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| Guest Columns | Tim Lloyd |
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WE ARE THE UNION... This is not an article about the short-lived and even more quickly forgotten WWF faction. This is about the largely taboo subject of a union for professional wrestlers. Jesse Ventura has mentioned it, there were some rumblings after Owen Hart's death and Vince MacMahon has publicly laughed off the concept but nobody (that I am aware of) has had a serious look at unionism in wrestling and how/if it could work. So in the interests of bringing something original to internet wrestling discussion I thought I would look into it. I will try to make this article bare as little resemblance to a formal essay as possible and keep it mostly lighthearted. The Wrestlers For arguments sake lets leave indie wrestling out of this and just focus on the Big Three for the moment. As it stands currently wrestlers negotiate individually with the management of the wrestling companies to come to an agreement (most recent, well publicized example is Jeff Jarrett and Jim Ross). Obviously in this situation there can be a big gap between the power of the two parties. It is not just always in favor of the company - just ask Paul Heyman - but most often it would be. One of the methods that workers can use to increase their power in the workplace is to unionize If the wrestlers formed a union the current situation could change dramatically - a union could act as a bargaining agent for the wrestlers or they could negotiate a collective agreement setting the majority of the terms in all the wrestlers contracts and then the wrestlers individually negotiate the rest (usually just money and duration). The latter is the standard in professional sports. The wrestlers could opt for an enterprise level union which would mean that the WWF wrestlers would form a union and their WCW and ECW counterparts would form separate ones. Each would negotiate an agreement separately with the management of each company. This is how 90% of unions operate in Japan (although I'm not sure if it applies to wrestling) but it is not as popular or successful in the US or other Western countries. This idea would probably not work in wrestling because: The alternative is an industry union. The wrestlers of WWF, WCW & ECW could form a union similar to the player's associations in other major league sports. This would give the wrestlers the most power and make negotiations for a collective bargaining agreement more efficient. There are problems with this as well though. Getting past the inter-fed rivalries and heat between individual wrestlers would be difficult. Just imagine for a second some of the dialogue at the union meetings: Bret Hart: I move that we insert a clause into the agreement sentencing Vince MacMahon to burn in hell for all of eternity. Shawn Michaels: Shut the hell up Bret or I'll go on Raw next week and cut an interview about your 'Martha Days'. *Bret and Shawn start brawling in the back of the room.* Sid: Is there any way we can have some sort of wrestling off-season to coincide with the softball season ? And we really need to do something about that Benoit guy, those chops really sting. Shane Douglas: Hey lay off Benoit there big man, at least he can....... Scott Hall: Hey 'Dean' ...... kiss my ........ Shane Douglas: Scott I thought you were banned from these meetings. Will someone give him a breath test. *Scott Hall and Shane Douglas start to fight - Shane gets the upper hand when Hall is distracted by an elderly women walking past outside* Jeff Jarrett: We need to put in place a system where certain wrestlers can't refuse to work with certain other wrestlers...... Steve Austin: Oh shut up Jarrett you whiney little bitch - how many of those god damn 'Don't piss me off' shirts do you think people actually bought? Goldberg: Yeah, don't get any ideas Jeff, if you think I am going to put you over then you are crazy. *Warrior appears out of nowhere* Warrior: What you people fail to realize is that only through the intricacies of the soul can the singular ever hope to overcome the omnipotence of the great authoritarianism of the...... Steve Austin: Who the hell let that sonofabitch in here. Security get him the hell out of here. *A bit of a ruckus ensues as Warrior is escorted out during which time three more wrestlers are injured on Warrior's trapdoor* Sorry about that little interlude but I didn't want you to get too bored. Business and the opportunity to make money and better ones situation should override all of that petty stuff - if both sides see the benefit then differences can be overcome. Look no further than Arn Anderson shaking hands with Sid or Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen co-existing with Dennis Rodman for your evidence. Regardless of how it is achieved this solidarity is crucial because history has shown that for unions in the sports industry to have even a moderate level of success, 100% membership or close to it is essential. The next major issue would be appointing leaders. This could be a big stumbling block. Picking an active wrestler poses major issues. Say for arguments sake that Steve Austin is elected by the union as its representative and chief negotiator (feel free to make your own joke about the use of the phrases 'that's the bottom line' or 'because Stone Cold said so' during negotiations). Suspicions would quickly arise about Austin's motivations - 'is he is pushing a deal favoring the WWF?' The union would disintegrate into factional fighting. The best option would be to appoint either an independent professional negotiator or an ex-wrestler who knows the ins and outs of the business but is not affiliated with any federation and is highly respected by the rest of the industry - someone like Ted Dibiase, Tully Blanchard or perhaps Jake Roberts (heh). Management This is where even bigger problems arise. Wrestling does not operate like other professional sports where a board oversees the entire league and franchises while competing on the field have common goals off it. Wrestling federations are not franchises of a larger organization they are direct competitors outside of the ring. Given the current 'fight to the finish and you don't have to win clean' attitude of the companies this would make coming to an agreement to govern the entire professional wrestling industry difficult although not impossible. Given the formation of a 100% coverage wrestlers union, I see two options to facilitate making an agreement. One method is to just keep the existing structure and have the union negotiate separate agreements with existing WWF, WCW and ECW management. This could work but factional issues within the union could again threaten the process very quickly. The ideal solution in my opinion would be to establish a governing body to regulate professional wrestling. With wrestling's current public image it is really only a matter of time before the 'powers that be' (I'm talking government here not Russo and Ferrerra) are swayed by some lobby group into restricting and regulating what wrestling can and can't do. If instead wrestling pre-empted this by setting up their own self-regulatory group to set standards for the industry, as is common in many other industries, they could do so on their own terms. Once a governing body is set up this can be the group that negotiates with the union to establish a collective bargaining agreement for professional wrestling. Of course problems would again arise about appointing people onto this board but standard practice for this type of thing would just be representatives from each of the feds and maybe an independent chairperson. Having a collective bargaining agreement makes negotiations central and therefore much less time consuming. Instead of sitting with each individual wrestler and hashing out details, the negotiations can be limited to two or three issues - like money, duration and push. If wrestlers go 'on strike' Randy Savage style management would have immediate recourse through the system rather than through the courts. Management could also negotiate a collective agreement which avoids nonsense like Sting not wrestling for 18 months or all the top WCW stars refusing to work Thunder or wrestlers abusing their veto power over storylines. Collective Bargaining Agreement - what could it cover? There are way too many possibilities so I will just list a few that could be covered in a wrestling collective bargaining agreement: These are just a few - the agreement can cover pretty much anything the parties want it to. Conclusion If this model was implemented it could benefit the whole industry. WCW would probably be against some of the financial constraints because it may restrict their ability to just dip into Billionaire Ted's wallet, WWF may be against it because, um well, because it appears that Vince has an ideological issue or two with the concept of unions and ECW might have some trouble meeting the minimum wages for all its wrestlers. In reality the only major negative of this system would be the increased potential for industrial action on either side disrupting wrestling. But if there is one thing that the past couple of years has taught us and that is that competition breeds success. A strong union negotiating with wrestling's governing body to create a collective agreement to cover the whole industry would definitely enhance competition. The biggest benefit of all would be that wrestlers or management would have a channel for their problems and grievances because processes and structures would be in place to handle them. This way if Owen Hart did not want to go up into the rafters he could take the matter up with his union rather than just reluctantly going along with it. Tim Lloyd freelance Mail the Author |
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