The Wrestling Observer Yearbook '97: The Last Time WWF Was Number Two

by Dave Meltzer

  For ECW’s Barely Legal to be the show that Terry Funk and Paul Heyman have envisioned in their brains and hearts for the past several months, it’ll require Funk once more staving off that finite end, a fight far harder and one hell of a lot more realistic than any pro wrestling storyline. Barely Legal is hardly the appropriate name. Almost Reality is a lot closer.

  APRIL 28

  The 4/13 ECW Barely Legal PPV show, besides getting a great response as a show, appears to have done better from a buy rate standpoint than the initial indications last week.

  Request TV sent out a press release claiming the show would do between 50,000 and 60,000 buys in a 17 million home universe which would be a buy rate of between 0.29 and 0.35. Multi Channel News estimated the buy rate to be 0.26 and 45,000 buys, and other industry sources also estimate the buy rate at between 0.24 and 0.27 but believe the 17 million universe figure is highly inflated and the realistic number of buys as closer to 40,000.

  I’m skeptical of a 17 million home universe carrying the show as well, since there is a basic rule of thumb within the industry to exaggerate that figure. Recent WWF and WCW PPV shows have had a universe of 26.2 million homes, and if you take away Canada (4 million homes), Cablevision (3 million), and half the satellite dish homes that didn’t carry ECW (2 million), that already cuts it down to 17 million. That isn’t even taking away the Viewers Choice homes which have to run into several million. Others who do PPV shows regularly claim that the total Request homes are more like 11 million, and if you add to that two million satellite homes and perhaps another million homes that carried the show on a stand-alone basis, that’s only a 14 million total and that’s not taking into consideration that a lot of the Cablevision homes and Request homes are the same and those homes weren’t able to purchase the show.

  The general rule within the PPV world is that the figures most companies claim publicly for their shows, not just within the pro wrestling world, are inflated by 20 percent. For example, the Oscar de la Hoya vs. Pernell Whitaker fight on 4/12 that was publicly claimed to have 1,000,000 buys really had closer to 800,000. Paul Heyman said that when he first received the press release, he thought the numbers listed were exaggerated but says he now has been led to believe the show will end up doing in excess of 50,000 buys and at that figure would be a profitable show doing a gross in excess of $400,000. Heyman estimated his expenses on the show at $320,000 to $330,000, so a break-even number would be approximately 40,000 buys.

  Heyman said the only concession to get Request to carry the show was to guarantee them their share of the money the show would generate on a 0.2 buy rate, which is now a moot point. Because of it being a new player in the marketplace, there was more interest in tracking an accurate buy rate on this show throughout the industry than any show in a long time. In addition, ECW skews considerably higher to insiders (to nobody’s surprise) as we received a greater number of responses to the ECW show than to most recent WWF and WCW shows, although the number of responses wasn’t as many as the first show of either AAA or UWFI.

  The show live drew 1,170 paid to the ECW Arena, and drew a company all-time record live gate. That figure has been given to me as either a $66,000 or $70,800 house, depending upon whether or not there were 320 or 400 ringside tickets sold at $100 as different company sources have given different numbers.

  Whatever the real figure is, and really all the estimates are all fairly close, the show did along with lines of what many groups have done for their debut show so to tab the buy rate as anything like a major shock would be overstating things, especially considering that most industry estimates going in were in the 0.2 to 0.3 range. The show did about the same buy rate, perhaps a tad lower, than the debut of both Extreme Fighting and Pancrase, a little higher than the debut and only show of AAA, significantly lower than the debut of UWFI and UFC, and well above the debut shows of Martial Arts Reality Superfighting and World Combat Championships, let alone the basically forgotten debuts of the Continental Wrestling Federation, Herb Abrams UWF, LPWA and World Fighting Federation.

  Of those groups, ECW, Abrams, LPWA and AAA were the only ones with any weekly television exposure. ECW is the only one that based its television for weeks around professionally building the PPV as the biggest event in the history of the company. Only one of those groups actually succeeded in PPV to the point it was consistently profitable, which was UFC. It’s hard to compare different types of shows, but based on the response we’ve received, it appears the debut of ECW was better received than most of the above mentioned groups.

