Date: January 4th One of Mick Foley's proudest moments as a wrestler. One of the WWF's biggest moments as a company. One of WCW's dumbest decisions ever. A lot of things have been said about this moment and they're all true. The WWF was still on the rise in 1998, but this was the moment many viewed as the official turning point in the Monday Night War. This was back when not every episode of Raw was live. They would often have episodes taped in advance and WCW knew this. Eric Bischoff kept having the bright idea to go on the air early and spoil Raw's results on weeks their show was taped. It wasn't the greatest of moral decisions but it was effective. Fans that were normally trying to decide on whether to watch Raw or Nitro but WCW was trying to make sure those fans had no reason to watch Raw since they already knew what was going to happen. When it was revealed that Mankind would be winning the WWF Title, it was supposed to be a "haha, now nobody will watch your big moment" type of move, but instead, hundreds of thousands of viewers decided they wanted to see that happen, so they switched over to Raw. The match those fans got to see was incredibly short (not even nine minutes from bell to bell) but equally as memorable. The Rock had The Corporation in his corner, so Mankind had Degeneration X in his. When The Corporation stuck their noses in where they didn't belong, DX was there to counter it and a brawl broke out. That's when the glass shattered and Steve Austin came out to one of the biggest pops you'll ever hear. With the referee down and out, Austin would lay Rock out with a chair shot, allowing Mankind to get the pin and the win. Mick Foley was such an easy person to root for and fans were ecstatic to see him finally reach the top of the wrestling world as WCW's hubris had come back to bite them.
Columnist/Podcaster/Director at LordsOfPain.net for nearly seven years, with nearly 2000 total columns written. Interviewed and/or involved in interviewing the likes of Tyler Black/Seth Rollins (twice), Diamond Dallas Page, Jimmy Jacobs, Christopher Daniels, Uhaa Nation and more.
