Why UWF never did invasion on NWA?

[indywrestling]

After watching tons of shoots about former UWF wrestlers, they all mention that they thought UWF was goin to do an Invasion angle on NWA, i think it would have drawn serious money, alot of them explain it was Dusty Rhodes who didnt run with the ball when he had the chance, anyone know anything on this??

[Deleted]

dunno much about it man but me it was a serious blunder IMHO

it would have been awesome IMO.

[Road Warriors]

Dusty had loyalty to his main people. He was not about to let Watts people come in and go over on people like The Horsemen, Nikita Koloff, Barry Windham, R&R Express, Midnight Express, and last but certainly not least The Road Warriors. They had to start at the bottom except when they were in Watts territory where Dusty would book them higher up on the card.

I personally would have done the same thing.

[indywrestling]

they could have made bookoo dollars had they went with the invasion angle, of course NWA would have provailed, but it woulda coulda been a long lasting angle that would have drawn more than anything @ the time

[Johnny Lawrence - Cobra Kai]

I remember watching the NWA on TBS back in late 1987 and seeing them tease interpromotional feuds... Steve Williams vs. Barry Windham in particular. I remember that one because I instantly thought "wow, this could be a huge deal."

Seemed at the time like they wanted to do UWF-NWA feuds but were careful to make sure the NWA guys always came across as the true stars, which doesn't work well for mega-feud booking. The WWF did the same thing to the WCW guys, but on a much bigger scale. They trie to book them into a promotional feud but in refusing to allow them to look strong on TV, they shot themselves in the foot.

Interpromotional feuds (or large factions) work best when they're viewed as equals at the very least... sometimes it's even better to book the lesser faction as world beaters for a few months just to be safe (the NXT storyline is a good modern-day example).

[carly1988]

Honestly I dont think it would have been as big of a hit as you'd expect. Looking back the UWF was awesome but at the same time it was a territory. It wasnt as well known as JCP. You also have to look at champions compare UWF to NWA. Dr Death is one of my all time favorites. Is he on the level of Ric Flair? No way. How bout Terry Taylor? You know he was one of my most wanted figures but was he on the level of a Nikita Koloff? Nope. Even their last tag champs, The Sheepherders (Bushwackers for you kids). A vicious vile team that was miles again of their WWF gimmicks......but they couldnt hold a candle to Arn Anderson and Tully Blanchard.

Basically saying the UWF was the "B League" of the National Wrestling Alliance. Crockett's best interest was to just unify titles to make the NWA titles stronger. I think he chose to fade out the UWF Heavyweight and Tag Teams instead but he did unify the TV titles.

If the timing was better I think a JCP vs World Class feud would have gone over better. Horsemen vs Von Erichs and Dusty, Magnum, Road Warriors vs Freebirds & Garvin would have been exciting

[Raine]

Invasion angles very rarely work as the bigger promotion of the two, will always want their guys to come on top and not to look weak. Case in point (as mentioned) WCW vs WWF.

Thats why Bischoff's nWo angle will go down as the best (false) invasion ever, because the invading company came out on top quite a bit for 18 months. And the best part was Bischoff made the nWo look like a believable invading outfit. Can't see this type of thing ever being repeated.

[Johnny Lawrence - Cobra Kai]

Another thing to remember is that not all of the top UWF talent was there long enough to make the transition to Crockett, and some of the ones that did make the transition left quickly.

At its peak, the UWF had the likes of Steve Williams, One Man Gang, Ted DiBiase, Hacksaw Duggan, Terry Gordy, Michael Hayes, Terry Taylor, Bubba Rogers, Sting, Rick Steiner, Eddie Gilbert, Chris Adams, Sam Houston, etc.

DiBiase, Gang, Duggan, and Houston went to the WWF before the Crockett sale, which put an immediate dent in the number of top UWF stars they could have used in an angle. Gordy, I think, went back to Japan instead of going to Atlanta.

Chris Adams once said in an interview that he turned down the chance to move to Crockett at that time, which he admitted was a poor career move on his part.

They pushed Williams for a while as the UWF's main guy, but didn't pair him up with their own main champion (Flair), opting to have him chase guys like Windham instead. Not that Windham is bad by any stretch... but when your champion is perceived as content to fight upper-midcarders, it speaks volumes, storyline-wise. The Terry Taylor-Nikita Koloff feud (short as it was) was the closest they came to a legit UWF vs. NWA feud.

Sting, Hayes and Steiner were absorbed quickly into the NWA fold, so they didn't even try to paint them as UWF representatives. Williams soon got the same treatment.

[Calcifer Boheme]

And invasion angle wouldn't have worked as well back then as wrestling was still promoted like a sport.

They did a few "Dream matches" though which fit their style more. Sort of like a world series or superbowl type thing.


Even that didn't go as far as it could have but still. An invasion just wouldn't have made sense at the time.