Did WWE Purposefully Bury Former WCW Stars?
Da Man joined WWE on the post-WrestleMania Raw, confronting The Rock and drilling him with an almighty spear. It was a great debut and WWE must have been mightily pleased with the reaction Goldberg received. It shouldn't have come as a surprise, since Goldberg was one of WCW's most consistently popular stars. Plus, he hadn't been seen in over two years, having left WCW and the national US wrestling scene altogether in late 2000. Absence makes the heart grow fonder and all that...
Goldberg beat The Rock and then he beat Chris Jericho on consecutive pay-per-views. The matches weren't five star classics or anything, and Goldberg had to sell for longer than he really ought to have but they did the job (well, Rock and Y2J did). Still, something just wasn't clicking with Goldberg and the WWE Universe, moving Linda McMahon to call his run 'disappointing' during a Junne 2003 conference call. Ouch.
Still, Goldberg was getting good reactions and he seemed like a sure thing to topple World Heavyweight Champion Triple H at SummerSlam. Then The Game suffered another muscle injury and the match was changed to a six-man Elimination Chamber outing instead. This suited Goldberg just fine and he entered a dominating, breathtaking display inside the structure. He looked like the old WCW Goldberg as he cut through Shawn Michaels, Jericho and Randy Orton.
All that was left was for him to spear/Jackhammer Triple H and Goldberg would have been the guy. Regrettably, it was Trips who walked out the victor following a sledgehammer shot to his foe's head. This seriously hampered Goldberg's momentum, momentum that he never recovered during his final months with the company.
Was this another case of Triple H and WWE holding back the former WWE star? Quite possibly, but it also could have been down to something else, perhaps that time HHH and Big Bill had a run-in at a media event in the late 90s (but probably the whole WCW star thing). Goldberg did lift the WHC, but his run with the strap was unexceptional and he was handcuffed creatively.
WWE just didn't get him, because he wasn't their creation.
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