by Rick Scaia
Exclusive to OnlineOnslaught.com

[Note from the present day: it was an annual tradition, first at WrestleManiacs and then at WrestleLine, for me to publish a RAW vs. Nitro retrospective every September to commemorate the start of the Monday Night Wars on September 4, 1995.  Then, WCW went out of business in 2001, and the tradition died.  But here, on our usual sanctioned "OOld School" day, we're gonna go back and revive it!

My detailed final edition of the the Monday Night Wars feature will be published in serial fashion over the next few Thursdays.  The publication schedule means that the final parts will be posted here at OO on Thursday, September 4: the exact 8 year anniversary of the beginning of the RAW vs. Nitro battle!

I've been meaning for almost two years now to publish this feature at OO, and having a weekly throwback column has finally motivated me to dust it off, reformat it, and present it here for posterity.  It has been polished and corrected a bit since 2001 -- most references should be current, though I refused to change "WWF" to "WWE" at any point along the way -- and should stand as my "final word" on the Monday wars.  Enjoy.]

Year Two:  It's Total Elimination 
September 2, 1996 - August 25, 1997 (Part Three of Eight)

YEAR TWO MONDAY NIGHT WAR SNAPSHOT 
Click Here for Head-to-Head Ratings Chart for Year Two 
Head to Head Battles: 44 
Nitro Wins: 44 
RAW Wins: 0 
Draws: 0 
Nitro Average Rating: 3.4 (up 0.6 from Year One) 
RAW Average Rating: 2.4 (down 0.2 from Year One) 
Combined Average Rating: 5.7 (up 0.3 from Year One) 
Unopposed Nights: 8 (five for RAW and three for Nitro) 
Highest Head to Head Rating: 4.4 for Nitro (on August 4, 1997) 
Largest Margin of Victory: 1.9 for Nitro (on December 29, 1996) 
Longest Winning Streak: 44 weeks for Nitro (spanning all of Year Two)

Heading into Year Two of the Monday Night Wars, WCW didn't need any help... but that didn't stop the WWF from lending a hand. 

With the departure of Kevin Nash for WCW, and the even quicker-than-expected flight of the Ultimate Warrior, Titan took another step down the reliability continuum, as they resorted to bringing back "Psycho" Sid Vicious as a main eventer. And then, to flesh out the mid-card, Titan adopted a "throw it at the wall and see what'll stick" philosophy. Ron Simmons debuted as "Faarooq," a Roman centurion with a fat ass and a goofy helmet; Bill Irwin debuted as "The Goon," a hockey player with a bad attitude; Tracey Smothers debuted as "Freddie Joe Floyd," a southern boy with no other remarkable qualities; Alex Porteau debuted as "The Pug," an amateur wrestler with Charisma Deficit Disorder. Headshrinker Fatu returned to the WWF as "The Sultan," a hated Iranian protégé of the Iron Sheik who wore a mask to prevent us from recognizing his Samoan heritage. The list goes on and on....

In some cases, the WWF realized their mistakes and turned them around, as they did with Faarooq. As the man got into better physical shape, his character was rehabilitated first into the leader of the Nation of Domination, a very over heel group that would eventually launch the careers of D-Lo Brown and Rocky Maivia, and eventually into a beer-drinking, ass-kicking Acolyte. The Sultan (Fatu) was actually aided by HIS fat ass in later years, becoming the massively popular Rikishi after the misguided attempt to book him as a masked Iranian. But in most cases, the WWF just kept shoving lame gimmicks down our throats to no crowd response until they were left with no choice but to cut these guys loose.

And while this was going on, WCW was cruising. Jeff Jarrett debuted for Turner in Year Two, the first former WWF worker to turn down NWO membership in favor of jumping to WCW as a babyface. Hall and Nash were red hot as cool heels dominating the tag team division, while Hogan was back on top of the world as a heel World Champion. Eventually, WCW head Eric Bischoff was revealed to be a backer of the NWO, marking the first Big Two involvement of a "real life" wrestling boss in a storyline.

In a lot of ways, the gap between WCW and the WWF was never wider than it was in the first half of Year Two. While the WWF had some decent things brewing (such as the debut of Rocky Maivia, the return of Bret Hart to the Fed, or the emergence of Steve Austin as a major star), they were things that wouldn't come to true fruition for months or years. The majority of what was going on RIGHT NOW wasn't working. The reverse was true in WCW: the company was noticeably cooling off after a red-hot summer of '96, but the boring or predictable elements of Nitro were still months or years away from turning the mainstream fans away from the WCW product. The majority of what they were doing right now was still clicking.

This was a slow period in terms of major developments in the Monday Night War, as WCW knew they had a good formula, and were sticking to it. Titan knew they were in trouble, and were trying anything and everything. And so, on Tuesdays when the ratings came in, there was no longer any drama: Nitro was in the middle of what would eventually turn into an 83-week-long winning streak.

