10 Times WWE Threw Money Down The Drain

Though the wrestling business had its ups and downs in the 1990s, one thing was constant in the U.S. - WWE and WCW were the top two promotions. Though stars jumped back and forth between the companies over the years, the idea of a full-fledged interpromotional battle was nothing more than a pipe dream.

That all changed on March 23, 2001, when WWE purchased the rights to their failing competitor. Still, despite the fact that WCW had floundered for the last few years of its existence, fans were salivating at the dream matches that could come from the sale, and WWE had millions more fans to potentially add to their base.

Instead, the whole thing tanked horribly, and for one single reason - Vince McMahon didn't want WCW to be a success, even a WCW that he owned. Despite the fact that he put the group out of business, he still felt the need to prove that his product was superior, and so he made WCW's stars look weak at every possible opportunity. Soon, they (and a group of ECW alumni) were playing backup to WWE defectors, and the whole storyline was dead in less than six months.

Many fans have blamed the failure on the fact that so many of WCW's top stars were getting paid guaranteed money from Time Warner and thus chose not to sign with WWE, but the truth is, had WWE wanted the WCW guys who did join to be seen as on the same level as WCW's stars, they would have been. Diamond Dallas Page was hugely popular during the Attitude Era, but when Undertaker squashed him repeatedly, fans couldn't buy him as a legitimate contender.

WWE could have run WCW as a separate promotion, injecting some life into the fading brand. Instead, they killed it altogether - and in the process, drove off millions of fans and threw away billions of dollars.