  The buy rate was certainly strong enough that Viewers Choice would have no economic reason not to carry the proposed second show on 8/17, which ironically is going to be subject to enormous confusion in the marketplace because the already resurrected Extreme Fighting Championships are scheduled for 8/15. Adding those homes and maintaining a buy rate of better than 0.25 would keep the group consistently profitable in the PPV game.

  And while most groups decline significantly from the first show to the second, (UFC being an exception) ECW did make the most out of its first opportunity unlike other groups that debuted by throwing a subpar show out there without any long-term purpose or direction to build it to a next show. Overall, by almost any standard, as a first show, it would have to be considered a success.

  14 – WWF Working with FMW

  APRIL 14

  WWF had expressed interest in using Atsushi Onita, however Onita had no interest in wrestling in the U.S. However, Wing Kanemura of FMW, who is a good worker, is expected to get an interview and possibly a try-out in early May.

  APRIL 28

  Atsushi Onita of the Frontier Martial Arts and Wrestling promotion in Japan held a press conference on 4/16 to announce that they were going to start negotiations with the World Wrestling Federation for a major show in Japan.

  Full details of exactly what this entails haven’t been released, but Onita got the ball rolling when he showed a letter Vince McMahon and Bruce Prichard sent in early March where the WWF attempted to open up a business relationship between the two offices.

  Onita, who along with Wing Kanemura (Yukihiro Kanemura), are scheduled to come to the United States along with FMW booker Victor Quinones in early May to meet with WWF officials and perhaps Paul Heyman as well about participating in the show. The meeting is scheduled for 5/1.

  Although the story has already received significant play in Japan, as best we can tell the only thing definite from a WWF perspective is that they are going to meet with Onita and there have been no talks about anything other than setting up a first meeting.

  In an unrelated deal, Prichard and Jim Ross met with the wrestlers from Michinoku Pro Wrestling that appeared on the ECW PPV show on 4/21 at the Titan offices in Stamford, CT about those wrestlers working in the WWF. Reports are that the chances of doing business together appear good at this point and the WWF is planning on starting a lighter weight division but is trying to work out the logistics of when the wrestlers and which wrestlers would be available at certain times.

  A potential deal with the Michinoku office, provided dates could be adequately worked out, would probably make the WWF’s relationship with AAA in Mexico obsolete because the Michinoku wrestlers offer the same type of action but are far more polished workers. Because of the disorganized nature of the AAA office, the WWF has been having problems getting the wrestlers they want on the dates they want, thus unable to give any of the wrestlers any kind of a push or storyline.

  MAY 12

  Frontier Martial Arts-Wrestling from Japan had meetings this past week with both the WWF and ECW about putting together a major joint show set for November and in addition, there is the beginning of dialogue between the WWF and EMLL in Mexico.

  Atsushi Onita, Wing Kanemura, Terry Funk and Victor Quinones represented FMW in what was reported in Japan as a three-hour meeting at Titan Towers on 5/1 with Vince McMahon, Bruce Prichard and Jim Ross. According to reports in Japan, the meeting talked about a joint show whi
ch was reported in Japan as being in October (our reports indicate it was November) and the possibility of the WWF promoting an explosive bomb match later this year at Madison Square Garden, as Onita after the recent Yokohama Arena show talked about having a bomb match against Antonio Inoki on a WWF show.

  Years ago there were serious negotiations for such a match at a stadium in Japan, but the match politically fell apart. It would be difficult now with New Japan’s relationship with WCW, for Inoki to work on a WWF show, not to mention that the match itself would be terrible and unlike in Japan, the two aren’t super over legends to be able to get away with it. It also makes no sense from a WWF standpoint to do a bomb match, if they could even do it in a place like Madison Square Garden, with wrestlers that the fans don’t know.

  Kanemura worked both ECW shows over this past weekend against Kevin Quinn, a former Windy City wrestler out of Chicago who most recently had worked for EMLL in Mexico. They shot an angle for Japanese consumption over the weekend where Kanemura and Terry Funk were brawling backstage when Tommy Dreamer joined in and the two Americans, who would be the heels in this angle, set Kanemura on fire, likely to build up a tag team match on a big show later this year.