One memorable Monday night came in November '96, as RAW decided to run away from the fight, instead of facing it head-on. The WWF and USA Network decided to move RAW to 8pm, away from the 9-11pm timeslot taken by Nitro. And on their first night in the new timeslot, the WWF shocked many fans by airing profanity-laden live inserts featuring Steve Austin attempting to break into the home of a gun-toting Brian Pillman. It remains one of the few truly memorable RAW moments from this period.

The WWF and RAW pretty much hit rock bottom with WrestleMania 13, widely considered to be the worst promoted and least interesting cards in the history of the industry's top spectacle. How bad was it? Rocky Maivia, as a plain vanilla babyface who had won the IC Title despite overwhelming fan apathy to the boring character, defended the company's second most prestigious title at the company's most prestigious event against.... the Sultan. The Sultan, who was Rikishi in a lame Arabian get-up, and who was even less-over with the fans than Maivia was at this point. This was a major storyline going into WM13, and should give you an idea just how bad things were.

Also hurting the company: Shawn Michaels, after regaining the title from Sid, "lost his smile" in February '97, and vacated the WWF Championship. The official story is that Michaels needed time off to heal his injured knee. The unofficial rumors have Michaels unwilling to do a job to Bret Hart at WM13 or having to deal with drug problems at this time. His hiatus from the company not only hurt the "star power" of the WM13 event, but also reduced the credibility of the WWF Title lineage at a time when every little sniping potshot a fan could take against the WWF reverberated like a cannon blast.

But March '97 also marked the beginning of the WWF's uphill battle to claw their way back to competitive status on Monday nights. In February '97, the WWF ran a couple "special" editions of RAW that ran two hours long, including a return to NYC's Manhattan Center (the birthplace of RAW) for a RAW that featured appearances by ECW performers. In March, RAW was renamed "RAW is WAR" and expanded full time to two hours, from 8pm till 10pm (only the 9pm hour overlapped with Nitro at this point).

The new two-hour format also meant the end of taping 4 weeks of RAW at one time. For the remainder of Year Two, RAW was live every Monday night. Combined with the growing appeal of Steve Austin -- who along with Bret Hart turned out the sole highlight of the WM13 PPV, as the two put on a great match which saw the two trade places: now, Austin was the babyface, and Hart was the heel -- the live format meant that the "anything can happen" atmosphere was coming back. Austin's attacks on Hart, and the subsequent formation of the red-hot heel Hart Foundation stable, became popular features, and resulted in a slight rebound in the ratings for RAW as the summer of '97 continued.

As RAW was languishing, WCW kept on putting on the same basic show... their ratings, which peaked a 3.6 in Year One, remained pretty steady, and if anything, dropped slowly but steadily between September '96 and March '97. But as the WWF started to regain a little momentum, it was enough to jump start the stagnating WCW creative team (and eventually, Nitro's ratings).

RAW was cashing in on the popularity of Steve Austin and the US vs. Canada feud that was sparked by the Hart Foundation's excellent work. But Nitro began ramping up for a climactic Hulk Hogan vs. Sting match to come at the end of 1997; it started very slowly and grew somewhat tired in the earlier stages of Year Two, but picked up speed towards the end of the second year of head-to-head Monday night battles.

Between March '97 and August '97, Nitro -- which had sunk back to a weekly average of about 3.0 -- grew it's audience to an average Nielsen rating of 4.0 by the end of Year Two. RAW also saw it's numbers grow: lucky to score a 2.0 in the weeks preceding WM13, RAW had bounded up to ratings hovering around 3.0 by the end of Year Two.

The lesson seemed clear: competition made both shows better. When RAW sucked, Nitro didn't have to try anything interesting to maintain a lead. BOTH shows saw their viewership dip. When RAW got competitive, Nitro stepped it up again, and the result was an average gain of almost 2 full ratings points for combined wrestling viewership on Monday nights!

And if that lesson wasn't clear, this one sure as hell was: for the second 52 weeks of the Monday Night Wars, RAW was Nitro's bitch.

MILESTONES AND MINUTIAE: The first 4.0 rating in head-to-head battle came on August 4, 1997, when Nitro scored a 4.4.... in Year Two, RAW scored BELOW a 2.0 on 3 different occasions, including a 1.5 and a 1.6 on back-to-back weeks in December '96... the first combined 7.0 rating for wrestling on Monday nights came on August 4, 1997... Titan started with a one hour RAW airing at 9pm, then moved the show to 8pm to avoid competition, then expanded to two hours in February, and eventually moved their two hour show to a 9pm start time during the summer of '97, going completely head-to-head with a two-hour Nitro... Year Two also saw the first of Nitro's special three-hour broadcasts (which would become standard for a two year stretch of time).

Continued in "RAW vs. Nitro, Year Three"...

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