1999 was the worst

By Scott Keith on November 4, 2017

People talk about 1993 or 2001, but in terms of pure quality I think 1999 was the dirtworst year in the modern US pro wrestling era.

Russo in the WWF went absolutely nuts with the (nonsensical) turns, swerves, violence for violence's sake, horrible new gimmicks, cursing and directionless napkin-booking in general. Things got better after he left somewhat. Match quality was poor at best, with mostly supershort TV bouts (only screwjobs, interference, DQ or no contest as finishes) and bad workers (Godfather, Henry, Viscera, Mideon, Headbangers, Albert, Big Show, deteriorated Taker and Goldust). PPV's ranged from okayish (Backlash, Armegeddon) to abysmal (KOTR, Rumble)
Meanwhile WCW tried turning things around with multiple booking/presentation changes (more in Death Of WCW book) that seemed to get ratings and attendance numbers further down by the week. Hogan still had free reign over his booking (always a bad idea), Nash turned out to be an even worse booker than everyone feared, money was thrown out by the ton (musicians, helicopter cam gang beatings, tons of pyro) with little entertainment value, reunions on a weekly basis (original NWO guys now as Wolfpack, Harlem Heat, NWO Black & Silver), boring factions (Dark Carnival, Filthy Animals, No Limit Soldiers, Revolution), relying on ALL the old guys, none of it succeeded. Besides some glimmers of hope (Spring Stampede, trying to build up younger guys like Vampiro, Booker and Berlyn but failing miserably, the usual midcarders busting their asses) this company was chaotic in every way imaginable. Hiring Russo looked promising but we all know what type of quality TV he enjoyed producing…
ECW on the other hand had its big new nationwide TV deal that turned into a nightmare, some heavy departures, bad PPVs, lots of injuries and chaos as usual. Quite the drop from an enjoyable if messy 1998. RVD, Awesome, Tanaka and the smaller guys somewhat saved the cards with their matches from being totally unwatchable. Pushing Justin Credible to the top and watching Sandman and Sabu stumbling and falling around wasn't the prettiest sight though
What say you?

Oh yeah, I HATED 1999 overall. Rumble was ass, Wrestlemania was ass, King of the Ring was legendary bad, you had the Higher Power, Owen dying, the Union, the Ministry, the Corporate Ministry, the Ministry of Dogs With Bees In Their Mouths and When They Bark They Shoot Bees…it was awful. Thankfully the departure of Russo turned it around for me at the end of the year, but I was watching a lot of Japan tapes to maintain my sanity.

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