Looking Back at Goldberg’s Original Run to WCW Championship Gold

Bill Goldberg made his official debut on WCW Nitro, September 22nd 1997. There was little fanfare for his debut, but the commentators made a big deal out of knowing nothing about Goldberg. However he had been training at the WCW Power Plant from 1996 onwards, but little do people know he made his unofficial debut in WCW in June ’97.

He won his first four matches, though in July of the same year, Bill Goldberg suffered a pinfall loss to Chad Fortune. So technically Goldberg didn’t win his first 173 bouts. He did, however, have one of the longest win streaks in wrestling history. Winning the World Title less than a year following his debut, we take at look at the most interesting matches during Goldberg’s road to WCW gold.

 

September 22nd 1997 – vs. Hugh Morris

Goldberg’s first televised match is a bit of an odd one. Watching Goldberg’s attempt at chain wrestling is laughable. He manages to mess up a hammerlock reversal, then holds a wrist lock the wrong way around, these are really first day of training holds; a wrestler should have these down. That said, the WCW Power Plant isn’t exactly known for its ability to train people technically, you only have to watch Louis Theroux’s wrestling documentary to realise that. A little later on in the bout Morris hits a nice springboard clothesline, Goldberg was following in a bit too close, and ended up taking Morris’ line square in the face.

Morris then hits his finisher (moonsault) and Goldberg kicks out. Nitro’s announcers Larry Zbysko, Bobby Heenan and Tony Schiavone seem impressed. The match continues and Goldberg avoids Morris’ charge into the corner then impressively, but pointlessly, stands behind Morris and performs his own standing back-flip. Impressive, but I’ve never seen Goldberg do this since. The match ends predictably, with a spear then a Goldberg’s finisher, the Jackhammer. During Goldberg’s return to the locker room he is stopped by Gene Okerlund for an interview. He isn’t interested in talking. Goldberg seemed a bit heelish in this early showing.

 

December 28th 1997 – vs. Steve McMichael

Probably Bill Goldberg’s biggest match to that point took place on one of the biggest cluckerfucks in pro wrestling history, WCW Starcade 1997. Goldberg is feuding with another former football player, Steve ‘Mongo’ McMichael. I’ve never rated Mongo, and this match was one of the longest Goldberg matches to date. WCW had begun promoting Goldberg squash matches, which effectively hid Goldberg’s weak points. But Goldberg’s weaknesses are here for all to see. Surprisingly, the match isn’t terrible, not great, but not terrible. The match starts with some entry way brawling, which again helped Mongo cover Goldberg’s weaknesses. There’s some brawling, a piss poor table spot (in which McMichael pretty much just fell off the apron), but that was WCW trying to do hardcore. Goldberg beats Mongo in the feud, and would continue to feud (and beat) him throughout January.

 

February 9th 1998 – vs. Lord Steven Regal

This is a match that needs no introduction. For those who don’t know, this match would be the first match that showed Goldberg’s vulnerabilities, from a kayfabe point of view, it would look like Goldberg’s closest match yet. There’s plenty of speculation on this one, rumour had it that an unnamed main event player felt threatened by Goldberg’s momentum, and asked Regal to ‘school’ the rookie. This would be easy for Regal, who in the past would wrestle members of the public at carnivals. Both Goldberg and Regal have spoke about this match. Goldberg claims Regal simply wanted to make him look foolish, and went about out-wrestling him. Regal claims a road agent told him to have a competitive match.

All angles seem unlikely. Regal is quite a professional and it’s hard to imagine him going off script just to make someone look silly. That said, Regal had drugs problems back in 1998 and WCW was the sort of environment where you had to be ruthless to survive. But it’s also hard to imagine a road agent ordering any such thing as by this point they’ve started pushing Goldberg in squash matches. In Regal’s defence, watching the match back there are obvious moments that Regal is speaking to Goldberg, perhaps Goldberg was just too green for such an experienced opponent. That being said there were times where it seemed that Regal was stiffing Goldberg, no selling moves and even at one point, kicking Goldberg right in the face. Goldberg seems genuinely unnerved during the bout.

