(Alert! This wrestling column was written before WrestleMania. Seat belts are provided to the left of you in the event of disaster) I was thinking, with the recent WWF buying of WCW (the biggest wrestling story ever, IMO), it would be good for me to, you know, comment on it. Being the biggest wrestling story ever, it deserves come commentary from me. Then I got to thinking of a unique edge or spin that I could put on the situation for purposes of this column. I finally came up with an idea: why don't I put on the "fantasy booker man's cap" (as well as keeping on the smart cap), and do a bit of company building. With the acquiring of WCW, one Vincent K. McMahon now has a lot of wrestlers under contract with him. Does he keep the current WWF wrestlers in the WWF? Keep the current WCW wrestlers in WCW? And what about all the ECW guys who have no where to work? I'm going to see if I can make some sense of this.

I won't include ECW stars which haven't yet signed contracts with either promotion.

WWF
There's going to be some big changes around the WWF. The Rock and Steve Austin will remain the top two faces in the company. After WrestleMania 17, Chris Benoit will be elevated as an upper mid-card face. The big change in the WWF will be he departure of Triple H to WCW. He's accomplished a lot in the WWF, but after losing to Steve Austin (at the April PPV) in a loser leaves town match, Triple will embark on a future in WCW. More on that later.

Other departures from the WWF: Taka Michinoku, Funaki, Al Snow, Crash Holly, Matt Hardy, Jeff Hardy, Lita, Val Venis.

The WWF will center around competitive wrestling again, but it will still have a sports entertainment edge to it.

WCW
WCW will drop almost all of the sports entertainment values which it failed in employing. World Championship Wrestling, will go back to its name's sake and become renowned as the primary pure wrestling promotion in North America. Match times will become longer, which will co-incide with the matches getting better. Competitive wrestling will be bought to the forefront, and all focus will be put on those who can work quality wrestling matches (see: All Japan). Vince and WCW will also buy in some big name crusierweights from international sources to solidify the crusierweight division. I won't speculate on who they will bring in, because, due to them not being on the current roster, it kinda defies the point of what I'm doing here. WCW will bring in wrestlers from places like Japan, Mexico and Europe, though.

Triple H will come in from the WWF, and get immediately pushed as the top heel. How? He'll seriously cut down on the 20 minute promos and get over as a heel through work (see: Bull Nakanko). This is Triple H's next big challenge and he should rise to it. He'll have to get over on in-ring work along; not promos. Should be interesting.

As mentioned earlier: WWF lightheavyweights like Taka, Essa, Crash, etc will be brought in. These will pad out the lightweight division. The women's title will be kept, but only for competitive women's wrestling (as seen in Japan). The world title will be given to Triple H early on after he beats Booker T (who won a tournament). WCW will also bring in some international heavyweight talent. It's important to put WCW over as the pure wrestling promotion of the two. That way, American fans have the best of both worlds: sports entertainment and pure wrestling. Raw will remain on a Monday, whilst Nitro will take up a Thursday slot. If fans want, they can watch both. It should re-educate fans to watch longer matches.

But don't get me wrong, they'll still be lot's of wrestling in the WWF. They'll probably be even less sports entertainment. But will guys like Benoit, Jericho and Angle still there, they should put on some great matches.

Lance Storm will leave WCW for the WWF. This should enable him to put on some great matches with people like Benoit, Jericho and Credible. There's a lot of room for feuds to be created over old issues. Think Jericho-Storm against each other, or even together as the Thrillseekers again. What about an extension to the old issues which Credible and Storm had in ECW?

I'd like to see Nash in the WWF. He's certainly not welcome in the pure wrestling WCW which I'm trying to create. It would be great for him, Hogan and Hall to lead to nWo invasion in the WWF. Bring back Shawn Michaels and the possibilities are endless. Through X-Pac into the mix as well, plus you've then got the possibility of a Triple H return to the WWF.

The hardcore division will be kept to the WWF. WCW will still feature old school brawling and falls count anywhere stuff every now and then, but the hardcore belt stuff will be restricted to the WWF. It would be good to get the odd celebrity involved with the hardcore title. It beats having them win the world title.

Scott Stenier should go to the WWF, also. They could set up an angle where Stenier appears without the world title and goes on about being the real world champion (a la Ric Flair in 1992).

Speaking of Ric Flair, I'm stuck with what to do with him. It would be great for him and Sting to stay in WCW, but I don't think the new WCW is for them. Flair would probably end up in the WWF, and if the nWo invasion angle went down, I'd have Sting go to the WWF also.

Of course, I wouldn't want to put all the heavyweights in the WWF. Booker T, Dallas Page, Kanyon and Triple H would be some of the top stars in WCW, with Goldberg staying around for a while.

I would have Goldberg jumping between both promotions and just destroying wrestlers from both organizations. He'd be known as a lone wolf character, but not in the Sting vein. This change of Goldberg character will be beneficial to him, and should also set up an inter-promotional feud further down the line.

Same thing, different time
I actually predicted the Steve Austin heel turn at WrestleMania. Along with about 1002 other smart fan, I predicted the turn. Okay, I predicated it about five minutes before it actually happened, but the moment Austin locked in the Million Dollar Dream, I knew he was turning heel. Austin went on to become only the second heel to walk out of a WrestleMania main event as world champion.

You'd think some things would change, then, wouldn't you? Austin's a heel, sure, that's a change, but we're still left with the McMahon Family Never Ending Story. That shit should have ended at WrestleMania. Shane should have beaten Vince, as he did, and they should have ended the storyline. Vince should have gotten off TV, and Shane should have gone down South to sort out the re-launch of WCW. Instead, they're still dragging on the McMahon-hates-everyone-including-other-McMahons story and the re-launch of WCW has been set back. Just get the fucking McMahons off TV, center your attentions on doing the right thing in the WWF, and on re-launching WCW.

Steve Austin may be heel, but Triple H, the number two heel in the company, is trying to shadow him and his heat. Why else was Triple H joined with Austin and McMahon as a heel team? Austin and McMahon could have easily gotten over as heels without Triple H. Granted, it would have taken slightly longer, but it still would have worked. Austin doesn't even need McMahon anymore to get over as a monster heel. All he needs to do is continue berating Rock, attacking Ross and bullying the Hardys. Triple H should have turned face on the Raw after WrestleMania. He's outstayed his welcome as a heel. Two monster heels riding at the top of the company is doomed to fail: history has proven this. At a time when the WWF should be elevating faces to take over from where the Rock left off, they're making the mistake of elevating Triple H as a heel!

I enjoyed WrestleMania.