Did WWE Purposefully Bury Former WCW Stars?
Which brings is to Sting, the one WCW holdout who had eluded WWE's grasp until he finally signed in 2014. WWE had previously tried to sign him in 2003, but Sting opted to go with TNA due to their lighter schedule. As a good Christian man, he also objected to a lot of WWE's onscreen content at the time (these were the days of HLA and Katie Vick).
When his TNA run ended, he joined WWE and Vince's company immediately set about portraying him as a WCW icon and made reference to the fact that he was the only WCW guy to have never so much as ran the ropes in a WWE ring.
It was a sad, familiar story for Steve Borden, who debuted to a thunderous ovation at Survivor Series, costing the Team Authority in their big grudge match with Team Cena. From there he entered into a feud with Triple H which sent alarm bells ringing. They couldn't. They wouldn't. Would they? Fourteen years after WWE had one the War and after the controversial beatings of Steiner, Booker T and Goldberg, they wouldn't sacrifice Sting to Triple H.
Erm, yes they would! In Sting's first WWE match, after months of video packages promoting him as WCW's MVP and talking up his history with the promotion, he did the job on the biggest show of the year to WWE's Chief Operating Officer/sometime wrestler. A great many fans were perplexed but those who had been watching WWE since WCW went under had an inkling of what was about to come.
The fact that WWE had a mini DX vs. nWo brawl during the bout suggested that they were far from over the past and were, in some respects, still stuck firmly in it. Vince has never been able to properly get past the fact that somebody got the better of him for such a prolonged period of time.
People assumed hell had frozen over when Eric Bischoff signed with Vince in 2002, but how long did it take before he was being verbally dressed-down by Stephanie and having Mae Young's crotch rubbed in his face? This was Vince's dose of payback and, while he couldn't conceivably do the same to former WCW wrestlers, his method of revenge was to have them be decidedly beaten by a real WWE superstar, usually his own son-in-law.
When it came to WCW, the letters might as well have stood for 'We Can't Win' as opposed to World Championship Wrestling. While not everyone who once worked for WCW was buried, there is ample evidence to suggest an underlying plot to undermine the company's legacy, or at least certain top performers, for reasons I can't quite fathom.
The War was won. You did it, Vince. Now you are able reflect on it honestly with shows like the Monday Night War series on your very own Network, safe in the knowledge that you had the last laugh. You can run a competitive, long invasion storyline where the competition - which you own - get the upper hand every now and again. You can bring in Scott Steiner and Sting and Goldberg and make them your own stars at the short-term expense of one of your own.
But you didn't and you don't, and you never will, because Billionaire Ted and a ballsy guy named Bischoff managed to beat you at your own game. 'WCW' is a dirty word to Vince McMahon and he still holds a grudge. Just ask Booker T, Sting, Goldberg and Scott Steiner.