20 Mind-Blowing Facts About WCW

Listen to any number of older grappling fans, and they'll tell you that March, 2001 was the month when pro wrestling ceased to be as fun as it once was. A large part of the reason for this falls squarely at the feet of Vince McMahon, who couldn't resist buying out his major competition, WCW, for a paltry sum of around $2.5 million. Few can blame McMahon for taking the plunge, considering there was a period in the late-90's where WCW was giving him a bit of a kicking in the ratings war.

As if that wasn't enough, ECW also went out of business, which left WWF/WWE as the monopoly on mainstream North American wrestling - a lot of fans don't feel the industry has been the same ever since. Regardless, at least people have their memories, and even though World Championship Wrestling was an absolute horror show towards the end, there was still so much to like about the company overall.

Looking back in retrospect, it's genuinely fascinating that WCW had such a big audience at the end as it did, especially considering some of the absolutely horrendous television fans were being force fed on a weekly basis. Indeed, when younger fans bemoan today's WWE product, all it takes is to fire up the WWE Network and glance back to a time when another company were doing things that seemed to be a joke, only no-one was laughing.

This list looks at 20 of the most fascinating and mind-blowing facts about WCW, a company that almost wiped Vince McMahon's smile from his face permanently.