Jim Herd Vs. Vince Russo

[carly1988]

I think it's safe to say that the two worse promoters/bookers/head guys.....whatever you want to call them in WCW were Vince Russo and Jim Herd. Whom, however, was the worse of the 2??

Jim Herd-

Pros

-Felt that Sting and Luger were major names to carry the company.

Cons
-Ran off the biggest name in the company (Ric Flair)

-Took the traditional wrestling of NWA/WCW and went the gimmicky rout by debuting stars like The Ding Dongs, Big Josh etc

-Had disputes with MANY major names in the company such as Jim Cornette, Stan Lane, Road Warriors, Ric Flair, Stan Hansen and Kevin Sullivan.

-Had no prior wrestling experience before joining WCW. Was an executive for Pizza Hut.

Vince Russo

Pros

-Pushed a rising star in Booker T to the top of a company that lacked success by African Americans.

-Ratings under Russo higher then recently before he arrived and after he was taken out of position (replaced by Kevin Sullivan)

Cons

-Much like Herd, felt the younger wrestlers could carry the company. Began to put career best mid carders as Main Event stars (Jeff Jarrett, Billy Kidman, Scott Steiner)

- _____ on a pole match (Just fill in the blank)

-Putting the World Title on himself and David Arquette

-Constant swerves, shoots, worked shoots etc

-Have we forgotten about the infamous Goldberg/Nash/Steiner Power Bomb match?

-Tank Abbott for WCW World Champ?



So who do you think was worse?

[tnafan17: The Total Package]

Definitely going with Jim Herd here. Although I'm only 20, when I was younger I would constantly rent old WCW PPVs and doing my history research it seems many were from his era. Not that Russo was much better, but I could definitely sit through a whole WCW PPV or Nitro but I could not sit through some of the WCW PPVs from Herds era.

I mean come on Herd Honestly?:

[Road Warriors]

Sept 23, 2010 11:28:07 GMT -5 @carly1988 said:

I think it's safe to say that the two worse promoters/bookers/head guys.....whatever you want to call them in WCW were Vince Russo and Jim Herd. Whom, however, was the worse of the 2??

Jim Herd-

Pros

-Felt that Sting and Luger were major names to carry the company.

Cons
-Ran off the biggest name in the company (Ric Flair)

-Took the traditional wrestling of NWA/WCW and went the gimmicky rout by debuting stars like The Ding Dongs, Big Josh etc

-Had disputes with MANY major names in the company such as Jim Cornette, Stan Lane, Road Warriors, Ric Flair, Stan Hansen and Kevin Sullivan.

-Had no prior wrestling experience before joining WCW. Was an executive for Pizza Hut.

Vince Russo

Pros

-Pushed a rising star in Booker T to the top of a company that lacked success by African Americans.

-Ratings under Russo higher then recently before he arrived and after he was taken out of position (replaced by Kevin Sullivan)

Cons

-Much like Herd, felt the younger wrestlers could carry the company. Began to put career best mid carders as Main Event stars (Jeff Jarrett, Billy Kidman, Scott Steiner)

- _____ on a pole match (Just fill in the blank)

-Putting the World Title on himself and David Arquette

-Constant swerves, shoots, worked shoots etc

-Have we forgotten about the infamous Goldberg/Nash/Steiner Power Bomb match?

-Tank Abbott for WCW World Champ?



So who do you think was worse?

Only Jim Cornette could answer this question.

[Jimmy]

I still say that Russo's original run in WCW from mid October 99 - right before Souled Out 2000 was entertaining. It was a car crash mentality but it was better then the crap WCW was churning out in 1999 before Russo and really what was lacking was the production value. So many times during that period they would go backstage for a segment where you couldn't hear the guys or they would cut while live or whatever. If they had been slicker with their production, as well as having better announcers, Nitro/Thunder wouldn't have been any 'worse' than RAW/SmackDown at that time.

[slappy]

Herd.

He wanted Ric Flair to shave his head and put a diamond ring in his ear and have this entirely different gimmick.

[Quanthor]

The Jim Herd era wasn't the worst era of wresting I've ever seen. He made a ton of piss poor decisions due to his ingorance of the business but there was still a ton of classic matches that went on during that period despite the overall lack of talent.

Vince Russo's WCW was some of the worst television I've ever seen that was maybe only topped by late '88-91 AWA and the last 2 years of TNA.

[Deleted]

Regardless of the fact the Herd came in from a totally different industry and changed WCW to the levels of absurdity mentioned already, as well as disputes with guys that knew what they were talking about.

The fact that Russo is still doing whatever the hell he's doing after such a long time and never changes his 'booking' style which in most respects denigrates the business is enough for him to get my vote.

[gordon]

Big Josh and PN News ftw.

No but seriously, the Jim Herd regime was terrible.

[Calcifer Boheme]

Herd had no clue what he was doing, but Russo actively insults the fans intelligence and seems to really hate the business... His mantra when people would tell him things didn't make sense was "It's only wrestling" which just makes me mad because good story telling is good story telling regardless of the medium.


So I vote for Russo.

[Deleted]

hard to choose......they ar both shitehawks IMO but Herds regime did have Sting vs The Dangerous Alliance and The Steiners vs Miracle Violence Connection at Beach Blast 92.....(I think)

[LeighD]

Hmmmm, it's like trying to decide which sh*t stinks the worst. While Herd had some plain, awful ideas, he did have some great ones as people pointed out, but I also feel he had no clue what he was doing.

Russo, the man's stuff just didn't make sense most of the time and at the same time insulted fans everywhere.

