10 Biggest Wrestling Scandals Of The 1980s
6. Black Saturday
If you hear a wrestling fan talking about the ‘territory days’, they’re most likely referring to a time before July 14th 1984.
In the good old days, wrestling was run like the mafia. Each territory would house one major promotion, while other companies would stay away out of respect. Alas, Vince McMahon doesn’t know the meaning of the word ‘respect’.
Once he’d inherited his father’s company, Vinnie Jr. went about hoovering up territories like they were crumbs on a carpet. The old system was being gutted in real time and the killing blow would land on the aforementioned date.
‘Black Saturday’ refers to the day WWE took over a TV time slot previously held by Georgia Championship Wrestling. With his new acquisition, McMahon now controlled every nationally televised wrestling show in the country, which went against every principle of the old ways. While Black Saturday confirmed that one era of wrestling was over, it also inadvertently started another one.
Outraged by McMahon’s monopoly, Ted Turner reached into his deep pockets and bought Jim Crockett Promotions. The company would eventually contribute to a new venture called World Championship Wrestling and… well, you know the rest.