 

April 20th 1998 – vs. Raven (for the United States Title)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67GOTPp80Es

By the time Goldberg’s United States title shot came around, he was well over with the WCW fan base. Fully buying into this unstoppable monster, Goldberg would easy man handle any opponent which have the whole gimmick the air of believability. In this bout, Goldberg met one of the coolest undercard heels in WCW at the time, Raven.

Leader of a undercard faction called The Flock, they could often be seen taking up much of the front row at WCW events. This grunge inspired faction were heelish, ready to pounce on their unsuspecting rivals right from ringside, but were also loved by WCW fans and managed to capture much of the alternative style of the 90s. The match went as expected. Raven brawling like a maniac in order to retain his title. Naturally, Raven was eventually out-muscled, and called on his teammates for assistance. Sick Boy initially looked to get the better of Goldberg but when Billy Kidman’s springboard manoeuvre goes awry, the ‘berg easily dispatches the pair. Scotty Riggs attacks Goldberg with a STOP sign, which is easily shrugged off as Riggs is taken out.

The giant Reece then attacks, the huge 7-ft fall monster lifting Goldberg right off his feet and into the air, this doesn’t last long, as the ‘berg counter and lifts and Jackhammers this huge man. Raven returns but is quickly speared onto the STOP sign, leading to a second Jackhammer and Goldberg’s first singles title. Easiest the most fun Goldberg match yet. It had all the chaos and run ins of a match involving the Flock, a faction that has sadly been forgotten by wrestling.

 

6th July 1998 – vs. Scott Hall, vs Hollywood Hulk Hogan (for the WCW World Heavyweight Title)

So Goldberg’s world title came out of nowhere. This was due to WCW ratings problems. WCW had been pasting the WWF in the Monday Night Wars since mid-1996, and it looked as though the WWF was well on the backfoot with no way back. The end of 1997 the WWF introduced something called the ‘WWF Attitude’, making their events more violent, more brash and highly sexualised. It had already seen one of its main stars, Bret Hart, leave the company shortly before and in January 1998 Shawn Michaels would suffer what would look like a career ending injury and retire from in-ring competition in April 1998. The company began pushing new stars.

WCW, on the other hand, were still sitting back on their old tried and tested characters and shows largely focussed on Hogan, Sting, Nash, Hall and co. – Goldberg was the only successful star that the company had made since the formation of the NWO. In 1998, the tide turned and WWF Raw is War began beating WCW Nitro in the ratings, not by much, but enough to panic WCW bookers. So they decided they needed to do something major to regain ground. Hogan was still the biggest heel in the company – he was seriously over, more than you may remember. So the prospect of Hogan taking on Goldberg was a huge one. Goldberg could not lose, but everybody knew Hogan’s attitude by now, how would he agree to lose fairly against a green newcomer. No one expected Goldberg would take the belt, but how would the match play out?

Firstly, he had to take on Scott Hall to get a title shot. Hall doesn’t look particularly happy about having to lose to Goldberg, his selling is slightly exaggerated. The match is by the numbers, longer than the usual match but the usual finish came fairly quickly, spear and Jackhammer, then taking the match clean. As for Goldberg vs Hogan, it should’ve really taken place on pay-per-view, if WCW hadn’t panicked they could’ve built up this match and had a few decent ratings out of this. But no, the biggest WCW match of 1998 took place on Monday Night Nitro. The match itself is mostly dull: headlocks, facelocks, a couple of chair shots.

But the match does have some interesting points. Hogan does at least seem to want to put the whole angle over, which the same can’t be said for Starrcade ’97, in which Hogan did his best not to put Sting over cleanly. Goldberg kicks out of three Hogan leg drops: the match doesn’t build too well if truth be told. But then it takes a quick turn, Goldberg hits Hogan with the spear, and the crowd goes nuts, one Jackhammer later and the crowd lose their shit – Hogan is actually losing the belt! And that was that. Nitro beat Raw that week, but it didn’t last. The two sides competed until the end of September, but then after that Nitro only beat Raw is War once, and that was because Raw is War wasn’t on that week.

Now just short of 19 years later, he’s World Champion once again. Pro wrestling nostalgia: never to be underestimated.