10 Fascinating WWE SummerSlam 2001 Facts
A collection of WWE, WCW, and ECW all-stars produce a fun, but flawed, SummerSlam.
Somewhere around 2001, the McMidas Touch had gone flat. With no more Monday Night Wars to dominate, and no more WCW to kick around like inanimate garbage, WWE seemed to scale back its frenetic storytelling, taking more of a leisurely pace in 2001. The audience slightly dropped, owing to the end of the wrestling boom, though many stuck around for what looked to be an historic angle.
A number of WCW malcontents, including Booker T and Diamond Dallas Page, stormed the WWE castle looking for a fight. They would be joined by ECW renegades such as Rob Van Dam and Tommy Dreamer, and suddenly, the ultimate professional wrestling holy war was about to play out on weekly television.
SummerSlam 2001 was one of the battlegrounds for this would-be unbridled chaos. While it was a quality show with a handful of top-flight matches, something was missing. It was apparent, given the manners in which DDP and Booker both lost, that nobody on the villain side was going to look good, unless they were part of the WWE machine previously (save for Van Dam).
In this "Invasion", the flesh was more than willing. But the spirit was somehow weaker than weak.
Here are 10 facts about SummerSlam 2001 you may not have known.
10. WWE Was Having A Major Fight With DirecTV Regarding Revenue
During the telecast, Jim Ross noted that SummerSlam 2001 was the last WWE pay-per-view that would be available on American broadcast service DirecTV. Given the widespread customer base that DirecTV had, this meant that a lot of WWE fans were potentially going to be shut out of future pay-per-views. The issue stemmed from contract negotiations between WWE and DirecTV in the summer of 2001, with the big hang-up being how to split revenue.
WWE hates having to deal with middlemen (hence the latter-day, "Why spend $55 like a dumbass when you can watch on WWE Network for $9.99!" spiel), and certainly wanted a bigger cut than what DirecTV was offering. The weekend of SummerSlam, some DirecTV subscribers received a recorded phone call from Steve Austin, imploring them to order SummerSlam, a tactic designed to show the provider just how strong WWE's fanbase was.
DirecTV did end up airing Unforgiven in September, but the issues started up again the following month, when WWE announced that No Mercy would not be available on the service. Eventually, things did work themselves out, and WWE pay-per-views are available on DirecTV to this day.