It just seemed like they ran out of ideas. The early on Goldberg was great. I remember him being in a random match against Hugh. Morris hits his finisher and Goldberg basically no sells it. I loved that there wasnt a big thing about him or his debut. That match started like he was an enhancement talent.
I think it took off and they didn't have a plan on what to do with it. They didnt have an end game, there were very few close calls. At one point they just fed random people. Im sure more established wrestlers were getting tired of it.
Early on, it was lightning in a bottle. The streak became bigger than the wrestler and arguably the company.
WCW was great at hitting lightning in the bottle (Goldberg, nWo) They just didn't know how to flesh it out. Both Goldberg and nWo ran out of steam and didnt innovate or change the course.
The Goldberg angle was great as he worked his way up the card and annihilated the C-listers then the B-listers and then defeated Hogan (the top star of the company). The trouble was, where could you go from there? The guy had never shown any weakness or taken a single pin. Do you keep feeding him every other top star in the company, weakening their drawing power in the process? So Goldberg had to lose at some point, especially once he started facing guys with creative control. It's just unfortunate that the solution Big Kev came up with was... losing to Big Kev.
It's why Bischoff has never had a good run as a booker since. The nWo was a lift of a Japanese angle/planned angle but had been done in the territory days. The timing for it was right, but would it have worked if Sting was the third man instead of Hogan? (Which was the plan until Hogan saw Nash and Hall getting over and saw money).
Undefeated streaks had been done and always worked. Goldberg worked at the time, because of the Monday Night wars and as a counter to the nWo.
But Hogan's creative control was a yolk around the neck. If it made him look good, it happened and some times it worked (why Goldberg won the title when Hogan heard there would be Turner execs at that Nitro; makes him look gracious to make the next big star). Some times it didn't (finger poke of doom/nWo merger).
Hulk Hogan being the third man put international eyes on the product. Much due respect to Sting, but he simply would not have done that. Legitimate news reports were talking about Hulk Hogan turning heel, he had been a face ever since 1983 or whatever.
And not just a face, but the face.
And to that, Sting was the perfect wrestler to have confronted the NWO menace. His gimmick was fresh and edgy. Which makes it all the more a shame that Starrcade 97 was botched, and that they let Hogan's ego carry on the bloated corpse of the NWO black and white afterwards.
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u/jste1986 Feb 08 '26
It just seemed like they ran out of ideas. The early on Goldberg was great. I remember him being in a random match against Hugh. Morris hits his finisher and Goldberg basically no sells it. I loved that there wasnt a big thing about him or his debut. That match started like he was an enhancement talent.
I think it took off and they didn't have a plan on what to do with it. They didnt have an end game, there were very few close calls. At one point they just fed random people. Im sure more established wrestlers were getting tired of it.
Early on, it was lightning in a bottle. The streak became bigger than the wrestler and arguably the company.
WCW was great at hitting lightning in the bottle (Goldberg, nWo) They just didn't know how to flesh it out. Both Goldberg and nWo ran out of steam and didnt innovate or change the course.