10 Greatest Things About WCW’s Final Year

2. Booker T Gets His Due

Scott Steiner
WWE.com

After debuting with WCW in 1993, Booker T spent the next several years establishing himself as one of the best in-ring performers in the company. A tag team performer, sure, but he was still one of the best talents WCW had.

As the decade rolled on, Booker went from one half of a legendary tag team to becoming a singles star in his own right. The only problem is, Book would have to navigate a minefield of poor booking and the god-awful decision making to give him the G.I. Bro gimmick as part of the Misfits in Action stable.

Despite anyone with even a semblance of awareness being able to see just how good Booker T was and just how good Booker T could become, it took Hulk Hogan's infamous walkout at Bash at the Beach 2000 for Booker to finally get his chance to run with the ball.

There, Booker T defeated Jeff Jarrett to become the new WCW World Champ. That was in July of 2000, and Booker would go on to be positioned as one of WCW's top stars right through until the company was bought out by Vince McMahon in March 2001 - to the point that the Master of the Spinarooni was the WCW World Heavyweight Champion when WCW first made its presence known on WWE TV.

Senior Writer
Senior Writer

Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main dayjob, his role as the lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Adrienne Barbeau, Rob Zombie, Katharine Isabelle, Leigh Whannell, Bruce Campbell, and Tony Todd, to Kevin Smith, Ron Perlman, Elijah Wood, Giancarlo Esposito, Simon Pegg, Charlie Cox, the Russo Brothers, and Brian Blessed, to Kevin Conroy, Paul Dini, Tara Strong, Will Friedle, Burt Ward, Andrea Romano, Frank Miller, and Rob Liefeld, to Bret Hart, Sting, Mick Foley, Ricky Starks, Jamie Hayer, Britt Baker, Eric Bischoff, and William Regal, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, Brian Flynn, Denis Smith, Gary Bennett, Karl Connolly, and Bryan Robson - and that's just the tip of an ever-expanding iceberg.