  FMW proposed to WWF doing a multi-promotional show on a Sunday in November which would include FMW, Michinoku Pro, Pancrase, ECW and WWF, which is quite a strange amalgamation of talent. At this point, as best we can tell, the WWF agreed to continue negotiations for such a show but that no deal had been completed. FMW also proposed to bring a crew of ECW wrestlers in for three shows during that same time period which would consist of two smaller arena shows including a Korakuen Hall date, along with the big show. FMW already has a major show set up for 9/28 at Kawasaki Baseball Stadium, but they didn’t bring that date up to either WWF or ECW so it appears they already have the ideas on where they are going for that show.

  Additional politics have sprung up involving the Michinoku Pro wrestlers. WCW is mad that the Michinoku wrestlers, who they believe are affiliated with New Japan since they appear on the New Japan major shows, worked the ECW PPV show and were negotiating with WWF rather than working for WCW. Don’t know exactly where this all stands right now but WCW is going to pressure New Japan into pressuring Michinoku Pro on this subject and according to one report, New Japan has already told Michinoku Pro that if its wrestlers work for WWF, it’ll cut-off their working relationship with New Japan.

  Among other items apparently discussed at the meeting included Quinones, who is the foreign booker for FMW, booking a WWF tour to South America, and also Quinones, who books foreign talent for EMLL as well, getting involved in forging a relationship between WWF and EMLL.

  At this point, the WWF relationship with Antonio Pena isn’t officially dead, but it’s almost certainly on life support systems. No AAA talent has been brought in for the television tapings in several weeks, nor has any been mentioned. The inability to do business with Pena due to the disorganization of the AAA office, has pretty much ended the relationship as WWF would request talent on certain dates and AAA would never get back to them about it making them unable to break one or two of the names that would be marketable in this country out of the pack of anonymity.

  WWF was likely interested in booking some AAA wrestlers for the 6/28 show in Anaheim since it’s a one-day war with WCW in the same market (not to mention that tentatively the Mike Tyson vs. Evander Holyfield fight is scheduled to take place the same night) but didn’t even bother, and although AAA has continued to talk on television for months about big-name WWF talent coming to Mexico, aside from Razor Ramon and Diesel, who are under WWF contracts but never used in the United States because it’s readily accepted in hindsight that the gimmick didn’t work, and Jake Roberts, who no longer works for the WWF, no foreign wrestlers have appeared.

  Paco Alonso of EMLL, who met with Eric Bischoff in late February in San Francisco, has also either met with Titan or had communication with Titan in recent weeks along those lines. It is likely that the hold-up to the proposed WCW/EMLL affiliation was WCW’s dealings with Konnan and the Promo Azteca crew, which are a rival promotion in Mexico. This may result in some interesting political maneuvers behind the scenes both in the United States and in Mexico.

  MAY 19

  Atsushi Onita returned from his meeting with Vince McMahon, Bruce Prichard and Jim Ross and talked about wanting to do an explosive match on a WWF PPV show. He said that Mr. Gannosuke and Wing Kanemura would be wrestling in the WWF and that McMahon had asked him to help promote a WWF tour in not only Japan but also in Asia.

  FMW’s ideas appear to be along these lines. Run a big show on its own in September, then come back in November with a show using Michinoku Pro, WWF, ECW and Pancrase. At this point neither WWF nor Pancrase have agreed to the show. That show wouldn’t have inter-promotional matches and each group would run its own matches, but it would wind up in angles where FMW would first feud with ECW, then run a larger show feuding with WWF.

  JUNE 2

  No WWF deals are done with EMLL, FMW or Michinoku Pro, but the odds are good that they’ll eventually be consummated. The Mankind feature [on Raw] makes me think they’re building up to one of those FMW style explosive electrified barbed wire matches and Atsushi Onita has been in the Japanese press talking about doing a match of that type at the September Madison Square Garden show. Onita has never wrestled Cactus Jack in a singles match although they were on opposite sides of a six-man on 4/29.

