10 Things WCW Ripped Off

8. Payne Stewart

Sting Crow WCW
WWE/By Supergolfdude (Own work) [CC BY-SA 4.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

In 1998 Payne Stewart was among the top golfers in the world, known for a particularly elegant swing and a fondness for the arcane traditions of the game. He was also famous for his lurid dress style of clashing patterns and colours, and it was this latter attribute that made him tempting bait for WCW's creative, especially given the inbuilt hilarious pun potential.

Thus Stewart Pain was born, an evil golfer whose personality ran the gamut from 'evil' to 'golfer'. Barry Darsow was used for the gimmick, perhaps because he was a veteran of lame repackagings as gimp-themed tag team wrestler Smash and the hapless Repo Man. The real-life Stewart was killed in a plane crash in October 1999, a tragedy acute enough for even a wrestling company to make a adjustments for taste, and Darsow was hastily renamed 'Mr Hole-In-One Barry Darsow'.

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Ben Counter is a fantasy and science fiction writer, gaming enthusiast, wrestling fan and miniature painting guru. He was raised on Warhammer, Star Wars and 1980s cartoons that, in retrospect, were't that good. Whoever you are, he is nerdier than you.