. I fantasy rebook that show every time I watch it
ReplyDeleteI'm sure Bret built up to his IC title defence at TTIT by losing to Skinner and The Barbarian clean in non-title matches on Superstars and Wrestling Challenge... right?
ReplyDeleteUndertaker and Paul Bearer did a little interview on Prime Time Wrestling the Monday night before too. Him just holding the WWF belt looked so odd.
ReplyDeleteAnd they totally booked themselves into a corner by putting all the upper mid carders together, as they clearly didn't actually want to pin any of them. Thus we got that ridiculous cheap Flair victory that didn't do wonders for his credibility. No wonder Flair/Hogan stopped drawing in the arenas.
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