  JUNE 9

  The first part of the WWF/FMW tie-up appears to be an appearance by Ken Shamrock on the 9/29 show at Kawasaki Baseball Stadium. The idea is for Shamrock to do a mixed martial arts worked match which would be broadcast on television in the United States. Right now his scheduled opponent is Gregori Veritchev, a Russian who competed in judo in the 1988 Olympics (and I believe won the gold or silver although I’m not positive of that) and worked as Atsushi Onita’s tag team partner with FMW several years back.

  The downsides of that match are that Veritchev was a terrible worker and the match, because of Veritchev, really won’t be a big money draw in Japan. However he does have the credentials and will do the job. Others who have been considered are Kimo (wants it as a shoot), Allan Goes (ditto), Yoshiaki Fujiwara (too obvious in Japan it’s a work ahead of time) and someone from Pancrase (who won’t work with Shamrock because of the heat between the two sides).

  The main event right now is scheduled as Onita vs. Wing Kanemura, but they are contemplating shooting an angle to turn Onita heel and join Funk Masters of Wrestling (ala Bret Hart and Hulk Hogan) and feud with Masato Tanaka & Hayabusa.

  JUNE 23

  At this point it appears that Ken Shamrock will face Vader on FMW’s 9/28 Kawasaki Baseball Stadium show. The deal wasn’t finalized as of our last report, but that was where the negotiations were headed.

  The feeling from Atsushi Onita and others is that Gregori Veritchev, the Soviet Olympic judo player, had been gone from Japan for so long his name would mean nothing and a match with Shamrock wouldn’t sell enough tickets to justify bringing Shamrock over. They spoke with Kimo, but he wanted about $150,000 to put Shamrock over and that was out of their price range. Bam Bam Bigelow would have done it for less, but the hold up was that when Bigelow was told the match was going to be taped on a Sunday for airing the next day on Raw, he didn’t want to appear on Raw doing the job.

  Onita believes this is the year FMW can overtake All Japan as the No. 2 wrestling promotion in Japan which is why he’s trying to work with WWF and ECW with inter-promotional feud type matches. Onita wants to bring five or six WWF stars to Japan for both November and December and do Japanese angles with them although this is all at this point in the planning stages.

  They are going to do a second baseball stadium show, now in December, which as the current plans are, would consist of five WWF matches including a Shamrock vs. Vader rematch as the main event, which likely means they’ll split their two matches, and a Terry Funk & Dreamer vs. Onita & Wing Kanemura explosiv
e barbed wire bomb match, an ECW heavyweight title match, an ECW tag team title match and several FMW matches with WWF and ECW both being partners in the show.

  FMW announced a show for 8/2 in Tokyo at the Shiodome with an explosive barbed wire match between Wing Kanemura vs. Masato Tanaka with the winner getting the singles match with Onita at Kawasaki Stadium. We’ve also heard Onita may turn heel on this show ala Hogan and Bret Hart and set up a tag team match for the Stadium main event.

  OCTOBER 6

  With inter-promotional help from both All Japan Pro Wrestling and the World Wrestling Federation, Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling of Japan drew one of the largest crowds in company history on 9/28 for its annual show at the Kawasaki Baseball Stadium.

  The crowd was announced as being 50,012 fans. We’ve had several live reports, most indicated the real number was around 40,000. However, one report said that early in the show, the 40,000 figure looked correct, but that the stadium (which should hold about 52,000 for wrestling) was almost completely filled by the time the top matches were into the ring, saying it was a late arriving crowd (not unusual at all for Japan) due to that same day in nearby Tokyo there were huge sports crowds for a baseball game and a national soccer match that ended while this show was in its early stages.

  We don’t have a gate figure other than FMW has done $2 million in the past in that building, and the ticket prices for this show were scaled higher than any FMW show at the stadium to date, ranging from $166 ringside down to $25. All live reports indicated it was a very good show with the interpromotional tag team match involving All Japan’s Kenta Kobashi & Maunukea Mossman against FMW’s Jinsei Shinzaki & Hayabusa being the highlight. The show airs on the Samurai Channel in Japan, edited down to a 90-minute format, on 10/12.