I voted Russo.

[carly1988]

I decided to let this run for a bit before I made my argument....

I as well voted for Russo and really for me it only came down to one thing. Even though Herd was a complete idiot and though Flair was past his prime, he saw future company stars in Sting and Luger. Both of which were major draws, legit world title contenders and legit main eventers. Russo seemingly wanted to do the same thing by replacing names like Flair, Hogan and Sting....yet he did that with Jeff Jarrett (career mid carder), Billy Kidman (Career under carder), Vampiro (Mid carder at best, at least in his US era) and the likes of a bunch of no names like Stasiak, Palumbo and O'Hare.

Herd, not having been in the buisness, didnt know any better and still made a below average decision. Russo, who was in the business for years, just made a failing decision.

[Jimmy]

Sept 24, 2010 10:23:58 GMT -5 @carly1988 said:

I decided to let this run for a bit before I made my argument....

I as well voted for Russo and really for me it only came down to one thing. Even though Herd was a complete idiot and though Flair was past his prime, he saw future company stars in Sting and Luger. Both of which were major draws, legit world title contenders and legit main eventers. Russo seemingly wanted to do the same thing by replacing names like Flair, Hogan and Sting....yet he did that with Jeff Jarrett (career mid carder), Billy Kidman (Career under carder), Vampiro (Mid carder at best, at least in his US era) and the likes of a bunch of no names like Stasiak, Palumbo and O'Hare.

Herd, not having been in the buisness, didnt know any better and still made a below average decision. Russo, who was in the business for years, just made a failing decision.

Well I think it should be pointed out that Herd had quite a bit more to work with in terms of talent and in terms of 'slack'. Herd was pretty much able to do whatever he wanted during his time while Russo was restricted in a lot of ways. Sting and Luger were already well established by the time Herd came into power, while Russo was stuck with relics like Hogan and Nash and Flair (and I mean that in the nicest way possible to Flair). The 'future' of WCW by late 1999 was already very dim.

[carly1988]

Sept 24, 2010 12:29:33 GMT -5 Jimmy said:

Sept 24, 2010 10:23:58 GMT -5 @carly1988 said:

I decided to let this run for a bit before I made my argument....

I as well voted for Russo and really for me it only came down to one thing. Even though Herd was a complete idiot and though Flair was past his prime, he saw future company stars in Sting and Luger. Both of which were major draws, legit world title contenders and legit main eventers. Russo seemingly wanted to do the same thing by replacing names like Flair, Hogan and Sting....yet he did that with Jeff Jarrett (career mid carder), Billy Kidman (Career under carder), Vampiro (Mid carder at best, at least in his US era) and the likes of a bunch of no names like Stasiak, Palumbo and O'Hare.

Herd, not having been in the buisness, didnt know any better and still made a below average decision. Russo, who was in the business for years, just made a failing decision.

Well I think it should be pointed out that Herd had quite a bit more to work with in terms of talent and in terms of 'slack'. Herd was pretty much able to do whatever he wanted during his time while Russo was restricted in a lot of ways. Sting and Luger were already well established by the time Herd came into power, while Russo was stuck with relics like Hogan and Nash and Flair (and I mean that in the nicest way possible to Flair). The 'future' of WCW by late 1999 was already very dim.

Herd def had more "control" over what he could do but Id argue that Russo's talent pool was still better. I mean we've seen Sting, Hogan, Nash all still go another 10 years (some of those years brutal) but all 3 could have still had 1 or 2 more good runs in them. When he first took over he still had Benoit, Malenko, Guerrero and possibly (not sure the time line) Jericho on the roster. Now none of those were technically maineventers yet except Benoit but Id take them all over the Natural Born Thrillers.

[Jimmy]

Sept 24, 2010 15:39:53 GMT -5 @carly1988 said:

Sept 24, 2010 12:29:33 GMT -5 Jimmy said:

Well I think it should be pointed out that Herd had quite a bit more to work with in terms of talent and in terms of 'slack'. Herd was pretty much able to do whatever he wanted during his time while Russo was restricted in a lot of ways. Sting and Luger were already well established by the time Herd came into power, while Russo was stuck with relics like Hogan and Nash and Flair (and I mean that in the nicest way possible to Flair). The 'future' of WCW by late 1999 was already very dim.

Herd def had more "control" over what he could do but Id argue that Russo's talent pool was still better. I mean we've seen Sting, Hogan, Nash all still go another 10 years (some of those years brutal) but all 3 could have still had 1 or 2 more good runs in them. When he first took over he still had Benoit, Malenko, Guerrero and possibly (not sure the time line) Jericho on the roster. Now none of those were technically maineventers yet except Benoit but Id take them all over the Natural Born Thrillers.

Jericho had bolted by the time Russo took over. And Russo was actually the first writer/booker to put Benoit in a main event, at Mayhem 1999 for the WCW Title. He only had them from October 99-January 00 when he was relived of head writing duties, and then the Radicalz jumped ship.

I agree that the Natural Born Thrillers were still very green but I really don't fault Russo for trying to push them, Jarrett, Booker T, etc in 2000. I mean, it was obvious the old formula wasn't working and buyrates/ratings couldn't really get any lower. Try and make some new stars.

[STING]

Russo, in my opinion. Never have liked that guy. I think he is part of TNA's problem right now.

[Deleted]

Sept 30, 2010 0:23:47 GMT -5 STING said:

Russo, in my opinion. Never have liked that guy. I think he is part of TNA's problem right now.

he sure is.

[greenjack1992]

Herd takes it.

He was diabolical.