4. Thought He'd Be Fired For Raw Match With Buff Bagwell
Story: Even as late as July, 2001, Vince McMahon was interested in launching World Championship Wrestling as a second brand to complement the WWF. The idea behind booking Buff Bagwell vs. Booker T in the main event slot on Raw was to see how fans would respond to the tarnished WCW product, and see if this 'Brand Extension' could be a viable option. The match was a disaster, and was Buff Bagwell's last under WWF contract. McMahon is reported to have been so low on the bout that he was contemplating scrapping the 'Invasion' angle altogether and moving on. As a consequence of the rotten main event, Booker T's job was also rumoured to be on the line, but he survived and eventually thrived in the promotion. Why People Believe It: The match between Booker and Bagwell has become legendary. In the words of Buff, he feels the WCW stars were in a no-win situation, because WWF management had already deemed them as failures. Nonetheless, it's feasible that McMahon was irate post-match, and was thinking about letting the wrestlers go. Should We Believe It: There's no certifiable proof that Booker T's job was on the chopping block. That said, there's a good chance he was worried about reaction backstage to the match. Booker has spoken about the bout, and says he thought it possible that he'd never be given another shot at the top of the WWF card.
